That is not dead which can eternal lie (Strellaris AAR)

[Jynks]

Stellaris v1.03 (4816)

1K Galaxy / Elliptical / Ai : 30 /Advanced Ai Starts : 8 / Normal Difficulty / Any FTL / No Ironman​

: Mods @SteamWorkshop :

• Expanded Colours [120 New Colours]
  
• Flags : Emblems & Backgrounds
  
• Lovecraftian Name List
  
• Increased Research Window Size

The universe had changed. A subtle wrinkle in the very fabric of space-time travelled like a expanding bubble across creation touching all that were attuned. The ripple moved through space, through the dreamscae and across what never-was or could ever-be. It created life and took it as it altered reality in its wake. This rearranging once again brought Kadath into being and the Eldritch awoke. They knew they were called to their purpose and Kadath once again pulsated with terrible life.

The way would be prepared.

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.

2200.1.1 - Turn Zero

Well this is my 1st AAR for Stellaris. Some of you may know me form my DW and GalCiv AARs. I like to roleplay a little in these games, but... hey you didn't think I was going to write like the start the entire time right?! hehe... but I will add some flavour text here and there.

The AAR will be event based. I'll not be checking in constantly in such a verbose manner (I hope) and while this first post is an AAR Turn, the latter posts will be more about larger events as they happen, along with a few historical notes that might be important from what happens between posts. I'll name each section with the game as well as a thematic title.

Anyway, hope you like it and remember comments are the bloggers crack cocaine, so please leave advise and comments as I'd love to read them!

Rock on!
--Jynks

Starting Tech Choices

Physics : Some great options in Physics here. The obvious choice here is Blue Laser but I felt that based on my previous games that my fleet dosn't do much actual fighting for a while. The Shield is great as well but with out a power source it is a kind of a dead tech at this point. As I am playing a 1K map, I think that I couldn't pass up the +5% research speed. This is a great early tech which pays more the earlier you get it.

Society : This is one of those starting techs that forums members will fight over ad nauseam. Day Zero Colony research has many great plays, but as with my Physics choice I like the idea of some increased speed early on. I think that with the +5% research and bonus from Administrative AI added to the extra research points getting mined by upgraded bio labs basically means my Colony ship will not be delayed, or only a tiny fraction delayed and I am sure my economy will be much stronger. I am not convinced that auto-picking Colonisation turn zero is the best course of action. Lets find out!

Engineering: I could go for the Mining Network II for the same reasoning as the biolab and early game materials is a issue for me, but I'm planning on spending those creds on speeding up Society Research. At this point there is just not enough resources to use both these building upgrades at the same time. The only other choice here is the exoskeletons. While army damage is nice, the plus materials is the real reason for the pick

Chosen Techs

I got lucky with my Scientists. The Endless have the Venerable Trait so getting a Genius is the dream, but two maniacal scientists with a +5% in any discipline, who basically will be alive for the entire game... not bad. I have chosen to swap Yhagni and Hzi and put that +5% into use in Society research to clear out that biolab and hopefully to soon get colonisation back in the list.

Kagath : The Dreamed Sate

Kadath is not the best starting planet, though it is far from the worst I have seen. There is a decent energy output with 10 attached to the city adjacency. So that is pretty sweet. I always used to think minerals was the real problem, but energy is the physical resource I struggle with the most. The food spots should make feeding the Endless a easy task, and could lead to over feeding, freeing some slots latter on. In fact, I am starting to warm to this planet, I think it is a better start than I first thought.

Starting Governor

Governor Nct is a sweet starting governor as well. He has the Agrarian Upbringing trait so making feeding even less of an issue. He will be a great character to take on colonisation mission latter on to alleviate some of the pressure when producing food. Though we will be looking to move him from Kadath soon.

Emperor Z'Toggua

Finally our luck runs out a little. Remember we have the Venerable Trait so we are basically stuck with this most of the game for as far as I know you can not depose the Emperor and get a new one. The + Happiness will come in handy and the outpost cost reduction is nice, but the actual meat for this guy is in the War Demands.

Unfortunately ,they do not fit perfectly with the Eldritch philosophy.

Lovecraft stories are full of cults and other crazy religious people worshipping blindly these indifferent alien beings. In trying to replicate that in the game as much as possible we are going for a suboptimal slaver build. Out goal is uplift pre-sentients, infiltrate and co-opt pre-flt races, form protectorates and force vassalisation of other empires, not annex worlds to add to our own, not until they are true believers anyway. So he is a bit of a dud for us. We want to control the universe, not assimilate it and get most of them into our cult.

Turn Zero Actions

• Remove all the auto build ships and add in a skeleton version for each ship type.
• Start building a 2nd Science Ship
• Move the Mi-Go (Science Ship 1) to the only system in our starting build radius with a planet to directly survey it
• Set the Mi-Go to then survey the rest of that system.
• Making sure the Servants of Glaaki (Fleet 1) are set to passive I que them up to fly in and out of every system in my initial StarGate range.
• Set tile 13 to be cleared, freeing up a +2 Energy tile for latter.

Admiral Ghatn

Checking the Admirals I see a good one, so decide to hire him and assign him to the Servants of Glaaki. You do not really need a Admiral at this stage and can use the influence for a research boost or to save up for that 1st outpost. That being said I usually pick up an Admiral that has a nice evasion bonus. Ghatn's main job will be scouting stars looking for planets. Hopping in and then right out. With a nice evasion Admiral you can practically automate this process and que up a ton of things, for the StarGates allow fast warp outs is there is an encounter, though they may take a few shots. Hence why I feel an early evasion Admiral is a good pick.

