Messages

1

AI War / Re: [Minor Suggestion] Anti-Clutter Lobby Settings

« on: March 15, 2012, 02:52:27 PM »

Sorry, gotta go with "it's just you". But I can see how it would be annoying to have them around if you're never gonna use them. Maybe you can pretend they're an AI defense mechanism - "player annoyance doohickies" - designed to irritate you until you quit (or give up AIP to get rid of them!)

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AI War / Re: making AI better

« on: March 12, 2012, 11:33:49 AM »

I was under the impression that the AI would sometimes retreat when local firepower spiked, and that the degree to which it would do this depended on the difficulty level. I haven't seen a significant amount of that, but I am only in the 7s yet, for difficulty.

While we are on the general subject, I would like to have to deal with AI scouting. I don't like that the AI is omniscient. The AI should make good decisions based on the info it has, giving it the advantage in a fight. But, the only way to make this balanced would be to have the player be able to disrupt that info.

However, there are a number of problems with this from a both a raw design perspective and from considering the existing game. AI scouts would be problematic both because of the way cloaked units work, and because it might perhaps give the player too much power. Maybe there could be structures that analyze the situation in surrounding systems (acting as cross-system scouts) to get around the cloaking problem. And maybe these units generate AIP when destroyed...

3

AI War / Re: Poll: Worst Unit Of The (time interval) Award (IV)

« on: March 12, 2012, 08:31:18 AM »

With the Zenith, Spire and Neinzul ships, why not add another tab to the starship constructer, marked ALIEN, or ALN or something. Although a more powerful starship, or two would have to be added to make up for the loss of the two above the Flagship, that way, the Zenith could go back to the mobile fortress slinging missiles, the sniperish Spire, and the building Neinzul.

And maybe drop a Neinzul ship, Mk 1 builds Mk 1/2 ships, Mk 2 builds 1/2/3, and the new top, Mk 3, builds 1/2/3/4.

Just thinking out loud, but...

I like the idea of adding more starship tabs for any reason. The tabs are easy for noobs to miss and I feel more would make this (a little bit) less likely. I missed riot starships for a long time. Even since I've seen how awesome they are, I still forget about them sometimes. But maybe we are getting into expansion territory with additional tabs and splitting of lines and such.

4

After Action Reports / Re: 7/7 Variety Games

« on: March 11, 2012, 08:01:29 PM »

Hiya! Nothing better than seeing more threads in the AAR forum!

What was your starting ship, and any idea on the other AI type?

On a side note, those planet names... lol. Darkdo AND Darkto? Barkboom, Killerasub, Toothpelanc?! I personally am hoping for an epic battle at "Caved'em".

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After Action Reports / Re: first time with Fallen Spire...

« on: March 11, 2012, 06:48:50 PM »

It was a 7/7, I don't recall ever seeing any golems come through. I think the 8/8 probably makes all the difference. I DEFINITELY built massive defenses. Lemme dig out a save... Here, the selected turrets are the ones in range of the exo wormhole. There are more turrets near another wormhole, lines of gravity turrets and EMP mines, since this planet used to be a whipping boy before I had to clear room for spire cities. (Yeah my home planet was a whipping boy, it has an exo wormhole on it anyway!  ) I used that lone force field to push the ships just a liiiiiitle bit further away from the command station / spire settlement.

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AI War Strategy Discussion / Re: Various things

« on: March 11, 2012, 06:23:55 PM »

Im wondering why noone suggest that yet ?

I just got used to doing it "backwards" by reversing "them > me", "me > them", and win/loss in my head.

There are two problems here. One is that the sheet is supposed to be usable in both "directions", and the header names make this weird.

The other, larger problem is that the default "direction" the sheet seems designed to display is, I think, not the one that people want to use the reference sheet for. This is not only because of the use of "me" to mean "thing in the 'display comparisons for ship' box" but is apparent from, for example, the "results" column. Players are far more likely to want information on an ENEMY ship, and thus enter it as the "target" for comparison. The question "how would this ship that I control fare against a variety of targets?" is not something that players generally want to ask; "300 of these are coming, how do I kill them fast?" is.

7

AI War Strategy Discussion / Re: Stealth units

« on: March 11, 2012, 05:48:01 PM »

Create "pit stops" at hostile planets with a group of cloaked engineers. Less useful when you get engie 3s, but it will still keep them alive.

