Tips for playing against Hard AI

[Auron]

I recently decided to try playing against Hard AI in the hopes that it would extend and make the games more interesting. Well I was spot on with that assumption, and then some. Does anyone have any tips for playing against them because they currently wipe the floor with me and I'm not sure if I'm advancing too slow and/or in the wrong order. I'm trying to use the strategy I used against Normal AI prior to the update, but its not working....and I get easily out numbered now.

Any tips and/or suggestions are greatly appreciated, thanks in advance :)

[Auron]

That sounds alot like a situation in a game I was doing with myself, usually what I'll do in that situation is try to find a planet with only one or two jump lanes (close together if possible) and fortify it, then expand in the other direction until I have a decent income rate, after that I usually develop the planets and let them attack before moving on them. Though in that game with a friend, we were stuck in a stalemate for a good 4-5 hours of game time xD

[The Shakin' Thing]

What race do you prefer. It all can come down to what kind of defenses you prepared for this kind of situation.

[Auron]

I've played as each race/faction at least once, though I tend to play Advent, Vasari, and TEC Rebels based on the map and type I'm doing. Sometimes TEC Loyalists if I'm doing a locked team game.

[kaiyl_kariashi]

I beat a max number of hards by simply playing them off against each other, sending envoys to everyone and keeping them just happy enough to stay peaceful with me, as I "helped" them conquer the others and took the planets they opened up, until there was only one left, who was simply bombed out of existence by the massive amount of Novalith Cannon's I had, and the max pop fleet I simply overwhelmed them with the moment the last guy fell, before they had time to restock.

As soon as it became clear who was going to be the last, I built star bases in all of their major gravity wells in preparation for crippling their production centers.

[The Shakin' Thing]

You have to be careful when playing into a race too much I find in multiplayer. It is best to test a strategy versus the computers. However, it is rare that most people online even want to play a match with open teams. That strategy will not be playable and most people would understand what is happening.

[Doomy]

when playing against all kind of AI you need to don't forget some things :
1- AI will always out produce youand out colonize you
2- AI will always do more things than you like attack 3 place at the same time
3- AI will always attack your starbase when you uppgrade it to don't loose planet control.

so, knowing this all you need to do is :

1- Colonize wisely, dont overextend your empire but try to reach some sort of chokepoint, if you can colonize 5 to 8 planets and have no more than 2 frontiers to defend do it.
2- set up a starbase asap on your choke, the one under immediate attack for exemple and start protecting it with repair platform, 2 is enough at beginning but you will need more and more with time running.
3- your empire is now safely defended, start building up your economy with trade line and some major social uppgrades but not to much , you need military teching for your fleet and titan, build a titan asap, lvl it asap, all you will do for a while is defend. when you have a good support fleep you can start attacking yourself, wait for an AI fleet to crush with your starbase and counter attack.

as an idea for timing i try to set up or be able to set up my first starbase for the first pirat attack.
If my economy allow it i tend to pay for it so i can continue colonizing and set up starbase later but if in trouble i build my starbase, sometimes you start fighting an AI sooner than expected so you cannot colonize as much as you wanted.

usually i play with only 1 cap ship, a fighting one and some fleep support, but sometimes i make a colony cap ship and after that a fighting one like this i can continue colonizing if fighting somewhere.

i can stad against unfair and higher IA doing this

[Auron]

Well thanks for the tips, I'll give them a try next game :) they all seem like good ideas to follow, so thanks agian for them and the details ^^

[GoaFan77]

引用自 ^4Doomy：

1- AI will always out produce youand out colonize you

1 is half false. The human player can easily out colonize the AI, save perhaps cruel and viscious. Just use at least two colonize capable ships and expand in two directions. With a good map set up you can average a planet a minute if you don't need to worry about other things.

[UNiT]

Grab as much teritory as you can and then bunker up with starbases and camp your way out to victory is the easiest but longest way.

[Doomy]

well that s for 4 to 10 players map FFA or team game, if you want to 1vs1 against an IA just make a fighting cap ship spam corverttes and crush it :)

[Beardsly]

I find that figuring out where you wanna draw the line is most important. Gotta get all the planets you think you will need to build a decent fleet and then advance from there.

[El Jefe]

Here's how I managed this: I played as TEC rebels, and researched Truce Amongst Rouges as fast as possible: That resulted in allowing a rapid expansion of my colonies as I could send out colony ships. This also gives me free defense ships (local militia) in the gravity well. It aslo took the pirates out of the question. I upgrade colonized planets to avoid overhead on it and keep moving on, expanding as fast as possible (it's all about getting market share first), while building an attack fleet and investing in trade and culture to support it. Once I hit an enemy, I put up defenses. At one point I held off a Vorastra Titan multiple times with a Kol, a Dumov, and a Starbase (with max weaponry, squadrons and docking bays) that also pumped out hoshinkos. It was scary the first time, but it worked marvellously again and again. This while I was busy attacking on another front. Once I was getting enough income, the win was inevitable. The hardest part was at the end I had to take on a level 10 Eradica, which darn the Unyielding Will and Chastic Burst. I made the mistake the first time of taking my entire fleet in and watched in horror as all the supporting frigates were microwaved. I reloaded the scenario later and only attacked with my capital ships and Ragnarov and managed it just fine. Lesson learned.

[Hully]

The larger the map the greater the challenge the AI will give you, smaller map limit their growth limiting the effect of the x1.5 cheat.

Anyone got any recording of a medium-large at least 6 player all hard or above AI's games?

Also Maps, anyone played any with decent choke points so many have almost none... lol

[The Shakin' Thing]

The point is for the game to be hard, thus the lack of choke points. In space there should not be a thing such as said "choke point".

[Hully]

Anyone looking for a good map to play on Hard try Twin Empires large map 8 player.

Why?

You start next to your ally who has you flank.
Good choke point into your core systems.
So although they can out produce you they more or less have to come at you straight on.

As someone who has yet to win on hard (Medium to Large Map) This would have been may 1st Victory it was progressing really well it was just a matter of time everything was under control... or so I thought lol.

Lost to a Diplomatic victory! Never saw that coming!!!

Good luck.