Clarification regarding AI Command Stations

[Vinraith]

There are two things with respect to enemy command posts where the Wiki and my personal experience seem to differ, hopefully you guys can help clarify for me.

1) The Wiki seems to indicate that once the AI Command Station in a system is gone, the AI will receive no more reinforcements in that system. Is that correct? It seems like I'm seeing the AI reinforce the system even once the command station is down. Perhaps those ships are actually coming in from neighboring systems?

2) I'm unclear on the conditions that cause post guards in a system to become "freed" and swarm towards the wormhole I came from. The wiki indicates there's a 50% of this happening if I destroy a command post. Is that 50% per guard post, or for all posts in the system? Also, I swear I've gotten swarmed simply from firing on a command station without destroying it, does that cause it as well?

Thanks for any guidance you can provide.

[x4000]

To your questions:

1) You are correct, the AI can still reinforce there in many cases, usually because of a special forces guard post there or some other similar big structure.  Any big structure with Warp Gate - Reinforce works for reinforcements just as well as the AI command stations do.

2) It's 50% chance of that happening for the entire system all at once, it's not per-guard-post.  But usually ships under force fields will opt to stay put.  That's with them becoming literally free -- to your second question, about them sometimes swarming you when you just fire on the command station, that will happen about 100% of the time.  That doesn't free the ships, it just lets them move freely on that entire planet in the manner of a Tag Teamer AI.  So they can run over at your ships and attack them, and then they'll go back to their guard posts after that.  However, sometimes if they wind up chasing any of your ships they will actually become fully free, so you may see some ships break off from the pack during that sort of situation.

Hope that helps!

[Vinraith]

Thanks!

To your questions:

1) You are correct, the AI can still reinforce there in many cases, usually because of a special forces guard post there or some other similar big structure.  Any big structure with Warp Gate - Reinforce works for reinforcements just as well as the AI command stations do.

So the reinforce-Warpgate only attribute allows any structure with it to reinforce all posts in the system? That would match experience, then, as I always see that happen when there's still a Spec Ops post present. Now it makes sense!

2) It's 50% chance of that happening for the entire system all at once, it's not per-guard-post.  But usually ships under force fields will opt to stay put.  That's with them becoming literally free -- to your second question, about them sometimes swarming you when you just fire on the command station, that will happen about 100% of the time.  That doesn't free the ships, it just lets them move freely on that entire planet in the manner of a Tag Teamer AI.  So they can run over at your ships and attack them, and then they'll go back to their guard posts after that.  However, sometimes if they wind up chasing any of your ships they will actually become fully free, so you may see some ships break off from the pack during that sort of situation.

Hope that helps!

I must be seeing instances of chasing ships becoming fully free and misinterpreting it in some cases as all ships becoming free. That matches experience, actually, as sometimes the pursuit seems relatively light (though still present) and when I go back to the system there's still a lot of ships there.

OK, I think I get it now, thanks again for the clarification!

[x4000]

My pleasure!  Sounds like you've got it exactly right, yeah.

[keith.lamothe]

Wait, a planet with no command station but with a spec ops post will still be eligible for normal reinforcements (i.e. all posts including wormhole posts get stuff)?

Learn something new every day

[x4000]

Yep, you stated it exactly correctly.  Some of the other big things, like possibly Alarm Posts and similar, have an effect like that, too.  That sort of influx of ships can be particularly worrisome with the specops posts because so many guys spawn there in special forces mode, then see your guys and flip over to free, and suddenly you have minor battles you weren't expecting, etc.

[Vinraith]

Is it wrong that Keith not knowing that makes me feel better? 

[x4000]

 

[Dragon]

So if it has only guard posts, it won't get more troops?  Does that mean that I don't need to kill them (other then if I want to capture the planet), I just need to kill the Spec Post?

[x4000]

Yes, that is true.  Assuming you kill the command station and the special forces guard post, and anything else large with a "warp gate - full" or "warp gate - reinforce only," then that planet won't be getting any more reinforcements, so you can leave it be. 

You've already paid the AI Progress for that planet at that stage, though, so you probably want to go ahead and clear it out at least well enough to travel through it even if you don't want to capture it.  And it's still a risk for joining into a CPA, too, so that's another reason I tend to clear them off.

But if there are a bunch of guys under a really hard-to-kill force field or something, I've definitely left them alone while even capturing the planet in the past, it's certainly valid to do that.