No one has said anything about the scenario BrokenStar.

Has anyone played it and likes it? Some general information would be nice.

Mmm..it hasn't interesteed me enough to even try playing it. :p

It is entertaining, too many units near the end though (WAY too tedious). I think it is good practice for playing with modern units. Between me and my biggest foe we ended up using ~3000 troops over 250 turns! :eek:

Maybe epic would allow for fewer troops and less tedium, but I think the turn limit is still the same (250 turns) so you have to move faster. Marathon is way too slow to win with anything other than a time victory IMO.

I beat it on deity/normal but it sure was a tedious pain after the first six hours! (~8:58 total ~6500pts)

I am a big Fan of Broken Star and think its a great mod. I am no good at modding and therefore only good for ideas. so here are some modding ideas for the mod: I would like to see more UU's and UB's as well as have different units and buildings for the diferent districts. I would also like to see the Rebel Forces and Coalition as Playable Civs.

I am a big Fan of Broken Star and think its a great mod. I am no good at modding and therefore only good for ideas. so here are some modding ideas for the mod: I would like to see more UU's and UB's as well as have different units and buildings for the diferent districts. I would also like to see the Rebel Forces and Coalition as Playable Civs.

Your ideas have no substance because the firaxis modders never change much to their mods except maybe Jon Shafer. Modding is easy especially those ideas.

Your ideas have no substance because the firaxis modders never change much to their mods except maybe Jon Shafer. Modding is easy especially those ideas.

I am no good at coding or any other modding skill, so I post My Ideas so other people may include them in their mods if they wish, whether they are Firaxis Modders or a consumer Modder.:scan:

I have 2 issues with this mod.

1) The leaders and their respecive diplomatic music are different from the epic game. (small issue)

2) The unit strength progression is too small. Each advancement only grants you 2 extra strength, which is hardly anything in the inmmediate steps. Perhaps they can make the strength progression greater and more toward the end.

Otherwise this is a fine scenario.

I have 2 issues with this mod.

1) The leaders and their respecive diplomatic music are different from the epic game. (small issue)

2) The unit strength progression is too small. Each advancement only grants you 2 extra strength, which is hardly anything in the inmmediate steps. Perhaps they can make the strength progression greater and more toward the end.

Otherwise this is a fine scenario.

I agree with the unit streghth. Most of the units end up being underpowered.

I found it fun, though it's mostly about tactics and promotions, rather than a true historical sim. Pretty much the goal is to get oil; research, build and promote a powerful stack and take down some nukes. Then the fun really begins when the other players try to take the nukes from you, and the coalition sporadically assaults towards the nukes. I lost, pretty much because I neglected anti-air until the other players started to want the nukes, as the coalition doesn't use any air forces.

I think you will find that the sound change was probably deliberate.

AI spams their settlers though, and i hate them gobbling up land between two of my cities.

This is one of my fave mods. I only wish the coalation was a bit harder.

I found BS a little easy and didn't become a challenge until Immoral. In my Immoral game I barely got my 4th nuke armed to win before one of the AI with two vassal was about to take it on the very next turn. This AI almost double in power and growing each turn which already took my two of my cities around the 4th nuke. These cities acted as speed bumps that lead to my victory.
As Captinkid pointed out there were a massive amount of units near the end.

My second favorite scenario. I like the modern warfare in civ4 so it's nice to be able to use the modern units when tech and power levels are balanced.

If you hadn't built a settler yet they are very cool in this scenario, because the city starts with around 5 population and all the building preconstructed.

I played the eastern district and got nuked four times, but still managed to win domination after nuking them twice. It is a little too easy, so are all the other scenarios, but it might be boring to have to replay them many times to win.

Yeah, I think the scenario has huge potential but I felt like it was rushed and simply made use of some of the standard bts concepts (i.e. mercenaries) instead of going above and beyond the norm. I just visited Russia, so I'm a little biased, but I would love to see more history in this scenario as well as region specific units, buildings, etc.

Here in the West we always think of Russia as this monolithic country, but the areas of NW Russia (Moscow, St. Petersburg) are very different than other parts of the country. This mod just feels like a giant free for all that could be located in Africa or anywhere. I mean when you're going to have a mod about Russia, at least make it obvious that it's Russia!

I played this scenario a couple of times with the spiritual leader (forgot the name)

I always end up turning off research for the first couple of turns to save up money to buy 2 bomber. That way I can concentrate on building Mech Infantries for my initial conquest of the barbarians with oil.

With bombers, you can pre-bomb, as opposed to artilleries where you'd have to do it with the other units in place. Plus you can do air strikes once the Mech infantries are there.

My opening strategy was to use my main city solely for building buildings (and maybe some worker), with buying units with all remaining gold (100% gold, later less to quell unhappiness with culture slider).

With stack of mech. infantry and mobile artillery I could overpower any city.

I wish the coalition was a playable civ.

It is an easy scenario if:
1- you concentrate immediately on taking a maximum of barbarian cities
2- you do no waste time trying to create settlers and new cities!
3- using teh tec tree is pointless: concentrate on "future tec" for expanding more (health + happyness), hence having a better production
4- using higher units, ex. infantry IV vs infantry I only makes sense if you also promote them. A +2 bonus for each research makes a lot of sense if you have a +20% or 30% strength.
5- do not take prisonners. Vassals will take nukes and wont give it to you: stand alone in the battle
6- built your armies while nukes are not taken. Places groups close from at least 4 nukes. Wait for an opponent to weaken the group and take the nuke when both sides are weaken...
7- don't worry too much about building stuff in your cities: make them good at producing units and use ALT+unit for infinite unit creation loop

I enjoyed playing it. No need to have so many units as some players!! Just have groups of units with good promotion ratherthan quantities: it will be more fun to play with less micro management.
However, I won it, and I am unsure if I will play it again. and might favor anotrher scenario where fighting is less crucial (I am a builder...)

I played this scenario a couple of times with the spiritual leader (forgot the name)

I always end up turning off research for the first couple of turns to save up money to buy 2 bomber. That way I can concentrate on building Mech Infantries for my initial conquest of the barbarians with oil.

With bombers, you can pre-bomb, as opposed to artilleries where you'd have to do it with the other units in place. Plus you can do air strikes once the Mech infantries are there.

Its an interesting scenario but the tech tree and oil distribution are problems. As the previous poster stated, there is little benefit from researching better units. The power increase is too small to justify turtling.

Rushing the nearest barbarian city with oil is clearly a dominant strategy. Its easy to pump out stacks of modern armor and bombers to claim a huge empire after capturing oil. The AI doesn't prioritize oil enough and this really weakens it. Several AIs researched Flight or Armor without trying to take nearby cities with oil.

It probably would be an interesting MP map but the AI doesn't recognize that it should ignore early research and prioritize capturing oil.

Perphaps someone should mod in a few changes...

@ all: Good discussion.

While there might have been some more uniqueness to each of the civs, I like the scenario and the premise. So far I have played it three times and I only managed to take out a single opponent before being stonewalled by Rebel Leader.

