Not all of this is for 1.3, but here goes.
1) The Fleet Cap system is good, but can lead to some trouble on big maps. I'm known to, er, destroy the enemy fleet upon occasion and once they sold their economic souls to host a big honking fleet that gets blowd'd up, they are S-C-R-E-W-E-D. I set up a huge random map and went at 'em till I had half of the second of three stars. I saved the game and quit planning to start again the next day, but once I looked at the post game stat screens, I knew the game was over. They had built (now destroyed) huge fleets, I don't know just what their caps were, but it must have been over 60% of their economy, so the HIGHEST credit income that any of the surviving enemies had was 7 credits a second (the remaining advent empire was brining in zero/nada per second). I mena they were probably all eating cabbage soup and waiting in bread lines by this point.
I was making 30 and had enough reserves to build half my empire over again. Their metal and crystal situation was the same. Needless to say, there was no point in staying around to mop them up if they couldn't rebuild those monster fleets.
2) Related to the above point, I think the AI could do alot better with their economy. I was shocked to see that they didn't have the kind of economic reserves that I did. In fact they had nothing in the bank. It could only have been the fleet cap. They put everything into fleet cap. Even the late game TEC Capitol ships in the next system had basic bare bones armor levels.
I think they should prioratize military research. I mean, they could cut back on a few light frigates and improve the performance of that huge honking fleet a great bit. I saw in the next star system of that huge map that, finaly, the AI was building good ships with few light frigates. But they should be doing this much earlier.
I was always wondering why they build no defenses or economic planetary developments, but now i see they have no money and are going for big fleets instead.
So the question is what should they cut back on economicly in order to improve their defenses and research?
I think its.....Siege Frigates
3) Siege Frigates. I don't see these as the terror that everyone is complaining about. SOMETIMES, they make things uncomfortable, but I think they do more damage to their host economy than the target empire. They take up a full 12, (TWELVE!) Fleet cap points for each one. That is alot of resrources tied up in a squadron of those things. When you see a gaggle of those things, that represents about 10% of their entire economy! While they do sometimes get a world or two (which can be rebuilt and might not have been bringing in much money anyway), they usualy die like dogs once I have set up my mid game defenses. It depends on how many border worlds I have and how limited the acess points are to those worlds (it's hard to protect those crossroad worlds as you don't know where the back door is).
But really, I don't think these things pay off for the enemy like they should. Not only do they cost money to build, but they have to increase their fleet to host them wich is not just the purchase price of the ship, but it' also a constant penalty against their income. If they spent the money on military research, they could invade with a smaller fleet cap rather than raid with a big one.
I suggest that at a certain point, they should knock it off with these things and spend the money on, to beat a dead horse, military research or planetary development (like trade posts or refineries, they never build nearly as many of these things as I do which is really daft considering they have no resources and could just fill a world with big fat juicy refineries between a pair of ice worlds and never worry about crystal again).
4) Diplomacy. I think this needs some work. THe mission system is Ok, but i would like to see more cooperative "psst, how about 400 metal for 1200 credits?" kind of missions rather than "See that empire on the other side of the map? Yeah, well go blow up their tactical instalations, OK?". I have been turning teams to 'Locked' which I really don't want to do as the other empires are, honestly ALWAYS teaming up on me in the early game otherwise. And early game I'm not in any position to do what they want as far as missions which are way too agressive and scattershot strategicly; if I'm attcking early game its against a nearby, vulnerable empire and its to the death with victory meaning I have a nice resource nest with a obvious choke point at the other end of it. I'm definatly not going to say "Well, maybe I should divert my meager resources, which are are barely sufficient to colonize the neighboring ice world, to go blow up some green gauss turrets on a contract from the orange guys; WWAAAAYYYY over there which will lead to nothing as I can't defend their worlds even if I take it and I would be wildly over extended with a wide open flank. While I do that I could let the blue guys take that ice world I've been working twords".
But now the orange guys are PO'd and even the green guys are coming for me, and well, what are those purple guys doing getting in on the action and....ack, et tu blue guys!?!
I like that they're agressive, but it would be nice to see the squabling be a little more balanced and the means for cooperation be a little more driven by my initiative rather than their wild demands. Some of them that are attacking me are not even bordering empires and i don't think that they have finished colonizing all the worlds nearby their distant empires.
5) Don't listen to people asking for increases to static defenses!
It's called 'Sins of a Solar EMPIRE'! The Romans didn't take Greece with gauss turrets and repair bays, they did it with Cap Ships, er, Legions.
Seriously, the defenses are there to stop raids, to slow down invasions, offer a sanctuary for a fleet of your ships getting wailed on and running like little girls or to suplament an inferior fleet against a superior one. If they could just up and stop a concentrated invasion, it would kill the game.
'Sins of Solar Turtle'.
6) The Enemy running away.
Honestly, i like this. They are pretty savy. I mean, why get gunned down like dogs when you can 'discretion' out of a hopless situation?
I have seen them hop back and forth between systems and I'm trying to catch them between my battle and carrier fleets. It seems like they're a headless chicken and are just buying time and delaying and I have a plan to catch them with my carrier fleet by holding it in the rearward system rather than chasing them as I think they will continue with the chicken pattern and run back from my battle fleet in the forward system. But they pull a curve ball and rush past the battle fleet which was trying to buffer them (it can whittle them a bit, but not stop them) and go into a third, farther forward system! Hah, the cheeky bastards, I love it! They shook me and broke an impossible situation with an unperdictable move. Well of course I continued to chase them to a dead end system and they died like digs, but they tried their best.
I often see them leave an important syetm in retreat from a superior fleet and then come back once they are situated.
Honestly, they do alot of the same kind of stuff that I do and I'm impressed with their decisions as far as maunvering their fleet, although I'd like to see them attack my worlds a bit more often and also try and bypass my fortress worlds and head to my mushy underbelly instead.
Ok, well thats more than enough blathering.
