Rematch - Keith's Revenge

[Mánagarmr]

It's not so much pumping up my post count as it is actually participating. Though that particular day it happened to be comboed with extreme boredom.

[keith.lamothe]

It's not so much pumping up my post count as it is actually participating. Though that particular day it happened to be comboed with extreme boredom.

It is good to see you around again

Now we better be quiet in this thread before those new Blade Spawners of Wanderer's start looking our way.

[Wanderer]

Woot, 146 Rebellion Fighters come to help me.  The fleet was able to open up Hacker, but when they hit Poker they REALLY woke the planet up and got wrecked.  Meanwhile, the defense held... ish.  It probably would have barely held on its own but I'm happy the resistance got there.  I do, however, have a MK III EMP Guardian enroute.  Joy.

Wait, what?! Minor factions aside from the fallen spire are never supposed to free AI ships, only wake them up from low power mode. The EMP guardian should not of abandoned its post only due to go for you.

Well, I don't know about that rule one way or the other, but the Rebels weren't the ones who freed said EMP Guardian.  That'd be my own damned fault.

Unless you had military presence on the AI planet as well. Actually, does allied minor faction firepower add in to the hostile firepower accumulation before the AI tries to abandon a planet? (Assuming there is human or fallen spire military presence there of course)

Well, I can confirm that allied firepower will 'push' a threatball, watched it happen.

[Wanderer]

Oh, right, MK III Eye.  [...] time for a refleet.

Refleet-Defleet, Refleet-Defleet, *continues theme song*

AI-Eyes are probably the main source of "oops" when I play too.  I guess I just never shook the earlier habit of "ctrl-,;ctrl-V-right-click" being the "clear planet" macro.

I don't think I've FRD-cleared a planet in a long while.  95% of the time I need to keep the fleetball together.

Hmm, could try to bump up their vacuum rate again, it's just a very coarse stat to change because we can't do partial-second-reloads (since the early-unity days, due to adding the performance profiles).  I guess I could try to have it vacuum more than one ship per "salvo" and increase the time a bit to get more granularity.  Alternatively I could just make it have better guns and/or be cheaper.  Or just leave it like it is

I'm honestly not sure how to deal with the issue.  Part of the issue is Maw survivability on their own is too low to risk the existing hold of ships, so they need to stay with the fleet or at least near something that can distract firepower.  So, with that in mind, you end up with the next bit.

Maws target the same primaries as your fleet.  At Maw I, with 5 seconds to tractor, they'll start tractoring about the same time a chunk of the fleet (or turret bank) starts picking on that particular ship.  Said ship dies in about 4.5 seconds... meaning the maw just wasted the tractor attempt.  Rinse and repeat a few hundred times.  So, they DO end up with the occassional tractor, but even at perfection it'd be 12 ships/minute, compared to the old 30/minute... at MK I anyway.  A wave/decent fleet combat usually lasts about 3, maybe 4 minutes.  Assuming 3, that's a maximum of 36 ships the Maw could inhale, x5 being 180 ships.  Figure that half their targets die/are under heavy abuse before tractor, they'll get 90-100 ships there.

The question really is, is that a problem?  Maws went from low-mark godliness to 'just another ship'.  They are still invaluable against higher mark stuff (IF you can escape with them) and a MK or two of investment would help tremendously here, I just haven't had a chance to do it.

Interesting, I don't recall previously hearing an argument for intentionally placing turrets intentionally out of range like that, but it makes sense here. 

Another unexpected move, intentionally not taking advantage of a no-cost defensive boost for tractors, but also makes a lot of sense.  When dealing with attacks of that kind of intensity it seems like it becomes more important to figure out how to "shape" the enemy than simply trying to bash it to bits with brute force.  That part comes later.

Hmm, perhaps try placing some of the tractors on the very periphery of the ff's so they die after the non-ff ones but before the deep-ff ones?  In theory you could also play with manually standing down some tractors to release their loads, though the other tractors will just pick them up if there's capacity.

It basically comes down to trying to keep firepower on the board for as long as possible.  The mid-range turrets (Basic, Laser, and occassionally MRM) were getting thrashed by the alpha, so it was basically one shot a piece and then the enemy ended up with free rein.  By moving them back, they can't soak the alpha, so it goes elsewhere (the massive tractor wall or the ff), allowing them to apply their weight afterwards.  It's a balance and I wasn't sure how it'd work.  Once the FFs go down about and the second half of the wave frees (or that damned carrier pops out) it's game over for the turrets anyway.  If I can keep it under carrier levels, it works.  A carrier with more than 200 ships or so breaks the pattern completely.

I tried the gradually dying tractor turret line in the FFs, but I'll need to up the FF count for it to really matter.  What ends up happening is that things shooting at the FF tend to continue shooting at the FF, so those turrets don't gradually die off, they get pounded nearly all at once.  It'd be nice if there was a text fluff that would tell me how many ships a tractor could hold at this ship level (high/normal/etc) so I could plan better.  I think it's 50 ships at normal but I'm not sure.  Either way, usually the things targetting the FF are after the AoE turrets, not the tractors, so they don't end up freeing themselves.  I've slowly been moving more of the tractors out from under the FF to let them go.

I should note that my defenses do not actually stop wormhole escapees right now.  The FF bank and AoE turrets are off center of the wormhole (a little to the left, actually) to allow room for a circle of EMP Mines around the WH.  With the way the spawns occur, they end up deformed against the FF bank.  I'll grab a screenie later, hadn't thought to do it.

