January 27th, 2017, 11:57
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Great stuff guys! Perhaps this begs the question. What is a stringent enough *battle screen* limitation that would make for a challenging game? Perhaps the slower combat ships wasnt enough given the runaway expansion/eco that this game seemed to have.
I like the other challenges about not building colony ships etc. But what can you cook up for challenging battles?
January 27th, 2017, 18:42
(This post was last modified: January 27th, 2017, 18:43 by RefSteel.)
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(January 27th, 2017, 11:57)Reformations Wrote: Great stuff guys! Perhaps this begs the question. What is a stringent enough *battle screen* limitation that would make for a challenging game? Perhaps the slower combat ships wasnt enough given the runaway expansion/eco that this game seemed to have.
It could have been an absolutely devastating variant if anyone other than the Meklar got missiles better than Hyper-Vs early (or if anyone else but the Alkari got any missiles at all!) but it's true that - thanks to some really great work by our players, plus Artemis in our back-lines and Paranar once we finally got it up and running - we quickly developed a very powerful economy. A different galaxy could have punished our variant a lot more than this one did.
Quote:I like the other challenges about not building colony ships etc. But what can you cook up for challenging battles?
I don't know if we want to do another combat restriction for our next game - challenging battles happen naturally when neither side has overwhelming force (as in the one I misplayed in 2415) or when a well-played fight can make the difference between a crushing and a pyrrhic victory (like several I played very well in the last set of our previous OSG, and like one from an Alkari challenge a couple years back where the Meklar had an overwhelming fleet, but I made them pay for the planet they took and eventually turned the game around in part because of the losses they took in that battle).
Speaking of such things though: After we wrap this one up, does anyone have an idea they'd like to try for another OSG?
January 27th, 2017, 22:06
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I'd say that this one would have been much MUCH more challenging without Autorepair and Repulsor Beam. Huge ARS ships don't NEED maneuverability, especially against the low level missiles we had here. Stingers would have been a whole other story.
And what do you mean by "challenging" Reformations? There is a fine line between "exciting strategic challenge" and "crushingly frustrating" that I don't really want to push the boundary of. Maybe "only use missiles" or "no specials of any kind except colony pods" would be interesting. But personally I look at these succession games as opportunities to learn from other good players and maybe teach them a thing or two in return. While a challenge is fun it isn't the whole point as far as I'm concerned. Your mileage may vary however.
As for another game I don't have any significant ideas right now, but it would be good to not go 18 months between games like last time.
January 27th, 2017, 23:19
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I am pretty sure we have done this. But I would love to try a No Huge Ships, only Large Colony Ships, only Fighters and Medium ships with the Alkari.
Interested?
Did we do an always war? I think so, with the Humans.
I am more then happy to revisist a good challenge as a OSG, I enjoy those quite a lot.
January 28th, 2017, 14:16
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Cool; thanks, Thrawn! It was fun playing this one with you. Good luck with the other commitments!
And two questions for the rest of the team:
TheArchduike: I see the save - looks like 2438; is that the right one?
Ianus: If I don't manage to wipe the galaxy clean by 2450, shall I take the domination win or leave it to you to erase everybody? (Note: I haven't looked at the save in depth; I did say if.)
January 28th, 2017, 15:46
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I've always subscribed to the There Can Be Only One school of galactic domination, and by then we should be able to field many dozens of our Huge bombers, so I say glass the lot of them!
January 28th, 2017, 23:24
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Right one, I may have missed to make a turn, feel free to play it.
January 29th, 2017, 01:26
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In that case, GOT IT!
Basic plan for the set: Kill a lot of aliens, and make sure Ianus can kill the rest unless I meet my...
Stretch goal: Kill all the aliens! (I won't know how much of a stretch this is until I actually test the Meklar defenses....)
January 30th, 2017, 19:24
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Basic update on the real-life hassles I mentioned, since I brought them up here when they got rough:
On the game: I played the turns last night, but I'll be working until 9 again this evening, so the report will have to wait until tomorrow.
Apologies to Ianus: I didn't manage to build dozens more huge bombers; in fact, I only built two. On the other hand, like TheArchduke this round, I only played eight turns.
Notes for the next emperor: I like TheArchduke's basic Alkari variant; it would be a nice change from this game's slow-moving fleets! (Also, Always War is difficult to do in MoO since there's no option to declare war yourself, and as the Psilons showed in my previous report, AIs are sometimes too dim to actually declare war even when being attacked! What do you guys think?
Save: Yeah, I guess you've already figured out how my turns ended here. Full report hopefully tomorrow.
January 31st, 2017, 06:35
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Spitballing here...
"Noah's Arks: You must equip weapons (including bombs and missiles) in pairs of 2. If there is only space available for 1 weapon, then you cannot equip it."
The idea is a nerf to smalls (particularly bombers) by delaying their armanent rollout of recent (larger) tech. Two isn't that special. Could be 3, 4, or 5 as needed for difficulty. The larger the 'pair' the more reliance on larger ships.
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