Alpha Centauri 2

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri & Alien Crossfire => After Action Reports => Topic started by: bvanevery on January 16, 2018, 02:15:35 am

Title: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 16, 2018, 02:15:35 am

I always thought it would be Yang and Deirdre, personally, and that Cha Dawn was their [progeny of unmarried parents] child.  But I guess I could wrap my lips around H'minee's orifices if I must.   ;yang;  ;caretake;  Really??

Huge map, average settings, random opponents.  I start on some kind of island, in an ok but not great agricultural belt on a southern coast.  A number of pods are 2 squares from me.  I can't tell how big the island is, and I'm on Rolling Arid terrain, so I go ahead and found the Hive.  I pop pods and don't get anything noteworthy from them.  A comm frequencey for Zhakarov, who declares war on me.  My other colonist gets wounded popping a pod, but isn't killed, which is what I expected in the first few turns.  It limps northwestwards, and I start to wonder if walking such a long distance while wounded is a good idea.  I do get a base settled on a river on a northern coast, and soon I get a Monolith next to it.  This is not a very big island though, just a spit running east-west.  I expand to 5 cities and that's as much room as I've really got.

I had started with Discover, Build focus but switch to Explore, Discover as I anticipate needing to get off the island.  I get Social Psych somewhere in the course of this, and of course I go Police State pretty soon, so I won't be worrying about happiness.  I don't have any major mineral deposits on this island, they are offshore.  I do have a couple of abundant food places, and food + forest = viable Secret Project city, in my experience.  I do the usual drill of planting forests on all the flat arid / moist squares, to increase their minerals output.  I start The Human Genome Project, The Weather Paradigm, and The Command Nexus.  My other 2 cities, I build Rec Commons, hoping that something better will be along soon.

Zhakarov chills out and declares a Truce.  Even later we sign a Treaty and then a Pact.  He kept trying to sell me Marr's comm frequency and I kept declining.  What do I need some alien immediately declaring war on me for?  I am wondering if proximity to Marr caused Zhakarov to mellow out.  Like he might actually need some human help sometime.  Zhakarov should not inherently be an enemy of the Hive anyways.  Later I find out that Marr is not only close to Zhakarov, they're right next to each other on a continent.  Endgame of that is typically Zhakarov completely wiped out, but they have a Treaty for now.

Zhakarov never really trades tech with me during our thawing period, and I have to figure stuff out on my own.  Eventually I do get Doctrine:Flexibility.  I manage to build The Weather Paradigm but Domai nabs The Human Genome Project.  I had hoped he might not have figured out Biogenetics when I chose to finish TWP, but he had.  Nobody seems ready to challenge me for The Command Nexus and I expect to complete it in a few turns.  I hope I can get a new SP tech fairly soon, as I have a 3rd city with a SP copy nearing completion.  I will start supporting units from that city, so that the minerals production dwindles to perhaps 1/turn.  That way I won't be wasting production once the SP copy is finished.  I call that "parking a SP".

I have fished 1 Artifact out of the water.  I discovered the Caretakers immediately to the northeast, so close that I could easily get a land bridge to them.  Surprisingly, we made a Pact.  I got some needed techs like Information Networks, which will enable me to cash my Artifact at some point soon.  I need to get more techs from my 2 allies though.

Aside from the Usurpers and Domai, we have Lal and Cha Dawn in the game.  Neither one of those should like me.

However I'm leery of invading them.  The running time of my last game was dominated by the amount of time it would have taken me to reach the Usurpers and wipe them out.  I never made it, despite piles of inbound ships and a fair amount of Super Formers doing land bridges.  I got bored and quit!  I could have easily declared Diplomatic Victory that game, if it were not for the Usurpers.  They were on the toroidially opposite side of the board from me and it took forever to get there.

The Usurpers are closer this time, and the Caretakers are my neighbor.  So I think I will concentrate on wiping out the Usurpers.  Then I can turn around and wipe out the Caretakers.  Then I can declare Diplomatic Victory if I want, without having to chase everyone else to hell and a handbasket.  That's the initial plan at any rate.  It could be foiled by someone doing a lot better at growth than I saw last game.  Last time around, I utterly dominated.  I had all these size 16 Cloning Vat cities, massive tech advantage, etc.  This time, I will make sure the "far away aliens" problem has been taken care of.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 16, 2018, 04:35:10 am

I pulled Industrial Base out of the water, and immediately completed The Merchant Exchange!  I moved my HQ to that base as well.

Cha Dawn is on an island to my west and is hostile.  He's been bothering me with a few units landed here and there, but nothing that requires much of a response. 

My alliance with the Caretakers is shaky, despite being a Planned economy now.  My ally Zhakarov has declared war on the Caretakers, but as luck would have it, we just entered a blackout!  So they're both going to have to put up with my funny allegiences for awhile.

I discovered that if your Pact brother asks you to break your Pact with someone else and declare war on them, and you agree, you will be demoted from Noble to Faithful.  I played that turn over again, because I would not have agreed to it if I had known.  Lucky for me, on the replay the blackout happened before Zhakarov could ask me anything.  I think that's a mildly more interesting way to do a blackout.  I think I also get to nerve staple anyone I want during a blackout, as other factions don't hear about it?  Maybe I could commit chemical weapons atrocities and nobody would learn about it, except the victim.  I don't have a good target for that at this time though.

The Usurpers completed The Virtual World.  Zhakarov completed The Empath Guild and we voted him Governor.  Lal is at war with both of us.  He's somewhat far to the north and not that relevant now.  Domai is somewhere far to the east, over land I think.

