Imperium Three - Head of the Class

[DaveV]

I won a diplo win in 2425; I was securely in the driver's seat at that point, with a production edge and scatter-packs, thanks to the Bulrathi. This game was really over in 2368, when Escalon went from being a front-line liability to a powerhouse, thanks to the Rich event. I see this outcome as a new poster child for how random events can invalidate any comparisons between games; I didn't make any particularly smart decisions this game, just pressed my advantage. Here's my log:

Pre-game analysis: although many players worship at the altar of the Psilons, they're weak in the early game. We need a fast expansion to make up for that, and there are only two reds in range. At least the Silicoids aren't in the game, so I should have a good shot at the hostile worlds. I send the colony ship to the coreward star. That yellow star to the NE makes me nervous - at 7 parsec range, it could be a homeworld. I send my two scouts to the green and red stars near the suspect yellow (Dolz and Incedius).

2300 My standard opening: one click into scouts.
2301 Another click into scout production.
2302 ... and another click to scouts.
2303 Colonize Escalon. Poor production is grim news, but I can use it for colonists, and, eventually, research. Transport 3M Mentar->Escalon. New target for IND is 3; extra clicks continue to go to scouts. New scout goes to Centauri.
2304 Send new scout to Exis. Transport 4M Mentar->Escalon.
2305 Dolz, Incedius scouted. Send scout from Dolz to Zhardan. Send new scout to Exis. Transport 3M Mentar->Escalon. ECO needs another click to send any colonists.
2306 Send new scouts to Gorra, Ukko. Transport 3M Mentar->Escalon.
2307 Send new scout to Pollus. Transport 3M Mentar->Escalon.
2308 Send new scouts to Rigel, N white. Everything into factories.
2309 My scout chases a Meklar scout from Centauri, Centauri scouted.
2310 Gorra, Zhardan, Rana scouted.
2311 Rigel scouted. I guess I was supposed to send out scouts before the colony ship this game . Crank Mentar back to 3 factories, remainder into colony ship (19 turns).
2312 My scout chases a Meklar scout from Ukko, a Bulrathi scout from Centauri. Ukko, Exis scouted. Send scout from Exis to Escalon. Put 10 RP into research on Escalon, split evenly between Ecology and Construction.
2313 No choice in tech. Construction: IT9; Planetology: Terraform +10.
2314 My scout chases unarmed Bulrathi colony ship from Rana. Crypto scouted. My starting neighborhood:

2320 My scout chases unarmed Bulrathi colony ship from Rana.
2323 Planetology is at 13%; transfer enough to Construction to bring it down to 10%.
2324 Improved Terraforming +10 researched; next is +20 (my next few colony prospects don't require Dead Environment, I don't plan on using Death Spores. As a bonus, +20 is the cheapest available choice). Colony ship completed; send it to Centauri to try to establish a border. Set Planetology and Construction to 50% each again.
2326 My scout chases unarmed Bulrathi colony ship from Rana. Construction is at 3%.
2328 My scout and colony ship chase unarmed Bulrathi colony ship from Centauri. Centauri colonized. Contact with Bulrathis: they have 2 planets, are slightly ahead in tech and production, well behind in population. They agree to 25 BC/turn trade. Put Centari on 50% DEF, 50% IND.
2332 My scout chases unarmed Bulrathi colony ship from Rana.
2333 Colony ship built.
2334 Improved Industrial Tech 9 researched, Duralloy next (over Industrial 8). Send colony ship to Gorra (oops, I forgot last turn).
2338 Gorra colonized. Transport 20M Escalon->Gorra; put Gorra on 50% DEF, 50% IND.
2340 Colony ship completed, send it to Rigel.
2342 Bulrathi colony is enroute to Gorra; I hope it's still unarmed. Put 1/3 of tech into Construction, Planetology, Weapons.
2343 Rigel colonized, set weapon research to Hand Lasers. Transport 27M Escalon->Rigel.
2344 Bulrathi colony ship flees from my scout at Gorra. Whew. Newsdroid says: Darloks have 6 systems.
2345 Colony ship completed, send it to Pollus. Escalon is fully terraformed. Put a couple clicks into laser fighters on Mentar, a couple clicks into bases, remainder into factories and technology.
2347 Gion scouted. Change tech sliders to 1/2 Propulsion, remainder split between Construction, Planetology, Weapons.
2348 The only choice in propulsion is range 4, which is what I wanted anyway. Centauri has its first missile base; leave 1 click on defense, split the rest between IND and ECO.
2350 Pollus colonized. Transport 22M Escalon->Pollus.
2351 Mentar reaches max factories. Put one click into industry.
2352 Hand Lasers researched, Hyper X next.
2355 My scout chases 5 Bulrathi scouts from Bootis; Berel, Bootis scouted.
2356 My scout chases unarmed Bulrathi colony ship from Rana.
2357 Meklars have a colony ship and three escorts headed to Rana. I sign a NAP with Bulrathi since I'm going to lose that planet anyway. Increase trade to 125 BC/year.
2358 It looks like the Bulrathi and Meklars will both arrive at Rana next turn.
2359 Meklars chase my scout away from Rana, Bulrathi establish colony. My scout arrives at Meklon: 19 bases, 3 colony ships, 9 intruders (medium), 13 nexus (large), 11 penetrator (medium). Scout retreats. Espionage against Bulrathi: only choice is force field. I steal class 2 deflectors. Colony ship produced at Mentar. Change Bulrathi spies to Hide; I won't tempt fate again. Switch Mentar to scout 2. Still waiting on propulsion (at 13% with one click).
2360 My scout reappears at Meklon: their fleet is now only one nexus. Kronos (Bulrathi) scouted.
2363 My scout arrives at Darrian (Meklar): 3 bases. Bulrathi are now Amiable. Propulsion at 15%. Sigh.
2365 Terraforming +20 researched (at 1% last turn!, Enhanced Eco Restoration next. Plough most tech into Planetology. Propulsion is at 16%.
2366 Propulsion at 17%.
2367 Propulsion at 18%.
2368 Hydrogen Fuel Cells researched, nuclear engines next. Send colony ship to Gion. Escalon magically changes from poor to rich. Better to be lucky than good :D. Contact with Klackons; they agree to 45 BC/year trade.
2369 Give Bulrathi Terraforming +20 for Deuterium Fuel Cells. Human colony ship appears to be headed to Rigel. Contact with Meklars; they refuse trade. Bulrathi refuse to declare war on Meklars.

2372 Gion colonized. Human colony ship is headed to Ukko.
2373 Transport 10M Gorra->Gion. Bulrathi refuse to declare war on Meklars.
2374 Rigel is maxed out. New design, laser 2: small, 1 laser, BC1. Meklars agree to 60 BC/year.
2375 My scout arrives at Hyboria: 5 bases, 4 colony ships, 50 mediums, 77 smalls. Move on to SE yellow. Talas scouted.
2376 Human colony ship bypasses Ukko, too - on the way to Colassa? I give the Bulrathi 375 BC to declare war on the Meklars.
2377 Colassa scouted.
2378 Vega scouted.
2381 Human colony ship chases my scout away from Colassa. Hyper-X rockets researched, Neutron Pellet Gun next.
2382 Planetology is at 3%. Bulrathi demand 400 BC to break alliance with Humans, I refuse.
2383 Pollus is maxed. Planetology at 5%, Construction at 7%.
2384 My scout arrives at Crius (Human): 8 bases. Retreat. Aquilae scouted. Construction, Planetology at 8%.
2385 Construction 8%, Planetology 9%.
2386 Construction 9%, Planetology 11%. Increase trade with Bulrathi to 375 BC/year.
2387 Enhanced Eco Restoration researched :D, Controlled Toxic next. Tech spending is about 50% Planetology, remainder equally split. Even my rich planets are ploughing some of their production into tech.

