returning (newbie) player : questions

[LaughingThesaurus]

Oh no, I definitely know that they add a lot of Fun to the game. I generally avoid them just because I'm satisfied with the regular gameplay. Likewise, I'd suggest to most players just a sort of vanilla game maybe with only expansions enabled, to get a good feel for the main game, then add in the seasonings.

[Nibelung44]

yes, that's a bit of my philosophy, 'losing is fun', ala Dwarf fortress.

Back to questions, what are the ships the AI gets 'from thin air' and what are the ships which are drawn from the strategic reserve? Basically, how this reserve gets reinforced? I have read that CPA only take ships from the reserve and the map, but I guess on the other hand that exo attacks create ships just for this purpose?

Said differently, if I kill some random ships on a planet, will the AI compensate by weakening something else (the reserve, another planet) or will they come back for free after a timer?

[Tridus]

The AI gets a certain number of reinforcements every time it reinforces (which is on some kind of timer), and that number is based on AI Progress. More AI Progress = more reinforcements. Some of those go into the strategic reserve. You can shrink the reserve by attacking planets the AI will deploy it to defend, like the SuperTerminal or core worlds. The Reservist AI will use it more frequently, I think.

You can influence where the AI puts the ships it gets in normal reinforcements by putting worlds on alert. The AI only gets a certain number of ships each time it reinforces, and it favors putting worlds on alert. Few worlds on alert means the ships will primarily go to those worlds. Lots of worlds on alert will spread them out more.

So no, just killing ships won't do a lot, unless you put a world on alert doing it. That will send more reinforcements there, and thus fewer somewhere else. (That said, killing ships does mean fewer ships there, and you don't just want to let ships build up forever.)

[Nibelung44]

Thanks!

a) I don't find the shortcut to see AI weapon range?

b) my Zenith bombard don't fire on anything immobile like force field and guard post? Why? And why it is not written in description?

c) How do I rotate a fleet made of several formations I organized with the J key (maintain relative position).

d) why some of my ships like starships are in darker color when the rest is in bright blue? I did not put them in stand down. Same for AI ships, some are in darker colors?

e) I'm not sure what it means (1)Wave(2)Reinforce when on AI planets.

f) How can I produce more of a resource (except by taking mines and crystals)? In previous version you could convert energy to a specific resource I think.

g) My storage capacity is limited to 999.999 (yes, that's already quite a lot), is it possible to augment that?

[LaughingThesaurus]

Thanks!

a) I don't find the shortcut to see AI weapon range?

b) my Zenith bombard don't fire on anything immobile like force field and guard post? Why? And why it is not written in description?

c) How do I rotate a fleet made of several formations I organized with the J key (maintain relative position).

d) why some of my ships like starships are in darker color when the rest is in bright blue? I did not put them in stand down. Same for AI ships, some are in darker colors?

e) I'm not sure what it means (1)Wave(2)Reinforce when on AI planets.

f) How can I produce more of a resource (except by taking mines and crystals)? In previous version you could convert energy to a specific resource I think.

g) My storage capacity is limited to 999.999 (yes, that's already quite a lot), is it possible to augment that?

a) Hold z and mouse over a ship to see its range. Hold z and x simultaneously to see the range of everything on the planet.

e) Those are the warp gates on the planet. Each wave warp gate can send a wave to its own planet or any adjacent planet. Each reinforce warp gate can warp in reinforcements to each guard post and stuff. AI Command Stations also warp in reinforcements so I don't believe you can actually get rid of it completely. The warp gate is both warp and reinforcements.

f) You can upgrade harvesters, but that's all. There used to be manufactories, but now they operate automatically when you're out of a resource.

g) You can't increase your resource storage capacity.

[Tridus]

b) my Zenith bombard don't fire on anything immobile like force field and guard post? Why? And why it is not written in description?

It is, just not in the description of the bombard. If you look at the ammo type of the bombard, they fire "antimatter bombs".

AI forcefields (and a lot of other things) are immune to antimatter bombs. You can see that in the immunities list of the AI buildings. I assume it was done because otherwise higher mark bombard fleets could one shot almost anything from the other side of the planet.

d) why some of my ships like starships are in darker color when the rest is in bright blue? I did not put them in stand down. Same for AI ships, some are in darker colors?

The AI has ships in different colors because there's two AI players, and the default colors are red and darker red. If you change one of the colors in the new game lobby, you can make them stand out a bit more.

I don't know why you have multiple colors, unless you've got multiple players or you have zombie ships (taken with a botnet golem or insanity inducers). Zombies are a different color and you can't control them.

e) I'm not sure what it means (1)Wave(2)Reinforce when on AI planets.

As LaughingThesaurus said, that's the number of AI warp gates. Reinforce gates let the AI bring ships to defend the planet. Wave gets let the AI launch waves to attack you from that planet. If you take out all of the wave gates (the warp gate primarily), the AI can't launch waves from that planet. Doing this creates AIP, but sometimes you want the AI to launch waves at a specific planet and this lets you make it do that (kill the other ones near you except ones next to that planet(

f) How can I produce more of a resource (except by taking mines and crystals)? In previous version you could convert energy to a specific resource I think.

Take more territory. Alternately you can upgrade your harvesters using the science lab to produce more. Economic command stations also produce more than the other options, particularly if upgraded (I don't upgrade econ stations personally, I do upgrade harvesters).

g) My storage capacity is limited to 999.999 (yes, that's already quite a lot), is it possible to augment that?

Nope. But what you can do is when it gets that high, turn on a mercenary space dock and start building mercenary ships. Those are VERY expensive, but powerful ships. You don't want to waste any resources by sitting at the resource cap.

You can automate this if you select a mercenary space dock and push CTRL+0 to put it into group 0. Then go into the CTRLS menu (bttom right), and the control group specific tab set the resource limit for group 0 to 1800000. That'll have the mercenary dock only start building when you're near the cap, so it'll stop if you build anything else.

[Nibelung44]

Thanks a lot for all the explanations!

I'm returning to a question, is it worthy to try killing AI ships, just to force the strategic reserve replace them, so they don't go somewhere else? I'm again thinking about how the AI gets its ships. if for a given AIP it gains X ships every y minutes, then each ship I kill is a good thing, no?

Or this war of attrition can't be won?

forgot a Q: how to tell a group of ship to escort another group?

[LaughingThesaurus]

The AI will get its ships back eventually, but until it does, you can theoretically deplete the amount of ships it actually has by killing them. I think it's worth it to kill the strategic reserve until it runs out, but it will come back. It'll buy you some time though.

You can have one group of ships escort another by selecting all of the ships that'll be moving, and group moving them together. That way your military won't leave the defenseless ship in the space dust.

[Nibelung44]

ok thanks.

I find the space planes a real pain in the rear... I know the theory, tachyons, but still, they are fast, can't be hit from afar and not seen except in tachyon range!!