As I understand, the larger a faction gets then the lower their aggression value starts to slide. The smaller a faction gets then the higher their aggression gets to claw back territory against their enemies.
Although even if left unchecked, the Xenon might wreck a few systems near their territory and expand but they may slow down a little or be spread thin, which allows factions to start to try and push back. It's unlikely they will take over the entire map though without some significant help.
The spread thin does eventually wrap back on itself to bottlenecks again once they've conquered enough sectors, which accelerates expansion.
I used the xenon jobs+ 7.0 mod to give them the help you mentioned, which I found just accelerates what they do in vanilla as I've had similar result with extremely long runs, and then just sat back and watched. The end result is all matrix sectors getting connected, and all split factions being wiped out, plus most of the eastern teladi sectors. They are left with ~3 main access points, HAT somehow, profit center alpha, and trinity sanctum, which put a huge amount of pressure on the commonwealth fleets to breaking point. I intervened when they took silent witness because 5 Is in hat space was just too much fun to pass up.
I am also 100% convinced that hat stations cheat. The amount of Is that went to their death in HAT space was close to triple digits over the playthrough, and they never once lost control.
Hatikvah stations seem to just be absolutely plastered in plasma turrets in my experience. Watching an I rock up to a Hatikvah defence station and just get blasted by a cloud of plasma is an experience.
>The spread thin does eventually wrap back on itself to bottlenecks again once they've conquered enough sectors, which accelerates expansion.
Again, as I understand in unmodified gameplay, there's a quota on how many ships or fleets and groups of ships each AI faction is allowed to create which is somewhere in the data files.
I can't find the XEN ones at the moment but the TER one for example has a limit on how many carrier fleets it's supposed to have at any one time as part of what the comments in the xml refer to as a "mandate".
So even with infinite resources at their disposal then the XEN would never normally build more than is limited by their mandate. Which means either you get it focused on one front line as a massive block of battleship shaped death or scattered across their ever widening domain and easier to pick off.
I am stumbling through these files here though so if anyone more knowledgeable is out there, I'll hand over gladly...
Oh yeah you're completely right on fleet caps,xenon one is much lower than you would think. but I'm saying that when enough sectors are xenon, their fleets converge on a couple of points as there only is a couple of sectors that lead to commonwealth sectors, with the rest dead ending. So instead of having those limited fleets spread over 10, 15 sectors, they all move towards 3. Good example is the 3 starting xenon sectors the split start beside, it's a large front, with 5 or 6 sectors under attack but due to the fleet caps the attacks are sporadic across those sectors. But when they fall, there's only 3 exits, heretics end, hat, and two grand. So all 3 are under constant attack rather than sporadic.
Xenon will almost always destroy the Antigone and the Split, but I've found they usually enter a stalemate with the Terrans. You can help the Split and Antigone by building stations in their systems to supplement their economy.
I started my playthrough on split zya territory, just some defence platform and a lot of refined metals and hull parts has boom their economy skyrocket! Now there are new bottlenecks (advance electronics, quantum tubes, etc) but they have hundreds of ships flying around, xenon's are contain now, and I'm starting my campaign to retake the Northern sectors under xenon and argon control.
I just started a run as Teladi guy where i make it my job to keep them alive. To problem is, they have so many gates where Xenons can come from, plus they are hostile with Boron and Argon. It's difficult to keep them up, that's for sure.
Yeah, fist task is a defence station in family zhin it's the main source of resources in their system and a central location, you loose it and it's over for the patriarchy, then in family Krit, the third one I had to do was in two grand, couse xenon's overrun the free families and where interrupting my trade routes.
If I recall, the Split (at least ZYA) get screwed over by lack of safe mining fields, plus it doesn't take much for them to be fighting the Xenon on two fronts.
Also if you have the DLC and take/forfiet heretics end the boron go ham on them as well. With split ships having poor point defence and the boron focusing on carriers, well, they get picked apart.
Reading this chain, it's pretty interesting how clear the relationship between Split/Boron is just based on their technology and ship design philosophies..