He seems to outspend me 10:1 with all his cities, generating research and building troups. This is probably also why the tech upgrades I-IV aren't too powerful. By the time I'd have researched one upgrade, he is three levels ahead and would be even more formidable with ultra powerful Modern Armour IV against my spearman infantery.

But I'll take the advise of JPRC and forget about tech for a change and crank out weapons. Normally I'm very much a builder, so I like having to adapt my ways to survive in this scenario.

Hmmm... Took three cities this time, one from Rebel Leader and two from an opponent and then I got nuked by Rebel Leader. And it's on Warlord even. What's going on?

Has anyone tried extracting the 'Buy Experience' component from the scenario? Im looking through the mod files and cant find it. Would be nice as a stand alone mod :P

Hmmm... Took three cities this time, one from Rebel Leader and two from an opponent and then I got nuked by Rebel Leader. And it's on Warlord even. What's going on?
I have no idea. When I played (on deity) the rebels were quite pathetic because they had no money and many of their troops went on strike. Maybe it's somehow easier on the higher difficulty levels.

I have no idea. When I played (on deity) the rebels were quite pathetic because they had no money and many of their troops went on strike. Maybe it's somehow easier on the higher difficulty levels.

Could be. I'll have to try it on a higher difficulty level (although not quite deity, thank you very much) because I also think the AI playing the other factions will be more aggressive on higher difficulty and so I won't be the only one taking on the rebels.

I agree with mercade, i tried playing on noble and got the same result: took 4 cities from rebel leader and killed one of the AI, then rebel leader came at me with a relentless army and smashed me. I don't think any of the other AI had even captured one city.

I also agree with Mercade ... having difficulty with the Rebels focusing on me, and the other AI for some reason don't go after the Rebels at all any more. I'm not sure if this is a change with the latest patch (313) because before I patched, the AI very aggressively went after Rebel territory and it was a big land grab, after which a nice battle between whoever was left. Now, post-patch, the Rebels get a couple of nukes right away and hurl both at me, while in the meantime the AI seems to just be twiddling its thumbs, not trying to expand NOR going after any nukes. Odd.

I was enjoying this one pre-patch but now it's just frustrating.

emilie,
what level were you playing pre and post patch? i did not play this scerieno until after installing the patch so i don't know if it made the AI less aggressive. Others seem to be suggesting the it is the difficulty level that makes the difference but perhaps you are right that it was the patch. Any one else had similar experiences?

both pre- and post-patch i've been playing on Noble/Normal... another factor seems to be which faction you are playing... if I play as the Eastern guys, the Rebels get nukes right away and annihilate me, even if I'm completely passive towards them... whereas if I play as, for example, Yulika Ibatova (just guessing on the name there, I'm sure I didn't get it right) the Rebels don't seem to go for the nukes right away, nor do they seem to fortify their cities as rabidly. It's odd. (When I play as the eastern guys, when I try to take over a rebel city they send their entire force there to fortify, it seems, and it's an ugly battle with heavy casualties on both sides just to get one city.) Whereas when I play as YI, I can just go around and pick off a bunch of the rebel cities right off the bat. It seems oddly imbalanced after the patch. Not sure why. And I realize it may just be purely coincidence too... I've only tried playing as those two, so maybe I'll try someone else and see how the Rebs behave.

ETA: forgot to reiterate the thing about the other AI behavior though... why don't they go against the Rebs any more? They seem to just sit there and do nothing now.

So I've tried a few more test games... and though there's nothing in the Patch notes that suggests changes were made to AI behavior in this regard, it certainly seems as though the Rebels now focus solely on annihilating me with nukes, even if I have not attacked them in any way, whereas the other AIs can tool around in Rebel territory, take nukes, etc, with no response from the Rebs. This just seems unfair and unrealistic.

Is getting nuked (and recovering from that) just a basic part of this scenario now? Since the other AI don't seem to be going after the Rebs any more, it seems that it's solely up to me to prevent the Rebs from getting nukes (impossible) or to just accept that I will be nuked, and make sure I have enough cities by that time that I can continue playing.

I do think it's really lame that I can sit there passively, doing NOTHING but building infrastructure, and I get nuked immediately after the Rebs get their launch codes. I've always suspected that the AI goes after the player in a far more aggressive manner than the other AIs, even on Noble level, but this seems ridiculous.

ETA: obviously sitting there doing nothing is not a viable strategy; it was simply a test to see if the Rebs are programmed to nuke me no matter what. They are.

have you tried playing on a harder level as others suggested. this might make the other AI more aggressive toward the rebels. the only time i played i was moscow and i had the rebels attack and nuke me while the other AI pretty much sat around with their thumbs up their butts. I really don't think that this scenario is suppose to work like that. I also do'nt think that it should be solely up to the human to prevent the rebels from having nukes. how is that possible with nukes spread all over the board. it would take 20 turns just to find them and move your army in position.

i had the rebels attack and nuke me while the other AI pretty much sat around with their thumbs up their butts. I really don't think that this scenario is suppose to work like that. I also do'nt think that it should be solely up to the human to prevent the rebels from having nukes.

I agree with both points. I have this weird feeling that this scenario is sort of "broken" for me now on Noble/Normal for some reason. Why aren't the other AI doing anything? Pre-patch they were all over the map, exploring, attacking, etc. They were constantly bugging me to open borders so that they could attack more Rebs. I wonder is there a setting I need to "re-set" after the patch, or a new setting I'm unaware of that has changed the AI behavior?

I can try playing on a harder level though I'm not optimistic, since Noble is about all I can handle at this stage of my Civ skills. :blush:

ETA: Okay, I'm playing one level "harder" now and it's soooo much easier! Doesn't make any sense. AI is weaker, stupider; I can build faster, etc. Maybe this scenario is just "broken" on Noble for some reason.

If you guys think this is a bug, you should post it in the bugs forum too. Rumor has it there is going to be another patch 'some day'.

Problem is, I really don't know if it's a bug.

I just finished (lost) a game because Rebs completed nuclear arsenal, which doesn't surprise me since it's apparently up to the human player to do everything. It's discouraging to watch the replay at the end and see that none of the other non-Rebel AIs ever took over even 1 Reb city for the entire game. It's like they literally just sit there and wait to be picked off by the Rebs. Not sure how little old me is supposed to grab and defend at least 4 nukes while also defending against the neverending onslaught of the Rebs, who only increase their numbers and strength as they eat up all the non-Reb AIs, who just sit there and let it happen.

But is this really a bug? Or is this just part of the challenge, the "puzzle" of figuring out how to win this one? (e.g., is the "trick" to take over all the idiotic non-Reb AIs myself before the Rebs do?)

Anyone out there play this scenario and have the non-Rebel AIs actually "try" ? Just curious.

Gah the new patch killed this scenario. First off, 'Rebels' are disorganized armed elements that dont class as a Military district or regional power that can be recognised and thefore spoken with via Diplomacy...

Yet WHY do they power up into super cities filled with Modern Armor and Stealth Bombers... and blatently rape everyone?

I cry.