2388 Klackons are now Amiable. They refuse to break alliance with the Darloks, but increase trade to 275 BC/year.
2390 Duralloy Armor researched, Automated Repair next.
2391 Deep Space Scanner researched, ECM 2 next. Newsdroid reports tech leaders: Darlok, Klackon, Bulrathi, Meklar, Psilon, Human.
2392 Klackons demand 825 BC to break alliance with the Darloks; I refuse. Meklars give Class 3 shields for Enhanced Eco Restoration.
2395 Aquilae colonized, High Council meets: Bulrathi vs. Psilons. Humans (4) Bulrathi, Darloks (5) abstain, Klackons (3) abstain, Bulrathi (6) themselves, Meklars (2) me, Me (7) Bulrathi. Bulrathi demand 1150 to break alliance with Humans, forget it. Klackons demand 1150 to break alliance with Darloks, forget it. Waiting on lots of tech: Force Fields 5%, Planetology 6%, Propulsion 27%, Weapons 13%.
2396 Personal Deflector Shield, Nuclear Engines, Neutron Pellet Gun researched; Class 4 deflectors, Sub-Light, Neutron Blaster next. Planetology is at 13%. Design NPG fighter.
2397 Controlled Toxic Environment researched, Soil Enrichment next. Design Toxic colony ship.
2398 Send colony ships to Crypto, Zhardan.
2399 Send colony ship to Berel. Bulrathi demand 1100 to break alliance with Humans, forget it. Klackons demand 1200 to break alliance with Darloks, forget it.
2400 Crypto, Zhardan colonized. High Council: Bulrathi vs. Psilons. Humans (4) Bulrathi, Darloks (5) abstain, Klackons (3) abstain, Bulrathi (7) themselves, Meklars (1) me, Me (7) abstain. Contact with Humans. Transport 10M Mentar->Zhardan, 10M Escalon->Zhardan, 10M Gion->Crypto. Humans agree to Non-Agression Pact, 60 BC/year trade. Klackons agree to Non-Agression Pact.
2402 Berel colonized. Transport 22M Gion->Berel. Meklars agree to Non-Agression Pact; Bulrathi demand 950 BC to declare war on Humans, I agree. Klackons refuse to declare war on Humans.
2406 Klackons demand 300 BC to break alliance with Humans, forget it.
2407 Klackons, Meklars cancel Non-Agression Pact. Turn on espionage against both. Bulrathi agree to declare war on Meklars.
2408 Talas colonized. Newsdroid says: I control 12 systems. Contact with Darloks, they refuse to trade. Transport 15M Gion->Talas. Humans agree to declare war on Darloks, demand Enhanced Eco Restoration to declare war on Klackons (forget it), increase trade to 375 BC/year.
2409 Planetology is at 1%, computers at 10%.
2410 Planetology is at 4%, computers at 12%.
2411 ECM 2 researched, Robotic Controls 3 next. Darloks refuse to trade, Humans agree to declare war on Klackons.
2412 Soil Enrichment researched, Atmospheric Terraforming is next. Kakata scouted.
2413 Ion Cannon stolen from Klackons.
2414 My scout arrives at Ryoun (Klackon): 4 bases, 103 smalls. Drakka scouted. Klackons declare war. Darloks refuse to trade.
2415 Klackons appear to be coming after Zhardan.
2416 My scout arrives at Willow: 1 base, 1 medium, 1 colony ship, 12 large. Class 4 deflectors stolen from Klackons, go after Repulsor Beam next. Humans issue a threat because I'm too large.
2417 Rigel is hit by earthquake. Klackon fleet appears to be headed for Mentar. Darloks give Battle Computer 2 for Duralloy Armor, refuse to establish trade route.
2419 Klackons were going after Zhardan after all: they destroy it . Stupid nebulas. Darloks declare war. Contact lost with Humans.
2420 Reduced Industrial Waste 80% stolen from Klackons, Darloks framed. Newsdroid gives production rankings: Psilon, Darlok, Klackon, Bulrathi, Human, Meklar. Design Bug Killer ship.
2421 Unknown spy destroys 1 missile base on Berel.
2422 Meklar spies destroy 8 factories on Centauri.
2424 Bulrathi give Scatter Pack V for Enhanced Eco Restoration.
2425 High Council: Darloks vs. Psilons. Humans (5) me, Darloks (6) themselves, Klackons (3) Darloks, Bulrathi (6) me, Meklars (2) me, Me (10) myself. I win!

[Zed-F]

A very nice first report. Good show!

And a cute touch at the end.

[Sinaht]

Thanks for the advice, but it was a fortunate way to make the challenge interesting (Hard level on anything but a tiny map? We're in for a ride!. The plan was to anhilate them one by one, but by the point the Humans won the election, I already had too many planets for them to win.

If I had had 6 planets instead of 15, it would have been quite interesting. Normally, if you get the high level planetary techs, you can come back from behind with 5-6 planets if you behave nicely, but I wouldn't have had enough production in a rest-of-the-galaxy vs me contest. And of course, your plan is THE plan to make the impossible possible. I just hope Imperium 4 or 5 are on impossible...

[Selentine]

That yellow star to the NE makes me nervous - at 7 parsec range, it could be a homeworld.

It could? Does anyone have a save file with an enemy homeworld at 7? (particularly on medium, but I don't remember seeing one even on small)

This game reminds me of mine (Rigel in 2343, glad to have company) until the Escalon event. I got Rebellion (in 2372). That does make the rest of the game hard to compare. If the next one is being scored, anyone object to turning off events?

Selentine

[Maniac Marshall]

I have to appologize for the structure of this report. I'm currently out of town and don't have access to my screen shots or my detailed, in character report, and I don't have time to rewrite it. If anyone is interested in seeing those, I'll post them when I get home in a few days. Anyway, here are the game notes.


OK, the starting position looks good. there are several planets in a loose cluster around us. One downer though is that it appears our empire will be known as nebula planets r us =/. I'm not sure if its one planet or maybe all 4 that are in the nebulas, but I guess I'll find out for sure at planetary shields.

There are 2 stars in range, both red. Ordinarily I send my col ship out blind to the most likely to ber good star when there are 2 choices, and send my scouts to stars 6 parsects out or towards yellow or near to yellow stars. But this time I think thats a risky move. Why? Because neither star seems more likely than the other, because they arent yellow or green, so one or both is likely a dud if not uninhabitable, and most importantly because they are almost completely at 6 & 12 to each other. If I choose the wrong star, I'll get slaped with a 6 turn delay. If they were both in the same general direction, near each other, I would choose diffrently. In this case I decide to play it safe and eat the 3 turn delay to get the best planet.

Ummm. Holy mother of... Folks, Rigel is quite quite definately the best star I've ever seen within 3 parsects of my homeworld (not counting Orion). Size 110 Rich and it ain't hostile? Hell, its even Fertile!? This was generated randomly?! Holy MoO cows Batman!

Rigel founded in 2305. I ship 23 off to there from Mentar, leaving 33 at home. I'll ship a few more off over the next few turns as well. I start making Scout II's as well. We need a whopping total (for this size map anyway) of 10.

2308 - Find midsized Rana at ranges edge near the southeastern yellows, and no habitable Dolz near the northern yellow. That yellow is probably uninhaited or I'd most likely have met a scout there.

2309 - Chase a Bulrathi colship off Rana. I didn't get there much too soon did I?

2310 - Find Incedius. Radiated Rich size 10 up near the no habitable system.

2311 - Chase a Meklar scout off Centauri, which is a rather nice size 80 Ocean planet north of Rana. I may push that direction first, even though I'd have to use the poor planet as a steping stone. We'll have to settle the poor planet eventually anyway. Also find midsized Gora, which should be safely out of everyones range, though not quite backyard.

2312 - Chase a bulrathi scout off Centauri. They appear to be to the southeast. Find annother rich planet in the south nebula. Zhardan Toxic 35 UR.

2313 - Find Pollus and WOW at a size 50 UR DESERT planet thats in range immediately! This is definately an amazing start. Also found small size 15 radiated Ukko near the frontline.

2314 - Find size 20 Toxic Crypto in the backyard. Hmmm.. starting to pile up hostile planets in the backyard =/.

2315 - Chase off some more Bulrathi colships. The last scout finally finds a good backyard planet. Gion, size 65 desert.

2318 - Chase off the Bulrathi again. Chase meklars off Ukko.

2325 - Both planets have "maxed out" and are building colships to try to grab the south area quickly.

2331 - With 3 colsips built and a 4th 1 turn out, I decide to open research from the home planet full blast on range to try to bring a couple of planets into range for colships.

