Game has become too hard, for me at least.

[fuser312]

I am playing on "Captain" difficulty and this was my fourth run and I lost in first 50 years.

I am always lacking vital resources while my first contact is apparantly not as in my last run I was having a crippling shortage of eneergy even when I didn't build a single research station, only mining stations, I am trading 30 minerals per month to get more energy, have build couple of generators. When I lost the game I was -5 per month in energy department, oh and I also had a trade deal with one of the empires where I was getting +5 energy for most of my surplus food.

Alloys is something that I am also lacking, I have managed to build three additional alloy foundaries and I own three planets, its 2235. I am around 25% of my fleet limit, have build two starports, both at choke points with my first contact which is a swarm and hostile, one of the starports has all the defensive platforms build while others is 2/6 build. I have +25 alloys per month and around 100 total when I quit, so I couldn't had build anything else at this point. I had to build farm and civilian industries too, so I couldn't go full alloys foundaries at this point.

I have a fleet power of 1.1K, and then they declare war at me, and come at me with 3.5k fleet completely obilterating my first choke point as I rush with my fleet to engage them, my fleet being at other choke point, now I just don't have any hope at winning this war which too me it looks like that I lost because of economical reasons. Now I am not sure what am I doing wrong, I have watched couple of you tube videos but uptill now it doesn't seem like I am making some kind of huge mistake here, so can I get some help here, how could this run had gone better, what exactly am I doing wrong.

 

[AlanC9]

Maybe a silly question, but do you have pops actually working those generators you built?

Defensive platforms are a bad idea in the current build -- their alloy cost is way too much for the power they give you. You're better off with ships.

 

[fuser312]

Yes I try to keep 1/1 ratio for my Job/Pop, iirc when I left the game, ratio was 33/31, 9/9, 4/3 for my three planets.

 

[AlanC9]

3.5 K on Captain seems a bit much by 2235, actually.

 

[fuser312]

Ok, I went back to the last save, it was Ironman and some info I provided is not correct. Here is a couple of screenshots:

As you can see they still have 3.1 fleets, it's 2241, not 2235, so my number is a bit off but I think my main problems still persist. Also, I have attached a screenshot of my home Planet to show that my Job/Pop ratio isn't way off.

 

[evilcat]

You can always lower difficulty, on Captain AI is cheating but is not smarter.
Devauring swarm is somehow effective and can dish big fleet. Maybe some defensive threatty?I haD similar experience.

Ethics: Radical Egalitarian, Mild Materialist
Gov: Democracy (free unity)
Traits: Rapid Breader, maybe consumer goods discount.
Civics: Mining Guilds, Functional Architecture are universal.

In empire policies there is food policy, if you can afford lavish food then that is good happiness and growth. Otherwise food is good to sell on market.
In empire policies there is trade policy consumer market, which produce small amount of civic goods.

Start colonizing with just green/yellow planets (habitable) since migration inside empire splits on all colonies, so need to control number of colonies.
Leave building slots open if you dont have to fill them.
Specialist strata to worker conversion takes 5 years (meh) but researcher to metalurgist is instant. Which means if you need to war you may convert all your specialist buildings into alloys, monuments, research labs, even civic good factories if you have surplus. You can convert them back when you win the war.

Unfortunetly cant recommend slave empires too much, they seems to be more micro intensive.

 

[Felidae]

Having 3 planets at 2235 sounds a bit low to me. You're not letting the Administrative Cap stop you from expanding, are you? Unless you're a MegaCorp you should basically ignore it. Also, well-developed planets are insanely more valuable than colonies, but it takes time to turn the former into the latter. Basically, you should colonize ASAP, especially since (I believe) the maintenance costs of colony ships and growing colonies has been way nerfed from pre-2.2 days.

3 additional foundries sounds a bit much to me, although the amount of alloys you're getting sounds about right for the stage of the game.

Have you built a trade station to slurp up all that tasty tasty trade value and direct it to your homeworld? Sounds like you haven't. You should be getting most of energy from trade, not generator districts. Ah, I see you haven't. Gol, Headus or Uzayglore (depending on level of station tech) would all have been good choices.

In other things, you didn't need those luxury residences on Pritvi. Having a Gene whatmacallit would have been better if you had the tech. Or an extra research building. Being slightly undersupplied with your amenities is no problem.

And yeah, your fleet should have been at Ophang...

 

[ArmChairAttila]

Your fleet capacity is good for this time but you only have 17/34 filled. If you had it filled this war would be a non issue. I noticed that you heavily expanded (this is good) but did not build many resource stations (bad). The system Kenn Hijal has 8 unmined minerals for example. You can still stall this fight but you will have to put every thing on hold and build up your fleet. Sell everything you can for alloys.

 

[Pyrocyborg]

Hi there!

I started playing three weeks ago, so I'm kinda new and can't compare to what it was before 2.2.0, but I wouldn't say that the game is too hard, especially on "easier" difficulty level like Captain. Take what I say with a grain of salt as I only have the base game, Utopia and Synthetic Dawn.

