The AI 9 through 10 run

[TechSY730]

In general, a fascinating conundrum   The actual AI attacks (at least the waves) aren't being much of a challenge to thorough defense, but the overall situation is still highly non-obvious in how to win.

Actually, in my experience, most games at >=8 wind up like this if you know how to defend yourself. This is what I think to be the number one pacing problem of the game as it currently is. (Actual difficulty cutoff depends on skill)

Basically, if you are playing at a high enough difficulty to be interesting but not be rolled over by the AI, you will wind up in a near stalemate situation way too frequently.
But that it just my experiences with the game.

[zoutzakje]

In general, a fascinating conundrum   The actual AI attacks (at least the waves) aren't being much of a challenge to thorough defense, but the overall situation is still highly non-obvious in how to win.

Actually, in my experience, most games at >=8 wind up like this if you know how to defend yourself. This is what I think to be the number one pacing problem of the game as it currently is. (Actual difficulty cutoff depends on skill)

Basically, if you are playing at a high enough difficulty to be interesting but not be rolled over by the AI, you will wind up in a near stalemate situation way too frequently.
But that it just my experiences with the game.

I like stalemates actually. Just another puzzle to solve.

[Solarity]

I like stalemates actually. Just another puzzle to solve.

Then it wouldn't be a stalemate would it since a true stalemate nobody can win?

[Wanderer]

I like stalemates actually. Just another puzzle to solve.

Then it wouldn't be a stalemate would it since a true stalemate nobody can win?

Ever met a windmill in chess?  Look it up.  It's inane, insane, and utterly effective.

Mapgen = strategy.  AI = Tactics.  You react to tactics to make the strategy work, or you rework the strategy when tactics dictate the strategy is ineffective.  Lot of dead soldiers when you choose badly.

My AI 10/10s stalemate.  This is 9.3.  I have a plan.  The AI will chew on it like a damned bone as soon as I choose.  Wait for the wheel.

[Solarity]

Or think of the strategy as a cog wheel and the tactics as the teeth which make the stategy turn / advance etc

[Wanderer]

It cost me me 2250 in K for Scout IIIs, a few sets of Raid Starships and a whole lot of threat defense, but...



The MapGen apparently went to the Laurel and Hardy school of comedy.

[keith.lamothe]

I... wow.  On the homeworld?  Forget Laurel and Hardy, this thing went to the Crocodile Dundee school of humor.  That's the mapgen telling me about Super Terminals:

"That's not a nerf.  That's a nerf."


And the dual neinzul spawners is just taunting your Raids, too.

[Wanderer]

I... wow.  On the homeworld?  Forget Laurel and Hardy, this thing went to the Crocodile Dundee school of humor.  That's the mapgen telling me about Super Terminals:

"That's not a nerf.  That's a nerf."

And the dual neinzul spawners is just taunting your Raids, too.

Yep.  I'm thinking I gotta go with Dirty Harry right now... "You feelin' lucky, punk?  Come get it."

[keith.lamothe]

Though I have to say: riding an ST to the AIP floor on the homeworld on Diff 9.3 would be rather hardcore.

[Wanderer]

Though I have to say: riding an ST to the AIP floor on the homeworld on Diff 9.3 would be rather hardcore.

Heheh, you're readin' my mind. 

The story so far.  I was trying to long range raid Kirk out for later while the AIP was low.  It was working at meh levels with only Raid I/II.  Waves looked like so:


I'd drop the fleet back to Craps and try to bait the wave into Kerensky with it's now 50 snipers (stole a few off the Whipping Boy), 2 Fortresses, and Ion V.  It worked for about half the raid, then I'd have to go out and finish the job with the fleet.  Rinse repeat.  After 3 tries I decided it's not working until I get Raid IIIs.

However, at that point, I've got most of a wave sitting on the doorstep to Kerensky that just WON'T commit.  For anything.  A 600 ship CPA announces, I figured that'll push 'em in.  Nope.  Really guys?

Gah. Threat's been building in Macross so while the fleet's in the back I go clean it up, hoping these guys will eventually commit.  I get done with that (10 minutes of travel, Craps is a LONG system) and head back, still no love.  Fine.

