I just generally throw afterburners on my battleships and group everything together because I like my fleets to arrive together and not have one get there way ahead. Against the AI you can probably just go full Battleships because they aren’t going to be spamming torpedo corvettes against you.
If you are fighting the Unbidden go all Kinetics for weapons and shields as your primary defense as they rely almost exclusively on shields for protection and use energy weapons which are bad against shields. You don’t need a single PD slot in your fleet. Something like Giga Cannon/Kinetic Artillery/Kinetic Artillery in the X/LLL/LL slots.
Thanks for that helpful reply. I’m glad to know that about the Unbidden. I tried but failed to figure it out for myself. (E.g., I tried researching their debris fields.) How can you tell what builds the enemy is using if you don’t have intel on them?
Alas, my war against the Unbidden did not go well, and I was eliminated in 2265. Too bad, cuz I swear I was wearin’ em down!
I’m getting ready for a new game. Already installed the beta. Also installed Tiny Outliner and might try the Ironman version (achievement-compatible) of Amazing Space Battles. Now I’m shopping for DLC. I’ve already got Utopia I’m thinking maybe Leviathans, Federations, Distant Stars, but I dunno…
I fired up another game this morning since the last was kind at a dead end after the guardian AE beat the crap out of the fanatic AE.
This time we look like dwarves, so fanatic materialist + militaristic, and natural engineers, industrious, along with quarrelsome. The galaxy gen was fairly kind to us, and we had a nice secluded cluster on the outer rim with a good chokepoint into the core worlds. We quickly set off trying to grab as much territory in the early game as possible. We eventually bumped into some others. One was a bunch squids that decided to attack us. We smashed their fleet and looked to be well on the way to victory, but instead of leaving well enough alone our fleet was hammered pretty hard by a starbase. So we went back to our border system to regroup and they offered status quo. Since then we’ve been grabbing up the systems we bypassed, trying to tech up and get ready for when we will dine on fresh calamari.
Sounds like a fun start! Keep us posted on the calamari.
I started a new game too, using the beta and the ironman version of Amazing Space Battles. ASB is beautiful! I watched my corvettes duke it out with robots, and the colors were glorious.
Initial impressions of the beta are positive. Unity now purchases leaders, so there are some tougher decisions on how to use it.
I created some crusading pirate sharks, fanatical aquatic militarists with a dash of spiritualism. We expanded smoothly into a dozen systems, at which point we had only two paths forward, both blocked – one by hostile lizards to my north, the other by droids and space amoeba and space trees and such down south. Naturally, as I was clearing out the droids, the lizards declared war on me. Sharks vs Lizards! Bring it.
In the case of the Crisis there are only 3 possible results and they each use a static weapon and defensive layout, so there is always a hyper-optimal way to set up your ships.
Contingency use all energy weapons, stack maximum shields. They have extremely strong shields AND armor but very weak hull. Use penetrating weapons (Disruptors and Arc Emitters) for maximum efficiency. Don’t use PD.
Unbidden are what I said in my above post. Protect yourself with shields against their all energy weapons and mount all Kinetic weaponry to counter their defenses which are hugely shield based. Don’t use PD.
Prethoryn Scourge you want all armor/hull to combat their weaponry, and some PD might save you some losses. Use energy weapons on them.
KevinC answered how to see what the AI civs you are fighting are using!
Edit: Forgot to mention you can get Galactic Defender? Protector? ascension perk to get +50% damage to Crisis fleets.
I have jellyfish to the left of me, squids to the right. We just had the kahn horde event in our part of the galaxy. In all of this I messed up something, and my influence is in the gutter between my factions being upset and agreements I have. So now to try and fix that. The squids were my protectorate while the kahn was running loose. I let them go afterwards, so don’t know if that contributed to the influence tank or not. I can’t reform the government, because of lack of influence and I just got the gateway tech, but can’t build any because it requires influence. I also can’t declare any rivalries right now, because either they are too weak, or we get along too well.
Regarding seeing the enemy ship tech: I think listening posts and some ship sensors can reveal it as well, right?