Regarding the Shield Bearers.  I might take them if they weren't a hack.  As a hack, and with me forseeing the need to K-Raid a bit, the mirrors are going to be roughly as useful, just in different ways.  I'm wicked crystal heavy and going to get more so, might as well put it to use on suicides... and Mirrors have awesome range.  Anti-Raptor.

*whistles* the AI's gonna regret starting that research project.

Yes, yes they are.

They really should be more careful where they put the exhaust ports on those data centers.  Stupid cooling requirements.  That -20 AIP pulls you back from the brink, though, from some of those waves I was thinking you wouldn't survive past the 70/80 AIP level.  At least not and still making progress.

LOL, yeah, was really a 'Stay on target...' kind of moment for them.  I'm making progress mostly by sheer force.  Having to knock down over half the galaxy to even find a second one was relatively rough, and the setup of those Eye/MD worlds along with a couple of MK IVs was pretty intense.

Building off the Ship Hacker and Transport, I run into energy problems again.  Time for another matter converter.

So much for the economy.

Pretty much.  I'm up to two collectors and 3 converters at this point.

[Wanderer]

It's not so much pumping up my post count as it is actually participating. Though that particular day it happened to be comboed with extreme boredom.

It is good to see you around again

Now we better be quiet in this thread before those new Blade Spawners of Wanderer's start looking our way.

Heh, I should probably mention that I happen to LIKE random discussion threads appearing my AARs... though 3 pages might be a bit much for new mechanic discussions.    It let's me know people are actually engaged by the AARs and reviewing the strategy I'm using never hurts, I'm usually open to new tactics and ideas. 

[rabican]

Wait, what?! Minor factions aside from the fallen spire are never supposed to free AI ships, only wake them up from low power mode. The EMP guardian should not of abandoned its post only due to go for you.
Unless you had military presence on the AI planet as well. Actually, does allied minor faction firepower add in to the hostile firepower accumulation before the AI tries to abandon a planet? (Assuming there is human or fallen spire military presence there of course)

Resistance  fighters destroy everything. Or at least all the guard posts, don't think they destroy BHG's and the like. They often leave friendly space to go put out threat ballls and end up neutering systems. This is kinda annoying sometimes because they end up killing  special forces guard posts for that +1AIP.

[keith.lamothe]

FYI, the line-place thing is out now.  Wanted to get that out before switching gears to continue expansion work.

[Wanderer]

FYI, the line-place thing is out now.  Wanted to get that out before switching gears to continue expansion work.

Nomnomnomnomnom! 

From the wiki for everyone else:

Added "Line Place" context menu option for when you open the context menu (defaults to alt+right-click) while you have the build menu open and an item selected for direct placement. From the line-place menu instructions: Step 1: Click where you want one end of the line segment to be. This line segment doesn't actually set the final location of anything, Instead it tells the game the length and angle of the segment.
 Step 2: Click where you want the other end of the line segment to be.
Step 3: Specify the maximum number of units you want to place below (left click the number to increase, right click to decrease, and the usual keys for multiplying by 5, 10, or 50), pick whether you want a packed line (good for mines), and then left-click where you want to place the units.
 
The main use case in mind for this was efficient use of mines, but can also be helpful for many defensive emplacements, or simply for aesthetic appeal. The interface could be cleaner but this is what we had time for right now.
 Thanks to Wanderer for inspiring this addition.

[keith.lamothe]

Let me know how it works out; the interface experience isn't quite as execrable as it was, and it certainly does pack those mines in nice and tight (in my tests; that wasn't easy but it works now), but I'm sure it's gonna feel like "wha? Is this a user interface designed by an engineer?".

[Wanderer]

"Sub commander, put 1 hour, 59 minutes on the clock.  Release on my mark."
"Aye aye, set sir."
... "Mark."

"Gentlemen, we have THAT LONG to save the Rebels.  Let's get to it."


(This next part I think I'll write a little differently, for fun).

Captain's Log:

We start on Misery, collecting up what we can of the fleet, including the higher mark ships from Blackstone's leech unit.  We leave them a smattering of assitance but this needs to be done effectively.

There's over 476 ships worth of threat from the AI that's being reported out there, and a massive portion of that has fleeted up in Eridani.  Blackstone's defenses are in serious trouble, however, we can't help them.  We'll need to go around that fleet and head for Earth.

Command has informed me that the Raid Starships were dispatched to take down all the Ion cannons in our way, including the ones on Hacker and Poker.  It's a shame, we'd hoped to be able to use those in the future to assist our defenses, but it can't be helped.  We have to make our way through as quickly as possible, and that means those Ions can't be there attritioning our ships.  I don't know if I agree with High Command on this one, but I don't really have a choice.

115:30 on the clock... Ions in Poker, Hacker, and Earth are reported as being down.  Our fleet has arrived on Earth and is engaged with the defenders that the Raid attack released.  I'm informed that not only did the Raid SSs manage to clear our path of Ions, they also got rid of two laser guardians under glass that would have cost us precious ships.

We've already lost a maw to artillery guardians, and haven't even gotten off Earth.  High Command really needs to get us new designs for Maws with better armor and tractor systems, these just aren't up to the task.

113 on the clock... and the fleet has reached Poker.  We begin with taking out the local guardposts, waiting for a new Raid Starship squadron to be produced.  It shouldn't be long. 

112:00 on the clock.  High Command has informed us the Raids are ready and are enroute.  We finish up what we're doing and head for Hacker.  Ship losses have been reasonable so far, I fear to write 'minimal'.  Last time I did that we ended up losing the entire fleet.

109:12 on the clock.  Hacker falls.  AIP is reported to be at 65.  I have no idea who came up with this scale back at High Command but they really need to come up with a better way to report threat ratings to the fleet.  I believe the correct and appropriate value for this is "Oh my god we're all going to die."  High Command tends to disagree.  We really have to take out that Data Center, either way.

