Pre-turn: Look around at the state of the empire, all is pretty much as expected for this stage of the game. Set up the Kolaz build queue, though we only have 2 things to put into it as of yet, and set research to Comm Theory though we are not spending anything there yet. We have only been sending 100M colonists per ship out of Sol, so the population there is already starting to grow to the point where morale is a concern; Sol is in fact the limiting factor on our taxes. Raise taxes to 40% and
set propaganda at Earth to 50% (3bc). This will need to be revisited once we start our social builds and build some PQ/morale improvements; generally speaking we don't want to be spending cash on propaganda at our best planets, but for now this is the best solution to local morale issues there.
Jan: We colonize Quatrale, which gives the following event:
I could take a big morality drop for a big production bonus, but I am not interested in that with potentially powerful Altarians right next door; I'd rather stay neutral for now. Still, I'm not taking the neutral path if it has a worse penalty than the good path! A -2% production penalty is trivial, however, and only worth 1 morality point. It will take 6 months for a colony ship, though, and the planet can't really afford the population loss yet, so I set it to build a scout first. The new colony ship heads SE for now toward Dubhe, the double planet system, but I may divert it south if I spot another habitable system in that direction.
I consider sending the surveyor westward to scout the chain of stars heading in that direction; if so the question is whether it turns SW now, or keeps going SE to scout the two planets in that direction (toward Arcean space) first. I don't want to wake up any majors too early, but there's also the question of whether scouting that western chain directly with colony ships and allowing the surveyor to continue outward might not result in better overall intelligence. I decide to scout the two planets to the SE first before turning south (and possibly west.)
Feb: Our cultural borders expand, and we make contact with the Yor. They still seem to be stuck on their homeworld:
Our SW-bound colony ship explores Geta, which is useless. Travelling further west would be to travel ever deeper into Altarian-claimed space, so I elect to turn the ship a bit more southward. Our surveyor, however, discovers Betelgeuse, which has a PQ14, and Octavia, which has nothing useful.
March: The Yor have managed to settle a second system. Jotunheim and Nestor have produced colony ships. The Nestor ship launches with 20M pop heading in the general direction of Betelgeuse, while the Jotunheim ship also launches with 20M pop and heads NW into uncharted space north of the Altarians, looking for unclaimed worlds.
April: The Yor have colonized another system, this time to our NW. I also see a Drengin colony ship peeking out of the fog to the SW of our surveyor. It looks like it is heading to Dubhe, and might well beat us. It's 11 moves away, while ours is 13 before taking its move for this turn. If we are lucky and the Drengin don't have/get Impulse engines, we might have a chance... but odds are if the Drengin don't have engines yet, they will soon, so it doesn't look good.
Our Jotunheim ship will require over a year to reach the NW corner of the map. I'm now unconvinced that we can get up there before the Yor & Altarians snag everything worthwhile, and the newly-completed scout out of Quatrale can do a better job of scouting out Yor space. Sol has also completed a colony ship, but there is still a small hope of being able to grab planets to our south. The fact that Altarian influence has not expanded into our territory yet suggests the next sector to Jotunheim's west doesn't contain any PQ15s, so perhaps there's a PQ13-14 there it can snag. Sol's colony ship launches with 20M and heads south, also looking for PQ13-14s.
It looks like we are too far away from everything else too be able to win any more races, and I don't want to settle many PQ13-14s in what looks like it will be pretty deep in enemy territory, hard to defend culturally and militarily. We have 6 colony ships outbound and I doubt we will have that many viable targets for them. I turn off military and start us on research.
May: Bad news...
The Drengin are now only 8 tiles away from Dubhe, meaning they have impulse engines as expected. We will lose this race. Currently they have only 2 systems, but I doubt we can beat them to anything south of Dubhe, meaning Betelgeuse is a lost cause as well for being too deep in Drengin territory. That doesn't leave many options for our colony ships, though there may be a couple PQ13-14s on the fringes of our space it may be safe to grab. The colony ship from Nestor is now earmarked for PQ13 Sol IV. The NW colony ship has had no luck so far, having found that neither Hatch nor Hyadea have useful planets. Options for our colony ships on the way to Dubhe are very limited, due to the vast expanse of nothingness between us and the Arceans; I turn them SW and hope for somewhere to settle not too far away from our core and too close to Drengin space.
In other news, we research Comm Theory and start on Translators.
June: UT researched, next up is Diplomacy. Some good news: We discover Devoa in Altarian-influence space, which has 2 PQ14s and a PQ13. If we hurry some colony ships in this direction we may be able to claim this system. We will have to fight an influence battle to keep it, but it is right next to a sector with two PQ15 planets of ours so I'm not
too worried.
Talk to the Drengin and Yor, to see what they have. Somehow the Drengin are still missing Deflectors! They will surely research them soon, however. At max research rate it will take us at least 3 months to research Deflectors, and another month if we have to research Defense Theory first. Drengin are also missing Comm Theory, though it's not worth much to them -- a 3/99 discount on Defense Theory, for instance. I'm pretty sure that the Drengin can come up with Deflectors within 4 months. What about getting Medical Theory and trading it plus Comm Theory for Diplomacy or Trade? It's worth a shot.
