OSG 13 - Today is a Good Day to Die

[OlorinStormcrow]

Pre-turn: Lots of factory construction going on, good size fleet at Kholdan to make mischief. We still have those warp 1 las's around, I end up scrapping them when a few replacements are built to hold claims.

2460: Launch all bombers and about 20 each of Las 3 and X3 to Phyco, it is starting to build bases, but has little fleet defense.

2461: Range 7 comes in I choose Fusion drives over nuclear and pulsar.

2462: Phyco bases destroyed with no losses, Mek ships retreat. 47 Cat troops arrive vs. 65 Meks...4 Meks survive.

2463: 27 more Cats storm Phyco. 5 Meks kill 7 Cats. We find neutron blaster and ion cannon. Because Rocks will soon declare war to help Mek allies, I take initiative and send bombers to Keeta, Argus, Artemis, Anraq and Simius. I send some groups off now to coordinate my assault. All these planets have no bases, and either no fleet or only a few Barracudas.

2464: RW60% comes in ARS or IIT6* (to advance tree).

2465: Rocks send large fleet to Esper (other UR by Fieras). Includes 4 colony ships, so I won't waste ships trying to stop them. We can always bomb it later.

2466: Simius destroyed. Argus, Keeta, Anraq bombed. I found out that the Barracudas have 3 AM bombs, Spd 2, no shield. Worthless as defenders, but build lots of bases if they come our way! I accept peace from the Humans.

2467: Artemis destroyed. Argus, Keeta, and Anraq whittled down. I underestimate how many bombers were needed. I'm sending all spare bombers out to help. Rocks send fleet at Phyco (5 Huge, 14 Large). Phyco changes to tech as it's a lost cause. Meklar fleet is heading to Kholdan, which just finished shield. They are slow, so several bases will be up, and most of the Phyco fleet is transferred to help (if we can destroy Mek fleet here, Meklon will be easy pickings).

2468: Anraq destroyed. I pull bombers off Argus because Psilons are coming to take over attack (Argus is Tundra).

2469: Keeta destroyed. Scout Neptunis (Rock staging planet). It has 40 pop and only 7 bases. Many of our worlds max factories. Rhilus has one Rock Huge inbound. It's at max factories, so it puts everything into bases (including reserves). I begin evacuating Phyco (dumb planet finished soil enrichment with eco spillover).

2470: Mek fleet somehow magically turned around from Kholdan w/o a fight. Could it be cause I threatened them earlier? Rock fleet leaves Esper to go refound Simius. I send some bombers to take care of Esper.

Post-turn:
Managed to capture Phyco, stand up Kholdan, and glass 4 Silicoid worlds. Phyco will likely be destroyed next turn, but we did get two weapon tech from it. Also 3/4 of pop is on it's way to Kholdan. This will allow Kholdan to send troops at Meklon and have some replaced quickly. The Meklar fleet is headed back to Meklon, but they take 4T, and ours only needs 2

I don't know if we have enough firepower to take out the Meklar Huge, but we might be able to seize Meklon before it gets back. We'd loot some tech, and force the Meklars to decide between destroying Meklon or trying to invade from their colony 10 parsecs away. We might even be able to knock out the Huge with our X3's. Kholdan can also build two rounds of ships, and still get them to Meklon before their fleet arrives.

Rock targets:
Neptunis is a tempting target with only 7 bases; if you can catch it without a fleet. This would disrupt the Silicoid staging of their fleets.

Paladia is probably a better target. It's that Rich Tundra they got from us during expansion, which is defended only by 9 bases, and 100+ Barracudas. But the ships are only bombers, so with a big enough fleet, we can smash the bases, and maybe even take it on the ground. It would be a treasure trove of tech if we pulled it off.

Another thought is that if we can take out both Neptunis and Paladia, as well as whatever weed colonies they found in our core, we might be able to trap one of their fleets outside of fuel range. They still have only R6, pushing them back might get those UR planets safely out of range.

 

[Liquidated]

I am just leaving for dinner out etc and will most likely not be in any sort shape to play turns tonight...

Nope! no car keys tonight baby!


got the save and all, looks lots more exciting than my last turn set!

