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[Flying Birdy]

1 ship wont make too much different in a huge battle, like 20 vs 20 ships.

A player-piloted ship is so much more powerful than an AI one. I simply don't see how it's possible to play the game without personally piloting a ship and destroying 10+ ships per battle. Like half the time my AI controlled fleet is just my cannon fodder, stalling for time while I pick off the enemy. And even if the AI is capable of taking down an even weighted enemy, half the time its not worth it because the AI takes too many losses over a long fight. Better to just pilot a battlecruiser and do 80% of the damage while cheap disposal frigates stall for time.

[Big Bee]

I don't pilot ships manually because I despise the controls but generally I just try to build ships well with good flux stats and balanced weapons with similar ranges.

Usually I just make my smaller ships escort my bigger ones and give those elimination orders targeting enemy ships of the same size (or have like, several cruisers target a battlecruiser or something idk), then adjust orders as needed.

[Plantissue]

The obvious answer to how to fight battles is to actually fight the battles? Difficult or not doesn't change anything. Whether personally piloting or giving commands, both are highly effective and will give a massive difference to the course of the battle. I've played games where I've focused on either styles and there nothing that prevents you from doing both either as you can pause the game any time you like.

It really depends on the type of flagship you got. If you are commanding from a carrier then might as well set it to autopilot and give general orders from there, like getting PD ships to escort and so on. You will still need the command system and applicable use of it anyways when it comes to fighting rem ordo's.

The player flown combat ships and the like are much better though, and the AI cant appropriately use certain ships like Ody or Zeno so its worth it to learn how to pilot your own ship.

I would consider a carrier as the best choice of a personally piloting a ship if you don't have combat skills, outside of a capital or phase ship. It's is also very easy and lax on attention. Equip bomber type fighters, keep to about 2000 distance to be safe from most threats, but near enough for quick bombing runs, can be closer if you are more attentive or behind a line of blocking ships. Press Z to toggle fighter engage off, press R to target a ship and press Z again to choose the most opportune time to strike. This being when the missiles arrive, the target ship is under fire and about to withdraw as the AI doesn't seem to respond in time to bomber strikes. This, I find, is far more effective than any other style, short of phase ships or capitals for big battles. You don't even need the carrier player skills as you aren't taking repeated fighter losses.

The only thing you have to be wary of is to not get too close, say about 800 distance as that seems to muck up the bombing animation of some bombers. The closer you are the better, as your bombing rate greatly increases.

[Serenitis]

"Flagship first" still works for large battles, although it takes a little more effort now deployment limits are affected by objectives.

Battle starts - deploy only your flagship.
Immediately press <G> and check how many of your combat ships you can deploy - if it's all of them (or enough for you to be comfortable), close/cancel the dialog and hold <C> to stop your ship where it is. And wait.
If you want to be able to deploy more ships, use your flagship to capture the nearest objective and hold position there.

The enemy will spend some time capturing the other objectives, and eventually approach you.
Since you only deployed 1 ship, the force they send will be mostly frigates and dregs which can be dealt with quickly.
As you destroy thier ships they will deploy more, and when you get a decent amount of opposition start deploying your own ships.
This will force the enemy to decide which threat to face, and get punished no matter what they choose.

This works best when your closest objective is dead centre, as your incoming ships will appear right on top of the enemy.
The ones off to the side need some degree of caution to work, as your flagship will be cut off from reinforcements until you can defeat your local oppoistion.
If you're facing too much opposition to keep control of, deploy all your ships then let the enemy take the objective. It's done its job and doesn't matter once your ships are out.

The key is to stay somewhat near the bottom-centre of the screen, or at very least the bottom so your reinforcements are closer than thiers.
And you can surround and defeat their advance forces while thier reinforcements are still travelling.

[db48x]

- you don't know the current ECM/nav rating unless you're piloting a ship

Yea, I’ve noticed that.

- you cannot issue orders to multiple ships simultaneously

Did you never try dragging to box–select multiple ships? Or holding down shift and clicking to select multiple ships? These are pretty standard actions across all GUI systems, so they should be familiar to you.

- most orders seem to be "fake": for example Search and Destroy is just the default ship behaviour so what it actually does is exempts the ship from other global orders, and ordering to take/hold an objective seems to just be a move command

It’s more subtle than that. When you create an order to take an objective, ships will be assigned to it automatically as long as the order exists. The number of ships assigned to it will vary based on how many enemies are visible in the area.

