Massive wave out of nowhere - what happened?

[eoraptor]

Hi! I am really having a blast with A.I. War, but I've got a situation. I've been playing out an (excessively) long game now in it's 52nd hour(!), 3.1.7.2 with Zenith expansion. 80 planet galaxy with a Devourer roaming about, AI progess at 488 (II). Up until now the A.I. has been sending waves averaging around 200-400 ships from a single warp gate I've left it next to one of my heavily defended systems. Everything under control until I get the familiar incoming wave notification and this one's a doozy: "7119 A.I. 1 Fighters (IV) to ?? in 2:09." Look out kid, there's a world of hurt coming! 

This is over 10x the ships that it's been throwing at me up until this point. I note that the current A.I. tech level is only at Mk. II and it does have a functioning warp gate adjacent to one of my systems. I haven't acquired any new worlds or capturables in a couple hours of game time. What might I have done to suddenly provoke this massive beatdown? Or are even my computer opponents getting bored with me? 

Screenie: The A.I. goes bananas

[keith.lamothe]

Welcome to the forums

Hmm, this sounds like a scrap wave, since normal waves have a hard cap of 2,000 ships.  Scrap waves don't generally happen unless the AI has a LOT of ships, but if it's had 52 hours to reinforce it's certainly possible.  Basically it just "scrapped" a metric ton of ships somewhere and is rerouting them to pay a visit.  At least, that's my theory.

[eoraptor]

Thanks for the fast reply!

Doing a search and reading up on the scrap wave mechanic, it sounds likely to be the case - the A.I is very built up in about 2/3 the galaxy since I've been puttering for so long. I guess this is what I get for la-dee-da'ing my way through the war. It'll be interesting to see how much of this my defense can hold back, but I suspect this one will end abruptly and badly without some timely assistance from the Devourer Golem.

[Vinraith]

This raises an interesting question: in light of the new barracks mechanic (and the AI destroying ships it can't barracks or release as border aggression) can scrap waves even happen under newer patches?

[Diazo]

Isn't this essentially border aggression in a different format?

This is the first I've heard of scrap waves, I understood excess ships of this sort to be used in a CPA or come at you as border aggression.

Actually, that raises the question, as I'd never heard of scrap waves before, what is everything the AI can do with extra ships?

Border Agression
Release for a CPA
Barracks Structure
Scrap Wave
Something else?

D.

[keith.lamothe]

It can also combine lower-mark ships into higher-mark versions.

Honestly, I'm not sure scrap waves are even mathematically possible in the newer versions with the new AI per-planet ship caps, so I think you won't see them unless you're loading a save from an older version.  They were intended mostly as a "corrective" measure than any kind of core game mechanic

[Ozymandiaz]

Thanks for the fast reply!

Doing a search and reading up on the scrap wave mechanic, it sounds likely to be the case - the A.I is very built up in about 2/3 the galaxy since I've been puttering for so long. I guess this is what I get for la-dee-da'ing my way through the war. It'll be interesting to see how much of this my defense can hold back, but I suspect this one will end abruptly and badly without some timely assistance from the Devourer Golem.

Time for a nuke

[Frozen Critical]

Sounds More like a CPA to me

Check the Message again , Did you Overlook Something?

[eoraptor]

Positive that was no garden variety CPA - in 52 hours I've seen my share of those and the onscreen message given was completely different (wrong tech level, abnormally high ship count, ?? given as destination). In any case, it's moot now - I've since upgraded to the latest prerelease and my mind is officially blown.

[Signata]

This sounds like something I just had happen to me, except *way* earlier in the game. Probably only a couple of hours in with three planets captured and an AIP of only 57. I had eliminated the final jump gate leading to my homeworld, and had one other planet with plenty of jump gates around it. I was in the middle of an assault against a juicy AI planet, not too tough, but it had some nice capturables and resources, when a 620 Bomber MkII wave targeted my homework. This was not a CPA or ?? type wave, it was an actual count-down based, single planet attack---but it came out of the middle of space instead of any wormholes. Being that early in the game, I didn't really have anything that could counter it, especially with the 3 minutes of warning it gave me. I wasted a bunch of knowledge teching up to MkIII fighters and tried to pump them out as fast as possible but could get nowhere near enough to stand up to the wave in the time it took for it arrive, even pulling all of my riot ships in to help. The wave also had a fairly strong mix of bombards and fighters. Given that the game was only two hours in, and even adjacent planets were still sitting at about 160 units total, border aggression or scrap fleets really shouldn't have been in play. According to that galaxy stats, there were only 7,000 enemy units total, meaning this wave represented nearly 10% of their entire fleet.

It was kind of frustrating since it came so early and I don't think I could have fended it off even if I knew it was coming from the very start of the game and had been preparing for it all along.

Any idea what could cause that; how to avoid it in the future?

[Winter Born]

This sounds like something I just had happen to me, except *way* earlier in the game. Probably only a couple of hours in with three planets captured and an AIP of only 57. I had eliminated the final jump gate leading to my homeworld, and had one other planet with plenty of jump gates around it. I was in the middle of an assault against a juicy AI planet, not too tough, but it had some nice capturables and resources, when a 620 Bomber MkII wave targeted my homework. This was not a CPA or ?? type wave, it was an actual count-down based, single planet attack---but it came out of the middle of space instead of any wormholes. Being that early in the game, I didn't really have anything that could counter it, especially with the 3 minutes of warning it gave me. I wasted a bunch of knowledge teching up to MkIII fighters and tried to pump them out as fast as possible but could get nowhere near enough to stand up to the wave in the time it took for it arrive, even pulling all of my riot ships in to help. The wave also had a fairly strong mix of bombards and fighters. Given that the game was only two hours in, and even adjacent planets were still sitting at about 160 units total, border aggression or scrap fleets really shouldn't have been in play. According to that galaxy stats, there were only 7,000 enemy units total, meaning this wave represented nearly 10% of their entire fleet.

It was kind of frustrating since it came so early and I don't think I could have fended it off even if I knew it was coming from the very start of the game and had been preparing for it all along.

Any idea what could cause that; how to avoid it in the future?

Short warning sounds like a Counter attack guard post. If the attack showed up lower right on the planet under attack then most likely you killed a counterattack GP or its com station
http://www.arcengames.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=AI_War_-_Guard_Posts

If you are playing against the backdoor hacker you have a hostile exo-wormhole on your home planet.

[Lancefighter]

thankfully, the latest changes make short warnings for counterwaves a thing of the past.

[Signata]

Yup, lower-right, that must be what it was. I'm still learning all of these new guard posts and did not even notice it. Wasn't anything like 14 minutes of warning though. I must need to update. Fortunately, after reloading my save game about five times, I finally countered it. Since I couldn't afford tractors *and* fighters, I rapidly modified the riot ships for maximum engine damage and strafed the bomber line, stopping it before it could reach the CC. Whew. Good thing I had those three ships.

[Winter Born]

Warp Counter Strike Guard Post looks like evil scruffy PacMan, mouth open to the right in the galaxy view planet summary.