[Malorn]

Originally Posted by SKYeXile

3 empires does work, because the moment an empire captures a majority of the map, they will have no choice but to fight the 2 weaker enemy's on different fronts because the 2 weaker enemy's have no bases near each other. you don't get that with 2 factions.

lets say this is a planetside map at the start of the day, TR has 50% of the pop, vs 20 and nc 30

after awhile the map looks like this:

you cut the vs off from the NC, and give the vs no choice but to attack the TR, the tr is then forced to fight on 2 fronts.

and after awhile the maps back to looking like:

<snipped charts>

Your charts do illustrate one way it could play out, but there are a few problems.

1) You are leaving out the other continents. This is a "Global" problem, not a localized continental problem. The VS could ignore that continent and go attack the NC on another continent. They do, in fact have a choice.

2) You are making an assumption on map layout. We don't yet know how warpgates play into the design, nor how the empire bases are situated.

3) Attacking TR isn't the VS's best option in your scenario after initially reclaiming their territory. If you look strictly at the best option for the VS & the NC, that is the correct move. However the VS aren't thinking that. They're thinking of the best option for them without consideration for what is good for the NC. The VS, after initially retaking their bases from the TR could attack the NC once again since they would be unlikely to be capable of adequately defending their eastern territories while the TR most certainly can and would put up resistance if they took too much or went after meaningful resources. They could then lock up a decent chunk of the territory into a 3-way near NC territory and maintain resources. They will do this because they are outnumbered by the TR and they will want to keep the TR occupied with the NC to protect their own interests and not get pushed back out of the continent again.