Dealing with Missile Drones

Can you counter this by using lots of fast interceptors?

PD drones?

You can counter with lots of fighters using a edited strategy to target drones first. His missile drones will be useless against them. Set your current ship strategies to maximum range as well, so that they maximum their PD chances against the incoming missiles.

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I have never encountered drones, so I don't know how fast or maneuverable they are. However, in the combat simulator, you might try a point-blank range strategy that stays in a task force formation (top-most element in the strategy definition menu), and use a formation with close ship spacing such as Arrowhead or Barricade, to keep your ships' pd together. Point blank settings can be useful against swarms of faster, longer ranged opponents, because it scatters them and opens up chances that your ships and the enemy will have moments where you are moving toward one another, which can bring them into range of your ship-to-ship weapons. See how that works.

As soon as he starts putting on defensive weaponry, the amount of space for missiles is reduced, which decreases the overall amount of missiles he can fire at once.

You'll also want to mix up your types of PD. Use a combination of short and long range PD weapons if you can. This will improve your overall survivability.

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Hmmm i haven't used drones to much but some heavy researched point defense cannons shoud do the job. If not Frig whit ripper beams and quad engines shoud do it . They just avoid any missile fire and can nail the freighter .

Deploy large numbers of mines and satellites on the wormhole chokepoints to prevent him getting reinforcements through.

If it's a game of paper-rock-scissors, try bringing all three elements (or four in your case) to make sure you can both counter his attacks and take the offensive yourself.

Max out your income.
Improvement plants to take all your planets to 250% value
and Atmosphere converter so you get max buildings. then Monoliths everywhere!! suplemented with System wide boosters. System robotoid factory, system mineral scanner.
then construction yards everywhere.
then outbuild him
win with sheer numbers

I'd suggest following Fleet compositions:

Try mixing Some fighters, some bombers, and some drones.

Fighters should be fast, and target the drones. Doing this helps your Ships survive. their secondary target should be enemy fighters.

Bombers are like fighters, give them one or two weapons direct fire weapons, and fill rest weaponry with rocket pods, torpedoes, seekers in general (torpedoes work better due to shorter reload time). Bombers don't need to be as fast as possible, just as fast to surely catch the enemy ships. (so less engines means more weapons) Obviously, their main targets are ships.

Drones should have PD weapons with average range, maybe one missile and warheads (warheads in internal space). Drones will use their PD to fire any drones they happen to pass, so you can get some nice weakening on the enemy drones before they hit your lines. Ideally your drones and bombers are equally fast.

This leads to your units arriving at enemy ships at the same time, with bombers firing torpedoes/rockets, drones firing missiles, and trying to ram (kamikaze attacks).

So, enemy PD has to choose between bombers, drones, rockets or missiles. Drones re target rams if target is destroyed, so there is a bit less overkill. In general you should be able to swarm enemy PD untill enemy defense fighters come in (and having PD in the drones will help there a lot.)

You can improve the attack by adding some mine carriers and mines to your fleet. I think mines are launched in combat, and can hit ships/units in combat, but am not 100% sure.

Overall, whatever you do your opponent is quick to copy. This is why it is important to set a long term plan. I'd suggest defending critical chokepoints with powerful spacestations. THis frees ships to attack. Supported by satellites and mines the stations can hold wormholes easily.

As your game seems to use plenty of units, heavy RD on PD is suggested. PD has great damage/size comparison, and can fire all units short of mines.

On your no-mans land: Here is what you should do:

Find the biggest planet there. This means biggest breathable if one is avaliable, other if not. Get your self a colonizationg team, and some extra freighters. Before your go, build weapon platforms, satellites and mines on other planets, and load them on freighters. Break through, colonize a planet, and establish a beachhead. Move all the weapon platforms on the planet, deploy the satellites in defensive rings, lay mines, and have some ships ready (just few). This beach head gives you a bit better control over the system, and you can have it fully defended with prebuilt stuff at the end of the turn you colonized it (build a shipyard and supplydepot(s) too.

If your friend leaves you to it, you have a safe place and benefit on the sector. If he hits, you have heavy defenses (ever checked how much WP:s a huge planet can hold?) so he has to use really a lot of ships to break the planet. If you can do this to many planets in one turn, the better it is for you.

LordDemon, your ideas are really fascinating. You are really good on SE5.

