Arcen Games

General Category => AI War II => AI War II - Lore, Vfx, Sfx, Code, & Meta => : Captain Jack September 15, 2016, 06:58:02 PM

: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Captain Jack September 15, 2016, 06:58:02 PM
Hi everyone!

I've been thinking a lot about social media. It's a very powerful tool for outreach and connecting with fans but it needs a constant stream of fuel to keep going. To build up hype for the imminent Kickstarter we should be celebrating the game we have and reminding people of the good times they had with it.

Here's our starting point on Twitter. (https://twitter.com/ArcenGames/status/776223654308933636) We want to add to that, so here's what we're after:


Anything you post in this thread is fair game for posting. Let us know what attribution you want, otherwise we'll just go with your forum handle.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Cinth September 15, 2016, 07:29:28 PM
what exactly that quote in Cinth's signature is about
That's actually Keith's story.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Dominus Arbitrationis September 16, 2016, 12:56:19 AM
Here's a screenshot from https://steamcommunity.com/id/incredidave
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Draco18s September 16, 2016, 01:11:36 AM
I might be able to dig up a semi-AAR of the last game I ever won, the one I refer to when I say "you can thank me for transports having out-of-supply attrition."  'cause I'm pretty certain it was my posting about it that got that change added.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: tadrinth September 16, 2016, 01:51:04 AM
You may remember that there was an ARS in my arm of the galaxy.  You may be wondering why I didn't capture it yet.

That would be because it offers Gravity Drains by default, which I could design download, and Lightning Torpedo Frigates as a hackable option.  All hail the RNG! For without it's blessings, surely we would be lost!  I'm going to hack that ARS.  But, not until I have my champions as ridiculously pimped out as I can manage beforehand.

Unfortunately, a wild CPA appears and distracts me. 

That's from my extremely silly AAR titled 'Limburger vs the Angry Gods'.  http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,15770.0.html

Might be some other amusing bits in there. 
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: kasnavada September 16, 2016, 02:15:12 AM
Is there some guidelines, like whatever is on that twitter should be understandable by people that don't play AI War ?
::)

I'm asking that because, besides not being on twitter myself, nor being PR representative... that there is probably a few simple things to know to "lure" people in rather than scare them away. For example, "fans" ramblings of Eve Online always disgusted me with their "WE ARE THE HARDCORE, YOU'RE THE CAREBEAR" attitude (shouldn't have said that, it's troll bait).
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Captain Jack September 16, 2016, 02:18:47 AM
Is there some guidelines, like whatever is on that twitter should be understandable by people that don't play AI War ?
::)

I'm asking that because, besides not being on twitter myself, nor being PR representative... that there is probably a few simple things to know to "lure" people in rather than scare them away. For example, "fans" ramblings of Eve Online always disgusted me with their "WE ARE THE HARDCORE, YOU'RE THE CAREBEAR" attitude (shouldn't have said that, it's troll bait).
That helps to be sure! But I'm also editing anything that we get to make the affection clear and cut out most of the smug.

I'm really more interested in the mechanics of stuff. What are the things in the game that sold you on AI War? Better yet, what version did they show up?
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: kasnavada September 16, 2016, 02:31:16 AM
What sold me on AI War ?

AI is always dumb in any games, because it's difficult, at best, to have an AI play as a person. In AI War, Arcen didn't waste their time trying to make the AI play like a human. It has its own its rules, designed so it really understands how to use them. Let the better win !
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Misery September 16, 2016, 03:00:38 AM
Hm, I don't have too much interesting to show since I'm not exactly hugely experienced with the game here... but I can say that the thing that sold me on the game is that it's an RTS where the actual strategy really matters instead of just how fast you can mash the keyboard.  It's the Dwarf Fortress of RTS games to me, and the complexity promised tons and tons of replay value.  Tons of cool units and things, and best of all, an AI that's capable of DOING stuff.   It takes everything that I always wanted the RTS genre to be, does those things, and then adds a million other awesome things on top of it.

: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Pumpkin September 16, 2016, 07:13:20 AM
Created Tweeter account. Followed Arcen Games and AI War. Not sure what to do now...
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Mánagarmr September 16, 2016, 08:31:55 AM
Created Tweeter account. Followed Arcen Games and AI War. Not sure what to do now...
My greatest condolences. Twitter is a cesspit of pointless and often inflammatory blurbs for the most part.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: tadrinth September 16, 2016, 10:43:29 AM
A chunk of the AAR for my current game, which is inspired by the Light of the Spire expansion.  If it has spire in the name, it's on... including the AI type 'Crafty Spire' which starts with Spirecraft superweapons on many AI planets.  This is 1 minute and 20 seconds on the game clock. 

So that’s why Crafty Spire is RED difficulty

I send out the champion to start clearing the first planet.  Then, something unexpected shows up.

That’s an angry Spirecraft Translocator.  What did I do to make it angry?  Better build some more HBCs... I retreat back to Home; no idea if I have enough stuff to fend it off if it follows me.

Oddly, it doesn’t.  In fact, it falls back somewhere outside my scouting range.  That’s really weird, Threat doesn’t do that.  And what did I do to make it angry?

I decide this merits some testing.  Queue up a sandbox game with complete vis. Sure enough, the instant I leave my home planet with a military unit, EVERY SPIRECRAFT IN THE GALAXY CHARGES FORTH. I retreat back, in hopes that they all go back to their home planets, but no. That would be too easy.

They all meet up at a planet three hops out. Every last spirecraft in the galaxy, chilling on that planet. Rams, Martyrs, Shieldbearers, Siege Towers, and Translocators, at least. 

That’s when I figure it out.  There is an AI behavior that rushes to defend AI planets, doesn’t attack human planets, and hangs out 3 hops away in a collected fleet.  That’s what Special Forces does.

All of those spirecraft... are SF.  That is the scariest SF fleet I’ve encountered to date, and I’m not even 10 minutes in.  I guess that’s where the ‘Crafty’ part comes in. 

This might end up being the most guerilla campaign I’ve done. 
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Captain Jack September 16, 2016, 02:34:23 PM
Created Tweeter account. Followed Arcen Games and AI War. Not sure what to do now...
Make connections. See if there are other Arcen folk on Twitter and follow them along with the people who are commenting on our Twitter feed going back... two months. Try starting conversations with them! Follow some game reviewers and streamers who've talked about AI War in the past, and try sounding them out in a week or so. In the meantime post content, but not just about Arcen/AI War since no one likes a PR bot. Post cat pictures, comments about restaurants you visit (without naming names), comment on current events without being a jerk and try to show you're a real person... who really likes Arcen games.  :D

A chunk of the AAR for my current game, which is inspired by the Light of the Spire expansion.  If it has spire in the name, it's on... including the AI type 'Crafty Spire' which starts with Spirecraft superweapons on many AI planets.  This is 1 minute and 20 seconds on the game clock. 