Cheers!
-Liq

 

[IamI3rian]

I just grabbed the save to check out all the chaos that Olorin managed to cause to the Silly war machine. The first thing I noticed was that we've made a LOT of progress since my last set.

The second thing I noticed was that incoming Silly huge on it's way to Rhilus. Unless they refitted the Kracken, it was the first huge they had when I took my first turn set. 13 X3's and 13 bases _should_ make short work of it. Of course, that's only if they didn't refit it since I saw it.

I would be QUITE a bit more worried about what the SoD headed to Simius is gonna do after they refound the colony. Being THAT close to Fierias, which only has 4 bases up, is a pretty scary thought. They also have about 300 baracudas North of Rhilus. Here's to hoping those are amazingly outdated Krackens, and not shiny new BC 6, inertial stabalized, Class 5 shielded and Andrium hulled stinger missile platforms.

Edit: Incidentally, I went back to my notes (yeah I'm a dork) and I found that in 2426 (40 or so turns ago) there was in fact, a different hull design of a 'Coid huge ship. The SECOND huge hull, was NOT the Kracken 'pic' or the Kracken tech, it was more advanced (based on time of 'first sight'). I didn't take _extensive_ notes though, (but I happen to play almost exclusively with that shipset) and I've been known to confuse ships which LOOK like the one they use as a MAKO (not in this case as notes include Mako sightings) for a huge. It could've been just a large they built, that was quickly scrapped, but I'm PRETTY sure (say my notes) that it was another huge design.

The same name, and hull is a bit 'throw-offish' but I'm still not convinced that it's refitted (i.e. scrapped and rebuilt) or a more advanced version, as I specifically remember, and confirm in my notes (yeah I'm STILL a dork) that it was the same ship. (the 'panther' according to the 'pic' with the software piracy check answers) Uh.... /end Edit.

We can build a medium hull with inertial stabalizers, and a Heavy Blast cannon for 90 BC's each... is that worth it? A more modern attack than our Las 3 is needed, and I'm not sure the NPG fighter is gonna be able to go it alone... thoughts?

Class 3 shields, inertial stabalizers, 2 ion cannons, and a Nuke bomb (for moving after attacking) will cost only 97 BC's on the same hull... more mobile, more durable, and about the same damage over all... Or is the NPG fighter still the best choice?

With the sillys having class 5 shields open, that's -2 from our overall damage with the NPG, on a modern ship. The pellet gun is 2-5 so it's 0-3 per hit. We're the cats , so it's not gonna be 0 as often as 3, but that's only 7 (or so) NPG fighters, compared to 1 medium hulled fighter. 10-70. I think the NPG fighter is definitely a 'must-have,' but wouldn't something with a little more punch be in order too? Maybe those BC"s would be better spent on building mroe X3's... Such hard choices to make I suppose.

I certainly don't envy Liq, and his 'exciting' turn set.

 

[OlorinStormcrow]

I considered putting together a more advanced ship, but held off as tech was coming in from both research and ground assault. What I'd really like is to steal the Repulsor beam from the Meks, and trade the Psilons for ARS, and put some Huge ARS ships into the field. We could outfit them with Heavy blast cannons, and if the Rocks are still favoring the short range beams, too bad for them.

A medium or large design with nothing beyond a repulsor beam would also be a good move. It could ward off those hordes of AM bombers the Silicoids have, and allow our missile bases to chew them up. A Huge would be preferable though, since the Sillys are bound to escort their bombers with some hefty firepower.

I still think we need to make an attempt at Paladia and Neptunis. We really need to create a buffer zone so that our "front line" doesn't consist of 90% of our empire. Kakata will probably fall, but Xengara and Rhilus may be able to build enough bases to hold their own. Especially if we can take Paladia on the ground and steal a better missile tech.

Tech trading with the Psilons is also an option. They were willing to trade when I checked, but they wanted Soil, RC3 or 4, or RW60% and I wasn't sure if I wanted to hand them that much economy. Then again, strengthening the Psilons at this point might not be a bad thing, and if we manage to get Repulsors from the Meks, ARS would be a very nice tech. The Psilons also have Armored Exoskeletons and BC3 as trading options. The least damaging option to give them would probably be RW60%, as they only have 2 factories/pop, so their production would rise much less than for any of the other techs.

 

[StuporMan]

Things sure seem to be getting interesting now. Good job all.