The Raid Starships are given to my control.  While I applaud their soon sacrifice against the Data Center, we have a problem in Nero.  Namely, an Ion III being protected by a Fortress.  I could either weather the huge losses to my bomber squadron or I can have the Raids high speed into it and clip it before it becomes a significant issue.  We need to crack Nero of it's nearly 100 ships for the Raids to get through completely anyway.  Then, Sushi will be all theirs, for the few moments of life they'll have after entry.

108:28 on the clock.  The Raid Starships were successful, but one fell in the attack.  I've issued orders to the remaining two to R&R at home and return.  The flight for them is short and they'll need all three to counter the Peacemaker AI's Mass Drivers on Sushi.

The fleet entered Blackjack and took massive losses to the gaurdians there. About 2/3s of the fleet is still operational, and we're still trying to knock off all these guardians.  I've issued orders for the bombers at 107:00 to attack the Fort I and SF post on Blackjack.  The rest of the fleet is preppign for Nero. 

At 105:00 22 ships Engine Dead from siege fire had to be scrapped for rebuilding on Nero.  There's no way we can recover them this deep.  The Bombers completed operations in Blackjack and are on their way to us in Nero.  The Raids, also, are enroute.  We're hopeful we can get to the Data Center before the AI notices us. 

103 on the clock.  The fleet is at less than half strength, and nearly our entire bomber contingent has been wiped out by a Heavy Beam Guardian under glass.  We've nearly destroyed a Spire Shieldpost along our route and then will finish clearing the exit wormhole to Sushi for the Raiders.

The Raid was nearly a failure.  Our well protected Raid SSs ran into a minefield and a suicide Guardian on entry, which with Mass Driver support took out two Raids immediately.  Black Box transmittals were reported to us with everyone watching anxiously as our last lone Raid SS flew across the entire system and got in the first salvo on the Data Center, crippling but not destroying it.  Anxiously we saw the telemetry of two additional Mass Driver shots inbound on the Raid SS, as they dropped shields to pour everything into the laser battery recharge.  Their final salvo landed just as the Mass Driver shots could be visibly seen, destroying the Raids nearly immediately after.

Success though, is marked at 101:40 on the clock.  AIP is reported at 47.  The fleet, tattered and a broken shell of what it once was, prepares to retreat to Misery to get some R&R in.  High Command has whispered that they intend to pull back our picket scouts to be able to further investigate this region of space.

101:24... I've been given orders by HC to bring the tattered fleet through Eridani, and to wipe out the building threat fleet there.  We don't expect to come home anymore.

99:45 on the clock.  A double wave has been reported sighted heading for Blackstone.  Nearly 1,700 ships will be heading for our primary defenses.  Coupled with the threat fleet, it's unlikely Blackstone would hold on its own.  I've been informed our reinforcements have been sent to Blackstone instead to help with the defense, including the new Bomber Starships that were built for us to help with these guardians.

In the middle of the assault, our fleet managed to reach Eridani, and proceeded towards Blackstone to offer whatever assistance we could.  We didn't make it.  After the assault had been determined to have failed by the AI, over 700 ships evacuated into Eridani from Blackstone.  We were obliterated.

I need to leave the remote control station now and head up to report this tragedy to High Command.  So much material and manpower lost when they reversed into us.  Threat is reported at over 800 in the galaxy now.  This will make the next stage of the Rebel Recovery that much more difficult.

One positive note, though, was reported to me during the end of that amazing hectic battle.  140 Human Freedom Fighters joined our failing defenses on Blackstone to help protect it.  I've heard it was the only thing that saved us.

The remaining forces were called back to Misery for R&R and the Freedom Fighters were left to deal with the huge threat.

In the end, approximately 70 of them were left, patrolling Blackstone and attacking Eridani and Hot Sauce occassionally.


88:30 on the clock:
I've finished my briefing with High Command and instead of the whipping I'd expected, I was congratulated.  My arrival on Eridani was never meant to support Blackstone, but to play bait.  They played a dangerous game but it worked, giving us time.

I've prepped the fleet for the attacks on Liao, Krupp, and finally the Data Center on Sox, which is stage two of Plan: Rebel Recovery.  We begin to move out, but we're still waiting for bomber and Polarizer rebuilds.

I've got 8 Scout IIs to work with.  I send them out to see what's built up since their last visit to Liao and Sox.

Liao has 35 ships, mostly guardians(16).  Sox has 34 ships, against mostly guardians... 22 of them.  One's a suicide, another's a sniper under glass. Neither, luckily have the ever dreaded EMP Guardians however.  This may be successful after all.

86:30 on the clock.  The fleet is finally rebuilt and ready to go.  I organize them, attaching the Bomber SSs to the Maws, figuring they can protect each other, and so I can easily leave them behind when I enter Mass Driver territory.

592 ships begin the slow approach to the other side of the galaxy.  High Command has told me they've got designs for a ship that can help us with this constant deep retreat to resupply, but they don't want to activate them yet.  That's so helpful, High Command.  Thanks.

83:00 on the clock.  The fleet hits craps and we find a smattering of freedom fighters out here helping to clear the way.  We send them a communique thanking them, but as usual, they won't respond.  I have no idea if their ships just don't have communication gear or if they see themselves as above or apart from us.  Either way, we're thankful to have them on our side.  It would be nice if we could combine our might in a better way, but I have a feeling that Rebelling colony calling for help will provide us some inroads to them.

81:00 on the clock and the primary fleet invades Liao, with the main goal of taking down the mass drivers.  We'll be doing the same in Krupp, shortly.

