Imperium Three - Head of the Class

[Selentine]

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?

My experience was that AI homeworlds were at least "8" (7.01) pc from the player's, though I've seen them 1 pc from each other. My experience is that on small maps with 5 opps, I never get a central location because it would be impossible for all the AIs to be >7 away. But apparently Zed's seen more than me.

Selentine

[Sirian]

Hi guys. I'm glad to see some reports here!

I tried over the weekend, and as late as 5PM Monday, to get an older machine hooked up so I could play this event. (And so I can get the next one going! It just didn't go right. I've had to give up on that box entirely and try with another one. I should be able to get that one up within a couple of days.

Although I've been quite busy lately, I'm also looking out after our community interests in the broader sense, even if not much evidence of that has been showing up this month. h34r:

I am going to play and report for Imperium Four. It will be our first Impossible difficulty event. I'm sorry I missed this one. :unsure: I hope you can cut me some slack. :wub:


- Sirian

[Patroclus]

I believe I picked the worst possible scouting path. I sent the colony ship coreward, to Small Poor Escalon, and sent scouts down and west, in hope of boxing out neighbors from scouting planets. I didn't scout the other possible starting planet, the Rich Fertile Rigel, until 2309, and couldn't colonize it until 2325. I didn't scout the Desert U-Rich next to Rigel until 2325 either.

I was so disgusted with the vicariances of fortune presented by the 2 starting planets that I stopped taking turn-by-turn notes at that point.

I did manage to poach Rana from the Bulrathis, and then played a defensive builder game, focusing on production and population techs. I still had about a dozen planets, including 3 U-rich and 1 Rich, so I had plenty to work with. My goal was to just run the tech race for a while until I had an overwhelming lead, and then flatten 'em. Between my being the largest race, and the humans agitating almost the entire galaxy against me, I nearly lost the vote in 2400 (and if the Darloks hadn't abstained, I would have lost) so I bribed the Klackons with numerous low-level techs so I would have a friend in the council. The 2425 vote was still close, but by 2450 my population was in explosive growth and I had enough pop to stop the vote on my own. I exterminated the Meklars and Darloks, the Bears were down to a refugee planet in the humans' backfield, and I had enough pop for a conquest win (the klackon votes were irrelevant to the 2/3 margin) in 2474.

Being curious about the difference that Rigel vs Escalon would make in the game, I started the game over. Send the colony ship to Rigel, stand it up ASAP, and use the colony ships from there to poach Rana, Kronos and Bootis from the bears! I went on to get an extermination victory inbetween turns 2450-2451, passing up a conquest victory in 2449. The Meklars were the last race to fall, even though they were on my doorstep and had only 2 planets. This is because they had 11 points of shielding and I had *NO BOMBS*, not even Fusion bombs! I spent about 5 turns cracking Meklar, losing 5 of my ARS-equipped Huge Heavy Fusion Beam ships, but I finally took the planet. But their last planet was Darrian, which was large and rich and had even more bases than Meklar had... I didn't think I would be able to crack it without building a huge stack of missile boats, but then I remembered something my troops had gotten from the Darloks, and one turn later I had a stack of about 500 Speed 4 small ships with Death Spores. That, needless to say, was enough to finish the game as soon as it arrived at their last planet.

The game was fun but I would vote against using maps like this one. Too much hinged on the decision you made on your first turn, especially since the usual "correct" play (Colonize Coreward) couldn't have been more incorrect for this map.

Thanks for hosting up the game for us! Looking forward to the next one.

[dathon]

Before I get to the action, I'd like to make three quick comments. One, I've been Lurking the Civ 3 lounge for some time, and it was
the discussions there, and on Sirian's webpage that drew me to Orion. I'm looking forward to having fun with people who love to game as
I do. Second, I'd like to apologize for the tone of my first post under the thread. Losing is an educational experience, but it doesn't
mean I have to like it However, I probably should have waited on the post until I'd calmed down. Third, I am a relative newbie at
this. I've got 5 games finished on Average, two diplomatic losses as the Darloks and three wins as the Humans, Meklars, and Bulrathi.
This being my sixth full game, and first on Hard, I know I have a lot to learn, so please PLEASE rip me a new one on how I did Ok,
enough prattle, on to the report! BTW, I meant to write this better, but as always RL had other plans. Please forgive the fragments; I
simply tidied up my notes.

