The Talisman
 

Now that I'm in a high-stakes PBW game where someone is actually "playing the Talisman card," I'm inclined to agree with some others that it is an inordinately powerful tool. A little too powerful for the little expenditure it takes to obtain it.

So now that it's out there, and it's coming, what in the world (er... Galaxy...) do you do to counter it? Is ECM III even going to help me?

Turin[img]/threads/images/Graemlins/icon42.gif[/img]

Re: The Talisman
 

TurinTurambar said:
"Is ECM III even going to help me?"

No. And keeping your ship at long range only gives you the distance penalty. Amass fleets that are larger than his, set strategy to short range or point blank, and hit them hard (most powerful weapons, not longest range or balanced resource cost).

Try to get the rest of the players to turn against him with an "its Us vs Them" mentality. And try to hit his planets that are sources of income to pay maintenance.

Re: The Talisman
 

There is nothing that can counter the Talisman. Sufficiently superior numbers will work, but that's true in any situation and the required ratio of your ships to his is considerably higher than in any situation that does not involve extreme tech/racial combat bonuses superiority. If intel is allowed and you have enough of it, you could try crew insurrecting his ships, but that probably won't work without several allies helping you wear down his counter-intel.

Re: The Talisman
 

Here's one I use against the talisman. Include in your fleet ships that have nothing but shields and a short ranged weapon. The default strategies tend to target ships with the most hit points so while he is wasting his shots against those ships you're able to slip ships in to do damage to him. You'd be surprised how much havok you can create by using those shield ships along with small ships toting an NSP.

One rule I play by when facing off against a religious race is that my ships are disposable.

Re: The Talisman
 

This is your best bet. Failing that, there's not much to do if you can't out-produce him.

If you can get just one other player to help you, you can "double up" on a minefield (each player lays 100 mines in the same sector). Then when is uber-fleet runs into it (there's always an uber fleet!), counterattack. That trick will work once. And is a questionable tactic in some groups, so you might want to clear it with the game owner if you aren't sure.

Re: The Talisman
 

Easy soultion sends lots of small weak ships against it then just basically swarm.

Re: The Talisman
 

So the New Alliance is pretty much screwed. LOL!

It's 4 empires against three, and the one with the Talisman has almost as many ships himself as any two of ours.

Oh well, there's a lot of RP going on and it's fun anyway!

Turin[img]/threads/images/Graemlins/icon42.gif[/img]

Re: The Talisman
 

Maybe you can get around this. Is it possible to attack, not the ships, but the system they're in? I think making their suns into black holes would work rather well, if you can afford it.

Re: The Talisman
 

Well, yes that works - if you can afford it and they don't have system gravitational shield facilities, and you can get the ship in position safely.

Re: The Talisman
 

Well, the problem is, we're on our heels and trying to buy time. When it gets gritty, it'll be in our systems. It's only turn 47, so Stellar Manip is new and building a Star Destroyer takes 15-20 turns after you achieve the technology. The Evil Axis will be smacking us around in 10 turns or less by my calculations and spying, and him tipping his hand intentions-wise.

Oh and speaking of that there's no intel in this one.

If they let us live, we'll cloak and bring it to them. If it comes to us as soon as I think it will... well...

We're toast.

Turin[img]/threads/images/Graemlins/icon42.gif[/img]
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

Re: The Talisman
 

Retroseries build those puppies. Don't wait 20 turns. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif Design a series of ships that get as close to the maximum retrofit limit of 150% (total) cost from the old design to the new. With several stages, you can get the initial hull build in maybe 6 turns, then spend 4 more ordering retrofits. Takes a lot of resources in storage, but it works well.

Re: The Talisman
 

Ah yes. I'd heard lots of talk about it but never actually done it, so it didn't even come to mind. And I've got more than enough resources lying around with all these partnerships going.

But doesn't a design containing a Stellar Manip device.. any such device... take a long time to build? I'm assuming you'd have to have that component on there in the first build, wouldn't you? Or is there no restriction as there is in colony modules? (No retrofitting allowed from a class without a colony module to a class containing one.)