I actually found the Unity crash site and got all the goodies from it, including 300 cash!  It's on the continent east of the Caretaker home island and my home island.  I have almost land bridged to the continent, just 1 square remaining.  The Caretakers have some settlements up north, in particular at The Ruins, but mostly she has coastal bases.  I don't know which way I'll go to settle.  I've attached a strip island to the west, and will soon have an island to the north.  I've still only got my original 5 bases, but some are now hitting size 7 and people are unhappy with that.  Time to colonize!

I've managed to stay at tech parity with Zhakarov by buying techs from him.  We have R-lasers available.  Cha Dawn is only coming with synthmetal and mindworms, so I'm not going to bother making a bunch of expensive R-laser gear.  I've got High Energy Chemistry so if the Caretakers become a problem, I can X them.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 16, 2018, 05:46:03 am

The blackout has ended.  During that time, the Usurpers swiftly and suddenly eradicated the University.  So now Marr holds both The Virtual World and The Empath Guild.  The silver lining is H'minee is now quite happy with our Pact.  I'm not quite sure how this is going to go, because the Usurpers are now clearly the most powerful faction in the game.  Fortunately I have the Caretakers as a complete shield in between us.  They have to fight by water, so I think it will be some time before either makes progress against the other.

Lal and Cha Dawn are at war with me.  Domai is Belligerent towards me.  For my part, I'm just trying to eXpand as I have not discovered Industrial Automation yet.  I did get Intellectual Integrity from H'minee so I can use police to get my bases to size 7.   I could pop Artifacts, but I haven't infiltrated everyone so I don't know if I'm at tech parity.  Probably oughtta get that done.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 16, 2018, 06:48:34 am

I've infiltrated Cha Dawn, who as expected, doesn't have tech.  I've got 2 skimship probe teams heading northwards, to either Lal or Marr.  I don't know if they will get through.  It's an awfully long way to push them, but they might survive in open ocean if the other factions are busy enough.

Strangely, Domai decided to ally with me.  He even traded me some tech.  He's got a pile of Build techs.  With Zhakarov's death, I have kept an Explore, Build focus, hoping for The Maritime Control Center among other things.  Domai beat everyone to building The Planetary Energy Grid.  He looked like he was going to get The Planetary Transit System, but finally I researched Industrial Automation myself.  I spent 4 Artifacts to get TPTS done in 1 turn.  I still have 2 left in my cities, and 1 slowly walking back through the wilderness with a scout escort.  It's too soon to pop them for tech as I'm behind others on tech.  At least with Domai, for now I can buy his tech, but I'm not sure our alliance is going to last very long.  He's already getting crabby, not that he started friendly.

I attached the northern island and am colonizing it in earnest.  I had a nutrient boom in my capitol and made a larger than expected number of colonists because of that.  Unfortunately they are outstripping my ability to provide garrison forces.  I may have to build a garrison unit as my first build order, rather than the recycliing tanks I prefer to do.  At least I have The Command Nexus, so such garrisons do not suck.

I guess we don't have a Governor.  Maybe now that my cities can get bigger, I can eventually beat Lal on sheer size.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 16, 2018, 08:30:30 am

I've infiltrated everyone except Domai.  Lal and Marr both have Optical Computers, otherwise I am caught up on tech.  Sadly, my skimship probe team got sunk by Marr's needlejet, just 1 fungus square away from a theft.  Maybe I'll try stealing from Lal next time.  Or maybe by the time I get to it, Domai will have got it and I can just buy it.

Domai has been out-Building me, which is annoying.  He got The Planetary Datanlinks.  I learned Cyberethics the turn after he finished it.  I hope he doesn't beat me to The Ascetic Virtues, that would really annoy me.  This is not like my previous game, where I totally dominated all the SPs.  Various other factions have managed to build important SPs before I could get them.  I think in this game I had a bad start compared to others.  Various factions got huge land masses to settle, I got an island that could fit 5 cities.  Yeah, I'm catching up, but it's a bit of a drag.  The power graph shows the Caretakers and Usurpers way ahead of the rest of us.

My bigger cities are now building Tree Farms.  There's nothing to fight about really.  Cha Dawn has been quiet.  Perhaps H'minee has been bombing him.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 16, 2018, 05:39:11 pm

I built The Maritime Control Center, but Domai built The Ascetic Virtues.  I am switching to Explore, Discover focus because I just can't seem to out-Build Domai.  Having destroyer probe teams did enable me to steal Optical Computers from Lal.  Neither Lal nor Marr has advanced in tech at all.  Thus I think there's a good chance I can dominate in the Discover category.  Domai also broke our Pact and is Belligerent to me, so at some point I imagine I'll be stealing Build techs from him.

It's not clear to me how I'd end this game quickly, with both the Caretakers and the Usurpers having large empires.  I am going to try to make a land bridge between them so that they fight more directly.  This requires bringing Formers on Cruisers to a scrabble of islands between their land masses.  Right now I don't think these areas are much patrolled.  Pretty easy place to get strafed by Needlejets though.  Nobody has Advanced Military Algorithms yet so I'll just have to make do.

An alternate path is to follow a chain of north-south islands up to Lal, invade him, eventually build some massive railway, and attach to the Usurper mainland.  I am hoping the Caretaker-Usurper connector is quicker.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 16, 2018, 09:11:29 pm

I don't understand why Domai is doing as well at research as he's doing.  His social choices are Fundamentalist Free Market Power.  That should give him -4 Research!  Yet he figured out Pre-Sentient Algorithms at the same time I did, and I don't think he got it from The Planetary Datalinks.  I beat him to The Hunter-Seeker Algorithm, but now he's subsequently researched Centauri Meditation.  He's very likely to get The Xenoempathy Dome, just switching over the HSA project he didn't complete.  I wanted that!  I'm starting to think the AI is cheating, as I don't see anything about his empire which should make him a research powerhouse.

