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A Sequel Unlike Any Other - Let's Play AI War 2! Launch Trailer Current 'Post-Launch Polish' Patch Progression I'm so awesome, I'm LPing this here monstrosity with the launch version starting on the day before the launch! That's because they dropped v. 1.001 ahead of time to make sure there was nothing horribly wrong with it. AI War 2 is the sequel to multiple-award-winning AI War: Fleet Command, released by independent developer Arcen Games in 2009. It's been a decade and change since then, largely filled up with the six DLC expansions for the original. I'm mostly through those on my treatment of that game. For this version, multiple 'pivots' and other internal drama contributed to cramming a one-year development cycle into three, but by all appearances they stayed the course admirably and came out with something worth the wait. What Kind of Game Is This? Oh, just your everyday, run-of-the-mill, Grand Strategic Tower Defense 4X RTS. AI War features assymetrical gameplay, metric tons of options and replayability. It's really complex but also really rewarding. Come prepared for the learning cliff. How Does The Sequel Compare to the Original? Jury's still out with this being the launch version - though it's been in Early Access for a year - but its both bigger and smaller, streamlined and at the same time expanded. It's hard to briefly summarize. . There are changes I like, and changes I don't, but on balance more of the former than the latter. The community agrees, with a current (including early access haters) positive score on 89% of Steam reviews, 93% in the last 30 days though that's a more limited sample. The first game has 87%. So basically just haul your butt over there or wherever else you prefer and buy the darned thing. It's worth your money and Chris Park is as good as it gets with customer support. I put up a suggestion in the hinterlands of the Arcen Forums just today, day before launch, and less than two hours later he had not only typed out a LONG answer to a guy who didn't contribute anything during the Early Access period, but also reposted my question and his reply on the Steam forums as well. I'm a fair bit of an AI War fanboi but a raging, hysterical one when it comes to the developer himself. Nuc_Temeron, longtime Arcen community member, in a recent Steam review posted:AI War II has evolved massively during it's last months of Early Access. It has become a worthy descendant to my all-time favorite strategy game. The gameplay feels quite similar but everything has become more comfortable, more modern. Things are different, but the same. In a good way! A lot has evolved, there are loads of new features and it's really quite excellent. Corbeau, SA member, recently in my LP of the original referring to AI War 2 posted:It kind of spoiled all other strategy games for me, with how good most of it's design choices are. LP Style Exclusively video with my associated ramblings, I'll begin with roughly daily uploads for a bit after launch, then things will slow down eventually. A total beginner entry-level how-stuff-works treatment will start things off, and then I'll gradually tighten the noose around my neck as I did with AI War 1. One of my top goals for this project is to make the game more accessible to noobs - we all start off there, but lots of folks bounce off these games. I did at first with the original, and I'm super-glad I came back to it eventually and stuck. Galactic Histories Herein shall be contained a record of my misadventures to date. Beginner Walkthrough Basic Quick-Start, Difficulty 4, Single AI Intro & Setup Options (26:03) Defenses & Resources (20:27) Basics of Fleets and Combat (20:32) The Bigger Picture (22:13) End of the Beginning (24:36) Strategic Thinking (31:50) Galactic Scavenging (27:55) Hubris (27:36) Support Matters (27:09) Hacking Spree (22:08) Deep-striking, Golems, and More (23:35) Chokepoints for Fun and Profit (21:41) Unmasking the Overlord (19:19) Crisis Management (24:05) What the Hack? (24:15) The New Superterminal (19:10) Victory!! (31:44) The Real War Begins Multiple 'standard' Difficulty-7 AIs, Marauders, Devourer, Human Resistance Fighters. A 'baseline' setup for an accelerated, advanced-tutorial feel Setup Strategy (15:06) Planet Defense Fundamentals (20:28) Attacking Concepts (25:17) New Obstacles (22:53) Divide & Conquer (20:26) Reshaping the Galaxy, Part I (18:58) Disruptive Influences (22:07) Midgame Machinations (29:15) Closing In (18:43) Rogue One (29:24) Approaching the Climax (13:12) Ankru or Bust (39:29) Faction Frenzy Galaxy of Chaos (16:09) Cloaking Power (24:12) Nanocaust Nightmare (28:40) Painstaking Progress (24:41) Chaos Abhors a Vacuum (23:40) A Rare Discovery (24:38) Marauder Menace (25:02) Timing Is Everything (31:22) A Planet Divided (29:58) Hack Away (24:21) A Major Speed Bump (26:46) Frenemies