Post by pendell on Jul 6, 2014 0:19:30 GMT -5
So I admit I still haven't played seriously. Nonetheless, the games seem to follow a particular outline ... do your games follow the same pattern ?
Stage 1: Embryo. Your hive ships land on three stars and you begin nourishing your first three colonies. Mining, followed by a factory, followed by habitations. Need a lot of habitations in a hurry since population expands quickly. The starting ships explore nearby space looking for other colonizable planets. Alternatively, the explorer looks around while the defenders stay near the core worlds.
How large do you make your planets before moving on to the next phase?
Stage 2A: Aggressive strategy.
Find the xenos and deliberately choose planets as close to their zone as possible , so as to hem them in, limiting their expansion at the cost of an early war. Use yellow or red stars and hope for high quality planets, as a bad roll giving you, say, a quality-3 planet is a disaster at this stage of the game.
OR
Stage 2B: Defensive strategy.
Find the xenos but stay away from them. Build up your first wave of colonies in a defensible perimeter, while letting the xenos expand as they will unchecked.
How do you expand? I typically do it in groups of 3. Build 3 worlds, wait for them to get on their feet, then build another three worlds. This expands more slowly than the xenos typically do, but if I over-expand I find myself unable to subsidize improvements , resulting in morale-3 planets.
This stage ends when the xenos find you and launch their first attack, which may very well result in never-ending waves, especially if you chose strategy 2A above.
Stage 3: Turtle and build.
At this point the player is under attack by the xenos but has no means of planetary invasion, and so cannot carry the fight to the enemy. Thus the player must fight a defensive battle, researching fighters 3 and upgrading the starting fighter with whirlwind II guns. If at all possible, let your core worlds remain idle and provide financial support while the outer worlds build defense ships and improve themselves.
Continue fighting this defensive battle. You probably won't be able to do much else. When the attack ends, proceed with further expansion or improvement of your own territory.
This phase continues until the aliens overwhelm us, or until we research planetary invasion 3 AND have a large economy to back us up.
Stage 4: Liberation.
Build a large force of assault transports and an equally large force of fighters to escort them, backed by a repair ship and 1 or 2 refueling ships. Send a colony ship as follow-up. Then start taking the xeno worlds one by one. Every planet purged should either be immediately colonized or sterilized, but under NO circumstances should the xeno be given the opportunity to retake the planet.
Once this is started, don't stop for anything until the xenos are eliminated.
Stage 5: Post-xeno. After the last xeno world falls, disperse the fleet to act as sentries against further encroachment, and begin colonizing the rest of the quadrant. Build ships optimized for sensor scan and long-range flight to continually patrol the dark spaces of the map.
This stage poses a challenge for me, as I cannot build a force large enough to defend every planet effectively, but I have not been able to build a ship with greater than 4 MP. So I do not have the ability to put a ready-reaction force at the center of the empire prepared to respond to any incursiion wherever it occurs. If a new alien force appears, it will likely be several turns before I can bring more than a fighter or two to bear. Any ideas?
This is against only one xeno enemy. I imagine against two you will have to simultaneously destroy one while defending against the other, then serve the other in turn.
Do the xenos fight each other? What strategies do you use against multiple opponents?
Respectfully,
Brian P.
Stage 1: Embryo. Your hive ships land on three stars and you begin nourishing your first three colonies. Mining, followed by a factory, followed by habitations. Need a lot of habitations in a hurry since population expands quickly. The starting ships explore nearby space looking for other colonizable planets. Alternatively, the explorer looks around while the defenders stay near the core worlds.
How large do you make your planets before moving on to the next phase?
Stage 2A: Aggressive strategy.
Find the xenos and deliberately choose planets as close to their zone as possible , so as to hem them in, limiting their expansion at the cost of an early war. Use yellow or red stars and hope for high quality planets, as a bad roll giving you, say, a quality-3 planet is a disaster at this stage of the game.
OR
Stage 2B: Defensive strategy.
Find the xenos but stay away from them. Build up your first wave of colonies in a defensible perimeter, while letting the xenos expand as they will unchecked.
How do you expand? I typically do it in groups of 3. Build 3 worlds, wait for them to get on their feet, then build another three worlds. This expands more slowly than the xenos typically do, but if I over-expand I find myself unable to subsidize improvements , resulting in morale-3 planets.
This stage ends when the xenos find you and launch their first attack, which may very well result in never-ending waves, especially if you chose strategy 2A above.
Stage 3: Turtle and build.
At this point the player is under attack by the xenos but has no means of planetary invasion, and so cannot carry the fight to the enemy. Thus the player must fight a defensive battle, researching fighters 3 and upgrading the starting fighter with whirlwind II guns. If at all possible, let your core worlds remain idle and provide financial support while the outer worlds build defense ships and improve themselves.
Continue fighting this defensive battle. You probably won't be able to do much else. When the attack ends, proceed with further expansion or improvement of your own territory.
This phase continues until the aliens overwhelm us, or until we research planetary invasion 3 AND have a large economy to back us up.
Stage 4: Liberation.
Build a large force of assault transports and an equally large force of fighters to escort them, backed by a repair ship and 1 or 2 refueling ships. Send a colony ship as follow-up. Then start taking the xeno worlds one by one. Every planet purged should either be immediately colonized or sterilized, but under NO circumstances should the xeno be given the opportunity to retake the planet.
Once this is started, don't stop for anything until the xenos are eliminated.
Stage 5: Post-xeno. After the last xeno world falls, disperse the fleet to act as sentries against further encroachment, and begin colonizing the rest of the quadrant. Build ships optimized for sensor scan and long-range flight to continually patrol the dark spaces of the map.
This stage poses a challenge for me, as I cannot build a force large enough to defend every planet effectively, but I have not been able to build a ship with greater than 4 MP. So I do not have the ability to put a ready-reaction force at the center of the empire prepared to respond to any incursiion wherever it occurs. If a new alien force appears, it will likely be several turns before I can bring more than a fighter or two to bear. Any ideas?
This is against only one xeno enemy. I imagine against two you will have to simultaneously destroy one while defending against the other, then serve the other in turn.
Do the xenos fight each other? What strategies do you use against multiple opponents?
Respectfully,
Brian P.
