Newbie getting owned by the AI

[Palarran]

Hello everyone, first post.

I picked the game and Alien Bundle up during the ridiculously cheap Steam sale last week.  This really is an amazing game!  The learning curve has been very steep, to say the least.

I spent my first thirty hours playing the tutorial, and then five real games.  I played with all three expansions, and with all options on (except Fallen Spire) against two random easier AI's, both on 7.  I guess I'm a glutton for punishment, but I had bought the expansions and I wanted to play with them.  To say I got stomped would be an understatement.  But each time I did better than the last.  At first I would struggle to capture two systems before the AI killed me, then I was able to hold four or five--maybe even capture an advanced research station.  Then the first exogalactic waves would crush me.  But as I said, I got further each time.  The fifth game I managed to take seven systems with a defensive perimeter, and I survived the first two exogalactic waves and two mining golems.  I also managed to take a tech level III system with an AI Eye with an advanced research--it was behind a tech IV.  I probably shouldn't have gone that way in retrospect, as I burned a few fleets taking down the Eye.  But I still had a full fleet when the third set of exogalactic waves hit, but I misdeployed it.  I killed most of the incoming ships, but enough slipped past me and took out the home command station.  Ugh.  This game is hard.

So this morning I decided to do something a bit easier.  I started up a game that was plain vanilla with two 7 AIs with the three base game minor factions enabled.  After three hours of game time, I have nine systems, and have gate raided and neutered all but one of the adjacent systems.  A solid death trap is set up on the single gated wormhole into my space, and I'm ready to push for my second advanced research.  This is so much easier, but I do miss some of the toys that I'm used to.  I don't miss the toys that the AI lost, however, and I'm definately looking forward to some payback for all of the death the AI has dealt to me.

One suggestion would be to put the fact that the AI Eye is a warp gate for purposes of waves into its tool tip, as that is how it obviously behaves.  I had gate raided a system with an Eye, but it still spawned a wave and I was quite surprised that I had to move my fleet down to cover.

[x4000]

Welcome to the forums!

I would suggest playing without the spirecraft and golems on hard, as together they really REALLY make the game harder.  Also the hybrids are something that really up the difficulty of the game.  Not that you shouldn't play with the expansion content, but it's fairly suicidal to start as a new player with the above options in particular; they were designed with experienced players in mind.  But to each his or her own!  Personally I prefer to only use a few of the minor factions at a time, like you're currently doing, rather than all of them at once.  What a crowded galaxy it can get with too many at once!

In terms of the warp gate ability on the AI Eye, that actually is in their abilities list in their tooltip.  There are a few other ships that have that same ability, so be sure to watch for that!  You can also see a count of the hostile wormholes on the galaxy map, which lets you know which planets still have something with the warp gate ability, etc.

[keith.lamothe]

Wow, you actually survived to get a defensive perimeter against Spirecraft - Hard and Golems - Hard, as a new player?  I think you're going to be rather good at this game once you've got more experience

Yea, that would cause major, major stomping of the human.

If you want to play with the Spirecraft or Golems without the exo waves, set them to Easy.  If you want a more tame tradeoff for them, pick medium, it makes them much more expensive to deploy and a few other things but no massive strikeforces descend upon you in response.  But you might find medium a bit frustrating as the cost gets pretty high.

Were you also playing with all the AI plots on (Hybrids, Advanced Hybrids, Beachheads, etc)?  If so I don't know how you survived at all, those hybrids should rip new players to pieces

[Palarran]

Thanks very much for the complements.  Yes, I was playing with all minors enabled, except Fallen Spire.  The Hybrids did kill me quickly several times, but I gradually learned how to cope.  I also thought the Roaming Enclaves were very difficult to deal with.

It's a great game.  I'll get back to it some more after this weekend.