So that’s why Crafty Spire is RED difficulty

I send out the champion to start clearing the first planet.  Then, something unexpected shows up.

That’s an angry Spirecraft Translocator.  What did I do to make it angry?  Better build some more HBCs... I retreat back to Home; no idea if I have enough stuff to fend it off if it follows me.

Oddly, it doesn’t.  In fact, it falls back somewhere outside my scouting range.  That’s really weird, Threat doesn’t do that.  And what did I do to make it angry?

I decide this merits some testing.  Queue up a sandbox game with complete vis. Sure enough, the instant I leave my home planet with a military unit, EVERY SPIRECRAFT IN THE GALAXY CHARGES FORTH. I retreat back, in hopes that they all go back to their home planets, but no. That would be too easy.

They all meet up at a planet three hops out. Every last spirecraft in the galaxy, chilling on that planet. Rams, Martyrs, Shieldbearers, Siege Towers, and Translocators, at least. 

That’s when I figure it out.  There is an AI behavior that rushes to defend AI planets, doesn’t attack human planets, and hangs out 3 hops away in a collected fleet.  That’s what Special Forces does.

All of those spirecraft... are SF.  That is the scariest SF fleet I’ve encountered to date, and I’m not even 10 minutes in.  I guess that’s where the ‘Crafty’ part comes in. 

This might end up being the most guerilla campaign I’ve done.
:o

Sweet Jesus that's incredible, and exactly what I'm looking for.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Pumpkin September 16, 2016, 02:40:05 PM
Post cat pictures, comments about restaurants you visit (without naming names), comment on current events without being a jerk and try to show you're a real person... who really likes Arcen games.
You asks me to have... a... real tweeter account? Meh! Why do you think I didn't have one before?!

Sweet Jesus that's incredible, and exactly what I'm looking for.
Something like that too?
I often feel "Neinzul" when I (ab)use the MkI-IV ENclave Starship + Combat Carrier.

I also remember a wonderful game where I had the chance to unlock three youngling designs: I maxed them all up to MkIV, unlocked the Mobile Space Dock, let everything else as defensive fleet, and went storming AI space with my MSD (loop-build on 3x4=12 caps of younglings and FDR: as the MSD has no gun, with a FRD order, it goes straight to the target, but everything that comes out of it inherit FRD and spread toward enemies.)

It was like controlling dozens of friendly Roaming Enclaves. It's a golden memory I truly cherish.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Captain Jack September 16, 2016, 03:03:17 PM
Post cat pictures, comments about restaurants you visit (without naming names), comment on current events without being a jerk and try to show you're a real person... who really likes Arcen games.
You asks me to have... a... real tweeter account? Meh! Why do you think I didn't have one before?!
Because keeping a social media presence can be work. I had to ditch my Twitter account because it was eating productivity. It's possible to have fun with it though! Pick a few things to follow in game dev, science fiction, pop culture, real science, and just post two or three times a day.

I often feel "Neinzul" when I (ab)use the MkI-IV ENclave Starship + Combat Carrier.

I also remember a wonderful game where I had the chance to unlock three youngling designs: I maxed them all up to MkIV, unlocked the Mobile Space Dock, let everything else as defensive fleet, and went storming AI space with my MSD (loop-build on 3x4=12 caps of younglings and FDR: as the MSD has no gun, with a FRD order, it goes straight to the target, but everything that comes out of it inherit FRD and spread toward enemies.)

It was like controlling dozens of friendly Roaming Enclaves. It's a golden memory I truly cherish.
That's pretty good yeah. What I want from it though is to know why you like feeling neinzul, and if you have any memorable victories or defeats using this strategy.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: kasnavada September 16, 2016, 03:42:31 PM
@captain jack: just trying to understand here, but stuff that's going to sound like klingon to "outsiders" is ok ? Then... My biggest story around here has to be this one:

AI war : knowledge is power.
Once upon a time, the Arcen forums bruised with activity, some discussions were done, and a challenge arised. It's not possible to win a game with spending 10k knowledge, people said. A few days later, at 2h30 AM in the morning, some newbie had done it.

He detailed his strategy :
- rush advanced research station.
- scout / neuter as much as possible up to 3 system away from colonized systems / reduce AIP with the CP and DC.
- regroup some stuff so you do not die against exos.
- take some more planets (core shield)
- take out the first AI.
- reinforcements start to become annoying, you have to intensify clean-up so you can still pass from system to system (scout 2 was taken because it was necessary to see what happend to be able to do the clean-up properly).
- take the last research station which I completely forgot about
- take out the second AI.

He went to bed. Next day he found out he stirred the forum with alarming posts (extracts):
Keeeeeiiiiiiith! Balance problem! :)
You won on 7/7 while spending only 500 knowledge (on scouts).  This is absurd ;)
I agree, but there's a huge difference between "not hardcore" and "you can win even if you ignore the entire Knowledge mechanic" ;)

Much discussion then occured, and thus started the story of how a self-initiated challenge removed mark-2 ships from ARS, forever.

With Arcen, devs care: suggestions, challenge, everything you do can make a difference. In my case, make everyone hate me (a bit). Well =).

Complete post (for reference).
https://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,12915.0.html
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Captain Jack September 16, 2016, 03:50:55 PM
*cackling*

I had NO IDEA this was a thing, this is great. I'll actually want to work with you to expand this out into a longer narrative if that's all right.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: kasnavada September 16, 2016, 03:57:56 PM
*cackling*

I had NO IDEA this was a thing, this is great. I'll actually want to work with you to expand this out into a longer narrative if that's all right.

Sure :D. Twas 3 years ago so I forgot some of it. You do have the "source" material too.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: kasnavada September 16, 2016, 04:23:32 PM
Found it again.
https://arcengames.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=AI_War:Current_Post-6.000_Beta#Revising.2FPolishing_Expansion_Stuff

Important part I think, the Arcen process where people are credited for what they've done, and inspired. And, their fast response to issues. I mean, it was about 5 days between report & release.

Prerelease 6.024 The Squeaky Wheel Gets The Buff (or Nerf)
(Released April 29th, 2013)
(...)
Advanced Research Stations now no longer give MkII of their bonus type for free, but:
    They now grant 500 extra Knowledge immediately upon capture.
    Not directly related to ARS's, but related to Knowledge balance: researching a MkIII triangle or bonus ship type now costs 4000 instead of 6000.
        The idea being that we're no longer going to count "You get MkIVs of this type if you also have an advanced factory" when computing the cost of these. In theory that yields a cost of 3750 but we went with 4000 since mkIII units are slightly more than 1.5x as useful as MkIIs. We're not yet sure of whether to apply this same philosophical change to MkIII starship costs, as the balance of those is still very much in flux.
    Thanks to kasnavada, TechSY730, Hearteater, Cinth, LaughingThesaurus, Wingflier, Winge, chemical_art, Kahuna, Faulty Logic, Zeyurn, and others for inspiring these changes.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Draco18s September 16, 2016, 05:05:28 PM
Ah, here it is.

