RBSotS1 SG2

[Zed-F]

T146: Last turn of build-up before we launch the fleet to intercept the Locusts, as they will be 0.2 LY from Baymu this interturn. We want to be sure to meet them in deep space so we can start as close to them as possible; we will lose the resource bonus for defeating them, but doing so should be considerably easier. Our last builds for the interception fleet are assembling at Baymu now.

We will be sending everything we can muster -- about 25 refineries, 40 APMD cruisers, and 10 APMD CnC cruisers, plus some older mass driver destroyers for outnumbering bonus. If this interception fleet does not kill the Locusts, they will probably have repaired all their locusts by the time they reach Baymu, so any follow-up fleet we could send to defend Baymu proper would likely be toast. We will still try, of course, just in case the fleetworld is badly damaged from the deep space interception.

Fortunately, I misread the Miirio system as the Morrigi AM system, but that's Mitrou. Miirio is actually an iceball we have gated. We could try to assemble another fleet there, but again we'd only have a handful of turns to do it -- probably not enough. I certainly hope we can stop the Locusts here at Baymu or we will probably have to deal with them splitting (either at Baymu or at Miirio), which would double our workload as the Locusts will mainly be working their way through our territory, with only a few of their children heading to Tarka and Liir space.

Fleet maintenance is up over 0.5M credits per turn, which is about a quarter of our income. I expect that to drop fairly precipitously soon however.

Interturn:
Shononu is safe again for the moment, though we will need some reinforcements for our fleet here. Since Shononu seems to be a favourite target of the Tarka we should probably station a cruiser fleet here semi-permanently.

[haphazard1]

And the tension continues to build....

Looks like very good turns so far, Zed-F! Our neighbors continue trying to poach worlds from us, while we are stuck trying to deal with the Locusts. And as you noted, it is our worlds that will get eaten.

If we manage to destroy the Locusts, I think we will need to think seriously about destroying the local Tarka faction. They will not stop coming after us, so we will need to destroy their ability to cause us trouble.

Good luck with the big battle!

[Zed-F]

Turn 147: We launch 77 cruisers and 32 destroyers against the locusts. I think it ought to be enough... at least I hope so. Fingers crossed! I also send a gate a short distance out-system from Baymu in case it's not.

After many turns of no research, I turn research on once again. We have about filled our trade networks now as well. We are still missing Izakis's former income, but are nevertheless on the sunny side of $2M per turn, which is not too shabby. What to pick? We still are going to need a fair bit of income for replacing combat losses with the Tarka, even assuming our fleet can take care of the Locusts. I decide not to pick anything too expensive in case APMDs are not enough to deal with the locusts; we might need to go for something more damaging for next time, such as corrosive missiles. But corrosive missiles wouldn't be needed for anything other than locusts right now, so I don't quite want to start it yet. Jammers are cheap and useful so I opt to go with that.

Interturn will be the locust battle, in the next post!

[Zed-F]

The trick is getting a couple CnCs close to the fleetworld so reinforcement refineries show up right next to it...

[Zed-F]

Ok, I guess we didn't need quite that many Locust 6.01 cruisers!

Of course, now we have a navy we could use against the Tarka...

[haphazard1]

Outstanding work, Zed-F!

From the damaged and destroyed lists, it looks like you fed in a long series of suicide refineries? And once most of the swarm fighters were destroyed, hit the Locust fleet/world with our APMD cruisers?

That was a lot of IO and money going boom with those refineries. But a lot better than losing another planet.

How do jammers work? The other empires can still tell that something is present, right? (Assuming they have sensor range there in the first place.) Does it look like a lot of ships, few ships, or just an unknown number of ships?

I would think we want to pick up Asteroid Mining fairly quickly, now that the Locust threat is destroyed. (Are we sure this is the first Locust fleet/world? Can we backtrack its incoming direction to Izakis to see if it points at another world?) Resources will be boosted in all our systems. I guess even Izakis will get a little bit back, or maybe not? Anyway, it will certainly help everywhere else.

Do we have any other pressing tech needs, or would it be time to head for Fusion and the various techs that get unlocked there?

[Tyrmith]

Excellent job Zed-F! Losing only one planet is a pretty awesome job.

I really think it's funny our main strategy was to simply send in suicide ships filled with gas.

[Zed-F]

Outstanding work, Zed-F!

From the damaged and destroyed lists, it looks like you fed in a long series of suicide refineries? And once most of the swarm fighters were destroyed, hit the Locust fleet/world with our APMD cruisers?

Yep, that's the ticket with the low-tech approach. You want to try to get your refineries close to the fleetworld since that's where it keeps its spare fighters; it can field a lot at once, but not all of them. So if you can asplode a refinery on top of it, you usually get a whole bunch at once.

