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The lumeris lady always says sorry we're doing something but i have yet to figure out what it is. "Sneaky" must mean abs. nothing? Like Nothing happens. No trade routes blocked, treaties ended, colonies sniped...
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May 31, 2017 16:40
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Lately I've been hitting a bug where I'll get an AI diplomacy chat (usually something like sneaky or deceptive) that just runs on loop. If i sit there I'll just get a million notifications, like the trigger for it is firing repeatedly and doesn't stop even if I end turn. Not sure if I'm alone in that one.
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May 31, 2017 16:42
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Kanthulhu posted:I need a tutorial to understand how to play the Vodyani. I tried playing them but I detached my Ark to fight some quest spawned pirates and then my upkeep erased my money before I could return and produce money again Find a Minor Race ASAP to leech off of. Build a couple of military ships early to keep pirates from obliterating your leech ships. Prioritize colonization techs (Gas planet especially) and find systems where you can 'colonize' 4-5 planets at once.
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May 31, 2017 16:54
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This game is kicking my rear end on hard which is very rare for a 4x. Im loving it
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May 31, 2017 17:07
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Sophons are just brokenly good. I don't think I've lost a single one of my absurdly teched up ships in this game.
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May 31, 2017 17:17
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Kanthulhu posted:I need a tutorial to understand how to play the Vodyani. I tried playing them but I detached my Ark to fight some quest spawned pirates and then my upkeep erased my money before I could return and produce money again The only time you'd detach your ark is if you had a built up ark on a system with only a couple planets and you just found/conquered a new system with 4 or 5 planets. Alternatively if you've just built a new ark it can be worthwhile to leave that one behind and detach/move the built up ark to a new location. Play the Vodyani a bit more like the Cravers early on, build up some actual military early and focus on exploring before scanning to find some minor civilizations. Plop down fleets over the minors to harvest and beat off pirate spawns while you find a AI neighbor you can contain. Push Arks in that direction to keep them locked in and treat that as your game preserve for the rest of the game. Alternatively rush your military up until you've got a good hold on one or two minors while supporting ecologists. Rush research/build the improvements that are based on number of planets and not number of people. Put your arks on systems with 4-5 planets and once you can get the Ecologists in power you'll get the law that allows you to colonize any planet. The population on the planet itself will do nothing until you've got the right tech researched, but all the +planet buildings count. With just a few buildings and some common types a 5 planet system, even if you don't have the tech for any of it, can push out 50-100 production, food, and science. Same strategy works pretty well with the Unfallen, but harder and longer to get started since you need to vine them up.
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May 31, 2017 17:20
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Jesus Christ, Impossible mode is nonstop war. I pretty much only feel comfortable playing as UE in it because I can poo poo out a billion ships with a decent loadout at a clip that can match up against the enemy AI. And that's enemy AI, because these fuckers are certainly not your friends; they will backstab you because I suspect that have some "destroy the human" programming or are hard-coded to gang up on anyone in the middle of a war. The unfortunate problem is that I'm pretty much stuck with the free Militarist Law in my slots now. It's not bad per se, but I can't risk the revolution to another government because most of the laws I'm running are vital to the empire; which means I'm SOL regarding progressing the main quest. Oh well. If 300 turns is the limit for normal speed games, then I have about the latter half remaining to knock off 200 points from the Cravers for a win. I reckon I'll be sending some doomfleet to capture their capital and raze it to the ground once I get all my border fleets upgraded.
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May 31, 2017 17:56
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toasterwarrior posted:Jesus Christ, Impossible mode is nonstop war. I pretty much only feel comfortable playing as UE in it because I can poo poo out a billion ships with a decent loadout at a clip that can match up against the enemy AI. And that's enemy AI, because these fuckers are certainly not your friends; they will backstab you because I suspect that have some "destroy the human" programming or are hard-coded to gang up on anyone in the middle of a war. They're not. Their aggression towards other players is largely influenced by their difference in current military score (strength). At lower difficulties, the AI doesn't get a lot of bonuses and you can kind of keep pace, so they act like lazy pacifists towards you. At higher difficulties, the AI gets huge quantitative bonuses that you can't possibly keep up with for most of the game, so they act like a bunch of belligerent assholes and Impossible would be literal if they had a clue what to do. If you're looking for a tip to make things easier, the AI is completely inept at surviving early game-rushes, even on Endless. If you research the first military hull and throw a fleet of 3 or 4 of them at the nearest AI before turn 30 or so (?), you can easily eliminate them and take their bonused-up worlds. Avasculous fucked around with this message at 23:00 on May 31, 2017 |
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May 31, 2017 22:57
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Avasculous posted:They're not. Their aggression towards other players is largely influenced by their difference in current military score (strength). Fair enough, though they may need to rethink their parameters on military strength since a single elite fleet of mine has managed to kill every ship Horatio has sent at me for the past 50 turns or so. Some of the other factions have also been chill with me since I met them, though they're not neighbors so I can't comment on whether proximity affects aggression since the Vodyani and the Cravers are my neighbors and they've been always out for my blood.