A little trick: Colony ships can hold Population and other stuff. Add the colony module along with as many cargo bays you can get on the hull. Load 1 million Population then the rest Defensive stuff. When the colony is created the other cargo becomes cargo on the planet.

I have Population, Fighters, Weapon Platforms all loaded on my Colony ship when hitting a contested area.

Colonize and 'Poof' instant defenders.

You will need to bring in more Pop, but this is a quick hit to secure/start a resupply Depot.

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Since no-mans land appears to be going, well, nowhere maybe you should attempt to get warp point maker, and start dropping small fleets behind his lines, start wiping out his infrastructure. He will either have to pull fleets from the front to cover this, or reinforce his defenses, which will cut into his offense.

Of course this is all dependent on you getting warp makers first, if he gets it first, you are in a world of hurt.

I just realized something else, if he is using Missile drones, he is going to burn through ammunition at a spectacular rate. That means while he has a hell of a weight of fire, he will not be able to sustain his fleet in a combat situation more than a few turns, an in order to rearm them, he is going to need to stay close to his controlled planets. Perhaps you can use that somehow.

Idea for YOU attacking. Build lot of cheap frigates (or heavily armored with PD and running away from danger, but notr retreating), and attack his drones/drone launchers with ONE frigate. His launchers will launch drones and they will overkill frigate (burn more supply than this frigate was worth). After few frigates, he will be dry and then you can bring some killing force.

This to work needs you to attack him lot of time quickly (in turna based in your turn, i never played simultaneous, so i don't know whether its possible there).

Can you perform intel actions against him? If you can't defeat him in a stand up fight, then maybe you can wreak some havok with his empire's internals via sabotage. If you get some of his planets revolting, then that will require him to either ignore it (losing resources that those planets provided) or take them back (diverting his military). Better yet if you can take control of one or more of his ships.

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
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I'm curious: what turn are you at?

Sounds like quite the stalemate, and from the sounds of it, you're on the losing edge of this war of attrition.

You need to re-gain the edge with a sacrifice fly, but a decision needs to be made fast on your part.

1. Research warp openers and closers (assuming he hasn't). This appears to be the only thing that can break the stalemate decisively. Be there first. Sacrifice systems for the right research, and you will turn the tide.

And during a single turn:
2. Evacuate and close your warp points to the contested system.
3. Warp in with a guerrilla drone fleet mixed with fighters, behind his lines, and let them take out infrastructure and prey on lone ships like a swarm of angry bees. Then warp in your capital ships to counter his counter once he starts doing so. His fleet should be quite busy attempting to cleanse his systems of your ships like a bad plague.

4. Regroup your efforts into out-producing him at home (monoliths, etc), while he is taking out your guerrilla drone/fighter fleets.
5. Harass his undefended warp point connections and close them.

Hopefully you will regain the edge of attrition and he will be forced to adopt new tactics as you harass him to the point that you wind up taking over a good portion of his systems with your increase in capital ship and unit production.

Be prepared for him to turn ugly and develop cloaked star destroying weapons.

You have to see the target system before you can warp into it. If you don't know what his systems look like then the WP strategy I outlined will not work. I wonder if there is a way to obtain system maps via intel. I haven't used intel much in games. But at this point, researching something significantly tactically better is the only way to break the current stalemate, and WP openers are the counter to stonewall wormhole defenses.

I think it can. Et least it surely can from defended side (i put ship on nebulae side of WP and AI still got through to my defense line (consisting of shiled depleter & power leach satelites and boarding ships = ship lose shields, lose supplies, so is realy slowd down + cannot fire except PD )).

Yes cloaked ships can go through any type of unitis except mines. If I were you; I would put mines (cheap ones) on the warp points leading to your home systems. BUT I personally believe he doesn't have cloaked stardestroyers yet. Why?? Those things take forever to research (I believe over 14 million rp in stock) and are expensive to build and maintain. If he has one or 2 in your systems; you have heard them by now (destroyed some stars with them).

I would not discount the probability of cloaked spies (ships with sensonrs; cloaked) in your empire. Any decent tycoon scanners should help you out. I would make a sat with them; and launch it on the suspicious entry path to my systems. That should spot them.

Any reason; you are not building cloaked spies??

Have you considered letting him "win" the disputed system? and focus on improving other things in your empire and eventually out producing him? I don't mean completely withdrawal form the system; just stop sending reinforcements and make him waste resources kicking you away?

