Home » Stars! 2.6/7 » The Academy » Mineral Packet Attacks
| Mineral Packet Attacks |
Tue, 19 December 2006 14:17  |
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 sjangers |
 | Crewman 3rd Class |
Messages: 6
Registered: January 2005 | |
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I’m looking for a little assistance in trying to figure out something somewhat unusual that’s happening in a game I’m now playing (not here on AH, Ron. Sorry.).
I’m playing a WM race in a team game. One of our opponents is an IT who has been a very successful expansionist. As part of our effort to keep his growth in check, my teammates and I have used mineral packets to attack his colonies and those of his team members. The problem is that his colonies have been very difficult to destroy.
In calculating packet size and speed, I assume that enemy colonies are 25% larger than current scanner readings. I also assume an annual growth rate of 20% in determining the size of the population to be eliminated when packets will be in flight more than one year. When defenses and mass drivers are present we work their effect into the calculation. To make the final determination of packet size and speed I am using the Stars! Calculator 3.04 utility. This is a program I have used on many prior occasions and have found the results to be generally quite satisfactory.
Outcomes against this particularly IT have been largely unsatisfactory. We have packeted his colonies on nine occasions and have only completely eliminated populations twice. Once was with a Warp 13 packet at a distance of less than 84 l.y. The other attempts have usually left a small enemy population still in control of the colony. The few occasions we have packeted his teammates (JOATs) have been uniformly successful.
In trying to figure out this problem I have considered the possibility that well-cloaked space stations with mass drivers could account for a modest reduction in damage, but I don’t believe this is possible in all cases (i.e., we have had a pretty good look at some of these stations either before or after an attempt). I have also considered the possibility that well-cloaked transports with colonizer modules might allow him to re-colonize a packeted planet as a Waypoint 1 task on the turn a packet arrives, but this also seems reasonably unlikely in all cases.
Is there anything about an IT race that would make it more resistant to mineral packet attacks? If not, does anyone have any ideas about how this player might be keeping his colonies alive?
Replies to me at this location or to my e-mail address, sjangers@sover.net , will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
Steve
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| Re: Mineral Packet Attacks |
Tue, 19 December 2006 16:46  |
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| LEit |
 | Lt. Commander |
Messages: 879
Registered: April 2003
Location: CT | |
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IT's are actually a bit more vulnerable to packets then normal races, their drivers are only half as effective at catching packets.
But you can build before packets arrive.
If the target is less then speed * speed / 2, then it arrives the same turn, but after the target gets to build.
If the target is between .5 and 1.5 the one year distance, then it arrives before the target can build anything the following turn.
If they built defenses or drivers with that turn, then your calculations are probably off.
Also, if they had freighters in orbit when you launch, they could have dropped the pop waypoint 0 (or IS overflow) and built with that pop too.
If the target is in that .5 to 1.5 range, it is possible to station freighters at the place where the packet will be and drain it.
Also, for dealing with "Pan-Galactic-Wack-a-Mole" (phrase coined by overworked in a game where he played an IT that was getting packeted) the target can terraform/build factories some years, and then it'll be able to spend enough in one year to build driver and defenses.
The other thing to remember about packeting an IT. If you fail to kill the world in one year, it's basicly over, because they can gate everything in.
- LEitReport message to a moderator
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| Re: Mineral Packet Attacks |
Wed, 20 December 2006 02:20 |
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| iztok |
 | Commander |
Messages: 1206
Registered: April 2003
Location: Slovenia, Europe | |
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Hi!
| sjangers wrote on Tue, 19 December 2006 20:17 |
...The other attempts have usually left a small enemy population still in control of the colony.
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By your description I'd say he has recolonized the packeted planet. A nasty tactics that makes opponents wondering what went wrong... To check if he did that, you had to look at a planet's defense level after packeting. If it is 0%, and there is not an orbital, then that's what happened.
That's quite common tactics I used recently against a PP race. On mid-game-gained planets in his range I haven't built any defenses and just the cheapest Dock to refuel. When I've seen packets flying after those planets, I just lifted all pop and sent a colonizer there. In between I kept building there factories and mines, because those are not destroyed when planet loses population. After some time I had enough resources to build so many defenses in a single turn, that packeting became so much more expensive he almost never used it. My race being 3-immune HE, and so not feeling any effects of packetforming, and another race on my side being a WM also helped a lot. 
BR, Iztok
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| Re: Mineral Packet Attacks |
Wed, 20 December 2006 13:20 |
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| LEit |
| Lt. Commander |
Messages: 879
Registered: April 2003
Location: CT | |
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| sjangers wrote on Wed, 20 December 2006 09:29 |
Packets, the turn they are in space, are the appropriate 75% of launch size, and I don't think this guy has any cloaked freighters that just happen to be in the right place at the right time
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You won't see the packet shrink until the following year (at which point it'll be gone anyway, as it hits that year). It is possible to calculate where a packet will be if you can have the launch site, the target, and the speed, or correct guesses.
Hmm, one other thing, the orbital could have two drivers on it, and that counts as +1 speed for catching packets. A bit silly for an IT, and very expensive, but possible.
- LEitReport message to a moderator
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| Re: Mineral Packet Attacks |
Wed, 20 December 2006 16:48 |
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I think starscalc is accurate.... I suspect that the part of the function that estimates the amount of minerals that arrive at the destiation is innaccurate (it seems to calculate the shrinkage based on the exact distance to destination, but I think the game may actually just consider number of turns to destination for strikes.) I'll need to test this to confirm - this is a hunch, nothing more, but that seems to be consistent with what I've seen in games.
