One's Own Medicine

[keith.lamothe]

So, I returned to this game with intent to just wrap up the win so I could wrap up the AAR.


The game had other plans.


It is only appropriate, I suppose, that part of "one's own medicine" be picking up a game after version changes have caused massive balance overhaul, etc.


What follows is a tale of audacity, hubris, disaster, and nuclear explosions.

After playing with the squid a bit I decided I would poke at the other homeworld (core raid engine) first.

I also decided that my AIP (99 or so) wasn't high enough with the new rules that make attacking at less than about 200 AIP a bit of a net-loss.

So I took both spire archive planets and ran them out of K.  One of these also had an Advanced Starship Constructor so I got mkII and mkIII of flagship, spire, and zenith starships.

A mighty weapon, indeed.

With my starship fleet in hand I kicked down the door to the southern homeworld and slaughtered the Core Raid Engine where it stood (flew? floated?).  The reprisal wave and the mini-exo from killing the CRE were fairly easily dispatched.

So I decided to just get it over with and, having divided my fleet to defend the various important zones throughout the galaxy I sent in the starships again and killed all the remaining core posts in sequence, followed by the home command station.  The situation in the rest of the galaxy was getting dicey as the combined mini-exos exceeded my expectations and tons of mkIV/mkV ships were rampaging through my outer worlds and battering on the main defenses.

But the AI's home command station fell, and I figured that despite the fact I was losing fabs and my fleet was getting chewed up in various places, I could fight a rolling galactic retreat and defeat the AI's assault before going after the other AI HW.

Then there was this little chat line from the AI, one I wrote roughly 3 years ago.  It says:

"So be it."

I was puzzled at first, then I remembered what that means.

The Avenger.

Specifically, the Avenger I forgot I had enabled in the lobby.

(to be continued)

[Oralordos]

"So be it."

Plays Imperial March from Star Wars

[keith.lamothe]

I ordered my starship fleet to attack the Avenger, but they could only get its shields to 50% before expiring.

The Advanced Starship Constructor's defense fleet fell after a valiant fight.  Too many enemies.

The Advanced Factory fell.  Too many enemies.

All but one Fab fell.  Too many enemies.

All my satellite colonies in other clusters fell.  Too many enemies.

The enemy crashed against my main defenses.  My homeworld-neighbor defenses went down.  The homeworld held.

But precariously.

300+ mkIV/mkV AI ships parked on the ruins of my homeworld-neighbor command station, waiting for sufficient force to attack.

I gathered the tattered remnants of my fleet on the homeworld, with my space docks cranking for all they were worth with a totally floored economy.

I needed to attack the Avenger before it reached my homeworld, but I had to deal with that threatball first.

I remembered a lesson well-learned in recent times, and constructed a mkIII lightning warhead to clear the threatball.

As the warhead was headed to the wormhole, however, the threatball came through.  It began to scatter to my great alarm, and the bulk that was still together began to fire on the warhead before it entered standoff attack range, but in the end it closed far enough to kill 2/3rds of the enemy force when they blew it up. 



The remaining AI ships were killed with some difficulty, but they were in fact killed.

Alas, the Avenger was already nearly to the last wormhole leading to my homeworld.  Not that I really had the fleet to kill it after that fight.

(to be continued)

[keith.lamothe]

Thankfully, the Avenger is slow, and my fleet still had some teeth.  My turretry had decidedly more teeth and if they were not on the Avenger's main approach they were in range of the last leg of its journey and it had picked an entry wormhole that meant a fairly long run.

The Avenger's shields still held as it began to hammer on the forcefield net covering the home command station itself, but they didn't hold much longer than that. 



The Avenger's hull is thankfully quite a bit less durable than its shields, and as my FF net was at about half strength the Avenger went down.



The problem is that when the Avenger goes down, it also goes up.

In nuclear flame.

On my homeworld.



My homeworld was gone.  Only my few MkV ships remained.  The fleet, the turrets, the forcefields, the resources... all gone.  The rest of my empire was nearly completely devestated, with only a Core Bomber fab left of the irreplaceables.

And with my homeworld nuked and thus no supply, there was no way to build an effective static defense against future attacks.

But I'm. Not. Dead. Yet.

(to be continued)

[Aklyon]

I think the ai was a bit annoyed for making it wait so long 

[keith.lamothe]

My HCS's very hull plating actually tanked the Avenger's last salvo that was in flight and landed because the death-nuke killed the forcefields.  So I'm nearly alone and I'm in the red, but I'm not dead.

* Terry busts out of the fridge.

"Hey, boss! You still got me!"

There are advantages to a linebacker that's immune to nuclear explosions.

Terry would prove instrumental in my shoestring-fleet's defense of several outlying worlds while I rushed around trying to put out fires faster than they came up.  Eventually we ground the threat count down to a reasonable level and the waves stopped hitting long enough for me to complete my mkI fleetship force, and I moved on to the higher marks and then the starships while sending rebuilders out to recolonize the lost worlds.  Just being able to V-click with some rebuilders (who will be automatically replaced on the planet of origin) to rebuild a whole CommandStation+Forcefield+Miniforts+Turretry setup... I really like that.  Beats manually-ordered colony ships with a stick.

Apparently the accountants also survived, as my harvesterIII+econIII setup managed to produce a full mkI/II/III fleet of everything I had in relatively short order.

I took my homeworld's last remaining AI neighbor and fortified it along with the other two homeworld-neighbors using all available turretry and forcefields.  My full mkI/II/III cap (and the 8 mkIVs that survived the apocalypse) of shield bearers provided impromptu shielding to the HCS itself, with two miniforts (not requiring supply is nice) and a small fleet to keep them company.

