Hi!
This is the story of my long play in Soyuz difficulty ("very hard", game says, it's 1 lower than Apollo). Long play - means i played the game long after pressing "just one more turn!" button, i.e. for many hundreds turns.
I play this game with seven extra challenges, which together makes the game nearly as difficult as a normal Apollo game would be in terms of achieving victory in the game (thus enabling "just one more turn" button). However, doing those challenges makes the _long_ term power of the colony higher, in the same time - which is why i take 'em.
Here is the list of those self-set challenges:
The story.
0. Setting up the game.
I selected Kathithan Protectorate as a sponsor, standard map size, standard pace, Soyuz difficulty, Artists colonists, Continental Surveyor spacecraft, Machinery cargo (free worker), and Terran world. The only change in advanced settings i made - is selecting "lush" biome, since it's the biome i enjoy the most looking at.
Chapter 1: Early game
I started research with Engineering - doing a "recon run" earlier to see what i got in the game (i hate the fact not all resources are visible at the start!), i knew i have a Titanium tile near my capital.
I started production with making 3 extra explorers. Those are lifeblood at the start. Then Relic, after that - just-unlocked Ultrasonic fence (sometimes its quest gets delayed for a LOT of turns, and i didn't want that to happen), and then colonists.
I started exploration going around my little continent. I found that it has LOTS of aliens - some ~7 aliens nests, no less. Tremendous luck! Why is that, you ask? Because i knew i am going to take Scavenging virtue really early, and with two +culture pods and my Artists people, i took it really early - about turn 20 or so. This Might virtue gives +science for every alien killed, and a whopping (early-game) 60 science points for every alien nest cleared.
One of explorers found Progenitor ruins on my continent, made an expedition, and it gave me my 1st affinity level. I made it Purity. Purity will be, for most of the game, a secondary affinity, but for now, it's good.
Few dozens turns later, with explorers roaming other continents, another Progenitor ruin was found - and again, +affinity points; other side of the map, Alien Skeleton gave me +affinity as well. I spend those for Purity as well, as virtually, it nets me a bit more "virtual" affinity exp - higher levels are more expensive. Some affinity quest popped up, and i completed it, getting to level 4 in Purity with it.
Two other affinity quests popped up early, by the turn 68, both are in progress; choices i made steered one of those quests to Harmony, and another - to Supremacy. Getting balanced affinity gains from quests is a part of my long play plan to get 18/18/18 affinity levels end-game - despite some extra difficulty this produces during development.
Turn 68.
This turn 68 is special, it indicates how amazing start i managed to get - since by turn 68, i got Computing researched, and i got Defense Grid researched by turn 67 after it, along with 5 other basic technologies.
With just 11 beakers per turn, this was possible mostly thanks to Scavenging: explorers managed to take out 7 empty alien nests (some of nests - twice!) - and so far, aliens are still green (neutral), somehow; perhaps they don't get mad if they don't "see" their nests taken? Plus, my capital killed several aliens with its city strike, giving even more science from Scavenging. I see many aliens not far from my capital all the time - perhaps killing aliens attract other aliens, who leave their nests empty? And, of course, few pods with +science helped too.
By the turn 68, i also got my Spy Agency built. No AI got it by this point - i was first to get spies going!
And i got one more city operational by turn 67, and an outpost settled for a third one. I also got a trade route with a station going early, and the station turned level 2 some 60th turn. Didn't lose any unit to aliens, so far.
The only early wonder which i, personally, consider as really improtant - which is Panopticon for its +1 sight range for units, - is started by turn 68, too. It will be done by turn 79 or a bit earlier (if that nasty bug steps out of one of my mines - i spend time building it with a great risk to my worker, and now they aliens regularly block it by stepping on it!).
The free solar collector is about to drop down in a few turns, and i tried to pile up some energy, as i will be getting Investment virtue well before turn 100, and energy problems are definitely on the horizon as expansion of cities and building more units will happen.