Since he's accumulated all these SPs I wanted, invading Domai might be the thing to do.  We're already at war, as the Caretakers asked me to support their fight against him.  Problem is, Domai is pretty far away.  I can send ships of stuff, indeed I've stolen some techs from him that way, but he's so spammy that I worry about holding ground.  I'm Police State Planned Wealth and not really in good shape economically right now.  I'm building a pile of Hybrid Forests, a tech I just stole from Domai, hoping that solves the problem.  I really need better weapons, or Fusion Power, or better economics before making a move.  If my economy was under control I could switch to Power.

The perceived need to conquer Domai, feels like a big distraction from actually finishing the game.  I can't declare Diplomatic Victory unless the alien factions are eliminated.  Yet, Domai is like this freak runaway.  He's not considered especially powerful on the graph, but I think the graph does a poor job of rating the value of SPs.

I do have an Elite destroyer probe team now, so I'm going to try to frame Domai and get Marr fighting him again.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 17, 2018, 02:18:10 am

Domai was already fighting Marr by the time I got to Marr's city.  I tried to frame Lal instead.  I succeeded in getting Superconductor, but the frame job didn't work. 

My rash of Hybrid Forests has stablilized my economy.  I am now deemed the most powerful faction in the game, although not by much of a margin over the Usurpers or Caretakers.  I am building the Supercollider in my capitol.  Some of my cities have reached maximum capacity, so I've been filling out my empire with a few new bases.  I'm trying to make it "rounder", putting bases close to my capitol so they'll give me economic advantages.  However my land settlement is roughly a northwards facing half-circle.  There's nothing but ocean south of me, and any heroic land raising efforts, will be spent on trying to get the Caretakers and Usurpers to fight directly.

I've sent my 1-movement Formers to the Caretaker frontier.  It's a rather slow journey to get there.  I hope they survive long enough to raise some land out that way.  I've started building faster land and sea Fungicidal Former units at home, even though I only have fission power.  I have the productivity and I need the speed of movement.

In many ways I'm just waiting around for Fusion Power.  I've refrained from invading Cha Dawn because he's a distraction and not worth anything.  The last game I played, I did invade Cha Dawn, and then built a land bridge between our islands.  Pretty similar to what I could do this game.  But, that resulted in a boring game that I ultimately quit!  I think "land briding heroics" need to be spent on something more important.  It gets old after awhile.

I'm trying to steal from Domai but it's a long haul.  He's got Centauri Meditation and Silksteel Alloys.  Nobody else has got anything, they're pretty stagnant.

I built a nuke, although I'll never use it.  That reminds me, I should cash it to speed The Supercollider along.

My population is still not enough to overcome Lal's 2x voting advantage.  So there's no Governor.  Zhakarov used to be Governor but Marr killed him, and there hasn't been an election since.  Marr has The Empath Guild and The Virtual World, both of which he seized from Zhakarov, but they're pretty far away from me.

I could definitely do a naval invasion of the Drones if I had Fusion Power.  I might not even have to conquer them completely.  I could just take their core cities with the SPs and hunker down with superior defense.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 17, 2018, 04:49:00 am

Well if that isn't the most random thing ever.  All my effort to slowly build a land bridge between the Caretakers and Usurpers... is obsoleted by an earthquake from popping a pod!  Well hey it cuts 20..30 turns off the effort I guess.  I saved that game the minute it happened.

Domai researched Mind / Machine Interface and started the associated SPs.  A turn later I researched Fusion Power.  I've stolen MMI from him and am now in a mad rush to complete the SPs before he does.  It's quite possible given my fast Fusion Speeder Supply Crawlers.  If he had half a brain he would buy those projects outright, but he doesn't.

I'm pretty ticked that Domai is researching as well as he is though.  I think the AI is cheating.  Only other possibility is he's cashing Artifacts.  I thought the AI was stupid and didn't generally do that.  I've sure seen a lot of Artifacts sitting around in enemy bases for a long time.  Well, maybe Domai thinks his tech is so abysmal, he'd better well cash them?  So perversely, having -4 Research could make the AI get techs faster.  I suppose I'll snoop around his bases before putting too much credence in this theory though.

He still has Silksteel Alloys.  I have a good chance to steal it in the next 1..2 turns.  I've been approaching his homeland by way of the Sargasso Sea.  He can plow right through it because he has The Xenoempathy Dome, but I think it still creates a conceptual barrier.

Domai recently made a Pact with Cha Dawn and started flying his planes up to my land.  I had only built 2 interceptors, but I did manage to shoot down 1 of his planes.  It's not terribly important if he kills old fission Former units and they're almost done with their work over there anyways.  Cha Dawn has had an air force this whole time and the Caretakers have done a good job of suppressing it.

Once I get those 2 SPs built, it's time to invade someone!  But who?  Marine strike at Domai's core?  I could use The Ascetic Virtues as I've got unhappy citizens in my biggest cities.  However my budget is only 50-10-40 so I could increase Psych spending.

Maybe I just go eliminate Marr, over that brand new land bridge.  That would get me The Virtual World and The Empath Guild.  Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.  At least take at by land.  Might give the Caretakers the beachhead they need to really mess him up.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 17, 2018, 07:14:39 am

I got the MMI SPs.  I'm currently building The Longevity Vaccine.  Nobody's had any new tech, except Marr, who has now leapfrogged everyone militarily with Organic Superlubricant.  I'm endeavoring to steal it, but it's a long ways to Marr's bases.  I have 1 probe team waiting off Domai's coast in case he researches something, but so far no dice.  I'm finding that framing factions doesn't work when there's no tech to steal.

I built a whole bunch of Fusion Labs.  That seemed to stablize my economy.  My budget is now 40-20-40.  I haven't popped any Artifacts; too cheap.  Seemed like someone could still provide me a tech for free.

