History VideoGame / AIWarFleetCommand

** The Artillery Golem can effectivley 1v1 any unit in both games. Key phrase, 1v1. Against swarms of units (which is what makes up the bulk of the AI's army) it's outmatched.

* ViolationOfCommonSense: In ''2'', any unit caught in a tractor beam can attack whatever's holding them, regardles of distance. This includes ''melee'' units. If the AI sends a widow golem your way, it's perfectly viable to send your melee units into it's tractor beams, so that they can A) clog up the tractors, preventing other units form being caught, B) attack the widow golem from an extended range, so other AI units will likely not be in range to shoot back and C) not have to worry about getting kited around.

* ViolationOfCommonSense: In ''2'', any unit caught in a tractor beam can attack whatever's holding them, regardles of distance. This includes ''melee'' units. If the AI sends a widow golem your way, it's perfectly viable to send your melee units into it's tractor beams, so that they can A) clog up the tractors, preventing other units form being caught, B) attack the widow golem from an extended range, so other AI units will likley not be in range to shoot back and C) not have to worry about getting kited around.

* ExpansionPack: Six of them for the first game: ''The Zenith Remnant'', ''Children of Neinzul'', ''Light of the Spire'', ''Ancient Shadows'',''Vengeance of the Machine'' and ''Destroyer of Worlds''. Each adds not only new ships but various features such as planet setups and AI types (and often completely new gameplay styles). Each one can be toggled on or off per campaign, and they don't have to be installed in any particular order. As of February 2020, the sequel has ''The Spire Rises'', ''Zenith Onslaught'' and the upcoming ''The Neinzul Abyss''.

*** AI Relentless Wave and Tsunami CPA units will constantly seek to do battle with you, with absolutly zero regard for their own lives.

* KeystoneArmy: Downplayed in ''Fleet Command''. Killing both AIs still lets the AIs send waves and responds to hacking, but AIP never increases from that point forward. Played straight in the sequel, once the AI(s) are dead, the AI forces stop attempting to attack you and will sit idly about on whatever planets they're on. They can still shoot back at you. If there are multiple AIs, a dead AI will become a "rouge" wildcard and will attack other AIs as well as you.

* ArbitraryMaximumRange: Radar dampening enforces this in classic. Certain units and all guardposts (barring wormhole guardposts) have a certain radar dampening range, which makes them immune to being shot at unless the enemy closes the distance specified, or the enemy is immune to radar dampening. Note that this doesn't make them immune to receiving damage from nearby area of effect attacks.

** Immunity: Radar Dampening will let the unit in question ignore the enforced ArbitraryMaximumRange that several units have.

* UnexpectedlyRealisticGameplay:
** What happens when you make a ruthless AI with more resources than you ever can have sit up and decide you're a threat? You get flattened, that's what.
** Then again, what happens when you've all but annihilated human civilization with your mechanical might and then turn your back on the last pesky human remnants to focus on ''far'' worse threats outside the galaxy? Those humans find ways to stay under your radar until they've built up just enough forces to take out your brain in one desperate strike, that's what.

* [[UselessUsefulSpell Useless Usefull Building:]]The Counter Spy in ''Fleet Command'' is a structure that can instantly kill any (non immune) cloaked ship. However, it's limited to only one target at a time, and it can't actually ''detect'' cloaked units unlike decloakers or tachyon drones. Anything that can be killed by it is usually able to be replaced near instantly, or is immune to being instant killed. The only real time it's actually somewhat annoying is when it catches your mk4 scout off guard.

*** Even further, the second game has five tiers of Exogalactic forces, each being a threshold on its own. If all are crossed, [[spoiler:the [=AI=] will deploy an [[MechanicalAbomination Extragalactic War Flenser]], a starfish-shaped metallic abomination. According to the devs, the player should ''never'' see it normally; it takes stacking [[EnemyCivilWar every]] [[EnemyMine possible]] [[VestigialEmpire irritant]] in the AI's face to even approach this threshold. If you do, the AI has basically had [[VillainousBreakdown the mother of all apoplectic fits]] and decided to kill not only you, but everyone and everything else in the region of the galaxy you're in, even if it means letting the UltimateEvil outside the galaxy gain a foothold in the meantime.]]

* ACommanderIsYou: Depending on the AI type, it can be almost any of the archetypes.
** The Player - ''Balanced/Guerrilla''. Usually the player starts off as ''Balanced'', but depending on what units they decide to grab, they can remain ''Balanced'', transition into ''Elitist'' with Golems and Spirecraft, or ''Spammer'' with Neinzul. The Guerrilla aspect comes into play when you remember: Humanity is just a small resistance, barely worthy of attention of the AI. Getting the AI's attention is a good way to die, so hit and run tactics as well as sniping High Value targets is encouraged.

