RBGC SG2 - In the Thick of It - TEAM E

[Sirian]

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

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

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


VARIANT RULES:

Team E will aim for evil alignment and must win by Conquest.

Team E must finish with alignment at or below 30.

Team E will pursue an invasion strategy: terror star modules and cultural modules may not be added to starbases.


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


TEAM E:

BamBam (Team Captain)
Isit
Aaberg
TBC
Aviator99


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

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

Galactic Civilizations

Realms Beyond

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

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

RB Metaverse Empire

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

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


- Sirian

 

[Sirian]

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


PROCEDURES


How to Play Your Turn

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

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


How to take Screen Shots

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


Naming Convention for Files

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

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


How to Zip and Unzip the Saved Game

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

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

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


How to Upload Files to CivFanatics

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


How to Use Uploaded Files

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

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

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

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

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

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


Team E - 2178AD


- Sirian

 

[Bam-Bam]

Here's what we get at the start...

Right in the middle, and you can see the influence of the Drengin to the south and the Torians to the northwest. Not too sure why our sponsor picked range here--I have found that this is not the most useful trait on medium maps. Ah well.

Earth, as you can see, is a PQ18 with no other planets around Sol. Not bad--a reasonable start. I have already set Earth for the Ms. Kolez governor--to avoid the Mr. Ford bug (AIs can produce improvements if they are in that human queue, even if they lack the requisite technology). I tend to only use one governor, but leave off the maintenence-intensive improvements for manual selection. I am open to other alternatives, so other players feel free to make two governor queues. I will be setting all new planets to Ms. Kolez as they are founded--just to save the tedium later.

I set us to 100% military, with spending set to produce a colony ship every three months. Taxes are raised to keep us in the 70-80s range with -4bct (billion credits/turn).

January

Looking at the map, Sirian's sensors picks more than make up for the range picks (probably not weed, but doesn't look useful on this map), because we can immediately see a PQ16/PQ15 system to the southeast. Colony ship heads straight for it. The surveyor heads northeast--largest concentration of planets there.

February-March

Ship movement

April

Scouting to the north, our surveyor comes across another PQ16, next to a junk system, while our colony ship reveals a junk yellow system south of the PQ16/PQ15 system to which it is heading. Our first colony ship completes--filling with 100m colonists heading for the PQ16 up north. Scouting has also revealed a military resource to the west.

May

The PQ16 in the Gladstone system is settled with our starting colony ship. Governor set to Ms. Kolez, and production set on colony ship. Our surveyor reveals two more planets--a junk yellow and a red with a PQ14--something to settle around the time we are ready to start social production.

June

We can also see some Altarian influence up north. Our scouting surveyor picks up a 1% defense anamoly on his route and reveals another empty system.

July

Another colony ship completes, and our surveyor spots a PQ18 system to the Northeast. Our colony ship enroute to the PQ16 is re-routed to this prize, and our fresh-off-the-ways colony ship heads to the PQ16.

August

More scouting.

September

Colony ship out of Gladstone completes. I opt to send it out in search of other systems; we can settle the Gladstone PQ15 at our leisure.

Now isn't this just a sight for sore eyes? [dance]

Wonder where this colony ship is going??

October

Colony ship slides off the ways at Earth. Our scout finds a blue PQ14 up towards the Northwest. 100M colonists from Earth heads southwest towards yet to be scouted planets.

November

Surveyor finds another junk yellow to the Northwest, turns southwest to scout the planets immediately west of Sol. Most recent colony ship finds a junk blue SW of Sol. Petroni (PQ19/15 system SE of Gladstone) colonized--no morality event.

December

Quiet scouting.

End of Year 2178

Another colony ship slides off of Earth's ways. Loaded with 100M colonists, with all movement left.

Here is our current situation.

All the known habitable (PQ14+) are marked. Ships are marked with an S (surveyor) or C (colony). The suspected Drengin planet is based on them having over 300 influence in that sector--you do not get that with planets in adjacent sectors. We should get the habitables to our west. Further south, northeast, and northwest will be contested by the Drengin, Altarian, and Torians, respectively. We will get the good systems shown on the map. That will give us 5 PQ15+ systems with seven planets. We should also grab the 2 PQ14 systems marked, but that is of a lesser priority.


Notional roster:
BamBam (just played)
Isit
Aaberg
TBC
Aviator99

Like it says, this is notional. All of us save Isit and TBC have more than 10 maso games complete. That being said, I have seen TBC in our other SG, and you are definately a strong player. Therefore, I know that everyone can cover each other's back here , so no need to tailor the roster.

SO, whoever is available, post "I got it" and take the game. We will do that for the first round, then the roster will be set.

Take the "E" Train

 

[Isit]

I got it. I should be able to play sometime later today with the writeup by tomarrow.

 

[Isit]

Isit takes the throne for the year of 2179 and there was much rejoicing.

We seem to be off to a good start. Early expansion on a scattered setup can be nasty but this map looks pretty good for us.