KOWABUNGA!!!!!  Ow.  Nearly 80% of my fleet is wrecked and I only halved the 800+ ships (420 or so MK IV, rest MK II) on the wormhole.  I retreat in utter tatters.  However, a Human Rebels attack spawned at the system while I was in there.  Once they drag off the majority from the wormhole I send the tattered fleet with a few reinforcements back through to deal with the rest.  It's carnage.  You could build a Spire Dreadnaught with all the dead ships in that region of space, it's a flight hazard at this point.

So, I pull back, and start re-evaluating my options.  I can't raid out Kirk yet, so it's time to look at what has to happen.  The CSG map looks like this.  The purple worlds are worlds I will HAVE to take.  The only CSG-D is on Jumping Jax, I tried but there's nothing enroute to Riker so I'll have to take a random world.  Liao is on the east and while the Dyson would have a better chance of stopping/slowing whatever goes after Canopus, Liao lets me get one world deeper without deepstrike on the Riker arm.


That's 100 AIP + time + random silliness like SF posts.  Then I still have to drill my way through to Riker, as Three Kings is a little better but still rather ugly.

However, that gives me some K-Raid opportunities.  The yellow dots are the K-Raid targets.


That's 5 standard worlds of K + 8 worlds of K-Raid for 39000 K to hit Riker with.  I'll also have added two ships to the arsenal, even if I do have to put Kirk on permanent alert, and I'll have a MK IV factory to work with from Liao.

What can you do with 39k?    The only way I can take Earth is to get BEHIND the wave and deal with the Eye in the system.  I know of only one way to replace troops on an enemy world.  I'll be spending 11000 K on Engi IIIs and Neinzul II/III craft builders.  Another 6 for Maw III.  Another 9 on Frigate II/III.  13k to work with.  If ARS's go as usual that means I'll get Bulletproofs and Autobombs.  Neither of which I consider good choices for significant upgrades.

Which means my best choice will be to harden the shield that protects the homeworld.  9k on Mil II/III.  Mil III into Kerensky, Twycross, and Liao.  SolarMoon and Jumping Jax will be disposable, but they'll get some Mil IIIs just to help tie up Earth Raids as well.  The last one will be for the wild pony ride on Riker.  The last 4k will go into Basic IIs, Lightning IIs to harden up the shield edge.

Once I can take Riker, I'll also take Three Kings.  There's a Spire Archive on Three Kings that will give me another 12k to work with after I drain Riker's K too.  This will most likely be invested into the Neinzul IV builder.

Then we go to Earth.  Most plans don't survive contact with the enemy, but that's where I'm going to take this for now.

[keith.lamothe]

C'mon AI, you can pull this off!

I know when you're planning to drop K on defense that there's going to be fireworks.

[Wanderer]

Minor update.  So far so good with the plan. SolarMoon fell easily enough and I K-Raided the locals.  With the K I've gotten I've opened Basic IIs and Maw IIIs.  With the Maw IIIs in play it's been very easy to hold down a double research K-Raid.

I got my bulletproof fighters again.  No big surprise but if a system's lightly defended I can use them instead of dragging my Raids along for Ion fighting.  Of course, I drag my raids along because I'd like the Ions to die *today*.

Next boost was Missile Frigate IIs.  I head for Jumping Jax, I forgot to pop the local warp gate connector, and it blows up while I'm dealing with a Counter III that landed on Roulette.  15 minutes to get there, took me 10 just to walk the fleet back there.  Yeesh.

With that cleaned up I K Raid and normal science that, and I get Missile Frigate III.

At 8:30 plan is so far so good.  The Zenith Traders FINALLY got into the back systems.  I just finished my ZPG, and I've got the whipping boy quartet placed and slowly building up on Kerensky and Twycross. That quartet: Black Hole Generator, Armor Inhibitor, Armor Boost, and Radar Jammer II.  Kerensky is up to 3 Fortresses at the moment.

Next stop, after I get my Missile IIIs built, is Liao.  It's time to get the Mk IVs in play.  AIP is 152.  Income is roughly 1650/second each once I goofed around with the power supply units.  I've got everything behind the Twycross wall with double generators for later.  Once the outer systems start falling I'm going to need overpriced power.

[Wanderer]

Fireworks it is... Yeeeesh.

Well, I get to Liao.  No big deal, we ace the place and a nice small 1800 ship CPA decides to spawn on top of the 500 or so threat I caused by deepstriking it.  I dig in down at Liao for a few and research up some HBCs to help with defenses here and there for drift-off.  I K Raid the neighbor while Liao digs in and I produce myself a nice MK IV fleet for my Maws, Blade Spawns, Missile Frigs and Bombers.