 

[Eid3r]

Very interesting

 

[Jynks]

2204.11.27

The 1st thing is to get a healthy income of materials. Energy is also important but for now we want to get that material gain high so we can start colonising and getting out fleet to 10 Ghats. (Corvettes). We already set up the construction que during turn zero to build a new scientist as well. All we have to do is wait and see what is out there.

Emperor Z'Toggua has gone though its mitosis division to create a 2nd ruling spawn.

The spawnling is a much better choice for a latter ruler. Unfortunately with the venerable trait Z'togga isn't going to be going anywhere quickly. I'll have to look into if Paradox has included ways to remove the current Overmind with a new one or the next in line. Either way, +1 Influence is huge as is building costs of armies and ships.... much better choice in the long run for the Eldritch.

We find our first alien contact in the Sendron System. For now we are choosing to not research any alien contacts. We want to delay diplomatic communication as much as possible to enable us to grab as close to all the space inside out initial StarGate range. Also, it seams that you can research multiple alien contacts all at the same time for no extra time, reducing any delays on tech research.

The contact is a robotic mining crew. This usually denotes that the system has some nice resources as well as meaning that I can safely assume there is a Alien Culture close by that we will be in competition with for that station. Emperor Z'Toggua dose have a reduction to outpost costs, and we have our first goal. Though I am still prioritising materials.

The 2nd Mi-Go has been birthed and I go to recruit a overmind for it. I was hoping for a reduction to anomaly chance or survey speed but to my great joy I find a nice juicy Lythalla, who is a genius.

I assign her to the Society Research moving Hziu down to engineering. With two maniacal (+5% each) and one genius (+10%) I have a really strong science team that will last me well into the mid game. It is a shame that Yhagni has no traits to help in surveying, but she is Adaptable so the +15% Xp should mean that if we leave the anomalies alone for now, they will be easy pickings when she has a few stars.

We assign her to survey the entire home system, then que her to survey all he systems inside our boarders.

Our second Alien Contact, this time it is the space clams. Again, we choose to hold off any research so we can dump all the alien research tech into a single 180 day think-tank.

We survey our 1st habitable planet. Remember we have sent out our survey ship to any planets scouted by the Servants of Galaki and which have no hostile aliens. We did not set it to do the entire system, just the planet. Then shift clicking it to survey the next revealed planet. Once all the planets are scanned, we will set Xitalu to start surveying the entire systems, starting with the habitable planets.

Looks like a ok planet. It has a lot of food, so there is room to redevelop into powerful buildings and it dose have a 2 point energy token. Other than that it is a little sparse. Only 2 material deposits and it also has the Barren trait

​

So habitability is down a tad, and well, maybe we will need all those food sources.

The 2nd world is much more like it. Not barren and immensely rich in resources. There could be some food problems on this one though, but once we get a good habitat going this should be a great mining world.

Seamed like such great luck, but at size of 10 and hardly any natural resources (though research is nice) AND being inside our existing boarders, Scorom Ia is a very low priority planet to colonise, even with the Gia trait giving it 100% habitability.

Krant III is a good middle range world. There is a nice mix off resources and materials as well as a few research that will make it a good target for colonisation in the long run. Though at this time we would like to claim space, so it being in our boarders and most of the sweet tiles requiring clearing this is not a planet we want to grab early. We are looking for something good that will expand our boarders.

This dosn't look like it is but the Norgon System is just outside our boarders. Possibly it will get added to us in the 1st boarder range expansion, but it is hard to judge, I have waited for that before and still had the planets just outside. Unfortunately this is a poor planet choice for us. The thing is only 13 tiles, and nearly the entire surface is blocked and requiring technology research.

This is another extreamly good planet and a possible location for out future capital. I like to build my capitals on larger planets.. usually a 20 tile planet. This will mean it will always be under my direct control and be out of the sector system. By choosing a larger planet, you have more room to build all those ubr special buildings. This is right at the edge of my current range and there is little else around it. Also it will be slow to develop due to all the tile blocks.

Another nice large plant on the edge of our range. Like Tarazed this is in a prime position for grabbing the most space. Though it is so far away that I will need to put a station out, nothing is worse than having a planet in the middle of an alien territory. This is another good all rounder planet. Needs clearing but all in all this is the 2nd best we have found.

 

[Jynks]

Another alien contact, this time a alien squid thing. As with the other two contacts I have not started on the research so I can research all of them in a single time period.. after my colony ship is researched!

Our survey ships are finding all the juice about the place. A lucky 4 point material mine in my home system, which I was lamenting as it was nearly empty. At this early stage orbitals are an easy way to get your economy out of hand. I tend to go for 3+ at the very start. There are plenty of other spots for those creds early game. Energy stations are a different story as they have no monthly cost that I know of. That being said, energy is not an issue early game, so I'm trying not to over spend.

Two more mining robots are found around Clzar and Tazi.

I am particularly interested in Clzar. There is a Continental Planet here that is only 20% habitable to us without terraforming, but the region of space Clzar is in looks pretty lively. There are three systems in close proximity as well as a Singularity. This looks like a prime place for a outpost. The bonus is that there is an actual planet there, so if things are going very slow we may colonise that planet and get out influence back. If possible I try and place outposts in systems that have a planet in them.