My goals for this year are:

1. Find and settle all nearby planets.

2. Begin to ID the planets of rival species for trade and later conquest.

3. Time and opportunity permitting, research trade.


Jan 2179
Colony Thuban III settled. There was much rejoicing.

The colony ship by the Sol system is sent westward in the hopes that one of the three sectors in that direction has a planet suitable for colonization.


Feb 2179
Colony ship produced at Gladstone I.

Our Colony ship settles Wardell I but it turns out that it is already settled! Quite a lucky find don’t you think? Morality down to 40.

Sector 2, -4 west of earth turns up dry. The colony ship currently exploring it will push on into sector 1, -4. Got to love that sensors bonus. Who needs a scout when you have a colony ship?

Colony ship from Gladstone I settles Gladstone III.

Another lucky break, we found a highly advanced starship in orbit. The crew is captured and interrogated. They tell us many new and interesting ways to blow stuff up.

Morality now at 37.

Scout ship finds a PQ 19 planet in the Ratha system. The colony ship from sol is diverted to settle it.


March 2179

Continued moving scout and colony ship to sector 2, -4


April 2179

Colony ships produced from Sol and Petroni. Ship from Petroni settles Petroni I. The ship from Sol heads to the closer of the two PQ 14 worlds found earlier. More movement of the scout and other ships.


May 2179

A Colony ship is produced from Thuban, it heads to the other PQ 14 world. Petroni I settled.


June 2179

We meet a Torian Confederation colony ship that seems to be heading south. I suspect its heading to the Ratha system. We will get there well ahead of them fortunately. They send us a message but we have no idea what its says.

Ratha II is settled. Hmm… whats this?

Morality down to 27… my we ARE evil aren’t we? Muhahaha

Nestro I is settled.

Question… if we are already evil why try to get any more evil? Style baby.

July 2179- September 2179 (Got a bit messed up with my dates here)

A colony ship is produced at Gladstone I. The ship is launched and heads west in the hope that there is more then one good world in that direction.

Holy cow! Look at what we found…

Our colony ship is ordered to settle there with all due haste! I Hope we get it. <Crosses fingers>

I think we have grabbed or are in the process of finding and grabbing everything we are going to get. There may be a few PQ 14 planets sitting around in the far reaches of space but we can always grab them later. For now I feel its time to start developing some new tech.

Spending shifted to 100% research. Government spending dropped down to 50% for first the month’s research into communication theory.

It’s a fair bet the Torians will hate us fairly soon so our scout ship is redirected north to find their worlds. Perhaps a little trade followed by a few billion troops?

We got communication theory. Research started on the universal translator.

We got the universal translator. Just in time to get a nasty message from the Drengin Empire. Dang this is just great, two colony ships heading for that awesome system. It’s a race but I don’t think we will win. Colony ships set to manual control. Maybe the move orders will allow me to get it there first.

Research started on diplomacy. Spending upped to get it in one turn.


October 2179
We research Diplomacy. We also become a republic. (Or so those unsuspecting voters are lead to think.)

The Drengin got Dester! To say this hurts is an understatement.

Our colony ship will move on into 0,-4 to check the 2 planets there.


November 2179

The senate is elected and our party controls it. I guess those new mind control devices really do work. All our good government bonuses kick in.

Economics +5
Defense +10
Pop. Growth +10
Luck +25

We grab weapons theory. ( Yes I know. I lost track tabbing out to get a screenshot. Still getting used to this style of play.)

Research set to trade. Spending set to get it in 1 turn. More movement. Our scout finds a Torian system.

We found a PQ 20 world in sector 0, -4. Don’t know if we can beat the Dargon to it but we will try!


Dec 2179

We got trade! Research set to industrial theory. Settings managed to get it in 1 turn with little waste.

Unukalhai settled. Man that’s a nasty name to type. Another event. We become even more evil.


Jan 2179

Research set to nano-metal but final goal is up to the next person to take office.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

A report from the realms beyond intelligence service follows:

Sir! The Torian Confederation is currently cool towards us. They control 4 systems 2 of which we have found

The Drengin Empire is currently natural towards us and control 5 systems. 2 of which we have found.

There remain 2 unclaimed resources that we are aware of. One is a military resource, the other is morale.

We currently control 10 worlds, 2 of which will need some PQ enhancing tech to bring up to level PQ 15.

Sir!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

A. Military resource
B. Morale Resource
C. Unknown Resource
D. Destor
E. PQ 20 planet

All in all I think this year went pretty well. It would have been nice to get Dester but we still control a good amount of worlds. Assuming we can snag that PQ 20 one we should be in good shape for the rest of the game. Good luck to the next ruler!

The game:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/rbgc2-e-2180a.zip

 

[Bam-Bam]

Isit. Problem with the link--looks like too many "http://"

correct way to link it would be {url}http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/rbgc2-e-2180a.zip{/url} (replacing the braces with brackets).

Here is the correct link.

Note: File should be extracted into the base C:\ directory to work correctly.

The unknown resource is military (clicking in the area, even if you cannot see the graphic, will reveal the resource).

We need to trade tech with the Torians ASAP--we have trade and they do not, so should be some good trading opportunities.