*Start: Two habitable planets, reds, completely opposite each other. If I choose one, and it is uninhabitable, that's 9 turns before my
first colony. Deeming that to be too much of a risk, I decide to scout both first.
*2303: Let's see, Ocean Poor 75 to the South. And to thw North... WOWSERS. 110 Rich!? Guess my colony ship has a course to set. If people
gambled here and went south first... OUCH. Built three Scout 2's (yeah yeah, I got that from Sirian's site). Why not wait for the colony
ship to settle? 3 very at-risk worlds in easy range of yellow stars. Probably already scouted, but I at least want a look.
*2306: Rigel founded. 16 colonists leave from Mentar. Normally, I'd send 6 to keep homeworld at around 50, but I want this powerhouse
planet stood up quickly. 5 more Scout 2's leave Mentar.
*2309: First 3 scouts arrive. No planet, radiated, toxic. Well then. On the upside, if there are AI's in those yellow stars, they won't
be settling near me for awhile Also, the toxic is ultra-rich.
*2310: 13 more from Mentar to Rigel, putting it at 1/3. Very unusual for me to drain the homeworld like that, but as I said before, I want
this planet up to capacity sooner rather than later.
*2311: Scout the Greens to the south. Chase the Meklar away from Centauri. Nice Jungle 80, should be in range when Escalon settled.
*2312: Scout reports back from the red in the nebula. Desert yeah yeah, pop max 50 yeah yeah, ultra rich yeah... WHAT!? Ho..ly..Cow.
Well, if ever there was a good game to ease into Hard, this is it LOL.
*2313: Scout toxic Crypto, and Rana, Arid 65 with a Bulrathi colony. Wait a sec... a colony Hmmmm... Mentar isn't even close to
being ready to make colony ships. Perhaps my decision to speed Rigel wasn't a good idea after all? We shall see.
*2318: Rigel can now build a colony ship in 5 turns, faster than Mentar I need to get the boats going now. I intend to build 4
to grab Centauri, Gorra, Escalon, and Pollus. Gion will have to wait for range tech. Set the re-base to Mentar to gain a turn.
*2323: First colony ship produced. Micromanaging the slider on Rigel allowed enough factories to build the next ship in 4 turns, with
run-over. Mentar has hit the crossing point of pop growth and factory production, so I allocate 20 rp to see my options.
*2324: I get Scanner (only option), Industrial 9 (only option), Terra +10 (only option. missing both waste clean-up techs? where's
Greenpeace when you need them...), Range 4 (only option), and weapon.... all 3 available. Wow, almost no choices. Interesting bunch of
Psilon's we have here... I choose Hyper V's. I'm going to be using Mentar, of all places, to seed the next four worlds, so I decide to
go full research there; no sense in building empty factories for now as most of the pop will be going to new colonies. 159RP across all
categories... this should be quick.
*2328: Escalon founded, 20 scheduled from Mentar. The second colony ship from Rigel arrives at Mentar next turn, 4 more to Centauri.
Third ship for Gorra comes in 3 turns. Terraforming +10 already ripening at 14% (geez Psilons).
*2330: Terraforming +10 comes in. Mentar is set to do it in 1 turn. Rigel is about to complete another col ship, so I let it and put the
scraps to terraforming, planning to top it off next turn. All second rung planetology techs are available. I choose Controlled Dead to
leap-frog to Controlled Toxic (hopefully); I want that ultra rich East of Mentar sooner rather than later. Plus, I note it is rather tricky
to use the research slider as a measuring cup with the Psilons
*2333: Centauri founded, opening communications with the Bulrathi. Aggressive Ecologists. Well, better than erratic. They have 4 planets,
and we establish minimal trade. If I had to guess, based on scout encounters, I'd say Meklon is the yellow Northwest of Ursa. Stunted
Meklars. Well, as much as you can stunt the cyborgs. This is a good thing. Range 4 comes in, work started on Nuclear Engines (we learned
to travel at Warp speed before Nuclear Engines?? interesting timeline... ) 26 pop from Mentar to Centauri. 6 more Scout 2's ordered
from Mentar for new systems.
*2334: Industrial 9 comes in, I choose armor as the next tech given the proximity of the Bulrathi.
*2335: Scanner comes in, choose Robotics 3. According to GNN we are... behind the Klachon's in research!? Yikes. Yep, Meklon was where I
thought it was. Looks like the Cyborgs are sitting pretty with just one little planet. Can't say I feel sorry for them.
*2336: 35 Inferno scouted at yellow to the NE.
*2337: Gorra founded, and can now see a second Meklar colony at Darrian in the SE. I would ship people from Mentar, but Pollus will found
next turn, and I don't have enough for both. Send 11 pop from Escalon; it is poor and will not be able to grow fast anyway. Puts it back
at 1/3 mark, and puts Gorra at 1/4.
*2338: Pollus founded, making me first in Galaxy to 6 planets. Send 15 from Mentar. Class II shields come in, only option is personal
deflector, but useful with the Aggressive Bulratih next door. Wow, another Ultra Rich discovered at NW blue, Dead. 3 UR and 2 rich,
unbelievable. Give a click from construction and 2 from propulsion to speed controlled Dead a little. Last col ship will complete next turn.
*2343: Colony from Rigel arrives at Crypto.. err.. oops, wrong planet :rolleyes: He is sent skipping to Gion, a delay of 3 turn. Got to pay
closer attention, self.
*2344: Hyper V's come in, decide to back track for Hand lasers. Hey, the Bulrathi make me nervous. Hind sight (aka 5 mintues later), I
realize I should have gone for Ion Cannon or Hyper X. I'm only going to be able to hold the line with weapons, not troops. Well, Hand
Lasers shouldn't take long. I fail to scout Darrian, retreat to the nearest purple. Scout the yellow directly East: Hyboria, Klackon
settlement. Um, yay? Relations warming with the bears, decide to up our trade package to 100 BC/year. Let's keep them Teddy's and
not Grizzlies :war:
*2345: Rigel maxes, and takes over research so Mentar can max. I don't usually research with Rich planets, as the industry bonus seems to
not carry over into research (is this the case?). But in this situation, it is called for.
*2346: Gion founded. Hmm, no good source for sending colonists... Send 20 from Escalon; we'll just defend it with ships. yeah. Will try
to terraform Centauri in two turns.
*2348: Centauri terraformed. Handlasers come in, start in on Ion cannons. All but Fusion bombs were available at this tier. Escalon
should terraform in 2.
*2350: Mentar maxes, research shifted back. Since no Bulrathi fleet can be seen, and we are relaxed relations, I decide to put Rigel on
Reserve to stand up border worlds faster instead of building ships. There is enough in treasury to double them all this turn from scraps.
*2351: Escalon terraformed, Gorra in 1 more turn. 4 from Escalon to Mentar to max it in 3 turns. Little slow on that one; should have been
done a few turns ago. Ah well. Oh, and can terraform Pollus in 2 turns.
*2352: Gorra terraformed, continuing to double production of factories to stand up border faster. Find 12 bases and 2 huge ships at Meklon.
Um, help? Find a poor terran 85 at the green star in the NW corner, 5 parsecs away. Oh, looks like the ultra rich at Berel is 5 parsecs
away. Uh, oops. Plus, Range 7 is not in my tree. Didn't report it, but Nuclear Engines finished a couple turns back, and I selected
Inertial Stabilizer. Now, that appears to be a small error. But I was thinking at the time I'd need it for warships. Maybe it wasn't a
mistake. We'll see. Since I don't need it immediately, dial down Controlled Dead to propulsion and weapons. Also dial down force fields..
I need worships and I need them soon. I'd need both Range 6 and Stabilizers, so maybe it wasn't so bad what I chose. We'll see.
*2355: Um, Meklars have by my count 7 large ships, and 3 huge in scanner range. However, there is no contact, so they are not in range.
However, I think I'll, um, get to those bases really soon. Centauri should be maxed in a turn or two, and I can funnel help to just
Gorra and Escalon.
*2358: Klackons get the derelict event. They were first in tech awhile back too. Could be interesting. Centauri maxed, can build a base
every two years. Hmm, Meklar fleets flying across Bulrathi space. Can't tell the destination.
*2361: 25 Bulrathi transports spotted near Rana... um... whew.. they are headed for the new colony for the bears to the Southeast.
*2364: Robotics III comes in; Mark IV ordered. Go Psilon scientists go!
*2366: Bulrathi come asking for a Non-Aggression pact. Suits me just fine.
*2373: Contact established with the Meklar's; they must have learned Range 5 (or higher). Xenophobic Industrialists. Again, better than
