Devnull AAR

[Oversway]

2406.2 - encountered drushocka. judging from the warppoint they came in through, they may be warring (or allied) with the praetorian. I'm not worried about them yet, the warppoint is defended fairly well with sats and fighters. Next turn, I should start invading the Xi'Chung. I need more worlds to expand my research faster.

2406.3 - move into Xi'Chung system through warppoint at (4,0). Their defense consists of a bunch of missile sats. Lost a couple carriers and a sattelite transport, plus 1 carrier damaged. I still have a large enough force to contain the system. Leave some fighters and the damaged carrier to guard that warppoint (I have a repair ship en route), move the rest of the fleet to cut off the other warppoint at (12,4).
The system has 8 colonized planets, but 6 of them are tiny moons. There is a small moon and one large planet. There is only one frigate in the system, so as long as too many reinforcements don't show up before I cut off hte other warppoint (nebula system on the other side), I should be ok. I plan to glass all the planets and recolonize.

2406.4 - A second Xi'Chung system entered the system before I got to the warppoint. Glassed 2 out of 3 tiny moons in a sector with minor damage. Ran out of time to finish off the third moon in that sector.

2406.5 - Destroyed one of the frigates in the system. The other wants to escape but is blocked by my wp defenses. Sent fighters to glass a tiny planet, which succeeded. Then sent my fleet to a sector with 2 tiny moons, but here I make a mistake. The moons have some fighters, but I'm out of them in the carriers in my fleet! So I wind up having to ram the enemy fighters. No losses, but heavy damage. At this point I don't even bother attacking the planets, the fighters did too much damage.

Meanwhile I warp another carrier with a full load of fighters in as backup. I'll have some more on the way.

In another note, the toltayan warps a carrier sized ship with a talisman(!) through. My warp point defenses handle it with no trouble, but I'm worried about how far along they are in technology. I think I will need to build up my blockades.

2406.6 - Expend some fighters in destroying the last tiny moon in the first sector I attacked. Sent empty carriers back into my system to pick up fighters. Xi'Chung frigate has moved towards large planet, perhaps to defend or resupply.

2406.7 - Drushocka send some drones through, which destroy some of my fighters as they are tough for me to hit. Xi'Chung test some of my other systems with single ships but are dealt with easily. They also sent an intel attack my way but I've built up a large reserve.

Carriers, laden with fighters, are returning to the system I'm invading. For this turn I wait for them to reach the rest of my fleet.

I am getting close to having enough ships gathered for a second large fleet to attack the Xi'Chung in another sector.

2406.8 - Destroyed the colonies on the remaining two tiny moons (where I screwed up before). Set ships on course for Xi'Chung large planet and its moon. I have a couple repair ships in the system to catch up with the damaged fleet.


Research Continued:

Repair 2
Fighters 1
Ship Construction 3
Point-Defense Weapons 3
Monolithic Construction 1
Organic Technology 1
Astrophysics
Physics
Stellar Harnessing 1
Tractor/Repulsor Weapons 1
Shields 1
Stellar Harnessing 2
Propulsion 4
Shields 2
Propulsion 5
Sensors 1
Applied Research 1
Planetary Engineering 1
Cargo 2
Planet Utilization 1
Organic Weapons 3
Planetary Utilization 2
Smaller Weapons 3
Satellites 2


I'm going out of town today so I probably will not have another update until next week.

[Oversway]

Some of my research and gameplay choices may seem odd or sub-optimal. I am trying to do several things with this game.

1. I have played a few devnull games but I am not that familiar with it. Also I havn't played the game at all for sometime, and have forgotten a lot. So some of this is just learning about the game and mod.

2. The most enjoyable game for me is one where I have to struggle, but eventually overcome the AI. To that end, I am purposefully not going for a more optimal research/gameplay choices. If I focused more on weapons, ships, and I could probably out expand and overwhelm the AI. Instead I am trying to research things I havn't used much before and not expanding as much. Hopefully this will give me a greater challenge by letting the AI build up and use its bonus, and making me use technologies I don't normally use.

Satellites are a decent example here. Normally I do not use them too much, but in there they compose a good portion of my warp point defenses (with fighters being the other big part). devnull has 'external mounted missile weapons' which are 1 shot seekers that only take up 10kt of space. Putting these on my sats can be fairly effective in warp point defense against ships (unles you get bad positining). Since seekers cannot target fighters, I've also added some anti fighter rockets (in devnull normal pdc doesn't target fighters, but you get another high damage version that can). Alongside my own fighters (to overcome the sat mobility issue), this makes for decent maint free wp defense. These same sats can also be effective in tactical combat where you can do things like position sats just outside of a planets range or run your sat carriers ahead of your fleet, drop the sats, and have them retreat.

