Eyebots plus Infiltrators... NO! 
Better go pop some popcorn, this should be hilarious. 
That's what the Mil III stations are for. Can't kill me if I can see you.
I have two options: Take Imbar for the two Cursed Golems and Titanite, or take Osmoian for a Black Widow Golem, ARS, and Titanite. The Osmoian ARSs have Gravity Rippers/Polarizers/Munitions Boosters, and Autobomb/Torpedo Frigates(!)/Blade Spawners. Thanks to that Raid Engine earlier, I have just enough hacking points for Osmoian. Plus, there's that nuke eye on Imbar that I don't want to deal with yet.
Osmoian is going to get a beachead for hacking, but I need to do something about those ion cannons. My new infiltrators Vs are useless, sadly (damn Dark Matter immunity), but maybe a cap of Sniper Vs can take down all the shields, and finally the cannons themselves. And it works, albeit slowly. Very slowly. While I work, a 6.6k ship CPA declares just after the 2 hour mark. Does the AI even have that many ships? I guess we'll see. I'll build a warhead just in case. And while I was looking away, the ion cannons died, but I'll have to postpone that hacking until after the CPA. Which is no doubt going to sync with some waves.
With 3 minutes left on the CPA timer, all the Spire Shield posts on Osmoian go down. This is a good tactic.
One minute left.
1661 AI 1 Enemy ships, 4 Starships (II) to Losgar in 2:30There it is. But there's two AIs, where's the o-
555 AI 2 Enemy ships, 4 Starships (II) to Losgar in 2:30Ah, here we are. 8,836 incoming ships
238 MK III ships freed in Cross planet attack
1186 MK IV ships freed in Cross planet attack
479 MK V ships freed in Cross planet attack
3,372 MK II ships from Strategic Reserve committed to Cross planet attack
2 from special forces committed to cross planet attackI see the AI wrote a check it can't cash. There's only 5283 ships in this CPA. I think it even drained the strategic reserve.
Waves hit at 2:16. Lots of it eats it to minefields. I have to pop a warhead. Attack 2k. Then I notice that there's 200 Mark 3 Zenith Siege engines wailing on my command station. Losgar falls, I lose the fabs. Shark triggers. Armored Golem dies. Ships start reaching the HW.
EIGHT EMP GUARDIANS trigger on the HW.
I clearly underestimated the strength of a CPA on 10/10. I need more warheads. And turrets. I unlock grav turrets. Try two. I still die, but not as badly. 800 missile frigates is my undoing this time. I need to intercept the CPA as it hits on Imbar so that the defenses on Losgar can hold against the announced waves.
Except that doesn't work either. Next try is to use the armored golem directly on the carriers, since last try I found that it obliterates them.
Yeah, that failed too. By engineers proof this game is officially unwinnable. I'll try again on a better map.
Same settings as last time, except I'll turn off the Botnet and Fallen Spire, lower Spirecraft and Golems to 3/10, and switch a different map. Since I'm going to need a lot of cheese, starting ship is switched to Lightning Torpedo frigates. I'm leaving Shark on, of course. Actually, I'll turn the AIs into Chivalric/Random med-easy. Losing any of my capturables = losing in this kind of game, and I could probably do the whole survive thing if I can afford to lose planets.
I rolled a Viral Enthusiast and a Sledgehammer, doesn't sound too bad.
Scouting results
Map:
Blood Angel: Hive Golem, Needler Turret, Teleporting Leech fab
Osiris: Armored Golem, Laser Turret, Zenith Medic Frigate fab, an ASC, and some Ebonite/Adamantite
Agae: Arty Golem, ARS, Spider Turret, Youngling Vulture fab, Titanite(!), and a Spire Archive
Shatterpoint: Black Widow Golem, TWO Cursed Golems, Flak and Missile Turret, Fighter, Sentinel Frigate, Raid Starship fabs, Advanced Factory, TWO Titanite, and a Spire Archive. Can you say jackpot? There's also a data center, but who cares about those.
Frozen Synapse: Regen Golem, Lightning Turret, Bulletproof Fighter, Flagship fabs, and nothing else.
Game priorities: Actually surviving the CPA at 2 hours.
First wave goes just fine... huh, why are they just stopping in the minefield? *looks at ship types bar* TACHYON MICROFIGHTERS OH GOD. And then the second wave has EYE BOTS. AGAIN. Silly me, thinking the RNG was being nice with those map seeds.
Blood Angel gets capped at 38 minutes, and I gate raid Osiris to let me concentrate my mines. Teleporting Leeches, Hive golem, and Needler turrets captured. Defenses are all up by 43 minutes, and I start work on the Hive Golem. This thing should be able to tear apart any CPAs with a full load of wasps. And even better, my missile turrets and Command Station include the incoming wormhole in their range. I get my first starbase, Epsilon Erdani, then Destroyer Hull.
First wave against Blood Angel is 1300 ships. 1300 missile frigates, which manage to avoid my loving minefield. Half of them escape and make threat on Osiris. At least that's a dead end, so I can mop them up whenever. Except they immediately came back. And then, as usual, the resistance arrives at the end of the party. Keith, you need to take a look at the spawning logic for these guys, it feels like they only show up once you don't need their help anymore.
With the K from Blood Angel, unlocking Human Mod Forts. When combined with the rest of the mod forts, these guys are great. Also, holy crap that energy cost. Each one takes two whole matter converters to run.
Hive Golem comes online at 1:23. Next up is taking Osiris as an energy production planet. Since it was preneutered, it fell immediately. AIP is at 50. I throw down a cap of sniper turrets to keep sneaky raids from destroying the command station. Spire mod fort and Gray spire base unlocked. For once, I'm running at a comfortable 200k energy.
Next wave is probably going to be the CPA, so I'll make a save.
In unrelated news, Osiris has the Exile. That things spawns a bunch of exos once I repair it, right?
