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The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR

 
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The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/17/2013 1:16:56 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		The NDA for Shadows is lifted, and we are free to do AAR. This is my contribution and it will be full of SPOILERS.

If you want to find all surprises yourself, don't read this. It will show how the pre warp era looks from the empire, and new challenges inflicted by the changes to pirates.

Comments and questions are very welcome.

Settings

An overview of the galaxy settings used.

Elliptical galaxy of 700 stars, with 10x10 sectors.
PreWarp expansion
Restless aggression
Hard difficulty (makes just about everything harder)
Expensive research (because normal feels very fast)
Normal space creatures
Many pirates

Not checking "scaling victories", nor "destroyed pirates do not respawn".

Plentiful Colony Prevalence
Plentiful independent alien life
100% colony influence range (recommended)
2 sector colonization range limit

Apart from difficulty, research and colonization range, this is the default Shadows era setup.

Race, empire, opposition

I choose the Ikurro. I have some work to do here after aborting a game in beta due to a new version arriving.

Random galaxy position.

Normal home system.
Starting expansion.
PreWarp tech level
Normal corruption

Random Government.

For opponents, randomly generate 14 empires (11 is the default).
We do allow independents to set up new empires.

To keep victory track I set conditions to 66% of everything and 100% threshold, so
no one will ever win this. No storylines, but all events.

Automation

I have done AARs with lots of automation. This is not one of them.
I automate taxes, population policies, ship design, and characters. And may change my mind as time goes on.

I may do some tweaks to ship design at certain points.
Among ships, explorers will be automated for the most part.

The start position

When starting the game, I find that we call ourselves "The Great Ikurro Territory", and notice that we live on the continental planet of Ikurro 1. We are positioned a bit above the galaxy center, in the E3 sector.

Our government is despotism. It will remain that way unless forced by revolution or other things.

What is relevant in a pre warp start, is how the home system looks. And this does to look too great at all.

Why? Because distance matters when you can't warp.



The system has 5 planets, 3 moons and an asteroid field.

I spot a decent (86) quality desert planet closest to the star.
A 68% ocean planet not too far away. It has a 16% scenery bonus.
Two gas giants, one with 12% energy research bonus.
Three barren rock moons, one around Ikurro 1, the other two around the outer gas giant.

Worth noticing is two ruin sites. One at one moon at the outer gas giant (out right). Another is at the innermost planet.

Action

It is 2100.01.21, and it is time for the very first moves.

We order a medium spaceport for Ikurro 1.

Research

Research matter at the start. A new starting level of items is introduced, and you start without things like shields, armor, and hyper drive.

The AI designer (and researcher) has been improved quite a lot. I prefer manual research, but want to research the 'correct' weapons. One easy way to figure out what the designer wants to use, is to peek at the research and design part of empire options. Tech emphasis for the Ikurro include torpedoes and phasers. This means
the ship designs use torpedoes and phasers as their main weapons.

My early priority for research is.

Armor Plating (first)
Torpedoes
Beam tech towards phasers

Shields (first)
Energy Collection
Space construction (we start with 160 size max)
Hyper drives (two techs, and they are expensive)

Transport Systems (troop compartment)
Colonization (expensive)

Energy research is key early on. Colonization can wait, but you want hyper drive
(and those other energy techs) fast. There is also likely to be independents nearby, and transport systems is a lot cheaper than colonization :-)

Research from the start is armor plating, shields, transport systems.

2100.03.11 - pirates arrive



A single escort from the pirate gang "Lone Force" arrives. They want money. We sport a MSP build with 0 armor, 0 shield, and 0 firepower, and accept. We are defenseless until that spaceport is up. Or rather, until that spaceport is finished and shielded, and shields are not yet available.

We accept the protection agreement.

2100.06.10. Our spaceport is complete. No shields, no armor, but weapons...

We order 2 explorers and 4 frigates. Destroyers are also available, but they won't be once we research some more techs. Designs are rather small without armor, shields, and hyper drives.

2100.06.16. We spot an explorer ship from the Sollost Pillagers. That is a new pirate crew.

2100.07.23. We complete our first spaceships. The two explorer ships. We tell one to explore our moon, then explore the innermost planet with the ruin. And we automate it. We tell the other to explore the moon with the other ruin, then automate it. The latter one is told to explore the ocean planet first, since it is hardly
a detour at all.

We also order a construction ship, which is a bit premature. We should have done another step first. The frigates are finished, and are declared the 1st fleet.

2100.08.18: A lone trader arrives, then another one. It is nice to see visitors with no guns. We are not so happy that they are here to pick up steel, carbon fiber, and gold (and the reservation flag may hint at the freighters being
controlled by the Lone Force).

2100.09.24: The construction ship is done, and is told to build a mine at our moon which we now know holds lead.

We order the colony to build two energy research stations. They complete fast.

2100.10.25. Our dear advisers reminds us to cancel the silly protection agreement. Thank you.

2100.12.23. A pirate frigate attacks Ikurro 1. It is from the Soliost Pillagers.



We see the pirate approaching. The constructor is working, the 1st fleet is waiting. The shield less, and armor less 1st fleet and spaceport prepares to defend themselves. We notice the fleet leader marker on the pirate with some worry.

The brave 1st fleet hide behind the spaceport. There is no need charging ahead, is there?

The pirate drops an assault pod, and die fast.



One of our frigates has 3 components damaged, but manage to limp for repairs.

We can also see that our civilians are prepared to transport whatever may appear on our mining bases. We have one partly built mining base, and 6 freighter to serve it.
We welcome the mining ships, though.

2101.03.09. We have explored the Sanctuary of Ikurro, and increased our understanding of shields. Yay. That was the ruin at the innermost planet.

As the mining base is done, we tell the constructor to build a mining base on the ocean planet. It has polymer and dilithium crystal

2101.04.03. The explorer heading for the outer ruin, is under attack from a pirate frigate. It is a hyper drive less frigate that was in the system, and that the pirate explorer picked up.

The frigate is fast, and the explorer dies.

As this happen shield research is complete. Energy collection is the next item on the menu.

1st fleet is sent to retrofit (shields!), then to kill the frigate. We book a new exploration ship (the other one is far away).

After waiting a bit for cash, we can even retrofit the spaceport (8k to retrofit to new medium spaceport design?!)

2101.10.03: Energy Collection is researched. Space Construction is next.



Pirates attack the mining base on our moon. The 1st fleet is off, and we don't plan to bribe them. "Bye, bye, mine". They capture it, and sadly they leave, rather than attack the now shielded spaceport.

1st fleet kills the silly non hyper drive frigate, and heads back to kill the captured mining base. The order is changed to "refuel", since they barely have fuel to return. Crawling around the system burns fuel fast.



2102.09.22 the explorer investigates the ruin, and we discover info about something called Warp Field Precursors.

We stop research on space construction at 89%, start warp precursors, and queue space construction(2) and hyper drive(3) as the next two projects. Every moment counts.

We notice that the innermost planet is getting close, we order the construction ship (now done with the ocean mine) to build a mine there. This will take some travel time both to get materials and to get to the spot.

The left gas giant is a caslon (and hydrogen) source. The right one is not. It is way too far to go to with no warp by our judgement.

2103.03.19 we have research troop compartments, and start on colonization.

A frigate coming out after refuel runs off to kill the mine. A good thing about building mines with no shields and no armor, is that they are easy to destroy once captured.

2103.06.17. We get the 15400 credits needed, and start to retrofit our spaceport to the Large Spaceport design.
The constructor have just left to build the new mine.

We spot an exploration ship from the Dark Transport. The more the merrier.

While money is not present in abundance, the cashflow is good. +7500. That is one nice side effect of not having enough money to build a lot of stuff.

2104.02.15: We have a setback in warp field research. Back to 10% (from 30-ish) :-(

2104.09.18: The mine on Iddaxcy (innermost planet) is done. It is one year and 3 months since the constructor left the spaceport. And the planet was rather close.
The construction ship is told to retrofit (for energy collectors), which should bring it home and ready for warp drive.

Caslon stock is at 9800 we are doing fine. We hope. There is quite a bit of stores on the colony at start.

2105.03.16. A frigate from the Lone Force attacks the new Iddaxcy mine. It fails to capture it, but leave it with 31 damaged. Oh well.
While travelling away from it it realises how stupid this is, and turns to kill it. Then changes mind again and teleports away. We noticed it it heading east - north-east before jumping...

2105.06.13. Armor Plating is researched. That took almost no time at all. Energy Torpedoes are next.

2105.07.13. The Lone Force arrives at Iddaxcy mining station and raids it. They find nothing of use, which is not so strange considering they have destroyed just about every single component there.

2106.06.16.

That is rude! We build another energy station at the capital (one is not enough).

Apart from that? We got a new mine at our moon, and all state ships sit idle at the capital. Our gas mining
ships are also idle, rather than running across the system to the fuel source. We don't hold that against them.

Advisers keeps begging us to build a defensive base, but we ignore them. We hope we won't regret this.

The Lone Force keeps raiding Iddaxcy mining base. They get away with 868 credits. We again notice they exit heading NE. There is a close star system in that direction...

2108.04.01:



Finally there is some room to maneuver. This won't bring us far though. Maybe to the closest systems, but at least our own system is ours to control.

We accept the retrofit of all ships and bases. Our frigates won't retrofit as the new design is too large, but considering there is 11% left on space construction, that should not take too long.

2108.06.04. Space Construction is complete, and we have a 230 max build size.

We tell the frigates to retrofit and order 4 destroyers and 4 more frigates.
We also order another constructor.



This is the range of the frigates in 1st fleet. One explorer headed out left on own initiative, and we chased the other to the NE manually. The warp drive does not only have short range, it is also dead slow. The explorers have some more range than the frigates, as do the construction ships.

We did not notice them attacking, but the 1st fleet lost one ship attacking kaltors in the system. We add the destroyers to their fleet giving the 1st fleet 3 frigates and 4 destroyers, and put the last 4 frigates in the 2nd fleet.

Cash is at 38k, cashflow at 10k.

NJ298, the system to the left of ours, got nothing at all.
Gundur, the system in the NE, has 4 planets, 2 moons, and no pirate base. One planet has a 26% weapon research bonus.

We are not yet interested in building a weapon research station, we are happy with pumping everything into energy.

Our stupid advisers want to post a general smuggling mission. They don't understand that we don't want to pay pirates, we want to kill pirates. We also got no resource shortages.

2109.12.03: We complete research in energy torpedoes. We start researching maxos blasters, which will replace our pulse blasters.

We build an energy research station at the bonus site in the capital. Once finished, we scrap one of the two we got at our capital.

The Gundur system is in constructor range, we start queuing constructors to build there, as they are done in our system (apart from asteroids).

2110.09.19: A new intelligence agent is a reminder about that part of the game. A glance at the diplomacy screen shows that neither of the 3 pirate gangs are very strong, but that the Lone Force, our first visitors, are the strongest.

We send two intelligence agent into the world, to try steal the territory maps of the Lone Force and the Dark Transport. The latter are the second strongest, and the ones we have seen the least of, and possibly the ones we are likely
locate last when exploring.

If we get their territory maps, we should get info about both their spaceports and their controlled colonies. Which are independents that we want. They have 1 year each, with 74 and 80% probability to succeed.

Gundur 1 mining station (incomplete) is raided and captured by the Lone Force. So much for some silent mining in that system. It is a bit far for attacks by our fleets.

