To Derail a Train with a Tank

[Trandrin]

This is my first try at a proper battle against a 10/10 difficulty. I really hope it doesn't smash my head. Absorbed as much information as I could before starting this to help my chances of not losing. Also decided to just start simple. Also the Train Master was as close to a Vanilla type ai I could get with just Base game.

Diff 10/10, Tank and Train Master
Single HW, Game Version 5.063
Realistic 50 planet, Complex ship types, no CSG
Schizo, 1/2 waves, Avenger and Astro trains.
No expansions (wanted to try a game without all the special "toys" I love, well except one)
Ship of choice, Tasty Parasite.
0 AIP Auto-progress.

Hour 0-1
Starting out I favor a strong economy. So I got mkIII Resource collectors. Both crystal and metal. Then explored my surroundings. Two of the bordering worlds are mk4. Good start. I build up for a hour pushing the attack wave off easy before my fleet starts its first attack. Right against the mk4s. First push the parasites started their grisly work. I eventually got beat back but I brought a few new ships with me. Repair and rearm and right back in my fleet goes. Eventually I have enough forces to neuter them both.
Unlocks(Metal,crystal Extractor mk2/mk3, Grav Turrets)

Hour 1.5-2?
I then look at my other few border worlds. One has a fortress. So Unlocked goes the bomber mkIIs. My fleet gathers and pares down all the neighbors as much as I can while fending off waves and scout. I see a variety of targets. I decide to claim a ARS world. Left most p1. I get armor ships. I also spot a nearby mk4 factory. Very good start so far, even with poor ARS craft. My fleet cleanses many planets to try and get my scouts out further, and allow highways to and fro. Eventually getting me the entire left side mostly explored and most worlds close to mine ruined.
Unlocks(Metal,crystal Extractor mk2/mk3, Grav Turrets, Bomber Mk2)

Hour 3
Take second world little while later. No strategic importance now, but for awhile was one of my whipping boys along with the ARS world. Decided to purge all the data centers I could after this. Lost a lot of raider star ships, even with them inside transports. But I killed all 4 of the DCs I could find so far. Heavy wave beaks the secondary whipping boy around 3 hours in. My fleet responds by rushing there in transports, and controls the situation. I learn to love transports and make heavy use of them at about this point and onwards. I also start using a hefty number of mercenary ships as resources pile up with no super weapon projects to fund.
Unlocks(Metal,crystal Extractor mk2/mk3, Grav Turrets, Bomber Mk2, HBC mk1, Spire/Zenith Starships mk1)

Hour 4
sees me moving north and claiming the right p1, another ARS world. Teleporting Battle Stations, behind the lines hunters for my forward defenses.. My scouts also uncover the first of the AI home worlds. I leave it alone till I find the other. Throughout this my Parasites have reclaimed me quite a large following. Among them many mk3-4s. Love the little guys.
Unlocks(Metal,crystal Extractor mk2/mk3, Grav Turrets, Bomber Mk2, HBC mk1, Spire/Zenith Starships mk1, Fortress mk1)

Hour 5+
I am slowly exploring the right side of map. Not making as much progress as I want due to large waves crushing my defences. Schizo doesn't seem to be stoping them from sending 500+ of the same ship type. Need heftier scouts. I unlock mk2 scouts and engineer mk2s for extra support at home. Also my parasites have claimed me 9 mk3 engineers. I also start my knowledge raiding around here. Got it up to High response. Those raid Starships are sneaky. but grav turrets stop them at my wormholes and my fleet gibs them. Even with this though one made it through and burned my now defunct southern world. No big loss just a lot of energy brownouts. Also realized I had unlocked Basic turrets mk2 sometime earlier.
Unlocks(Metal,crystal Extractor mk2/mk3, Grav Turrets, Bomber Mk2, HBC mk1, Spire/Zenith Starships mk1, Fortress mk1, Scouts mk2, Engineers mk2, mk2 Basic Turret)

Present
I have 4.5k knowledge my lines are holding and I am just waiting on scout information. My AIP is at 71. A tad bit high. Any thoughts? Also I hate Astro Trains. They keep zaping my turret farms. Tried to maul them with fleet but only got one of them to early red and a few others to yellow. I will probably knowledge raid once or twice more. And I will maybe will take one of the p8 planets for another ARS. Or another stepping stone on the right front for the second ai core that I bet hides there.
 

[Diazo]

Interesting to see others 10/10 games.

Looks like I may have been overly worried about AIP, my current game has it on the floor at 17 with two systems captured.

Are you able to take the waves on static defences or do you support with your fleet?

D.