I am currently out of town attending a funeral for my wife's grandmother. I will not be back until Friday, so if my turnset comes up before then, feel free to skip me.

StuporMan

 

[dathon78]

Well, we've stirred the hornet's nest now

Good luck to ya Liq! When you get sober that is

dathon

 

[Liquidated]

man my loss, sorry isp just crashed the weekend and got to re register the modem again, meh just skip liq don;t enough stalling to get fired as emp!

Cheers!
-Liq

 

[dathon78]

@Stup -- Somehow I missed your post earlier. My condolences on your loss.

IamI3rian is up. Lead us to victory!

dathon

 

[Zed-F]

I agree with the sentiment of trying to acquire repulsors, ARS, and/or better tech in general before fielding a beam-oriented ship. I've never been that fond of medium hulls as a beam platform; they are not built to take a sustained pounding like large/huge ships are, and are also not built to be super-dodgy and waste most enemy damage on overkill like fighters are. To me that means that mediums are best used as missle platforms or for certain specials.

 

[IamI3rian]

I just got in from work, and I'm gonna take a nap. I've re read the last few posts (Sorry to hear the bad news Stup) and I think it's probably better to wait. ARS + Repulsors is gonna be a great combo. Definitely more effective than the medium ion ships. We'll see what I can do to help out our tech levels. In the meantime, I'm gonna hit the sack. I should be up around 12 latest (eastern time) to play out my set.

EDIT: Sorry guys, real life interfered (sp) yet again last night. It's 6:15 pm eastern time wednesday, and I'm starting to take my set now.

 

[IamI3rian]

It's a good thing I keep notes. During combat in my second turn, comp crashed. Almost everything happened the exact same. A silly huge Kracken didn't attack Kakata the second time. All in all, a decent recovery I'd say. Sorry in advance for long report. I tried to shorten it as best I could.

Preturn: I didn't really understand how we were supposed to beat the Meklar fleet to Meklon. I didn't understand (well I kinda did) evacuating Phyco. Sent them to a full Kholdan. Anyway, I send the ships parked at Phyco to Kholdan, in preperation of invading Meklon. Send fleet from Kholdan to Meklon to try to scout the planet, before the bad guys arrive.

2471: Silly's attack (now defenseless) Phyco, destroying it. 18 intruders coming at Exis... so I up the bases construction there. Kracken headed to Kakata (the first time, it didn't go after the recovery.) I send Hyp X's there (both times) and increase defensive spending on Xengara. (Meks catch 2 spies)

2472: Combat at Rhilus.... ERROR (blue screen of death crash mentioned in opening statements) MUST START OVER FROM 2470. (Same things occur except the Kracken heading to Kakata in 2471.) 2 shots from our 19 bases at Rhilus total the Silly Kracken. Meklon scouted, and bases destroyed. (75 pop there, of max 100) Lost some Fusion bombers, but that's all. Esper (silly colony) destroyed (again) Head to Simius with bombers, trying to trap the silly SoD. Send 62 Million Cats from Kholdan to Meklon.

2473: Send help to Kakata from Xengara. 8 Silly Whales incoming. Kakata will have 7 bases and 15 Hyp X's when they arrive. 118 baracudas still guard Paladia. (they don't leave til my last turn) Start making NPG fighters.

2474: Combat at Meklon. We win, but lose more bombers (due to hugely outdated Las 3's interestingly enough). Silly Spies destroy 4 Kholdan missile bases. 62 Cats v 69 Bots on Meklon. 2 Cats Survive! 347 factories captured at Meklon! New tech Found:
Hyper V's
ECM Jammer Mark II
Class IV Deflectors (not bad)
Repulsor Beam!!!
ARS!!!
Duralloy Armor!!!
Contact lost with Meks. Send 30 Kholdan colonists to Meklon. Rhilus builds NPG fighters to help in the north. Neptunis is undefended, so I make a play for it. 1 Kracken, 3 Whales, 9 Baracudas headed to Kakata. Fusion Beam at 1% I design two huge ARS Repulsor Ships. Please redesign them if needed, I'm not particularly adept at designing ships like this with repulsors. Fierias begins building ARS 3.0 (huge ship name)

2475: VOTE 26 total votes, Sillys have 11 only Psilons vote for us (3 votes). We have 9 votes (abstain). Sillys end up with 14. I start to get a bad feeling about Kakata. Set Rha from researching to ship buliding (Hyp X's)

2476: No losses at Kakata. Neptunis has a total of 10 shields on it's bases. 5+5 I believe. Attack fails, but one base is destroyed. Lost all bombers. I cancel all spying this year too, to help boost research.