In some rare cases, you'll find yourself overpowered by an empire early on and it's due to the luck of the draw : Depending on your map's size and setup, you might end up with two or more advantaged AI, and if you're unlucky or if you did intentionally set it up this way, they're your neighbors, and they're generally agressive. Against these guys, there is not much you can do except trying to find a single choke point, build an upgraded starbase, use defense platforms and max your fleet as soon as you see them (or maybe go over the maximum for a while). That being said, double check your map's settings: There should be settings called "Advanced AI start" and "Advanced Neighbors" on the bottom. You could deactivate the last one for the first few games, until you get a decent idea of how to get the gist of the new system. They could end up being your beighbors anyway, but at least, you won't force it this way.

As for the "proper" planet management early on, I tend not to trade for an obvious reason : You're losing too much in the process with that 30% rate, and it keeps going up if you're trading too fast up to a point where it's unsustainable. Trading really is useful during emergencies, or when you're going over the cap, but it shouldn't be done on a monthly basis unless you're going to hit the cap, or if you're the market leader with something like a 10% trade fee. At first, you could try to balance your production so that you're positive in everything, and by producing a lot of alloy so that you're ready for anything :

- If you have to build fleet in a hurry (and you will), use your alloy.
- If you have to sell something to get more energy to buy anything else, sell your alloy as it's worth way more than minerals and minerals are actually needed if you've got to re-arrange your planet's production or upgrade your buildings. It's not foolproof, and shouldn't be overdone, but I think that right now, alloy is a good ressource to stockpile compared to everything else, as long as you're acquiring enough of the other ressources.

Unless you're in desperate need of a particular ressource, try to set Gene clinics as one of your first buildings and if you find yourself with 1000 food, use that decision that increases pop growth. Unless your planets are filled, you can never have too many pops and it could give you the much needed edge against these guys.

Also, early on, systems tend to give more ressources than what your planet can produce and there are a lot of research that increase mining stations' production. Don't build too many districts early compared to what your population actually needs on as these use admin/empire sprawl and increase your overall leader's upkeep and slows down your research and traditions' upgrades without giving a lot in exchange. After all, you want to find new/better systems and colonize new planets and by setting trade routes between them.

As for trade routes and trade value : If you find out you're laking Consumer Goods, you might want to set up your policies so that half your trade value is in Consumer Goods instead of energy. I find it to be efficient early on, or if you end up not being the market leader (which could happen if you're in the galaxy's "dead-end street" and don't find many or any of the other empires before it's set up).

I tend to start my games with a lot of expansion possibilities : I create a least 3 science vessels and 2 construction ships, maybe more depending on what needs to be done. That way, I can go get that sweet system while another construction ship is setting up mining/research stations (which you didn't do in many of your eastern systems).

 

[Felidae]

Oh! Another thing I noticed. Early on especially, you really don't need the extra fleet building capability, don't have more than your capital system as a fleetyard. Make them either trade stations or defensive stations.

 

[Pyrocyborg]

I just noted that maybe you don't have these unique tradition buildings (Autochthon Monument). They tend to give unity and social research which is great IMO, especially early on. It can speed up your overall research, reduce your upkeep fees and so on depending on the traditions you chose. Unless I play with the Technocracy civic, I tend to get one per planet until 2400 or later (where it might or might not be necessary even to keep the edicts on).

As you're still early in this game, I could recommend starting over as there are some slight mistakes or oversight here and there, and while you could still overcome this enemy, you would probably end up behind and not powerful enough for end-game crisis. I mean, if you know where you're going and play on fast/fastest, this shouldn't take more than a hour of playtime to get to where you were, which is, consequently, probably what will be required to manage to turn your economy over and to manage the few battles to come.

 

[Duuk]

Oh! Another thing I noticed. Early on especially, you really don't need the extra fleet building capability, don't have more than your capital system as a fleetyard. Make them either trade stations or defensive stations.

Except... his issue is that he's being overwhelmed by a fleet 3x his size. So not only did he need that fleet capacity, he needed to build a fleet that size or larger.

 

[Pyrocyborg]

As for the caps themselves : Don't worry about going over. They're mostly soft caps.

Administrative capacity (or Empire sprawl in 2.2.3) is a very soft cap at first, which means that you could technically stay under the cap limit, but it's not advised to do so as the increase in productivity by going over is significantly better than what it "costs" you in research/tradition time and upkeep, especially early on or if your planets are set up properly.

Naval capacity : It could increase the upkeep by a lot, but here again, if it's a necessity to keep the AI at bay, go overboard. AI empires tend to leave you alone if your fleet power is better than theirs.

 

[fuser312]

First of all thanks everyone, I can more clearly see my mistakes now, so let me try to summarize it :

1. I shouldn't build defensive platform and focus on my fleet as in this run only I ran out of alloys as I spend too much on defensive platforms.
2. Trade Stations, I had completely ignored them.
3. I didn't know that Autochthon Monument reduces upkeep, will surely try.
4. I was too worried about happiness/amenities.

