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Home » Stars! 2.6/7 » Game stories » Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped (A good, well-fought, fast-paced game)
trophy.gif  Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped Thu, 04 June 2020 13:39 Go to next message
vmanuel is currently offline vmanuel

 
Chief Warrant Officer 3

Messages: 187
Registered: October 2004
Location: Dallas, TX USA
And the winner of the game this round is... The Magic!

The players were whittled down to three top competitors, the Magic, Pentacle, and Paran0rmal. The game was well-fought up to 2515, and started August 7 of last year. That's 10 months of game time, which I do hope you all enjoyed!

I again had some good lessons hosting, this time to do a better job of double-checking new player races. Dispersion and local hab ranges went very well, actually, and I was happy to have the level of involvement from all of you.

I'm playing in Once More Into The Breach (first time in a long time) so I'm not going to start up another game right away. That being said, it looks like a couple are starting from other hosts, so that's awesome!

I'm going to see if I can have the files for this one turned into a gif, I'll let you know.

Always a pleasure,

Victor.



Editor in Chief of the Kaynan Space News.
All Space, All The Time - Kaynan!
www.myhood.biz

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Re: Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped Thu, 04 June 2020 13:49 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Ludi Magister is currently offline Ludi Magister

 
Master Chief Petty Officer

Messages: 103
Registered: April 2019
Thank you for the hosting, it was an entirely enjoyable game!

Congratulations to the Magic! A well deserved victory.

The Fremen

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Re: Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped Fri, 05 June 2020 16:23 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Lqdtr is currently offline Lqdtr

 
Crewman 1st Class

Messages: 28
Registered: February 2012
Location: Ru
Big thanks to all players of this game and to Victor for hosting! It was pleasure to play Stars 10 months in a row!

This game was very hard for me becasue of a great deal of MM and a lot of difficult decisions I was forced to made. Every war was pain and torment Smile

Race:

The Magic
HG JOAT
IFE, NRSE, OBRM, RS
G: 0.15 - 1.88, T: -80 - 184, R: 29 - 95, 1/3 habitable, GR: 19%
1/1000, f - 10/9/15, m - 10/3/15, box checked
W cheap, rest expensive Laughing

https://i.imgur.com/RfIiloL.png

Short story.

2400 - 2421 - years of exploration and expansion to the north.
Second place in score in 2401.
Both of my neightbors, Unicorns and Pentaclevm, turned out to be WMs. Unicorn was -f I think.

2422 - 2438 - war with Unicorns (WM).
Fourth place in score in 2422.
A fleet of 49 DDs, 7 PP and 2 colonizers was detected heading to my cluster in 2422. It was an attempt to early rush. Unicorns got a foothold in my cluster in 2424 and I lost my greeting fleet trying to defend. In 2429 the starbase on my HW was destroyed by ~100 bazooka FFs, but the next year Unicorn entire fleet was shred by my new SB armed with Delta torps. Arrived bombers were forced to retreat. Next years I managed to kill some of Unicorn planets in the central cluster and wiped out his foothold in my own cluster with mineral packet. Finally Unicorns dropped the game and I got all of their panets and space.
This war had an enormous impact on my economy. I had to spend all my resourses to research and fleet build for years. Despite this I got 24k resourses in 2450.

2449 - 2456 short war with Randoms (IS).
Second place in score in 2446.
For some reason I thought Randoms were the first in score so I decided to attack them ASAP. I managed to invade two or three of their planets, then I was attacked by Fremen Warriors - the real (first place?) monster.

2456 - 2484 war with Fremen Warriors (JOAT).
First place in score in 2453 till the end.
I misjudged Freman as inexperienced player. He had only few planets in the central cluster. It was a great surprise when my scanners detected his BB fleets not far from my new ex-Random worlds. This war was hard and painful though no major battles ever happened. My race was always behind in technologies so I had to build large stacks of cruisers vs his BBs for example. Finally I conquered his cluster and forced his fleets to retreat to the northwestern ex-Randoms cluster. Eventually he lost all his forces and planets in the war with Paran0rmal. I think Fremen could win this game if he had advance to the center cluster instead of attacking his neighbor.