Erratic. Bases continue to be raised along the border. Oh yeah, Gorra maxed factories 3 turns ago. The Meklar's won't trade. Stingy
capitalists.
*2374: Ion Cannons and Stabilizers come in; I choose Range 6 and Neurton Blaster. Here's hoping Stinger's are available. Probably should
have gone for the Merculite's as they are available, but what the hey. Guess I'm feeling like a lucky punk
*2380: Duralloy comes in... whew, Reduced waste 60% is available. Meklar's still won't trade. Time to design a ship. Since the Meklar's
are using large and huge ships, and I have a rich and ultra rich planet, I design a large warship stacked to the gills. 2 Heavy Ion's, 8
Ion's, Mark I, Class II shields, Duralloy armor, Nuclear Engines, Stabilizer, and Maneuver 4. That should do it. Pollus can build one in
3 years, Rigel in 2. Centauri has 10 bases, so switches to research; Gorra will when it reaches 10 too. Da bears are building large ships
too; I up our trade package to 225.
*2381: Controlled Dead comes in. Let's see here, all choices are available. Well, I'm getting a waste reduction from Construction,
and I really want that Toxic U Rich, so I go Controlled Toxic and will backtrack for +30.
*2382: Range 6 come in, and I choose Sublights, the only available option. First warship (they're called Defenders, BTW) rollds off the
line, headed for my poor planet at Escalon. Start Pollus on colony D2's to nab the Dead and the poor in the backlines.
*2385: Personal Deflector's come in. Class IV is the only option available... I'm missing Planetary V??? NOT GOOD™.
*2386: Berel founded. Even though Gion is full, I send 15 from here; only good option. Aquilae in the back will be founded in 3 turns.
5 Defenders have rolled off the line. Gorra has 10 bases; switches to research. Meklar's still won't trade. And their fleet is...
scary. I count 18 large ships, and 1 huge in sensor range. Don't ask what that translates to on the status graphs :rolleyes:
*2387: Try to Scout the yellow SE of Escalon (I sent ships out shortly after Range tech came in.) Find a Human world, Crius, defended by
a Dreadnought and bases. I retreat of course. Bulrathi have also been steadily expanding into the SE corner. While I'm glad they aren't
coming after me because they have room... yikes.
*2389: Aquilae founded. Sent 30 from Gion. It's a poor and thus needs the pop to grow in a reasonable time. Hmm.. that's the reverse of
the logic I used for my poor planet on the front lines. Comments?
*2390: Kholdan found NE of Hyboria. Also, spot a Darlok fleet moving past the Blue I just scouted (I think). I'm guessing Sol is directly
SE of Crius, and the Darlok's are based in the NE yellow star. That leaves the SE corner open, and the Bulrathi are expanding into there
like a Sakkra. Um, Granny, what nice pointy teeth you have...
*2393: TERRIBLE NEWS... Centauri gets hit with the depleted event and becomes Poor. Now I have two Poor planets on point! Argh!!
*2395: Mark IV come in... only option for continuing up the tree is ECM IV, Gah. Oh well.. I take it. Oh yeah, and the Meklar's still
won't trade. OUr relations have been uneasy for the longest time. I've been trying at every available opportunity since I've met them and
they just won't trade. What, do we smell or something??
*2397: Scout arrives at the only star in the south not inhabited by Bulrathi. It's a blue, and I find an Inferno, 40 U Rich there.
Interesting. Would need range 9 to get to it, and there are two homeworlds in my way. Still, it's hard not to think greedy thoughts...
*2398: Ok, Neutron blaster comes in. Aw nuts... Stingers are missing. As are Anti-matter bombs. Guess I won't be assulting any planets
anytime soon... *sigh* back track for Merculite's. Took a gamble on the tech and got bit. :axe:
*2402: GNN reports tech leaders are now the Meklars, followed by me, followed by Bulrathi. Klackons have fallen to 5th! Gion maxes
factories, and Berel was terraformed last turn.
*2403: Escalon maxes factories (finally); set to research. I find poor planets, once maxed, are actually best used for research, since it
appears that the Poor penalty only applies to building things, not research. Likewise, Rich and esp. Ultra Rich planets should not
research in general because the bonus is wasted. This is based on observation of the numbers AS I UNDERSTAND THEM... is this right??
*2404: Controlled Toxic comes in.. ooh, Soil Enrichment is available. But, I decide to backtrack for terra +30. Unfortunately,
Humans settle Ryoun. The first vote is held; it's me and da bears. Everybody but the Bears abstain. I vote for them for diplomacy the boost.
Design colony X2 (toxic, nuclear engines) Rigel set to build them. 2 per turn, need three first off.
*2405: Reduced Waste 60 finally comes in; economy much improved. Choose Auto repair special. yes, again not going up the tree, but this is
important. Both Zortium and Industrial 6 available next. Aquile terraformed. Human cruiser headed for either Dolz or Incedius in
NE. 1 Defender on its way couple turns ago to each system to prevent scouting, just to be obstinate and make the Humans fear me a little.
Hopefully. When sublights and forcefield 4 come in, I'll design a better gunship. Should be soon.
*2406: First X2 rolls off the line, headed for Toxic up North. The Toxic UR E of Mentar is defended by 4 Defenders, as I will be colonizing
the Inferno to the NE first. I don't want the Humans(or anybody else) blocking me in. Surprise, Meklars still won't trade. Wonder if I
was framed for a spy job?
*2407: Easily defeat the Human large Cruiser at Dolz.
*2408: Crypto founded, 10 from Aquilae to stand it up.
*2410: Centauri gets the Nova event. At a poor planet??? Berel set to reserve to help. Sheesh, I don't know what it is, but my event
luck always seems terrible. I never get good events, and always seem to get bad events at even worse times, places or both. Not sure what
I think of the events, but I'm beginning not to like them. Anyhoo, got 10 years at Centauri.
*2411: Talas founded; puts me in contact with Humans and... Darloks!? Kind of forgot about them... they are inhabiting most of the NE.
And uh, relations SUCK. The honorable Humans are Wary, the Xeno Darloks at Unease. Maybe I shouldn't have destroyed that Human warship?
Both will accept max trade, though. 425 to Humans, 275 to Darloks. Meklar's must not like Psilon merchants. Waiting for sublight before
standing up Talas. Trade crimping economy, but I need the relations boost. Need an extra click of Eco at each world.
*2412: Sublights discovered. Wow, Fusion, Range 8 and Dissipator available. I Choose Range 8. Zhardan founded, contact with the Klackons.
Aggressive Militarist bugs??? What fun. And OH MY what a LARGE fleet they have ay Hyboria. Their bar is twice mine on the strength chart.
546 pop guns, and 209 medium lancers. Um, hoping those are laser ships. Please?? Oh yeah, Pollus on reserve to help Centauri. I need
Zhardan stood up NOW. 30 from Mentar, set to max growth rate, should be back in 3 turns. Also, 20 from Gion to Talas. Couple more ticks
to Auto repair. Hope I have time. Klacks will take max trade (200).
*2415: Nova solved at Centauri. Pollus and Berel stay on reserve for a little while... saving for a rainy day while I can afford to. Soon,
those planets will be building new worships Everything but propulsion ripening. While painful, the trade working; Darloks to
Neutral, Humans to Unease, Klackons a hair over half way up the graph.
*2416: Terra +30 comes in, empire set to grow (where appropriate aka not new colonies). Soil next.
*2417: Mass factory building. Now the Human relations are at Neutral, surpassing the Darloks. Uh, the Bulrathi and Meklar's now have an
alliance?? :blink:
*2418: Rigel and Pollus max factories...um.. where is that purple fleet headed North going???? Far away, but maybe Rigel??? Um, Pollus
set to ships, Rigel set to bases, everybody back on research, I might need those techs NOW. Hit next turn...
*2419: Um, nope Gorra. Uh, bases. Need bases. And all the Defenders at Centauri (only planet with ships in range).
*2420: Oh my gosh, Klackons and Darloks declare war out of the blue. WTF??? We were at Neutral relatoins, Klackons now well over halfway
up the relations graph. Meklars are heading for Gorra. Fleet from Centauri will make it, but I don't know if it will be enough. Well, it
will be 15 bases at Gorra, 16 Defenders against a Meklar fleet of 63 large ships. Hyper V bases. yeah.
***THE BATTLE***
Ok, the Darloks have 22 Ajax bombers, 11 fusion bombs. 1 Heavy laser. 150 HP. Class 2 shields.
21 Nemesis, 150 HP, Class 2 shield, 8 Hyper V's, 1 fusion bomb. Class II shield. 3 col ships with 1 fusion bomb.
17 Nexus ships, 4 Merculite missles. class III shields, 150 HP.
Ok, ships will take the Nexus's, planet the Ajax, and let's pray.

