Thargoid invasion - Next target systems?

(Responding to this)

If they can't be called off, then it would be safest to assume that a Spire attack couldn't practically be called off at 85% either, and next week would probably have to remove as many controls as possible assuming that the Spire would not be available in future.

The other alternative would be if (big if?) five more alerts clear out, then there should only be ten systems to be concerned about within the periphery.

… assuming no more “surprise Orthrus” come out, that is.
 
This is probably a good test of whether an attack can be called off to protect a Spire position for future weeks. Once Tougeir completes, there will be Muchihiks at 61% and AF-A c9 at 43%, and if both of those complete (which there's plenty of time for at current pace) the final Spire will be peripheral next week.
AF-A c9 will be finished tonight.
 
Based on the three populated Alert systems alone, indeed an exposed Spire looks unstoppable! That being the case, the general goal becomes as many more Alerts as possible, where the further target of everything up to HIP 10778 (12%!) would break through the strategic mistake and deliver a Final Ten next week 72.

Assuming no further Titan capabilities and assuming an exposed Spire cannot be prevented from falling, this is the overview with an emboldened row to show the present state:

Alerts preventedWeek 72Week 73Resistance
21Final TwentyFinal Ten6
22Final TwentyFinal Ten5
23Final TwentyFinal Ten4
24Final Twenty + SpireNo spire3
25Final Twenty + SpireNo spire2
26Final Twenty + SpireNo spire1
27+Final TenCleared0

Within that critical band and with the full clearance goal, the only remaining line of defence against strategic mistakes is to steer the Spire progress carefully over the duration of week 72, providing enough that one can choose to reach 85% yet also not so much that others can then choose to reach 100%.


So to make sure I'm getting things, pretty much, the line/question is... how crazy would we like to get. because stopping here = all good if old rules resume, the fresh controls cannot spawn alerts for a week as I recall?

Indeed those new Control systems can attack only at the end of the week 72 in which they appear, causing Alerts in week 73, at least under the normal simulation rules! The next normal attack from existing systems would be at Ardhri after week 73 to become Alert in week 74, perhaps unless the new Cephei Sector AV-Y b3 becomes Control in week 72 and remains to attack one week sooner. I was not thinking properly and that made no sense.


If they can't be called off, then it would be safest to assume that a Spire attack couldn't practically be called off at 85% either, and next week would probably have to remove as many controls as possible assuming that the Spire would not be available in future.

Definitely a Spire siege cannot be stopped, although its higher strength means at least that it can be paced. I had imagined that M. Indra would have become the practice attempt at that, where the consequences of losing the final Spire early are minimal in the context of destroying the Titan, ahead of the final test at M. Cocijo where it is actually needed.
 
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Alright, apologies for the delay, wanted to run it by folk internally both above and below - working on arranging carriers to store samples for the 'reasonable' 4 out of the 6 systems that will be left if both Muchihiks and AF-A c9 are cleared.

Given Lyncis Sector WU-P b5-0 reading approx >41,000 samples -
Ex-Spire 'before' (after scout kills were calculated from previous hour, before delivery) - { "timestamp":"2024-04-06T03:23:04Z", "event":"FSDJump", [...] "StarSystem":"Lyncis Sector WU-P b5-0", [...] "WarProgress":0.005619, { "timestamp":"2024-04-06T06:45:26Z", "event":"Location", [...] "StarSystem":"Lyncis Sector WU-P b5-0", [...]"WarProgress":0.008034, -- i passed out in the middle so, 3 hours apart readings, apologies. At best, if noone else touched it, that'd be 0.002415 for 100, putting us around 41,400 total.
and WO-A b3 at approx >69,000 -
Before 100 samples (after killing some scouts & relogging) - 0.000151 { "timestamp":"2024-04-04T19:22:41Z", "event":"Location", [...] "StarSystem":"Cephei Sector WO-A b3", [...] "WarProgress":0.000151, After 100 samples - 0.001581. { "timestamp":"2024-04-04T19:30:56Z", "event":"MarketSell", "MarketID":129021567, "Type":"thargoidscouttissuesample", "Type_Localised":"Thargoid Scout Tissue Sample", "Count":100, "SellPrice":1636, "TotalSale":163600, "AvgPricePaid":0 } { "timestamp":"2024-04-04T20:23:29Z", "event":"FSDJump", "Taxi":false, "Multicrew":false, "StarSystem":"Cephei Sector WO-A b3", [...] "WarProgress":0.001581, which would give 100 samples a value of 0.001430, needing about 69,931 samples.`

at minimum each, I consider those out of the running for this week, better to tackle with spire assistance.
For our remainder...
SystemProgressTitan Dis.Strength (PDES samples calc)Strength (dev.iniv lookup)15% of INIV (if they end up as recapture)
Lyncis Sector KX-U c2-162.99*%11.7615072157462362
HIP 1077814*%12.2413728144392166
Cephei Sector AV-Y b33.05%14.33787688221323
Chernobo16*%15.589362142482137
All in all both largely match up as 'Feasible but will take some work', intrigued by the difference between the two regarding the inhabited alert system.

