Keith's Challenge Attempt #2 (victory!)

[zoutzakje]

haha yeah I noticed the AI forum not being very active atm. Ah well, I'll just continue with writing my AAR anyways and keeping the forum alive Someone might actually read it, who knows

The funny thing with the first exo was that I got 3 equally strong seperate "waves" with 42 firepower the first time. But then I had to savescum for some reason and then I got the regenerator golem. The one with the regenerator golem seemed tougher though, even though there were very few other enemies. So those numbers you said seemed about right ^^ I'm hoping the first H/K won't show itself just yet...

I was thinking about unlocking counter missile turrets yeah. They will definitely be useful later, since I will most likely get frig waves the entire game. But for now 4k knowledge is to much. I need more fleet ships and grav turrets.

I just destroyed the remaining 2 mining golems with less than a minute on the timer. I send my mk I and II bombers to deal with the one on ooze (which had recently been neutered so not much enemy ships there yet). The mk III bombers stayed with my main fleet to reneuter Haures and that's the end of that.
A warp gate gardian spawned on Gale, but I didn't even destroy the warp gate itself yet, so it doesn't matter. Needs to be neutered at some point anyways.

I made my decision for the ARS. I'm not using any cloacking ships in this game, but even if I had, I wouldn't hack for space planes. Chameleons, space planes and space tanks all seems like solid unlocks to me, so I figured I'd just go for the chameleons. I'll save hacking for when I really DON'T want a certain bonus ship, but chameleons are just fine. Their damage will help with killing wormhole guard posts as well.
I too like the new ARS system. Having to make a choice is good.

But before I take Dark Archer (and thus the ARS), I need to keep enemy numbers low on Rabbit again. I hate having to babysit that mk IV world to not let it get out of control lol.
But first a wave of 231 space tanks. That's kind of low actually lol. I expected 700+ of them by now. Fighters, blade spawners, plasma sieges and the 5 anti armor ships I reclaimed stay behind to deal with the wave. The rest will try to reneuter Rabbit.
Crap, a wave warning of 377 bombers. Well, I already got the right ships to counter the attack, just not the right numbers. Let's see where this goes.
Space tank wave gets destroyed without me even having to look at it and now I got 16 seconds to prepare for the bomber wave. I do still have the Heavy Beam Cannons though...
Awesome, it worked out great. Bomber wave killed all my fighters, anti armor ships and 1/5 of my plasma sieges, but all the HBC's were still intact. Meanwhile the rest of my fleet finished up at Rabbit, so now it's finally time to take that ARS. Finally, at 4 hours ingame.
Dark Archer is mine now, time to do some neutering and replace all the HBC's.
Second exo warning popped up, but I still have some time for that.
My fleet got almost completely destroyed trying to neuter Dirge, but there were 17 blade spawners on that planet so it makes sense I lost that fight. Luckily I managed to take most of them down. 17 is a lot though. Until now I had never seen more than 5 blade spawners on a planet.
My economy is good though, so just a quick rebuild and I can kick their asses again.

[zoutzakje]

a wave of 510 bombers arrived, of which unfortunately a large part escaped and spread threat across my borders. Most of it luckily ended up on Gale, so I decided to neuter it right away. the rest of the threat ended up on Tentacle Plant, so I figured I'd move my fleet back and destroy the threat before it decides to harass my homeworld. And of course another wave shows up right when my fleet is busy.
765 fighters this time, coming from Sorceress. Good, that's exactly the wormhole where I wanted my HBC's. Let's see how much they can destroy until my fleet arrives. A few hundred of them died before my fleet arrived. Perhaps it wasn't such a good idea to send my entire fleet to deal with it... most of my bombers and chameleons died. Ah well, I'll just rebuild it.

