OSG 12 - All Your Rocks are Belong to Us!

[Liquidated]

OSG 12 - All Your Rocks are Belong to Us!

It has come to the attention of our great Monolith Mauna Loa that ancient glyphs recorded by our ancestors untold ages ago speak of a Greater Glory where our people cast across the Void.

Also, the glyphs speak of ancient enemies that live in the Void which exhibit a despicable Softness unimagined, enemies that exist only for the moment and are dust in a fraction of a cycle. The Glyphs warn of a great war with these Void races where their seething, boiling masses were able to build upon unknowable synergy to defeat our Ancestors.

In a flurry activity never before recorded by even the most eldest of Mountain Ranges, Mauna Loa has dictated we spread our seed to it's rightful place in the stars and has enacted The Great Flow.

Since The Great Flow is only sustainable for less than an eon, we are charged with finding stars similar to our own to spread our seed. When the Enemies of the Void appear, know that their existence is intolerable but their tricks of old must be incorporated by assimilation.

Variant Overview

Race: Silly
Map: Medium
Other Races: Five
Difficulty:Hard

The rocks have embarked upon The Great Flow, as close to the softness of the Void they will ever see.

Hard Cap level 10 techs in all fields with the exception of propulsion, to ensure an upgraded engine and proper range tech. Once level 10 is reached(or next tech is over level 10), all research must stop in that field. When the last field is researched it is the duty of all players to ensure no BC goes into research to the best of their ability.

All other tech must be gained from capture of enemy Factories or sussed from them by espionage.


No trades, no diplomacy at all. All votes we abstain. (update: because the way diplomacy mechanics work in moo, a single minimum bc trade may be maintained with each race for galactic Vote reasons)

Expand naturally with voluntary limits of expansion should the map prove too favorable.

No glassing of planets with more than 50 factories. Avoid attacking races with no tech we need unless no other option.

Victory is assimilation of all other races.

Dath
Zed
Stup
Liq
Olorin
Str00ld3 (if interested)

Cheers!
-Liq

 

[StuporMan]

I have picked up the save from RB, and will take a look at it. I do not expect to get a turnset in until this weekend, but I have a little time tonight so we shall see.

Liq, Thanks for the minimal trade allowance. We might be able to survive the first few votes now.

StuporMan

 

[dathon78]

If there are no objections, I could get this thing kicked off either today or tomorrow, but I'm also perfectly willing to wait

dathon

 

[StuporMan]

I am willing to step aside and let dathon play. Next week will likely be better for me to play anyway. This week I have a Numerical Analysis homework to complete and a Test in same to study for. Since Zed stepped aside for me I guess we can go :

Dath
Zed
Stup
Liq
Olorin
Str00ld3

if nobody seriously objects.

Stuporman

 

[OlorinStormcrow]

Checking in.

I have no objections to any of the proposed roster changes, since they don't affect me anyway.

I will be able to play when my turn comes up, because I am in the process of printing out my revised proposals now. Next step is to schedule my oral exams

The next few weeks will be less crazy, without the writing to do, and I'll need something to take my mind off prepping for the orals every once in awhile.

 

[Liquidated]

the player order was random... go for it dath!

all I recall of the map was a non corner start and a ton of reds....

Dath
Zed
Stup
Liq
Olorin
Str00ld3 (if interested)

roster is subject to change if delays don;t line up properly.

Cheers!
-Liq

 

[dathon78]

Ok, got it, will post later this afternoon, probably.

dathon

 

[Str00dl3]

You can most certainly count me in..

Im looking forward to seeing how my game play differs to others more experienced.. Am looking forward to learning more of the dynamics of the game, and the different strategies used by different people..


"You biological and technological distinctivness will be added to our own"

Resistence is futile...

 

[dathon78]

Well, I turned out to be a little busier than I anticipated this afternoon, so sorry, no roleplay writing this time

Our "Soft" opponents are the Humans, Psilons, Alkari, Bulrathi, and Darlok. The inital map draw seems to favor us, with a large chunk to the SW that we can expand in, and the other AI likely to be cramped. I sent the col ship to Draconis (obviously) first turn, and found a nice size 70 Ocean. Now, normally I'm not a fan of building col ships too soon, but our scouting found a VERY nice size 95 Terran (circled in Blue). I also found a settle Human world just North of it. Their homeworld is probably the one circled in white, though it might be the one to the NE of it. Cryslon built more factories than its population could work very quickly, of course, so I burned 6 turns on a ship. It's even with Draconis now, should arrive in 3-4 turns. The other yellow flag is a recently grabbed Psilon world; both they and the birds have their homeworld in the greed circle. I've been seeing some Psilon scouts at yellow circle S of the Psilon colony. The orange/pink circle is Orion.

On the tech front, I opened Construction (IIT9, only choice of course), IT+10 (again, only choice, of course), and Propulsion. I chose Range 4 over range 5, since all 5 would give us is the Western cluster, which can be reached from the Tundra next to the size 95 world. That turn out to be weed if we can't hold that planet, so the next leader might want to think about some guns there. I've got a popgun and medium laser ship designed, but you're the boss IT +10 is almost in, I decided to grab it alongside the col ship, but in retrospect, I probably should have been beelining Range 4.