Initially was thinking 'Better safe either way - can gather and store samples up to the 15%, then if Muchihiks tips over/any system progresses well, push further' but, these aren't insurmountable numbers for samples, if we can pull things off.

-- So far between TRGE and TCIA three carriers volunteered to cover the uninhabited alerts, currently they're working on parking.
Was attempting to double-check an experiment run by DemiserofD regarding 'Do orthrus kills Multiply the effects of other actions' over near Indra maelstrom (given pretty much Every Oya alert has seen ad-hoc progress now) so mine's out of position, will be available for Chernobo tonight or when i get tired of USS hunting if needed.
 
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If it helps to know, Lyncis Sector KX-U c2-16 is unnecessary—with Tougeir already complete, Muchihiks almost complete and Cephei Sector AF-A c9 covered by the wonderful PDES, you need only three more systems to leave ten next week! Assuming no more misbehaviour, that 15072 could be omitted, leaving only HIP 10778 (14%...), Cephei Sector AV-Y b3 and Chernobo needing completion.
 
Parking logistics and folk having chance to log in/etc. took a bit, and then me writing things down properly took a bit more one carrier was marked as in its target system for a little while, but, three carriers now up thanks to short notice volunteers -- apologies for any more severe distances, with the alerts and original 'everyone, titan, now' summoning any carrier that could move, getting close proved rather cumbersome.

HIP 10778 - [TCIA] Dawn of Sari parked in Cnephtha**, buy order presently 11785.
Cephei Sector AV-Y b3 - [TRGE] TCG Van located in Cephei Sector CQ-Y b5, buy order running in 4k chunks to offer the 500k/sample akin to previous efforts
Chernobo - [TCIA] Langley (JLY-B1K) residing in Bumba, initial buy order 7600.

A few days to work with here, curious to see how it all goes.
 
Can someone help me understand it all a little. When the 30 new alerts spawned the general thought was, as far as I know, to knock them all down because otherwise they would fall into invasion, or worse controlled. Now I hear that we have to stop cleaning them up with the last 8 alerts standing? I think there are about 1700 samples on the PDES Cloudbase ready to be shipped to the rescueship to clear Cephei Sector AF-A c9, at least that was this morning before I went to sleep. As far as I know they are still there and shipping them would clear this system. Is this, or is this not a good idea?

Ok, did some more reading and I think I now understand that it would be a good idea to try to clean up the remainder of the alert systems, and there are carriers in place to collect the samples.

You never stop learning in this game. Awesome.

CMDR Prins Hugo [VANS]
 
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Can someone help me understand it all a little. When the 30 new alerts spawned the general thought was, as far as I know, to knock them all down because otherwise they would fall into invasion, or worse controlled. Now I hear that we have to stop cleaning them up with the last 8 alerts standing? I think there are about 1700 samples on the PDES Cloudbase ready to be shipped to the rescueship to clear Cephei Sector AF-A c9, at least that was this morning before I went to sleep. As far as I know they are still there and shipping them would clear this system. Is this, or is this not a good idea?
It's complicated.

Spire attacks give a big discount to clearing the outer 10 systems in a week, but if the Spire itself is in the outer 10, doing so also destroys the Spire, which means that it's harder to make progress in future weeks.
Alerts have a lower clearance threshold on paper than the resulting Invasion or Control ... but are generally harder than Controls in practice. Meanwhile, an Invasion that lasts several weeks won't be getting Oya a new Control for some time anyway.

So there are two very valid tactics possible:
1) hold up so that Oya's remaining Spire isn't in the outer 10 next week to allow a much less risky and easier to coordinate attack next week
2) push ahead so that all of Oya's remaining systems are in the outer 10 next week to allow it to be completely wiped out to 0 controls the following week

Unfortunately in-between those two, in terms of how many Alerts are cleared, is one which potentially ends up with the disadvantages of both: the Spire will be destroyed so won't be available in future weeks, but Oya will still have Controls left and might be able to use them for another surprise move. So having gone past the point where tactic 1 above is really practical, there's now a need to clear as many more Alerts as possible (starting with the most distant, for practicality) so that tactic 2 becomes viable.


Most of the coming Titans will have similar strategic complications, and the possibility of making a Titan essentially unassailable except with extreme brute force if an error is made in terms of which systems are captured / it happens to pull some new trick out of its hat at the wrong moment is quite strong.
 
So having gone past the point where tactic 1 above is really practical, there's now a need to clear as many more Alerts as possible (starting with the most distant, for practicality) so that tactic 2 becomes viable.
So you say we have cleared so many alerts that the current spire site is within the 10 outer systems and will go down when we use it to clear the outer 10 systems?
 
