MOO2 playing as all 13 standard races, again

[neilkaz]

This is take 2 for me playing as all 13 standard races again. Hopefully, this time, I'll be able to win all 13 games , but seriously I expect to lose a couple of them at least as things get bad quickly when using the weaker races and if I roll a bad start.

All games will be on my typical Cluster Map and Impossible, PreWarp, 8 players and if I roll a bad start...too bad I have to keep it. I'll start with the easier races first as I am a tad rusty. Perhaps some other players would also like to try this.

Silicoids are clearly the easiest standard race for my production oriented style to win with as Lithovore and Tolerant are an awesome combo. Starting out I can have either 24 production or 24 research or any combo of and no worry about pollution nor saving up production. No worry about early freighters to ship food to my colonies although I will want them to transport people to other systems and I'll need to feed conquered planets. Anyhow, I played Coid last night.

Yuck, my starting system only had one other planet and it was poor. I still wanted to get rolling quickly so I sold my SB which I don't need yet and like with any other production race, I will build colony bases first. After 4 turns I had 104 production remaining and it didn't cost much more than twice that ammount so I bought the base and started my research path (computer, research labs, build labs (usually buying when half built as $$ permits) then reinforced hull and factories and build them (hopefully buying when half built). Then the basic techs so I can get out 2 scouts and then build colony ship(s).

Silicoid -50% growth can really slow you down, but I can overcome some of that with pop-1 housing early on so I set my lone colonist on the new planet to housing while I waited to research to build labs. In retrospect the gain per turn from housing was so small that I think I'd have been better off researching with the lone colonist until I had a factory built. With a factory built I was able to make a new colonist once every 7.5 turns and transfer him over to my home world while continuing pop-1 housing.

One of my scouts died quickly at a nice monster planet and another found Kronos, a good leader with Galactic lore. Hmmm.. boxed in ..Humans to my left, but they seem to want to play nice and Trilarians above me don't seem aggressive. Lizards to my right and their allready at war with the Bugs to their right. Lizards seem to be the uber-race here with added attributes of tolerant and high-G and no wonder they are doing well quickly.

I colonized two nearby systems and each soon made a colony base so I had 6 planets and in each of three systems, one planet initially doing pop-1 housing with factories and lab in each system for a while and soon I had reasonable overall population. Now it was time to get ready for combat and if I don't have some ships the AI's will view me as weak and attack. So I research Deut cells (I felt I could wait for Zort armor later for armor,as I wasn't in combat yet) and Merc missiles and rebuilt my star base at home and had my Nuke 18 (battle ship with MV nukes) out by just after turn 100. I couple turns prior the Lizards had made peace with the Bugs and sure enough a Sakkra CC was headed toward one of my systems, but a rush built DD with 5 MV nukes ended that problem. The Humans and Trilarians had a brief war and traded planets and didn't seem concerned with me so it was full speed after the Saks.

One BB and one or two more DD's were plenty enough to destroy their SB's and even MB's that they had on planets. Soon I took all three planets in their closest system and none of them warm farming planets and I had many hungry purple lizards to feed and ended up with my home world entirely devoted to farming after a while. As I progressed thru Sak systems he some had Battlestations but I had added another two more battle ships and easily destroyed them.

I had a few spies and noticed the human had battle scanner so I took a chance and got a quick steal in a couple of turns and he tolerated it. Now I could get Tachyon Comm and the CP gain and not go without battle scanner later and this helped me afford more ships and transports as did the Battlestations I upgraded to on a few planets (ground troop steal from Saks).

Onward to Sssla and soon I had a big population of very talented and fast growing Sakkra slaves and I spread their goodness to a couple of other systems as except for needing food, they were a better race than my own. As usual, I also had a bunch of stolen techs. Now I could crank out more ships and research and had Zort armor so it was time to upgrade my ships to Merc 18's and go after the Trilarians, Humans and nearby Orion. I soon had EMG and left a couple EMG DD's back in Lizard Land to hopefully not leave me open to Klackon ambush. The races below me seemed to be fighting and trading planets back and forth.

On 213 I went after Orion with 3 Merc 18 BB's and 6 EMG 2 Merc DD's. The Guardian killed two DD's with his first shot and my first salvo of EMG's didn't kill him even though my Mercs easily knocked his front shields down. Darn lightning field so I had to face a 2nd attack from him. On my turn after knocking the shields down again, I was able to move an EMG DD right next to the Guardian and poof...engines blown.

Yes..beloved Xent armor so refit ships and to war while letting Locknar's ship defend Orion for a while so it could build up. Trilarians died easily and Humans offered little resistance. Hmmm...I didn't have enough defense for Sssla (my mistake) with one DD and even though I now had Weather Controllers, much of that pop 30 planet was farming to feed my conquered empires so it was slow building the SB and I failed to see the Bugs ambush.. bye bye Sssla but he didn't DOW me until I counterattacked with Locknar's ship and a couple Merc ships and Death Ray ships a few turns later. Locknar could easily kill 3 enemy ships/turn and teleport up to the SB, blast it with Death Rays killing all marines (deselected earlier) and board and take it over.

As I was rolling up the Klackons the GC vote came up on turn 251...hmm 34 votes is more than 2/3 of 48 so this easy game was over. By conquering most enemy planets with transports, I steal many techs and get a big population built up and easy wins in the GC, speeding up the game if I want to. I was completely dominant by that time and with autolabs all over and two Death Ray Titans just produced.

A couple things about Advanced Gov't for dictatorships which I'd researched a few turns before the game ended. That +20 moral everywhere is very nice! Defensive agent bonus only goes from +10 to +15% however. Psionics, of course was very useful with +10 moral and +10 spying helping to make sure my Orion techs weren't stolen. My own spying was early as I stole a couple from the Humans (democracies have agent penalty) and a couple from the Saks as they have -10 spying and after that there wasn't much I needed to steal and a couple spies had died so I just concentrated on keeping what my accelerating research was providing.

Next game in a week when I return from vacation.... not sure who I'll play. .. neilkaz ..

 

[scratchthepitch]

Sounds like it was a fun game. A couple of comments:

Strange the Guardian went after your destroyers. Mostly I now use missile armed destroyers to attack it, but a few times I loaded up a cruiser or 3 with missiles and sent them along with the destroyers. The Guardian went after the cruisers. When it was just destroyers, the guardian always went after the regular missile armed ones, and left the EMG armed ones alone. I figured the AI attacked the cruisers or regular missile armed destroyers because these had more missile launchers than the EMG destroyers and the AI didn't figure in modifications to weapons when sizing up who was the greatest threat.

The Avenger is almost a fleet all in itself, especially if you capture Orion early. A tactic I've used is first have ships armed with enveloping beams peel the shield from the battlestation. Then use the Avenger's SS tele to approach it and blast it with one or both of it's death rays. I then move the Avenger next to the battlestation and the planet, board and capture the battlestation. Next I attack the planet and remove it's bases using bombs from the Avenger and if that's not enough (it usually is), use the battlestation's weapons to finish the job. The rest of my fleet then goes after the ships. When it was just a battlestation and planet bases, I've sent the Avenger in on its own and seen it capture the planet in a single turn.

 

[neilkaz]

The Avenger has a couple of death rays so I turn them off initially and blast what ever else I want to with its other weapons and then I teleport up to the star base or battlestation and blast it with death rays, killing all marines and then board it without opposition. The Avenger is a fabulous weapon even past turn 300 (prewarp).