I've got a wave of expensive X Missile AAA Silksteel Rovers heading towards Marr.  I really don't need any more navy, as the small handful of fission AAA Missile ships has been sufficient to keep Cha Dawn from getting any transports to me.  Everyone else is too far away to bother with, and my experience last game trying to clean out the Pirates, is that naval conquests are extremely dull.  So I'm trying to avoid that this game.  My sea bases, having nothing better to do, are building Clean R-Laser Silksteel Marines.  When I have a few boatloads of them saved up, I'll put 'em on transports and send 'em to Domai.

Many other factions unfortunately have figured out Fusion Power, so I may not be able to cakewalk anyone.  However, my wave of Rovers may get to University Base before Marr figures out how to garrison it properly.  Waiting for that is like watching paint dry though.  Yaaaaw-ner!

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 17, 2018, 05:57:01 pm

Domai continues to annoy with his unrealistic rate of research.  He has figured out Superstring Theory and Advanced Ecological Engineering.  I've stolen the latter, so now I can make Super Formers. After my last post, I did poke around his cities and find an Artifact.  I don't see it anymore, so he could have popped it for a tech.  I suppose at some point he will run out of pods to pop.  On the other hand, those 2 techs are expected for someone focusing on Build.  A Democratic Free Market Power may not be that bad of a research faction, not couting Domai's inherent -2 Research penalty.   I suspect that soon he will provide us all with mag rails, which is why I haven't focused on Build tech myself.  I'm still doing exclusively Discover.  I have Photon armor and they don't.

I tried to send a bunch of unescorted Formers past the Caretaker frontier, to make a land bridge to Domai.  I managed to get the road pretty close to his domain.  But then he became vigilant about my presence, and summarily cut my Formers to shreds with Needlejets and Copters.  I will soon make a 2nd attempt, this time with armored unarmed AAA rover units as a defense against air attacks.  I hope they hold up.  I'm worried that they could become Conventional Missile fodder.

Similarly, the 1-movement Formers I marched all the way up to the Usurper land bridge, were summarily destroyed by unexpected ground forces.  I was more careful with Formers that arrived later.  I guess getting the Caretakers and Usurpers to fight is working, but I wanted it to be the Caretakers advancing, not the other way around.

Expensive AAA Silksteel X Missile Rovers arrived at the Usurper land bridge, and proved lousy against ground forces.  Of course they can kill stuff, but Marr was shielding his ground troops with his air force.  So then I'd get counterattacked and wiped out by mere Speeders.  I backed off and regrouped after losing 4 of them.  I've diversified my production to send up a mix of units now, at varying costs.  There isn't going to be any easy walk-in, I'm going to have to actually fight.  I may even have to provide my own air force; I find that annoying because it's more unit pushing.  I will at least make the Tacticals at a base that's relatively close as the crow flies, or the fish swims.  My land route, in contrast, is this circuitous maze.  A big coastal crinkle.

Maybe I should build a city up there, just to have a free Aerospace Complex.  Also to prevent the Caretakers from claiming stuff I don't want them to.

 

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 17, 2018, 08:59:30 pm

I stole Superstring Theory.  Domai hasn't done us the favor of researching Monopole Magnets yet.  Hurry up, Domai!  I've got Shard weapons and am working on The Living Refinery.

This is a slow war.  The only reason I'm making progress on the Usurper land bridge, is I started making planes.  Just as his planes were covering his ground troops before, now my planes are covering mine.  The AI is not shooting down my covering planes, which would be the correct response.  I've built a road halfway to the 1st Usurper base.  Many of my expensive Silksteel rovers have been destroyed.  If I was going to do this kind of assault again, I would have built armored, weaponless rovers to act as shields, and then just mix in conventional, non-expensive forces.  I have that sort of force allocation arriving now, so soon we'll see if it's any better.  It can't be any worse, and it's definitely cheaper.

I've stopped making offensive units, because if this raft of crap isn't enough to actually take University Base, I'm not going at it the same way again.  Instead I'll build a rail.  I expect to be building a rail soon in any event.  Domai will probably provide the tech.  If he doesn't, I can finally start popping Artifacts.

I've almost got a large contingent of Marines ready to make a strike on Domai.  I'm making some Battleships to escort them.  I hope to seize his cities with Secret Projects in them.  I haven't checked how full those cities are.  They're coastal and not on his front lines, but then he doesn't really have a front line.  If they're full of spam units, that could put a damper on my plan.  I need to take a beachhead immediately because otherwise I think his air force will sink my fleet.  Weapons are strong enough now that I think planes can afford to suicide at ships a few times to destroy them.  Marr was doing something similar against my AAA units coming at him, and I'm sure Domai can spare the planes and productivity.

Cities are building Orbital Power Transmitters now, to try to shore up my economy.  Since I have The Cloudbase Academy, that should help.  Currently I'm at -17 credits per turn with a 350 credit reserve.  I haven't launched any OPTs yet.  I'm still Police State Planned Wealth with a budget of 40-20-40.

I've almost got some Super Formers ready to try to make the land bridge to Domai again.  I need more AAA units to cover them than I thought, as Domai strikes pretty far inland with his air force.  Domai has been eating up the few islands that the Caretaker settled.  That's good for me though, because it makes it easier to steal from him.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 17, 2018, 11:44:50 pm

Orbital Power Transmitters did a bangup job of improving my economy.  I could probably win the game with those alone, if I just sat around building them.  It only took a few to put my income decidedly in the positive.  That's what happens when combined with The Cloudbase Academy.

I researched Retroviral Engineering.  This gives my old probe teams something to do: they can go inflict genetic atrocities!  That oughtta help clean Marr out.  My memory is it seriously knocks down the population of a city.  Can't remember if it also wounds the units inside; maybe it does.  I'm not going to bother to build the Genejack Factories as I don't need the unhappiness and my production is fine.

