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I didn't implement this in my vanilla run through (Xenon are doing ok there), but I tried it with my XPANed sectors mod run through because they seemed occupied with guarding new routes, mostly sitting there... with Larger Xenon Fleets, they woke right up and started plowing forward.
If you don't want mods, then you're kind of stuck rolling the dice. Not sure how some people are getting wiped out on vanilla but there should be some visible pressure in Hatikvah/The Void/Zyarth territory.
This thread is just really a counter to the "omg xenon too strong" threads. A lot of folks find the Xenon to be a pushover. Rather than demand that the devs "fix the game", we have a wonderful modding engine that lets folks play the game as they like! It is awesome!
Less whining, more installing mods :)
I'm planning on doing a 'hell' run of sorts later on. Custom start, enough to get past the initial storyline and grind, not fully decked out. But with Xenon fully 'unlocked' persay. Make it more of a strategic defence game. :)
Let me know how the mods go! Hopefully they give the AI a good reckoning.
The ones on attack will target cap ships BUT they wont prioritise targeting em over anything else, and all ships on attack purely focus one random target at time theres no load spreading, however once intercept portion of fleet wipes the smaller ships leaving only caps the attack fleet will fully focus them down, so usually enough to wipe xenon without player notice, tho you do have to replace destroyers and less often corvettes every now and then as until intercept portion done and attack ones focus caps, the k's and especially I's will damage every destroyer near it, sometimes destroying one or two, fighters always seem to survive tho good source of 3 star + pilots xD)
, infact i need 10... but 10th still under construction xD, i have my personal heavily modded asgard sitting on a def station near the 10th gate, the npcs there good enough to wipe the smaller ships but i manually hop over and wipe out the i's and k's when they pop out once an hour ish (once an hour per gate so happening every few mins across verse xD), I estimate i had to spend the equiv of about 60 billion on anti-xenon defence overall xD, tho much of it is lost income from my entire economy (90 stations and growing) focusing on churniing out massive fleets, a recent mega upgrade (going from 1 to 5 carriers per + adding Asgard commanders) i had 80 km line of carriers and Asgards fresh of the production line next to my largest shipyard (home to 75,000 teladi xD),
When the 10th fleet done be nice to go back to building up economy again, I own 14 sectors atm another 4-5 grey ones i could claim on top of that when i got time and I only developed 7 of them thusfar , an 8th now has 1 mega-high tech factory with 14,500 ish workers, but it only makes 1 or 2 of each production line(err cept adv electronics has 8 of dem), its more a station to help supply local npcs with ingredients they often lack and get cash, but also will provide mats to allow me to build further stations in system so good choice as 1st economic station type in sector), but 8th still long way to go and rest nothing but def stations, darnd xenon xD, and my personal trading barbarossa literally spent days going from one side of map to other to supply the mats to build station as totally missing in that area lol xD
Good read and congrats on staying with that save for long. Are you using mods?
I tend to restart after I tinker with expanding and creating efficient economies and learn something new. So I create a new game (nowadays with mods) to do it well from the start.
I have a 3.20 (last played) vanilla save parked and backed up for when ventures come back. I achieved alot on that save including running ventures regularly and taking over Atiya Misfortune before HOP pushes through from Faulty Logic. I siphoned HOP economy to feed ANT and ARG and seed the necessary stations to build independently from them. That is, Complexes for Claytronics and Hull Parts. so would hate to see it go. Hatikvah Remains strong including Ianamus Zura. But Litany of fury is gone as well as some ZYA sectors.
Now that was a fun save without mods.
As to OP.
With the Xenon, I am always looking too far ahead on reaching a stale gamestate when AI pushes into Xenon Territory. I would love for those territories to be very difficult to take over by the AI and keep the game challenging for longer. Current versions does not allow that if you know what you are doing and even limit yourself from taking all Xenon sectors. These sectors can get taken over too soon for my taste and of course it is my fault but also i still do not want Xenon to overrun unchallenged.
I now limit what I sell to AI to not overwhelm them with resources and get them to kill off Xenon sectors. This is done using centralised trade stations for each faction situated in a sector that reaches all their known sectors. Wares enter from my economy, and wares leave to a specified faction using trade rules.
If I need a Xenon sector, preferably, Savage Spur, Atiya and Faulty Logic as I love my main sectors to be built around Getsu Fune, it means that I have eliminated a conflict that will limit trade to an AI faction. When that happens I then set up trade to buy from that faction's excess wares since with less conflict they would likely have things in abundance, then and shift the wares to others. I then mostly supply them minerals and gas to keep them producing.
In this way, ANT's economy for example is now closely linked to mine and i can shift more wares elsewhere. I generally ignore HOP as that conflict reaches a stalemate, as long as sectors do not shift hands I do not care so i just monitor the situation. I tend not to do the storyline.