In terms of score, by turn 68 i am at the 2nd place, with ARC being just 3 points higher. Overall, with a coastal capital able to spit out more colonists and trade vessels, and lots of space on shores of "my" continent for more coastal cities, i expect excellent and fast progression as soon as some internal sea trade will be established. Ultrasonic fence quest already happened, and, of course, i took trade units immunity vs aliens from it.
Here is how it looks by the turn 68.
Turn 105.
Things go really well so far. By now, i am leading best of AIs in terms of score by some 60+ points.
Two wonders built in the capital by now - Panopticon and Ectogenesis pod.
Two more cities were found by turn 103 and 104, so my colony is now 5 cities. Trade depots are present in all five, 1 trade convoy (to a station) and 7 trade vessels are doing their thing, and two more vessels will be created by turn 106 to complete my current trade fleet.
Two more virtues taken - Alternative Markets and Investment, boosting my energy output to +30sh per turn, and that's with no solar collectors at the time and only one thorium generator built so far.
Two gunboats are now shredding bugs on landmass edges, and extra explorer lurks around, looking for more "freebie" alien nests. The capital is starting to spit out Rangers, which it can now produce in 1 turn each - i'll have at very least four of those, but more likely about six by turn 111...112. Lots of aliens to deal with - and so, more science coming my way through Scavenging.
Two water refineries are already built, and the technology for autoplants is being researched.
Quite a few "two" things, somehow. Funny. %)
In terms of technology progress, my technology score is already higher than any AI, and that's with still low beakers per turn (24 @ turn 105 - had no time to build all those +science buildings yet).
AIs still didn't build any Spy Agency to themselves. My three spies generated some intrigue in 3 AI capitals, and all three are now doing their 1st steal tech operations, which should be completed by turn 112. Somehow, the spying quest chain still didn't start; instead, one more affinity quest popped up by turn 100, - a purity one. So now i have 3 affinity quests active, and each is for different affinity. Going broad, eh.
Health became an issue already, being -19 at the time - despite two +3 pharmalabs i squeezed in by turn 105. But with solid sea-based internal trade going on, i'll fix most of this in few dozens turns. Gene gardens already available and mindfully taken Purity affinity allows them to be built, - on top of all the basic +health buildings. Magnasanti virtue is already on the horizon, too.
Explorers actively roam other continents, doing expeditions where possible, snatching an empty alien nest now and then for +60 science and a bit of energy per each, and revealing terrain. No more +affinity from expeditions so far, though.
Amazingly, no sea aliens were met so far by explorers and gunboats, nor spotted by my cities (which are all coastal). Unusual. And unfortunate, - those give good +science from Scavenging, thanks for their higher combat strength, and i don't do Ultrasonic fence in any city except the capital (for the quest), hoping some sea aliens will come in range of city strikes releatedly, and eventually killed. But so far, no luck. Not a problem, of course, and i guess they'll show up sooner or later, anyway.
Turn 150.
This turn quite marks the end of "Early game". By turn 149, Magnasanti was taken, and most of expansion is complete now - with only two more cities planned on the "mainland", one of which will only be possible if/when a station will be removed.
Here's how it looks by turn 150:
On this screenshot, i enabled resource icons. As you can see, 12 Xenomass tiles are present. 11 of them had Miasma on them right since the start of the game, - and alien nests, of course. To clear the land, it was rather large war with aliens (as expected), which i won without losses. Several times aliens were turning "orange" - semi-hostile, - but i keep one alien nest within my territory at all times (near the capital - Mandira), which pacifies them rather well, especially since i got Harmony affinity levels.
The outpost across the ocean next to the capital (Mandira), i created on the western continent to grab more land, "screen" my capital in the future, and possibly be the city from which land trade with stations and/or AIs could be made, if so desired. It has some nice resources to it, too.