Harvesters don't seem as overpowered as they were before. But upgrading them to mk III right from the start gives you an economy that's probably good enough for the rest of the game. At least if you take as many planets in your games as I do. So far, rebuilding my entire fleet is only time consuming. My resources can handle it.

after destroying another wave of 600+ missile frigs, I decide to check my status. There I found out I killed nearly 12.000 ships already :O And that on low caps, while I'm not even far in the game yet. This is madness lol.

All these waves keep distracting me from my job (neutering till I drop dead), and now I have to retreat my fleet to my homeworld in order to protect myself from the second exo -.- it's at 97% and I don't think I can make it in time if I finish neutering Dirge right now. I hope the exo brings some nice stuff....
The exo spawns 4 small groups. 2 of them head straight for my homeworld while the other 2 decide to pick another planet and try to destroy it. I forgot exo's could go after other command stations besides the homeworld one. Not that it mattered, they died before they could do any harm.

May I finally continue neutering now, AI? You keep distracting me with your pesky little attacks. If you want to kill me, send something bigger.
I'm sure he eventually will, but for now everything seems managable. I got this far already and I haven't been in serious danger yet. I think I'm definitely capable of playing a "regular" 9/9 game. Crosshatch is just brutal.

Data center discovered on Sea Dragon. I should really take out the data centers I found already. -40 total AIP will make things a whole lot easier for a while.
Another data center on Sea Fighter.
Hive Golem on Foot Soldier. But so far Foot Soldier is surrounded by 3 mk IV planets... so there is no way I'm ever going to get that hive golem.
And another data center on Origin, very nice. So far I can get a total of 80 AIP reduction, which is almost half of what I got.

Allright, it's finally time to start destroying wormhole guard posts. That will keep me busy for quite sme time, so no more updates for a while probably.

[zoutzakje]

Allright, so i managed to fully neuter Whorl and Tentacle Plant and I'm more than 7 and a half hours ingame. A lot of stuff happened. I had another CPA, another few exo's, 3 more mining golems and a whooooole bunch of waves. I love the fact that I can continue playing without ahving to pay attention to any waves. They get destroyed completely by my turretball. 500 bombers? no big deal. 700 fighters? who cares. 600 missile frigs? oh crap, time to retreat my bombers. It's always those missile frigs giving me trouble really. I blame their long range.
With Tentacle Plant fully neutered it's time to kill some stuff at Doom Dragon and then finally retrieve the first shard. Since I mostly don't have to pay attention to waves, now is the right time to collect the first one. I'll continue killing wormhole guardposts after that.
I decided I'm not gonna destroy all wormhole guard posts. Only the ones from planets I'm absolutely sure i will never take. The Judged can be skipped, because I will be moving towards the next ARS after all this (Torent). Ooze is going to be my first Spire City, so I can skip Ooze and Haures as well. And I might expand past Dirge someday, so I'm not sure yet what to do about that one.

wow, recovering the first spire shard was challenging. Ships are coming from every direction. The shard was only 2 hops away yet it still suffered 18% damage. Recovering shards from 6 hops away is going to be fun. Ah well, at least I got it. I honestly never expected I would get this far in a 9/9 crosshatch game, but so far things are looking really good. Especially once I manage to take down a few data centers, then I can actually relax. I will attempt to take out the first one right now, before I continue destroying wormhole guardposts. I do NOT want to reach the next AIP threshold just yet.

[madcow]

Slightly off-topicish question, but how do you a) attach a screenshot to a post? And b) how do you get system names to actually show up on the galaxy map?

I'm about to start a thread of my own for my noobish 7/7 run. Your game looks crazy based on my readthrough of it!

[Diazo]

Slightly off-topicish question, but how do you a) attach a screenshot to a post? And b) how do you get system names to actually show up on the galaxy map?

I'm about to start a thread of my own for my noobish 7/7 run. Your game looks crazy based on my readthrough of it!

First, to get the planet names to show, hold down CTRL when you press the screen shot key. (Or whatever key shows planet names in your setup.)

As for getting pictures to show, there are two ways.

