Monoceteris VII - All Posts in Chronological Order

 All the posts from Monoceteris VII game

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Tick 1

Tick 9

Tick 24

Tick 30

Tick 34

Tick 38

Monocerotis VII - Cycle 1, Tick 38 - Victory

And victory. A quick game, and one that won't count for records since my opponent resigned 2 ticks before the end of the second cycle. I hope these posts have been instructive and I hope you can see some of the considerations and I hope this motivates more people to play 1v1's.

A quick soap box on the 2 cycle rule. This is the second game I've won in 1v1's that hasn't counted because it ended too fast. Whilst both were against inexperienced players and were not difficult victories, I should have gained a win and ELO from each of these matches though.

1. One of the things that separates players in strength is the ability and commitment to see out matches. An opponent going AFK and you not going AFK is not a random fluke or some anomaly of the universe. It's because you were more committed than your opponent. Commitment is part of ability and so it should be reflected in ELO. An opponent that goes AFK or quits on cycle 1.5 is also more likely to quit on cycle 7.5 when the going gets tough. 
2. Asgana is now over-rated compared to a random player who has never played 1v1's before. They will both be rated 1200. However, our random player has not lost a game and has not been AFK through parts of a game. They're likely to be slightly better than Asgana. You might only think they're maybe 52% likely to beat Asgana in a match based on what you know, but statistically the odds of a 1200 player beating a 1192 player would be 51%. 
3. I am now under-rated compared to what I should be. This will correct over time (I'll get slightly more ELO on my next win, and the one after until eventually there was no difference) but it will affect my future opponents too.  Beating me will now be worth slightly less, and losing to me will now hurt their ELO slightly more. By discarding this game we push the impact down the road.
4. I don't blame my opponent for quitting, the game was lost on tick 2 and they shouldn't be required to play it out. It's very unlikely they even knew about the 2 cycle rule. 
5. The blog shows the thought process and level of effort put in to a match. I wouldn't usually document it and a lot of these considerations are usually done rapidly in a few seconds, maybe with help of a few checks of the ruler tool, but I still did the work and put in the effort. I should be rewarded with a win in this game. 

Finally, Asgana if you're ever reading this. Thanks for the match. You had an uphill struggle. Hopefully you took something from it.

Monocerotis VII, Galactic Cycle 1 - Tick 34, 11:30AM 07 July

A quick game update. My opponent has still not made any new movements today so I think they are AFK/Semi-AFK. This, combined with my good early games is making me shift approach slightly.

In this situation against an active and engaged opponent who was sitting on 13 tokens I would be retaining mine for defence as it would be too risky to spend them. Since I don't have this concern I've bought an Explorer to start picking up my stars at the back and next cycle I will even consider a second to get behind my opponents lines and pick up their stars.

Thought Exercise. Changing Seats

Since the purpose of this series of posts is to educate and since this will likely be a short game let's do a thought-exercise where I place myself in command of my opponents empire and see what I'd do. For the purposes of this exercise let's assume similar tech parity and infrastructure (otherwise it's hopeless) at the present time - but maybe life got busy for me and I've just checked back and my adversary has all the momentum. So I am even on ships/infra but I am in a really bad state on stars/positioning.

Let's drill down a little closer. 

• Ship parity at the moment is 950 to Pink, 930 to Blue so I'm going to make a reasonable guess about where those ships might be, knowing what I can see on the front lines and knowing where my opponents capital is/where they have been AFK. In this scenario I have highlighted where the ships are in blocks of 100 and I've included what I (as Blue) know about Pink's force disposition from time machine etc. 

• Star count is 16-23 against me, but effective star count is 24-36 looking at who can likely get to which uncaptured stars first. This is bad news. I need to address this URGENTLY as this will lead to a loss in the medium term. You can probably hang on in a good position for a long time and look for a window to get back in with a star count of 27-33 maybe 26-34, but anything beyond that is looking bad, all else equal. My aim then is to find stars I can retake fast.
• I know I have 13 tokens (3 coming soon) and my opponent has 3 tokens (3 coming soon) I also know my opponent has a smuggler (I've seen it) and a space dock (inferred from industry on the player card.) I know they have just spent 3 more tokens on a carrier specialist that I can't see on the front line, it's reasonable to assume this is an Explorer. So considering the upcoming Cycle end at Tick 40 let's consider token counts as 16 for me and 6 for my opponent.
• I know the location of 600 of my opponents 900 ships and I can probably (correctly) assume a further 100 are in the north through time machine and some inference. That leaves 200 unaccounted for. They're likely moving to the central front lines.