The Electric Glow of Turtle Soup (https://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,5775.msg42640/topicseen.html#msg42640)

Zenith trader came though.  We bought a Planetary Shield Inhibitor.  Next time around, a Black Hole Machine, unlocked Grav Turret Mk2 and dropped two of those down.  Next trade ship we went "what else can we buy?  HOW ABOUT A SUPERFORTRESS?"  So I did.  [...]  I had enough resource income that at the current rate of Wasted Resources 101 I could speed build the Super Fortress for fifteen minutes and get it half-completed.

Footnote about transports: Our previous game had found that we could go 7 jumps before the transport died.  [So we jumped 7 systems out], set up a temporary base to get the regen, and jumped another 6 systems out for an Advanced Factory.  I am certain that it was my posting about [that previous game] that got the Transport attrition rate upped to its current value of 35%.  Which I fully support, as being able to get that far out in hostile territory with a huge fleet is way too much.

I can't find any prior AAR, just a comment on how to use transports to assault the homeworlds.

It's worth looking at the couple of linked screenshots, too.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: tadrinth September 17, 2016, 07:27:05 AM
I think this is already in the marketing materials, but if not, may I suggest the best line from Peter Ebbesen's Ride the Lightning AAR:

Playing AI War is a bit like playing whack-a-mole, only with armed moles, an ever increasing number of mole-holes to keep track of, a rubber mallet, and moles that smile knowingly at you all the time, even as the mallet descends.

That AAR is epic and while I think that's the best quote from it, there are probably some other good ones. 
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Pumpkin September 18, 2016, 11:49:58 AM
Post cat pictures, comments about restaurants you visit (without naming names), comment on current events without being a jerk and try to show you're a real person... who really likes Arcen games.
You asks me to have... a... real tweeter account? Meh! Why do you think I didn't have one before?!
Because keeping a social media presence can be work. I had to ditch my Twitter account because it was eating productivity. It's possible to have fun with it though! Pick a few things to follow in game dev, science fiction, pop culture, real science, and just post two or three times a day.
Twitter spammed me with emails. Beside, I'm not interested in that kind of activity. Supporting Arcen a thing; talking about my like on a social media is another. Account deleted.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Draco18s September 18, 2016, 11:59:10 AM
You can unsubscribe from the emails (and by type, e.g. only getting an email when someone mentions you)

But I completely understand.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: chemical_art September 18, 2016, 03:39:37 PM
Here's a screenshot from https://steamcommunity.com/id/incredidave

It is exactly those kind of situations that I love fireflies.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Dominus Arbitrationis September 18, 2016, 11:16:09 PM
It was not an exciting story however feel free to dress it up a bit.

When I first saw it. My first though was mainly to find a Achilles heel if you will. It was not easy to find something that worked short-term. I looked at everything I had available and then unlocked more. It did not help that I had no idea what to expect. Dive into the deep end first if you will. My biggest problem was time.

So I basically brought time by having one of the shipyard (one of those mk V fabricator don't' recall which one it was) that somehow escape the destruction behind GSC build ships as rapidly as they could. Each time a new ship show up behind the GSC it would stop and turn around back and waste time getting to my HQ command station.

As soon I had everything built except for that one shipyard. I threw everything at it and manage to stop it a few hops away from my HQ command station.

This was before they toned it down. Otherwise it was small game since I set the AI to 1/1 to completely focus on experience the GSC firsthand.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Vyndicu September 19, 2016, 12:03:57 AM
Found a very old screenshot. The numbers on top screen for threat is actual number of ships not "firepower". I think this was one of the most laggiest AI war game I ever had. This actually inspired one of the dev to change dark spire spawns so that if total x already exist in a galaxy. Then each 10 x would instead become a stronger y for performance reason alone.

I caused this to happened purely by accident. I thought that the neinzul spawned by roaming friendly enclave carrier would NOT contribute to spawn dark vengeance and I had a regeneration golem to prevent anything from contribute (that part did indeed worked).

Turn out that was a deadly mistake on my part! Each time the AI would show up at the choke hold system Swoverko which also happens to host a dark spire vengeance sphere. I had fortress (champions) with module to spawn neinzul. My friendly neinzul enclave carrier were in the 15 and could easily spawn enough neinzul to kill a hunter/killer mk1. The trouble was not that bad at first. I expected them to show up anyway and decide to have some fun. It was not until much much later that dark spire vengeance start to kill "everything" that the trouble really started.

At that point they had enough roaming ships to essentially locked me down in Swoverko. I could not get a command station start up in Murdoch to get the friendly enclave carrier move over there.

Also notice how everything I scouted were all on alerted? Heheh. None of them were on alert from anything I had. What I had in those area were scouts only.

I would say roughly 99% of those were dark spire vengeance ships roaming and knocking on the AI's homeworld (already cleaned out the mk 4 system next door). You can see me scouting and seem like the only place that remain almost untouched by this swarm is bottom left branch as my scout can't go past the tachyon station there.

Why did I put my chokehold there in Swoverko and not Murdoch? Funny story that. Notice how some of the branch in my corner in the bottom right all were THREE hops exactly across Laslovgor to Swoverko except for two branchs?

Well to min-max my territory for spire cities. I put them the following systems: Dintune and Gicitio and Swoverko. See how the hops from Dintune and Giocitio fall exactly on third hop at swoverko so I could make use of my fallen spire cities on the chokehold. Spire cities need to be 3 hops apart and it just happens that map layout like this allow me to put lot of cities behind a chokehold or two.

Lesson learned NEVER ever ever make a dark spire vengeance system a chokcehold FOR any sane reason ever!

(http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/253714756089205160/5155367BD5C8F5FAC4B60ABDFA397CF7911A744E/)
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: chemical_art September 19, 2016, 08:57:43 AM

Lesson learned NEVER ever ever make a dark spire vengeance system a chokcehold FOR any sane reason ever!

When they first came out they were strong enough to wipe a 10/10 AI which made things more manageable. Of course you (the player) had to manage to outlast what the AI could not, but the payout was amazing.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Vyndicu September 19, 2016, 12:09:28 PM

Lesson learned NEVER ever ever make a dark spire vengeance system a chokcehold FOR any sane reason ever!

When they first came out they were strong enough to wipe a 10/10 AI which made things more manageable. Of course you (the player) had to manage to outlast what the AI could not, but the payout was amazing.