Galore (26:35) Impasse at Zombri (28:15) Just Like I Drew It Up (25:10) The AIs Strike Back … Hard (20:26) Tasting the Spire Introductory run for The Spire Rises, the first expansion. Dark Spire, Scourge both allied and hostile, and of course, the Fallen Spire. The Spire Rises Intro (10:53) Early Steps … and Missteps (24:09) Encountering the Spire (39:43) Core Expansion (34:11) Scourge Highway (32:21) Military Matters (20:11) Upgrades, but too late (20:51) Spire, Simplified No Scourge here, just Fallen Spire this time at the 'default' of 5 intensity. Revised Spire Reboot (33:13) The Race Is On! (25:35) Raising the Stakes (36:37) Battleships Ahoy! (18:46) Old-School Relic Defense (38:07) The Final City (26:29) Inevitable Surrender (3:27) Faction Overview (23:04) Strategic Sage fucked around with this message at 15:50 on Mar 24, 2020 |
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Oct 22, 2019 05:49
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 Intro & Setup Options (26:03) First session is all about explaining some of the various possibilities. In a number of ways there's a larger box to play in when it comes to the fundamental types of galaxies you can set up. Many things were just glossed over here for the time being. We can already see a revamped UI, a 'in-game Wiki' thing going on, etc. Up Next Actual gameplay begins as we dive into the fundamentals that make AI War the glorious strategic mess that it is.
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Oct 22, 2019 06:00
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I enjoyed your last LP and it got me into buying the Early Access version of the game, but haven't played it that much. Hopefully this is the kick that makes me give it another go.
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Oct 22, 2019 12:40
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I saw it come up on EA a couple of weeks ago and it was close enough to a final release that I figured that it'd be worth the :tenbux: or so. Definitely worth it, I've been playing it a lot since I got it and I haven't even broken into the specialty scenarios with Dyson spheres and wacky things like that. The new fleet system is way more reasonable. You don't have nearly as much of an issue keeping track of what ships are where and you can easily either fling around a doomstack or split things up into specialized fleets. Doomfleets are still kind of necessary for the final push, but the game so far has told me what kind of static defenses I'd need on average to keep things safe while I'm at the invasion store. The flow of a game has a structure to it that gives you a notion about what to do next too. Build up fleet strength, go get some defense enhancers, you need to capture a certain number of systems to win which is cool because it really paces the game. One of the interesting things I've done, and I'm not sure if it's necessary or even possible once I enter higher difficulties, is avoiding reaching the AI progress threshold of hunter fleets. Since those 'target weak systems', I go out of my way to hunt down and collect progress reducing items. Game is good, go get it.
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Oct 22, 2019 15:17
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Yeah, it was not in an amazing state w hen i picked it up a year ago or so but it's really improved- i think the fleets thing was the right call.
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Oct 22, 2019 16:06
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El Spamo posted:I saw it come up on EA a couple of weeks ago and it was close enough to a final release that I figured that it'd be worth the :tenbux: or so. Definitely worth it, I've been playing it a lot since I got it and I haven't even broken into the specialty scenarios with Dyson spheres and wacky things like that. The new fleet system is way more reasonable. You don't have nearly as much of an issue keeping track of what ships are where and you can easily either fling around a doomstack or split things up into specialized fleets. Doomfleets are still kind of necessary for the final push, but the game so far has told me what kind of static defenses I'd need on average to keep things safe while I'm at the invasion store. The flow of a game has a structure to it that gives you a notion about what to do next too. Build up fleet strength, go get some defense enhancers, you need to capture a certain number of systems to win which is cool because it really paces the game. One of the interesting things I've done, and I'm not sure if it's necessary or even possible once I enter higher difficulties, is avoiding reaching the AI progress threshold of hunter fleets. Since those 'target weak systems', I go out of my way to hunt down and collect progress reducing items. It is very good. Been playing for a while in the Alpha.
