General Summation of Stellaris's Warfare Problems

[Ragnarok Ascendant]

War in Stellaris currently has a lot of issues. I'm just making this thread to collate them all and see what could be done to fix them.

Issue One: Doomstacks. They're still a thing, and because of them, strategic gameplay goes to 'force decisive victory, then play whack a mole with fleets'.

Issue Two: Ship balance. X-slot battleships beat everything.

Issue Three: Chokepoints. In addition to making doomstacks worse, they really just make playing any given empire a strategy of 'expand to chokepoint and backfill'.

Issue Four: Weak Starbases. End game fleets will roll over anything. This partially contributes to doomstacking (as nothing can beat a big fleet, and you can't rely on your forts to protect you or provide any real advantage) and makes fortifications basically pointless. Strengthening starbases won't solve the doomstack issue, especially in isolation - it's just another unrelated issue to the general problem.

Issue Five: Easy Logistics. No consideration is given to guerilla fighting, sabotaging enemy supplies, or having to secure supplies beyond capturing an enemy starbase to repair at.

Issue Six: Planets, and space in general, don't matter. They have no means of defending themselves, they don't contribute to fighting beyond serving as a glorified roadblock once you slap a few forts on them, and them being occupied really doesn't change all that much. Basically, since space is not important, it means your one strategic asset is the fleet - and so the only thing you have to defend is the fleet.

Overall, the current state of Stellaris warfare is one where only fleets matter, strategy is pointless, tactics are basically non-existent, and it all devolves into a (admittedly pretty) smashing of action figures together.

Any other war-related issues? Any suggestions on how to fix them?

 

[grommile]

Three: You can drastically diminish the presence of chokepoints by cranking up the lane density. (In extremis, I believe x5 hyperlanes basically ensures that every pair of adjacent systems – by whatever the adjacency criterion is – has a hyperlane.)

Four: I have never understood how strong starbases are supposed to reduce doomstacking. Pray enlighten me, because the notion seems contrary to all reason.

Five: The challenge, as far as fixing this goes, is to avoid turning wars against the AI into purely a frenetic game of whack-a-mole.

 

[Kinkness]

Three: You can drastically diminish the presence of chokepoints by cranking up the lane density. (In extremis, I believe x5 hyperlanes basically ensures that every pair of adjacent systems – by whatever the adjacency criterion is – has a hyperlane.)

Four: I have never understood how strong starbases are supposed to reduce doomstacking. Pray enlighten me, because the notion seems contrary to all reason.

Five: The challenge, as far as fixing this goes, is to avoid turning wars against the AI into purely a frenetic game of whack-a-mole.

Then problem as I see it, is not the fact you or the OP are wrong, but the fact that stellaris's combat at its very core is abysmally simplistic.

It's literally a paper and pen top down stat spread sheet. That's it.. literally.. everything else is smoke and mirrors. Nothing matters, and to make it even worse, it's literally a rock paper scissors, except the that you have different sizes of rocks and scissors, but the bigger one always wins.

------------

1) Supply lines needs to be a thing, or at least supplies for your fleet. If those supplies run out, they are severely weakened. This would make long planet sieges something you need to plan for. Not just jump from one to the next like you're playing hop scotch or something.

2) Enemy captured bases should not be able to repair your ships. THey were never designed, or engineered to deal with your kind of ships, and don't have the infrastructure for it can be the argument. This would make wars less about gobbling up massive swaths of land, and more about strategic systems. Making a big push deep into enemy territory is something you have to plan for.

3) Bases need to be much more expensive, but much more powerful. Less of them, but make them much more important and powerful than now. Allow them to do more things, and maybe even stretch influence into nearby systems without directly being in them. (Such as boosting trade, mining, etc. whatever).


Just these changes alone would make war more interesting and dynamic. Less about land grabs for every war, and more about taking just what you need and want, and pushing deep is costly and could even lose you the war if you push too much.

 

[Ragnarok Ascendant]

Four: I have never understood how strong starbases are supposed to reduce doomstacking. Pray enlighten me, because the notion seems contrary to all reason.

They're connected to another issue, namely that fleets are all that matter. They don't reduce doomstacking at all, nor would increasing their strength really change the fundamental strategy re : chokepoints. But the vanilla situation of being entirely unable to trust fixed fortifications to protect your borders is untenable.