In my game they were strong enough to actually prevent nearly ALL exo-wave/CPA and the likes from reaching my chokehold at all. So in effectively they manage to neuter any dangerous from AI itself heh. It was rare for a minor faction in my game to do that in any shape or form. Of course fallen spire campaign is an exception.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Captain Jack September 20, 2016, 04:31:53 PM
So my social media work is about ready to start coming. We'll be scheduling it ahead of time which certainly won't come back to haunt me at all.  ::)

Before that gets started, can I ask another favor? Can anyone name content or mechanics that were introduced in the expansions that made their way back to the base game?

I also need the major game changing mechanics changes.  I already have things like "remove crystal" and "hacking" and "per planet turrets". CSGs I guess?
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: tadrinth September 20, 2016, 06:07:57 PM
You're looking for stuff that was a big deal but wasn't listed as a major feature of a new expansion, yeah?

I skimmed back through the patch notes to the 5.0 release, here's the big stuff that jumped out:

Salvage and reprisal were big changes to the base game. 

There was the great 'Divide health and damage by 100' change.

There have been MULTIPLE iterations of the 'homeworld assault counter-exo' mechanic; didn't exist, then launched exos whenever a core guard post died, then launched those exos but from the attacked AI homeworld, then the current system is that you have 10 mins to kill the homeworld once you start or a BIG exo launches.

Champions got a new champion-nemesis exogalactic strike force response, as well as threat and defending nemesis responses.  And an alternate progression mechanic, which is hugely popular for people that have played the same nine nebulas 800 times.

Carriers got totally overhauled; now if you damage a carrier, it damages the ships inside, and if the carrier is empty it despawns.  That's a HUGE improvement over the old version where a dying carrier would merge its carried ships into... interesting things to avoid the ship count on the current planet getting too high.  Oh, and carriers do more damage the more ships they contain.

Bullheaded targeting: carriers and some other things go straight for your fortresses and command stations, ignoring everything else.

Threat logic: the AI is now very sneaky about attacking you when your military force is far away or occupied in battle, or if your planets are already under attack. 

Warheads got changed from 'X damage to everything within range' to 'X damage total, capped at Y damge per target', and you also can only build one per minute.  That was a huuuge balance improvement.  By which I mean, a nerf to Kahuna and various other masters who were otherwise unstoppable. 

Reinforcement and wave logic were both heavily overhauled; they're both now based on strength budgets which accumulate over time, reinforcements track debt per planet, at high AIP reinforcement strength gets redirected to waves which is freaking terrifying, etc.

Golems got rebalanced (no more attrition, gigantic buffs).  Spirecraft also got tweaked; siege towers and ion blasters became oversized plasma siege starships and translocating spire railclusters, which are both amazing to have on your side.

Special Forces got Riot Control Starships (and there was *much* gnashing of teeth).  Somehow, this is Faulty Logic's fault, even though he didn't inspire this on purpose. 

Astro trains got totally overhauled and are a colossal pain in the ass now. 

Map untangling!

Batch auto explore for scouts (also auto-explore and auto-pick behaviors). 

Enclave Starships went through a bunch of overhauls. 

Planets got ship-type preferences to increase planet 'feel' variety (AI Reinforcement Focus).

AIs unlock particular guardians like they do fleet ships, rather than just having access to all of them, increasing variety between games.

Motherfreaking CPA + Exo + Wave synchronization: if a CPA launches, any Exos that are 60% charged will *also* launch at the same time, and any waves that are sufficiently charged will try to launch 90s after the CPA.  Oh, and CPAs now launch in carriers. 

Roaming Enclaves were revamped to be a smart, coherent fleet that you can give high-level directives to; these guys are like having a friendly player around that can act independently and sensibly enough to be a major asset.

Back in the day, the ships in waves were all the current tech level of the AI; then it was changed so that they gradually transition to the next higher mark to avoid suddenly difficulty spikes in waves. 

Various AI mechanics got added at some point, before my time:
* Deepstrike mechanic: if you send ships too deep into AI territory, it spawns threat to discourage such behavior.
* Strategic reserve: the AI has a reserve of strength it can use to spawn ships to defend important worlds that come under attack, especially the homeworlds. Always has spiders, and as of the most recent expansion, it also always has Powerslavers.
* Special Forces: hangs out in AI territory and rushes to defend AI planets that come under attack
* Threat-fleet: freed AI ships that can't find a good way to hit the player will back off into a single coherent fleet and wait for an opening

The energy system got reworked from some horrendously complicated system to 'every planet gets 150k energy' + 'matter converters give 50k energy but -200 metal/s'. 

A bunch of minor factions got changed to have intensity sliders instead of just being on/off. 

'Helper' player type was added, so you can add a friend mid-game and have them help coordinate ships but not add any extra units to the game (basically an observer that can have shared unit control).

Do you want things that are always-on if you have that expansion enabled? Things like:

Coprocessors, the Superterminal, Core Turret Controllers, Dire Guardian Lairs, Spire Archives, all the 'brutal' core guard posts.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Vyndicu September 20, 2016, 07:40:43 PM
Armor used to have a VERY different logic than they do today. Made to be simplified and easy to understood (happened roughly at the same time as divide by 100 hp/damage change).

You used to have to "reroll" map seed if you want a certain ship type at map start. You can now right click and pick what you want if you had a map you liked enough as opposite to find map and ship type you want together.

It used to be that if you lose your rare "unique structure such as core fabiractor Spire ram". You couldn't build any more afterward. Now with hacking system you could gain permanent access even if it died.

Additional of a turret-per-planet cap. They mostly were used to be galaxy wide capped (mostly because turret controller mk V are still galaxy wide capped and especially the HBC line). Fortress used to be all galaxy capped as well until we got mini-forts.

In the past AI command station (especially 3 to 4 mark) would sometime through sheer luck manage to get a combination of stuff that would be "painful in the rear end" than on average to break through for conquest or neutering purpose. But otherwise were MOSTLY themselves unremarkable. Now? Planetary Subcommander on purpose put guard post and other stuff in a way that is on purpose designed to inflict pain on top of the subcommander unique command station's planet-wide effect!

A new CTRLS (configuration of autonomous behavior) was introduced in 4.0.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Captain Jack September 22, 2016, 03:52:03 AM
Hey all, thanks a bunch for your suggestions! I've just got with some Fleet Command trivia. Take a look in the morning and tell me what needs emphasis or further commentary about the base game!
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: chemical_art September 22, 2016, 04:55:12 AM
I am not a master of this game. Others have done that. I have only done one bug,


Those evil dark spire. Yes them. We get along perfectly. They are not as strong as I like. We both agree that is sad. We have a mutual agreement vs 10/10 AI that we miss.