My question is, does Egosoft not want games to play so long after the point when Xenon sectors are no more? Is the journey to get there all that matters? If it is then it seem to be a very short journey for players who know what they are doing. The only thing slowing you down is the time it takes to build stations or amass a mining fleet, and or including the time it takes for you to earn credits, buy blueprints and gain reputation. Once resources are in abundance both for you and AI, what gameplay will be left if Xenon are reduced to dust?
One may argue that expansions and story missions provide means to escalate conflict. But we have no means to end it and start another or some form of diplomacy to negotiate peace and dynamically start and end wars. Or perhaps i do not see the immense time, effort and resources required to take over another faction because I have not tried.
To conclude, I think the Xenon taking over sectors is an intended feature of the game. It adds to the game play because you now have a goal to achieve, build a strong economy, aid retake of the sector while strengthening other factions to not be overwhelmed. If you choose to of course. But many players do not like that. Now that is what I do not understand. Because, without conflict how can they keep the game going. When they build those choke-point stations what other conflict is the AI subject to that really makes the player sell resources to them. Or is the Xenon containment needed to have a safe space to build an economy and just finish the story line missions and terraforming, and call it quits?
Without mods, the xenon simply don't pose any threat whatsoever. Anyone claiming to have the xenon steamrolling them isn't playing a vanilla game. They are outright lying about not using mods, I'll plainly state that as an absolute fact. I've played about 30-40 runs of the game since launch and the xenon posed a threat in exactly... ZERO of them. (When I played vanilla.)
Now with mods... Yeah the xenon can quite literally bring upon the end of days. Many of the mods actually make them unstoppable without cheating in fact. See the issue with the vanilla xenon isn't their economy per say, it's the garbage-tier A.I. the devs gave them, possibly deliberately. They never amass proper scale fleets that can actually take sectors unless the sector they attack has been crippled by the player. And they suicide all their mining ships into enemy sectors. (No idea why.) Combined, this usually leads the xenon being wiped out by the npc factions even without the player getting involved. They can make ships with nothing more than ore and power cells. And it costs them literally 120k in materials to build an I-class battleship. But they never have the resources to build them since they suicide all the mining ships, and they never amass any fleets that can win battles, eventually... they kill themselves.
You simply MUST be using a mod... I have over 30-40 playthroughs and hundreds of hours in X4, and never ONCE have the xenon ever posed even the "slightest" challenge or threat to literally anyone on vanilla. I've seen them take over a total of two split sectors and a HOP sector, and that was only because I crippled those sectors first. If I don't actually help the xenon, they are extinct about a week into the game. The terrans always wipe out the northwest xenon first, then the HOP wipe out the southwest xenon second. The teladi wipe out the xenon in the southeast next, then the xenon in the northeast hold out for quite a while till they succumb. Though it's never the split they beat them since split have a trash economy in vanilla.
Thats... possible, I know the npc factions are almost completely dependent on the player for working economies. The xenon economy being so simple can function without the player, though they still tend to suicide all their mining ships, crippling themsevles.
I suppose if you played for a long time and never actually did anything the way your supposed to play the game... That could lead to the xenon winning, since the factions would have no resources to build anything new after about 8-12 hours into the game.
I support the Xenon being a slightly bigger threat than they are now. As it is they are ALMOST where they need to be. Just a bit of a nudge more and they could be a real threat that shakes things up but not a universe destroyer faction.
Yeah you have mods running and they interact with things and most mods dont mention alot despite heavily skewing things or turning it upside down. If you use mods dont talk about balance of the base vanilla game. Since your views are flawed.
The last time Xenon where a headache was when Defense station where bugged and they could plow through them without resistance but since then we got split and terrans.
Especially with Terran dlc 2 fleets spawn in xenon territory from the get go.
I can garentee that The crystal mods Have nothing to do with Factions, If you think so, you need a lot of help. FYI I will talk about balance as X4 is so far out of Balance that it is almost embarrassing. Don't get me wrong I really like the Game, However that does not change the fact that the only Faction in the game that does anything, Is the Xenon. At least in X3 TC all the factions tried to somewhat defend themselves without the player babysitting them. X4 is an exorcise in Babysitting All the factions, Except the Xenon. In my 5th play through the Xenon took half of the Terran sectors until I went and helped them. Now I just let all the factions do what they will do. It's not worth babysitting them. But we all have different play stiles. I just wish the rest of the factions were Half as motivated as the Xenon.
you must definitely have mods that affect xenon. theres no way in the vanilla game does the xenon ever threaten the terrans. the absolute safest spot in the whole game especially with the oversimplified terran economy.
i can understand if all the other factions can struggle because it depends on if they get the right stations at the start.
try disabling all your mods and see how a fresh game goes. because i would not be surprised if some random mod is doing more changes than what it says its supposed to do