The Void - All Posts in Chronological Order

All the posts from The Void game, a 1000+ star 32 player epic.

• All posts were written at the time and unedited. That means sometimes I was right/wrong or missing the full picture.
• As much as I attempted to give a galaxy (and indeed alliance wide) perspective games are always fought through the individual lens and so it's worth remembering whilst all of this was happening to me in the eastern part of the galaxy, entire month long wars were happening elsewhere. In particular the war between Uy Scuti and the western scattered neutrals was one that I wish we had as detailed a narrative timeline on.

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-starting-out-tick-0-cycle-0.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-12-cycle-0.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-24-cycle-1.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-36-cycle-1.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-42-cycle-1.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-60-cycle-2.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-72-cycle-3.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-84-cycle-3.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-92-cycle-4.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-114-cycle-5.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-132-cycle-6.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-138-cycle-6.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-162-cycle-7.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-180-cycle-8.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-204-cycle-9.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-240-cycle-10.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-276-cycle-12.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-288-cycle-13.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-312-cycle-14.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-354-cycle-15.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-408-cycle-18.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-432-cycle-19.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-444-cycle-20.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-474-cycle-21.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-480-cycle-21.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-492-cycle-22.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-504-cycle-22.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-516-cycle-23.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-528-cycle-24.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-540-cycle-25.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-588-cycle-26.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-612-cycle-27.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-624-cycle-28.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-648-cycle-29.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-660-cycle-30.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-708-cycle-32.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-744-cycle-33.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-768-cycle-34.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-game-over-tick-853.html

https://necriasolaris.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-void-tick-372-cycle-16.html

The Void - Game Over - Tick 853

 

Final leaderboard and known identities

TdT (CRISPR) - 165 Stars

Baskerville (Necria) - 147 Stars

Ragnar Lothbrok (Lanian) - 129 Stars

Hello There (Maul) - 103 Stars

UY Scuti (Royluc) - 87 Stars

Beez (Melkor) - 83 Stars

GrumpyReaper - 56 Stars

Dieste (Battery) - 49 Stars

Aogami (Falken) - 48 Stars

Mar - 46 Stars

Tube-Pipe (LeDazz) - 40 Stars

Tzeentach (Zachsmack) - 37 Stars

Holy Roman Empire (SteveFree) - 15 Stars

Sea Serpent (Rakec) - 14 Stars

Still Vahnee - 13 Stars

Major Tom (Zorg) - 3 Stars

TheBorg (Kip) - 3 Stars

Athos (LimitingFactor) - 1 Star

DEFEATED Amogus😮😮 - 65 Stars

DEFEATED Coobykins - 14 Stars

Meowrion - 0 Stars

Corn (Bappo) - 0 Stars

🦀👺🦀 - 0 Stars

Ikit Claw - 0 Stars

General Kenobi (Noot) - 0 Stars

🥸🥸🥸 - 0 Stars

taktwienixe - 0 Stars

Dr.Bronya - 0 Stars

Imperio Helghast -0 Stars

Leroy - 0 Stars

C++ - 0 Stars

Szeth - 0 Stars

If I've got your ID wrong or I didn't know it and you're happy to reveal message me on Discord and Ill update the post.

What went down between the last post and this one?

The last war of the game coincided with a very busy period at work and waning interest as we moved closer to the victory.

In the south we pushed further but eventually came to an agreement to not wipe TheBorg, Major Tom or Tube-Pipe. The latter retained a significant deterrent (though interestingly post-game, a smaller one than he claimed some time earlier. A little misdirection there...) We took some more stars but then collectively came to a 'lets not push our luck' understanding and froze the front lines, freeing ships to move north. I did still have to kill several thousand Tube-Pipe ships on legacy waypoints.

Final front lines in the south.

 In the north, the war against Holy Roman Empire was ferocious. Here are the key beats.