My Ships do manage to destroy 11 Nexus's before they retreat. Planet destroys about 4 Ajax's before the bases are destroyed.
Nemesis and col ships bomb planet while I whittle down the Ajax stack. Meklar's retreat 8 Nexus, 1 Ajax, 20 Nemesis, and 2 col ship.
Now, for the damage... not bad! Bases gone, but still 68/85 pop, and 167 factories. Can build 2 bases/y. Only lost 3 Defenders.

*2421: Merculite's come in, upgrade bases on front line. One lousy turn... Auto and forcefields and computers in next few turns. No
incoming Klack or Darlok fleets. 10 people from Aquilae to Berel to bring it up to speed. Upgrade Mentar as well. Meklar's and Bulrathi
are no longer aligned. Humans allied with Bulrathi... and both the Darlok's and Klackons.
*2422: Humans won't NAP, but will upgrade to 575BC/yr. Normally, I wouldn't do it.. it actually hurts my economy. But I don't want to get
dogpiled. Trade still in the black though, with mature Bulrathi agreement and Klackon and Darlok trade gone.
*2423: Well shit. The Humans declare war. What the hell happened!?!? I'm guessing their alliance with Klack's and Darlok's. Well, now..
vote in 6 turns. If everybody votes Bulrathi, I will probably lose. I have most pop, but don't know if I have a bloc. So I ally
with the bears, and turn them against the humans. I'm hoping for abstinations. I'm going to be REALLY pissed if I lose this to a vote I
could do absolutely nothing against.
*2424: And it is all for naught, as the vote is held, everybody votes Bulrathi, and I lose.

Let me tell you, I was pretty angry at the time. It seemed like everything hit the fan at once. Races I was trading with, and were at
good to neutral relations with, just decided to all up and gang me. Looking back on it, I lost as soon as the Darloks and Klackons
declared on the same turn. Something I didn't write, was after I discovered the Humans has allied with those two, I tried to get them to
break the alliance.. and failed. So now I open it to the floor: what mistake(s) did I make, or did I just get monumentally unlucky?

Thanks,
dathon

[Brackard]

One of things I was really curious about this game was the effect of which way everyone settled. So I took a look at all the reports posted so far, and this is what I've got:

Harris: Rigel, yr 9 (redirected), conquest victory 2425
Sinhat: Rigel, yr 6 (wait for scouts), elimination 2657
Zed: Rigel, yr 9 (redirect), conquest 2450
Factoid: Rigel yr 6 (waited), diplo 2475
Maniac: Rigel yr 6 (waited), extermination 2516

Justus: Escalon yr 3, Diplo 2450
Dave: Escalon yr 3, diplo 2425
Patroc: Escalon yr 3, ext 2450
Brackard: Escalon yr 3, diplo 2550

(The type of victory may be off a bit, but it was close)

End result? There doesn't look to be THAT much of a difference between which planet you took first.