Once the objective is captured, the order changes into a “defend objective” with similarly automatic ship assignment. The main difference is that this order will sometimes be assigned zero ships, if no enemy ships are near enough to threaten the objective. This frees up ships to work elsewhere.

- there is no way to adjust general ship behaviour outside of two extremes(full assault/full retreat)

Don’t forget about the ship captain’s personality. This can have a huge effect on how well any particular ship performs. Some ships are designed to be most effective when run by a captain with a particular personality.

- no "keep formation" order or at least "keep together" - you can use the move command but that makes ships bunch up and block each other's line of fire and leashes them to a location which can be bad too

Select one or more ships and right click on a ship of your own, or use the light/medium/heavy escort orders. The selected ships, or a dynamically chosen group of ships, will guard the target ship. Same with attack orders if you right click on an enemy ship, or put attack/strike/eliminate orders on them.

- no orders relating to overall strategy - charge down the middle, work on flanks, prioritize one flank, charge, give ground(I guess that's more general ship behaviour) etc.

Use attack position orders for that. This saves the game and the ship AI from having to understand where the flanks are on the battlefield, or where the center is. Just click on the appropriate spot on the battlefield and give it attack or defend orders.

[BCS]

Did you never try dragging to box–select multiple ships? Or holding down shift and clicking to select multiple ships? These are pretty standard actions across all GUI systems, so they should be familiar to you.

When you select multiple ships the order icons disappear and keyboard shortcuts for them stop working.

Don’t forget about the ship captain’s personality. This can have a huge effect on how well any particular ship performs. Some ships are designed to be most effective when run by a captain with a particular personality.

I shouldn't have to put a cautious officer on a ship to make sure said ship fires its weapons at maximum range.

Select one or more ships and right click on a ship of your own, or use the light/medium/heavy escort orders. The selected ships, or a dynamically chosen group of ships, will guard the target ship. Same with attack orders if you right click on an enemy ship, or put attack/strike/eliminate orders on them.

All that does is create a traffic jam and causes the escorts to get in the way and block fire.

Use attack position orders for that. This saves the game and the ship AI from having to understand where the flanks are on the battlefield, or where the center is. Just click on the appropriate spot on the battlefield and give it attack or defend orders.

Sure I can do almost everything I want(well, whether the ships obey is a different story) with a dozen move orders and waypoints but the command point limitation was introduced to specifically prevent excessive micromanagement. "It's not an RTS" I believe someone said?

[Thaago]

If orders are issued at once (before a little timer ticks down) then they only cost 1 point. And the game auto-pauses when going into the tactical screen.

[Voyager I]

To answer the question directly: difficult fights are balanced around the player using their superior human judgement to have an outsized impact on the battle. This actually starts on the campaign layer, with players having more optimized fleet compositions and ship loadouts compared to the autofit grab-bags fielded by the AI, such that your ships are pound-for-pound superior to the enemy. In the battle itself, you have a better ability to see the 'big picture'. The AI has pretty sound tactical judgment in terms of engagements between individual ships, but it doesn't do more advanced strategic planning like "avoid their anchor ship until we've cleared out its support, then converge when it's exposed" or "aggressively hunt down their carriers while keeping their main line engaged". On the level of piloting the flagship itself, the human is generally better at making risk assessments that allows you to make decisive actions that an AI pilot would be afraid of (or misjudge and die attempting). A well-positioned human ship is enormously more powerful than the same vessel in AI hands.

All this is just comes from decision making. If you're an arcade keyboard maestro there are some ships that let you do hilarious things on top of all this, but you can still beat the game comfortably sitting in a giant brick of guns and putting it in the right spot.

I've never understood why anyone would go AFK during battles in this game.  They're the main selling point.  They're almost universally the top reason people like the game.  Tricking out an awesome flagship is one of the biggest goals of my fleet development.  Taking it into battle to shred my foes is the second.

To be fair, I have found that the AI can make better use of multiple turrets and gun groupings than I can on larger vessels, if I'm piloting a capital I'll take control to get it into position and to take out key targets but otherwise I'll let autopilot take over and let the AI autofire for me.