2477: Kakata attacked again, successful defense. KLACKS ARE ELIMINATED! By the Meks. We've got contact with them again. New 'coid Huge ship at Neptunis. They are amassing a big SoD there.

2478: Anraq destroyed (again) Huge SoD headed to Kakata. Meklon begins building it's shield. More colonists sent from Kholdan.

2479: Unknown spies strike Exis 17 facts destroyed. New Rock large (called Polaris) at Paladia.

2480: Simius destroyed (again) Meks ask for peace. I agree. Nothing else is done this turn. Next emperor has some things to take care of.

Meklon spending will finish the shield. Kholdan is set to industry, after regrowing their pop. Kakata is going to be attacked next year by the 'coid SoD. I'm not sure it will hold. Sent bombers to Esper, I think the Rocks will finally be out of our back yard.

PALADIA is undefended this turn. I strongly suggest that it's attacked. There is a Psilon Colship headed to Phyco. A small fleet from Meklon should keep them from it.

Not shown in the fleet screenshots (my bad) is the 'coid colship. It's armed with 1 5 shot stinger rack, and 2 2 shot racks. We could REALLY use a better missile.

 

[Zed-F]

Sounds like a pretty productive turn, IamI3rian! Sounds like we have momentum on our side now... hopefully fusion engines and fusion beams will come in soon. If we have a whole round of tech due soon it will be a good time for a redesign.

dathon --> UP NOW
Stup --> On Deck
Zed
Olorin
Liq
IamI3rian --> just played

 

[OlorinStormcrow]

Nice round. Really good news on the techs gained from Meklon!

I looked at your ARS designs. They were good. I'd change a few things though. We only have BC1, so I'd trade the IS for a scanner. I'd also knock the maneuver down to 2, since 3 doesn't add to combat speed. Combat speed 2 is fine for a Repulsor ship.

Which beams to use is a trickier question. With the changes I made above, I could choose between 32 heavy ions (3-15) or 18 heavy blasters (3-24). We are mostly worried about the Silicoids, who have Shield 5 and Comp 6. So we're looking at -2-10 vs. -2-19 against their most advanced designs. Since our comp level is at 2 (with scanner) + 4 for being Mrrshan only gets us even with the Silicoids on comps, so we're not going to be hitting max damage too much. An average hit would be 4 vs. 8.5 after shields. This would argue for mounting the heavy blasters, because they take up slightly less than twice the space of heavy ions. With better computers, the heavy ions might be a better buy, since we'd be hitting in the upper end of the damage range, and while this would be almost even between ions and blasters at Shield 5, against ships with less shielding, the ions come out ahead.

Where can we get better comps? Well the Psilons have BC3 that would be up for trade, and the Meklars have BC4. We'd probably have to be willing to part with Soil Enrichment, RC, RW60% or something comparable. I'd consider giving either Soil or RW60% to the Meks (Soil so that they can improve the planets for us before we take them, RW b/c they already have RW80%). It's a tougher call with the Psilons, they have a lot more planets, and we don't want to conquer them soon, so boosting their economy is more dangerous. Plus they would only trade us BC3, which is not as nice as BC4 from the Meks. Then again, the Psilons have some nice construction tech that would help us fit more goodies onto our new ship.

I think that we could get by with a BC1 ARS ship (only because we're the Cats), but I'd feel alot better trading for a better comp before building any of them. It would have been great if we could have gotten a better computer from Meklon, but ARS + Repulsor + FF4 + Duralloy was already hitting the jackpot for ship construction.

Once we get one of these ARS ships covering our front-line worlds, we will not need to worry nearly so much about getting glassed by a large stack of Barracudas.

