Thanks to all who gave me sound advice on my help request thread (Darvin3, GoaFan77) and Greg30007 (who posted on similar threads from other authors in the past).
Warning! Long wall of text incoming. Apologies ahead of time.
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I had an interesting match last night playing as Advent vs 3 cruel AIs (one TEC, one Advent, one Vasari) on a random medium map.
At first I thought I was screwed since the map was such that the only planets within 4-5 jumps were all volcano planets (four of them int total), with several asteroids and two 'space junk' and a wormhole. But beyond the volcano world there was a natural choke-point asteroid bordering the TEC. Pirate world blocked transport across the sun, and at the other end there was a nasty desert planet two steps from the vasari player HW.
I resisted the temptation to go for civ labs and research volcanos at first. Instead I followed the sage advice of others to go to 2 mil labs (repair bays and carriers) and lived with a Halcyon, some disciples and built two colonizers to grab roids in opposite directions (one via the turret trick, the other via disciples while the Halcyon moved through to the volcano worlds. The whole point was to skip the volcano worlds but destroy the light frigates and Krosovs on the way through (chain of 3 in a row) to get to that choke point asteroid. I had to thin the neutrals out just to get a colonizer through the gauntlet.
I then laid down a 3rd mil lab and 'gasp' skippped illumiantor spam and opted for a couple carriers. When I colonized that key asteroid and collected the bulk of my disciples and my Halcyon _ couple carriers, I immeately laid down repair bays, a frigate factory (HW was a long ways away, with neutrals behind) and constructed a star base just as TEC was showing up. My fleets delayed the TEC enough to get the SB up. The TEC kept coming but I knew I couldn't make the mistake of keep my whole fleet pinned down.
So.. I left the SB on its own and went the other way towards the desert planet. By now it had been colonized but the Vasari hadn't pushed beyond that much because there was a 'space junk' between us. I tied up his secondary fleet (i.e. no caps, but skirmishers and assailants) for a few minutes by kiting a scout around the desert planet grav-well, and beyond that he had only poked a bit at my other fringe asteroid that I had semi-fortified (no SB). I then blitzed his desert planet with most of my fleet. I knew I couldn't take the planet yet nor could I survive a full reprisal from the Vasari. But I figured if I didn't bog the vasari ai down asap I was doomed.
In the mean time with the TEC border roid SB fighting continually vs TEC (I had to upgrade twice early, and exploit 3 repair bays), I finally settled the volcano worlds, pop upgraded, got the metal extractors up and built civ labs and got trade ports going with a chain of six lanes (not great but a start).
Meanwhile the desert planet was a mess, at first my strikecraft had the rule of the day. I still knew I couldn't win that front as is and I needed that world badly as my 2nd chokepoint. So I gambled and built a Talion and built and offensive SB right near his planet while I fended off a low level Kortul and waves of LFs and LRMs with mostly carriers and disciples. My Halcyon had to flee and jump twice to get repaired but my SB came online. Then the 'bleep' hit fan. That pushed a button of the Vasari. He countered with Skirantras, strikecraft and sentinels.
But following again sage advice I had already teched 4 labs for mass disorientation and got the hull upgrades (both tech and SB upgrades), kept my carriers at the edge of the gravwell (whiole my Halcyon repaired), built some defense ships, rushed a new mothership in and then teched guardian, destra and repulse. At this point I had built maybe a total of 10 illuminators (having lost half).
Fortunately the TEC stopped hitting me at the other end as they got sick of my SB ripping there LFs and LRMs. I always had enough repair bays and flak or carriers in defensive mode to make sure he couldn't overwhelm me with bombers. Long story short TEc went the other way against the AI advent and I had a drop down cluster-bleep with the vasari on the desert planet in their 80% allegiance (which sucks).
Still things were looking worrisome (I lost my 2nd Halcyon and my SB was down to 2500 hull) when my destras started to arrive and I got meteor control online. I had to stretch multiple times to kill a migrator trying to build and Orkulus. Up to then it was all shield recharge, telekinetic push, and mass disorientation as the vasari ai sent also a level 7 Kortul (those suck to fight) and waves of lrm and carriers. But once the destras started tearing him up from behind and a couple of well placed guardians kept him from rushing me when mass disorientation was on cooldown then things rapidly changed in my favor. To be honest meteor control was just the icing on the cake. My SB was still anemic with 3.5K hull (even with upgrades maxed) but my shields were overflowing by then (though with vasari that doesn't mean a whole lot) and I picked him apart. I then reduced his world, slapped down defenses and from their I could finally expand.
It turns out I had crippled the vasari while the TEC was crippling the Advent (who were so remote I never fought them as our relations were excellent based on my bloodbath with the vasari). I expanded to take out the Vasari HW and the rest of their holdings (it was early enough and they had lost so many ships), they only had one infant Orklus in on of their systems. By then I had an elaborate trade network, was overflowing in metal from five volcano worlds (no ice and the only terran was the vasari HW), had 70+ bombers, lots of destras and guardians, only then built a lrm sub-fleet (maybe total of 40 by the end).
Then it was the inevitable huge fleet battles with the TEC but by then I had teched up and it was all over for the AIs.
As an aside I see now the wisdom when fighting the AI of having some disciples in your massive fleets, since the AI loves to target them and via shield bubbles, repulse, shield recharge, etc. they last for a bit. So what if you lose 10+ disciples, they are cheap and they take surprisingly long to kill with all the support buffs. Bombers still go for the destras but that is what multiple TK pushes are for. Repulse is to keep Kodiaks and such off your fleet.
I also see how useful later on a revelation is so it can tie up a Dunov or Skirantra, while you malice and pound another cap ship.
In the end I only ever needed those two key starbases. I built very few illuminators until near the end and even then not that many (contrast that with Vasari where I am overflowing with assailants). I never built more than four temple of harmony (the fourth only for culture upgrades and metal extractors, since I had so much metal income anyways).
So it seems I had more luck this time even with a terrible map, of going on a low iluminator, high strikecraft diet, rush to starbases + upgrades and pray for destras. Even then the game was won with the offensive starbase which would have never worked on a human player. But then again the human player doesn't start with the money 'cheat'.
Still it seems much harder than if I was playing Vasari.
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