Found another nice spot for a mining station. I'm still spending nearly all my cash on single items, and holding out a few months for a 1 energy to 3 materials worked out nicely. I would have found this by the time a less optimal 1:2 was 1/2 complete.

The Biolab research is done, Lythalia chooses to go for Planetary Unification as colonisation didn't pop. It should being the next list after this one. The extra influence point will really help us with our expansion efforts soon as we are starting to get a nice material pipeline into out coffers.

We had already cleared out the bio research tile, and built on it. The first action after gaining the level 2 tech was to upgrade and get that Bio Pool filling up as fast as possible.

Not soon after both the other Scientist also hand in their findings. Ymnar goes for the Orbital Energy Collectors to help with the growth of our fleet and cost of maintaining the orbitals which are about to start being spammed. Hziu has a harder choice. I do not think robots fit into the Theme of this civilisation. They are all about the manipulation of flesh and the worship of the great old ones.. more "body horror" and less "Terminator". Also, I'm not a big fan of the plate armour, I'll defiantly be aiming for shielding latter on. So my choice here is the Nuclear Missiles.

We have found a number of anomalies, but I tend to wait to research them until they are very low risk with my scientists at least at level 3 or more. There has also been the Habitable World special project but this is our first major arc chain quest. The investigation of the great and mysteriously vanished cyber race, Cybrex.

Lythalia finishes up Planetary Unification and moves onto Colonisation. The orbital habitat is tempting, but without the colonisation tech it is not really needed and there will not be any ground wars for a long while, with luck.

Using the spare point of influence Emperor Z'Toggua enacts the Sociality Research Growth Edict to rush colonies. Stacked with genius and the Research Speed +5% tech from before and we jump from 19 to 49% to our resource production, which is in turn boosted by our upgraded biolab.

Some pirate activity has flared up and I want to start to clear out those miners and place in my frontier orbitals. I usually prefer to wait maybe until the 2nd weapon tech before doing an upgrade but thought I would do it right away and get started. I like to mix lasers with rockets. I enjoy seeing the first volley firing off at the start of the battle!

The colony tech has finished and it is time for a hard choice. I feel the clearly best pick here is Colonial Centralisation which gives us and 5th influence point. Still I feel there there is going to be some rapid expansion soon as my economy can already produce colony ships at a decent speed. The Frontier Clinic is a good temporary building that gives the planet some breathing room in the early days. So I decided to get that instead. Still not 100% sure it was the best choice.

Well that is it! The initial steps are done into the universe and it is time to start seriously look at expansion. The sociology edict has been removed and I am back to 4 influence a tick. Next session I'll start clearing our the Xenos and with luck getting that edge of the Weeping Ghost Nebula into my kingdom.

... to be continued

 

[AKicebear]

I'll be following this too!

 

[Gregorovitch]

Can't wait for a further update on the adventures of a moluscoid body horror trip called Lethalla. Mercedes, your time is up I'm afraid

Damned enjoyable read.

 

[Deaghaidh]

Interesting that you didn't choose the tentacles Cthulluminoids.

 

[mjj55409]

This is great. I've been waiting for an AAR like this. I'm learning a lot.

 

[Jynks]

2213.01.06 : Ghatnothoa's Campaign of Cizar

So, we left the last save with the intent of starting our expansion. The first location we have our eyes on is the Cizar system. I think this looks like a good place to grab. The plan is to take the Cizar system with a outpost and then colonise the planet below it, Tarazed.

I move out my main fleet and have it set to auto attack. I want to make this a surgical strike and get it under way as fast as possible. I also send in a constructor and science vessel, both set to Passive. This is important as it allows you to have them in the same system as enemy fleets.

As soon as the fleet engages I get the Science Vessel to start surveying the system. Starting with the Sun. They are still out of system at the moment, so I am assuming the battle will be over, or near it by the time they arrive. Speed is the key here. I can not count the amount of times systems I have had my eye on a system only to get it snatched away form me at the last second when Aliens put up their boarders. You can start surveying as soon as the combat starts at the base. The Constructor I set to "orbit" the star for the same reasons, speed. Outposts are placed on the star and it requires it to be scanned.

The battle goes well. I only suffer minor damage to the fleet, and major damage to a single ship. Using the split command I select that one ship to head back to the Starbase for repairs.

Putting the fleet back into passive I attack command it into the space station. I do not want to enter combat with any Alien Civilisation during the outpost construction period unless I have to. I have seen them popping in and out. It looks like I may have to actually combat one of these guys.

Their fleet is more powerful. I have a number of reinforcements on the way from my Homeworld. I choose to research my alien communication tech for these aliens, cancelling it with only a few days to go. If worst comes to worst I can quickly complete it and save my fleet. The hope is that the Aliens can be held at bay by my fleet until the outpost is up, then quickly getting communications up will protect it from attack, at least for now.

The constructor completes, I instantly pause, bring up the influence screen and click Social Research Boost.

Now at +49% social and only a few days to finish getting communications up it powers through. To be honest I am not sure if the research bonus effects special projects, but better safe than sorry.