[Zed-F]

The game was fun but I would vote against using maps like this one. Too much hinged on the decision you made on your first turn, especially since the usual "correct" play (Colonize Coreward) couldn't have been more incorrect for this map.

Sometimes you gotta play the hand you are dealt. I would try not to get worked up about it -- as you can see, I made the same mistake you did (except I scouted the other range 3 planet as well.) It's called a gambit for a reason, sometimes it will fail, and we should be prepared for that eventuality. Everyone makes mistakes, and sometimes we are led to make mistakes by a deceptive situation in the game - the important part is how well we can recover from them.

This map had no scoring, so there's no particular reason to feel that an early finish is especially desirable, from the point of view of comparison purposes. In fact, I am certain that there will be scored games where an early finish does not reward the player. Now, if that's something you want to add for yourself, you're free to do so, but be aware that early finish is far from the only basis on which to make a comparison.

[Zed-F]

Well, losing the vote is not the end of the world... as Psilons, you probably could have come back from that to win in final war. However, you'd probably need to have some more games under your belt to feel comfortable trying that. A valiant attempt! You probably could use a bit more practice with diplomacy. Note that talking to an AI every chance you get is just going to annoy them. You need to wait several turns between attempts. Still, don't be afraid to stir up trouble -- you don't necessarily have to give stuff away, just keep pestering the AIs every so often (e.g. every 5-10 turns) and ask them to go to war with their neighbors. Eventually, someone will agree to a 'let's you and him fight' proposition, and that will be one more divisive force when it comes to the senate.

As to your question:

Ultra Rich planets should not research in general because the bonus is wasted. This is based on observation of the numbers AS I UNDERSTAND THEM... is this right??

Rich planets are exactly as efficient at researching as they are at pumping money into the reserves. Ultrarich planets are more efficient at pumping reserves than researching. So with a rich planet, feel free to either pump reserves if you need more, or not if you don't, but I would always set an ultrarich planet to pump reserves unless I'm wanting to build ships there. If I have a huge reserve I can always dump a wad of cash at one of my mature planets and convert it into RPs.

[Erick the Red]

So the next Imperium game has us playing the Psilons on hard? I guess it’s variant time! My Psilons our so caught up in their research faculty that they have no need of other race's discoveries. Also, the most esoteric and therefore most prestigious field of research is the force field branch. Ah, the intricate beauty of energy-matter wave equations. No other field can match their mathematical subtlety, and the bulk of their research will be directed there.

In game terms, they will never trade for, steal, or otherwise acquire techs from other races. Planets can be invaded, but only if they have no or very few factories. Also, to start all research is directed towards propulsion. After the first discovery, 3 clicks will be divided among all branches, with the remainder allocated to force fields.

My motivation for this is that I have played several games where I researched a few key techs, (warp 3, a few weapons, possibly duralloy armor) and built a fleet of combat ships and small bombers and started capturing enemy planets. This should dramatically reduce my ability to get the early jump on my opponents. Planetary shield technology should keep my systems safe, and I would like to see how skewing research will affect the game.

I start by sending my colony ship to the south east and scouting to the north near the yellow star. I of course find that I guessed wrong with my colony ship, and that the systems to the north are not habitable so I’m not racing in that direction.

I redirect the colony ship to the rich planet, and make scouts to cover systems to the south. I send many colonists to the rich planet. They both mature at the same time, and each make colony ships.

At 2334 I’ve finished building colony ships, and Rana will be colonized in a bit. With both the Meklar and Bulrathi to my South, there will be no further explansion. You can see part of my land grab in the following image.



I start research at about this time. I’m happy to see terraforming +10 in my tree, as I will only get very cheap techs in the near future, and this population boost will help with all the rich planets. Speaking of all the rich planets, I’m normally pretty meticulous about shuffling population around in the early game. I’m letting factories sit idle on Mentar while it sits at 50 population since there are so many rich worlds under my control. I don’t remember having my home world grow population at this stage of the game before.

I build up my infrastructure and technology for the next 30 or so turns. There’s still no sign of pollution control. I’ve researched Shields IV, Deep Space Scanner, and Nuclear Engines by this point.

At 2368 I can see that the Meklar and Bulrathi have mixed it up a bit. Also the Bulrathi only have gatling lasers as a weapon tech. [image2] Those can’t penetrate class IV Shields.

To fit class IV shields, I have to make large ships. I've never designed a large ship with class IV shields, nuclear engines, 13 nuclear bombs, and 2 lasers before! These do their job and scare off the Bulrathi defense forces and defeat the missile bases.

I didn’t plan ahead quite well enough though. My fleet can defeat a planet’s defenses, but it only can bomb a few population a turn, and I’m not allowed to invade. I have to build some small bombers to mop up quicker, and it takes a while for them to arrive. I also don’t know why I didn’t give it a battle scanner.

If I had made these sooner I might have made a little more progress. At around 2393 the Bulrathi have researched Hyper-X Rockets, and my fleet doesn’t look so clever anymore. Especially since I chinsed and gave my mop up bombers speed 1. I’ve taken Kronos and Bootis, but Ursa’s 16 missile bases are too intimidating.

On the research front, I’ve recently researched Robotic Controls III, and will start building up factories. I’ve also just selected Enhanced Eco Restoration, so will eventually get some pollution cleanup ability. I’ve just picked up Duralloy armor, and got Hyper-X rockets of my own a few turns back.

It appears that missile raiding is the way to go. The Meklar declare war, and send a large fleet, which can’t harm any of my well shielded core planets. However the beginnings of my missile fleet are tied up defending Rana while it sets up a shield from the Meklar. The Bulrathi use this opportunity to retake Bootis. Centauri is able to bring up a planetary shield while being bombarded.

The first vote occurs at 2409. I have 8 out of 24 votes, so I can see that I am almost safe with my current holdings. Of course my planets are maxed out, and other races are gaining the ability to colonize new systems, so I expect to lose some ground there.

It’s now time to send my fleet against the Meklar home world with 19 missile bases. You can see my first bomber design at the top of the list. The small bombers were my next design. Then came the Bomber 2.1's and the Missiles.