Its not pefect, but thats where the fun (struggle but triumph) comes in. So I decided to research sats 2 and try to use them even more, maybe with some direct fire weapons as well.


Another thing I normally wouldn't do is to research planet utilization and stellar manip. early on, but since I don't want to expand too fast, I'm going to squeeze what I can out of the planets I do have.

[Oversway]

2407.0 - lots of border activity. a praetorian fighter carrier almost broke through at one waypoint - some fighters there were away being refueled so I was undermanned.
Glassed the remaining Xi'Chung planets and frigate in the system. Sent colonizers in to repopulate.


2407.1 - The toltayans push hard on my borders, destroying some fighters and a couple missile sats with a group of 3 talisman equipped cruisers. I need to increase how those are fortified. Meanwhile, I'm concerned about stealth armor ships, so will research military science again.


2407.5 - My fear about cloaking was justified - Drushocka attacks one of my planets with 4 cloaked drones. Luckily I had some weapons platforms and fighters to defend. I'm making sure all my important planets are similarly equipped.
I am moving my first fleet (the one that took the Xi'Chung system) to refuel and then engage the toltayans. My second fleet is complete and is moving to attempt to capture another Xi'Chung system.

2407.6 - Invaded 2nd Xi'Chung System. There is currently a large battle going on between them and the Praetorians. The praetorians are closer so I attack them first.
Fought off more drushocka stealth drones -- moved a few ships to guard the planets in the system where they've broken through. Gathering up a few more ships (need some more minesweepers), and will move through toltayan system in a few turns.


Research:

Ship Construction 4
External Mount Missile Weapons 2
Shields 3
Tractor/Repulsor Weapons 2
Military Science 2
Organic Technology 2
Advanced Military Science 1
Industry
Advanced Military Science 2
sensors 2
Advanced Military Science 3
Propulsion 6

[Oversway]

2407.8 - Destroyed large Xi'Chung fleet with minimal damage. Headed to small breathable planet to create colony as base for securing the rest of the system.
I realize that I'm making way more resources than I'm using. So for I've just been building storage containers, but after reading some stuff on the forums, I'm now building 5 more space yards

2408.0 - Created colony in Xi'Chung system. Building a weapons platform, then a refueling station is next in the queue.
Warped 2nd fleet into Toltayan system - 44 mines swept - and am heading towards most populate planet, a tiny breathable.

2408.1 - Destroyed Toltayan breathable planet, along with a mine layer and four transport ships.

2408.2 - Yikes! A praetorian fleet of 5 battleships(!) and a few cruisers warps in and cleans out my defense. However, they take heavy damage from my missile sats. I send a carrier with fighters at them, which manages to destroy everything except for two BBs. One BB is heavily damaged, but the other BB is unharmed, and destroys my carrier and fighters without any significant damage. I have every planet in that system building fighters, for defense and to plug the warp point.

I glass another planet in the Toltayan system. This had a space yard, war shrine, and death shrine, but only had some space stations with missiles and a few missle weapons platforms guarding it. In the Xi'Chung system, I destroy a couple cruisers and a carrier that were near my colony.

I now have a level 2 hyper optics sat in nearly every system I control, so stealth armor cloaking should no longer be an issue.

2408.3 - Attempted to drive out the praetorian BB as well as a drushocka heavy cruiser that came through the warphole this turn. However, I get crushed. I don't have the staying power to get close enough to the long range weapons. I realize I'm rather behind in the tech race! I'll get fighers 2 next turn, hopefully that will help to some extent.

Warp through to another toltayan system, looking for better targets. Notice they have ice colonizers now, as there is an huge oxygen ice planet they have colonized. I will wait at the warp point to take care of any ships that follow me, and attempt to glass it next turn.

2408.4 - Luckily, the praetorian bb is going back, either to refuel or to fight elsewhere. The drushocka heavy cruiser is trying to go through another warp point, but I've reinfoced that and hopefully it will hold. However the troops are on the entrance side.

2408.5 - The drushocka cruiser takes the bait and is destroyed at the warp point

I glass the toltayan extra huge ice planet (I forgot the turn before)


2408.7 - Drushocka has been sendin drones through fairly regularly, but now they come in with a small fleet, through the same warp point that the praetorian fleet came in. They are possibly allied. I dispatch the fleet but do wind up taking some damage.

