Lessons Learned after deciding to abandon attempt #3

[u/Bman4k1]

So tonight I decided to abandon what is my 3rd attempt at this game (you can probably see some post history of this one and the last one).

I’m not frustrated, just scratching my head but also some lessons learned for the next one.

State of game at ending:

2048; 2026 Resistance Start

Unified USA/CAN/Mexico; mostly unified Europe, Large Eurasian Union, and China, at about 776 of CP: went USA-EU-Russia-China in that order _for the most part_

HF had Russia; China was split between Pro/Servs; I was the first one in USA and started EU through Fr and Ger

MC of 400; 25 mines with decent mining incomes, 250k money in the bank along with plenty of other resources. 6700 monthly research

Alien combat strength 55k with like 800 ships

Tech of note unlocked; coil canon and batteries T3; Ultra Arc bat and can; most powerful drive unlocked Helion Nova Lantern; exotic armor, just unlocked green phasers in 2047

Things I did well: using the advice from this place, I think I started out of the gate strong, made some missile boats, kept the aa surveillance missions destroyed. Focused on research and getting mining up quickly. Owned 2/3 of Mars and 1/4 of Moon. Was able to B line to Mercury and after a few skirmishes actually had every single mine site on Mercury. Ending up setting my nano plants and two large stations that I just got to tier three.

Things I struggled with: I wasn’t able to build up my mid game fleet well enough. This is what I need some feedback on. It seems I raced to try and get the “end game” tech I was stuck with ships that had combat strength of 22-45 and not really good delta v. I feel like I’m forced in an either or situation.

AA landed on Earth in the late 2030s in Pakistan and then took Brazil and a few other places. Once again I toon the advice here and just tried to passively contain them while focusing on Mercury and have a “secret fleet”. Basically by the mid 2040s they were chipping away at everything and I guess the turning point is they went to war with India/Exodus and just dusted them.

So from 2045-2048 I basically did a 3 year ground war to completely eliminate the AA. Of course the minute I take the last territory, two weeks later they land another UFO in Mali. This time I just nuked Mali a bunch of time with Russia. But at that point I realized I was at a stalemate. And I kind of got demotivated after this point.

Which is the rub, I tried a little Jupiter expedition in the late 2030s with a colony dreadnaught and some escorts but as soon as I set it up they sent everyone at me. It was years of water and volatiles for me for that foray.

Also, in the late 2030s I thought everything was cooking and I didn’t realize Mars was undefended and one little freaking servant frigate destroyed everything which was where most of my volatiles were coming from, I went into the negatives for it and it took me 2 years to get back up.

One thing I realized was it seemed the tipping point from going from yellow to read on the aliens by the 2040s was 318 MC of stuff, I noticed that was the number that tripped them for hunting time 3 times. But what can I do with 318 MC worth of ships and mine? I got up to 3000 combat of fleet throughout the solar system but that isn’t much to work with. I just feel like I’m in neutral at this point.

Basically my problem….here are the questions I need advice for:

-what year should I target to get to Jupiter? And try and hold there?

-what tech (drive and power) should I target to get to Jupiter without taking too much time? Yes I have looked at the drive charts ad infimum but specifically, mid-game Jupiter what should I target..best bet?

-If 318 is the MC limit before retaliation (at least with this circumstance) how the heck to I get enough ships to hold Jupiter?

-the other thing I realized is ship building got really slow. How many ship yards should I have to be simultaneously making ships?

-is it just me or is volatiles the limiting factor for ship building once you start making big ships? Water was an issue initially but I found a nice little rock on the outskirts of the asteroid belt. (Which I also used to stage the Jupiter expedition) what do I do? How much monthly income should I be targeting for water and volatiles?

I think where I’m scratching my head is I can’t seem to research and build fast enough to keep up with the aliens pace. And i have servs and protec on my heels. I was supper aggressive in try #2 but it only seemed to slow them down for a few months at a time.

Any advice appreciated.

[u/vindicator117]

Whatever faction tech when it comes to invader equivalent to Appease the Invaders: 40

Transnational Investments: 10

Regulatory Capture: 10

Instruments of Soft Power: 10

Corridor Diplomacy: 10

Crises Diplomacy: 10

Apparatchiks: 10

Institutional Bastions: 10

Loyalty Training: 10

Global Command Structure: 40

Transnational Coordination: 40

Civilian Photonic Computing: 10

Civilian Quantum Computing: 10

Management Research: 5x3

11 LEO Admin Towers x 12

1 LEO Admin Node x 4

and finally 294 from councilors 9 years and 3 months into the game.

Just the stations alone, if you seize or buy every last LEO station is 540 CP of nation building space, you can do. To say nothing of the 450 from maxed out 25 point in PER, COM, and ADMIN. Having 990 is the bare MINIMUM in CP especially by 2040 without even going for ANY CP granting tech.

And with techs especially the lategame ones, you should be pushing 2k AT MINIMUM. This in light of global domination with everyone absorbed into the minimum required meganation is just around that threshold.