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| Re: Mineral Packet Attacks |
Thu, 21 December 2006 02:15 |
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| iztok |
| Commander |
Messages: 1206
Registered: April 2003
Location: Slovenia, Europe | |
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Hi!
| sjangers wrote on Wed, 20 December 2006 15:15 |
Generally, before and after packeting, this guy's planets don't show any defenses. Orbitals, however, do remain in cases where there was an orbital.
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Hummm... three things come to my mind when reading your responses:
- a silly question (probably needless) first: what type of scan you had on his planet before and after packeting: a pen-scan, chaff "ping" (your ship in orbit) or just "normal" scan? If only normal scan, it is possible you killed the planet, but the info you got was not accurate.
- did you accompany your packet with at least one ship (did you have a ship at the location of the packet at the launch turn)? If you didn't, it's entirely possible he had a cloaked fleet there and had some minerals loaded into his ships.
- the Stars!Calc you're using is 3.04. I have 3.06. Could it be your version calculates damage wrong? I know even my version does that - several times when packeting with exact number of proposed minerals it didn't kill the planet. Now I just add 10% of minerals and it works OK (so far ).
BR, Iztok
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| Re: Mineral Packet Attacks |
Thu, 21 December 2006 03:36 |
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| Marduk |
 | Ensign |
Messages: 345
Registered: January 2003
Location: Dayton, OH | |
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| iztok wrote on Thu, 21 December 2006 02:15 |
- the Stars!Calc you're using is 3.04. I have 3.06. Could it be your version calculates damage wrong? I know even my version does that - several times when packeting with exact number of proposed minerals it didn't kill the planet. Now I just add 10% of minerals and it works OK (so far ).
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Population growth and/or added defenses while a packet was in transit, perhaps?
I have had frequent odd results with packets as an IT. Launching a 30,000kt packet at warp 12 against a WM world just under 70ly away (a same-year impact) with full (but low-tech) defenses and a MD7 had no effect. The system was under pen-scan before and after, and the same year I sent the packet I sent a fleet to attack it. I won, but took some loses because the orbital was still there (didn't have enough chaff to handle it as well as the fleet). My fleet then bombed out half the original pre-packet population, leaving... about half the original pre-packet population. What packet? Should have sent it UPS or FedEx, obviously, then I could have tracked its location. Or maybe they simply refused to sign for it.
As an IT taking incoming fire, I'm sure the MDs aren't half as effective. It's more like a quarter. Instead of a MD10 counting for 50 (half of [10 squared]), it seemed to count for 25 ([half of ten] squared). Populations that should have been annoyed (incoming W7 packet, MD10 to catch with good defenses) were instead devastated. Populations that should have been devastated (incoming W7 packet, MD7 to catch with fair defenses) were instead obliterated. Obviously my people loved to sign for mystery packages. In triplicate.
Of course the IT coffin packet has a silver lining. This sort of thing forced me to learn a lot about intercepting packets and keeping them from doing harm through population-lifting/re-colonization tricks.
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| Re: Mineral Packet Attacks |
Thu, 21 December 2006 22:43 |
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| sjangers |
| Crewman 3rd Class |
Messages: 6
Registered: January 2005 | |
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Hi Iztok,
- a silly question (probably needless) first: what type of scan you had on his planet before and after packeting: a pen-scan, chaff "ping" (your ship in orbit) or just "normal" scan? If only normal scan, it is possible you killed the planet, but the info you got was not accurate.
Not a silly question at all. You have no idea of my skill level, or my stupidity level on any given day. We are using penscanning to assess planetary populations, defenses and orbitals. Sometimes scans are in the outer half of penscanning capability, so cloaked ships in orbit could be an unknown, but we have also had similarly perplexing results when scan results offer a reliably clear picture of the situation.
- did you accompany your packet with at least one ship (did you have a ship at the location of the packet at the launch turn)? If you didn't, it's entirely possible he had a cloaked fleet there and had some minerals loaded into his ships.
I haven’t done this and I should. From evidence gathered to date I’ve tended to assume he wouldn’t have this capability, but I could be wrong. He might be just clever enough to bleed off a fraction of the packet rather than giving the game away by capturing the entire mass.
- the Stars!Calc you're using is 3.04. I have 3.06. Could it be your version calculates damage wrong? I know even my version does that - several times when packeting with exact number of proposed minerals it didn't kill the planet. Now I just add 10% of minerals and it works OK.
I do generally make liberal allowances for enemy population and capabilities- usually adding that little bit extra, just to be sure- in making my calculations. But that hasn’t always been the case. This is another potential source of at least some of the unexpected results.
You and the other members of the Forum have offered a number of very useful suggestions and reminders. I think what I need to do now is go back and rigorously test for some of these possible explanations, leaving nothing to assumptions or other opportunities for error. Lots of powerful scans to make sure we are seeing everything that could possibly be happening to impact each packet attack. That’s the only way I can be sure that the problem isn’t some form of dreaded operator error.
Thank you, Iztok, and all members of the AH Forum who have taken the time to offer some very helpful advice. If I do figure out what’s going on, and I don’t look like too much of an idiot in sharing the information, I’ll post back to the Forum and let you know what I’ve learned.
Steve
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| Re: Mineral Packet Attacks |
Tue, 26 December 2006 17:25 |
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| sjangers |
| Crewman 3rd Class |
Messages: 6
Registered: January 2005 | |
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Thanks, Iztok. Good advice. I try never to make these attacks more than a one-time occurrence, but that has been my problem with this guy.
In the categories of "I don't know why I hadn't thought of this before" and "I wonder if I've recently suffered brain damage", using the scanner pane and clicking on a packet in space will give exact location and tell an opponent where a packet at similar speed and trajectory will be x turns after launch. I should start making notes of these things.
Steve
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results while 3.04 gives wrong 
results.