AI War:Game Objectives
Contents
Objectives Overview
As AI War is a procedurally generated game it does not have a story line that you follow to victory, rather you have to destroy both AI Home Command Stations to win and how you do that is left totally up to you.
Note that the Fallen Spire Campaign does offer an alternate, story driven method to win but this is only available when enabled and is discussed on its own page.
All the mechanics described on this page will still be viable while pursuing the Fallen Spire Campaign.
Gameplay Objectives
While your only objective is to destroy both AI Home Command Stations, there are several gameplay activities that will be underway at various points during the game.
Note that these are not presented in any sort of order and in fact multiple of these objectives will be underway at the same time during the course of the game.
Scouting
Perhaps the most important long term goal, you need to scout to find the AI homeworlds and to decided on how you want to get in a position to destroy them.
While any ship entering a system will allow you to look at the system, a ship with Ability: Gathers Scout Intel is required to display the ship sidebar on the right hand side of the screen and to remove the ??? from the Galaxy Display of that system.
The Scout is the primary method of doing this, although the Scout Starship and a very few other ships, such as the Eye Bot, also have the Ability: Gathers Scout Intel.
Defend your Empire
The most obvious way of defending your empire is to build defences such as Turrets or other defensive structures.
There are also more aggressive options to defending your empire, such as Gate Raiding to control where the AI's waves will attack from, chasing down Threat in the AIs systems before it reaches your own worlds and Neutering worlds to reduce the amount of reinforcements a planet on alert gets.
Any tactic that is undertaken with the purpose of reducing the AIs threat to your own holdings would come under this heading.
There are as many variations on it as their are players and the specific map layout will determine how much of this is done during any given game.
Gather Knowledge
Knowledge is required to unlock both additional units as well as higher Mark units.
The easiest way to gather Knowledge is to capture a system and then move a Science Lab to it. 3000 Knowledge per system can be gathered this way.
If a system can not be captured, most likely because it is not worth the AIP increase, you can Knowledge-Hack a system as well to get the 3000 Knowledge from that system.
Note however that this can provoke an extreme response from the AI and care needs to be taken to use it.
Expand your Fleet
There are 3 types of structures in the base game that can be Captured from the AI to increase the size of your fleet.
Advanced Research Stations unlock another Fleet Ship for you to build at the Space Dock.
Ships captured this way come with the Mark II version already unlocked.
Each Advanced Research Station offers 3 different ship types for capture.
You can see these 3 ships by moving a Science Lab into the same system and changing to the Hack tab on the Science Lab menu.
If you just capture the system, the ship listed first (on the left) is the ship that will be unlocked for your use.
If you want one of the other two ships, you can Ship-Hack before capturing the system.
If you do so, after you capture the system you can chance to the Hack tab on your Science Lab and choose one of the 3 ships listed to be the one made available to you at your Space Dock.
Take care however, Ship-Hacking can provoke an extreme response from the AI.
Advanced Factories allow the construction of Mark IV units.
Any unit that can be constructed at the Space Dock and that you have spend the Knowledge to unlock the Mark III version of can also have the Mark IV version constructed at the Advanced Factory.
Fabricators allow the construction of the unit named in their description.
Capture useful units
While the units listed in Expand your Fleet will probably be the ones most often captured, there are other units that can be captured from the AI that provide other bonuses.
While there are too many to list here, any unit with the Ability: Captured on Planet Ownership Change will come under your control when you capture the system.
You will have to decide for yourself which ones are worth capturing based on your game's map and layout.
Reach the AI Homeworlds
Your own Homeworld will almost certainly be out of effective striking range of the AI homeworld so you will have to setup a forward base from which to mount your attacks.
Once again, there are as many ways to do this as there are players. You will have to find the way that works for you on the map you are currently playing.
Destroy the AI Homeworlds
The objective everything you have accomplished has been working towards, destroy both AI Home Command Stations to win the game.