The plan

• I build a Space Dock on my home star (11 tokens remaining, 14 soon) I need to be able to match my opponents industry output, or at least stay within 25% of it (to account for the defenders advantage) 
• I launch 150 ships south from Andos to Sale and when they are 1 hour into their journey I launch from Sale on Alren with a Pathfinder (10 tokens left, 13 soon), which it is reasonable to infer is lightly guarded. The ships from Andos cover Sale and hopefully I can now defend both these stars whilst seizing Alren. Depending on my opponents ship movements they may be able to use warp gates to cover Alren and defend it, but I think it's unlikely. Seizing this star will create a headache for my opponent.
• As a discarded plan. I've looked at an attack from Andos on Gala, or Andos and Sale on Gala but with reinforcements potentially inbound, I think there is a good risk here that I can seize Gala but potentially lose Sale to an attack from Maru in the process. I don't think I can reliably, definitely, seize Gala, hold both my current stars on this front line against best play. Or at least, there are better options.

• Further North I expect Pink to capture Gesi and he's probably but not definitely going to be doing so with 100 ships, based on my expectations. I can reach Agos and Derri first but my forces will be fairly spread across them both. I build a Smuggler (5 tokens remaining, 8 soon) and race to Agos, dropping 50 ships, Derri dropping 50 ships. These forces will 'hold the line' whilst I bring in others. My smuggler continues south to Kaesya where it will meet some ships coming from my capital, I will be spreading the 300 ships I have accounted for on my capital as follows: 150 to go north (offensive duty... soon), 100 to go to south front (defensive duty) and 50 to centre front with the next set of reinforcements to go to centre front.
• I build an Explorer and start capturing the stars behind me. This takes me down to 2 tokens but I'll be back up at 5 very shortly. Assuming my opponent spends none, this has us equal. I wouldn't buy an Explorer yet if we were more than 3 hours from the end of cycle (less time than they can cross a gap and attack me) and even with this it's a risk but since my opponent already has a star lead and has already sent an explorer of his own, I probably do need these stars in the coming couple of cycles. It's an educated gamble and does come with risks. 
• I'd like to immediately seize more stars but need to be pragmatic about things. 

Fast forwarding time

If we play out this little scenario and my best guess of what happens, here is the new world by this evening. 

• The star count is 21-28 and effective star count is 25-35
• The image below shows the force disposition and new borders. Front line stars are squared in white. I've been very generous to my opponent and given them three hundred extra ships in reasonable locations whilst only adding 100 more ships to my own tally (let's assume I have 200 spread across different stars). This is a flattering logistical boost for my opponent who has even been able to better cover his attacked south than a real opponent would likely have been able. On my side, the only positive assumption is that my pathfinder attack broke through unharmed.

• From here I have a long road ahead to get back into the game properly but I'm now making a contest of it. My opponent may launch a bad attack (in particular in Centre N where my now re-positioned Smuggler is going to be an incredible asset for rapid re-deployment and paired with my 5 token reserve could bloody a nose) I may also be able to slowly bring pressure to bear in the north. In the Centre I'd play defense whilst trying to win on the upper/lower flanks. In the South I have really good prospects of hitting more stars. That 100 ship fleet can move around stealing economy and industry until it's eventually killed. I wouldn't bother to defend with it. That fleet is purely there to cause trouble. I would be tempted (it would require thought and depend on what I see on my scanners) to buy a second Smuggler to move through stars quickly. Burning the rest of my specialist tokens would create a weakness elsewhere so I'd perhaps only do it if I felt my opponent was conservative/would over-react to my attack by trying to chase me down.
• Tech wise, my research priorities would be scanning to help give me a tactical edge and specialists because I'll need specialists to hold back the tide of ships.
• My medium term aims would be to secure solid borders in the south, eventually knocking out the triangle of stars south of my main territory. If I could do that, or even take two of them I might be able to bunker down, last out my opponent, cause surprises overnight, and win

Of course none of this happened, but this sort of thing is a useful exercise to think about what your opponent might do and to be resilient in defence. If you refuse to quit and continue to make things difficult for your opponent there is a likelihood they will lose interest or get sloppy. 4/5 times your plucky behaviour will go unrewarded but 1/5 times it will pay off. 