Game 2, I played as Klackon, also a nice production race but not as easy to play as Silicoid, IMHO. Accounting for pollution, Kholdan could initially produce 22 PP/turn so I sold my SB and after 5 turns bought my first colony base and the researched freighters, built one and then onward to labs and as usual for a production race. My third home planet was only pop 1 and basically useless until I had biospheres so I didn't build the 2nd col. base til later. I used pop 1 housing in new systems after making labs and factories to help grow for a while.

Being non-creative, I didn't have autofactories but was soon able to trade for them with my Trilarian friends. I'd spawned near the upper right and was able to grab a couple new systems and things progressed well as I researched up to Merc missiles and started a Nuke 18 battleship.

I guess Cats don't like Ants as they were never friendly and soon attacked. My Nuke 18 was ready and in place and easily repulsed them. I traded for Deut Fuel cells to reach them and made a few transports and soon had one Kitty planets and slaves. I made another Nuke 18 and more transports and soon I had 4 planets of kitty-slaves and that was all of them.

Those Cats had spawned to the right of center and along the right edge were the Bears. Noting that they'd basically have no where to go but thru my empire, they had to be my next victim. My 3rd Nuke 18 was soon ready and noting how good Bear ground troops are, I made transports from two planets for and my production proved to be too much for the Bears. Four more slave planets for me, and again some nice stolen techs including supercomps which I built everywhere. Spies managed to steal a couple more techs incuding atmos. renewer and tachyon comm so I had little CP issues.

Now it was about turn 190 and with no threats in the right 40% of the galaxy I colonized a couple more systems and was growing huge. Trilarians just to the left of top center and humans below them were both my friends with treaties and NAP's. Trilarians wanted to ally, but I didn't want to get drawn into their silly skirmishes, often for a turn vs Humans and then they'd make peace. Humans were doing rather well and as often, had lots of tech.

Two more chem techs finished and now I upgraded my Nuke 18's to Merc 18's (BB's with battle pods, reinforced hulls, and 18 FU non-EMG mercs). Now it was time to research my beloved EMG and then autolabs, both of which were luckily available to my non-creative race. Mmmm six yummy looking Bird populated planets near the bottom edge and it seemed clear that he couldn't stop my fleet so after him I went. I took two systems and while I was conquering the third and not paying proper attention , those Birds allied with the humans who soon broke the NAP and attacked the middle of my empire "honoring its alliance" hitting me mostly in my conquered Cat systems . I managed to rush build some EMG 2's (Destroyers) and along with star bases (no one I could trade with had missile bases) caused him some casualties. I had 4 nice planets destroyed (causing me some CP issues from lost SB's) until I could get enough heavy ships to end the threat. I'd also allied the Trilarians, but they'd always instantly make peace with the Humans after I told them to go to war.

I couldn't pull away from the battle with the Birds for fear of them counterattacking as the tried a couple of times. Anyhow, turn 225 and Birds are gone and I set my sights on Orion, right next to the large Human Empire. On turn 233, Orion was mine (thx EMG Mercs) and I got the perfect haul of techs along with Death Ray..X-armor (a godsend since my only available armor was Trit), and reflection and damper fields both of which I use.

Time to refit ships, add a couple with Death Rays (noting my missile ships were becoming less effective) and build up economically. I also recolonized a couple planets while teching as I now had autolabs all over. Into the humans I went with The Avenger and some support and many tranports resulting in more stolen techs. Spies took a couple more from him. At turn 251, it almost seemed that I was creative as I had so many techs and I just missed winning the GC vote.

At turn 271 the GC vote came up again, and by then I'd conquered 3/4 of the Human Empire and had enough votes to win, ending a reasonably easy game. By taking planets with ground troops, my population and planet totals get big quickly and this results in GC wins. Non-creative can be a major drag, but once you get rolling it is critical to be able to steal techs via ground conquest and if a race has poor spy techs, your spies can score a few more techs. I did try to take a couple human ships with assault shuttles, but they'd just retreat them.

 

[scratchthepitch]

Sounds like the Mrrshans and Humans did well in that game (though not quite as well as the Klackons ), poor Alkari, they never seem to get anywhere. In most of my stock games, races like Mrrshans and Humans usually had small, weak empires, while Sakkras, Trilarians and Klackons usually ran amok.

 

[neilkaz]

Game 3, I went with Psilons for some techie fun. I am better and more experienced at playing production races than tech races and unlike the Coid and Klack games, I nearly lost this one. I recall that an early patch to MOO2 raised Creative to 8 picks from 6 and somewhat nerfed the Psilons compared to what they are described as in the few remaining sites that describe the original race.

I spawned with a decent 4 planet system somewhat to the left of the top center of the galaxy. To my left was an empty system and then a monster planet with a nearby nebula. Two of my planets were normal G and my Low G planet was Poor and small. I noted a neblula near my right and one other system (Parma with 3 planets). Below me was Nir, a system with a decent planet and a UP planet. To the right of Nir was a system with mediocre, at best, planets and then below Nir was Orion, more off center than normal. This would seem like a great location for Psilons to hang out and just tech and enjoy the creative benefits and then grab Orion with EMG Mercs and then conquer all. However, things didn't quite work out as expectected.

As usual I sold the SB on turn 1, to save many turns of paying 2 maintenance and for cash to buy things when half built. It would seem to take too long to build col. bases without auto factories for a "normal" race so I went for labs and factories first. Once my system was colonized, I started on a colony ship. I'd met the Mecklars, near map center, and the Trilarians to my left near that edge. Mecklars, didn't want to be friendly and wouldn't trade, but didn't turn hostile. Trilarians wouldn't trade either and a couple of low nearly useless tech gifts made them like me, and once they accepted a NAP they made trade and research treaties with me. The Mecks colonized one new system in my direction and I colonized Nir, which seemed to me to be far enough from presumed Mecklar space.

It seems that then I was playing with blinders on and just teching and made some bad mistakes. I should've also colonized the Parma system as it was then far enough from the Coids in the upper right of the galaxy and would've given me more research and production once built up, but instead I concentrated on research but was too slow and then the Mecklar attack came at Nir . A missile base and a couple of rushed Nuke 4 DD's saved me barely but Nir's small new 2nd colony was destroyed. Then more Meck ships and more ship losses for me and Nir is bombed and almost destroyed before my first Nuke 18 BB saves the day. Rather than researching, or working on econ, I am forced to use all population to make ships to fight before I am ready and falling dangerously behind with only 5 planets.

Then I made a couple transports and took the Mecklar's only new colony and it was onward to Mecklon, which was better defended so I needed to make more ships to try to take its star base and destroy the missile base. I was suffering some CP issues as well, but needed ships and could little afford to make more star bases.

OMG then the Coids decide to attack me (LOL long range fuel cells rather early)and it looks like the end. My Mecklar colony is destroyed and I lose quite a few ships with the rest retreating to Nir. The SB and MB on Nir's main planet just hold out but more ships are lost (more wasted production for my production poor race) and Nir's small planet is again lost. Onward to Mentar come the Silicoid Ships of Death but my home world holds out aided by the SB and MB and a couple of EMG (just finished the tech) DD's.

The next wave of Silicoid BB's came..3 of them with a couple small ships to support and I lost 5 of 6 EMG 2 DD's barely fending them off. This same basic dance was repeated a few times and I barely hung on and felt that I was maybe 100 turns behind a decent game .

