by dimkadimon » Tue Nov 02, 2010 3:18 am
What about the strategy where you slowly capture a neutral in multiple turns, ie send fleets of 1 to it.
By the way, why is it so surprising that some maps don't have a dominant strategy? If you had a map with just the two starting planets, then there wouldn't be a dominant strategy (assuming planets have same growth rate and number of ships). If you know that there is no dominant strategy and you assume that your enemy is rational and also knows this, then your best strategy is to force a draw. Essentially this is a version of Prisoner's Dilemma.