I moved the vengeance fleet into attack position of the last AI homeworld.

It wasn't enough, I couldn't even get through the core world in the way.

[Faulty Logic]

So I took both spire archive planets and ran them out of K.  One of these also had an Advanced Starship Constructor so I got mkII and mkIII of flagship, spire, and zenith starships.

A mighty weapon, indeed.

Yeah, learned that when the AI sent 2 mkIV zenith starships supported by a core flagship. At gametime 8 minutes.

the combined mini-exos exceeded my expectations

Please tell me either that the Special_Difficulty_Multiplier doesn't apply to these... or that Aspirin is on sale.

I remembered a lesson well-learned in recent times, and constructed a mkIII lightning warhead to clear the threatball.

Just one? Clearly you did not learn well enough.

Specifically, the Avenger I forgot I had enabled in the lobby.

You both forgot an Avenger and aren't dead?

The Advanced Starship Constructor's defense fleet fell after a valiant fight.  Too many enemies.

The Advanced Factory fell.  Too many enemies.

All but one Fab fell.  Too many enemies.

All my satellite colonies in other clusters fell.  Too many enemies.

Must be Tuesday.

The problem is that when the Avenger goes down, it also goes up.

In nuclear flame.

Well, the thread title wasn't just for show.

But I'm. Not. Dead. Yet.

"You'll be stone dead in a moment!"

My HCS's very hull plating actually tanked the Avenger's last salvo

"And they though I was crazy when installed that steel plate."

I moved the vengeance fleet into attack position of the last AI homeworld.

It wasn't enough, I couldn't even get through the core world in the way.

"For Vengeance! For Survival! For Humanity!"

<Splat>

AI subroutine 1: what was that?
AI subroutine 2: just humans attacking the core world. Happens a lot around here.

[keith.lamothe]

Plays Imperial March from Star Wars

Indeed.  When testing the Avenger's original implementation back in 2010 I just couldn't help humming "Doom Doom Doom doom-do-doom doom-do-doom" to that tune.  An experience repeated in the implementation of some later features as well.

I think the ai was a bit annoyed for making it wait so long 

I don't think it was annoyed so much as amused.  Maybe feeling a bit of pity.

Please tell me either that the Special_Difficulty_Multiplier doesn't apply to these... or that Aspirin is on sale.

I believe we could arrange for a pain-killer-cost-defrayment scholarship.

More seriously, while that multiplier does indeed apply, on 7.6 the actual result wasn't that bad.  Were it not for the fact that I was playing like a moron during that assault AND playing with absolutely no attempt at a chokepoint, the mini-exos would not have been a significant threat to anything I really tried to defend.  It was the combination of all the above plus me forgetting the avenger that made things... interesting.

Just one? Clearly you did not learn well enough.

Yes, my personal warhead-fu is quite substandard.  That one warhead probably saved my behind, though.

You both forgot an Avenger and aren't dead?

Yes, and the moment I realized that was when I decided I needed to give some kind of proper conclusion the AAR.  Just too awesome to pass up.

Must be Tuesday.

Never could quite get the hang of Tuesdays.

<Splat>

Indeed, but it would not stand.

[keith.lamothe]

That core world had been alerted since I took the first spire archive (right next to it) so I needed something else.  Warheads would work with proper baiting, or simply going around through a different core world, but I decided to go for more strength first.  I eyed the remaining ASC (in the southeast cluster).

The fleet made its way there, eyes grim.

And ran smack into a huge special forces blob camping the ASC's planet with 30+ spire blade spawners (among other unpleasantries).

If I didn't know better, I'd say it had specifically learned that MkIV starships are a very unhealthy proposition for it and that several caps of Spire Blade Spawners are a very unhealthy proposition for me.

So my next attempt was to go the back way to the AI HW, and on a planet adjacent to that core world was the other advanced factory.  Well, I could get mkIV bombers and a few other things, at least, and I could set up shop to siege my way through if necessary.  So I set about clearing the planet.

Then a bunch of raptors appeared out of nowhere.  My fleet made them disappear again but it reminded me: the SF will come to me, here.

Spire Blade Spawners aren't nearly so dangerous if you can get into firing range.

[keith.lamothe]

Having arranged for the Special Forces to have an unfortunate accident, I left the AdvFact world untaken (but neutered aside from the CS and WHGPs) and regrouped my fleet for an assault on the ASC world.

Pausing to deal with the counterattack-post wave from the AdvFact planet, my fleet set out to capture the ASC before another SBS-SFB (SF blob) could pile up, around 7:17.

By the time I actually get there, there are 19 SBS's in said blob.  Ah well.

After this I take the AdvFact planet, build up my fleet, deal with some attacks, etc.  Then the starships go back to operation "field dress the squid".

At 8:24:50, the squid is no more, and the final battle of Roadbagnu begins.

At 8:27:45, the last core guard post falls, while mini-exos smash against the defenses on my homeworld-neighbors.  Secondary defense layers outward from them are already falling, but the forts deployed to the primary layers appear to be performing as desired.



And victory!



And vengeance!

The few survivors of my homeworld getting nuked celebrated with some radioactive wine.  Questions about the dwindling food supply were deferred unto the morrow.

[ZaneWolfe]

If I may be so very bold... Does that really say FIRST VICTORY?

[keith.lamothe]

If I may be so very bold... Does that really say FIRST VICTORY?

On that particular install   I've done a lot of uninstalling and installing this game.

I've not actually finished all that many games, but I've finished more than one

[zoutzakje]

woohoo congratz keith ^^ nice to see you finally wrapped this game up The avenger almost raping you was fun. Better not forget that I have them enabled in my current game as well