• I had to call off my war-opening attack on his Cryo wormhole as he moved ships onto the wormhole. I adjusted plans and hit him at multiple points across the front line, flipping a total of 8 stars the turn the war began. HRE and Ragnar seen this attack the turn prior.
• HRE responded as expected by pulling back fleets from the southern fight against Sea Serpent (Rakec) and throwing some big attacks at me. These I was able to defeat using a combination of warp gates, generals, smugglers running ships to the generals. 
• I initially made big gains against HRE with the benefit of the attack and initiative, but as he pulled back more and more fleets from the SW I started to find the situation challenging. For a couple of days he and Ragnar had ~30K ships operating near the front lines (within my scan) versus my own 20K ships (I had 40K+ total but mostly moving in) 
• I played the fight against HRE very well, jumping between stars and taking favourable fights. All the fighting was done in his space so I had the freedom to do the fight on my turns. My strategy was just to keep them on the run/chasing their tails and moving backwards in their own space whilst my industry did the heavy lifting of giving me another 750+ ships per tick. Here is how it looked at a couple of points. 

Approx tick 806? 

Approx tick 824?

• In the west I know TdT and HelloThere were making big gains against Cooby, so big that he quit and that Uy Scuti (Royluc) was making grinding attritional gains against his long term nemesis Aogami (Falken) and others. I was happy with the progress on both of these fronts. Dieste (Battery) was having some more peace, geography cutting him off from these theatres of war.
• I eventually did manage to snipe the Wormhole Cryo Chamber, which I used to build 20 generals, sending them out to all of my front lines. I knew I couldn't hold it so the same turn I turned it into an Orbital Array, the general stealing complete. 
• I warp gated every star south of the front lines to race reinforcements north and with every turn that passed the ratio of enemy ships to my total ships began to improve slightly. My starcount rose quickly to around 148 before dropping back to 142 as Ragnars fleets started to push me back, but my Industry caught back up and I was able to start climbing again. Closer to the front lines I spent a tonne on warp gates, flicking them on and off as I wanted. As a general rule no predictable gate stayed open for more than 2 turns and I never once ran afoul of an enemy anticipating a gate.
• I offered HRE to stand down and stop fighting alongside Ragnar and I'd keep him alive, but he nobly refused and kept fighting, albeit jadedly. 
• TdT and HelloThere broke through Coobykins and were able to start directly threatening Ragnars east which brought the game to a close. He knew he was done.
• As the game ended heres how the front line situations looked. Although RTQ you can see the fighting was ongoing with both sides bringing more ships in. At game end Ragnar had 66K ships and HRE had 12K to my 50K.

Final thoughts

Game settings - I really enjoyed the game and thought the settings worked well. I would have changed the starting hyperspace and removed Cryo Chambers but I thought it was a fun long game. I loved the pacing and the large galaxy and with almost no AFKs and everyone actively engaged it was a good battle with some of the best players in the game.

Cryo Chambers - I never bought one myself because I hate slow specialists in offense and I was broadly fighting an offensive war at all times. There was a window where they were essential for a lot of people (whilst I was finishing up Ikit Claw and preparing for war with Major Tom) but I personally didn't need generals in that window. I do think they took a lot of the tactical nuance out of some front lines though and next time I'd make specialist tokens harder to come by and also ban cryos.

My allies - The coordination and focus between me, Maul and CRISPR in particular was perfect. It's not easy to sustain focus in a game over a month and our communication was super tight. Royluc and Battery also proved great and essential allies, but geographically I never seen them (didn't see one of their stars all game) and their battles raged outside of my core focus. I hadn't played with Maul much before this match but he was a top tier ally too.

The winner, CRISPR is the most dangerous player in the game now in my opinion. His sixth win puts him on a par with LeDazz total and while LeDazz is the best tactician and the person I'd want to face the least in a 1v1, CRISPRs read of diplomacy and desire to win is second to none. He doesn't pull punches and he isn't here for a fair fight. if it will take an alliance of seven to win he will have an alliance of 7. For anyone facing CRISPR in future matches you need to have a game long plan to manage him because he will be pulling strings in the background and doing so very effectively. So will I by the way.

My enemies in the south - I have the benefit post-match of knowing more about what was going on behind the curtain in the southern alliance. I can imagine how frustrating it was for LeDazz/Tube-Pipe trying to rally a coalition across the galaxy to counter us and hearing crickets or negative responses. This was active counter-diplomacy from both me and CRISPR to be fair, we dialled up messaging and interactions with HRE, Ragnar, Sea Serpent, Tzeentach, Beez, Amogus any time we felt any of these were at risk of being swayed into an enemy coalition. In the end the deciding point was that Tube-Pipe didn't really want Ragnar to win so didn't want to continue a losing war for his benefit, but objectively and emotions aside the play was for them to continue to fight resiliently and play for time. The way you handle any situation where your alliance is losing slowly to another (in my opinion) is to choose moments to fight, keep fleets alive and wait for the situation to change. If the southern alliance had kept fighting us at 100% effort I believe Ragnar would have won the game as we wouldn't have been in time to pivot north - even without anyone else flipping to their side. 