At 78 on the clock, we struck Krupp.  Krupp has a Mass Driver under glass and an Ion V that just pounded down our fleet.  Our Fighters were too slow to actually get near the Ion in a reasonable speed, but that Fortress is blocking the Krupp Wormhole.  We knew this was going to be bad but we might be in over our heads on this assault.  However, the road is clear for the Raids to get at Sox, even if the fleet never opened up any holes on it.  They've been issued orders to assault the Data Center, then to head to us to support when they can.

At 77 on the clock a suicide guardian was able to eradicate the bomber squadron heading for the Fortress, well, what was left of it.  The rest of the tattered fleet is just... useless.  However, the majority of these guardians should free up and head for our defenses somewhere.

HC has informed me they've sent an Explorer class Science vessel to Sox to investigate the ARS there, as well.

I'd forgotten about the heavy fleet we'd left on Liao.  They were toasted due to my inattention when the marauding guardians hit them without backup nor attention.  I've informed High Command a full refleeting is needed.

AIP is now 27, however.  Humanity is safer for a moment.

I investigate Desperado again with the Scouts (6 now sicne we've done further picketing at Liao and Krupp) and it's not heavily guarded... yet.  However, there's dual Mass Drivers and an Eye on that planet, along with 6 guardposts.  We're going to have some trouble taking that planet's defenses out.

The explorer vessel sent to Sox reveals the local ARS has a set of easily found plans, and some that will require significant hacking on our part to get at.  Primarily they were researching Laser Gatlings, but hidden in its databanks are plans for both Impulse Reaction Emitters and Anti-Armor ships.  The science boys just didn't understand when I explained to them I was unimpressed, and I wanted to investigate the final ARS we've found at Arc Royal as soon as was reasonable, and long before we committed any resources towards the recovery of the ARS on Sox.  They agreed, eventually.

Personal log...
With time winding away waiting for the rebuild, one of my staff handed me a bottle of carbonated disinfectant.  Needless to say, I was confused.  She informed me that it was old human tradition to smash a bottle of this cleanser across the bow of a new ship.  I blinked at her in confusion, we were producing HUNDREDS of them, and I informed her as such.  High Command, however, was apparently making a big deal out of a new type of ship being built, the one they'd promised before.  The Neinzul Enclave Warship.

What the hell are we doing mixing AI tech, Bug Tech, and Human Tech?!  Didn't this get us in trouble LAST time?

I went out, did the two minute ceremony, and broke a bottle of cleanser over its... point.  Then I went to see what the fuss was all about.  This mobile factory would be able to support the fleet on long range operations.  While this ship would only be able to immediately MK I vessels, with some research into various technologies, it would also be able to defend itself with short lived drones.  Of particular interest to me were the needler drones, since R&D had been cawing about being allowed to go apply some of the recovered resources towards a set of higher end Basic Turrets. 

I was very impressed.  Cheap and basically nothing more than a gun with an engine, they would be able to do a reasonable amount of damage.

Of course, the Mercenaries HAD to upstage us.  They sent us information regarding one of these ships that they could produce that would allow for MK II construction in the field.  And the price tag was rediculous, as always.  In this case, though, it may be worth it.

A new wave was announced to Blackstone, a mere 539 ships.  The fleet would be unnecessary, thankfully, so we continued to rebuild.

A backup wave was announced to land a minute after, for 756 ships.  70 of the Human Freedom Fighters were still available at Blackstone to assist, so again, we waited.

62:30 on the clock, the Raids head for Blackstone to pickup a cloaked starship and make their way to Krupp.  They'll need to take out that Ion cannon for us.  The new factory ships worked nicely, rebuilding the majority of the MK I fleet long before our MK IIs were ready from the main space dock.  Our economy is utterly trashed now, though, and we still have 90 ships, 1/6th of the fleet, to rebuild.

I almost errored on the strike.  I forgot that the cloaked ship needed to be in system before the raids were, else those snap-shot mass drivers would be able to see them for the half-second they were visible.  An immediate retreat and re-entry solved the issue, but it was a close thing.  The plan, however, worked like a charm.  With a quick dual salvo hit and run back to the cloaker, all the Raid SSs survived (barely).  They moved to take out the Mass Driver as well, since it was under glass, and having freedom to raid in Krupp could only help me eventually.

56 minutes on the clock.  Less than an hour left and the two hardest systems still to go.  Cloaked Raiders vs. Mass Drivers though gives me an option I didn't have earlier.  I have the R&D boys looking into MK II Raids now.

50:30 on the clock and we hit Krupp again.  I move the Factory ships out to the edge for now, allowing them to send Free Roaming killers out to the system on rebuilds.  A Cross Planet Attack of 223 ships was detected via the hacking net, but there's not a lot we can do about that right now.

At 48 minutes on the clock we take down the Fort defending the entry to Desperado from Krupp.

(One thing that always annoyed me about the Ctrl-Group for Neinzul Enclave.  I can't just move the enclaves because everything they build ends up in the same blinkin Ctrl-Group.  Meh.)

Alright, calling this one here for now, I've got some other stuff I wanted to do tonight.  Krupp's clear.  Now it's me vs. 46 minutes to take Desperado.

[Wanderer]

"Commander, 46 minutes on the clock, we need time to setup the colony ship as well."
"Relax, Ensign.  Remember, it's only their cloak that'll fail in 46 minutes, as long as we're there protecting them the colony ship can take its sweet time getting to us."
"Yes, sir, but earlier you said..."
"I know what I said Ensign.  Now shaddup."