Monoceteris VII - Galactic Cycle 1 - Tick 30, 09:30 07 July

 A quick update to demonstrate what I mean by front line stars and why they're important.

Asgana is sleeping on the job and it provides me with an opportunity to be more aggressive than I originally planned. In the image below I have highlighted all the front line stars. A front line star is a star that needs to be actively defended by fleets. Stars further back don't because you can always pull fleets back from the front lines to cover them if needed. 

As you can see one of the downsides of my advance is I now have more front line stars than my opponent in this part of the map. This is OK for the reward of extra stars, but it's undesirable all else equal so a good objective would be to close my lines. 

If Asgana had a larger fleet on Maru he would threaten my two stars to the south. I can not move fleets from one to the other in less time than it would take him to attack so both are front line stars. However, if I capture Maru I will no longer have 4 front line stars in this shot. I'll have Gala, Alren and the newly captured Maru. Koorla and Coria will no longer be front line stars.

Current state:

What I want

What I REALLY want (medium term objective) in the image here, I have launched on Sale from Maru, possibly some ships from Gala and by capturing Sale Maru is no longer a front line star because it can just about be defended from Sale if I react quickly. This minimizes the stars I need to defend on the front line. You should always be thinking about how to keep your front lines as limited as possible.

As a final explanation I will share an image from another game to explain the real danger caused by having long front lines. This is from a long match against Yellow, a very good 1v1 player, and I will eventually lose this game. 

In the image below taken at the end of some skirmishes at the end of the expansion phase, tick 124, Yellow and I have equal stars. 28-28 with two loose stars each at the back to take the tally to effectively 30-30. By original lines this map would have 6 front line stars per player. However, in the early fighting I have captured two stars on Yellows side and he has captured two stars on mine. This has stretched both of our lines but Yellow has gained more strategically advantageous stars, in particular the Red circled one. This means I now effectively have 9 stars to defend and he has 8. This really does matter. I would trade the two I've gained here for the two he has gained in a heartbeat. As of the current time of writing (Tick 440) I've never managed to recapture that Red star as Yellow has always been very well prepared to defend it, knowing it's importance. I go on to lose the game, I am sure.

Monocerotis VII - Cycle 1, Tick 24. 06:45AM 07 July

A few mobile updates on the get ready/way in to work.

My smuggler incursion into Asgana's 'territory' in the south was successful overnight and all the other borders have held up. Mission 1 achieved.

Asgana hasn't bought any industry or science in the new cycle which means they're either AFK or in an EUish timezone and havent woke up/checked yet. Il be watching closely for when those numbers change. In a 1v1 you can get a good feel for an opponents timezone in four ways.

1. Message reply times (including initial good lucks etc)

2. The time they joined the game if you were in the lobby first.

3. When infrastructure is - or isnt, if it normally would be - upgraded

4. When ships are built or take new commands (using time machine and thinking about logical waypoints you can usually spot the human touch)

Why does it matter? Well if you can initiate and finish an attack before your opponent sees it then they dont have time to buy specialists or reinforce from other stars. Even getting an attack fleet half way across the divide might be enough to prevent reinforcements.

On tech I went Terraforming 2 Banking 2 and now close to Banking 3. That would normally have been another round of Terraforming to get the advantage mid cycle and then nabbing Banking 3 just before the end of Cycle 1 but I was asleep so what can you do. I did build 3 more industry after this screengrab was taken all on frontline or support stars - im willing to pay more to upgrade a star closer to the front (! That im confident of holding) than one at the back. 

Updates from each front.