2332 - Range 4 is our only option, but thats not bad on this map. Its allrady at 9%. Breakthrough imminent. As soon as it hits, I'll open all fields. Pollus & Escalon both founded on the interturn.

2333 - Well, I can't seed both worlds from Mentar. Ordinarily I wouldnt touch that awsome huge rich world, but they are going to go stand up a mid sized (huge for its class) Ultra Rich so I bite the bullet and send em.

2334 - gnn shows we are last in fleet strength.... big shocker there..... Range 4 is due any past turn now... I open all the fields.

2335 - We go for Scaner (only option), Improved 9 (only option), Class II deflectors (allways the only option), +10 Terra (only option.... we ARE the Psilons right??), Hand Lasers (Hyper-v/Gats were other options).

2336 - Centauri founded. STILL no range 4 =/. Time for Mentar to make a fresh batch of scouts. IBT we finally get the breakthrough....... erm, on Terra +10. STILL no range 4.

2337 - Finally Range 4 hits. Choices are neuclear engines, Range 6 or stableizer. Hoping for Sub Light Drives and seeing no urgent need for warp 2, I pick Stableizer. Scouts find Dead UR Berel.

2340 - Rana settled (whew). gnn informs us that there are runaway psilons!!!! oh wait, thats us :p. Contact is established with the Bulrathi. They have just the 3 planets. We really did poach Rana out from under them in an almost criminal manner, but I was counting on it for one reason. The Bears like huge death star model ships. Those take a long time to produce. You don't see those running arround escorting colships very often :lol:. If that had been the Alkiri, Darloks, or most other races, I would have made some LR lasers and tried to protect the planet as long as I could. Meanwhile, I decide to prioritize planetology for now. I'll attempt to trade for range 5/6 when it becomes available.

2341 - Hand lasers hits. With new choices of npg, hyper-x, and ion cannon, I select the pelet guns. If forced to build an early fleet, I like to build smalls and mediums. IMHO the npg is the single best fighter weapon for a long, long time because it has a much longer usage window than a laser and is smaller and at least as good as an ion cannon. By the time you can fit a better weapon than ion cannon on a fighter, the enemy will probably have stack killers or repulsors. On hard with Psilons, it should have a pretty decent shelf life. I hope that scatter pack is in the tree to be our next choice.

2343 - I'm using the huge rich planet to feed the reserves so I can double the production of everywhere except Mentar. Improved 9 comes in. Choices of Improved 8 and duralloy, I choose Duralloy. Gion founded. Realy no choice but to seed it from the Rich planet :(. We discover the yellow star in the north, Tallas, is a ho-hum Inferno, and that Vega, a purple star to the southeast has no planet =/.

2345 - Gora founded. I'll seed it from the Poor planet. We scout Kronos... the scout was allready en route before we knew Bulrathi lived there. We spy a human scout by there. Ah, yep, they are allied with the Bulrathi.

2346 - Find meklon. I also manage to scout Darrian (Meklar colony) and Bootis (Bulrathi colony). Pollus maxes out. I set it to grow people since its only about half full.

2347 - Find Klackons at the yellow west of Zhardan. their base shoos me away however. It looks like we may be fairly well boxed in now, with our only further gains coming from our local hostiles.

2348 - Both Class II and Scaner hit. Choices are Jammer II, Robotics III, Mark III. I chose Robotics III. Personal Deflector is our only option in force fields. We also find Arietes, a large ocean planet southeast of the Bulrathi. It is a human planet. There is only one more planet to look at in the south, a purple on the left edge. If it is claimed or highly hostile, I'll get a nap with the bears.

2350 - Find Aquillae. A large but poor planet in the top left corner. Out of range but safe for the moent.

2351 - The aforementioned purple planet is Collossa. A Radiated Rich size 35. We'll hopefully get that one later. I try to trade with the bears, but they dont want any of our techs.

2352 - Chase a meklar scout off Beta Ceti. A large UR Inferno in the south. My buff Rich planets are now doubling even mentar's production for a few turns.

2358 - Centauri finally maxes factories, starts on bases/research.

2359 - Klackons come calling to tell us we are worthless.... how nice. They only have 2 planets (Kholdan is the yellow next to Hyboria that we scouted a few turns back. I'm betting this changes fast though as they now have range 7 allready... They are killing us in tech. I initiate max trade of 200/year.

2360 - Terra +20 comes in, revealing choices of Enhanced Eco, Terra +30, and Toxic. This is a tough call with no clear as yet best answer. The Controlled Toxic would let us grab 3 new planets, but there are some radiateds we want. If radiated is in the tree, then toxic is redundant in the long run. We are dying for some kind of cleanup. so I go for the Eco.

2365 - Pirates pop up in trax. I have no clue where that is. As I'm still losing money on trade atm its not catastrophic. I hope an AI owns it and does something about it though.

2366 - npg comes in and new choices are Ion Rifle, Mercs, and neutron blasters. bah. no scatter packs =/. Missiles cant wait any longer. I go for the mercs.

2368 - relations have improved enough with the Bulrathi to get a nap. I pull the trigger.

2369 - Robotics III hits. Choices are Jammer III, Mark IV, Immproved Scanner. I go for the scanner. Personal shields also hit. The only choice is Shield IV. no planetary shield...... That could be catastrophic...

2370 - Duralloy comes in. The new choices are Auto Repair or reduced 60. Since I'm going hard for the Eco clean up, Auto repair is a no brainer. The meklars show up long enough to tell us they don't want to talk to us.... They lead us in tech barely. I start minimal trade (no use going any higher with the pirate event looking like a semi permanent event.)

2373 - Pollus becomes the first planet to refit. We now have the tech to build a LR settler on a medium to grab the large poor in the corner so we do it from pollus.

2374 - Rigel maxes and can make the colship in 1 turn. we change plans and build it there. I scrap the scout design. Both are in orbit with a scout ii so they are redundant.

2376 - The Klackons will now nap with me. I take it since whoever gets controlled whatever is probably going to get the planets first anyway.

2377 - Stableizer comes in, and the (only) new choice is sub light, but thats fine because thats what I wanted anyway. That's the last piece to the puzzel of making good fighter stacks should we need them.

2378 - Darn near everywhere maxes factories again. Time for a big research push. The meklars have branched out to 5 systems. They now controll the 2 (non hostile?) systems at the bottom left.

2381 - Eco comes in and ARGH Radiated is not in the tree. Rather than going for Soil Enrichment, I go back for Toxic. It might still be worth doing it backwards as we desperately needed a cleanup tech and no one would trade me one.

2383 - The meklar come calling wanting to up our trade.... kinda silly with the pirates going on, but I don't want to make him an enemy and hes close to nap level so I agree. Aquillae founded.

2386 - Toxic is nearly done allready. I shift priorities to try to get sub light at the same time to make fast settlers. Human destroyer probes approach the poor planet and the toxic next door to it. I'll have a few bases on the poor. It shouldn't be a problem.

2387 - Grr, the plague event hits Centauri.

2388 - Sub Light hits. The new choices are dissipators and range 8. I go for the dissipators. Time to make those new/fast toxic colships. We'll need 5. The riches can make one per turn. Mentar will take 2 turns and a boost from the reserves.

2389 - We have allready cured the plague!

2390 - Berel founded. I send 20 from pollus and set it to grow them back in 2 turns. The first vote happens. Oh crap. The Humans are nominated? I could lose this :(. Humans 8 votes themselves, Darloks 3 votes no one, Klackons 2 votes me (really?!), Bulrathi 3 votes no one, Meklars 4 votes humans Me 8 votes abstain. I need to make some friends fast...

2391 - Imp scanner hits. Bad news is the only way forward is ECM IV. I vascilate between getting it or going back for mark IV. I decide to grab the ECM for now. I can trade for mark II or mark III if needed. We found Talas and Crypto. Gnn special report: Psilons have 12 systems. The Psilon empire. Running away since 2340. This gets me contact with both the Humans and Darloks. To my surprise the entire northeast is settled except of one planet 10 parsects out. It's the southeast where planets remain. Specifially one next to and the others behind sol. We had pulled away in tech I thought, but now we are behind the humans. And the Darloks are in 3rd place. Wow. I get the Darloks to agree to minimum trade on the first try, and ship them Scanner as a bribe, which moves them to neutral. Hopefully they don't declare on me for a while at least. I get minimal trade and a nap with the Humans as well.