2408.9 - The 2nd Xi'Chung system is a mess. The praetorians, the Xi'Chung, and I all have a colony. Lots of ships have met their fate there. I'm having trouble reinforcing my own fleet due to pressure at other warp points from the drushocka and praetorian.
On the other side of the map, I'm returning the toltayan fleet for retrofitting. I have another smaller fleet in the system now. After some retrofitting, I should be able to blockade that system off and colonize it.
Building fighers and cruisers like crazy. Running a large mineral deficit, but I'll have minerals 2 researched in another 2 turns, which will hopefully help.



Research:

Advanced Military Science 4
Planetary Utilization 3
Fighters 2
Stellar Manipulation 1
Ship Construction 5
Organic Weapons 4
Deep Space Mining 1
Mineral Extraction 2
Stellar Harnessing 3
Combat Support 2

[Hunpecked]

Do you recall the construction details of the Praetorian BBs? I'm curious as to how they compare with BBs by another AI, the Narn.

[Oversway]

2409.3 - I have nearly secured the Toltayan system. There are no enemy ships in the system currently and I have one warphole guarded, and a large fleet 1 sector away. Providing that the toltayans don't have too many ships enter the sector next turn, I should seal it off and begin colonizing.
The toltayan ships are tough to fight, they are bigger, faster, and have better range, and talismans. I take heavy casualities when fighting them (except in warphole ambushes). Luckily, I have a lot of ships to lose

The praetorians are ahead in the 2nd Xi'Chung system. They have over twenty BB and light carriers in the system. I have a decent sized fleet but very outdated ships. I am building a 2nd fleet but I'm not sure how good it will be. The Xi'Chung have one planet left and one ship in that system. Their homeworld is in a neighboring system, but I havn't seen in there for awhile.

Wow: The praetorians send most of their ships through the warphole into my system. All are destroyed. I take some damage, but compared to their losses it is minor. It will be interesting to see if the Xi'Chung will be able to recover from this.

Research:
Computers 1
Deep Space Mining 2
Shields 4
Stellar Manipulation 2


I can l

[Oversway]

Do you recall the construction details of the Praetorian BBs? I'm curious as to how they compare with BBs by another AI, the Narn.

I'll take a look at the combat reports in my turn. I think I recall 6 or 8 PPBs as their main weapons, but I could be mistaken. I'm not aware of the Narn AI being available for devnull (but if it is, can you point me to it?), so the comparison might be a little off.

[Oversway]

I was mistaken

5 Engines
1 Heavy Mount Shield Depleter
5 Heavy Mount Anti Proton Beams
3 PDC
2 Anti-fighter Missile
2 Shield
1 Scattering Armor
1 Combat Sensors
1 ECM
1 Multiplex
1 Engineering Dept

[Hunpecked]

Thanks. The Narn are in the TDM Modpack; they're one of my opponents in a stock game against 5 AIs. Despite losing their home world, the Narn in my game got to battleships before I did. Coupled with their Talisman, the Narn PPBs gave me fits until I developed phased shields.

Typical Narn BB:

5 Ion Engine III (slow!)
1 Master Computer
6-7 Heavy Mount PPB V (dang!)
1 Talisman (yikes!)
2-3 PDC
3-4 Shield V (useless against my PPBs, muahahaha!)
1 ECM I or II
1 MultiTrack

So far the Narn are the only AI in the game to use PPBs. Now that I have phased shields, they should switch to APBs and take advantage of their perfect gunnery at long range.

If PPB vs shields works the same in Devnull as in stock, I would think the Praetorians would do better with all PPBs and no shield depleter on their BBs.

[Oversway]

PPB vs shields works the same in devnull, however each research level alternates between non-phased and phased (so level 1 shields gives you regular shield generator 1, level 2 gives you phased shield generatior 1, level 3 gives you regular shield generator 2, and so on). I find this diminishes the usefulness of PPBs.

I modified the Praetorian design a to somewhat min max them. So they have a better research ability than typical devnull. Most AIs seem to have BB now, with medium bonus. I'm only up to cruisers. Without my fighters, I'd be a goner.

Comparing to the Narn, the Toltayan BBS have a talisman and 4 or 5 APB and 1 or 2 torpedos. In devnull, torpedoes get a bonus to hit, and in later tech they are similar to stock null space projects (but reload of 4, bonus to hit, and I think better damage). My only complaint would be that the Toltayan BBS put the torpedos at the end. This maybe due to some AI limitation.