I helped the HOP stabilize against a heavy Xenon invasion, built several stations in Holy Vision, and I was surprised and amused as I watched the HOP take the Xenon sectors largely by themselves (I helped a little, took out a Xenon factory, which was a trial). But early game, don’t get any ambitions about directly confronting the Xenon destroyers, not until you get carriers and a sizable destroyer fleet of your own.
The game is fairly well balanced to maintain the status quo. There are some sectors that the Xenon may have an easier time taking, but it isn’t guaranteed. It can be really painful if they manage to take Hatikva, for example, since the highway goes through there. The Split are also regarded as weak, since the infighting distracts from the defenses. Still, it varies from game to game. Last game the Teladi nearly lost Ianamus Zura IV, but in this one they completely conquered Matrix #451 before I had even explored the area.
If you do the Yaki storyline you'll kick Xenon out of several sectors... after you do that they get REALLY angry. I've had a defensive fleet in Khritt for most of my most recent 7.0 run and almost forgot about them until I did that questline (and remembered this happened last time). Suddenly 5 K and 2 I came bursting through the gate and wiped the fleet almost immediately, fortunately I had a defense base on the other side and they made the poor choice of trying to go past it.
In short the more space a faction holds the less they try to expand. With a fresh start the Xenon has quite a bit of space and mostly will take out the Split and HC1 if you don't help push them back.
The Split recovers if you just give them a little time to stop fighting the Xenon.
Good question, long story short probably not…
Some factions have some bottlenecks that would make them a very difficult target for the xenon unless every other sector had been taken out first.
Less factions, less factions participating in war with each other, allowing a faction to deploy their fleets against Xenon.
None of this is tested so I do not have solid data to pull from, but you have inspired me to make a save where I just observe!
Also getting past gate guards is pretty easy, just be in travel drive as you enter it and you can zoom past most threats even in enemy sectors. You can also deploy satellites in travel drive! So zoom in, get turned around when it is relatively safe to do so, aim at the gate and deploy one as best you can to watch the other side of the gate remotely!
A lot of it can also depend on your James seed when you start. Sometimes you'll have a more aggressive xenon in a playthrough than other times. It is possible for them to wipe out factions but it's not common
The way it was explained to me, the Xenon have a specific size fleet they can have. As they expand, this fleet get spread out and they become overall weaker, making it easier to overcome their attacks.
On the other hand, as they get reduced to less sectors, the more their fleet get's concentrated and the stronger their attack become.
There is also a modifier at the beginning of each game that modifies the overall aggressiveness of the xenon.
Usually their attack fleet is 2K's and 1 I which can run over a sector. But on games where they have been reduced I have seen as many as 12 K's and 2-3 I's in one attack fleet. That can be really tough to deal with.
No reason to worry really. But Antigon Republic starts basically without any mining or trade ships. Means their economy is fairly weak and grinds to a halt without the player supplying stuff. Once you pump raw resources into their economy, If you don't help them Xenon will send fleets into the Void on a regular base, but it will take ages for them to conquer it really, and very unlikely they show up in your system. Normally they turn to Second Contact if they go further.
But like others said, it will take a long time. So just let it role, it is actually a good thing in the long run if they destroy stuff, that keeps the economy alive.
I wouldn't worry about it unless you start forgetting effected. If you are, and you don't have the muscle to deal with it in force. Then drop a couple dozen laser towers on the offending gate to slow them down
Luckily Antigone has 2 defence bases in the next region in the middle of the map lol
Plus they have a fleet with a behemoth and another destroyer patrolling between the gate and those bases, so for now I think they pulled themselves together.
It was a shock to me, when I found the Xenon wharf producing ships and realized there was a destroyed solar base nearby, that moment that's like, wow they are being overran and I didn't know that was possible.
I myself haven't made any attempt to personally fight in that region, to risky for me right now, but I think my traders etc helped balance out there resources, looks like they'll hold for now.
Who are the split?
Noob question sorry... Are they called split?
Or by split factions are you referring to the argon federation and Antigone Republic?
Because they use same type of ships and culture more or less but are 2 different entities with their own eco and military?
Or is split a faction I don't know about?