Their construction ship arrives to repair the unfinished mining base they stole. Pirate construction ships are prime targets, but they are extremely hard to catch until quite a lot of tech is obtained. So there is no point chasing after it for a while.

With the new gas mine in Gundur, the strategic source situation is quite good. We lack nekros stone (on the base captured), tyderios, emeros crystal, and Aculon. None of those should be rare. Some of our sources are less than impressive, though (18% carbon fiber, 11% chromium).

2111.09.23: Both spies succeed in stealing territory maps.



Interesting points are circled. The blues (Lone Force) are close, that was expected. The colony below them is ikurro, 99% and large. The colony to the west is ikurro and on the size of a newly planted one (tiny).
The two systems to the right are controlled by (I guess) the Gizureans. This means they are close, as with control circles on, they are within my circle... And this is bad news, as the gizureans breed fast and are strong as the game is balanced now.

I want that colony to the right badly, and I don't think their control stops an invasion, but I need hyperdrives first.

The lower independent is Mortalen, the two on the far left are Haakonish. The orange pirates are dangerous, as they are far away, and possibly hard to catch early even with hyperdrives.

Both pirate bases are small spaceports at this time.

But this is 2111, and we don't have hyperdrives. Progress is 41%.
Lets pray the Gizzies has stumbled around a bit and don't get into space too fast.

The spie with bonus to espionage is sent to grab the territory map of the third pirate faction. The other has bonuses to counter intelligence and assassination (and a 0% sabotage bonus).

2111.12.28: We meet an explorer of the Black Rock Transport in the Gundur system. The second agent is told to steal their territory map. They are probably somewhat distant, since they have taken quite some time to appear. They are also stronger than the others, according to the diplomacy screen.

We wait for our intelligence agents, and wait for hyper drives.

2112.10.05: Our agent comes back with the map of the Sollost Pillagers. They are in the gas cloud straight left, twice as far away as the independent that way. They bring no new info of independents.

2112.12.27: The agent heading for the Black Rock Transport is captured. Not so strange considering that the first thing happening after he left was him getting the lawful trait (-10% espionage among others).

Hyper drive research is at 57% and we got plenty of time. We send the other agent.

We get the contact details for yet another pirate crew. The Blood Dagger Pirates are yellow and weak. Hopefully that does not mean that they have been spanked by the Gizureans.

2113.02.13. We approve a defensive base.

Silly advisers want to offer smuggling and attack missions. We do our own mining and attacks. Even if camping at our capital may make it look a bit different.

2114.01.03: Gordas Dokari is back with the territory info of Black Rock Transport. They are similary placed
as the orange/brown, but up-right instead of up-left. They know 7 extra independents to their north, on the rim.
4 are securan, 3 in one system. 2 are Dhayut.

2114.03.14: Sollost Pillagers attack Aldai mining station in the capital system.



1st fleet is told to attack one of them, 2nd fleet to attack the other. It is nice ot have forces in the system.

The mining station is badly damaged (43 components), the raiders are dead. A bored constructor is happy to get some repair work. A destroyer is also badly damaged, the other constructor is also happy to get some repair work.

Darn gravitics...

The damaged destroyer refuses to stop, it insist on heading for the spaceport on its own. The bored crew on the construction ship Jubilant Remorse files a formal complaint.

While fighting went on, maxos blasters are researched, we proceed with improvements to them.

2114.08.21: As hyper drive research is at 79%, we prepare for the future, and order two troop transports and 5 troops. This leaves 4 garrisoned and 6 free troops on the capital.

We tell our fleets to retrofit for maxos blaster, the most important thing with this is to have fewer updates to do when the precious Gerax Hyperdrive is available.

2115.08.18: We approve a second defensive base. This can allow us to worry less about keeping ships in the capital system.

Pirates keep offering protection. They should rather ask for protection...

2116.01.07: Yet another pirate crew shows up (with explorer) in the Gundur system. The Lone Army.
Hyper drive research is at 98%, and we would not be happy about a 50% setback at this time.

2116.03.04:



Status

It is a good time to stop for now.

We are just a retrofit away from being in space. There are no sign of Kuristar 1 (the very nice ikurro independent) not being independent anymore.

It took 16 years to get into space properly. It is worth noting that research speed is slow in this game, that doubles the cost. So with normal research speed, we would be at this point around 2108, or a bit later as it takes some time to find that warp ruin. It is the first time I have the explorer destroyed before it reaches the ruin, though. It did not slow me down, since I would have researched space construction before gerax anyawys, and we had a whopping 11% left when the warp ruin was discovered. Our research is further slowed by despotism (25%).

The status is not very interesting, but...

The map is the same as the one above, with the additon of a pirate base up right, and a cluster of independents above that.



The diplomacy screen has only pirates, and is a tad misleading. The orange, Dark Transport, seems like the far more dangerous. They have a MSP, 37 ships and 1992 firepower. The rest have SSP, and firepower in the 600s.

Dark Transport are the ones up and left in the map image earlier in this post.

For comparison, we got 1439 firepower, and most of that is the spaceport and two defensive bases.



The colony list is compact. 5% bonus development because they love lead and got lead. Is that healthy?



The economy is relaxed since we have spent little money. The cash is a nice reserve, and the cashflow will allow for 30 ships of the current (warp) design. Life has been lazy so far, but once we establish colonies, I expect to want more military ships than I can afford over time.

Colonies means independents, as colonization is at 38%, but we have put everything into energy this far.



37 freighters to serve 1 colony, 8 mining bases, and 2 construction ships. The private sector is quite aggressive about ship building, and will remain so through the game.
Post #: 1
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/17/2013 4:46:13 PM   
Constantine XI


Posts: 25
Joined: 5/16/2013
Status: offline 		This was great - THANKS! I love text AARs, and wish we had more.

Exactly the kind of thing I have been looking to see to tide me over.

Thanks again.

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 2
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/17/2013 5:33:23 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		I am old fashioned myself, and prefer to read info rather than watch a video with it :)

The start is a bit stale, once you start poking at independents, things are not quiet and peaceful anymore

This is the AAR (vanilla) that won me over big time: http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2495880


(in reply to Constantine XI)
Post #: 3
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/17/2013 6:28:58 PM   
ASHBERY76


Posts: 2136
Joined: 10/10/2001
From: England
Status: offline 		Boarding seems a bit overpowered and very conclusive from what I have seen.I think disabling should be more likely than actual capture..I wonder about the snowball effect.

_____________________________


(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 4
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/17/2013 6:33:13 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		Into Space

2116.03.13: Gerax Hyperdrive has been researched, and we are promted to retrofit. We accept.
We set up the energy reserach to research the traditional basic versions of various technology. Advanced Nuclear Fission, Proton Ionization, and Enhanced Maneuvering. We add Enhanced Construction at the end, larger ships is always nice.

We scrap the extra energy base at the capital, and queue a hightech one. We plan to order a constructor to build a weapon research station on the bonus site in the Gundur system once it has hyperdrive.

2116.06.09: We meet an exploration ship of the Gizurea Hive in the Gundur System. We better hurry to try grab that independent.
The plan was to send a fleet first, but a trasnport with 3 troops is ready, and we send it to the star, just in case pirates are there.

We book 8 exploration ships to give a total of 10.

Once they exit the construction yard, 2nd fleet of 4 frigates is sent to Kuristar 1, our invasion objective.
1st fleet is told to attack Gundur 1 mining station, which the pirates captured from us.

As our troop transport enters the Kuristar system, no ships are present, but a battle is happening on the ground. The colony is being raided by the Sinister Claw Clan, a pirate clan we have not yet heard about.



As the troop transport jumps at the colony, and 2nd fleet lands, two more pirates approach to drop their pods.



The pirates jump away after dropping their pods. Strength on the ground now favor the raid, and they are 4 vs 1 and will probably win easily without our intervention.

2 more pirate escorts enter, our ships goes 2 on 1, as that fits their positions. The pirate escorts will die. The transport still creeps towards the colony.
The pirate raids succeds before our transport gets there, and they kill the defender. Our troops land on the empty colony and captures it.

At the same time, 1st fleet and the other transport heads for Tapoi, the tiny Ikurro Colony west of our capital.

The Sinister Claw Clan may prove to be a challenge.



Kuristar 1 has 1437M Ikurro, is 99%, and will soon have 4 garrisoned troops. Our 3 invaders, and one that the independents started recruiting. It has decent quality polymer and chromium sources.

Soon enough 2 more sinister escorts arrive, as do one of Lone Force. (Former) independents are popular spots.

We book another fleet, 4 frigates and 4 destroyers.

Two ships of the 2nd fleet take a beating. Pirates hurts. They go home for repairs.
We also fend of the raid forces dropped.

2116.11.11 We meet a ship of the Sinister Raiders a bit to our north.

2116.11.25 We complete Efficient Blasters, and start researching first defense tactics, and then assault tactics, for our newly recruited troops.

The troop transport landing at Tapoi, find 5 raiders of the Dark Transport. Our troop transport jumps away. 1st fleet lands, the pirate jumps after the transport, and the transport renews attack.

As the Dark Transport also damage our ships bypassing shields, we redo our energy research, and insert "Swift Robotic Repairs" as the first research target. We also wonder why we never noticed this tech the last time we tried the Ikurro...)

2117.02.06. Iddaxy mining station in the capital system is under attack from the Sollost Pillagers. 3rd fleet moved to Kuristar, and is soon there. 1st fleet is waiting for the troop transport to land its troops at Tapoi. 2nd fleet is not yet home for repairs.

2117.02.18. Tapoi is ours. 10M ikurro, 82%. Decent carbon fiber source, as well as Riphidium Ale.
Ships of the 2nd fleet enganges pirates in the capital system.

We order 8 more frigates and 12 destroyers, to reinforce the 2nd fleet, and set up two more 8 ship fleets.

The Zygeria Hive 3rd fleet of 5 ships show up at Sollost Star. This is the system with our new colony Tapoi.

We tell our espionage master, Gordas Doakri, to locate the territory map of the Sinister Claw Clan.



An updated image of the local area. We see 4 pirate gangs (there are more roaming), and our colonies. The gizurean 3rd fleet is in our western system. Our 3rd fleet is in Kuristar, and the damaged fleet leader of 2nd fleet is only half way home. Our 1st fleet with one ship damaged sit at our western colony, unseen in the image.

We see a constructor building a mine in a system of ours, and in general we will prefer to build mines in systems of ours that does not have a colony. Colonies see lots of visitors, random mines less so.

The pirate attacks seen are hardly unexpected, there is a reason why we have two defensive bases at the capital, and the prime reason is not the powerful Gizurean empire.

Advisors have suggested a defensive base on Kuristar 1, but we rather want a spaceport, and need a sizeable fleet to defend the build before we can even consider that. And with the amount of damage inflicted even by a couple of pirate escorts, 8 ships is not likely to be enough.

The yellows have two colonies not yet found, but yellow systems on both sides of Kuristar is a hint of their location.

The (blue) base of the Lone Force is very easy to reach. They have 13 ships, but we are unsure if we don't like them to hang around in case they bother the Gizureans more than they bother us.

Without noticing, we have learned about the Haakonish Corporation. We also can see that one independent (securan) up north is now owned by the Securan Utopia, but we don't know about this empire...

2117.06.22: We meed the Ylex Technocracy (Zenox) in a system to the south. A bit later we see a 2 ship fleet of theirs led by a powerful alien cruiser.

Pirates land in the systems of both our colonies at once (different gangs). It will not be feasible to mention every minor pirate attack and raid repulsed, and every single ship damaged while doing so.