We should try to take down Paladia if possible, but at this point, I would recommend glassing it rather than a ground assault. This Silly's have PDS, Andrium armor, and Fusion rifles. Getting enough troops to Paladia would be very difficult until we close the ground combat gap. I'd advise looking to restart the war with the Meklars once the Silicoid front is stabilized. We know we can take them on the ground, and they still have quite a few nice computer techs to take. We'd also finally have more planets than the Silicoids. Plus, the Meklars can probably be handled using only Kholdan, Meklon and Exis to build a fleet and produce troops.

 

[dathon78]

Got it. Report to follow soon.

 

[dathon78]

Pre Game

I agree with the current discussions that ships should wait a bit. I scrap the 3.1, but keep the ARS 3.0 to preserve Fieras's investment. My intention is to steal a computer from the Meklar's from Cygni, so I send our attack fleet at Meklon to do just that. I think we have enough ships for defense now, so all planets go on research, save border worlds who go on bases. Xengara in particular needs about twice as many bases if the rocks come calling.

Preparation For the Storm...

Kakata had BARELY enough bases to survive the Silicoid assault. That huge Monitor class ship was NASTY (see pic). Cost me all the NPG's, half the Hyper X boats, and 6 out of 9 bases to take it out, but the planet held.

Cygni turned out to be a size 40 minimal, with only 13 pop and 22 factories. Deeming it not worth the trouble, I steer the fleet back to Meklon for defense. Went ahead and traded Soil to the Meklar's for BCIV.

Humans declared war on us about two turns in, and the Psilons went and backstabbed us on my final turn No idea what happened there, they had no alliances (at war with EVERYBODY now), we were trading, at Peaceful, and they are Honorable. Maybe we were framed for espionage?

On the tech front, I managed to pop all but propulsion, which should go next turn or so:
Fusion Beam --> Omega V over Megabolt and Ion Stream
IIT6 --> Armored Exo, only choice
Class V --> Class VI, only choice
Scanners --> RC V over BC V and ECM VI. We have a good enough computer, and BC V doesn't advance us.
Atmos Terra --> IT +50
All our hostile planets set to terraform.

Post Turn

Once those Fusion Drives pop, a decent Huge ARS can probably be made. Now, as for armament, I did a little analysis. Most Silly designs are running around with defense 2-3, and with BCIV + Scanner, we are at AR +9, meaning we are running +6 to +7. IIRC, +6 should give us about 10% on our weapons. At our CURRENT tech level (this will probably change when Fusion Drives hit, but not by too much), we can field 14 Heavy Fusions, 18 Heavy Blast, or 31 Heavy Ions. +10% weapons range is ~+2 to min damage. So for a def3 ship, here's the average damage for a variety of shield levels:

Weapon.....................Shield 0..........Shield 3..........Shield 5
Fusion 14/6-30..............252...............210...............182
Blast 18/5-24................261...............207...............171
Ion 31/5-15..................310..............217................155

Heavy Blast Cannons should not even be considered. The Ion's win for shieldless ships (Barracuda's) and for Shield 3 ships (all current Silicoid designs, and probably Psilon as well). However, their edge isn't that large once you get to shield lvl3, and drops off quite a bit if anybody upgrades to Class V. My recommendation would therefore be the Heavy Fusions.

On the tactical side, there are Silly fleets inbound to Kholdan and Kakata, but nothing that the bases can't handle. I've re-directed the pop guns at Meklon to Kholdan to maybe bait the Whales to stay and get blown up by our bases. There are now 134 of those Barracuda-class bombers at Neptunus. If they go for Kakata, it's toast, otherwise, I think our other worlds can handle them, but I would keep an eye on them.

Spying is at 2% on the Humans to try and nab BCII or IIT9. All tech levels can help, but your choice if you want to continue there. We could probably also steal comp tech from the Meklar, and low-level tech from the rocks with our current computer levels.

ROSTER:
dathon --> just played
Stup --> UP NOW
Zed --> On Deck
Olorin
Liq
IamI3rian

Stup said he would be back this Friday, I'm inclined to wait for him, but your call Zed if we don't hear from him by Saturday. I might be out of town again, so you make the call.

dathon

 

[Zed-F]

There's nothing that says we can't put a mix of beams on the ships too, though I'd predominantly go with Fusion Beams. I would probably put on a mix of Heavy Fusions and Fusions, actually -- note that if an enemy ship moves into the repulsor beam range, we have enough initiative to get off a shot with whatever weapons we haven't yet fired that turn, which would include any one-space weapons we mount, before we push them back out of range. Something like 8-10 heavy fusion and 12-18 fusion will probably do more total damage than just 14 heavy fusions would. Or we can go with a mix of heavy fusions and regular ion cannons if we're worried about a lot of shieldless ships.

