This response and the assumptions in it make ZERO sense to me. At the time of the CPA wave, ideally all of the turrets are up on all of the planets. Before I move forward, I will have rebuilt everything on those planets.
What I pointed out was that when what you were talking about was defending
chains of planets for CPAs/Reprisal waves (as you did), i.e. targets that would be hit in sequence, you could obtain the same defensive result if the defences were par-galaxy instead (as they used to be), merely be building them one planet at a time when defences failed - something that would surely be more cumbersome (move in bunch of rebuilders and engineers, then on to next planet), but as effective as a defence.
I was not making the assumption that you were doing this, or that you had ever done this, or that you should do this if all defences reverted to being per-galaxy, I was merely pointing out that it was a (tedious) strategic option.
If I misunderstood you, and you didn't mean the defence of planets in a chain that would be hit in sequence by CPA/Reprisal waves, I guess my answer made little sense to you, but that was what I thought you meant.
I am not going to be building turrets on planets as planets fall, my focus will be on microing my fleet to minimize my losses.
I am going to place all of the per planet defenses as I see fit, having them in place to defend, so that I can focus on microing my fleet to minimize my losses.
I am going to have my per Galaxy defenses in place to defend so I can focus on microing my fleet to minimize my losses.
This is absolutely preferable, when it is enough to successfully defend, and nothing I said disagrees with that.
For the record, I almost exclusively use logistic stations so that microing my fleet is more effective as I can respond MUCH faster. (And the extra scrap is nice)
Understandable. Logistics stations are wonderful.
I don't tend to buy Engineers 3 until I have more resources than I know what to do with... and given that I usually have planets with extra matter converters on them.. that takes a while.
And that is the one assumption that I definitely did get wrong, as I noted in my original edit.
I assumed that people accumulating hundreds of AIP (you were talking 500+ in your example) would find the K to spare to unlock mark III engineers, because I personally find them so darn valuable for their ability to go-anywhere, do-anything, thus vastly expanding both my offensive and defensive strategic options over those available with only mark I and II engineers.
I strongly disagree with your assessment of the impact upon my play.
I don't think that I assessed the impact on your play, but perhaps I am wrong.
I
thought that all I did was point out that I thought that what you considered a downside of per-planet defences was, properly speaking, not a downside introduced by per-planet defences, since the sort of chain defence they enable was something that could also be accomplished back when the defences were per-galaxy - at least after salvage was introduced - and as such the problem presented was really a variant of an old defence rather than a new problem originating with per-planet defences.
Given that, as far as I could see, it could be accomplished with both the old per-galaxy and the new per-planet, and that while both seemed tedious to me, it seemed considerably less cumbersome in the new way, I thought the new way an improvement - one could use them for chain defence or, when not needed and old-style choke points were sufficient, not use them.
Having turrets per-planet rather than per-galaxy certainly makes such a deep chain-defence easier and more attractive to use due to the less overhead (so long as one has the energy for it), but it does not - or at least, does not yet - make it more
necessary to use. Though that might change if Keith starts throwing larger hordes at players to breach chain-defences*. Then again, if he does that, one can always reduce the difficulty level one is playing on if one doesn't want to feel forced to use defences in depth.
* Personally I'd prefer seeing AI improvements in finding holes in defences and/or concentrating power when CPAs hit, but that's easier said than done. Still, the developers are tricky guys, so let's see what happens.
In multi-player, we usually end up waiting until everyone's fleet is rebuilt, all of the defenses are back up, and everyone feels ready to go... this is FAR SLOWER than single player, and I would really like to avoid adding to the things that need to be rebuilt because we can now build more of them.
My multi-player Fallen Spire game took over a year, and probably close to 200 hours of play time. Rebuilding expensive structures for multiple people before forward progress takes a VERY large amount of time. We had entire evenings where it was rebuilding, defending from Exo, rebuilding, defending from Exo, without ANY offensive progression. Distributed Forts would recreate this effect.
That is an interesting consideration and, as I noted in my answer, I did not address multiplayer issues at all.
In trying to understand your point, it is my understanding that in multiplayer as well as singleplayer, players are encouraged to choose the game setup that provides them the most enjoyment. If the setup you are playing throws the sort of waves at you that you think necessitates excessive downtime rebuilding, to the degree that it cuts down on your fun more than the fun gained from whatever challenge you face, such as that Fallen Spire game might have been, why are you playing with that difficulty level and that resource handicap? Or at least, why do so more than once?
With respect to defences in depth, a player resource advantage would make rebuilding defences faster and defence in depth more attractive, while on the other side a player resource disadvantage would dissuade in-depth defences - and both of these would also have offensive implications. Either of them, or maintaining a neutral resource handicap, can be coupled with changes to the AI difficulty level and AI reinforcement handicap to manipulate the level of AI challenge, which also affects both the level of threat faced and amount of rebuilding required.
I guess my main problem in understanding why you consider distributed defences of turrets or fortresses to be a problem due to rebuilding downtime is that given the many variables there are to tweak upon game creation, surely it should be possible regardless of whether defences are per-galaxy or per-planet to find a setup in player handicap, AI handicap, and AI difficulty, that matches your preferred balance of time required for rebuilding and time spent on progression.
EDIT: Upon rereading my post, I am afraid it may come across as dismissive of your concerns about time expenditure. I certainly don't intend it that way, as they are definitely valid concerns. It is just that if I have understood you right, they seem to be concerns that can already be addressed upon game creation by choosing a setup to give the desired outcome.