The planet fires at the small bombers, which retreat. Meanwhile my missile ships reduce the bases down to 11. Next turn the missile ships will reduce the base count down to a small number for the bombers to finish off. The defending laser ships can’t penetrate the class IV shields, so will have to retreat. My combined arms carry the day.

It takes several turns to bomb Meklon down. Meanwhile my combined arms whittle down another large Meklar fleet.

I get nervous when I’m framed for spying on the Klackons and they declare war on me. My opponents are the humans, and I’m at war with the Klacons, Bulrathi, and Meklar now. The Bulrathi want class IV shields for piece. I take it, but can’t get them to war with the humans.

The vote comes up, and I no longer have 1/3 of the population. Fortunately, the Darloks abstained.

At 2434 I wipe the Meklar out, and will soon resettle their planets. I now have class VII shields, sublight drives, and enhanced eco restoration. (Yay! While my fleets were tied up with the Meklar, the Klackons are threatening the poor planet Escalon. They have a fleet parked above it and are bombing it as it was not able to stand up a shield in time.

Then the dopey Klackons ask for piece when they have one batch of invaders in flight that can’t take Escalon without a second wave. I accept, and turn towards the Bulrathi.

Their planets are now defended by Scatter Pack V missiles, which would be scary if they could reach me. They have a stack of 39 ships each with a Scatter Pack V as well. They don’t have any defense against my missile ships though.

Man is it painful watching key technologies slowly ripen at my research rates. Automated repair is only going up a couple percentage points a turn. You can also see how far ahead my force field tech is staying.



Then the game hears this gripe and I get it next turn. I make this design to scare off enemy fleets from newly conquered worlds. It takes advantage of my shield superiority, as enemy ships will have a hard time hurting it. It feels a little weird putting auto repair on a large instead of a huge, but I don’t want to pay the credits or maintenance for huge ships that really would be invulnerable.



The design does it’s job, and I start to sweep (well, that’s a relative term as my missile ships are still at warp 2, and it takes a while to bomb down enemy systems) Still, it’s nice to park these over planets and laugh at the remaining Bulrathi forces which can’t get past the defenses. They also chase off some armed human colony ships.

At 2449 the votes are as follows: Human 8, Darlok 3, Klackons 3, Bulrathi 2, Psilon 12. The Klackons and Darloks voted for me. I’m now safe from losing a vote.

By 2456 I’ve cleaned up the Bulrathi colonies in the SE, though they still have one planet left in Human space. Speaking of the nasty humans, they have just stolen Duralloy armor from me. Here’s their tech chart.



They are slightly ahead in all other fields but don’t have a planetary shield. This is very nice, as I don’t see a bomb in my tech tree. By the way, I also don’t have controlled Radioactive, so I guess I will never be settling those.

I want to press the attack against the humans. At Arietis my missile ships can destroy a couple of bases in a volley, and the bombers can finish the planet off. Their huge ship with 26 Hyper-X rockets can’t hurt my rock design, so it has to retreat.

When my fleet reaches Trax, a wave of colonists that was sent to reinforce Arietis as it was being bombed becomes an invasion force at my new colony that will arrive just before my first rounds or reinforcents.

I have to send my fleet back from Trax or it will be destroyed. Actually I wonder what the rules are. I think my fleet will be safe if I tell it to fly back home, as it will be within my range after it’s movement. It does survive, but I will lose several turns as they fly back.

Actually I lose more than that, as a human fleet shows up at Arietis. I hit the auto button expecting the fleet to retreat, but it doesn’t! Their new huge design nabs my rocks with a warp disipator before I get control back, and they have the firepower to defeat them. Sloppy play on my part, but it doesn’t matter as the final vote is just a few turns a way.

In the year 2474 the Darloks with 4 votes and the Bulrathi with 1 vote cast their lot with me. With my 18 votes, that makes 23/24 and I win. I didn’t know this ahead of time, since I never made contact with the Darloks, so didn’t know if the Humans were at war with them. Also while I was not at war with the Klackons, they would not talk to me, so I could not do anything to get their vote. So I think I was a little lucky to win at this time. No complaints though, as the game had run its course.

I would say my variant rules had the desired effect. Although I was able to go on an early offensive, I did not run over the enemies with my standard ship designs. My offensive did stall, but with all the rich planets at my disposal I was able to build up new fleets easily and overpower the opposition. It was neat being able to take advantage of my shielding to build a large instead of a huge ship that was immune to enemy fire. Between the land grab and early success against a warring Meklar and Bulrathi, this game was won early. I was kind of hoping for a bit more of a stalemate. It would have fun to have had a situation where I was turtled up behind invulnerable planets until I busted out the Black Hole Generator! :war:

I also have been wondering about the tactic of having missile ships attack the same planet repeatedly. The way the computer reacted to my fleet I think it can be used as an exploit. When the missile ships act alone, they often have to retreat early or take a hit from the planet, since the planet fires first and if the defender has a tech advantage will have faster missiles. That’s why I had two designs, so one could retreat while the other fires. Now I see that if I bring along a relatively cheap fleet of even slow moving bombers, the planet will fire at them instead. They can retreat before the missiles hit them, which gives my missile ships time to get in their volleys safely. It seems wrong that I wasn’t taking any loses.

On a related note, I have wondered if it might help in some situations to give an AI scatter pack V tech. Would it use those instead of faster missiles that could actually reach my ships?

Here's the final map by the way.

[DeceasedHorse]

Imperium 3: The Mad Psilion Scientists

Well, it¡¦s time to get started on my third (hopefully) full game, and my first one on the hard difficult level. I¡¦m not exactly sure what the differences between the various difficulty levels are in Master of Orion; I am pretty sure that there is diplomatic, some kind of production bonus, and research penalty, but I don¡¦t know what else. The manual was less than helpful; oh well, I guess I¡¦ll learn as I go along. The Psilion¡¦s natural advantage in research will help offset any research penalties.

I have decided to make this report a little bit more coherent than my last time. It will still be written as I go along, but this time I will take the time to add little things like dates that help convey the big picture better.

