Reactions to Ancient Shadows and Suggestions

[Cinth]

Thank RCIX. I went to check on what he was posting about and saw that mess

[RCIX]

You have to go into the UI, click on each slot individually and fill in a module, name and abbreviate it, save it, then apply to selection.

Actually you don't have to name, abbreviate, or save it.  Just make whatever changes you want to the current loadout and hit apply-to-selection.

Maybe make that button bigger and flashing?

[LaughingThesaurus]

Maybe make that button blue. =p

[bonesbro]

I'm playing my 4th scenario this game and it's just brutal.  It's the EE vs. SF mission.  Even taking out a couple of spawners early the SF builds ships much, much faster than the EE and they're steamrolling the map.  I've tried it three times now and can't even come close to winning.  I've been trying to kill enemy ships while staying in missile range of a spawner (ZS-DD with a shield and 3 Missile IIIs).

I just patched up to the version which added abilities, so we'll see how much shadow shield helps.  But right now it's really frustrating and feels unwinnable.

(Two AIs on diff 7 if it matters)

[Eternaly_Lost]

I'm playing my 4th scenario this game and it's just brutal.  It's the EE vs. SF mission.  Even taking out a couple of spawners early the SF builds ships much, much faster than the EE and they're steamrolling the map.  I've tried it three times now and can't even come close to winning.  I've been trying to kill enemy ships while staying in missile range of a spawner (ZS-DD with a shield and 3 Missile IIIs).

I just patched up to the version which added abilities, so we'll see how much shadow shield helps.  But right now it's really frustrating and feels unwinnable.

(Two AIs on diff 7 if it matters)

The three way battle(for the very first mission) is also rather brutal. The spawn of the AI each appears to be 1.5x what your allies are, and both sides just focus on killing you rather then each other. I really needed to run two Champions to be able to beat that, as they might as well be allies with how little they attack each other, meaning you are outgunned almost 4:1 with just 1 Champion there. I only won it when I got it second so I had the upgraded hull and weapons going into the fight. Without it, I need to slow down to -5 to Mirco enough to just hold the AI back, forget about winning that stupid fight.

It is filling up the void rather nicely, but in a slow and drawn out way... Can we get the spawn rate of those ships halfed or something? Because at the number they flow out at, as soon as my two Champions clear out a group, another one and a half spawns. That is with the AI doing what little it can to help.

[RCIX]

I'm playing my 4th scenario this game and it's just brutal.  It's the EE vs. SF mission.  Even taking out a couple of spawners early the SF builds ships much, much faster than the EE and they're steamrolling the map.  I've tried it three times now and can't even come close to winning.  I've been trying to kill enemy ships while staying in missile range of a spawner (ZS-DD with a shield and 3 Missile IIIs).

I just patched up to the version which added abilities, so we'll see how much shadow shield helps.  But right now it's really frustrating and feels unwinnable.

(Two AIs on diff 7 if it matters)

The three way battle(for the very first mission) is also rather brutal. The spawn of the AI each appears to be 1.5x what your allies are, and both sides just focus on killing you rather then each other. I really needed to run two Champions to be able to beat that, as they might as well be allies with how little they attack each other, meaning you are outgunned almost 4:1 with just 1 Champion there. I only won it when I got it second so I had the upgraded hull and weapons going into the fight. Without it, I need to slow down to -5 to Mirco enough to just hold the AI back, forget about winning that stupid fight.

It is filling up the void rather nicely, but in a slow and drawn out way... Can we get the spawn rate of those ships halfed or something? Because at the number they flow out at, as soon as my two Champions clear out a group, another one and a half spawns. That is with the AI doing what little it can to help.

The trick for that is to just stay defensive and pop ships till a few allies attack some of the Spire stuff, then use that as cover to start circle-kiting the Spire bases. Their beam attacks deal pitiful damage if you do that. the Neinzul are far too strong to do that straight up since you can't dodge their attacks, but the journal gives you a hint: "Individually, the Zenith would have an edge on either one of them, but there's 2" (or something to that effect)

Make sure to unlock/pack the missile launchers. You won't get far vs those bases without them.

[keith.lamothe]

On the 3-way scenario the enemies each actually have significantly lower spawn rates than the allies, but together they have more.

On the later scenarios, monday I'll put out a patch significantly reducing the scale-up that happens from later scenarios and more champions.  Enough distinct testers have said "Uncle!" that it's clear that the current numbers have accomplished the goal of dealing with the earlier problem of "every scenario after the first is trivial" and "taking multiple champions makes it really easy"

Just so you know, it's likely to take several iterations to get that part right, but it'll happen

[bonesbro]

It got a whole lot easier with after getting the abilities patch.  Shadow Shield to save my allies (or myself) turned an unwinnable fight into, well, something we won.

[bonesbro]

Also, I noticed didn't get a scenario in nebulas 5 and 6.  They were just completely empty.  Is this expected at the moment or should it have given me a dupe?

[TechSY730]

Also, I noticed didn't get a scenario in nebulas 5 and 6.  They were just completely empty.  Is this expected at the moment or should it have given me a dupe?

Sounds similar to 9305: nebula past third did not generate scenarios

[Nodor]

From playing with the tractor launcher ships.

1.  The 80K range for Military FRD needs to be looked at.  Having to turn FRD off and manually target the entire fleet to prevent it from being outside of the orange line.. by a lot is not best.
2.  8 Mk 1 Ships + 20 Sniper turrets + "something to handle a starship/golem/champion" can take out a 600 ship wave of bombers.   Being able to ignore bomber waves is "different".  (Except for the Champion units...  that required the rest of the fleet.) 
3.  Tractors seemed to send ships about 160K from the Drones.   Putting them in a quarter-circle around the edge of one side of the map, next to some sniper turrets meant that nothing got back to the center - and everything in it left almost immediately.

Suggestion: Halve or quarter the tractor lifespan/distance.  These things are sick and wrong in their current state.

[TechSY730]

Sounds like the new tackle drone launchers would be a certain winner of the next "what is so OP that it is detracting from the game and thus needs to be nerfed?" poll (Or as Keith put it far more "elegantly", what needs the nerf-bat ), except of course that these things are so new that Keith will probably take "off the cuff" feedback more seriously as there isn't much other feedback to go on yet.

[Ozymandiaz]

So far I am liking what I see in this expansion. I did not think you would expand AI War this way, but I really like it.

I foresee many hours of gaming in the coming months

[Coppermantis]

Yes, everytime I bring the tackle drones into an engagement there are inevitably a great many ships trapped in the gravity well. It's fairly annoying, actually, since almost nothing can actually reach them.

[keith.lamothe]

Yes, everytime I bring the tackle drones into an engagement there are inevitably a great many ships trapped in the gravity well. It's fairly annoying, actually, since almost nothing can actually reach them.

Is that still happening in 5.067?