A different 10/10

[Cinth]

So I play the game a little bit different... so what lol


10/10 Tank(green)/ Vanilla(red) (Golems/Spire hard 4/4, DS 10, HRF 10, Fallen Spire 4, Z Trader)
no plots complex ships ultra low caps. 120 planets, 16 HW X layout.

Goal.. Win and win big.  24 hours into the match now and not really doing much. Murdoch has become the defensive bastion and I am in the process of cleaning out guard posts (especially counter attacks) and AI Eyes while AIP is still low.

 The NW branch of the map is home to the Neutral Dyson. While DS doesn't like me much, He does a good job at keeping his corner of the galaxy clear.

SW branch and SE branch contain the AI home worlds. SW at Rexvar (Raid engine and AI Eye) and still unknown in the SE.

Interesting finds during scouting the SE area... TWO Botnet golems. The one in Coudon is easily reachable and doesn't have anything in the system that I would want to keep... and it has a bunch of asteroids 

It's a frantic race to take out the AI on Coudon, set up shop and get a simple defense up to cover the botnet... spawned on a wormhole . Once Botnet is up spawn a bunch of Spire Attritioners for Murdoch. Once all that is done, abandon Coudon and pull back to Murdoch.

AIP 35 and yeah... waves are bigger and I know there are a few DC that my Raids can pop up in the NW.. Send them off and AIP back to 15.

Continue sweeping the map for counter posts and prep for the second Exo... 77% and counting.

Plans: Finish scouting the SE area of the map. Kill off the remaining counter posts and the AI Eyes that I can kill off without boosting AIP. That would complete phase one.

Phase two? Complete Armageddon. 

There is what the current map looks like.

[keith.lamothe]

10/10 Tank(green)/ Vanilla(red) (Golems/Spire hard 4/4, DS 10, HRF 10, Fallen Spire 4, Z Trader)
no plots complex ships ultra low caps. 120 planets, 16 HW X layout.

I hope your computer has an updated will

24 hours into the match now and not really doing much.

24 hours in, 35 AIP?  Good grief.

Continue sweeping the map for counter posts and prep for the second Exo... 77% and counting.

Wait, 24 hours in and it's just closing in on launching the second exo?

Phase two? Complete Armageddon.

Naturally

[Cinth]

Some of the recent changes (sprite pool adjustments) are making the game run better.. longer (and my PC is a beast). I can play for hours and not have to reload at all.

24 hours in and 15 AIP.. I popped 2 data centers to get back the AIP from killing Coudon (wanted the Botnet that was there). AIP floor is at 11 I think.

Yeah. Second Exo. and it's only 77% complete. The first Exo was WAY late... I'm used to about 3:30 for the first.. this was way past 12 hours for the first.

I'll bundle up the save and logs if you want to poke through them.

Edit: Threw everything in there I could think of, and all the saves for this game.

[keith.lamothe]

Golems/Spirecraft exos are based of AIP so if it was really that low the entire time then 12 hours / 24 hours makes sense for first/second.

Up through 5.049, that is (/ominous)

Glad to hear you've been able to play this kind of game without frequent restarts

[Cinth]

I could update to 5.050. The changes in the SS lines would give me more ships for the general purpose fleetball... but the unknown is since I have control of a botnet.. how does it play in with the game in progress.... and your upgraded Exos don't scare me... much

[keith.lamothe]

Existing games with Golems-Hard won't be affected by the Botnet change, except that the Botnet will take 80k instead of 40k energy to run.  Moderate would take the new energy/AIP numbers, though.

[Cinth]

Sounds like reason enough to upgrade to the new beta. Challenge accepted 

[Cinth]

Finished mapping out the rest of the galaxy. Noticed I have 2 archives on the map... thought there was only one of these?

Anyway, phase one complete. next set is to eat the incoming Exo. upgrade to 5.050 then plot out Phase two.

[keith.lamothe]

Finished mapping out the rest of the galaxy. Noticed I have 2 archives on the map... thought there was only one of these?

I think it's been one-per-AI-player for a long time.