2392 - Found Zhardan. I decide to take a look at everyones tech so i set each to 1 year hide spy.

2393 - Construction hits. The new choices are Indust 6 and Zortium. Both would help, but since most of the new planets are rich I go for Zortium.

2394 - The spy with the humans lands. Hmm. Wow, their weapon tech sucks. Just Gats and Hyper-X so far. On the other side, they have Mark III. Shield III and Planetology out the wazoo. A fighter stack would probably still be effective against them. Unfortunately I had no decent bombs yet.

2395 - Mercs come in and my npg decision looks less weedy now as Stingers are also not in our tree. The new choices are Graviton, Hard and Fusion. Graviton is great if you are going after the folks who make lots of fighters, but I wasn't planning on that. Hard Beams are too big to be good on smaller ships. We didn't yet have a 2 space beam. That could be bad if somone delcares war and strolls in with repulsor beams. I select the Fusion Beams

2396 - The Darloks also have Class III shields and more Terraforming than us, not to mention Toxic Environ. Wow. Everyone is beelining the planetology techs.

2397 - Hmm, the Humans will trade Range 6 for Mercs? Merc isn't much of an upgrade from Hyper-X and Range 6 might let me explore the last few planets in the southwest. Done.

2398 - Class IV comes in. Wow a shield choice. We take Repulsors over Class V shields. Klackons arent very advanced. They have Range 7 and Ion Cannons. very little else. The Bulrathi have Class III, and Ion Rifles.... remind me to nuke them from orbit.

2399 - Find Draka. Yet annother Radiated planet =/. Finnally get that Meklar spy. They have little except Fusion Bomb. With that and Anti Missile Rockets they could make a bomber I'd have to fear.

Human 9 votes themselves, Darloks 4 votes Humans, Klackons 2 votes Humans, Bulrathi 3 votes abstain, Meklars 4 votes Humans. Me 10 votes abstain... Ok THAT was scary. If the Bulrathi vote for the Humans I lose.

2400 - Found trax down by Sol. It's the pirates base and an Inferno. I'm going to try to grab it.

2402- Soil Enrichment hits. the new choices are Cloning, Atmospheric and advanced Eco. All uber options. Gime Atmospheric first :). Crap, Crypto goes poor on me. At least it was small and had over half its factories up =/.

2406 - Here we go. People start complaining we are too big. Guess it's about time to whip up some extra bases when planets start maxing out.

2407 - Jammer IV comes in revealing Advanced Scanner and Mark VI. The Advanced Scanner is nice, but we really need a battle comp. I'll go back and grab the scanner later if needed.

2408 - Looks like we just beat the humans to trax. Here comes a fleet with a colship in it. I dial up the Humans and inform them that Trax is my planet. They cough up Mark II. Well, I need to get rid of the pirates, but first I want to get the fusion beams to miniaturize my fighter design.

2412 - Found Orion. It's pretty much where I expected at the blue star southeast of Trax. The humans complain again. The pot is calling the kettle black =/.

2413- despite having 4 fields at 17-20%, we hit on nothing =/.

2414 - Zortium, Warp Dissipators, hit. The new constr choices are Reduced 40%, Exoskeleton, and Tech 5. I choose the Exoskeleton. The new choices for propulsion are Impulse drives and Range 9. I really think Range 5 is sufficient for this map so I take Impulse drives.

2415 - Fusion Beams finally come in and the new choices dissappoint me. Anti-Matter Torps, Fusion Rifle and Megabolt cannon. WTF, we have a completely bombless tree??? I don't think I've ever seen that before with the Psilons. I guess we'll have to be bulrathi wannabees if people have good force fields. The no planetary shields + no bombs is going to make this a bit of a challenge. I take the Fusion Rifle. I dial up the meklars and make a trade I dont like, but we need a bomb and they are the only ones in the universe with a bomb. I ship them the stableizer for Fusion Bombs. I design a small fighter, a small bomber, a medium 5 shot missile boat with an npg since the space wouldn't work for anything better, a Fusion Beam cruiser, and a heavy fusion repulsor dread. I start building just fighters for 3 turns to take care of the pirates, then switch over to producing everything.

2417 - Repulsor Beams come in. Choices are Planetary Shield X (YES!) and Personal Shield. Since im allready doing 2 gropo options, this would be a no brainer even if we had Class V planetary shields up. I priortitize the new shields. I set up 2 regional forces. One at trax, one at Talas.

2418 - Pirate activity in Trax is eliminated.

2424- Here we go. Humans 10 votes themselves. Darloks abstain 4 votes. Klackons 2 votes the Humans. Bulrathi 3 votes the Humans. Meklars 4 votes abstain. Me 14 votes abstain.

2432 - Class X Planetary comes in. I go back for Personal Absorption instead of forward for Class VII.

2434 - I didn't even see it coming. The Meklars, the only people I've never been able to get a nap with, make a cold war move at Centauri. They take out 2 of the 14 bases at the price of all but 2 ships they sent.

2437 - Bulrathi break our long standing nap...

2439 - Darloks down to wary. Meklar make annother move. This time im ready. I'll have 20+ bases and 1/2 my fleet there. They'll cue up some Pink Floyd methinks (Run Like Hell).

2341 - Meklar fleet destroyed. I lost about 5 fighters. The Bulrathi make a move toward poor Escalon at warp 1. I'll be waiting... nah, enough of this peaceful Psilon crap. They may not have FORMALLY declared war on me, but they might as well have. I can go waste one of their colonies and still get back in time to defend the planet. Lets rock.

2342 - I infiltrate a klackon base with spies? Ack, it was supposed to be on Hide. Oh well, we go for computers since I haven't kept track of their techs. We get Jammer II... and frame the Humans for it. Better to be lucky.... Darloks cancel nap unsurprisingly. They'll be next after i squish the meklars & bullrathi if they move against me.

2444 - Kronos had 9 bases and 44 pop. Had. planet glassed. I lost about 5 bombers. The Darloks also declare war. Time to drag some ppl into this. I dial up the Klackons who are more than happy to declare ov the evil darloks. I also dial up the Humans. They want 1000BC.. um ok.

2445 - Bootis glassed. Heck, I didn't even need the bombers. The Merc boats took out the bases. All six of them =/.

2446 - Heh my spies make a breakthrough vs the Bulrathi, all fields available. I go for planetology and get controlled Barren. We frame the meklars. It doesnt matter. We glass Uras. Say goodnight Bearies. IBT Atmospheric comes in. I go for adv soil and lazily click the +25% button.

2447 - Kronos & Bootis Refounded. The vultures descend heh. Ill take the meklar planets via ground action which should free up the fleet.

2448 - Meklars declare war. Guess they know whats coming. Wow, its been a while since I played hard. Im actually knocking over a planet with fighters with npg's. I know its a backwards Darlok planet, but its still pathetic.

2449 - Exoskeleton hits, I go for Andrium Armor. Everyone votes for the humans, but I now have over 1/3 so it doesnt matter.

2450 - 2452 not much going on. chasing the vultures away from former Bulrathi space. Troops are on the way to capture the ultra poor darlok planet. My attempt at meklon failed because i forgot to send the bombers. I did knock out 1/3 of the bases with the dreads before time ran out though.

2453 Humans manage to beat my fleet at Bootis. I guess I was lulled to sleep by the other AI's patheticness.

2454 - We anihilate the human fleet at bootis.

2455 - We take Kataka from the Darloks. Zortium Exoskeleton/Absorption/Lasers vs Titanium Suits/Lasers. It wasn't close. We pillage range 5. The Humman's break our nap...

2459 - We capture meklon. They had Duralloy suits/deflector/ion rifle. I miscalculated my advantage and nearly lost. Only 5 survivors! We pull Reduced waste 80%, Tundra Environment, Jammer III, Range 7, Class III shields, and Anti-Missile Rockets from the wreckage. The Humans are making a warp 1 play for Zhardon. I wish em luck. 50 bases and 3 dreads will be waiting for them. At this point, I've quit making anything but the dreads. The other ships served me well vs the bullrathi, meklar and darlok fleets, but their usefulness against the humans will be low except for the bombers. The humans have dissipators and repulsors, so the cruisers and fighters will be sitting ducks. What we need are dreads. If I had better missiles, I'd keep making the missile boats. But to be honest, the compromise mercs have been the crapiest design I've had so far this game.