Alright, first thing's first, we need to knock down those Mass Drivers.  Best method would be to come in from Hoth, one of them's on the wormhole, and that's the closest wormhole to the other one.  Hoth, however, has 3 Ion Is sitting on it.  I call for Raid SSs from High Command, and they deliver promptly.

Hoth apparently has been building for a while.  The AI designated it a MK III planet, so apparently something important to it is there.  Our scouts can't figure out what however.  There are around 200 defending ships there, however, so we're gonna have a bit of a fight to get through it.  The Raids manage to get two of the three Ions down, and release the majority of Hoth as threat in their wake.  The fleet is now heavily engaged in defensive operations on Krupp.  They did, however, get 88 ships off of Hoth.  These factory ships are very handy for in the field replacement of troops.

At 41:30 on the clock the main fleet invades Hoth.  Our purpose here isn't a cleansing, just getting enough control to setup a strike point against Desperado.

At 38:30 on the clock a flight of Bomber Is is broken off from the main fleet and sent into Desperado to get the first Mass Driver.  A Beam Starship (My Gods, we HAVE to get one of those!!!) chews deeply into the Bomber fleet, along with local guardian help.  They are barely able to cap the first Mass Driver, but they did succeed.  I don't have high hopes for them getting at the second one.  I get cloaker starships shipped up to the main fleet in preparation for another Raid/cloak assault.

Our new factory ships aren't really able to keep up with significant fleet losses.  They help, but they just aren't able to replace ships as quickly as I'd like.  3 seconds for a bomber, 2 for a frigate.  This takes time... time we don't have.  The Raids just arrived in Hoth at 36:30 on the clock, with a few dents in them.  I'm still waiting on the arrival of our cloakers.  They're nearby, in Krupp.

That Beam starship is fast and that run to the second mass driver is LONG.  I can't reasonably expect a raiding fleet to survive the trip without significant cloaking.  I'm intending on sending in a bomber flight with the cloaker starships to get them where they need to be.  The only problem with that is the Tachyon Guardpost on the other side is still active.  I send through another sacraficial lamb of Bomber Is.

Once again, though, the AI has setup their waves back to back with a 1 minute gap for Blackstone.  574 and 480 ships.  We expect it'll hold for now.

At 35:30 the Bomber flight heads in and pops the Tach Guardian.  With 37 left they succeed, and I suicide them towards the Mass Driver.  Here's hopin' those Rookies can learn to dodge some shots.  Meanwhile, 88 of our Freedom Fighter friends have gathered on Blackstone to help the defenses out.  I expect little, if any, turret losses.

Even with a Zombie Guardian (and a few buddies) attacking our Bomber fleet they managed to kill the Mass Driver with the last 6 of them.  Those Rookies down in Section Q will probably want me take life support off low power for a day as a celebration.  Well, they earned it, I guess we can afford the power loss.

With the Mass Drivers downed, the Raids have entered Desperado and are currently doing guard post cleanup.  They succeed with roughly 31 minutes left on the clock.  Now to figure out the final piece of this plan.  How to defend the place.

At 31:00 I order a Colony Ship from homeworld.  It'll travel with a small fleet of the MK IIs we can't produce in the field, namly the Bombers and Polarizers, and a spare Bomber SS to replace one we lost.  They'll be along here eventually.

Oh gods.  We missed a guardpost.  Upon entry into Desperado 284 MK III zombies spawn up and chase the fleet.  Quickly, we retreat.

We lost one of our factory ships in that debacle.  That's not going to help.

None of the reserve fleet made it us through that mess, either.  Going to need to figure out a way to help transport a colony ship up here.  However, at 28:00, I can announce that the Rebel Colony planet is now a neutral system, and merely needs us to get them back up to speed.  I'm bringing the fleet back to misery.  We'll just mass-escort the poor thing up here, along with a few spare engineers.

AIP is at 51.  I'm informed this is probably going to cause Blackstone a lot of problems.  We'll have to see what happens.  We still have a small armada of Freedom Fighters supporting us, so we shouldn't be completely destroyed unless they double wave us... again.

21 minutes on the clock, and the main fleet, fully R&R'd at Misery, heads out with 5 Engi Is and a triplet of Colony Ships, in case one gets destroyed along the way.  We're coming, boys.  Don't mind the static... that's just Section Q's party.

While the fleet travels, I have a chance to evaluate a few options.  It's not going to make the eggheads overly happy but I inform them to use our research resources to upgrade the Basic Turrets, develop Beam Cannons, and to get me a better version of our current forcefield on a different command circuit.  We've run out of how many we can deploy of the base model.  I have no idea WHY a forcefield needs a control frequency, but the boys downstairs tell me they don't phase adjust properly without constant reattunement.  When they can explain what the hell that means to me, I might be able to help them with a solution.

I tell our Factory ships to begin production of their Needler Drones as well for additional support and firepower.  Let's see how good flying guns really are.  they are... not that impressive.  A flight of them couldn't handle a single Fighter MK III.  However, these appear to be best against Frigates and Starships, so that might be a poor test.  I'm informed when we can build MK II and higher in the field, I'll be able to use upgraded versions of these drones as well.

A problem arose at 16 minutes on the clock when the fleet arrived.  We attempted to build our first station and it was popped, almost immediately.  We're not sure by what, but there's 46 cloaked ships here on the planet.  We can only assume we've got Raptor problems.  I send for the Scout Starships back and home and hope we can ferret them out.

With our Military station setup on Desperado, we immediately look to communicating with our new friends while we build up some defenses for them.  They don't have much to say, just that they're willing to offer us a portion of their pilots and will construct us some ships for them to pilot if we can provide the resources.  Having seen what their freedom fighters can do defending our turret wall, we happily say yes without pushing the issue further.