[Cinth]

Finished mapping out the rest of the galaxy. Noticed I have 2 archives on the map... thought there was only one of these?

I think it's been one-per-AI-player for a long time.

I wasn't sure. I usually mess around below 7/7 and hardly ever get this far into a campaign. I just have fun throwing my massive fleet against massive AI fleets 

This go however, I'm going to play it out and see how it ends.

[Faulty Logic]

Always nice to see another lamb to the slaughter 10/10 game.

Seems like it's going well so far, good luck.

What have you researched, and have you really spent 24 hours just popping Counter posts and Eyes? I would not have that kind of patience.

Also, you can steal asteroids without taking their planet, and it seems like another worthwhile timesink if you have the patience (which, apparently, you do).

Finally, how are you defending against x16 waves? And exos?

[Cinth]

Pretty much that's what I've been doing. You can do a lot of damage to the AI without costing any AIP.  I did grab one planet, Coudon, for the Botnet Golem that was there and the asteroids (attritioners).  I abandoned that planet right as I was done there though.

Research wise ...  where to start lol... pretty much all the T2 turrets and Stealth tachs (AI space planes). Sentinel Frigates II, Shield Bearers II, Snipers II, Parasite II, Anti-Armor II, Raider II, Raid SS II, Harvesters III, MRS, Fort II,Z Space Times.

Start off with Harvesters III.. drop 9 docks, 2 ships each for 20 total, in constant rotation. ~50 engi and place the 7 SS constructors. Get up about 500 ships (easy and fast) and hit up Murdoch to set up the beach head.  Rally ALL constructors to Murdoch, build 5 Mob Builders and head into Murdoch. Pop the warp gate BEFORE any wave warning shows up so waves wont backdoor the beach head and will slow boat through Murdoch.
Drop 8 FF Is on the worm hole and drop the full cap of sniper turrets close by. That's done add in the Spider turrets. The first wave should have hit by now but it at 15 AIP the waves are really small.
As your HWs gather research, unlock the turrets and add them to the beach head. Once I have all the turrets down, I add the FF I ring (stops and bunches up most ships) and a few tachs.

Keep fleet near by while all this building is going on... it takes a good while (~40 minutes) to get full caps for the fleet ball.  Start scouting out. Raid when the scouts have a road block. keep building the beach head.

The main fleet hasn't been more than 4 hops from Murdoch yet.  I keep them near so I can pop counter posts once every 3/4 minutes if I want.

For defending x16 waves? At AIP 15 the waves aren't anything to write home about.... the most I've seen is about 1200 ships and that was a back to back. 2 Exos about 16k FP.. the first with a mothership, the second was a bunch of golems and Spire Shields.

Do take full advantage of the Trader though.  Full cap of OMD, Ion I + II s and all the superforts built. I'll drop a screen of the beach head (more of a blockade).

Also want to point out that the 24hourgame.zip above has all the game saves up to that point (23:52)

[Cinth]

Well Phase Two is underway.  Let's just say ... it hit the fan...

First was to free the Dyson Sphere. It's good to have friends...

Cleared SW area of the map and am now working on the NW area. Dyson wants more room to play... And for the free distraction.. I'll do it.  AIP well... that don't matter anymore. Already fended off another Exo. 22k FP and most of it seemed to hit at once. The blockade is holding for now.

For the curious... 700 AIP waves are like early Exos only with some nastier surprises.

Right now my Raids are the star of the show. They run in.. blast a planet and haul off to the next planet. My main fleet is able to stay at the blockade and provide.....whats the word... frangible targets, keeping those investments healthy.

As far as the MVT, Most Valuable Turret, OMD hands down.  Set about a third of the cap to target Raid SS first and the rest can go willy nilly on the other big stuff. Honorable mention to my Ion I and IIs. They may not be getting kills but they still do damage and importantly.. engine damage.

[keith.lamothe]

Oh man, that blockade picture made me laugh so hard... 144 Fortresses?

At some point the clever thing for the AI to do is to load an older save... or reroll the map.

[Hearteater]

I'm surprised the AI just didn't say "Enable the Beachheads, screw game settings."