First is to upload the image to web storage somewhere and then link to it via

Code: [Select]

[img]http://server/image.jpg[/img]to display it in your post as a picture. Such as here

The other way is to attach it to your post under 'Additional Options' at the bottom of the reply window. That adds a link that opens the picture in a pop-up window when clicked. Such as here.



As for your game zoutzakje I am following this with interest.

Crosshatch is a map style I have never tried, I may attempt it on my next 'challenging' game I start. (I play 'fun' games with reasonable settings and 'challenge' games with impossible settings depending on my mood.)

D.

[zoutzakje]

Data center destroyed and that -20 AIP really makes a pretty significant difference in a 9/9 game. In 7/7 games I only destroy the data centers that are on my path or nearby. But I realized I probably need to take out all of them if I want to win this game.
Second shard (alien refugee ship) was on Scarlet Needle, figured I might as well get it right away.
I nearly lost it. I forgot the refugee ship only has 50 mill hp, even though it moves a lot faster. Managed to bring it back home with only 14% hp left. Spider and sniper guardians are NOT your best friend when it comes to bringing back that refugee ship. They definitely did the most damage.
Oh crap. Crap crap crap. Just found a Coreworld. And it's a whole lot closer than I had hoped it would be. Briggs is it's name. And I had just put it on alert temporarily when I destroyed that data center.
Black Widow golem on Windmaster. Windmaster is only a mk III planet, which means Meredy should be the homeworld.
yup, I was right. Meredy is the first homeworld, which means there are 5 coreworlds in the way. Thank god there are no nasty core guard posts on the homeworld. Not even a Neinzul spawner. Good.
Allright, I'll leave that alone for now. More importantly, a CPA is about to spawn, so it's time to prepare.

as for the slightly off topic question...
If you want the planet names only to appear for the screenshot you can just hold control yes. But I find it much easier to navigate the galaxy map when I see all the planet names at all times. So I changed it. Somewhere in the settings you can toggle planet names on or off.
For the screenshot I just click on additional options and then upload it directly from my files. Is so much easier than using some webstorage.
Also, good idea to write an AAR madcow. That way if you ever happen to get stuck in your game, there are always a whole bunch of experienced players who can help you out.

If you ever decide to play on a crosshatch map Dazio, may I suggest you play it on 7/7 first? I had never played on a crosshatch map before until I tried it for this challenge. And 9/9 is brutal. The inside of the grid scares me lol. I will stay at the edges for as long as possible.
You probably don't need any settings to make it more challenging. Crosshatch itself is a real challenge.

[keith.lamothe]

I'm hoping the first H/K won't show itself just yet...

I forget, did I give those cloaking recently? ... j/k

I need to keep enemy numbers low on Rabbit again.

They bree... nah, just gonna leave that one on the table.

My fleet got almost completely destroyed trying to neuter Dirge, but there were 17 blade spawners on that planet so it makes sense I lost that fight. Luckily I managed to take most of them down. 17 is a lot though. Until now I had never seen more than 5 blade spawners on a planet.

Yea, theoretically it could wind up having dozens of them, but at least it's paying for them properly now

I forgot exo's could go after other command stations besides the homeworld one.

Yea, they can go after irreplaceables too, like an adv factory, fabricator, or golem.

Not that it mattered, they died before they could do any harm.

Awww.

Allright, it's finally time to start destroying wormhole guard posts. That will keep me busy for quite sme time, so no more updates for a while probably.

Something seems wrong with this picture

wow, recovering the first spire shard was challenging. Ships are coming from every direction. The shard was only 2 hops away yet it still suffered 18% damage.

Glad it at least registered

Second shard (alien refugee ship) was on Scarlet Needle, figured I might as well get it right away.
I nearly lost it. I forgot the refugee ship only has 50 mill hp, even though it moves a lot faster. Managed to bring it back home with only 14% hp left. Spider and sniper guardians are NOT your best friend when it comes to bringing back that refugee ship. They definitely did the most damage.