There are indeed some mechanical limits to human interface that the AI isn't restricted by. You can only directly control a single weapon group, and you probably can't manage an omni-shield at the same time. Thus, more complicated ships will typically require delegating some tasks to the AI even when being flown by the player, but you can give the AI some guidance. Autofiring guns will prioritize your selected target. Normally I use this to make sure everything is focusing my primary target, but you can also do something like target a frigate attempting to flank you so that your secondary batteries ward it off while you continue to engage your main target with the big guns, or give the AI full control of the weapons while you manage the shields if you're being pressured from multiple directions. Pressing CTRL+[Number] will toggle autofire for the corresponding weapon group, which you can use to manage flux levels if you have your groups set up to facilitate it (ie turning off your HE / Ion weapons while you're trying to break shields).

[Ahueh]

In (sort of) the spirit of the original post's question, does anyone mind posting their fleet comp vs Ordo's? I usually start encountering Radiants before I have a colony printing whatever ships I want, so I'm at the mercy of whatever I can find. I recently had a Conquest, Onslaught, and a few various cruisers get demolished by a Radiant and a bunch of brilliants. The only ship I've found that reliably holds the line vs Ordo's is the Paragon. I guess I could tailor specifically with solar shielding, etc..

[Hiruma Kai]

In (sort of) the spirit of the original post's question, does anyone mind posting their fleet comp vs Ordo's? I usually start encountering Radiants before I have a colony printing whatever ships I want, so I'm at the mercy of whatever I can find. I recently had a Conquest, Onslaught, and a few various cruisers get demolished by a Radiant and a bunch of brilliants. The only ship I've found that reliably holds the line vs Ordo's is the Paragon. I guess I could tailor specifically with solar shielding, etc..

What type of fleet are you looking for?  What's your playstyle?  Focused on piloting your flagship, top level order Admiral?  Mixture?  Do you like the idea of a line of tough slow ships or more of a fast wolfpack?

I will note, you'll want to be hitting the 240 DP deployment limit when taking on a full Ordo.  Also, a way to grab defense points quickly to get your deployment limit up to 240.

Here are a couple campaigns save files I have (ignoring unique campaign ship configurations) and the fleet configurations as they are saved (so I may have been doing a bit of experimenting, but nothing too crazy).

Campaign 1: "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em"

Character: Combat Endurance, Impact Mitigation, Field Modulation, Target Analysis, System Expertise
Wolfpack Tactics, Crew Training, Navigation, Gunnery Implants, Energy Weapon Mastery, Electronic Warfare, Flux Regulation, Cybernetic Augmentation, Neural Link Automated Ships

Combat Ships: Radiant (Quad Autopulse, Plasma, Quad Typhon, 2x Ion cannon, 2x Burst PD) acquired from from Red planet quest, 2 Odysseys (Plasma, HIL, Hurricane, Sabots, assorted small guns), 6 Hyperions (SO, Heavy Blaster, Ion Pulser, Heavy Machine Gun)
Logistics Train: Atlas, Prometheus, 2 Revenants

Relies on transfering from one of the Hyperions to the Radiant at the beginning of the fight, and relying on superior human sense of positioning and timing (when to fire off a quad reaper salvo).  There's no real "holding the line" with this composition but more of an amorphous set of distractions which the Remnants can't quite pin down while the Radiant comes in and just annihilates one ship at a time.  Probably the strongest go in and just smash non-unique ship setup I've been using recently.


Campaign 2: "Old School or New School? Why not both?" or "Is Neural Link any good without a Radiant?"

Character: Combat Endurance, Impact Mitigation, Field Modulation, Target Analysis, Missile Specialization
Wolfpack Tactics, Crew Training, Navigation, Gunnery Implants, Flux Regulation, Phase Coil Tuning, Neural Link, Field Repairs, Ordinance Expertise, Polarized Armor

Combat Ships: Onslaught XIV (start in this one), Afflictor (neural linked), Onslaught XIV, 2x Legion XIV, 2x Medusa, 2x Hyperion, 2x Scarab
Logistics train: Atlas, Prometheus, Revenant, Phaeton, 3x Shepherd

This was an attempt to figure out how good Neural link was, and I was focusing on jumping between the Afflictor and the Onslaught.  Used a low tech capital core, combined with high speed and reasonably killing high tech frigates/destroyers.  It was cute, but I'm not sure it was that much better than just sitting in the Afflictor 100% of the time.  Afflictor in player hands with a fleet to distract is quite strong.