Communications are established in the nick of time, just as The Servants of Glaaki are valiantly defending the fledgling system. All hostilities are instantly resolved and their fleet leaves. Their commander commits suicide rather than order the retreat. This dose not bode well. Even so, I am extreamly happy with how the Cizar Campaign has gone.

 

[Jynks]

: Strengthening our Boarders :

During the Cizar Campaign I had been constantly building Ghasts every time the mineral count had popped and then sending them to join the Servants of Glaaki to join in the heroic effort of Admiral Ghatnothoa to hold onto that system. Now that we have diplomatic contact with the Tendra-Zhun we can ease off the corvette production and move into colonisation production so we can consolidate the ground hard fought for.

Colonisation can be a expensive thing.. so I use some creds to prepare a homeworld tile for energy production. I have a new pop about to come available as well. This next bit is more by chance than design, along with the spamming of power orbitals (and the occasional material orbital) I am exactly even on power consumption about 1/2 during the colony procedure. This is great news, as with the power only needing 1 more orbital to stay positive, and my material input decent, I can now spam colonies if I wish.

We head to Tarazed. This is a nice 19 tile planet. Not the best, but the best positioned. As the colony develops I hope to completely cut the Zhun out of my space.

Now it is time to look to the other large planet in the Yultup System (blue highlight). Admiral Ghatnothoa thinks that we could use the same expansion ideas as last time to secure this region. Using our Overminds reduction on outpost costs as a carrot, we will once again place an outpost (red highlight) and then colonies, with the hope that the boarder range will eventually close up making a nice solid wall against the Xenos. Once again there is the fear of interaction with another civilisation, though this time we have an upgraded and larger fleet. Admiral Ghatnothoa is supremely confident he can deliver the Almach System in short order.

..... to be continued

 

[Jynks]

: The Taking of Almach :

Using simular tactics to last time we head into Almach with a Constructor, a Surveyor and the Servants of Glaaki. This is the same as last time, we want to secure this system as fast as possible in case there is a diplomatic event that forces us from the system.

The steps of this tactic are as follows.

• Set fleet to aggressive, set Constructor and Surveyor to passive.
• Have the fleet engage the enemy fleet
• At the same time send the Surveyor to scan the system, starting with the Star and send the Constructor to orbit the star
• Keen and eye on it, you want your fleet to take out the resistance and then engage the orbital around the star before the Constructor and Surveyor get in position.
• At some point during this, or even well before you started researching communication with the fleet. This only works if you are against a AI civilisation. BUT you cancelled the special project only days before completion.
• As soon as the fleet destroys the orbital set the Constructor to build the outpost.
• Move the fleet away from the star so any combat will be well away form the Constructor.
• The instant the Outpost is built, restart the communication project and put a halt to all combat.

Securing the Almach System goes incredibly smoothly. The Alien fleet was easily dispatched and they made no attempt to try and retake the system. I could have held onto the communication research, but I didn't want to push out to much further at this time. So I let it finish.

During all the chaos Xitalu gained a new trait! This gives +10% research to computer tech. This is important. As these guys live for so long we are looking to expand out leader slots as much as possible and hot swap scientists tailored for the job. Gaining a Genius and two Maniacal Scientists at the start makes this less of a needed game plan. Even so it will not hurt.

During all this we have been building a new Colony Ship to take Yultup.

This should close up the boarder gaps around the area and give us a much needed stability. Also the Constructor has built a new Star Gate at Tarazed. I tend to build a Star Gate in every colonised star system, and latter when resources are a bit easier to come by I also build one at every Outpost.

It is also worth noting that the Nass is actually pretty far away from us. This should be good and lessen boarder friction. Also it means are boarder range should expand nicely, not that there is a lot around.

Next on the expansion list is directly north (the red circle). We already have two outposts up and I like to have a minimum of +2 influence at all times, so what I am hoping for here is a actual planet in this cluster I can colonise. Unfortunately the very top three systems, Thaaran, Betelgeuse and Qamm are all out of range. So step one will be building a Star Gate at Hoeddim.

Heoddim is home to our 1st 20+ planet.. and what a whopper it is at 24! It even comes with a Happiness and Society Research Bonus! The problem... well it is really uninhabitable. We will need to use cult members form other species, design our own species or genetically modify The Endless themselves to favour this environment. If the Terraforming tech becomes available, then we will defiantly be picking it up.

See ya next time!

 

[Jynks]

2217.05.06 - Overextended and the Battle of Pirate Island

Next on the agenda is to capture the top position and complete our first expansion phase and then start top work on internal economy and the possible institution of our first sector.

1st thing I did was do some trading to improve my standing with the locals. I also set up embassies for both. I think this could come back to bite me, especially the deal with the Nass.

The before and after approval is a huge improvement. Remember the Nass with drop another 8 points over the coming months as the New Contact values drop. We are not aiming to make these guys allies, but we do want to vassal them in the future. It is important with how far we have over extended to make are boarders secure so we can tech up and get the economy running smooth.

I start attending to this clean up... clearing out other random hostiles

.... and surveying all the remaining systems in my boarders not surveyed so I can start exploiting the resources.

One of my captains gets a promotion. This is a tricky event and if you do not keep an eye on it you might wonder why you are at your leader cap. These guys go into the Admiral Leader section and do not require recruitment influence, but still take up the slot. Go check.. you might have 3 unassigned leaders in there!