Domai hasn't provided us with Monopole Magnets, so I decided it was time to pop all my Artifacts.  I didn't have as many as I thought, maybe 6?  I got a number of other things, including 3 SPs to build.  Probability armor is mildly useful.  Carrier Decks will be good for X bombing Marr into oblivion, saves me the trouble of founding cities or making air bases.  My last Artifact, finally yielded Monopole Magnets, so the traditional rail assault will eventually happen.  Although, that may only be to reinforce University Base.  By the time I reach it, Marr might actually be dead.  That said, I shouldn't discount either the difficulty of the task, or the speed at which I can produce Super Formers and get rail lines built.

I've destroyed 1 Usurper city.  University Base is the next one up.  I need to leave it sufficiently intact to take the SPs inside it though.  It shouldn't be too difficult given that I can use a Carrier now.  I might have to wait for that, and perhaps I will flank University Base and destroy other cities, until the Carrier arrives.  I thought I was going to have to go after it without air support, as I've got few Formers in the region that are slowly building a road, and need to stay on that vital task.  But with a Carrier, I should be good, as long as it doesn't get sunk somehow.

The Marines are still staging for a departure to Domai's heartland.  I forgot to check on how fully stacked his cities are.  These Marines were expensive to produce, because for some reason I decided to make them Clean and armored.  I was thinking my sea bases didn't have tremendous productivity and I didn't want to lessen it.  Also invading Domai was a low priority project compared to the main effort against Marr.  So... I don't want to just throw this corps away.  If I wait too long though, the point will be moot as I'll just be invading by a land rail.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 18, 2018, 05:14:17 am

My attack on Domai's major port city was poorly orchestrated.  The Sargasso Sea sits in front of it, and a SNAFU with 2 transports briefly occupying the same space, caused my lead transport to only have 5 Marines in it instead of 8.  That 1st wave was not enough to take the city, although it did deal devastating wounds.  Then an enemy battleship came and sank the transport, so I lost all 5 Marines in that 1st wave.

The 2nd wave carried the day, as expected.  Thus I have seized The Ascetic Virtues, but can I hold it?  Time will tell.  I sunk the enemy ship, but if he has more, he could attack again.  The Sargasso Sea made me so slow, that I was unable to pull my ship into the city after attacking.  So he could destroy 3 more of my Marines if he sinks that transport.  Hope he doesn't.

There was clearly no point whatsoever in making Clean Marines.  If I were to do this over again, I would have made some Isles of the Deep to maneuver through the fungus.  But I didn't think of it, as it's not every day that I do an amphibious assault through a big patch of fungus.  Also in many games, I have The Xenoempathy Dome.  I intended to get it in this one, but I didn't.  It is tantalizingly close, if only I can hold this city.

I discovered an unexpected problem with making land bridges: paying for them, when they're in hostile territory.  Earlier, I didn't have the money.  I sent my Super Formers back along the road to work on a rail, planning to bring stuff in later.  I've had my sea bases building Orbital Power Transmitters because I really don't need more of a navy than I've got, so I'm quite a bit richer now than I was.  I could take the sea  bases in the area with Marines, but I'm leery of adding any cities to my empire that I don't need to.  Maybe it doesn't matter anymore, now that I'm so wealthy, but I definitely feel limited by my Zero Efficiency.

The assault on University Base has become a siege, due to the large number of spam units in the base.  I've weakened them with artillery and have been hitting them with mostly Fusion rovers.  It's annoying to misuse those expensive units that way.  The need to take the city intact, means I can't afford to use X weapons on it.  So I end up with a lot of wounded or even crippled guys, and some of them get picked off by retalliating air force.

On the positive side, the genetic atrocities have been darned useful.  I use probe teams to knock down surrounding cities, then I bomb with an X Needlejet to finish them off.  This leaves a bunch of crippled, diseased former city occupants standing around in a disposable stack.  If I have sufficient speeder penetration, I wipe those out too.

Worrisome however is Marr has at least 1 nuke.  He hasn't used it, so maybe his 3 human alliances are restraining him from doing so.  I'm starting to think that wiping out his nukes, wherever they may be, might be a higher priority than taking University Base.  It contains The Empath Guild and The Virtual World and I'd rather not lose it in a big crater slag.

I've got rails connecting most of my homeland.  I hope I can get the line finished to Domai pretty quickly, as otherwise my Marine assault may be for naught.

I think I've finished The Living Refinery, so my support situation is pretty good.  I've got The Pholus Mutagen and The Cloning Vats in progress.  Oops, that reminds me that I haven't started The Theory of Everything!  It didn't give me any new weaponry, and my turns are rather long now, and often interrupted by Life, getting food, tending to the dog, etc.  I wonder how long I've been spacing on that?  Well, I'll correct it forthwith.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 18, 2018, 07:50:38 am

I have been unable to take University Base.  Marr sent piles of spam into the field around the city.  I felt obligated to destroy them before they could enter the city.  That caused me a lot of wounds, so I had to retreat my forces to heal them up.  Most of them made it back.  I've kept 1 artillery piece shelling the city to suppress it.  The rest got killed trying to deal with some of Marr's spore launchers.

It's not all bad though.  It's a "field" around the city because my probe teams have absolutely destroyed everything in a fair radius around University Base.  Awhile ago I talked about flanking the city; well, that's what actually came to pass.  A rail line will soon be connected to the area, and then it'll finally be mine.

Provided I've eliminated Marr's nukes.  I was able to destroy a city that had 1 nuke inside and 1 in production.  Unfortunately that 1 nuke is still sitting on the ground with some of Marr's garrison units.  I didn't have the ground forces to punch through.  The air strike was worth it to eliminate the nuke in production though.  If he moves the nuke then I'll have to go chasing it again.  If he leaves it be, next turn my air strike will finish the job.  Marr has 1 other city producing a nuke, unfortunately to be finished in 4 turns.  I doubt I'll get there because it's far inland.  But at least my air strike, did reduce Marr's potential nuclear arsenal by 1/3rd.

