An Interesting Game.....

[Starhawk]

Hey all I have been playing this game for a few days now and am having a great time, I need some advice though so I'll give a few details as to what's up so you guys may help me.


Okay so it's rather early in game so far as it's only 2417.7 and most of the Empires are still trying to hatch out their own territories....I myself have eliminated two neutral Empires and have a rather good empire built up and thankfully for me it's also very easily defensive and I can gaurd it with only 3 fleets.

Anyway I am at war with EVERY race that is within striking range of my empire and they have been raiding me on and off for the past 5 months, now so far my losses are not so bad at only 3 BCs, a transport carrying 260 troops and my mining world of Valhalla.
Their's however have been rather heavy at around 20 ships and 2 colonies but I am afraid do to the fact that I am being raided from every border point and have just now corrected a dire resource problem that these three races will be able to destroy me through sheer numbers in the end.

Okay my intel says the Cue Cappa (my biggest enemy and most dangerious of all my enemies) has 65 of their 77 starships (I killed the others in a series of skirmishes) and that my other enemy the Taltaran or whatever have 10 ships (I had been at war with them for years before a breif alliance so most of their fleet was destroyed in the war with me and an as yet unknown race but they are rebuilding their navy.

I have 3 fleets of warships with an overall 51 cruisers and battlecruisers (plus 2 troop transports carrying 520 troops) and I'm feeling rather like the Imperium of Man from Warhammer 40k as in I have the most powerful Empire in the galaxy but am also in the most dangerious of positions. Due to the way I have always organized my fleets I lost an entire sector's worth of troops to a minefield when their transport blew up so in that sector I am in a bad way and am going to attempt to raise a new force of soldiers off of my sector capital.

Anywhoo my question is....should I go on the offensive even with my precarious defensive situation or should I let my enemies break themselves upon my defensive fleets in the hopes that eventually they'll give up?

Also the Cue Cappa are Psychic and I have thus far defeated them only through outranging them (and a few lucky misses on their part) yet they have sadly turned on of my ships against me and I was forced to destroy it.....I have an 8 ship fleet guarding the ENTIRE sector (which leads streight to several of my most important worlds) from which they can come through and so far it's been barely enough but enough none the less. My question for you is how do you recommend I deal with the Cue Cappa psychic abilities? Because gun for gun my ships can wipe the floor with them but my fear is their allegience turning weaponry.

Example of how gun for gun I can easily outmatch them....I destroyed an 8 ship fleet with 4 of my own and then another 7 ship fleet with 6 of mine but it was in the 7v6 that they managed to capture my ship which with it's devestating weapons proceeded to cripple a second of my ships until I destoryed it (so in the end I defeated the 7 enemy ships with my 4).

Please give any tips or hints possible okay thanks.

P.S. if you want details on how I organize my military because you think that might make a difference let me know okay.

Oh and the 3rd race is the Cylons whom are at war with the Cue Cappa on and off but ironically it's also THEIR space that the Cue go through to attack my border system which is were Valhalla was taken out and 50 million of my people burned.

[Atrocities]

Anywhoo my question is....should I go on the offensive even with my precarious defensive situation or should I let my enemies break themselves upon my defensive fleets in the hopes that eventually they'll give up?

I would construct a few mine sweepers before going on the offensive. Also build a repair ship or two and a couple construction ship and deploy mines and satellites at your warp points. Also arm your planets with weapon platforms.

Once your construction ships are built, deploy them to the warp points and build defensive bases and orbital ship yards.

Then with the minesweepers leading the way, go on the offensive. Take at least one or more planets with troops, but don't be afraid to glass a few into obivion.

Rememeber, Gun boat diplomacy works every time.

[Ed Kolis]

Put Master Computers on your ships. Then the allegiance subverters won't work!

(To get Master Computers: research Industry 1 then Computers 1-3, the higher level ones are just smaller and harder to hit)

[Starhawk]

To Atrocities: Well I have very powerful battlestations in orbit of most of my worlds as most of my planets are capable of producing ships .

