RBGC SG2 - In the Thick of It - TEAM N

This is a succession game sponsored by Realms Beyond. In a succession game, members of a team take turns at the helm of a single player game, playing a specified number of turns before passing the game to the next player. This game will involve three teams, each playing with a different stragetic slant toward a different victory condition, each on the same map from the same start file. Our team in this thread is the Neutral Team. We will be playing Galactic Civilizations with the following specifications:

Version: 1.13
Difficulty: Crippling (All Genius AI's)
Map Size: Medium
Habitability: Occasional
Star Clusters: Scattered
Political Party: Universalists
Bonus Picks: 3 picks Sensors and Range, 1 pick Influence, Repair, Trade, Weapons
Victory: All conditions enabled

24 hours "got it" notification
48 total hours to play and report a turn
Twelve Turns (one year) per player.
Autoturn: On.
Changeover: At the beginning of the first turn of each year.


VARIANT RULES:

Team N will aim to remain neutral and must win by Culture.

Team N must finish with alignment between 40 and 60.

Additional variant rules may be added as the team agrees, with the approval of team captain Zed.


TEAM N:

Zed-F (Team Captain)
Walker
Cheng
G-Force


Active participants will not view the threads of the other teams until their game has been concluded. We ask spectators to maintain an ettiquette of no spoilers. PLEASE do not say anything about what is going on with the other teams, or if you download the games to try to "follow along at home", please do not mention any elements of that until the team has completed the game. This will best protect the quality of the competition and the fun factor for those doing the playing. Thank you for your cooperation.

Here are links for those who may be interested in GalCiv or Realms Beyond.

Galactic Civilizations

Realms Beyond

RBGC Forum (Feel free to decline any ad-related promptings).

Recruitment Thread for Realms Beyond players, at Stardock's forum.

RB Metaverse Empire

This round of games includes guests from other Metaverse Empires, who are welcome to post links to their resources and introductory information about their groups. We hope everybody playing and watching has a good time with us.

After posting procedural instructions for our newcomers, and uploading the start file, I will depart this thread and not return until my team, Team G, has completed our game. I now leave this thread in the capable and experienced hands of Zed-F, Neutral team captain. Good luck!


- Sirian

These directions are lengthy, but I wanted to cover every step for those who may need the detailed help. Feel free to skip any or all of this post and refer back to it only as you need directions.


PROCEDURES


How to Play Your Turn

Each player plays one year, twelve month-long turns. Your turn starts and ends in January of each game year. After you move all of your active ships in December, your last month in office, the game moves to January. You should issue new build orders through the production cycle, as that is still part of your turn, but as soon as production ends and the calendar shows January of the next year, save your turn with all ships unmoved and pass the game on to the next player.

Each team will have its own saved game. You may want to save a second copy after your turn under a different name, to have a backup. For the main copy, save over the same game name as you received.


How to take Screen Shots

Since we are playing in Windows, you can use the PrntScrn key at any time while playing to dump the screen to the clipboard. You may then Alt-Tab or use the Windows key to reach your desktop. Open a graphics program of your choice and paste the image from the clipboard into a file and save it. It is a good idea to use jpegs, which save on file space and which download faster. Using moderate jpeg compression will further save space without compromising a lot of image quality. After you are done playing your turn, you should crop your screenshots, saving only the most relevant portions of the image, to reduce the image size to get rid of unnecessary portions and keep only the parts that are relevant to supporting your report.


Naming Convention for Files

In order to ensure that files of one team do not conflict with files of the other teams, each file should begin with the following identification: "rbgc2-g-" for the Good Team. Use "rbgc2-n-" for Neutral and "rbgc2-e-" for Team Evil. You can use your player name or the current game date to further identify files, and then whatever naming procedure you like for additional effect. The goal is to ensure that players do not use the same file names. The file server won't write over existing files, but if your upload is renamed because a file of that name already existed, you'll have to go the file server and track down the new file name.

Example: "rbgc2-g-2178ad-a.jpg" for the first screenshot for Team G from 2178AD.