 

[Typee]

I'd argue if you want the players to act a certain way the least you could do is give them a convenient UI to do so.
You know maybe doomstacking isn't that great, maybe the best way to play Stellaris right now is to have several smaller fleets spread over your empire, but I'll never know that because I absolutely cannot be arsed to confront the fleet manager any more than I need to. It's still broken, it still doesn't work, it's been years now.
Other than that, yes, fleet supplies are the solution. Distant Worlds already showed us that, but the Stellaris team either hasn't played it or are too busy pretending the game doesn't exist to draw lessons from it. Establishing a front toward an empire should be a long winded effort that involves starting one or more starbase on their border years before. Of course that should also mean starbases have to be refocused on their military role and not the abortion that are the trade and piracy system. If you don't want to crush your player's military ambitions under busywork, don't implement a system that is designed to be nothing but busywork.

 

[klopkr]

It might look silly in space but I wonder what this game would be like if there weren't choke points and the game played a bit like hoi4 where it's more important to have no gaps in your front line than to have the largest army. Then pushing the enemy lines back rather than just killing them having them disappear.

I think it would make space wars really fun to have to basically meet your enemies everywhere on your space borders or risk losing it all, stretching your lines thin.

On the other hand it would completely flatten space and basically make no sense realistically. (you blow up a space ship so it moves back a system?).

I think fundamentally the problem is that 3d space functions in a way that isn't easily represented on a 2d screen and we're also making up constraints as to not make space accessible from all points or so empty you would never see each other. We're making choice on how to simplify that reality in a satisfying way.

Or what if stellaris was more like hoi4 ship fleets where they automatically set out to do the tasks you desire and you watch it play out.

Originally stellaris was a confusing clusterfuck but somewhat more complex because there were tons of special movement options you wouldn't see in another paradox game but it's confusing and unintuitive and hard to design around so it wasn't exactly fun for everyone unless you really understood it. Now it's kind of like eu4 with no ocean tiles and unit death rather than manpower which is definitely something paradox and players have more of a grasp on but inherently is a bit of a less interesting version of eu4 type wars.

I'm having a hard time imagining the right solutions to these problems that either do more than a tweak but takes less than a ground up rework.

I think a deep thought at how the map is generated is going to be fundamental to adding non confusing complexity to the war system but it also seems like something that would need aa massive risky patch or a sequel.

I want to know what warfare would look like to your guys if you had to redo it for the game. More like EU4? A new more unique and complex space based system? More like hoi4? Like another game I haven't played?

How do other non turn and tile based space games handle this?

 

[jwk4heels]

They're connected to another issue, namely that fleets are all that matter. They don't reduce doomstacking at all, nor would increasing their strength really change the fundamental strategy re : chokepoints. But the vanilla situation of being entirely unable to trust fixed fortifications to protect your borders is untenable.

I think it would be interesting if the fleet and starbase systems were directly connected. What if fleet cap covered both fleets and starbases? Perhaps you would get more bang for your fleet cap buck from starbases in terms of firepower since they're stationary.

As an example of how this might play out, let's take two empires a few decades into the game that are similar in power. One dedicates most of its fleet cap to the mobile fleet, the other dedicates most to defensive starbases. The aggressive empire has a larger fleet and has more flexibility in how and where it can apply its military power. The defensive empire has a small fleet, but uses it to reinforce its much stronger defensive starbases at strategic chokepoints. Even if the aggressive empire doomstacks, it won't be able to beat a combined small fleet reinforcing a defensive station since you get more bang for your buck on the station, assuming they're sitting at similar fleet caps. Therefore the might a defensive empire can bring to bear in its chokepoint systems could eclipse the doomstack.

Balance, and a way for the aggressive empire to punch through could be provided through various means. Ships have a chance to escape and the fleet could regroup faster than the starbase can be repaired or replaced. Aggressive empires could have increased mobility through diplo stances, military doctrines, or some other mechanism in order to get to chokepoints before a reinforcing fleet.

I don't think it's realistic necessarily for an empire to be fully defensible without the use of a fleet in any capacity. And there still needs to be a way for aggressive empires to get through the defenses, just from a gameplay perspective. That's why I have a reinforcing fleet in my example. Although it might be neat to have an origin that completely forgoes the ability to have fleets in favor of some super turtle defensive stations.