Few turns before turn 150, two nests spawned in the middle of the continent, quickly produced a drone, two beetles and a raptor bug. Those were dealt with by my gunners and a lone soldier, and both nests were taken. Total amount of Science i got so far from alien killing and nests' taking (on "my" and some on other continents) - i estimate as over 2000 beakers. Now that my own beakers per turn passed 100, Scavenging became nearly minnor source of +science, and there is little point in keeping some nests present, spawning aliens.
Speaking of science, i am now firmly in lead over all AIs in terms of technology score: Scavenging and Tech stealing early. The latter, so far, i made 6 attempts of, 3 failed, 3 worked. One of stolen technologies was Mechatronics, and by turn 150, i already built the Crawler out of it. I also got me Master Control - with more and more internal trade going on, the Capital is already well over 100 production. AIs so far managed to only get them two early wonders in total, and that's on Soyuz. That's how powerful Scavenging + lots of aliens start seems to be!
Overall score lead increased to 215 points - over 50% lead over best of AIs. Here's what the score is made of:
You can also see another outpost of mine on the eastern continent, far north. I built it on the only tile which is a single tile between two oceans; this city will allow passage of my navy into northern sea over eastern continent, if i'll need it, - and, of course, trade routes too. One of firaxite tiles nearby is a whopping +10 firaxite, on top of all. Yummy.
In total, by turn 150, i have 7 established cities and 5 outposts, 2 of which are 1 tile away from becoming a city. This is quite wider than optimal in terms of research and culture at the time, and i know it - but taking all those territories is a part of long-term goal to have LOTS of unimproved tiles to work Orbital Fabricators over them. Starting oil supply is already secured - one +6 and one +7 oil tiles. Titanium tiles are also present.
Two more outposts are not directly visible on above screenshots - one at very southern tip of the mainland (actually on a 1-tile island next to the tip), and another one on eastern continent - that big peninsual was too tempting to not set a settler there. If rapid border expansion of KP will allow me to have that single city to grow its borders to 5 tiles in all directions, then it'll be LOTS of unimproved land tiles for Orbital Fabricating strategic resources on them, for just a single city, that is. Here's how south looks like:
All those 12 cities and outposts (in total) are of course coastal, and all are "looking into" ocean parts which are around my mainland, allowing rich sea trade to florish.
Science becomes a major problem now, as i can't do any Academies (due to challenge #1). Current research will give me Institutes, and i'll put specialists in them to the capacity. That's at least 12x3x3=108 beakers per turn from those specialists alone. 120, if i'll build one more city on the eastern coast of the mainland (which i'll likely do). Some more will come from Firaxite tiles, then i'll probably aim at some point for more buildings with +science specialists. Other than that, given another challenge of this game which makes me mostly ignore +science in quest choices, - it'll be direct +science buildings everywhere (some 200+ beakers per turn), and population (over 100 beakers per turn), by the turn 200. In total, it'd be good to have 500+ BPT by the turn 200. This is still very low, of course, in terms of "normal" game, but it should suffice to achieve victory before any AI would. I guess i'll aim for Contact victory 1st.
On the spying front, above mentioned 3 stolen technologies is pretty much all i got from it so far. Strangely, spying quest line didn't appear - the quest to establish a network never popped up. Instead, "Redacted!" quest popped up some 120sh turn right away - the one which requires to make a level-4 covert op. I was only able to try level 4 operation once, and it failed; all AIs except Elodie have spying agencies now. Worse, they made a rush to my Capital, Mandira, and raised Intrigue in it to level 4 in less than 20 turns. And my agents were busy doing their own operations. By turn 150, one of my spies arrived to Mandira to do counter-intelligence, and i hope it'll save me from getting a coup in my capital, done by some AI... %)
On the diplomatic front, AIs are all neutral so far, except African guy, who's guarded. No AI did any DoW to me so far; they do wars with each other alright, though. I guess being separated from AIs by oceans helps with this - as does noticeable army. At the time, it's 1 soldier, 6 gunners and 4 cruisers. We'll see how it'll go now that i'll have cities on all three continents. I keep selling all my resources to them for energy, of course; so far, able to maintain 45 energy per each resource.
