Ps5 toxoids question

[Sarendalar]

OK, I'm not sure what happened here could someone maybe give some pointers or is there a bug somewhere?

The situation:

I just wanted to have a nice chill easy game (just got over covid and now have pneumonia:/)
So I started up with a toxoid empire on the easiest setting. I've not really bothered my neighbors, never started any wars, kept to myself going through the toxins arc. It's year 2392 and my in game had somehow switched to spiritualist from tech (learning psionics). Suddenly one of my little neighbors decides to make war on me. In a matter of minutes I got steamroller because for some reason he had over 150k worth of ships. It literally came in, took down my defensive ports with over 49k defense maxed maxed upgrade with 3 ion cannon plus 5 other platforms and my main planet with a ring, 2 more ion cannons and 3 more defensive cannons and literally wiped out my home sector that had over 30k worth in cruisers and battleships with titans and quite literally wiped everything out in 8 seconds flat.

Can someone help me understand WTF just happened and how on the easiest setting possible that in about 3 minutes, half my empire is gone along with all my forces that were cruisers, battleships an 3 titans? It's NOT like i was even playing with matches to get burned. I just want a nice EASY playthrough to get me past covid and pneumonia. Easy. Relaxed. Chill.

Anyone have any pointers on this? it's an Ironman game (for trophies, no saves) on all the default easy settings. It's like it took my nice "easy" game and suddenly flipped me to insanity mode???

Help?

 

[Bl4ckSh33p]

Hm as far as I know difficulty only affects the production bonuses AI gets. With enough time even the easiest Ai has enough materials to build huge fleets? But I'm not sure, it could be something else. (there are several bugs in the latest build)

 

[Sarendalar]

Hm as far as I know difficulty only affects the production bonuses AI gets. With enough time even the easiest Ai has enough materials to build huge fleets? But I'm not sure, it could be something else. (there are several bugs in the latest build)

OK, sounds like there might possibly be a bug, but I don't even know where. Though, I might have found out what happened.pretty much all the conclave fleets got bought out by the idiotic AI.... SOOOO....Got my bum trollstomped by an AI rofl

 

[Sarendalar]

Hm as far as I know difficulty only affects the production bonuses AI gets. With enough time even the easiest Ai has enough materials to build huge fleets? But I'm not sure, it could be something else. (there are several bugs in the latest build)

The AI bought/rented at least 8 different fleets :/

 

[Sarendalar]

Hm as far as I know difficulty only affects the production bonuses AI gets. With enough time even the easiest Ai has enough materials to build huge fleets? But I'm not sure, it could be something else. (there are several bugs in the latest build)

It also made it go from pathetic to superior that me in practically in instant. Is this kind of thing something that should happen?

 

[TheFuzzy1]

Same happened to me on a play through, early on my neighbors formed a federation and very soon I had a ridiculously large federation/mercenary combined fleet on my doorstep that wiped my fledgling empire. I have started to make sure my custom species especially any war focused mega corps are off if I’m not playing them to try to slow the flood of mercs. And to vote against any pro mercenary resolutions in the galactic community. It sadly is more difficult to use in your favor as it seems the other empires almost always buy mercs first and keep them employed nearly all the time, it looks like the ai prefers mercs to building their own fleets.

 

[Sarendalar]

Same happened to me on a play through, early on my neighbors formed a federation and very soon I had a ridiculously large federation/mercenary combined fleet on my doorstep that wiped my fledgling empire. I have started to make sure my custom species especially any war focused mega corps are off if I’m not playing them to try to slow the flood of mercs. And to vote against any pro mercenary resolutions in the galactic community. It sadly is more difficult to use in your favor as it seems the other empires almost always buy mercs first and keep them employed nearly all the time, it looks like the ai prefers mercs to building their own fleets.

For me it was really weird. I keep an eye on the contact list and every other empire was either the lowest raring or 2nd lowest rating vs empire strength then to get suddenly stomped into the ground made me so surprised with it literally coming out of nowhere. Is there a way to turn mercs off or down some?