That was a lot of IO and money going boom with those refineries. But a lot better than losing another planet.

Or than, say, losing the resources off all our planets.

We could perhaps have survived the locusts stripping the galaxy, but it wouldn't have been pretty. And the races on the far side of the barbell would have had time to tech up to the AM era before the locusts arrived. It's possible some of them would have been able to withstand the locusts, especially our rival hivers. That would have made it even more of a challenge to come back and win the game -- and all the sweeter as a result if we pulled it off. But I'm certainly not going to complain about beating the Locusts off here!

How do jammers work? The other empires can still tell that something is present, right? (Assuming they have sensor range there in the first place.) Does it look like a lot of ships, few ships, or just an unknown number of ships?

Yup, if they have scan range, they will see that an unknown number of ships is present. The AI tends to assume that unknown = 'enough to be a threat.' Jammers also reduce scan range to detect a jammed fleet by some amount, though that matters a bit less for us since our fleets are so slow anyway. It still can help our gate fleets out to the far side of the barbell though, with respect to interception chances.

I would think we want to pick up Asteroid Mining fairly quickly, now that the Locust threat is destroyed. (Are we sure this is the first Locust fleet/world? Can we backtrack its incoming direction to Izakis to see if it points at another world?) Resources will be boosted in all our systems. I guess even Izakis will get a little bit back, or maybe not? Anyway, it will certainly help everywhere else.

Yep, Mining will help globally, even Izakis. And we can dump enough ore on Izakis for it to get its trade routes going. We can be sure that there was only ever one Locust because it was in scan range from the moment it arrived in the galaxy and we tracked it every turn.

Do we have any other pressing tech needs, or would it be time to head for Fusion and the various techs that get unlocked there?

We do want to make sure we can make friends with Warriors of Mind in the far side of the galaxy, and perhaps pick up UV lasers if we are still interested in that. Otherwise, Fusion sounds increasingly like a good idea; we know the Tarka have had it for a while now, but we have been too busy to try for it ourselves.

[Zed-F]

T148-T150: Celebrations ensue! We clean up the fleet attacking Chozanti. And we detect a trade raider group, which we should squish, in trade sector 17 near Ko'Rorkor. We also meet the Hivers from the other side of the barbell and immediately get a NAP with them. Yay for knowing our rivals' language!

We have a whole load of cruisers now waiting to be used. And, we'd better use them for something, as they are eating a big hole in our wallets. We don't really have the gate capacity to shift a huge fleet like this around though; I have to break it into quarters to get chunks that will fit through our gate network. We'll also need to add a bunch of support ships since the locust fleet was entirely combat ships (counting Boom ships as combat for the purpose of the locusts...)

Problem is, we have zero missile defense, and the Tarka have lots of fusion missiles to toss our way. Not a huge problem if we are defending, but a big problem if we are going to attack anyone. However, we are still waiting on special projects to help out on that score. So... I'm thinking a quick pit stop to Deflectors before Mining would be useful.

After Deflectors, I'm thinking Mining and Translate Steelsong, then on to Fusion. We could grab UV lasers if we intend to build a lot more destroyers for defense... but with all these cruisers begging to be used up I don't see us building many more cruisers soon, so HCL can probably wait a bit.

Building a couple DD defense groups around here and there in case of Tarka/Morrigi sneak attacks. Otherwise, trying to reposition our Locust fleet toward Shononu for a potential strike against the Tarka. Besides deflectors, consider the use of jammers as decoy attack fleets as well; this is a classic Hiver strategy. Usually you try to time your decoy attack fleets to arrive simultaneously with the real attack, though this is most important when attacking an enemy Hiver and isn't quite as crucial when attacking a non-Hiver enemy. Make sure you include a jammer in any fleet we launch an attack with as well.

Another good idea would be to build a jammer for each of our colonies, to add to the garrison. This will provide increased scan range and cover where our fleets are.

I believe this puts Haphazard up next. You have a big navy to marshal. Good luck!

[haphazard1]

As previously noted, I will not be able to play until Monday evening at the earliest and maybe not until Tuesday. So if Tyrmith (or anyone) has time to grab the save before then please feel free.

Would it be worthwhile to use our current cruiser fleet to attack the local Morrigi or Liir? We need to avoid harming relations with distant empires if they are allied with their local counterparts. But if they have less advanced missile tech we might be able to make a successful assault. Or we can just wait for deflectors or special projects to mature.

I assume that we want to try to start spreading gates through the other Hiver empire's systems now that we have the NAP? Assuming we can get them there past our local Morrigi.