How to Zip and Unzip the Saved Game

Using Winzip is recommended. Once the Altarian Prophecy expansion comes out, galciv saved games will be contained in one file, but for now, we have to deal with a folder. There are two elements you need to save. Both are readily identifiable. There's an index file "GameName.sav" where GameName is the name YOU used to save the game. There will also be a folder with your game's name, containing all the other save files. Saves are located under "Galactic Civilizations\Data\SavedGames\" wherever you have GalCiv installed. You want to zip the files with full path name included so that when files are unzipped, they can be quickly put into place without tedium.

When you unzip, the GameName.sav file, the index file, needs to go into the SavedGames directory. The folder containing all the other files goes there, too, but the files (all except the index file) have to be INSIDE that folder, or the game won't be able to find them. And each saved game has its own folder. You may want to unzip to a temporary folder, then copy and paste from there to the final destination, since the Full Path Name you receive may not match where you have your copy of GalCiv installed. I know it sounds complicated, but a little trial and error should help you figure it out if you are having trouble. You can use Windows Explorer or any other file management utility to look around and see where the files belong and how the folders are structured.

If each player uses the same saved game for outgoing games as incoming, then once you've successfully done this once, you'll have no trouble repeating the process for subsequent turns.


How to Upload Files to CivFanatics

At the bottom of each forum page are some banner ads, between which are sandwiched notifications and a row of links. You need to use the far right hand link, Upload File. This opens a new window where you can upload up to three files per window to the file server: just browse, select and go. That simple. You will get a confirmation message after the files are uploaded.


How to Use Uploaded Files

In your forum posts, you can link to images (anywhere on the net, frankly, but here on the CFC file server for our purposes) and to files using vB code. There are helpful shortcuts above the message window where you write your post. Click on IMG and then type in the URL of the image you want to show. Click on http:// and type in your link text, then the URL for your zip file containing your zipped saved game, to pass the baton to the next player.

I keep a utility text file on my desktop containing one line:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/

That's the URL of the current CFC File Server active folder. When it fills up, they'll close that one and open uploads7, etc. All I have to do to keep it current is keep the upload folder number current. Then any time I post a turn for an SG, I open my temp text file, copy the URL, and paste it into every IMG or http:// command I decide to use. With the folder address ready to paste, all I have to do then is type the correct filename. The IMG button will produce the commands to display your image file (screenshots, etc) and the http button will create a hyperlink for you.

This may sound like a lot to learn, but it's not really. You do it once or twice and you'll have it mastered, since the parts you have to take responsibility for are short and consistent. Once you know how, it becomes a piece of cake.

CFC will link anywhere, but since they offer a file server for use in combination with the forum (and it is primarily used to support modmakers and succession game players) you might as well use it. The ability to use images largely unregulated, and to upload saved game files, sets CFC apart as a unique site on the net. However, for all this hospitality, it is still in our interests to conserve space, so please crop your screenshots and choose wisely on which details you decide to illustrate.


Team N - 2178AD


- Sirian

Got all the rules, and eagerly await the start of the game!

G-Force

Hopefully I can get a start on this tonight.

Some proposed rules amendments:

• Maso-like tech selling restriction: This one I'm all for. This is a significant crutch for pre-maso difficulties and I don't particularily like to take advantage of it. While on Maso it is possible that other minors will buy tech, the usual scenario is that only Alex will do so, so that's what we will play here.
• Culture orientation: Of the 3 teams, we have the easiest victory condition to achieve. I think we ought to have some sort of variant rule that reflects our status as culture-mongers, to make things a bit harder. How about this one: we are a cosmopolitan empire and value diversity among our population, as we know diversity leads to improved trade opportunities. We may never invade an enemy planet to wipe out their citizens, or use terror stars to destroy one. All planets must be captured by culture flip. This will make early poaching significantly more problematic, making effective expansion and early influence wonders even more critical.

Comments? Anyone have other suggestions?