He has some neat stats. Evasion is really good and also a upkeep reduction! Neat-o. Normally I run a single stack for a long time, but as I have two Admirals and a descent sized space for them to patrol, I thought I would try something new and run two squads. This means I need to build more ships. I would like each stack to be 7 large. At the moment the fleet logistics limit us to 14 ships. With Star Gates I can still travel most of the distance across the Empire before a battle is done.. meaning reinforcements should mean the slightly smaller stacks will not be a problem.

Krupannga takes control of 1/2 the remaining fleet and call takes it as his own. He calls it the "Tendril of Nyogtha".

in all the excitement during the last few turns with the expansions I forgot to take pics of the research options for you. I've got a few good ship upgrades, like Nukes II and Blue Lazers. I thought this was a particularly strange research window, what with 7 static tech that will not go way.

I choose the Antimatter Power tech. The Lazers, shields and X-Ray Lazers will all still be there, but they can not be used in a ship without decent power.

Now the shit hits the fan.. PIRATES!! They spawn in my home system and immediately head off to Almach to start destroying my orbitals. My 2 fleets are severely weakened and not even close to being repaired. I send The Tendril of Nyogtha to Almach to stop the small pirate vessels harassing my orbitals and leave the Servants of Glaaki to remove the pirate star gate and pirate base.

The servants of Glaaki are out powered on paper, but I am fairly certain that they can take this Pirate Space station. It has very low fire power and no Pirate King commanding it. The battle will take a while and give the Tendril of Nyogtha time to clear the pirate fleet and then come back to support.

The Tendril of Nyogtha lead by the fledgling Admiral Krupannga strikes the weaker pirates and make a descent work of them, but they do loose a ship. I probably should have left the weakest at the repair bays but felt the added DPS would be better. At this point the ships are easy to replace.

Meanwhile the battle at Swur is going as expected. There is a lot of damage needed to take this pirate base down, but it is doing little in return, not nothing though. Can the Servents of Glaaki hold out!

2 ships down and the Servants of Glaaki are considering retreat. They have done a lot of damage but there is now a real risk of Ghatnothoa getting killed in action. Lucky at the last minuet a volley of missiles sounds form the edge of the battle field and Ghatnothoa looks out into space to see the remaining Tendrils of Nyogtha barrelling down to help!

The station goes down but there is still the Star Gate itself... this has no defensive systems, but with the base itself gone and as far as I know no more gates in the region there will be no Pirates coming to help. Both the Tendrils and the Servants took heavy damage, each loosing 2 ships. Remember they had no time to repair and upgrade after the combat with the mining drones and pre-contact civilisations during the great expansion. I think we were a little lucky here... but it worked out.

Ghatnothoa heroism in single handy attacking an entire Pirate Battlestation, with a broken and underpowered fleet dose not go unnoticed. +25% Sensor Range. This will make him a great front line fleet to keep a eye on the space lanes and see who is coming and going without being in the same system.

During all that I have still been trying to secure the area at the top of the map. As I am so distracted by the epic battle vs the pirates I accidental build a constructor ship instead of a colony ship! Also, as always I am afraid of encroaching Alien boarders and want to get the area nailed down as fast as possible.

The top three planets Thaaran, Betelgeuse and Qamm are all out of range of my star gate, so while the battle is on I send a constructor to Hoeddim to build one. Hoeddim is the location of that massive 23 tile world. I try to build outposts ontop of planets if I can so latter I can easily remove them and get the influence back. This opens the map a little and give me the chance to find a habitable planet. My luck is holding.

Unfortunately battle is taking a lot longer than I thought as my fleets are so weakened. So the colony ship pops long before the they have had time to clear the area and even if they were not in battle, they need to be reinforced at the least, upgraded preferably before taking Qamn. I know these mining droids will not attack unless you get to close, so I que up a securitious root to try and sneak in and scan that planet. If they attack I know from experience that tehre is time for the science ship to warp out with only a few dents in the hull.

I do the same with the coloniser. If the Science Ship can sneak by, then I am sure it can as well. There will be plenty of time to hold it if there is a problem.

Upgraded but only a single new ship added to each fleet. I head in. The consolation drain on my credits is real and I want to end this quickly. The two fleets attack in formation, using shift+click to send The Tendrils of Nyogtha to the side before heading in.

A perfect cross fire, coming from the front and behind. The battle ends quickly leaving just the mopping up of the station....

And the colonisation itself!

The Icon Thruster finishes.. I do not think there is a lot of good options here. I know the hulls and projectile defence options will be hanging around, so I decide to grab the power plant. Maybe I will be luck and have this rare resource. I do know that I am going to be stretched a little thin here and having the extra power will be a big deal.

The long task of stabilising my new empire will now begin. Getting the planets stable and rebuilding the fleet is top priority. I repair to max one ship of each fleet and send it out with each admiral to scout the new planets open to use with the star gate... the rest go back for refit and redesign.

So the expansion is done. I got a little reckless vs those pirates but I seamed to have pulled it all together. The only real problem is that the Mako'Nass have expand down. Probably because of my overly generous diplomatic promises.

.... to be continued

 

[Jynks]

2225.06.01 - Birds of a Feather Flock Together

The Galaxy after the Pirate Crisis is still fairly compact... I spend a lot of time doing various management tasks to rebuild my economy. Even so I have marked out my next goal for expansion. This nice cluster of planets were a single colony or outpost will probably snatch up all those stars.

