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Starsector 0.97a is out! (02/02/24); New blog post: Anubis-class Cruiser (12/20/24)

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Author Topic: Drawn-Out Battle  (Read 11395 times)

tchan

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #15 on: May 08, 2017, 12:54:06 PM »

LOL wow.  I haven't fought against that many Onslaughts before.  Wonder how long that battle will take?  :P
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Gothars

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #16 on: May 08, 2017, 01:29:24 PM »

Yeah, that's just what happens when you deploy a lone, slow capital ship. I mean, the options are 1) this, 2) AI getting totally suicidal, or 3) AI retreating without a fight. None are what I'd call "good". Possibly #2 would be better, though.

Question: aren't there any hooks in place that tell the battle commander AI something about the campaign context of the fight/how important it is? Because, for something like a first time transponder transgression an early retreat seems appropriate, while defending your home world from a "vengeful" enemy would believably demand greater sacrifices.
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Megas

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #17 on: May 09, 2017, 07:03:32 AM »

AI kiting and turtling is not limited to slow capitals.  It can happen even to fast, but not-too-fast, ships.  I tried killing Remnant frigates with Wolf or Medusa, but they have similar or better mobility, and their shot range is not much worse than mine, plus their shields can take enough hits before I flux cap with my flux inefficient weapons.  (I tried killing them with SO Lasher, but those with damage mods and no skills lack the flux stats to win the flux war.)  Trying to kill them with some high-tech ships is tedious.  On the other hand, I can deploy a Drover and murder them somewhat painlessly with Talon spam.  Even Tempest has an easier time due to Terminator drone.  (But if the Terminator dies too early, then it is about as hard as with other high-tech ships.)

This is why a little more than half of my fleet are carriers.  Nothing outruns fighters.  However, some tanks (usually cruisers) are necessary to capture points (carriers will not obey capture/control orders, only assault/defend), protect the carriers, and kill enemy ships that can destroy fighters easily.  In endgame, if I do not use Paragon to murder things, I use Legion and sic fighters at the problem while I blast something else.

Re: Death Fleet
That was the point of soloing the simulator.  If you can do that, you can probably solo such fleets.  Failing soloing the simulator, try to kill everything in the simulator with your fleet.

Before 0.8, character with skills was stupidly powerful, and the enemy did not kite and turtle as much.  Kiting started to appear in 0.72, but it was mainly limited to field boundaries.  Now, the AI always kite and turtle anywhere on the field unless there is an obvious advantage, then they swarm and go for the kill.
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Megas

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #18 on: May 09, 2017, 07:35:42 AM »

Speaking of kiting and turtling, I have considered deploying a disposable capital (e.g., Onslaught with Reinforced Bulkheads), hide in the corner, and wait until everyone loses CR.  Then, deploy another ship to sweep the field by killing every enemy with 0% CR.

This probably would not work with standard battle map size.  (I play with max battle map size so everyone can deploy as much as possible.)
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Giblodyte

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #19 on: May 09, 2017, 07:41:14 AM »

When I pilot a paragon I got frustrated by this too, BUT the solution for me was easy, just press 'X' and you will hold fire and then press it again when you're in range to unleash hell. You don't even need to worry about taking damage since the paragon has ungodly range, it outranges everything except REDACTED bases and has a lot of armour and HP.
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Megas

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #20 on: May 09, 2017, 07:52:37 AM »

When I pilot a paragon I got frustrated by this too, BUT the solution for me was easy, just press 'X' and you will hold fire and then press it again when you're in range to unleash hell. You don't even need to worry about taking damage since the paragon has ungodly range, it outranges everything except REDACTED bases and has a lot of armour and HP.
I do this too.  They need to get into your weapons range sometime.  As for battlestations, it is possible to outrange it.  It requires character with max Command & Control, Gunnery Implants, and Electronic Warfare; plus enough ships deployed to get the max -25% to enemy shot range (and hide them at the corner so they do not get shot at).  Beam Paragon needs Advanced Optics.  With everything, only Gauss Cannons have the range to shoot at your Paragon, and those can be shrugged off easily.  Paragon's HIL outranges the battlestation's enough that you can fire your HIL, but the station cannot do the same back.  It does not bother launching Squalls.  Aside from Gauss cannons, only Flash bombers can hurt your Paragon, but with nothing else firing, they too are insignificant.  The biggest threat is time, but you have plenty of time to strip enough sections before it becomes a minor threat, then you have all the time you want to pound shields and attack the Guardian PD sections.
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Linnis

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #21 on: May 10, 2017, 10:48:39 AM »

Now, the AI always kite and turtle anywhere on the field unless there is an obvious advantage, then they swarm and go for the kill.

Thats the problem, soemtimes they kite to wait for friends, but then when ALL off their ships are surrounding you, but they still try to kite and stay out of range... They might as well retreat at that point...
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Aratoop

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #22 on: May 10, 2017, 11:24:54 AM »

I have to say, I haven't really had an issue with turtling/kiting. It may be because my fleet is 75% >=destroyers, but I tend to find my fleet and the enemy's will engage along a battle line before the enemy eventually break and (try to) flee. However, I do try to avoid the enemy kiting by just having overwhelming firepower (especially the remnant ships).
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tinsoldier

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #23 on: May 10, 2017, 03:55:34 PM »

I have to say, I haven't really had an issue with turtling/kiting. It may be because my fleet is 75% >=destroyers, but I tend to find my fleet and the enemy's will engage along a battle line before the enemy eventually break and (try to) flee. However, I do try to avoid the enemy kiting by just having overwhelming firepower (especially the remnant ships).

I haven't really had an issue with kiting ever since I got a bunch of fighters.  They are kind of a necessity.  The Remnant Lumens will kite you all day long, it's the worst.
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sotanaht

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #24 on: May 11, 2017, 04:31:40 AM »

AI simply kites and turtles constantly now, not just boundaries.  My cruisers routinely run out of peak performance in endgame battles because the AI on both sides are so cowardly.  They only engage when they think they have an advantage.  Fights are much longer than they used to be.

I have now resorted to doubling combat speed via settings (i.e., permanent global time shift for all).  I am seriously considering cranking that up to triple speed.  Double speed still does not feel quite fast enough at times.

How do you do this?  Are you modding a setting file or something?
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Megas

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Re: Drawn-Out Battle
« Reply #25 on: May 11, 2017, 06:40:41 AM »

There is a line near the top of settings.json.  I forgot what it is, but it is there.
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