Okay, If I hadn't been enraged enough already, I'm now on the verge of just throwing my BTS disc into my microwave and zapping it out of sheer frustration and disgust at the stupidity of this scenario.

I just tried a new approach, which only exposed the further idiocy of the non-Rebel AIs and the unfair strength of the Rebel forces. My new approach was to focus solely on churning out units (both through production and purchase), which were then sent out to capture nukes. I left pitifully few/weak units in my cities, gambling that nobody would come and capture them (which they didn't, because the AI is predictably dumb about that.) So I went straight for the nearest nuke and grabbed it. Once armed, I used that nuke to *destroy another nuke* (this in an attempt to prevent the Rebs from winning an arsenal victory, since it seems impossible to do so with troops, as the non-Reb AI make no attempt to grab/defend nukes themselves, and it's physically impossible to get troops to all the nukes before the Rebs.) Without wasting *any* time doing anything else, by turn 94 I had made it to and defended a mere 2 silos and had used both to take out 2 other nukes. (I'm only *assuming* I took them out, since I was unable to verify what was left over as the territory was too far away to do an air recon.) In the same period of time, the Rebs had a) nuked me 3 times; b) destroyed all but 1 of the other non-Reb AI civs; and c) had grabbed and were arming 2 more nukes (and were 5 turns away from one of them, which would have given them Arsenal Victory. It was also apparent that even had I been able to prevent them from getting the Arsenal Victory (god only knows how) by that time I would have been the only non-Rebel civ left on the map and in no way could have defended myself against their forces, at that point having about 1-3 cities (if lucky after all that nuking) against their *entire map* of cities.

What really makes me INSANE is that I was able to verify through air recon, that some of the rebel-held nukes being armed were pitifully defended, often by only 1 unit, just a mere few spaces from a well-fortified non-Reb AI city that could have easily sent out a small force to take the nuke back. But nooooo.... they were too busy... uh... doing what? Ahhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

:wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash:

Hmm, reading over my own rant gave me an idea...

Idea for new strategy:

1. churn out troops
2. buy a few air units, use them to hopscotch to other civs; make friends.
3. drop enough troops into their cities to take back/defend the nukes nearest to each city.

The main issue will still be time, and the ability to churn out enough troops to do this before the Rebs come and pound the living crap out of me.

emilie,
are you still playing as noble? you mentioned before that you had more success at higher levels. i was just wondering if you are still having all these problems at higher levels as well. personally i was afraid to try this scenario at a high level because usually i am a noble or lower type player. i think tonight i am going to start broken star on the next level and see if it is easier. If you are not having success with it I would stop trying on noble. i really think it is some sort of bug, especially since you and others have played this pre-3.13 without problem. The AI behavior is not at all typical of a CIV gave especially one that is SUPPOSE to be an aggressive scenario. I am pretty sure this is a bug and not just a challenge by the game designers. After all, they included easy levels so everyone could enjoy the game. :)

also do nuke still count toward your arsenal victory if they have been used? how many nukes are on the board or does it vary. also do they change positions after each game or do you have some idea where they are in future games.

yeah, i'm still trying on Noble. i know i posted before that it was easier on a higher level, but i think that was just a fluke, or maybe i had better luck that time because of a slightly altered strategy, but ultimately i'm doomed to failure anyway. maybe i'll try it on an *easier* level and see what happens?

re: the nukes

as far as i know, it's always the same number, and the same positions. at least they have been the same for me, whether on Noble or Prince.

my questions about nukes-- if you nuke another nuke, is it destroyed? if you capture a nuke from someone else, does the arming countdown start over? (if so, then the AI cheats because the Rebs suddenly had 3 nukes at like 15, 5 and 5 turns to go or something...) and on the victory page, there's a number of "remaining nukes"... to what does this number refer? nukes that are still under the control of the *neutral* forces?

i'm still planning to try again later with my latest strategy idea... but i've got all-day baby duty today (a 9-month old) so i have to walk away for now :crazyeye: if anyone else has any luck, please post! at this point, i'd love to hear of ANY success!

last night i tried on two levels above noble and got one city from rebels and then moved to take another and by the time i got 4-5 mech infantry and mobile guns, they had amassed about 10 mech infantry. every time i killed one 2 more appeared the next turn. the AI's were exploring the board but i didn't see any capture a city. after loosing my whole stack to the rebels i had a good idea to where that game was going and restarted at one level above noble. i am currently at turn 40 in that game and i have captured 4 cities. thus far only two of the AI's have more than one city but it am pretty sure they were built by settlers not conquered because i think you get a message in between turns if a city changes hands. my strategy for that game was to be the north Caucious district (the red dudes in the lower left corner). i think they have one of the best starting positions because they can get oil fairly quickly by taking the city to the right of it. (i think it was <10 turns before i got oil) there are two other rebel cities to the south west that i conquered to give me only one front to defend. i used the same starting strategy both times. The first was unsuccessful, and the second...well so far so good. the rebs have not got any nukes yet (probably only a matter of time though). ill keep you posted

I've been trying my totally new strategy, and it may actually be doable with some tweaking. I started by purchasing an air unit right off the bat, to leapfrog to all the other non-Reb cities, and get open borders. Then, as I'm able to purchase more, I place air units in all those cities so I can keep an eye on the Rebs (and, in the meantime, bomb the heck out of all their resources and improvements.) Back in my own territory I spam out mech infantry. Then, as soon as the Rebs get a nuke, I do recon with my air units around the map to find out which one they got, and send my mech infantry over there to take the nuke back (here I have to rely on the AI stupidity, because even though it can take up to the entire arming period to get my guys over there, they usually leave the nuke guarded by only 1 or 2 weak units which I easily destroy after the long journey). This is also one of those maddening points, because it'd be nice if one of the other non-Rebs would go ahead and take some of those nukes back instead of making me do *everything*-- in some cases they could leave their capitol, retake the nuke, and go back home practically all in one turn. But nooooo... I have to spend 15 turns going all the way there myself.... Anyway. Once I have the nuke, I *destroy* it. This is simply to avoid having to waste units defending it, and the fewer nukes left on the playing board, the better.

Unfortunately, I still got to the point where I could see I was going to lose anyway, because suddenly the Rebs took 4 more nukes within just a few turns, and there was no way I could go take them all back on my own. Again, because I'm forced to go all over the map to do so, I suffer huge casualties on the way as I have to cross the Reb territory.

2 possible solutions?... 1) Use vassalage to allow airdrops of my units directly into other non-Reb cities, thereby avoiding long and dangerous travel times to the nukes. 2) Give up on this defensive strategy altogether and, still using vassalage to airdrop past the Rebels, gradually build up 4 armies across the map and then simultaneously take, or take back from the Rebs, 4 nukes, and then attempt to hold them for 20 turns to get an Arsenal Victory. Hmm. Could work. I feel the timing would have to be pretty sophisticated, though-- have to be quick enough to beat the Rebs out on the nukes, but not so quick that my armies aren't big enough to defend the nukes once taken.

