Does anybody else not bother with fallen empires?

[scaper12123]

I don't know how everybody else does it, but I find that the current design of the game makes the awakened empires unbeatable, primarily because of their delightful 250k doomstacks they tend to make during every war. I've never beat them legitimately before, ever; I either savescummed or I console-command killed their doomstack (and even then they instantly spawned another one, the cheaters). I get that they're supposed to be very powerful but I don't think making them unperturbable is an appropriate way to raise the stakes.

 

[Derp]

Kill them in their sleep, or contain them and deny them the ability to expand so that when they awaken they have to go through you to get to anyone else.

The worst thing you can do is let them gobble up AI empires.

 

[prismaticmarcus]

they're beatable if you're in a strong enough federation.

 

[scaper12123]

Kill them in their sleep, or contain them and deny them the ability to expand so that when they awaken they have to go through you to get to anyone else.

The worst thing you can do is let them gobble up AI empires.

they're beatable if you're in a strong enough federation.

That's the thing I don't like about them, though, that they're so obscenely strong that there's no way to directly challenge them. Now, obviously directly challenging an awakened empire would be a HORRIBLE idea unless you had a supremely powerful fleet, but I actually do have a supremely powerful fleet - around 150k strength. Having a very very strong navy should be cause to be able to challenge them directly.

There was one time I was able to beat them, when I was playing a xenophobe and had about a third of their naval strength. They had their fleet split up into the normal 60k units, as they spawn in and should be in my opinion, and I was able to trick them into sending one out to attack my fleet and took it out. That left them weak enough that I was able to more directly confront their remaining two fleets and cede their entire empire.

I don't mind the fallen empires being super ultra godly strong as long as they're not impossible to kill, and yes I know I can be sneaky and either attack them before they awaken or form a federation, but here's the thing: Maybe I'd rather not form a federation, and stay out of the way of things while I build up my forces. Taking them on directly should be a difficult challenge that requires tremendous preparation, not a literal wall of 200k fleet that you can't get past ever in the history of not dying.

 

[henzington]

I have never had an issue challenging them even with awaken then again by the time it happens I usually have a sizable empire and at least equal fleet capacity

 

[pieman]

That's the thing I don't like about them, though, that they're so obscenely strong that there's no way to directly challenge them. Now, obviously directly challenging an awakened empire would be a HORRIBLE idea unless you had a supremely powerful fleet, but I actually do have a supremely powerful fleet - around 150k strength. Having a very very strong navy should be cause to be able to challenge them directly.

There was one time I was able to beat them, when I was playing a xenophobe and had about a third of their naval strength. They had their fleet split up into the normal 60k units, as they spawn in and should be in my opinion, and I was able to trick them into sending one out to attack my fleet and took it out. That left them weak enough that I was able to more directly confront their remaining two fleets and cede their entire empire.

I don't mind the fallen empires being super ultra godly strong as long as they're not impossible to kill, and yes I know I can be sneaky and either attack them before they awaken or form a federation, but here's the thing: Maybe I'd rather not form a federation, and stay out of the way of things while I build up my forces. Taking them on directly should be a difficult challenge that requires tremendous preparation, not a literal wall of 200k fleet that you can't get past ever in the history of not dying.

how many years in are you? and what size is the galaxy? because those factors determine whether a 150k fleet is impressive or pathetic.

 

[Atahal]

That's the thing I don't like about them, though, that they're so obscenely strong that there's no way to directly challenge them.

There is a way to directly challenge them.
prismaticmarcus said it, you need to be in a great federation.

And it seems pretty legit to be unable to destroy the strongest entity of the galaxy alone. They were design like this.

I don't mind the fallen empires being super ultra godly strong as long as they're not impossible to kill, .

Realy, they are destroyable.
You just have to make up your mind, realise that you are in a strategic game and be able to create alliances when it's required.

 

[Zulfurlubak]

As people said above it really depends on your current year, size of the galaxy and last but not least difficulty of the game.
From my own experience, Awakened Fallens tend to be much less of a threat on Insane, probably because they do not get AI insane bonus to production (+100%), only their Awakened +50% bonus. But I suppose they get this bonus even on normal. So dunno if it's intended or not.
Matter of fact, in my latest game on 1.4 I have witnessed how alliance of democratic empires (bound by defensive pacts) annihilated and consumed awakened materialist fallen. It happened on the other side of the galaxy, so I could not participate but I had some leftover scout ships there so I could watch the whole thing.

 

[Agamemnic]

FEs start with 1000 naval capacity and will keep amassing fleet power until either energy or mineral income goes negative. With around say 5 planets, they'll stabilise at over 200k.

Beeatable? Yes. But Crisis fleets start at much lower power level and take more time to grow. Therein lies the imbalance for me. FEs (more accurately AEs) can too easily eclipse the end game crisis. They ARE the end-game crisis.

 

[Diezy]

Beeatable? Yes. But Crisis fleets start at much lower power level and take more time to grow. Therein lies the imbalance for me. FEs (more accurately AEs) can too easily eclipse the end game crisis. They ARE the end-game crisis.

