Tips on winning at 200% Difficulty

[Loopy]

Did it once on hardboiled with other settings at normal, on my first 200% game now and I've avoided all problems up to year 11 where I have ~700k worth in currency and goods, 6 systems free, and nanitoids (most important thing in the game lol).

- Do Faeyan Merc. Tier B missile launcher is priceless, you have a slightly bigger hull, and since your home system is Faeyan you will have much better equipment than a Peleng syatem. Make up the cash difference between you and the Peleng Pirate by hitting the business center immediately and then doing the training runs. This should get you nearly 20k worth of cash on hand and in goods.

- Forget everything other than 2 systems. Just forget them. In my 2nd game I tried to defend 3, and it wasn't worth the effort when 2 systems is more than enough to power your trade (constant dominator attacks makes prices shift like crazy). After about 4 years the coalition can pretty much defend on their own but you should still be there if you want the bases to survive. Or fortify them yourself, I had some 50k worth of money lying around at 3 years and had nothing to spend it on, might as well make the science base invincible.

- Pray you get lucky with a good hull showing up. I did. Almost 300 space Rapid Housing II hull with +150 speed showed up during July at the science base for me. Score! After that constantly check all bases for any equipment that is small, decent, and adds +missile capacity (which is actually + damage per missile). I got a speed of almost 700, a +20 repair droid, and totalled +12 damage per missile fairly early on while leaving about 130 space for hauling stuff. All thanks to luck, but if you are surviving you are bound to get lucky sooner or later...

- Screw anything that isn't a missile launcher. The first weapon I used that wasn't one of my 2 starting missile launchers was the 3rd missile launcher I bought a few years into the game. At best you can go toe to toe with a single enemy using close range weapons but anything more and you are toast instantly. Missiles also tend to be space efficient which leaves a lot more room for trading, 20 space or less is easy to find and all 4 launchers I'm using at the moment take up only 58 space combined.

- Trade like mad. Money is your lifeblood. Every single time you land check the prices for trading, they can shift dramatically as dominators move in and out. Keep plenty of cash on hand to exploit them, eventually you want to be able to buy out a full 400+ luxuries instantly whenever they go on sale.

- Do all missions, including RTS ones. At the worst, you get a crappy micromodule you can trade for dominator nodes to push you closer to getting your first +30 missile launcher damage micromodule at the ranger base. As soon as you get that your offensive power triples, so get to it. If you practice a bit at it RTS most missions won't take more than about 10-15 mins.

- Use probes. Hope to god they find you nanitoids ASAP. I got them in a nearby dominator system.

- Bases will never respawn until you control the entire sector. Protect all of them you can, at a minimum you want to peruse their excellent equipment. I don't think non-keller black holes spawn until you control the entire sector either, which sucks because you can't find those juicy artifacts early on.

- One semi-exploit you can use is to fire at dominators at max range, immediately land on a planet on the rim of the system, then take off and fire again. Repeat. Dominators will fly at you one turn and away the next, getting stuck in a loop where you rain constant missiles on them. Saved a system for me once. Keep in mind that if you wait a turn on the planet and there is no other friendly ship in the system, the dominators take over and you lose.

- One much bigger exploit you can use is to simply kill Keller in hyperspace as soon as you see him. This is somewhat hard depending on how good you are at hyperspace, but as soon as I did it all dominator attacks ceased. I could literally hit end turn for 10 years and never have my home systems come under attack. Not sure if it was some kind of bug, but I reloaded on my second game and didn't kill Keller early because it felt a bit cheap.

[ywenli]

200% diff 2nd update for Peleng Pirate:

<sigh> I should have listened to my old pap and stuck to being a pirate. I mean, who has heard of a Peleng Fighter gain wealth and richest from fighting the Dominators? If you have received this transmission, then that would mean I have perished at the hands of said Dominators.

I got too cocky trying to liberate Diater by myself after joining in a coalition attack on the initial attack. My fellow Peleng military ships and 1 human lasted less than 10 combat rounds I'd wager, but I actually was able to expend all my missiles and rearm before returning for another go around.