Campaign 3: "I like piloting an Odyssey"

Character: Combat Endurance, Impact Mitigation, Field Modulation, Target Analysis, Systems Expertise
Coordinated Manuevers, Crew Training, Carrier Group, Officer Training, Best of the Best, Navigation, Gunnery Implants, Flux Regulation, Field Repairs, Polarized Armor

Combat ships: Odyssey (with designated officer with Combat Endurance and Missile Specialization - I swap in combat to benefit from the extra missiles), 2x Onslaught XIV, 1x Legion XIV, 4x Enforcer XIV, Scarab, 5x Omen
Logistics train: Atlas, Prometheus, Phaeton

Not as strong as it used to be.  I'll sometimes deploy just the Odyssey, sweep a bunch of frigates and destroyers against an Ordo, then deploy the rest of the fleet to focus on the remaining cruisers and capitals (or retreat and redeploy).  To be honest, the line holders are too slow to pair with the Odyssey play style, and likely would be better with a more high tech wolfpack tactics line up with the Odyssey (similar to the first campaign except without the Radiant, but using this skill setup).


Campaign 4: "Losses?  What losses?"
Character:  Impact Mitigation, Field Modulation, Target Analysis, Ballistic Mastery, Missile Specialization
Tactical Drills, Crew Training, Carrier Group, Officer Training, Best of the Best, Field Repairs, Ordinance Expertise, Polarized Armor, Containment Procedures, Hull Restoration

Combat ships: 2x Onslaught XIV, 2x Legion XIV, Eagle, Fury, Afflictor, 2x Scarab, 2x Omen.
Logisitics train: Atlas, Prometheus, Colossus, 3x Ox Tugs (with 1 s-mod each)

All officers take Ordinance Expertise instead of Combat Endurance, since Best of the Best + Hull Restoration + Crew Training is already +30% CR.  You don't sweat ships getting blown up since you have Hull restoration.  This one is also a bit on the overall weaker side, but was able to beat the double Dorito fight, and take on a standard single Ordo.  Also have done versions where the core capitals stay the same (2x Onslaughts + 2x Legion XIV) but use enforcers XIV as the cheaper distractions instead of cruisers.


This list isn't getting into phase fleet setups, like the unique ship and/or Dooms and so forth, or the heavy fighter spam utilizing heavy d-mod Moras + Support Doctrine + Derelict Operations.

[db48x]

In (sort of) the spirit of the original post's question, does anyone mind posting their fleet comp vs Ordo's?

As I posted the other day, Luddic Path Brawlers are a lot of fun. Pick your favorite personal ship and then fill out the rest of your fleet with the brawlers. Properly outfitted, they will swarm all over everything like ants and kill them. Once three or four brawlers are attacking the same Radiant, it doesn’t stand a chance.

[db48x]

I will note, you'll want to be hitting the 240 DP deployment limit when taking on a full Ordo.  Also, a way to grab defense points quickly to get your deployment limit up to 240.

I must be doing something wrong. Usually the whole battle is 250 DP, with one side getting 150 DP (60%) and the other 100 DP (40%). I had to fight three Radiants last night and it only let me start with 106 DP, which was pretty annoying.

[Hiruma Kai]

I will note, you'll want to be hitting the 240 DP deployment limit when taking on a full Ordo.  Also, a way to grab defense points quickly to get your deployment limit up to 240.

I must be doing something wrong. Usually the whole battle is 250 DP, with one side getting 150 DP (60%) and the other 100 DP (40%). I had to fight three Radiants last night and it only let me start with 106 DP, which was pretty annoying.

On the main start screen, settings, settings (w) tab, what is your battle size slider set to?  If it's set to 400, minimum you should be able to deploy is 160, maximum 240.  Sounds like your slider is set to 250.  Even if that is true, you should be able to capture 2 comm relay defense points, or 1 comm and 2 of the other types (Nav or Sensor) to reach 150 deployment (comm adds + 10%, others +5% deploment).  But yeah, having some fast location claimers can make the fight much easier as you deploy an equal number of ships.

