Good read, although atypical to post something like this in the general section
Yes, I'm trying to use it to drum up some interest in the AAR section, as it is the most-ignored part of the forums presently.
I think many people don't see it or know what it is.
I indeed would agree that it seemed you tried to expand quickly - in my latest games against a special forces AI, I dont tend to go anywhere until 30-45 minutes in (I'm determined to beat a special forces one day <.< ) Then again, the timescale would probably step up a tad with more players, given the increased resource gain
Yeah, more players does change the dynamics some -- you tend to have more ships, and more to lose as time passes. And you need way more planets very quickly to sustain a comfortable economy. But still, we rushed into it way too much. We've beaten special forces captains a couple of times, but that was on various older versions of the game. I think they have grown more formidable since last we faced them.
Silly question then; Have you played against an alarmist often? It seems in your haste you didn't think properly of what alarmists would actually mean, especially with them in almost every other system
(note here, I dont even own the expansion, so I've never seen them :x )
I have not played against alarmists much, and we as a group never have. We've encountered alarm posts several times, but that's very different from having alarms everywhere. From my own experience in solo with the alarm posts (and my initial design of them as a unit) I of course knew what to expect -- what I didn't expect was how they combined with the speed boosters to create super-speedy-giant-waves of ships. Had it not been for the speed boosters, we would have been perfectly fine with the strategy we had. Alternatively, had it not been for the alarm posts, we would have been perfectly fine with just the speed boosters. Put them together, and I didn't anticipate the result.
EDIT: And then, after seeing that result, the second time I still did not expect the
severity of that result. When I lost my home command station, it was not clear just how badly I had been overwhelmed, since the cleanup went quickly. So my forces in the western planet seemed more likely to hold. But by the time I saw what was coming from those alarm posts, it was far too late to do anything about it, anyway. That's a case of where if I had been more observant earlier in the game, I could have made a better logical prediction and would have known to not use a general brute force tactic against the alarm. But so it goes when you're somewhat tired and still recovering from a protracted period of over-intense development.