However, these "Keller" Dominators were smarter than I thought. I have finished off all the small shrip ships with their higher (30) damage energy weapons and was going toe to toe with the rest of the mid class ships (4-5 damage). I could taste victory with just a few more cycles. Little did I know that they were merely baiting me while tagging my fuel tank. Before I knew it, I sprung a leak and was trapped in the system!

Ah! Just yonder, there is Dominator fuel container just 2 secs away. I picked it up, but little did I know they were merely baiting me all along. No wonder they weren't doing much hull damage to me at all, but were focusing on merely damaging all my equipment. Soon, my missile launchers were expended and the rest of my equipment started failing. First, my sensors, then my shields, then my triple frag cannons! I was trapped in the sector with no more guns to finish them off. My dual engines still had some juice and I boosted for Pkhedock, but those "Keller" wise asses got me again! Their fuel tank now sprung a leak and I was experiencing total system failure. I limped to the jump point hoping for rescue, but I obviously had no where left to run. My life is ended here in cursed Diater...all for trying to "play" a hero. Should've stuck to being a pirate...
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Here ends my 3rd attempt. I was probably rushing to clear the system and before I knew it, I was out of missiles and started to head back, but as in my story, my fuel tank was destroyed so with a dead fuel tank, dead engines, I was stuck too far away to boost or even fly away.

In the end, I destroyed about 61 dominators, freed 1 system, had about 70k in the bank already (money wasn't much of a problem now), and ended with the Maloq Arrival Tolosum ship with the Forcer module for boost and mostly pigamar equipment for all slots.

Major annoying points was that the military base was destroyed really early on so I was stuck being a rookie. Being a pirate would've also been tough and very time consuming being in a Peleng system if I attacked mostly peleng civilians.

I never bothered doing any of the RTS or quests since I didn't want to use the time, but will try to do them to get micromodules and artifacts as well as exp.

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Going to try again with a Faeyan and try to keep the military base alive.

New game maybe tough map wise since Blazer is right next to me, but we'll see if they attack immediately.

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Thanks for the tips Loopy!

Yeah, I am going to try the Faeyan again. It's annoying early on since he has no money, but I guess I could do some minor stuff before triggering the equipment tutorial quests as well as get the loan like you say.

Agreed on the 2 systems. I freed 1 with my previous game and lost it immediately after I left so it's a pain to keep it alive. I should have deployed more of my probes since I had 7 just sitting around, but didn't bother due to laziness.

Agreed though, trading has always been the fastest to make money for me.

The thing I don't like about missiles is they keep destroying the equipment. I suppose packing 3 more guns though like I was doing was eating a ton of space (probably 70-75) and you're right, most of the time, you aren't using the frag cannons anyways. I did notice with my last ship, I could sit toe to toe with the mid level doms though. Died before testing it out further.

On the bases, for some reason, when I freed Altair, the business center didn't come back even though it was the last system in the sector. Is there a time delay of when they auto respawn?

The hyperspace battles are real tough for me at 200% diff. Even that 1st fight gave me some trouble early on. I think little droid or nanitoids heal you in hyper so that would make it immensely easier.

[Loopy]

If your missiles are killing things when you fire them while trying to pick up stuff, path your ship so that you move to the side and pick it up horizontally so that the missiles coming out of the front of your ship don't hit it. You can also use boost, the missiles are usually shot at the end of the day so if you move faster and run over the equipment at 25% through the day its safe from destruction.

If your excess missiles are constantly destroying all the equipment after the target is killed, you are probably firing a bit too many. Of course, fire too little and it might live, but don't fire 3 salvos of missiles on a target you know for sure is going to die in 2 salvos. That increases the chance of a stray missile hitting equipment by 5x.

I just don't like how quickly you can die at close range to some of those hordes with the frag/energy weapons. The fact that they use Rethrones to make your getaway dash slow makes it even worse. Taking back systems can wait until you have 4+ missile launchers with 35-40 missiles each and a stronger coalition. It sucks playing several years without a base you really want, but patience is key.

I believe the total amount of bases is still limited by the amount of systems you have even after you control a sector, and other bases have a higher priority to spawn. In both of my games I've had only a Research/Medical/Ranger base, and when I took the last system in a sector both a Pirate and a Military base spawned literally the next turn. The Business base only came back after I took another 1 or 2 systems.