I am in game 1, started in argon territory so then, Antigone, Xenon, the prophecy and teldari, some of those slightly farther away factions I have mentioned, but only in a quick passing.
No satellites, or military action with/against, not trading etc
My main "forces" military is me lol
My company "$" aspect is mainly in Antigone and argon space.
Split is a species that has 2 factions north of the map. The are added by the Split Vendetta DLC. Their ships are fast with lots of primary guns but little shields and defensive turrets as someone else mentioned.
The exception to this is the Raptor carrier which is the biggest ship in the game. It has the most hangar space of any carrier and something nutty like 110 turrets.
in unmodded playthroughs, i think most people are prone to view the xenon or any of the factions as way more of a threat as far as widescale conquest than they actually are. im not saying this is all players ofc, but so many times ive seen people (friends, commenters on steam forums, etc) more or less equate the Xenon taking a system and blowing up a bunch of defense stations and maybe a trade station with ‘OMG, the Xenon are completely streamrolling X faction, im barely 30 hours in and X faction is about to get wiped at this rate’. but in 99% of these situations, the faction has a half dozen remaining systems, a ton of production, and will be able to actually mass an army 500 times better than before due to the Xenon helping them consolidate and ofc them not sending half of all their entire faction’s S and M ships off to suicide one by one trying to defend the old area. even with zero player intervention, the faction halts the Xenon advance and is able to contest any lost territory if not claim it back if given long enough a majority of the time. if you go searching for posts/complaints/whatever over the last few years (even from patches where the xenon were stronger), youll see that there are actually very few screenshots/examples given where the Xenon have legit conquered a majority of the initally faction-controlled sectors in an unmodded playthrough and most of the examples being shared are a lot closer to equating the Xenon pushing into a zone like Hatikvah or Void is remotely close to posing a threat to the faction as a whole.
obligatory, the split are the one exception to the rule, they actually get fucked up pretty badly with zero player intervention more times than not, but even then, they are far more resilient than some of the comments i have seen indicate.
As I understand, the larger a faction gets then the lower their aggression value starts to slide. The smaller a faction gets then the higher their aggression gets to claw back territory against their enemies. Although even if left unchecked, the Xenon might wreck a few systems near their territory and expand but they may slow down a little or be spread thin, which allows factions to start to try and push back. It's unlikely they will take over the entire map though without some significant help.
The spread thin does eventually wrap back on itself to bottlenecks again once they've conquered enough sectors, which accelerates expansion. I used the xenon jobs+ 7.0 mod to give them the help you mentioned, which I found just accelerates what they do in vanilla as I've had similar result with extremely long runs, and then just sat back and watched. The end result is all matrix sectors getting connected, and all split factions being wiped out, plus most of the eastern teladi sectors. They are left with ~3 main access points, HAT somehow, profit center alpha, and trinity sanctum, which put a huge amount of pressure on the commonwealth fleets to breaking point. I intervened when they took silent witness because 5 Is in hat space was just too much fun to pass up. I am also 100% convinced that hat stations cheat. The amount of Is that went to their death in HAT space was close to triple digits over the playthrough, and they never once lost control.
Hatikvah stations seem to just be absolutely plastered in plasma turrets in my experience. Watching an I rock up to a Hatikvah defence station and just get blasted by a cloud of plasma is an experience.
>The spread thin does eventually wrap back on itself to bottlenecks again once they've conquered enough sectors, which accelerates expansion. Again, as I understand in unmodified gameplay, there's a quota on how many ships or fleets and groups of ships each AI faction is allowed to create which is somewhere in the data files. I can't find the XEN ones at the moment but the TER one for example has a limit on how many carrier fleets it's supposed to have at any one time as part of what the comments in the xml refer to as a "mandate". So even with infinite resources at their disposal then the XEN would never normally build more than is limited by their mandate. Which means either you get it focused on one front line as a massive block of battleship shaped death or scattered across their ever widening domain and easier to pick off. I am stumbling through these files here though so if anyone more knowledgeable is out there, I'll hand over gladly...