North - All looking good we are both expanding northward and I'd expect my 100 ships heading up there to be able to hold off any attacks. My opponent didnt rush the north like I rushed the south so should be static front lines or better.

Centre North - I have a good advantage in ships here as my opponent seems to have prioritised Centre South and I sent my overnight capital reinforcements here. There may be opportunities to go on offensive here in the future but for now im content to hold.

Centre South - On the front lines here I'm effectively outnumbered 400 v 200 however my opponents attacking forces are divided which means specialists must be split and he also has to think a little about defense. I have 6 tokens now and he has 13 (enough for a sab + colonel.) An immediate attack from my opponent here might be interesting. Id have to decide between standing and fighting or dropping back and seeing my front line stretch. Either way its clear the 120 ships built overnight on my capital must be sent here immediately.

South - A successful adventure overnight and whats more, slow expansion from my opponent means I can try to stretch them further. As i send a 1 ship carrier south to grab those two stars my smuggler is racing east with 50 ships to nab another. The acquisition of these 3 new stars plus the one i took overnight makes the effective leaderboard (once the loose stars are collected and assuming theyre collected on expected lines) 34-26. This is already a near-game-winning majority. By that I mean if I could hold and consolidate that the weight of those extra 8 stars will allow me a huge infrastucture advantage. 

All in all, a good night. This game is already effectively won but its important to stay vigilant and not make any silly mistakes to make it more competetetive. In the coming updates youll see me closing the net star by star around my opponent.

Monocerotis VII - Cycle 0, Tick 9 - 23:00 06 July

All progressing rather smoothly. I'm 2 hours away from Terraforming 2, which I'll be sleeping through. Since my opponent has spent all their money on their starting stars I'm not too worried about being optimal and staying up to buy economy with that. I'll get away with it. 

My smuggler is racing off to the south and with no enemy specialists in sight, I am on course to capture my target star and maybe more in a little over 10 hours. That means I just need to keep things tight elsewhere and not give up any stars overnight. Just because I'm sleeping doesn't mean they will be.

In the center, this is how it's looking. Interestingly my opponent hasn't sent a ship immediately from Arthel to Andos. They could have done it as it's within hyperspace range. It does tempt me to make a play for that star but there is a chance they made the move just a tick or two late and I don't want to risk being second to it. I need those ships to defend my frontline star.

Since I won't be awake for any overnight strikes I'm massing 100 ships at each of those touch points and relying on the defender's advantage to protect me. I'm also bring in another carrier from my capital to reinforce the front line. Meanwhile, my carriers will explore off to the north and south. My smuggler is already off-screen south racing with 100 ships and the second set of 100 ships heading to Sidua will depart north to provide some force up there. 

To show how important it is to not buy Economy at the beginning of the first cycle, compare what I've been able to buy this cycle against what my opponent has - AND - factor in that usually if it wasn't awkward cycle end timing I'd have captured another 3-4 stars before I needed to buy Economy - AND - I'd be on Terraforming 2. Even without these edges I clearly have a big infrastructure lead. This is a good lesson to learn in a 1v1 though and from Asgana's perspective better to learn it here than in a bigger game you're going to invest more time in. I'll let him know next cycle.

I'm also still sat on 254 coins. I don't usually roll over credits from the first to the second cycle but there's nothing that jumps out at me to buy yet. Maybe if I wake in the night I'll find a home for it on some newly captured stars.

Monocerotis VII - Galactic Cycle 0 - Tick 1 - 19:00PM on 06 July

After a short wait an opponent joined the game and it got started at 18:27. Mentally that means I'm now conscious that ticks are passing at 25 past and 55 past (giving me a 1-2 minute cushion.)

At this point in a real-time game, I usually look forward across the first few cycles and make myself aware of the key timings around cycle ends. 

- Cycle 0 will end at 04:27AM (I'm asleep, but waking soon)

- Cycle 1 will end at 14:27 

- Cycle 2 at 00:27 the next day. (I'd usually be asleep)

Not ideal but not horrendous. Why are cycle timings important? Well, ideally you want to buy Infrastructure and Science at the beginning of a cycle and Economy right at the end. If you're not around at the start of a cycle you're missing the opportunity for some new industry/science to be working for you and if you're not around at the end you're pressured into buying your economy sooner before you might have higher Terraforming technology (if you're researching it) and in the early game before you have expanded to new stars that will mean you get more for your money.