* OverarchingVillain: Players of VideoGame/TheLastFederation may notice on the Neinzul Abyss' description section a familiar enemy race from that game. [[spoiler: The [[AlwaysChaoticEvil OBS]][[OmnicidalManiac CURA]] are returning, and given the wording of the page, it seems like teaming up with the ''AI'' to survive may be necessary.]]

** The Mothership is a planetoid that the AI armored up, strapped engines onto, and added on a ton of weapons with an orange paint job. It's weapon is already alarmingly strong, but what makes it terrifying is it's (for all intents and purposes) infinite range letting it hit units from afar. Combined with an absurdly high armor rating of 10,000 and a healthpool of 8,000,000, have fun trying to take this beast down. Think you can just skip fighting it and go straight for an AI Homeworld? Nope. It comes equiped with a core shield generator, meaning as long as it lives, you can't harm any Dire Guardposts or AI Command stations.
** The Galactic Control Ship: Take the mothership, and turn it up to eleven. Additionally, if you manage to take down these titanic beasts, you will be rewarded with a mark 2 nuke detonating on the planet the Galactic Control Ship was slain on. 500+ AIP included.

** The Galactic Control Ship: Take the mothership, and [[UpToEleven turn it up to eleven.]] Additionally, if you manage to take down these titanic beasts, you will be rewarded with a mark 2 nuke detonating on the planet the Galactic Control Ship was slain on. 500+ AIP included.

* TakingYouWithMe: The Avenger plot grants the AI powerful ships that will go straight to your homeworld, and cause nuclear explosions upon death if an enemy home command station is destroyed. [[spoiler: Taken UpToEleven with the AI Galactic Control Ship, where after you taken down the AI Warp Grid in Showdown Device plot, it send that ship down as the last "Fuck You" gesture to destroy everything you have. There's 2 of them. If it dies it'll cause nuclear explosion on the current system and surrounding systems. Then there's the fact that just one of that is basically ''the most powerful unit in the game'', even more powerful than the AI Motherships that you'll face in the Fallen Spire campaign. Good luck!]]

* ExpansionPack: Six of them for the first game: ''The Zenith Remnant'', ''Children of Neinzul'', ''Light of the Spire'', ''Ancient Shadows'',''Vengeance of the Machine'' and ''Destroyer of Worlds''. Each adds not only new ships but various features such as planet setups and AI types (and often completely new gameplay styles). Each one can be toggled on or off per campaign, and they don't have to be installed in any particular order. As of February 2020, the sequel has ''The Spire Rises'', ''Zenith Onslaught'' and the upcoming ''The Neinzul Abyss'', with more to come in the future.

* FanNickname: The Devourer Golem is affectionately referred to as the Cookie Monster.
** To a lesser degree, the Zenith Trader is given the moniker Zenith Traitor, due to an... interesting bug where the Trader sold stuff to the AI for an absurdly cheap price, making worlds look like [[https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/242012213580136448/684204863680413716/20190306233303_1.jpg this]]

** In the first game, if you hack so carelessly that the AI response ends up at "Forest Fire" levels (going too deeply into the negatives by hacking too many things at once will quickly trigger this), it will get so angry it will summon dozens or even HUNDREDS of [[BossInMooksClothing Avengers]] to crush you.

** In addition to the skill levels, the AI Types are sorted according to difficulty. They come in four categories; Easier, Moderate, Harder, and [[ThisIsGonnaSuck Red]]. As you can imagine, Red AI types are ''nasty'', including the Crafty Spire, which spawns with lots of Spirecraft, and The Core, whose ships are all ''Mark V''. Have fun. The sequel is more upfront and calls the last AI difficulty ''Brutal'' instead of Red, and has more flavors of death for you, including [[ZergRush Swarmer]] and [[BossInMooksClothing Golemite]].

* GuileHero: You. Unless you plan to go down the Spire route, you cannot match the AI blow for blow. You have to resort to skirting around the AI and picking fights you know you can win, and obtaining whatever you can without iritating the AI to much, or failing that irritate it the lowest amount possible. Going full brawn and capturing territory all nilly willy is sure to make the AI angry enough to crush you.

* RealityEnsues:
** What happens when you make a ruthless AI with more resources than you ever can have sit up and decide you're a threat? You get flattened, that's what.
** Then again, what happens when you've all but annihilated human civilization with your mechanical might and then turn your back on the last pesky human remnants to focus on ''far'' worse threats outside the galaxy? Those humans find ways to stay under your radar until they've built up just enough forces to take out your brain in one desperate strike, that's what.

* GameMod: 2 already has two big mods, Civ Industries which adds in a player friendly faction that assists you in defeating foes and has an emphasis on taking territory to boost their production and Galactic Conquest, which VASTLY changes the scale of power. There are 2 more big mods in the works at the time of this writing, Precepts of the Precursors which adds in 3 new factions, and a whole host of new arks to capture, and Classic Fusion, which aims to replicate Fleet Command in 2, hull system, immunities and all.