Remember, it's FUN! :crazyeye:

I am still convinced that something got mucked up with the AI aggression possible due to the patch. I put out a post asking for the leaderheadinfo.xml from pre 3.13. i don't know much about modding but if the preference for war values for the post 3.13 are different from the pre, then we know there is a problem. I figure this is a more proactive way then just posting it as a bug and hoping for a fix. based on the responses here i don't think many people play this mod, so might have to take things into our own hands.

I think I may have "figured it out"... or at least found one possible solution... I'm playing as the Red guys (you're right, Graves-- it's a good starting position). As before, bought an air unit right away and used it to leapfrog across the map and make friends with everyone & open borders. Continued to buy air units and place them across the map. But then, instead of defending the nukes or building up an attack force right away, I put almost everything into air units, and used them to completely destroy the Rebels' infrastructure. This seems to have intimidated them and they did not go for any nukes until the 70-somethingth turn, at which point I now have a nice handful of their cities and have even had a chance to build up my own cities & a good ground force. Things are going well. I vassalized everyone who would agree to it, if only to avoid fighting them at the same time, since the others were starting to get annoyed at my increasing territory.

It's interesting how the destruction of the Rebs' infrastructure turned off whatever cue causes them to go for the nukes right away. From what I can see, they still had plenty of troops to do so and if they had done so earlier, they would have caused me quite a headache.

Still playing on Noble. Will let you know how it turns out. Right now I'm feeling pretty optimistic that I could take it. In fact it's been pretty easy and boring up to this point.

emilie,
Interesting strategy. i hope it works. did you buy the plane after you got oil? (i assume you took over the city to the right to start.) otherwise it cost something like 640 for one bomber. i wonder if the rebels rely on modern armor or bomber to attack the nukes and that is why they leave them alone without oil. I would suspect when the computer sees the 2 x 45 strength tanks guarding the missiles vs rebel mech infantry it does some calculation that says "bad idea to attack".

Yeah, I got oil first... I usually spend the money right away on a couple of mobile artillery to help with taking out the first city or two.

I think this strategy (the air assault) is doable... it is a looooong game though. I finally got bogged down with about 90 turns to go and I'm quitting because the Rebs are finally starting to whittle me away with superior troop numbers. I could probably still win a time victory with some careful planning, but it's getting pretty tedious and I don't want to waste several more hours only to possibly lose. I got a bit cocky midgame and started building up my cities instead of just focusing on troops. I think if I just went for troops in all my cities, pausing only to build happiness buildings when absolutely necessary, this could be a win. I may replay and see how that comes out.

Still a couple of oddities (bugs?) with this one though... for one thing, one of the nukes I took back disappeared right after I took it. Another strange thing I noticed-- the percentage of land territory required for the domination victory seems to fluctuate throughout the game. Is that a bug, or does it change based on how much land the Rebs have?

I noticed both of your oddities too. i wasn't sure if it was just me, but it looks like you confirmed it as well.

Well, I finally won.... that was one loooooong game. But using that strategy (air destruction/vassalage/takeover of Rebel cities) it was actually pretty easy, albeit somewhat tedious. Once I solidified my position on the western side of the map, I was able to build up 3 really solid armies made up entirely of mobile artillery and modern armor, and I just ate up the Rebel cities from 3 directions-- west, south central, and southeast. (Funny, the southeastern coalition never bothered to take that little city to their southeast, even though that's easy pickings on their very first turn. Idiots.)

Not long after taking the Rebs' last city, I got a Domination Victory.

No doubt one could also get an Arsenal Victory using this strategy to begin with, and probably much more quickly too.

I haven't posted in the longest time but would like to thank the posters on this thread for their good advice on this battle.

Glad to see someone is talking about this issue. I just bought BTS and this is the first scenario I am putting through its paces. So far it has very little in common with its description. The Rebel forces are supposed to be independent city states that fight mostly amongst themselves, rarely attack the principal players, and definately do not make a concerted, intelligent, effort to wipe them out.
What I have found is that even on Warlord Difficulty the Rebels act as a single massive enemy that uses every capability at its disposal to wipe out the "real" civilizations as quickly as possible. Within a few turns the "Rebels" dropped 4 nukes on my cities and systematically distroyed all others with overwhelming numbers of troops far beyond the technology of the "real" civs. They attacked with air units, followed by siege units, followed by massive armor stacks on the same turn. It was a perfect and concerted effort.
Since none of the real civs ever do anything other than to act as speed bumps for the rebels, this mod has a very lonely feel. It is basically the human player versus a massive and much larger rebel player where nothing matters accept how fast military units can be pumped out. So far I must say I am extremely disappointed in this mod. If it played anywhere close to its description it would be one heck of a fun game.

Just played another game of broken star this time on "Settler" difficulty to see if it was even winnable post patch. The result was the same, this scenario is completely broken.

I was playing this mod/scenario and found that i ended up getting nuked by the rebels no matter what my strategy was.
I read this forum for some ideas...and then it struck me - no, this mod isn't broken - it just requires a little thinking out of the box.

Basically, the philosophy of the Broken Star scenario is this:

Your reasearch and to a lesser degree production is screwed.
But in this mod you can purchase units AND promotions.
That is the KEY...

So focus on aquiring $$$$.

As for victory:
Conquest is out of the question as it will be impossible to take out the Rebels
Time may also be problematic as by the end the Rebels may be too strong to hold out against...
So that leaves with you going for an ARSENAL VICTORY.

I'm playing Oksana <Aggr, Imp> at Diety/Marathon (which slows production of the rebels and the othe generals as well as yours).

Basically plunder your way to victory!
(As an aside, this was what the Nazis did in WWII, they plundered their way through europe and used the aquired gold to finance their war machine...)

Macromanagement.
1. Choose civics to boost finances: <State Prop, Vasselage, Police State>
2. I found that getting a Great Merchant gives you $2700. This can buy you a whole stack of units and promotions.
So i chose <Caste System, Pacifism> to boost great person production and set all my cities to produce <$$$, gr8 ppl>.
3. Don't build any buildings...as you cities may get nuked.
7. Turn off reasearch....so 100% $$$.
8. Don't bother with settlers...in the marathon game it takes 43 turns to produce a settler...while a mech takes 7.
9. Manage health and happiness with civics and use workers to produce a forrest reserve for a :-)
10. Build mechs/artilary/SAM in my HQ. Spies in other cities.

Military Strategy:
Focus on creating a highly promoted, compact, elite fighting force!

1. Purchase your units: Gunship (to pillage), Armor (city attacker), Stealth bomber (to destroy crucial resources).
2. Focus espionage on the rebels. Use Great Spies against rebel for espionage boost. Use spies to make contact with the rest of the non-rebel A.Is. Then...
3. Use spies and stealth bombers to take out cruicial Rebel resources. You really need to stay on top of this!
(FYI: If you have enough spies and bombers, you'll be aware of when the rebels secure nukes. In this game, 20 turns is enough to go take them out).
4. Attach Warlords to a medic to give you super medic (i.e medic III) for a battle stack, and to gunships for +1 movement (morale) to pillage and clear.
5. When securing nukes, use your guships to create a perimiter of 2 sq. (destroy roads); leave a stack of units (mech, medic, gunship, SAM, artillary) to guard it.
6. If one of your cities gets nukes, move on...
7. Remember to use $$$ to promote your units.
8. Ally with the non rebel A.I where possible. Turn them into vassels when possible.
9. Pillage, pillage, pillage! (Those groups of town are waiting to be pillaged...allowing you to buy new units).
10. ENGAGE THE REBELS: keep the rebels week. You need to find a secure location (hill + forrest) near a rebel town to take out its units. This will also give your units promotions. Which you may augment with purchased promotions.