First, you need to drive him out of the system. You need to grab the warp point, and hold it. It's much harder to take a warp point you have to transit. Then go back and clear out any planets he holds.

Have some fast frigates w/ minesweepers clearing the system. They should also have the best sensors, to look for cloaked ships. (If you know he's researching cloaking, you should research sensors to counter.)

You can send fighters/drones without a freighter. Do so - send fighters/drones to clear out his missile drones, and fighter-bombers/kamikaze drones to take out his capitals. You need to focus on ONE aspect of his force at a time, to whittle it away effectively. If you don't, it's just a numbers game.

If you don't need to transit a warp point, send in a force of interceptors to clear his drones/interceptors. They should go for Fighters first, then satellites/drones, then retreat.

Next, send in missile/kamikaze drones to take out his bases/capital ships.

Then you can send in your capitals to hold the warp point/clean up.

If you have to transit the warp point, I'd send in Kamikaze drones first, to target static defenses (bases, big ships). Lots of them.

Follow that wave with a slew of carriers carrying fighter-interceptors, or PD-drones.

Technically, you could accomplish the whole thing with a slew of drones (missile/kamikaze and PD ones). The idea is to overwhelm one aspect of his force, and nullify the rest. If 50% of his force is devoted to anti-fighter/drones/seekers, and 50% to anti-capitals, by *only* sending drones/fighters you have nullified half his force. (it'll only work once, though, so you need to back it up with capitals and mixed arms)

Yes, I meant that cloaked stardestroyers would probably only be a threat in his systems as part of a last-ditch scorched earth policy to counter your advance.

As some agree already, giving up that no-mans system is really your only chip to spend to some good use elsewhere for your empire. WP research and then spend the chip (give up the system gradually to force him to pull most of his fleets into it) to gain access behind his lines via WP openers is what I recommend, but I wouldn't do it personally without researching WP closers first. In the end, he could instead opt for shielding his systems from WP tech, and just completely close off - at which point you could claim a tactical victory and a technical surrender of control of the galaxy to you.

From what it sounds like, it appears he's on the losing edge of the attrition, so I am not sure continuing to duke out no-man's land is the best solution. He's got a base there which can do more to hold off the enemy while he concentrates his efforts on a longer-term strategy. I suggested WP closers/openers to counter his enemy's strong WP defenses which will throw his foe completely off balance long enough for him to establish similar beachheads inside his systems and hold out again long enough to build up production at home and win the war.

Are Bomblet Missiles still fairly long range and useful in BM?

They have a range upwards of 200ls in stock, so if they are still roughly the same in BM, they could be handy for dealing with drones and sats, especially with a max range strategy.

Other random ideas that may or may not work... (suggest testing them in simulator first)

Flexible stuff.
Good old combined arms warfare.
Mix and match specialists with multi-taskers, make it difficult for any one enemy strategy to get an advantage.
Like groups of drones, fighters and drigates, creating a well balanced little mess.
(note, I can have dozens of ship designs at once, some multi-taskers, some specialized, some big, some small)
My fav concept at present is a cruiser that is well rounded, packing good weapons, PDs, armor and shields, and 4 fighter bays with fighters meant just to chase down those fleet footed cowards and shove small torpedoes up their tailpipes. Get a few of them together, and watch the theoretical fun ensue...

The fact they could get jumped by fighters with no carriers/freighters around might catch them off guard, especially if you are purposely having your carriers stick to a different group/fleet.

More variety of fighters.
Make fighters with max engines and anti-ship weapons and at least one anti-drone capable weapon (small meson blaster?) and give them a strategy that will make them focus on the freighters first, backed up by well armored fighters fighters with modest weapons set to go after drones first plus some fast fighters with just guns.
Also have a fast fighter with cluster bombs if you need to go glass some planets without risking your big ships.

Mobs of well rounded ship groups.
Sticking with frigates for their good defense bonus.
Some with mainly PD weapons and a few direct fire/seekers, plus a few with mainly direct fire weapons for anti unit and anti-ship combat.
I've had some success with that kind of stuff, even after I get the big ships.

Fight fire with fire.
Drones, max engines, some armor, lots of warheads, strategy specilaized to make drone carrying ships the main target.
Get satisfaction of seeing fleet footed cowardly drone carrier getting a drone up the rear and (hopefully) exploding, or otherwise no longer be able to outrun its fate.
Maybe do similar with anti-planet drones packing heavy armor, try and glass their colonies in the contested system.
Slightly expensive, but can create a nice mess if it works.