I have connected a rail to the place where I want to bridge to Domai.  I'm making a pile of ECM AAA Probability units to protect my Super Formers as they work on the final section of rail, that will take me to my newly conquered base with The Ascetic Virtues in it.  Domai keeps lobbing Conventional Missiles at it, so it can't hold out forever.  It does ok against any ground forces that come at it though.  The base's other big problem is food.  It faces the Sargasso Sea which doesn't provide much sustenance.  The Pholus Mutagen gets me 1-1-1 from the fungus, but that's not enough to feed a size 16 city.  For some reason Domai didn't choose to clear the fungus, and if there were pods in the middle of it at one point, they didn't trigger any sea kelp either.

I completed The Cloning Vats, but I don't think I'll choose Power as I already have Support +4.  Morale isn't that important to me because I've got better weapons than anyone else, The Command Nexus, and The Cyborg Factory.  I think my troops come out Hardened and that's good enough.

I'm still working on The Theory of Everything.  Even though the Orbital Power Transmitters are greatly boosting my economy, I still have city improvements to do, which soak up the credits.  I think I'll conquer Domai's sea bases just to save money on the cost of raising the land.  And because, well, it's time to conquer Domai anyways.

The Caretakers are pretty pathetic.  They're still back on fission power!  You'd think they could steal something from someone or go on the offensive somewhere but no, they mill around lamely.  I wonder if I should perform an "Order 66" and eXterminate every one of their cities in 1 turn.

If I don't eXterminate the Caretakers, then I'll need to conquer all the other humans.  Or I could corner the energy market.  Whatever.  I'm supposed to be traveling tomorrow, but we've had snow and I might not be able to leave.  If I do get my trip underway, this game is in danger of getting sidelined.  When I pick it up again, it may be too boring to continue.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 20, 2018, 07:05:15 am

I'm visiting other family now and quite a bit busier than I have been.  I did manage to play a little bit more last night.  Don't really have time for it tonight, only for a writeup of what happened last night.

Domai took back the city with The Ascetic Virtues.  Given the amount of force he had to bring to bear, and my complete lack of willingness to manually push units all the way across the ocean, I'd say this was strategically inevitable.  There's really no point in trying to conquer a strong foe without a rail.  I could have used those expensive Marines for something else, or probably should never have made them at all.  The only tangible I got out of that, is I raised my city size cap to 16 for a short periord of time.  So I have some cities that are size 16 as a result.  Otherwise, a complete waste of time.

Fortunately I do almost have a rail to Domai now.  Then it'll be a direct competition of his industry vs. mine, and I'm betting I have better.  Last I checked he's Democratic Free Market Power, which should give him +0 Industry.  I'm Police State Planned Wealth, which gives me +2 Industry.  He has Support +0, I have Support +4, which means I support units up to the size of my base for free.  He'd have +2 Morale.  I'd arguably have +0 Morale in practice, because I have The Cyborg Factory.  He could build Bioenhancement Centers everywhere and gain further advantage, but I doubt he did.  My armor is superior to his: I've got 6, I think he's got 4.  My weapons are slightly superior, 13 to 10.  I think I also have more cities than he does.  So that sounds like a win.  Especially against an AI, who can't be expected to fight all that well.  The AIs do lots of stupid things that get their units killed.

I did take University Base.  Next turn I'll have a rail to it to reinforce it.  Contrary to what I thought, it only has The Empath Guild in it.  I do not quite have enough votes to win an election against all the other factions that hate me.  But once I take a bite out of Domai, I will.  I don't even have to conquer him, I just have to push the votes a little more in my favor.  Or just grow some more turns with The Cloning Vats.  The Governorship will be mine "soon".

Marr's grounded nuke got away.  He's probably about to produce a 2nd.  I've thought of bringing over a pile of Conventional Missiles to pound the crap out of wherever those nukes are.  But I'm feeling a bit lazy about pushing them across the board, so I probably won't bother.  He hasn't used the nuke he's got, so....

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 22, 2018, 04:13:38 am

I'm still kinda busy, and this is still a slow war.  It takes a long time to get even 1 turn done.

I became Governor.  Taking a few of Domai's cities was enough.  I raised some of those captured sea bases to make them into land bases, to solidify my claim and also to make my bridge, in a way that I could control access over the bridge.  I'm not directly connected to Domai's core.  I'm sort of snaking up on an isthmus, as though I took over Panama, and going up to Mexico to get to the USA.

Domai's peripheral cities were easy to take, but his main cities are heavily stocked with defenders.  I don't think I've quite mustered the forces to blow them away.  I stopped 2 squares short of one of his cities, using a bunker that he conveniently built for me.  I shelled his city with a lot of really weak artillery units, barely scratching him.  But hey they were gifts from my wondrous ally H'minee.  Can't believe I loaned her money.  The sex must be good.  Or the offspring are delicious when dropped into the tanks.

The stack of weak units in the bunker, provoked a sizeable open ground counterattack.  Which worked out better for me, because then I killed his big stack next turn.  His dead units are worth far more than my dead units, mine are mostly just crap that H'minee gave me.  So if he continues with this drill, he's gonna lose badly and quickly.  Well, unless his spam rate is so high that he can keep it up forever.  I doubt it though.  As noted in an earlier post, my industry is actually spammier than his industry.

I've redeployed all my Formers to the conquered cities near Domai.  They have needed a lot of land improvement, which is nearly done.  Domai shoots some of them with planes.  I'm not going to go through heroics bringing Tacticals over, as it's a loooong ways away from my other cities.  Eventually my cities will have enough productivity to cough up their own Tacticals.  In the meantime I'll probably conquer the cities the planes are coming from, long before I would be making defensive planes.

H'minee might be fighting Domai with her air force some, and thereby diverting some of his planes.  I'm really not sure.  I've got my video settings to move everything as fast as possible, which is still slow watching H'minee poke along my rail lines.  Maybe fights are happening and being resolved that I'm not even sure of.

Absence of Formers on the front with Marr, means I'm not really advancing against him.  I am destroying his units as they come inboud to University Base.  Quite a ways before: my perimeter around the base is quite large.  I am slowly X bombing any nearby cities into oblivion.  An Artifact gave me Wave technology, so now I've got bombers coming that ignore any AAA unit defenses and so forth.  I think that same tech also gives me a reasonable amount of food from fungus squares, and probably also allows me to build on them, so I don't have to clear them anymore.  Not that there's much fungus around to deal with.  The ground we're fighting over, has been worked for a long time.

Marr mistakenly left one of his nukes in a city that I could bomb out.  I don't know if he was intending to hit me with it next turn or not.  Maybe it was sitting there all the time, and I just missed it in the soup of cities I needed to deal with yet.  At any rate, it is destroyed now.  He has only 1 nuke remaining, sitting in the city with The Virtual World, quite a ways away from me.  He doesn't have any other nukes in production.  Once I get to The Virtual World, the nuclear threat from Marr is over.

I intend to take Domai's core of cities that have Secret Projects in them, then go after Marr's Virtual World.

I have Neutronium armor now.  Domai and Marr have Shard weapons same as I do, but are still back on Silksteel armor.

I'm soon to complete The Universal Translator.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 23, 2018, 07:21:16 am

I have taken Domai's core of cities.  This gives me The Planetary Energy Grid, The Ascetic Virtues, The Xenoempathy Dome, and The Planetary Datalinks.  I'm not going to bother to advance further on Domai, unless he starts throwing Conventional Missiles at me.  I think the Caretakers will probably try to hassle Domai, so I hope that keeps him busy.  He's no longer a threat and doesn't have anything important to take.  With my population as high as it is now, I could easily vote myself Supreme Leader, if only there were no Aliens in the game.

I am still only skirmishing with Marr, but now I'm starting to advance a rail northwards towards his city that contains The Virtual World.  Otherwise I will X him out.  I recently got Hovertank technology, so I'm making X Wave Shard Hovertanks which will blow his cities to bits.  I also got Robotic Assembly Plant technology, but I'm only bothering to make those in my capitol, University Base, and the 1 city south of it.  Those 2 will crank out more planes so I don't have to push them across the map anymore.  Otherwise I have enough cities that can produce things for me.  I really don't need massively more productivity to wipe out Marr.  If I did build those plants, he'll probably be all but dead by the time they're done.

If I don't backstab H'minee, then I'll have to conquer Cha Dawn, Lal, and Domai.  Or else build even more Orbital Power Transmitters than I have.  I don't think I'm anywhere near cornering the energy market.  I guess that's a problem with Efficiency 0.

My social choices are Police State Planned Wealth Thought Control.  I don't suffer any penalties from Thought Control because I have The Cloning Vats.  With The Ascetic Virtues, I have +5 Police, which offers no benefit over +3 Police.  I could go Free Market and have +0 Police.  Strangely I would not make much more money, and I'd have to build stuff to compensate for the loss of police.  At present I am disinclined.  Eventually I suppose I'll get a better advanced society to choose from, like Cybernetic if I can actually get any efficiency from that.  Pretty sucky if I can't.  Anyways that or Eudaimonic will put me back to +3 Police, which gives double police power.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 25, 2018, 07:13:19 am

Well I'm still at this.  I'm doubting I would continue, if I wasn't doing this writeup about it.  Hope this read is useful to someone sometime!

I have taken The Virtual World.  My X Wave Shard Hovertanks have obliterated most of Marr rather quickly.  What weapons!  I also have my 1 aircraft carrier circling his continent counterclockwise to the east.  It uses planes and copters to obliterate his sea bases.  Marr's main stuff won't last more than 3 turns, and that's only because he has some sea bases that need wiping out.  I think he has only 1 city left on land now.  Marr has a few more sea bases scattered to the far east, interspersed with Domai's territory.  Once those are gone, Marr will be eliminated.

I decided to build Robotic Assembly Plants everywhere, since they can be used to produce Orbital Power Transmitters more quickly.  I could probably wipe out Domai with my existing offensive units.  I would need garrison units to hold the ground though.  I'm at the point where I have to decide whether to backstab the Caretakers or not.  They've been allies since the beginning of the game and at this late a time, I don't think I have the heart to put them to the gas.  I have a feeling I'm not going to make enough money to corner the market, so it's looking like a Conquest victory is needed.

I didn't change to Free Market as I was worried about keeping everyone under control with police.  I've got double police power right now.  Selling all my Hologram Theaters has made some people unhappy, as not every base has a Network Node.  That's something more to do.  To compensate I changed my budget to 30-30-40.  I still make about 200 credits a year.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 26, 2018, 12:16:35 pm

Marr sunk my carrier.  He just had some ships patrolling and I wasn't bothering to look for enemy ships at all.  2 choppers got badly wounded in the incident.  Next turn I was able to destroy the attacking ship and some other things before they ran out of fuel.  This has put a cramp in the maritime destruction of Marr.  I guess I'll need to build some other kind of carrier and take the time to send it waaaaaay out there again.  Alternate possibility is maybe I'll sufficiently invade Domai to get an air strike from the land.  Kind of a pain.  I don't care to push a serious navy to those targets.  I quit the previous game I played due to boredom from that.  Pushing navies is slooooow.  Pushing 1 carrier might be acceptable, but what if it gets killed again?