I just typed this stream of consciousness with very little nuance or detail, I know. I'm just spitballing here. Thoughts?

 

[Hansatron]

How do other non turn and tile based space games handle this?

If you take away the decorations, its basically an extremely stripped down RTS where armies just get right clicked into each other. And have much more limited movement options due to hyperlanes.

Common things an RTS has:
-unit counter systems, which stellaris has in name although maybe needs balancing to have in practice.
-"towers," or stationary defenses that enable turtle gameplay over some time horizon (but aren't invincible)
-units can kill each other and (most of the time) almost all units have some ability to take down buildings/structures/objectives too.

That last part is critical to why RTS game metas often involve splitting forces and other ruses outside of raiding villagers. In stellaris, only a dedicated siege unit can take capture an objective (armies going at planets.) And armies cannot fight ships in any capacity. Because of this, I suspect it sets up the pace of war we have where you sweep away enemy fleets and then send in the armies to take a planet. I'm not sure what the answer is, but something around this facet probably needs to change. Should all ships have some embarked marines to simulate their "siege damage" ? I don't know. But the fact that most of the time, most inhabited systems have zero military presence is kind of odd. (I do think having planetary defense projected into space, either little ships with no hyperdrive, or having planets acting like carriers for starfighters, would make a nice addition.)
Or maybe fleets need a blockade action. I'm not sure. But I smell that the space-ground combat interaction is part of what makes war so one dimensional.

 

[MichaelJanuary]

The CONCEPTS that are missing in Stellaris strategic combat model (to me) are the following. To be honest, I dont mind HOW its solved, as long as the solution is engaging:

• Fleet operational range. I think I would have preferred some system of enforcing an operational range (be it fuel, supply, morale, sensor/comm range)
• Defense in Depth: The hyperlane system (however dense the hyperlanes) means there is a specific route that ships will follow, as well as a hard unambiguous frontline. Wormholes/Gateways/Jump drive might mitigate this to some extent, but there is no concept of defense in depth.
• Occupation: There is no requirement to garrison, occupy, police or otherwise convert captured planets or star systems.
• Attrition: Related to occupation and defense in depth, there is no way to inflict attritional losses on enemy units, or to trade territory for damage, like in say a scorched earth retreat, or a funded resistance, or booby traps.
• Morale: All ships are basically robots. There is no human (or sentient) aspect to them, in that they do not suffer morale loss or gain. Retreat/Disengage is based on damage, rather than morale. Morale is exactly the same regardless whether you are outnumbered, on home ground, in foreign territory, or have not been to a friendly base in years.
• Diplomacy: Treaties impose very few limitations, and cannot be violated or broken. Neighbours only care that you have a fleet, not that your border is undefended, or your fleet is on the far side of the galaxy. (Well humans do, but the AI should too). It should be possible to establish a 'Neutral Zone', or have a 'Balance of Power' on a disputed border, or to violate treaties at a diplomatic cost (Trust, grievances, Dislike, whatever you want to call it).
• Asymmetry: Whether through different drive mechanisms, different tech trees, more diverse fleet doctrines, there is very little to militarily distinguish one empire from another.
• Resource and Production Model: I really don't think the current global resource model and magic shipyards work at all. No economy works like that. The Hearts of Iron economy to me is fantastic .... your production is limited by your access to a range of resources, and I like complex supply chains. Stellaris supply chain is not decently complex, its fairly linear and too abstract.

The other area where I would like to a shift in focus is I would like to see LESS micro on the economy side, and MORE micro around things like planetary engineering, fleet management and ship design. Note: There is a big difference between complexity and micro. I mean, why do I have to cycle through planets clicking to upgrade buildings? Why do I have to cycle through planets at all? Couldn't i just have built the better building in the first place? And a better UI or Outliner would negate the need for me to cycle through planets looking for stuff that needs to be done.

Note 2: Abstraction is fine. Abstract the planetary economy. Less abstraction on the orbital economy, and much less abstraction on the space economy. We want to play a SPACE game, not a planet management game.

Strategic resources really need a major rework, the current implication is not strategic at all, and sucks donkey testicles.


Here is an example of how you design a sci-fi game: Your technologies are dependent on specific resources (Unobtanium, Duranium, Neutronium, Dust, Spice, Gravitonium, Immortalum, whatever). They cannot be synthesized, they can only be mined, and they only occur in specific places. He who controls the <magic space dust>, controls the universe.

