Stellaris - 2300-2310 victory!
The first 100 years, once we encountered each other, had a lot of back-and-forth war between me and the neighbouring militaristic fungusoid empire. The first war, I didn't know what I was doing and barely got out without worse losses. The second war, they declared on me and stomped over my home planets, but I managed to gain several key systems at the back of their empire, and issue diplomatic claims on their homeworld.
This time I wanted to do it right. I copied the save file so I could experiment before committing myself (may only work with non-cloud saves, not sure). I chose ironman with no saves because I didn't want the temptation to ALWAYS replay until I got a perfect result, and I think that helped because I do have that weakness. But with the war I felt like it wasn't so much that I wanted to save-scum the situation, as that I didn't really understand the mechanics of war.
Which, ok, is realistic, but I didn't want to lose several wars to just learn the mechanics, so I had a few goes at it.
First I made sure I COULD declare war, but apparently my federation allies agreed with my opinion of the fungusoids even though they weren't on their border. I almost chose "claims" war goal to try to claim the planets I'd already laid claims on, but that still leaves the funguses with their most-recently-colonised-planet, so I chose liberation, where if I get my claims leaves the rump of their empire politically converted to egalitarian pacifists, who I can then hopefully draw into federation membership or vassel-hood.
The first time I ignored winning and just bulled into their core systems even if I lost my fleet to check that their military strength was about what I expected. It turned out it was, they'd combined their two smaller fleets into one with 3k or 4k compbat power, and possibly had some small fleets too. And starbases about the same strength as mine, vulnerable to any serious fleet but enough to stand off a couple of isolated ships.
In fact, it seemed that 4k was about the fleet strength of my allies too, and also the federation fleet (currently controlled by my less-overwhelming ally).
I also discovered they tended to (understandably) start by attacking my systems I took from them last war. Or ones I'd already invaded this war, if there were. But because I was exploring a bit randomly, it took a few tries to understand exactly what they were prioritising, cos often they'd change their mind if I attacked from the other side at the same time.
But eventually I decided a simple strategy. Spend most of my minerals building up my fleet to exceed the biggest strength I'd seen from them. At the same time, slowly fill in other bits of empire construction and research I was overdue for if I had excess resources.
I actually hit my current max fleet size here, which I'd always struggled to do before as I had so many competing demands for resources. That's why I wasn't as militarily formidable as the AI empires, presumably :)
Then park myself on my starbase closest to them, where they would probably attack. First attack the system behind that to make sure to draw them out (and to hopefully cause my allies to start joining in). Ambush their fleet with my larger fleet and starbase.
Do I win? I tried this as one of my experiments and my fleet wasn't quite big enough, but I only did it "for real" once. I carefully saved the game every month during the war in case of disaster but didn't need any of them.
For real, I defeated their fleet, then flew into their core systems, taking each system as I passed through, with the aim of capturing their starbases and re-engaging their fleet before it could be repaired.
I forgot that I needed to attack their planets in order to progress further (if they have ftl inhibitor technology and build a stronghold on it). But fortunately, I was able to bombard the planet (using the "destroy military buildings, minimum damage to everything else" option) and destroy that fairly easily. My armies were too far behind -- I wanted to keep them out of ship combat but then I needed to wait too long before they took the planet, but fortunately bombardment worked ok.
Then I was able to roll through their core systems, and mustered some smaller fleets but none enough to challenge me.
I wasn't quite sure how the end of the war worked. I thought I needed to occupy all their planets in order to be able to keep them -- that's how it usually works in wars that end in armistice rather than surrender.
But when I conquered their last planetary system they straight-up surrendered, which makes sense, but I wasn't sure. I *think* they then automatically ceded all claims to me whether I occupied them or not, PLUS reformed their government to be fluffy rather than malicious.
Then I paused and saved the game and took a break. It also gave me some achievements, "win a war" and "conquer another empire's homeworld".
Next time I need to consolidate my gains -- see if I can vassalize the remnant of their empire, incorporate the conquered worlds into mine, make the populace happier, spin of a sector because that jumped me up by 50% more inhabited planets. Then conquer some of the interesting systems I see, and some of the empty space I've been saving.