2460 - Fusion Rifles and Impulse Drives hit. I select Ion Drives over range 10, and then comes the interesting choice. Auto Blaster vs Pulson Missiles (no scatter VII... typical. It's never in my tree it seems). Ordinarily I'm all over Auto Blaster here as it's simply the best beam weapon vs low to medium shielded ships in the entire game, but our missle techs are SO BAD I feel like we need worthwile missles for our bases. Also, with the humans having repulsors, the auto blaster isn't really helpful until HEF arrives.

2461 - We take out about half the bases at darrian, but lose most of our remaining fusi bomers in the south. I was hoping to hold off on scraping the old design for a new one, but I may not be able to. Their fleet isnt much threat, but our lack of decent bombs or missiles makes taking out their bases a real chore.

2462 - We make a successful steal vs the meklars. I go for construction hoping for Robotics IV, but get Battle Suits. Oh well. We easily capture the 2nd Darlok world. We pull out Mark IV and Planetary Shield V, a tech they just got.

2462 - Annother successful theft. This time we pick planetology knowing we'll get the recently discovered controled Radiated and we do. After I clean out the Meklar presence, I'll go grab those Radiated worlds.

2463 - A Dark year as the Humans waste a large fleet and over 50 bases at Zhardon. Oh the joy of being in a nebula :(. Meanwhile, our invasion of darian fails as the meklar research scatter packs just in time to hose our transports.

2467 - The Darloks come begging for peace. I accept. Maybe they'll vote for me from now on. The Klackons are peaceful. Maybe they'll side with me too.

2468 - The Human troops arrive. Geez are they lagging in gropo. my kill ratio is like 10/1. This might actually work out ok. The humans will keep that scary fleet parked there and suicide there people on me heh. On the Bad news front the klackons break our nap :(.

2469 - The humans try again at zhardon. our kill ratio is 29 to 1 :lol: They have taken to bombing it from orbit now, but they only do like 1-2 million and half a dozzen factories. I'm replacing them faster than they can kill/raze them. They may get it eventually, if they get some gropo tech, but it will be a spud if they do. Meanwhile, we have success at darrian this time :) gnn reports leaders are preparing to merge with us. We pull neuclear engines, robotics IV, scatter pack V (yea!), Jammer I, Ion Rifle and something that escapes me off Darrian.

2471 - The Humans are sending annother suicide squad to zhardon. I wish I'd had the scatter pack tech when i made the new missile boat. Oh well, It'll have to do. I'll scrap the bombers soon. The humans showed up with class X planetary. Fusion bombs are pretty worthless vs that. I hope to god we get a good bomb eventually.

2472 - Kill Ratio 28:1 this time. I don't think they'll ever get it by invading. IT's fairly comical, but its time for it to end. I've gathered about 85% of my fleet from the far reaches of the galaxy at Escalon. Everything other than one Dread watching the Darloks, one Dread/bomber force finishing off the meklars, and one small patroll force guarding our new bulrathi/meklar holdings. It's going to kick some human fleet's ass at Zhardon. Meanwhile I glass Anraq, an ultra poor that was the meklars next to last planet. Just as I figure I'm about to be at peace, the Klackon's declare. Oh well, who needs friends.

2474 - The most important ships to get rid of are those annoying repulsor ones. My fighters can butcher the others.... if they survive and aren't paralized out of range. I concentrate missile fire on the repulsor ships. And.. success. When the vote happens everyone votes for the Humans, but we own 20 of the 37 votes, so it's no big deal. In fact, if we can get 5 more votes to switch sides, we win this puppy.

2475 - I really want to do some ship redesigns, in particular I can now make a small merc boat, but the ones I have are still useful/needed till I squish the meklars and klackons. That should'nt take long. I completely quit making ships and throw everything into making those Robotic IV facts and or class X shields at the new acquisitions. I have also rethought my position about the usefulness of fighters. That nebula battle showed me they are still useful vs the current human designs because, if nothing else, they make great, cheap sacrificial lambs. The humans had amassed annother fleet at Colossa that was nearly identical to the one I had just wasted except for the presence of 3 dreads. I really wanted to know what was on those puppies, so i decided to send a probe ship to find out. Depending on what was on those, i would either make fighters or i wouldnt. However, I wanted something with more punch vs higher shield levels than npg, and the humans just happened to have mass drivers. Ordinarily drivers are too bulky to be good on a fighter, but if still building fighters at tech level 30 to combat shield 6+ ships, the driver is worth it. I ship the humans the stabelizer for it. They like big ships and the stabelizer isn't as useful on those as it is on smaller ships generally. Meanwhile, I my final invasion force to finish the meklars arrives next turn.

2476 - Meklars RIP

2477 - Hmm, their dread has repulsors/dissipators/scaner :(. They also replaced their outdated escort with a model called cruiser i can look over next turn. Fighters can evade 1 stack with repulsors, but not 3, probably not 2. Looks like im going to need cruisers/battleships.

2479 - The invasion of Hyborea. The planet is size 65, so I sent that many... geez, they are as sad as the humans. They have Zortium Combat Armor, no shields/weapons. Our 65 troopers kill 50+ klackons with only 3 casualties. It is aparently much safer to be a Psilon marine than a Psilon fighter pilot.
I've come up with a shoping list to take out the humans.

1) High Energy Focus to blast those repulsor/disspiator ships out of the sky
2) Auto Blaster - See HEF above
3) Advanced Scaner so we can invade w/o scouting
4) Cloning -so we have the people to invade anywhere
5) Andrium Armor - almost complete.
6) Class VII Shields - 2/3 done

I prioritize research accordingly.

2480 - I ship half the survivors at Hyborea onto Kholdan. Our 31 take out 110 kalckons and 15 survive. Humans show up with Graveton Beams, cementing the nfp (no fighter policy).

2482 - Darloks commit suicide, declare war.

2483 - Ion Drives Come in, we go for HEF - Space superiority at nazin. invasion force sent.

2484 - Space superiority at the other Darlok Colony. Invasion force sent. Mark VII hits, we go back for the Scaner, avoiding the temptation of Robotic Controls V, Hyperspace Communications, and mark VIII comp.

2485 - Pulson Missiles hit. The new choices are Tachyon Beam and Hand Phasor. They don't tempt me at all. I go back for the Auto Blaster. We take out 90+ Darloks at Uxmai with 32 troopers, 16 of whom survive. We pull neutron blaster (worthless), Reduced 60% (nice), Terraforming +30 (10 better than what we had so good), And Improved Factory 6 (kinda late coming but still may be useful).

2486 - Uxmai falls

2487 - The darlok homeworld comes under Psilon control. The time approaches for final war with the Humans....

2488 - Advanced Soil hits, we go back for Cloning.

2491 - Hasn't been much going on because I've been maxing planets out with shield/gaianess/factories. I'm doing research off the rich planets :lol:. I had so many that my reserve is huge anyway so in an odd move they are carrying research forward while other planets max out. Andrium Armor comes in. Its improved 5/4/3 and waste 40% available. I go for Improved 3 at single click.

2493 - Cloning hits, we go for complete restoration.

2495 - Adv Scanner, Auto Blaster and Shield VII all hit. We go for Hyperspace comm, Class XV Planetary, and Hand Phasor. Looks like they are going for Hyborea again. They may get it, but they wont win the comming war. Umm, nope. I misjudged. They are headed to settle 2 radiated planets finally. They have cloaking devices... that could be a problem. Just waiting on HEF now. It's at 30%.