Yea, I seem to recall those guys being a real pain on recovery too.  If you like, you can keep a scout starship or two near the shard/ship to make it immune to sniper fire.

Anyway, hopefully the spire frigates will help burn down wormhole posts   May not have the scale for much of it, though.

yup, I was right. Meredy is the first homeworld, which means there are 5 coreworlds in the way. Thank god there are no nasty core guard posts on the homeworld. Not even a Neinzul spawner. Good.

Hmm, the RNG must be plotting something mysterious...

You probably don't need any settings to make it more challenging. Crosshatch itself is a real challenge.

I rather thought so

[zoutzakje]

I need to keep enemy numbers low on Rabbit again.

They bree... nah, just gonna leave that one on the table....

Hehe nice one Keith. Didn't even think of that one

As for using scout starships to protect it from sniper fire, that's a great idea. I'll definitely try that out, since the next shard is 3 hops away instead of just 2.

But first it's time to deal with a CPA and an exo.
I was surprised to see mk III ships got released in the CPA. There were only about 300 mk II ships left in the entire galaxy. It makes sense though. Most of the planets I've scouted so far are mk III or IV and the few mk II planets I can see now only have their guardians left. I really should let mk I and mk II planets build up a bit for the next CPA. I don't want a full mk III CPA next time.
Either way, the CPA got destroyed pretty quickly and now the exo is at 90%. Guess I'll destroy 1 or 2 wormhole guardposts on Rabbit before it hits.
I actually managed to kill 4 of them before I had to retreat. My fleet is more powerful than I thought.
Meanwhile I just finished my second trader project. First I completed the Radar Jammer mk II, which will be a huge help with defending against exo's. And now I finished the Zenith Power Generator, so energy won't be a problem for a while.
exo is at 98% and a wave of 755 fighters just showed up. I'll just watch the fireworks =) Full caps of heavy beam cannons and lightning turrets are waiting for them.
oh another wave, 644 armor ships this time. Fighter wave should be cleaned up by the time the armor wave hits, so I'm not worried. I'm more curious about the exo. I hope it brings a golem, I'm curious how fast my bombers and chameleons would take it out.
armor wave arrives when there are less than 150 fighters left, so that's good. Exo spawns 2 groups without golems. Most of the ships seem to be mk V though, including the lead ships. They both decide to attack my homeworld and that's the end of that. Armor ship wave is being cleaned up and now it's time to attempt to bring back the third shard. I want my first city.
Unfortunately Mars (shard location) had an AI eye. First I had to kill all guard posts, then I had to retreat and rebuild / repair fleet. And now I can finally begin. I hope my fleet will survive the constant hammering of exo waves.
I quickly decided to stop using scout starships to protect the shard from sniper fire. Doing so caused the spider guardians to attack my fleet instead, which resulted in a lot of slow moving ships really fast. The shard is not as squishy as the refugee ship, so I figured it would survive.
80% hp left when I brought it home. Unfortunately my fleet was almost completely destroyed, so I quickly had to rebuild before the remaining exo's would show up.

Game time is now 9 hours and 45 minutes. That's how long I lasted in my previous attempt. Only this time everything is going much smoother, even though AIP is almost twice as high. I actually managed to bring back 3 shards already.
I'm really not gonna play with the dyson sphere in a 9/9 game anymore lol. The difference is huge.

[zoutzakje]

Colony ship has been built. But I'll wait with taking Ooze and Haures. First I at least want to finish destroying wormhole guard posts and take out the 2 data centers on Sea Fighter and Origin. If I take Ooze and Haures right now, the AIP will reach tech II, which I'd like to avoid for as long as possible.
And right before I killed the last wormhole guardpost on Rabbit, 3 mining golems spawn. The Judged, Fairess and Dirge. Time for a short detour then I guess.
oh good, my resistance fighters took care of the one on Fairess. That saves me 30 seconds of time.
Mining golems are down so now it's time to slowly advance towards the data centers. I'll just destroy every world near them. Makes scouting the upper part of the map easier.