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Oct 22, 2019 16:52
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If you want to support this game, it currently has a big launch sale on steam. Probably because bbcisdabomb posted:In the Kickstarter announcement a few days ago Chris Park, the creator of Arcen, mentioned that he had one cash-positive month in 3-4 years. There will be DLC, so he's probably banking on those sales for the real cash.
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Oct 22, 2019 18:33
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And I just mysteriously got a -25% coupon (for owning the first game), which works with the sale. Guess they were slow sending them out, but I really can't turn that price down. I hope this works out for them.
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Oct 22, 2019 20:16
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I bought the game on sale and the bundle with all of the AI War DLC as well - the DLC wasn't on sale but fuckit, 25$ to support Arcen and get the full AI War experience isn't the dumbest thing I've bought this month. I hope I get into it.
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Oct 22, 2019 20:43
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Defenses & Resources (20:27) I'm doing things in a bit different order than I normally would simply for the purpose of breaking up the exposition as much as possible. Gameplay itself begins with homeworld defense, and taking a look at some of the new graphical treatments - I'm pretty impressed by the unit models in a game that you normally play zoomed-out like a wargame - and then move on to talking about the key resources. Up Next Fleets and hopefully early expansion.
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Oct 22, 2019 20:46
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Panzeh posted:Yeah, it was not in an amazing state w hen i picked it up a year ago or so but it's really improved- i think the fleets thing was the right call. Honestly the biggest stop gap to me playing and enjoying the last one was just managing unit movement and reinforcement. Fleets solve like 90% of the problem I had so I'm really looking forward to this even though I'm only a half hour into my first game.
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Oct 23, 2019 04:35
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Picked up the game even though I have no time to play it. The fleet stuff sounds pretty interesting and just reading through the "for people who played a lot of AI War" part of the tutorial I have to agree that most of the stuff that got removed was basically busy work. The interesting decisions in AIW mostly boiled down to where and how to defend and attack, which is intact. It was in the top sellers on steam so that's a good sign. I hope Chris Park makes all the money. Sindai fucked around with this message at 05:16 on Oct 23, 2019 |
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Oct 23, 2019 05:12
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El Spamo posted:I saw it come up on EA a couple of weeks ago and it was close enough to a final release that I figured that it'd be worth the :tenbux: or so. Strix Nebulosa posted:I bought the game on sale and the bundle with all of the AI War DLC as well - the DLC wasn't on sale but fuckit, 25$ to support Arcen and get the full AI War experience isn't the dumbest thing I've bought this month. Sindai posted:Picked up the game even though I have no time to play it. I approve of all of these decisions.
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Oct 23, 2019 07:10
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AI War 2 dunks on other strategy games unbelievably hard once you figure out the interface. The more tutorials out there, the better. e: Specifically, I used to really get into Paradox Grand Strategy games and Civilization-style games... yet I haven't touched one since I started to grok AI War 2. I just can't face the amount of busywork filler that other games insert between your strategic decisions. The AI War 2 dev did an exceptional job automating or outright removing any player actions that didn't add to the game's decision space. AI War 2 can't scratch the same thematic itch as a civ-style game, but it really shows how much better other strategy games could be and now it's frustrating when they aren't. Corbeau fucked around with this message at 18:30 on Oct 23, 2019 |
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Oct 23, 2019 18:19
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It looks really impressive... And really loving intimidating with all the resources, toggles and having to know when to automate what.