 

[PK_AZ]

2) Enemy captured bases should not be able to repair your ships. THey were never designed, or engineered to deal with your kind of ships, and don't have the infrastructure for it can be the argument. This would make wars less about gobbling up massive swaths of land, and more about strategic systems. Making a big push deep into enemy territory is something you have to plan for.

Just give your BadBoys regenerative hull.

I want to know what warfare would look like to your guys if you had to redo it for the game. More like EU4? A new more unique and complex space based system? More like hoi4? Like another game I haven't played?

Well, if I was designing Stellaris warfare system (which I obviously don't), I would try to get something unique in context of Paradox games, through strongly inspired by hoi4 naval system. Here is rough sketch - I mean rough, it is in no way concrete and full concept, but I kinda like writing such fan fiction, so here we are.

Core concept of my idea is triangle of Starbare-Fleet-Fuel.

Starbase is static point on the map. It is used as base for Fleets, therefore it create fleet Area Of Operation.
Fleet is movable point on the map. It is anchored to Starbase.
Fuel is special resource which you have to pay with if you want to move your Fleet from its Starbase. It is global resource.

When I say "docked" I mean "fleet is standing in a starsystem which has starbase".
When I say "stationing" I mean "fleet is standing in any starsystem".
Fleet who dock in system X is also stationing in system X. Fleet who station in system Y may or may not be docked in system Y, depending on if system Y has starbase with access.

1. Every Fleet has its Homebase and its Fuel. If Fleet is docked at its Homebase, it do not use any Fuel. If Fleet is stationing in any system that is NOT its Homebase, it uses some amount of Fuel daily. Everytime Fleet do hyperlane jump, it use some amount of Fuel. Ships can be refueled only if they are docked in Homebase.

2. If Fleet is in default stance, it will automatically order itself to return to Homebase, whenever its Fuel is low. If Fleet ever found itself Fuel-less, it will do emergency jump to its Homebase.

3. Additionally, every Starbase has limited naval capacity. Ships below Naval Capacity can be docked for free (i.e. they do not use any fuel for just stationing). Ships over Naval Capacity has to use fuel like if they were stationed in any non-starbase system.

4. BUT Fleets docked use Fuel from global storage, not from their fuel tanks. They are also refueling their fuel tanks as normal.

The point of Rules 3 and 4 is to make force concentration expensive, but possible.

5. Additionally, you can build Fleet Depots in any system that do not have Starbase, including occupied enemy systems. Basically, Fleet Depots are naval bases with 0 Naval Capacity.

Expected results:

1. In current Stellaris, your force projectors are your fleets. In my version, your force projectors are your Starbases. Fleets are forces being projected.

2. Operations long way from your Starbases and Fleet Depots are impossible - your ships will empty its fuel tanks before they achieve target system.

3. Stationing in systems other than Starbases is discouraged - your ships will empty their fuel tanks and be forced to return.

4. Fleet Depots are the way to circumnavigate results 2 and 3, at the cost of Fuel.

5. War has its rhythm - your fleet execute attack, using some of its fuel, then it has to return to base and refuel.

6. Force Dispersion is encouraged - optimal way (fuel-wise) to station your fleets is to dock them in many starbases, so not single Starbase Naval Capacity is exceeded.

7. Force concentration (for example: to take enemy fortress) is still possible, but it costs Fuel.

8 and the last. Most operations are executed to take down enemy Starbase, or to retake your Starbase. By taking enemy Starbases, whenever they are captured and used as yours, or just burned down, you deny enemy ability to freely operate in region that was in that Starbase Area of Operations.

Known problems:

First and only. System is as good as its Fuel balance is.

2. System has in-built stalemate risk. Sometimes nor you nor your enemy can effectively execute operations because your starbases are unable to support operation so long from your borders. I'm not fully convinced if it is bad.

3. It may lead to fortress problem, when you or your enemy cannot take key starbase, because forces stationing here are bigger than how much force aggressor local starbases can support. I believe it will won't be a problem because of depots and going over Naval Cap, but the risk exist.

4. Fuel Depot spam - as Fuel Depots are unlimited and increase your Area of Operation basically for free, it may be optimal to spam every system with them "just in case". Simplest way to circumnavigate it would be to give every Fuel Depot its own fuel usage per day, maybe increasing with number of depots.

