The Rook's Bailey

My inner space Caesar cries for more blood! After just completing an epic, eighteen hour tale of conquest amongst the stars via Sins of a Solar Empire (Entrenchment), I am yet again feeling the urge to crush trembling space aliens under my pressurized space boot. Onward!

This time around I am trying my hand at Kerberos’ Sword of the Stars, utilizing the recently released Argos Naval Yard micro-expansion (I know, I know – my gaming budget was shot to heck with ArmA II, but I couldn’t resist this $9 add-on!). In some ways, Sword of the Stars is far more complex than Sins as it is literally jam-packed with technology, tactics and uniquely operating alien races. This is understandable as unlike the swiftly flowing RTS enviro of Sins, Sword is akin to CA’s Total War series as it incorporates a turn-based strategy game along with real-time tactical battles. In short, having more time to think, Kerberos gave the gamer plenty to think about!

Let’s get to work:

My race is human, Sol Force to be exact (Repensum est Canicula!), versus three random alien races (two easy, one normal – because SotS' AI plays a mean game! ) I pick a random, 60-odd star galaxy to begin my conquest. My homeworld: Excalibur.

A summary of some early events:

My early turns are relatively quiet and we expand quite quickly with about six or so colony planets. I only encounter one alien race, the crow-like Morrigi. Initially, they allow my low-tech destroyers to pass freely through their systems, but then attack an exploration party that, I suppose, penetrated too deeply into their empire. They follow up the attack with a message that, once translated with the right tech, reads "We see many possibilities with your race.” Hmm….

Our biggest threat so far was the randomly appearing Von Neumann raiders. These sentient machines appear out of the darkness of space without warning, and if not driven back, will pillage the surface of a planet by beaming up a quantity of resources. Fortunately, I had sufficient defenses to drive both attacks out of our gravity well.


A Von Neumann raider (not to be confused with the much larger mothership) approaches Excalibur…and my small fleet of destroyers and light defense satellites


SF Stark and a refueling vessel watch as two missiles close on a retreating VN raider

Victory!

Unfortunately, Sol Force cannot catch a break as shortly afterwards an asteroid storm descends upon my colony planet of Procyon…and just after we completed terraforming it! Urgh! Worse, all I had were ten defense satellites to stop the asteroids…we got most, but not all.


A defense satellite watches helplessly as a cluster of asteroids descends upon the night side of Procyon

It was a heavy day for the colonists of Procyon: 128 million imperial citizens and just under 700,000 civilians dead. It was so bad I had to dispatch another colony ship to replace the dead!

After this catastrophe, things progressed quietly…until I stumbled upon a real roadblock. Sitting astride my most important node line (the space highways humans use to travel) was an infestation of space bugs. These guys live in a hollowed out asteroid orbiting Alpha Centauri and attack, with blinding speed, any ships that approach. They are tough to kill…so tough that I lost about 20 destroyers, in two separate attacks, trying to defeat them. Part of the problem is that my tech has all been devoted to colonization. As a result, my ships don’t have the armament to stop this type of attack.

Back to the drawing board.

I have begun researching point defense systems, to help intercept incoming fire, and then I will hit battle computers, something that will give me the ability to command more ships at one time. Unfortunately, that will take many years (i.e., turns) to develop. So, in the mean time, I am just refitting my basic destroyer. I have removed all the slow firing mass drivers and replaced them with quick firing, high accuracy green lasers. I have also removed the slow firing, dorsally mounted missile launcher and replaced it with a quicker firing medium mass driver. Lastly, all my ships will be getting a 'hammerhead' bridge upgrade that will double the number of forward facing weapon hardpoints. Hope this works!

Checking the port side firing arcs

Stay tuned for news from Alpha Centauri!