Distant Worlds: Shadows (Released)

[Kushan]

I have always found pirates annoying. Which is why I turn them off

I like having them to give missions to, especially the resource mission. Helps supply a new colony with the needed strategic resources. But I really think the AI is going overboard with the whole boarding thing.

[Martok]

Thanks for the update, Erik.  Will download today! 

This:
- altered "Random" proximity setting in Game Startup to distribute starting empires *EVENLY* across the galaxy

Probably my favorite change/addition as well.  Yay! 

[OJsDad]

Kushan,

    Have you looked at arming  your stations with a few light weapons to fend off pirates.

[Darkspire]

How is everyone getting on with the pirates with 1.9.0.6? Would have to say these have been the best games to date so far in the 2+years I have been playing, I am on normal difficulty, on a 10x10 400 prewarp and it has been complete and utter chaos, constantly under attack and planets having raids, which fortunately I am able to hold, just about, the pirate factions I have not found and destroyed are usually in another empires domain and some of them now are numbering 100+ military ships and are really having a party, now about 25 years into a new game and am only just getting on top of them, the attacks and raids have been so thick and fast I have not even had a chance to stem the growth of other empires.

Darkspire

[Rayfer]

I'm loving the game now, always liked it before but it is better now.  You can still set the pirates on few, although you will get them in the pre-warp era as part of the Shadow addon.  At least that's how it seems to me.  I am finding them much tougher than they used to be but I enjoy being able to hire them to attack other civs bases, protect my own and smuggle in rare resources that I need....adds a new element to already great game.

[JudgeDredd]

I haven't got back into it since my faction ran out of money (creating ships to try and thwart pirates).

I hate the pirates.

[Darkspire]

I haven't got back into it since my faction ran out of money (creating ships to try and thwart pirates).

I hate the pirates.

You will have a good reason to hate them playing a prewarp empire with the current update  ;D

Darkspire

[JudgeDredd]

Have they made them more of a bastard then? Because if so - that's really not going to help me decide to go back to it. They were already a pain in the arse.

Though I suppose I could turn them off. FWIW I never seemed to get them to gather resources for me anyway. I used to get a message asking if I wanted to, I'd reply yes then a while later I'd get the message saying the agreement was up and I never seemed to pay anything out.

[Yskonyn]

I have been on holiday. I am itching to start up a game of Shadows again after reading the reports about the new patch! YARR!

[Darkspire]

Have they made them more of a bastard then? Because if so - that's really not going to help me decide to go back to it. They were already a pain in the arse.

Though I suppose I could turn them off. FWIW I never seemed to get them to gather resources for me anyway. I used to get a message asking if I wanted to, I'd reply yes then a while later I'd get the message saying the agreement was up and I never seemed to pay anything out.

They seem to supply quite well now from a prewarp point of view, as long as they are not to near my colonies I let them exist but its a whole new ball game trying to find the balance to keeping them about for supplies and whittling them down because there numbers tend to grow. As for the pirates, the words, 'stirred up a hornets nest' seems to spring to mind, they are very aggressive but it just makes the game so much more interesting really.

Darkspire

[Kushan]

How is everyone getting on with the pirates with 1.9.0.6? Would have to say these have been the best games to date so far in the 2+years I have been playing, I am on normal difficulty, on a 10x10 400 prewarp and it has been complete and utter chaos, constantly under attack and planets having raids, which fortunately I am able to hold, just about, the pirate factions I have not found and destroyed are usually in another empires domain and some of them now are numbering 100+ military ships and are really having a party, now about 25 years into a new game and am only just getting on top of them, the attacks and raids have been so thick and fast I have not even had a chance to stem the growth of other empires.

Darkspire

Despite my complaining, I do like the current pirate strength. I have not been having an easy time squashing them. I made the mistake of expanding to quickly, went from 2 colonies to 4-5 before I had the defenses to guard them. Now my 2 main fleets and 2 smaller fleets are to spread out defending and trying to hold my mining stations and defend my new aquisitions, that I don;t have the spare strength to go on the offensive. Sooner or later I'm going to have to bite the bullet and do it, or the pirates are just going to run over me with ships. And that doesn't even take into account my several unhappy neighbors. Some naturally dislike me, but now the Securans, who before I ran into the humans where the strongest military power, are starting to dislike me because the "covet my colonies and resources". Not good since I'm only 6th or 7th in military ranking.

With the new economic system, I'm struggling to afford a bigger fleet without running a huge deficit.

@Darkspire:

Normally I leave ship design to the AI, but I'm doing my first full micromanage game right now and seem to be having trouble coming up with good weapon combinations/ship designs. Do you have any advice? I believe you mentioned you did a fleet redesign in a thread on pirates on the DW forums, and I'm wonder what exactly you did.