Finally a lull in the Silicoid War and with the tech level for Zort armor completed I could make some better ships and Mirv Mercs to go after Orion. Before I could go to Orion, there was another attack wave to fend off, this time rather easily which was promising. As I took Orion on turn 271, getting only Partical Beam, Compression Field, and Reflection Field with the usual Death Ray, the Coids took Mecklon, ending the Mecklar's suffering.

WOW the race bonuses in this game. The Coids were doing well aided by the addition of subterranean and had about a dozen systems whereas the Lizards were also tolerant and basically the master race and allready about 15 systems. The Trilarians, now my allies were doing OK as were the Klackons in the lower right corner whereas everyone else had been absorbed.

OK nothing like sweet revenge and nothing like the Avenger with some support and a bunch of transports for enacting that revenge . During the next couple dozen turns I rolled thru Silicoid planets like a knife thru butter and kept building support ships (mostly EMG enhanced) to leave behind to guard nearby just conquered systems. I also made a couple colony ships and colonized anything I could and concentrated on teching hard. My research and population graphs were growing exponentially and it was clear that I was going to be OK in this game. In the mean time (early/mid 300's) the Lizards were still growing and didn't like me, but didn't seem to want to fight anyone.

To illustrate the strength of Locknar's ship around turn 305 or so, it alone attacked a Silicoid world defended by a battle station and missile base and 2 titans, 3 BB's and one CC and just managed to survive. As usual taking the Base quickly by teleporting and blasting with death rays and boarding was critical.

A couple wonderful, high pop Coid UR planets became great ship yards and my attacks seem to free up a couple of great leaders. By the mid 300's I had finished also rolling up the Ants and was surpassing the Sakkra in tech and tied in population. Now whom to attack..the Sakkra or my weaker Trilarian ally or simply build up and go to Antares?

OK I can't resist as a stream of Trilarian war ships an transports has been sent to the last Klackon world I'd just taken. Turn by turn for several turns they get destroyed, wrecking nearly half his fleet and I then quickly attacked and took over the Trilarian systems eliminating him while teching like crazy and making some Titans with some specials and Death Rays, and other high end beams. Once I had a couple levels of miniturization, I made some Titans with my beloved heavy disrupters and jumped the Lizards in three places at once.

By turn 370 I had 200 moral on most planets and huge production and cash flow and research. The leader on Mentar cost 14 BC upkeep but had all sorts of huge benefits as well as +37 moral added to my 200. Soon I'd maxed out a couple of pop 42 UR huge formerly Coid planets and they, helped by leaders were pumping out Doom Stars in 6 or 7 turns.

Sakkra planets were falling like ripe apples now but they had this 40+ ship fleet to worry about. It wasted one of my meaningless planets and then decided to spend several turns going thru the nebula to Parma. This gave me time to build all sorts of defenses (some bought) in Mentar and nearby and after beating on Parma they decided to bring that fleet home while I continued to take their planets. Thanx to star gates I was able to combine much of my fleet and intercept their's. My superior tech along with some high energy focus and structural analyzers sliced and diced their huge fleet to shreads.

OK onward to turn 394 and I have reduced them to one planet so off to attack Antares with about 80 ships. I've had a enough levels of Adv. Physics techs that I couldn't reduce disrupters any more and with one Adv Chem tech, I could add in a few MIRVed EMG Zeon Missile Titans which made short work of their defending ships as Antarans can't stop strong EMG missiles so game over as so many ships easily ripped up their Star Fortress.

At game's end I was researching with most everyone and had many droid scientists on poor planets and was getting over 20,000 RP/turn. The build up and final attack were fun compared to my earlier suffering and near loss from a less than well played start.

 

[scratchthepitch]

A few days before you started this new round of games I had got back into testing out my mod. It had been a while since I played and I wasn't sure if I had checked out the last round of changes. One of the last changes was I rearranged some of the traits for some of the races and had also changed some of the weapon stats. I gave Meklars and Mrrshan the poor food production trait. First game I played was as the Meklars. The poor food trait worked out great for the Meklars. It's not too tough on either the player or the AI. I used a custom race with Meklar traits and the game also rolled up Meklars as one of the AI races, so I fortunately could observe Meklars as both player and AI. Both the AI and I had large, thriving empires quickly in that game. The Mrrshans were also in the game, and giving them the poor food trait must have really hurt the AI's ability to play them, since they never got more than a second system. With the poor food trait, Mrrshans start the game needing 5 out of their initial 8 pop just to make food. I figured that while bad, the rest of their traits would make up for it. For a player, they could do it, with later techs compensating for low food production, though the beginning of the game would be challenging, but the AI apparently was hopeless with that combo. The Mrrshans not being creative possibly meant the AI failed to chose food production techs and couldn't reduce the numbers needed for food production. Since I also found some of the weapon's stats were not working so well, I quit the game, made necessary changes and began a new game a couple of days ago.

I decided to try out Psilons in the new game. How's that for a coincidence? I chose them because they're creative and I want to make sure the tech arrangement works as it should, since I moved a few of these around after the Meklar game and I also wanted all the techs so I could better observe the weapons stat changes I made earlier. To fix the Mrrshans, I had switched their poor food production to low pop growth instead. In this game the Mrrshans are doing very well, but the game changed their stats and gave them +50 pop and +.5 money. The Silicoids are the front runner, and they are right next to my Psilons. Like in your game, with those Meklars, the Silicoids were initially resistant to naps and treaties. Since I've found that if you don't at least nap an AI, their attitude will continue to slide towards the negative and they will will attack. While treaties and stuff doesn't prevent them declaring war, which seems rather random in the game, they do help adjust the rolls, and my plans didn't involve an early war with the Silicoids. I gifted them death spores (does anyone ever use these, including the AI, I've never seen them used ever in a game?) and alien management center and they demanded scout lab, also, for a nap. Five turns later, a trade treaty cost me biospheres. It's been about 100 turns since then and their attitude is now only average, even though I later got a research treaty with them. I'm still not ready to fight them, I only have destroyers still, they have battleships, so I may gift them some more techs.

Like you, going from a high production race to one with normal production was a bit of shock. I'd been playing mostly productive races in my last few games and had forgot what regular production was like. The Psilons got off to a much slower start than the Meklars before them had. When I checked out the opening turn, I saw how Psilons could do 11 research points per scientist, on their HW with their specials, and thought, hey, these guys will walk over anything very quickly. Didn't happen. I got the techs fast, but the slow production held them back. The Meklars I played in the previous game expanded much faster and actually rose faster up the tech tree. That was because they could use less people on production due to their production bonuses, less of food and put these to work on science. So a mediocre science race outstripped the science kings in the tech race for level.

 

[neilkaz]

In my Klackon game, the Cats didn't do all that well as I ran them over rather easily, but the humans did well. Democracy can help the humans tech, if left alone, and sometimes being Charismatic may help them avoid conflicts. Of course, how well an AI does depends on how much space around them they have and how friendly their neighbors are towards them.

AI bonus traits on impossible can be a huge help if those traits lead to more effective production and worker use. A research or cash bonus along with Democracy is also magnified.

Sakkras sometimes get Tolerant as a bonus and then they often become monsters since they can get even more population on bad environment planets and more importantly have no pollution worries from their huge populations and can crank out ships. Silicoid when they get Subterranean are also going to build up huge pops and become production monsters. I've seen Silicoid get +50 pop growth rather than -50 and they were quickly a real power.

Re: bio-weapons...about a year ago the Coids dropped some death spores on one of my planets, but they are rarely used by AI's in MOO2. I don't really recall how to play MOO1, but I do recall AI's using bio-weapons more often. I believe that bio-weapon use is supposed to result in a large reduction in relations with all races so perhaps only the repulsive Coids don't mind that reduction?