A dark transport visit finished off the remaining ships of the 1st fleet. The 3rd fleet takes damage fending off small pirate ships attaking Kuristar 1. The new 4th fleet is near the last remnants of the 1st, the new 5th is soon at Kuristar. 3rd fleets is given repair order.

There is a reason we shifted to research racial repair bots...

Two destroyers of the 4th fleet landed on top of a dark transport escort finishing off the last ship of the 1st fleet. Two destroyers vs 1 escort that is a bit occupied, and this is the result for the 4th fleet destroyer targeted.



It is 2117.12.09. It is still not 2 years since we researched the gyrax hyperdrive, and we consider our options.

Status

Pirate hurt, but I kind of knew that.

The map is the same as above, we have yet to locate a Gizurean colony.



Alien ways still have a huge influence on diplomatic relations, but the Gizurean are no natural friends. Their "power" is related to their population, twice ours.

What appears to be the two stronger pirate crews, are Sollost Pillagers with 82 military ships, and Sinister Claw Clan with 122.



This will be 3 nice colonies. Tapoi has been kept down by repeated pirate raids, which each have killed off some of the population



Enough economic freedom to du a large build to bust some pirate structures, or to protect a spaceport build.



The privates are busy building, we build military ships slightly faster than the pirates can destroy them.

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 5
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/17/2013 6:55:03 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76

Boarding seems a bit overpowered and very conclusive from what I have seen.I think disabling should be more likely than actual capture..I wonder about the snowball effect.

I don't think boarding is so bad.

You have to lower the shield to board, and once they are down it is often quite a few shots following that damage the structure quite badly. So often pirates board your frigate, which you kill off because the pirates also killed its hyper drive (and most other components)

I have not played much with boarding myself, though, I have been more exposed to it.

(in reply to ASHBERY76)
Post #: 6
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/17/2013 6:58:42 PM   
ASHBERY76


Posts: 2136
Joined: 10/10/2001
From: England
Status: offline 		Does the race traits factor into boarding power.

_____________________________


(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 7
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/17/2013 7:02:59 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		I have never looked closer at boarding power. The number of hab modules count, I think.

(in reply to ASHBERY76)
Post #: 8
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/17/2013 10:44:31 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		Pirate struggles continue

We look towards the Sollost Pillagers, the purple dudes out west. They have been frequent visitors in that part. They have a medium spaceport of 446 firepower. They also have 82 military ships according to the diplomacy screen.

If that is their only base, destroying it is going to be a real blow to them.

We order 40 destroyers at a cost of 102k. That will be a test of our resource and fuel situation. 113k caslon at Ikurro 1 should make the fuel no problem, at least.



The 1st Zygirean War

2118.01.10: A photo opportunity is fumbled, as the Zygirean Hive declare war.

Their 3rd fleet of 13 ships is spottet on attack vector towards a mine in the gundur system. We don't have a realistic match for that one. The 2nd fleet has some 7 ships at the capital.

Our 40 ship destroyer build is in progress.

We book 3-4 troops more at each of our colonies.

We manually order explorers to head for unknown systems on our right, where a Gizurean capital is assumed found. As we do this, we ponder: "Aren't they plagued by pirates?". We do not have spare time for war.

Some destroyers complete, and we send the 2nd fleet (short of one damaged ship) to a system where we think they got some mines. It was where their 3rd fleet started from.

Succes on first try. Zygirea is the system NE of Kuristar, our SE colony. It has a host of mining station, and the capital has a large spaceport, surrounded by 4 defensive bases and 2 research stations. There are lots of forces on the ground. We spot frigates with 30 firepower, and ours have the same.

Kuristar 1 is visited by multiple pirate gangs at once, never a boring moment.



The updated map shows that they did not need a second colony to occupy systems left of Kuristar...

We can see their third fleet having fun with our mining bases, and our 2nd fleet heading away from the capital to the system where we saw the 3rd fleet take off from.

We can see our local pirates building a new spaceport to our south. The gizureans have two more colonies we don't know where are.

Our 6th fleet, the 40 destroyers ordered, is up to 1248 firepower. It looks like maybe 16 is unbuilt.

Our 2nd fleet finds a gas mining station - a soon to be dead, gas mining station.
We queue even more troops at Kuristar 1...

We spot a second colony in the system directly to the right of their capital. It got 1 troop.

Our agent returns with the territory of the sinister claw. They liv NE of us, and have two bases. We spot a Solost Pillager spaceport build just SE of our western colony.

We discover that the nasty Gizzies have engaged the Sinister Claw Clan to attack us. We are not sure we would feel any difference
even if they had not...

We make sure the second transport loads troops, and join our two transports in a fleet now carrying 6. They head for their smaller colony, where 2nd fleet is also on their way to kill a gas mine.

A strike fleet got to our capital system and killed a lost energy research station. The fleet was killed by the up and coming 6th fleet of soon 40 destroyers.

The Sinister Claw may be bribed to attack us, that does not prevent them from raiding Ganc, our invasion target.

2nd fleet that is in the target system is enganged by lots of ships. They try to jump around keeping defenders busy while waiting for the transports to arrive.



Meanwhile at Kuristar, 5th fleet is trying to prevent raiding, but we can (hardly) see 4 dark green ships of the Black Rock Transports on top of the colony, as purple sips of the Soliost Pillagers prepare to do their raid. We suspect the 5th fleet will soon expire...

"Please stay in line, everyone will get a chance"


Our ships are sloow. One troop transport manages to drop its load on Ganc, the other is destroyed. A gizzie 4 ship fleet refueling at the colony did not help our cause. They were all supposed to be distracted at the other end of the system.



One ship of the 2nd fleet, and one troop transport escapes. It is soon 11 vs 43 on the ground, we are hopeful.

2118.11.28: We capture Ganc. A 67% volcanic moon with 353M Gizurean. Resources are Nekros Stone, Aculon and Osalia

We inherited a defense platform build that is soon enough shot down. The population at Ganc rebels, 46 vs 25.

They value peace highly, so no cheap peace anytime soon.

We send the 3rd and 5th fleets, badly hurt in Kuristar system, back home for repairs.

2119.01.08: Time for status


Status

We have 4 colonies and 9458M population. They have 2 colonies and 16750M population, almost all of it on their homeworld.

Military Strength is even at 4k, but they have more defensive bases. That ought to mean that we have more ships.

We got a 40 ship destroyer fleet we need to decide actions for. We may be in the mood for peace, so maybe a mining base busting trip in their capital system is what is needed? Assaulting 4 defensive bases and a LSP seems a bit out of our range, even if those busts is one of my favorite parts of wars.



The map.

We can see our new green blob. There are lots of enemy ships in the system.
Out left is the pirate base we pondered killing. They are building another one SE of our left colony.
We can see fleets heading back to the capital from Kuristar, and the two survivors of our attack getting close to our green area.

The spaceport build we had on our last screenshot (south) is gone. Either we lost view of it, or more likely, it has stopped. Spotted pirate spaceport usually stay spotted.

The two blues outside the yellow (top right) are the sinister claw clan, the ones harassing both us and the gizureans, and being paid to attack us. They have high military strength, the same as ours.

Constructors are probably idle, and should rebuild some mines somewhere. Or something. Visiting our colony systems apart from the capital one is not recommended, and the capital system also see visitors both Gizurean and Pirates.



Not a whole lot to say about this. The sinister claw does look like the most badass pirates. Considering their strength, we are not keen to meet anyone stronger, anyways.



We got a new, unhappy member.
The capital got a decent number of troops (12 or so).
Kuristar 1 has 11 troops, and are currently fighting Kiadian raiders (1 group). They frequently kill raiders.
Ganc has our 3 invaders and are recruiting 5 gizurean war swarm. They are fighting some beat down rebellers (militia).
Tapoi has 3 troops, and are recruiting two more. They are fighting 4 groups of naxxillian pirate raiders.

Fighting raiders is a steady early game activity for garrisons. Only the larger, well defended colonies can escape that.




Economy is not bad, but carrying more maintenance is probably not a good idea.



We got quite a few destroyers. They need to do more than sit in the capital system recharging shields.
The mine count is down.

Apart from that? Research? Not a lot of time has passed (3 years sine gerax drive). We have researched improved defense tactics,
and are 5% into improved assault tactics. Swift Robotic Repairs is 25%. Colonization is 56%. We only got the hightech station left, the other two are casualties of war.


< Message edited by Bingeling -- 5/17/2013 10:54:47 PM >

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 9
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/18/2013 12:52:12 AM   
Erik Rutins

 

Posts: 37503
Joined: 3/28/2000
From: Vermont, USA
Status: offline 		A nice early war there - the Gizureans can be tough, but 49 destroyers is a heck of a sledgehammer at this point in the game.

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(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 10
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/18/2013 8:01:57 AM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		True, but the destroyers are made of plastic .

I doubt the Gizurean are very dangerous at this point, but when a couple of large pirate factions also are at it, it gets hectic.


(in reply to Erik Rutins)
Post #: 11
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/18/2013 9:02:19 AM   
Data


Posts: 3909
Joined: 1/3/2011
Status: offline 		Plastic ones? But many of them....yeah, this is a Binge AAR allright

_____________________________

...Igniting stellar cores....Recharging reactors...Recalibrating hyperdrives....

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 12
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/18/2013 9:53:41 AM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		Just hinting that the destroyers are not the ultimate force at their current state.

- An inefficient reactor invented in someone's barn.
- Basic shields
- Engines they developed by improving water jets
- Thruster technology based on salvaged spray cans
- Basic armor
- The good old newbie torpedoes
- Improved maxos blasters

What is important to keep in mind at this stage, though, is that the Gizurean are not much better off (if anything). My empire carries research penalties from difficulty and despotism, though. I have not noticed anything other than frigates and escorts, so it could even be they can not build anything else. I have forgotten to look at their ships and build queue when peeking into their system, and likewise did not notice what kind of research stations they got.

(in reply to Data)
Post #: 13
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/18/2013 3:53:36 PM   
Plant


Posts: 418
Joined: 4/23/2013
Status: offline 		Do you know how many ships the Gizureans have?
Power is relative afterall.

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 14
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/18/2013 6:29:02 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		I don't know a way to check ship count of empires. They had comparable numbers to us, since military strength was comparable.
The Gizureans are crazy, I know that because I have used them while automating games to test for AI issues and crashes... They are the most likely ones to grow large.

Now for the next episode.

(in reply to Plant)
Post #: 15
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/18/2013 6:47:45 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		We are in the middle of a war, and need to figure out what to do.

Housekeeping

Some mines and research stations have been lost. As a short term solution we rebuild the lost enerergy and weapon station at the capital. This does not occupy constructors, and if they want to bust them, they are welcome to try catch them underneath our large spaceport (and between two defensive bases).

We order one new troop transport to replace the one lost.

Resource check reveal 0 sources of silicon, argon, gold, iridium, dilithium crystal, emeros crystal
Also, 2 sources of caslon, at least one more won't hurt. They killed our stuff in the Gundur system, and we are not sure if they will return, but avoiding it may not be a bad idea.

So constructors (the two of them) is poked into activity.

There is a very nice mining source, but it is a 98% continental we can colonize as soon as we reserach that tech. We are better than the AI and don't put mine on our colonization targets. The only worry is that it is just outside our capital circle (below).

We already have a constructor with a caslon mission. We add one more.


Operation Wrecking Ball

Objective: To end the war. They feel smug after killing some research and mining bases, thinking they are doing quite well. We are gonna try adjust that impression of theirs.