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Oct 23, 2019 18:51
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There's a lot of nuance going on. I just jumped up to the 'moderate' difficulty scenarios and the Two Stars one is interesting since it really makes you think about how to use stealth strikes to good effect. So what can you do with them? I had been really uncertain about how useful stealthy ships were. They're not useful for hacking, since performing a hack naturally decloaks the ship so you can't scoot around hoovering up tech goodies because you'll just get swatted when you do. Then after reloading a save a few times I noted that I was having a really hard time breaking a system that had a ton of guard posts. Normally, when you invade a system you have to kill all the guard posts in rather short order or a massive counter-attack will come smashing through your poo poo. If you have enough ships you can forestall that, but sometimes that's just not enough. A stealth ship however can take a set of hard-hitting, structure wrecking units right up to a guard post's nose and smash it, and then disappear back into vapor before the AI has time to react. Do this throughout a system and now instead of having to worry about triggering a counterattack, you can take your time whittling off chunks of the enemy until they're weak enough to invade altogether. It's a bit more involved than 'throw massive fleet here', but it has much better results. I do have a couple questions about other folks' experiences though. I'm pretty drat conservative with AI progress and I really really try to keep it below the threshold that unlocks hunter fleets. What AI progress level do you tend to try to keep things under?
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Oct 23, 2019 20:41
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anilEhilated posted:It looks really impressive... And really loving intimidating with all the resources, toggles and having to know when to automate what. As a total moron when it comes to these kinds of games, the tutorials were very straightforward and got me acclimated, and I'm now a few hours into my first game at difficulty 4. It's surprisingly transparent and easy to understand, and I'm not even playing with the automation toggles like Thotimx is. I'm conquering planets to get new ship lines, slapping them onto my flagships or buying more if I'm out, and then slowly figuring out that instead of expansion I need to focus on thinking about what I want to expand to - tech? New lines? That mercenary beacon? Hmmm.
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Oct 23, 2019 20:46
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Basics of Fleets and Combat (20:32) A first look at the Fleets system, and then we see some combat as our primary strike fleet heads off to Thaf and clears that out. Auto-fleetbuilding via the factories, the combined transport/fleet HQ/hacking abilities of the fleet centerpieces, and differences between the command station types and how to deploy them make an appearance. The new-look AI Guard Posts are seen in action - they actually hold their guards in internal docking bays until needed now - as well as just getting some action right away. Up Next We'll be stepping back a bit and diving into some longer-range strategic decisions now. I think it's gone as far as it can usefully go without taking a look at empire-level stuff like science, the galaxy map, and so on.
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Oct 23, 2019 21:32
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StrixNebulosa posted:As a total moron when it comes to these kinds of games Everyone who hasn't played AI War before is a total moron when it comes to it. The joke's often been made that if somebody says 'I'm overwhelmed and don't know what to do' the correct response is just well, welcome to your first hundred hours with the game! It's an exaggeration, but not by that much. El Spamo posted:I do have a couple questions about other folks' experiences though. I'm pretty drat conservative with AI progress and I really really try to keep it below the threshold that unlocks hunter fleets. What AI progress level do you tend to try to keep things under? My sense of it (way too early for firm conclusions, mind) is that the balance is about the same as the first game. Around 200 is a decent target, over that you might start getting into trouble. Empires are larger in general for multiple reasons but there are also more ways to reduce AIP so I think that roughly equalizes.
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Oct 24, 2019 06:45
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The furthest I've gotten was by keeping AI Progress ruthlessly low. Like, double-digits until assaulting the AI Homeworld low. I still lost that game though, so it may not have been correct.
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Oct 24, 2019 07:43
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StrixNebulosa posted:As a total moron when it comes to these kinds of games, the tutorials were very straightforward and got me acclimated, and I'm now a few hours into my first game at difficulty 4. It's surprisingly transparent and easy to understand, and I'm not even playing with the automation toggles like Thotimx is. I'm conquering planets to get new ship lines, slapping them onto my flagships or buying more if I'm out, and then slowly figuring out that instead of expansion I need to focus on thinking about what I want to expand to - tech? New lines? That mercenary beacon? Hmmm. If it's anything like AI War (although unlikely to have everything that AI War + all expansions had) you'll get crazy complex setups down the road with new mechanics but the challenge of getting over the initial hurdle of AI War has always been just shutting off your brain and going with initial gut reactions until you reach the point where it sounds like you are, starting to notice how you could have made different/better early game choices now that you know what to expect.