Here's the save

 

[Liquidated]

nice the psilon planet is poor, potential spud material there.

A rich radiated is great as we can take our sweet time getting to that gem. Also as mentioned, lots of room to expand to the SW making sure the humans don;t slip in by the NW.

range 5 is one of the most important techs, good to get that out of the way, only other question is if we get real engines.

Nice turn dath

Cheers!
-Liq

 

[Zed-F]

I'm not sure when we are planning to drop from 20 turns per player to 10 turns per player, but I'll assume not yet.

Inherited Turn: Notice that we are building factories on Cryslon, currently having 130, but only have 52 pop. Start a new colony ship rather than overbuild factories. Pull most of the funding from IIT+10 and reallocate to Range 4.

2321: IIT+10 comes in, we choose IIT+20 next. Redirect remaining planetology funding to IIT 9. Start working on terraforming Cryslon at a trickle while we continue to build a colship.

2324: Colonize Dunatis. Contact the 5PE Honorable Humans -- they have gotten off to a fast start! Impossibly fast and evidence that the AI cheats when it comes to colship landings, IMHO. Establish a minimal trade agreement. Transport 16M from Draconis to Dunatis.

2325: Build a colship and send it to Tundra 25 Gion on the human frontier. It's a crap world but opens up better planets to the west. Plus I don't want to have to worry about humans getting Tundra bases and poaching it early.

2326: Chase away a Psilon colship at Yarrow.
2327: Chase away a human colship at Dunatis.

2331: Settle Gion. Build a colship and send it to... Radiated Rich Stalaz I guess. The planets I'd prefer to send it to are all 4 parsecs away. Propulsion is at 3%.

2332: Now Range 4 comes in, oh well. Pick nuclear engines next as it's cheap and useful for expansion. Readjust research to get IIT9 quicker and start on Terraforming +20.

2333: Alkari scout turned back at Nyarl, an asteroid system NE of Stalaz. I guess the Alkari are N of Psilons and E of Humans. Or else they have an early alliance going on.

2336: Scout Radiated Rich Dolz in the west. It's at range 5 so we'll have to get it later.

2337: Colonize Stalaz. Chase away scouts and colships from lots of places, including a Darlok colship that has no business anywhere near our space other than by early alliance. I also suspect the Psilons and Alkari are allied as I've seen their ships both north and south of the Psilons now.

2339: Colonize Romulas. Gain contact with the 2PE Honorable Psilons, establish a minimal trade agreement. Discover Zoctan, an arid Artifacts world, in the far west, next to the Human empire. It will be very difficult to get there before they do. We are really starting to spread our influence all over the map now though. Construction at 1%. Send a colship along with a bunch of scouts to Yarrow, they can explore further eastward from there.

2340: Nothing much, a new colship is due to be built at Cryslon right away. The next couple colships should probably head toward Arid 65 Volantis to the west and Inferno 25 Mu Delphi to the east, to open up further colonization opportunities.

The save: http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=142273&stc=1&d=1163344239

 

[Liquidated]

seems first 3 or 4 people taking 20 turns is about right on a medium map. One of the reasons I placed myself as 4th btw.

Seems packed start for the other races.

Cheers!
-Liq

 

[Str00dl3]

With this many alliances and the humans having such a good start and possible access to an artifact its going to be hard to assimilate anything to the east without starting a galactic war and we will be shooting peas at the humans fleet..

Also lacking any decent mineral planets and no way of getting a decent ground assault tech other then theft or assimilation i see no way to conquer other then early assaults on the competition or mass planet colonization early in the game..

Computer tech 10 will make stealing tech from more advanced races almost if not impossible..

Have a awfull feeling about this variant..

 

[zakalwe]

Lurking in the shadows.

Would be nice to see a win in this series, but it seems like you do have a knack of setting up hard variants I still play some MOO from time to time, but have never ever tried any sort of early aggression. I frankly have no idea how to make that work, so it will be very interesting to see if/how you pull this off. I don't know much about the effects and mechanics of biowarfare, but could death spores be applicable here? Do the silicoids have an easier time of recolonizing spored planets?

 

[OlorinStormcrow]

I don't know if the Silicoids have any benefits in terms of recolonizing spored planets. In terms of our variant, we wouldn't want to use spores to kill off a planet and then use a colony ship. Even though that would allow us to get the factories left over, we wouldn't have a shot at getting any tech from it.

On the other hand, I could see some use in using bioweapons to knock out the majority of the population, and then sending in the ground troops. Bioweapons would work better than bombs because they leave the factories intact, and allow us to gain the same amount of tech, but with fewer troops needed.

The danger of using the bioweapons is that they hurt relations with every AI. If we employ them too early, we could end up facing a Final War that we aren't equipped to handle. I think that the big thing we've learned from the previous several OSG's is the importance of diplomacy, especially the trade agreements. Without some way of improving our relations with the AIs, it's too easy to lose due to an early vote. I think that any of our recent losses would have ended up as wins if there had been an option to turn off the voting process.

