Matrix Games Forums

I just ran into what has to be a bug or a design flaw. When the rat people managed to invade and capture a world of mine ALL of my space stations immediately became hostile and began firing on my ships. This makes no sense at all and if it is intentional then it creates a micro-management nightmare. This mass defection is not logical. Surface conditions would not affect orbital defenses. For them to stop fighting the successful invaders and begin firing on the ships of previous owner defies comprehension. If this is as intended, it calls into question the wisdom of building orbital structures. Also, assuming one had the troops on AI auto-build control, it creates a situation where the player would need to go back and check all of his planets to make sure the AI had built massive garrisons. This defeats the purpose of delegating to the AI and will make the micro-management awful. It is hard enough to manage this game already. Either 1) prohibit invasions until orbital defenses are destroyed or 2) leave the orbital defenses in the control of the player that built them if the planet's surface is invaded successfully or 3) if a planet is captured have all orbital structures immediately self-destruct. This is a Major event and it is really screwed up. There is simply too much going on in this game to have to manage for minimizing the odds of such an oddball defection.

2) leave the orbital defenses in the control of the player that built them if the planet's surface is invaded successfully

I choose this one. I'm against artificial limitations.

-Plus, maybe allow invasions/captures of space bases.

BTW - I am enjoying the game. Rough edges to be sure, but it looks like it could be OK. Even playing in the smallest possible galaxy it is a massive project to manage the Empire. With most functions left to the AI, understanding the situation at any one time is almost overwhelming. This invasion thing really cuts your legs out from under you. I think I'm going to shelve it until the next patch clears some things up and, I hope, addresses these concerns in some fashion. I hope that patch comes soon. DW has a future with the support I think we will get.

If this is true then this is a major problem. You should not be able to invade a colony when it still has defenses up. Thats just silly!

Have not noticed this yet, but if its true then it should be fixed, no point in defenses if you can just bypass them and land troops on the planet.

Yes, right now by design if you invade and conquer a planet you get control of its orbital bases. Probably not worth my discussing why that makes sense as I can see good rational arguments on both sides.

It is not a bug, so right now you need to make sure you have enough troops on your world to defend it from invasion as well as orbital bases to defend against bombardments. Good orbital defenses will generally also keep troop ships or other ships from getting close enough to invade, but if your defenses are swamped this can still happen.

We could make some tweaks to this in the future, but right now this is by design.

Just make sure your homeworld is well defended.

I have had the AI many times Fly half way across the galaxy just to take on my homeworld.

And if this is the way it works then its an easy target for the AI if undefended.

MY current game went to war with one empire that had only 4 planets, they were very far from my core worlds. And the ai sent 3 fleet (small ones) at my homeworld. I thought it was funny until I noticed that out 5 of the ships 3 of them were troop ships.

I had something like 14 troops on my planet and 3 orbital defense bases, plus the large ship yard that made quick work of them.. But still.. I was like wow. LOL

Maybe just imagine that troop tansport invasions are also boarding, fighting in, and capturing, the space stations.

ORIGINAL: Wade1000

Maybe just imagine that troop tansport invasions are also boarding, fighting in, and capturing, the space stations.

That makes perfect sence.You would not invade a whole planet and leave the most important strategic element alone.It also helps the invasion flow for the A.I too.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
Yes, right now by design if you invade and conquer a planet you get control of its orbital bases. Probably not worth my discussing why that makes sense as I can see good rational arguments on both sides.

This is a MM nightmare, even in the smallest galaxies, not to mention a bit silly. Yeah, I though of several arguments for the way it is now set up, but they all seem fairly contrived to me. This also introduces a "gamey" tactic, if one decides to use it on the AI. DW might be a lot of fun in the empire building area, but there is already so much to manage and monitor that we don't need to have to constantly check up on the AI manager for garrison troop and fleet levels. I urge you most emphatically to change this "feature". It is illogical AND it introduces a lot of boring, mundane work into a game that already has a heavy administrative load on top of a very, very busy environment. I have made several suggestions that seem reasonable and I am sure that other options exist as well. If the game is set up this way because the AI opponent just cannot handle it any other way, then please tell us. It then becomes a distasteful neccessity imposed by limits beyond anyone's control. If it can be changed, it should be, for both playability and sensibility.

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76

ORIGINAL: Wade1000

Maybe just imagine that troop tansport invasions are also boarding, fighting in, and capturing, the space stations.

That makes perfect sence.You would not invade a whole planet and leave the most important strategic element alone.It also helps the invasion flow for the A.I too.

I cannot imagine how this makes sense. I also cannot imagine how any defender could allow any installations to fall intact even if you could stretch credulity to include such space assaults.

ORIGINAL: solops

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76

ORIGINAL: Wade1000

Maybe just imagine that troop tansport invasions are also boarding, fighting in, and capturing, the space stations.