I do think that -1/2 food from farming really slows down a normal civ. As you saw, they need 5 farmers at the start and will need to use their 9th (first born) worker to farm as well. But Mecklars being Cyborgs eat less food so -1/2 food doesn't hamper them as much.

 

[neilkaz]

Game 4 ..Sakkras.

I spawned just above the lower left corner and researched to labs and factories and colonized my other planet and then it was time to make some cheap colony ships using the only advantage of being Feudal. My scouts revealed that I was alone there and had a seemingly nice position to turtle for a while and build up my large subterranean fast growing population. I chose to be careful about expanding outward so as not to be provoking any AI attacks.

Perhaps I erred in not sending outpost ships (67 PP for Feudal) to each new colony first so as to turn instantly into a 60 PP cost marine barracks so I don't have -20 moral on new worlds. I'll have to test that at some point as I have little experience playing as Feudal.

Three new systems were colonized, all with an extra planet or two and then it was time to use my large population mostly for research. Towards the galaxy center are the Psilons and they want to play nice with me so we get treaties. Beyond them are the Elerians and they don't want to play nice with anyone. In the opposite corner, the Gnols aren't wanting to be friendly either. To the right of the Psilons are the Silicoids and against the right edge, the Ants. Bears are above me, and LOL they are repulsive this game and in the upper right corner, Trilarians are also repulsive ! So those techie guys are my only friends and trading partner.

With no one near me and not having too many borders to defend, I decided to go quickly to supercomps to enhance my miserable Feudal research. Along the way, Neural Scanner aided my poor spy defense as did a leader. After supercomps were built, it was time to gear up and research towards Zort Armor so I can MIRV Mercs and have killer ships. All along the way I was careful to make sure to bank production from at least 1 worker on all planets. This wastes nothing to pollution and was helpful to make Merc 4's (DD) when the Elerians who'd taken one Psilon planet wanted one of mine (again early long range for them). Their earlier trashy BB's couldn't withstand a few MV Mercs so that was repulsed.

My first Merc 18 was finished on turn 176. I could've bought it a couple turns earlier but didn't need it. I assigned a good leader and went after the Space Crystal guarding the very nice splinter colony in the corner. Next onward to the Space Dragon UR planet followed by a colony ship. Quickly I transport a few workers to these new planets and I used banked production to time the building of a few transports to go along with my 2nd Merc 18.

The Elerians have pissed off about everyone and there's considerable fighting happening. The Coid HW has been blasted and the Gnols and and others have been trading a couple of systems back and forth. The Elerian planet in my vicinity couldn't come close to stopping MV Mercs and I transported in and rather than keeping the lone alien, annihilated it while bringing my own high pop fast growing superior race.

Those repulsive Bears were hating me, so they had to be next since Elerians were now far away and have their hands full with other wars. Nice of those Bears to waste colony ships on systems right next to mine. I used a commando leader and had +58 GC allready. Bear star bases exploded in the first salvo from a single Merc 18, and I had three of them now. All 6 Bear planets fell by turn 195 and I annihilated all and transported in my better race except for Ursa which was pop 16 and whose HG aliens seem better suited for that HG HW.

Turn 195 and I stopped with 13 systems, a fast growing pop and lots of war ships. EMG now researched so I can refit and go after nearby Orion and/or run over those hateful repulsive Trilarians. EMG DD's will be useful to defend conquered worlds from quick counter attack while I run over a victim. They are also useful so I don't leave huge flanks totally wide open as I expand. I am suffering a CP deficite and if a few DD's die going after Orion, it is no major loss. I'll soon tech to Subspace Comm and solve that CP issue.

EDITing as I progress with the game: Continuing to turn 201 When I took Orion...Klack ships were on the way to my former Bear colonies and I figured they had bad intentions so I destoyed a couple waves of them. Then I refitted a couple Merc 18's with the last two rows containing MV EMG Mercs (Merc 10 EMG 4) and refitted a couple DD's and added a couple new ships and went after the Guardian who died easily as the regular Mercs managed to knock down his front shields and some EMG's got past the lightning field. My haul of techs with Death Ray was not good as I got reflection field, quantum detonator (yuck) and black hole gen (yuck also). BUT my bonus tech was advanced gov't which means that for Feudal I now make ships at 1/3 the cost rather than 2/3 !!!

Silly Gnolams who are expanding into the upper center and doing better than usual and they want to colonize Orion and daft me didn't have a colony ship instantly available. Both of us arrive at the same time, me with one EMG enhanced BB supporting and they with a whole fleet support their colony ship. They don't want to start a war, so we had a Mexican standoff for a few turns, until they got back into another Elerian war and move away. Elerians in spite of being nearly trashed and fighting others, still won't make peace with me..LOL.

I stopped at turn 215 after taking 4 Klackon systems, keeping the one planet with decent pop and annililating on the others while sending in my fast growing lizards to the other three. I now think I need to consolidate for a while and get better build infrastructure and more pop. I was running a CP deficite of -21 but traded black hole gen to Psilons for Subspace comms. I also traded then Q.Det for N-armor.

I'll get some more starbases built and add in missile bases in exposed areas while in some newish systems building a colony base and then switching my workers from the developed planet to the new planet and pop 1 housing on the developed planet (factories and robo-miners) while the brand new planets build up. Auto labs will be added. I'll refit couple missile ships as death ray ships.

Editting in to wrap up the remainder of this game: I progress building up, researching Galactic Currency Exchange to get even more income to pay for my large CP overruns. Star bases coming on line helped also, but still I had to make a few more warships with death rays as I'm spread thin all over the galaxy. With Feudal's Adv Gov't I could make outpost ships for 34 PP and Colony Ships for 167 PP. Thus to colonize more planets in systems I allready owned, I would build the outpost and colonize in my own system since 167 is cheaper than 200 for a colony base, and the outpost turned instantly into a functional barracks giving me +20 moral.

Onward to turn 227 and I've built up nicely with more population and no longer need 20 to 30% taxes with a planet or using all production to trade goods. The Ants now have gone after the Coids who were too boxed in and fighting too many minor wars to really get rolling. The Klackon's rather large fleet (quickly rebuilt) was 1 space away from a nearby Coid planet which had a starbase and 2 BB's defending. I liked what I saw since they'd beat on each other. But...all was not as it appeared to be. The Ants made peace with the Repulsive Rock Eaters whose ships went into a nearby system of mine and wiped out two new colonies before I could get enough defenses there, whereas the Klackon fleet went into my lower left corner and ruined a nice monster planet. Even with missile base, star base, 2 EMG DD's and one rayed BB I couldn't save it, but did take a few ships out. Hmmm...I didn't think the AI was this clever..and that was a nasty stab in the back from those Coids as well.

I then allied with the Psilons and told them to go after the Klackons while I while I added the remaining two Silicoid planets to my empire enslaving their nice tolerant workers. The Ants hit me at one more colony I couldn't quite defend and then it was onward to the Psilons who made peace with them so I demanded they honor the alliance and go to war again which they did. Everyone had Thorium Feul Cells quickly this game except me and could get all over the galaxy which was a nuisance for me trying to defend everything and still spare warships and transports to attack. Now the Klacks pounded a Psilon planet and this time there was no quick peace and then their fleet spent five turns creeping thru a nebula to a distant Psilon planet (perfect place for it so I don't need to worry about it noting that now the Elerians were coming after one of my planets). In the lower right corner, combined Psilon and Sakkra forces finished off the remaining five Klackon Systems while that Klackon fleet died to superior Psilon tech defenses at that distant planet so it was another race gone.