I think it's because in the end they just overwhelmingly prefer to annex everything, instead of waging war to forcefully vassalize. Perhaps in that case, losing could be part of the experience, to endure an era under their shadow until you figure a way to rebel and overthrow them, together with some other fellow vassals maybe. The Awakening wouldn't be your average Prethoryn/Unbidden blob that way.

 

[Atahal]

I think it's because in the end they just overwhelmingly prefer to annex everything, instead of waging war to forcefully vassalize. Perhaps in that case, losing could be part of the experience, to endure an era under their shadow until you figure a way to rebel and overthrow them, together with some other fellow vassals maybe. The Awakening wouldn't be your average Prethoryn/Unbidden blob that way.

This is an excellent idea.

 

[scaper12123]

I think it's because in the end they just overwhelmingly prefer to annex everything, instead of waging war to forcefully vassalize. Perhaps in that case, losing could be part of the experience, to endure an era under their shadow until you figure a way to rebel and overthrow them, together with some other fellow vassals maybe. The Awakening wouldn't be your average Prethoryn/Unbidden blob that way.

If anything, this would definitely be a way to mitigate the difficulty of fighting the fallen empires. It honestly skews the game drastically when they take over other planets due to the drastic production boost they have. They either need to fight for vassalization or have a bit of a nerf to their production bonuses (like maybe 40% instead of 50%) so that they don't overwhelm and eat the entire galaxy in one swift stroke.

although, again, the biggest problem with beating them is the dreaded deathstack. 60k fleets would be no problem to defeat aside from the strategic nightmare of coordinating your fleets to attack at just the right time so all of their fleets are not in the same system. A massive challenge, yes, but not unbeatable.

 

[MrDisaster]

Just managed to defeat an awakened empire in my most recent ironman game. So far I fought two wars against them. First one was kind of funny because their fleets didn't want to engage in combat at all, so I quickly stole their 5 most valuable planets. Second war, my fleet power was around 350k. Enemy had three 125k stacks but kept them separated for some reason. Easily destroyed them one by one.

Only problem.. by the time I had that kind of fleet power, the game was crawling at a snails pace..

 

[scaper12123]

Just managed to defeat an awakened empire in my most recent ironman game. So far I fought two wars against them. First one was kind of funny because their fleets didn't want to engage in combat at all, so I quickly stole their 5 most valuable planets. Second war, my fleet power was around 350k. Enemy had three 125k stacks but kept them separated for some reason. Easily destroyed them one by one.

Only problem.. by the time I had that kind of fleet power, the game was crawling at a snails pace..

That second war is the kind of scenario that this game would benefit from, having their fleets in stacks of powerful but manageable fleets rather than all in one. That war of yours would not have been won if they'd have merged their fleets together

 

[Diezy]

They aren't all in all -that- ridiculously strong, their effective fleet power is much, even 2-3 times less than the one shown. On even odds, with equal fleet power levels, our fleets have always crushed them, especially if they're specialized for beating Awakened Empire's fleet design.

With something like 60k-80k power at least, and weapons of the highest upgrade tier, it's an evenly matched war. 100k+ will crush them. And Awakened Empires preffer to attack weaker neighbors first. If you're the powerhouse of the galaxy and it neighbors something else, they'll usually tackle that other one first!

Even if they snowball and can rebuild their fleets, our casualties are ridiculously low. If we have the bigger number, we barely lose a dozen ships, easily replaced in a single round of Starport constuctions. They can't rebuild their fleet by the time the war is over.

With that 33% bonus damage against Fallen/Awakened Ascension perk coming up in 1.5, perhaps there will be a strategy to rush a Fallen Empire and win surprisingly early!

 

[Schatten51]

they can be killed but i still have disabled them from start in the last games i made.
Thats simply since as soon they *awake* they start killing the normal AI Empires that are helpless against them and kill so the End Game even faster.....

Beating them is actually not that hard....they use Jumpdrives....observe the System they use to jump, build here 3 or 4 of the Fortress (with the Fortress Mod of course that make them usefull) and put your Fleet in and you can kill their Stacks without spamming doomstacks

 

[Secret Master]

I don't find them that hard to beat.

I find Awakened Empire to be a pain when they wake up really early (higher difficulty, plus someone goes over the threshold too soon), but that's because I'm not far enough along in conquest/tech to overcome the power difference between us.

But then it's a case of "They woke up early near me, and attack me too soon," not "I can't even think of beating them."

 

[Von Thoma]

LOL I have the problem to get rid of mine ... beeing in a Federation to the one, which awake (had 5 FE in my game, only this one awoke )
destroyed the unbidden together and 3 other FE , the last FE didn't want to attack , even rivaled and insulted

But the Awakened Empire didn't want to attack anybody, also the third member of the Federation,
but we would need still a lot of planets to win , and I am not able to leave the Federation ... WTF

So once again, that game couldn't be finished ... never was able to finish any, always had some bugs or strange behavior of the game !

 

[terrycloth]

I was really surprised to see them annexing people. I thought they were supposed to conquer you and force you to join their faction. Instead they just ask nicely once, and then if you say no they go on a killing spree.

 

[artemis667]

The production bonus could be a modifier that gets removed once they annex their first planet.