Couple questions about guard posts and transports

[allmybase]

1) As I understand it, guard posts put a cap on reinforcements the local planet receives, but reinforcements will still arrive elsewhere in the galaxy to other planets.

Now my question is, what if you destroyed every single guard post the computer owns? Would it receive overall less reinforcements throughout the universe because now every planet it has is capped? Or in that case does it "ignore" the planet local cap and still receive the same reinforcements?

2) There was another thread on this I saw, but are transports overpowered? (overpowered doesn't mean its the only way to win, but it's such a good way to win that it overshadows every other strategy) I understand that this game is themed around guerilla warfare and the ender's game mantra "the enemy's gate is down" but it does seem like some sort of secret cheat once you learn how to use transports. You zip them in to take out key points of interest, then zip on out. Or use them for insane decoys. The game becomes infinitely easier when you don't have to engage the enemy at all, instead picking off their key points of interest with little to no risk.

It was like black and white once I learned to use transports. I used to do silly things like research raid starships or try to brute force through massive turret defenses. Why should anyone once you have a transport?

I don't know what changes should be made, but I think that the problem exists.

[RCIX]

with 2, transports have a capped unload rate of like 10 per second when not on a player owned planet IIRC, plus they're a massive power hog (so much so, i only have one because i want a fleet too), can only go so far out of supply, and can't be shut off. So there's certainly drawbacks

[allmybase]

Are these changes new to the next beta? The version I'm playing the transports unload 100% units immediately and I definitely have no supply where I'm striking either (15 jumps away from my supply base)

[RCIX]

Yep, i think they were introduced after the last official version (3.060)

[superking]

you have supply in adjacent enemy planets, so no penalty

with the slow speed of combat, the slow unload is really not much of a penalty. it makes a snipe take perhaps 30 more seconds- that translates as a few extra losses in a non-ion cannon planet.

personally I agree that transport is just so much more effective than other stratergies

[x4000]

The transport balance is something we have been keeping an eye on, and adjusting in the betas so far.

If you play long enough, any AI planet will "fill up" to whatever its max number of ships are based on guard posts, etc. But when that happens, typically the galaxy-wide ship count is north of 70,000 units, so the AI starts combining its ships. Two Mark I ships equals 1 Mark II ship, and so forth. That logic is actually a short term loss for the AI, but it lets them consolidate and then do more reinforcements, so planets keep getting more difficult as the game progresses, even after all the planets have all hit their cap -- they are simply "teching up" instead of getting larger in numbers.

If you were to play a single campaign long enough (at least 30-40 hours, it seems, from player reports), you eventually end up with all AI planets being fully capped out with Mark V ships. This is not really a worry unless you are playing a super completionist game. If you are to that point, you also have the resources and such to deal with it. That's what keeps the game interesting and from just hitting an "end state" for the AI at any point remotely near the length of most player campaigns (sub 20 hours).

[superking]

The transport balance is something we have been keeping an eye on, and adjusting in the betas so far.

If you play long enough, any AI planet will "fill up" to whatever its max number of ships are based on guard posts, etc. But when that happens, typically the galaxy-wide ship count is north of 70,000 units, so the AI starts combining its ships. Two Mark I ships equals 1 Mark II ship, and so forth. That logic is actually a short term loss for the AI, but it lets them consolidate and then do more reinforcements, so planets keep getting more difficult as the game progresses, even after all the planets have all hit their cap -- they are simply "teching up" instead of getting larger in numbers.

If you were to play a single campaign long enough (at least 30-40 hours, it seems, from player reports), you eventually end up with all AI planets being fully capped out with Mark V ships. This is not really a worry unless you are playing a super completionist game. If you are to that point, you also have the resources and such to deal with it. That's what keeps the game interesting and from just hitting an "end state" for the AI at any point remotely near the length of most player campaigns (sub 20 hours).

I was thinking that, since planets filling up with an unassailable number of ships makes for dull stalemates, there should be some agressive mechanic to partially empty them again.

just an idea- when a planet fills up with enough ships in proportion to the number of human player ships, it prepares somthing alike to a cross planet attack, but only applying to the one planet. you get the # minute timer, after which #% of the insanely garrisoned planet become freed and attack. if the player survives, the planet is more assailable. I imagine this to be a late-game mechanic; possibly having a large lower limit, like 1000-2000 ships, before the AI even starts checking if switching them to attack is desirable.

this would make having high mark planets adjacent to your worlds more dangerous, but the mechanic of emptying them would also make them more assailable, which might work out for a more fluid late game.

[x4000]

It really doesn't make for stalemates, it just creates a situation where some players don't want to play anymore. But there are plenty of others (Kalzarius, et al) which I think would be upset by a change along those lines.  The CPAs do sweep through and empty out some ships every so often in those incredibly long games, and those are incredibly risky if you are playing completionist.

But really, the assumption is that if you are playing more than 20ish hours on a campaign, you're looking for a grind and to beat the whole map.  Seriously -- you should have won or lost well before then in most cases, if you don't want a grind.  So I think that a change like that would dissatisfy the grinders, and not really affect anyone else, honestly.

[superking]

You are right of course, so long as the game is played properly it is a non-issue. Judging by the forum posts though, inexperienced players who move too slowly and get hemmed in by huge inpenetrable garrisons usually quit in frustration. I was suggesting it with that in mind rather than the completionist grind.

[x4000]

The problem is, those players get a "crust" around themselves with high degrees of reinforcements there.  If they just look one more connection out, the planets are then really easy (aside from when they are playing on super tiny maps, which is a bad idea in general).  Given that that mechanic is pretty much central to the game, it's unlikely to change.  That sort of experience with insurmountable odds, and picking targets based on scouting, is what a lot of people like best about the game.  Not that I'm unwilling to make any changes -- obviously, given that we make change all the time -- but that's something really central.