I'm ok with that, it will be my hardest game by far though.

The culture flip rule only affects my personal strategy against pop-up minors. I find poaching to be well... almost unethical.

Zed's rules are perfectly fine.

About random events: we should probably take the neutral path for all EXCEPT possibly for one that adds significantly to PQ when first colonizing a planet. Even if we take a 10pt hit, we'll still hopefully be at 40 and can redeem ourselves with a few positive morality choices.

Diplomacy and trading shall rule. We can get everything we want with a little bargaining. Our traders shall spread our suprerior culture into all sectors of the galaxy.

Let this old maxim guide us:
Violence is the last resort of the ignorant.

This will be the highest level of AI for me, all rules are good for me.

Happy gaming!!

G-Force

Bah. Tell that to the Carthaginians... if you can find any. Violence you see is usually the first resort of the ignorant... we are enlightened.

- "Waiter"
- "Sir"
- "Another 12oz Alterian steak, and remember the Drengin medallions"

Yes trade is essential, or how will we ever be able to achieve that right blend of ethnic flavour in our food...

That saying was from Isaac Asimov, and he meant it as to not resort to violence to solve your problems. He most likely meant it as, "Do not use violence, because there's almost always another solution." Therefore, only the ignorant would think that violence is a "last resort," while there may in fact be another option open.

Hmm, can't seem to access the file server to get our game start. Will have to try again tomorrow.

2178 AD, Pre-turn: Our empire, destined one day to form a hegemony of all races in a vast comercial empire, starts with a humble beginning of a single colony ship and a surveyor. Nevertheless we can already detect the influence of two alien races, the Torians and the Drengin. The Torians are to the galactic NW, while the Drengin are to the south. Thanks to our superior sensor technology, we are just able to determine that our closest neighbor star, to the SE, is a life-bearing world. That makes it an obvious candidate for early colonization.



Pic of Gladstone peeking out of the fog...



Jan 2178: Inherited from the save file, we have military production set to colony ship, spending set to 91% (all in military), and taxes to 37%. After fiddling with the sliders for a moment I concur with these settings, which will let us build a colony ship every 3 turns with maximal tax income at 100 morale. Our colony ship gets on its way, and I send our surveyor toward a clump of 3 planets to our north, with the intention of continuing NE from there. However it takes a slightly roundabout path in order to scout 1 or 2 planets to our west on its way north. Our nearest star to the SW is scouted and found to be inhospitable, and we spot a military resource to the NW.

Feb 2178: Our surveyor spots another habitable star system to our west; Rathra II is a habitability 19 planet. The other system in the sector to our immediate west only has a PQ10.

Apr 2178: We launch our 1st colony ship and start on a 2nd. The question is whether to send it to the known PQ19 planet in the west or gamble on something being available to our north (slightly further away) and follow up with a colony ship to the relatively close star to our west next. There is also the matter of potentially grabbing stuff in the unexplored west. In the balance I prefer to head to the known PQ19 in the west to further our exploration/colonization efforts in that direction. The next colony ship will head north-northeast. Our surveyor should be in range to begin scouting the stars there by then. Additionally, we settle Gladstone I and begin production of another colony ship there. Our surveyor explores an anomoly and gets +1% weapons tech.

May 2178: Altarian influence appears in the triple star cluster to our northeast. This doesn't mean they have settled there, but they may have settled two sectors to our northeast. We will have to be quick if we want to grab any territory to our north.

Jul 2178: In the sector to our NW, Unukalhai I is a class 14 planet, a good candidate for a small colony, while Shugar I is useless. This means that the Torians are likely stuck in their corner with nowhere to expand to until they get Controlled Gravity for range 3, as there are not many sectors containing potentially habitable stars within 2 of where I believe their homeworld to be, and I expect they will get beat to all of them. We complete our 2nd colony ship at Sol and send it northeast, with the option to turn north if we discover a potential colony site in that direction. Our surveyor gets +4 hit points (not very useful, but I wanted to see what Shugar had and that anomoly happened to be in the square I needed to go to.)