My northern friends/enemies - Me and HRE had a 450+ tick peace and he was my earliest ally. I didn't feel guilty in the end attacking him because the situation demanded it and I know a war with the north was inevitable. I waited until I had a casus belli before making the move but it was him or me. The intercepted communication below shared by Sea Serpent was way too risky to not respond to. It indicated active planning/readiness for war with me and the prospect of a truce here created the prospect of Sea Serpent joining HRE and all their MANY, MANY fleets down there coming my way. Instead, I worked with Sea Serpent with the promise of helping keep them alive and getting revenge.

Ragnar played a good game, with the exception of his diplo missteps against the south. He built up a lot of strength through some early wars and executed some nice surprise attacks, I hear. 

On the margins between victory and defeat - 

Excerpt of a message from me to Maul and CRISPR. 30 June, about tick 500, 12 days before game end.

What strikes me sometimes is how transient even positions are and how almost always one side will start to come out on top and it then looks inevitable. The margins between winning and losing are super small, a couple of key battles. For example, if Corn and Beez are smarter in their attacks on your west - just handle a couple of the attacks better (avoiding fighting each other, not using generals to attack from far distances early on at outset of the fighting...) or you both are more tentative with your fixing attacks on LeDazz, allowing him to stabilise and take initiative. If any of the three of us have shitty logi, or if Battery stays neutral, or they have ships garrisoned on the warp gate nebula I hit killing my 3.5k fleet and meaning my other 2k on a pathfinder is going to its doom. If some/all of these things go differently suddenly it looks like we had no hope all along.  If Aogami doesn't make all these mistakes hes talking about and they manage to just about overpower Royluc, you both would have had a western alliance gunning for you whilst we were still stalemated with LD etc. It's all super marginal. It's never as inevitable as it seems afterwards.

I maintain that 2-3 days ago we were arguably losing, a few things happened simultaneously then that changed the picture (1. Royluc got on top in the west, 2. You guys started to win in your western war and started to win quicker than youd originally anticipated 3. I got a breakthrough on Borg)

CRISPR response

Yeah I agree we were losing 3 days ago. From my point of view there are three major inflection points.

1) Dieste agrees to join in east fight, if he doesn’t ledazz and borg blow me open with an excess margin of about 3-4k ships

2) We get beez to gift us 1,500 ships and agree to game long NAP with them in exchange for five systems. Royluc almost doesn’t agree, and it hurts me to give up systems for someone who might just stab us, but we do it anyway. These ships stabilize Royluc, and ledazz directs major Tom and corn to pull back and attack hello there instead (unknown possibily weaker tactical player who may crack) - a crucial error.

3) Necria decides to roll the dice with a +3 scan spec, then makes a very risky attack that pays off big.

4 Other things that could have sunk the game- amogus attacks me instead of going where Royluc tells him, especially if partnered with sea snake. HRE and Ragnar hit you two instead of wormhole 

The Void - Tick 768 Cycle 34

 The last war has begun and whilst I've taken the initiative, HRE is about to bite back hard.

The initial attack seized 8 stars in the declare war turn, which is good news. A combination of conventional strikes and deep smuggler hits on warp gates. 

The bad news is Holy Roman Empire is mobilizing at least 10K ships at short notice to strike back (6k on a smuggler departing from the wormhole southeastward, and another 4k arriving through the wormhole next turn) This is just what I know about, and it's reasonable to expect more. Prior to the onset of war I could see 30K Holy Roman Empire ships compared to my 38K. 

I'm confident I'm bigger and have much more industry than HRE, but he has had shorter, more imbalanced, and from what I can tell less fierce fighting with Sea Serpent than I had against the southern alliance. That means he's been able to build up some strong fleets. He also has a minor weapons edge, but I even that up next turn. I'm about to reach weapons 10 and I'll continue researching weapons for the next cycle at least.

I'm offering encouragement to both Sea Serpent (Rakec) and Tzeentach (Zachsmack) in their respective wars with HRE and Ragnar. Both are losing and at risk of elimination but retain enough ships to cause major problems. Sea Serpent in particular pins down some of HRE's ships which means he can't bring everything back through the wormhole. 

