Ok...

Col. Mustard · #1 December 1st, 2004, 03:20 AM

No, they arent kidding. They arent saying its hard, they are saying its long, tedius, and boring. After your in 1st place for a while, with 2nd far behind, you get bored. You know you won, so why drag it out any longer?

kerensky · #2 December 1st, 2004, 05:55 PM

Quote:

You know you won, so why drag it out any longer?

Exactly...

Slick · #3 December 1st, 2004, 05:59 PM

I almost always set a victory condition for percent score for the leader over the #2 player. This the game will actually be won by someone without actually having to exterminate all traces of all other empires.

Slick.

President_Elect_Shang · #4 December 1st, 2004, 06:12 PM

Quote:

Slick said:
I almost always set a victory condition for percent score for the leader over the #2 player. This the game will actually be won by someone without actually having to exterminate all traces of all other empires.

Slick.

I don�t know there is something about total extermination that tosses my cookies.

Quote:

Col Mustard said:
This is getting rediculous. I can't freaking beat the game! I've had it for almost a year, and every single time I play I loose miserably. I even crank all the settings to easy, and give myself all the boosts I can. I simply can't win. Just a min ago I lost while the attacking player (AI) had 2.0M while I had not even 300K score. what on earth is going on here?

Hay if you are saying it gets boring than I can understand, but your original post sounded like you just couldn�t beat it. Now if I misunderstood than my fault.

Slynky · #5 December 1st, 2004, 06:21 PM

Quote:

Slick said:
I almost always set a victory condition for percent score for the leader over the #2 player. This the game will actually be won by someone without actually having to exterminate all traces of all other empires.

Slick.

That's the way I do it, too, Slick. I think 800% is the number usuall use.

Slick · #6 December 1st, 2004, 06:52 PM

800%!!! That's almost the same as total extermination. I typically use 300% or sometimes even like 260% - with a 5 year delay. I would think that anyone could win being at 300% of 2nd place after > 5 years. It's just a matter of how much you want to continue to develop your empire for your own edification.

Slick.

AgentZero · #7 December 2nd, 2004, 05:17 AM

I usually set it at 400%. 200 if I'm looking for a quick game. Last time I set out to play a total extermination game, I was playing with in a galaxy that had about 100 systems. I got to the point where I had 31 systems and 3 other AIs had the rest. I'd built massive fortifications on all WPs leading to soon-to-be-enemy territory, mined them heavily and had thousands of satelites over all the WPs as well. My invasion fleets numbered 4800 (and I had about 60 pop transports racing around trying to fill up smaller colonies).
I then launched my massive invasion; 48 100-ship fleets (16 per enemy empire) burst into enemy space through artifically created WPs.
And ran smack into the stiffest resistance I have EVER seen the stock AI put up. I'm lucky I used my own WPs because the largest of the three had the main WP to my space defended by sixteen Starbases! And these weren't your mamby-pamby stock Starbases, either. Each of the behemoths clocked in at 6,000kT.
Anyhoo, I realized that I'd be looking at fighting tactical combat for every single planet if I was to be assured of victory. I then whipped out the calculator and plugged in a few numbers.

69 systems for me to conquer with around 10 planets each makes 690 planets. Call it 650 for arguments sake. 650 planets * 15 minutes average tactical combat = 9,750 minutes = 162.5hours = 6.7days non-stop playing, but since I only average about 2 hours a day game time that worked out at 81 days.

So, to conquer that galaxy would require the better part of three months just counting combat, and not taking into account repair & maintenance, replacing lost ships & troops, protecting conquered worlds, AND running the rest of my empire to boot. Needless to say, I declared a moral victory and went to bed. ;-)

geoschmo · #8 December 2nd, 2004, 10:26 AM

I don't know if you guys are talking about solo play or PBW here, but I've been in PBW games where 300% or even 400% would have been too low. It's entirely possible for the 1st place player to be that much stronger then the 2nd place player and still get beat if the others gang up and play a good end game. Especially since score is so easy to manipulate by building lots of cheap, low-tech ships. And as bad as it is being in a game that seems to drag on for ever, it's much worse to have what is shaping up to be a really good ending to a game be aborted by an arbitrary limit.