Defensive evils.
Freighter or other ships with sat bays, sats loaded with PD and missile/trop/lg mt gun sats, ships set to drop andd run.
A variant of what they are doing, except their drones have to go through your sats to get at your retreating ships.

Torpedoes (or at least the Stock ones... not sure how BM treats them)
Handy if you need to engage stuff other than drones.
I personally love quantum torpedoes.
In stock, they are lighter/cheaper than CSMs, and fire faster with equal range.
Don't use anti-matter torps, shorter range and weaker than CSMs, although they are dirt cheap.
Gamma Pulse torpedoes have the worst range of the three and are a little lighter and fire slightly faster when compared to CSMs, and do more damage per torpedo on top of slightly better firing rate.

Nasty idea from Stock that works in nasty ways... (in Stock anyways)
Large Drone + single anti-ship warhead standard, max engines, combat sensor, and as many Ripper Beams as will fit (4 on a large drone) plus some armor.
Speed of drone makes up for lack of range for heavy hitting Ripper Beam, if they rip the target to shreds before impact they will slam on the breaks and go after another target, if not, they slam into it, go boom, rinse and repeat until out of targets or out of drones.
They're like multiple use missiles of sorts, very nasty.
Only down side, they can't target units.

What do the BM pros have to say about these ideas?
Would they work in BM and work for the present matter at hand?
Or are my ideas heading the way of the Titanic?

Wow! It sounds like you have a great game going. Hope you write an after action report (if you have the time.)

Use caution, secure and fortify the warp point ASAP in case they are planning to do a mass refit of ships, with plans of coming back with a vengance.

Get at least some cheap mines on/around the warp point, and keep an eye on them to see if your foe tries to sneak in cloaked ships.

You mentioned an 'alternative' route to their systems, correct?
Make sure that back door is closed shut to be on the safe side, in case they are planning to steam roll through the AI empires to flank you.

If you are lucky, one of the AI empires is causing major problems for them, or otherwise annoyed them...

Or maybe they accidenly triggered MEE and have other things to worry about... (although that's just wishful thinking)

Perhaps the war effort took a heavier toll for him than you. Perhaps it did not and this is a feint. Perhaps as has already been suggested, he's going back to re-fit his fleet. Perhaps he's swapping gears for high research or intel.

It's very conceivable this did cause economic problems. All his drones armed with CSMs and ECM? Now that you're regularly blowing them up, it's got to take a toll on him - especially with high maintenance fees still around as he tries to produce more and get them to the frontline.

It is up to you to gauge what the chances could be and act accordingly. Sitting around in "What If?" situations and doing a half-assed job will probably lose it for you. Make a decisive decision which way you'll go from here. You don't have to keep this system - what would happen if you withdrew too? What would he think to such an irrational move?

Oh and Question: Sequential or Simultaneous turns?

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Maybe he's trying to suck you in system (away from your WP defense).

Maybe he's reading this post as well!!

.

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Your opponent sounds very worthy. It's fun just reading these posts to see how the war goes.

Are you guys playing over the internet in a Similtaneous(sp?) game? PBW? or how?

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You left a single piece of system unwatched?
For a long period of time?!?
*face palm*

Situational awareness is a key factor in any war.
Do not neglect sensor tech, and do not leave any area unwatched.
If knowledge is power, than to be unknown is to be unstopable.

They did something that almost sounds like something I would do, as I have a nasty habit of dropping sensor sats in storms and asteroid fields and other out of the way places using regular or stealthy ships, and also moving around stealthy construction ships afterwards to build stealthy bases...
Heck, I LOVE dead end systems with nothing in them, especially nebulas or ones with asteroids or storms, good places for building up bases with space yards, hiding backup resupply points, and overall acting as a backup ace in the hole.
For storms/asteroid fields, I use them to make resupply points.

I also love to toss every stealth measure possible on a ship with a space yard and support ships, sneak them around/through enemy territory, and build either behind them, or even some backwater system with a storm or asteroid field to build up stealthy bases in...

Don't leave it fully as long as possible. Its better to slowly loose with controled looses than give it up without strugle.