Aug 2178: Our surveyor discovers a +2% morale anomaly. Wardell II, to our north, is a class 16 planet. Our +sensors pick is proving to be worth it so far this game, as our surveyor is able to take an efficient route and learn about quite a lot of planets while still picking up all the best anomalies we've spotted so far.

Sep 2178: Gladstone I completes its first colony ship and starts on another. There is Drengin influence to our south, and not many stars in those sectors. By the time our colony ship can get to any of the systems 2 sectors south of Sol, I expect the Drengin will have already settled that region out. There is one star in the sector east of Gladstone that might have a useful planet, and it's fairly close by. With our increased scouting range, I pull a slightly tricky move; rather than launch with a minimum complement to keep Gladstone I at around 100 pop, I take nearly half the planetary pop. If I don't see a good planet in that system, I can turn around and land at Gladstone III almost immediately, quite possibly on the same turn. This will let me get 2 colony ships going at once out of Gladstone. It turns out that the Petroni system has both a class 15 and a class 19 planet! I send the colony ship to Petroni. I would like to land on Petroni I (class 15) and send a more heavily loaded colony ship from Sol to Petroni II (class 19), but I think Sol will be busy sending colony ships in other directions for a while, so I plan to land on Petroni II and let the population build on its own. Moreover, we can always build a colony ship out of Petroni and re-land it in the same system at Petroni II to move some of the pop from Petroni I to Petroni II if necessary. We also colonize Rathra II. No morality events so far.

Oct 2178: We complete a 3rd colony ship out of Sol. Our surveyor gets espionage +5%, and spots planetless Sitlet to our north, completing our exploration of that sector's stars. Our colony ship heading NE toward Altarian space spots Thindor, which has no habitable stars. The question to be asked is whether that colony ship should continue NE looking for other habitable stars, or turn NW and head for Wardell II. In the former case Sol's just-completed colony ship could head for Wardell, but at a delay of 3 turns from where this colony ship could get there. I don't have to make the decision until next turn; for now I hedge my bets and send Sol's ship with 200 on it NW. It can turn SW later if our NE colony ship needs to make a left turn and head for Wardell. Torian influence has spread to 2 sectors to the west of Sol, which may mean they have now got the range to colonize regions to our SW. Our colony at Rathra II will need another 3 months to pop out a colony ship, so it may need some help from Sol if we are to get our share of the planets in that direction, assuming that help doesn't arrive too late.

Nov 2178: Our surveyor discovers that Nesro I to the NE of Sol has a class 14 planet, no need to rush there since the AI will not settle those right away. Our NE-bound colony ship decides to take one extra turn to head NE off the optimal flight path to Wardell in order to scout the last star in that system, thereby letting us know whether the colony ship just out of Sol will need to turn SW or NE. We colonize Petroni II.

Dec 2178: The last star in the NE sector is Thuban, with Thuban III being class 18! Our NE-bound ship continues straight there. Now, what about our NW-bound ship, should it go for Wardell III or head SW looking for habitable planets in that direction, and let the next ship out of Sol head for Wardell? It is hard to judge whether Wardell is in more danger from the Torians/Altarians or whether we need to increase our presence in the west first. My gut says to head for Wardell, a bird in the hand being better than two in the bush, especially since we are due to have a ship out of Rathra next turn anyway. However, for this turn I continue NW, and leave that decision up to the next leader. This ship needs to make a decision as to which way to go at the start of next year, however, in order to not lose any turns arriving at its target -- it is now on a direct line for Wardell, if it turns NE.