Energy reserves, as you can see on scrennshots, are solid 4444 energy. Funny number. Why i don't spend it, you ask? Because of the "Investment" virtue i took, which gives 1% of current energy store per turn. To max this virtue, i need to have 10000+ energy stored, and as you can see, i am almost half-way there. That said, i do spend energy for most critically important things: buying a tile here and there when i really want it and the city is expanding "other directions", and, of course, buying trade deports as soon as outposts grow into cities. This energy reserve has practical meaning, too: if any AI places an outpost on my mainland, i can buy it as soon as it turns into size=1 city (while it's still relatively cheap to buy), and either keep it (unlikely), or raze it and, if required, expand my territory to where it was built, or make my own city nearby.
Culture per turn is rather low, it's the only stat so far most AIs have higher than me (considering cultural part of my and their scores). Well expected because of one of challenges in this game, and to become much better by turn 200, since more and more +culture buildings come "online".
Affinity progress for Harmony is rather hard at this point, but i'll keep on it. That Supremacy = 5 you see on screenshots came nearly for free: one tech i researched for a wonder, plus one higher-tier tech stolen gave Supremacy points too, and then the quest for Autolabs gave more. That supremacy=5 allowed me to get cruisers, which is nice, but if stealing technologies will give more Supremacy points, that would significantly slow Harmony progress... Fingers crossed it won't happen.
Overall, early game, this long play went very well, and created a good foundation for further progress, victory and "happily ever after" long play. The seven extra challenges described at the start of this post start to really slow me down, but this was well expected, and should be so. We'll see how midgame will go; it'll define whether i make it to "Just one more button" or not, and correspondedly, whether this story would end prematurely, or would go on to the full extent of my plans.
P.S. I encountered character limit: it's 30000 characters. Woot woot, the story gets long, huh? Proceeding to 2nd post! %)
This is the story of my long play in Soyuz difficulty ("very hard", game says, it's 1 lower than Apollo). Long play - means i played the game long after pressing "just one more turn!" button, i.e. for many hundreds turns.
I play this game with seven extra challenges, which together makes the game nearly as difficult as a normal Apollo game would be in terms of achieving victory in the game (thus enabling "just one more turn" button). However, doing those challenges makes the _long_ term power of the colony higher, in the same time - which is why i take 'em.
Here is the list of those self-set challenges:
Spoiler :
The story.
0. Setting up the game.
I selected Kathithan Protectorate as a sponsor, standard map size, standard pace, Soyuz difficulty, Artists colonists, Continental Surveyor spacecraft, Machinery cargo (free worker), and Terran world. The only change in advanced settings i made - is selecting "lush" biome, since it's the biome i enjoy the most looking at.
Chapter 1: Early game
I started research with Engineering - doing a "recon run" earlier to see what i got in the game (i hate the fact not all resources are visible at the start!), i knew i have a Titanium tile near my capital.
I started production with making 3 extra explorers. Those are lifeblood at the start. Then Relic, after that - just-unlocked Ultrasonic fence (sometimes its quest gets delayed for a LOT of turns, and i didn't want that to happen), and then colonists.
I started exploration going around my little continent. I found that it has LOTS of aliens - some ~7 aliens nests, no less. Tremendous luck! Why is that, you ask? Because i knew i am going to take Scavenging virtue really early, and with two +culture pods and my Artists people, i took it really early - about turn 20 or so. This Might virtue gives +science for every alien killed, and a whopping (early-game) 60 science points for every alien nest cleared.
One of explorers found Progenitor ruins on my continent, made an expedition, and it gave me my 1st affinity level. I made it Purity. Purity will be, for most of the game, a secondary affinity, but for now, it's good.