I go between building a new Ghast or Fire Vampire and a mining base on a alternating rotation until my fleet is rebuilt and I got my economy up and running smoothly.

I like to mix in a few Rockets into my designs.. they just look so cool and give some nice DPS at the start of the battle to help clear those shields.

It is time to mop up those anomalies. Xitalu is my go to guy for that, at 4 stars and with the Archaeology trait I think he is the best bet. I like to way for 10% or under before I search an anomaly. I go though the entire map and send him on a mission around the empire.

Our fleets have been exploring all the remaining in range stars. They are tiny fleet so no combat, just trying to see what is out there. We run into a new Race.. The meeting is a blessing but...

It is a little hard to see so I marked it but these guys are already expanded right into my space and over the exact cluster of starts I have had my eyes on..... this is a affront that can not be tolerated and I instantly declare them a rivalry.

It is very tempting to get a tile clearing tech, but I think tat this stage boarder range is going to be much more important for us.

I pick up a new scientist. I have decided to take those stars by force and with Xitalu checking out the anomalies and needing 1 ship to search derbies after any battles I need a 3rd scientist to keep surveying stuff. With my incredibly strong research team I am not really hoping for a researcher, like you normally do when you get a 3rd science vessel. Instead I am hoping for something that will make anomalies have a higher susses rate on exploration or a survey speed increase.

I place my physics research into over drive and move my Genius scientist over to the physics lab. The goal here is to get the Antimatter Power tech out as fast as possible. I'm be using it as a start gun. Get the tech, build a new design with better shielding as there is more power, refit the fleet and then attack!

Yhagni gains one of the rare Phyonic traits! This means she can get a huge boost to researching physic technologies. That is really great news! She is in a Science Ship though, so with luck I can keep her alive!

My patience is wearing thing. My fleet has been maxed out for a while now but the new power tech has nearly 50 months left to go, even with the bonuses. With the Pirate Rebellion and now this planned war I have greatly neglected my research orbitals and buildings. I really need to get everything under control, and soon.

I declare war and decide to go for taking their planets. They only have 3 of them. Before I did so I moved a science ship (for debris clean up) and my fleet to the closest Star Gate.

Meanwhile my anomaly hunter has found a derelict space ship! With luck it is a ubr battleship or something.. that would be great timing!

I go for Geothermal Fracking. While we seam to be doing well, we are falling behind on planetary development and research collection due to the constant fleet construction... more minerals will be key to finally trying to stabilise.

I move into their homewold and to my shock find no opposing fleet. There can be only one answer.. they have moved into my domain to harass my planets. I take out there fleet base and start to bombard the planet. My hope is that I can draw their forces back out of my systems.

After a while of bombardment I realise they will not be taking the bait.. my only hope is to flay to Tarazed and take them out, and then return. This reminds me a lot of a tactic I use in multiplayer. Do they have another, maybe larger fleet ready to pounce elsewhere once I move away?

We are very evenly matched, though they seam to have the upgraded lasers to mine but I have shielding instead of armour.

The battle is going in out favour, but coming at a high cost. I've been continually pumping out Ghauts to replace my losses on the way back to their homeworld.

News of the War has gotten out. I ma contacted by more than once race, yet find little time to delve into diplomacy. Once the war is over we will have a better idea of where we stand in the universe. Out coming action will resonate for a long time.

After a failed invasion and finally resorting to aggressive bombardment to bring the fortifications to zero. The Combine finally sees reason. Acquiescing to all out demands.

Now that the war is over we are left with the monumental bureaucratic task of getting the Empire to be once again stable. We will need to set up sectors, build outposts to connect the new territories with the rest of out presence, get our research production into full swing..

and maybe... just maybe... look towards the Zulm!

 

[Jynks]

2205.06.01 - The Enslavement of the Fafossan

Now that we have taken over the Fafossan we have a serious bureaucratic problem with our planet management. We have a lot of stuff to do. Build sectors, hire new goveners, set up star gates and get our sectors production off the ground and of course.. rebuild the fleet and and move into the Zum territory. (Purple blob at top)

Lucky for our game plan the Fafossan have a high tolerance for slavery due to their collective nature. So we are going to enslave the entire population of the old Fafossan Combine. Now slaves are not the best at technology or even energy production, but they excel at food and mineral production.

1st thing to do is create a Sector to reduce the bureaucratic drain on the Emperor and his advisors. The obvious thing to do here is make a sector for the new captures Fafossan worlds.

Unfortunately we are not given a great leader choice for our sector. Even worse is that we are going to be capped for our total leaders once this guy is hired! Leaders cycle every 10 years or so and this is a problem with the Eternal race. Other Venerable races usually go for a government type that adds extra leader slots and use some kind of rotating government, as after elections or w/e they leaders are cycled. We on the other hand are kinda stuck with what we got so we need to prioritise any +leader slots techs.

The only real choice here is the Environmental Engineer. Extended life span is not the best option for us and the plus research leader is not going to be good for an enslaved population. What we wanted was a slave driver that increases slave output.

I set the sector to Allow Predevelopment and to ignore tile resources. I put the tax at 75% and set Krang to work these Dodo's for Material Gain. I also give him a nice 800 energy and resources to help him get started with the production.

I like to tax 75% and just put resources and energy in when they need it rather than tax less and have them accumulate huge pools. You can always put money in, just not take money out.