Around turn 242, an small Elerian fleet showed up with a CC and BB and I wasn't terribly concerned and now had shifted upwards along the right edge to attack the Gnolams who'd just DOWed me bcuz I told them to stick their request for tribute and my 3 spies quickly took Thorium cells from them so I had no issues reaching them. OMG...I can't kill either Elerian ship quick enough but am damaging them and not taking much star base damage but somehow they'd stolen Death Rays from me and a ship quickly got up to my starbase (it couldn't have survived another salvo or beam hit) and boarded it as the rays had killed all marines. Bye-bye planet as it was mind controlled.
This happened to four more planets before I had enough defensive ships and missile bases built all over to stop them and was able to retake some of my lost planets while the Psilons also traded a couple planets back and forth. Meanwhile my fleet with the Avenger was taking more of the Gnols planets and I had well over 20 systems and was finally stealing some good techs with my ground troops. LOL at one point about turn 245 I was actually running a -44 CP deficite and that was with the help of Subspace Comm !! The big ROFL was that the Gnols had somehow gotten ahold of Quantum Detonator which I'd trade to the Psilons, and they were using it so when I destroyed one ship, a few hundred damage was done to nearby ones, sometimes causing a chain reaction!

Turn 255 and just as a couple queued up Titans are finishing, the GC vote finally comes and my votes plus 9 from allied Psilons ends this game.

In retrospect I probably should have been more aggressive and built an outpost to quickly reach those remaining 5 Klackon systems and just bombed them. Same thing for the Elerians..I let them hang around too long as well and could have reduced them to just one far away system sooner than I did. Taking planets with ground troops means stolen techs and your empire grows and you don't need to build a colony ship. This approach often results in a GC win or simply a huge unstoppable empire that is both a tech and production powerhouse. However, it can be difficult to defend a spread out empire especially if there are many races remaining. Missile bases aren't in my research plans as I need economy instead early one, but they are nice to steal or trade for and cheap and a great defense if some AI has death rays or enough neutron blasters to kill all the marines in the star base. The added missiles coming from the planet, may all be shot down by a big AI fleet, but at least those shots aren't hitting your other defenses.

 

[scratchthepitch]

AI bonus traits on impossible can be a huge help if those traits lead to more effective production and worker use. A research or cash bonus along with Democracy is also magnified.

Those changes are not always positive. For example in my current game, the Trilarians had their uni gov replaced by dictatorship.

Re: bio-weapons...about a year ago the Coids dropped some death spores on one of my planets, but they are rarely used by AI's in MOO2. I don't really recall how to play MOO1, but I do recall AI's using bio-weapons more often. I believe that bio-weapon use is supposed to result in a large reduction in relations with all races so perhaps only the repulsive Coids don't mind that reduction?

So the AI does use bioweapons. I don't get bombarded by AI too often, other than by Antarans, which is probably why I don't see them get used. You're probably right about the rep hit causing the non-repulsive AIs to skip bios.

Perhaps I erred in not sending outpost ships (67 PP for Feudal) to each new colony first so as to turn instantly into a 60 PP cost marine barracks so I don't have -20 moral on new worlds. I'll have to test that at some point as I have little experience playing as Feudal.

I've used that outpost gambit a few times, when I wanted some planets near an AI and I needed to stake my claim before the AI can get there and there wasn't time to build colony ships. It works if the AI isn't too aggressive, unfriendly or boxed into a corner, since they wont hesitate to attack the outposts if they are. Neutral and freindly AI will usually respect the outposts and leave them alone. It didn't really matter if I was feudal, though if I was, then that was an added bonus. The trade off in using this strategy is it takes longer to get the actual colonies and therefore longer to get them productive. So I don't use this strategy except under those special circumstances.

Edit: I noticed a new thread by someone playing MOO1. It's been since the late 90's that I played that one and I've also forgotten how it was played. The thread is interesting.

 

[neilkaz]

Time for an update as I won my Human, Mecklar, and Trilarian games rather easily.

Game 5,Humans: I start out near the top center and find the Birds to my right and they quickly become friendly trading partners. Hmmm what's this? Quickly I see that the Bears who are repulsive and tolerant (nice slave labor and good to transport to bad environment planets) have quickly grabbed a system right behind me at the galaxy's edge.

This cannot be tolerated !! Since I need that territory to expand into so that I don't bump into hostile AI's towards the center too soon. Time to prepare a sneak attack with my meager early resources. I refitted my two scouts with nuke missiles and made two transports and at turn 82, I arrived and as hoped no defenses with yet there at Proteus and my 8 troops just managed to beat his Bulrathi enhanced couple of ground troops. Soon I meet the Elerians also to my right but towards the center and bottom and they also want to play nice so treaties and NAP with them as well. I make one colony ship to grab a decent nearby system and then onward to Ursa I go, once I have a MIRV Nuke BB some support and several transports (I made an outpost so I could reach).

We had some good battles but eventually the systems fell. BC and RP from my trading partners was a nice early help until I grew stronger. I refitted to MIRV Merc ships and with Orion found I made some ships with EMG Mercs. The Cats were beyond the Bear systems and looking weak so I swept thru them with ease.

On Turn 252 Orion fell yielding a dream come true..X-armor, reflection and damper fields. I allied with the Birds and Elerians and we all went after the large Sakkra empire. Once again I took most planets with transports growing my overall population and stealing techs. On turn 271 I got an easy win in the GC with my allies votes added to my large total.

Game 6, Mecklars: Again not a real good startin system with only a Tiny, but Gaia planet but at least I am alone in the upper right corner. I progress as usual and make two colony ships and gear up for missiles to take the monster system while becoming friends with the Cats below me along the right edge.

Hmm..Bears to my left and once again they are repulsive so I know who target #1 is. Mecklar start up can be a bit slow due to eating up production and needing more production to feed new borns, but once you get rolling with some production buildings and then Atmos renewers on big production planets you can really get cranking. I am left alone by the Bears long enough to get my first MIRV Merc BB out at turn 176.

Soon as I am gearing up to go after those Bulrathi they decide to come after me but are wasted by my fleet so it is onward to take all their planets, aided by a commando leader and some ground combat techs. The GC comes up, and I vote for Sakkra (not enough total for him to win) and this improves relations so he'll trade with me and soon we have a NAP since I don't want to fight him yet. Bears fall with ease (had nothing close to being able to stand up to MIRV Mercs) while Sak's take out a very weak human race in the upper left. I take Orion on turn 231 and the only extra goodie is X-armor.

I continue onward, no allied with both the Lizards and Cats and sweep counterclockwise around the left edge and bottom taking out the weak Birds and Psilons (both had suffered some losses to Sakkras and then we finish off the Coids at turn 286.

Hmmm.. I don't want to attack either ally so, having many Titans and other ships it is onward to Antares at turn 291 with more than 30 war ships. EMG kills off their two support ships, but their Star Fortress takes a nasty toll but as my ships are dwindling, I destroy it. I'd not have survived two more rounds of shots from it.

Game 7, Trilarian: I start in the bottom center and am not terribly happy with nearby planets as not many have good size or are wet for my Aquatic race. The radiated rock in my own system also isn't going to be promising until I find time for radiation shield and a couple terraforms but off course I colonize it anyhow after getting labs and factories built on my HW since it can be used for housing and research.

Hmm..further above me are a couple nice systems with some nice ocean and swamp planets. I want those ...but allready the Ants have colonized in that direction and they don't want to be friendly to me and won't trade even though I've found a leader with +30 diplo bonus. They seem to know who the real enemy is. Birds in the lower left corner become quick friends, and Darloks (OMG what a game breaker they can be) to my right become trading partners after I give them a two low tech items that they'll likely steal or research anyhow.

I have to gear up to make some quick MIRV nuke ships and expecting a quick war, I research trit armor and trade it to my Bird and Darlok friends for things I need like deut cells and missile bases. LOL Darloks frame me for spying on the Klacks and it is war, but I am ready for them. Slowly I can progress into their systems and take them.

I allied the Birds, but they wouldn't stay at war vs the Ants. I didn't ally the Darloks since they are so commonly at war from spying (Gnols at that time) and I didn't want to be drawn in. Cats decided to pounce on my from above the Klackons just as I'd finished taking Kholdan, eliminating them. Cat's died to missiles and I refitted with some EMG and off to Orion at turn 229 with three BB's (some with EMG MIRV Mercs included) and a few EMG DD's. I lost two BB's and some DD's but the Guardian exploded to the second wave of missiles. Now time to take the Avenger into Cat systems while cranking out transports.

I switch over to produce a couple of Death Ray BB's with Reflection fields and refit other ships with X-Armor. Hmm..Gnols soon steal Quantum Detonator (was them as Darloks had no spies on me ..when they did the said they'd stop when I demanded they stop spying) so I guess I need more agents.

I sweep thru the Cats and no into the Gnols and they put that QD on some ships and there were some chain reaction explosions in their fleet formation. I then turned leftward and no allied with the Darloks as well and made sure to tell either of my allies to make peace with the other if they DOW'd each other. Mecklars fell, and as I was finishing off those nerdy Psilons, I won in the GC on turn 296.

 

[neilkaz]

Here's the story of my two Alkari games. In the first one, I started in the center of the galaxy along the top edge which would seem to be safe enough. The only usable planet in my system was small and poor and low G, but after getting my research lab and auto factory built, I colonized it. My scout ships didn't find great systems nearby as the planets were lousy or the systems had nothing to colonize, but I need to colonize at least a couple of them or I will be too weak later on.

I met the Gnols near the center of the galaxy and rather unusual for them, they don't want to play nice and won't make any treaties with me and soon decide to try to help themselves to my new system. This is barely repelled by a couple of destroyers with Nuke missiles and once I get enough tech to MIRV them I make a battleship (BB) and take one of their systems (just one crappy planet) but then I got bogged down at their HW which had a missile base as well as the star base and a defending BB so I had to retreat and await a 2nd BB and better tech.

Humans to my right were friendly trading partners and doing quite well expanding all over the upper right while Mecklars to my left became friends and quickly agreed to a NAP. They had some issues fighting the Trilarians along the left edge. They also became my friends so things looked fine while I geared up to finish off the Gnols who'd been expanding away from me now and having a quick war with the Humans (a fast skirmish and a quick peace like the AI's make, but the human player can never seem to make with the AI's)

I was simply too weak and slow and didn't have enough tech to get adequate ships to finish off the Gnols so I allied with the Humans and got them to help me. During this time frame I was framed for spying on the Mecklars twice and then they DOWed me and I barely fought them off trading that crappy Gnolam planet back and forth, but while I did, it was the Human (becoming a run away civ now) who got to take most of the Gnolam planets.

I asked my Human ally to DOW the Mecks, but he made peace right away twice, so I allied the Trilarians and got them to fight, but they took one lousy system and then made peace a couple of times. The Mecks soon had me almost pinned into my small empire and the attack waves kept coming but I repulsed them and took one colony of their's.

Then at turn 273, I knew my death certificate would soon be signed as the Humans, sensing my weakness stabbed me in the back, breaking the alliance for war and this was quickly too much to handle. Star Bases, Missile Bases, MIRVed Merc, EMG gave me some defense for a while but there were too many Human and Mecklar ships hitting me from both sides.

My only chance seemed to be to get to Orion and hope The Avenger could save me, as it has many times. I had to take a Mecklar planet to get in range of Orion and simply hope to be able to spit out enough EMG DD's to go with my BB soon enough to take Orion. I lost a couple ships taking the Mecklar colony and then three Human BB's showed up and I could only kill two of them, before the defenses on my only decent other system collapsed. Then it was into my HW system for both Humans and Mecks and at turn 286 I got to hear my beloved "Your insolance has cost you your empire".

Oh well, I knew I couldn't win all 13 games.

A few days later, I tried Alkari game #2 (I have to win with all 13 races or die trying).
This time a slightly better start along the center of the left edge with two colonizable but low G planets in my system. Gnols below me were compatable this time and soon became trading partners as did the Darloks in the map center. No one was above me, so I could expand towards the upper corner, taking a few decent systems. I made NAPs with both of them and a few spies to keep Darlok spies at bay. I asked them to stop spying and they liked me well enough to comply.

Things were looking good and I was well ahead of the previous Bird loss, but I made a few small ships just so I wouldn't appear to be too weak to the AI's as if so, they seem to demand gifts and then may DOW me when I don't comply. As my tech progresses I can refit these ships, and later they can be used in battle if needed. A simple weak DD with a couple of nuke missiles will become an EMG 2 (two MIRV Merc EMG) later on, useful for taking Orion and also for defending newly conquered colonies from counter attack.

So nice to be left alone to have several decent multi planet systems and one monster system and make great infrastructure with auto labs all over etc etc. I'd met the humans in the upper center and the Elerians and they became good friends near them who moved into the upper right corner, conquering the pathetic Bears. Silicoid in the lower right maintained an uneasy peace with the Darloks who continued to expand nicely.

At turn 225 peace would end as I was framed for spying on the Humans just as I was gearing up to take Orion. The Humans didn't send much to attack with and their ships were quickly destroyed by my MIRV Merc (some with EMG). Orion was on the way towards them and on turn 241 I got my beloved X-armor, and reflection field was also useful. I cranked out the transports now and quickly took a the few Human systems by turn 253 and now was almost equal to the Darlok in tech, while being slightly ahead of him in population.

The only hostile left was the Coids who'd easily killed the Cats in the lower right corner and as I was refitting with X-armor and making a couple of Death Ray BB's they decided to attack me first but could do little as my counter attack swept thru their systems with ease. They were nearly conquered by turn 276 when the GC vote came up and my friends, the Gnol and Elerians voted for me instead of Darlok and I had just enough votes to win, noting that I'd also colonized a couple new systems away from the war front.

Easy to win with even a rather lousy race, when you have room to expand and friendly neighbors with research and trade treaties. Three trade treaties and a ship leader who had a trading bonus meant that I never had any financial issues.

 

[neilkaz]

Long ago I finished this task, but that computer's hard drive failed and I lost my old saves and notes, but here's what I recall from playing the rest of the races.

Gnols, I had enough friends and income to get strong enough to conquer and expand to a GC win in the late 200's (turns).

Cats, trying to take advantage of Warlord and +50 attack I went the mass driver route and once I had decent shields and AP AF and some reduction, I was unstoppable. Warlord meant that I could make small ships and not have so much worry about CP overruns although I still had some.

Elerian teleblitz was again effective. One enemy decided to colonize towards me and was rather quickly met with a cruiser and my mind control.