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Oct 24, 2019 08:39
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The big deal is owning your choices and making sure to go for the throat. I routinely have high aip? maybe like 400-500 by the end? Outside of Lol hilarity games in ai war one where I did a max stars snake map and literally forced my way through to the end With the help of... a thing
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Oct 24, 2019 13:39
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My first difficulty 5 game has hit a wall. I feel like I dont know what to do next and that perhaps starting over might be wise, maybe on diff 4. I've played the previous game and even won a few rounds of that one, but I'm far from an expert.
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Oct 24, 2019 14:30
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Is it me, or is that music filched from Home Alone?
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Oct 24, 2019 17:13
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The Bigger Picture (22:13) Time stands still as we delve into the Intel tab for some guidance , discuss upgrading ships, and then finally take a look at Science and the Galaxy Map. While there we take a gander at some of early capturables. I also do a bit of a riff on the most common criticism so far, which is that the Fleets & Tech systems take away control from the player compared to the first game and introduce too much randomness. Up Next We should start transitioning into a little more action and a little less exposition in general, and start advancing the game more as I make my way into the galaxy.
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Oct 24, 2019 20:30
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Hah, was that a quote from our discussion from the Master of Orion thread?
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Oct 24, 2019 21:17
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Semi-subconsciously, but yeah it was. I've thought a lot about that whole distinction since then, why I like the kinds of games I do and don't prefer others. And you should have heard - well, actually be glad you didn't - the stuff that ended up in the digital dumpster from that part. Everyone once in a while I get tongue-tied or just cannot for the life of me figure out how I want to articulate a thought - this was both. It basically gave the general impression of 'Dude, never mind clarity, was that even English?'. Ahh, the joys of editing.
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Oct 25, 2019 07:40
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The Murdoch agenda involves fighting a war with an AI overlord? I KNEW IT.
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Oct 25, 2019 16:53
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I backed this game way back during the Kickstarter and I'm stoked to see it finally out. It sounds like Arcen Games went through hell to get this game made so I hope this works out well. I'm still torn on the fleets system. I really, really don't like it but I'm giving it a chance. I'm looking forward to seeing how you play this. Speaking of which now that scouts are not a thing how is everyone handling threat fleets? I used to post scouts and move them around to critical areas to see where the threat was building. I really don't want to spend hacking points to watch systems. 
Travic fucked around with this message at 21:24 on Oct 25, 2019 |
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Oct 25, 2019 20:41
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End of the Beginning (24:36) Hacking and Scouting conclude our tour through the game's major systems/central mechanics or what-have-you. We also get our first wave incoming to Murdoch - calling it a ripple would be overpraise, I think the AI yelled at me for longer than actually destroying the enemy took. Also a demonstration of why not loading ships into transports and attacking with Pursuit Mode on are not really good ideas. Plus we have Parasites now from the ARS, so we get to see Zombification (formerly reclamation in Classic) at work. Up Next Finishing the buffer zone and getting into some long-term strategic stuff. I intend to blather on a bit about the different mindset required for AI War compared to a traditional RTS, how AI reinforcement works, things to consider when deciding what to conquer, that sort of thing. Hoping the patch drops soon so the custom fleet bug can get squashed, I'm intentionally avoiding talking about those until that happens. Here's what they are working for the curious .