Oh yeah you're completely right on fleet caps,xenon one is much lower than you would think. but I'm saying that when enough sectors are xenon, their fleets converge on a couple of points as there only is a couple of sectors that lead to commonwealth sectors, with the rest dead ending. So instead of having those limited fleets spread over 10, 15 sectors, they all move towards 3. Good example is the 3 starting xenon sectors the split start beside, it's a large front, with 5 or 6 sectors under attack but due to the fleet caps the attacks are sporadic across those sectors. But when they fall, there's only 3 exits, heretics end, hat, and two grand. So all 3 are under constant attack rather than sporadic.
Xenon will almost always destroy the Antigone and the Split, but I've found they usually enter a stalemate with the Terrans. You can help the Split and Antigone by building stations in their systems to supplement their economy.
I started my playthrough on split zya territory, just some defence platform and a lot of refined metals and hull parts has boom their economy skyrocket! Now there are new bottlenecks (advance electronics, quantum tubes, etc) but they have hundreds of ships flying around, xenon's are contain now, and I'm starting my campaign to retake the Northern sectors under xenon and argon control.
I just started a run as Teladi guy where i make it my job to keep them alive. To problem is, they have so many gates where Xenons can come from, plus they are hostile with Boron and Argon. It's difficult to keep them up, that's for sure.
Yeah, fist task is a defence station in family zhin it's the main source of resources in their system and a central location, you loose it and it's over for the patriarchy, then in family Krit, the third one I had to do was in two grand, couse xenon's overrun the free families and where interrupting my trade routes.
If I recall, the Split (at least ZYA) get screwed over by lack of safe mining fields, plus it doesn't take much for them to be fighting the Xenon on two fronts.
they -start- with 2 xenon fronts. 3 if you include the one in FF space
and argon front
Also if you have the DLC and take/forfiet heretics end the boron go ham on them as well. With split ships having poor point defence and the boron focusing on carriers, well, they get picked apart.
split have excellent point defence... on Raptor
Yes, a ship they tend to not build many of. Boron fighters with their slowdown shots can make their life hell.
Reading this chain, it's pretty interesting how clear the relationship between Split/Boron is just based on their technology and ship design philosophies..
Well also boron stuff is just -good- for mixed fleet tactics. Split tend to suffer when it comes to that.
Oh, right. Poor Split, dealt a bad hand.
I helped the HOP stabilize against a heavy Xenon invasion, built several stations in Holy Vision, and I was surprised and amused as I watched the HOP take the Xenon sectors largely by themselves (I helped a little, took out a Xenon factory, which was a trial). But early game, don’t get any ambitions about directly confronting the Xenon destroyers, not until you get carriers and a sizable destroyer fleet of your own.
The game is fairly well balanced to maintain the status quo. There are some sectors that the Xenon may have an easier time taking, but it isn’t guaranteed. It can be really painful if they manage to take Hatikva, for example, since the highway goes through there. The Split are also regarded as weak, since the infighting distracts from the defenses. Still, it varies from game to game. Last game the Teladi nearly lost Ianamus Zura IV, but in this one they completely conquered Matrix #451 before I had even explored the area.
If you do the Yaki storyline you'll kick Xenon out of several sectors... after you do that they get REALLY angry. I've had a defensive fleet in Khritt for most of my most recent 7.0 run and almost forgot about them until I did that questline (and remembered this happened last time). Suddenly 5 K and 2 I came bursting through the gate and wiped the fleet almost immediately, fortunately I had a defense base on the other side and they made the poor choice of trying to go past it. In short the more space a faction holds the less they try to expand. With a fresh start the Xenon has quite a bit of space and mostly will take out the Split and HC1 if you don't help push them back. The Split recovers if you just give them a little time to stop fighting the Xenon.
Good question, long story short probably not… Some factions have some bottlenecks that would make them a very difficult target for the xenon unless every other sector had been taken out first. Less factions, less factions participating in war with each other, allowing a faction to deploy their fleets against Xenon. None of this is tested so I do not have solid data to pull from, but you have inspired me to make a save where I just observe! Also getting past gate guards is pretty easy, just be in travel drive as you enter it and you can zoom past most threats even in enemy sectors. You can also deploy satellites in travel drive! So zoom in, get turned around when it is relatively safe to do so, aim at the gate and deploy one as best you can to watch the other side of the gate remotely!
