Sneaky AI transport trick!

The AI rocks!

I have to admit I was completly taken back by this and it was awsome!

Playing on intelligent and in a medium sized galaxy.

I had managed to outrace everyone on the colony production (This method does NOT work.. I've lost more games by overexpanding..) and I was in the center of the galaxy.

I had a nice custom race with a good tech bonus and was grinding away at things as my colonies built themselves up and I climbed slowly out of the debt spiral. Helped occasionally by tech sales to the Snathi and the other 5 major civs out there.

The Altarians and I had been steadily worsening in our diplomacy, I kept doing evil things.. and they declare war on me.

Not overly concerned as I had made some anti-transport ships (cheap small fighters with a popgun on them). I was far more concerned with the sudden influence increase the Torians had suddenly found.

Gathering a small group of raider ships to attack the Torians I saw some transports from the altarians winging over towards my capital and a few other colonies. They appeared about 3 squares out. I kind of laughed at it, expecting the usual early 2 movement speed transports. Plus I had my anti-transport ships figuring I was covered for the time being I could deal with the Torians.

The next turn I lost 3 planets including my major manufacturing planet and my capital. What happened?

The Altarians had created transports with Guns.. and armor!! Big guns too (they had raced up the beam weapon side) and they attacked with 3 transports at each location with the armor stopping me from killing any of them.

They not only killed my picket ships with transports, but they completly sucker punched me.

I tell you.. I was in Awe..

Promptly had my empire sacked and burned after that, but man that was the coolest thing ever.
14,615 views 13 replies
Reply #1 Top
Must have espionaged you and seen you made ships with diddly guns that a good armor will totally negate XD
Reply #2 Top
Well yeah I assumed as much, but I was completly unprepared for that kind of sneaky tactic.

I mean I've seen feints and end rounds, but tricking out a transport with guns? that was just too cool
Reply #3 Top
Oh that sneaky AI. Gotta love it. There have been a couple of games where I've had to stop for a sec to see if there is a little green guy in my PC just because of the things it does.

I had one game where the AI sent a couple of constructors along with it's fleet and promptly built a military star base with the ship assist extras to trounce one of my heavily fortified (or well I thought fortified until this) star clusters. I was so mad that I promptly added the tactic to my bag of tricks . I find it sweet that the AI will show you new wrinkles to tactics as it's handing you your head on a platter.
Reply #4 Top
Heh, painful.

Good thing the A.I Hasent mastered the art of slamming 12 or so engines on a huge ship, Kitting it out with a few guns and Advanced Troop Modules and racing it towards your planets
Reply #5 Top
You may want to reread page 57 of your manual ! The intelligence level descriptions
ARE accurate. This is one of the first AI situations where the AI is as strong or stronger
than in a multiplayer game. Many players have been greatly surprised by this AI and what
it can do on each level. REMEMBER: Assumption is the Mother of ALL screw-ups !!!


JIM
Reply #6 Top
Hehe... yeah assuming your planets are safe is not a good thing against the intelligent AI setting. It's just that I can't help but wonder what weakness it's plotting to exploit in the next turn. Being forced to stay on your toes is refreshing. All too often these types of games boil down to *hey do this and you win 95% of the time*. This one just doesn't let you get complacent. And if you do it will smack you around and make you it's back room b----. Fun fun fun...

I really hope that other companies take notice of this and we get to see more TBS games have this level of AI development. All the better for us!
Reply #7 Top
Whats really funny is I thought I had gotten the upper hand on the AI by countering their "transport rush" that I've seen them use before.

This game just rocks
Reply #8 Top
The thing we have to remember is, an AI is a computer, that said it will not forget to do a move. For example, say you are playing a game of chess, you never seen that rook about to take your queen out, the comp, it will always see it and won't forget to move it. Another thing, I would not underestimate its ability to design a ship, as noted above, it can and will surprise you. In GalCiv1, I used to lose on a regular basis against the AI, time and time again even on lower difficulty levels. So GalCiv2, being an even more intelligent game, I tend to drop the difficulty level down so the AI may be a little more forgiving
Reply #9 Top
I had one game where the AI sent a couple of constructors along with it's fleet and promptly built a military star base with the ship assist extras to trounce one of my heavily fortified (or well I thought fortified until this) star clusters


Crap, I thought I was Mr. Creative when I did this last night to the Terrans! Mobile Attack/Defense bonus... what an idea! Didn't matter tho... they rolled in their pre-cursor "Ranger-class Cruiser" they "found" the turn before and wiped me out! Which just reinforces Citizen CapitalShip's point... the PC doesn't forget, and we dumb humans do. Should've found that cruiser and checked it out, beforehand.. something like 24 Mass Drivers and 21 Shields, and lots of engines -- it got to that fight in a hurry!

Yeah... All I ever find is stuff like "worm-like" life forms in the oceans of the planets I colonize. What do the Terrans find?! Hulking pre-cursor butt-kicking ships! The AI is already too good... they don't deserve to be lucky, too!

Heart-breaking, yeah... but I still do love this game!
Reply #10 Top
Don't you all worry, I lost to the Snathi in a war. What's even worse is that I had another major empire backing me up as well. I guess it means the AI is really good if a minor race can beat you. Grant it they didn't really attack, but their defense was too good. Hmmm.... maybe i just suck.
Reply #12 Top

Thats odd. Precursor rangers typically have 4 engines, I thought...


Yeah... that was probably the case. All I know is it had more than my Medium-hull Corvettes did (they all have 2 Impulse Mark III engines), and it crossed a fair amount of space in a short amount of time.
Reply #13 Top
There are augments in the game for ship speed so maybe the Terrans had those. I've gotten that Ranger ship a few times and while it does pack quite a bit of fire power it moves at a pathetic 2 parsecs / wk.