AAR 1.0.3 Vanilla Challenge

I am taking the Vanilla challenge.

• Impossible / Emperor difficulty
• Huge Galaxy
• 7 Players
• Standard Tech and Culture Trees
• Few Events

• Custom Race: The Vanilla Federation
• Affinity: Kaek (no particular reason)
  
• Perks: None
• Special Abilities: None
• Points Spent: None (standard Medium-G and Dictatorship kept)

​

The goal of this challenge is to see if I can beat the AI despite significant disadvantages.
Of course, the game throws me smack dab in the middle of the galaxy, just for fun.



Based on my starting position, and a lack of worthwhile systems early on, I actually choose the Stellar Navigators space culture. I suspect most people would call me foolish for not taking Space Fervor (free colony ship), but look at my map. I have several nebula near my homeworld and on my north, west, and southwest, with a Dark Nebula below me. Being able to have extra movement speed and 2 travel speed in nebulae is going to be key to me defending my empire's core easily.


By turn 8, I found a tolerable second colony location (Desert). Thankfully, Desert is one of the easier to terraform to Icy in the future.

I also found a rather nice system, Cups. Unfortunately, it had a nice space amoeba guarding it. So I'll have to save that for later.






I continue exploring my surroundings, but there are no good systems. Desert and Acid is the best I can find. The Jers system near my homeworld is terrible. A lot of planets, but almost all of them are poor or ultra poor.

I select Overmining space culture to make the most of my two colonies.
I select Space Privateers next to hopefully get some piracy income later on.
I get lucky and get Dexana. She is going to be helpful as a spy to steal tech and sabotage my opponents to slow them down a bit early on.

First event is More than a Diplomat. I have to choose to satisfy my leaders and suffer a diplomatic penalty with the Nova, who were the only race I had met by turn 76.

Space Culture choices are Megacorporations and Aggresive Terraforming (going to need to change those desert worlds), and perhaps another less popular pick, Planetary Prospectors. I have 2 colonies... I need all the production I can get.

It's now turn 83 and Humans are apparently me neighbors. Howdy, Neighbor...




While I've been slow to develop colonies, I have not been slow to hire leaders.
Sadly, Sophia will not be working for me this game. Isaac's Philanthropic trait and Kxuta's Genius traits are too good to pass up and they have my two system covered.
Note Dexana has been sabotaging the Nova to try to slow them down. I destroyed a tech capital, a star base, and later a space mirror array I believe.

This is turn 83 still.



By turn 108, everyone has joined the party... except for my Kaek lookalikes, who are hiding in the galaxy still.
I am refitting my destroyers to include Fighter Bays. Having hired Rak-kax, I knew fighter bays were how I wanted to conduct war. This led me to rush to Phasors and later Wurtzite Cannon as quick as possible so my fighters would do most of the heavy lifting. The destroyer itself just had some lasers.

NOTE: The AI does not equip much/any PD from what I've seen. Fighters are tearing them up, and I suspect missiles too.

 

TURN 150:

I've cleared out the Space Amoeba and started colonizing the Cups system.
Hey I finally have more than 2 colonies! Both have... 1 pop each.
I also terraformed Cups IV into an Icy planet! It's a rich world. Oh it's tiny, max 4 pop, 3 infrastructure. Oh well.

Notice I am now researching Wurtzite Cannon.
I am not at war currently, but I know it is coming. Draguul detected my poor Dexana paying them a visit (whoops) and the Nova are mad about the More than a Diplomat quest.



TURN 177:

Everything kicked off shortly after that.
The Cups deserts are now Icy.
I have been at war with the Draguul, as have the Sulak. Together, we swallowed them up. Meanwhile I had to fend off harassment from the Nova to my west.
I signed peace with Draguul after their empire shrunk to insignificance.
I declared war against the Sulak to prevent them taking all of the Draguul systems for themselves.
Lau will be taken from them before too long.






I dropped to -4 SSP a number of times. It was a tightrope I walked to avoid the damage penalties but get the ships deployed I needed.

I have now built my first battleship. Rak-kax desired to command one, and so he shall. It's a pretty decent design, and the fighters have Wurtzite cannons now. Combined with his secondary skill, he will lead the border wars to the south for us.

Ships are: 5 Destroyers, 3 Cruisers, 1 Battleship, 2 Support Ships (both in Cups), 3 assault ships

Turn 177 screenshots

Diplomatic situation


Vanilla's Leaders


New Battleship Ship Design

 

TURN 200:

I am at war with the Sulak, Draguul, and Humans.
Most of the former Draguul territory is now mine, as well as some of the Sulak border systems.
I am going to push for Zinia as soon as Lau is mine. Zinia is the "real" capital of the Draguul now. The most valuable system they have.




I have a stable of lone wolf ship leaders apparently. I will be splitting them up.
Doc and Rak-kak are doing some work for us. Doc defending the home Vanilla system and Rak-kak leading the charge in Ostara.

NOTE: The Draguul AI smartly targeted Rak-kak twice with espionage to try to flip him. I wouldn't have any of it though, I met his desire to command a battleship and, as shown above, started working to get an Imperial Resort for more leader opinion gain.

Leaders


Ships: 5 Destroyers, 3 Cruisers, 3 Battleships, 2 Support Ships, 7 Assault Ships
1st Titan the Vanilla Sundae is being constructed at Uiter II.





TURN 220:

This is where I am now. This is the current state of affairs.
Draguul are gone and I am at war with the Humans and Sulak.
If I have to predict how this turn out, I feel I will win.




Current Empire Overview/Rankings:




I don't put much stock in the fleet strength one. The AI has well defended ships, lots of armor and structure, and the Sulak have Adamantium Armor (I do not). The problem is their weapons are pretty poor and can't compete with me. I am tearing through them. They have not built any defense against my fighter squadrons. They are also sending 1 cruiser or battleship at a time. I can see where they are going in get there in a turn or 2 with my perk choices giving me the logistical advantage.

I will be interested to see how this ends and will assess fully at that time. I did notice a lot of the AI worlds I was attacking building silly things like survey, outpost, and colony ships while I was at war with them. A lot of wasted production on their part.

I would not say my race selection or start has benefited me in any great way. I can see how someone with a proper race could be dominating the AI even sooner.

Next time... we may find out if the Vanilla Federation can prevail!

 

Here are a pack of the early saves up to turn 220 if you want to review anything. One about every 25 turns.

 

AAR update will come a bit later, but I wanted to report this:

I experience a number of issues with this battle, and many others afterward, where I would gain control of the enemy forces and have to end task the game. I also had issues where they would flee with one of their ships and the battle would hang and never proceed after. I believe it was the ship fighters were targeting and after the fighters were re-launched. Play this one a few time, focus fire on a battleship with firepower and fighters, and see what happens for you.

I can provide saves later in the game if needed.

 

Let's get things rolling again, shall we?

TURN 244

The Human raids against our interior were quickly repelled.
Compared to the Sulak, who have access to Admantium Armor, the human ships are torn through like single-ply toilet paper by our fleets.

They have been engaged in a war with the Kaek, nestled in the NE corner of the map, and have been unable to divert much attention to their war with us. We take Truaac from them, just to send a message to stay back, and for the most part the humans listen.

This allowed us to focus our efforts to take out the Sulak. As we reach closer and closer to their interior, the quality of their colonies continues to increase. These creatures have been multiplying with great vigor, and all of their young are now OUR young. We pacify them with many troops, both on the ground and in the air, and only a lack of assault marines prevents us from expanding even faster.

Gniri and Zinia have all been taken, and Oplaa will soon be are as well. 29 pops have already joined our cause just based on these systems.

Our empire is pushing hard. We have gone as far as -4 SSP several times as we push and push and push. Establishing more Star Fortresses and taking more colonies will allow our war machine to continue.

Meanwhile, the war waged on between the Moltar and Nova. The Nova are the #1 ranked empire in the galaxy, so hopefully the Moltar can help hold them off while we attend to other matters.



TURN 263

Well our SSP concerns are a thing of the past for the time being.
The Sulak have now lost Oplaa, Acriu, and Acrail to our forces. The core of their empire crumbles beneath them.