For PR terms, I guess you would say one of the "minor" factions is wanting payback against the "unbreakable" 10/10 AI. I feel like that is gamesmanship enough.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: RockyBst September 22, 2016, 06:03:29 PM
This might be a decent source of material, if a bit old: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,13491.msg153119.htm . And of course the classic 'This AI is awesome' thread.

Alright, I promised I'd pull out some bits and bobs you can potentially use. These are from random posts, the LP on LP-Archive and my AARs:

I have met the enemy, and he is a mini-fortress: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,16172.msg178867.html#msg178867

Sooo, Mimes.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/mimmmmmmes.png)

I was not expecting that.

Super-Terminal Rebalancing: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,16265.msg179842.html

p.s, for those wondering:

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/ohGodShips.png)

Why yes, that is 76 million threat mere seconds before my game desynced and crashed.

Cheese.png - This was back before the carrier changes when we still had the chipper shredder mechanism in place, and didn't work out quite as well as I'd hoped - http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,13934.msg158445.html#msg158445

A tale in three screenshots.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/special.jpg)
(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/forces.jpg)
(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/ow.jpg)

Yes, chase that champion ... ignore the cloaked martyrs floating just off the port bow.

EDIT: <Chipper Shredder Stuff> Uh, did I just spawn myself a threatball full of max level guardians?

Regen Golems - http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,13000.msg145421.html#msg145421

So, the new regen golem is awesome. Perhaps a little too awesome, considering I just saw one crank out a botnet golem for about 40% of its health.

Remarkably good trolling - (Somewhere in All Creatures Great and Small)

By the way, when did tractors start dragging away mobile rally points to other planets? That is really irritating.
That's a remarkably good troll on the AI's part. Fixed in 7.021, regrettably.

From somewhere in the LP:

So, AI progress. As I mentioned before, it's a rough indication of how aware of you the AI is. Think of it like a peace keeping troop deployment. You start off with a lightly armed foot patrol, which after a few 'accidents' expands to some dudes in a Humvee. Then tanks, and large scale troops deployments, and napalm. Eventually, if you rile them up enough, the AIs will start sending motherships and Hunter/Killers after you. This is roughly the equivalent of para-dropping a fully operation Nimitz class aircraft carrier into the local village pond.

Zombie Redirection: First mentioned http://lparchive.org/AI-War-Fleet-Command/Update%2016/ , I'm sure there's somewhere else further on in the LP where I use it against a CPA or something like that. Pull the two together, maybe with an explanation from someone else as this is quite a common technique.

From that same page on the LP:

I see AI War as a rogue-like RTS. Just like in a dungeon crawler there's a theoretical 'end goal' that you're striving for. But the real meat of the game is in working out the interlocking systems, figuring out how to overcome the challenges, and once you've done so then handicapping yourself or adding extra difficulty to see if you can do it all again.

For reference, I've only ever won one difficulty 10 game. In order to do so I exploited at least three different loopholes or inconsistent behaviours which have now been closed. It was done just after the introduction of salvage, which has now been balanced / nerfed fairly heavily. And at one point I ran out of tactical options so hard that I had to put the game on pause for a week until the developer added black-hole immunity to the Mk V spirecraft jumpship just for me. Which I then exploited the hell out of. Other tactics that have worked in the past are choosing an X-map and turtling up behind a massive checkpoint, exploiting Martyrs and lightning missiles so hard that they got redesigned, and adding as much positive cheese in the lobby as physically possible.

The best part about the game though is that when you're playing at this kind of difficulty you can get an almost dungeon-master relationship with the devs, if you want. As an exercise take a look at the 7.0 patch notes, especially around the 7.021 release when I was last really active. In particular, the line 'Now when launching a CPA, if it empties the galaxy of all guard ships and Strategic Reserve ships and STILL does not have enough to fill the specified number of ships, it starts freeing Special Forces ships for the attack.' As one of the devs is keen on saying, 'And they say AI War doesn't have PvP...'

The great Neinzul Lightning Warhead [strike]Robbery[/strike] Translocation (from All Creatures, and I think it's mentioned in the LP somewhere too)

Uh, there's a Mk III lighting warhead here from the neinzul rocketry corps. It's just kinda ... sitting on the planet next to the Cenurin wormhole, doing nothing.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/good-doggie.png)

Yup, that's a spirecraft translocator herding those lovely immobile Neinzul rocketry corps lightning warheads into position.

Exhibit B

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/exhibitb.png)

Exhibit C.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/exhibitc.png)

Problem solved. Turns out I didn't need the Martyrs after all. Ahhh, just a shame that bug got fixed so fast.


I like to imagine that the AIs use their hyper-advanced technology to open a miniature wormhole just behind my ear so they can whisper taunting insults to me. But they're too honourable to send a lightning warhead through it.

: Shady Amish Terror
That...went more smoothly than I might have expected. I was kind of figuring 'smashing a planet into an AI core' would perk the AI's attention a little more than that. I mean, granted, that was still completely absurd, but it's interesting that the AI STILLdoesn't seem to consider you its main priority.

At this point I think you could consider the AI as having a fairly significant case of Alzheimers. We've been poking holes in its memory by taking out data centres, scrambled it's brain by removing the co-processors and then did a super-terminal hack on top of that. That has left it with a vague idea that something is wrong (~200 AIP floor), but not fully aware (~460AIP).

Dodgy number crunching (you might want to check this, or maybe do something similar for other achievements): http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,18227.msg195949.html#msg195949

First Victory: 3.8% of players
Rarest Achievement: They're just bigger targets, you know - win against Starship Command on diff 9 plus - 0.4%

10.5% of the players who have completed the game have the rarest achievement. I'd wager that if you actually added everything together, seeing as nobody really plays that many games, 1/5-1/4 of the people who have won the game once have also won against a rare/dangerous AI type on 9+.

This is a game that has a lot of experts.

Edit: Also, 21% of people who have ever won a game have the double godlike achievement for beating two AIs on diff 10. Even I don't have that ('cos of a bug).

I do have four others, but honestly I've already spent quite a while pulling stuff out for now. So I'll just mention them briefly:

The 10/10 AAR in general, under the title of something something 'The Bug is Real'.

Lyudmila from the AAR, because damn if I didn't love cheesily circle kiting that little cursed golem back when it only cost 10AIP to repair before the big rebalance.

Something about the tactic of using a spire jumpship to cross the entire planet and unload ships on different sides, tying up the threat essentially forever as they chase them from side to side. A significant if micro-intensive reason why the new 'move on' logic was implemented I think.

Maybe something about the Mk V spirecraft changes (i.e. the spire transport and it getting upgraded so I could get across a blocking HW).

