Go Big or Go Home

Go Big or Go home is damn near impossible on a large map. I did it on Point Blank. Pick TEC and send a Marza over to your enemie's homeworld. It can get his constructors and take on your opponent's cap early. What you must do is not upgrade your homeworld, and instead, invest your early resources in a second cap. Say, a Kol or an Akkan. What this does is it alows you to destory your computer opponent early.

This task is frankly a little ridiculous. Only Capital ship fleets lose damn quick.

I say TEC because the Marza is a very effective 1 vs. 1 ship

I've effectively done this against a Hard Aggressive AI on Point Blank, as TEC. The thing you need to capitalize on is that the AI, while hard and aggressive, doesn't really adapt the way that a human player would.

The best way to do this on this map is to just be offensive, and not worry about colonizing other things.

Point Blank starts you on a desert planet, so you can't upgrade your planet population. So, for the cap-ship build, you should start out by scuttling your frigate factory, building the cap factory, all available extractors, and a military research station.

The first capital ship you need is the Kol battlecruiser, since it can take a good amount of punishment. In the first few minutes of the game, you'll have to play defensively and buy for time, because the enemy is gonna fly in their own cap ship and about 6-7 frigates, while all you have is the one cap ship. Giving the Kol the experimental shields ability is your best bet for success here.

Now, to get that second cap ship out, all you need to do is the one Command Crew research. Your starting fleet size is actually enough to accommodate two cap ships.

Once you have the cash, I'd suggest building a Dunov support cruiser. Its Recharge Shields ability is invaluable here. By the time it comes out, your Kol has probably lost all shields and taken a bit of hull damage, but having the Dunov there for support will help you destroy the enemy fleet (or at the very least, have them retreat).

At this point, since you have a military research structure, you should research repair bays, and build a few on your planet. Then, fly your two cap ships to the enemy home planet. Make sure the Kol is in the front - most if not all of the AIs ships will target it, leaving the Dunov to sit in the back and just keep recharging its shields (this is what I was talking about with taking advantage of the AI - a human player would more intelligently go straight for the Dunov). Stay in the planet and do as much damage as possible, but once you start losing the fight, retreat back to your own planet and its repair bays. Just keep doing this over and over again ... you'll probably need upwards of 4 cap ships eventually (I favor having the 3rd ship be a 2nd Dunov, and the 4th be a Marza) before you turn the tide and overrun them.

Of course, be getting relevant military upgrades all the while, and your ships will most likely all get to level 4 by the time all is said and done.

I haven't had much success with other races ... The Kol/Dunov combination seems to be the best bet to win this achievement.

wow lots of different strats here.
i beat the achievement on a random small map as tec. i scrapped my frig factory first thing as my cap factory was being built. my first ship was an akkan. i researched a couple of weapon upgrades and then the cap ship limit upgrade. my second ship was a kol i think. then a sova. this gave me a nice set of strike craft and and some other useful abilities. i took worlds and heavily defended them with tactical goodies.

i continued to research weapons since it gave my caps the extra advantage over the easy ai.

by the end i was using all 16 cap slots but i was overwhelming the ai all over the map.

This is interesting because from what I remember (not looking at it now) to get the achievement you had to use all of the cap ship slots. Is this not the case? From what I am reading it looks like it isn't. If not, I would imagine it would be a lot easier because you could "rush" with caps early and throw the AI off. I was playing rather defensively and keeping only a few planets to not stretch myself too thin but it was too difficult.

It does appear that I need to keep this against 1 opponent.

Is TEC the only one to do this with? I haven't really played them, most just Vasari. Maybe it's time to expand into other races then expand out and do this.

It depends on your play style, I am usually very reliant on capitals. Scouts are about the only frigate I build (plus colonizer for asteroids) early game. I usually go either Akkan/Mothership out of the gate, followed by a Kol/Radiance, and then a Sova/Halcyon.

I find this very hard to do with Vasari, their capitals just don't seem to have fleet stopping power.

If you get a raging economy quickly and expand as fast as you can, you can stop pretty large frigate fleets if you pour resources into captials and atk/def/hp/shield research. I LAN with several friends and almost always have significantly more capitals which nullifies pretty good sized fleets. Once the Cap fleet reaches about an average of level 6, (especially Radiances) they are near invincible. Just never stop advancing and leveling. Heal as fast as you can from battles, and move on.

Note that focusing on Capitals though makes it near impossible to hold off numerous opponents due to the max amount of 16. Once you hit level 7-8 on all capitals, you can make two fleets.

Two games ago, I actually only made capitals and killed an unfair computer, held off another, and backstabed a human player, while having only capitals, they even got all the way to an average level of 9 among all 16. (Had a few 10's, and a couple 8's left). But admitenly, once I went up against two human players, I had to create a fleet of 200 frigates (largely crusaders), to commit my pincer manuvere (a double attack into two different systems at once via wormholes)

Just know when to pull them back, never lose them and they will only grow stronger. If your losing them to fleets that size your not paying attention, I don't micro much, but I watch their health and shields in a battle, and keep them near repair stations and the like.