Few dozens turns later, with explorers roaming other continents, another Progenitor ruin was found - and again, +affinity points; other side of the map, Alien Skeleton gave me +affinity as well. I spend those for Purity as well, as virtually, it nets me a bit more "virtual" affinity exp - higher levels are more expensive. Some affinity quest popped up, and i completed it, getting to level 4 in Purity with it.
Two other affinity quests popped up early, by the turn 68, both are in progress; choices i made steered one of those quests to Harmony, and another - to Supremacy. Getting balanced affinity gains from quests is a part of my long play plan to get 18/18/18 affinity levels end-game - despite some extra difficulty this produces during development.
Turn 68.
This turn 68 is special, it indicates how amazing start i managed to get - since by turn 68, i got Computing researched, and i got Defense Grid researched by turn 67 after it, along with 5 other basic technologies.
With just 11 beakers per turn, this was possible mostly thanks to Scavenging: explorers managed to take out 7 empty alien nests (some of nests - twice!) - and so far, aliens are still green (neutral), somehow; perhaps they don't get mad if they don't "see" their nests taken? Plus, my capital killed several aliens with its city strike, giving even more science from Scavenging. I see many aliens not far from my capital all the time - perhaps killing aliens attract other aliens, who leave their nests empty? And, of course, few pods with +science helped too.
By the turn 68, i also got my Spy Agency built. No AI got it by this point - i was first to get spies going!
And i got one more city operational by turn 67, and an outpost settled for a third one. I also got a trade route with a station going early, and the station turned level 2 some 60th turn. Didn't lose any unit to aliens, so far.The only early wonder which i, personally, consider as really improtant - which is Panopticon for its +1 sight range for units, - is started by turn 68, too. It will be done by turn 79 or a bit earlier (if that nasty bug steps out of one of my mines - i spend time building it with a great risk to my worker, and now they aliens regularly block it by stepping on it!).
The free solar collector is about to drop down in a few turns, and i tried to pile up some energy, as i will be getting Investment virtue well before turn 100, and energy problems are definitely on the horizon as expansion of cities and building more units will happen.
In terms of score, by turn 68 i am at the 2nd place, with ARC being just 3 points higher. Overall, with a coastal capital able to spit out more colonists and trade vessels, and lots of space on shores of "my" continent for more coastal cities, i expect excellent and fast progression as soon as some internal sea trade will be established. Ultrasonic fence quest already happened, and, of course, i took trade units immunity vs aliens from it.
Here is how it looks by the turn 68.
Turn 105.
Things go really well so far. By now, i am leading best of AIs in terms of score by some 60+ points.
Two wonders built in the capital by now - Panopticon and Ectogenesis pod.
Two more cities were found by turn 103 and 104, so my colony is now 5 cities. Trade depots are present in all five, 1 trade convoy (to a station) and 7 trade vessels are doing their thing, and two more vessels will be created by turn 106 to complete my current trade fleet.
Two more virtues taken - Alternative Markets and Investment, boosting my energy output to +30sh per turn, and that's with no solar collectors at the time and only one thorium generator built so far.
Two gunboats are now shredding bugs on landmass edges, and extra explorer lurks around, looking for more "freebie" alien nests. The capital is starting to spit out Rangers, which it can now produce in 1 turn each - i'll have at very least four of those, but more likely about six by turn 111...112. Lots of aliens to deal with - and so, more science coming my way through Scavenging.
Two water refineries are already built, and the technology for autoplants is being researched.
Quite a few "two" things, somehow. Funny. %)
In terms of technology progress, my technology score is already higher than any AI, and that's with still low beakers per turn (24 @ turn 105 - had no time to build all those +science buildings yet).
AIs still didn't build any Spy Agency to themselves. My three spies generated some intrigue in 3 AI capitals, and all three are now doing their 1st steal tech operations, which should be completed by turn 112. Somehow, the spying quest chain still didn't start; instead, one more affinity quest popped up by turn 100, - a purity one. So now i have 3 affinity quests active, and each is for different affinity. Going broad, eh.