2491 - 2516 war with Paran0rmal (SS)
While Paran0rmal were busy to conquer last of Fremen planets I decided to attack them. The goal was to move the border to the north as far as possible and get enough time to finish cons26 research. 2493 - detected first Paran0rmal nubians. I was still 3 years away from cons26. There were numerous stealth minelayers, 98% cloacked BBs, nubians and all of that SS staff walking around my territory. I spent a lot of time managing to catch these intruders. Eventually I made enough nubians to get a strategic initiative. Finally Paran0rmal main fleet fell into a trap and was killed in 2512. I got about 130k minerals on surface of my own planet after the battle.

2514 - war with Pentaclevm (WM)
Pentaclevm was my right neighbor. In the early game I captured some of his planets but we never were at war untill 2514. In the late game he took the control of Unknowns (AR) cluster and got all the minerals typical AR wallow in.
This war ended before it even began. Pentaclevm main fleet of more than 300 beam and missle dreadnoughts and about 400 nubians was destroyed by my 1000+ nubians fleet I gated to defend my planet. His best modern missile ships were sent to the nearby planet so I suffered no great losses. More than 240k minerals left on surface of my planet. Then the game ended. Before this battle I had about 1600 Diabolic Sorecerer nubians and enough minerals to produce more than 1600 Cosmic Horror nubians in 6 years. Thanks to mineral management.

https://i.imgur.com/tWVqYiR.png

When the game ended I had about 200k resourses, 149 planets, 93 starbases and ~1600 capital ships.

The main weak point of my race was an expensive techs. I was always behind my opponents and forced to spent all my resourses to research from time to time. On the other hand the economic power of JOAT allowed me to withstand all the challenges. Mineral management was deadly important especially at the end of the game so I had to use excell sheets for logistics purposes.

Hope to see other players stories here. Thank you!

---

Some designs:

https://i.imgur.com/J4AN6ib.png
Fallen Angel II - these CCs were used to protect my planets from initial Fremen attack. The counterpart were BBs with Heavy Blasters Shocked Used them as sweepers in the late game.
Black Dragon II, Royal Assassin - mid game BBs used to attack Fremen and Paran0rmal.
Diabolic Sorcerer - late game main fleet nubian design. Had to use so many jummers to counter Paran0rmal and Pentaclevm large missle stacks. About 700 were lost in major and minor battles.
Cosmic Horror, Nightmare - the very endgame ships, disigned to counter Pentaclevm nubians.

---

Some of enemies designs:

https://i.imgur.com/0AW6M9d.png
N disrupt0r - rareripe Paran0rmal nubian. Easily countered by Sorcerer.
The Great Deflect0r - mature Paran0rmal nubian design. Counters my Sorcerer and almost completely invisible Mad

https://i.imgur.com/DPuqGvD.png
D Day 876542, D Day 1 - Pentaclevm mid-late game dreadnought designs. Used to kill Unknowns and to attack me at the end of the game.
Sleeping Giant, Nightmare - end game Pentaclevm designs.

---

P.S. Sorry my english. I'm so ashamed I couldn't master this language all my life...

P.P.S. Hate those sneaky invisible SS. Burn in hell all of you! Mad Very Happy Twisted Evil

P.P.P.S. Many thanks to the author of StarsWine. This soft is great to play Stars on 64 bit windows!

---


[Updated on: Fri, 05 June 2020 16:58]

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Re: Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped Sat, 06 June 2020 06:10 Go to previous messageGo to next message
paran0rmal is currently offline paran0rmal

 
Crewman 3rd Class

Messages: 7
Registered: July 2019

Thanks everyone for amazing game, thanks Victor for hosting!

