exo-galaxy wormholes broken?

[darke]

I took out one AI about 90 minutes ago game-time, but I haven't seen anything at all coming out of it's exo-galaxy wormhole.

Given it was previously spitting out one to two starships along with a few dozen other IV ships per disgorgement, it seems kinda strange I haven't seen anything.

EDIT: And on that note, I just saw the yellow AI's core command center spawn 250 of the pink AI's ships. The pink AI is the one I've already toasted. Err, wha?

[x4000]

I took out one AI about 90 minutes ago game-time, but I haven't seen anything at all coming out of it's exo-galaxy wormhole.

Given it was previously spitting out one to two starships along with a few dozen other IV ships per disgorgement, it seems kinda strange I haven't seen anything.

EDIT: And on that note, I just saw the yellow AI's core command center spawn 250 of the pink AI's ships. The pink AI is the one I've already toasted. Err, wha?

This is all working as expected.  Exo-Galaxy wormholes don't allow for reinforcement, they only allow for offensive waves.  So the reinforcements you were seeing were actually coming from the AI Command station, which you destroyed.  Having an Exo-Galaxy wormhole on a planet you captured is the same as having one on your starting planet from the Backdoor hacker.  I played with that over the weekend, and it seems to be working fine.

As for the "dead" AI still spawning ships on the yellow AI's planets (or its own for that matter), that is also by design.  The AIs don't get hampered at all by you destroying their first command station (in fact, they get a boost of 100 AI Progress).  It's not until you destroy both that the game is won or lost.  This holds true for human players, as well.  When one player loses their home, if other teammates still have home planets, play continues as normal.  It causes some AI progress boost there, too, and also causes a loss of some income for the player who lost their home planet, but no players, AI or human, are "out" until the game is completely over. 

This is a major selling point for co-op players, and it also prevents that "it's all downhill from here" feeling that you get with the end of a game with many other RTS games.  I've seen in a few other threads that you stopped some games near the end when your victory seemed assured, and to that I say: your victory was not assured.   When you take out the first AI, that +100 boost can often swing the victory to the AIs if you are not prepared.  A number of people have lost at the last second, with the AI sneaking freed core ships over to the human homeworlds and destroying them, too.  Like a cornered animal, the AI is very dangerous right at the end. 

Of course, when both the AI planets were being right next to each other, that often meant you could finish off the second AI too quickly for this to be noticable, but now that problem is solved with the AI planets no longer being close together.  So, I'd be reluctant to stop early and declare myself the winner, is all I'm saying.

[darke]

This is all working as expected.  Exo-Galaxy wormholes don't allow for reinforcement, they only allow for offensive waves.  So the reinforcements you were seeing were actually coming from the AI Command station, which you destroyed.  Having an Exo-Galaxy wormhole on a planet you captured is the same as having one on your starting planet from the Backdoor hacker.  I played with that over the weekend, and it seems to be working fine.

Cool.

As for the "dead" AI still spawning ships on the yellow AI's planets (or its own for that matter), that is also by design.  The AIs don't get hampered at all by you destroying their first command station (in fact, they get a boost of 100 AI Progress).  It's not until you destroy both that the game is won or lost.  This holds true for human players, as well.  When one player loses their home, if other teammates still have home planets, play continues as normal.  It causes some AI progress boost there, too, and also causes a loss of some income for the player who lost their home planet, but no players, AI or human, are "out" until the game is completely over. 

Ahh. Never had a chance to study things so intently before so I was a little surprised as to how things worked. Guess that's a bit of a benefit of only having to worry about defending and attacking a single planet in such a small game.

This is a major selling point for co-op players, and it also prevents that "it's all downhill from here" feeling that you get with the end of a game with many other RTS games.  I've seen in a few other threads that you stopped some games near the end when your victory seemed assured, and to that I say: your victory was not assured.   When you take out the first AI, that +100 boost can often swing the victory to the AIs if you are not prepared.  A number of people have lost at the last second, with the AI sneaking freed core ships over to the human homeworlds and destroying them, too.  Like a cornered animal, the AI is very dangerous right at the end. 

Yeah. It's more of a patience thing for me really. I just assume I'm going to win because I can't be bothered carving my way though yet-another-half-dozen planets of the same grindfest. Oddly never encountered this effect on AI7 though back when I was playing it, but that was a while ago and a bit before you added more meaner AI effects.

Of course, when both the AI planets were being right next to each other, that often meant you could finish off the second AI too quickly for this to be noticable, but now that problem is solved with the AI planets no longer being close together.  So, I'd be reluctant to stop early and declare myself the winner, is all I'm saying.

The "destroy the command center gives +100 AI points" thing is easily solved by not destroying it, and just ringing the entrance wormholes to your planets with turrets and camping it out whilst you go over and take out the other AI, then come back and mop this up later.

I've also ringed core command center with turrets before too, but that proved less effective. It might work better now that turrets are considerably stronger.

[x4000]

Yeah, "neutering" the AI home planet to avoid the +100 progress is certainly possible, though I'd say it is a bit dangerous.  As for the "grind fest" thing, I think that's mostly a factor of playing on AI10, which is extremely grindy.

[darke]

Yeah, "neutering" the AI home planet to avoid the +100 progress is certainly possible, though I'd say it is a bit dangerous.  As for the "grind fest" thing, I think that's mostly a factor of playing on AI10, which is extremely grindy.

Yup.

Even my 10-planet/8-start-world game against them was Extreme Grind. Though I think that was probably contributed to by the knowledge starvation problems you have at that low number of planets, you really only have enough knowledge to get the bare minimum of stuff, so after a while it's just more-of-the-same. Really feels like it needed an extra 750 to 1000 knowledge per planet at that sort of cramped map so you could make meaningful decisions. I probably should try another game and cheat in another 8k of knowledge.

I need to do a bit of testing with the "neutering", but last time I used the tactic it wasn't too difficult, and I expect given the huge waves nowdays that you're expected to deal with, "only" having to worry about cleaning up a large spawn of ships in the center of the map every now and again seems almost a banal task.

[x4000]

Bear in mind that in recent versions, the AI home planets were not reinforcing properly (at all, basically), so it should be pretty different now.  I might also up the ship cap on the home AI planets so that those are never lowered no matter how much you neuter them, for instance.  I think that would make sense for something as important as their home planet.