Just played my first Fallen Spire game

[Kalieum]

So, after having two wins and a loss for my first three games, I figued I'd try enabling Fallen Spire. it started off slow; I was planning on seeing FS through to the end, so I wasn't that bothered in exploring too far out, also one of the AI homeworlds was 22 jumps from mine (my bad for starting in the middle of a Concentric galaxy, I guess).
I got as far as getting the first city hub up before finding the chase waves far too problematic - it didn't much help that I didn't know Spire cities were strong, and took 'put it somewhere defensible' to mean somewhere safe, not making up part of my major defenses. Actually, does the Fallen Spire strength affect the chase waves or just the regular exos? I had it at 6/10, but I didn't find the regular exos too much trouble (well, I had to recall my fleet for them, but didn't take too much losses for them), but the chase waves just overwhelmed me.
Anyway, I spent quite a long while trying to build up some sort of stronger defenses to deal with the chase waves to get the shard for the second hub before finally calling it and deciding to just play through with my 1 cruiser 2 destroyer 12 frigate fleet. Problem was, I only had about a quarter of the galaxy explored, and AIP was a bit high due to my trying to establish territory while still pursuing Fallen Spire.
Finding the remaining CSGs and carving a path to the AI homeworlds took forever, especially with having to recall everything to deal with Fallen Spire and Broken Golem exos every now and then, but eventually 25 hours and 45 minutes in with 380AIP looming against me I was finally in position to assault an AI homeworld.

So there I was, entering the system with 6 loaded assault transports and an armoured golem, already kinda laughing at my first time seeing a wrath lance in action, pathing my assault transports over there to deal with it quickly and pausing and unpausing a lot to better take stock of things unfolding when I suddenly notice something.... large.
"A colossal armed planetoid. The AI would not normally consider even the entire Milky Way galaxy worth the attention of a mothership. What did you DO?"
This thing is rocking 21 H/Ks of varying marks as escorts.
"58 massive AI ships (231,260 S) are en route to your planets."
That's an whole order of magnitude greater than I've ever seen that number.
I - I'm sorry, humanity. I don't think I can do this.

...But man, that has got to be the most entertaining way to have a prospective victory turned into hopeless crushing defeat in an instant. It's half an hour later and I'm still just tabbing back in to the paused game, looking at it, and laughing. Next time, AI, next time!

[keith.lamothe]

Welcome to the game and to the forums

Ah, the Mothership. Yea, the last-ditch-defense exo the AI gets when you play FS is one way you can meet those. Often it's plural, if you've gone heavily into it.

I think the main difficulty you ran into is FS 6/10 instead of 4/10. That particular faction just gets harder with the higher intensity, I don't think it gives you more benefit to go higher.

An admirable effort, considering what you were facing

On the fight itself, a full set of armored and lightning warheads may have made a difference even against that menace, especially combined with other creativity. Whether you could actually go on to win is a separate question, but I figure if you can take out that attack you've got a good shot.

[RabidDonkey]

Fallen Spire is definitely my preferred playing style/campaign. Always good to see other players jump into it. I think it's the best addon feature of the game.

You sort of stopped at an unfortunate spot (2 cities) I think as in you made the AI harder than just having 1 city, but that didn't get you access to battleships or dreadnoughts.

Next time, try to just play normally and build up first. The Fallen Spire campaign can be started at any point and as long as you don't pick up that first shard, the AIs won't send the exogalactic forces. Much easier to hold against AIs in fallen spire than to expand against them.
 
Give X map a try as well. It's by far the safest (and cheesiest map) to complete Fallen Spire but a good way to cut your teeth into the campaign.

Spoiler for Hiden:

If you continue with the fallen spire campaign and get 5 level 2 cities, you can get some VERY powerful weapons and an alternate victory condition, which can be easier than assaulting the AI homeworlds in some cases... if you are prepared beforehand. I also suggest turning on zenith trader too to give your choke a little more umph.

The final quest in the Fallen Spire campaign is what makes the X map so so sweet. You'll get what I mean once you get there. Any map with long linear pathing is also good but X is the best map I've found.