We got 40 new destroyers. Our two exposed colonies can live without protection for a while, and hopefully the garrisons can stall most pirate raids. Kuristar in particular has a huge garrison. A reason for recalling them, is to leave a decent amount of ships in the capital system, and that they are pretty beat up.

We know of 3 mines outside their capital system, none of them gas mines. One is in the system of our new conquest. We don't know the resources of their capital system, but it is full of mines. Primary target are the ones that look the most caslon-ish.

The 4th fleet has damaged ships and is out west, we give the repair order to those as well.

We take 30 destroyers of the "new ship fleet", and make them "Battle 1". They top up their fuel, and will head off to the enemy capital system to kill mines, and possibly ships. Things depend a bit on how many enemy show up.

The sinister claw managed to sneak away with some resources from Kuristar 1. We only have 230 military strength on defense, no wonder they could sneak through.

Garrisons can not keep pirates away, but we need to end this war. The Gizurans value peace at 674k.

2119.04.01. Battle 1 is told to move to Zygirea 9, a red gas giant looking like a likely caslon source.

By the time it takes to fly between our colonies, about 4 pirate raids land at each of them.

Ganc is also attacked by pirates. The gizureans have ships at their mine in this system, and helps in keeping them at bay.

The attack spam on Kuristar 1 is crazy, and they get away with loot. The worst loss is credits. We gather 13 frigates in the 3rd Fleet and send it there. Currently pirates battle with each other above the colony.

Two Gizurean strike fleets, and the Sollost Pillagers 6th fleet of at least 6 ships, compete to kill a steel mine in our capital system first.



2119.06.01. The Gizureans attack a mine in the Sapila system. We are also building there. Too bad we had time to build stuff before their explorers went through that area ;-) Battle 1 is near the enemy capital system. Gizureans and Pirates battle outisde ganc (pirates win).



Battle 1 has killed the gas mine, and enter battle with local defenders. We can see only escorts and frigates in that group.

They lose approximately 3 ships and kill a lot, and head for the next gas mine in the system before killing all.

It is hard to target mines that hide behind freighters. Pirates have been kind enough to kill the Giz mine outside Ganc.

Lots of giz ships are dead, so are 3 mines with one more soon to follow. Their price for peace has dropped to 70k...

3rd fleet is fighting pirates at Kuristar 1, Battle 1 is killing mines and gizzie ships.

Battle 1 has killed all of the mining bases in their capital system, and a host of frigates. This has not been without casualties. 13 out of the 30 ships head home. We have only seen construction ship, escorts and frigates.

The Gizureans still love this war. 600k.

We notice crash reasearch on our racial repair bot, and we are at 87%. Go, go!.

3rd fleet fought pirates bravely, 6 out of 11 ships crawl home for repair. About 2 will actually get home.

Battle 1 has refueled, and head back in, we have spotted 2 gas station builds. 6th fleet is heading for another mining base we know of, 6 ships in 5th fleet are hunting pirate mines in system where we also got bases. Pirate mines work as loot generators, just like their bases.

We spot 3 factions trying to raid kuristar 1 at once. And the stupid insects refuse peace.

2120.10.09. We complete research in switft robotic repairs. We continue on reactor, engines, thrusters.

We are short a defense base. How did that happen? We got a message of the Gizzies attacking a research station. It is under our LSP.

We get no buildable destroyer design. We modify the one we have built and remove 1 shield and add 2 repair modules, and some armor (they only had one).

Battle 1 and the 6th kill a mine each and head home for retrofit.

Our closest pirate base has changed ownership. The western sollost pillagers got it now. They are prime target if we can get this stupid war to end.

We lose ships, and order 14 more destroyers.

2121.03.26. Battle 1 and 6th fleet are close to home, we build and repair ships, and the war is still on. What will it take to convince them to end the war? Blockading their capital is a bit hard considering the defenses.

A new thing is that you can click the troop field for detailed view even if no combat. That way we can see that their capital defenses are 384K. We can see that Kurstar 1 is 267K, and our capital 298K. An invasion of a valuable target is not very likely, in particular as they seem to have no troop transports (but we have spotted a single destroyer).

We take a glance at diplomacy, and notice new factions Mortalen Union, Securan Utopia, and Secura Paradise. The latter is one of the 3 independents in the Secura system that we learned of early on.

2121.06.14. We notice 2 troop transports attacking ganc. We got 7 troops and a 20% defense troop general on the site. 144K defense strength.

Evil Star Skyjackers? Aren't those new? We have repulsed their raid on Kuristar 1...

The gizzies land 122k (vs 143) at ganc. Hopefully they leave and lose the 25% space control bonus (they do and it is 133 vs 101).

6th fleet of 9 retrofitted destroyers, head for Kuristar 1, hoping the dual repair bots and armor makes a difference. With the amount of rail guns and gravitic weapons flying around, 1 less shield should not matter much.

Gordas Dokari completes research in storage systems by stealing info from the sinisiter claw clan. He is sent on a new mission to steal the gizzie territory map.

Battle 1 is reinforced to 20 repair-botted destroyers, and head for a gas giant in the enemy capital system, where we know there is a fresh mine.

Indications from the trade screen are that the Gizzies have 7971 credits. Keep at it. They value peace at 609k...

Some frigates and two troop transports arrive at our capital. The 9 members of the 4th fleet kill one transport, the LSP finishes the other. This reminds us to verify that the battle of Ganc is over.

Ships are too slow in getting into space, and moving around. Battle 1 kill 3 or 4 mines and lose 7 ships. It is hard to keep count.

2122.04.13. We try to build a SSP at Kuristar 1. 6th fleet is there, and it has been a few moments of quiet (we believe).

We learn of three colonies of theirs (1 sector on the far side), in two systems.

Pirates attack Kuristar 1. Lots of pirates die, the spaceport build is not damaged. 3 gangs at once.

2122.10.01. As Battle 1 has 9 destroyers and 6 filled troop transports and wait for the last ones to refuel, the Gizzies want peace.

We agree.

The system with 2 very nice continentals makes this decision a bit questionable. Once filled with huge amount of bugs, they will be harder to grab. We hope we will be in a better shape to grab them too, although the Gizzies are more annoying than dangerous at this point.

Status

Research says.
Star Fighters at 95% (auto selected)
Reactor at 90%
Colonization at 72%. Having researched this for almost 20 years, makes us check the message log. We are short 2 research stations, though.

Operation Mystery:
2120.07.12. Our missing defense base was destroyed in an explosion.
2121.12.21. Ikurro Research station was destroyed in an explosion.

No signs of a critical research failure.

We queue constructors to build research stations on bonus sites. We also order a third constructor.



We can see the two other Gizurean systems. The upper one has two very nice continentals. That they colonize those is a bad sign.

We can see the closest pirate base having changed owner, and we spot another base of one of our tormentors below the yellow circle.

We know of one Haakonish system (continue up and left through the orance pirate base, and you get there).
We know that the three securan colonies in the same system are now 3 empires (one of them the starting Securans). Straight above the green pirate base at the top.



Three securan empires. Independents don't wait forever.

We don't look outmatched at all. By colors of empires, we can guess that the Ketarov and Shandar are not included.

The pirates with more than 1000 military strength are:
Sollost Pillagers (2117)
Sinister Claw Clan (1998)
Dark Transport (1188)



The same as last. The SSP on Kuristar 1 just misses hab modules. The build has been fast.
Tapoi have more than 10M, that is not bad, considering the amount of raids.

There are some complaints about shortages (among colony populations). Some peace will help up the mine count. And maybe bust some pirates. The Kuristar culture level is pathetic.



Mining stations killed by Gizureans, Pirates, Explosions... It is a pain. We rebuilt the lost defensive base.

We could need some more destroyers to bust pirate bases. 8 destroyers per colony, 30 in an attack fleet. That is 54.
Replace some with the 4 frigates...



This shows that 20 new destroyers may not be healthy. Maybe some happy mining and system control (improves transport) will up happiness and tax income a bit. And if lucky, the numbers have not updated since war exhaustion stopped (even if that is just about the single thing our despotism is good at).

Firing some troops is an option.

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 16
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/18/2013 7:04:47 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		I did not notice this until now, but that the Gizies are "Pleased" is a tad surprising. They like our reputation (we kill pirates, even if we don't kill enough), and they like our Despotism. The "foreign ways" is probably gone, was -13 at start or war, but how about a sizable negative for past relations?

The game is shut down, and I am too lazy to check.

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 17
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/19/2013 1:16:06 AM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		Pirates!

It is 2122.10.06 and war has just ended.

Transports are moved to their own fleet, and some troops are disbanded. Invasion fleet drops 3 low strength troops and fetch 3 at Kuristar 1, where they have gotten lots of practice...

We look at the bases of the Sollost Pillagers. Both their known spaceports are medium.

We merge 6th fleet into Battle 1. We tell them to retrofit to be sure, which would make most of them (or all?) refuel. We add some ships from the 4th fleet, and the fleet at Kuristar for a total of 21.

The two mentioned are renamed Def Kuristar and Def Ikurro.

2122.11.24. Star Fighters are researched. We continue to improve our epsilon torpedoes.

2123.01.23. We finish research for the Fission reactor. We continue with engines.

2123.02.20. Battle 1 is refueled and ready. They head for the closest pirate spaceport. In a perfect world more than 21 would go, but this world is not perfect. Care will be taken. First target? The star. To check for ships.

2123.04.15. Battle 1 finds few ships, and a MSP with only 2/3 of its shields up. And a gas mine, but that is a secondary target.



The first destroyer is lost to fighters before we get close. How will progress be?

They win with 18 survivors, 2 damaged. Repair bots will hopefully fix them. 21 is a bit too few to kill a MSP with friends.
And yes, that was a pirate colony ship. *Was*.

Kuristar has frequent visitors, no fuel, and the defenders are very low on fuel. We plan to swap ships with Battle 1, so that we keep defense and get these ships refueled.

We see our first shortage message as a mine is trying to retrofit. Our second spaceport was finished a while ago, it only missed the hab modules when this session started.

We got some cashflow and still too many pirates. We order 7 destroyers for Battle 1, to give it a total of 25.

There is a sort of control at Kuristar 1, now. Frequent visits that do no damage of any importance. Two colonies are still raid targets with no defense apart from garrisons.

The mortalen independent (south) is a very tempting target, but we can't defend what we got...

Not everything is a paradise in the Securan camp. Secran Paradise declare war on Securan Utopia.

2124.06.16. Battle 1 is finally all refueled. The ships from Kuristar took ages and a half to get to the capital.
Target? Sollost pillagers out left. The return back home will likely take a while considering their range. They have 25 military ships.

2124.07.03. Proton Thrusters are researched, Thrust Vector is next.

The orange pirate flag to our NW has disappeared. Hopefully that is not a false hope... They have raided our western colony a lot.

Battle 1 lands in the cloud of the pirate base. A number (10?) pirate ships are kind enough to come out to greet them.

Fleet members lack discipline, and some jump at ships at their base. It is a bit chaotic as two construction ships approach, and we only manage to get a photo of the base explosion...



We killed two pirate construction ships. A great victory!

Battle 1 is told to refuel, and finds a gas mine north of our western colony.

One ship without hyperdrive lags behind while it repairs itself. We love repair bots :-)
Another has damaged repair bot (only one with new design), and leaves fleet and heads for repair. That leaves 22 out of 25 ships, a modest price to pay (2 ships).