2496 - HEF hits, we go for SS Teleports. The humans declare war. Time to make my new designs.The Merc III is to shred the human ships obviously. The Blast Cruiser is just a standard cruiser with complementery to the dreadnaught specials. It's slightly less firepower for the buck than the dread, but the diffrent specials and the fact that several places can crank out 1 of these per year makes it worth it. The Sun Fire is, well, a human fleet anihilator. The Pulse boat is a bomber. It does 20 every hit so it will do 4 damage per missile hit to each human base at their current shield levels. And the fighter design? Didn't we say fighters were useless? Well, they aren't useless against the guardian :lol:. I go through and make sure that each planet that doesn't have a missile base will build one this turn. Under these circumstances, one base IS enough, because the humans cant hurt any of my planets except the nebula ones. My shielding exceedes all their weapons. I cue up a couple ground invasions from the few planets not building ships. The 2 most vulnerable planets are Xudax, their artifact planet, which is conveniently near my new, non shipbuilding holdings, and Aurora, a Rich Inferno behind Sol. They have 11 and 13 bases respectively. Taking those planets ought to gut the Human tech/production pace. 42 from willow, 33 from Uxmai, 54 from Kholdan, and 48 from Hyborea are cued up to invade Xudax. Some from nazin will join them next turn. The planets are told to regrow pop. 77 million from Centauri, and 47 million from Kronos are dispatched to Aurora. It will take 4 turns. Marines from Ursa Rana and Bootis will join them next turn, and ones from Trax the turn after. The planets are told to regrow pop. Tech is off. We don't need anymore tech.

2497 - 90 million from Ursa, 65 million from Rana and 42 million from Bootis are sent to Aurora. Planetfall in 3 turns. Meanwhile, 59 million from nazin are sent to Xudax, Planetfall next turn.

2498 - A human fleet shows up at nazin. Our 1 base shooes them off :). Meanwhile 23 of 161 transports run the gauntlet at Xudax. We get bad rolls, but 16 still survive to take the planet. We'll go 100% spending on shield/base and feed it from the reserves. Once its got a shield and a base its safely ours. Our brave marines transmit back to us the secrets of Graviton Beam (useless as the humans have all big designs), Advanced Eco (Very nice), ECM V (useless at the current tech situation except for increasing spying), Trilithium (Range 10 could be useful, but I doubit it.), and Cloaking Device (Ordinarily wonderful, but it came too late to be useful). I send 55 million from Trax to join the invasion of Aurora. The Humans have Settled Draka, Incedius & Anraq. I failed to notice that their one planet in my territory before the recent settles also has only 11 bases, so I order up an inasion of it. I send 45 from Hyborea, and 41 from nazin for starters, with additional troops from Kholdan, Uxmai and Willow to follow next turn. The human fleet has allready left Drakka so I order an invasion there that should all get through, 25 million (the planets size) from Kataka. On the fleet front, our rally point at Escalon allready has 69 Merc III, 3 Blast Cruisers, 2 Sun Fires, and 111 Pulse Boats in orbit. I'll wait one more turn, then send the first fleet out to go wreck some Human fleet/bases starting at Crius most likely. I'll make a second, similar fleet, then I'll go all fighters to take out the guardian. At least, that's my current plan. The Humans send 65 mil vs our 17 mil at Xudax. We suffer only 3 casualties :).

2499 - We get a spying success with all 3 fields available. Construction would be most helpful as it has 2 cheaper factory and Reduced 20% available so i try it and we get the booby prize of Improved 5. Our invasion of Drakka comes off. It's 25 vs 25. We take the planet with 3 casualties. Taking Drakka got the Human's attention. Their fleet from Incedius heads there at top speed. Unfortunately for them, This Leaves Incedius undefended. I order up an invasion of it from Crypto. The planet is just size 10, so I send 10. What the human fleet headed for Kataka doesn't realize is it's going to run out of gas when it gets there, as I'll be taking every planet within 10 parsects of it this turn :) 71 million from Kholdan, 45 million from Uxmai, and 42 million from Ryoun are sent to aid the invasion of Ryoun. The fleet at Escalon now numbers 161 Merc III, 10 Blast Cruisers, 2 Sun Fires, and 184 Pulse Boats. I order it to go Run over the Defenses at Crius, the main Human staging point.

2500 - Humans make a joke attack at Uxmai, they then glass Drakka :(........... I hadn't counted on that. Guess I'll have to make a colship to go retake it. Actually, the stupid nebula eta bug caused this. My troops weren't even supposed to arrive till this turn. We capture Incedius with 3 casualties. 48 of 244 Transports penetrate at Ryoun. We lose 3 marines, but take the colony & its 271 factories :). The Humans suicide 34 more guys on Xudax, taking it down to 9 Psilon marines. At Aurora, 76 of 287 transports penetrate, we slaughter 73 human troops with only 4 casualties. From Ryoun, we learn Class IV deflectors (we allready have Class VII so ho hum), Improved Industrial 4 (Thats a nice one), & Improved Terra +40 (annother goodie), From Aurora we learn Reduced waste 20% (the best tech the Humans had period :) ), Controlled Inferno (useless), Improved Terra + 50 (yea!), Improved Industrial 7 (a dud, but I think its the last tech they have that we dont). OK, I'm wrong. The Humans do have one tech we dont still. They have Bio Toxin Antidote :lol:. Hmm.. The Humans are sending their Fleet from their joke attack at Uxmai to Ryoun. I've a suspicion the Fleet from Drakka will meet them there. I send wht fleet I have assembled at Escalon 123 Merc III, 7 Blast Cruisers, 2 Sun Fires, 63 Pulse Boats to go guard it till it gets a shield up. All new acquisitions except Incedius which has 1 factory and really cant yet are doing full on reserve fed production on shields. Everywhere else takes a turn off shipbuilding to terraform/max pop.

2501 - Annother Joke attack at Uxmai is repulsed. Hmmm. Thats a nasty looking fleet at Crius. I might lose a bunch of ships here. Yep. They manage to kill my whole fleet cept for the 2 dreads and a handful of mercs. We do waste all their bases however. More bad news. The humans did indeed more in force vs. Ryoun. 38million killed, 115 factories destroyed :(. Good thing i sent my fleet there to arrive next turn. The humans send 82 marines at our 73 at Aurora. We swat them down taking 9 casualties. The Humans are also making annother Play for Zhardon with a small fleet. I'm pretty sure we can sawt it down however. What fleet I have at the rally point hops over to greet them.

2502 - We shoot down half the fleet at Ryoun before they can move. The rest retreats. At Zhardon, we repulse the attack, losing 3 Cruisers and a handfull of merc boats. They never get anywhere near the planet. Crius came up with 2 more bases this turn. Unfortunately I dont have any pulse boats to kill them so i retreat for now, but I'll be right back. The Humans try to Invade Aurora again. Our 1 base shoes off their fleet, shoots down half their transports, and we lose like 2 guys killing their 40+. Everywhere except Incedius and Xudax now have at least a class V shield up, even Ryoun a turn late. Several places have finnished Terraforming and Maxing Factories now and go back to building ships. Replacment colonists shiped to Ryoun from Willow. The fleet at Ryoun Redirects to Crius except for 2 cruisers who stays behind. they'll park over Drakka which the humans will resettle next turn. Humans have settled way back there Ukko. It's size 15. I'll send 15, then park 2 cruisers there to shoo off invaders.

2503 - We steal Bio Toxin Antidote. We Capture Ukko w/o a scratch. The computer virus hits our weapons research wiping out 174 points...... we may never recover....., The humans send 2 Escorts and 2 cruisers at Ukko, I send about 2 dozen mercs to aid our 2 cruisers and set Berel, which is set to produse 2 cruisers to Reloc em there. It's probably more than I need, but better to be safe. In an attempt to stamp out my previous weed, I send half to population of Trax at Crius to take it as the bases are toasted. Meanwhile, 59 million Human marines arrive to take on our 63 million at Ryoun. Final score Psilons 59, Humans 0. At Crius 65 million Psilon marines arrive. I forgot how many humans there were. Somewhere between 50 & 70 million. They managed to take out 5 million, but 60 million remained to take over the 520 factories :). We got no tech because the humans have none.

2504 - The 2nd Battle of Crius goes much easier. We lose a handful of Merc boats, maybe a dozen or so, and trash the entire human fleet & 2 bases w/o breaking a sweat. We actually take a casualty retaking Drakka (25 vs 3). The Humans are making annother play to glass Drakka. not this time slimeballs. I have that small fleet at Zhardan head there to intercept it. One more turn of fleet regular fleet building, then we'll switch over to some Guardian Killers. I've decided we want to controll the whole galaxy afterall. (OK so I can't settle the no habitable planet systems. I'll settle for having a fleet in orbit at them at games end.) I send the Pulse boats and one dread on to take out the bases at Sol. The rest stay behind at Crius to defend it till it has a shield up and to intercept the small fleets headed there currently. The humans are making a joke attack at nazin again. The fleet currently at Escalon is dispatched to run over Galos. Other than that, it's a quiet turn.