LOL now for the Bulrathi suffering story... I lost my first FOUR games as the Bears !! Some of the losses had very poor starting positions and I was quickly overwhelmed by aggressive neighbors. Two of the losses featured bad stabs by the humans breaking treaties. I also suffered badly due to being framed for spying. Finally I managed to luck out with nicer neighbors and was left alone for nearly 200 turns and could then build BB's with MIRV Mercs and took a worm hole into enemy territory and in about 70 turns I was very strong and with Orion and Locknar's ship and some good techs was unstoppable.

I also won the Darlok game and had friendly neighbors and 5 NAP's at turn 200 !! Sakkra(always vulnerable to spies) was repulsive and far away and I stole his techs by the bushel. I won a GC vote around turn 255.

Since then I played 6 more Bulrathi games (settings Cluster galaxy, Impos, prewarp, 8, rest normal as usual) and won 4 of them hopefully learning something in the process.
A good way to use their ground troop advantages is to capture enemy ships with assault shuttles. A few times there was enough warning of Antaran attack for me to have at least one capture ship waiting for them. These capture ships have aug engines so they can move right next to the victims and launch assault shuttles. The 50% self destruct rate for Antaran captures seems accurate to me. Not only can you get Antaran tech from scrapping, you also may get the +125 attack computer.
Bear troops with many troop techs and powered armor (now takes 3 hits to kill) are very tough indeed. One game the Gnols (lousy ground combat landed 52 troops on a planet where I had 4 maxed out Bear troops and couldn't take it!

Of course when playing the weak non-econo-advantaged AI races, the first 100 to even 200 turns are all about staying alive if you have a bad spot and seemingly unfriendly neighbors. Make a couple destroyers so that you don't seem to have too weak a fleet and sometimes these can save a planet as well. Sometimes I have to forgo Deut fuel cells since I must have Trit armor to have tougher ships and star bases. Often I must research soil enrichment for my HW so that I don't have almost everyone tied up farming to feed other colonies. Occasionally I am so boxed in by other AI's that it is more important and much safer to attack them and conquer their system(s) than to make my own colony ships(s).

I'm still working to perfect/improve my starts with these lousy civs.

 

[scratchthepitch]

Having a poor starting position makes the marginal races a tough proposition.

 

[neilkaz]

Having a poor starting position makes the marginal races a tough proposition.

Yes, this is certainly true and as I an basically only playing these poor stock races for a while I am finding this out once again. I'd like to get good enuf to win with these garbage races almost no matter what.

I forgot to mention that two of those Bulrathi losses were the only two games I recall ever losing when I defeated the Guardian of Orion. In one game, it was total desperation as I was allready almost completely overrun by several enemies and Locknar's ship died to EMG missiles trying to save my last planet. In the other loss, Sakkra was a completely runaway AI with half the galaxy by turn 270 and simply had too much for me inspite of Locknar's ship and even though I refitted to X-armor and made a couple new ships. A dozen Sak BB's soon ravaged me, and The Avenger was destroyed. Often at this stage of the game that awesome ship and a bit of support would be enough to hold off a dozen battleships, but the Lizards had been very dominant for a long time and had lots of advanced tech. Even my X-armored starbase with reinforced hull and death rays couldn't hold up. Some Sak ships were destroyed, but more kept coming.

Another thing that hurts a marginal race is early contact unless you find a very friendly race and even then if you don't make a couple spies, your research becomes their tech.

 

[scratchthepitch]

I don't think I ever lost a game after getting Orion, but lost more than a few when the AI got Orion. Usually my losses happened early and often it was from a mixture of poor start and using the wrong strategy for the situation. Sometimes, not having a friendly neighbor lead to an early demise. The first time I played Gnolam, I had 4 close neighbors and 3 of them were repulsives.

 

[neilkaz]

Most all my games lately have been playing as the weaker AI races in my usual PreWarp, Impossible, Cluster galaxies. I'll post some of my experiences in several posts and some of what I've hopefully learned along the way. Much of playing these poor races involves staying alive initially and not bein regarded as too weak by hostiles who will demand gifts or just outright attack if the think you're too weak.

I usually prefer not to meet new AI's quickly (quicker in Cluster which is 72 systems jammed into a large galaxy vs Huge which is 72 in a huge galaxy) so I may delay fuel cell research somewhat as I'll be forced to commit a few hundred PP to make two or better yet three spies to keep enemy spies at bay and this can be more delaying early on than any treaty gains. You might get by with 1 or 2 as Darlok although I've had a couple things stolen when not having 3 defensive spies, and a couple of those agents can be sent on offense to steal if no one is currently spying on you.

Getting a treaty going (I usually start with research since that is so weak for bad races so any gain helps) will result in relations gradually improving and you'll add a trade treaty and later likely a NAP. Some races will be happy to deal with some other races ASAP while others need some encouragement and still others just won't deal with you even if the aren't repulsive.

One game as Gnolam I unfortunately met the Darloks quickly and they didn't seem friendly. I didn't expect to meet anyone else for a while and since I felt no chance to defend against their spies, rather than make a few spies at that early juncture and likely still suffer to their spies, I gave the Darloks the 3 early techs that they didn't have and then relations were awesome and we made treaties and were friends for the rest of the my sucessful game while my PP went to colonize and build up a nice nearby system. However, I really don't want to give away Research Lab, Reinforced Hull, or Autofactories if the AI research has skipped them, but in a VERY rare game I may have no choice and might give them to all AI I've met in hopes of good relations.

Gnols are better than Darlok or Bulrathi due to all the extra cash, although LG can be a drag on expansion. You can counter that by easily buying econo buildings on new colonies when about half built. All the weaker AI races are at risk of being run over early on my aggressive neighbors. I played several Gnol games, winning all but the one where Klackon was nearby and hostile and inspite of not selling my Star Base to start (Gnols have plenty of income) and having 3 DD's to defend, they came into my lousy home system on turn 107 with enough (Higher Tech BB,CC, & two DD's) to just manage to kill my defenders and SB, and that was game over since my colony system was too weak and not built up.

One thing to stress on this or any other crowded map is that if you can tell that your at risk of attack, make a couple defensive ships and even refit any scouts that are still alive to hopefully not look like a sitting duck to AI's. I've played the same game over, but making a couple DD's vs not and when I didn't have the couple of ships, they attacked. If you're at extreme risk of attack, you may have to forgo Deut Cells for Trit armor for tougher ships early on. This has made the difference between death and survival in a couple of games. However, in a huge galaxy the extra range is almost a must early on. Hopefully, I can trade for one or the other or steal it and research that missing chem tech. In one Darlok game, I suffered and lost several ships during early skirmishes since I was lacking Trit armor. I was fortunate to survive and later win.

The Chemistry reseach early choices are critical for these poor races (all non tolerant of course). If you take Deut Cells you have no good armor until you get up to Zort which is means lots of RP and time to be expended but killer ships with MIRV Mercs once you get there, if you get there in time and alive. This means Deut Cells, Mercs, Atmos renewer, the Zort.

Once in a while the ship leader Sparky comes along and you hire him and get Adv Damage Control before the AI's. I've then traded it for both Deut Cells and Trit armor as well as a couple other useful things as I had 4 AI's to trade with.

Alternately, you can go, Trit, Pol Processer, Iridium Cells, and then Zort, but you have no good missile as shields will have more of an effect at blunting Nukes than Mercs and Nukes are basically useless vs the Guardian whereas MIRV Mercs with a few Merc EMG will take him out. If you go Trit,Merc, Iridium, you'll suffer to much to pollution and if Trit, Merc, Atmos Renewer, you have no range. Difficult choice indeed and you'll have to make do with Trit armor to stay alive sometimes and hope to steal Mercs or even Pulsons later.

