Home » Stars! 2.6/7 » Challenges » Challenge 2 - Kill AI
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Re: Challenge 2 - Kill AI |
Thu, 15 May 2014 05:50 |
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m.a@stars wrote on Wed, 14 May 2014 21:04nmid wrote on Tue, 13 May 2014 20:06 Why don't you play and see what everyone's experiencing , instead of theory-crafting yourself ?
It's not theory. I've played equivalent setups, and related (increasingly harder) ones, with the Humanoids themselves, dozens of times. That's how I started, so many years ago, before even knowing what "race design" was.
Have you played this challenge yet?
It's not tough, but it's not as easy as you make it out to be.
You have 2 HE neighbours throwing metamorphs (8 shields variants) and using bazooka's while you are still on x-ray lasers... and only 1 station with only 700-900 resources.
By the time you get to bazooka's/colloidals, they are using jihads.
Unless you don't do 2 things (which I am not stating), you can't survive.
If you say you survived the 1st 25 years without reloading any backups or did it in one go, I'll be very hard pressed to believe you.
I know my minefields.. but I'm a chaff sweeper.
I used to curse when I got stuck in traffic... till I realised I AM traffic.Report message to a moderator
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Re: Challenge 2 - Kill AI |
Thu, 15 May 2014 06:18 |
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m.a@stars | | Commander | Messages: 2765
Registered: October 2004 Location: Third star to the left | |
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nmid wrote on Thu, 15 May 2014 11:50Have you played this challenge yet?
I've played worse, 20 years ago. This one ranks nicely among them, but other than the tricky start I wouldn't rank it as the toughest.
Quote:You have 2 HE neighbours throwing metamorphs (8 shields variants) and using bazooka's while you are still on x-ray lasers... and only 1 station with only 700-900 resources.
By the time you get to bazooka's/colloidals, they are using jihads.
I also have my wits, and plenty enough experience baiting AIs and milking them. Plus a million+ pop and a few little ships. By the time they come knocking I'm no longer techless or resourceless.
As for Jihads, yeah, the AIs weak designs can be slaughtered with Bazs, even without using chaff. In fact, I'm now building my initial chaff to help my Jugg BBs hold my newly acquired colonies. My main worry in the med-late BB era is that tech is getting harder to come by, except of course Weaps, and I might need to Research some.
I'm not sure I'll be able to beat any speed record, tho.
Update: I just killed the last ship of an AI somebody else had already destroyed. Does that one count for the challenge?
[Updated on: Thu, 15 May 2014 08:19]
So many Stars, so few Missiles!
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Re: Challenge 2 - Kill AI |
Thu, 15 May 2014 18:06 |
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m.a@stars wrote on Thu, 15 May 2014 12:18
I also have my wits, and plenty enough experience baiting AIs and milking them. Plus a million+ pop and a few little ships. By the time they come knocking I'm no longer techless or resourceless.
As for Jihads, yeah, the AIs weak designs can be slaughtered with Bazs, even without using chaff. In fact, I'm now building my initial chaff to help my Jugg BBs hold my newly acquired colonies. My main worry in the med-late BB era is that tech is getting harder to come by, except of course Weaps, and I might need to Research some.
I'm not sure I'll be able to beat any speed record, tho.
Yeah the AI desines are not good and will never become good
But it is a lot of mass what will come for you so be prepaired. ( Special when 6 Races hit you and the beamer start 3 fields next to your jaggas )
My score is no speed record. So if you real try it you should beat it about 50-100 years.
ccmaster
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Re: Challenge 2 - Kill AI |
Sat, 17 May 2014 17:46 |
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mrvan | | Officer Cadet 1st Year | Messages: 220
Registered: May 2014 | |
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First attempt - played to 2515.
Start went decent, especially with the forum hint of scouts as researchers. Lost my starbase a number of times, but was able to rebuild every time without problem. After around 50 years (I think) I had approximate tech parity and my HW felt secure, guarded by a fleet of jihad cruisers and some BB's.
Then I made the mistake to attack neighbouring planets in full force and attempt to keep them. Managed to capture Blue Giant, Hill, and Spittle without difficulty, but was booted off all of them by enemy Jihad BB's against a divided defense fleet. I am ready to give up, my HW was bombarded with a large packet and apparently packets go before defenses built, so the expeditions plus the package dropped my HW to around 500k with nothing to show for it and my fleet more or less gone.