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May 31, 2017 23:19
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babypolis posted:This game is kicking my rear end on hard which is very rare for a 4x. Im loving it I'm having the opposite, I bumped all the way up to Endless and haven't even come close to losing a game. I am playing on Fast though, it's probably that the AI is tuned for normal speed.
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May 31, 2017 23:43
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I wish there was an option to have system automation not change planet specialization, or at least to respect planet type bonuses when considering specialization.
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Jun 1, 2017 05:04
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Playing as the Sophons now and it feels like I'm teetering on the edge of disaster at all times. I'm sandwiched between the Riftborn and Horatio and had to fight an early war with the Riftborn that I barely survived enough to get a truce. I do have peace with the Horatio, but they're not happy about a small outpost of theirs getting swallowed up by me. The Sophons' research bonus is good, but building science buildings is tough when you also need to get an industrial and dust base up and running too. I've run dust and influence deficits for a good portion of the game. That isn't saying I'm not having fun, as surviving turn to tun has been a pretty thrilling experience.
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Jun 1, 2017 11:07
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Serf posted:Playing as the Sophons now and it feels like I'm teetering on the edge of disaster at all times. I'm sandwiched between the Riftborn and Horatio and had to fight an early war with the Riftborn that I barely survived enough to get a truce. I do have peace with the Horatio, but they're not happy about a small outpost of theirs getting swallowed up by me. The Sophons' research bonus is good, but building science buildings is tough when you also need to get an industrial and dust base up and running too. I've run dust and influence deficits for a good portion of the game. That isn't saying I'm not having fun, as surviving turn to tun has been a pretty thrilling experience. It was pretty much the same with my Sophon game until I got a trade agreement going with the Lumeris. My dust suddenly skyrocketed and I could go around buying up all the expensive high end science improvements. Right up to the point where I got the pop up notifying me that the Lumeris were closing in on economic victory 
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Jun 1, 2017 11:24
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OK, finally finished my first game on Impossible as the UE. Avoiding trade companies was doable; otherwise the game would've been even more of a stomp by the end. Considering than the galaxy was running at x12 or so inflation when the highest I remember from a previous attempt was x76 with all 5 companies running at full speed, this was probably a good decision. Might play on Fast speed next time too; the last hundred turns were running like poo poo and basically was just me running down the clock after sniping key worlds from my closest competitor in terms of score to keep them down. But in any case, that was a cool game. Needs a lot of work though; I'll be back after a bunch of performance and balance patches. Eternal war leading to Militarists being in power is fine, but maybe not a 96% senate lead for 255 out of 300 turns. Also, that trade company mechanic, maaaaaan.
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Jun 1, 2017 11:44
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So I've just bought this game and playing through my first game (having played to death Endless Legend and the original) and I picked unfalle. I've been at war with some sophons and captured two of their systems, but the vine network slowly withered away around the two systems and when I send vine ships to reattach them the vineships keep stopping and not completing it, it's really frustrating as there is a bunch of planets connected to these systems I want to connect into and I can't get a link going with these two blocking me. The systems are not connected by nodes if that makes any difference, I had to slowboat across to them
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Jun 1, 2017 11:57
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It's a bug, as far as I can tell. If you're ever at war with a faction, ever, then every system they've ever touched will continuously unentwine your vines until that faction is eliminated entirely. The workaround would be, uh, never go to war as the Unfallen. Clarste fucked around with this message at 12:52 on Jun 1, 2017 |
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Jun 1, 2017 12:32
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Clarste posted:
Peace, love, and trees.
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Jun 1, 2017 12:35
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Clarste posted:It's a bug, as far as I can tell. If you're ever at war with a faction, ever, then every system they've ever touched will continuously unentwine your vines until that faction eliminated entirely. That explains why it suddenly started working after I wiped the sophons entirely from existence. I feel as though I'm playing pacifists wrong as I've wiped out the Sophons and I'm currently commiting craver genocide, and the militarists have won the last 3 elections.
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Jun 1, 2017 12:40
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There ought to be a quest tech where vines contribute towards invasions or something. Like, spitting empty pods down at the defenders. There ought to be cooler quest techs in general, mind. The weapons like the UE laser kinda don't scale past a certain point, so if you lag on the quest then your reward gets pretty obsolete.