So how are the front lines looking? Let's split everything west/east of the wormhole.

West of the wormhole

The big question here is what Cooby and Ragnar can mobilise to help HRE. I don't think Cooby has any options, HelloThere and TdT are more than keeping him busy. Ragnar on the other hand has reached out, clearly irked by the attack and I'd expect a non-token force from him. I don't think any of us are directly fighting him yet and he will have been preparing for conflict for a while. My guess is he has something to send south and help. That's why my operations here are mostly just stealing what Industry I can and grinding down HRE but ultimately, I have attacked to make the fight happen on HRE's territory. I'm not going to win this game (probably) I think I'll come second or third, but I do want someone from my alliance to win and that means really all I need to do up north is not lose.

That's why I'm already thinking about choke points I can fall back to if needed.

East of the wormhole

Down south

I've reconfirmed to TheBorg and Tube-Pipe that my advances are stopping and have stopped all further waypoints into their territory. I could be a bit greedy here, but I'm aware Tube-Pipe retains a significant fleet and could still cause major problems for me if I push my luck. I've encouraged HelloThere/TdT to do the same but that's their choice.

The Void - Tick 744 Cycle 33

 It's time to go to war with Holy Roman Empire and win this game for the alliance.

I have a casus belli via communications indicating HRE has attempted to sue for peace with Sea Serpent and is actively plotting against me. This in itself wouldn't be enough to persuade me to act but there have been some diplomatic shifts out west. Amogus is no longer allied to Dieste, he needed to free up the slot for some reason, and Beez has stopped defending Sea Serpent) which to me suggests Dieste/TdT/Uy Scuti are going to be hit by them in the near future.

TdT and HelloThere my allies are preparing to attack Coobykins imminently anyway, which would have very likely brought everyone into a war via chains of alliances. So all in all, it's now time to act and be the one to have the element of surprise and initiative rather than responding to threats.

So what is the plan?

1. I've hard pivoted the logistics in all of my original (pre-breakthrough) territory north. All the industry on these stars will now support the war effort against HRE.

2. I've extended Sea Serpent a formal game-long NAP/offer of help to just keep resisting/not join the enemy. Sea Serpent (Rakec) has 12 stars and 9k ships left. I have 37K ships but an extra 9K is not to be sniffed at and I do not want those ships on the other side.

3. I've checked scan lines across the border with HRE and his visibility is pretty poor, I'm going to keep up the pretense for the next two turn processes that I'm trusting/keeping the border demilitarized but I'm now racing ships to the stars just beyond his visibility.

4. I'm going to initiate the war in 12 ticks time (he will see it in 18 ticks when the turn processes) with a smuggler strike on their Cryo Chamber. I can't hold it but I can turn it into a useless Orbital Array, after sending myself a fleet of generals back south the same tick to distribute across my front lines

5. I already have generals moving into position and I already have some fleets in Nebulas tucked away. At the far west of the front line I have 1K ships, I have another 1K in a nebula centrally and 2K towards the east. I believe HRE has a similar number.

6. I'll start the war with 20 tokens to use and I intend to use them on speed specialists for what I hope will be a demoralizing first set of attacks/star flips to seize early momentum. Even if HRE responds rapidly and musters a large force he will be taking time seizing back his own stars not mine (originally) giving time to my allies. I'll buy at least two smugglers to deep-strike warp gates and I might buy a third somewhere useful.

Western part of the front line

Eastern part of front line

7. I'm switching to a weapons tech focus now. HRE is on 9 and Ragnar 11, I'm on 8. By the time I attack HRE I'll be on 9.

8. I'll still retain some industry pushing south into TheBorg and Tube-Pipe, but this is lesser priority now and I'll be less ambitious with trying to gain additional stars. They just want to survive and see out the game now and I don't want to force them up against a wall.

I don't think this war sees me gain enough stars to challenge TdT for first place. I think there is some risk it leads to a star reduction depending on how quickly HRE reacts and what he has tucked away in his various nebulas. Let's see how it goes.

The Void - Tick 708 Cycle 32

The southern alliance has been defeated (at least mentally) and we're likely entering the final stages of the game, with TdT (CRISPR) on track to win. My guess is we have a few days of gameplay left as both alliances wrestle to see who comes out on top.