On adviser request, we send a spy to get the territory map of our victims. Are there more bases? We also look for the operations map of the oranges who'se base disappeared from map.

The pirate marker (blue) closest above the yellow circle disappears. Are we not the only hunters?

Gizzies colonized the lovely continental just outside our circle. Colonization at 94%.

2125.04.27. Battle 1 still heads for fuel. We have some cashflow and cash rises. We retrofit kuristar 1 spaceport to medium.

Pirate raids frequently get away with 4-6k cash. We build 8 destroyers to form a new fleet and defend a small spaceport build at Ganc.

4-6k? 9283 is more like it :(

The first 7 battle 1 members to refuel, forms Def Sollost, and bases themselves at Tapoi. That colony is kicked back to 10M by raids all the time.

The Evil Star Skyjackers destroy Kuristar 1 spaceport. Nerf sabotage, please. At least we spotted him. We start construction of a new MSP. The SSP at Ganc is already started as defenders are there.

Kuristar 1 has a steel shortage. We are not invincible in that area. The capital got 13k.

2125.11.26. Thrust Vectors are ours. Bigger yard is next.

2126.01.03. Colonization is researched. That took almost no time at all. We continue with recreation and medical systems for our spaceports.

We lack continental candidates that are nice, not pirate infested, and will expand our borders. Our gizurean are busy building a spaceport. We start with Teecorc, in the same system as Ganc. It has nice resources and 80% quality.

The now 15 ship strong Battle 1 is heading for Algara 1, the nice Mortalen independent to our south. When they have a suitable lead, invasion follows (from a different start point). For some reason we believe there may be pirates...

The fleet at Ganc fumbles, and is not present when a raid arrives. The fleet leader is fired, but the raiders luckily ignore the not finished spaceport.

We got the territory map of the Sollost Pillagers. We find nothing.

Dark Transport attack a gas mine. We hope for better control, and book mines for the two caslon sources in the Solost system where the troubled Tapoi now got some defense.

2126.06.23. Ganc spaceport is complete. Some sort of control...

Battle 1 finds no pirates, 1 mortalen construction ship, and 1 defending troop. Invasion returns home, but one ship proceeds to attack.

Dark transport are annoying and attack mines. We got our best agent on the case of "where the **** do they live?".

Gizurean colonize our volcanic objective, just as we order a ship from Ganc.... Lots of nicely contested mines appear...

We find a Sollost Pillagers construction ship trying to build a SSP north of our circle. Def Ikurro heads there for a visit.

We invade Algara 1. A 64% Mortalen with 568M mortalens, and a wiconium source. Battle 1 drops 6 destroyers for Def Algara, and head back to the capital.

It is 2126.11.01, and time for status and a break.

Status

Things have quieted down, but it requires manual attention to stop raids even with spaceport and defensive fleet on the spot. Automation was attempted, but that won't hold ships at the colony.




The local area with an ugly alert circle I am too lazy to get rid of...
We see the trespassing of the yellows. Those two were all mine...
Juicy contested mines should ensure a new war soon enough.

Battle 1 has just left for home. Def Ikurro has just left aiming for the construction ship trying to build the Sollost SSP just above.
All the known pirate bases remotely close are in the image.

Otherwise? Fleets in all systems. Apart from the capital, but defenders have an emergency task, invasion is soon there, and battle 1 is on the way.



We almost got friends, and the Gizzies don't like us.

We need a scrollbar to fit all...

There is only one really strong pirate faction, Red Moon Pillagers, not in the image, and we have not had any clashes with them. They have a 9000 strong military, about the combined strength of us and the Gizzies.



A rather poor one have been invaded. Kuristar 1 is gonna be a doozy.



Our cash on hand seems worse than the cashflow indicate. Maybe retrofits draw some cash? And pirate raids?



We got research stations, but lack a hightech bonus one. The one we had was outside Ganc, a rather unfriendly spot until recently. We queue that task.

Only 2 gas mines. Pirates have killed some (puny dark transport with 13 ships). Four caslon sources are queued.
Colony ships are not yet complete, we started a volcanic one, but the target (NW) was grabbed. We got other options, though. We also queue a desert colonization at a nice target on the left of the map given, a bit below the middle. The circle can probably barely be seen.

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 18
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/19/2013 5:50:38 AM   
peddroelm

 

Posts: 41
Joined: 5/18/2013
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: Bingeling

..We killed two pirate construction ships. A great victory! ..


Capturing them not an option yet ? More research needed ?

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 19
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/19/2013 6:43:10 AM   
Fetrik


Posts: 58
Joined: 1/24/2011
From: Occupied Skåne
Status: offline 		Seems like life in the shadows is a constant struggle. Good read.

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 20
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/19/2013 8:51:28 AM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: peddroelm

quote:

ORIGINAL: Bingeling

..We killed two pirate construction ships. A great victory! ..


Capturing them not an option yet ? More research needed ?

I don't have boarding tech, but why would I capture them? I could scrap them for money (I think), or I could retire for tech, but they are probably hard to capture with several habitation modules giving more defensive strength.

And when you are hitting a MSP from close range, but targeting two constructors instead, being fancy is not the first thing on one's mind anyways. Because unlike constructors, spaceports hit back quite a lot.

The Sollost Pillagers have obviously been able to capture constructors, though. I killed two constructors at their spaceport, stole their territory map (should make their spaceports and colonies show), and there is no sign of a base apart from the one they try to build. Which requires a third constructor. They must have captured two of them, lacking a colony to build them at.

And the reason I want to kill their constructors, is of course that if I can kill all they can not build anything (apart from planetary stuff). Without a base they should be a spent force, anyways, just like pirates of old. How do you gather materials for a new spaceport with no spaceport to fetch them from? With lots of patience, I guess...

< Message edited by Bingeling -- 5/19/2013 9:01:06 AM >

(in reply to peddroelm)
Post #: 21
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/19/2013 9:10:09 AM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: Fetrik Snubbe
Seems like life in the shadows is a constant struggle. Good read.

It is very much a struggle once you try to control some colonies. These guys are cheating with easy access to repair bots. Without repair bots, you really need both a defensive fleet and a spaceport. A fleet to kill stuff, and a spaceport to repair the ships damaged. The damaged modules really adds up fast with the frequency of visits from pirate gravitic weapons.

I have not seen much of any big pirate fleets yet. The orange ones killing off my mines at the end of last session was probably 8 ship strong. The raiders are usually 3 escorts and such.

The "Age of Shadows" will end, though. New pirates will spawn, but they are unlikely to be anywhere near as strong as to original ones that fed on independents (and fresh colonies) early on. And the early pirate tech lead becomes a tech disadvantage as time passes.

(in reply to Fetrik)
Post #: 22
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/19/2013 2:36:38 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		Peace and Prosperity

One can always hope, right?

Anyways, there is peace, and right now it seems like not a single pirate is present in our colony systems. That is probably not gonna last long, though. A bigger cash reserve would be nice, but will there be a chance to collect it?

The mine count is low, we are working hard to correct it with our three constructors.

Silicon, Gold, Argon and Emeros Crystal are the strategics with less than 10k in store. Carbon fiber hover just above.
We have 2 silicon and 4 gold sources. Adding more silicon is not likely.

2126.11.13. Kuristar 1 gots its MSP ready. Nasty pirate saboteurs destroyed the old. Evil Star Skyjackers... we remember you. Not that this makes them more likely target than any other pirates, we kill those that we can catch (and that we dare attack).

Every single pirate attack is not recorded. Assume that defensive fleets shoot down raiders now and then...

2126.12.04. Our first colony ship is complete at the capital. It sets course for our eastern colony system where a nice colony option is present. If they only were more swampy, and could colonize north of our western colony, that would be better. We worry that the nice mining system (where all mines were killed) may succumb to the yellow plague.

Def Ikurro went north to the pirate spaceport project. They fail to kill the constructor, but kills the spaceport at the cost of 1 damaged armor on a frigate.

2127.02.18. We got 131k cash, and wonder how that happened. Good things happen when you don't pay attention (unless a pirate raid is involved, in which case they get away with resources and cash). 14K cashflow, and no sign of massive spaceport income. We upgrade the Kuristar 1 spaceport to large. This system will be pure gold, and is expected to be high on the Gizurean target list.

Another nice spot is our western colony system of Sollost. Tapoi is "Ok", but Sollost 5 is a 90% continental in the system that will be a valuable colony once its get a population of some size.

We wonder if we messed up colonization range in the settings. We will avoid colonizing far away anyways, even if there is a 99% continental in the upper right corner...

Ganc and Algara 1 has shortages halting progress on colony ships. We hope our freighters are up to the task.

2127.04.15. Teecorc in the same system as Ganc becomes our first self founded colony. 80%, polymer, steel, carbon fiber, gold. We like it! Will the defense fleet manage to protect it? Ganc and Teecorc orbit the same gas giant (where a gas mine is booked) it ought to be possible, but we have our doubts.

2127.05.02. 183K cash? 63k spaceport income. Please order ships, in particular expensive ones requiring no resources we have small supplies of.

2127.05.25. Recreation center is researched, medical stuff next.

We steal the Dark Transport territory map, and find nothing of interest. That should indicate that they have no spaceport.

The Mortalen capital circle touches the Algara one. With explorers actually exploring, we learn more an more about the galaxy around our immediate surroundings.

2127.08.14. The stupid fleet commander don't hang around at the colony, but the defenders barely manages to prevent a raid on Tapoi. A good trend is that sinister claw escorts now turn away when attacked by destroyers, it makes them harder to kill, and colony raids easier to prevent.

2127.11.06. We finish research for improved epsilon torpedoes. We continue with improved logistics to save on troop maintenance, and queue Phased Beams.

We notice that our population management department prefer to assimilate everything. It is a good thing we got Ganc, which allows us to have small scale practise in Gizurean population management. We guess we are going to see a lot of those even without more wars.

2127.12.02. Speaking of gizurean wars. Trade sanctions are imposed by them. We celebrate by ordering 10 destroyers at the capital spaceport.

Advisers want to sanction the Naxx. we don't quite agree. We got problems closer to home.

2128.05.10. We colonize Sollost 5. In existing colony system.

The pirate base in the Da Suukha system disappears. We accept a suggestion to colonize there. This was the skyjacker base that was the right and lower of the 3 bases to our up-right on the last map image. We fear the bugs will get there first.

Pirates try to raid Kuristar 1. 3 escorts vs large spaceport and defensive fleet. We wish them good luck in the advanced classes of 'better target selection'.

2128.08.06. We complete 'Enhanced Construction'. We queue enhanced shields and compoment prefabrication. Max ship size is now 300. It will surely help our destroyers that are of the same size as frigates, currently.

Destroyers go up in size, frigates down in size, and troop transports also ups size to 300 without adding a troop compartment. Retrofit juggling incoming.

With 5 sources, gold reserves are not increasing. Silicon is also struggling (but still present), and there are no good options to add to our two sources. Or, they are all in yellow territory (or far away). There is one system "behind" Kuristar that will probably be ours once Kuristar 1 grows a bit more, which holds both Silicon and other goodies (strategic goodies, not that fancy stuff).

The 10 new destroyers alongside most of Battle 1 form 3 6-ship fleets after retrofitting at the capital. They head off to Sollost, Shadur, and Algara to replace the defending ships, so that they can retrofit at the capital. Kuristar fleet retrofits at its own spaceport, we do not trust the Genc one in Shadur.

This has been a quiet episode, and we fumble yet another photo opportunity.