My new opponent, Asgana has 0 rank, 0 renown and a starting 1200 ELO which suggests they are a new player and they begin the game with a mistake, spending their starting credits on their first six stars. This is bad because its cheaper to spread infrastructure across many stars and buy spending all this money on just 6 (mostly bad) stars Asgana will get much less for their money than I will. 

Without putting too dramatic a point on it, against an experienced opponent (which I am) Asgana has already lost the game. I don't think there is any coming back from this, but I'll show why.

On the positive side, I can see Asgana has invested sufficiently in ships to expand and whilst not spending any specialist tokens seems conservative to me it does give them some good options/capabilities later as remember I am down to 3 specialist tokens to their 10.

My ships are already off on their adventures to the front lines down preset waypoints. I always preset waypoints when joining a lobby of a game in case I miss the first few hours for any reason. What I'd highlight here is that all 600 of my starting ships are on the move and almost all are moving east towards the front line, remember my first goal is to get these ships to somewhere useful - that is front line stars for offense/defense. 

I'll check back in a few hours and see how things are unfolding.

Monocerotis VII - 1v1 - Preview.

This series of posts will cover the 1v1 match Monocerotis VII and the aim of the series of posts will be to provide an introduction to a match format a lot of Solaris players don't play regularly and share some basic tips or things to think about. These matches have no diplomacy and are a straight shoot out between two players on a mirrored match with all randomness removed.

The rules

These rules may and hopefully will change in time.

Starting stars - 6, including a 20:20:4 capital. This beefy capital makes Space Docks viable.

Starting ships - 600 How you use these ships is extremely important. It will take your starting industry 120 ticks (6 cycles) to produce another 600. With new industry that number will come down but this force will still represent most of your fighting capability for the first 3-4 cycles. It's essential that you get all of these ships to somewhere useful (a front line), as fast as you can.

Starting tokens - 10 A generous amount but choosing how to spend them will be a big decision.

Starting Credits - 2000 very generous and means you can be gung-ho with carrier creation and early infrastructure purchases. I spend it all on the first cycle.

Ticks per cycle - 20 Fairly standard but importantly for real time this means the cycle end will rotate through the full day and both players will eventually have cycle ends falling during their sleep window.

Weapons level - Fixed at level 3 Meaning attacks need to be well executed or supported by tokens. Favours the defender throughout the game and makes early game Infiltrators deadly in defence (a force of 50 ships can defend against a force of 100 ships due to combo of the Infiltrator dropping enemy weapons to 2 versus your 3+1 on defence.) 

Specialists level - 3 (can be increased) Means you'll be getting a steady supply of new tokens and so can risk spending more of your starting tokens. Makes the jump from Spec 3 to Spec 4 only a 33% uplift and less essential in the first 2-3 cycles. 

Banking tech cheap, Manufacturing tech expensive. Makes banking more viable and really makes you think about when to take your manufacturing up.

No experimentation tech. No great loss :) 

The map

All of these maps have '30 stars each'. Winner needs 40/60 stars to win. 

The first thing I do in a 1v1 is draw a big line down the map separating the stars I can reach first and the ones my opponent can reach first (excluding use of specialists, except maybe pathfinders.) 

Then I look for key features such as very close front line stars [Pink Squares] or stars far from others (the band of stars I've referenced in Orange and labelled 'A')

The next thing I look at, using the line that I drew, is the attack times across the front line stars (red lines and times) in a turn-based you worry about anything that is below your turn length here (and worry slightly less about anything below your turn length using a smuggler/coward) in a real time game like this match I worry about anything that is less than 7 hours, because I have to sleep sometimes.

The final point is the reinforcement times to front time stars (blue lines and times.)