There are three achievements having to do with capital ships:
1) Beat the game without using cruisers, frigates or strike aircraft (thus it is necessary to use capital ships)
2) Own at least 1 capital ship of every kind at the same time (there is a separate achievement for each race to do this, I think)
3) Own the maximum amount of capital ships at the same time, while also having all fleet researches completed.

Just do a 1v1 on point blank vs nearly any difficulty AI. Build a Marza and send it, you will find that you will tear apart the enemy.

Scuttle your frig factory and just spend money to level up your Marza. Take out their frig factory first and then its game from there.

yup, quite easy

Wow really managing this stratagy game with humans and ai is hard i really need 2 pratice more before i take on experience human players. 200 ships how can u make fleet so quickly ??

I recall doing this on Doppelgangers as Advent and Fulcrum as TEC.

As Advent it was simply a matter of pairing Progenitor Motherships with Radiance Battlecruisers. After I had 2 or 3 of each kind I'd start building other capital ships. I'd always make sure the Radiance would spearhead assaults so the AI would target it first, thus leaving the Progenitor to do repairs each time while also attacking. I also had heavy defenses during that game. I'd also always micromanage the targeting on the Progenitors so that they were in the thick of battle with all banks firing on something. This is probably much harder to do these days since they nerfed Malice so badly. The more capital ships I got, the easier my time was. Fleets of 5 to 8 capital ships worked well for the fleets. I didn't have much success with small strike groups of 3 capital ships unless the planet was not defended by enemy ships. My advance as Advent was slow and steady without a retreat. As enemy forces grew, so did my capital ships. I also remember racing to the top of the military tech tree to get the auto-leveling up for capital ships ASAP. I also spent a little on the economy.

When I was TEC, I immediately sent a Sova Carrier to the enemy homeworld and started siphoning credits and causing chaos. I would hit the smaller ships first so that the Sova would gain experience and start dropping missile pods off to help in the battle. By the time the Sova had to retreat I had a Kol there to cover its departure. Then I'd have the Sova come back, sit on the outskirts and let its long range weapons and strike craft do damage. The Kol and Sova normally were sufficient to stop offensive enemy forces at the home world, although I had to micromanage things to prevent construction facilities from being built. I'd be building a Dunov next and using it for defense or sending it to wipe out one AI's home world. The next capital ship would be another Sova or Kol. I recall having to pair a Dunov and Kol together as well as pair together the Sova and other Kol because I was getting attacked on 2 fronts. At that point it was a pretty defensive battle to save resources, until a fifth capital ship became available. I grouped a trio of capital ships into a fleet and took them offensive, commonly retreating after doing lots of damage to the enemy. I'd try to make the two fleets flank an enemy target as much as possible until 8 capital ships became available. By that time the Kols had gotten so high in level that they were unstoppable as long as I took care of them. As for research here, I did a little of military and a little of economics. Most money was gained off embargo even if I sent a Sova into a system only to have it chased off shortly after arrival--it was still free money.

Think on your toes and consider the above. If you micromanage things to make sure your ships are firing on all banks, then you'll have an easier time. I know I'd purposely put capital ships right into the middle of a battle and order them to retreat only when their HP got to 1,500 for a small enemy force or 2,200 for a large enemy force. The presence of phase jump inhibitors necessitated a build up for allied forces since the PJI would be the primary target after having jumped in. Also prioritize capital ships that can heal when choosing targets.

Plenty of good info in this thread already, so I'll try to keep it succinct. It's not easy, though. I want to say this was done against 3, but it was awhile go and I'm not entirely sure. It was actually a fairly leisurely game.

First thing to know is, are you aware of tab cycling for capital ship abilities? If you select all capital ships, hitting tab will subselect the next ship, so you don't actually have to click on them to use abilities. This makes micro way easier, and allows capital ships to be much stronger. Shift+tab goes the other way.

Vasari is a pretty good race for this type of game, and what I used. The trick is surviving to the point where your capital ships are mostly level 7+, maybe about 8-12 of them. In the early game, build econ like usual, stop at maybe 3 capital ships while you work on research/infrastructure. Keep plenty of repair bays at every attackable planet and rush phase jump inhibitors. You can't build frigates, but you can build plenty of turrets. Defend while your ships gain experience. Get the training upgrade and start your new caps off at level 4.

For Vasari, there are plenty of options. 1 Marauder, (or 2 if you prefer) at least 1 nanites cap, at least one Evac, at least one carrier. Fill the rest out with 4-5 of the offensive ships. Desolators for the phase swarm, nanites cap, (the one with overload) or even Evacuators for the disassembler nuke. All of these function well when micromanaged. If one of your caps is going down fast, use Repair Cloud on the carrier, followed by Phase Hull from a Marauder on the ship getting hit. They will continue to repair while otherwise invincible.