You may have noticed that I no longer announce every wave that pops up. That's only because they don't pose any threat to me right now. I'm getting waves allll the time, most of them just aren't powerful enough to mention, especially once I've destroyed the data centers. That will most likely change once AIP reaches tech II though.

Allright, that was harder than I thought it would be. Sea Fighter had 26 blade spawners on it. Combined with a whole lot of guardians (like every other planet has) this wasn't easy. Had to take a few ships with me as threat each time. Moving my fleet in, killing a few ships, then pulling back. The alerted ships would go to Dark Archer through a different way, where my defenses would blow them to bits. Took me 3 times before I finally had reduced the number of blade spawners to 5, after which I could destroy the planet and the first data center.
The other data center planet (Origin) has no blade spawners, but a lot more guardians (6 zombie) so we'll see where this goes.

More than 11 hours ingame time so far and I just reached the 35.000 kills. Awesome.

[keith.lamothe]

Meanwhile I just finished my second trader project. First I completed the Radar Jammer mk II, which will be a huge help with defending against exo's. And now I finished the Zenith Power Generator, so energy won't be a problem for a while.

Harvester upgrades aren't overpowered, he says   Well, this is more than a few hours in, I suppose.

I quickly decided to stop using scout starships to protect the shard from sniper fire. Doing so caused the spider guardians to attack my fleet instead, which resulted in a lot of slow moving ships really fast.

Ah well, time to print off a few hundred next-of-kin letters explaining "It seemed like a good idea at the time..."

I'm really not gonna play with the dyson sphere in a 9/9 game anymore lol. The difference is huge.

Yea, I've been tinkering with the dyson these last few days, and a galaxy-wide population cap for the gatlings is part of it.  But also want it to be possible for it to dominate games for people who want it to dominate games so... we'll see

You may have noticed that I no longer announce every wave that pops up. That's only because they don't pose any threat to me right now.

Global AIP is rising...

Allright, that was harder than I thought it would be. Sea Fighter had 26 blade spawners on it.

Ginsu!

More than 11 hours ingame time so far and I just reached the 35.000 kills. Awesome.

On low caps.  I hope the AI has optimized its notify-next-of-kin routine.

[zoutzakje]

ah so that's what you've been talking about Keith, when you said you had something planned and hoped you could get it done by the 9th. Messing around with the dyson sphere Well, I don't mind much if it gets nerfed or stays overpowered the way it is now (or somehow both), I just hope to see the perma-alert issue fixed someday. If it wasn't for the dyson, I would most likely have been able to finish my first attempt, since I found a black widow and a botnet at the edge
Not much luck in this game yet. 2 ARS's at the edge is good, but so far no easy-to-reach golems.

Which reminds me that I just discovered another Black Widow golem on Rock Golem (heh), but I'm afraid I won't be able to get it. I suspect the next homeworld is right there somewhere.
hmm, Meagaera is not a coreworld and has an ARS and nice asteroids on it. I didn't expect the third ARS to be at the edge as well. That's lucky. Now I'm just hoping that Wind Element is not a coreworld.
Looks like today is my lucky day. Wind element is not a coreworld, but has in fact another Black widow golem and a Co-processor on it. Both Rock Golem and Wind Element are mk IV worlds, but they're a whole lot easier to deal with than coreworlds.
Rat Soldier is another mk IV world with an advanced factory. I had hoped I would find one at an edge. Good.
Haha this is funny. Shadow turns out to be another mk IV world with a black widow golem, a data center and the last co-processor. So that's 3 black widows and 2 co-p's really close to eachother. Guess I'll go rampage through the galaxy with a few black widows then
I decided to save the ARS at Torent for later. It's to close to the AI homeworld to my liking. Everytime I have to neuter worlds there, i put coreworlds on alert. Not a good idea.

Incoming CPA... that's the 4th already. But I'm keeping AIP relatively low, so it's about the same number as last time. Only 550 ships. That's nothing. My fleet is eager to take out the other data center, but now I'll wait till after the CPA. I'm busy doing some extra scouting now anyways.