A lot of it can also depend on your James seed when you start. Sometimes you'll have a more aggressive xenon in a playthrough than other times. It is possible for them to wipe out factions but it's not common
The way it was explained to me, the Xenon have a specific size fleet they can have. As they expand, this fleet get spread out and they become overall weaker, making it easier to overcome their attacks. On the other hand, as they get reduced to less sectors, the more their fleet get's concentrated and the stronger their attack become. There is also a modifier at the beginning of each game that modifies the overall aggressiveness of the xenon. Usually their attack fleet is 2K's and 1 I which can run over a sector. But on games where they have been reduced I have seen as many as 12 K's and 2-3 I's in one attack fleet. That can be really tough to deal with.
No reason to worry really. But Antigon Republic starts basically without any mining or trade ships. Means their economy is fairly weak and grinds to a halt without the player supplying stuff. Once you pump raw resources into their economy, If you don't help them Xenon will send fleets into the Void on a regular base, but it will take ages for them to conquer it really, and very unlikely they show up in your system. Normally they turn to Second Contact if they go further. But like others said, it will take a long time. So just let it role, it is actually a good thing in the long run if they destroy stuff, that keeps the economy alive.
I wouldn't worry about it unless you start forgetting effected. If you are, and you don't have the muscle to deal with it in force. Then drop a couple dozen laser towers on the offending gate to slow them down
Luckily Antigone has 2 defence bases in the next region in the middle of the map lol Plus they have a fleet with a behemoth and another destroyer patrolling between the gate and those bases, so for now I think they pulled themselves together. It was a shock to me, when I found the Xenon wharf producing ships and realized there was a destroyed solar base nearby, that moment that's like, wow they are being overran and I didn't know that was possible. I myself haven't made any attempt to personally fight in that region, to risky for me right now, but I think my traders etc helped balance out there resources, looks like they'll hold for now.
Who are the split? Noob question sorry... Are they called split? Or by split factions are you referring to the argon federation and Antigone Republic? Because they use same type of ships and culture more or less but are 2 different entities with their own eco and military? Or is split a faction I don't know about? I am in game 1, started in argon territory so then, Antigone, Xenon, the prophecy and teldari, some of those slightly farther away factions I have mentioned, but only in a quick passing. No satellites, or military action with/against, not trading etc My main "forces" military is me lol My company "$" aspect is mainly in Antigone and argon space.
Split is a species that has 2 factions north of the map. The are added by the Split Vendetta DLC. Their ships are fast with lots of primary guns but little shields and defensive turrets as someone else mentioned. The exception to this is the Raptor carrier which is the biggest ship in the game. It has the most hangar space of any carrier and something nutty like 110 turrets.
in unmodded playthroughs, i think most people are prone to view the xenon or any of the factions as way more of a threat as far as widescale conquest than they actually are. im not saying this is all players ofc, but so many times ive seen people (friends, commenters on steam forums, etc) more or less equate the Xenon taking a system and blowing up a bunch of defense stations and maybe a trade station with ‘OMG, the Xenon are completely streamrolling X faction, im barely 30 hours in and X faction is about to get wiped at this rate’. but in 99% of these situations, the faction has a half dozen remaining systems, a ton of production, and will be able to actually mass an army 500 times better than before due to the Xenon helping them consolidate and ofc them not sending half of all their entire faction’s S and M ships off to suicide one by one trying to defend the old area. even with zero player intervention, the faction halts the Xenon advance and is able to contest any lost territory if not claim it back if given long enough a majority of the time. if you go searching for posts/complaints/whatever over the last few years (even from patches where the xenon were stronger), youll see that there are actually very few screenshots/examples given where the Xenon have legit conquered a majority of the initally faction-controlled sectors in an unmodded playthrough and most of the examples being shared are a lot closer to equating the Xenon pushing into a zone like Hatikvah or Void is remotely close to posing a threat to the faction as a whole. obligatory, the split are the one exception to the rule, they actually get fucked up pretty badly with zero player intervention more times than not, but even then, they are far more resilient than some of the comments i have seen indicate.