Ship Designations:
Small-Fighter, Interceptor, Scout, and Bomber. Bombers, obviously, are designed for planetary assault.
Medium-Destroyer, Frigate, Missile/Gun Boat. Missile and gunboats have specific weaponry and roles, of course.
Large-Cruiser, Heavy Cruiser, Pocket Battleship. Pocket Battleships are large hulls that are exceptionally powerful relative to others, generally due to a higher level of technology used in their construction.
Huge-Battleship, Dreadnought, Super Dreadnought, Titan, Juggernought. Super Dreadnoughts, Titans, and Juggernaughts refer to exceptionally powerful vessels.

Special:
Siege: Any design intended for planetary assault that is not a dedicated bomber. Generally large or huge with Auto-repair, level II armor, and possibly ECM or defensive specials. Intended to slug it out with Missile Bases.

BDZ: ¡¥Base Delta Zero¡¦, the command code used by the Imperial Navy from Star Wars, ordering the annihilation of a planetary population. Usually done using heavy turbolasers to melt the surface of the entire planetary surface. Synonymous with ¡¥glassing¡¦.

For this game, I will be using famous scientists for class names. Seems to fit the Psilons well. Sure, it¡¦s not likely that the Psilons would name their ships after HUMAN scientists, but it¡¦ll do.

2300: Well, one difference is that the starting population of the home world is ten less. It looks like there are 2 stars in range, both Red. I pick the core ward one, and send one scout to the other. The extra scout is sent to the green 5 parsecs to the west of Mentar.

2303: Scout discovers Rigel, a size 110 Arid that is fertile and rich. Nice! The colony ship reaches Escalon, a poor Ocean 75 to the south. Booh! The colony ship is sent towards Rigel, ETA six turns. I feel that the benefits of settling Rigel first far outweigh founding earlier on a crappy one.

2305: The scout sent to the western green reveals it to be Zhardan, a size 35 Ultra Rich toxic. 4 re-designed scouts, designated VoyagerI, are constructed and dispatched.

2308: My first colony is founded on Rigel. One scout discovers Gorra, a size 55 terran, driving off a Bulrathi scout. Another scout discovers Centauri, a size 85 jungle, driving off a Meklar scout. 15 million colonists dispatched from Mentar to Rigel.

2309: Scouts discover Pollus, a size 50 Ultra-rich desert. Outstanding! Another reaches the Dolz system, which turns out to have no inhabitable worlds. Pollus is three parsecs from Rigel, and will clearly need to be my next target for colonization! It is in a nebula, and from what I remember this means that shields don¡¦t work? I¡¦ll just have to find out the hard way, I suppose.

2310: Scouts discover Ukka, a size 15 radiated. Pretty useless.

2311: Drive off another Bulrathi scout from Centauri. Scouts discover Incendius, a rich size ten irradiated.

2313: Build another four Voyager1¡¦s.

2314: Scouts discover Crypto, a size 20 toxic.

2317: Scouts discover Rana, a size 65 arid to the galactic south. It is a Bulrathi colony; scout immediately recalled.


Rigel is up to 58 million colonists; Mentar will stop sending more and tool up for colony ship production; however, Rigel actually has a slightly higher production. I don¡¦t know if using a colony world, even a rich one, for colony ship production this early will work out well, but it certainly seems like a possibility. Both worlds would take eight years to build a colony ship at this point.

Note: I lost track of the date a little at this point.

-Scouts discover Gion, a size 65 desert to the north.

-Rigel starts on colony ship production, due in six. Homeworld splits production between factory construction and research.

-Tech tree opened up Computers-Deep Space Scanner, only option. Construction: Improved Industrial 9, only option. Force Fields: Class two deflectors, only option. Planetology: Improved Terraforming +10, only option. Propulsion: Hydrogen fuel cells (range 4), only option. Weapons: Hyper-V rockets, other options are hand lasers and gattling laser cannons. Research prioritized in Planetolegy and Propulsion.

2326: Rigel completes my first self-built colony ship. Additional factory construction and pop growth will get the next one done in 5 turns. Colony ship charts a course for Pollus.

2327: Improved Terraforming +10 comes in. Options are improved Terraforming +20, Controlled Dead, and Death Spores. I have no need for the additional Terraforming right now, but I have yet to discover any dead worlds and death spores suck. Furthermore, Terraforming +20 is the cheapest option, and I select it.

2327: Mentar builds a couple of laser fighters to picket Centauri, but then I discover that the stupid things don¡¦t have the range (no fuel tanks, forgot) to even reach Centauri.

2328: Pollus founded. Mentar sends 22 million colonists to get it up to speed. ¡¥

2331: Rigel finishes colony ship. The only star in range is Escalon, so the ship is dispatched core ward. Rigel¡¦s production reaches the point where it can build a colony ship every 4 years with enough left over for plenty of additional factory construction.

2332: A Bulrathi colony ship shows up at Centauri, but retreats. Chance of a breakthrough in propulsion has been hovering around 25% for awhile now.

2333: Sure enough, Hydrogen fuel cells come in. Nuclear engines, Iridium fuel cells (range 6) and inertial stabilizer opened up. Start on Nuke engines.

2335: Colony ship completed, dispatched towards Centauri. Scouts discover Talas, an Inferno orbiting a yellow to the northeast. Colonists from Mentar finally reach Pollus, bringing it up to 27 million peeps. Mentar and Rigel finish Terraforming +10.

2336: Escalon settled. Contact established with the Bulrathi. Mentar sends 20 million settlers. The Bulrathi have 4 star systems under their control. Sign a 100 BC/year trade pact with the Bears.

2337: Scouts discover Berel, a size 30 Ultra-Rich Dead world. Ok, maybe researching controlled Dead would have been a nice idea ļ.

2338: Improved Industrial 9 comes in, options are improved industrial 8 and Duralloy armor. Start on Duralloy. Rigel finishes a colony ship, send it core wards to Gorra. I can always backfill later on.

2340: Found a colony on Centauri. Poor Mentar has to send another 30 million colonists on a long interstellar journey. Mentar also reaches max factories, all production put into science.

2343: Deep Space Scanner comes in. Options are ECM mark 2, robotics controls 3, and Battle Computer mark three. Start on robotics III, and hope I get some pollution control tech in the meantime. Rigel finished colony ship, it is sent north to Gion, the last system I can currently settle. Rigel set to all-out factory construction. Deep Space scanner reveals that Meklon is literally right next store to Ursa: furthermore, my scanners detect no Meklar colonies. I think the ¡¥bots are in trouble.