After a long pause, I came back to Stars! I played with some race design from 10 years ago, rushed without thinking too much. Thought it will be fun to play with SS, but never actually built a single ship with Robber Baron Scanner and never actually tried to do big stealth attacks. It's a shame Smile

The paran0rmal
SS IFE + NRSE, NAS obviously
Immune G, -56 - 136 T, 17-37 R, 1 in 9 planets
15% growth
1000, 12/9/16, G not checked, 10/4/11
Weapons and construction cheap - rest expensive, start at 3 checked

Probably would've increased growth a bit, checked the G box, and "start at tech 3" was not that critical, probably ISB would've really helped.

2430
The start was really slow, 8th place out of 8. Got my foot in the center, started seeing the hordes of Bunnsy HE colonizers nearby, built some pest control Smile No major battles, just growing.

2450
6th out of 8. We intersettled with Random a bit, never got to a big fighting yet, but he started shooting some of my ships, and it was just a matter of time. Unknowns on the right were covering their territory with mines and we just lived peacefully.

https://i.imgur.com/hAHurdM.png

2470-90
3rd out of 7, had a few brief moments in 2nd place. Started cleaning up Random in the center. Tried to move to Random HW, but Fremen got there first. When Magic attacked Fremen from the south, I moved to take over Random HW from Fremen. No interaction with Unknown (AR), had my stealthy pen scanners on all players, but never actually found that information useful. It doesn't matter what you are building a thousand light years away Smile

If I remember correctly, I lost some of my larger fleets to Random or Fremen (or both, can't remember), but somehow managed to stay afloat. Around 2490, fights started with Magic, but he seemed to focus on Fremen first, so I was left in peace for 10 turns or so.

https://i.imgur.com/cC4YsiF.png

After Magic eliminated Fremen, I was hoping that he will focus his actions on his closest neighbour - Pentaclevm WM, but instead he focused on me. Playing against JoaT with SS is also hard, since every d### chaff has scanners inside, so he can track me down easily. Around that time it was clear to me that winning is impossible, unless Magic got into the dogfight with Pentaclevm. This of course made me do some harsh risky moves, but I was losing my hope anyway, thought I'll just make it quicker. Tried to do guerilla fighting and bore Magic with MM to death, but he seemed cool. Build 50 or more of these, stealth spies-miners-sabotagers:

https://i.imgur.com/HUamsHV.png

See you in other games! Regards from Lithuania

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Re: Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped Sat, 06 June 2020 08:36 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Lqdtr is currently offline Lqdtr

 
Crewman 1st Class

Messages: 28
Registered: February 2012
Location: Ru
paran0rmal wrote on Sat, 06 June 2020 13:10

and never actually tried to do big stealth attacks. It's a shame Smile


I had a lot of unprotected worlds without defences and was always afraid you'll send the fleets with stealth bombers to attack them. Anyway, fighting with you was a huge headache for me Smile

paran0rmal wrote on Sat, 06 June 2020 13:10

After Magic eliminated Fremen, I was hoping that he will focus his actions on his closest neighbour - Pentaclevm WM, but instead he focused on me.


I couldn't attack Pentaclevm because they were much stronger than me. I had about 250 BBs in 2490, half of them was old ships armed with heavy blasters. Pentaclevm had about the same amount of more powerful dreadnoughts. I wonder why didn't they attack me right after Unnowns dropped?

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Re: Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped Sat, 06 June 2020 11:06 Go to previous messageGo to next message
paran0rmal is currently offline paran0rmal

 
Crewman 3rd Class

Messages: 7
Registered: July 2019

Lqdtr wrote on Sat, 06 June 2020 15:36
paran0rmal wrote on Sat, 06 June 2020 13:10

After Magic eliminated Fremen, I was hoping that he will focus his actions on his closest neighbour - Pentaclevm WM, but instead he focused on me.


I couldn't attack Pentaclevm because they were much stronger than me. I had about 250 BBs in 2490, half of them was old ships armed with heavy blasters. Pentaclevm had about the same amount of more powerful dreadnoughts. I wonder why didn't they attack me right after Unnowns dropped?


