Save-scumming / Mastery of time-travel

[PokerChen]

Let me put it this way:
 "What do you mean, I'm not allowed time-mastery when the AI obviously have space-mastery?"

Anway, I wouldn't mind an iron-man mode - it's tempting to erase your mistakes as a Braid-lover.

[Catma]

Well I've only played a few games. I expect my temporal excursions will decrease as my playtime increases. I only use it if there's a very obvious mistake that makes me lose. I've used it forreals twice, in this last game. Once when I took out an AI homeworld right before a CPA, earning me a Mark III CPA instead of a II and making me lose; the other when I failed to attend to a CPA properly and died.

However, I do like to note important decision points, and save them for potential return later. This is the only time I'll use it without having first destroyed all humanity. Just think of it as viewing an alternate timeline, once you already know how the first timeline goes! 

[BobTheJanitor]

I abuse it pretty readily, I admit. Ironically, I'm also a big proponent of adding an optional ironman permadeath mode. Maybe I have such bad self control that I need to have the option completely taken away from me?

[eRe4s3r]

So far i never had a reason to save-scum but i do a 3-repeat save cycle so that in the event of some outlandish raid i can not actually lose. For a Golem i'd not do it neither for adv fabs. Game can always be won without them.

I would obviously save scum if i mess up the optional campaign victory thing like losing the first shard.. because when you commit to that you forgo the "offensive" strategy go go for homeworlds and then you can not afford switching mid-campaign (12+ hours)

[Orelius]

Most of the time, I don't abuse saves, but in some cases I do so anyway.  Namely, for example, sniping a command station a minute before the deadline so I can get the AIP reduction from it.

Generally, it's just after losses of golems though.

[HellishFiend]

Generally I never save scum, except in a few rare cases:

- If I lose an asset or engagement because of something unintentional (like, pushing the wrong button or mis-clicking)
- If I lose the game and know I could have prevented the loss, and feel I'd have more fun by going back and redoing it rather than starting a new game

Actually, both of those things have only happened once each, that I can think of. Generally I find both victories and losses more enjoyable if I take the ups and downs as they come. Plus, I would think that dealing with the consequences of save scumming would be just as aggravating as losing engagements or assets. Generally even a severely unfavorable occurrence on 7/7 like losing a golem, a vital system, or wiping your fleet, can be overcome unless your "grand strategy" choices and maneuvers are fundamentally flawed.

[Coppermantis]

If I lose something valuable for a stupid reason, like as HellishFiend said, mis-clicking and sending a botnet golem into a swarm of Zenith bombards, then I will save-scum. Or if I handle something badly, like a Fallen Spire Shard grab and take huge losses, I'll reload and establish better defenses that time. Other rage-inducing things, like losing to raid starships, taking terrible damage from a devourer, having my home command sniped by a regenerator golem  () I will accept the loss and move on, since that was a legitimate tactic on the AI's part.

[Wanderer]

I save scum like it was no tomorrow.  Part of that is I'm still learning the ins and outs of the strategies so I like to try different things, including some that seem inane, another part is that after 7 hours I'm just not willing to put with a raid starship loss that snuck in the backdoor.  I will, however, make sure I put up enough defenses to make sure it can't do it twice. :-)

[PokerChen]

I think my most aggravating mistakes are clicking on the command centre when I'm meant to just neuter the system... I tend to spend a lot of time in pause mode to evaluate likely enemies directions, what reinforcing planets to keep down, etc. - and so prepare (the minimum amount of) defenses better than most. Often I'd get there just in time while in incursion force is beating down the shields - playing schizophrenic waves makes the AI consistently dangerous, which is more predictable than risking pure bomber waves.

[zoutzakje]

In the past I used to save scum pretty often, but nowadays I only really savescum when I'm in serious danger. Mistakes like "whoops, didn't see that AI eye there" simply don't happen anymore. And if it does, I know how to deal with it. I make some losses yes, but I won't lose the game. I do save before every attack or incoming wave, just in case I happen to screw up big time.
I do pause a lot though. I simply like taking my time for all aspects of the game. Especially scouting. I always play with "view unexplored wormholes" off and extra fog of war, so I have to do all scouting manually, instead of just clicking somewhere on the galaxy map and watch them go. This would take an enormous amount of time without the pause button.

[_K_]

I stopped save scumming once i beat the 7.3/7.3 AIs for the first time.

Playing with no save scumming forces you to take all possible precautions, be prepared for everything, play skillfully and carefully. Possibility of savescumming just makes me play carelessly, ignoring potential threats because i know i can load a backup and make preparations retroactively if the threat happens to be real.
And when mistakes are made and game loss happens, its a lesson learned hard. I learned to always keep a bunch of reserve martyrs and rams at all times, not only 5 minutes before the particularly hard wave you KNOW is going to break your defences because it has already done that once, i learned to always monitor adjacent systems for AI ships to ensure i dont disturb it if I'm not ready for a counterattack, and so on.

[Shrugging Khan]

NEVAR!

Which, coincidentally, makes me play very carefully. Until I get frustrated by my own meticulous thoroughness and launch surprise attacks against everything. EVERYTHING.

After that, it's usually time to start a new game.

Need I mention that I never actually won?

[keith.lamothe]

Need I mention that I never actually won?

The AI likes players like you

[KingIsaacLinksr]

When I play Ai War, we don't usually bother with save scumming.  We take losses as part of the game and move on, which means we don't aren't ending perfectly.  We have gone back to a previous save if we feel we could save ourselves from a mistake we made.  (Like angering the AI at the wrong time) but that's only when that mistake costs us the game.  if we lose a Golem, oh well. 

King

[zoutzakje]

I abuse it pretty readily, I admit. Ironically, I'm also a big proponent of adding an optional ironman permadeath mode. Maybe I have such bad self control that I need to have the option completely taken away from me?

I actually really like this idea. I read about it before, but never put much thought into it until now. I'd defenitely would play most of my games with the permadeath option on. As _K_ said, being able to savescum makes you careless sometimes. If it wasn't for savescumming, I would not have won my hybrid game. I prefer learning the hard way.