The enemy in the south

Major Tom upheld his end of the surrender bargain and didn't resist the attacks on the three stars he held. TheBorg and Tube-Pipe pulled back to more defensive lines and are looking primarily to hold their star count and wait out the RTQ. They're still a formidable road block to quick advances but I am now making some solid gains and pushing as much as I can. 

I think the game deciding war will be up north though so have now detached around 30% of my industry to pool ships in northern stars.

The enemy in the north

My situation with HRE is an interesting one. We've been allies in diplomacy all game and we have both respected the situation on our border. We both have our own proper alliances though and they are increasingly moving towards a potential conflict, with Ragnar Lothbrok needing to be tackled to ensure a victory. I believe both me and HRE planning for conflict at this point. I am storing ships on Nebulas near the border and from what I can tell and see he is doing the same. I have better scan visibility than he does due to my deep lying scouts both up north and through the wormhole to the far south.

Up north we are tucking ships away.

Through the wormhole there are huge Sea Serpent, Beez, Ragnar and HRE fleets stored and mostly not fighting each other. My main risk and worry at the moment is what happens if Sea Serpent and Beez ally with the northern pair. I will have a very short response time. I'm consulting with my allies about how a war with Sea Serpent and Beez would look. I worry it would be a victorious war, but not necessarily very positive for me. I am the most exposed to war with that group.

I think objectively, I'd be wise to launch a pre-emptive attack on HRE, but I'm going to let him make the first move. He's honoured our peace and like us, has refused direct requests to attack us. I think I owe him the responsibility of making the first aggressive move (I'd perceive any large fleet movements in my direction as aggressive). I will only break that stance if Ragnar attacks an ally elsewhere. As soon as he or Ragnar pull the trigger I will respond.

The Void - Tick 660 Cycle 30

 Diplomacy and the next attack wave.

TdT (CRISPR) has been discussing a negotiated surrender with Major Tom and it seems probable that he might accept a deal whereby he gets to keep three stars (not the wormhole) but surrenders the rest to us. Negotiations haven't been finalized yet but I'm taking the opportunity to attack whilst he might be indecisive and is less likely to launch counter attacks. 

I'm taking the opportunity to throw a new 4.8K attack at TheBorg and attempt to dislodge him from that star. He will need 3773 ships to defend and there's currently around 2k there. I will warp gate Kasha next tick which will mean to rally an adequate defense they'll need to switch out the orbital cannon for a warp scrambler and race in some fleets. 

If successful, it will pave the way for me to bring in an additional 1.8k ships from off the north west of that screenshot and to start fighting my way through their west flank. I'm retaining threat of attacking south into the Tube-Pipe/Borg pair of stars down there but my intent is actually to go down to the wormhole (via diplomacy ideally) and then down that west flank.

The Void - Tick 648 Cycle 29

My own progression has stalled, but my allies are making gains against Major Tom whilst I build up firepower for my next wave of attacks. This update is more of a 'state of the galaxy' than an update on my front lines which are currently stalled. 

The game looks likely to be won by (in what I expect is the current leaderboard order) one of

• TdT/Ragnar Lothbrok
• Baskerville
• Tube-Pipe
• Uy Scuti 

We hold three out of five of those positions and with well sized Dieste and HelloThere on our side look likely to convert the victory if we can hold our nerve. Tube-pipe has been again trying to negotiate deals with us, and I've heard from Ragnar that he is doing the same with him. I do think Tube-Pipe and co would like the game to be over but until it's not, they're continuing to cause trouble. We (me, HelloThere and TdT, the very core trio) had a long debate again this morning about the best course of action and whether we should make a deal with them but we opted not to. 

It seems we are now breaking through in the west (TdT's attack on Major Tom) and if we can snowball faster than Ragnar (who has a very high science count) or even almost as fast as him we have the skill to be able to turn a victory. 

Necria (Baskerville) map.

HelloThere (Maul)'s map is located to my west. You can see that Cooby's space stretches around what must be a gap in the map up north with few stars. 

Dieste (Battery) map - I was surprised here to see how big Amogus is. This sparked a discord discussion. Dieste (battery) believes he is bigger than him by some distance. The latest reports suggest Amogus is fighting our enemies so nothing to worry about imminently.

Uy Scuti (Royluc)'s map. At least the northern part of it. 

TdT (CRISPR)s map

12 out of 21 players have hit RTQ though this number hasn't changed much in the last 24 hours.