Ugh, lot of mk IV worlds on top of the grid. Winged Dragon is just a regular mk IV and Star Magician is a coreworld, which means Dark Spear is the second homeworld. At least none of the homeworlds are inside the grid. Luckily now I only got 5 coreworlds per homeworld, instead of 8.

Allright, that's all I can scout for now. Time to review my plans based on the new intel.
First I will destroy the CPA, then I will take out the data center on Origin and then I will deal with the exo which is currently at 62%. After that I will slowly advance in the direction of Shadow, taking all planets along the way. After I settled on shadow, I will make way for the advanced factory on Rat Soldier. The only thing that worries me is that I probably don't have enough defenses to hold all those planets, especially the ones that border those nasty mk IV worlds. This means that I have to do both offensive and defensive unlocks. New fleet unlock comes first though. I want everything mk II at least. I also musn't forget to replace my turret ball whenever I found a new good home.
And the last thing I have decided is that I will NOT go through with the fallen spire campaign for now. The only reason I wanted it in the first place, was because I couldn't find any Golem at an edge close by. FS ships are powerful, but I need to take a lot of extra planets (especially in this crosshatch game) and deal with extra exo's as well. That's something I rather not risk unless I really have no choice.
So I'll make a backup save after I destroyed the exo and am ready to advance towards Shadow. That way I can reload and play with Fallen spire, in case I can't win the game with golems alone.

All this writing for just 10 minutes of gameplay Guess I just wanted to share the info and my new current plans.

[TechSY730]

Incoming CPA... that's the 4th already. But I'm keeping AIP relatively low, so it's about the same number as last time. Only 550 ships. That's nothing

Ugh, tempting fate again?
Now it's going to be like
400 Mk. IV ships released for CPA
150 Mk. V ships released for CPA

[zoutzakje]

hehe that would be nasty. I could only survive that if most of it would come through my turret ball. But there should be enough mk II and III ships left in the galaxy (especially mk III).

[zoutzakje]

I've realized that it probably wasn't a good idea to leave CSG's on. Don't get tricked by the RNG's kindness of giving me good edge worlds, it's more devious than you think. We all know that A-type CSG's are always on ARS worlds only. 5 ARS in a galaxy means I need to capture at least 4 of them in order to destroy the A-types. So far I have found 3. The other 2 must be somewhere in the unscouted area, which means I somehow have to move past one of the homeworlds to take it.
And that's not all. So far I have only found one C-type CSG, which is on Windmaster. Windmaster borders 2 coreworlds, so I can't really take it. This means I will have to take at least 2 planets out there somewhere, putting coreworlds on alert while attempting to do so.
My only way out of this mess is if Baby Boar holds another ARS and if The Fugutive holds a C-type CSG. Unfortunately the odds of that happening aren't really high, as there are still 20 unscouted planets...
This is going to be a tricky game, but I guess I knew that when I accepted the challenge.
Anyway, I probably still got about 20 hours of game time to worry about that, so let's focus on the problems at hand.

I really wanted to try to take out that data center on Origin before the CPA would hit, so I figured I would try it and savescum if I failed. It went better than I thought. I lost my entire fleet, but both the data center and the CPA got destroyed, so I'm happy. With AIP at only 134 now, I can finally relax a bit.
Meanwhile, 2 more trader projects got finished. The orbital mass driver and the counter spy. I think my homeworld is pretty well defended now. All I need is a mk V ion cannon and no CPA or exo will get through alive
Speaking of exo's, the one I got coming right now is only at 71%, so that will give me some time to destroy wormhole guard posts on Haures and maybe Gale too. I will start expanding again soon. After all, it's been more than 7 hours since the last time I took a planet.