I then enslave the entire population on all the planets in that sector.

Now that we have that under control, lets move onto the fleet. With the capture of Fafossanga we gained a new space port. So I am sending The Servants of Glaaki there to repair and the Tendril of Nyogtha to our main fleet production station on the homeworld. The Tendril of Nyogtha is commanded by Admiral Krupannga who has the reduction to fleet upkeep. So it is important that he is at the homeworld overseeing the rebuilding of our Doom Stack. Meanwhile I break off 1 ship to check out some of the remaining planets that have not been probed before sending it back to the Homeworld as well.

Now the science ships! I leave one in the Bird Cage. His job is going to be to clear up the remaining space trash. I am convinced these are worth the time and effort for those bonuses to research. He will be busy here for a while as he will have to then survey the entire Bird Cage, a big part of getting the sectors economy up and running will be maxing out the orbitals inside it.

I also send down a constructor. I like to build a Star Gate on every planet and outpost on the map. So there are three to build here. I will not Shift+Click que the buildings as once the 1st gate is up in the Fat Prime System (above) all the space lanes will change..

It is also time to start checking out those anomalies I have been passing over all game. I prefer to only search them when it is under 10%... preferably lower. Still with out a scientist who has a reduction to anomaly failure now is as good a time as any. We will in fact be getting a new scientist once the new Star Gates are up to check out the extra systems available to us leaving these two guys to their work.

And that is it... we are ready to unpause. There is going to be a lot of empire matience here, so I'll be switching to fast/fastest for a while.. the next update will probably be a long amount of game time from now .

I'll be building Star Gates, Surveying new planets, surveying the Great Bird Gate, rebuilding my fleet and building orbitals, with a priority on The Great Bird Cage. Also I will be periodically sending more resources to the Great Bird Cage sector if it gets low and needs it for development.

Once I have a decent army up, we will turn our eye towards the Zum and try and take their territory as well!!

 

[Jynks]

2237.01.16 - Economic Restructuring

The main focus of this entire section is the rebuilding of our economy and the reinforcement of our boarders. This is a longish session with out much action. My current thoughts on Sector management is to basically leave them alone to do their thing. I tax than as much as I can and make sure their coffers are stocked enough to build anything they need. So at least 500 / 1000 / 2000 energy and minerals depending on how much I have to spend.

Most of my civilian ships are involved with the exploration of this sector as well. As I detailed in my last post I have sent multiple ships into the sector to scan the planets, clean the derbies form the war and most importantly build orbitals on all the mineral and energy locations. Once the systems of The Great Bird Cage are scanned and have mineral and energy orbitals I work on the doing all the research orbitals.

While I also do a few here and there in the non sector areas for the most part extra minerals are spent, new / upgraded space docks, planarity upgrades as well as the occasional mineral dump into the sector itself so there are resources available for it to build. At the same time I am constantly upgrading my core worlds as well as the fleet, which I have condensed into Admiral Krupannga's Tendrils of Nyogtha as he has the reduction to fleet upkeep.

During this time Geothermal Fracking pops and allows us to start on our upgraded research buildings. We are going to have to hit research pretty hard soon or risk falling behind.

Research has been going a little slow as we have been pumping physics. We are planning to invade the Zuhn soon and really want to get out hands on the Antimatter Power so we can run our level 2 shields.

I also use this time to get my top scientist to go around the empire and pick up all the stray anomalies. I always wait for under 10%, but even when most are 0% or 7% I still get two annoying failures!!

 

[Jynks]

Invasion of the Centralised Suns

In only a few short years we have greatly strengthen my economy and built a larger fleet than we have so far fielded as well as upgrading it to some new tech for great shielding and dps. It is now time to do and invade the Centralised Suns.

Unfortunately physically taking the planets like we did with the Fafossan is not an option as the war score for all the planets is over 100. Meaning we would have to fight two separate campaigns which includes a cooling period where war is illegal.

So I decide to go for vassalisation instead.

Just by looking at the map we can identify a secondary target beyond the actual war goals. It is clear as there are no planets in that red circle and from how the "blob" looks that there must be a frontier outpost in this location. As a secondary objective in the war we are going to try and take out this location and reduce to total dominion of the Centralised Suns. This will allow us to colonise behind it as well as above and completely hem them in. For as a Vassal they will keep their own boarders after the war.

We enter the Tarim-Zal System with our full stack and have it set to auto kill. We are looking to clear this entire system and then besiege the planet.

Before the 1st contact I split off a few ships and head for the Outpost. They have little, if any defence and I only send 2 ships. Just enough to take it out and possibly draw the enemy fleet.

sure enough there is the out post!

Meanwhile the planetary defensive is of little concern. It is strange they we have not yet met the main fleet though.

We take out a few of their Star Gates...

There fleet shows up to defend their outpost. My own men warp home safely and the enemy respond by attacking Tarazed.

We finally track down their main fleet in Tarazed. They have far superior weapons to us suing Plasma Throwers vs out blue lazers. Even so our number ensure victory, though we take more losses than we planned. Luckly we were playing on normal speed to look at all the cool battles and have had plenty of time to keep an eye on the rest of our civilisation and have been building new ships as well as taking care of the continuing economic expansion.

Before heading back to the besieged planet we make a quick stop at the pulsar to remove that outpost.

on returning we find yet another stack to deal with. This one slightly smaller, so there is little doubt of the out come!

