History VideoGame / AIWarFleetCommand

* DegradedBoss: Dire Guardians in classic are very powerful and terrifying. A single classic Dire Guardian can wipe whole battlegroups out in a matter of seconds, and only spawned under specific circumstances. In 2, Dire guardians are relativley common, and always spawn on mk4+ worlds, and are a relativley common sight on high difficulties in hunter fleets.

* GameMod: 2 can be has two already 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.

** The Core AI type as a whole is this. While it starts with less ship and has a lower budget to work with, ALL of its mobile ships (when applicable) are deadly mark 5 core ships, meaning unless you have an overwhelming fleet or are capable of replacing losses quickly, the AI will curbstomp you.

* StealthInSpace: Working differently between the two games. In ''Fleet Command'', it's a fairly simple "either cloaked or not" affair where firing or being lit by Tachyon systems decloaks for a time. In ''2'' there's actual Cloaking Points, that get 20% subtracted whenever the vessel fires and are worn down at varying (numerical) speeds by any Tachyon systems in the area, or other decloakers. As a result, attacking while cloaked isn't something that lasts, but it's ''very'' useful for deep strikes and assassinating particulars.

* BigEater: The Devourer Golem. In ''Fleet Command'' it's completley invulnerable while in "2",it's killable, but it will shortly respawn after a couple of minutes. The Devourer Golem will eat anything mobile and generally the only way to deal with it is to simply not be anywhere near it.

* HomefieldAdvantage: An important feature when defending is that command stations provide various benificial effects to your units, in addition to being able to place down defensive structures.

* InfiniteSupplies - but not for somethings not adjacent to a system you control, or have a mobile factory in. So long as there's enough Metal (which has infinite sources) and Energy (static) to go around, you can generate a billion ships over time and easily make more after they all explode. The sequel does away with the supply mechanic, focusing only on metal as your production limit, and energy as your unit count limit.

* InstantWinCondition[=/=]WeWinBecauseYouDidNot: Destroying all Home Command Centers, even if the other player happens to have a much stronger presence and is about to kill you outright. And in turn, destroying all the AI Overlords, even if a massive plague of GreyGoo[=/=]metal-eating MegaMicrobes[=\=]space pirates is still out and about and likely about to kill you.
* IShallTauntYou: When one of your command stations is destroyed, the AI taunts you with a derisive voice clip mocking you and your skills. In the sequel, it taunts you over ''everything'', even its own minor defeats; it just twists things to reflect badly on you even when you acquire genuinely dangerous things.

* WaveMotionGun: A few. The Exodian Blade's main gun definitely qualifies, and the Mark IV Heavy Beam Turret probably counts as well. And Ion Cannons, of course, which can eliminate any ship they can touch in two shots, tops. The Spire ''love'' these, too, with even their resource gathering structures packing enough heat to evaporate a mountain. And some of the Extragalactic War units have these; the Flenser packs the topmost, and can erase everything in a sector with a decent sweep. The Flenser was designed to take on a Spire Fleet enhanced by 13 cities, which is immensely overpowered.

** ArtificialBrilliance: ...until you set the difficulty up to 7 (out of 10), at which point the [=AI's=] RestrainingBolt comes off. Sudden the AI will use ''everything'' it knows about your forces, and even basic types will assemble raids from ship types strong against your defenses, counterattack the vital strategic asset you just stole, and time huge cross-planet attacks for when your main fleet is on the other side of the map.

* SubsystemDamage: Engine health in the first game determines how much engine damage a ship can take (from engine damage weapons) before it stops moving completely. The sequel adds in weapon jamming which slows down a unit's rate of fire, but otherwise subscribes to CriticalExistenceFailure.
* SuicidalOverconfidence: Almost as common a cause for defeat in this game as it is in most {{roguelike}}s.
** The hunter fleet in the sequel can be set to "kamikaze", which makes them much more aggressive, charging defenses lines that are more than double their strength. This makes them easier to kill generally, but can result in surprise attacks on worlds that are weak relative to their strength value.

* ActionBomb: The Zenith Autobomb (just Autobomb in the sequel)is simply an explosive strapped on to an engine. While it's generally poor to use against structures or high health targets, they can absolutely destroy groups of enemies and are pretty cheap to spam. There's also the Neinzul Nanoswarm (also renamed to just Nanoswarm in the sequel) which in addition to damaging groups of units, can also reclaim them (zombify in the sequel) for you to control! Just don't send either against missile frigates in Fleet Command, [[KungFuProofMook which are immune to AOE damage]].

* ArmorPiercingAttack: In Fleet Command, certain units can pierce a certain amount of armor. The Zenith Polarizer is notable for dealing MORE damage to units with higher armor! The sequel has fusion attacks, which bypass a certain amount of [[DeflectorShields personal shielding.]] Bubble force fields are unaffected by fusion attacks, but have their own share of counters themselves, and specific units can fire through force fields, such as Fleet Command's Zenith Devestator, and 2's Exogalactic Poltergeist.