TEC can go several directions as well. 1 Akkan, 1-2 Marza, and then any number of the other three ships. Level 6+kols will pump out tons of dps during Finest Hour, and will shred strike craft. Sova carriers can spam missile bays and supply lots of strike craft, all of which can be switched from one type to the other almost instantly. Dunov cruisers can shut down enemy antimatter, keep all your ships at full shields, and empower other capital ship abilities with the antimatter reduction. Armistice is also great if you get into a sticky situation.

Advent I'm least familiar with. I'm guessing that you would want to use a couple Motherships for the shield restore, and plenty of Radiance ships for spamming Cleansing Brilliance. This is probably the easiest race to win with, but less fun imo

Just make sure to get your ships exp. Start fights even if you won't win them, and retreat the caps as needed.

I did my "Go big or go home" with the TEC on "Systems of War" (4 players, 5 systems), and did a 2x2 with pirates enabled. So I did have frigates - my ally's, and the pirates . Normal difficulty only... I regard special restrictions to be an inherent "hard" setting, and see no need to bump it up further.

Key to this is to realize that capships are SLOW. Therefore you have to figure out where you need to be well in advance of being there. If you get attacked in a system and you don't have a cap nearby, give up on that system, build fortifications on the nearby ones, and task a force with an Akkan to throw back the assault and retake the worlds.

The capship slowness also means, paradoxically, that you have to outexpand the AI at first in order to be competitive later. You need to begin with 2 Akkans and take as many worlds as possible before the AI catches up. I had begun on the central system before the AI finished their home systems (note that on hard, the AI will outexpand and eventually kill you). Your need for cash and hence trade is critical: you must purchase capship upgrades and ensure your enemies are too preoccupied with pirate raids to hinder your desperate expansion. That also means that contra the first commenter's advice, you MUST upgrade homeworld immediately like normal. Otherwise you get the second cap earlier but you can't pay for upgrades.

Then I built the following order of capships:
Kol, Dunov, Kol, Kol, Dunov, Kol, Dunov, Sova, Mazra, the rest Kol's.

I probably shouldn't have built 3 Dunov's - You fight on 2 fronts often, 3 not so much. Once you get a Dunov/Sova/Mazra combo, its time to harass the enemy with it. Eventually add an Akkan and maybe a Kol and the will mop up worlds. 2 Kols and one Dunov can handle medium-size threats, and 1-2 Kols should play defender at each of your star systems.

Capships are not enough firepower to fight off the enemy: You also need fixed defenses. Fortuately, you are playing against normal AI, so they can be relied on to mostly attack the nearest planets. At each heavily contested world, you eventually want four hangers, 1 pji, 2 repair bays healing each other, and one turret to fight off close-range attacks. This will hold the world until the patrolling capship(s) can help. This combo, if all-bombers, can survive a max-pirate assault with only nominal capship help.

Key abilities:
* Shield restore: any time you face a major attack, this Dunov ability will keep the Kol(s) going forever.
* Targetting uplink: Because you need every shot to count, and what else are you going to spend the point on?
* Flux field: Turn this on then set all Kol's to spam railgun shots and flak while recharging with...
* Finest hour. The only way you are going to get the firepower you need to kill enemy fleets. Remember to get the Kol right in the middle of the enemy formation to use all guns.
* Embargo - no reinforcements for you! Give me some money for upgrades!
* Radiation bomb, EMP charge: Any attack that affects multiple ships is something you NEED. Now. Because you will always be outnumbered, and every shot that isn't killing hull is a wasted shot.
* Armistice: Suspends the battle until the Kol(s) arrive or if you need just a little more time to install those tatical buildings.

Three notes:

1: The requirement is no frigates or cruisers, so you CAN build strike craft on your capitals, or hangar bases.

2: If you want to expand at all (usually not that bad an idea) you'll want to go with a colonizer capital first.

3: You will want a ship that is good at dealing with 'hordes', as such the dreadnaught/ desolator style ships are an advanatage. My personal favourite for this task is the Vulkoras Desolator, its phase missile swarm will deal with frigates easily enough once it's level 2-3, and combined with the evacuator's nano disassemblers it is perfectly capable of taking out most capital ships as well.

Pt. 3 is only for small systems where you don't really expect things to take all that long. Small random or point blank or some such.

One part I forgot - after you have the computer players reasonably under control and take the closest planets to the pirates, build them up with defenses then have the pirates attack you to build up the levels of the capships you have defending that star system. This will help you go for the "captain" bonus where you max out one capship's level.

If the computer players are about to die and you haven't achieved all the achievments you want, backstab your AI ally before he kills them off. Then you can go for all kinds of achievements.

Remember that you have fewer guns - weapons-enhancing tech isn't going to help nearly as much as more capships and more emplacements. However armor and regen techs (esp AM regen) help a lot.

the achievement does not say that u mustbuild cap ships. I wonder if it is possible 2 win with culture and/or pirates?

Without caps OR frigs, you aren't going to be able to colonize.

So, its VERY unlikely.