Meanwhile, we start getting them defended with a few forcefields over the Command Center and the Mil I base that we built next door to them.  Also, we bring online a new energy collector here in this system to feed the network.  Hopefully we can shutdown a few of those matter converters soon and get better resources going.

Because of the layout of the wormholes in Desperado, and the fact that the Colony is basically stuck between them, we elect to do a shorter range defense for now, placing 2 HFF Is and 28 Basic IIs with 4 HBCs near the colony/Military station.  It's not much but for the moment the fleet's here.  We'll eventually need to get them some longer range firepower to help out.

With the full fleet on defense and with the factory ships standing by to replace losses for now, we're as strong as we can be defending our new friends while they get their own fleet operational.  We also took down two matter converters and still have a positive energy flow, as well as improving our resource consumption.  This may be very beneficial for both parties.

I'm leaving the fleet in the hands of SubCommander Jenkins for now, while I report to High Command and discuss the situation.  We don't have enough to truly leave them independent of the fleet yet and that will need to be corrected.

--- END LOG ---


Gametime: 10:30.  Rebels saved, with about 15 minutes to spare.  Next up I need to get those mirrors from Hacker, get defenses in place there, and then go grab me my Blade Spawners by hacking.  Meanwhile, the Rebels will be out making a significant nuisance of themselves so I can see what the hell's going on out there.  The map really hasn't changed, and I still haven't found that last CoP...

I grabbed 20 Sniper Turrets off of homeworld to help support them here, but really, it's going to be Rebels vs. Waves up here.  The smattering of turrets is really just to deal with bleedthrough.  I'm waiting on a wave to hit me so I know what I'm actually going to be dealing with here.

The first wave announces about 10:35 for Blackstone, 932 ships.  The max-time vs. non doesn't really look like it kicked in yet.  The logs show it as a 2.4 time multiplier, and that's about right with single choke, so my guess is it just hasn't 'caught up' with the two-target thing yet.  However, finally, I'm not dual-waved.  I've also got roughly 90 Freedom Fighters left hanging around so they're good to go, since another wave of them came in from nowhere to give a hand.

However, 1,235 ships announced for Desperado shortly after that, and the Rebels are still far from ready.  The fleet will have to handle the majority of this defense.  I tuck the Maws under the base shield and protect the Rebel fleet.  They're taking a while to build and I really don't want them suiciding right now, I have plans for them.

Immediately upon entry, some 800+ ships (including the carrier!) just U-turned and ran for it.  The rest stayed and fought.  I think they were running right for the homeworld, but they're running at either that or Blackstone.

Eventually, I find the majority of them went for Blackstone, and got chewed on due to the spacing distances.  The carrier, however, was heading for Misery.  Also, with the Rebels building... yeah, I was ahead of myself taking down the Matter converters.  Had to build a new one.  Damn those buggers are power hungry... alright, two of them (after doing some math...)... I'll build the other one when I need it.

The Freedom Fighters intercepted a majority of the carrier troops on Green Lanter for me, thinning the herd before it got to the turret defenses on Misery.  I need to find a better way to deal with escaping waves.  Economy's in the gutter again, too, particularly from fleet rebuilds on top of trying to get the rebels online.

Safe(r) for the moment, the fleet (sans factory ships and Rebels) heads to Hacker to go get my Mirrors at around 10:51 game time.  Gods, it's THAT late already?  Wow I've been badly stalled up for a long time.  I don't mind Epic but it took me FOREVER to get going here.  I've got a Transport with a colony and 5 Engi's to help setup.

About 10:55 the Rebels are ready.  I pause to look at my first victims... errr... objectives.

I've gotten scouts to see what's up in the Northwest planets I couldn't see into before.  There's nothing there of import.  On the east, however, there's 3 MK IV planets hosing me up.  I send the Rebels over to Hacker for now to stage for striking up into the northern center to see if I can't get scouts deeper up there.  I need to see where the final points of this are, and I need to get a Science II onto Arc Royal to see the last ARS.

I've finally got some K to work with again, too, sitting at a nice flush 6,500.  Not sure what I'm going to do with it yet.

At 11:00 I'm at AIP 54 due to SF posts and auto progress.  788 ship wave for Hacker is announced.  That's good.  Time index shows a 2.1 time wave.  Excellent.  The majority of the fleet's there and can handle this.  Meanwhile we're still rebuilding economy while the Rebels play in the area leading to Arc Royal.  Hacker has a similar defensive need as Desperado, and they've got 40 Basic IIs, 4 HBCs, and 17 Snipers.

This wave is amazingly raptor heavy, and I have NO Tachy turrets left, the majority of them in use on Blackstone still.  Well, that's just great.  Add to that again most of the wave escaped into the AEther.  Great.  850 threat just floating around out there.

It basically hit everywhere.  I probably need to move some turrets near the entry wormholes on Desperado to help with inbound removals that get caught in the tractors, the 20 snipers just really aren't cutting it.

Next wave is 1061 to Blackstone.  Even with 3 planets up for targetting I'm still getting pounded on by near max-time waves.  This one's a 2.21.  I'll have to attach a log after a few more events.  However, Multi-Inbound started at 10:35, roughly, in game time.

Arc Royal ARS has Sniper ( MLRS/Mini Ram).  That's just perfect, Snipers it is, they'll complement the Blade Spawners as a long range team nicely.

Now, for the next confirmation.  Rebels vs. Eye+Mass Driver.  Can I replace the Raid SSs?

Oh gods, I forgot they were blind.  Crap.  I send the Scout SSs over to help out.  The answer, however, is roughly yes... FFs of course are more of an issue, but still.

