Computer houses give a small BBS rivals to play against. They give orders under the same rules as players, pay the same costs and get no extra resources at any difficulty. They also play under the same fog of war: they only attack systems their worlds and fleets saw at the last turn, and only settle where they know (or last saw) an unclaimed world. They keep three scouts out, revisiting the systems seen longest ago, to see what their rivals are doing.
ComputerHouses in REACH.CFG names the houses that join each new game (default Varro, Ostrel; blank for none).ermaint join “House name” “Player name” -ai does the same from the command line.
PeaceDays (10 by default) is how many days after a player joins that the computer houses leave that player's worlds alone. During the peace they don't send strikes, blockades or landings at the player; they still defend their own systems, so a player who attacks them will still meet their fleets. On the day the peace ends, the player's report warns that the computer houses may attack from that night. 0 turns it off.
The peace counts from the day each player joins, so a player who joins late gets the same start as everyone else.
| Level | How they play |
|---|---|
| Easy | Wait until about day 20 before sending strikes, attack only with three times the defence, build troops later and keep more ore back |
| Normal | The default |
| Hard | Attack from about day 8 with smaller odds, build troops early and spend more of their ore on ships |
Set Difficulty in REACH.CFG for new games, or change it for the running game with reachcfg option 9.
A player who is away for AutopilotAfter days has the computer play their house each night until they come back. A house on autopilot still counts as a player's house for the peace days.