So initial thoughts on this map

• Starting star NR is low (50,27, 17,14,13,11) this makes Mineral Extractors slightly more tempting than usual but I think I'll have more pressing needs for the tokens. It will mean I can't go for my usual Terraforming2 -> Banking2 -> Banking3 cycle 1 tech strategy though as the amount of expense for the science necessary doesn't sit well with me. 
• Both players start fairly close together in a map that seems to be more orientated N/S than E/W.
• If borders get split 50/50 there are 7 front line stars each. From my perspective, 2 in the North. 2 in Centre North. 1 in Centre South and 2 in the South. 
• It will be easier for me to attack in the south and easier for my opponent to attack in the north. This is because if you look at Centre N, my opponent has one frontline star that threatens two of my frontline stars. All else equal, this splits my ships and any specialists on defence because I can't scramble between these stars to respond to an attack without using warp gates/specialists which themselves comes with costs.
• Whilst attack times are longer in the North/South it will also be harder to supply these fronts both because of the longer transit times and also because of the potential of cutting them off. The stars in these places also have longer resupply times. This will create opportunities and because the attack windows still fall within a normal sleep window my hot take is that the easiest breakthrough will be found in the South, and I'm most at risk in the North.
• To get the 4 stars tucked at the back I need to create an Explorer. Timing this purchase and weighing it against other potential tokens will be an early consideration. 

The strategy

In my opinion it's better to carry out an average plan than to play with no plan at all. My plan will change depending on what my opponent does but it's good to have an early idea.

1. Tech strategy is Terraforming2 -> Banking2 in Cycle 1. 8 Science would get me there in 20 which is too slow since I want Terraforming first for cheaper upgrades mid/end cycle. 9 Science gets me there in 18 ticks. I'm going to buy up to 8 and then take it up to 10 halfway through the cycle when I've captured some higher NR stars. In the second Cycle I'll try to take these to 3 and 3 respectively which will take 300 NR demanding 14-15 Science.
2. Specialist strategy is a Space Dock (2 tokens) on my capital to help provide an industry boost which will be essential for holding my desired borders in Centre N and Centre S. Then a Smuggler (5 tokens) to surge south with 100 ships and try to carve out a star advantage in the south. My opponent will need to commit a fast spec of his own to counter it. I will hold 3 tokens in reserve for an Infiltrator/Colonel to counter any early attacks effectively. This means I go without an Explorer. This shouldn't be a big problem in the early cycles. In 1v1's expansion is critical but front line expansion stars at the back are less important early on.
3. I'll barely upgrade my poor initial stars, I bought 8 carriers, 4 science and 2 industry and I'm currently sat on 1353 credits. I will spend upgrades on front line stars and on the stars serving them. Yes, I could start building up ships sooner if I bought industry sooner but ships being produced 12 hours from the front line are not as useful to me as ships being produced on the front line and I'm willing to burn some hours of production to get them where I want them. When you start factoring in carrier transit times it balances out anyway.
4. My goal is to get more than (or failing that, at least) 30 stars out of the expansion phase with the extra 1-2 I think coming in the south, the circled star in the image below is my prime target. Firstly, it will take me 12 hours to reach this star on my chosen path which my opponent can only match with a speedy specialist of his own or a pathfinder (and I'll know if they used a pathfinder in time to abort the attack... more on this later if it happens) so there is a real good chance I'll get it. if I do get it, I probably also get the two south of it and then to the North/East of it there are three stars I'll threaten. The two images below show the danger of this.

Here you can see the front line stars if I capture my target star. Notice how in this scenario the star count is 31-29 in my favour but my opponents connection to the two stars south of it is broken and I am threatening multiple points, this will make launching an operation to re-take the star dangerous and further losses possible. If I get this star without losing my own version of it, I'll have achieved my expansion phase objective and I will put that 31-29 (soon to be 33-27) advantage to work like a python.

As for what I'll do if my opponent does the same (I'm not committing the specialists north required to counter this strategy deployed against myself) I'll come to that if it happens, but in short I'll be pragmatic about it. I'd still do this in the south and be willing to cede those 3 stars in the north. This would lead to a new border that looks like this.

Now all I need is an opponent. I'm hoping I get an experienced opponent to challenge me and make the blog more interesting but I'll cover the game end to end whoever I face.