Have reprisal waves gone too far?

[Qatu]

 I find reprisals/scrap to be extremely punishing when I play maps without chokepoints and with high cap low hp high death ships, while i find reprisals to be extremely rewarding when i play chokepoint maps and low cap high hp low death ships.

 Comparison between my 2 ongoing games, both vs lv8.6 (everything+random)x2.
- maze a easy map, 60 planets with no nomads, translocator bonus starship, time ~4h30, I own 13 planets including one AI homeworld planet, almost ready to assault second AI homeworld and win game, I'm almost always on the offensive
- simple map, 60 planets+nomads, raptor bonus ship, time ~5h30, I own 5 planets, I haven't been able to find either AI homeworlds yet, I'm almost always on the defensive

 Basically I find reprisals+scrap to multiply the advantages of chokepoint maps and low cap high HP bonus ships.

[Lord Of Nothing]

While that would certainly explain what we saw, it does make me wonder. Where is our salvage efficiency boosting structure that is independent from our command stations?

Come to think of it, how are the AI's salvage rate and efficiency calculated? Mk. of its command station? Number of guard posts? Some combination thereof?

Hmm. Just an idea, but maybe fortresses could provide some base rate, but not buff the existing rate (Otherwise chokepoints are probably a little too favoured)
I'm thinking minifortress uses in particular, here...

[motai]

thinking about it ... maybe mines should give bonus to salvage rate. this would reinforce rich systems supporting infrastructure to aid your system and make it better to base defenses on production planets rather than trying to make your mines totally int he backwaters. it also would explain why the ai goes out of its way to kill them so often over just being annoying.  this also would get back to making exo shields almost worth it.

as a counter point from what i have noticed any guard post will generate salvage. I'm not certain but it does seem that multiple posts cause the ai to get alot more salvage per ship lost. i have hit reprisal 2 waves from a half fleet wipe on 10 gp+ systems and then done the same losses on 4 gp systems and ened up under level 1 trigger levels.

[ErictheRed]

In my last game, I generated a reprisal wave of 3000+ ships and moved a botnet to the respective planet. When the wave hit, it turned out to be full of zombie ships! So now the AI can choose to send non-reclaim able versions of any fleet ship in a reprisal. That's a bit crazy.

[TechSY730]

Upon further thinking about this, I am now of the opinion that the current system is near perfect with fleet ships. It starts to fall apart, IMO, with starships, especially with higher their starships. It makes it feel like losing a higher mark starship is too punishing (or too rewarding, for the case of the AI losing one on a human planet).

I wonder if introducing some form of sub-linear salvage rate over base metal cost again would be worthwhile, though not to the same severity as the original try at it now that there are other factors in place to keep salvage from getting out of hand (like the per planet salvage limit).

Also, I think the AI should't get a "dynamic" salavalge rate based on having more structures, xor, humans should get such a structure.

In my last game, I generated a reprisal wave of 3000+ ships and moved a botnet to the respective planet. When the wave hit, it turned out to be full of zombie ships! So now the AI can choose to send non-reclaim able versions of any fleet ship in a reprisal. That's a bit crazy.

Was one of the AI types mimic? Sounds like one of the strange interactions with mimic that can happen.

[ErictheRed]

No, I was playing against Sledge Hammer & Support Corps

[Kahuna]

From my experience, reprisal waves have been rather weak (on difficulty 8 ), and really only served as needed extra metal after losing some important units.

You aren't losing enough ships, then.  >D

For the full experience, try a fleet wipe in enemy territory.

Or scrapping a ~500 Turret beachhead.