 

[StuporMan]

I am back in town now.

Thank you for the condolences, my wife and I appreciate your support.

I have lots to do but I should be able to get caught up on this thread and get a turnset in tomorrow one way or another.

StuporMan

 

[IamI3rian]

Nice turns dathon. I'm impressed that you managed to hold Kakata (at least for the time being.) I was convinced that it was gonna go during your set, and likely during the SoD attack with the monitor. Good choice on the bombs, we need to crack those 'coid shield 10 bases. As for the Psilons, I thought you always get the 'you were framed' message when that happens... did they mention WHY they were so pissy?

As for ship design, I'm glad I wasn't TOTALLY oblivious. Had the right idea for the most part. Didn't realize we could fire before repulsing a ship. Good stuff to know (thanks Zed). Is that a function of initiative, like because we're the cats, or is it a total initiative thing, including all bonuses? I've never fired before repulsing before (favoring Meks and Bears myself). Either way, I wasn't really expecting my ship to be built, it was mostly a placeholder. Seeing the numbers, I'm inclined to agree with the fusion beams. At the price of those ARS hulls, we don't want them going 'obsolete' any time soon. Once we pop one of these newfangled fusion ships, the silly's should just go ahead and vote for us. No way they can take Kakata, our weakest world near them with that thing in orbit.

Does getting the armored Exo's put us in any kind of gropo shape, for attacking the rocks? It would be GREAT to get some tech for taking Paladia, but I suppose if we still have to glass it, that's the next best thing.

I do wonder what the future holds. If the psilons and the 'coids make nice, we could still be in a galaxy of trouble.

 

[dathon78]

I'll admit, I shouldn't have been able to keep Kakata. I used a little bit of tactical screen cheese to outmaneuver the AI. Basically, if the AI can retreat a ship from a barrage of missiles, it will. So, if you have missiles that don't cover the length of the tactical screen (like our Hyper X's), you can keep incoming ships at the back of the screen while the bases knock them down. Here's how it works:

I positioned our boats right in front of the planet. That is not close enough to hit the furthest row. As the Monitor and Whale class ships advanced, I fired ONE volley at them. They retreated to the back rows to wait and avoid the missiles. I could do this a total of 5 times (3 times for the Monitor, twice for the Whales). All the while, Kakata's bases are hitting the Monitor. What they SHOULD have done, is charge through the missile volleys; the Whales have enough hit points to survive several volleys, and enough speed to catch my boats and destroy them with all those NPG's, and then the Monitor could advance and destroy the planet. The NPG's were sunk drawing Stinger missile fire and protecting the missile boats from the other large stack. Lost half the boats by drawing the Monitor in a zig-zag approach to the planet to buy another volley from the bases, and even then, they still got off a round (or two? don't remember) of bombs before it sunk, at which point the whales retreated. Never would work against a human, but worked here

Rock's still have Fusion Rifles and PDS, but the only way to even that advantage is to take it from them, so I vote to invade. Will require some coordination from backline worlds, but a planet or two should see us with the tech we need to decisively win.

If the Silly's come out with a 2-beam or lots o' missiles design, they can counter our ARS. Not likely, but I have seen it happen before.

We did not get a framed message, but I'm not convinced you get one every time. Sometimes when the AI catches you spying they call to complain, other times they don't (you can tell if their relations drops after a successful steal), and I suspect being framed works the same way. We got the "We knew all along you were a threat, so we will strike first" message. I suppose we also might have crossed one of the "you're getting too big" thresholds and the hit to relations was enough to set them off.

dathon

 

[IamI3rian]

I've used the missile 'trick' before, but not on purpose. The simple math of how far the missiles go, and how fast the AI ships move, in relation to the missiles is apparently above my head. I usually end up moving the missile ships too close to them to avoid return fire, and get higher casualties than I probably should. Never occured to me to use the AI's fear of missiles to smash them with the bases Brilliant idea, whoever thought that up, though I suspect it's been around for years.