Pages intentionally left blank:

1. Fuel production and Fuel balance.

2. Ground operations.

3. Influence of technology.

 

[FuzzyLogic]

I wouldn't be too opposed to a logistics system that would decrease a fleet's fighting efficiency if it can draw a direct link to its home space. I haven't played the more recent HoI games but I think I recall that's how the old games abstracted logistics, both for ground and sea units.

 

[HugsAndSnuggles]

IMO, the main problem with warfare is that it beats everything else, while having no counter (AI idiocy aside) or reasonable alternative.

Although when it comes to conducting warfare, there are plenty of other issues too:
- no reasonable warfare explanation in tutorial
- defensive starbases are way too weak to counter early warfare (and be of any reasonable use after the first 20 years)
- controls and related stuff is broken to require more micro: armies not keeping aggressive stance, fleet attack orders parking fleets on star instead of starbase, starbases not repairing fleets upon reactivation... hell, you can't even park anything on your first starbase, unless you manually re-park your initial fleet; reinforcements often break (an there's no explanation anywhere in game on how they work), fleet manager is still half-finished mess that hows you wrong flet half the time, there's still no way to properly group several fleets...
- indication of occupied territory and claims leaves a lot to be desired
- warscore needs a lot of tweaking still: 3-side wars, for example, that require you to either kill your enemies' enemies or wait for a few decades.
- same with planetary warfare (apart from being generally dull): blocades do nothing (access to empire-wide resources), devastation is a joke (because it's an additive modifier and easy to get rid of), occupation still gives half planetary production to its owner, pops are pretty much immortal... and nothing stops you from resettling (mojority of) pops them moment you are in danger of losing a planet.

 

[InvisibleBison]

As an example of how this might play out, let's take two empires a few decades into the game that are similar in power. One dedicates most of its fleet cap to the mobile fleet, the other dedicates most to defensive starbases. The aggressive empire has a larger fleet and has more flexibility in how and where it can apply its military power. The defensive empire has a small fleet, but uses it to reinforce its much stronger defensive starbases at strategic chokepoints. Even if the aggressive empire doomstacks, it won't be able to beat a combined small fleet reinforcing a defensive station since you get more bang for your buck on the station, assuming they're sitting at similar fleet caps. Therefore the might a defensive empire can bring to bear in its chokepoint systems could eclipse the doomstack.

In order for this to work, starbases would have to not only be more effective per point of fleet capacity than ships, but they'd have to increase their factor of superiority over time. Consider two countries with equal technology and 200 naval capacity. If one uses all of its naval capacity to build a fleet, and the other uses half of its naval capacity to build a fleet and half to build starbases, then in order for the second country to win each starbase has to be equivalent to 150 naval capacity worth of ships (to give the defensive country a 25% fleet power advantage). If, on the other hand, the two countries had 2000 naval capacity each, the starbase would have to be equivalent to 1500 naval capacity worth of ships to maintain the same relative strength. And starbase upgrades don't suffice to explain how this is happening, because you can keep increasing your naval capacity even after you've upgraded all your starbases to citadels.

IMO, the main problem with warfare is that it beats everything else, while having no counter (AI idiocy aside) or reasonable alternative.

How exactly would you use something other than warfare to defeat someone who's declared war on you?

 

[LWE]

How exactly would you use something other than warfare to defeat someone who's declared war on you?

There are non-crude ways like diplomacy, with your allies helping (I make use of it in my games). It still requires warfare, of course. You could also have a small, technologically-advanced fleet defeating a bigger backwards one, but Stellaris economy currently operates on the "why not both" principle.

 

[InvisibleBison]

There are non-crude ways like diplomacy, with your allies helping (I make use of it in my games). It still requires warfare, of course.

"Having someone else fight a war for you" is not a non-warfare method of countering war.

 

[Dragatus]

I like complex supply chains. Stellaris supply chain is not decently complex, its fairly linear and too abstract.

Please no. I do not want to have to deal with supply chains of any sort in my space opera genocide simulator. Key strategic resources required to construct advanced spaceships components? Yes, please. But supply chains? Nope, nope, nope.

The rest of your points I can get behind though.

 

[HugsAndSnuggles]

How exactly would you use something other than warfare to defeat someone who's declared war on you?