My thoughts as well. You are playing with a double edged sword. You ask a question. You get an ansswer then he works out a possible response. Remember the old saying "Walls Have ears."

I suppose its too late to say don't fill in his gap that he left, since he is probably regrouping for a new offensive in the next turn or two...which he did.

You say you have own both sides of the wormhole to your territory? At this point, I'd say you must keep control of both ends at all costs, else you risk a puncture on your front line, breaking your strength and with the enemy massing on one side to eventually overrun your front positions in a systematic invasion that will end with your eventual surrender, wormhole tech or not.

At all costs my friend you must maintain your presence in the no-mans land. You have just entered into the reality of your defensive position in this phase of the war. Whether or not you go back on the offense will be determined if you can hold out long enough to develop WP tech and take advantage of it. If you lose no-man's, you risk him massing up and rushing into your systems and rendering the effectiveness of your WP strat to regain the offensive, mute. Even a token presence in no-man's is better than no man in no-man's. It's psychological. Make some guerrilla fighters and drones and keep him off guard in there. If you have to throw your entire fleet into it, do it. This is the turning point of the war, and if you can hold out long enough to use WP tech to surprise him, your defense can easily turn into a powerfully massed offense for which he will be unprepared (assuming he isn't reading this thread!)

At which time when you do break through his lines, don't force the issue. Just keep up the harassing guerrilla tactics and use them to buy you valuable time to build up infrastructure at home and so increase your production to match, and eventually beat his. Use the WP harassment strat to close off some of his undefended WPs if you can find them, and if not, just get jump happy and keep him off guard while you build in and build up. I say "don't force the issue" because he will retaliate by throwing everything he does have at your systems in an attempt to stop your apparent offense (which is why you must keep the bulk of your fleets defending the no-man warp points). After researching WP openers and closers, I'd switch to monoliths and build up your infrastructure that way. Monoliths would be the next strategic research item, for as you have guessed correctly this has certainly turned into a unit-war. Monoliths will certainly help support your unit fleets and will enable you to eventually support a greater number than he can, and thus you can win the war if you can find a way to glass a few of his core worlds into submission using units and additional techs. I hope these suggestions help.

Close them now in case a Newly built ship makes a run for them. If he gets it through he could Glass several planets in your soft underbelly.

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Yes, clean up after yourself. Yes start closing his undefended WPs (and then divide and conquer!). Cause havoc. Beef up your defenses where you know he can still attack you, and attack you he will. Don't throw everything into him yet, remember to use your WP strat to BUY you time to build up YOUR infrastructure while keep him on the defensive. Don't make it your main attack yet. You need to build up to deal him a final blow. If you pour most of your fleets into your new WPs, he will simply pour into your no-mans land with everything he's got in a finale that will leave you both stalemated again. Keep more than half your fleet in reserve at home. Trust me, it will save you grief and not lose what you have gained psychologically against your enemy. Resist the urge to deal him some major pain, and invest that in dealing him a final blow later. Use your guerrillas to disrupt his rebuilding/defense efforts, but use your monoliths (research those next ASAP) to win the game. Keep your main attack fleets at home and build them up and steamroll him later with a divide and conquer strategy...with a little core world glassing mixed in for fun.

Launch drones thru the open WP's as well hitting any lone ship you can see. Spread Intel sats thru the systems if you can (hide them).

Keep in mind he is cloaking. He may have already entered your newly opened WP's and scouting you as we speak.

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Question: Can you explain how you got the VPN game created and working?

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Yeah, that's why if you ever use WP openers, that you also have WP closers closing them behind you. Better to lose a WP opener stranded with its back to the wall in an enemy system, than to lose it and still have your WP open to one of your systems, even if it is defended. You want to keep him on the defense, and not provide him with opportunity to engage you offensively...yet.

Nicely done! And nice WP strategy!

Definitely close the door behind you - you can always re-open one when you need to send in reinforcements.

Start closing off his WP's. Isolate his systems, and then conquer them. (Capture the planets if you can - get a start on infrastructure/population - with ground troops; glass them if you can't and recolonize).

