What's going on in your empire/planet/battlefield?

[TheBawkHawk]

I found 4 more geosurvey ships on the way there, and they all were heading along the same bearing as the first. I took them out, and kept on towards the waypoint. All I had to do, if my math and assumptions were correct, was to wait until the next time a ship transited. I didn't have to wait long at all, as a 70 kiloton ship transited within a day of me arriving, only 25m km away from the waypoint. I don't know whether to be happy or afraid, as I am having a lot of fun with this, and I'm happy that it worked at all (let alone with such precision), but now I have to deal with a very angry hole in spacetime in my core worlds. I took out what was presumably a construction ship, and transited with my small detachment (DL, 2 DDs, 2 FFGs, 2 FFs) and found myself in the NPR home system. How the tables have turned!

[Sarganto]

Because my game grew a bit stale with no NPR around, I cranked up the NPR generation rate to 100%. And of course I find 4  (!!!) NPRs in the next 3 (!!!) systems.

Some interesting stuff:

Two NPRs sharing a planet and even the same picture in the race screen. I didn't even know you could get split-up NPRs!
Fortunately/unfortunately(?) they seem both to be quite underdeveloped compared to me. Their thermal/em signatures point to populations of around 100 million each. Ground forces in transports are on their way for inv...err...integration into the empire. I am not sure though what I am going to do with 2 populations on one planet. Can I merge them later? We will see.

Another NPR I have found with a planet with a HUGE thermal signature. It's around 134.000! My home planet only has around a third of that! I am trying to initiate contact, but no luck so far. I am getting messages that tell me that they have think communication may be impossible. I am not sure if that is a pointer to precursors. But I already have a precursor race flying around – can there be TWO? (other spoiler stuff is turned off)
I have not yet investigated further. But this race could potentially be a huge threat. Interestingly, I haven’t seen any of their ships yet. Hmm…

The last one is unremarkable, yet, as I don’t really have sufficient intel about them yet.

I am excited as all this happens while my carrier group is about to finish their refitting and some new missiles got rolled out.

[GodEmperor]

Two NPRs sharing a planet and even the same picture in the race screen. I didn't even know you could get split-up NPRs!

You can, Steve said something about the possibilty of encountering alien races split between 2-3 empires on the same planet.
IIRC probability was somewhere in the 1-3% range tho...
And once i even got three empires on one planet.. Thats some "You know you play Aurora too much if you .. ".

[Sarganto]

You can, Steve said something about the possibilty of encountering alien races split between 2-3 empires on the same planet.
IIRC probability was somewhere in the 1-3% range tho...
And once i even got three empires on one planet.. Thats some "You know you play Aurora too much if you .. ".

Good to know. I am currently shipping troops there, so let's say a unification of these two is coming up. I am wondering though about the merging them later stuff. Let's see.

In other news, the unremarkable race has declared war while I was surveying their home planet. I had good relations (+50 or something) with them and the surveying didn't seem to bother them...until it suddenly did.

Now I am thinking if I should deal with them first and let the split-empirese be for now. Or just follow through with my initial plan, conquer them and then turn to the aggressive race.

Plus, my game got really intense really fast. The race with the 134.000 thermal signature planet seems to be way more advanced than I am. I have found a fleet with ships ranging from just a couple thousand of tons up to +25.000 tons, with a max speed of around 9.500 km/s! That, together with the huge thermal signature tells me that I am probably not ahead technology wise this time.
Everything got even more exciting when their fleet with about 25 ships just appeared in SOL! First they made a beeline to Pluto and after that directly towards Earth. I was torn between just keeping still and firing everything I got at them. But I only had 2/3 of my fleet in SOL at the time and out of the 6 carriers 3 were undergoing a refit, although I am not sure if that would have changed anything, as I probably could have used their CAG anyway.
So anyway, I didn't fire. I didn't know anything about their capabilities and if this was their only fleet or not. I am pretty sure with all the stuff I had in SOL I could have killed that fleet, but what then? I would be at war with a definitely capable opponent who knows where my main system is and who might have more than just one fleet of high tech ships. In addition to that I have no idea how they got to SOL that fast. They are more or less on the other side of the galaxy, but they probably used a connection to SOL or at least close to SOL that I haven't discovered.
In the end, they hovered over Earth for about 2 weeks and then just left. They are still in SOL and I am passively tracking them, but I can't really follow them because I have NO SHIP that is faster than they are. 