2129.02.30. The Zygirea Hive declare War

Status

War discussions will be a part of the next session.



We can barely see the green pirate base, which leaves only one far to the south that is not in the image (of those we know about).
We can see mortalen, zenox and naxxillian to the south. And some other to the north, but far enough away.

We can see the three 6 ship fleets going away from the capital to replace the defenders in our corners. Battle 1 has one single ship and is at the capital, Invasion of 4 troop transports is also there.



A quick comparison with the enemy. We are the home team, and list ourself first (no American style here).

Territory: 7 vs 8
Population: 17848 vs 19828
Tax Revenue: 139K vs 189K
Military Strength: 6596 vs 9562

A couple of pirate factions are high in military power. Sinister Claw has over 7000, but we have yet to see more than small fleets.



They are filling up. The bottom feeders are promising in the long run. If we can keep them...



Some more mines, some additional exploration ships... 3 colony ships are being built. A short while ago we had 7 large freighters, the civilians are busy purchasing new ones. Which probably explain lack of growth in resource stores.



Resources are a bigger worry than money when it comes to waging war short term. The first alert about a mining base attack has already been received (a mine in the NW gizurean colony system).

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 23
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/19/2013 10:50:30 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		The 2nd Zygeira War

So, we are not exactly prepared, but it could be worse... Offensive operations are not easy to manage on short notice, with 6 ships or

so in each fleet.

A repeat of the map from the last post.



Some points about war for me.

1: I don't like to lose colonies.
2: I prefer "clean borders"
3: I avoid capitals until they are the last natural target, or even a bit longer.

It may be that point 1 is enough of a focus.
Point 2 says that the two to the left are prime targets, and the lower one has a silicon source.

Diplomacy stats say they have 8 colonies. The yellow systems in the image only got 6.

Our Mines in Beta Kappola (top left) not only know they are getting attacked, they see stuff. 3 troops. And 19 ships in the 24th

fleet. 30 firepower frigate. 132 firepower destroyer.

Our new destroyer design has 89 firepower. Ouch. Our latest frigate 48, but that is not so relevant.
We have nothing in the lower left system, nor their capital.

Action

Our 19th fleet has 6 destroyers sent to relieve the Algara defense fleet. They are just above a system where we know they got a gas

mine, and drops down to check on the situation. We don't have anything there, but freighters (or others) have visisted it in the past.

Kuristar spaceport got a shortage, and is full of civilians.
We book 30 destroyers at the capital, without the GUI giving hints that resources are short. If booking with the yellow buttons below selection panel, there should be a change once you look at stuff you don't have resources to build. So if you have enough mats for 5 destroyers, the button will change once 5 are booked.

We remember that we have forgotten to book troops on our two new colonies. We book 3 new troops at every single colony.

Apart from that, we wait.

The yellow exploration ship in Shadur (east) is blood daggers. I would never expect to be happy to see a pirate explorer in my system

:)

The 'enemy targets' panel is nice to have when Gizurean freighters try to defend their gas mine in the Durog system by hiding it. No

military is present.

2129.04.11: A few days into the war, and we don't fumble a photo opportunity.



The gizzie 23rd fleet attack Ganc. Defenders are busy chasing the pirate explorer.

The colony ship at Ikurro is done. Best of luck to you...
Invasion is ordered to go to Ganc, while we await the landing.



Very early invasion info. We have both the defense fleet and their replacement on site.

As the first destroyers are complete, we book 10 more.

They add more strength, as the sinister claw arrive to raid. 166 vs 391. Space control on the other side does not help. Pirates are

added to attackers.

We get a look in their SW system. Small spaceport, small fleet, 3 troops, general. 54k strength. We tell both fleets i Sollost and the

19th heading south to attack the spaceport. They are at approximately the same distance.

12 new destroyers of questiable shield strength move to replace the Sollost fleets. Invasion stops outside Ganc and turns to attack

the SW colony.

Naxx attacks Algara 1 (our southern Mortalen colony). that does not look good at all.

What a lovely start to the war :) Good thing is that this is the two colonies we care the least about.

Three ships exits Shador. Of about 12. Pirates and Gizzies hurts. And the arriving pirates had destroyers.

Ganc is soon lost.



The ships from sollost arrives at Yaselur 2. The ones from the south is not quite there yet, and invasion is a bit further out than

that.

The spaceport crumbles, the local destroyers hurts.

Algara 1 is lost to the Naxx.

Their 23rd, the one that attacked Ganc, is busting our mine south of Yaselun. We saw them head off a while ago.

Like we expected, the yellows are first at Da Suukha where our colony ship headed.

43 vs 272 at Yaselur 2.

Our diplomats feel we should offer peace to the Naxx. We agree, and the naxx agree. We don't need another, bored, 20 ship naxx fleet looking for something to invade.

We steal their opeations maps. Highlights are.
A sizeable fleet heading from the capital to blockade something (good old AI).
The fleet outside our invasion target heading to the capital system to refuel (good sign).
The strike fleet at top left heading to our invasion target.
A fresh build of SSP in top left. 3 troops.
No big fleet with immediate evil plans.
Not a whole lot of trooops on the capital which makes it easy to load up a large invasion (but a massive garrison).

18 ships of various shield preparationt take off from the capital to the NW. 1 transport is ordered to load at Kuristar, another at

the capital, while two wait for the invasion to end.

2130.01.17: Yaselur 2 is ours. A 98% continental with lead, gold, steel, iridum and 233M bugs. 20% development bonus from ruin.

The two remaining troop transports loads.

We consider washing our glasses as a bunch of frigates is complete at Kuristar 1 space Port. There is a number of non-automated ships

in both our major systems.

2130.04.01. We meet a ship of the Sluken Collective in Mortalen lands.

Our Yaselur attackers are sent to refuel, they are all thirsty.

2130.07.21: Holy cow



A capital of the Dark Transport (our mine busting friends of no base), attack Yaselur 2.
The raid is defeated, but that one will be a pain (352 firepower, 1300 shields).

The 3 fleets that attacked the spaceport, attack the capital once they have refueled at their chosen gas mine to the north.



The first two fleets arrive, while the third is a bit out still.

It hauls ships inn to be killed (and boarded), and flee when low-ish on shields. Fleets are 3-4-3, and we think they were all 6...

We built another transport since our old was so slow in getting fueled. 4 transports attack in Beta Kapola where the 21st is camping.

The wrong memory of silicon location will soon not matter, it is in Beta Kapola, not in Yaselur. 21st fleet of quite some size that headed there early in the war, and has been in that system since.

The zenox has bribed Dark Transport to attack the Gizzies. Maybe that was why the pirate capital appeared? It was gizzie until recently.

Rats, a Dark Transport Construction ship showed up at our new conquest, we gave it some damage before it managed to jump. We research proximity sensors, unaware we even started. Target tracking and counter measures, then long range scanners is the future setup. Enhanceds Shields are very close, consider it reported. Larger yards next.

2131.04.03. Beta Kappola 1 is ours. A 71% volcanic with Aculon and Otandium Opal. 118M gizurean. More importantly, there is a silicon source in the system.



The galaxy map, or most of it. We miss one row of sectors both left and right. We miss 2.5 sectors at the bottom. We have no info

about those parts. Yellow dots are pirate bases. The two northern yellow colonies are new, the rightmost was the one we hoped to colonize.

Our Kuristar circle does now meet our capital circle. The capitals are now evenly matches, and we gain control of some systems. If you see the two systems in the very lower left yellow part inbetween the green, the top one is actually now ours, and the lower got another silicon source. We killed a gas mine there, there are signs of it being rebuilt. There is a mining ship in the upper one, and now two of the beat up fleets from Yaselur move to the lower one.

Do we want peace? We are pretty happy about this state, and don't feel very threatened. The rightmost of the main body yellow colonies, is a very nice system with 2 continentals...

The left of the two north colonies has 3 troops (and a host of pirate mines in the system). Ganc still has a lot of troops, we see that since we have a small, not very happy, colony in the system.

Reshuffling fleets, moving things towards the capital, creating Battle 1 and Battle 2, and defensive fleets for the western systems.

Setting garrison levels, telling invasion to load troops and end up at the capital...

Troop loading is a breeze with the garrison feature. No more worrying about colonies being stripped bare.

Setback in phasers, crash research in component prefab. You win some and lose some. Both in research, and in colonies.

The Zygirea Hive offer peace if we give them Teecorc, the contested colony in the Shadur system. We could get all their money alongside it, but.. nah.

2132.02.06. Reporting is sloppy. We ponder why the money level is so low, and remember we ordered 18 destroyers for battle 3...

Battle 1 and Battle 2 starts prowling for mining station and small fleet kills, while the 4 ship 23rd fleet also is mine hunting in yellow non colony systems.

The Pirate Capital returned to Yaselur and ate our defense fleet. Since the system seems dangerous for ships, we hire some more troops as garrison and give up defensive fleets there for now.

2132.06.12. Combat targeting is done.

We find another Gizzie colony very near the left of the ones up north. Battle 3 heads over, Invasion stirs. This is _very_ close to the green pirate base of many map images.



The sneaky yellow goes through or rather pathetic (non existing) long range scanner cover, and attack Yaselur 2. The defenders are hiring troops, but have no fantastic strength. Invasion sets course, as does the defensive fleet at Kuristar. Battle 1 and 2 are headed for Kuristar after doing refueling trips.

1% natural quality gain for Ikurro 1. Nice!

92 vs 114 at Yaselur 2. We have to make sure the fighting ships arrive before troop transports, but this could go our way.

As the incoming fleet lands, and invasion is just outside, it is clear defenders will in (we get space control) 90 vs 67. Invasion turns to join battle 3 up north, with a refuel stop on the way.

A sizeable fleet lands to kill Aldai Mining Station in the capital system. Battle 1 just arrived, and the tiny defense fleets jumps to the rescue. they disappear with the mine intact, a few ships short.

2133.01.28. The invasion if Yaselur 2 is defeated by the garrison. The space control of Def Kuristar helped in the later stages, but was probably not required. The missing bonus for the attackers (that left) could be key, though.



Map update. We see another gizurean colony in the south. It is the Haakonish that has the brown colony on the left, a site we wanted to colonize with the mortalen. Our advisers want to trade sanction them.

We can see Battle 3 at the top, they have busted a spaceport attempt and a pirate mine. Invasion is above the capital, heading for a gas mine just outside the green circle. Battle 1 is at the capital, Battle 2 is retrofitting at Kuristar. We have probably killed most mines in the capital circle that are not in the capital itself.

Just moments after this image, we get their operation map, and prefabrication compeltes.

We add Accelrated Construction so that we can build resupply ships. We queue Advanced Maneuvering that just lacks a tiny bit after some agent action, Enhanced Engines, and Enhanced HyperDrives.

The operation map? Is that a better image? nah, it is chaotic.

24th fleet. 15 ships, 0 troops, blockades a mine up north.
They have rebuilt the gas mine in Durog SW of Kuristar, barely in yellow now. The fleet at Yaselur is on the task.
There is a gas mine NE in the yellow circle, Battle 1 is on attack vector.
Another gas mine at the very right edge of their capital circle. The 23rd leaves Kuristar to visit that.
They have started a small spaceport at the lower of the two top colonies, 69 unbuilt. Two destroyers of battle 3 attacks.

The research breakthrough makes a 400 size cruiser available. Destroyers at 287. We order 8 cruisers at Ikurro, without further plans for them. The system is a tad lightly defended since Battle 1 went mine hunting.