Have fun...

FYI: NOTES ON GAMEPLAY:
I took out the coastal city of Vladivostock in the first couple of turns, then Amur to the north soon after.

I got a great spy (my first gr8 person) which i used against Rebels. My next was a Great Merchant which i used to buy stealth bomber, and a stack of units to take out the 3rd city (which i gave to white guy) and my first nuke.

The Rebels nuked my HQ...but no problem, i keep on...
As my neighbour (orange guy) turned on me, i took two of his cities and turned him into a single city vassel.
One of those cities became my new mech producing city...and the game continued.

Acquired another vassel (white guy).

Now i'm taking out Rebel units one-by-one next to a 4th city i'm after. Then onto my second nuke...

That's odd, I always found the Rebels to be borked because they're in constant strike with colonial costs and a lack of a capital city. Ouch.

Well I may retry it on Diety level sometime. I played far east and got creamed both times, will be curious how your game eventually ends. Anyway I played the Charlamagne scenario last night and had a lot more fun with that one. Its not so one dimensional.

I said i will post what happens...well actually the game turned to . .. .. .. . shortly afterwards so i had to go back and finesse the strategy.
I've updated my previous post to reflect that.

I work, so sadly i've gotta wait until the weekend to play :-)

rmendis:
what version of bts are you using? also are the other AI players attacking the rebels? from your last post it sounds like they are. the reason i think this scenario was bugged was i have never seen the other AI attack the rebels. the description of the game makes the rebels sound like a minor player and their role is to be gobbled up by the human and other AI before going after each other. Is this your experience or are you only facing rebels? you strategy sounds like it might work. keep us posted

rmendis:
what version of bts are you using? also are the other AI players attacking the rebels? from your last post it sounds like they are. the reason i think this scenario was bugged was i have never seen the other AI attack the rebels. the description of the game makes the rebels sound like a minor player and their role is to be gobbled up by the human and other AI before going after each other. Is this your experience or are you only facing rebels? you strategy sounds like it might work. keep us posted
graves_09, yes, the Rebels have been at war with the other AI...in fact destroying a couple of them...however, i've noticed that the Rebels only nuked me :-)

That was not exactly his question. He asked if the other major players have attacked the rebels, not whether the rebels attack them. Post patch the other major powers do not attack the rebels. They are guaranteed to all be destroyed by the rebs if you last that long.

Hi everyone!

It could be that the discussion is way past this, but comparing my experience in playing this scenario before and after the latest patch, I'd offer that there's something in the patch that changed the nature of the rebels. Pre-patch, the other AI-controlled playable civs attacked the rebels vigorously, and the rebels themselves acted less in concert than they do post-patch.

In between bouts of trying to figure out how best to approach this new development, I saw a game where the rebels actually took out one of the non-rebel factions, which shocked me...

Yes, others have confirmed that the patch seems to have broken the mod. Post patch the Rebs not only attack they "Real" powers, the rebs systematically and intelligently destroy every single one of them, and then the human player.

This mod is hilarious. The description of it is "Fight for dominance with the other powers, by capturing cities from the weak and disorganized rebel forces". Yet, in reality, the rebel forces are this vast and well organized superpower, and you have to use every trick there is to survive against them. Rmendis and Emilie devised super complicated strategies for doing this... good job guys.

I think I've figured out the real meaning of this scenario. "rebel leader" isn't the rebel- you are. I mean, why would the rebellion be spread across so many cities, while you just have one? In fact you're some sort of crazy terrorist leader, who must use guerrilla warfare (blowing up infrastructure/pillaging) to keep the government at bay, while desperately searching for nukes.

Yeah that's a good way to put it. Apparently it was not like that before the patch.

Ha! It took a while, but I finally beat it. I pillaged like crazy, and spent it all on my air force, while grabbing oil as fast as I could. Then I bombed them unmercifully, and their military was stuck huddling in fear inside of their starving, unhappy cities.

did the new patch made the rebel leader (barbarian) too strong? The rebel leader has like lvl 4 units while I am stuck at level 2. All other states dont have oil, and the barbarians have conquered the purple and red states...with stealth bombers 4, mech 4, helicopter 4 and armor 4.... I am playing on prince epic

Also, it is about to control one of the nuke station within 5 turns...


Edit: After playing 50 more turns, I got overwhelmed...the rebel captured all other states and took over 3 nuke stations. I got blasted with nukes and I think I lost...:cry:

The rebels are too strong, they start with too many cities. In the beginning I can take over 3 cities but then stalled because they produce way more numerous and more powerful units.

The rebel leader isnt barbarian. thats the problem. its a regular AI player like the Nato player set to 'minor civ' that you are always at war with and cannot speak to. therein lies the problem becuase a Barbarian AI has limits set to itself on how it acomplishes military attacks, city building and research.

The 'Rebel Leader' simply is another AI civ with a massive amount of cities with Oil and Aliminium to fuel it... Unfortunetly.

Any way to mod this into 10 copies of the rebal leader to that every rebel city is a civ?

because it is annoying to the "Disorganized" rebel leader airlift in enough capacity to the city I attack to make it impossible to take

Ok. I finally got around to playing this again this bank holiday weekend.

FYI: This time i had the latest patch (as of today).

I played the game at Marathon/Immortal and i won an Arsenal Victory at 2020AD fairly easily (with ~130 turns to go :-)

So the game is and must be playable at the Deity level. Another time...

Highlights
======

Same strategy as i've described before.

I played Oksanna (Imperialist, Aggressive).
This meant i had a steady flow of Great Generals whom i turned into warlords to give me Medic III (aka "supermedic") and Moral (+1 movement gor gunships).

Military Strategy
==========

Additions to previous post:

1. I decided first to make contact with the other generals (using spies - the only units i ever built - cos you can't buy them).
2. Then i took the small rebel cities between the generals, so that i could trade with them.
Note, that when pillaging and attacking, don't destroy the roads/railroads you will later use, just pillage the improvements - towns/villages/hamlets/etc in particular.

FYI: These were Irksutsk, Omsk, then Volgrad.
These three cities allowed me to trade with the other generals.

3. The cities were each strategically located a few squares from a Nuclear silo. So along with Amur (which i had taken as described in a prior post), i had secured 4 cities nearby the silos.
This is very important also, as one can transport units from the HQ (which had an airport) to these cities in the event you need to beef up security at one of the captured silos.