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Oct 25, 2019 21:01
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1.002 Patch was released today; ARSes, Instigators, and Tech Vaults, Oh My! Fulfilling my wishes (that's totally the reason why I'm sure). The main stuff: ** Custom fleets bug squashed and some of the hacking stuff for fleets things that were confusing people made more obvious. ** ARS and Tech Vaults now officially belong to the AI, meaning hacking them increases response. This is a balance to the fact that some hacking costs were reduced and the convert-to-science reward increased. ** Tech Vaults no longer increase the research cost of the next upgrade. This was requested so that you aren't effective penalized for not buying the lower-level upgrades before hacking one. There's also a Reroll Tech Vault option now. ** Instigator base give more (and more accurate) information, and also in general were nerfed some. ** Two new higher-level quickstarts from zeusalmighty. They look nice. I also won't be touching them with a 10-foot pole anytime soon. Not for the faint of heart. ** Experimental Pursuit Mode is available in custom start setups. Makes ships (including the AI attackers) in pursuit mode more likely to finish off what's in their area before going off and attacking something else. Edit: And nvm that, for the moment. Apparently a rather bad bug was also included and they're recommending rolling back to launch version pending a hotfix .
Strategic Sage fucked around with this message at 00:12 on Oct 26, 2019 |
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Oct 25, 2019 23:11
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This game is pretty brutal. I started my first game thinking I was being clever by concentrating all my turrets one wormhole while my army went to conquer the other. Well, maybe that *was* clever, because it worked, so I doubled down on the strategy and made an econ command station first thing, since I only had one other connection and I was going to conquer it. The actual fight was fairly simple, but out of nowhere the AI launches a fleet of incredibly fast ships that, although attritioned by my army, beeline through the wormhole and destroy my econ command station before I can react. edit: Oh, and I guess it was because of the aforementioned bug that I couldn't repair it?
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Oct 26, 2019 07:05
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On the repair thing, in Classic you couldn't repair something while it was being damaged or for a few seconds afterwards - 8-10 or something. I've had ships and stuff get repaired after combat on 1.002. I don't know exactly what the bug affects and what it doesn't, but I know Flagships don't repair properly if they get crippled. That's the only for-sure thing I've seen mentioned. Otherwhise, enjoy the FUN of having the AI wreck your plans. As you learn, it will happen less often. ETA: Ok so it also causes claiming of fleets (when you take a new system) to take a lot longer and cost a lot more than it's supposed to. Which is bad, but not game-breaking. Strategic Sage fucked around with this message at 08:28 on Oct 26, 2019 |
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Oct 26, 2019 08:06
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Strategic Thinking (31:50) A longer video but also one of my favorite ones to make as I got into some of the philosophy of progressing through the game in a galactic sense. I invest in research for the first time and we have our buffer zone around Murdoch completed. Unfortunately the hotfix has not yet arrived - apparently it was fixed within minutes internally by others but they've but unable to contact Chris Park to get the update out. Up Next Looking at some of the other capturable and destroyable elements in the galaxy, and hopefully begin grabbing territory further out.
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Oct 26, 2019 21:34
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Thotimx posted:
 I'm sure he's just wiped out after his marathon AMA on reddit.
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Oct 26, 2019 22:44
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Apparently you can bypass the bug by moving your view to another system. If you're in the galaxy map, make sure to select any other system.
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Oct 26, 2019 22:45
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Yeah, sort of. It still doesn't work as fast as its supposed to, but it does work over time. Thanks for that link. I also saw the reddit. That was … really something. My brain exploded at the machinations to put this game together. Edit: After messing around with it a bit, I am putting a short video up just to help spread the word about the workaround possibility. Strategic Sage fucked around with this message at 09:14 on Oct 27, 2019 |
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Oct 27, 2019 08:37
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doctorfrog posted:
Thotmix got linked on that ama. and responded. AtomikKrab fucked around with this message at 15:31 on Oct 27, 2019 |
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Oct 27, 2019 15:10
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huh, is that bug why one of the tutorials took over 20 minutes? (mostly at 10x speed while I tried to google for answers)
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Oct 27, 2019 18:27
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Yep, lots of people asking questions about that the last couple of days.
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Oct 27, 2019 19:32
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