End-of-year notes for next leader: The colony ship due SW of Wardell needs to either head straight for Wardell or turn SW and scout for planets to colonize. Sol and Rathra have just completed colony ships, go ahead and launch these and start looking for places to land! I recommend launching Sol's with about 200m pop and Rathra's with whatever you feel it can spare; at this rate there's bound to be another class 15 or two to our west. Gladstone and Petroni are about to complete another colony ship apiece (Gladstone sooner.) The safe option is to use these to populate the second class 15+ planet in their respective systems; the gambit move is to send the Gladstone one SW and the Petroni one SE, each with about 20m pop on them, looking for more systems further away to colonize. The Gladstone one could head towards a single-star system one sector SW of Gladstone and proceed west or southwest from there if that one's not habitable, and seems like a good move. The Petroni one is a bit riskier given that we don't know where the Arceans or Yor are; at least one is likely to be in the SE corner of the map, meaning that the best you'll likely find out that way is a PQ13-14 planet if there happens to be one in a sector with no AI presence. Don't settle within the same sector as an AI; our culture is not (yet) to the point where we can get away with those sorts of shenanigans.

Here is the save: http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/rbgc2-n-2179ad.zip

Good luck!

Zed-F << Done
Walker << UP NOW
Cheng << On deck
G-Force

Got it.

Wardell it is for sure. As you said on in the hand is better. I think it is close to the time for us to shift production a bit, but I'll have a close look at the save before that.

Surveying the Imperial Star Map Emperor Walker the First is pleased. The imperial subjects have done well and his predecessor had an almost magical ability to find beautiful planets for the Human race to expand into. The overall galactic position is a bit awkward due to the rather unpleasant and violent folk to the Galactic South.

An Imperial Secret Police Colonel steps into Walker the First's presence.

- "We have disturbing news, your Imperial Majesty"
- "Well spit it out son, we don't have all day, the aliens are out there hunting for the same planets we are."
- "It's Mr. Ford, emperor. He seems to be sending out coded messages into space describing our social and economic planning. Nothing critical yet, your majesty, we caught him before we put into place any of our secret projects."
- "Mr. Ford, a traitor to the Empire! He is one of our finest govenors, he ran the American continent before my predecessor put him in charge of the colonies."
- "The evidence is incontrovertible your majesty, we have the data logs."
- "Place him in custody and place Ms. Kolaz in charge of the colonies. We need to find a fitting punishment for traitors Colonel Kali, when you find one, bring it to my attention. Now I need to attend to our fleets."

Jan 2179:
- All planets have their Govenor switched to Ms. Kolaz, Mr. Ford is rather treacherous and has been placed in custody for selling our building plans to various Aliens. We are still looking for a "Final Solution" to our traitor problem.
- Colonized Thuban - Set production to colony ship (Nesro PQ14)
- Sent Colony ship to Wardell
- Colony ship from Earth w/ 100M -> 2-6
- Colony ship from Rathra w/ 50M -> 1-4 Spots Weber w/ PQ7 in 2-5

Feb 2179:
- Gladstone I Produces a Colony Ship which immediately colonizes Gladstone III with 40M - Both are set to constructors.

- "Your Imperial Majesty, on Gladstone III there seem to be some parasite pods which can increase the population's intelligence in return for excruciating pain. Do you wish to force their usage on the colony, your majesty?"
- "No need for extremes Mr. Brown, we would of course encourage people to acccept the parasite, but there is no call for force."
- "As you say your Majesty"

- Gladstone III gets a +14% Research Bonus

- Taxes are adjusted for morale purposes.

March 2179:
- Our Western colony ship spots Westerfeld with no planets and there are now only five planets left in a reasonable colonization area.

"I feared for my legacy. It looked grim. We needed more planets."
- His Imperial Majesty Walker the First commenting to GNN in December 2179.

Apr 2179:
- Colony Ship Produced at Earth 600M -> Petroni - Another Colony ship for Rathra is started.
- Colony Ship Produced at Petroni II 20M -> Petroni I

Colonel Kali steps into the Imperial Control Room.
- "I think we have found a solution for our Mr. Ford, your Majesty."
- "You have my full attention Col. Kali."
The predatory smile makes the techs working in the control room blanch.
- "On our new colony of Petroni I we discovered a precursor artifact. It allows us to improve the habitability of the planet in return for some... sacrifices."
- "I assume these sacrifices do not involve the people returning to us damaged, this is a permanent solution Col. Kali?"
- "Yes, your majesty, quite permanent."
- "Excellent, Mr. Ford can be our first volunteer. I suggest we only use volunteers and criminals. It should be an efficient but not overly harsh solution. You understand - cripples, the terminally ill, mentally ill and so on. The unproductive ones."