Of course there's plenty of other great AARs out there, especially the older ones where the game was completely different. Also seconding a vote for ride the lightning. Highlighting one every five days or something like that would be a great idea.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Captain Jack September 22, 2016, 06:09:56 PM
My god it's full of words.  :o And pictures, even better!

Thanks for this. If you're in touch with any of the other old guard who aren't circling the forum like sharks(A or B) could you prod them? I saw that Steam group and the SA thread, and I'm convinced there are other places.

I'll be putting up AAR and LP content starting tomorrow, doing more every other day. The other days are actually for rough descriptions of the expansions and major version changes. I think I will start with yours since LParchive is still pretty well known.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: RockyBst September 22, 2016, 06:17:37 PM
TODO: The below can probably use a lot of tidying up and revising. Think of it as a first draft for a potential KS post, probably part way through after posting the (much better written and laid out) LP.

AI War has had a ridiculous number of changes over the years, but it's when you really stress the game that things get the most fun. Even some of the 'bugs' become a fascinating part of the emergent gameplay, and you get near real-time feedback from the developers ... what more can a strategy gamer ask.

All Creatures Great and Small. My personal favourite of all the AARs I did, especially given some of Keith's comments. If you want to read the full thing it can be found on the forums (http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,15435.0.html), but here's a shortened accounting:

Omnipotent AI getting you down? Tired of getting beaten into a bloody pulp by your robotic overlords? Then it's time to give someone else a chance.

...

<A whole bunch of 10/10s >

120 planet realistic map
Human Marauders: 10/10
Human Resistance: 10/10
Colony Rebellions: 10/10
Zenith Miners: 10/10
Dyson Sphere: 10/10
Zenith Cookie Monster
Neinzul Rocketry Corps: 10/10
Neinzul Preservation Wardens: 10/10
Neinzul Roaming Enclaves: 10/10
Fallen Spire: 10/10
Darkspire: 10/10

AI plots, for both:

Avenger
Hybrid Hives: 10/10
Advanced Hybrids: 10/10
Astro Trains: 10/10
Hunter: 10/10
Beachheads
Shark A/B: Disabled. I mean come on, I wouldn't last 10 minutes otherwise.
...

I think I've got just enough counter-cheese here to let me live. Possibly. Will I regret choosing double 10/10 astro trains for one AI? Regret the 10/10 dyson sphere with dyson antagonisers springing up everywhere, and counter-spies on half the planets? Regret ... y'know what, let's just assume I'll regret everything.

00.00: Okay, so I've backed myself into a fairly small corner on this map.

00.02: Scout the immediate neighbours, Murderlance and Poan.

00.06: Nuclear train on Poan. Nuclear train on Poan. Oh man, what have I let myself in for. It's covered by 2 shields, a couple of widows, and 2 regens. Even worse, it's just routing through ... meaning that even if I kill the train station on Poan, I may well get another one.

00.10: Okay then, let's talk strategy. First up, yep, I'm regretting those astro-trains. I think the first order of business is going to be staying on the homeworlds and wiping out every single train station within deep-striking distance.

00.14: Oh F@*$. Hey, guess who just decided to pop his head into one of my homeworlds for no apparent reason? That's right, the nuclear astro-train! Everything explodes. Planet loses supply. Much wailing and gnashing of teeth of the AI overlords turn into a boot stamping on the face of humanity forever.

<Tape Rewinding Noise>

00.45: Oh, you have EMP astro trains now? That's ... that's real nice.

01.03: First AI astro train secret project complete. 3 massive AI ships en-route to my planets. Uh-oh.

01.12.30: So uh, those three massive ships. That wouldn't happen be the black widow golem, armored golem and H/K currently proceeding through the ruins of Poan's turret beachhead, would it? The ones heading right for my homeworld?

03.00: Well, we're back up to 12 massive ships again. But at this stage I'm fairly confident I can handle any two or three golems who peek their heads into a homeworld. Just a tad concerned what might happen if, say, 9 golems get it into their heads to join the threat fleet...

03.10: Penetrator manages to catch one of the nuke trains as it passes through Poan again. Escapes with about 15% health after the hybrids once more display their displeasure. Even with scouts dropping like flies due to counter-spies and tachyon trains, here's what my warning box normally looks like:

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/warningfun.png)

Maybe add a few waves in there as well.

03.22: EMP astro-train hits Murderlanceras. EMP immune units hit it. That's one way to take one down, I suppose...

The forcefield inhibitor astro train with it is painful though, as it means the widows will once again successfully steal half my fleet.

03.27: Oh, hello two black widow golems and a H/K on my homeworld. I'm kind of getting used to this now. Implosions!

03:31: So, uh, bad news. Spirecraft asteroids aren't nuke immune.

04.27: Nuke train is heading straight for my homeworld. Good job I noticed it. That would be one heck of a one-two punch from the AI, nuke your homeworld then follow up with four golems to take out the now unshielded command station. Unfortunately the golems take out the brave penetrator pilot, then turn around and run away. C'mon, I need the scrap!

P.S. This really is a lot of golems. I'm becoming uncomfortably blase about them waltzing in to my homeworlds. Thank goodness for implosion artillery.

05.17: Dual EMP trains on my homeworld. Ouch.

07.04: My favourite part was when a widow train passed through and stole all by bombers. So I put all the riots back in the transports, stealing 200 of their ships, and unloaded them right next to my base defences. Payback.

07.12: 30 massive ships en-route to my planets. Viral shredders doing their normal tachyon clearing thing. Scouts find the super-terminal - and a planet with two(!) train stations.

07.41: On further investigation, it looks like it's going to be close to impossible to get trains to stop routing through my homeworlds. Here, for example, is a world 10 hops away from my homeworld which will still route a train through it while trying to reach a train station 15 hops away.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/ohtrains.png)

I figure I'd have to clear the best part of half the galaxy, around 50-60 worlds, to stop this. I really messed up putting my homeworlds where they are, rather than in the little 'safe' cluster at the bottom left.

08.18: Nuke train is stationary at Jicidis. Penetrator is suicided to remove it.

08.23: Under the combined might of both normal and rebel fleets, Sezon goes down in under a minute. Turns out there's now another nuke train on Jicidis, so a penetrator is sent to take care of that threat as well.

It fails. The regenerator train next to it RESPAWNS THE NUKER...

09.33: Nuke train nearly 'Oh Yeah!'s Poan. By which I mean of course it did 'Oh Yeah!' Poan and I save scummed, seeing as I had the penetrator sitting just right there and only missed the scout warning by a few seconds. That message is certainly one way to fix a null pointer exception Keith ;)

<Side Note: After finding nuke trains blowing up a planet causes a null pointer exception after the first one or two, the developers fix it by having the AI say, in the style of the Kool-Aid Man, 'OH YEAH!' every time a planet explodes>

09.40: Power goes out, Poan command station explodes, the usual golem battlegroup is on the scene.
 