Health became an issue already, being -19 at the time - despite two +3 pharmalabs i squeezed in by turn 105. But with solid sea-based internal trade going on, i'll fix most of this in few dozens turns. Gene gardens already available and mindfully taken Purity affinity allows them to be built, - on top of all the basic +health buildings. Magnasanti virtue is already on the horizon, too.
Explorers actively roam other continents, doing expeditions where possible, snatching an empty alien nest now and then for +60 science and a bit of energy per each, and revealing terrain. No more +affinity from expeditions so far, though.
Amazingly, no sea aliens were met so far by explorers and gunboats, nor spotted by my cities (which are all coastal). Unusual. And unfortunate, - those give good +science from Scavenging, thanks for their higher combat strength, and i don't do Ultrasonic fence in any city except the capital (for the quest), hoping some sea aliens will come in range of city strikes releatedly, and eventually killed. But so far, no luck. Not a problem, of course, and i guess they'll show up sooner or later, anyway.
Turn 150.
This turn quite marks the end of "Early game". By turn 149, Magnasanti was taken, and most of expansion is complete now - with only two more cities planned on the "mainland", one of which will only be possible if/when a station will be removed.
Here's how it looks by turn 150:
Spoiler :
On this screenshot, i enabled resource icons. As you can see, 12 Xenomass tiles are present. 11 of them had Miasma on them right since the start of the game, - and alien nests, of course. To clear the land, it was rather large war with aliens (as expected), which i won without losses. Several times aliens were turning "orange" - semi-hostile, - but i keep one alien nest within my territory at all times (near the capital - Mandira), which pacifies them rather well, especially since i got Harmony affinity levels.
The outpost across the ocean next to the capital (Mandira), i created on the western continent to grab more land, "screen" my capital in the future, and possibly be the city from which land trade with stations and/or AIs could be made, if so desired. It has some nice resources to it, too.
Few turns before turn 150, two nests spawned in the middle of the continent, quickly produced a drone, two beetles and a raptor bug. Those were dealt with by my gunners and a lone soldier, and both nests were taken. Total amount of Science i got so far from alien killing and nests' taking (on "my" and some on other continents) - i estimate as over 2000 beakers. Now that my own beakers per turn passed 100, Scavenging became nearly minnor source of +science, and there is little point in keeping some nests present, spawning aliens.
Speaking of science, i am now firmly in lead over all AIs in terms of technology score: Scavenging and Tech stealing early. The latter, so far, i made 6 attempts of, 3 failed, 3 worked. One of stolen technologies was Mechatronics, and by turn 150, i already built the Crawler out of it. I also got me Master Control - with more and more internal trade going on, the Capital is already well over 100 production. AIs so far managed to only get them two early wonders in total, and that's on Soyuz. That's how powerful Scavenging + lots of aliens start seems to be!
Overall score lead increased to 215 points - over 50% lead over best of AIs. Here's what the score is made of:
Spoiler :
You can also see another outpost of mine on the eastern continent, far north. I built it on the only tile which is a single tile between two oceans; this city will allow passage of my navy into northern sea over eastern continent, if i'll need it, - and, of course, trade routes too. One of firaxite tiles nearby is a whopping +10 firaxite, on top of all. Yummy.
In total, by turn 150, i have 7 established cities and 5 outposts, 2 of which are 1 tile away from becoming a city. This is quite wider than optimal in terms of research and culture at the time, and i know it - but taking all those territories is a part of long-term goal to have LOTS of unimproved tiles to work Orbital Fabricators over them. Starting oil supply is already secured - one +6 and one +7 oil tiles. Titanium tiles are also present.
Two more outposts are not directly visible on above screenshots - one at very southern tip of the mainland (actually on a 1-tile island next to the tip), and another one on eastern continent - that big peninsual was too tempting to not set a settler there. If rapid border expansion of KP will allow me to have that single city to grow its borders to 5 tiles in all directions, then it'll be LOTS of unimproved land tiles for Orbital Fabricating strategic resources on them, for just a single city, that is. Here's how south looks like:
Spoiler :
All those 12 cities and outposts (in total) are of course coastal, and all are "looking into" ocean parts which are around my mainland, allowing rich sea trade to florish.
