It's good to be back
I had a rather awesome and challenging game the other day. I used UE to half running costs and multiply the shield and armour values of all ships 10x what they originally were but left the weapons alone and had a long game starting low tech Klingons.
Took 400 turns to finish and because of my modifications I kept having engagements involving 100 ships, but the AI had a chance to have a real scrap before running away with most of their fleet intact so they could regroup and hit me again. Got rather tricky when all empires decided to go to war and had more advanced ships, though I countered that by being able to build fast and outnumber my foes. True, my ships were crap, but because I had my industry to level9 while most things were at lv 5 I build swarms of scouts and destroyers quickly. The changes also largely negated the cloaking advantage.
I'd take a system or two, then had to hold station and fend off one or more empires in my newly conquered territory while building re-enforcements, as well as deal with a Federation who kept randomly rocking up to distant systems with a full invasion force, only to disperse whenever I sent numbers away from my front lines to ward them off. I know the AI is terminally stupid, but just for once, it was smart and really gave me a game.