My front lines. I've got another 4000 ships heading down here and when they arrive tomorrow, I'll make another attempt to break through.

The Void - Tick 624 Cycle 28

Hello, Ragnar Lothbrok.

I've had scan visibility of Ragnar Lothbrok for a long time but he was previously behind me on tech so I stopped checking, especially as he was fighting enemies/neutrals. However, this turn we heard reports of a 14k ship coward attack on Tzeentach (ZachSmack) which has woken everyone up to a renewed and more dangerous northern threat. My mental map also places Tzeentach bottom left so there must be another wormhole up north (which is probably a good thing, honestly. Rather Zach gets buried under those 14k ships than me.)

For reference. I have 19K ships total. I have been throwing them regularly into a grinder which is keeping my numbers down, but a single 14K fleet is a daunting total (currently my largest fleet is 3K). It's almost certainly the biggest fleet on the map and then behind it is 15 Terraforming which will be making all Ragnar's infrastructure upgrades cheaper. This is 4 levels above me and a MAJOR problem because it will snowball.

What's worse is we still haven't had our breakthrough attack in the south. Tube-pipe and friends continue to defend well and trade ships at ratios that favor them.

TdT wanted us to take Tube-pipe up on an earlier offer to accept ships for passage to new battlegrounds and NAP. I think this would be cheap and take the spice out of the game though so I've refused. We've had some discussion and I think we're all aligned now that we're going to attack the southern alliance with everything we've got. I'm OK with CRISPRs plan of attacking Major Tom in the west. The way to think about these situations is as if the whole alliance was one player and it makes sense. I can already feel this game slipping away as a potential win, I don't want to jeopardise an alliance win.

However, this is an interesting map from TdT (CRISPR) shared via Discord. With a single screenshot its hard to tell the timeline but it looks very much to me like he's had ample opportunity to attack Major Tom here and for whatever reason hasn't taken it. The MT ship moving east to west is also suspicious. Did they come to some sort of agreement to allow TdT to grow? He has now passed me on stars due to the bogged-down front line I have. Either way, what is is, I just need him to attack now.

Tactical Map

We both have options to attempt attacks this turn but I think with their inbound reinforcements they may be tempted to try and take a bite out of me. My warp gate has been up for a few turns now and it might be a tantalizing prospect. I looked at some of my own attacks - which work if their gates stay up - but compromise my position if they don't. As it is, I feel I need more reinforcements to make ground here so I'm going to drop my warp gate and watch and wait.

If all these stars were gated and they launched attacks they could potentially hit my rear star with an overwhelming 4.5K+ ships. They only see a Colonel on it so it might be quite tempting. 

Research wise I'd planned to Manufacturing then Specialists before end of cycle but I think I need to respond to that Terraforming threat and go Manufacturing then Terraforming, forgoing the token.

The Void - Tick 612 Cycle 27

Now that the weekend is over I'm planning to re-apply myself to the game and start making pushes. I haven't really gained any stars over the last few days and I'm conscious that others, including my allies are. If I want to win this game I need to start seizing stars fast. In the next 48 hours I want to turn that around with some important star captures.

My allies have resumed attacks on the enemies west flank, which has been necessary because they took full advantage of a shift in priorities to the west to reconsolidate and throw up some firm defense. The good news this morning is Dieste is preparing to launch some new attacks further south and TdT has hit them with a surprise deep smuggler attack (1k ships). HelloThere has also been chipping away over the weekend. Now I need to throw my ships into the fight to break through.

Here's how the front lines are looking. I launched a big siege breaker attack to try and dislodge the enemy from Kraela. I don't expect the fight to happen on Kraela - they will retreat or counter attack but I'll pressure them into doing this and test their coordination a bit. Seizing Kraela is really important to me to allow me to keep warp gates up more confidently in the area and streamline my logistics. At the moment I'm doing a lot of gate flickering (on/off) and it is expensive. 

If I can capture Kraela, plus the two Major Tom stars north of the wormhole that will give me a really nice defensible front line and allow me to build back up ships for the push south. The intel I've seen from TdT and Dieste suggests reinforcements will be thin from the south so sustained attacks will hopefully break resistance. 

The Void - Tick 588 Cycle 26

Quick update because it's the weekend and I have less free time.