Nanitoids don't heal you in hyperspace, but the little droids do.

[ywenli]

Originally Posted by Loopy

I believe the total amount of bases is still limited by the amount of systems you have even after you control a sector, and other bases have a higher priority to spawn. In both of my games I've had only a Research/Medical/Ranger base, and when I took the last system in a sector both a Pirate and a Military base spawned literally the next turn. The Business base only came back after I took another 1 or 2 systems.

Nanitoids don't heal you in hyperspace, but the little droids do.

Yeah, I usually try to pick things up on the side or behind with boost if it's a real nice item (like Lvl 1 Micromodules). I was wondering, do you use a nice high level scanner? I normally don't so maybe that's why I overkill things since I don't know what it will take to kill them. That and the low level shields, I tend to skip since it doesn't do that much early on (10-15% defense) and I need the space. The last 2 games, I kept them on though since I wanted to max out on my droid and shields since like you said and I agree, if you get surrounded, you'll get pounded for gobs of damage.

Another downside I don't like just using missiles is that the dominators destroy their parts pretty much the next turn if you aren't there to let them shoot you. Do you have a tactic for that? Most frustrating thing is seeing a nice lvl 1 micromodule and the blow it up.

You're probably right on the number of bases. I should do better in my current game since I'm being more careful, but it's still really early. Most likely, it's probably been a lack of patience after that 1st year or so when I plan all my moves more carefully. Once I start fighting dominators, it takes a lot of time/turns so I tend to just let it play out.

Was watching some youtube videos on the RTS games. Looking forward to playing that again.

[Loopy]

I pretty much never use a scanner unless its really small and/or gives bonus to something else. Same for shields early on until its at least 20% damage reduction. I just figure out ballpark estimates of how many salvos it will take.

Dominators destroying their stuff is definitely the biggest problem. I try to fly in loops around the system, this way destroyers behind the one I'm shooting at won't fly directly over the loot that dropped, instead flying directly towards me further along the circle. The faster your engine and sharper you can make the circle, the harder you can turn and the further it gets them away from the loot. No matter what you do though, they are going to blow up lots of their own stuff.

For the RTS games I highly recommend either all 3 rockets + 1 repair + 1 mortar bots, or 3 rockets + 1 stunner + 1 mortar for offense and 2x 4 repair no mortar per group to stay behind them and repair. All of them get the antigravity and locator. Just don't let enemies get close, don't fight big groups without defensive turrets to support, and try to have your robots retreat/dodge constantly. Probably most importantly, don't use big groups, they block each other from firing and can't dodge because dodging just means the rockets hit another robot next to them anyways. Split into groups of 3-5 offensive robots per group if you have lots of robots.

If you aren't familiar with basic RTS control schemes, Ctrl-# will save a group of robots so that you can reselect them just by pressing the #, and you can instantly move the screen to the group by double tapping the #.

[ywenli]

Thanks for the tips!

On building the RTS bots, is the stunner really worth it? I tried it before having been stunned, but noticed that when my weapon is already hot (after firing), it doesn't seem to activate. I typically just go with the 4 rockets and dynamo. I'll have to give locator a try if that works more effectively.

Also, I noticed it in the videos as well, they didn't use the mortar for the healing bot either. Any reason for this? Just not worth it since they might run and attack?

[Loopy]

I use stunner because 3 rocket launchers is more than enough. Pretty much any bot will die in 6-8 rockets, which come out fast from 2 or 3 bots in a group. The problems come with enemy bots that strafe, because they can take 15-20 rockets to destroy when they move around and most of your rockets are missing. Stunner helps prevent that some. Think of it as being an automatic win against the first 2 enemy bots in any fight. Its also good for charging into rocket turrets that normally cause a lot of trouble and force you to stand off while slowly picking away at them.

Locator is good because if you shoot an enemy before it shoots you then you win. Ideally you should be running backwards so that you are in range firing rockets while the enemy is out of range and taking the rockets straight in the face.

You are correct on the healing bot. Giving them a weapon means they might not always be healing and they are too damned expensive to risk the chance of them running into enemy fire.