Need Advice on Game, 16+ Hours in

[magirken]

Hey folks,

I've been plodding along in a game I setup and have until recently been doing pretty well, or so I thought but I'm having some difficulty making new progress.

Here's the setup

Realistic/Conquest/Normal
AI Auto Progress every 30 min
Minor Factions

Human Marauders 4
Human Resistance Fighters 3
Human Colony Rebellions 3
Zenith Miners 1
Zenith Dyson Sphere 2
Zenith Devourer
Broken Golems (Hard) 2

AI #1 Vanilla 7
AI #2 Avenger, Astro Trains 2

I've claimed about 23 planets. I haven't even found a homeworld yet, but have found several advanced production facilities which is good, plus a couple of broken golems. I've tried to maintain 2 large fleets for raiding and response, but at this point in the game all I seem to be doing is putting out fires, sending fleets to put down raids on my outlying systems. The AI is getting smarter, they'll wait for me to send a fleet to respond to a raid elsewhere, then when I leave the system, they'll hit that one as well.

There are a large number of systems with various EYE guard posts, like the Threatening Eye or Plasma Eye and those make things pretty difficult. I'm wondering if my strategy to this point has been flawed; is it better to maintain many smaller fleets (400-500 ships) or a couple of large fleets (1000+)? In the beginning, I went for the land grab to expand borders, taking almost any system as long as it had resources, but then became more selective, targeting only systems with golems or advanced production.

Can anyone offer any suggestions?

I'd include a screenshot, but I'm not sure how to do that.

[Faulty Logic]

I've claimed about 23 planets.

That is quite a few.

I'm wondering if my strategy to this point has been flawed; is it better to maintain many smaller fleets (400-500 ships) or a couple of large fleets (1000+)?

Usually I only have one fleet, for offence, with fixed defenses handling defense (sometimes supported by said fleet).

Can anyone offer any suggestions?

Find AIP reducers. Data centers, co-processors, and, if extant, the superterminal.

Gate raid/conquer planets until the AI can only send waves at one planet. Put all your fixed defenses there.

Conquer the remaining golem planets, and don't worry too much about holding them.

I'd include a screenshot, but I'm not sure how to do that.

Under the text window, there's an "additional options" button. One of the options will be to attach a file. Go to AI War-Runtime Data-Screenshots.

To put a screenshot there, press f12 at any time ingame.

[magirken]

I've been gate raiding adjacent planets, taking out warp gates and spec ops posts, but I'm still getting pretty consistent raids from those directions. I expected taking out the warp gates to reduce or eliminate raids.

[Faulty Logic]

Ah, you're getting border aggression. Warp gates are for waves, the "N ships to Murdoch (or wherever) in X seconds" attacks.

When an AI planet is "full," then it converts its reinforcements to threat. To deal with it, kill all the ships (and non-wormhole guardposts) on the planet, then either repeat every few hours or so or put a warp jammer command station next to it. If you have trouble during the "kill them" phase, you can use a few warheads to help out.

Note: you can detangle the map, by making sure you haven't selected any units, switching to galaxy view, pressing ALT+rightclick, selecting galaxy layout, and setting it to my layout. Then, holding shift, you will be able to drag worlds around with rightclick.

Almost forgot: Welcome to the forums!

[Hearteater]

To protect systems from low amounts of ships, Militiary CS under a Force Field + 5 Spider Turrets right next to the CS (inside or outside the FF) can spot a few hundred ships, because the CS pushes them away and the Spiders destroy their engines so they get stuck immobile.  Put down your two Mini-Forts next to the CS (outside the FF) and you can probably stop ~300 ships.  For added amusement, put a Leech Starship in the system on FRD (V+click next to the CS so it waits under the FF between attacks) and you can get quite a few reclaimed ships automatically.

There are some ship types that will crack this, teleporters, sniper-ranged and immune to engine damage are concerns.  You also need to take care about cloaked ships.  But that's a minimalist defense that stops quite a bit more weight that expected, and nicely baits in small groups of AI ships that don't realize it's a trap.

[magirken]

To protect systems from low amounts of ships, Militiary CS under a Force Field + 5 Spider Turrets right next to the CS (inside or outside the FF) can spot a few hundred ships, because the CS pushes them away and the Spiders destroy their engines so they get stuck immobile.  Put down your two Mini-Forts next to the CS (outside the FF) and you can probably stop ~300 ships.  For added amusement, put a Leech Starship in the system on FRD (V+click next to the CS so it waits under the FF between attacks) and you can get quite a few reclaimed ships automatically.

There are some ship types that will crack this, teleporters, sniper-ranged and immune to engine damage are concerns.  You also need to take care about cloaked ships.  But that's a minimalist defense that stops quite a bit more weight that expected, and nicely baits in small groups of AI ships that don't realize it's a trap.

thanks for the spider turret and Leech SS idea. unfortunately I took teleporters out in the setup

[Hearteater]

That can only be good for you, because none of the defenses I mentioned are teleporters, and since you've turned teleporters off, one of the big holes in that defense doesn't exist.

[PokerChen]

- 5 Entry ways, 700AIP... you'll need fortresses in addition to the military setup suggested to free-up your fleet. You'll need one one each entry way, since I don't see a way to narrow down the number of entry points. Also, you're going to stall soon with that automatic progress, so concentrate your fire-power and punch through to what you need. E.g.:

- Scout the galaxy, find that Dyson Sphere, and free it. It's a bit late now, but you can still use their help.
- Find the remaining research stations, and pick up a couple of golems.
- Try to go for the vanilla AI world soon with help of several of them.

If you need a delay at home, leave your Mark-Is behind as they're useless on the offense now with mark-III foes. I hope you have better ships? Leave a cursed golem on defense and come back only for exos.

[magirken]

I've been checking back in on this game and I think I'm screwed. The aggression level is so high, the AI is hitting me with large fleets now and almost made it my home world. I was stupid and lost one of the broken golems I had captured as well. I may give up on this one 

[keith.lamothe]

I'd say it's recoverable, but you'd have to play rather well.  700+ AIP is really high for a non-Fallen-Spire game.  I do think you're more likely to enjoy starting a new game and applying what you've learned

[magirken]

Do you think I took over too many planets with little strategic significance?

[keith.lamothe]

Do you think I took over too many planets with little strategic significance?

Looking at the screenshot, yes.  Generally you can't take a block of territory that large while leaving absolutely no AI planets within it, while keeping AIP reasonably low.  Better to take a smaller core you can defend (relatively) easily and just take "outpost" worlds where needed from there.  Or at least take every other planet along a path rather than every single planet.  There are other ways than taking a planet to "tame" it, relatively speaking.