Definitely send off some scouts to map out his territory, and keep the pressure on. Hit in where he won't be expecting it (i.e., don't hit one system, then the next one adjacent...skip around systems)

Now that you are behind his main defenses, I should mention he prob hasn't mined or fighter-defended his inner warp points yet. Send in cloaked scouts ASAP and map out his inner systems so you have targets for later WP harassment, and then when you've discovered the system, close the warp point you used to get there. You've got to acquire more system targets for your WP guerilla strat to be most effective. Shutting down his Warp Points and cutting off his empire will effectively end the game for him until he can scrap up enough research points to counter your strat by developing WP tech too. You may not be able to glass or take all of his planets, but cutting off warp points between his systems will cripple his support infrastructure (spaceports can only transmit resources through clear lines of transit if I recall, so if you're lucky enough to close off all the lines from a system back to his empire, he will no longer receive those resources) and cause his resources to go bankrupt. A bankrupt empire is a dead empire. And remember to resist the urge to send in everything you've got. You still need to build up for the final blow later.

Also if you happen to know you've cut off a significant source of his intel planets...you will have won the upper hand in intel and probably could start doing more offensive intel. He may even desperately scrap intel facillities for research to gain WP tech, in which case you will only gain the ability to dominate offensive intel against him. Keep up the good work, and keep your main fleet in reserve until you are ready to wipe out his core systems, which will usually be about the time when he finally gets his own WP tech.

Of course, I know how to counter WP guerrillas, but since he's not here asking for help, I'm not sharing it. Everything has a counter. Man I love this game (maybe it's about time that I share that I have never played against a human yet, but have always wanted to. I sleep and dream SEV).

haha this thread is so much fun!
i'm happy you managed to make the WP strat work!!
break him!!
plague was a very nice touch. little mean
but yes. close your back door. set up spy sats and if the coast is clear you can always open a gate and send in new ships, then close it again.

Maps, maps, maps. You need targets to keep up the WP harassment. He's prob researching WP tech to counter which is to your advantage since you already have it and can focus research on the next big thing: monoliths, and then cloaks, and then stardestroying weapons.

Since he's prob working on WP tech, keep your fleets building up at home. He will attack you eventually, and you will need your fleet home to counter him. With you focusing on monoliths and gaining the edge in production, he's in for a nasty surprise.

Yes, the plague bombs were a nice touch.

Since you now have WP tech, know this: he who decides the battlefields often wins the war. Don't let him take up the offense and attack you through your open WPs. Close them behind your fleets. Better to lose a fleet (even an expensive warp opener) on the offense deep in their systems, than to lose control of a warp point you opened and never close it again.

Do the following with warp fleets:
1. Openers stay at home system and open warp point.
2. Attack fleet warps through, picks a target or two and attacks.
3. Closers close the warp point.
4. Attack fleet survives retaliation
5. Open warp point and pick up as many survivors as possible.
6. Close the warp point.
7. 4rs: Repair, Refit, Re-suppy, Re-arm.
8. Rinse and repeat targeting a different or same system.

Intel:
Start testing his intel. Most likely he's converting intel planets to research to get the WP tech he so carelessly didn't think was all that important. Send more attacks to gain system knowledge and maps.

Research:
Research monoliths, then cloaking, then the big guns... star destroying weapons.

Build:
Monoliths
cloaked scouts (warp them in to scout out systems)
then units with supporting capitals
then cloaked star destroyers

Target:
units against his units and worlds
capitals against his ships and worlds
star destroyers against his heavily defended systems - if you're lucky, you might be able to plant one in his home system using a giant escort fleet to take care of any defenders he might have setup at his sun.

Good luck. It sounds like you've taken the strategic lead. Keep him guessing, but keep your main fleet in reserve until you know you can decisively win. He may be redoubling his defenses at the moment. That's ok. Stardestroyers will make a sudden end of his hard-earned efforts later.

Is there a counter tech to the warp point opener/closer tech that "protects" a system from this sort of attack?

It almost sounds as though it could be a game-ending technology, thus in a long game everyone is forced to go after it.

System Gravitational Shield Facilities are the counter. It prevents all stellar manipulation in a system. Everything in this game has a counter.

SGSs are researched under shields>planetary shields in the BM. It's an equally expensive tech to WP techs, and it takes considerable investment to set them up. Once the facility is created, no WPs can be created in or out (or stardestroyers blowing up, or nebulas created, or even *gasp* black holes made in the system). It makes for a nice way to refocus the game on conventional warfare again...until of course the SGS of a system is destroyed by an enemy fleet. Once there are no longer any SGSs in your system, then um you'd better run as fast as you can to the nearest wormhole, before Judgment Day comes in a blinding flash of light and a dark black spot where your sun, planets, bases, and ships used to be ... because players typically hate enemy players who use SGSes to prevent them from using their new big weapons.