- Petroni gains 4% PQ - Starts producing constructor
- Colonize Wardell - Set to produce constructor

Assistant Sensor technician Holloway twitches in his seat as he stares at his screen. It's late, as the fresh meat on the ship he pulled the worst shift of course. For the last couple of months, always around 0300 when his eyes start to slip he spots odd signatures on the peripheral sensors. Nothing definate, nothing absolute - just a vague signature. He mentioned it to Lt. Ashford the head of the department - he just laughed it off as midnight delusions and asked him to perform a full systems diagnostic on the sensors on his next five shifts.
0335 - The screen suddenly lights up and there is a clear ship signature at extreme range. Same signature as before, same strength, just a different heading. Holloway slams his fist onto the panel. "Told him so, I told him so!" He calls up to the bridge.
- ''It looks like we have a bogey at extreme range, I'm pulling in more data as we peak. It looks like it is Altarian. To bulky for a Survey, I'm looging this as a colony ship, is that ok sir?"
- "Looks right from the data. Carry on Holloway, excllent work."

- Our Surveyor spots an Altarian colony ship to the Galactic NE, no contact is made.
- Taxes are adjusted -> 42% for 100% Morale we are currently loosing 46 BC per turn.

May 2179:

Production:
Colony Ship @ Rathra 50M -> 1-5 ->Colony ship
Colony Ship @ Thuban 10M -> Nesro PQ14 -> Scout

Wardell is changed to Scout
Gladstone II is changed to Scout

- "Sir, sir you have to see this!"
- "Calm down Lt. Samadh, there is no hurry."
- "No, no you have to see this, it is absolutely incredible!"
The captain of the colony ship walks over the the sensor display. He looks once at the data. Does a double take, and his jaw just drops.



- Dester discovered with three Habitables PQ 15, 18 and 19 and the colony ship heads straight for it. :jump:

- Our Southern colony ship spots Markus in 2-6 with PQ16, 14 and 13 and bee-lines for it.

- Taxes adjusted.

June 2179:

The Drengin got to Markus before us, and with their speed (3)they may beat us to some of the Western planets. Markus now has a PQ20, so the Drengin must have found a significant PQ bonus.

Production:
Scout @ Gladstone III -> Constructor
Rathra changes to constructor.

- Colonize Nesro PQ14 - Constructor

-"M'am, there are worms down there. They seem to be eating resources and sverely affecting the growth potential of any agriculture on the planet."
- "I'll contact the emperor and see what we do".
Minutes later...
- "Emperor Walker the First, the colony ship Ymir here, we have run into a slight problem here on Nesro. There are large numbers of worms here. Major worms, a la Arrakis. They seem to be reducing the available habitat for us. We need orders."
- "My dear Captain, it is simple. Send in the Imperial Storm Troopers. Kill them all."



- Nesro is now PQ 18 (30% Bonus) and needs another colony ship from Thuban.

- The Southern colony ship -> 1.5
- Scout goes east into empty space

- To be continued.

July 2179

Production:
Scout @ Wardell sent West towards Torian space -> Scout

- Colonize Dester III where we find some ancient ruins which we carefully clear so that there is more space for us (Neutral Choice). Production set to colony ship.
- Spot Jotunheim in 0-5 - Two planets PQ 10&5
- Taxes Adjusted

August 2179

Production:
Colony Ship @ Earth 600M -> Rathra

It really looks like the Drengin are going to beat us to 5.1

September 2179

The Drengin turn back! This of course means that the last couple of planets are not PQ 15+

Production:
Colony Ship @ Rathra 150M -> Dester
Colony Ship @ Thuban 150M -> Nesro

Colony ship 600M arrives at Petroni II
Surveyor finds 1% soldier bonus anomaly.

