First game musing and questions

from Stardock Forums

I'm halfway through my first game, and I'm enjoying it a lot. The AI is set pretty low, so I'm finding it pretty easy. But here's some questions.

1) What do I do with my military? I've got 3 Defenders on each planet, and a big fleet of Corvettes a few turns away (gonna wipe out one of the minor races). But this whole time I've been cranking out Constructors non-stop. I've got 5 starbases, all with several upgrades. It seems almost too easy.... am I missing something? Does this freewheeling era of spending pass later in the game when I get the bigger military spaceships?

2) My colonization strategy so far is to ignore all the 13ish systems and focus on making big, mega-planets. All my planets are up to 18 or 20 by now, with one way up at 28. In other games I've been burned by expanding too much and I end up with piddly, useless colonies that just drain my resources. Since territory doesn't seem to have much of a strategic value in this game, I find I'm not too focused on gobbling up every single planet that's 13+. Should I start?

3) I've completely ignored the Drengin and the Yor, but I've got four trade routes split between the Altarian and the Torians, but THEY are the ones that keep slipping towards Wary and Hostile in the foreign relation screen. Why aren't they warming up to me? They keep giving me tributes of money, yet they don't seem to like me to much. Why's that?

4) I'm missing the elements of strategic territory and choke points that are present in games like Civ3 or MOO3. I can see that it'd be very difficult to add given the way the map works, but it still seems to detract from the game when the whole universe is just a sprawl and I can travel unhampered almost anywhere on the map pretty quickly. :(

5) On higher difficulty settings, how much does the AI really change? I'm finding the other races are pretty much ignoring me, even though I'm about twice as large as they are... combined. With tougher AI, do they keep on ignoring me, or do they start interacting with you more? Who knew it would be so lonely in a crowded galaxy.
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Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top
On issue #3... I noticed in one of my games that I was getting real close to being able to make an alliance with one race. Then I started spending destabilization money on a different race, and suddenly my relationship with the first race started decreasing. After I (eventually) noticed this, I tried turning off the destabilization, and the relationship started going up again.

It could be that if races see you (through espionage) destabilizing other races, perhaps they start distrusting you...
Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top
I've found a marked difference in AI behaviour as diff levels increase. Low levels = cakewalk...
Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top
On even slightly higher difficulty some ofthis stuff your referring to drastically changes. On the like simple difficulty the AI is much slower to colonize planets so you can typically jump on a good chunk as a result.

On the higher difficulties your generaly lucky to get 3 decent systems.

I generally dont go for planets under QL 14 unless times are just really hard and I need another planet badly. I will take a QL 14 planet though as you can get them up to 17 or so fairly easy with a couple of the enviroment improvments.



~SDC~
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top
1) Keep an eye on your military. It's easy for it to roll over so you are going in the hole maintaining it, depending on your map size and available economy. The higher tech ships can cost "tons" each.

2) I tend to grab all 13+. Sometimes 10+, depending on the particulars of the map. Can be useful to have, depending on your needs and range. Each little world can help in the spread of the culture, after all.

3) No clue. I toss off those I like extra money and my overstock ships for cheap or free. This seems to work well. Haven't noticed espionage causing any problems so far... maybe in future games? Or maybe I'm just too new to notice?

4) I've found the AI focuses on bases with resource type it likes. With an occasional feignt towards another (softer) target nearby. This focused approach of its behavior creates an effective hard point in my games so far. I've seen it go world stripping, but I haven't seen it invade well yet. Maybe on the higher levels? I haven't cranked it up fully yet. Still earning my journeyman standing. ;)