That makes perfect sence.You would not invade a whole planet and leave the most important strategic element alone.It also helps the invasion flow for the A.I too.

I cannot imagine how this makes sense. I also cannot imagine how any defender could allow any installations to fall intact even if you could stretch credulity to include such space assaults.

You mean like the maginot line,omaha?

I do not see any great micro involved in claiming stations for planet invasions.In my games taking colonies is a slow process and right click scrap is not hard.

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76

ORIGINAL: solops

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76




That makes perfect sence.You would not invade a whole planet and leave the most important strategic element alone.It also helps the invasion flow for the A.I too.

I cannot imagine how this makes sense. I also cannot imagine how any defender could allow any installations to fall intact even if you could stretch credulity to include such space assaults.

You mean like the maginot line,omaha?

I do not see any great micro involved in claiming stations for planet invasions.In my games taking colonies is a slow procces and right click scrap is not hard.

Given how busy things were I did not even notice the battles that resulted in the loss of two systems until the message came up that they had fallen and I clicked over to see what was happening. Scrapping was hardly an option. The scale of operations, the scope of command and control and the shear level of activity in this game argue against the manageability of this feature...I think this is a strong arbument even without addressing its plausibility.

I apologise if my comments seem too vehement. I invested a lot of time in the game, as have many others, and I was getting to like it when this...event...happened to me (more than once). Being crushed in a battle is OK. Losing a system to a gamey feature robs the game of some fun. The more I think about it the less tolerant of it I become. I hope DW develops into a better game for it surely has a good start.

ORIGINAL: solops

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76

ORIGINAL: Wade1000

Maybe just imagine that troop tansport invasions are also boarding, fighting in, and capturing, the space stations.

That makes perfect sence.You would not invade a whole planet and leave the most important strategic element alone.It also helps the invasion flow for the A.I too.

I cannot imagine how this makes sense. I also cannot imagine how any defender could allow any installations to fall intact even if you could stretch credulity to include such space assaults.

Khan!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! it's happened in Star Trek numerous times...not that Star Trek is law or anything. Even DS9 was taken. I think your overstating the effect on the game a bit...it's not a game ender for sure. It's good drama...and besides shouldn't you be blaming yourself for not having enough troops/ships defending the planet? When the galaxy gets tough the tough don't stop playing till next patch...buckle up my friend and get back in the game. Kirk is laughing at your superior intellect as we speak. Speaking of which a Star Trek mod would be great so I can stop playing Birth of the Federation.

ORIGINAL: solops

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76

ORIGINAL: Wade1000

Maybe just imagine that troop tansport invasions are also boarding, fighting in, and capturing, the space stations.

That makes perfect sence.You would not invade a whole planet and leave the most important strategic element alone.It also helps the invasion flow for the A.I too.

I cannot imagine how this makes sense. I also cannot imagine how any defender could allow any installations to fall intact even if you could stretch credulity to include such space assaults.

It does happen


Tho if they changed it so when a colony changed hands a random amount of damage or destruction was done to any bases above the planet.. That would work nicely

For this to make sense we have to assume that:

1. The orbital defenses are being taken over by troops at the same time as the planet.
2. The well-armed orbital forts won't shoot down incoming troop transports... for some reason.

Hell I'll just design a massive troop carrier with huge amounts of armor and shields then spam the enemy colony with them. I don't need to bring guns, I get the enemy's guns automatically!

In fact this is a good tactics! I will try to create a new mega-troop carrier ship based on one of my useless resupply ships and see how it will work!

BTW what is the maximum ship size that can be build on a planet? So far i was building size 600 resupply ships. Is there a limit actually?

I dont mind the current situation as long as bases have a priority to attack troop transports.
Elliot or Erik, how does the automation work for troops. Does the AI prioriterise planets that are close to borders and/or are high value targets (luxury commodities, high development/population)? Sometimes I have noticed that some planets have troops that are far beyond my enemies' range. I disband them, but then the AI rebuilds them, which is annoying.

An update on this, which is truly annoying. I assume it is related anyway... I had found the ultra-rare fruit luxury good. It was on a swamp planet, which I could not colonize, so I built a mining station there and 4 defense platforms.

3 months later one of my free trade partners swoops in with a colony ship, colonizes the planet, and HE GETS ALL OF MY PLATFORMS! [:@]

This has got to change...

ORIGINAL: forsaken1111
3 months later one of my free trade partners swoops in with a colony ship, colonizes the planet, and HE GETS ALL OF MY PLATFORMS! [:@]

Hm, that's a pretty unique situation - I agree it makes no sense in that case. In a full blown invasion though, where the defense bases are engaging any troop transports and trying to prevent them getting to the surface, I don't really see it as a big problem. With that said, I think what we'll try to do here is first add more notification to the player and maybe some kind of pop-up option to scrap or destroy the facilities if the battle is being lost. The interaction with colonization is a bit more tricky, but I agree that what happened to you doesn't make much sense.