[Trandrin]

Usually my fleet packs into a transport and moves to the impending wave. The fleet itself almost equals the wave in number and surpasses more times then not in quality. The static defense is to hold the enemy there long enough for transports to arrive. Most times it works well. Sadly doesn't stop the mass amounts of teleporting stuff the AI got unlocked. They just jump to the command station.

 My last wave was about 1.4k ships. The static defense ate about 600-700 before it mostly fell. When the fleet in transports were in system they moped it up fast. I dunno about having two whipping boys or if I should go back to just one, with just one it would have enough firepower on its own to handle this stuff. I had heard they added in code to make one ingress point anger the AI to send bigger waves at that one spot. Ergo the two to see if I got/get lighter waves.

[keith.lamothe]

I had heard they added in code to make one ingress point anger the AI to send bigger waves at that one spot. Ergo the two to see if I got/get lighter waves.

It makes the AI pick longer times between waves, which makes for bigger waves.

One thing you could try is taking another planet on the "outside" of the whipping-boy and not defending it at all: ships that wave to it will just go after the whipping boy, and you'll have to recolonize the planet after each wave, but it should keep the wave-intervals shorter

[Diazo]

1.4K ships at AIP 71?

Interesting, how many ingress points?

I'm at AIP 17 with 1 ingress point and seeing waves in the 900-950 range.

I was under the impression that wave size would rise a lot faster then that.

D.

[keith.lamothe]

Might be a scale difference, or autocannons compared to electric shuttles, etc.  Wave log comparison ftw

[Diazo]

True.

I've only had 2 waves hit since the AIP went to 17 in my game so not a big sample size.

We'll see what hits on the weekend in my next play session.

D.

[Varone]

Diff 10/10, Tank and Train Master
Single HW, Game Version 5.063
Realistic 50 planet, Complex ship types, no CSG
Schizo, 1/2 waves, Avenger and Astro trains.
No expansions (wanted to try a game without all the special "toys" I love, well except one)
Ship of choice, Tasty Parasite.
0 AIP Auto-progress.

I presume the half size waves is what is causing the difference in your games?

[keith.lamothe]

1/2 waves doesn't affect wave size, just wave interval.  So the waves are coming twice as far apart, but with the same size as they would at the normal intervals.

[Kahuna]

Just tie The Tank to an Astro Train railroad and BOOM!
"You Win!"

[Trandrin]

Guild wars 2 has distracted me a bit. But here is a small update.

Hour 6
Another knowledge raid down. They are almost spawning faster then I can kill now. But riot star ships blow out engines on many. So they trickle into my fleet ball until they all die. Going off information I read here I made one of my whipping boys retire and focused everything on the other. It now kills waves on its own, without intervention from the fleet. I also decided to capture my mk4 factory, cleared out neighborhood warp gates to secure it. Fleet remains strong, despite grievous wounds from a limitless supply of zombies while knowledge hacking. I had to invest in some more defenses as well, so second mark of heavy beam cannons put online to bring the pain.
Unlocks(Metal,crystal Extractor mk2/mk3, Grav Turrets, Bomber Mk2, HBC mk1, Spire/Zenith Starships mk1, Fortress mk1, Scouts mk2, Engineers mk2, mk2 Basic Turret, fighters mk3/4, HBC mk2)

Hour 7
I have a 101 aip. I found the second homeworld on the far right. So I will have to secure a steping stone so as to not incur deep strike. I also have plans to knowledge raid once more, if only to get me 1k more knowledge. Combined with the future expansion on the road to the second ai homeworld I will have enough for mk3/4 bombers. I have neglected frigate unlocks. My parasites claim me more then enough higher marks. The ship type due to being long range doesn't get hit that much like my front line stuff. So any reclaims last awhile, supplemented with my mercenaries I have a reasonably strong frigate force.

Also I now have 14 mk3 Engineers.. Almost a full cap of them with no research invested. Yeah parasites. My teleporting battle stations have proven themselves good back line. More then once threat gets onto my world only to have 60 of these things pounce from across the star system and maul it before any damage can be done. On the bad news front though is the first AI homeworld I get to fight.. It has a eye and a fortress. Fun fight there.
Unlocks(Metal,crystal Extractor mk2/mk3, Grav Turrets, Bomber Mk2, HBC mk1, Spire/Zenith Starships mk1, Fortress mk1, Scouts mk2, Engineers mk2, mk2 Basic Turret, fighters mk3/4, HBC mk2)

Note: I find it disturbing that the mixed wave option doesn't seem to be working as well as I remember? I have been getting a few waves now of just one ship type like normal. Also.. I hate teleporting raiders. I now possess 2k threat from them literally coming into system in a wave then warping out and everywhere on the map. >.<

[rabican]

. On the bad news front though is the first AI homeworld I get to fight.. It has a eye and a fortress. Fun fight there.