Can someone help me understand it all a little. When the 30 new alerts spawned the general thought was, as far as I know, to knock them all down because otherwise they would fall into invasion, or worse controlled. Now I hear that we have to stop cleaning them up with the last 8 alerts standing?

There were various options strategically, although much depends on actual activity:
  • When thirty Alerts appear, that prevents any plan to clear the final Control systems, because any Spire progress will now go towards those outermost 10 Alerts instead.
  • The immediate strategic thought is actually just to destroy the Titan, because the resistance is no more than a previous example under which it could be done with a few days to spare. The problem is that such works only with the actual turnout present to do so.
  • Titan turnout not being the case, most of those 30 Alerts will indeed become Control, and with the Spire problem still present. At minimum, that means we need to remove the outer 20 Alerts, meaning that the Spire can help with the other 10 as Control systems next week and clear them before they attack anything.
  • More than 20 have been cleared—actually 22 and almost now 23—and a few more are on a trajectory to follow. That means those outermost 10 systems next week will now include some of those inner systems which were planned for clearance this week.
  • Of those seven Control systems, the Spire site system is in the middle, the fourth position from either end. We need the Spire site to be able to clear any of them, but at the same time we also do not want to lose the Spire site prematurely; if the Spire site will clear itself, we need its effect to work for all remaining systems.
  • Thus, clearing up to three more Alerts—23 total—would keep the Spire site only just out of reach of its own clearance progress. Total clearance would need two more weeks, although notably the Titan could also be destroyed easily in between, because that middle week will have only four Control.
  • Clearing between 24 and 26 Alerts would be great for lowering Titan resistance, but now the Spire site affects its own progress, which I have been calling exposed. It may be possible to pace the Spire action so it reaches 85% but not 100%, but more than likely it will fall while there are still some systems remaining, which means a lot of work to clear them away afterwards.
  • However, going further and clearing 27 or more would nullify the Spire problem by means of making next week the final clearance week instead. The Spire site is exposed, but so are all remaining systems, as desired!
Unlike any other part of the war simulation, this interaction with Spire sites is indeed one of the only occasions where action can actually harm strategy.

Based on the completion of Tougeir, the near-completion of Muchihiks and doubtless the following attention at Chernobo, we think that 24+ is inevitable, therefore an exposed Spire is inevitable, therefore we should attempt 27+ so that all remaining systems are exposed along with it.

Hopefully that made some sense!
 
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  • The immediate strategic thought is actually just to destroy the Titan, because the resistance is no more than a previous example under which it could be done with a few days to spare. The problem is that such works only with the actual turnout present to do so.
Do we really have enough information to say it's down to a low turnout? From what I saw there were plenty of CMDR's whenever I was there, with more people knowing what they were doing and also less likely to break the instance than with Leigong (although yes, a lot of broken instances nontheless)

Do we have any way to measure number of CMDRs, number of attacks/missiles, or are there assumptions that High Oya = High Leigong and so on
 
  • The immediate strategic thought is actually just to destroy the Titan, because the resistance is no more than a previous example under which it could be done with a few days to spare. The problem is that such works only with the actual turnout present to do so.
Turn out does appear to be indeed low. Right now 3 of us in an open instance that doesn't happen to be broken.
Last two titans had larger numbers.
 
One thing to keep in mind regarding turn out is that it is spring break for many in the US so I'm sure there will be a not insignificant number of commanders out of town and with limited play time.

Edit: additionally, there is probably a good chunk traveling to the path of totality for the eclipse regardless of spring break.
 
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Counting from Cephei Sector XO-A b3 there are 11 controls/alerts more outside, with 2 of them close to finishing.
So we need to hold of on clearing Muchihiks (97%) and Cephei Sector AF-A c9 (72%) and hope for the best.
When those 11 systems are not cleared before next tick, we have 11 systems further out from the active Spire site and we can use the Spire site to push 10 of those systems to 85% and finish them of using samples.
Do I understand it correctly?
 
Do we really have enough information to say it's down to a low turnout?

It is the same resistance as T. Taranis was when it lost over four rings in under two days, all testing has shown that all Titans last until the same total credits are paid, and the only differences are a longer Supercruise and a fixed glitch of which we knew nothing at the time; of course the turnout must be lower! The default position should be that the turnout must be lower. I posit that suggesting the turnout is similar is the position which needs demonstrating with measurements other than the Titan rings!


So we need to hold of on clearing Muchihiks (97%) and Cephei Sector AF-A c9 (72%) and hope for the best.

Commander actions cannot be held that way—Muchihiks is already complete, and Chernobo has already been targeted!


When those 11 systems are not cleared before next tick, we have 11 systems further out from the active Spire site and we can use the Spire site to push 10 of those systems to 85% and finish them of using samples.
Do I understand it correctly?

Closely; the original thought was to leave 14 systems, because 13 or fewer would include the Spire site at Cephei Sector XO-A b3. As you can see, the astounding amount of action is not going to allow that, so instead the goal is now just to leave 10 systems!
 
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