November 2012 Game of the Month: Nomads (SMAC)

[bdanv]

​

Description
The November 2012 Game of the Month - Nomads - was built around a custom faction made by Torvald Normann (Cytroll) with art by Robin Pirez and BUncle, who added his personal touch for the new leader portrait. Your mission, as the leader of this faction, is to fight your way to a Conquest Victory. Estimated time of play: +/- 4 hours, depending on your skill level.

Background
After the tragic death of Ahto Ilmar, ex-Colonial Marines Officer of Unity and leader of the Nomad faction since Planetfall, you, Steinar Vog, as his second-in-command and newly-appointed Companion, finally have the means to achieve your goals.
The scenario starts in MY.2181 and your faction is a well-established one. The Nomads have built the Virtual World and explored part of the world map while building some infrastructure. Contact was made with the Morganites and the Nomads have started conducting business together with them. Everything was in place for a long prosperous peace period, but this is set to change shortly.

Your mission:
All you will have to do is let yourself be driven by your nomadic inner nature. Steinar, invading the lands of the other six factions is what you were secretly aiming to do for so long. This is your moment! The time has arrived!
Reaching a Conquest Victory is the only way to finish this scenario. Still, this must be done in a pure nomad way: you are not allowed to build additional colony pods. If you need more bases, you will have to conquer them...

Directions:
1) Download the zip file from this page and place it into your main game directory. Usually this is: C:/Program Files/Firaxis Games/Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri
2) Unzip it there.
3) Start up SMAC (not SMAX), then select "Scenario", "Play Scenario", and then go to the subdirectory "1211NomadsGotM" and choose the scenario.
4) The game will automatically load with the Nomads faction.

Restrictions:
No additional bases can be built (you're starting with 5 bases at transcend difficulty level). Even though you have the possibility to build colony pods, doing so will invalidate your submission.

*Notes:
You can check at any time the objectives using the '=' key.
The scenario ends when you get the 'Mission completed' popup. Please save before taking the last base!
Don't forget to inform us on the moves needed to complete the mission (if any).
The rules of the 2012 GotM Competition can be found here: http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?spage=gotm

Enjoy!

 

[Fugitive Sisyphus]

Cool. I think I'll give this a shot.

According to our faction profile we get

+1 planet
+2 efficiency
-1 police
-1 probe
+25% attack
Need Hab at size 5
Extra drone for every 4 citizens

We are in contact with Morgan(Treaty) and Santiago(Truce) whose black border is next to ours(eek!) But we have a bunch of ECM 1-4+-1 units so unless she has something crazy I don't think we have to worry too much yet. Morgan is a good distance away on another continent. We have the virtual world so the drone penalty shouldn't be a problem. We also can build hab complexes right away to tackle our population limit. @25% attack yay! +1 planet = free mindworms yay!

My general plan: Research mobility, build giant rover army, kill everything.

 

[bdanv]

thanks for giving it a try. also, looking forward for your feedback.

 

[Buster's Uncle]

​

 

[Buster's Uncle]

The GotM team needs your help - we are only human, and we need feedback to help us keep motivated. Making the scenarios, alone, is a lot of work, and our GotMs usually involve custom art and factions to give it more of that personality and immersive quality that makes Alpha Centauri so special in the first place. We often include some decent fiction, too.

We believe in the value of the GotM project; it provides content for the SMAC(X) community, and anything that grows our community is good. But counting downloads is just not a satisfactory measure of success, although Nomads is doing well by that measure. Tell us how it struck you. Report on what you liked and didn't like.

If you want to do something really ambitious to support and encourage us? Take screenies as you play and write up an AAR. Everybody loves a good AAR, and it's content all by itself. Make sure to put everything in spoiler tags, mind - you don't want to ruin surprises for others playing, and this IS a contest, too.

-Enter the contest, BTW. What've you got to lose?

 

[Darsnan]

Making the scenarios, alone, is a lot of work, and our GotMs usually involve custom art and factions to give it more of that personality and immersive quality that makes Alpha Centauri so special in the first place. We often include some decent fiction, too.

Having built a few scenarios myself in the day I can attest to the amount of hard work and effort involved in building and playtesting these for others to enjoy, and I always appreciated the feedback I received (good or bad, because the bad feedback let me know what I was doing wrong!), so I do hope that those who've downloaded and played the scenario do take a few minutes to reply here, if just to say well done to the team who put this scenario together.

D

 

[Buster's Uncle]

Why thank you, D.

Folks, Darsnan tended to write very good intro stories for his scenarios. He was a major inspiration for the storytelling aproach the GotM team employs.

 

[bdanv]

 

[Buster's Uncle]

​

 

[Buster's Uncle]

For those who find themselves stuck on this challenging scenario, check out Earthmichael's instructional Nomads AAR.

Remember, get your winning save submitted by the 20th to enter the contest!