I take the fleet down towards HotStar, figuring I'll end up eating a lot of the inbound wave on approach.  I clean up the two systems and as I'm finishing up most of the wave sidesteps me.  I take out about 400 of them and a chunk of the threat.  Great.  I leave the Engi IIIs and a colony ship to setup shop on HotStar with some token defenses and make my way home.

Note to self.  At 207 AIP you go to Tech III.  I'm now at 219.  This becomes important shortly.

I clean off the front door of Kerensky, where I've recently dropped a MK IV Warp Gate to bring troops out of Liao into the main corridor.  That's about 900.  There's a carrier with 600 or so troops and some friends over in Macross.  I head that way and a 900 ship wave pops up.  No problem, I figured.  I start cleaning out Macross and ANOTHER wave pops.  1200 more ships.

I repeat, I did NOT notice I went to Tech III.  The difference was phenomenal.

I continue to clean up the leftovers from the CPA and refill the fleet.  While that gets going I research up Basic IIIs and Lightning IIs.  I figure I'll go drop them on the whipping boy I've been ignoring and watch the wave get eaten.

The first wave hit and was stalled out as expected.  They weren't getting very far.  The second wave hit and MELTED the 4 FFs I had covering the Riot IIs, the Lightnings under construction, and all four Riot IIs went down about four blinks later.

Oh crap.  They flashed the joint.  There was no way it was going to hold.  I pop out and save scum off the autosave.

I check around to figure out what the hell happened and notice the tech jump.  Oh crap.  It's just as the first wave announced on the autosave and the second one pops up with 30 seconds of gap as my fleet is racing into Macross.  I ignore the CPA targets and Speed move my entire fleet through the mob to get to Twycross as fast as they bloody can.  Remember, that's a 5 minute run between Kerensky and Twycross, roughly, as the fleet ball.  I can't wait on the sieges and missiles.

Meanwhile my econs on Jumping Jax and SolarMoon fell to the CPA.  I thought I'd have time.  I don't.  Engi IIIs are becoming a lifesaver.  I toss together a quick transport with a few colony ships and ship them to SolarMoon for a speed rebuild.

Meanwhile I'm slamming turrets and FFs into play in Twycross. I drop the entire bank of L IIs under the FF, open up HFF I, and dump 10 on the wormhole.  They just literally can't build fast enough though and the first wave hits.  My fleet's 1/3 to 2/3s of the way through Macross and this is not going to end well.

I concentrate the Engis on the HFFs, figuring the Riots can buy time.  It works, to an extent.  Most of the midrange turrets are dead as I haven't been able to get the Jammer (or any of the Trader toys) up on the whipping boy yet.  My econ's been busy.  It buys me JUST enough time.  As the Riot IIs fall to the second wave, the fleet finally starts pouring in through the wormhole.

It's a NASTY little brawl.  My fleet of 1200 or so ships streams smack into the middle of their 1700 MK III fleet who are busy trying to figure out their next target.  My LRMS and MLRSs are basically the only turrets left on planet, along with about a half cap of snipers.  The brawl gets ugly.

When it's nearly done, my bombers are micro'd on a few starships that made it to the final FF on my cmd station, I've only got 6 Maws left, the bladespawners are down to 7 or so, and I've got 350 ships of mixed marks.  The entire whipping boy is just wreckage except for the command center.

So, now my econ is burning.  I pop 10 rebuilders up on the whipping boy, replace dead FFs, and try to get econ back up on SolarMoon and Jax.  My own econ drain is stopping me from getting my econ improved!  D'oh.  Head to Liao, shut down the Factory.  Head to Kerensky, shut down all the builders there too.

At 9:40 I'm rebuilding the whipping boy still.  My fleet's back at Kerensky to make sure I can respond to any significant hits.  Most of the whipping boy is back up but my econ's wrecked and my fleet needs a full rebuild.  I do, however, have 9500 in K.  It's time for Mil III stations.  That was just brutal.  Those were both nearly max time waves that landed simultaneously.