Too bad about Dester. The PQ20 should help.

Who's next??

 

[Isit]

Sorry about that. The link should be working now. You caught me in the middle of editing away all my bad spelling and HTML.

 

[Aaberg41]

I have got it and I hope to finish my turn tonight

 

[Bam-Bam]

No worries, Isit. I have lots of marks from the of Civ3 SG vets when I goofed on a save link or other things. Lee can attest to that. It happens to everyone. Luckily, the file listing is by date, so it is usually easy to find the correct link to the file if it has not been too long.

Nice to see that we are moving along--3 turns in a day!

 

[Aaberg41]

Goals:

1) Get trade going
2) Build PQ raising improvements
3) Aim for military ressource

Jan 2180
SPending is shifted towards military (77% and 23% social) and crancked up to 100%

Vesta has been colonized and yet another juicy military ressource uncovered before us (sector 0-5).
Evil colinze event gives us 53% starship bonus.

Last Colony ship is sent to Gladstone (hoping to up influence)

Mar 2180

Sol produces freighter which is sent to the Torians.
Petroni produces freighter which is sent to the Drengin
Thuban produces freighter which is sent to Altarian space.

Moral ressource uncovered in sector 0-2 (Torian space)

There is a tough call to be made: should we shift to social spending and get soil enhancement to improve morale
and economy or should we produce constructors to try and grab military ressources (our fastest constructor would be in 8 months).

It all comes down to whether or not we would want to bribe the AI's into war against each other.
If we do we will need money and grabing one/two ressources will cost us money (10/20 bc which is alot at game start).

I choose to build soil enhancements and see what this would do to our econmy (spending shifted to 100% social)

June 2180

Only Nesro (PQ 14) and Petrone I is missing soil enhancement. Spending is shifted to 75% military and 25 social
(just enough to let Nesro and Petroni I finish).

August 2180

Spending shifted to 100% Military to get constructors

October 2180

Drengin wants money. But they are send away, this moves our relations with them down to cool

November 2180

Petrone produces freighter

December 2180

Wardell produces constructor and spending is shifted towards research for Basic Environmental Control

Caranoids show up.

Notes:
Economy should be okay once freighters arive. We might be able to trade the Caranoids for some techs.
It is very likely that both the Drengin and the Torian is going to want money from us.
We are on the way to grabing miliary ressource. The game is wide open, but we will probably have to do something to keep Drengin and Torain of our backs.

Here is the game:
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/RGGC2_-_e_-2181a.zip

 

[Aaberg41]

Okay - just a short heads up. I have been reading the thread from the first RB SG and i enjoyed it alot. But i got to say that yesterday, when i started participating myself i felt like the first time i played a on-line Starcraft game.

I hope you will bear with me in regards to my post here. I see it needs a little more editing

 

[JaxomCA]

Don't worry Aaberg, you did a fine job of reporting the important information. When you get more confortable with this forum, you will have no problems to "dramatize" your report.

 

[Bam-Bam]

No worries. Most of us RB types have been through dozens of Civ3 succession games to refine our reporting skills.

What I find helpful is to keep a text file open for my reporting, and to keep my photo editor open for my screenshots.

We don't necessarily need every action reported--just things that are important. Especially key is letting the next player know what is either in progress or what you think ought to happen in the next 2-3 turns.

 

[Aaberg41]

Thx, for the support

 

[Bam-Bam]

Notional roster:
BamBam
Isit
Aaberg (just played)
TBC
Aviator99

TBC and Aviator99--first to claim gets the next round.

Excellent work in managing improvements and military production. Snagging a resource this early is a nice plus.

Good luck to the next player--our land grab was excellent--time to improve our planets a bit and solidfy relations--at least until it is time to invade

 

[Black Cursor]

Got it.

TBC

 

[Bam-Bam]

Right. That sets the order.

Final Roster:
Bam-Bam
Isit
Aaberg41
Black Cursor (PLAYING)
Aviator99 (ON DECK)

Aviator, please check in, since I have not seen you post in this thread.

Bam-Bam

 

[ABetterTomorrow]

I must say, a great thread to read for advice. I hope none of you are offended if I use some of your strategies for myself and try to make myself a better player. Maybe someday, I will be able to play a sucession game, but I would need a lot a practice. But you guys are doing a great job, from what I can see. Thanks from the onlookers.

 

[Bam-Bam]

No worries, ABT. Playing in the first RB succession game made me successful at Maso. I have already picked up a couple of ideas just from two turns by teammates here.

I think Sirian said it either at GalCiv or at our RB site--these are as much training day games as they are succession games--for the participants and the spectators.

Glad you are enjoying the read.

 

[uglyduck]

Originally posted by Aaberg41
Okay - just a short heads up. I have been reading the thread from the first RB SG and i enjoyed it alot. But i got to say that yesterday, when i started participating myself i felt like the first time i played a on-line Starcraft game.

I hope you will bear with me in regards to my post here. I see it needs a little more editing

No problems ..... the info is there and the acting/dramatising will come as you get more relaxed with it.

You are doing fine ...