Disable Superweapons for AI

Get the reference data, get the 3 super weapon (orbital cannon) entities and set the tactical slot cost to 99. Simplest way that I know of.

Unless you're playing on the insane difficulties, it should take hours (at least one, likely a lot longer) for the AI to start building superweapons... especially if you aren't on Faster speeds.

And even when they start firing, they shouldn't be hard at all to defend against, if you have some idea of what you're doing. For the TEC superweapon, build a SB and upgrade with planet protection,  for the Advent superweapon you can probably just ignore it, for the Vasari superweapon, just hope it doesn't hit your front-line world and you'll be fine. Build a starbase if you want to help defend.

That said, it is possible to mod out superweapons if their difficulty (what difficulty) is too much for you.

I'll give it a shot.

It's not so much that its too hard to win, I just like making my own "roleplaying" scenarios if that makes any sense. The planetary bombing was just a thorn in my side when it came to that

I should also probably say to make sure and make it a separate mod, do not replace the original entity files.

I don't think I have ever seen the AI build superweapons in this game before. In games lasting 10-20 hours on 10x speed with unlimited money and build slots. I actually thought it was impossible for them to get max tech until I read this topic.

It was, untill they patched it in, quite recently. I can't tell the exact patch which brought it, but at the latest it was the 1.2 patch for diplo and the equivalent ones for entrenchment and plain sins.

Now some AIs are very fond of superweapons, while others don't build them at all (since I usually go with random AI behaviour I can't tell you which ones). Even on normal difficulty the AI will build superweapons and on hard and insane it seems to take them just a bit over one hour to develop them and build the first one (on giant random galaxy with normal income rates).

I play on insane I will tell you bull crap 1 game will take me 2-3 days to complete that means taking over every single planet in the large 5 star systems thats like 144 planets or something. Those basturds build cannons like its nothing my planets are constantly getting hit in diplomacy more then once I have to rush to take the dam planets which are protected by starbases and fleets and hordes of mines do you know how long it takes to clear 150 mines from 1 planet after you take it with a scout and you cant build more then 1 scout you need the dam points to build fleets to destroy everything. letting the AI build those dam cannons was a mistake it was hard enough with the dam AI building starbases in the same dam planet gravity well right after you just destroyed one and they constantly send them so you have to keep a fleet held back just to take those dam things out before they are built. And then you hope and prey you have a fleet close by when they phase jump to a planet build a starbase in the gravity well and bomb the planet with 4-5 shots from a cannon yeah i dont know what setting you all play on but insane is insane its war out there and you better have the defense but most important you better have the fleets to back up those defenses or else you mine as well play on easy.

With the resource handicap, playing on large maps against cruel or vicious AI should really not be attempted unless you enjoy painfully long games or just to prove you can take everything that single player Sins can through at you.

To take care of mines (which the AI way overuses often) just use like 5 scouts and 10 flak together. Micromanaged well they can clear minefields extremely quickly.

For taking planets late-game against very tough AIs, I usually get a ton of carrier caps and LRF and park them at the edge of the gravity well while my fleet destroys everything automatically. At that point one's already won and there isn't much point in continuing except if you just like watching explosions.

http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/

Also, your bombers will take out enemy starbases very quickly late-game.

And, like said before, superweapons are not really an issue if you understand that Auxiliary Government negates the Novalith.

5 scouts omfg thats points wasted thats a ship wasted you only 1 scout playing for 2-3 days you have time to move that 1 lonely scout to each planet as long as you keep your defense a head of the planets you should never have to go back defending at the sun because the AI will phase jump to the sun from other stars a lot you have to move very fast to take the entire star you start in there can be no allience putting starbases in blackholes and 1 starbase every where and i mean everywhere you can not leave a single planet or even just space junk not defended with a star base most cases you have the best defense moving those fleets near a starbase when the ai decides its time to attack and I will say it is never just 1 ai attacking me they all attack at the same time I use up to 8 players and I never have an allience thats worthless its me against the universe on very hard and i like it if i give the ai a change to bull up after I take the first star it makes it even more fun because of how hard it can be to take out a planet that has 150ships 6 captial ships and a star base with planet defenses and hordes of mines you have to travel around I have a few bombers but I never rely on those because the AI has hordes of fighters I build fleets and fleets of fighters as long as you up the tech on the fighter weapons to max they will deal the damage needed to take out anything and why wait for bombers to destroy a starbase WTF mkove your dam capitail ships in thats what they are for have them attack that dam thing I do not lose capital ships all my capital ships at lvl 10 very early because i move them to attack everything and i mean everything if youm sit and do nothing you will just die but if you defend with an offence you will have a 50/50 chance at killing them before they kill you.

5 scouts is nothing if you also have a fleet capable of taking down an entrenched enemy planet.

You should also be making 50+ creds/sec, probably a whole lot more, in a long-ish game, especially in a larger map. That means you have the funds for another scout every 4 seconds. That's nothing. It's an investment well worth its cost if you don't want to be spending 10+ hours sweeping all minefields with just a single scout.

Also, if you don't even attempt to use sentences I'm not going to read your posts.

Yeay AI have super-weapons, glad they all build them at the same time....

try this

aiUseTime "OnlyWhenManyTargetsHyperspacingTowardsMyGravityWell"

in the Ability_____OrbitalCannon.entity  files

should make it so they ONLY fire when a large force is approaching the planet the cannon is on...in theory

do this for:

AbilityPhaseOrbitalCannon.entity

AbilityPsiOrbitalCannon.entity

AbilityTechOrbitalCannon.entity

Thanks, Wrath. Reading that was beginning to hurt my head. Assume he didn't bother to see where your link led.