Now some points in my defence, Ophang was indeed a system owned by me but it wasn't the only choke point, I had another choke point where our borders met, to the south of this map, my fleet was based there and I only found 1 green and one yellow planet so far and all of them are colonized, so tough luck too, I guess.

I will start another run and see where I go with it this time armed with these tips.

 

[DC E1G]

Others have mentioned it but bears repeating. In 2.2 you want to build mining stations and research stations very quickly after expanding your territory.

In 2.1 you had to do this a bit more slowly because minerals were more of an issue but the 2.2 economy means minerals are plentiful early, so you should be getting all the resources in your borders up and running pretty quickly. You may need another construction ship or two to do this.

 

[Pyrocyborg]

First of all thanks everyone, I can more clearly see my mistakes now, so let me try to summarize it :

1. I shouldn't build defensive platform and focus on my fleet as in this run only I ran out of alloys as I spend too much on defensive platforms.
2. Trade Stations, I had completely ignored them.
3. I didn't know that Autochthon Monument reduces upkeep, will surely try.
4. I was too worried about happiness/amenities.

Now some points in my defence, Ophang was indeed a system owned by me but it wasn't the only choke point, I had another choke point where our borders met, to the south of this map, my fleet was based there and I only found 1 green and one yellow planet so far and all of them are colonized, so tough luck too, I guess.

I will start another run and see where I go with it this time armed with these tips.

1) You could still build defensive platforms, but try to limit yourself to one easily defendable chokepoint per enemy early on, even if you have to give up a few systems to do so (e.g. If you know you won't be able to get a particular choke point system because the AI is getting there first, fall back to another easily defendable one, even if it leaves your other newly acquired systems vulnerable... as long as there is no colonized planet there!) Defensive platforms and upgraded Starport with Missiles/Gun Array/Hangar cost a lot, but they don't have an increasing upkeep like ships do, which means you can max out your fleet and your defensive platforms at the same time. In the end, it's better to lose 3 systems and then let the AI hit a brickwall than to lose the game because you were cocky and tried to spread so much that you're left in a undefendable position. You'll still be able to claim these systems back when you feel like expanding.

2) Click on your starport, and then in the first tab, there is the trade route button. When you first build your spaceports, it should automatically set up a trade route. You can set up individual routes between each starport which, IMO, makes it better to defend against piracy. Also, if you end up losing said space station or a planet (and then take it back), you must set up the trade routes as it won't be done automatically.

3) Autochthon Monument do no reduce upkeep per se, but as it gives Unity which turns into new traditions, you could chose to reduce upkeep, increase productivity, starbase count, etc. depending on your actual needs. Even when playing with a non-unity based species/government, you should still make a few of these buildings as traditions are pretty much mandatory.

4) Happiness isn't important early on, and IMO, don't go overboard with amenities unless your stability is falling. I mean, you don't want your pops to be unhappy, but they don't have to be at 100% happiness and stability, especially early on. As long as crime is a non-issue and as long as your planet's productivity is positive, you're fine. Plus, in some cases, you won't be able to be at 100% stability/happiness anyway.

 

[Felidae]

Except... his issue is that he's being overwhelmed by a fleet 3x his size. So not only did he need that fleet capacity, he needed to build a fleet that size or larger.

No, you didn't read.
a. I said fleet building capacity, not fleet capacity. He has two ship yards, and you don't need two ship yards early on. *edit* Even one yard can easily outbuild his alloy income, so there's really no point.
b. The fleet he has probably could have done the job in combination with the (now-captured) Ophang starbase, since star bases are pretty OP early game... except the fleet wasn't where it ended up being needed.

*editedit* Once you have a the first upgrade level, and you've expanded decently, then you can spare a spot for a shipyard for in-the-field upgrades. But otherwise, defensive stations should have two weapons modules, whether guns or whatever, along with the range-extending building.

 

[James_K]

Having 3 planets at 2235 sounds a bit low to me. You're not letting the Administrative Cap stop you from expanding, are you? Unless you're a MegaCorp you should basically ignore it. Also, well-developed planets are insanely more valuable than colonies, but it takes time to turn the former into the latter. Basically, you should colonize ASAP, especially since (I believe) the maintenance costs of colony ships and growing colonies has been way nerfed from pre-2.2 days.

One of the things that I'm still getting my head around is that the costs and benefits of colonising new worlds are very different than they used to be. Colony ships (and developing colonies) have a way lower upkeep than they used to, which means that you don't need to build up to colonising your first world like you used to. Instead colony worlds (i.e planets that haven't upgrade their capital yet) have reduced natural growth and increased immigration pull. This means that you can get away with settling one or two worlds as soon as you are able to. More than that and your homeworld population might start to decrease, but otherwise there is no reason not to have 1-2 colony worlds in development at any time, if you can manage it (unless you'r deliberately playing tall of course).

 

[nfmarque]

Looks like an advance start ai. Can you check?

 

[fuser312]

I just checked, I did the default start, so my Advanced AI is on, but Advanced AI neighbour is off.