[Clasmir]

So, after having two wins and a loss for my first three games, I figued I'd try enabling Fallen Spire. it started off slow; I was planning on seeing FS through to the end, so I wasn't that bothered in exploring too far out, also one of the AI homeworlds was 22 jumps from mine (my bad for starting in the middle of a Concentric galaxy, I guess).
I got as far as getting the first city hub up before finding the chase waves far too problematic - it didn't much help that I didn't know Spire cities were strong, and took 'put it somewhere defensible' to mean somewhere safe, not making up part of my major defenses. Actually, does the Fallen Spire strength affect the chase waves or just the regular exos? I had it at 6/10, but I didn't find the regular exos too much trouble (well, I had to recall my fleet for them, but didn't take too much losses for them), but the chase waves just overwhelmed me.
Anyway, I spent quite a long while trying to build up some sort of stronger defenses to deal with the chase waves to get the shard for the second hub before finally calling it and deciding to just play through with my 1 cruiser 2 destroyer 12 frigate fleet. Problem was, I only had about a quarter of the galaxy explored, and AIP was a bit high due to my trying to establish territory while still pursuing Fallen Spire.
Finding the remaining CSGs and carving a path to the AI homeworlds took forever, especially with having to recall everything to deal with Fallen Spire and Broken Golem exos every now and then, but eventually 25 hours and 45 minutes in with 380AIP looming against me I was finally in position to assault an AI homeworld.

So there I was, entering the system with 6 loaded assault transports and an armoured golem, already kinda laughing at my first time seeing a wrath lance in action, pathing my assault transports over there to deal with it quickly and pausing and unpausing a lot to better take stock of things unfolding when I suddenly notice something.... large.
"A colossal armed planetoid. The AI would not normally consider even the entire Milky Way galaxy worth the attention of a mothership. What did you DO?"
This thing is rocking 21 H/Ks of varying marks as escorts.
"58 massive AI ships (231,260 S) are en route to your planets."
That's an whole order of magnitude greater than I've ever seen that number.
I - I'm sorry, humanity. I don't think I can do this.

...But man, that has got to be the most entertaining way to have a prospective victory turned into hopeless crushing defeat in an instant. It's half an hour later and I'm still just tabbing back in to the paused game, looking at it, and laughing. Next time, AI, next time!

Curse you! You are making me play this again.    It is a lot of fun.

[Kalieum]

Thanks for the tips! Took me a while to come back to it, but I did end up losing that game - throwing everything at it a couple of systems away from the AI homeworld and once again near mine with everything I'd rebuilt by then just wasn't enough - but it was far closer than I'd ever have thought, with only 2 spirecraft translocators and 11 low mark H/Ks remaining of the AI's main attack force (and having a CPA and another exo trigger while the mothership was taking its merry time blowing up every irreplaceable first was fun).

In any case, I'm definitely going to give Fallen Spire another shot, and it looks like I've got some advice to take on board for next time, so here's hoping!

[WolfWhiteFire]

In any case, I'm definitely going to give Fallen Spire another shot, and it looks like I've got some advice to take on board for next time, so here's hoping!

Another piece of advice if you do X galaxy, if you want to minimize the amount of space you need to control for the victory condition, be very careful with your placement of cities in the X, and plan out all the placements beforehand keeping in mind the distance requirement, that makes the difference between whether you can fit 2 cities in your X or all 5.

[Glyoxim]

I just want do add, the same thing happened to me the first time I tried fallen spire. I think the tooltip says something about the intensity (4/10) is t how much the game will be affected by that faction. I understood it that if I set it to a higher value the chance is higher to encounter the fallen Spire. Naturally I set it to 10/10
When I constructed my second spire hub (I can't remember the AI progress but I guess something around 300 to 400) the AI sent 5! motherships...
I managed to kill the first 3 with all the towers, fortresses and even a superfortress I had but when the next two arrived I did't have anything left and with just two spire hubs I did't even have a proper spire fleet yet.
Awesome game and I learned about those settings

[ZaneWolfe]

I understood it that if I set it to a higher value the chance is higher to encounter the fallen Spire.

No. The 4/10 base setting is how HARD the retaliation from having Fallen Spire on is. It has nothing to do with your chance to encounter the Fallen Spire. Even if you set it to 1/10, you will STILL encounter the exact same chain of events. Just the AI response is much weaker.

Next time, AI, next time!