6 hops away Operation Death-Leap, after having waited far too long for a tachyon astro train to move on, is now starting. 1,600 ships in assault transports enter the botnet world.
 
09.41.26: Ships out
 
09.41.30: Rams up

09.41.49: Wait for another blasted tachyon train to clear off

09.42.28: Boom. FRD weapons free, gents.

09.48: Good news! I've found the first AI homeworld. Bad news - It has five armored and five artillery golems on it. And 8 black widow golems. And 9 H/Ks. And a core raid engine. And the only core world next to it also has a raid engine.  Guess I know where all those massive ships are now.

10.55.30: What a guess. Penetrator makes it with literally half a second to spare - the astro train disintegrates as it is passing through the wormhole to Poan.

: Keith
: RockyB
Oh. Man. When the rams take out the superfort, all hell breaks loose. I make that the best part of 70 dark spire ships, from the death of one fort.
Probably not too much to worry about.  Those guys used to be able to wipe galaxies on high intensity, but are tamer now.  I hope to make them less tame (at least that high), though, once I can find a way of doing so that doesn't involve melting everyone's CPU under eleven billionty spawns.

: RockyB
Uh ... -20AIP for the death of a data centre? I think the dark spire just took out a data centre for me - one on the other side of galaxy I hadn't even found yet. Thanks guys!
(Sounds of massive bar fight in the background) "No problem!" (sound of bottle smashing)

11.38: Oh. Hell. So, uh, turns out I wrong about where the second AI homeworld was. I just slapped a couple of raids into one of the jumpships, figuring I could cap this epic AIP reduction session by taking out the co-processors. On their way to the furthest away world, they stop one hop short. Why? Oh, y'know, just an AI homeworld. Jumpship explodes. Raids fall out. Core CPA post triggers.

: Keith
In other news: if you have so many alerts that the alert box has a scrollbar, start considering alternate possible habitable galaxies.

*cough*

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/notifications.png)

And I don't even have the nofications for seven mining golems yet...

12.52: Oh for the love of pete. Dark spire take down four Mk IV counter-attack guardposts, for 1,500 total attack to my homeworld. YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE HELPING, GUYS.

<Note: At this point a patch was released that fixed a bug with AI 2 ships not moving away from their spawn points>

13.00The name for the next hour and a half is going to be 'Operation: Oh F#@!, Golems!'.

Incoming exo-galactic patch in 00:59.59. When the patch hits I imagine the 36 massive ships and their entourages currently sitting on the second AIs world are suddenly going to wake up and attack us. So, before that happens:

- Get full caps of implosion artillery
- See if we can hack that core missile turret controller
- Do two shard chases to get the fallen spire frigates

Oh, and build Martys. Lots and lots of Martyrs.

I mean, technically I could just build a missile silo and set an FRD rally point on the AI homeworld for the armored missiles. But let's try not to exploit that too hard, huh.

<Note: This was just after the warhead rebalancing, when there was a fun little bug where the top tier armoured warheads cost 1 metal each.>

14.00: The patch hits. '36 massive AI ships (118,000 strength) are en-route to your planets' takes on a terrifying new meaning. Armored golem flexes as he realises his new physique, then the smile fades as he remembers his six brothers.

14.01: Little bits of threat are attacking all over. 300 ships on the previously peacefully rebuilding Charcuza, 200 taking advantage of Dislaju's supply interdicted state. Still, it's funny seeing the devourer golem two-shot a bunch of Mk IV spire corvettes. And profitable, those things are worth a fair bit.

Forwards scouts with over-active imaginations are reporting something about 'A heinous swarm of locusts, descending upon us to tear asunder all we hold dear'. A brief check of the threat fleet log indicates... yeah, they might be right:

totalExistingThreatFleetStrengthNotOnTarget:221,657.33
humanStrengthMustBeThisLowToBeAttackable:110,828.66
Priority override: targeting accessible human homeworld Murdke

14.04: Uh, there's a Mk III lighting warhead here from the neinzul rocketry corps. It's just kinda ... sitting on the planet next to the Cenurin wormhole, doing nothing.

Anway, the golems don't want this planet. They just want to move through Cenurin -> Miccacau -> Probably Panza, then hit Muderlanceras. But if I was to hold off the lightning warhead until they're close to the wormhole that this neinzul one is sitting on, and catch them in both blasts at once...

14.04.45: Before

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/beforelightning.png)

14.04.49: And after.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/afterlightning.png)

Yup, that's six dead golems alright. With the 2-warheads-for-the-price-of-one offer, that was a good 10 billion damage. Now, I could just sit here and take care of them all this way. Especially seeing as I have Mk III armored warheads on special offer at 1 metal each. But where's the fun in that.

Oh, scouts report that in addition to the two artillery golems still on Deramic there's three more arties, 3 armored, 6 black widows and 10 H/Ks on Etgin heading this way.

14.10: Now THAT's what I call an attack. Note, this is after three Martyrs detonated already taking out four golems who were encroaching a little to close to the command station. There's also not a single massive ship outstanding.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/thisisaknife.png)

14.11: After the Maytrs had their play, the only thing left was the cleanup.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/aislethree.png)

14.11.30: Then the enclaves showed up and ... well, that was that.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/kekeke.png)

14.11.40: The very last armored golem just managed to get a shot off at the command station and took it out. It'll be rebuilt in 30 seconds.

'Why do you throw your lives away'

15.00: Engineering mission successful. 8 Rams up. Then the power goes out, and so does the cloaking...

EDIT: Oh hey, I found the super hybrids.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/somanysupermen.png)

This is ... somewhat absurd. It wasn't until I was looking to crash a ram in the super-hybrid putting up the converter that I realised they were ALL super hybrids.

16.24.55: Of course, in retaliation the AI does this ...

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/creat/traaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaain.png)

Why yes, that is 1,200 ships caught in an unholy morass of Tractor/Widow astro-trains. Right after their transports exploded, moments after escaping the hunter fleet. Which they are promptly getting dragged back towards. The ship's struggles end when I realise all 1,200 of them are about to be dragged onto the core world. Right next to the Core Raid Engine. An instant 1 million scrap value, indicating that those were actually worth about 10 million metal.


At this point, unfortunately, I burnt out on the game. This happens with every single game I ever play, and it's a testament to AI War that it's one of the very, very few I end up coming back to. I got about another hour and a half into the game and in the face of probably an 80% certainty of winning just couldn't bring myself to put in another 4-8 hours of grinding. Not after the 10/10/10 game at least.

After a few months, an interesting new AI War expansion came out for me to play with. And that lead directly into the big one - the LP currently up on the LP archive. So rest assured that I'm still out there trying to find the perfect way to cook the AI's goose.