I will try again and do more guerilla style warfare from my HW, conquering a planet and transporting all minerals back until I have an expedition fleet that can withstand an enemy attack.
It is quite annoying that it seems very hard to keep my mine field up and getting their minefields down. I had something like 20-30 frigates laying mines, and sent out sorties of 10 gattling frigate sweepers to jump in, sweep, jump back. Is there a better way to do mine field management?
I guess I also need to learn about using chaff against enemy jihad BB's... I also used beamer cruisers (move 2.5, 2 sappers + 5 phasers or 6 Mk IV blasters) but they just die so quickly because they run at the enemy, even if the enemies are still fighting among themselves, and they seem a bit expensive to treat as disposable.
Anyway, the challenge is quite fun and instructive, I hope that the second attempt goes better!
Edit: second attempt went much worse. The AI attacked with stacks of morphs much earlier, forcing me to rebuild my station quite often; and it feels like I was less lucky in the tech lottery. Turn 27 they sniped my starbase (13 cruisers and 10 destroyers still alive) and immediately bombed my population down to 57k. Game over...
[Updated on: Sat, 17 May 2014 20:21] Report message to a moderator
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Re: Challenge 2 - Kill AI |
Sun, 18 May 2014 06:04 |
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m.a@stars | | Commander | Messages: 2765
Registered: October 2004 Location: Third star to the left | |
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ccmaster wrote on Sat, 17 May 2014 13:48Ok.
So enouth talking. Want to see some nummbers frim you MA and you Nmid !
As with your skills there should be no problems against AI or ?
Ccmaster
I'm far from finished, as I don't have enough free time. Year is 2535, been seeing/killing SupLat DDs for about 10 turns already, so Nub era looms near. Ranked 10th, 14 planets, 6 SBs, 100+ techs, building chaff and Doom BBs, and soon a MegaD replacement for my faithful Coll CCs. I'm more-or-less leading the "weak" pack, still far from the strong races. I've been hitting the Hicardis (former #1) hard until their growth curve reversed itself. Now the Eagles are #1 and sending Bombers and Upsilon DDs non-stop.
Found a weird little battleboard bug, where my Jug BBs retreated to backstop and refused to fire, while everything else performed as expected. Half a dozen re-gens later I saw it twice more, while most of the time the multi-way slugfest went ok. No clue what triggers it, or if number of AIs present matters.
So many Stars, so few Missiles!
In space no one can hear you scheme! Report message to a moderator
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Re: Challenge 2 - Kill AI |
Sun, 18 May 2014 06:14 |
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m.a@stars | | Commander | Messages: 2765
Registered: October 2004 Location: Third star to the left | |
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mrvan wrote on Sat, 17 May 2014 23:46Then I made the mistake to attack neighbouring planets in full force and attempt to keep them. Managed to capture Blue Giant, Hill, and Spittle without difficulty, but was booted off all of them by enemy Jihad BB's against a divided defense fleet.
Don't split your fleet(s) too much, and don't forget the chaff. Also, you need to lay minefields around all your planets. Both Blue Giant and Spittle are indeed my main lightning rods, so much so that I've been able/forced to send my HW fleet to defend them. Still, they're great investments!
Note: IIRC, I killed most JJ BBs with my trusty horde of Coll CCs. I was very lucky to get CC tech early and Jug tech shortly afterwards.
So many Stars, so few Missiles!
In space no one can hear you scheme! Report message to a moderator
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Re: Challenge 2 - Kill AI |
Sun, 18 May 2014 06:46 |
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mrvan | | Officer Cadet 1st Year | Messages: 220
Registered: May 2014 | |
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Hmm. Assuming that all AI have decent planetary scanners (say 320 ly) you really need quite a bit of cloaking to stay invisible in deep space. I can build a galleon with 3 mines and 7 supercloaks for 93% cloaking, but that is quite expensive at around 3x resources and 6x iron compared to a FF layer. Not sure that would be worth it?
BTW what happens if the AI targets a mine layer that accidentally got in range, and the layer moves to out of scanner range? And does the AI target mine field centers or can you just hang out and add mines from one position if it is out of scanner range?
[Edit: AI is too stupid to target mine field centers, so you can indeed position a 93% cloaked layer in a strategic place and just keep it there for 10 turns. That actually makes it quite attractive to build a couple, even if they are 400 resources and 120 iron each...]