I then split the fleet. I set both to bombard the planet but I set one to aggressive stance and the other to passive. This means if any reinforcements enter the system only 1 of the fleets will fly to engage, they other will continue the bombardment. Remember the rich economy we set up early has allowed a fairly constant stream of ships to fly in from the ship yard. I feel that 450ish is enough for the attack fleet and add all he reinforcements to the bombarding fleet.

Once the fortifications are weakened enough I land the troops and take the planet.

The surrender if forthcoming and they join our empire as a subservient vassal.

Over the course of the last few turns our Sector has turned into a little mining colony producing a heap of minerals....

And our main stats are all improved greatly across the board. Remembering we also funded a war as well as the development of out core worlds.

 

[Jynks]

We have quite a nice resource system in place, even with the war we are maxed out on energy. Partly due to having a low fleet count. We have finally upgraded to Level 3 Shipyards during the last days of the war, so soon we will be eating into our new economy to build a bigger and better fleet.

It is time to start working on our diplomatic relations as well, these have been neglected over the coarse of the last decade or so and we have been contacted by a few new aliens.....

It it time to identity who we might like to call friend and who is a potential target. We want to go to war with collectivists, preferably fanatical as they have a increased tolerance for slavery. We are not the most friendly race, ever .. even so...

We have two collectivist races to our left, one of which is inferior to us. The Cynn (the blue circle) and the Reshethi (red circle). Somone along the line while I was distracted the Reshethi had rivalled us and out of the entire galaxy is the one who hates us the most, making it a strong target. Its proximity to the Cynn, who are inferior but technologically equivalent makes this area of the map seam like the kind of place that could very easily become a alliance in opposition to us.

To our left is another collective race... and they also hate us, as in they have the 2nd lowest opinion of us in the galaxy. Still they are also on their own, far from help and a possible alliance, so this could be a good place to go for our next lot of slaves.

We set these both the Rax and the Reshethi as rivals to get some influence gain.

But I'm going to work on the okish rep I have with the Cynn and place a embassy with them. The hope here is that this will affect them joining a alliance with someone so hell bent on war with us.

These guys are the most cordial with us, they are also one of the greater threats. I do not want to commit to a full Guarantee of Independence but feel a long non-aggression pledge will improve our relations over time and also remove threat from our left flank.. allowing us to move right into all those nice juicy looking races, whom are almost all inferior in tech and power.

I've been so slack on my diplomacy that I have had a unassigned embassy all this time, so I give it to the and follow that up with a small 10 year non-aggression pledge. For +1 Material a month.

A small token gift to our newly acquired vassals will help smooth the transition of their government over to us.

It just so happens that the Celimy are now mutual rivals and due to my attacking the system next to there I think it might be prudent to try and improve our relationship a little.

While currently inferior in power, these guys are in fact in front of us in tech. They do not react well to being slaves, and could be a good target for an alliance.

All our trades go though and we now have a new diplomatic landscape!

 

[Jynks]

We start out the next phase of consolidation and expansion by building an outpost at Beznar. This will effectively cut off the Nass from expanding downwards for the time being.

Still not happy with our reputation with our Vassal I make a short research grant, followed by a long term small token of minerals. I want to get them happy enough to trade research back as they have some juicy tech!

I also send out my constructors to build a number of new Star Gates. Following my usual pattern of one per planet.

I set one of my research ships to clear all the space debris and also check out a near by special project. I think it is pretty important ot always clean up the debris.

The completion of our first Destroy Yard it is time to look at our fleet. I think we are falling far behind on weapon tech. I scrap the various version of the corvette and leaving just the Elder Things and build a a new Destroyer, a Chthonian.

We are still planning to take these locations. The closet starbase is marked with the orange circle. This will be out refit and repairing station. We will build a second yard focusing on Corvettes at another location, coordinating with the Destroy Yard at homeworld. I like to keep a 1:3 ratio of destroyers. Having two active yards will make fleet reinforcements much faster.

The frontier outpost has nicely boarded out the Nass. I place a colony in the Bellatrix sector as I will soon be working on my research sector.

We finish up on our major temple. This is a key tech for us in controlling the slave populations.

We follow it up with Pynoics a hugely powerful attunement for our ground forces.

We are lucky enough to have a expert on that as well, so once Yhagni is done with her research project we move her onto the project. As well as shuffling our Genius to the physics lab.

Our Star Gate range barely reaches the lands we want to invade... so I build a forward Star Gate. I'm a little worried that I will be destroyed cutting my fleet off from support... so I build a another back up one system back.

The choice to make this next colony may be premature. It will force new sector into being. Even so I think it is time to free up a number of planet slots and work on an entirely new area of space. I place it in a slightly odd place, but I really value having a food resource under the colony hub.

Finally we are ready for our next war. We have amassed a 2K fleet and with the help of our vassals I think we will have a good chance. The real question is what war goals do we want... more vassals or to enslave them. They are both collectivists so they make good slaves.... . . .

 

[cchyla000]

Thanks for doing this! I really like this style of AAR, and I'm learning a lot about strategy from it as well.

 

[Jynks]

Thanks for doing this! I really like this style of AAR, and I'm learning a lot about strategy from it as well.

Thanks man, I appreciate the kind words. I've got some more updates coming soon, and remember to feel free to ask questions or suggest things.