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Jun 1, 2017 13:01
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Serf posted:Playing as the Sophons now and it feels like I'm teetering on the edge of disaster at all times. I'm sandwiched between the Riftborn and Horatio and had to fight an early war with the Riftborn that I barely survived enough to get a truce. I do have peace with the Horatio, but they're not happy about a small outpost of theirs getting swallowed up by me. The Sophons' research bonus is good, but building science buildings is tough when you also need to get an industrial and dust base up and running too. I've run dust and influence deficits for a good portion of the game. That isn't saying I'm not having fun, as surviving turn to tun has been a pretty thrilling experience. Passing the super tax act immediately helps out with the budget problems, the happiness hit is unimportant early on. Sophons is a balancing act between making sure you have the industry to build and acquiring more science techs. Influence is not as easy to get in this v EL, and you may want to consider getting SPIN tech super early since the impact of the extra influence is more immediately noticeably than the other specializations, and more immediately beneficial by letting you praise minors to the point they start getting you dust to bolster your coffers. You also want to push out exploration vessels to gain sweet loot from curiousity explorations. it can help out a lot and there's some really good weapon tech you can luck into finding, including a triple laser that is better than the yellow laser tech, and there's a bunch of nice one shot buildings you can get out of it. I usually have a couple fleets of 2x exploration vessels with titanium probes moving around
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Jun 1, 2017 13:16
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The Deleter posted:There ought to be a quest tech where vines contribute towards invasions or something. Like, spitting empty pods down at the defenders. Guardians help! Having a probe module or two on an invasion ship isn't a bad idea in general if you haven't explored the whole galaxy, moreso as the Unfallen with their ability to turn probes into Guardians. Edit: I don't know exactly how they help, I just know they do. I haven't played in a little bit, got sucked back into Factorio, but I'm planning on starting another game soon.
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Jun 1, 2017 13:28
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How do per pop bonuses and buildings interact with Vodyani population? I'd assumed they count for every instance of a population unit on a planet but some things specifically say per pop per planet while some just say per pop so I'm not sure?
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Jun 1, 2017 15:52
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Sloober posted:you may want to consider getting SPIN tech super early since the impact of the extra influence is more immediately noticeably than the other specializations Everyone wants the SPIN tech (Xenodiplomacy or Xenobiology, second tier in the left hand tree) early on because it also unlocks the Academy unique building so you start getting your free heroes.
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Jun 1, 2017 17:01
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I feel like I'm still not understanding how invasions work, which made trying to consume the nearest empire a real pain in the game I was playing yesterday. So here's my understanding of how it works:
That I'm pretty clear on, but what I'm finding is that invasions take a really long time, and I don't have a good sense of what the levers are to make my invasion more successful and more importantly FASTER:
In general having a great deal of fun (the difference in presentation between this and Stellaris is night-and-day), but the obscurity of certain mechanics is annoying the poo poo out of me because I don't know where the levers are.
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Jun 1, 2017 17:42
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I've not invaded another system myself yet but on the manpower designation screen aren't there upgrade trees for infantry/armor/air and would it not be those that speed up invasions?
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Jun 1, 2017 17:46
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Only use tanks, upgrade them to the max. Don't worry about sieging down systems, it doesn't make a massive amount of difference. Bring titanium shells on invasions ships that also have spare manpower modules. Or not. I found my normal combat ships were fine once I had Ultimate Tanks.
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Jun 1, 2017 17:53
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kaynorr posted:That I'm pretty clear on, but what I'm finding is that invasions take a really long time, and I don't have a good sense of what the levers are to make my invasion more successful and more importantly FASTER: Yes, and it's increased by tech. Usually the same techs that increase command points per fleet. quote:Can I drop additional manpower into an ongoing invasion to hustle things along? Only with the Blitz tactic, which is almost always a bad idea. quote:Are any of the above statements incorrect or worth expanding on? Extra manpower beyond the per-fight cap waits in the wings as reinforcements. This is true both for invaders and defenders. If you control the space over one of your own planets which is currently being invaded, your fleet will reinforce the defenders if needed. Blockading a planet without invading it slowly erodes the garrison. The O2S module (a blue spiked circle, unlocked along with tanks and a command point increase by a second-tier military tech) increases this erosion significantly. An endgame fleet full of ships with one O2S module each will wreck even capital systems in 1-2 turns of blockading. Tanks and aircraft are a complete waste of time (unless you are Sophons). Buy the upgrades for infantry then never touch that screen again. quote:Anywhere I can look this poo poo up? The ES2 wiki is completely useless when it comes to mechanics at this level. Nope!
