Two questions regarding two of the contenders. While it is likely retreat will win, Razing systems has gotten a lot of talk in the forums as well.



1) Retreat - Will retreat be counterable? Will there be an option of a pursue card, or perhaps will offensive cards automatically pursue retreating ships? I dread a retreat card where a weaker AI enemy can simply spam retreat until your moves run out.



2) Raze - Will the Raze feature allow you to raze your colonies in the system or the entire system itself, i.e. destroying the star. From the way it is worded, it sounds like the latter, but I was hoping for the former.

2) I think its just about destroying the colonial structure not the planet itself. Or is it?

to1) i think it should be countered by tactics or sabotage

I think you should have a choice.



If you have the technology to destroy a planet then by all means fire away, however I think orbital bombardment of the settlement via bombs or biological weapons should be the alternative. Soften them up for the invasion.

I believe they have already said there will be no doomsday weapons capable of destroying enemy systems outright. But we are talking now about systems owned by you. Its worded like the system will be destroyed "so it doesn't fall into enemy hands" but I am not sure that is the case. As far as retreat, tactics and offense are definitely what I would consider pursuit options, as they involve offense. Engineering and Defense are definitely defensive options, and should there fore result in the opposition retreating. The Sabotage seems like a neutral option, so I think it too would result in a retreat.

1.) I'd imagine if you select retreat, the enemy fleet just gets a phase of free-fire on you. You'll probably take some damage and lose some ships, but in the end get away.



2.) I think it just means you start a scorched earth policy. You basically destroy everything on the planets so that when the enemy takes them, they have nothing to exploit. They would have to spend time to repopulate and rebuild to get any use out of the system. Think of what the Soviets did in World War II: when Germany was pushing east, the Soviets destroyed anything (farms, building, factories, food, etc) that the Germans could use as supplies. Of course, in a game like Endless Space, that won't really hamper an enemy so much, since in the wars we don't need to worry about keeping our fleets equipped, the servicemen fed, etc.