Also critical can be the early Physics choice between Tachyon Comm and Battle Scanner, but almost always I have to take Battle Scanner, since without it my SB's can't hit much of anything, and if I switch warships over to beams, they miss too much unless I have a very good computer. Thus I'll suffer some CP overruns in early wars until I can get to Subspace comms (rendering Tachyon superfluous) unless I've been able to get both somehow, or a leader with Operations has come along to boost my CP.

.. neilkaz ..

 

[neilkaz]

I don't think I ever lost a game after getting Orion, but lost more than a few when the AI got Orion. Usually my losses happened early and often it was from a mixture of poor start and using the wrong strategy for the situation. Sometimes, not having a friendly neighbor lead to an early demise. The first time I played Gnolam, I had 4 close neighbors and 3 of them were repulsives.

I may lose this ongoing Bear game as while I was away on the long journey to Orion (needing to ally with Mecks to get there, the Coids came with a dozen+ ships took the opportunity to decimate most of my few systems and I even had to move my capital. Thankfully X armor was one of the techs and now my SB's and Ground Batteries can do some damage with death rays and PD Partical Beams and kill two ships or two before I lose the planet. They seem to manage to avoid some of my capture destroyers or kill all assault shuttles enroute. Anyhow, had I not gotten X-armor I'd be almost dead.

It's nearly turn 290 and Locknar's ship has almost made it back so I might live and prepare a counter attack. At least it won't take many transports to grab a few Coid slave worlds.

EDIT: I barely managed to survive and capture a few coid ships and kill a few more with EMG ships and Locknar's ship but more kept coming. I was wondering why I'd see just a DD coming and then it would have 3 CC and 7 BB with it until I realized that most of the Coid ships had a stealth field so I couldn't see them en route. They nearly got me in a big battle as twice during the battle they were able to put the Avenger into a stasis field! I captured one of the stasis ships to free the Avenger for a turn and then managed to destroy the other one with death rays. I was losing the battle but had killed/captured half that big fleet and retreated the damaged Avenger which now was suffering from plasma webs along with a couple other beaten up ships.

The was the last major attack from them and I was able to capture a couple lone or duo attackers and I kept a few of them around to help out and scapped others when I had a CP overrun or wanted quick cash. Finally by about turn 340 I had a big counter attack going and it certainly helpful to not need zillions of transports to take their systems. The only thing the Bears are good at is capturing and ground combat. Ok by turn 370 I had cleaned the Coids out of the bottom right quarter of the map and had much of the top right corner where'd I started nicely built up and was spreading Silicoids all over except on high G worlds where I used my colonists. I was housing in a few places had almost caught them in tech. I'd trade enough that I had all the spy techs to both protect the Antaran techs that I wanted to keep safe from spies and to steal a few Coid techs.

By turn 390, the Coids were gone and I'd gobbled the remains of the Mecklars and was finishing off the Elerians. I'd easily captured the entire 4 ship attacking Antaran fleet and scrapped the two that didn't self destruct and got some good techs by trading quantum detonator. On turn 410 I'd almost finished off the Darloks and had mad expansion going with over 40 systems, cloning centers, Advanced city mgmt, and mercifully the game ended in the GC when I had 99 of my own votes out of 123. By then I'd captured at least 30 of various enemy's ships and had kept quite a few of them around for defense if needed. When invading most systems I'd bring a few capture DD's with 3 assault pod and my GC was so good that one of these ships could capture a Titan or Battle Station, freeing up my ships to pound planetary defenses.

This was an epic fun game.

 

[scratchthepitch]

Sounds like some fun games, especially the last one. I've never tried putting several troop pods on destroyers to use as capturing ships. Might try that some time. I usually don't use the troop pods and try and knock down the marine numbers with the anti-marine beams till there is only a few. Then I board. If using assault shuttles, I'll launch them at the beginning and while they are in transit, blast away at the marines. I also use my largest ships now for any specialized capturing ships since they are placed at the front and can reach the AI's ships usually that turn. If I have transporters. If I don't have transporters, having them close gets the assault shuttles sooner to their targets.

 

[neilkaz]

I don't use transporters or troop pods..just assault shuttles. This is quite effective for any race once you have some ground combat tech, especially for Bulrathi.

I am winning about 2/3 of all games using the two weakest AI races (IMHO) Bears and Darloks. Usual prewarp,impossible,cluster size.

This past Bear game was an easy win in 274 turns in the GC. I was friendly with almost everybody and used the Lizards too steal many many techs from while conquering them and the Birds who, for some reason (they were weaker and I hadn't done a thing towards them) broke all 3 treaties to unsucessfully stab me.

I must've captured over 20 enemy ships. This means a few stolen techs and tons of cash from scrapping or you can use the ships in a pinch.

I captured an Antaran FF but it blew up. They came back but with only 1 turn warning to a remote system I couldn't get nearly enough capture power there in time.

This Bear game I was near the middle so I didn't sell my Star Base on turn 1 and it seemed that I wasn't attacked, perhaps bcuz of this, although I was slower than with selling. I'll replay to early mid game with selling. Perhaps I was just lucky every I wanted to like me, liked me.

I knew the repulsive Sak's couldn't defend vs my spies so when I saw them take Merc Missiles I went for the quite useful Pollution processor. They also went Trit armor so I had no problem taking Deut cells. Soon I stole both armor and Mercs.

 

[scratchthepitch]

I don't use transported or troop pods..just assault shuttles. This is quite effective for any race once you have some ground combat tech, especially for Bulrathi.

I thought you meant troop pods but called them assault pods. Destroyers with shuttles are nice. I use them to capture the Antaran raiders. Shuttles work pretty good against AI fleets, but I've had them blown out of the sky when the AI fleet is decently equipped with beams. They seem to target the shuttles first. Which makes tactical sense. Transporters are my favorite and you can also use them for distance bomb dropping. Handy for when the AI has good planet shields and you don't have the more powerful later beams. The bad thing about transporters is the target has to have its shields knocked down first, which they don't if you go at them with shuttles. Damper shields hurt transporters also. I prefer shuttles against the Antarans, but transporters against the AI fleets.

This past Bear game was an easy win in 274 turns in the GC. I was friendly with almost everybody and used the Lizards too steal many many techs from while conquering them and the Birds who, for some reason (they were weaker and I hadn't done a thing towards them) broke all 3 treaties to unsucessfully stab me.

I've noticed the Alkari will usually attack like that. They seem to attack everybody and I've noticed they never get much of an empire before somebody wipes them out. In my modding, I've tried giving them all sorts of advantages, but they still never do very well as AI. Their lack of empire I think stems from them always attacking others and getting slapped down. I think it must be some sort of character trait hardwired in the programming.

This Bear game I was near the middle so I didn't sell my Star Base on turn 1 and it seemed that I wasn't attacked, perhaps bcuz of this, although I was slower than with selling. I'll replay to early mid game with selling. Perhaps I was just lucky every I wanted to like me, liked me.

I've had a few games where I was liked by most everybody. Getting the treaties and making occasional techs gifts also helped that. The AI does calculate whether attacking your system will be successful, and will avoid attacking if you are stronger there than they got that can attack. In the very early game a star base provides almost total immunity, much like an orbiting battleship will. But once they've built a couple of battleships, a star base no longer deters.