We had some epic battles against their large fleets, and their Adamantium Armor made them very difficult to destroy, but ultimately they lacked the firepower necessary to destroy our ships. We also used leaders to our advantage, having access to a lot of skilled ship leaders at this point, and the Sulak had very little leadership on their side. We also have refit most of our ships to take advantage of additional miniaturization and defensive upgrades.



We were very careful NOT to bomb heavily as we wanted to take these colonies as intact as possible. While our titans have bombs on board, they are primarily used to take our any military installations which may inhibit our invasions at least... for now.

Acrail has 3 planets, all Acid, 2 of which are ultra rich. Taking this from the Sulak has given us a very powerful system. 39 pops and very capable of building assault ships at the front line to hasten our conquest of their former masters.



Elsewhere in the Galaxy:
The Humans have pushed back and nearly extinguished the Kaek. We have been at war with them for a long, long time, but there has been little activity on their part against us. Both of us have been occupied with other things.

The Moltar vs. Nova war continues. For a short period of time, they even occupy part of Nova Prime, the Nova home system.

Perhaps most annoyingly, the Nova and Humans have formed an alliance. We will need to turn our eyes to the humans before too long or this could become an issue.

 

TURN 280

My how the once mighty have fallen. The Sulak children now hear only of the atrocities of their ancestors. They understand why their former government had to be deposed, and how the Vanilla Federation became their savior. The Sulak core systems, all their base, are belong to us.

Current Military Fleet:
11 Titans, 11 Battleships, 3 Cruisers, 3 Destroyers
34 Assault Ships, 2 Support Ships, 0 Freighters (all mining exploits are set to Trade, though they still don't produce much BC)

Our production capital, Uiter II, can produce one of our latest Sundae V titans in 5 turns. If I built a space mirror array or deep core mine, that changes to 3 turns.

Current Tech Tree (latter half shown):


With only a few remnants remaining, we can quickly sweep through the remaining Sulak systems and directly into the human federation.

Not a moment too soon either, as the Moltar have been scattered and lost a lot of ground in their battles with the Nova.
The Kaek are on the verge of total extinction.






The stage is set for the finals -> Nova vs. Vanilla.

The charts reveal we should be able to pull this off. Our fleets overpower them. We need to act quickly though, because they have significantly leads in the areas of production, technology, and culture.




@Adam Solo Saves attached.
The Attack Tolia one is one I had to reload and backtrack because the battle kept getting stuck due to the bug I described earlier.
Load that save, then send the fleet from Gidurn to Tolia (instead of their current destination). The Sulak will move in response for a rather large battle. I would have won it, without taking any losses, but it locked up towards the end when I took control of the enemy fleet.

 

FEW GENERAL COMMENTS BASED ON THIS SESSION


The Big Battles:
Looking at the turn 255 Attack on Tolia battle, the AI has some decent ships. They are still wasting space with Nuclear Missiles though. Also, even Polaris Missiles are out of date rank IV tech. They aren't even using MIRV, just the fast modifier. My ships mostly have ECM Jammers and my Titans have Wurtzite PD weapons. They would be better off with Quantum or Nightmare missiles, or Photon Torpedos, or a different type of weapon entirely.

Their titan is fairly well equipped. It could perhaps be optimized, but I definitely focus fired it to stun it with phasors and take it down as quickly as possible.

Their battleship has 16 x Nuclear Missiles (some with the fast modifier) and 9x Polaris Missiles (Fast). Nuclear Missiles get obliterated by PD. They have no place in this stage of the game.

Their Cruisers are a bit of mish mash of configurations. All have different loadouts. One has 4x Wurtzite Cannon but only 105 Attack. It is unlikely to ever hit my 140/150 defense ships with that, so it is pretty useless for them.

Their Frigates should be scrapped at this point.

This is a fleet with a titan, 2 battleships, 3 cruisers, etc. A major fleet for them. They don't have a ship leader. I have +60% ship attack and +50% ship defense from leaders. They should be trying to put a leader on such a large fleet with so much invested (assuming they have one somewhere).

Ultimately, I could have won this battle with no losses (had it not got hung) as they were mostly focus firing my very defensively strong titan.

