The Impossible Challenge

[liq3]

I was going to call this the "Ultimate Challenge", but I think realised that's an understatement.

Ok, so, basically do this solo or with a team, doesn't matter, you're going to lose horribly and painfully have loads of fun.

So, what is this challenge? Simple, see how long you can survive with the following settings, then post your time and stories here.

Map: Anything, doesn't matter, you're going to lose have fun anyway.
 
Ship Tab:
Available ships: Complex
All boxes checked.

Game Options Tab:
Combat Style: Your choice.
AI Modifier: 2x enemy waves.
Visibility: Extra Fog of War
Auto AI Progress: 250 every 5 minutes.

Make the AIs both Difficulty 10 Scorched Earths, with 300% handicaps.

Now, go lose have fun!

[x4000]

Holy cow.   It will be very interesting to see what sort of times people can post on that. I'm very tempted to fire up the game and try that myself, actually, but I really should... be... coding...

[liq3]

Well, I just tried.

baseline is now 9:37. That's minutes:seconds btw.

[eRe4s3r]

Mhh, we need to have some kind of screenshot on death system or a game-report feature, otherwise its hard to keep track when exactly one is dead (how do you do that?)

But i will try this challenge now too  

Actually

Can you provide a savegame so that the challenge is more unified?
Asking because depending on start position and game-mode (SP/MP) times will vary a lot.

So if its a real challenge you gotta give a 0.01second at start save for every challenger ;p

[liq3]

Mhh, we need to have some kind of screenshot on death system or a game-report feature, otherwise its hard to keep track when exactly one is dead (how do you do that?)

But i will try this challenge now too  

Actually

Can you provide a savegame so that the challenge is more unified?
Asking because depending on start position and game-mode (SP/MP) times will vary a lot.

So if its a real challenge you gotta give a 0.01second at start save for every challenger ;p

Ehhhh the only problem with that is that it'll become too predictable. I'm mostly just setting the difficulty level, then letting people do whatever they want. It's not really a real real challenge where I'd enforce strict rules and such.

[eRe4s3r]

Well i got 9:39 - First thing to notice, the time resource extractors take to build sucks if do ANYTHING during that time, you 0 out on all resources very fast

I could have survived a lot longer with maximum resources, heh - MK3 shields seems like the only goal to strive for, that and MK2 or MK3 MRLS (turrets)

[x4000]

Well i got 9:39 - First thing to notice, the time resource extractors take to build sucks if do ANYTHING during that time, you 0 out on all resources very fast

I could have survived a lot longer with maximum resources, heh - MK3 shields seems like the only goal to strive for, that and MK2 or MK3 MRLS (turrets)

The next prerelease should alleviate a lot of this, interestingly.

[Warnstaff]

14:10! I put up exo-shields for my harvesters and about 80 turrets + force fields around my command station while producing as many ships as I could. I still think having 2 Mad Bomber AIs is harder as those bombers tend to destroy my bases very fast, but this challenge is all but impossible. I had the munitions booster ship BTW.

[liq3]

14:10! I put up exo-shields for my harvesters and about 80 turrets + force fields around my command station while producing as many ships as I could. I still think having 2 Mad Bomber AIs is harder as those bombers tend to destroy my bases very fast, but this challenge is all but impossible. I had the munitions booster ship BTW.

Yeh, but with 2 scorched earth AI it's all but impossible to actually win, which was the original goal before I realised it's probably impossible.

[Warnstaff]

The command stations provide resources as well, not as much as a harvester, but should be enough.

With the new 1.20B, my time went from 14:10 to 9:36 LOL!

[liq3]

The command stations provide resources as well, not as much as a harvester, but should be enough.

With the new 1.20B, my time went from 14:10 to 9:36 LOL!

That's the thing... You can't build command stations on planets that were 'nuked' by a Scorched Earth AI. So that means no adv factories, no extra harvs, no new comm stations, no adv research. :]

[Warnstaff]

Really? Didn't know that - usually play random and Scorched has never come up.

[CogDissident]

With 1.201C they don't even launch a single attack until 14 minutes in, for me anyway.

[liq3]

With 1.201C they don't even launch a single attack until 14 minutes in, for me anyway.

Yeh, the times will have to be version based.

[x4000]

With 1.201C they don't even launch a single attack until 14 minutes in, for me anyway.

Yeh, the times will have to be version based.

There's no difference in the timing of attacks between versions (although I agree that the times need to be version-based for other reasons). 

BUT, this does raise another point: essentially, there is a big random component to how frequently the AI sends waves.  If it sends a wave really fast it will be weaker, but if it waits longer it will be much stronger.  Since in this impossible challenge all waves are likely to be fatal, it is just going to randomize how quickly you are getting killed most likely, making the relative times semi-meaningless (a spread of 10-15 minutes is a statistical nonevent here).

What I suggest is this:  also consider how many waves each player survives.  If someone survives 2 waves in 10 minutes versus dying on the first wave after 20 minutes, the first case is a bit more impressive to me.