New Meta Game breaking strat

[redharo]

Go Fanatic Militarist/Distinguished Admirality and grab supremacy first to get 40% fire rate.

Don't Expand/Build spaceports/Grab minimal amount of space around you.
Build Only Alloy Foundries, atleast 5.
Use the alloys you've been saving from not building space ports, and your foundries to build ships and War Dec the first person you meet with 20 corvettes move their pops to your capital for sweet +30 pop profit.

 

[happyscrub]

a bunch of unhappy pops

 

[redharo]

a bunch of unhappy pops

doesnt matter if they unhappy if they slaves

 

[sterrius]

how do you buy 4 alloy foundries in 4 years? this is 1600 minerals.

Also how do you have 20 energy and 60 minerals/month in such a short time?

 

[redharo]

civilian industry takes minerals to make consumer goods, which you can disable/demolish it and move the pops that work them to alloy fabricator.
your research lab isnt gonna do shit if you arent making consumer goods, so you disable/demolish that and move the 2 pops that work them to alloy fabricator

thats 2 already

You can sell consumer goods and buy minerals using the market

 

[redharo]

Yep, got it down to year 4

currently the "meta" build, then you spam corvettes and get +30 pops from another empire, orr... the other empire does the same thing. Literally nothing the other empire can do against this if they dont run the same build.

i could pretty much already afford like 8 corvettes by year 6 from the stockpiled minerals probably should have demolished the lab instead of the civilian infrastructure though, because i could have used the consumer goods for something else later on.

Any negative tech effects that you might incurr from doing this is offset by capturing a capital and getting 60 total pops, which you can use for tech

 

[Iron Spirit]

Yep I discovered a similar strategy yesterday, it works without fail. You don't even have to go with Militarist and/or Distinguished Admirality. Just Supremacy will do.

 

[Sarno]

So we are basically back to corvette rushes being the strongest...a cheese tactic that was eliminated/balanced...around 1.6?

 

[MightyFox]

Problem #1 You have no idea where your nearest opponent is at the start of the game. Spawn near an FE, good luck with your Strat.

Problem #2 Even with a 40% fire rate, 20 corvettes is going to do pretty poorly against early game starbases. Not to mention any corvettes the opponent also happens to have in system to support it.

Problem #3 Where are you going to get all the influence you need to actually claim their capital system so you can take their pops off world? Even with a clustered start, that's a still a hefty tag, and the moment you do it, a human player, at least, will start to build up their military. I suppose you can get around this by going purifiers, but then you've already thrown your cards on the table.

Problem #4 Armies? You need armies to take their worlds. Even if you take the system, starting defense armies are pretty tough. Sure, you can sit there and bombard all day, but 20 corvettes is going to take a looooooooooooong time. (Even longer considering you won't have 20 by then)

Problem #5 Seriously? Your going to turn off tech? You do know gun upgrades are commonly one of the first techs offered, right? Better hope your opponent isn't researching one before you decide to storm them.

 

[Sarno]

Problem #1 You have no idea where your nearest opponent is at the start of the game. Spawn near an FE, good luck with your Strat.

Problem #2 Even with a 40% fire rate, 20 corvettes is going to do pretty poorly against early game starbases. Not to mention any corvettes the opponent also happens to have in system to support it.

Problem #3 Where are you going to get all the influence you need to actually claim their capital system so you can take their pops off world? Even with a clustered start, that's a still a hefty tag, and the moment you do it, a human player, at least, will start to build up their military. I suppose you can get around this by going purifiers, but then you've already thrown your cards on the table.

Problem #4 Armies? You need armies to take their worlds. Even if you take the system, starting defense armies are pretty tough. Sure, you can sit there and bombard all day, but 20 corvettes is going to take a looooooooooooong time. (Even longer considering you won't have 20 by then)

Problem #5 Seriously? Your going to turn off tech? You do know gun upgrades are commonly one of the first techs offered, right? Better hope your opponent isn't researching one before you decide to storm them.

Early game starbases have around 300-400 fleetpower max, unless you decide to spam combat modules on them, which at that point good luck with dismantling your only shipyard in the game. 5-6 missile corvettes can take that out easily.

The influence might be an issue though, but 6-7 years...might be enough to get purple mana just for that one system.

 

[redharo]

pretty sure this can take out anyone year 6-12 who isn't doing same build.

 

[redharo]

1.2k just using standard T1 stuff
starting defense army at year 6-12 is just 78,
just build 3-4 assault armies

 

[Mitroll]

Very nice build. One one hand it's clearly very strong (perhaps too strong?), on the other hand it's nice to see a supremacy-first build that scales well into lategame.

 

[xsmilingbanditx]

I used to install the mod that makes the AI more competent and they really do go for fleet heavily. So fleet might be superior, but everything else is pathetic or inferior. I got declared twice but never attacked.
Still, same as for defending against spammed corvettes:

Find chokepoint, fortify chokepoint, upgrade starbase, slap modules and DPs on it. With some tech the Starbase easily exceeds 1k FP.
I don't say that fleet doesn't look scary early on. And it might work against the current AI. But it's safe to say, if you lose corvettes and this does not go fast, you're basically out of the picture.
But that's that with all strategies. Just yours doesn't have a backup

 

[redharo]

I used to install the mod that makes the AI more competent and they really do go for fleet heavily. So fleet might be superior, but everything else is pathetic or inferior. I got declared twice but never attacked.
Still, same as for defending against spammed corvettes:

Find chokepoint, fortify chokepoint, upgrade starbase, slap modules and DPs on it. With some tech the Starbase easily exceeds 1k FP.
I don't say that fleet doesn't look scary early on. And it might work against the current AI. But it's safe to say, if you lose corvettes and this does not go fast, you're basically out of the picture.
But that's that with all strategies. Just yours doesn't have a backup

The problem with this is that starbases are utterly useless if you dont have FTL Inhibitor, and you dont typically get FTL inhibitor by year 12.

If you are not going the alloy build, then you are kind of screwed because the starbase costs alloys, so do fleets.

 

[Mikhail_Mengsk]

It seems to work, but, honestly, the AI isn'It's game breaking only against braindead AI.

Just don't do it? The alternative would be to buff starting starbases, but wouldn't it lead to basically swatting down early wars?

 

[redharo]

it works on multiplayer against other players that tend to go tech/research or moderate tech/military. Its literally cancer/brain dead. Because alot of the time, you can literally just demand tribute, and a TON of people in MP will accept it when they see your fleet

 

[xsmilingbanditx]

A starbase is cheaper than a fleet and costs less maintenance. Expanding is also more expensive for a supremacy build.
It depends on the position and empire distribution. It may take you well into the 20 until you meet another empire and until then, you're kinda crippled. So going economy first is the save bet while trying to conquer fast is a gambit.
Another (player) empire building up in peace may well have overtaken you despite your jumpstart because it takes alot of time until you really integrated the new pops and closed the borders and so on.
Against AI...Yeah sure I'd say it works anyways. Currently I don't even bother waging war because the AI just rolls over to get banged.

 

[Linusz]

This actually happened to me performed by the AI. Year 2210, militaristic neigbour declares war and invades with 30+ corvettes. Spaceport and my own 15 corvettes stood no chance. Adminral difficulty. Never expected that from AI especially not in Le Guin.

Game was literally over.

 

[VoidEmperor]

I usually play very pacifistic, but I just tried the strat and it gets a S* from me