 

[zakalwe]

On the other hand, I could see some use in using bioweapons to knock out the majority of the population, and then sending in the ground troops.

Yes, that makes sense. Ground troops will be a scarce resource playing as the silicoids.

I think that any of our recent losses would have ended up as wins if there had been an option to turn off the voting process.

Absolutely. And I certainly didn't mean to imply that you have lost your recent games due to poor play. One idea is to play with only a single opponent - final war doesn't make that much of a difference then.

 

[Str00dl3]

Without glassing planets the only early aggression you can make is mass trooping planets. This variant restricts our tech so the longer the game lasts the less a chance of a win.

To be honest.. i dont see this being a possible win scenario..

You have the darloks who restrict any real possible chance of tech theft, you have the heads who will out tech us if left unchecked and the bulraths just wont be a option on ground invasion without the use of bio weapons, which will start an all out war directed at us..

If we step in to the east with guns blazing we will have more enemys then you can poke a stick and the option to open a basic trade with races for the vote balance will in the long run cost us votes when we do begin our invasions and break the aggreements..

Without any real factory tech we will never keep up the fight, and without any ground troop tech we will be throwing troops to there death at 3 to 1 odds..

The borg have unmatched strength and unmatched technology..

We will have the numbers but no real means to use them..

My opinion is to focus all assualts and tech theft towards the humans whom seem to have a solitary corner of the galaxy, without any alliance they shouldnt stir up to much annimosity from the other races..

Were gonna get owned if anyone makes it to fusion rifle and powered armour..

 

[Zed-F]

Chill, dude. Check what happened the last time we did early war, as the Mrrshan. We wiped the galaxy, under a harder variant than this one.

Truth to tell, since our expansion is so far pretty much uncontested, I think this one's going to be pretty easy. Not quite 'routine', but not that tough either.

 

[StuporMan]

Inherited: Look around, everything seems to be in order.
2341: Darloks arrive at Yarrow. They have some sort of weapon technology on one of their ships. We will have to assimilate that later, for now our scout must retreat. Meet Darloks, ask for minimum trade and they refuse. Looks like we have a first target. Oh wait, they are allied with the brains. (The brains also are allied with the Bulrathi).
2342: Send Col ship to the west Voltanis.
2343: Discover Rha in the north, it is yet untaken, tundra 40, 6 parsecs from our nearest star (long range col ship anyone?).
2345: IIT9 falls, duralloy only choice. Another Col ship build on Cryslon (I will keep crankin' em out until we have no more room to expand. Each one is worth 2 free population points, which is not a small deal for us rocks. We may not be able to push pop to all colonies immediately with how fast we are expanding, though.
2347: Voltanis founded. Human scout seen above the empty star of Tauri (7 parsecs from nearest human world by my estimation). Bumping up research on propulsion accordingly.
2348: Vox founded. Psilon alliance changed, Psilon troops inbound to Darlok colony of Yarrow.
2349: Mu Delphi founded. Humans want Non-Agression pact. They balk at the assimilation clause, so we politely decline. Darloks defend invasion at Yarrow. I take this opportunity to get a minimal trade in.
2352: Xendalla Arid 70 discovered in the far south. Nuclear engines at 4%.
2353: Scout Yarrow to confirm what the map was saying, the Darloks have built 0 factories the whole time they have owned it.
2355: Nuke Engines fall, choose Range 6 (Inert and 5 were available). Reticuli founded.
2357: Humans want Non agression pact, again they refuse the assimilation clause. Again we decline.
2358: Cygni founded.
2359: Bootis is discovered (far southeast green) No Planet. Looks like we will not get the ENTIRE southern portion of the map.
2360: Last colship made for planets in range (Vulcan poor 70), Cryslon on research and +1 pop. We are about halfway to range 6 which should let us colonize the rest of the 4-5 planets remaining. I just love how fast you can expand as the Rocks. We may want to consider running +1 pop on our more developed worlds to get them fully running and to help build up our new colonies. We may also want to get a fleet going as soon as range 6 comes in.

It looks like we will have several options for first opponents. My vote right now goes to the humans. They are isolated right now (only contact with us AFAIK) and are unable to exploit their racial benefits (though they are the tech leaders). The Brains are another good choice (their colonies are located far from one another and we will be able to rake the tech in from a captured colony, but they have been in and out of alliances all game. The Darloks look fairly weak, so we could probably take them down fairly easily, but we will not get much back in return.

StuporMan

 

[Zed-F]

We have 13 systems now, and are about to colonize 2 more. After range 6 comes in, there are at least 4 more stars we can grab, not counting unscouted systems (2 in the SW that no-one else can get to, 1 in the SE that we'd need an ER colship to reach, 1 in the NW on the other side of the humans that we might also nab with an ER colship, and possibly some in the NE in Alkari/Bulrathi territory.) Ideally we should pre-build a few colony ships so that when we are done range 6, we can send out the first wave right away.

Nobody else has more than 5 systems. The humans could maybe poach one of the ones we need range 6 for if they beat us to them, but they've left them alone for the last 20 turns. (Maybe they don't have range 5.) Otherwise I think everything that can be colonized by everyone other than us, has been.

Someone was saying something about this being a hard game?