- "It is time"
- "Are you sure Emperor?"
- "Yes it is time to call a halt to military production, we are falling behind in the technological race and we need to develop our planets."
- "A full freeze to new production of ships?"
- "Yes a full freeze. We will adjust after the last two unknown planets have been confirmed and only the Dester system has uncolonized habitable planets. And if the two planets prove to be duds we can shif those two over to Dester."
- "Brilliant Emperor!"
- "Fool - Col. Kali, take this sycophant to Petroni I, please."
- "A blind duck could have seen that move."

- Social 60%
- Tech 40% Comm Theory - Next Turn

October 2179

Technology:
Communications Theory

- Social 75%
- Tech 25% - Universal Translators - Next Turn

- Colony Ship arrives at Nesro.

- Taxes Adjusted

November 2179

Technology:
Universal Translator

- Social 40%
- Tech 60% - Diplomacy - Next Turn

I decided to go straight for trade, even as the Drengin have Diplomacy. We might beat them to Trade, although I doubt it. With our low diplomacy rating I wouldn't be able to trade with the medical techs, so I figure get our trade up and running as soon as possible. With the Drengin and Altarians close we need to establish trade with them quickly.

Survey finds 1% Weapons bonus and we see the Arceans to the South East.

December 2179

The Altarians contact us. They are way ahead in techs, and have about the same as the Drengin.

- "Emperor are you sure you wish to abdicate?"
- "Yes, it is time to move on from this form of government, I think an Interstellar Republic led by the Universalist cause would be the best for now."
- "Sire, I will arrange the press conferance"

Technology:
Diplomacy and we change to Republic and set research to Trade.

- Our western explorer finds Vesta a two planet system with a PQ 20!

- The Yor are spotted to the Galactic North East.

- Our western colony ship (50M) heads for Vesta, it will need a filler ship from Earth later if the Republic so desires.

- Our southern colony ship (100M) is heading into 1-5 to check out the lone planet just in case. If it doesn't find anything worthwhile it just heads to Dester.

- Our central colony ship (600M) is bound for Rathra.

- I add Banking Centres and Entertainment Networks to the build queue.

- Taxes Adjusted for 100% morale

Interim to January 2180

- The Torians and Carinoids (SE) contacted us.
- Election won with 87 seats.
- Trade was developed.

- And the Drengin military is twic that of everyone else.





That is the state of the galaxy and our planets at the end of Pro Consul and Ex-Emperor Walker the First's term of office.

Advice:

- We are bleeding cash as our productivity is high and the empire is large. Budget stabilization through trade and building those banking centres is going to be important.
- I'm not sure if further major population movements are a good idea right now, even though 500M to Dester and Vesta is really tempting. The transit time will hurt quite a bit.
- We are currently below 50 due to my choice of events. We really need to get to 51. Below 50 the Altarians will punt on us quickly, at 51 the Drengin and Yor couldn't care less, but the Altarians stay friendlier.
- You have four contacts, figure out what they don't have and research along those lines. Trading is going to be key until we have parity.

Comments?

Zed-F
Walker << Done
Cheng << Next
G-Force << On Deck

In Closing:

The former Emperor is resplendant in the all black uniform of the Republican Ground Forces.

"Citizens of the Republic. We have come far, we have secured ourselves several systems in the last two years, but our voage of exploration and discovery has barely begun. There are Aliens out there, or to rephrase that... There are markets out there, and we want to be sure we are in charge, and not some scummy Drengin on enslaved Torians. We need to be pragmatic and strong to ensure the survival of the human race in this hostile galaxy. Go forth, do your best and fight for a strong human race!"

Wild Applause - He raises his hands and motions for silence.

"As you can tell I have decided to step down from office. It is a dynamic galaxy, and a fresh perspective is always good. I have decided to also step down as the head of the Universalist party. In stead I will go back to my old job as a general in humanity's armies and will be in charge of the garrison on our newest acquisition - Vesta!"

