I play the Yor in my game, and my 3 closest neighbours are the Arceans, the Terrans and the Iconians. The Iconians, in peticular, were my main concern at first during the game. They were the closest to my border, and we shared 3 solar system (1 planet each in the same system).

So, naturally, when I built my military, I stockpiled many ships on criticaly-placed planet (in addition to a minimum of 1 defensive ship/planet). the 3 shared shared solar system, and 2 planets bordering the Arcean. I wasn't planning for war, but these were "just in case".

Eventually, the Iconians declared war on me. So I immediatly design a transport ship, buy them on some of my worlds, and send the stockpiled ship on attack. The Iconians never got any chance, and were wiped out. After 2 weeks, they had lost 3 planets to me, and their military position was quite bad. The most ironic is, I put the Iconians as the smartest opponent during the game (the lower level where they "cheat")

Which points out a critical failure of the AI's way to run military. It's one of the basic rule of Strategy: you attack when you are ready. You put the ennemy on the defensive, you make it react to you, never allowing him any chance to move. I could understand if I declared war on the Iconians that they were in no position to attack. But THEY declared war. They knew where my main fleets were located (in orbit near their own worlds), but they didn't had 1 transport ready. They didn't had 1 fleet located within striking range to wreak havoc among my fleet.

Now, I can understand how difficult it is to write those AI. Especially tactically sound AIs. On a range of 0 to 10, design these would take me about around 16.

However, would it be possible to include something like "Condition 1: Fleet within striking distance of ennemy world. Condition 2: Transport within striking distance of ennemy world. Condition 1 and 2 required to declare war".

It would be nice, when war is declared on me, to sweat and have to rush in order to scramble a desperate defence against the well-prepared ennemy. I have not even been attacked ONCE by the Iconians transports.

I know that when I declare war, I know where their fleet are. I know how protected my target planets are, and how long it will take for me to invade them all. Does the AI prepare a true coordonated empire-wide military campaign, or it simply sets itself target of opportunities and try to hit them? Does it need to be at war to build transport ships and prepare for an invasion?


Changing the topic, another strange behavior I noticed. Twice, during the game, the minor race called the Alixians declared war on me because "I stationned transport near their worlds, and they are not stupid". While I don't even know WHERE their world is (even with Eye of the Universe). I eventually always broke the peace with them witouth firing a single shot, and they always pay me a lot of $$ for the peace treaty. Weird.

But not weird as this: recently, they sent around 15 constructors unescorted inside my space, and they began to construct pointless influence starbases. What is going on????