At about 11:15 I sent the main fleet home to prepare to support a drive at Kerensky for the Ship-Hack.  The Rebels are nicely handling most of the issues up north. 

At 11:26 I get two notifications.  The first is I just triggered a core raid engine via Arrakkis.  That's 459 MK IV ships.  Secondly, I'm getting 887 visitors to Desperado, which means the Rebels need to head home after they pop a few things.  I'd previously scouted Arrakkis, but I hadn't noticed it was a coreworld, just another MK IV (there's a few of 'em, you'll see shortly).  Oof.

However, I let critical mass get ahead of me on a core world.  most of the Rebels died because I was running blind trying to take out mass drivers and tachyon posts.  This will get ugly.  The fleet's on its way up to Hacker to help protect things and to re-establish Desperado if everything goes pear-shaped.

Desperado, as expected, fell.  The Colony recloaked and I'll send over a rebuilder team when the fleet gets to Hacker.

Meanwhile, the Raid Engine's hitting Hacker.  Just great.  164 ships and growing.  AIP 56 is kicking me in the shins again.  The Needle Drones are attempt to help defend, but there's Core Guardians inbound.  Luckily, the fleet's not far.

Something on Arrakkis is decloaking my scouts on entry, even though I've popped the Tachyon Guardposts.  My guess is he's got Tachyon Microfighters... AGAIN.

Hacker fell as well. 1,200 ships of mixxed MK II-V.  The fleet couldn't even slow the onslaught, and the Maws were the first to die.
Savescum.  My autosave is from right after I triggered the Core Engine (about 30 seconds) on Arrakkis.  I immediately withdraw the Rebels and get the fleet moving.  There's about 100 Core ships on my tail.  A suicide guardian takes out most of the fleeing rebels.  This looks familiar.

This went slightly better, only 1000 of the AI's ships escaped.

My last save is from over an hour and a half ago.  I need sleep.  I'll argue with it tomorrow, but my guess is I'm savescumming back to 10:00.

Attached find the logs Keith if you're interested.

[Wanderer]

For anyone curious the waves are correct.  I didn't read the entries correctly and missed the trailing component that computes NEXT wave time.  I'd misunderstood and thought it was a limiter on the check for the current one.

However, it's a moot point, as an hour later things had settled out and was not the cause of this downfall chain.

Three things have kicked my 'low AIP' arse in this game.

1) Freedom Fighters have both saved me continuously as well as screwed me.  They've hunted down and killed at least 10, if not more, AIP of Special Forces Guardposts I would have ignored.
2) I got bottlenecked early by a CoP and couldn't use my original defensive plans.
3) At 10 hours into the game (with a 1 AIP/30 min pressure) I'm 20 AIP higher than I was in the very early game and had no significant gains for a long time through that period.

I did, however, learn a lot through this game so far, but I'm going to give this one to the AI.  I've found this game is no longer interesting, just frustrating.  I carried on a lot longer than I normally would have with that much stall but I'd wanted to see how it would go.

So, before I begin the next attempt on a different map, what have I learned:
1) Maws need to be examined again.  The Vacuum rate is now reasonable instead of being monstrous as early marks.  That 'reasonable' vacuum rate though leaves them incredibly vulnerable and much less effective during fleet actions at early marks because usually their targets die before capture.  They have shifted from an offensive 'overwhelmed' countermeasure to a defensive ship, similar to autobombs. Particularly at lower marks.  My guess is high mark Maws are still very effective, so would a group of them with the lower marks included to 'help out'.  I believe the idea of 'shot reload' that occurs with wasted shots (shots fired against units dead while it's enroute) and thus cutting the time on the next vacuum would help tremendously here.

2) Alpha Strike vs. mid-range turrets.  Large alpha strikes with mixed waves will ruin your mid-range turrets.  200-300 Frigates are all it takes (particularly at MK II) to lay waste to the entire turret bank of MK I mid-range turrets, even using 75% of the cap.  Toss in other ships with range (Beam Frigates in this case) and a lightly-loaded carrier and they're nearly as useless as unprotected AoE short-rangers.

The counter to this is wave shape control and distance, and not allowing the Alpha-Strike to contact the mid range turrets.  The problem with this is until you have some escapees, and that's a difficult thing to attempt to judge the right volume of tractors to allow, a large portion of your firepower lies dormant.  I'm still working out the solution to this puzzle.  I've used other tactics in different games to help deal with this issue but none of them really worked here.

An example is 'shape and splash', which is a Terran tactic in Starcraft using Siege Tanks combined with delay units.  Using disposable buildings or other terrain shaping techniques along with a rallied line of disposable marines, you build a corridor that slows and restricts the enemy advance while allowing AoE to continuously blow apart the front of the assault line.  Eventually, with concerted effort, a breakthrough by your enemy will occur, but you've done so much economic attrition at that point it's moot, you've either won or you're inept.  There's a similar trick with Protoss and (Dark?  been a while) Archons, it requires a rediculous amount of micro-management but it's a crapton more effective, particularly since it's also anti-air.  You'll notice I described a variation on this theme and had mixed results.

Typical RTS tricks like that will not work here, the AI has no economy.  The counterstrike cannot occur, not on a battlefield this wide and against an enemy so entrenched.  Add to that your enemy usually cannot alpha strike, pathing doesn't allow for that much force to applied simultaneously against a single defensive point.  It adds a twist I haven't figured out the best way to counter yet (sans BotNet or Warheads).

3) No EMP/Tazer = economic ruin.  Allowing that many ships constant firepower against my defenses cost me so much time in economy that I couldn't refleet in reasonable amounts of time.  I purposely didn't go after them this round early to see what the effects were and if there were reasonable alternatives.  I learned there are some, but you NEED that overkill.

