Same map and similar settings as last time:
100 planet X 1172876576 Impulse reaction emitters.
Ultra low caps (FS is slow, otherwise).
Schizo, comp-vis, 8 2 champions.
10/10 Neinzul Viral Enthusiast/Neinzul Youngster // Spire Hammer /Vorpal
Marauders 4
Resistance 10
Rebellions 4
Trader
Dyson 4
Preservation Wardens 6
Roaming Enclaves 4
Civilian Leaders
Golems 4
Spirecraft 4
Fallen Spire 5
Hybrids 4/4
Advanced Hybrids 0/7
Astro Trains 4/0
Shark 4/0
Hunter 0/10
(Avengers, too, not that they'll matter)
So I took out six negotiators, lowered FS a bit, added secondary AI types, and added shark and hunter. My first try had exotic. That didn't go so well (Regen golem + 4 caps of shield bearers + assorted starships/guardians at 10 minutes = dead). My second try had techno parasite and spire hammer. That also did not go so well (hello, spire battleship at 8 minutes).
Anyway:
===Operation Opening Blitz====
Instantly conquer the adjacent planet, repelling the first two waves there. Unlock HarvesterIIIs and Mil IIs. Upgrading your command station apparently triggers the AI taunt. Amusing.
Conquering the second planet was quite the grind. You know what the RNG gave me today? Tackle Drones and Disassembler Guardians.
To go along with the shield bearers, zenith siege engines, and artillery guardians.
And Vorpal means I get to deal with minirams, eyebots, and infiltrators, too.
Add to that mess something wonky with the wave interval (5 waves in the first 40 minutes? Really?), and I am seriously annoyed. It's 46 minutes in before I unlock and install milIIIs, and the first wave of jumpships goes out.
5 collaborators terminated, 3 freed by the first hour. AIP at 63 due to some data raiding.
The threat fallout (~220 ships) is coming, so I take the whole fleet and neuter my neighbor, so I won't have to deal with locals while killing the threat.
That's when the special forces join the party. Shouldn't be a big deal this early in the game... Hmm, a few core artillery guardians, that's new... WHAT!?! By the time the FIVE HUNTER KILLERS emerge from a wormhole, my fleet is too deep in the system to escape. Rebels tried to help. They failed.
Threat decides to attack now that my fleet doesn't exist anymore, but the reserve riots, a military III station, long range turrets, and Negotiation put them in their place.
By which time another wave has declared. And when I finish mopping up that one, another. This is ridiculous. And brutal. And did I mention that TDLs + Disassemblers suck?
Stabilized, refleeted (sans starships), conquered Cascade, trapping the SF, (a mixed blessing: I won't have to deal with it for a while, but I will have to actually engage it at some point to put everything behind Citadel) And recommence jump raiding.
The amount of champion and riot micro I'm needing to even survive at this point is insane.
I still haven't fully recovered from my first encounter with the Hunter plot.
I guess I asked for it...
Hour 2 arrives and sees the final two leaders freed (barely), AIP 84.
Counterwave heading for home, preservation wardens are a constant annoyance, and a new batch of hybrids just spawned, and a 930-ship CPA just declared (with an 800-ship supporting wave) but those are problems for next time.
Observations
This is hard. Without near constant micromanagement of riots/champions, I'd be dead a few times over.
A combination of getting a lot more waves than usual, needing to move fast for the SCLs, the various facestabbery the RNG provided, spire cruisers showing up in counterwaves, hunter 10, and of course the difficulty makes this my most stressful game (on average) so far. Shark definitely adds to the stress, though it hasn't triggered yet.
Guardians are tough customers.