Yeah, I was also afraid of Pentaclevm, because of their 200 or so dreadnaughts, albeit with lousy engines they had a whooping 18xGorilla shields. If they have decided to move on us after Unknowns shamefully abandoned the game - we would have standed no chance, but for some reason they stayed put and did not attack. Would love to know the reason! I kinda designed my own first nubians (N disruptor) to somewhat counter their design - have higher initiative, but probably that wasn't the best use of my resources.

Also, regarding MT, I really was unlucky. Bad idea to play with those random events. I only got the Enigma engines at the end of the game ~2513, with all my main fleets having slots wasted for Overthrusters. That's a big disadvantage, Fremen and Magic had even their battleship fleets properly equipped, also 30-40% cloaked, which gave a bit of trouble to see with pen scanners.

Lqdtr wrote on Sat, 06 June 2020 15:36

I had a lot of unprotected worlds without defences and was always afraid you'll send the fleets with stealth bombers to attack them

Yeah, fear is the only result I got. Anyway, after a single surprise attack you would know I'm there - send chaff to detect and kill me. It's really hard to run away in enemy territory with d### lousy engines. Oh well..



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Re: Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped Sun, 22 November 2020 02:44 Go to previous messageGo to next message
magic9mushroom is currently offline magic9mushroom

 
Commander

Messages: 1361
Registered: May 2008
Man, I should write that treatise on ship design I've been meaning to for years. Some of those designs made me cringe. Razz

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Re: Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped Wed, 25 November 2020 17:52 Go to previous messageGo to next message
paran0rmal is currently offline paran0rmal

 
Crewman 3rd Class

Messages: 7
Registered: July 2019

Quote:

Man, I should write that treatise on ship design I've been meaning to for years. Some of those designs made me cringe.


Hey, share your thoughts, would love to learn which ones and why. Some of them were designed to counter a particular enemy ship's design, so might look a bit odd.

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Re: Can't Stop, Don't Stop has stopped Mon, 07 December 2020 09:52 Go to previous message
magic9mushroom is currently offline magic9mushroom

 
Commander

Messages: 1361
Registered: May 2008
paran0rmal wrote on Thu, 26 November 2020 09:52
Quote:

Man, I should write that treatise on ship design I've been meaning to for years. Some of those designs made me cringe.


Hey, share your thoughts, would love to learn which ones and why. Some of them were designed to counter a particular enemy ship's design, so might look a bit odd.

Magic Nightmare - too many missiles and not enough jets; missile boats in Nub era want speed 2.5 to hardcounter AMP nubs.

paran0rmal N Disrupt0r - probably could have used a third slot of capacitors over a third slot of disruptors, though if you were especially tight on Germ disregard this.

paran0rmal d33p stat3 - I'd probably have gone with jets and range 3 beams over the extra scanners and Big Mutha in order to give skirmishing capabilities; the MegaD already sweeps so many mines (particularly if you fill the slot) that the Big Mutha Cannon's kind of overkill. I'd understand wanting to keep the weight down to make them Dockable, but you said you didn't have ISB.

Pentaclevm D Day 876542 - One of the key rules of warship design in Stars! is "each design should have only one weapon range". Keeps the AI's job simple. Also, dropping weapons from a WM design (25% cheaper weapons) to get under 350 kT and avoid the weight penalty seems a little pointless when there was clearly the tech available to use a better engine.

Pentaclevm D Day 1 - Again, this has weapon slots empty, and unless I've made a mistake with the numbers 28 missiles would actually still get speed 2.5 anyway.

Pentaclevm Nightmare - This has the opposite problem, as unless I've made a mistake with the numbers it only has speed 2.25. The 2 Nexi up front aren't really doing much in the Nubian era either; Nubians need 3 more Nexi to out-init Dreads, so 4 Nexi on the Dread forces 3 slots on the counter-Nubian but 6 doesn't force 4.

Those are the ones I spot, anyway.

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