Note: I find it disturbing that the mixed wave option doesn't seem to be working as well as I remember? I have been getting a few waves now of just one ship type like normal

Every AI home planet has fortress. At 10 most have eye and some have something worse . Or both. Check them out for raid engines before attacking...

Mixed waves now sometimes sends regular waves. Don't remember the reasoning for it but i personally like it, it adds  more variance to the waves.

[Hearteater]

Schizo waves are easier to deal with than regular waves, and pretty much every successfully 10/10 game abused this feature.  So now, sometimes you get regular waves just to keep you honest.

[TechSY730]

Schizo waves are easier to deal with than regular waves, and pretty much every successfully 10/10 game abused this feature.  So now, sometimes you get regular waves just to keep you honest.

Mixed waves are harder to deal with than mono-waves of ship types that are not really good for direct, "blob" offense against defensive stuff, but are much easier than mono-waves of ship types that are good at "blob" offense against defensive stuff.

Basically, mixed waves keep the difficulty of waves much closer to a average, and mono-waves can go quite a bit below or above that average. It's those times where it the difficulty goes quite a bit above average (usually by choosing a ship type that is really good at taking out defensive type stuff) that instills fear and is very threatening.

[Trandrin]

Hour 8
Do to unforeseen "fun". I got a wave of over 2k ships.. All teleport raiders. I killed many off the bat at the whipping boy. Even had to use my fleet, as the size had me concerned at first. Two carriers, allowing me a little breathing room. But one blew up entering the system, the other backed out to the little pocket world that serves as the ingress point and waited there. These raiders then proceeded to jump all over my small little expanse of space. My space stations fencing left and right to kill them before too much damage could be done. Surprisingly, works well and I scythe most of them down. My fleet proper took care of the spare threat on outlying worlds. Claimed near full cap of mk2 teleport raiders. Combined with my Teleport stations they are excellent watchdogs. 240 ships strong they are.

After this I began the next knowledge raid. It was not pretty. My fleet took nearly triple their number in casualties over the course of the raid. Many times I had to send the knowledge hacker back out of system while I dealt with the massive influx of combat. Up till the third push to get more knowledge I had set my riot star ships as standard shield wall. Forgetting that the lasers had more range I set them up custom and found it to work much better at slowing the horde. I was able to grab the full 3k pushing the hack response to extreme. I think I might be done hacking. XD

After the hacking and rebuilding I set my eyes on getting the right arm of the galaxy explored. My fleet dug through the 4 jumps needed to get me there. On the last jump they got bogged down by ion cannons and a fortress. Their lives bought me the deaths of all the tachyon guardians though. Not much of the fleet survived, lost all my mercs and most of the reclaims. My scouts scooted along revealing all but one planet on the arm. Ai homeworld #2. 
Unlocks(Metal,crystal Extractor mk2/mk3, Grav Turrets, Bomber Mk2, HBC mk1, Spire/Zenith Starships mk1, Fortress mk1, Scouts mk2, Engineers mk2, mk2 Basic Turret, fighters mk3/4, HBC mk2)

Hour 9-11
Another wave of good size.. All Missle frigates. Not so bad.. Another wave incoming right before this one hits. Good fun. Fleet engages to assist the whipping boy. No trouble of mention is to be had. Regrouping I send out my ship to claim the jumping point for the fleet onto the right arm. Complete with ARS. They take it with barely a sigh. I had already burned this entire section to ash to get my scouts out further so no defenders. And for my trouble I get space tanks. While my researchers tic away to get me knowledge I notice I will have 2k surplus. Not much to pick for that, but I choose flagship mk2s. Followed by my bomber mk3s. I spend most of this hour and next recouping numbers and building up. Never picked a fight with 10/10 home world/core worlds so I just wish to be sure I don't set off anything prematurely.
Unlocks(Metal,crystal Extractor mk2/mk3, Grav Turrets, Bomber Mk2, HBC mk1, Spire/Zenith Starships mk1, Fortress mk1, Scouts mk2, Engineers mk2, mk2 Basic Turret, fighters mk3/4, HBC mk2, Flagship mk2, Bombers mk3)

My situation currently is on the map. Red circles are AI home worlds. Green circle is my whipping boy, the green box is the one planet warp gate ingress point.
White circles are unimportant tertiary claims by me now. Blue is my mk4 factory. Powder blue is my jumping stone for the right arm. Currently uninhabited. Any thoughts or advice?