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AI War / Re: Nominations for Worst Ship Ever (IV)

« on: March 11, 2012, 05:28:39 PM »

Do you play on normal? There is a 2x multiplyer on normal to all the base stats.

So... normal is NOT normal, then... huh. Now I feel like I should play on high, but my CPU is trash.

I don't use the Neinzul starships because it's not really my playstyle, but it sounds like they need help. I don't use exoshields because they're bad.

Out of things that I use, I used to build mines and mobile repair stations. I've stopped; mines feel like they don't do anything(absolutely no evidence or numbers to back that up), and MRS cost WAY too much K.

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After Action Reports / Re: first time with Fallen Spire...

« on: March 07, 2012, 12:23:29 PM »

Nice! I did my first not too long ago against a backdoor hacker and something in the moderates. Exos coming in almost in firing range to my home command station was baaaad until I upgraded some turrets and filled out the caps. LOTS of force fields too.

Raid engine... I can't imagine playing against one of those. Some day I'll have to. And for shard retrieval you'd have to clear them all out along the path...

10

After Action Reports / Re: During Action Report

« on: March 03, 2012, 03:59:28 PM »

Oh dear, I should be concerned about such things? I guess I should be, if i want to keep increasing the difficulty.

13:04, 477. My time is coming down a lot, actually. Learning curve progression ftw!

11

AI War / Re: CoN and LotS AI types not in disabledaitypes?

« on: March 03, 2012, 02:12:28 PM »

Thanks! Yeah, I know they're just comments, but the codes are inconsistent - seems you switched from using_underscores to NoSpaceCodes in the first expansion and never looked back. It would have taken me like 45 seconds to check both kinds myself! It probably has never come up because few people are as lazy as me. 

Here is an updated disabledaitypes.txt including these codes, in case anybody searches for this later.

12

After Action Reports / Re: During Action Report

« on: March 03, 2012, 02:04:37 PM »

And the scouts union sharpens the axe a little more...

Cursed Leashed AI rights activists.... We're at war! Now is not the time to consider anything except what I say!

That's probably it, yea.

LOL.

Well, I walked easily into victory. Took the Fact IV on Jung, Neutered Dante, Killed Nevare, Finished the job. Never even thought about repairing a golem.

This was an especially placid game. Having half as many waves actually gives you MORE than twice as much free time - since the interplay between the timing of the AIs' waves is gone, there are just huge periods of time between waves. It also reduces the chance of a deadly convergence of events, like CPA + 2 waves + ill-timed-counter guard post-wave + exo. However, this is the first game that I gate raided consistently and with strategy, and created a full and proper whipping boy... so that could be clouding my perception of the difficulty. I was also very lucky in the placement of planets and assets (except for the AIP reducers which were mostly off in deep space.... but I didn't have to take any planets to deal with them.)

I would definitely suggest support corps to new players, as it creates a more relaxed pace without even the bother of grinding through heavily-defended turtle worlds. The core mechanic has its own flaws and advantages which can be balanced around, but there are other problems. Too many non-useful support units (I can't see why decloakers in a wave would ever be a problem... tachyon microfighters would be better, but still not really a scary support unit); tendency of support units to get separated from the main wave in a carrier when waves are large; and... do the support units get sped up/down to stick with the wave? Do they act as one coherent unit? I have no idea but it's possible they don't, and that would further dilute their effectiveness.

Thanks for reading. Til next time!

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AI War / CoN and LotS AI types not in disabledaitypes?

« on: March 03, 2012, 01:38:09 PM »

I am wondering if this is somehow just a problem for me, since it probably should have been discovered otherwise.

14

AI War / Re: New AI Modifier Idea

« on: March 02, 2012, 09:30:58 AM »

One version? I never thought of it that way for some reason, but I do believe I will take up that idea. I find the FS storyline to have some problems, especially if you take http://arcengames.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=AI_War_-_Overall_Mission as canon (particularly paragraph 4). Alas, I can see that there is not much else you could do thematically while preserving the AI as the primary enemy.

Also yes, exo waves are cool! 

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AI War Strategy Discussion / Re: What do you do with surplus resources?

« on: February 29, 2012, 04:53:15 PM »

So story-wise, does that mean mercs have pilots? Is that why they're so expensive? And why are they so strong?