So all research effort is now focussing on new propulsion technology. Strategy wise I am trying to find the connection that they are using to get to my home system. Once that is done, preparations for the biggest invason to date will start. I am just too curious to see what a 135.000 thermal contact world looks like...

[Sarganto]

Alright, everything is way worse than I thought.

I am only THREE JUMPS away from the scary futuristic race that is now more or less constantly parking its fleet around Sol.

That isn't going to end well for everyone involved...   

[Barkhorn]

I think now would be a good time to be laying some minefields.  Try to get a minefield on each jump between you and them.  You want the field on your side of the jump so they can't see it until it's too late.

[Sarganto]

I think now would be a good time to be laying some minefields.  Try to get a minefield on each jump between you and them.  You want the field on your side of the jump so they can't see it until it's too late.

Would the mines know when to switch from neutral to enemy? I would need a lot of preparation and probably can't just drow all mines at once.

[Barkhorn]

Just set the race you're worried about to 'hostile'.  It doesn't affect your relations, only how your automated weapons behave.

[Sarganto]

Just set the race you're worried about to 'hostile'.  It doesn't affect your relations, only how your automated weapons behave.

This means that the mines will only be activated by races which are set to hostile?

Are there any guides for designing mines?

[Barkhorn]

There's one on the wiki.  Or at least one that explains how to do it; of course you shouldn't blindly follow their design examples.

Pro-tip: Your minelayer doesn't need any sensors.  It does need a fire control, but it can be minimum size and tech.  The FC doesn't need to be strong at all, it only needs to exist.

[Michael Sandy]

A tip for minelayers:

Consider a fast launcher on a fast minelayer, where the first stage is a speed the minelayer can keep up with.  Then you can deploy all the mines in a single wave.  It makes a decent siege weapon, for hitting really large stationary bases.

[Arwyn]

Box launchers are great for minelayers. I drop mines in patterns of four to six, so I load up the minelayer with enough cells to do four patterns of mines around the WP, so sixteen to 24 cells and your done. Saves a ton of space.

Another handy minelaying method, for inhabited systems, is a PDC with "mine launchers". It a huge missile launcher with a multi stage missile. Second stage is a mine. They can be big and slow, with huge endurance, and you just aim them at a target point and launch. Mines deploy when they arrive, and instant minefield, no ships required.

[Haji]

My current campaign in numbers:

Years played: 100
Number of player controlled factions: 4
Population: 48 968 million
Inhabited planets: 202
Factories (all types): 62 416
Mines: 13 221
Automated mines: 63 097
Naval capacity: 5 506 550 tonnes
Commercial capacity: 14 216 500 tonnes
Fighters: 3 532
Gunboats: 2 324
Major warships: 2 700
Commercial ships: 6 546
Privately owned civilian ships: 3 070
Missiles in service: 1 610 764
Anti-missiles in service: 2 600 999

[superstrijder15]

My current campaign in numbers:

Years played: 100
Number of player controlled factions: 4
Population: 48 968 million
Inhabited planets: 202
Factories (all types): 62 416
Mines: 13 221
Automated mines: 63 097
Naval capacity: 5 506 550 tonnes
Commercial capacity: 14 216 500 tonnes
Fighters: 3 532
Gunboats: 2 324
Major warships: 2 700
Commercial ships: 6 546
Privately owned civilian ships: 3 070
Missiles in service: 1 610 764
Anti-missiles in service: 2 600 999

Woow!
For me, all numbers but the first would be a lot lower, are you that amazing, or am I this crap?
My estimates:
Years played: 90
Number of player controlled factions: 1
Population: 3000 million
Inhabited planets: 3
Factories (all types): ~5000?
Mines: ~1000
Automated mines: ~1000
Naval capacity: I'm not sure what this is. . .
Commercial capacity: see above
Fighters: ~50, only for geosurvey (about 25) and scouting (~20)
Gunboats: 3
Major warships: 10
Commercial ships: ~20
Privately owned civilian ships: ~100
Missiles in service: ~1000
Anti-missiles in service: ~2000

[Hazard]

He's referring to tonnage. That is to say, the combined weight of all the ships of respectively the military tagged and the commercial tagged ships. Or, possibly, player controlled and space line controlled.