War rages at the bridgehead and the enemy has taken advantage of a shift in priorities to the west from my allies to mass forces and start seriously pushing at the edges of the bridgehead.

Here's how the full map looks. I still expect I'm in first place with 89 stars, 435 economy, 271 industry and 139 science. I did reach 90 stars but have been pegged back.

And here is how the battle ground looks annotated

HelloThere has reassured me his cousin HRE is unlikely to attack me but I'm nervous about the force buildup on the other side of the SW wormhole (I have a scout down there on a black hole) there are several thousand ships and 4000 visible on my side of the WH. I've built up a ~1.5k contingency force in my north just in case. A northern alliance attack is the one way this game could really go badly from here I think, so it makes sense to plan to mitigate it a bit.

The Void - Tick 540? Cycle 25?

 I forgot to save the title with the actual tick number. I think this was about 540/550

Corn has quit and I'm watching the north like a hawk.

Up north I'm paying close attention to that wormhole. It's very close to my border and I have no idea what's happening on the other side currently. I have now reached it with a scout so plan to pop that through next turn and see the other end a bit more clearly. What I do see is 2K ships built up on the wormhole at the moment and it's not clear why they haven't gone through. I've decided keeping the warp gate close to the wormhole is too much of a risk so I've dropped that for now. 

Down south at the bridgehead the 'battle' rages. It's a point of debate how much battling there is actually going on from the other side here but they have fleets and specialists in the field and I'm working on the assumption I'm facing a coordinated, engaged enemy, because to do otherwise would be crazy.

I have three priorities at the moment

1. Retain and where possible expand the bridgehead so it's more permanent.

2. Find out where Tube-Pipe's core territory is. He's still the most dangerous opponent and at 78 stars (via the main chat, where he's rallying RTQs) he will need to lose 15-20 of them to improve the standing of my allies. That jobs likely to fall to me. Is he east of TheBorg, or south of him?

3. Make sure the north don't attack me.

I'm fairly sure now I'm first in the leaderboard lead (87 stars) but TdT/Uy Scuti/Ragnar are all possible alternative winners. I'd say at this stage the lead I have means there is about a 60-70% chance I'll win individually and I think a 90% chance our alliance wins. 

The quitting of Corn makes TdT's expansion much easier. 

The Void - Tick 528 Cycle 24

 A dangerous information war is ongoing

So after Tube-Pipe offered the surrender that conversation continued a bit. We discussed amongst ourselves and none of us feel the game is over or want to quit (even though I think I'd be RTQ'ing into first place at the moment.) all of his alliance and some of the others are now RTQ though. This is dangerous because we want to keep pressing the war but don't want the entire galaxy united against us.

Who is 'us' anyway? Well, here is how I see alliances.

Layering the onion my core alliance team is me, TdT and HelloThere. I've been working with those guys all game very actively and we coordinated together the inclusion of Uy Scuti and Dieste. 

I've also got a favorable relationship Holy Roman Empire. We haven't been coordinating on attacks or working together but we have a lasting peace. I don't have any plans to attack him and I'd consider defending him but I wouldn't say we're allies. It's still likely we may end up fighting eventually.

What's this look like at an alliance level? Well here's how I see it. Neither side is a 'mega alliance' but there are relationships and crossovers. 

The biggest diplo worry I have right now is the Northern Alliance turning on us. We have to really play up the fact that they're being pressured to do that. I think they are to an extent. Make no mistake, if they did actually turn on us now (meaning basically the entire galaxy against 6-people) we'd lose hard.

War

Politicking aside. I have my hands full actually fighting the enemy alliance. The bridgehead is still established but a good defensive move killed my smuggler and lost me 1000 ships. Reinforcements are inbound but you can see the ships facing me are starting to build up now.

I threw up a couple of gates to move some reinforcements closer and try to catch his Coward but I didn't succeed. The last couple of turns have improved their position here so I need to be cautious.

I think both gates have to go back down really. That's the first move. Now only Tooini and Bacre (the stars I'm willing to lose) can be hit before I can respond. I have 12 tokens to respond to other threats.

I think I'm going to attempt to reinforce Tooini with a further 450 ships. I think Tube-Pipe will be wary with his Coward and won't risk it attacking a fairly low-value star.  If I can reinforce it gives that star some more staying power. Other than that, I think it's a case of sitting tight for now and responding. 