It's more about preventing the need of territory grab to get more resources. Now, the best strategy is to grab AI capitals ASAP. What if there would be an alternative, like international treaties along the lines of megacorp, but with more investment and way more beneficial to both parties? To the point of where they actually rival early conquests?

 

[Dragatus]

Or actually controlling a grabbed capital could be harder and you'd actually have to invest an effort to prevent it from defecting back to the original owner.

 

[grommile]

It's more about preventing the need of territory grab to get more resources. Now, the best strategy is to grab AI capitals ASAP. What if there would be an alternative, like international treaties along the lines of megacorp, but with more investment and way more beneficial to both parties? To the point of where they actually rival early conquests?

The scope for a functioning autarky to quickly get comparative advantage from trading with other functioning autarkies is pretty limited.

And in the early game, everyone (other than empires with certain exotic origins) has to be a functioning autarky.

 

[methegrate]

War in Stellaris currently has a lot of issues. I'm just making this thread to collate them all and see what could be done to fix them.

Issue One: Doomstacks. They're still a thing, and because of them, strategic gameplay goes to 'force decisive victory, then play whack a mole with fleets'.

Issue Two: Ship balance. X-slot battleships beat everything.

Issue Three: Chokepoints. In addition to making doomstacks worse, they really just make playing any given empire a strategy of 'expand to chokepoint and backfill'.

Issue Four: Weak Starbases. End game fleets will roll over anything. This again contributes to doomstacking and makes fortifications basically pointless.

Issue Five: Easy Logistics. No consideration is given to guerilla fighting, sabotaging enemy supplies, or having to secure supplies beyond capturing an enemy starbase to repair at.


Overall, the current state of Stellaris warfare is one where only fleets matter, strategy is pointless, tactics are basically non-existent, and it all devolves into a (admittedly pretty) smashing of action figures together.

Any other war-related issues? Any suggestions on how to fix them?

Agreed, although I don't see the logic on Issue Four. It seems like stronger starbases would contribute more to doomstacking rather than the other way around.

I think issues one, three and five are all related. We have doomstacks because the map forces ships into a funnel, and because there's no better way to attack or protect a fleet than by concentrating your forces. Personally, my take on fixing it would be:

- First, get rid of the chokepoint system altogether. I can't understand why they built this in the first place, since it is virtually custom-designed to force players into using doomstacks.

Chokepoints also eliminate logistics or infrastructure from play. We do already have some infrastructure with anchorages, shipyards and trade bases. They are well worth defending, and fairly valuable in theory. The problem is that none of them matter in practice. Thanks to the chokepoint system, if the enemy is in a position to hit your anchorages and shipyards it means they've already essentially won the war.

- Second, eliminate fleets from war score and war exhaustion entirely. Right now, the fleet is the only thing in a war that matters. You can take half their empire, but war score/exhaustion barely moves if they still have their fleet. So you're always best off using the fleet to protect itself and target the other player's fleet.

As long as that's true doomstacks will always be the right move. Instead, your fleet needs to be how you protect the things that matter and how you take them. Losing a war with your fleet intact, because the enemy has taken too many of your systems and planets to keep going, that just means you used that fleet badly.

- Third, tie logistics to fleet strength. Right now logistics exists in the form of anchorages and fleet capacity. The problem is that this only affects fleet maintenance costs. Given how broken the Stellaris economy is post-2.2, any midgame empire has far too many resources for that to matter even if you could target those anchorages (which again, thanks to chokepoints, you can't).

In addition to anchorages, we also need infrastructure targets that reduce or eliminate a fleet's ability to fight. This would split the player's incentives. Offensively, if an opponent concentrates their forces you could split your fleet and attack their infrastructure. Defensively, it would give you a reason to split your forces between attacking and defending fleets.

- Fourth, dramatically reduce most ranges, such as for trade bases and sensors. Stellaris is smaller than it thinks it is. Even a radius of three or four hops can cover most of a mid-game empire by the time you've calculated out all of the connections. As a result, instead of a network of vulnerable economic nodes or sensor stations, an empire can build one or two of these assets and protect them.

Infrastructure with a range needs to be reduced to the point where an empire needs to build and defend networks, so that attackers have a logistics network to destroy. Otherwise, again, these targets will be mostly theoretical. It's a good idea that players can cripple an opponent's economy by striking their trade network, for example, but when that trade network is mostly collected by a single, central base, it doesn't matter much in practice.