Author Topic: Starting Planets  (Read 3095 times)

Offline Castruccio

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Starting Planets
« on: January 16, 2011, 09:36:45 pm »
What are the advantages and disadvantages to picking multiple starting planets?  I have read that this does something to ship cap (maybe?) but I am not sure what.  If I am playing an 80 planet map should I pick more than one starting planet?


Offline Castruccio

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Re: Starting Planets
« Reply #1 on: January 16, 2011, 10:14:43 pm »
Also, another question.  When you Scout a planet and it fires at your scout, does this mean that the planet is now on alert?

Offline Echo35

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Re: Starting Planets
« Reply #2 on: January 17, 2011, 12:18:59 am »
Also, another question.  When you Scout a planet and it fires at your scout, does this mean that the planet is now on alert?

Scouts don't cause the AI to freak out, the AI just shoots at anything that isn't theirs. Unless there are any Alarm Posts involved, the only planets that will be "On Alert" are the ones adjacent to planets you control.

Offline Shrugging Khan

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Re: Starting Planets
« Reply #3 on: January 17, 2011, 06:33:30 am »
What are the advantages and disadvantages to picking multiple starting planets?  I have read that this does something to ship cap (maybe?) but I am not sure what.  If I am playing an 80 planet map should I pick more than one starting planet?
The more starting planets you pick, the higher the multiplier for your ship cap. However, the AI gets the same bonus!

So with 8 planets, you and the AI suddenly have thousands of ships to throw at each other even at AIP 10.
The beatings shall continue
until morale improves!

Offline BobTheJanitor

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Re: Starting Planets
« Reply #4 on: January 17, 2011, 10:05:03 am »
That leads to another question that I'm still unclear on. Does the AI just get a random unlock from the entire pool of ships when starting? I picked two Vanilla AIs for a recent game and then ended up fighting space planes and teleporting battle stations. Cloaking and teleporting aren't my idea of vanilla! But anyway, if I'd selected two starting planets, does each AI also get two extra ship types, or how does that shake down? Anyone know?

Offline Red Spot

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Re: Starting Planets
« Reply #5 on: January 17, 2011, 10:32:06 am »
Not sure how many ships the AI gets, but I do know you disable certain abilities from your game, pre-game, if you dont like the AI having them. That does however also mean you wont be playing with those abilities, just incase you dont want the AI to have them but do want to use them against the AI ;)

Offline BobTheJanitor

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Re: Starting Planets
« Reply #6 on: January 17, 2011, 11:39:02 am »
Yeah, I'd expected Vanilla to mean it was just going to have standard fighters/bombers/frigates and starships, but the description does say it gets whatever unlocks come with the map seed. So I guess that's just what it unlocked. Teleporting units and cloaking units are making defense tricky to say the least. I'm only slightly embarrassed by the number of times I've had to reload a save after a brutal wave comes in and smashes my stuff.