Dread Lords ruined my game!

from Stardock Forums
And not in the way you think.

Now I did some board searching and found out they used to come pretty early and kicked everyone’s butt, so now they can come later. They came right before I was about to take out the major allied good empires, they show up close to the middle of the good guys.

They wipe out all the good guy ships and my invasion fleet just sorta walked in without any resistance and took about 9 systems in a couple of turns.

So I decided to go end this great menace and my fleet of about 5 dreds and some left over battle ships + 3 transports go in. I figure I'll need mass drivers or the like to take out the planet of course.

Man was I disappointed, they were down to about 1000 citizens, and they had a defense rating of 6 to my 26. Their rangers took out a dread or two, but kill ratio was about 5-1 on my part. So now my game enjoyment is basically ruined in that my enemies were gutted before I got there and all I need to do is clean up the evil empires whenever I want to end it.

Suggestion: Up the dread lords ground combat to 45+, they couldn't take over a single planet even though they had them cleaned of ships and the enemy was pretty weak defensively.

458 views 14 replies
Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top
I had them control the whole galaxy through their initial fleet of dreadnoughts, then overlords etc...

Even though they didn't invade any planets, no one could get a ship close to their planet. My ships were wiped out as soon as they were constructed.
Curtains - Customize Windows with additional styles
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top
wHEN dA eVIL wARNING fIRST cOME'S bUILD cOMBAT tRANSPORT'S & gET tHE fOLK oF tHAT sYSTEM & MoVE hALF a dOZEN dREADNOUGHT'S oR bETTER tO dA dOORSTEP wAIT tILL sHE cUM'S & gO cHOP..cHOP & bYB-bYB mRS dREAD lORDS :) ;)

p.S iF yA bUILD tRADE gOOD'S oN tHAT sYSTEM yA jUST lOSE'EM tOO :sniff!:

hOPE tHIS hELP'S jUST a lITTLE ;p
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top
This happened to one of my games recently. You'll notice I have one alliance victory in the middle of a bunch of military victories. The last remaining race and myself were getting pummelled by the Dreadlords operating off one planet. Eventually we agreed to be friends and end the game. :-)
Reply #5 from Stardock Forums Top
I'm not bitching they are too strong, just too weak.

They need to follow up and invade some planets and have a ground combat level closer to the ship level.
Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
Just wondering... Who are the Dread Lords?? I've never seen or heard of them before...
Reply #7 from Stardock Forums Top
Mitch: They're the inhabitants that were there before the current races. And they were veeery powerful :)
Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top
Cool thanks. So they just show up as a random event? Like how the new minor races show up?

What I'm wondering is how and why they show up during the game?
Reply #9 from Stardock Forums Top
Completely random event. Not very likely to happen. I've only seen a couple times. Here's the text of the event straight from english.str, if you're interested.

[Event_DarkArnor_1] Legend has it that hundreds of thousands of years ago there was a world called Arnor. On this world were a race known as the Precursors.\n \n Supposedly, there was a war between two factions of them. On the one side were the ones who called themselves the 'Arnor' and on the other side the ones known as the Dread Lords. The final battle between them was known as the cataclysm. And in that battle the Dread Lords were trapped in a crystal known as the Telenanth. There are rumors that a small religious sect is looking for a 'key' to unlock this crystal and set them free. This is surely something we must keep an eye on.
[Event_DarkArnor_2] We have learned more about this religious sect. They are looking for an orb. Our agents are on the case trying to track them down and stop them.
[Event_DarkArnor_3] Our agents have located the religious sect. After a fierce fire fight on the planet %s our agents have lost. Our espionage efforts were apparently not high enough to stop this religious sect and now they have used this orb to unlock a crystal that contained the frozen Precursor armies known as the 'Dread Lords'. \n \n They have seized control of the planet and seem almost unstoppable! They have sent a message to every civilization: YOUR TIME IS OVER. YOU WILL ALL BE EXTERMINATED.
[Event_DarkArnor_4] Our security agents have stopped this religious sect from acting. Thankfully we had done enough espionage work across the galaxy to locate their chain of command and discover their terrible plans!

~SDC~
Reply #10 from Stardock Forums Top
The main problem with the Death Lords is that they start just like any other minor, except with more ability bonuses and more technology researched.

If you can find them quickly, or they wage a large scale invasion early on, they can be eliminated by taking their one planet quickly.

OTOH, if you are forced into a waiting game, you can quickly outstrip you in power unless your survey ship is near-godly, in which case you have a time advantage, if only because there a limit to how high their power can grow without more events (or anomolies, and they don't start with a survey ship and rarely build one).

~SDC~
Reply #11 from Stardock Forums Top
Thankfully we had done enough espionage
End of quote


Who says espionage is a waste of money! :D
Reply #12 from Stardock Forums Top
Are the dread lords the same race as the draginol.
[Message Edited]
Reply #13 from Stardock Forums Top
Espionage is great. Just set it on max for 2-3 turns and you don't seem to do it ever again for that civ. Free techs too.
Reply #14 from Stardock Forums Top
I just got killed by the Draginol (Dread Lords). They took over Sol, all three habitibal planets. I had no other Star system, so the game ended. Interesting in that it said I had a military victory with about 640 points. I uploaded it, but I don't see it on Metaverse at this time. Usually see them right away. I had been doing espionage since the beginning of the game and was at the highest level. First time I have not done enough to stop them from appearing. :sniff!: