OlorinStormcrow
Warlord
- Joined
- Jul 18, 2006
- Messages
- 204
I remember playing MoO quite a bit when it first came out, and went back to it now and again through the years if I could get my newer "better" computer to run it.
Recently, I've started using DosBox, and have discovered the excellent resources available on the web for MoO, such as Sirian's page, RBO and this forum. Many of the strategies I had already been using, but I picked up quite a few new ideas as well (like redesigning the default ships).
Reading through some of the SGs and Imperia has inspired me to take a fresh look at the different races. I decided to see what the Meklars are all about. Are they destined to be stuck with a smaller, more productive empire, or can they translate their production bonus into accelerated expansion?
I designed a test. I started a medium, impossible, 2 AI game with the Bulrathis. I played the first 50 years, quitting in 2349; trying to use all the tricks I learned to maximize their growth--backfilling the homeworld with pop as the factories maxed, etc. I ignored the AI in terms of military or diplomacy, but I produced scouts and blockaded all the worlds in range (as I wanted to similate the start of any other game).
After recording my status using the Bulrathis, I used RaceEd to change my first turn save to Meklars. I ran four different tests with the Meklars to try to find the optimum way to grow and expand with them. I learned some valuable lessons for how to use the Meklars effectively.
1. Meklars can have 4 fact/pop instead of 2/pop like other races. This means that they will take much longer to max their worlds than anyone else, but then those worlds will be much more productive. The *most* important principle when playing with the Meklars---do NOT wait to max your planets before building colony ships, and doing other things. If you wait that long, sure you can produce the ships really fast, but the AIs will be way ahead of you in terms of grabbing planets. Also, you don't want to be producing a colony ship every turn when you only have the first two worlds! There is no way that you'll be able to transfer enough pop from your 2nd colony to fill all your new ones (since HW is maxed and can't be used to send settlers).
2. Meklars have in indirect population bonus. How? Let me explain. I followed the moves from my Bulrathi game exactly in my Meklars game up until 2323. This resulted in exactly the same pop/fact totals on both planets. But instead of shipping colonists from my first colony back to the homeworld as I did in my Bulrathi game, to max it out, I didn't bother in the Meklar game. This was because in 2327, the homeworld was at 88 pop/207 fact, yet still had unemployment due to the Meklars controls bonus. They don't need to max the population to work 200+ factories. So the 2nd colony is better off, having not had to ship any pop to the homeworld. Also, the Meklars can use their homeworld to send out settlers. If you stop at around 200 (or a little more) factories, you'll have basically the same production as the standard races, but you can drop your homeworld back into the 50-60 pop range when filling colonies without idling factories. That means you can keep your homeworld in the good growth range throughout your initial expansion phase (until you're ready to max the homeworld). All of the test games I ran with the Meklars ended with more population than the Bulrathi game, because the Bears stopped growing their homeworld. So the Meklars increased controls allow you to keep all your planets growing through the early game. This gives them an overall boost to population.
3. Meklars require more planning and decision-making. With the Bears, I started building colony ships when the HW maxed. I switched the 2nd colony to research when they reached 100 factories (it was a 100 terran), so that they could transport all colonist above 50 when filling new colonies. Meklars don't have any such signals to tell the player when to change from factories to ships and tech. The player has to weigh the benefits of changing out from factory spending to other priorities.
Summary: Meklars can be used by experienced players to gain indirect pop bonuses during expansion. This can make the Meklars an above average race for expansion. My recommendation would be to take the HW to 220 factories before building colony ships if you expect to be able to do lots of expansion. This allows you to transfer down to 55 pop to fill colonies from the homeworld before idling factories. You can use this to put higher than normal numbers of settlers on new colonies to enable them to ramp up faster. They will also pass the 1/2 pop point earlier, and will able to send excess population to new worlds over shorter distances. Try to keep factories growing on the 2nd colony as much as possible, and when it gets to around 200, it can take over ship building and give the homeworld time to max (or double the rate of ship building if needed). Figuring out where to fund research is tricky. One option is to put back-line colonies (esp. poor or ultra-poor) on research until your HW and core colonies to keep more in factory construction. Remember, the Meklars will almost never run out of unemployed to man new factories, you need to force yourself to put resources into research.
If anyone is interested in more details, and/or the save file I used, let me know and I'll try my hand at an AAR or upload the file.
--OlorinStormcrow
Recently, I've started using DosBox, and have discovered the excellent resources available on the web for MoO, such as Sirian's page, RBO and this forum. Many of the strategies I had already been using, but I picked up quite a few new ideas as well (like redesigning the default ships).
Reading through some of the SGs and Imperia has inspired me to take a fresh look at the different races. I decided to see what the Meklars are all about. Are they destined to be stuck with a smaller, more productive empire, or can they translate their production bonus into accelerated expansion?
I designed a test. I started a medium, impossible, 2 AI game with the Bulrathis. I played the first 50 years, quitting in 2349; trying to use all the tricks I learned to maximize their growth--backfilling the homeworld with pop as the factories maxed, etc. I ignored the AI in terms of military or diplomacy, but I produced scouts and blockaded all the worlds in range (as I wanted to similate the start of any other game).
After recording my status using the Bulrathis, I used RaceEd to change my first turn save to Meklars. I ran four different tests with the Meklars to try to find the optimum way to grow and expand with them. I learned some valuable lessons for how to use the Meklars effectively.
1. Meklars can have 4 fact/pop instead of 2/pop like other races. This means that they will take much longer to max their worlds than anyone else, but then those worlds will be much more productive. The *most* important principle when playing with the Meklars---do NOT wait to max your planets before building colony ships, and doing other things. If you wait that long, sure you can produce the ships really fast, but the AIs will be way ahead of you in terms of grabbing planets. Also, you don't want to be producing a colony ship every turn when you only have the first two worlds! There is no way that you'll be able to transfer enough pop from your 2nd colony to fill all your new ones (since HW is maxed and can't be used to send settlers).
2. Meklars have in indirect population bonus. How? Let me explain. I followed the moves from my Bulrathi game exactly in my Meklars game up until 2323. This resulted in exactly the same pop/fact totals on both planets. But instead of shipping colonists from my first colony back to the homeworld as I did in my Bulrathi game, to max it out, I didn't bother in the Meklar game. This was because in 2327, the homeworld was at 88 pop/207 fact, yet still had unemployment due to the Meklars controls bonus. They don't need to max the population to work 200+ factories. So the 2nd colony is better off, having not had to ship any pop to the homeworld. Also, the Meklars can use their homeworld to send out settlers. If you stop at around 200 (or a little more) factories, you'll have basically the same production as the standard races, but you can drop your homeworld back into the 50-60 pop range when filling colonies without idling factories. That means you can keep your homeworld in the good growth range throughout your initial expansion phase (until you're ready to max the homeworld). All of the test games I ran with the Meklars ended with more population than the Bulrathi game, because the Bears stopped growing their homeworld. So the Meklars increased controls allow you to keep all your planets growing through the early game. This gives them an overall boost to population.
3. Meklars require more planning and decision-making. With the Bears, I started building colony ships when the HW maxed. I switched the 2nd colony to research when they reached 100 factories (it was a 100 terran), so that they could transport all colonist above 50 when filling new colonies. Meklars don't have any such signals to tell the player when to change from factories to ships and tech. The player has to weigh the benefits of changing out from factory spending to other priorities.
Summary: Meklars can be used by experienced players to gain indirect pop bonuses during expansion. This can make the Meklars an above average race for expansion. My recommendation would be to take the HW to 220 factories before building colony ships if you expect to be able to do lots of expansion. This allows you to transfer down to 55 pop to fill colonies from the homeworld before idling factories. You can use this to put higher than normal numbers of settlers on new colonies to enable them to ramp up faster. They will also pass the 1/2 pop point earlier, and will able to send excess population to new worlds over shorter distances. Try to keep factories growing on the 2nd colony as much as possible, and when it gets to around 200, it can take over ship building and give the homeworld time to max (or double the rate of ship building if needed). Figuring out where to fund research is tricky. One option is to put back-line colonies (esp. poor or ultra-poor) on research until your HW and core colonies to keep more in factory construction. Remember, the Meklars will almost never run out of unemployed to man new factories, you need to force yourself to put resources into research.
If anyone is interested in more details, and/or the save file I used, let me know and I'll try my hand at an AAR or upload the file.
--OlorinStormcrow