Given the various fleet bonuses are typically designed for optimal use around 240 DP of combat ships, increasing the slider to 400 and increasing your fleet to 240 DP may help.  If you're running a highly mobile fleet, putting avoid orders on Radiants while running around and eliminating support ships can help a lot.  Alternatively, if you've got a strong, slow line, keep your line ships together and use your player ship to distract the Radiants at critical times during the engagement (SO Hyperion with Ion Pulser + Heavy Blaster or an Afflictor with antimatter blasters can be good for this).

[db48x]

On the main start screen, settings, settings (w) tab, what is your battle size slider set to?  If it's set to 400, minimum you should be able to deploy is 160, maximum 240.  Sounds like your slider is set to 250.

I’ve played this game on and off for years and never noticed that slider. Weird! And thank you!

Even if that is true, you should be able to capture 2 comm relay defense points, or 1 comm and 2 of the other types (Nav or Sensor) to reach 150 deployment (comm adds + 10%, others +5% deploment).  But yeah, having some fast location claimers can make the fight much easier as you deploy an equal number of ships.

Yea, I was able to cap some points and bring in more brawlers, but of course I had to send in my slow Conquerors first. One of my Conquerors was far enough ahead that it took a bunch of hull damage from that first Radiant before the brawlers could catch up. It got back out of range as the brawlers arrived, but with no armor left it didn’t last long once the other two Radiants showed up. I should have been more cautious at the start of the battle.

[Sly]

You have several different types of orders available. They aren't ever really spelled out for you in exacting text, so you need to experiment and get a "feel" for them, so to speak.

The most powerful order you can give is Eliminate (select some of your ships and right click a target, or click a target and press C). Ships without Officers, or Officers with the Steady personality, will push reasonably hard to sink the target despite any personal danger. Without keeping a careful eye on their situation, if they run into trouble, they will be sunk themselves. HOWEVER: this order is useful if you want an aggressive attack on a single target, or if you cancel the order before your ship's situation becomes dire, you can apply pressure to the enemy fleet, deal some damage, and manipulate their formation (and yours) in meaningful ways. Keep an eye on your ships and cancel the order (click and press N) if they're overreaching.

Aggressive and Reckless Officers will take this order to greater and greater extremes, to the point that Reckless Officers will exit the nearest airlock without a vacsuit to fight a supergiant trinary star cluster bare-handed. For Timid and Cautious Officers, the reverse is true. Timid Officers will probably go into shaking conniptions at the mere sight of their tactical console, so you might want to avoid them unless you absolutely want a ship to stay away from even stray fire. YMMV.

Engage (click a target and press E) is a bit of a mixed bag. You essentially indicate a priority target in a group for surrounding vessels to engage, as well as making a lesser priority of any ships nearby your designated target. It's only particularly useful in battles of ships with equivalent size, because this order will pull in ANY nearby ships to prioritize that target, making them less likely to take initiative against a different target. This is a problem if you have a number of frigates or fast destroyers operating on the wings of a battle - their wings will be clipped. You can get around this by selecting ships that have received the order by selecting them and pressing S, to return them to Search and Destroy, but you might want to avoid that level of micromanagement, as I do. In summation, this order is best used when you have a growing tactical advantage in a specific area of the battlefield, want to prioritize a target, and don't care which nearby ships are assigned to the task.

Harass (click a target and press H) is useful, but potentially dangerous. A small, fast ship will try to flank and draw the attention of a more powerful enemy. It usually works as described, especially when frigates with mobility systems are assigned, but your harasser can find itself isolated or badly out-ranged and sunk if you don't keep an occasional eye on them. It's best used peeling slow, high firepower targets on the flank of the enemy formation away, so you can press the attack. Just remember that it takes time to execute, since if you press too quickly your target will likely divert their attention back to the larger threat. Also remember that your harasser will be very vulnerable as well.

The Avoid order (click a target as press V) will cause all ships to stay out of the firing range of the designated ship at the highest possible priority. This can be effective when used in limited fashion, such as during the beginning of a battle when a Capital Ship is lumbering across the battlefield. You still want to fight, but you want to avoid tangling with the firepower of that ship, so you give the avoid order and fight on the fringe. If you leave the order on for too long, though, you'll find your ships pushed to the edge of the battlefield and isolated - easy pickings for the enemy. Additionally, slower ships will eventually be caught up to and destroyed anyway, so subtle pressure, timing, and position are vital to monitor when giving this order, or you may find an unwinnable situation has developed before you realized what had happened. Avoid intelligently - don't simply ignore the target.

