7/7 Attritioner and Raid Engine, how do I deal with this?

[zoutzakje]

title says it all really. I started another 7/7 game and the randomizer put me up against a Raid Engine AI type. I have never played against it before, so I'm asking for some strategic advice. Playing on a 120 planet map, and there are Raid Engines everywhere. I'm still on my homeworld only, any direction I will try to advance will trigger a raid engine.
My personal thought on this: bunch of Raid starships in a transport and try to snipe it off, only having to deal with a single raid each time. My first goal is to reach a botnet 4 hops away, but it's covered by 2 raid engines. Any hints and tips are welcome.

[HellishFiend]

Raid Engines are tricky, but you have the advantage of knowing what to expect. In AI War, the unexpected is usually what kills you, and the Raid Engines are actually quite predictable.

I agree with you that Raid Starships are one of the better options for dealing with them. In any case, you need to a) be prepared for each raid wave, and b) destroy the engines before they trigger a second time.

The trick to winning that game will be always being aware of when and where the raids will be triggered as you move across the map.

Other ways of dealing with them:
Transports to deliver deep strikes at the raid engines
Cloaking to mask your approach towards the raid engines
Penetrators
Artillery or Cursed Golem
Any other very long range or very fast ships to which you may have access

[Wanderer]

Raid Engines are tricky, but you have the advantage of knowing what to expect. In AI War, the unexpected is usually what kills you, and the Raid Engines are actually quite predictable.

I agree with you that Raid Starships are one of the better options for dealing with them. In any case, you need to a) be prepared for each raid wave, and b) destroy the engines before they trigger a second time.

The trick to winning that game will be always being aware of when and where the raids will be triggered as you move across the map.

Other ways of dealing with them:
Transports to deliver deep strikes at the raid engines
Cloaking to mask your approach towards the raid engines
Penetrators
Artillery or Cursed Golem
Any other very long range or very fast ships to which you may have access

Golems and cloakers will still trigger raid engines.  The faster you can hit them, the better.  Just be prepared for a very defensive war.  If you've ever played turn-based strategy games, think offensive defense, where you're using artillery as your primary attacks and just guarding it with your heavy tanks.

Another thing you'll want to do is hit as many raid engines as you can as early as you can, before AIP builds.  Low AIP = Low Raids.  Try to clean out 'roads' to the points you want to hit.  Raid engine games start really slowly with a lot of deep scouting and then flare to top speed once you start to move and have cleaned out your pathing.

[HellishFiend]

I didn't mean to imply that there was a way of not triggering them. As I said early in the post, a) be ready to deal with the waves, and b) destroy them before the second wave. 

[zoutzakje]

Allright thx, I will try out some tactics tomorrow and see if it'll work out. 120 planet galaxy against a raid engine will probably take a while to finish lol.

[zoutzakje]

raid starships in a bunch of transports really does work. Unfortunately it's a suicide mission, so I need to wait for resources each time. Managed to destroy 2 raid engines so far and I'm almost 2 hours ingame lol. Oh well, now I might actually get that 36 hour achiev. Almost got the botnet... then the raids should be simple to destroy.

[Catma]

Won't the botnet wind up triggering raids... everywhere?

[Wanderer]

Won't the botnet wind up triggering raids... everywhere?

Pretty much, and the raid ships I think are zombies, so they can't be reclaimed, but it's been a while since I dueled with the Raid Engine.  BTW, I lost that game badly, but I was very new too.  I did learn a lot of good strategies playing it however.

[zoutzakje]

I believe that zombies and minor factions don't trigger events like raid engines or core cpa guard posts. Besides, zombies won't attack a planet until I do, so there shouldn't be to much trouble. Raid engine waves are regular waves, not zombies, so I should be able to zombify them.
I could be wrong about all of this though, but I'll find out soon enough. So far I'm about 3 hours ingame and got 6 planets... still alive and kicking. Botnet is repaired and fully functioning, so the zombies will come to my aid (or demise) very soon.

EDIT: I was right, zombies don't trigger the engine and engine waves can be zombified. Hooray for finding a botnet 4 hops from my homeworld. I just succesfully destroyed 3 raid engines in a row, using my botnet to deal with the waves. 3 and a half hours ingame and now I can finally grab my first shard lol.