I've built 38 Orbital Power Transmitters and have belatedly realized they're not doing me much good.  Yes I've got The Cloudbase Academy, but the Help entry says the max bonus is the size of the base.  That's currently 16 as I haven't discovered Habitation Domes yet.  Even if I did have Domes, I've probably built as many OPTs as would ever be needed.  So I need to find something else to do.  My income is merely 240 credits/turn and going Free Market would merely add +40 credits.  Not exciting, not going to make me win economically.  Still waiting to discover Cybernetic society and see if I can actually get efficiency from that.

Time to make a lot of Gas Wave Shard Hovertanks I suppose.  Just hurry up wiping out other factions.

Title: Re: Yang the Alien Lover
Post by: bvanevery on January 27, 2018, 05:24:11 am

Well I'm finally quitting.  It's very obvious that I shall win and there's nothing anyone can do about it.  Nobody's been able to do anything about me for a very long time.  But why actually quit?  Well, Domai somehow has become convinced that I committed an atrocity against him.  I've spent the entire game explicitly not doing that, so when did he get this in his head?  There's a possibility than when redeploying a unit to Domai's front, I might have accidentally used chemical weapons against one of his probe teams.  If I'm right, well frankly I'm not even willing to replay one turn to rectify this.  Turns are taking that long and are that much of a drag.  And if I'm wrong, well then it would be hunting and pecking through several previous turns to figure out when I did it.  No way am I going to chase that down, or replay multiple turns.

So the moral of the story is if you don't disband your X units, sooner or later you're going to slip up and use them against someone you didn't mean to.  Corollary: wipe out Aliens first.

Some things were dissatisfying this game and I'll try not to make the same mistakes next time.  The main one is that building piles of Orbital Power Transmitters is very nearly worthless.  I really didn't expect that.  I don't yet know if it's my 0 Efficiency -1 Economy that causes that to be true, or if they really wouldn't be any great shakes until one got Hab Domes anyways.  But I've been playing this game a long time, as the leading research faction, just towering over other players on the graph, and I still haven't managed to research Hab Domes.  So that means in the real world of wall clock time, you can go on nearly forever without getting them.  If I had known this in advance, I would have not built all those OPTs.  I would have put the production into something else that would enable me to win the game faster, I hope.

Not having my capitol at a radially symmetric center of mass, also turned out to be a problem over the long haul, I think.  Yang is pretty sensitive to cities not producing much in the way of money, research, or happiness for him, when they are too far away from the capitol.  I had a lot of dead ocean water south of my capitol, that was never going to do anything for me.  It would have required a lot of terraforming heroics to make into productive cities.  I've done that in other games and it's a drag that takes forever.  I quit a game not long after finally completing that task.  It would be far better to put the capitol somewhere that's going to have financially productive cities in an even circle around it, for a fair ways stretching out in every direction.  But commitment to a base-specific Secret Project like The Merchant Exchange has the effect of freezing one's capitol wherever one did that.  The inefficiency of governing at a distance, makes it quite a bit less desirable to have those SPs anywhere other than in one's capitol.  I recall that I got The Merchant Exchange by a fluke, I just fished the tech out of the water and completed the project becasue I could.  This turned out to have long term structural consequences for the shape of my empire.  I will try to be more far sighted next time.

Similarly, being kind to the Caretakers was completely worthless from a Gamist standpoint.  They never conquered anything.  I'm not even sure they ever put any kind of pressure on anyone.  There's a chance that earlier in the game, their air power might have distracted some other hostile forces, but I really never saw any combat that convinced me that was happening.  Maybe my "quick movement" settings kept me from seeing it, but I just don't think the Caretakers mattered at all.  Maybe they were actually useful for tech at some point in the beginning, I forget and would have to look over this pile of posts to know for sure.  But clearly, there came a point at which the Caretakers were no use whatsoever.  They were worthless in the fight against Marr, for instance.

Because of my love tryst with the Caretakers  ;yang; ;caretake; half of my conquests ended up being very, very far away from my capitol.  They produced 0 energy and 0 research no matter what facilities I put in them.  They were all serious candidates for Punishment Spheres and I will think more seriously about that in the future, if I'm conquering that far away from home again.  They took heroics of mag tubes to reach, and that's a lot of mouseclicks spent on winning the game.  It ultimately becomes very boring and makes me quit games.

On the balance, I really should have just wiped out the Caretakers when they were no longer of use to me.  If I had done that, and then wiped out the Usurpers, I would have won the game easily by votes and it would be over.  Instead I got put in the position where I've all but wiped out the Usurpers, but I still can't enact Diplomatic Victory because the Caretakers are my best buddies.  And if I killed them at that point, it isn't that much less work than conquering all the human factions anyways.  There isn't that much of a military shortcut, as the Aliens were both allowed to get pretty big.  But boy, they sure can be taken down fast with X Wave Shard Hovertanks.

At the rate I was going, I would have never won this game by Transcending.  My financially productive cities had every research improvement you could think of, and even the financial improvements to back that up.  My research focus was Discover for the final half of the game, when I'm kicking everyone else's butt without even a challenge.  And still I didn't discover the Quantum drive, the Quantum lab, etc.  I guess the Wealth choice really won't do it, at least with Yang.  Yang can use help with Wealth though, because he starts with Economy -2.  Sure he can choose Knowledge but he doesn't get any Efficiency improvement for it, so it's not so attractive.

Ok, so, next game my empire needs to be a "circle" where I progressively wipe everybody out and don't show any kindness.  Need to seriously consider Punishment Spheres for cities that are beyond the radius of financial productivity.  Can't count on getting Cybernetic society ever.  I still don't even know if it would have helped, if I would have ever gotten an Efficiency improvement from it.