2505 - At Ukko they take out a dozen Mercs but are killed. At Crius half their fleet is slaughtered before they can move. When they do get to move they retreat immediately. Then at Sol we lose half our Pulse boats and run out of missiles leaving one base... we'll just invade past it next turn. Back at Ukko, 3 transports get through but we kill em w/o a scratch. I change plan. I feel like all we need now are pulse boats and a few Mercs. I'm going to make one round of those THEn the fighters.

2506 - At Drakka, its One dread and 9 Cruisers of varying designs for them, 3 cruisers, 34 pulses and 78 mercs for me. I lose 29 mercs and 2 Pulses, but they lose their whole fleet - the colony ship. I'd call that a good trade. Thats It for this rounds battles. Time to make a few thousand guardian killing fighters. We can redesign them however. I have 2 design's and I'm not sure which is better. Both feature Computer 6, Inertial Stableizer + max manouver so they can close immediately and and Andrium Armor. One design features a Mass Driver, ECM and Anti Missile Rockets to try to stay alive longer, and the other features a Fusion Beam which will do about 1 more damage per 4 hitting shots than the driver ship. I finally settle on the latter design. I figure about 2000 ships should do it. The Fleet at Crius is ordered to retake sol. Marines from Trax will take the planet at the same time. I'm waiting for the last of the non fighters to trickle into Escalon, then we will go run over the Southern human planets starting with Arietis.

2507 - We run over the bases at Sol w/o casualty. Human transportsat Drakka were all destroyed :). We take Sol easily as expected. We had like 5 casualties vs their 90+. We produce 1108 of our Guradian Killers. I'm going to produce em for 3 more turns, then I'll shut off ships and do some pointless research :p. I dont make any new offensive moves this turn. The Fleet at Sol doesn't have enough Bombers to level many bases anymore, so its waiting for reinforcements. The rest of the fleet at escalon is waiting for the last batch of non fighters to arrive.

2508 - The northern fleet arrives at Galos. It's got 24 bases and one cloaked ship that will run. Umm, nevermind. It wont run because its too slow to evade our HEF toting brigade. The 32 bases are all slaged without a scratch. The Humans arrive at Sol. I let them run. We produce over 1k more Guardian killers. The fleet at Escalon is ordered to Arietis. An invasion of Galos is ordered up in the form of 100 marines from nazin. The dreads and Pulsers from Galos are ordered on to nitzer to waste the 20 bases there since they have no fleet support.

2509 - Human joke attack at Hyborea. Our one base shooes off the fleet. Human fleet arrives at galos, it's wasted to the last ship with no casualties. Our Dread, 5 cruisers and Pulse Boats arrive at nitzer to fight off 5 Cloaked Cruisers and 20 Bases. We kill 3 of the Cruiser and all the bases w/o a scratch. The Human's show up wanting peace... umm, sorry but the game engine wont let me win peacefully anymore. Sorry, but I have to exterminate your entire race now. Have a nice day. We produce about 960 of our Guardian Killers. An invasion of nitzer is ordered up in the form of 75 marines from Uxmai. Having recieved its replacement pulse boats, the fleet at Sol is ordered on to Toranor. Some of the Pulse Boats at nitzer will meet them there. The Humans now have complete eco restoration. I'll get that in 1 turn when I take Galos.

2510 - Annother Human joke attack at Hyboria. Also at Galos.... ah crap there is a base there now and I didn't leave any pulse boats behind. Oh well, we'll get some of the 100 transports through anyway... 97 of the 100 in fact. Our 97 take out 115 Humans with 10 casualties. We learn complete Eco Restoration.... Death Spores was in our tree?? It's been there all along and I've been too blind to notice?? Really?? I've missed it all this time?? Sigh. Oh well,it's too late to worry about getting those now, especially since the humans have the Antidote. Besides, its been more fun playing without bombs anyway :). I select Universal Antidote (just in case) ahead of Terra +80 or Bio Terminator. It's just too late to mess with Bio Weapons when the humans only have 6 planets left, soon to be 5, one of which is that Ultra Poor the Meklars once owned (the last planet they'll have). We produce 920 more Guardian Killers. I figure thats enough. I shut down ship production everywhere but at Trax which is the Staging Point for the Orion attack which continues making Guardian Killers, and at Darrian, which is ordered to make Settler R6 Colship to grab that last Radiated planet. It's nice to be able to fit a Radiated base on a medium platform. When all the fighters (4003 + whatever Trax makes) arrive, we launch. Most of what is left of the human fleet is converging on Galos. I order our fleet that was forced to retreat by the lone missile base to stay in the system.... I guess this is a good time to explain a personal rule I play by. Some people consider the ship turnaround and stay in system thing introduced in v1.2 a cheat, others do not. I've noticed most if not all of the community here doesn't consider it so. I have my own standard on that thats middle of the road. I consider it ok if: 1) none of the ships have bombs or missiles or 2) If you don't use the bombs or missiles on any of the ships in that stack if they have been used previously in that system until you either leave the system or until a # of turns = to the ammount of time it would take you to reach the nearest owned/neutral/allied system have elapsed (exception: If you still had unused shots when you retreated, you may use that many shots and no more. This can get messy with ships with mixed racks of both 2 and 5 shots of course. In that case I simply consider the missles not usable) SO ships with both Beams and bombs/missiles simply turn missiles off or don't attack the planet unless its with long range beams if they have bombs in their design. Basically what this boils down to is you can't just keep turning bombers arround to finish off bases. Call it a silly concession to logic on my part, but missiles/bombs magically reappearing just seems like cheating to me. Especially later in the game with the Cloaked/SS Teleporting brand of bombers that you can often build. The point of this is to say that now that our marines took the system we can use the missiles next round here because we turned arround to our own system. For completeness so we can claim ownership, I send one cruiser to guard each of "our" four no habitable planet systems heh. Wow 26,926 research points/turn? I usually play small maps. That sort of makes my eyes bug out just looking at that heh.

2511 - Humans attack Crius. It's allready got a base. c ya. Humans attack at Galos. Our "turned arround" fleet is waiting on them. I expect them to run, but they decide to commit suicide instead. They do take out about 50 of our 75 merc boats though thanks to a misclick on my part :(. At nitzer, 2 more bases pop up. We shread them easily. At toranor we face 29 bases and 2 of their cloaked/graveton design which should run. We lose about half our merc boats before we can finish off the bases. The merc boats are mostly decoys now. It keeps them from shooting at the pulse boats. Spies take out 6 factories at Mentar. At nitzer its 75 of us vs 75 of them. They manage to take out 6 million of Mentar's finest before we take over the planet. Humans are sending a Colony fleet to Colossa. I totally didn't notice that earlier. It's due in 1. We have our own tiny fleet there. We'll attempt to fight them off and settle it ourselves, if we cant then we'll just invade. For some reason I've forgotten all about the fleet at Escalon. It is ordered to Arietis now. I send 62 million marines from Aurora to take Toranor next turn.

2512 - An attack at Gora. It's just completed its shield/base and is safe, but the human fleet can't resist trying to kill our little merc boats. I blow up the dread and about 6 of the 12 cloaked design before they retreat. We never got scratched. At Collossa its 13 of their Cloaked design, 3 colships and one other Large vs 6 of our cruisers and 12 Mercs. We may not win this one... Then again, maybe we will. We kill them all w/o any losses. All hail the Auto Blaster :). next up is our 62 marines landing to take out the 120+ at Toranor. Gotta give the Human marines credit, they did take out 15 of our marines, but still 47 remained to take the colony. Most of the Fleet at Toranor is ordered on to Imra to arrive next turn. The Mercs, half the Cruisers, and One of the 4 dreads are left behind to guard it. Meanwhile, the fleet at Galos is no longer needed, So it is ordered on to Phyco, as are the Pulse boats at nitzer. The rest of the fleet at nitzer remains behind to guard it till it completes its shield & a base. The fleet bound for Arietis will arrive next turn.