I've looked at whether they can attack my landing star from Kraela but because only TheBorg can hire speed specs from there and because he only has ~800 ships on the star I think it's safe for now. His weapons level is still level 4, so even if he went up to 5 and attacked with a coward it'd be 5 vs 8 next turn when my weapons go up and I'll have enough ships to defend.

Comparison of techs between me and Tube-Pipe. He's ahead right now.

The Void - Tick 516 Cycle 23

 The enemy offers a surrender as the attack continues.

Tube-pipe reached out early this morning offering the surrender of their alliance and reporting a lack of desire to continue pressing the fight. I'm continuing to attack and follow my plan for now, but I'll be paying close attention over the next couple of turns to see how the wider galaxy responds. Without knowing how their discussions are going, I think their surrender is premature but it's possible the robust defence in the west by HelloThere/TdT and mine and Battery's attacks have broken their spirit.

I've changed some of my northern waypoints to pool ships. The northern alliance might be persuaded to attack me. It's unlikely, and I think we could talk them out of it, but I'd like some contingency.

I'm also continuing to expand my attacks at the bridgehead.

They still have threats, so I have flicked my warp gate at the arrival star off for now and I've flicked my warp gate at Evian (where my smuggler launched from) back on to start building a force there. I'm continuing to be conservative with tokens and resisting the urge to buy a second smuggler. I want options to hire destroyers or colonels/infiltrators as needed. 

I did look briefly at throwing a siege breaker at the large force to the west of the bridgehead, before Tube-Pipe gets there and they have the potential to hire a +8 war hero with his w7. The aim here wouldn't be to win the fight just to inflict damage and minimize the force to reduce it's potential. I don't think it's worth the tokens it would require though. 

The Void - Tick 504 Cycle 22

 BOOYAKASHA! The first part of the attack was a success.

In the end not only did the Explorer move (it had not moved in the previous 4 turns) but Tube-Pipe went up to Weapons 7, meaning when my smuggler landed on the deep-lying star it did so at ratios of Weapons 5 vs Weapons 12. However, the star was so lightly defended I only lost 264 ships meaning I broke through with 3.5K. What a breakthrough. And 2k more reinforcements are coming quietly from the north.

Now I have to really make this count because this is a one-off. 

What are my goals:

1. Establish a permanent bridgehead.

2. Ensure the second fleet can arrive safely.

3. Cause maximum chaos and disruption.

Okay so, I don't want any rapid counter-attacks with Siege breakers on my shiny new star. If he wants to take it he will need to broadcast that attack and give me possibilities to respond to it. I also don't want any counterattacks at Evian (my launch star.) this would be a risky play since they now don't see how I'm reinforcing it but either way let's not give that possibility. I can always rebuild.

What would be nice is if they all collectively drop the warp gates I can see. I can see 5 in total. Just because they'll then need to rebuild them. They will be worried I'm going to jump at them, but I plan to use the speed of the smuggler for more conventional attacks.

Kasha being a Nebula and Asteroid field makes it a nice star to hold and I do intend to hold it. A hostile Nebula in your backyard is a bloody nightmare and it will cause them no end of fretting until they re-take it, which I would have the choice of making them bleed for. By being sparing with the tokens I've invested in the attack I'm close to being able to buy a destroyer.

I also need to maintain initiative/chaos though. That means spreading to more stars.

The plan is to keep 1.5K on Kasha and send 1.8K north to capture the landing star for the reinforcements. I've checked distances and I think even with Major Tom's black hole they won't be able to see that Pathfinder next turn, so I don't need to take out the black hole (6-tick jump with a smuggler.) which is something I was considering. I'll then bounce to another star.

The hope here is to be cautious, wait for them to make another mistake and bring in reinforcements. They will need to move a lot of ships to deal with an active 3.5K threat behind their defensive and general lines so this should relieve pressure on HelloThere/TdT. With combat on the cards, I'm finishing a hyperspace level to allow me to reinforce without the use of pathfinders and then going to Weapons 7.

* * 

Just a note, unfortunately, this adventurous pathfinder is NOT Pathfinder Jeronimo. I actually have three pathfinders operating now. Pathfinder Jeronimo was somehow up doing logi by my north border with Holy Roman Empire (I have no idea how that happened, last I checked it was out east) he is now racing south to join the forces across the breach though.

After buying economy here is how I sit. And yes, the missed turns were intentional. Every little helps.