AI War Beta 5.090 "Fish Or Cut Bait" Released!

[Eternaly_Lost]

I personally found that mini-forts and Military command go together very well. But I do have cloakers in the AI hands, so I am more using them for the decloak then to shot stuff.

[chemical_art]

I can go on and on about mini forts over comm stations on multi games.

For example:

On a multiplayer game with 3 players, you can have one player have 1/3 of your empire have military II stations. Those military stations suffer drastically over econ stations econimically, but hey, they certainly distract the enemy!

OR

You can have everyone get mini forts, and every world has 6 mini forts.  Enemies die. Your economies live.

[TechSY730]

Similar copy/paste from the other thread:

Maybe I need to buff mil stations then

People have been saying this is needed Mk. II and III of military and logistics stations for quite some time now.

The low-ish firepower boost cap overall and the even lower still firepower boost cap really hurt how much you get from the higher mark military mark stations.
I would still recommend that military command station for its translocating effect (great for stall) and the tachyon beams, but that isn't enough to make me think Mk. II is worth it.

Similar issue with the logisticts, except worse. IIRC, the magnitude of the speed nerf to enemy units does NOT go up with mark, only the speed buff to allies, which generally already move fast enough on friendly planets. Thus, you get almost nothing for the Mk. II of the logistics. If the speed nerf to enemies went down with mark (even if you had to reduce the magnitude of the Mk. I speed nerf to do so), I would consider getting Mk. II of these things.

So basically, the issue is that what you get for higher marks of these two is not very useful due to limits and stats of most of the other things in the game.

[keith.lamothe]

Maybe we can pick one thread in which to have this conversation

[TechSY730]

Maybe we can pick one thread in which to have this conversation

Don't be silly. This way, we can get distracted with two separate thread derails at the same time.


But yea, this topic is actually complicated enough to really deserve its own thread.

[orzelek]

Will mini forts get the buff nearby turrets thing or it was discarded?

[Faulty Logic]

Wow, the game has changed in a bunch of awesome ways recently, and I have really felt a sense of contribution. (I know it wasn't just me, of course)

The special forces changes.
The threat changes.
The CPA changes. (contribution tangential)
The HW buffs, including the strategic reserve (of evil).
The AIP changes (of super evil).
And even some champion stuff.

Awesome; 6.0 looks to be a significant improvement over 5, in a lot of fun ways.

Miniforts sound like a nice way to handle the satellite problem. I think they may solve a few too many headaches for their k cost, but I like the idea of them, and certainly don't see it breaking any games. (The update thread which introduced them seems the logical place to discuss)

[_K_]

Aww, it feels like people missed my suggestion about balancing the mini-forts with energy cost.

I'm just gonna keep nagging about the energy economy being broken until it gets fixed. I'm pretty sure that if the economy was tight, people would hesitate to spam those mini-forts everywhere if it cost them like 10-20k energy.
Right now i see the mini-forts as a must-have in every game (except maybe for super-tight ultra-low K ones). Even if they are rather weak, they cost you just 1k knowledge for a nice small defence in every single system.

[Cinth]

Ummm, last time I checked they were 9k a pop for energy. They have a per unit cost that is 1/10 of a Fort I.

And the energy econ is broken? I can't possibly build every ship and structure I unlock without taking more systems.

[Faulty Logic]

I think energy is just about right: not super-limiting unless really low AIP, but always a consideration.

[Cinth]

I'll just add for those who haven't seen the mini yet, it has costs comparable to the Flagship I.

[TechSY730]

Hey Keith. How rude of you to add new cheats in this (or the previous) version without letting us know.

Anyways, in addition to the existing gain hero XP cheat, "gain xp", there is also now
Give all champion unlocks: facilitate communications
Give champion many levels: terminate hostilities

[keith.lamothe]

Aww, it feels like people missed my suggestion about balancing the mini-forts with energy cost.

I'm just gonna keep nagging about the energy economy being broken until it gets fixed.

I didn't say anything because I don't agree that it's broken   But rather than just say "I don't agree" I waited to see if anyone else said anything.

The m+c side of things could use some work, as the current feast/famine situation... doesn't feel right.  But I don't think it's broken (if m+c were broken, the game would be broken, and the recent recorded games show it's quite intact), just not where it should be.  Anyway, I don't want to try to fix that until after 6.0 when we have a bit more time to work with.

[Lancefighter]

Energy matters up until I have two systems. Like.. thats literally it. Energy does not matter to me beyond my second system. Zenith power gens are completely useless to me. Throw something stupid like 100k energy costs on miniforts, and it literally would not matter to me 99% of the time.

[Diazo]

Seriously?

Wait, multiple homeworlds?

I play single HW and it's not that far off at the moment.

I'd have to pull some stats from my saved games, but in general, I feel that losing one system puts my energy balance pretty low and if I lose two (without losing a significant chunk of my mobile fleet) I'm looking at a power blackout.

I'll pull some quick numbers tomorrow when I load the game up again.

D.