6 layers and 4 supercloaks is much more cost efficient (around 3x iron and 1.5x resources per equipped mine layer) byt only gives 85% which is probably not enough to avoid detection....
[Updated on: Sun, 18 May 2014 06:50] Report message to a moderator
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Re: Challenge 2 - Kill AI |
Sun, 18 May 2014 11:54 |
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ccmaster wrote on Sat, 17 May 2014 17:18Ok.
So enouth talking. Want to see some nummbers frim you MA and you Nmid !
As with your skills there should be no problems against AI or ?
Ccmaster
lol.
I've played to year 90, but haven't been able to play a lot today.
I am currently ranked 1 (no big deal), killed 1 AI completely and 3 are almost dead ...
I don't remember my con lvl (perhaps lvl20ish), but I'm almost on lvl 25 weaps with jammer 30s (elec16?) and en 22.
[Updated on: Sun, 18 May 2014 13:23]
I know my minefields.. but I'm a chaff sweeper.
I used to curse when I got stuck in traffic... till I realised I AM traffic.Report message to a moderator
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Re: Challenge 2 - Kill AI |
Sun, 18 May 2014 12:58 |
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(Paraphrased)mrvan wrote on Sun, 18 May 2014 03:16(Paraphrased)
First attempt - played to 2515.
1. forum hint of scouts as researchers.
2. Lost my starbase a number of times
3. around 50 years (I think) I had approximate tech parity ... jihad cruisers and some BB's.
4. Then I made the mistake to attack neighbouring planets in full force and attempt to keep them. Managed to capture Blue Giant, Hill, and Spittle without difficulty, but was booted off all of them by enemy Jihad BB's against a divided defense fleet.
5. I am ready to give up, my HW was bombarded with a large packet and apparently packets go before defenses built, so the expeditions plus the package dropped my HW to around 500k with nothing to show for it and my fleet more or less gone.
6. I will try again and do more guerilla style warfare from my HW, conquering a planet and transporting all minerals back until I have an expedition fleet that can withstand an enemy attack.
7. It is quite annoying that it seems very hard to keep my mine field up and getting their minefields down. I had something like 20-30 frigates laying mines, and sent out sorties of 10 gattling frigate sweepers to jump in, sweep, jump back. Is there a better way to do mine field management?
8. I guess I also need to learn about using chaff against enemy jihad BB's... I also used beamer cruisers (move 2.5, 2 sappers + 5 phasers or 6 Mk IV blasters) but they just die so quickly because they run at the enemy, even if the enemies are still fighting among themselves, and they seem a bit expensive to treat as disposable.
9. Anyway, the challenge is quite fun and instructive, I hope that the second attempt goes better!
10. Edit: second attempt went much worse. The AI attacked with stacks of morphs much earlier, forcing me to rebuild my station quite often; and it feels like I was less lucky in the tech lottery. Turn 27 they sniped my starbase (13 cruisers and 10 destroyers still alive) and immediately bombed my population down to 57k. Game over...
1,2,3) You NEED that AI free tech + jihads. Try making sure you don't lose your station by using a mix of sappers + suicide fleets.
It's better to waste resources making suicide fleets that kill their fleets as well, rather than rebuilding your station repeatedly.
4) You are on the right track.. you need to attack and expand esp against those planets.. though I would suggest you do that even earlier.
5,6) that might work.. I did steal minerals, but I kept my footprint on those worlds as well.
A small suggestion, if you are staying on your HW for 40+ years, ensure you have orbit control (i.e. making sure none of your ships die). Bleed off excess pop of 45% into LFs in orbit.
With a default 15% GR, wasting years of growth won't help you any.
7) use 3-4 DDs stacked with 1 gorrila/bear shield + 2 gatlings. That will be enough to survive a hit + sweep the minefields.
8.) you NEED to use chaff. Without having a constant chaff supply chain, any defence or attack is doomed to fail.
10) Yea, I recall in my 1st and 2nd attempt, I was attacked by those metamorphs with a vengeance.
edit - 9.) Oh, forgot.. Ironical considering your (10th) point.. Good luck
[Updated on: Sun, 18 May 2014 13:24]
I know my minefields.. but I'm a chaff sweeper.
I used to curse when I got stuck in traffic... till I realised I AM traffic.Report message to a moderator
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