The problem with the minesweeper-layer deal is that I've been so buisy researching combat weaponry and shields to keep my ships a step ahead of my enemy that I havn't had much time for anything else. Plus up until 1 month ago (month 4 of the war) I was getting -28605 minerals +20500 organics and -5096 radioactives so I also couldn't afford to build any sweepers/layers I had to concentrate on the battlestations around my key worlds and supplying my warfleet against the enemy.

Also....good advice about the planets stuff I did go on a breif offensive into the Toltayan or however it's called guys' terriritory, that's where I captured one colony and destroyed the other. Sadly my offensive ended when I ran out of supplies....hehe I need to get supply ships on-line ASAP that's for sure.

To Ed: Well problem is in regards to research the same as I mentioned above. However it also comes down to space, my largest ships are BCs and currently only have 6 large phased cannons on them plus enough shields and other stuff to keep them in a fight and win. If I added a comp I'd have to sacrifice something that I kind of can't afford to in regards to equipment, I am hoping that as long as I can keep the buggers at range I'll be fine the only problem is judging the range and hoping I get it right.

However I've also come across a serious problem, in month 2 of the war I sent one of my BCs to a Cue colony that looked rather harmless, it had three weapons platforms (which I've dealt with before with a single BC) but they had those strange Psych weapons of the CUE that when on a planet just totally outrange my ships and blew my BC up in one turn. I was wondering if there was anyway to counter this as I was hoping to go on the offensive and take some CUE worlds?

Also heh I lost the entire 4th fleet (4 Enterprise class frigates, 2 Hunter Escorts) 2 months ago (month 3) five ships were blown apart by the Cue Cappa while inflicting NO damage at all and the frigate Scorpion (irony for yah) was captured, fortunately the 2nd fleet which was still being built and mobilized consisted of more advanced and more powerful ships which were able to take out that Cue fleet before they were able to repeat the Valhalla incident.

BTW I havn't played any more tonight since posting this so I havn't had a chance to try your advice yet but if I can muster the resources I'll do as you adviced Atrocities. And when I get BBs I may try using master comps.

Any more advice as to what I can do to keep from being swept away by these three players? They were all broterly allies up until just one turn where all of them turned against me HELL the Cue and the Tol guys BOTH had colonies inside my space (the cue still have two complete systems in my territories after they killed the Segmentus Icara fleet (12 frigates) in their border system. I just don't understand why three allied races all attacked me at the same time...especially since two of them are at war with each other!?! I mean the Earth Alliance is allied with me still....anyone know what THIS might be?

[ February 15, 2004, 06:13: Message edited by: Starhawk ]

[Sivran]

They may have decided you're the mega-evil empire. Watch for other AIs also suddenly declaring war on you.

As for the psychic weapon that's out-ranging you...this is possibly the result of weapon platform mounts, as they increase a weapon's range where ship and base mounts don't. If you want to glimpse into the future of weapons technology, make yourself a new game and set tech level for new players to high. You'll start with all techs, and under Help, you can find a weapons report. Good info to have.

[ February 15, 2004, 07:56: Message edited by: Sivran ]

[Alneyan]

Actually using the Master Computer *will* gain space for Cruisers and above, as if you have Master Computers, you don't need to put Bridges/Life Supports/Crew Quarters. So even with Computers I (which gives a 40kt Master Computer), you will gain 10kt on your Battle Cruisers. However, if you are afraid of Computer Viruses, you may put one Bridge/Life Support/Crew Quarter plus the Computer so that you will not lose all movement when the Computer goes down.

Bases mounts do increase range, as Satellites mounts (if anyone bothers to research Large Satellites) and Weapon platforms mounts, so it probably explains why you were outranged. Were they using their heavy direct fire weapon which does a lot of damage but only fires every four turns? If they didn't have much PDC on their weapon platforms, you might consider using fighters to take down the weapon platforms, but if there are few settlers on the planet, capturing the planet without destroying it will prove to be hard.

The AIs may have declared on you only because of colonization rivalry. If memory serves right, the AI claims as its own any colonized system and all neighbouring systems, so every planet of yours in these claimed systems will bother me. It poses quite a problem with Partnership as well, since the AI will know where are your colonies and may want a lot of these. Or of course you may very well be the Mega Evil Empire, if you have a nice lead.