Fighter Bays

I agree with @Konstantine these should not be allowed on Destroyers. Same goes for bomber bays. My destroyers with just 2 lasers were very powerful early on based on the fighter bay. Having access to 4 well armed fighters (Wurtzite Cannons or better) and being able sit back out of harms way makes them more useful as carriers than they should be for their cost.


AI BUILDING PRIORITIZATION
Just about every colony I conquered was building civilian ships. Things like Outpost ships, colony ships, and survey ships. This was at a time where I had been at war with them for dozens of turns and had been taking systems from them. If they had the SSP for civilian ships, they should have been pushing more military to fight back. When I conquered them, I canceled their unnecessary ships (the map is nearly fully populated as is) and focused on rebuilding a battle station and imperial garrison. I then built assault ships to reinforce the front.

It may not be accurate, but the impression I got as the player is that the colony AI has no idea a war is going on that it needs to deal with.

EDIT: MISSILE DEFENSE

Is the +70% from ECM Jammers really +70% ship defense against missiles? Is this why none of the enemy missiles are doing much damage to me? It was such an easy special system to add-in, I tossed it onto my titan.

Could also be the Wurtzite PD making quick work of the missiles.

Could also be that the shield recharge rate is so fast the missiles that do hit have zero impact.

Hard to tell, they just seem to blow up and my shields and ship seem untouched when my turn comes around.

EDIT #2: ORBITAL STATIONS

Some of my orbital stations have two fighter bays, one or even two battle sensor mods, ECM Jammer, etc. that makes them very substantial to deal with. These are how my Star Fortresses are equipped. They can fend off the colony from most small forces.

The AI's battle stations seem to sometimes lack even a single battle sensors mod. Is this because they haven't researched it? Their ship attack value is often too low to hit my ships at all, making them ineffective at defending against my attacks at all. I am wondering if they should prioritize installing battle sensors more often, especially when using Kinetic weapons.

 

Alright, now that I've digressed and posted some general feedback on the session (please see post above), let's dive back in shall we!

TURN 296

The Human Federation's last bastion is about to be attacked. Together with their allies the Nova, who are the #1 empire on the galactic charts (rigged!), they have setup for their last stand. The Nova have lent them several titans to help aid them in their defense.

Our fleets come from our homeworld, Vanilla, and Thecitune. 6 titans and 3 battleships.



The battle goes as expected. The power of mind control allows us to have them turn on one another, blasting their own titans to smithereens. Our elders wondered if our mind control was too powerful when used on titans, as if the gods would punish us, but we ignored their words. (So... maybe mind control should usable on battleship size is smaller only?). We won with superior firewpower and by stunning their ships with our phasers, not just with trickery.

For our trouble, we also found some antiquated old weaponry. It seemed suitable for our museum where we can show off the pinnacle of what the Human civilization had invented. It will be nice for people to still hear about the humans after we subjugate them and re-write their history as we have so many others.




TURN 301

The Nova secure a peace with our allies, the Moltar. They then declare war on us. We should expect trouble.



TURN 305

Oh dear.... almost none of these ships are that threatening, but unraveling where they are attacking is going to be a challenge. We work hard to make sure we have a battleship or titan ready to meet them at each and every location they are targeting. In one or two cases, they send a titan so we bring extra reinforcements to those areas.




TURN 320

We've fought back the Nova and convinced our ally the Moltar to go to war with them and the Human Federation.
The Human federation is scattered and broken as we move in to claim their worlds.
The Kaek are hiding somewhere in the north.
The Sulak's Rogue Planet hideaway has been found. Before we eliminate them though, Dexana is on a mission. She will try to steal their most valuable technology.

We have 42 colonies, 47 Outposts, 528 Pops.
Our military consists of: 25 titans, 18 battleships, 3 cruisers, 3 destroyers, and 48 assault ships.

In short order, we will begin our scorched earth campaign against the Nova.
We will hit them hard. We will hit them fast. We will bomb their worlds to oblivion.
Will their fleet actually be greater than ours? Time will tell I suppose.

But first... they meet at Cognaurus for reasons unknown. Titans, Battleships, Cruisers, Destroyers.
We should prepare our defenses. This can't be good.
Let's hope the Moltar can distract them for a bit. We didn't give them a few of our titans for nothing.




Saves attached.
If you want to see the battle at Sol, load the one from turn 296.