Thanks.

[Darkspire]

Designs. That is a very good question, I gave up on normal empire play as you have to use the design templates and although I have written a master document in word to make it easier they are so much more work than what was the standard in Legends. I now have a master set that I designed for prewarp, all prewarp design and just the basics, load them in at the start of a game and add new tech as and when needed. Weapons of choice for me are:

Escort 2x Phaser Lance + 2x Plasma Torpedoes + 2x Ion Cannon
Frigate 4x Phaser Lance + 2x Plasma Torpedoes + 2x Ion Cannon
Destroyer 6x Phaser Lance + 4x Plasma Torpedoes + 2x Ion Cannon + 1x Assault Pod
Cruiser 8x Phaser Lance + 6x Plasma Torpedoes + 2x Ion Cannon + 2x Assault Pod
Capital 10x Phaser Lance + 8x Plasma Torpedoes + 2x Ion Cannon

Remember that the escort is really a fighter and that the frigate is a just a heavier version, thus they do not have to much added regards weapons. Also to put missiles on and there upgrades until you have the spare power with quantum reactors to use torpedoes and then add the various defense tech like ion defenses, they seem to use ion cannons a fair bit, with the escort and frigate having less on they are fast and can keep hitting till something heavier comes to help, my escort and frigate designs run circles round the pirates, with the ion cannons stalling them they are easy prey in lower numbers. Also do not forget the added bonuses that combat targeting, counter measures and damage control give, I also make extensive use of hyper deny when I have ship size, power and engine speed, I add one unit to each class of ship, make cleaning out a base much easier, the smaller classes can keep up and stop them warping and the heavier ones can fire torpedoes and assault pods. If you can try to set capture settings to capture and disassemble, you will reap the rewards of tech advances which can really help.

Hope that helps a bit.

Darkspire

[Kushan]

What do you aim for with shields and armor? What a minimum speed of your ships? The games a lot different when your micromanaging everything, a ton of things I've never really had to think about. Right now I have missile armed escorts, rail gun armed frigates, and beam/capture destroyers. The DD"s armed with maxos blasters are probably my most successful design so far, with my escorts being the second. From reading the forums, my impression is that most people prefer rail guns early game, but I just don't get it. They don't seem that effective to me. My missile boats with standoff setting seem to be a lot more effective then my frigates.

Noticed all your ships are armed the same. Do you phase out escorts and frigates as the game progresses and go with all big ships in the end game? I try to specialize my ships so that way I have a reason to build escorts and frigates. I'd do it for immersion anyway, but I'm always curious what others do?

Will ships armed with assault pods automatically use them if you don't specifically give them the capture order?

[Darkspire]

Shields and armor.
6x armor on all classes except escort that gets 1x

shields:

Escort 2x
Frigate 2x
Destroyer 2x
Cruiser 4x
Capital 6x

My designs have a general theme of 'one size fits all' approach, cuts down on the need to micro fleets and  means I have less to worry about if I send them off and forget to monitor a battle. The designs are the same from the start, I just upgrade the tech and ship size to accommodate as the game progresses.

Engines and thrusters.

Thrusters I never have at the top of list, engines are way more important and I generally upgrade those as soon as I have enough research power to get them done quickly, getting to the vortex first level is my main aim, get proton as soon as possible and get all the upgrades, you will need the last upgrade to get the multi vector thrusters anyway, I ignore the other engines and upgrade the engines on the designs from proton to vortex. I keep 2x reactors on the escort and frigate, 3x on destroyer, cruiser and capital. As for speed, I add engines on all the class designs till I get a line on the graph that levels out with the power usage see the image, personal choice really but I find doing it that way I can get a good idea of the ship speeds and they become slightly slower as the classes get larger.
Ships fitted with assault pods will capture if they can, you do not need to intervene, just set your capture settings accordingly (see image 2), that is really very useful, see the point about the research bonus of doing so, as the pirates want to steal my tech, seems fair I should return the favor  ;)

Darkspire

EDIT: I have just upgraded the hyper drive which obviously requires more power  so I have added extra engines (image 3), and leveled out the power graph again, hopefully you can see now why I do it that way by comparing the two images.

[Martok]

Started a new game as a standard empire in the Classic Age.  Was immediately bombarded with protection offers from three different pirate factions...for just 48 credits a month (each).  :o 

WTH?  Not that I'm complaining, but were pirates this cheap before the latest update, and I'm only now belatedly noticing it?  And in any case, why does their protection suddenly cost to little?  Is that due to Shadows' tighter economy?