Something I don't understand at all about AI-behaviour:
Why does the AI think it's best to keep 90%+ of its fleets in orbit around its planets - especially when they don't even have a fleet manager or other defense-supporting-buildings on it?
That's something taht makes me shake my head everytime.
Like in my last game the Korx were really doing well, their ships had a quality that almost matched mine (or if they would have had the Large scale buildings as well, probably exceeding mine)
Anyway, I park some warships and troopers around some of their planets in order to get them to declare war on me - which they did.
gripe #1)
The should have done a preemptive strike - just as I do when I attack somebody: I "declare" war by attacking (unless theres some stupid UP rule).
The AI does nothing (Is it coded that way? If so that is not fair for the AI I think)
gripe #2) on all but 1 planet they didnt have a Orbital fleet manager.
But still it kept all its ships in orbit. At the start of the war it had like 40-50 really well-armed frigates + quite a lot smaller ships
Still it allowed me to take its ships off one by one.
When I attacked that 1 planet that was supported by a Fleet Manager I lost quite a few of my ships in the process, so if it had used its ships offensivly it would have been able to do much better. But so the only ships I ever lost were the 2 or 3 Large ships against the planet with the OFM.
gripe #3)
The AI doesn't even act when I act stupid and careless
Like parking 2 fleets of unarmed and unguarded troop-ships directly beside its planet (which had a crapload of warships in orbit at the time) for 2 or 3 turns. Well they were still thee when my warships arrived later and picked of the defenders 1-by-1.
If I would have been in the same situation I wouldnt have had to think twice: launch 1 warship - take out the 2 Trooper-fleets (was 2x7 1-million-transporters) and send the ship back into oribit (if I wanted so) smiling.
All in all I have no clue why the AI uses its military potential so poorly, it really spoils some of the fun.
I admit, nothing the Korx could have done would have changed anything at all in the end, but they could have at least done a LITTLE effort to make my life miserable.
They were the only ooponent so far that looked at the start of the war somewhat like a threat - but that they did nothing at all (well, that's technically not true...they once launched 1 frigate to chase one of my passing constructors, which unfortunately for them was faster - but my Large-scale-building was even faster ...) was truly disappointing.
And ya, all that was at Obscene difficulty...