The Orbital Win Button Strategy (SM)

[Zak0r]

Today I have tried the Space Marines and while learning their basics I noticed two things that I suspected to have a very strong synergy effect: The Captain's skill Deeds of Glory and the Orbital Strike that can be triggered as often as you can afford 100 influence. Then I tested an Orbital Strike on a city and learned that I does 8 damage. The enemy (impossible) city had around 154 hp then so I had my strategy idea to test.

The settings were
Impossible, 1 Random Enemy
Medium
Medium
Standard
no quests

My build order was based on getting two Captains and lvl 3 Deeds of Glory for both asap. So I researched Reclusiam first and built it after the apothecarion. I immediately started attacking surrounding Dogs but carefully. With the first captain I started pushing to the center of the map and gathered as much exp as possible by killing neutral units and buildings. I built a little more influence buildings (3) than usual at this stage at the cost of research (2 and relatively late) and was able to place three fortresses next to Jokaero Traders. With this I was able to gather ~2000 Influence in Turn 72. Making sure both captains were in range for a kill secured me 16 Influence per Experience point, for example a Kastellan Robot would yield ~80 Influence. At the end my army consisted of 3 Tactical Marines, 5 Devastator Marines (avg lvl 5) and two captains (lvl 7 and 8 ), also 7 Fortresses of Redemption (mostly map center) and two artifacts; so I would be able to hold off any attack the AI could muster at this time easily. I had scouted most of my half and sent two Tactical Marines on suicide missions to find the enemy (without success). A few turns before 72 I had also started to scan (25 Influence) the other side of the map to locate the enemy capital. On my third try I found a city tile in the fog of war and then the capital unit on the next turn. I unloaded 20 Orbital Strikes (1 was from a captain, the other one had his on cd) and the enemy capital was no more. Since the random had chosen Space Marines the match was over on this turn. But even if another faction would have lost its capital around this time it would probably be devastating and secure a victory by crippling the enemy's economy.

My tech path was: Reclusiam, Frag grenade, Dormitories, Krak Grenade, Devastator Marines, Fortress Expansion (could be Company Chapel but I Expansion was more useful to get another bonus and I found a loyalty artifact in the center and later another one), Orbital Relay, Melta Bomb, Kraken Bolts, Orbital Scan, Orbital Strike.


It's a funny strat that secures an easy victory but the question would be if this is intended. It could be prevented by limiting the number of orbital strikes you can call per turn. Although this probably still wouldn't kill the strat. If you could only call one strike from Influence each turn and your Captains would add two more each 5 turns it would probably take around 10-15 turns (and 250-375 more Influence for the orbital scans if you don't have vision from units) to achieve the same because the city would not heal when being hit each turn. Also each hit would already damage the enemy's economy. Another possible fix would be a building that reduces orbital strike damage by maybe 50%.

[Zak0r]

Just tested it again with two impossible AIs. Was a little faster with farming influence and research this time although I only found one Jokaero trader. Which makes it even clearer that the influence comes from the captains not from the city.

Turn 68 scanned Necron capital with 130 hp on the 4th try and nuked it from orbit (15 Orbital Strikes + 2 Captain = 1500 Influence). Turn 75 killed small (6) second Necron city with 1 captain and 2 devastators, rest of the army was already fighting Imperial Guard. Pushing them back and farming more influence in the process. Turn 92 Imperial Guard capital with 158 hp nuked from orbit (18 OS + 2 Captain = 1800 Influence). Turn 94 killed second IG city with devastators, captains and OS, turn 97 killed third IG city with devastators and OS.

I had apothecaries at the front already and terminators would be researched in turn 99.

It is probably possible to kill even 3 impossible AIs with this strat because you can gather even more influence from them once you have a nice army of devastators. I had 10 in the end and they keep sending what they have while you only have to hold the line and gather the fame. It is funny if you start delaying kills just so the captains can get in range.

[eddieballgame]

Considering the strength of this particular "Zak0R attack/strategy", which doesn't involve units having to physically engage a city; maybe some adjustments could be made to a few of the XML files.
Below are the 3 XML files in question.

Data/World/Traits
'DeedsOfGlory'
<influencePerExperience addMin="4" addMax="8"/>

Data/World/Factions
'SpaceMarines'
<orbitalBombardment requiredUpgrade="SpaceMarines/OrbitalBombardment">

<influenceCost set="100"/>

Data/World/Upgrades/SpaceMarines
'OrbitalBombardment'
<upgrade position="5"

Decreasing the 'DeedsOfGlory' influence gains, maybe increasing the 'influence cost' per the 'SpaceMarines', & or moving the 'OrbitalBombardment' tech to a higher level.
Maybe combine all 3...anyways, just some thoughts.
One last...thought; could a 'cool down' period be implemented? I suspect this would involve editing multiple files.