(Hint: It normally involves Limburger brûlée. Applied with a nuclear blowtorch)

Now for those of you who own the original AI war and want to continue this epic battle ... well, there's always the save file: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=15435.0;attach=8910

p.p.s: I take great pride in getting 33 patch note mentions in 2 months - Not sure quite what my favourite was. Using neinzul rocketry lightning warheads as defensive weapons? The charismatic golem? The 'move along, please' threat logic? The null pointing nuclear train? The instant infinite knowledge extractors? All I know is I look forward to breaking the new toys in AI War II just as much.

EDIT: Adding the above two posts in .txt format with the bbcode for you
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: RockyBst September 22, 2016, 06:47:26 PM
I'm sure I said I'm going to bed half an hour ago.

Last one, because I was just re-reading it and it made me laugh:

5.43: While we're waiting, let's talk grav reactors. These things are seriously evil. And I have to deal with three, one of which is sitting under a Mk. 5 forcefield. Now my normal reaction here would be 'go make some spire rams, flashbang the AI homeworld'. Problem is, I just used my last ebonite on a Martyr and Titanite can't be used for rams. No problem, I'll just make that long awaited pair of Mk. 5 jumpships and go looking for another asteroid field. Oh. Jumpships aren't blackhole immune.

F*@#

5.43.30: So, my new toys. A core railpod fab. Just a smidge under 9 million damage per cap, twice that if they survive for another 2 seconds. They could be a nice anti grav reactor weapon. Oh, sniper immune you say?

F*@#

5.44: My left-over penetrator has only 28 million damage per shot. It won't be able to take out a 60 million health grav reactor. Maybe I can use that Titanite to build a Mk. 5 penetrator though, at the astronomical cost of 1.5 million metal. Could at least deal with the one under the forcefield. Oh, wait. Planetery tachyon coverage. No tachyon immunity.

F*@#

5.44.30: Oh, and they're immune to nukes and EMPs too. Just to add to the fun. Also I suppose an EMP warhead could at least take out the forcefield.

5.44.40: Mk. 5 Forcefields are EMP immune.

F*@#

5.45: The only blackhole immune ships I have are raids. In desperation, I even check the mercenary space dock. Nothing. Looks like my best option at the point is to just spam youngling tigers and bombers at the immensely powerful guard posts with radar dampening and slowing drones. One of which is sitting on the opposite side of the gravity well, and another of which is under 264 million HPs worth of Mk. 5 forcefield.

5.48: I remember I have 74 HaP. Core guard-posts are immune to sabotage hacks.

F*@#

Cue failed attempt to kill them with Lyudmila, and the eventual blackhole immunifying of MkV spirecraft jumpships.

EDIT:

6.01: With three of the ion cannons down, 20 Mk. 2 scouts decide to take a jaunt through the AI homeworld to Murdoch. They almost make it.

6.02.30: The three scout starships are pulled from their current tachyon duties. 33 brave souls make the jump through the Desenan wormhole, hoping for sight of a land previously unknown.

6.02.52: The core heavy beam guard post sitting next to the wormhole to Murdoch annihilates them all.

6.05: Five transports are created. The reincarnated scouts, along with all 5 scout starships, split into two groups. Each enters a transport.

6.06.06: A full cap of railpods and younglings jumps into the Desenan system, with orders to raise hell.

6.08.08: The transports slip in right behind them, and make a dash for Murdoch.

6.06.20: Grav drones catch four of the transports. One, however, with 18 scouts aboard, is nearly at the Murdoch wormhole. It explodes, taking the first hit from the core beam guard post. 6 seconds before the beam post reloads.

6.06.24: Desperately struggling amid rapidly failing cloaking superboost, the scouts reach the Murdoch wormhole. One solitary starship makes it through. The other transports are wiped out, with no survivors. A reprisal wave is announced. But if we have more, new, vital information about the AI then their sacrifice cannot have been for nothing.

(http://www.shock-therapy.org/hotlink/AIWarAAR/arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh.png)

OH COME ON!

Bad. Sleep. Must. Sleep.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: chemical_art September 22, 2016, 07:18:14 PM

Edit: Also, 21% of people who have ever won a game have the double godlike achievement for beating two AIs on diff 10. Even I don't have that ('cos of a bug).

That is a very cool statistic. That just goes to show just how crazy we are all in our own way of finding "bugs".

It is almost a point of pride (internally for me at least) to find a bug and exploit it to get that 10/10 victory before it is patched. I have done it twice in 8 years. I wonder if I will find a third time.  ;)
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Draco18s September 22, 2016, 10:39:51 PM
That is a very cool statistic. That just goes to show just how crazy we are all in our own way of finding "bugs".

Mine was a 10 planet galaxy and 8 homeworld start against Turtle AIs :D
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: chemical_art September 22, 2016, 10:54:59 PM
That is a very cool statistic. That just goes to show just how crazy we are all in our own way of finding "bugs".

Mine was a 10 planet galaxy and 8 homeworld start against Turtle AIs :D

My reaction:

(https://media.giphy.com/media/Vg0JstydL8HCg/giphy.gif)
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Draco18s September 22, 2016, 11:14:37 PM
Yeah, pretty much.

Still took me three attempts (reload to a save made prior to my assault).
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: tadrinth September 23, 2016, 12:56:25 AM
Mine was a 10 planet galaxy and 8 homeworld start against Turtle AIs

I tried that!  A core raid engine wave triggered about 5s after the game started, and I died.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Draco18s September 23, 2016, 09:14:48 AM
Mine was a 10 planet galaxy and 8 homeworld start against Turtle AIs

I tried that!  A core raid engine wave triggered about 5s after the game started, and I died.

Oh I did it before Brutal Core Guard Posts were a Thing. (http://cdn-6.skypeemoticons.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Skype-emoticons-36-giggle.png)
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: Toranth September 23, 2016, 11:29:01 AM
Mine was a 10 planet galaxy and 8 homeworld start against Turtle AIs
I tried that!  A core raid engine wave triggered about 5s after the game started, and I died.
Oh I did it before Brutal Core Guard Posts were a Thing. (http://cdn-6.skypeemoticons.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Skype-emoticons-36-giggle.png)
Or just keep retrying until the AI doesn't spawn a CRE.  Multiple Core CPA posts are awesome, since they do nothing...
Or so I've heard.
: Re: War stories, trivia, screenshots, etc. for social media
: tadrinth September 23, 2016, 12:58:32 PM
Or just keep retrying until the AI doesn't spawn a CRE

I thought about it! I decided that it was more fair of a challenge to beat Diff 10 on the strength of my own understanding, rather than relying on forum suggestions, and I had not thought to do 8 homeworlds on a 10 planet map on my own.  I did manage it in the end: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,15770.0.html