Changes from Earlier Strategy
==================

1. Initially i did buy a fighter jet in addition to a stealth bomber. They are totally worthwhile to take out the resources of the rebel/barbs.
2. I did purchase christian missionaries to spread religion to my first to captured cities (Vladivoskok and Amur) - and this paid off - along with my gr8 person optimised civics : pacifism + cast system + mercantilism (later state prop to minimise costs of the distant cities + enamcipation), i got a great merchant each from those to cities. (In fact i spread christianity to all my cities. I got an extra great merchant from a third city, as i won the game).
3. Leter on in the game, the money traded by a Gr8 Merchant was mostly spent on promotions and stealth bombers and a unit here and there when needed.

Notes from Gameplay
=============

Essentially this was a classic devide and conquer strategy.
In the end, the rebels were split into 3 or 4 disjoint sections.
Three of the other generals became my vassels.

All in all i can confirm that this Mod is not broken (anymore at least).
It's a very fun and playable scenario. Thx.

Is there any progress on a mod of this mod where the different districts are more diverse and the rebels are actually disorganized and are not one massive civ? Or any other improvments?

OK, I just finished my first successful Broken Star game. In the beginning I had the same experience others described here before - I wasn´t defeated, I was blown into pieces.

So, the first thing I did was to change my starting position. I used to start with Jekaterinburg in the Ural (which I´d still prefer, but it´s just too tough).

So I changed that and began in the far east. I used strategy combining elements of what emilie and rmendis (thanks to you guys) suggested. I bombed the rebell leaders infrastructur where ever it was possible (having lots of fighters and stealth bombers everywhere on the map) - I felt bad about it, because bombing doesn´t give you a financial benefit and later on I could have used all these towns, but anyway, the rebel´s production must be kept low.

Then I built a little force that was strong enough to finally face the enemy (I conquered all cities in the north east and made it to Tobolsk by then - and I lost two cities due to Nukes, which didn´t matter much, since i developed the cities I conquered to $$$ production and I could pillage the surroundings of the nuked areas. )

At some point I had broken the rebel´s strength and with my bombers bombing all his units and cities and my fighters still destroying his infrastructure my little force was able to take city after city and went for the remaining nukes in the meantime. I made four other civs my vasall, I attacked and conquered one other (Ural).

Unfortunately I ran out of time (although I really had the rebel on the run in the end - 6 or 7 more rounds and all Russia would have been mine) - so it was just a time victory.

By the way: I use my generals to promote my units to "leadership" and "combat VI". I see no use for "morale" or "medic III". "Medic II" is enough and instead of "morale" all my units get "commando" and can use the rebel roads and railroads.

Any way to mod this into 10 copies of the rebal leader to that every rebel city is a civ?

because it is annoying to the "Disorganized" rebel leader airlift in enough capacity to the city I attack to make it impossible to take

I dont think that is a good idea, cause i think the rebels will bash the heck out of eachother, it would be funny to wach but the rebels shouldn't be fighting themselves... or should they???

Hmm, just tried this mod recently, playing on Noble/Epic (BtS 3.17). Haven't run into the same 'stomped flat' issues everyone else seems to have, though the other MDs are pretty much useless turtles.

I'm playing as the Far East one (Imp/Agg), and rushed the nearest 2 Rebel cities right off the bat. The second one, to the north, I basically turned into an XP-farm while I got my infrastructure up and running by parking a handful of Mobile Arty and Mech Infantry on the hill road leading to my territory.

I used my Great Generals on Military Academy then Great Instructors in my capital, so I was pumping out level 4 Mech Infantry at a rate of 1 every 1-2 turns before long. As a very nice alternative to the Medic III super-medics, try Woodsman III + Medic I, it's also 25% heal rate to same tile, but they can be mass-produced and fight better too.

Anyways, the only other MD that's accomplished anything is the one that's right next to me, mainly because I've killed off most of the nearby Rebel forces. I left him alone as a buffer state to the west while I sent large stacks of MI and Mobile Arty to take nukes. I haven't seen the need for using any other ground units, since the 3 promotions mine were built with were more than enough to specialize them. CG III for garrison troops, Woodsman III/Medic I (with a promo purchase) for medics, Combat III/Pinch or Ambush for primary attackers, Interception II + Combat for antiair. The Rebels got level IV troops very quickly, but +6 strength is still less than the +50%ish from promotions my MI were getting.

Finally, is it just me, or do Offshore platforms not work? I founded a city just to get the oil to the NE of starting location, but found I didn't get the resource once I built the platform.

Is there any progress on a mod of this mod where the different districts are more diverse and the rebels are actually disorganized and are not one massive civ? Or any other improvments?

Any Progress on this, anyone?

I dont think that is a good idea, cause i think the rebels will bash the heck out of eachother, it would be funny to wach but the rebels shouldn't be fighting themselves... or should they???

They should, but the lag might be bad. maybe 8 leaders. But if your PC is fast you might be able to crank it up so every rebel city is it's own "nation".

I Loved it! I was the Southern Fraction. Got the Caspian Sea Oil and Crushed all of the Rebels. I pushed the front North, then East. Then this guy declared war on my and I pounded his soldiers with 100 or so units. Then the way washed across and all the Rebels are mine!

Then, all the Remaining begin to turtle up, got bonuses and Gold buying units. As I lost most of my 1000 or so army on a few Coalitions they all crawled over me. Thousands of Units. I cried when I saw a 50 Str Modern Armour kill my 40 Str Armour and my 32 str Mech. It was over in a flash. The allies when they are done began to cut themselves into pieces...

At least I killed over 5000 Units.

I think I know what the problem is with this mod.

Expert players will be able to beat almost any scenario, no matter how hard it is, by using the fact that the AI is stupid. They find an effective tactic that cripples the computer (bomb improvements, for example) and then exploit it to maximum effect. Good for them. However, I am not an expert player, and nor will I ever be. I have played civ for at least two years, but I am still playing on medium difficulty, and do not plan to go any higher.

Anyway. The Rebels act as the AI should (using coordinated attack patterns and going for the win), and the AI act as the Rebels should (doing nothing but build up strength). I tried this game four times, and got stone-walled every time. I read these posts, and found out I was not alone.

Somehow the Rebel-scripts have been mixed up with the AI-scripts. I have not looked at the mod-files. I have no programming skills whatsoever. Still, by looking at the information and player reports, this is what must have happened.