We get a free trade agreement with the Mortalen.

Battle 3 heads to refuel at the same mine where Invasion is about to refuel.

We order a small spaceport to Tapoi. It is a good advisor suggestion, as we doubt the attack will come here, and we got some defense. This spot actually has Securan main population.

Battle 1 takes a bad beating by ships present at the gas mine (but defenders are worse off). Those 8 cruisers will fit right in.

The wimps at Teecorc is worried about the larger colony in the system and refuse to pay taxes. Like they paid any in the first place.

Invasion tries to capture stuff alone while Battle 3 refuels. Let's hope the blockading fleet further north does not show up...

Something reveals a strike fleet at the lower of the two northern, invasion attack the upper.

2133.09.07. The attack on teecarc finally happens. They offer peace again in trade for the colony.

As we invade Spetoo (northernmost), they they conquer Teecarc.

Again they attack a capital mine and leaves before damaging other than shields. Fuel issues?

The fleet from the lower upper colony, visits invasion in the neighbor system. We try to jump in one direction for later turn around and attack the colony to the south.

2133.12.18. We have taken over Spetoo, as transports close in on Virdanth 2 just below.
They drop their load, lose one empty transport to the fleet following them, and heads to refuel.

Celebrations! Durog, the system in the lower left corner of the gizurean capital circle is no longer that. It is at the very rightmost edge of our capital circle. Kuristar is also closing in on it.
Our capital now has the higher population. They maxed out early, we are getting there (but not maxxed). The rubbing capital circles bring resource issues (less systems under control). Now we got a very nice mining system with good strategics and some luxuries. The caslon source they love will be handy enough for us, there are not that many sources in our area.

The galaxy map on caslon, notice that the yellow half on top is soon green. The caslon at the lower green/red border just became ours. Also, it is not so bad for team yellow as indicated, we did kill two mines on the right end of that big circle. The explorers were probably chased away. They also got 2 or 3 in the capital system.



It is better than the dots indicate, as some (like our western one) have two caslon planets. We were not thrilled about pirates killing mines, among those two caslon ones.

We have a new hightech base just outisde that brown (haakonish) circle SW. We try a resort base in the system south of Yaselur (our now SW colony).

Battle 3 has refueled and heads to the invasion target. Single destroyers head for the 3 other systems in that yellow area, as we want to spot mines. The system north of our new colony holds a large pirate spaceport, and another one is not too far off to the right of this area.

Battle 2, ready at Kuristar, heads off to a caslon source in their capital system. 19 destroyers, which are by no means invincible.

2134.03.06. Virdanth 2 is ours. The southern of the two up top. A fresh 70% colony with some volcanic stuff. The one north of that, Spetoo, is 92% and also got some volcanic stuff.

Tapoi (west) is attacked by a pirate destroyer from Dark Transport. They have been pretty quiet for a while, apart from that capital annihilating our fleets. The spaceport is not done, and the defenders are in the outskirts chasing some explorer. That does not prevent them from killing the offender before he does harm, though.

To celebrate, Tapoi has a giant quake, reducing qualtiy to 63%.

A pirate capital looking quite lot like the previous one, but owned by others, attack Spetoo, our new northernmost conquest.

Battle 2 kills a gas mine at the cost of 4 destroyers. We did not pay much attention.

2134.04.26 (not sure exactly when this is compared to the above). The Mortalen empire is no more. No more friends for us. The opportunistic Naxx are the guilty part.

We verify that our new northern belongings only got pirate inventory, and suggest a peace. They accept.

It is 2134.06.01, and we are at peace.

Status



The current galaxy map. The known galaxy with pirate bases highlighted. That north part is a pirate nest.

The empire is a nice area, and the two in the north. Shadur is gone, both colonies conquered, but swapping those with the two in the west is a good deal. We lost the Mortalen colony in the south to the Naxx, that does not hurt a lot either.



Not looking shabby. The Mortalen are gone.



We lost two "poor ones" and a new one.
We gained Yaselur 2. very nice.
Beta Kapolla. Not a lot of income, but resources.
Spetoo. Potential, but hard to defend in war.
Virdanth 2. Meh, but has lots of caslon in its influence area.

Sollost, Ikurro, Kuristar and Yaselur are the main ones to not lose. Tapoi is down from 82% due to a quake.



More mines. More ships.



But still the economy is just fine. 6% population growth on the capital is nice when there are 17000M there. It is the top colony among the ones known to us.

We are short a weapon research base, rebuilding...

A fleet reform is probably an item for the next episode.

Edit: Evil line breaks gone (a lot of them)

< Message edited by Bingeling -- 5/20/2013 8:50:41 AM >

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 24
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/20/2013 1:41:38 AM   
Erik Rutins

 

Posts: 37503
Joined: 3/28/2000
From: Vermont, USA
Status: offline 		Exciting stuff, thanks for writing this up, Bingeling.

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(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 25
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/20/2013 9:28:22 AM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		I am a bit disappointed in the pirates, apart form one or two nasty capitals and the early rush. I guess they require a more quiet corner, and maybe it was too much competition in this area.

(in reply to Erik Rutins)
Post #: 26
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/20/2013 8:14:15 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		Housekeeping

The war has just ended, and it is time to consider the state of the empire. We are maybe no longer the upstart trying to keep pirates at a distance, but something resembling a proper empire.

Also, we got a 400 size cruiser design, and we need to consider defensive deployments. It is clear it is not easy to be prepared for everything. Core values should be protected, and recent conquests are more likely targets (in a new war), than systems that was "always" ours.

Good systems:

Ikurro - the capital
Kuristar - A very nice prospect of already decent population.
Yaselur - Will be nice, but is a recent conquest.
Sollost - Two good colonies once they have time to grow and Tapoi recovers after the quake.

Beta Kappola (up left) is also good in that it is the edge of this star cluster. We don't want anyone else here.

Defenses?

Ikurro 1: A rather pathetic 6 garrison, LSP and 3 defensive bases.
Kuristar 1: 8 garrison, and 6 other troops.
Yaselur 2: 10 garrison, 3 others. Stuff left after the conquest.
Tapoi: 5 garrison and SSP build.
Sollost 5: 5 garrison

Beta Kapola 1: 5 garrison, 5 other troops.

We garrison 5 on each of the northerners to stop some raids, and making future conquests of them more than an afterthought.

Plan?
Some space defense on Yaselur, 10 troops om Kuristar and Ikurro... Maybe a defensive base or three for Kuristar.

Ships

Maintenance cost and performance is key.

Ramadi VII - destroyer. 1136 maintenance, 89 firepower, 480 shields, 15 armor. 13 cruise.

Mashhad II - cruiser. 1602 maintenance, 110 firepower, 840 shields, 25 armor, 9 cruise.

Slow, slower...

The other difference is range, now shown on the design. 3.4 vs 5.3 sectors to the cruiser's benefit. They can better "move - shoot - move" over distances.

I think the destroyers are better for defense, and cruisers better for attack. Even if both are slow for defense. Frigates have too low firepower, anyways.

The maintenance difference is not huge, durability difference should be significant.

If we want 12 cruisers for three battle fleets, we need 28 more. At 4000 a piece. That is a hefty sum considering 171k cash, so maybe a bit over time.

78 destroyers is certainly enough for defense... Having defensive fleets to stop a proper attack is futile, unless it is a main battle fleet, anyways.

Bah, we want long range torpedos and phasers... And carriers carrying bombers... And armored troops for our invasions, and planetary defense units for our garrisons... Phasers are at 37%, and the rest is for the future.

Activity

It is 2134.06.07, and the war has just ended.

We notice that the capital is at max population, and hope that our 24 passenger ships are able to shift excess population to our other colonies.
They are a bit around the world, moving Securans to our areas (sollost), Mortalen from their old capital to Yaselur...

We eye the two large pirate spaceports around our new northern colonies. Those will require significant forces to bust, and are not extremely accessible. We have a lot of possible fuel sources in the arae, but can mines survive? Resupply ship research is at 25%. The black rock base that is closest does not look that powerful, but they got a capital ship that can probably eat most of battle 3 alive, before making its laughing escape.

We book 18 cruisers, which should give us two 13 ship fleets or whatever. 18 is the number you get when you want to add to your 8 cruisers to obtain two 12 ship fleets, and do a quick and wrong calculation.

Yaselur 2 gets a SSP project. Let's hope the pirate capital does not show up for a while.
Tapoi has 38 unbuilt on its SSP.
Beta Kapola 1 gets a SSP too.

That leaves money at 13k...

Battle 2 is almost at Kuristar with a repair order (to make it refuel, mostly). It is queued to go to Yaselur 2 in case that pirate capital returns. We assume the two similar capitals are two ships, but we are not quite sure. If it is the same ship, they were efficient in changing the owner, and getting it up north.

The troop transports of invasion are released and automated. We need more transports, but we also need more money. Which should solve itself with some time, as we have 36k cashflow before these builds.

Battle 3 is at our northern conquests, and heads off to bust some pirate mines found in its areas. Mines we found by single ship deployments before suggesting peace.

2134.07.02. The wekkarus suggest free trade. We got a new friend! We know of a colony of their's "down and left", 3-4 sectors away.

An adviser wants a 4th construction ship. We agree. We have queued 4 missions for each of our exiting ships. Not that we got serious shortages (apart from beta kapola complaining), we just benefit from a better selection and some backups. It will be assigned to build two gas mines in our new northern area, the worst tasks are left for the new boy...

We notice exploration ship count down to 7. They are a bit suicidal during war, it seems. We add 10 more.

2134.09.22. Trade sanctions from team yellow. We guess they need trade more than we do, so we really don't mind. They hold no grudges, but covet our colonies and stuff (-26). ((trade sanction at -3? really? Grumpy bunch)))

2134.10.24. Some intelligence dudes of sorts blow up the energy research station in the capital system (bonus site). We have to wait a bit to book a replacement due to lack of funds...

10k cashflow and 64k bonus income leave us relaxed, though, and this is after cruisers have been built. Battle 4 is created for 13 of the cruisers, the rest fill up Battle 1 that sheds its small ones.

The yellows soon do the same check that I did, and realize that they probably should not trade sanction.

2134.12.10. Tapoi spaceport is complete. Too bad Tapoi itself was ruined in a quake. It is recovering, though.

2135.01.22. Natural Harmony at Sollost 5. 1% natural quality gain. Nice!

Dark transport tries to raid Beta Kapola and fail miserably. They had that capital and no base, though. We give our best spy one year to gain their operations map.


2135.03.29. The department of human resources is shut down and manual control is taken. Why? We notice a red cashflow, and notice that our 39% colony income, 50% happiness governor has transfered to Yaselur 2. It may be that 90% population growth is not so needed on a full colony, but 39% income (and happiness for higher tax percentage) is better spent on the money machine. Especially when cash is 11K and cashflow -51K :) Cashflow to +8k on arrival.

2135.08.28. Our small spaceport builds have recently completed. The builds took a year, one of them had shortages. Yaselur 2 will start upgrade to medium once we get enough money.

2135.10.14. Long range scanners are available.

2136.03.22. Our agent returns with the dark transport operations map. We see 3 constructors stuck building gas mines in the clouds west and nw of our empire. A resupply ship is in Haakonish lands beyond that. And their capital ship far to the north, with order to raid a Securan colony.

Three fleets strike west to attack construction ships. They will at least scare them away and kill off the partly built mines. Another fleet queues up two gas mine kills. That is the defensive fleets of our 3 western systems, and battle 2 that was on a capital watch in Yaselur (alongside a defensive fleet).