But the worst game of course is where someone with WP tech closes off their systems to the galaxy, and then builds SGSs preventing anyone from coming in or going out. Such "turtle" empires are highly shunned as it practically ends the game, which is why the one who "turtles" first in a remaining 2 player game, is considered the retreating loser and the game over. Most games though, at least one or two chokepoints will always be agreed to exist to prevent this unethical surrender of the galaxy to the other. If one closes off first, they have in fact surrendered according to most players.

Most players agree to SGS and redesign WP traffic for their core systems, and leave one or two contested systems open to allow for enemy engagement. Though I have never heard of or seen a game lasting long enough where two empires obtained both WP tech and SGS tech and put them both to effective use in creating such a technological stalemate.

I suppose the counter to such a stalemate would be intel to destroy enemy buildings and so attack that system with a stardestroyer as soon as intel destroyed the system gravitational shield. But an open warp point is required to maintain contact with a race in order to do intel, which is why an agreed neutral zone is required to maintain the game at that point.

Well, it's your choice and a treaty means nothing as it can be torn apart with minimal warning. Do you want a dirty fight with Stellar Manipulations occurring all throughout or would you rather try and catch up on all the research he's been doing and win conventionally?

He's smart to raise his Intel. There's a chance he's scrapped his resource facilities to rush tech a bit - seeing you retreat and not being attacked again means it's not a bad thing to do. If that is indeed his choice (your call on whether you believe so or not), then you're on a time limit. Sounds like he has superior stealth, and he'll soon catch up and surpass you in Stellar Manipulation if he's rebuilt his empire into hyper research. You may only have a few turns to crack him before he's unstoppable.

But there is also risk in going all out - he might instead be waiting to wreck your fleet in easy-to-defend situations and just decide to raze you instead of researching. Plenty people have cautioned you on why it's not good to go all out. Your game, your decision.

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go here if interested . No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE V bug fixing.

Nice thread

Groovy Baby Yeah!

It's a bluff. He's obviously unprepared for the moment. Force him to pay you a tariff in exchange for holding back using such tech. He'll say no. Just keep researching monoliths, and let him worry about "opening the can of worms."

He's attempting to steal your WP tech. That's the only explanation for him going UP in intel as far as I can figure (or at the very least doing his best to stop you from getting maps and warping into his core). At the very least this works to your favor still since it means he's increasing intel and not research. Counter by increasing your defensive intel just in case, and enjoy the fact that you may have beaten the intellectual property war. You also have the option to sabotage his intel, but at this point I don't know where his intel strength is, so it's best left alone and hope you can rebuild before he steals your WP tech. He's probably stuck in the middle of researching something conventional at the moment in order to out gun your current fleets. You may have hurt him more psychologically than you know. Offer him the tariff if he's that worried. Tell him you will honor it the treaty, but only if he pays.

Just be sure to get your home fleet ready and massed to leap before he makes his move with any WP tech of his own. If he doesn't have WP tech, he doesn't have any of the other stellar tech, so nothing to worry about - except his own scorched earth policy IN which case, you will need to scan your target system for enemy stellar manip ship before leaving your fleet there over a turn, or else your neatly organized offensive fleet could be atomized.

Keep harassing him and obtaining a map of his systems. Get those monoliths and start building up. Keep up the unit front and don't let up. He needs to see you at constant work in his systems. Consider the fact that he may have actually retreated to his core systems for now as you continue to harass his front systems. When you get a map of his internal systems, warp in there and continue the harassment. Bring the fight to the enemy. Remember: he who chooses the battlefield, often wins the war.

As it stands, I think I've given you enough to turn the tide of the war. It's your game. Go dominate him. I look forward to your action reports.

Reverse engineering won't automatically give full research into a field - it'll give a boost unless he's far behind on pre-requisites. Either way, it does chip in seriously at your tech lead.

By the way, is this sequential or simultaneous turns?

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go here if interested . No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE V bug fixing.

Self-destruction devices... in SE IV they were guaranteed. But in SE V, I heard stories how they weren't guaranteed to be used.

Being defensive seems logical. Whether that's exactly what he's aiming for (sounds to me he can research faster than you if he can get a few more systems under his control) is the question. He's proven to be good at Misdirection and Stealth. Make a judgement you can trust.