Fallen Spire is far and away my favorite way to play. I can't recall ever turning the option off since I first turned it on. As you've probably seen, Spire Cities are CRAZY powerful. In fact they are pretty much one of the most powerful static defenses in the game, at least for players. And the best way to combo that is with Military MKIII Command Stations. You will double their damage output, decloak the entire planet, and knockback most things that the city defenses don't outright murder the crap out of. IMO the best way to use the cities are to create two 'types'.

The first type, the one you make with your first city shard, should be 'the front line'. Put it right in the path the AI has to take to get to your other systems. You build one habitation center and the rest reactors. Yes that means your first city will NOT have any shipyards. It also means it will have 6 shields, 12 heavy beam cannons, and 24 lasers. This, IMO, is the best configuration for something meant to stop the AI dead in its tracks. Also, put both the city hub AND your command station right on top of the wormhole leading deeper into your territory. That means the AI MUST remove the city defenses to get deeper into your space.

The second type, which you should build with your second shard, should be one habitation center and 5 shipyards. Put it WELL BEHIND the chokepoint. It's not a fallback point you hold the AI off from, its literally the place you pump out Spire Ship after Spire Ship until you can't build anymore. You don't even need to build modules on the habitation center. Save the metal for more ships. This setup also gives you the most shipyards per city. You can only have as many shipyards in your galaxy as you have reactors. The most you can get building shipyards in every city is 2 or 3. If you get 3 on one you will only be able to get 2 on the next. Thus every two cities, you get 5 shipyards, so it's better, IMO, to just get 5 shipyards all at once every two cities, than compromising your defense by splitting them up over two cities. (Remember, shipyards get ZERO modules, and have no weapons.)

You also get a new 'front line' every two cities. And, assuming you're playing on a map that allows it, you can keep forcing the AI into these chokepoints. Your third shard, which should be another frontline, you put it ahead of the last one, and then you're free to control everything behind it. Even if the AI breaks through your new frontline, they still have to get through the one that you built with the first shard, giving you an in-depth defense as well as massive chokepoints. What's even better, is that the main hub of a Spire City is IMMUNE to damage. Even if the reactors and habs get blown up, the main hub will not get destroyed. You can easily recapture and rebuild your overrun frontlines. On maps like X and Maze, where you can force the AI to take only ONE path to your HW, you gain the best possible chokepoints and in-depth defense in the game. Just make sure to turn of Counter Attack Guardposts, as those will DESTROY your 'backyard' as it were.

[Glyoxim]

No. The 4/10 base setting is how HARD the retaliation from having Fallen Spire on is. It has nothing to do with your chance to encounter the Fallen Spire. Even if you set it to 1/10, you will STILL encounter the exact same chain of events. Just the AI response is much weaker.

I learned that the hard way, I just misunderstood the tooltip

[keith.lamothe]

The AI's only real defense against Fallen Spire is to trick you into setting it higher than 4/10.

[Elestan]

Also, put both the city hub AND your command station right on top of the wormhole leading deeper into your territory. That means the AI MUST remove the city defenses to get deeper into your space.

I agree with the two types of cities you described, but would tweak this slightly.  I think it's usually better to let enemies reach the exit wormhole without forcing them to completely crush your defenses, so that you can repair them quickly rather than having to rebuild them (and suffer the rebuilding hit on the CS).  So I put the (indestructible) hub just in front of the wormhole, and the much more vulnerable CS next to the reactor farthest from the attack direction.

As an aside, it's always seemed odd to me that command stations (on both sides) have so few hit points; most CSs have less than a lot of fleet ships. Even the MilIII is more fragile than most starships, and its weapons aren't all that great against enemies that can't be translocated.

[ZaneWolfe]

The reason I put it right on the wormhole is that I find that the AI will usually stay long enough to kill the CS anyway. If not all of their ships, then at least enough of them to finish the job. This also buys more time for my fleets to arrive and defend the place. Once I have a full 2 cities, I usually only ever attack the AI with my Spire Fleet and my best support ships, leaving the rest of my ships for defense. Exos are a pony after all. (And I'm running around with FS, Botnet, Spirecraft, AND Golems) While somewhat limiting on my offense, the sheer power of even a 5 shipyard fleet is STAGGERING. I've seen it break through 10k-15k threat with minimal losses. A few repairs later from T3 Engineers, and they go right back to murdering the crap out of the AI's worlds. This only gets more silly at 10+ shipyards, and down right crazy once you unlock battleships and dreadnaughts.