** ArtificialBrilliance: ...until you set the difficulty up to 7 (out of 10), at which point the [=AI's=] RestrainingBolt comes off. Sudden the AI players will use ''everything'' they know about your forces, and even basic types will assemble raids from ship types strong against your defenses, counterattack the vital strategic asset you just stole, and time huge cross-planet attacks for when your main fleet is on the other side of the map.

* AttackAttackAttack: The sequel's AI Hunter Fleet focuses on probing your defenses and attacking the weakest point. Especially when set to kamikaze, which will make the Hunter Fleet units to have extreme disregard for their own lives in an attempt to destroy your command stations.
** AttackAttackRetreatRetreat: But the moment you set foot on an AI homeworld, that AI's Hunter Fleet immediately drops whatever it's doing and rushes back home to try and stop you from defeating the AI Overlord.

* TooAwesomeToUse: Spirecraft in Fleet Command. Since there is a limited supply of asteroids to create spirecraft, you can only afford to waste a few of them. It's very rare that you will ever get more than 6 titanite asteroids, which are used to create mark V spirecraft.

* BoringButPractical: Fleet Command has the humble fighter. Fast, durable and cheap, while its DPS is average, it hard counters bombers which is vital for protecting all your buildings, and can serve as cheap chaff to distract AI units. In 2, the V-Wing is a [[SimpleYetAwesome pretty big upgrade over its predecessor]], boasting engine stun which can slow down even golems! Additionally, it can deal bonus damage to anything with a low gravitic exponent and with a relative increase in DPS, it is able to erase whole groups of corvettes (except concussion corvettes which in turn counter V-Wings).

* DifficultButAwesome: Hacking the Superterminal. If you attempt to hack it, it will reduce the AI progress but raise the AI Progress floor (only in Fleet command will the AIP floor raise), allowing you to reduce AIP for as long as you can/have hack points. With proper preparation, it's possible to reduce AIP by over 100. However, the AI's response to this hack is exponential, and if you don't time the cutoff just right, you'll have a VERY large horde of angry ships beeline straight to your homeworld.
* DungeonBypass: One often-encouraged strategy is deep striking, where you load a transport or two with your fleet and skip past a high mark AI world to get to a lower mark AI world. Fleet Command's Assault transports come with cloaking and are plenty durable, while 2's transports are blazing fast, allowing you to almost always at least skip one planet. Be aware that [[GravityMaster Black Hole Machines]] are designed specifically to counter deepstriking; in the sequel, deepstriking a world too far from your territory can also cause the AI to warp in massive reserve forces to that world.

* EldritchAbomination: The Ravenous Shadow in Fleet Command. Gameplay wise, it is basically a Devourer golem copy minus the vampirism and is killable, but story wise it is a... thing that has begun closing in on the Memorium Terra group, and is only being distracted by fleeing neinzul ships. [[spoiler: It makes a reappearance in 2 as an Astrotrain project at max intensity, replacing the nuke train.]]

* EliteArmy: The AI's strategic reserve in Fleet Command. The Strategic reserve is composed of a full battalion of mark V core ships, granting them immunity to being [[OneHitKill nuked]] and stunned by EMP warheads. The AI only deploys the strategic reserve for specific situations, such as reacting to the superterminal hack, cross planet attacks, or having their homeworld invaded.

** Bombers in Fleet Command, despite having a relatively generous health pool, are one of the first things targeted by both sides. Their polycrystal armor type makes them easy pickings for many other ships as well.

* HerdHittingAttack: Ships that use major electric ammo in Fleet Command can hit many targets, but loose their effectiveness against smaller groups and are downright useless against single targets. (A Major Electric "shot" is actually a high amount of regular shots, that has a limit on how many times each shot can attack a single target.)
* HeroUnit: Fleet Command has shadow champions, which play like a typical RPG, starting out as a frigate and leveling up to battleship, and choosing between Human, Zenith, Spire and Neinzul forms. Their weapons are also modular, allowing you to swap gear as long as there is an engineer nearby to build said modules. The Exodian Blade may also count.

** Logistic stations give a major speedboost to your units. In Fleet Command, in addition to slowing down hostile units, at mark 3 they also stop hostile units from teleporting.

* 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.
* KungFuProofMook: In Fleet Command, there are various immunities to certain things and ships can have multiple of them. One of the best examples is the Hunter/Killer, which is immune to both [[{{BFG}} Mass Driver AND Artillery Golem]] shots, which are the usual go to counters for dealing with big targets, as well as a wide array of other effects.

** Fleet Command has Neinzul Enclave Starships, which constantly spawn drones to attack the enemy. There's also the AI Enclave Guardian which pretty much does the same thing. Shadow Champions with the correct equipment can also spawn fighters, bombers, or sawblades during combat. There's also the infamously powerful Hive Golem, which generates wasps to murder anything AI related.