Check the population tab on a planet screen. It will show the the rate of population growth and when the next pop will appear. Traditions, techs, and buildings like the gene clinic (unlocked via a fairly early social tech) are some of the ways you can increase pop growth.
You can also assemble pops through various methods. Building robots, for example, or hiveminds can use spawning pools. Just going for maximum population and research has been the meta for a long time now.
I’m having trouble figuring out how robots are supposed to work. I’ve got an Unemployed robot and an unfilled Technician job. Shouldn’t the Robot take the Technician job?
I haven’t played in about 6 months, and I’m finding it a bit overwhelming getting back in.
Apparently dealing with the portal isn’t as straightforward as I remembered, luckily the situation log explained it. We just finished an epic fight with the Unbidden in my game. Now we have a federation that along with a guardian awakened empire is about to defeat a doctrinal enforcer awakened empire. I think I just had the same events I had in the previous game with the Kahn, the Unbidden, and a Doctrinal Enforcer vs a Benevolent Interventionist.
Eventually got my influence worked out to where we were at +3 with some policy changes and a government change to satisfy the biggest factions. Did a better job with my starbase organization this game, and spent more time focusing on the habitat and planet setups.
Next game I need to remember to use control groups when I’m trying to move groups of fleets around. I lost a juggernaut to the ubidden because I didn’t get things selected properly and it got separated from the rest of my ships.
I also wish that when you are in territory that gets taken over by someone with closed borders that you didn’t go missing in action. The guardian AE had closed borders and we ended up in the same system going after the zealot, and when they took the system I had 2 huge fleets retreat back home halfway across the galaxy.
Any idea if there is a way to block the next version update? I don’t want it to kick in while I’m in the middle of an epic game. Similarly, if I were to buy new DLC now: would they take effect in my current game? Thanks.
Right click on the game in your steam list and select properties. Click on Betas, and where it says none, you can select which version that you’d like to stay on. Flip it back to none to go back to getting updates.
Is it strange that I have 2500 hours in Stellaris but have never played long enough to get to the end game crisis? I normally have conquered the galaxy long before that event will pop and don’t want to just sit there and do nothing for x game years.
Sounds like you should change the timing. How you play, your other settings, and particularly your map size will all have an impact on when you “want” a crisis. For you, mid-game and endgame clearly shouldn’t be at their defaults.
For me, I don’t like being rushed and tend to play on very large maps, so, if anything, I’m tempted to bump those markers back.
What Spaced_Cowboy said, only the current version should only show up when a new one is launched. Mods, though, tough luck.
It should be a few weeks off, though.
Very early in my first game playing as the Human Federation. I don’t know how far timewise I am in the game I do know that I have settled two more planets. My capital planet has not gained a new pop yet. From what I have watched on YouTube I know that clerks are not optimal. There are six on my capital world. Can I should I reassign them to other jobs?
If so how would I do that? Colony management seems more complex than any other space 4X I have played.
Apart from changing crisis timing, you might consider playing a Pacifist or other non-aggressive Ethic and making yourself do what I do – build and play defensively. It’s a lot harder to conquer the galaxy if you’re not conquering the galaxy, lol. Defensive wars can still gain territory, but you’ll be around for the mid- and late-game fun.
There are different tech levels for robot pops. The first and lowest tech allows robots only to take Worker jobs. The second, middle-tier tech allows robots to become technicians – but that may be a “dangerous” tech that can later provoke a crisis. (Not sure.) The third, top-tier robot-employment tech lets them even become rulers – definitely a “dangerous” tech.
So try building a district and see if the robot takes the Worker job created there.
Clerks aren’t so bad, IMHO, but you certainly don’t want them to the exlusion of all else. What have you built on that capital world? One way to “reassign” them is just to build better jobs for them, and they’ll automatically move on their own, or even emigrate (resettle) to other planets for better work. A more active way to reassign them is to click on the population tab on that planet and prioritize some other Worker job. If you’re new to the game, though, I’d suggest just building a variety of districts and buildings to ensure diversity in your job availability.
And a question of my own. When designing ships, does it matter where you place shields and armor? I think there are 3 facings in that bottom row of utility slots, but I’m not sure.