4) A running minefield is amazingly powerful in removing Raid and Bomber SS threats, and even some of the heavier flagships.  It needs to be STUPID long though.  There is, however, no reason NOT to build it.   It's too cheap to ignore.

5) No Black Hole Generator and allowing immediate escapees by not covering the wormhole = 50%+ threat from the invading wave using fleet for defense assistance.  Defend accordingly.  I also consider this a design flaw/feature.  I haven't decided yet if it's more frustrating than interesting, however, as there's ways to shape the landscape in most maps to eventually counter the issue, though it will require heavy threat cleanup constantly.

6) Carriers are counterable, but if your CPU can handle the ship load POP THEM IMMEDIATELY if possible.  You don't want to fight the same fleet twice.  They are wicked powerful and can cut your entire turret load to pieces.  Not that the ships inside can't too, usually, but there's no reason to eat the firepower twice.  They can take a bit to take out anyway.  In the middle of an enemy fleet it's like hiding a Golem with your fleetball to defend it.  It's amazingly strong as it is.  Now, add in all the rest and you've got a serious attrition problem, particularly if you rely on AoEs to lower the firepower over time.

7) Economic spirals are recoverable but it may cost you more than you expect.

8 ) Scout IIIs are overpriced just for more scouts.  I realize they open the Scout IV as well, but perhaps that should be modified.  I'll write that proposal up elsewhere.

I'll crank up a new game and re-use this AAR for it.

Score after new modifications:
AI: 2 Wanderer: 0.

[TechSY730]

(Not quoting Wanderer's post due to length)

- Can't speak much to Maws, haven't used them much.

- I think that making Co-processors unable to seed on planets adjacent to human homeworlds is a must, as you can rarely get away with not taking a planet adjacent to your homeworld.

- Human resistance fighters and human maurderers need to take a cue from dysons, NOT shoot at guard posts at all, as killing guard posts will have very noticeable side effects, especially those special forces ones (AIP)

- The short-mid range turret survivability thing during a wave is an interesting question, and one I don't really have an answer too. The AI is playing smart (take out what is in range right now) so I don't think that should change. Things like fancy special attributes that increases damage resistance if damage has been taken recently (and more resistance the more damage) has been proposed, but that would be complicated to implement. But that would help deal with this and similar sorts of situations.

- The fact you will have to deal with carriers AND their contents is a very good observations, and these games seem to have shown that this factor is enough to that even ~1/3 the firepower of the contained ships (on average) is still too much firepower for the carriers. (Again, that whole unit stack idea, while it would be extremely painful to implement, may be worth considering as it avoids this problem in a much cleaner fashion. The carrier mechanic could be kept for accumulation if the number of ship types is too high for savings by "stacking" to be enough, which would be rare but possible)

- The wave retreat thing is just smart play by the AI. Why keep ships around that will clearly die without doing much if kept in? We do the same thing. If we can do it, why shouldn't the AI? I the problem is that the AI tends to be too timid with freed ships, often leading to stagnation in mid to late games. (One such post I made about this is 7016: Reduce the firepower cutoff ratio that "stalking a wormhole" AI ships will wait for before entering)

[Wanderer]

- I think that making Co-processors unable to seed on planets adjacent to human homeworlds is a must, as you can rarely get away with not taking a planet adjacent to your homeworld.

I'm not sure.  CoPs against the homeworld have made for some interesting defensive shapes on my part.  They are removeable and I'd personally like to keep the 'never next to homeworld' restriction only for immediate game enders.  Raid Engines come to mind.

- Human resistance fighters and human maurderers need to take a cue from dysons, NOT shoot at guard posts at all, as killing guard posts will have very noticeable side effects, especially those special forces ones (AIP)

I heavily disagree with this one.  One of the things I like about them (and annoys me about the Dyson) is that they will go off and neuter planets for me.  I think the entire SF Post needs to be re-evaluated instead of adjusting a unit that's only one of the concerns regarding them.

- The fact you will have to deal with carriers AND their contents is a very good observations, and these games seem to have shown that this factor is enough to that even ~1/3 the firepower of the contained ships (on average) is still too much firepower for the carriers. (Again, that whole unit stack idea, while it would be extremely painful to implement, may be worth considering as it avoids this problem in a much cleaner fashion. The carrier mechanic could be kept for accumulation if the number of ship types is too high for savings by "stacking" to be enough, which would be rare but possible)

Given that the whole stack idea was basically nixed by Keith due to the invasiveness of the change, we probably want to try to figure out an alternate approach.  One idea I had was that Warp Gates would open next to the inbound wormhole, and the target would 'refill' as ships were destroyed.  This ends up with the multiple 1000 ship waves though that the original carriers did, so it's not a worthy one, though it's a better balance since you'll always be fighting 1000 ships or so.  The difference is with the right setup I could theoretically stop a continuous assault for a long time.  This game I didn't implement that, to my chagrin.

- The wave retreat thing is just smart play by the AI. Why keep ships around that will clearly die without doing much if kept in? We do the same thing. If we can do it, why shouldn't the AI?

Oh, I agree in general, but I'd like to see them hang around long enough to actually TRY before they run for it.  Watching half a wave retreat on SPAWN is a facinating thing to watch, however.  "We're gonna send this wave at them... oh, wait, nevermind, run."  What the heck did you send them for in the first place, AI?  Maybe a 30 second delay before the retreat order can be given?  Not much, but enough that they at least made an ATTEMPT to break into your system?

[Hearteater]

I still think the unit stack idea would be simpler to implement than Keith expects (not easy, mind you).  But not seeing the code itself puts me at a disadvantage in making that estimate .