Hey, if you can find one of the threads discussing this strategy amongst the newb stuff, could you post a link to it please so I can read up on it?

Thanks!
Turin

Re: The Talisman
 

There's no restriction on adding or removing stellar manipulation components through retrofits at all, aside from the cost difference limit. This will cost a LOT of resources, though, at least for the last retrofit, as you will be both removing some very expensive components that serve only to bring the ship's cost up and adding the even more expensive final component. The final retrofit can easily cost 100k+ in minerals alone. In the case of a star destroyer, it will be 120k minerals, 60k organics, and 120k radioactives, plus 30% of the cost of the components you remove. This comes directly out of storage before resource production for the turn, though you can also use resources given to you by other empires that turn, and the product of resource conversions. Income from scrapping ships will also be available. It's better just to have the storage, though.

Re: The Talisman
 

The concept is pretty simple. Copy your current design. Add up the 3 resource costs. Divide this total by 1.5. This is the absolute minimum cost you must design the previous step to cost. If your current step costs 10000 resources total, the previous step must cost at least 10000 / 1.5 = 6667 resources. ALWAYS round up. You need to make this step cost as close to 6667 as possible, without going under. Try to use as many of the same components as possible, so as to mimize the number of components that must be added and removed, thus reducing total overall costs. Retroseries design is somewhat of an artform... Once you have this done, you can now build this new design and retrofit it to the target design. Repeat this process to add as many steps as you would like.

Good filler components have a high (total resource cost) per (size) ratio. Master Computers help tremendously, as they are small and quite expensive. Plague Bombs make great filler components, especially for the initial build design. They are fairly expensive and cost only organics, so you can get the resource costs very balanced to minimize the build time of the first step ship.

Re: The Talisman
 

Are the resource steps calculated per resource or total resource?

Re: The Talisman
 

Total resources.

Re: The Talisman
 

If you meet a religious race early, then partner up or kill them. If you meet one late in the game, then partner up or use tactics that limit the talasmins atvantage. Many of these have been mentioned. One thing to avoid at all costs is a battle where the religious fleet is going to get the first shot.

Re: The Talisman
 

Are you using Devnul for this game??? If so, I'd suggest my remedy for religious races. Research missile tech up to plasma missile level three. They have a range o 19 and do 120 damage at max range. Since they weigh onlt 25kt, you can load up a ship with these and overwhelm their PD.

Re: The Talisman
 

Posted by Thermodyne:
Absolutely true!! But it must be a true first shot advantage; two fleets entering from opposite sides of the combat map won't do it.

I learned how true playing talisman vs. talisman. The player with the first shot has a HUGE advantage. In one battle, my 500 ships were obliterated by 300 enemy ships with first shot advantage. I killed less than half of his 300. Later, in a smaller battle, I suffered minimal losses while eliminating his fleet with my first shot advantage.

Find ways to get that first shot advantage; if he gets it, you are toast. One sneaky way is to get him chasing your "slower" fleet. When he finally catches you, you will not be on opposite sides of the combat map, you will be packed together on the side you both entered. Virtually all your ships will have convenient targets.

Of course eliminating his planets is the surest way: capture, destroy retail or destroy wholesale (star destroyer). Without support, his ships will wink out of existence.

Re: The Talisman
 

Seems to me that the best bet is to remove the Talisman from the game.

Re: The Talisman
 

In most of the games I've been in, religious tech was disallowed.

Pardon me if I overlooked a post about this, but has your alliance tried targeting planets instead of his fleets? If you can hurt an empire economically, even ships carrying the talisman will fall into disrepair.

Re: The Talisman
 

We're not at war yet. Still playing cold-war semi-friendly politics. Lot's of role-playing. He's more or less made his intentions clear however.

Trust me, if we can get enough ships up to the line before he attacks we'll go after planets. Problem of course is that his empire is about 6 systems deep.

We'll see.