July: The Drengin are suddenly up to 4 systems and have yet to colonize Dubhe. We also meet the Arceans, who have just 2 systems, one in the middle of what soon will be Drengin space! I guess Alva was one tile closer to their homeworld than Dubhe, but Dubhe would have been a better choice for them... In diplo news, now everyone we know has Comm Theory, so I guess no 2-for-1 trade will be possible. Options are research Basic Environment and swap that plus Medical Theory around for Diplomacy/Trade, or self-research Diplomacy first. We will try the former this time as it looks like we have a shot at getting good value for it.
Our SW colony ship spots a 3rd morale resource a couple sectors SW of Sol.
August: zzz...
September: We meet an Altarian freighter heading NE, either for us or for Yor space, and get contact. The Altarians have a nice compact empire of 4 systems, and their pop curve is looking good. It's still looking like the Altarians and Drengin are the top dogs, and both are about equally powerful so far. We will see if that continues to hold as time goes on.
We also settle Devoa I (PQ14) and get the following event:
I could take a 1-point good or evil shift, but we have both Altarians and Drengin on our border, plus the Yor up north; I don't want to push too far in any one direction alignment-wise for the moment. I suppose I could have taken the good path as a buffer in case we got a PQ event we really did want to take, but enh...
October: It looks like the Arceans beat the Drengin to Dubhe by about 1 turn, good for them!
Our surveyor spots an influence resource way down SE in Arcean/Drengin space. Otherwise, it's pretty much just moving ships. We get Basic Environment next month, and while the Altarians already have it, none of the others have so much as Medical Theory, so here's hoping something good comes of this gambit...
November: Basic Environment comes in. For sure I want Diplomacy and Trade, after that I'll start looking for other goodies like Phasers, Impulse Drives, and so on.
- Arceans have: Cold Fusion, Defense Theory, Deflectors, Industrial Theory, Trade
- Drengin have: Artificial Gravity, Cold Fusion, Controlled Gravity, Defense Theory, Deflectors, Diplomacy, Impulse Drive, Industrial Theory, Propulsion Theory, Trade, Weapons Theory
- Yor have: Cold Fusion, Defense Theory, Deflectors, Diplomacy, Impulse Drive, Industrial Theory, Propulsion Theory, Trade
- Altarians have: Cold Fusion, Defense Theory, Deflectors, Diplomacy, Impulse Drive, Industrial Theory, Propulsion Theory, Trade
Thus, the following trades are made:
- Basic Environment, Medical Theory to Drengin for Artificial Gravity, Weapons Theory, 12 IP
- Artificial Gravity, Weapons Theory 1bc/7mo to Altarians for Diplomacy
- Artificial Gravity, Basic Environment, Medical Theory to Arceans for Trade, Cold Fusion, 15 IP
- Artificial Gravity, Medical Theory to Yor for Industrial Theory
I could have gotten more value out of the Drengin if I had been willing to spend 3/99 to upgrade to Controlled Gravity, but am not really sure the results would have been worth it. I might have been able to get Impulse Drive from the Yor if so, but it's hard to say. The deals were getting awfully stingy toward the end. Research set to Nano-metal composition in forever, and several new improvements added to the Kolaz queue. Revolt to Republic. I go back onto military builds to get some freighters out.
December: Ship movement.
Year-end summary:
Our last 2 southbound colony ships have explored all the planets along the Drengin border without finding any PQ13-14 planets, though there was a PQ12. These ships each have 100M people onboard and I suppose will have to return to our core. Alternatively they could continue to wander around as scouts, looking for PQ13-14 planets near minors and away from strongly enemy held sectors. We have another 2 colony ships en-route to Devoa with 20M colonists apiece, plus one with 100M sitting next to Sol IV which should colonize as soon as we have pumped out a few freighters. I recommend 2 more months of freighter builds to get us to a total of 5 before colonizing Sol IV and starting our social push.
Our surveyor is heading to the SE corner to look for minors, while our scout is heading to the NE corner. We are building another scout at Devoa for the NW corner, which should also be done right away.
The save file:
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/rbgc3-2180ad.zip
Good luck, Aviator!
Bam-Bam
Zed-F << just played
Aviator << UP
Isit << On Deck
OPEN
In almost any game I would have played on these setings I would have regarded myself lucky to get any planet and certainly wouldn't have expected to get 3 in the first year.
AI's must be traveling at 3 to our 2 by now and as they know where to go normally It'd be ctl-N beconing by now.
At this level the only picks that work for me are speed (vital) & sensors (desirable) & influence or possibly diplomacy (useful). As we started I would have said impossible, but what did I know...........
and would doubtless have been wiped out by year 4 if it wasn't just a game (and alowed me to have another go).
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