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Jun 1, 2017 17:55
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I don't understand how sieging or the slugs work. I assume any ships in orbit of an enemy planet do some per-turn damage to the enemy group forces or something? It's not really shown or explained, there's no nice "siege planet" button or icon.
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Jun 1, 2017 18:05
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Baronjutter posted:I don't understand how sieging or the slugs work. I assume any ships in orbit of an enemy planet do some per-turn damage to the enemy group forces or something? It's not really shown or explained, there's no nice "siege planet" button or icon. You assume correctly. Mouse over the system and there's a percentage indicating how depleted the garrison is. Ships inflict damage based on their command points (I think), greatly increased by fitting O2S.
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Jun 1, 2017 18:07
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Cease to Hope posted:You assume correctly. Mouse over the system and there's a percentage indicating how depleted the garrison is. Ships inflict damage based on their command points (I think), greatly increased by fitting O2S. This explains why my invasions always go so poorly but the enemies always go so well. They'll hang out in orbit for like 10+ turns before landing.
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Jun 1, 2017 21:07
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Baronjutter posted:This explains why my invasions always go so poorly but the enemies always go so well. They'll hang out in orbit for like 10+ turns before landing. Also human players tend to avoid excess food, so they run lean on manpower to refill ships' crews and planets' garrisons. The AI takes all those crappy food techs and builds the food buildings and gets excess food from difficulty bonuses, so they run with more manpower than human players.
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Jun 1, 2017 21:31
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Cease to Hope posted:Tanks and aircraft are a complete waste of time (unless you are Sophons). Buy the upgrades for infantry then never touch that screen again. Don't tanks get an advantage against infantry though? Given that the game will be over before anyone bothers getting aircraft, isn't it strictly better to use tanks?
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Jun 1, 2017 21:40
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Cease to Hope posted:Also human players tend to avoid excess food, so they run lean on manpower to refill ships' crews and planets' garrisons. The AI takes all those crappy food techs and builds the food buildings and gets excess food from difficulty bonuses, so they run with more manpower than human players. I love food, food = quicker pop growth and 4X games are all about maximizing your early-mid game growth.
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Jun 1, 2017 21:41
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I also love food, but honestly I don't know what the pro strats for the game will turn out to be.
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Jun 1, 2017 21:45
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I believe ships at full manpower also get a damage bonus? To discourage endless (heh) ship spam when mediums start rolling out.
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Jun 1, 2017 21:45
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I think the idea is more that they get a penalty for running at low manpower, but it's not really significant enough to discourage ship spam, imo. Two empty ships are still going to be better than one full ship.
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Jun 1, 2017 21:47
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Clarste posted:Don't tanks get an advantage against infantry though? Given that the game will be over before anyone bothers getting aircraft, isn't it strictly better to use tanks? you'll never have enough antimatter/adamantan to upgrade tanks far enough to make it worth using them over infantry. by the time you would have enough orange/red metal, aircraft will already be all over the place. Baronjutter posted:I love food, food = quicker pop growth and 4X games are all about maximizing your early-mid game growth. food caps, while industry converts to anything you need. plus, the only factions prone to initially settling on low-food planets either have a large food bonus (Horatio) or don't use it as their main source of pops (Riftborn, Vodyani). the first-tier food tech is okay, the rest is all trash unless you've figured out some sort of plan to rush bio-fuel converters.
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Jun 1, 2017 22:10
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Cease to Hope posted:you'll never have enough antimatter/adamantan to upgrade tanks far enough to make it worth using them over infantry. by the time you would have enough orange/red metal, aircraft will already be all over the place. Well, that's not the case in my experience. I've only seen the enemies start using aircraft in super-lategame scenarios where it honestly doesn't even matter anymore. Whereas you can rush for 100% tank armies before you even get Titanium. Maybe I'm just thinking on a different timescale than you for this. Cease to Hope posted:food caps, while industry converts to anything you need. plus, the only factions prone to initially settling on low-food planets either have a large food bonus (Horatio) or don't use it as their main source of pops (Riftborn, Vodyani). the first-tier food tech is okay, the rest is all trash unless you've figured out some sort of plan to rush bio-fuel converters. I just played a Horatio game, and even then it takes quite a while to cap out on population. Frankly, it sounds to me like you're not expanding fast enough?
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Jun 1, 2017 22:26
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I'm always expanding and always micro'ing my system pops and making sure systems don't fill out. I'm also a huge racist and make sure my empire pops are a majority of my empire so I set up pure-population food systems who's main job is to export my primary species.
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Jun 1, 2017 22:32
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Yeah I've gotten tanks and aircraft in every game I've played so far. I've never invaded anyone though, but they are very handy for fending off invasions.
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Jun 1, 2017 22:43
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