I wouldn't be surprised if he started sending in Scout DRONES next. Hmm... do minefields stop Drones?

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go here if interested . No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE V bug fixing.

Oy.

Um, you left your wormhole open after your turn? You should always close them when warping in a fleet. Always. This is a very expensive lesson to learn.

And he captured it AND took it back home? Sweeet. Have to hand it to him, your opponent is pretty quick thinking. If I were him, I'd be doing the happy dance at what I just pulled off.

You are in a small world of hurt. Your advantage in WP tech is practically gone, and unless you are almost done with monolith tech, you will have a hard time converting planets while fending off his inevitable WP attacks like a mad hatter. No doubt he didn't like you refusing his treaty.

Not all is lost. You just lost your offensive edge and have been put back on the defensive, which was inevitable once he got your WP tech, which is why you needed monoliths to build up your fleets at home. But...now its harder that he's gotten it sooner rather than later. You really have to hunker down and build up your fleet. He is sure to attack the deepest system he knows of and can reach, with his largest fleet.

You've got a choice, throw everything you've got at him... and lose.

or

Build up your defenses... and lose until the monos start paying off.

Oy.

Get stardestroyers ASAP. Start putting self-destruct devices on these expensive crown jewels to prevent capture again. Don't give him any more stellar techs for free, ok?

I would be srprised if he took the ship to be analysed. As he will only gain 1-2 tech levels; not worth the loss escept if he is very very close to WPs. I would expect an attack with your warp opener in few turns. I also wouldn't be surprised if he tries to capture one of your warp closers.

I know this is BM; but don't monoth come from stellar manipulation tech or are they new tech level?

How many worlds do you have? How much intel/research are you generating?

If he's waging war on a different front, hit him with everything you have--multi-front wars are brutal for resource management. If you can find his homeworlds and wax them, that'll really hurt. Also, your priority targets are system _____ facilities -- anything that gives him a bonus to resource/research or intel generation on a system-wide basis.

Have you colonized EVERY planet in your own backyard? Are you using system improvement technology on your worlds?

If he's building up, you need to build up more. If you are doing guerrilla warp tactics, you shouldn't have any losses. At the very least you should be attempting to place cloaked satellites in his systems to test and see if he hasn't developed full scanner tech. This will give you an eye with which to watch for juicy targets.

Securing no-man's could be your intermediate goal and would give your fleets something to do. As mentioned above, building infrastructure and colonies is what you need to focus on now so that when monoliths come, you can be ready to start converting a few planets at a time. Mono tech takes a long time to reap the reward, but working on them as hard as you did WP tech will pay big dividends later in allowing you to maintain the huge fleets necessary to counter his and actually start glassing.

The neat thing about WP tech is that once you have it, you can call up friendly fleets instantly from any friendly system in range if there's trouble from the other side. Just be sure to invest in warp closers too. My favorite schema is a ship with both warp opener and closer, granted it costs a bit to get one, but it is well worth it to have at least two of them in order to assist transportation anywhere in your empire at a moment's notice (and to start redesigning your warp transit lines and improve transportation speeds across your empire, while closing off your core systems with shielding tech later).

It seems you were having some success with Intel, you could try increasing your intel attacks more, but if anything your number one goal at this point is the locations of his home systems for your warpships to exploit. Without home system locations, you may not have a quick victory, and may have to go more conventional.

After monos, go for cloaking tech and get some knowledge of his inner systems.

After cloaking tech, go for the star destroyer and prepare for the day when you will get lucky and obtain the location of his home system...and warp...clear up the sun defenders...and light a fuse and say a prayer - at least this is inigma's way of dealing with empires that refuse to submit to a gracious offer of unconditional surrender.

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go here if interested . No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE V bug fixing.

Isn't there a system gravitational facility in BM??

set one up in your core systems and there's no chance of him warping in unexpectedly.

Well... yes but... it's a significant investment of research and build time. Would practically require him to shift gears to defensive. Whereas researching star destroyers would be taking the offensive.

Still... Sys Grav facilities would also protect suns as well as warp points. It's not a bad way to go - really up to the player to decide what path to take. Depends on judgement of how the opponent is doing - are they pouring everything into researching and then building Stellar Manipulation components? Or are they investing in a conventional fleet?

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go here if interested . No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE V bug fixing.