I'm sure as HECK not ready to hold back 2xRaid Engine waves.  I may have to approach this slightly differently.  MK I/II units will probably stay on Kerensky to help hold the first section of the line, with rebuilds ready to happen to help defend Twycross once it falls.  My econ is going to concentrate on getting the trader toys online in both locations for a bit.  At 1700/s or so in econ, that's going to take a while.  5 Mill for Radar Jammer II, 1 mill for the cloaker killer (space planes and eyebots, oh my!), 5 mill for the two armor adjusters, and another 2 mill for the black hole machines.  That's 13 mill/planet, 26 mill total.  Luckily the first Jammer's about 65% done.  That'll take 3 mill off the top.

At 1700/s 'calm' income, that'll take...  3.7 hours.  No bueno.  I'm going to have to adjust for power somehow and play hamster games.  My true income is 2200/s or so, I'm just powering up half of Chicago on a cold night right now.  At max it'd be 3 hours.

Oh, did I mention I've only got an hour left to go save a rebel colony on Argyle?  It's right next to Jax as a dead end world.  It gains me NOTHING but its 3k in knowledge and the colony.  I sure as heck can't afford the 100 AIP so I'm gonna have to suck the 20.  Well, it'll keep me busy while things build I guess.  The Mil III and additional turret firepower should help Twycross hold.  It's holding up against singleton short time waves of 300 or so without blinking.  It was just one heck of a tandem suckerpunch.

I had intended to spend a good chunk of time down at Riker screwing around getting K and playing with the ST anyway.  I'm most likely going to concentrate first on getting the Whipping Boy fully tricked out (even spinning rims!) and then start Kerensky's stuff up while I go after Riker.

This game is not going to be a 13 hour game.  I thought I'd make it if I pushed it hard enough but I'm going to have to pull back a bit.

[keith.lamothe]

A Wave actually made a difference!   Well, waves.  I'm a little surprised Tech III made such a difference, since they're only 1.5x as tough (numerically, I imagine the actual-power-increase of 1.5x health and 1.5x attack is somewhat higher than linear), and they get a smaller number of ships due to the lower multipier for tech III.  But then again, if TII is all you've faced on the whipping boy all game, getting double-whammied by 1.5x harder waves is going to surprise you if anything will.

Seems like we're getting closer to the Diff+AIP point where "vanilla" AIP mechanics alone are capable of threatening even a solid whipping boy.  Not capable of simply overpowering it and requiring massive savescumming and cleverness to survive (like 10/10), and not even threatening except when "the stars align" for a double-wave or whatever, but at least getting to the point where those "peaks on the graph" are making legitimately stabbity motions towards your homeworld

[Wanderer]

A Wave actually made a difference!   Well, waves.  I'm a little surprised Tech III made such a difference, since they're only 1.5x as tough (numerically, I imagine the actual-power-increase of 1.5x health and 1.5x attack is somewhat higher than linear), and they get a smaller number of ships due to the lower multipier for tech III.  But then again, if TII is all you've faced on the whipping boy all game, getting double-whammied by 1.5x harder waves is going to surprise you if anything will.

I think it was a combination of the volume and the tech increase.  I'd handled 1000 ship waves before, and usually if their buddy showed up it was with a short-time wave of around 200-300.  That and I hadn't kept up with the Joneses.  I'd let FF volume fall off.  That was key, I think.  That and the anti-armor ships.  When they showed up their range chewed deeply into the medium range turrets alongside the Missile Frigates, causing my damage over time quotient to drop like a rock.

Include the additional armor of Tech III and the like, and my AoE turrets under glass were much less effective.  So, in those 2 second gaps, they died.  This was also the first major wave I'd faced since the .027 upgrade.  It's possible I was getting better Riot II locks then I'd figured.  The new mechanic released them for longer 'short stints', which probably made the biggest difference to the few hundred cutlasses under the FFs.

Seems like we're getting closer to the Diff+AIP point where "vanilla" AIP mechanics alone are capable of threatening even a solid whipping boy.  Not capable of simply overpowering it and requiring massive savescumming and cleverness to survive (like 10/10), and not even threatening except when "the stars align" for a double-wave or whatever, but at least getting to the point where those "peaks on the graph" are making legitimately stabbity motions towards your homeworld

Definately.  Now that I'm pushing up the AIP and we've tech jumped.  However, the additional FFs and the outright doubling of the whipping boy due to the Mil III should handle most of the issue.  Out of curiousity, was it a design decision to not allow Fortresses to get bonuses, or is that an oversight?