[Bug?] Can AI research [Warp Node Attunment] too?

[Jem]

I'm Orthin, Tinkers initiated war on me, so I bombed all their planets that I could reach and created a void which I left to my poor Human friends with 3 stars from the top right corner. So I thought to 'grow' my Human friend to take over the void and be strong enough to take out Tinkers while I put 10+ Dread Stars @ Star near the border of Tinkers to prevent their expansion. Yes, I was bored.

UnreliableAlly.png (947.8 KiB) Viewed 17440 times

As above snapshot, Tinker sent their ship all the way from their 'left' side to the mid-center-right (Mandir) to attack me while the only other race Human is allied to me and at war with them too. There's no way for them to do so unless Human offered OpenBorders. So how did this happen, pray tell?

[Arioch]

If you upload the game save, I'll tell you.

To upload a save, in the Options menu, click "Upload Game Logs".

[Jem]

Ohhh.. I just followed them to their retreated path. Saw a small Tinker planet In the Human territory near me BUT still way too far for them to even fly a colony ship there. Hmm.. If possible please delete this post, as I was too quick to post before more investigation is done. Thanks!

I'd go backtrack the turns to when they occupy the colony to find out why. Cheers!

*Edit
Game closed when sending report, maybe got too many 'apps & browser tab' opened...
https://www91.zippyshare.com/v/IObACUWt/file.html

I zipped the savegame and uploaded here. I noticed the planet in Human's Deb-something star changed to Tinker at 1931 where no ship or anything near it. So I rollback and sent a ship there before 1931 and waited.. nothing happened...?! Confused.

[Jem]

After my browsing and closing the browsers, I started SiS again and stepped through the savegame, and noticed my ally Human have social unrest & revolt at that time where the colony becomes under Tinker rule.

So it is confirmed I've jumped the gun when I thought this is a bug. My apologies. Please kindly delete this thread if at all possible. Cheers!

[zolobolo]

Yes it would be nice to see the enemy range circles as well somehow - it would make it obivous where their range etension is originating from

The most prevalant exploit I use against the Strategic AI is also denying range for them: this seems to be coming fro mthe fact that it does not consider the option that its bases might not be there by the time it gets to its destination which is fine in a way as neither do humans really

A solution ot the exploit itself might be to prioratize some small defensive fleets for the AI to build along border systems at risk of attack as well as bringing outpost transports with larger fleets to establish foothld when they arrive (thought htey might be automatically turned back I suppose in this case before they are able to deploy the outpost)

[Arioch]

Yes it would be nice to see the enemy range circles as well somehow

You can... activate developer mode and switch to the enemy faction, and you can see everything the AI can see.

[username]

A solution ot the exploit itself might be to prioratize some small defensive fleets for the AI to build along border systems at risk of attack

A small defensive fleet is a useless defensive fleet. He who tries to defend everything, defends nothing. By default, the attacker will always win, because otherwise he wouldn't attack in the first place. Which means the only way a defender can win a fight is by seizing the initiative and turning the tables on the attacker by moving in forces. Any defensive fleet that just sits there defending an outpost is ships that have been wasted, and will either sit there uselessly doing nothing, or be wiped out fruitlessly. Teaching the AI to engage in bad strategy like this is just going to cripple it.

[zolobolo]

A solution ot the exploit itself might be to prioratize some small defensive fleets for the AI to build along border systems at risk of attack

A small defensive fleet is a useless defensive fleet. He who tries to defend everything, defends nothing. By default, the attacker will always win, because otherwise he wouldn't attack in the first place. Which means the only way a defender can win a fight is by seizing the initiative and turning the tables on the attacker by moving in forces. Any defensive fleet that just sits there defending an outpost is ships that have been wasted, and will either sit there uselessly doing nothing, or be wiped out fruitlessly. Teaching the AI to engage in bad strategy like this is just going to cripple it.

Only if you dont consdier time as a resource. Moving ships takes a long time up till late game at which point the game is always over for me

When an empire is only a couple of systems strong, lossing any system cna cripple that empire and leaving system undefended leaves them open for invasion by transports only - easy to pick a target and take it

If you have small defensive fleets all across you cna muster a sufficient defense at any one point usually faster then the attacker can

Having at least one combat ship in a system necessitates an attack force which always needs to be higher then your defense = more assets commited. This way you cna lure in invasion fleets into their doom (as you can muster faster) and can also lauch a counter attack

You cna counter attack from any of your systems as you have ships everywhere If the enemy leaves even a single system unattended, you can swoop in and blockade, bombard or even capture it. This is a huge advantage

When I got to situations where the AI was much stronger then me (this was before the economic rebalance), they always lost against this tactic: I just placed small low-cost defense ships everywhere where they could attack. If they took the bait I could chose to muster a strogner defense or lauch counter attack in as many positions as they left open. It didnt matter if they have 8 battleship strong fleets if those couple of fleets are busy travelling to 1-2 systems and I can actually take out their border systme faster then that. Often the AI didnt evne have a chance to attack as by the time they arrvied I have already bombarde their nearest cononies out of existence and they had to go back due to lack of range

So this is an effective strategy that is not as complex as having to decide where to place 1-2 doomstacks. A doomstack is wortless if you loose the game by the time they actually get to unleash their potential

[zolobolo]

Here is a representative overview of system layout and travels times at around mid-game:

Planet Layout.gif (4.04 KiB) Viewed 15848 times

Now:
IF blue places 1-2 destroyers and a signle cruiser with any heavy weapon in each of its 3 border systems
AND red keeps its doomstack anywhere else but in its border systems
AND red attacks any blue systems
THEN Red has lost as blue can engage all 3 red border systems and take or bombard them before the red fleet even arrvies (min 6 turns). Red will then go on loosing another 6 or more turns returning to a friendly system due to loss of range so all blue has to do is take/bombard undefended planets with 3 tiny fleets.

Note that it doesnt matter what kind of forces Red has in this scenario as they never actually get ot engage the enemy. Red can have 10billion fleet carriers, it will still loose in the aboive conditions against 3 cruisers and 6 destroyers

The equition changes slightly if red has its doomstack in the border regions but is still too slow to win the war before blue takes everything as blue conquers systems 2X faster

And this is the key: time is the most valuable resource. It takes time to grow pops, build ships, refit ships and travel/retreat. Bote that Blue also finishes buildin the winning fleet well before red does and its time advantage icnreases the larger (useless) fleet red build

AI script has changed some time ago in order for the AI to amass larger fleets instead of small pockets of ships: this was done to ensure decidinig battles are provided to the player but this is for human enjoyment not becuase it is a better strategy. Its understandable but less effective
AI effectiveness was further reduced by the econmic rebalance allowing less ships to be fielded so an AI in advanteg cannot capitalise on time anymore

I dont suggest the AI main fleet behaviour or the economic rebalance ot e changed at this point - they serve their purpose
In orded to make the AI more competitive I would suggest complementing its fleetstrategy with cheap border defense fleets (1-3 small and a single medium hull) and/or making time less valuable.

The latter is likely easier to achieve with these measures:
1. Make bombardment less effective OR have considerable negative consequences
2. Prevent long range sniping of planets so that planetary defenses and starbases can hold their ground against 1-2 medium hulls at long range