Fighter Strike is like Eliminate, except for fighters only. Carriers will still operate independently, but must stay within range of the target. Carriers are fairly intelligent to leave to their own devices ordinarily, but sometimes you want to execute a large bomber strike. This will accomplish that role, but you will need to have your carriers within similar starting distance to one another, or the timing for the attack will be sub-optimal.  Does what it says on the tin for the most part.

Escort target: Escorts will act as fire support and shields for the target ship. Ships with the Escort order are required to stay as close as possible to their target, severely limiting their ability to escape envelopment. For the most part, you will only want to assign an Escort to ships with poor ability to defend themselves (such as carriers), or some VIP depending on the circumstances. Technically you can create a "wing" using a central ship as a leader and assigning escorts to it, but be careful: the escorts' ability to evade fire will be very limited. But, in this way, it's handy for organizing a smaller force on the edge of the battle against a disorganized enemy - try chaining the escort commands together for mutual cover if you're concerned for their survival.

Defend: Whether giving the order to Defend a Target or a Position, most of your fleet will be assigned to the task automatically. They'll try to hold the position, but wont sacrifice themselves in order to do so. If overrun, they'll try to retake it again. It's like a very light version of Escort, so if you want to consolidate your forces in a way that's simple and makes sense, use Defend. Beware though, with all your forces clumped together, you can find yourself surrounded while your ships clog each others' firing lines while the enemy easily envelops and exterminates the ships on the edges. Defend will outright fail to work if you are completely outclassed by your enemy in tonnage. They'll just push through with superior firepower anyway, so don't use this order unless you really want to group all your ships together to be quickly exterminated by a much larger force. They wont thank you.

Rally: It's like a move order, except your units aren't mindless automatons. They'll absolutely go to the designated position as quickly as they can, but they'll still fight along the way and retreat if the position is in danger of being overrun, or if maneuvering would give them an advantage on nearby targets. Don't use this order to "push" into enemy formations, use Exterminate instead. It's really only useful for re-organizing the position of your ships inside your own lines, or pulling away from the enemy. Rule of thumb: Your ships will carry out this order reliably in any direction except towards the enemy they're in direct contact with. That means they can move (almost) laterally and in reverse. The possibilities here aren't limitless, but there's good utility here.

Retreat: For a variety of reasons, you might never give the retreat order. If you do, well, here you are: there's retreat, and direct retreat. They do what they say. Almost all of the time you wont want to use direct retreat, but there are instances when you might want to leave a slower rear guard (retreat) and the rest hit the gas (direct retreat). If a ship has run out of peak performance time, if the battle isn't close to over, you may want to order it to retreat. Saves you a bunch of supplies. Heavily damaged? Probably want to retreat. Repairs and d-mods are expensive.

On the tactical screen there is Full Assault and Full Retreat. Full Assault is Exterminate 2: Exterminate Harder. Give any order except a right click attack - or Exterminate - and you'll cancel Full Assault. Makes your ships as aggressive as they can possibly be. Great for cleaning up heavily outnumbered enemies. Potentially dangerous to the extreme if you don't have a big advantage. Full Retreat just tells everyone to bug out, simple as that.

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How can you use all of this most effectively? Well, it depends a lot on a huge number of factors. But there are a few simple rules I can give you that wont do you wrong:

1. If you have more ships, or a slightly smaller number of better ships, and you judge yourself to be in a good position: attack hard, show no mercy. Envelop them (a half-circle, try not to surround them completely most of the time), clump them up together, and don't stop firing until they're all slag. They'll damage one another as they explode and wont be able to fire past allies (unless they have missiles, which are limited).

2. When fighting against a superior force, try to separate them into smaller groups and destroy them. Divide and Conquer.

3. If you can't defeat their bulk of their forces, try to destroy enough for a Clean Retreat. It will allow you to disengage without being chased and save you a lot of money and trouble.

4. If you can't do that, then run anyway. It will be painful. Spend a story point on special maneuvers to escape before the battle if you can.

5. Save scum. You can't save a battle replay, so if you want to practice in a battle you lost under "real" conditions, save scum. Learn from your defeat, if applicable.

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Dunno if Alex is reading the thread, but if so: battle replays doesn't sound like a half bad idea. Having the option to save it to replay later for learning would be invaluable for Ironman, even if it didn't result in any XP.