I just happend across this scenario and I liked the looks of it. And it´s quite inspiring for seeking out strategies. So I read all the posts here with great interest, but I found nowhere a word on spys simply blowing up the nukes. As far as I know that works. Of course it´s somehow against the idea of this scenario, but maybe I´ll really dispose of these spoil-sports, cling to one city crammed with defenders and wait for a time victory as the last surviving Civ.

i won this scenario pretty easily. Here is the tactics to beat it :

civics : favors military prod and experience : police state, vassalage, caste, state property and theo. This way you'll have super +4EXP and super workshops
workers : don't keep cottages (even matures), build workshop/mines everywhere
GG : only academies in taken cities
sliders : move culture slider to keep cities happy (until you have to switch to emmancipation civic about half game)

very important for a good start : turn 1 or 2 take the nearest barbarian city (use all your initial units promoted with all your starting money)

science : research future techs or whatever appeals to you, it has no importance as your science will be low and you will use culture slider to get happiness

production : build all production buildings first (forge, factory, electricity) then barracks then ALT build mech inf in capital and mobile artilleries in second city. Never build settlers. You should soon procude 1 unit/turn easily. Build happy buildings when needed.Do the same in all cities : only build production building first then mech.inf/arties then tanks, no need for aircraft or else.

general strat :
* cities should work all their workshoped tiles (build as many workers as needed to workshop taken cities fast)
* attack barb cities (weaken with arties) one by one till the nearest oil city (to make tanks) then cities near siloes next.
* No need to attack siloes early, keep units to take cities as fast as possible. You can start fighting for nuclear siloes when you'll have 5 or 6 cities, not before.
* Buy missionaries with your money for each new city (to get the happy and +2exp bonus)
* keep money to promote super healers (+25%/turn) mech infs (wood 3 and medic 1)
* keep GPs for golden ages (to change civic to emmancipation for exemple) to boost production when you'll have at last 4 cities

So this Mod is still alive and provoking new ideas :) . What difficulty/speed did you play and what kind of victory was that? And you thought no good of hurling out a merchant? I play the East and I think I got one in 9 rounds and received 900 gold for it immediately because of the direct contact to the neighbour. The little army I bought then is still taking towns by now (OK, it just stopped doing so when two modern tanks suddenly materialized in the sieged city. Airlift, I guess). Btw I play emperor/normal.

i tried my strat yesterday on deity level (speed normal), worked like a charm, this time i used the eastest general (near vladivostok), the first time i played that scenario i played the central general.

The only difference with the strat i described earlier is i put the science slider at 0% to get money faster and used it to buy lots of workers and promotions (a wood3 medic 1 healer for exemple)
At turn 30 when i stopped i had 8 cities (3 big barbarians (12+ pop), 1 big general city (12 pop) and 3 newly founded cities (8+ pop)) and about 1000 gold in reserve. My 2 starting cities (capital + city taken at turn 2) are around 20 pop.
3 cities are already upgraded (factories, temples, barracks etc) and are pumping out tanks/mech.inf/artilleries and 4 GG have built academies.

I have one nuclear siloe in the middle of my territory (north of capital) that i should attack in somes turns and i am ready to take a barbarian city in 2-3 turn with another nuclear siloe near :nuke:

I already used a golden age (still in it) and i have another GE ready when the next GP pop :goodjob:

Game is pretty much win with something like 15 mobile artilleries, 3-4 tanks (got oil late, i had to settle near coast), about 20 mech inf, 12-13 workers and soon (less than 10 turns) i will churn out 7-8 units/turn and will start to divide my army in 2 to attack 2 fronts. The only difficulty is that barbarians are attacking me with level 4 units :eek: (ouch it hurts!), but some good promoted units at choke point stop them with no loss

:hammers: :hammers: :hammers: Gratz, I´d say the scenario is really broken or cracked now. Sounds just too easy to try for oneself. :) Maybe State Property should be excluded to make it a challenge again.
But I´ll still finish my attempt, I still like the setting. The settler going for the sea oil is exactly what I did, btw. I´m not too much aquainted with the AI, so I hope that my strategy to destroy all the units in one city without taking it, wait for a new army to come and destroy that without a loss again will work. But so far the AI sent only one Artillery as replacement, so I´ll maybe have to look for trouble somewhere else.

i thought sincerely the game was won but i played again yesterday more 4-5 turns and even if i took a 9th rebel city they attacked my 8th city the same turn with a of units and took it back (protected by like 10 mech inf !!)
So maybe the rebel won't be so easily defeated, they have already crushed 2 other generals (3 staying with 1 almost dead). It can be done that way but it will be hard.
IMO the best bet would have been to keep the general east of my country alive, like a buffer between rebels and me (they do constant improvement destruction with planes, harrassing me) and instead concentrate early and only on rebel cities.

Should be fun but deity maybe allow too much production capabilities to rebels on the long term (and too much science power as they are at level 4 units very very fast)

Really? I just wanted to stop playing and finally turn to "Colonization", because I did get nuked although I blew up all endangered silos with a crowd of spies :) . I wonder why I didn´t get nuked in my first game, maybe I was regarded too unimportant.
But grinding works, the AI sends masses of Units to help out its sieged city and, IV or not IV, they can all be wiped out easily every turn with some bombers, arty and City-attacking tanks. But that´s "emperor", "deity" may bring about even more replacements.
As to the planes, the only little research I do is on airforce. I think a reasonable interception brigade is indeed a good investment.
So maybe it´s still a combination of all the tricks posted here, that will turn the red tide best. Maybe when I´m back from the new World I´ll have another go myself.

I also tried this scenario first with "classic" tactics. I had only got my advance going when 3 of my cities were nuked on the same turn. :mad:

So I read this thread and tried again, this time on emperor. I got a surprisingly easy nuke victory. All of the regular civs became my vassals (did not fight any of them) :eek:

Here's what I did:

* Started in the lower left corner and started by securing the oil
* Civics: police state, state prop, theocr, vassalage
* In all cities, I only built theaters, granaries, factories & barracks, then units. Mostly armors & mobile artillery, but later on also some SAM units. In my HQ, and later in another city, I built air units.
* I managed to get two great merchants. 2x1100 gold managed to get a lot of bombers. Later I mostly got engineers, which are quite useless in this scenario. At least the first can start a golden age.
* I used my money to buy air units. I placed these all over the place and bombed the hell out of the rebel's improvements. I also had a big armada of bombers softening the cities I was about to attack.
* I put all espionage on the rebels, and used spies to poison water and inflict unhappiness in their cities. One of my cities cranked out spies.
* I spread christianity to all cities.

The rebels never managed to put up a good fight, and they only managed to capture one or two of the other AI's minor cities. Even the AI's managed to capture a few of the rebels cities after they got hold of oil. The rebels were not able to activate even one nuke before I won.

I also tried this scenario first with "classic" tactics. I had only got my advance going when 3 of my cities were nuked on the same turn. :mad:

So I read this thread and tried again, this time on emperor. I got a surprisingly easy nuke victory. All of the regular civs became my vassals (did not fight any of them) :eek:

Here's what I did:

* Started in the lower left corner and started by securing the oil
* Civics: police state, state prop, theocr, vassalage
* In all cities, I only built theaters, granaries, factories & barracks, then units. Mostly armors & mobile artillery, but later on also some SAM units. In my HQ, and later in another city, I built air units.
* I managed to get two great merchants. 2x1100 gold managed to get a lot of bombers. Later I mostly got engineers, which are quite useless in this scenario. At least the first can start a golden age.
* I used my money to buy air units. I placed these all over the place and bombed the hell out of the rebel's improvements. I also had a big armada of bombers softening the cities I was about to attack.
* I put all espionage on the rebels, and used spies to poison water and inflict unhappiness in their cities. One of my cities cranked out spies.
* I spread christianity to all my cities.
* With the GG's I built military academies.

