enahs, "i did not attack him i was returning from attacking a vacant planet and prolevel must have just guessed or has emperor and put his ships there just too catch me"
Your ships can be attacked when returning from raids and moving? So they can be intercepted by really high level players. that is messed up, so much for balance in the game...
I do not know what mission you did or the specifics to how it happened, but I heard Phalanx Sensor on moons shows movements around areas. Perhaps they used that to know where you were going and went there and set them self to "Defend". why 1500 battle ships? that is insane still lol.
I have had really high level players kill me when I was killing pirates before. lost two fleets that way and much more careful now, or try to be haha. That I understand as it is a risk to open area and I also changed tactic when killing pirates after that as well since they are needed.(stupid missions...) I also don't really mess with people in alliances since they can have some high level player pop over to "Defend" while you are enroute...preventing you from ever getting to the planet if they are orbit on Defend...which i am thinking is what happened to you there ;)
I am new still, lots to learn! I hope it is not possible to stop people in mid-flight to attack. Also I am not aware if a player sends fleet to "Defend," if it's possible they "catch" the player after they attacked a planet if they did not get there fast enough to defend prior to the attack(seconds or minutes later).