I'm 200+ hours into my first game in which I am "learning how to play SE", and I am now on round 280, playing on a large Earth-like planet with lots of water at slow research speed, normal difficulty. Whilst I have enjoyed learning the mechanics of this game, the AI apparently has no concept of strategy, making me question whether learning the mechanics is worth it, in so far as SE is conceived to be a 4X as opposed to a sandbox simulator. Given that my planet is a bunch of unconnected islands without navies, one might have thought that the AI might rush air defence, but instead it has pumped out useless ground units that cannot defend against bombers. In fact nearly all of the major regimes don't have an air force at this late stage of the game.. They have airbases, but mostly no aircraft. I am wondering if this is partly due to the slow research speed setting that i chose for the world. Maybe it has something to do with a "random tech tree" effect that is specific to my game? It certainly took me many rounds and BP to develop aircraft. But overall, the AI controlled major regimes haven't invested nearly enough BP in air defense, or for that matter in R&D in general, and they spend most of their resources on ground units that they do not use effectively.
So, I've been continuously level-bombing the capital city of the most powerful major regime, which is within 25 hexes from an airbase on my island, for over 10 rounds, destroying all of it's public and private sector, apart from it's port and high-command (which have apparently miraculous healing properties), reducing the Civ level to barbaric and reducing its population of +300,000 to around 100,000. I've lost no aircraft and apparently the AI doesn't know that it should negotiate a truce. Also, the happiness level of this capital city that i have reduced to smithereens looks suspiciously fixed by the programmer at around 75%, with worker happiness rigid at 52%, which is laughable all things considered. This bombing campaign has put me about 15 VP above my nearest rival.
Also, most of the major and minor factions are passive to the point of docility, even when expanding. I suspect that this is partly due to the geographical isolation of each regime, and also partly because the planet in my game is much larger than the total manpower available, for according to the victory score screen, only above 60% of the planet is territory occupied by some regime, meaning there isn't much interaction among empires, even at round 280. I have also influenced the factions of every major regime towards pacifism, which also might have contributed. Sadly, nearly all of the drama in my game has been the reported naval conflicts between the Maritime Trade Houses, as opposed to the war-games i have partaken or observed between the regimes.
A much stronger diplomacy game-mechanic is clearly needed, for why is it so easy for me to unify with distant minor regimes that cannot be feasibly conquered or protected by either myself or any of the AI-controlled regimes in the short to medium term? And why aren't the AI-controlled regimes preoccupied with unification, given how easy it is? I think that only one of the majors has unified with a single minor regime, whereas I have effortlessly unified with at least three. I think it is fair to say that diplomacy logic is fully absent from this game, and that unification should be considered an exploit, given how reluctant the AI is to use it.
I suspect that if playing on large watery worlds, one should always choose the "nemesis regime" option to give the AI a much needed head start. Maybe one should also play on the "hard" AI difficulty setting. But perhaps, it is better to avoid the Oceania content and stick to playing worlds that are better suited to the wargame engine of Shadow Empire.
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Topic: SHADOW EMPIRE: Procedural Sci-fi 4x wargame - Kaiju Warning (Read 84221 times)