So I just tried Defender Mode

[Phantom]

I just tried defender mode again starting with 3 planets containing stealth battleship, shield bearers, and snipers. I set AI difficulty to 5 and 6 and did the plain old setup forcefields, tachyon, and gravitational turrets and continously adding turrets around the planets as much as my power can handle. I also control my fleet of ships from 1 planet to another depending on which swarm of AIs come first. They didn't take out any of my command stations until the part that I have already won the game.

I set the time to survive 1 hour.

The first time I tried it and set it to 30 minute with level 6 & 7 AIs, they came too swift too early and destroyed me.

Anyways, any advice on how one should set up defender mode?

[keith.lamothe]

It's worked well for me when taking the central planet an inner ring of an 80-planet concentric map (trying for 8-12 planets total) on 45 minutes.  Against diff 7/7.

[Phantom]

hmm concentric do look like the best type for defender mode considering its circularness and only one way entrances from the middle. Should I start with bonus ship also if I pick a middle and then some bonus ship station far about ready to be blown up? :p

[Wanderer]

hmm concentric do look like the best type for defender mode considering its circularness and only one way entrances from the middle. Should I start with bonus ship also if I pick a middle and then some bonus ship station far about ready to be blown up? :p

Huh?  I admit to beer but I really don't understand the question.

[keith.lamothe]

You won't lose unless you lose all your planets, but the AI's wave sizes will be proportional to the number of planets you started with, so if you lose 1+ early on you'll have fewer resources than you "should" for that level of attack.