The rebels never managed to put up a good fight, and they only managed to capture one or two of the other AI's minor cities. Even the AI's managed to capture a few of the rebels cities after they got hold of oil. The rebels were not able to activate even one nuke before I won.

Alright, yes I´m afraid airforce and bombing needs be. I hoped it would go without, cause I don´t like to see those bombers doing their flight all the time. Did you buy workers and turn all your tiles into workshops? And are you going to try on "deity" too? By the way, I also wanted to start in the left corner when I maybe tackle this scenario again some time.

No, I didn't find the scenario interesting enough for another go. I didn't buy any workers - I managed to capture some from the AI, and also built one or two. And yes, I put down workshops more or less everywhere.

Also on noble. Something is weird - I'm facing ungodly large stacks in rebel cities - I'm talking 30+ units. I think they using the airfields to transport their entire collective army into the city I'm attacking, which is ridiculously broken.

Also, Air is clearly the best of the 4 tech paths, at least up until Air IV. It nets you +25 evade chance for your bombers each step.

This scenario is somewhat broken now but it does provide a new challenge, just requires a different tactical approach.

The Rebel leader has a massive advantage in pumping out troops but he will also be less aggressive if you cut him off from aluminum, this will prevent him from getting air units and most importantly tanks.

He only has access to 3 nodes of this resource and a possible 4th one if he builds a new city near it(in my last game he built one right on it but luckily my main stack of 12 mechs and 10 mobile artillery was near by).The other two are next to AI citys and area easily bombed/pillaged. Now the last one is somewhat isolated, between two of his cites but not in production range. His workers are "automated" and will never try to secure a resource if there is a hostile unit near by. So just place a level 4-5 mech with woodsmen promotion next to it. My mech got attacked once by a gunship in about 50 turns. If you place a unit on the resource he will consider it as a bigger threat and bash you out.

As a bonus you can also neglect him of oil,to prevent gunship production. But duo to a far east offshore platform this is somewhat harder, you need a ship(stealth destroyer was my choice) or capture one of the highly fortified cites on east cost(to get bomber range).

Now why all this? How does it make him less aggressive?

Its because *dumb* AI considers all infantry troops as defense units, he still sometimes attacks but in very weak and small stacks.He also won't be able to eliminate an AI and attempts to get nukes will come very late(by the time you should have a reasonable force)

As others have stated, don't tech in early game. Spend all your gold on promotions and some units.

Build workshops, even tho they give no $$, its more important to pimp unit production to 1 each turn.

Make friends, all other AIs can be turned into vassals peacefully.This way you can guard the nukes.

When you get few cities up and running you can consider teching to air III.
Try to get around ~20 bombers before, get *Ace* promotion(req combat III) for all of them. When you reach air III you can upgrade them all to 100% avoidance superbombers and you basicly won.(note that Ace promotion is disabled once you reach air III tech to avoid this)

This thing with bombers is not needed, but it does make the end easier(less casualtys). You can't do this in early game as you will be bashed by rebel leader if you don't harass him.

Few more notes:
- attack in big stacks, fast and effective or he may bash your offense with artillery, once you reach a city make sure you can take it one turn or kill off most of the defenders(this is more important in early game as you production is limited and troops are expensive)

-his cities that bored with other AI have massive amounts of troops,avoid em at start

-remember if he can produce air units and tanks, its game over, you lost

-if rebel leader does get a nuke, he will leave only one unit defending it, if all is good you should have vassals by then and you can just drop a unit or two to get it and destroy it(if you are unable to defend it).There is also a bug that prevents rebel leader from recapturing the nuke, so its automatically destroyed if you fail to defend it

Sounds like you have this scenario figured out--I think I tried it once right after I got the game. I'll have to give it another go.

This sounds quite elaborated, so I presume it was tested on deity?

This was on monarch and normal speed, but a relatively easy domination victory by 120th turn.

I might try deity later and different speed if needed but the basic tactic of denying him aluminium should be the key(you also don't need any anti air this way)

I tried the strategy suggested by Malis with no luck on Noble using the most recent patch as both the Urals and Far Easterners.

the biggest problem, is that the other AI's won't vassalize until it's too late. They've either lost their capital and have been reduced to a useless secondary city, or they hold out too long and get eliminated by the rebels. So I can't position bombers near some of the farthest aluminum sources. I can see how this should work, but can't pull it off. The rebels eventually get an aluminum resource long enough to plow over one of the other AI's (giving them yet another aluminum source perpetuating their conquest) or they grab a couple of the far nukes that I can't get anywhere near.

Perhaps I don't know how to get a civ to vassalize properly.

Before reading this post I tried Broken Star and set difficulty level to Monarch.

Played Far East, got oil and aluminium, took a rebel city early and built another.

I had a stack of 6 modern armour, 3 mobile artillery, 4 helis, 4 mech inf, 8 marines, 4 stealth bombers. Attacked a rebel city but by the time my troops were in range its 4 defenders had increased to around 12. The following turn there were 30+ units there.

Approx 50 turns into the game all but one of the AIs had been destroyed by rebels and he nuked my capital. It gave me a warning too that another nuke was ready.

Might try on deity as the posts suggest it's easier on higher difficulty but for now I just consider this mod broken!

I found BS a little easy and didn't become a challenge until Immoral.

I just wanted to point out this old post because it gave me a chuckle.

Tried it on Emperor, I was doing decently, having conquered about 1/4 of the map.
Then he nuked my capital... (academy, great instructor, military academy)

It was getting harder and harder to defend against Modern Armors and Mobile Artilleries. I also had two more nuclear warnings. So I took my elite stack and sent them far into rebel territory to remove the nukes. I jumped from forest to forest with Woodsman upgraded Mechs and managed to take the nukes. Then I deleted them and when home, lol.

Took me a while to realize all I had to do to gain a sizable advantage was bomb his bloody oil resources. Since he can't make any more fighters it also means the airforce was getting more powerful, and eventually I started bombarding all his resources (happiness especially) and city tiles.

He was also running Caste System and State Property... very productive, so I send a large stack of spies and shifted his into Environmentalism. All his workshop cities started losing population like crazy.

So yeah... aerial dominance and resource denial. By the end of the game I had generated 16 great generals... One 40% healer Sam Infantry and a lot of city raider 3 + morale + leadership Modern Armors. I hardly lost any troops due to aerial and ground collateral damage. Also standing next to a city for a few turns and letting the Rebels fly in all their extra units before taking the city was a good idea.

I got a Conquest victory... just holding onto 4 nukes would have been a lot easier.

I'm making a mod for Broken Star.

Mostly just Graphical Changes. But I'll also put in a trait called Rebel Leader(Given to the titular leader) that makes research much slower for them.

IDK what happened, but the first and only time I played this, the Rebels had all level 4 units at the beginning of the game and destroyed everyone.

I've probably found out why the enemy keeps on having units, by changeing the "playable" thing for rebels from 0 to 1, in the map. on turn 16, 9 random units (SAM, mech inf,, inf) spawned on every city. plus, every few turns, one unit spawns on every city as well.
As the "rebels", by turn 25, i've killed every MP and those "UN" forces, and finished each techs by 3~6 turns.