2513 - Joke attack at Hyborea. One cruiser shows up at nitzer to face our 5 + Dread. It's too slow to retreat and is blown out of the sky. At Areitis Its our bad fleet vs 20 Bases, a dread a repulor cruiser, avd 2 cloaked cruisers. Ho-hum. We lose a few pulse boats. less than 10 I think. Their fleet is anihilated. Then at Imra its 19 bases and 1 cruiser. ho-hum the cruiser is too fast for us and gets away. Collossa founded. Only Collassa, Toranor and Ukko need Defending now. Everywhere else has its shield and base. There is one fleet playing a zone between Collassa and Ukko that looks to have one more battle before the end as the Humans had annother settler fleet en route to Collassa before I settled. It's geting some merc boat reinforcements next turn and should be more than capable of defending the 2 planets. Of the 4 remaining human planets, 2 have a fleet parked overhead, and a 3rd has a fleet one turn away. That leaves only Anraq, an ultra poor that was the one Meklar planet I glassed rather than invaded. I did that on purpose hoping the humans would settle it and give me somewhere to bomb them later. They obliged. There is still nary a base on that planet, so its mine whenever I want. On the Orion front, The last 16 fighters arrive at Trax next turn.. but its just 16 out of 4078. I don't see that it is worth waiting on them. The settler ship arrives at Trax next turn. I can then send it to Orion next turn and settle it. The game should be over in 2 turns. I order 56 million from Aurora to Imra due in 2, 52 million from Bootis to Phyco (in anticipation of trashing the bases next turn as they arrive) due next turn, 65 million from Trax to Areitis due next turn, and 72 million from Beta Ceti to Anraq, due next turn. We then order our Fighters on to take out the Guardian.

2515 - 2 Cloaked cruisers show up at Areitis. We thrash em. Guardian attacks Psilons..... Took 5 rounds but... guardian terminated :). At Bootis... yep, a joke attack. They see our 1 base and run. next up is phyco. The last bastian of human defense is about to be utterly obliterated. You got 19 bases and 5 cruisers? bring it on pal. We take down one cruiser, the rest retreat. We suffer no casualties. A joke attack at Toranor, they retreat before I can whack em. Our 65 million arrive at Areitis and take out well over 100 humans with only 8 casualties. Our 72 arrive at Anraq. We suffer 8 casualties but take out about 70 of their troops. Our 52 million arrive at phyco to take out their 104 million, which we do suffering only 6 casualties. Gnn reports we have thrashed the Guardian and pulled several new technologies from the planet. These include Death Ray, Reduced Waste 40%, neutronium bomb.......... OH SURE nOW WE GET A BOMB GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR, & Anti-Matter Torps. For fun I play arround with ship designs. We could now design a fighter with a mark 4, stableizer and AUTO BLASTER! (drool). I think thats why God created repulsor beams. Without those, that kinda firepower for the buck would have to be illegal. Yeah its 2 classes down on battle comp, but it gets 3 shots to the fusion beams one, so it's over double the fighter we just wasted the guardian with! We could also make a mean looking pulson missile small design. The huge design we could make now is simply criminal. SEVEnTY AUTO BLASTERS + Repulsors, Auto Repair, HEF, Andrium Armor, Mark VII & Shield VII. Thats sickening. The design we have right now has only 24 Auto Blasters. All this miniatuization without doing a bit of research. Wowzers. Of course, it costs over twice what the current design does, but it would be so worth it. Oh well, lets get it over with. I click next turn.

2516 - Attack at Collossa Repulsed. Their fleet anihilated. Attack at Areitis thrashed. They retreat after losing 2 ships to my superior speed. Attack at Orion?! lol. It's a colship vs my Dread, 82 Pulse Boats, 1870 Guardian Killers and R6 Settler :p. My fighters blow it out of the sky! One cruiser joke attack at Phyco. Cruiser Terminated. One cruiser arrives at Imra. It too is terminated. We have our first breakthrough in ages. We learn the secrets of Hand Phasor. Just in time to use them in the final battle. How nice . Choices include Pulse Phasors, Hellfire Torpedoes, Proton Torpedoes, Scatter Pack X missiles!!, and Tri-Foccus Plasma Cannons. The Brainiac studies this carefully and determines that at our current tech level and at the Human's current shield level, there is still no beam weapon in the entire tree thats better than Auto Blastors, while Scatter Pack X boats would blow the human dreads out of the sky about twice as effectively as Pulsons so he elects to research that :p. Meawhile, we arrive at Orion and settle. Also goivg on, our 56 million marines arrive at the last Human colony, Imra. There were 113 million there. But now, there are 51 million Psilons that call it home.

I really enjoyed this game. It will probably be a long time before I see annother "Rigel" 3 parsects from the homeworld.

[Zed-F]

I have had a game where I started within range 3 of an enemy homeworld (but I don't have a save.) Starting close to an enemy homeworld does not happen often, but it does happen. I agree that the odds were against the yellow star to the NE being an enemy homeworld, though.

[Justus_II]

Very nice report, I really like the +'s and -'s, I keep telling myself I am going to do more post-game analysis, so history won't always repeat itself... I also like the idea of coming up with an RBO-Standard glossary of abbreviations, I'm sure we could pull enough examples out of our first few Imperia to post a standardized listing. I know most people may already have their own they are comfortable with, so maybe we could even list a few 'alternates', but at least for those new to the game, it's a good starting point.

[Justus_II]

What are the limitations on how close homeworlds start to the human? I've seen them start much closer than 7 parsecs from other AI homeworlds, as was the case here, so is the minimum distance between Human-AI homeworlds different that AI-AI homeworlds? Also, I thought I read somewhere that homeworlds will not begin on the map edges, is that only for human or AI as well?

As for the random events, certainly they can cause some significant swings, while they do make the game interesting, they can affect the comparability. I only had 2 events this game, neither very significant, a 900BC donation, when I had plenty of reserves, and a Nova event at Gorra that I easily outresearched. I guess I'd like to leave them in for most 'normal' games, even for fastest finish games, but if it is a tightly scored game (like last time) where a few points could make the difference, I'd agree with disabling them.

[Selentine]

Y33 - Research begins. Let’s see what our choices are!
Y34 - Very pleased with the options.

That was not my reaction. Lacking 80% and 3/1 (Improved ECO) means ~1.5/head instead of ~2.0/head. I was unpleased with these choices, and lost literally decades. If I'm reading these scribbles right (and it certainly felt this long), I was on 2/1 reduction until 2405--no one I had contact with had 3/1 themselves.

Y38 - +10M finally comes in, not only later than I figured but with worse choices. +20M, Dead or Spores. I don’r recall any Barren or Dead worlds, and I’m anxious to get further up the tree, so I choose spores.

Taking +20 or Dead gives you the same new choices as taking Spores; they're in the same block.

Y58 - I meet Meklars and am disappointed to learn that I don’t have the biggest production in the galaxy! They don’t offer any tech I want, so I appease them with a gift of hand lasers.
Y69 - Ground battle with the Mekar at Rana! They have Duralloy arm,or, but I’ve got superior numbers (75). To my relief the battle goes well and 31 colonists survive.

I can't imagine offering troop tech as tribute. Much less to the Meklars, who often develop cabin fever and invade neutral/friendly colonies.

Y63 - Robotic Controls III arrives... I immediately set Pollus and Rigel for refits with max reserve support.
Y120 - Tech 5 comes in. Let’s start building factories!

Are we to infer that you left the rest of your planets on 2 facs/pop? For 57 years?

I'm not into all the baby-kissing. Refreshing to see it's unreliable, and refreshing to see the Sakkra strategy nonetheless proved viable. Seems like you still have fun with this game.

Selentine

[Selentine]

Well, this report is a little shorter than my previous ones, but then again this game went quicker (time-wise) than the others.

I couldn't believe this so I had to read the report.

I was missing Planetary Shields V, which made me a little nervous, but luckily I didn’t see any AI with it either.

Lucky you. Conquest does not go quickly when the AIs get it and you're relying on nuclear bombs.

Taking Rigel instead of Centauri was the right move. I didn't want to let the Bulrathis encroach because they're such a nuisance to kill, but Rigel was so sick taking it ASAP makes the rest of the game a walk.

Re: the report, PNG! PNG! PNG! JPEG stinks for 16/256-color, and the blowups of artifacty 320x200 .jpgs detract from an otherwise nice presentation.

Selentine