[BobTheJanitor]

I'm one of those that really likes putting golems on medium. The power costs get ridiculous, especially once you get two or three of them at once. But it gives me a viable excuse to take a large number of planets, which I always feel the urge to do anyway, along with the firepower to defend them from the massive waves that come with having AI progress that high. Fun times!

[chemical_art]

I'm actually part of the group who likes hard compared to medium versions of the extra units.

Now it certainly is harder, yes. But in my games energy is scarce (so no medium golems) and no repair is just annoying (so no medium spirecraft).

In addition, playing with all three exo waves makes for a even more tense play dynamic I think. This is in part because the exo-waves get stronger through different ways. The golem and spire ones I think get stronger in part based on AIP (I think) while the Fallen Spire follows event. Since you need those spire ships to eventually survive against three waves it becomes a race where you try to keep your "spire" exo's somewhat on par with the other waves. If you rack up AIP to fast compared to spire cities you get crushed. But to get spire cities raises AIP, so the source of your strength will also be your weakness...***

Compare this with just either on. With just fallen spire AIP becomes much less important because your greatest threat, exo-waves, are not tied to it in any way. Without the fallen spire the hard spire and hard golems eventually cap out at numbers that pale to those of spire, but you don't build able units to counter them.

***Oh, but it gets better. All the way until at least your second, maybe third city, you need to acquire larger amounts of AIP then usual because to survive the response waves you already need well established militaries. So your AIP is already higher then normal, leading to more brutal exo waves. To counter these waves you need to quickly translate those militaries to getting spire units, in the process increasing your fallen spire exo...to counter THAT you need yet more spire units which needs turf which in turns bumps up AIP which in turns pumps non fallen spire exo waves...

[Nalgas]

Yes, I was playing with all minors enabled, except Fallen Spire.  The Hybrids did kill me quickly several times, but I gradually learned how to cope.  I also thought the Roaming Enclaves were very difficult to deal with.

That is a completely ridiculously insane way to start the game.  I salute you.

[keith.lamothe]

The golem and spire ones I think get stronger in part based on AIP (I think) while the Fallen Spire follows event.

Yes, the golem and spirecraft ones go off AIP.  The Fallen Spire ones have some smallish (and unnanounced) ones that chase you during shard recoveries, and full on announced exo waves in proportion to the number of city hubs you have (plus extra if you have a capitol, and it just goes off the rails when you build the last structure in the sequence).

Yes, I was playing with all minors enabled, except Fallen Spire.  The Hybrids did kill me quickly several times, but I gradually learned how to cope.  I also thought the Roaming Enclaves were very difficult to deal with.

That is a completely ridiculously insane way to start the game.  I salute you.

That is almost exactly what I thought when I read that, too.

[GeneReyva]

Oh lord, I remember my first game with all the minor factions on. Blundered into an AI Homeworld as Marauders attacked my HCS.
Next few I got taken out by the exo galactic waves.
Eventually I learned how to cause waves to attack one place in particular and bottlenecked AI waves. The rocket corpse kept wiping out my planets. Next game they were off, as were spirecraft and Marauders. Cross Planet attack, threat was 3K and the roaming enclaves were always getting under my feet.
I'm pretty bad at RTS games, so I'm guessing the OP is really good if he did so well in his first few games... kinda scary.

also, regarding the topic title... "Newbie getting owned by the AI". That's what's meant ot happen, especially on 7 

[Palarran]

Thanks again for all of the complements everyone.  I'm not really a big fan of RTS games because they tend to be such a clickfest.  My main gaming hobby is board wargames (yes, they do still exist, and yes, people still play them), so I'm used to playing really tough opponents.  When I play really big games-and there are some wargames that are absolutely insane-I like to jump in feet first into the deep end.  It has been an education, to say the least.

This last game, I did quite well before I was killed by a 2,700 ship cross planet wave.  Two advanced research and an advanced bomber fab, and about 18 systems.  I only had a couple of advanced research stations to take, and I was going to start taking down the AI's.  I think I got overconfident and overextended myself a bit towards the end.