* NoRecycling: Downplayed in Fleet Command. When you scrap a unit or building, you either get 10% or .1% (depending on the cost) of its original cost. Played straight in the sequel, where scrapping anything gives you nothing but whatever Energy you were using to power it.
* NoSell: In Fleet Command, units can have immunities, rendering them invulnerable to specific things (see KungFuProofMook). A particularly strong example is the Hunter/Killer which can ignore Mass Drivers and the Artillery Golem, both of which are usually counters to high threat targets.

* OneHitKill: Ion Cannons in Fleet command can instantly destroy any ship that does not have immunity: being insta-killed, and are of equal or lower mark. Warhead Interceptors also do this to warheads without setting them off, making them useful for disposing of accidentally created warheads. The Counterspy is also able to instantly kill anything that is cloaked, but oddly doesn't detect cloaked units.

* PrecursorKillers: In the second game, the AI boasts of how it destroyed the Zenith civilization if it defeats a Golem, which has room for debate (it seems to have fallen apart on its own due to sheer age). The lore ''does'' however make it explicit that the AI fought (and was in the process of destroying) the Imperial Spire in Fleet Command, and straight up succeeded in destroying the Spire civilization in the sequel, so that's one confirmed Precursor-tier civ to their name, plus one that may or may not be.

** The best example is the Wormhole Guardposts in Fleet Command. They have a whopping four million health, but their attack deals a measly, nearly unnoticeable 2 points of damage in a game where the piddliest fleet ship has hundreds.

* SupportPartyMember: The Support Corps AI type from Fleet Command is this. By itself, it doesn't send waves (unless it is a dual type AI), but it augments the waves of the other AI with supportive units, such as damage amplifying Munitions Boosters, protective Shield Bearers and distracting Decoy Drones. [[LethalJokeCharacter If provoked enough however, nothing is stopping them from rolling over your fleets with hundreds of surprisingly durable Decloaker starships whenever its ally sends a wave.]]

* TheSwarm: Hive Golems, natch. In Fleet Command, they can store up to 500 wasps each, which are [[LightningBruiser fast, powerful and can clear out any system that's not an AI homeworld if they are allowed to hit critical mass.]] The sequel's Hive Golem is not as powerful in raw damage or swarm amount, but make up for this with an even faster spawn rate, being ranged and metabolizing their victims, giving you metal for each kill they score.
** Fleet Command also has the Neinzul enclave starships, which spawn a constant stream of drones. If you build all the MK 1 to MK 5 enclave starships, you'll have a neverending swarm of drones with which to bury the AI

* TacticalRockPaperScissors: In Fleet Command, regardless of where you start or what type the AI is, both of you will always have access to the three triangle ships: Fighters, Bombers and Missile Frigates.

** Translocation weapons causes TeleportationMisfire in enemies, generally knocking them away from the source of the translocation. In the sequel, translocation is renamed to knockback, and isn't as random as certain translocation weapons from Fleet Command.
* ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill: The AI initially averts this, content to letting you live as long as you don't go beyond your homeworld, but as you start to take more territory, the AI will start to ramp up its response to you exponentially, leading it to deploy exogalactic units if you start getting powerful enough. Ally yourself with the Spire and suddenly the AI will pull out all the stops to exterminate the both of you, spawning in countless fleet ships/strikecraft, hundreds upon hundreds of guardians, and either plenty of Golems escorted by hunter/killers (Fleet Command) or spawning in Exogalactic Units, 3 of which are noted to be overkill against an entire galaxy.

* WeaksauceWeakness: In Fleet Command, Fortresses and Super Fortresses are exceedingly powerful defensive structures, able to battle whole fleets and armadas on their own respectively. However, they have a damage multiplier of .01 against polycrystal hull, meaning the common bomber will only feel a slight tickle when they're attacked by a Super Fortress. Units with a radar dampening value lower than their range value are also able to take down Fortresses given enough time, such as the [[SpacePlane space plane]]

* ArmorPiercingAttack: In Fleet Command, certain units can pierce a certain amount of armor. The Zenith Polarizer is notable for dealing MORE damage to units with higher armor! The sequel has fusion attacks, which bypass a certain amount of [[DeflectorShields personal shielding.]] Bubble forcefields are unaffected by fusion attacks, but have their own share of counters themselves.

** The best example is the Wormhole Guardposts in Fleet Command. They have a whopping four million health, but their attack deals a measly, nearly unnoticeable 2 points of damage in a game where the piddliest strikecraft has hundreds.

** In the sequel, you can hack Vengeance Generators which house the Dark Spire. Hacking them can be used to obtain their ship designs, or destroy the Vengeance Generators. Or, you can perform a hack designed ''specifically'' to piss the Dark Spire off. The latter two should not be done without proper preperation for the angry hordes of Dark Spire.

* 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.