And that was all he said for now...

Savegame here http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/rbgc2-n-2179ad.zip

Very interesting. I'm on deck and awaiting orders

G-Force

Originally posted by Kabuki
Advice:

- We are bleeding cash as our productivity is high and the empire is large. Budget stabilization through trade and building those banking centres is going to be important.
- I'm not sure if further major population movements are a good idea right now, even though 500M to Dester and Vesta is really tempting. The transit time will hurt quite a bit.
- We are currently below 50 due to my choice of events. We really need to get to 51. Below 50 the Altarians will punt on us quickly, at 51 the Drengin and Yor couldn't care less, but the Altarians stay friendlier.
- You have four contacts, figure out what they don't have and research along those lines. Trading is going to be key until we have parity.

Comments?

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Looks like a solid turn. I'll also point out that researching Habitat should be a priority as well -- the higher the PQ of a planet, the more taxes you get from it, which should also help with the cash-flow. I found it interesting that you were already bent on equalizing our pop from Earth out to other major planets; normally I wait until considerably later to do that sort of thing. I tend to find my low-PQ worlds are more of a limiter on how high I can push taxes than my high-PQ worlds. In this instance, though, Earth is PQ18 but we have several PQ19+ worlds around, so what you have done so far in that regard makes some sense. Nevertheless, I agree that further spreading the pop around is probably not the best plan due to the transit time.

Got it.

Edit: The link to the savefile for 2180AD is wrong, it's actually the link to the 2179AD savefile. However, Walker uploaded the file onto the server, so I just had to enter the link manually and did in fact get the savegame.

I found it interesting that you were already bent on equalizing our pop from Earth out to other major planets; I tend to find my low-PQ worlds are more of a limiter on how high I can push taxes than my high-PQ worlds. In this instance, though, Earth is PQ18 but we have several PQ19+ worlds around, so what you have done so far in that regard makes some sense. Nevertheless, I agree that further spreading the pop around is probably not the best plan due to the transit time.

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It was not something I normally do, I generally only dump people off Earth if I have significantly (PQ 20 or higher) better planets relatively close. In this case, since there was only the one military resource in range it kept morale high and gave us three high pop planets. Also Petroni was a two planet system which I was hoping to use as our main trading hub. Now however Dester will be significantly better later in the game as it has three good planets and is farther away from everyone but the Torians.

I think we'll find out if I was hobbit weed or not in a couple of turns.

All my colony ships tend to only have at most 70M on them, generally 50, 20 or 1, so seeing the 200M advice was an eye opener for me and on this map it was good. I think I have a bad habit after all my rare maps in trying to push my difficulty up.

I'll also point out that researching Habitat should be a priority as well -- the higher the PQ of a planet, the more taxes you get from it, which should also help with the cash-flow.

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Should be available in two turns and as I haven't seen anyone with Medical techs it is good for trading as well.

200M is a good number in that at the start of the game, with Earth at 1B pop and building colony ships every 3 turns, you grow about 200M in the time it takes to build a colony ship. This way you don't have to worry about adjusting taxes or spending much in the early going 'cause as soon as your planet starts getting a little bigger you just reset it to where you were to begin with. 200M is a good starting pop for a class15+ planet as well as it allows you to send off small colony ships to PQ13-14 planets on a similar basis without digging into your original 200M settlers.

The only concern I have with splitting up the pop as you have is I'm not sure what impact it will have on the wonder race. I normally have one big producer where I build my Manufacturing Capital that builds the majority of the wonders, and I want lots of pop there so I can build them quickly. The fact that our pop is spread out so much in this case will dilute the usefulness of our manufacturing capital. We'll see how this plays out, however; it could still work to our advantage.

That was my concern as well, except I actually fingered Petroni for the Manufacturing Capital, with the 1PQ higher it makes a little bit of difference, add the extra planet in the system and it's a sure thing IMO. I was seriously considering taking 1B out of Earth for Petroni, but the distance made me decide against it.