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comments so far.
This time I wanted to do it right. I copied the save file so I could experiment before committing myself (may only work with non-cloud saves, not sure). I chose ironman with no saves because I didn't want the temptation to ALWAYS replay until I got a perfect result, and I think that helped because I do have that weakness. But with the war I felt like it wasn't so much that I wanted to save-scum the situation, as that I didn't really understand the mechanics of war.
Which, ok, is realistic, but I didn't want to lose several wars to just learn the mechanics, so I had a few goes at it.
First I made sure I COULD declare war, but apparently my federation allies agreed with my opinion of the fungusoids even though they weren't on their border. I almost chose "claims" war goal to try to claim the planets I'd already laid claims on, but that still leaves the funguses with their most-recently-colonised-planet, so I chose liberation, where if I get my claims leaves the rump of their empire politically converted to egalitarian pacifists, who I can then hopefully draw into federation membership or vassel-hood.
The first time I ignored winning and just bulled into their core systems even if I lost my fleet to check that their military strength was about what I expected. It turned out it was, they'd combined their two smaller fleets into one with 3k or 4k compbat power, and possibly had some small fleets too. And starbases about the same strength as mine, vulnerable to any serious fleet but enough to stand off a couple of isolated ships.
In fact, it seemed that 4k was about the fleet strength of my allies too, and also the federation fleet (currently controlled by my less-overwhelming ally).
I also discovered they tended to (understandably) start by attacking my systems I took from them last war. Or ones I'd already invaded this war, if there were. But because I was exploring a bit randomly, it took a few tries to understand exactly what they were prioritising, cos often they'd change their mind if I attacked from the other side at the same time.
But eventually I decided a simple strategy. Spend most of my minerals building up my fleet to exceed the biggest strength I'd seen from them. At the same time, slowly fill in other bits of empire construction and research I was overdue for if I had excess resources.
I actually hit my current max fleet size here, which I'd always struggled to do before as I had so many competing demands for resources. That's why I wasn't as militarily formidable as the AI empires, presumably :)
Then park myself on my starbase closest to them, where they would probably attack. First attack the system behind that to make sure to draw them out (and to hopefully cause my allies to start joining in). Ambush their fleet with my larger fleet and starbase.
Do I win? I tried this as one of my experiments and my fleet wasn't quite big enough, but I only did it "for real" once. I carefully saved the game every month during the war in case of disaster but didn't need any of them.
For real, I defeated their fleet, then flew into their core systems, taking each system as I passed through, with the aim of capturing their starbases and re-engaging their fleet before it could be repaired.
I forgot that I needed to attack their planets in order to progress further (if they have ftl inhibitor technology and build a stronghold on it). But fortunately, I was able to bombard the planet (using the "destroy military buildings, minimum damage to everything else" option) and destroy that fairly easily. My armies were too far behind -- I wanted to keep them out of ship combat but then I needed to wait too long before they took the planet, but fortunately bombardment worked ok.
Then I was able to roll through their core systems, and mustered some smaller fleets but none enough to challenge me.
I wasn't quite sure how the end of the war worked. I thought I needed to occupy all their planets in order to be able to keep them -- that's how it usually works in wars that end in armistice rather than surrender.
But when I conquered their last planetary system they straight-up surrendered, which makes sense, but I wasn't sure. I *think* they then automatically ceded all claims to me whether I occupied them or not, PLUS reformed their government to be fluffy rather than malicious.
Then I paused and saved the game and took a break. It also gave me some achievements, "win a war" and "conquer another empire's homeworld".
Next time I need to consolidate my gains -- see if I can vassalize the remnant of their empire, incorporate the conquered worlds into mine, make the populace happier, spin of a sector because that jumped me up by 50% more inhabited planets. Then conquer some of the interesting systems I see, and some of the empty space I've been saving.
You can also comment at https://jack.dreamwidth.org/1077972.html using OpenID.
comments so far.