Science becomes a major problem now, as i can't do any Academies (due to challenge #1). Current research will give me Institutes, and i'll put specialists in them to the capacity. That's at least 12x3x3=108 beakers per turn from those specialists alone. 120, if i'll build one more city on the eastern coast of the mainland (which i'll likely do). Some more will come from Firaxite tiles, then i'll probably aim at some point for more buildings with +science specialists. Other than that, given another challenge of this game which makes me mostly ignore +science in quest choices, - it'll be direct +science buildings everywhere (some 200+ beakers per turn), and population (over 100 beakers per turn), by the turn 200. In total, it'd be good to have 500+ BPT by the turn 200. This is still very low, of course, in terms of "normal" game, but it should suffice to achieve victory before any AI would. I guess i'll aim for Contact victory 1st.
On the spying front, above mentioned 3 stolen technologies is pretty much all i got from it so far. Strangely, spying quest line didn't appear - the quest to establish a network never popped up. Instead, "Redacted!" quest popped up some 120sh turn right away - the one which requires to make a level-4 covert op. I was only able to try level 4 operation once, and it failed; all AIs except Elodie have spying agencies now. Worse, they made a rush to my Capital, Mandira, and raised Intrigue in it to level 4 in less than 20 turns. And my agents were busy doing their own operations. By turn 150, one of my spies arrived to Mandira to do counter-intelligence, and i hope it'll save me from getting a coup in my capital, done by some AI... %)
On the diplomatic front, AIs are all neutral so far, except African guy, who's guarded. No AI did any DoW to me so far; they do wars with each other alright, though. I guess being separated from AIs by oceans helps with this - as does noticeable army. At the time, it's 1 soldier, 6 gunners and 4 cruisers. We'll see how it'll go now that i'll have cities on all three continents. I keep selling all my resources to them for energy, of course; so far, able to maintain 45 energy per each resource.
Energy reserves, as you can see on scrennshots, are solid 4444 energy. Funny number.
Why i don't spend it, you ask? Because of the "Investment" virtue i took, which gives 1% of current energy store per turn. To max this virtue, i need to have 10000+ energy stored, and as you can see, i am almost half-way there. That said, i do spend energy for most critically important things: buying a tile here and there when i really want it and the city is expanding "other directions", and, of course, buying trade deports as soon as outposts grow into cities. This energy reserve has practical meaning, too: if any AI places an outpost on my mainland, i can buy it as soon as it turns into size=1 city (while it's still relatively cheap to buy), and either keep it (unlikely), or raze it and, if required, expand my territory to where it was built, or make my own city nearby.Culture per turn is rather low, it's the only stat so far most AIs have higher than me (considering cultural part of my and their scores). Well expected because of one of challenges in this game, and to become much better by turn 200, since more and more +culture buildings come "online".
Affinity progress for Harmony is rather hard at this point, but i'll keep on it. That Supremacy = 5 you see on screenshots came nearly for free: one tech i researched for a wonder, plus one higher-tier tech stolen gave Supremacy points too, and then the quest for Autolabs gave more. That supremacy=5 allowed me to get cruisers, which is nice, but if stealing technologies will give more Supremacy points, that would significantly slow Harmony progress... Fingers crossed it won't happen.
Overall, early game, this long play went very well, and created a good foundation for further progress, victory and "happily ever after" long play. The seven extra challenges described at the start of this post start to really slow me down, but this was well expected, and should be so. We'll see how midgame will go; it'll define whether i make it to "Just one more button" or not, and correspondedly, whether this story would end prematurely, or would go on to the full extent of my plans.
P.S. I encountered character limit: it's 30000 characters. Woot woot, the story gets long, huh? Proceeding to 2nd post! %)