We have spottet a Sollost Pillager constructor in the system of our gas mine north of the capital. Battle 1 and the capital defense fleet is on their way. Also with modest optimism.

If lucky the dark transport may surrender, and we get that capital :-P

Def Sollost is not lucky enough in their landing pattern, and the constructor escapes. They find a Sollost Pillager constructor and gas mine, though. More pirates to kill.

We was a bit late, but considering the amount of ships, we are hopeful that battle 1 and def Ikurro was more lucky. Those are a spent force, anyways.

Def Beta Kappola only got the mine too...

Battle 2 kills its constructor.

Def Yaselur do of course manage to kill its gas mines.

No capital ship for us, the pirates hang on to their pathetic empire.

Sollost 5 gets a small spaceport build as advisers wants to build a defensive base. It is the nicer one in the system, where Tapoi already got a SSP.

On pirates... We find some bases in the south, but we don't care about pirates not attackin us. If they mess with others, is is to our benefit.

We swap territory maps with our friends, the Wekkarus. They have 4 systems, the capital, one nearby, and a distant one on each side of that.

2136.12.06. Battle 1 was parked after its constructor hunt. Battle 3 is fueled and parked at the northern colony. The giz has forgotten a strike fleet at the colony south of that, but it would help in pirate defense, so we don't care. The two northern gas mines are done. Battle 1 moves to the northernmost colony where battle 3 is, they are dreaming of pirate bases.

Battle 1 has 13 cruisers, Battle 3 17 destroyers. Explorers visited the system to the north, and the capital was pretty much the local fauna.

As we see some red explorer in our gas mine system (north), a black rock transport flag pops up of thin air, when a constructor starts construction. Nice timing, that, looking at a random system when the flag pops. The new Battle 4 (cruisers) is sent from Kuristar to try kill the constructor, or at least the spaceport project. Battle 1 is closer, but they aim for their LSP once meeting up with Battle 3.

Battle 1 and 3 set sail for a rocky spot with a mine in the pirate system. They hope to get the capital alone before engaging the large spaceport.

The Sollost Pillagers returns where Battle 1 (and a defense fleet) tried to kill their constructors, and plants the first pillar for a new SSP (or whatever the first part of a spaceport build is).

Battle 1 and 3 finds a mine to kill, and spot some 10 ships, but no capital.



They are better at fighting than finding. A capital is in the mix after a while, at least.



The behemot takes damage as it tries to reel in 3 more victims. Soon only a white cloud of dust remains.

3 damaged destroyers, one badly (but with OK repair bot), none killed.



Focus is soon on the spaceport, where fresh ships with no shields tries to help the defense.

The shield drops fast, but 4000 shield takes a while. The defenders do some damage, but the base is vaporized. One cruiser is missing as they start mopping up mining stations and ships.

Once the system is cleared, they head for fuel, and a gas mine is booked to keep watch in the system.

Sinister Claw Clan, our sworn enemies raid Spatoo (the northern colony) as this happens. Their base is less than one sector to the right, and next on the hit list.

2137.10.26. Phasers are researched. This should be a decent upgrade over the maxos blaster. Armored troops are next (offensive troops).

2138.03.02. Battle 1 and 3 are refueled, and step half a sector to the right aiming for a gas giant in the next pirate system. That faction is continuosly making noise at our northmost colony.

2138.04.27. As if Virdanth 2 was not enough of a hole to begin with, the recent super volcano eruption did not make things better.

2138.04.30. Battle 3 lands at the chosen gas giant. There is no mine, and they spot 46 ships waiting in the build queue at the local pirate spaceport.

The locals come to greet them, and these boys got a different type of capital. Both fleets focus on that one.



The capital runs away early, at least 80% shields. Is it low on fuel?

The sound of explosions ring, but our ship count is still the same.



Soon attention shifts to the spaceport, where the capital is heading very slowly.

As the spaceport launches it fighters, we add point defense weapons to our list of wanted tech...

This one is more dangerous than the last one (more firepower).


A storm of epsilon torpedoes is thrown at the giant structure.

The capital lights up its hyperdeny, a bad sign when it comes to their fuel shortage.


The capital drags a cruiser in for the kill, while the spaceport shields are down, and it is taking damage.

As it explodes, focus shifts to the capital ship. It tries to escape, but only manages to jump a very short distance and is finished off.

2 more cruisers have been lost. The destroyers of Battle 3 manages to stay alive. This has been a major blow to a pirate faction that has caused us much grief.

Once the battle is over, Battle 1, 3 ships short, heads for the capital. Battle 3 splits into two pieces and becomes defensive fleets for the two northern systems. Battle 3 is no more.

We notice that we are researching advanced medicine, we cancel that, and start marshy swamp colonization, and queue longer range for our long range scanners.

An explorer checking the system of the last pirate base, sees their 7th fleet arriving at a gas giant that used to house a large spaceport.

The Gizurean are colonizing fast. We wait for a couple of colony ships (volcanic) for internal matters. Our gizzie colonies are not huge, and these builds take quite a lot of time.

2138.10.24. We have completed accelerated construction. We have not noticed anything about the Bakuras... Wonders cost 10000 maintenance now (or is it 20k?), but we try this at our capital. From earlier we have queued better vectors, thrusters, hyperdrives.

As the new defense fleet arrives at Spetoo, and chases away the pirate camping outside, we order a new small spaceport.

2139.01.16. Advanced Thrusters is done (engines next), and the Haakonish post trade sanctions. They don't like our style, and want our stuff. They give up on the sanctions soon enough.

2139.02.02. It is soon 5 years after the conquest of Virdanth 2, and the end of war. The Gizurean 25th Strike Force still sits outside.

2139.02.25. Our agent Gordas Dokari have researched enhanced crew systems for us. Thanks to the Dark Transport.

We may have given Black Rock Transport a blow, but we see 3 attempted spaceport builds of them. Battle 4 takes off from the capital to try to give them further blows.

Gordas Dokari is not satisfied crew systems, he has now completed Gravitic Weapons after a visit to the Naxx. This opens the route to tractor beams.

2139.10.14. A constructor reports it is out of work. How is resource status? Unfulfilled (planets having less than wanted)? Nothing. Lowest strategic store? Silicon at 37.5K.

2140.04.18. Battle 4 busting small, incomplete spaceports is not image worthy, but this is:



Now, will the development bonus offset the 20k (or 10?) maintenance? It certainly looks that way as cashflow somehow went from -25 to +100 (k).

Maybe not worth a photo, but repair bots recovering a cruiser from 58 damaged is news worthy. One of the two SSPs in the cloud hurt a bit.

2140.07.28. Armored troops is complete, and we start building an armored factory on kuristar 1 and ikurro 1. These are invasion units. We continue with research towards carriers (two techs).

2140.10.13. Free trade with the Ylex Technocrazcy (zenox).

2141.01.23. The gizurean declare war on the Naxx. I guess I am too peaceful to exploit this.

2141.02.11. Gizureans from Beta Kapola colonize Bacora 3 south of Kuristar (in our area). A 75% volcanic with aculon, emeros crystal and osalia. Yaselur 2 needs to finish 4 components to colonize a better target in our area.

2141.08.08. Gordas Dokari is our guy. Recently he completed tractor beams, now he also completed ship boarding.

Invasion fleet has been fancy, and unloaded/loaded at Ikurro 1 to pick up 4 Armored Units.

We book 4 more transports (and more armored troops).

2141.11.26. We have colonized Framisc Yagin 1 in one of our traditional mining systems. A 99% volcanic with 3 typical volcanic resources. We add SSP builds to our two new colonies, and have already upgraded two more spaceports to medium.

The economy was balanced for quite a while (with the odd retrofits and spaceport upgrades), but has been booming lately. 339k cash, 98k cashflow, 93k bonus income.

Revolution

Our neighbours are boring and don't declare war. We order 26 new cruisers for 2 battle fleets. We order 4 troop transports to add to our existing 8.

Resupply ships were the reason we went for accelerated construction. Maybe buy one? Yeah...

We realize we are too peaceful, and hand the diplmacy department over to our advisors (automated).

A reason for boring neighbours may be our too good ambassadors, the gizzies freaking love us? We realize we rather send our ambassadors somewhere we want friens, even if one of them have a 10% counter espionage bonus (that maybe works?).

Status

This has been a peaceful episode, with lots of mine building, some pirate busting (including nice battles), and spaceport building. All colonies got a spaceport, or has one under construction, and MSPs are done in all 3 western systems.



The galaxy map, with pirate bases. We have killed a lot of pirate stuff among our northern parts.
There is one secotor to the left, right, and 3 at the bottom that are not included. This excludes one wekkarus and one sluken colony, and one pirate base, all at the bottom.

We can see that the Gizureans can build colonizers fast. They breed well...



Diplomacy. Advisors wanted mining rights to the zenox, so why not? Building mines is boring, so outsource the work...

Short stats from the comparison charts.

Population: Gizurean, Teekan, Naxx, Ikurro, Haakonish. Those are the large ones in that order. The top 3 have some significant lead.

Naxx lead on territory, they must have a lot in the south by my eye measure on the galaxy map. We are 6th with the Quameno adding themselves among the top ones.

Economy. We are third behind teekan and haakonish. Giz and nax follows.

Strategic value. giz leads before nax, and us almost even with nax.

Military Strength. We are 2nd behind nax, and that may not include 26 new cruisers.

Top colony? Ikurro 1. I am amazed that I got the wonder.

The teekan are among the big guys. And we don't know of a single colony of their's (left side, right side, bottom...).



Kuristar is in the works, but still not there. It is far from useless, though. Spetoo, the most northern colony is not bad, and in the future, I bet Framisc Yagin 1 will be lovely, as I believe in quality percentages.



26 cruisers and 4 troop transports have just been ordered. The mine situation is so good, I think I have an idle constructor or two... Or they are building luxury stuff somewhere.

I was puzzled at 3 resort bases. I remembered two. One just south of Yaselor, and a new one far north that could serve the Haako capital (I was bored). It seems I have two resort bases on the same planet, and both have visitors. Go figure.



26 cruisers are not free, that is where the money went. 2 defensive bases were added to Kuristar 1 recently.

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 27
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/20/2013 11:40:51 PM   
ASHBERY76


Posts: 2136
Joined: 10/10/2001
From: England
Status: offline 		I am not really seeing any economic difference from Legends.140 ships with that much cashflow.Way too much bloat for that stage in the game.



< Message edited by ASHBERY76 -- 5/20/2013 11:43:56 PM >

_____________________________


(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 28
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/20/2013 11:52:04 PM   
Bingeling

 

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline 		This is normal home system and "hard", it can be much worse :)

I have played on, and don't have massive amounts of money, retrofits, some new ships, it keeps things stable (and a bit positive).

Thanks for the comment, it is nice to see signs of someone paying at least a bit attention :)

(in reply to ASHBERY76)
Post #: 29
RE: The Great Ikurro Territory - A Shadows AAR - 5/21/2013 12:58:16 AM   
feelotraveller


Posts: 1040
Joined: 9/12/2011
Status: offline 		Ah, Bingeling style.  Got to love it.  I'm quite enjoying the AAR since I prefer reading to watching (but wish I was playing...).

I was a bit surprised at the lack of speed of the cruisers.  What happens if they run out of fuel, will they ever be able to catch a refueling source?

(in reply to Bingeling)
Post #: 30
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