Hahaha allright, a C-type CSG on The Fugutive, just like I hoped it would be. There's also an Artillery golem there, which is nice. Now it's just the ARS that concerns me...
data center on Moloch, nice. I can take that out once I got the Artillery golem.
damn, Baby Boar has no ARS   Please let it be Gnome then. Gnome borders a coreworld, but I rather just make sure I take that one as last, instead of having to maneuver past the AI homeworld.
Great, Gnome has a planetary cloacker, so now I still know nothing. Ah well, I'll find that out later.
I killed several wormhole guard posts and I made sure enemy numbers on several planets stay low. Exo is at 84%, time to take Dirge. I desperately need some extra knowledge too.

Both Dirge and Lapyx fell really fast, since I had already neutered them. I was going to let all waves comes to lapyx from the Sea fighter wormhole, but unfortunately I didn't have the chance to neuter Gatekeeper yet. 2 pretty large waves (700+ ships each) were attacking me right when I was busy moving my turretball and now I don't have enough time to neuter Gatekeeper before the exo hits -.- I just had a few waves though, so I don't really expect any until the exo is dead. We'll see. I'm tempted to unlock HBC mk II to protect the Gatekeeper wormhole in my fleets absence. After I neutered Gatekeeper, those mk II HBC's will make a good asset for my turretball, especially since waves will become mk II soon.
On the other hand, I still don't have fighters and missile frigs mk II... (I got blade spawners mk II just now). Hmm, I think I'll go with the mk II HBC's. Without a good turretball I find waves more challenging than anything else so far (my fleet is not good enough at stopping them quickly), but with HBC's and lightning turrets, nothing seems to make it through (except those darn teleporting leeches).

Allright, mk II HBC's are up, fleet is back at homeworld and exo is at 99%
Bring it on!

[zoutzakje]

Another disappointing exo Only some of the starships were capable of breaching through and take a few hits at my homeworld's forcefields before they died. I guess my AIP isn't high enough yet to see a lot of golems or at least a few H/K's.
Neutering Gatekeeper gave me quite some trouble, as there was an AI eye on it. I looked at the list of enemy ships and noticed that there were no blade spawners. So I just rushed my entire fleet inside and started killing guard posts. About 1/3 of my fleet was still alive when I finished the job. Had to trigger a counter guard post, which will send its attack to Dirge in about 7 mins. That's not enough time for me to capture the next planet, neuter surrounding planets and set up defences at the right wormhole. So I'll just keep enemy numbers low on border planets while I wait for the counter attack to arrive.
Managed to take care of Ooze, Haures and Gale before the counter attacked. Destroyed the counter without to much trouble (though teleport raiders are annoying and youngling weasels are hard to destroy), time to keep enemy numbers low on Gressil and Sea Fighter, after which I can take Gatekeeper. I hate putting a mk IV world on alert, but I don't think I have much choice. I'm thinking of taking that mk IV world (Rock Golem) later and place a warp jammer on it (once unlocked). Since warp jammers are all new and better, I figured I would try them out in this game. I will need them anyways if I have to move inside the grid to get that last A-type CSG. Though I'm not sure if they work on core and homeworlds. Do they?

Gatekeeper falls and the D-type CSG's with it. That leaves A, B and C.
Running out of mk II tractor turrets so I'm just scrapping a few of which I think I don't really need. I'm quickly going to set up a few minor defenses and then take and hold Meld. Meld will become my "wave-eater" for quite some time. I won't take the ARS on Meagaera yet. I would have if the 2 co-p worlds weren't mk IV. But for now I first want to destroy the data center on Magnius (maybe taking the ARS at Torent on the way), then take out the co-p's on Violent Viper and Geode, and then I will Take the ARS and move forward. Getting another -80 AIP total reduction will do me good, since AIP is 205 right now. And I still got some stuff to kill.
Meld captured and of course a wave warning -.- 896 mk II neinzul tigers.... and of course not at my old turretball on Lapyx. My fleet won't be able to handle a wave like this yet, so I'll have to sacrifice a martyr.

I'm sleepy now... I'll continue somewhere tomorrow.