2344: Class II deflectors finish, start on Personal Deflector shield (only option, and not a bad one at that). Gorra colonized; this triggers a GNN report, the first one that¡¦s occurred thus far. I think this means that I¡¦m the largest empire around. Mentar sends more colonists. Meklar colony world of Darrian detected.

2346: Hyper-V rockets finally finish. Start on Hand Lasers; Ion Cannons and Hyper X rockets opened up. Colony on Gion founded. Rigel reaches max factories; it will contributing to the reserve and builds some missile bases at the same time.

2348: One of my scout¡¦s stumbles upon the Klackon world of Hyboria, which has a single missile base defending it. The scout wisely retreats. Pollus reaches max factories.

2350: A Bulrathi colony ship shows up at Gorra, and is driven off.

2352(?): Vega explored, no inhabitable planets. Pollus and Rigel start on Prebuild vessels, as I think I might need some sort of military pretty soon.

Exis explored, no inhabitable worlds present. Hand Lasers come in, start on Ion Cannons.

Darlock and Bulrathi scouts show up at Zhardan. Centauri finishes Terraforming, begins work on missile bases, since it is my ¡¥front line¡¦ world in the event of a conflict with the Bulrathi or the Meklars.

Nuke engines come in, start on Inertial Stabilizer.

A scout discovers Aquilae, a poor terran to the far northwest of the map. Colony ship ordered up. The Prebuild-class at Rigel is chopped up into two colony ships.

2362: The two colony ships are launched from Rigel. One begins its long journey to Aquilae, the other remains in orbit, no where to go. Wait-Aquilae is range 5. My colony ships cannot reach it. Furthermore, I cannot fit reserve fuel tanks onto a large sized colony ship at this point. Oops.

2364 (EST) an armed Meklar colony ship drives my scout away from Zherbus-I am 99% sure they cannot colonize it anyway.

Mentar finally gets up to full size. 6% chance of breakthrough with improved Terraforming +20. Current map:

The Bulrathi are now slightly larger than I am, but I¡¦m willing to wager that my rich planets give me a pretty good advantage. Occasional sweeps have not revealed any spies.

Improved Terraforming +20 comes in and I have a tough choice. My options are Controlled Dead, Death Spores, Enhanced Eco Restoration, Improved Terraforming +30, and Controlled Toxic. Controlled Toxic would open up that Ultra rich next door; Zhardan, but enhanced Eco would sure help the worlds that I currently own especially if I decide to finish improved robotics three any time soon. I decide on Controlled Toxic, but I have no clue if this was the right choice. My research capabilities are currently in the basement right now, as I have diverted production to Terraforming. I insert a spy into the Bulrathi Empire, and his report reveals that they have couple of tech that I wouldn¡¦t mind, like controlled dead and reduced waste 80%, an audience with the Ambassador Lombardi reveals that they are only willing to trade controlled Barren, which is quite useless. The fact that they have controlled dead means that I will have to be sure that they do not scout Berel; I will not allow the control of an Ultra-Rich on my exposed left flank. It is very far out of their range, so as long as I don¡¦t give them an ROP I think I will be safe.

Research is back on track when Mentar reaches max factories and pop again. I set my spy to espionage; I (of course) have a higher computer tech level so I hope this isn¡¦t too much of a mistake.

The Bulrathi catch my spy immediately. Oh well.

Deep space scanners pick up a human warship and a colony ship down in the southeast. Still only have contact with the Bears. Ion cannon research is nearing fruition, however. Sure enough, Ion cannons come in the turn after I wrote that. My choices are: Gattling Laser, Neutron Pellet Gun, Hyper-X Rockets, Ion Rifle, Merculite Missiles, and Neutron Blasters. Let¡¦s see; at this point, Gattling lasers are useful only for miniaturization purposes. I already have a beam weapon, a missile, and a rifle. I decide on Merculite Missiles; they will help out my bases and give me an edge against the bears, which have Hyper-X rockets.

A few turns later, the Brainiacs of Mentar, now assisted by Gorra and Centauri and even a bit by Poor Escalon as those worlds come on line, near breakthroughs in Improved Robotics and Duralloy. Upgrade my trade treaty with the Bears to 375/year. They catch my hiding spy.

GNN pops up, and reveals that I am LAST in technology! Wow! This must be a factor of the difficulty level (obviously) but I don¡¦t think the difference in that drastic; the Bulrathi certainly had techs up on me, but the reverse was also true. Hmmm, I may need to change strategies. I need contact with the other races. Centauri has reached max factories and has six missile bases up, so most of its production can be sunk into research, which will help.

Improved Robotics III finishes. Planets begin the retooling process. Duralloy armor and Personal Deflectors come in on the same turn! Nice! Start on Battle Computer Mark III, Reduced Waste 60%, and Class IV shields. Some pretty nice picks. Another GNN report reveals that I am second in production, behind only the Klackons. Next priority is Controlled Toxic. Diplo check reveals that the Bulrathi do not have Robotics III, and I am not about to trade it to them.

2381: I screwed up badly, accidentally completing one of my prebuilds at Pollus. I had dolled out the planetary reserve at the end of the previous turn and forgot to check the ETA. So now I have a rather crappy Battleship mounting seven heavy lasers and 14 hyper-V rockets. I quickly create a new battleship design with 30 Ion Cannons, 15 Heavy Ion Cannons, speed 2, battle scanner, 4 nukes, and Duralloy armor so I don¡¦t accidentally build another one of my Prebuild class Battleships. I sent the SS Prebuild down to Centauri, might as well use it for something.

Scouts discover Collassa; a size 35 radiated Rich in the southwestern corner of the map. Hopefully I have controlled radiated in my tree.

Pollus is the first to reach max factories, so it start up on the prebuild with a couple of ticks, and the rest going to the reserve to help retool the rest of my more normal worlds.

Rigel finishes next. Design the Copernicus1 class missile frigate, with two five-shot hyper-X racks. Spies again penetrate the Bulrathi security network, revealing that they have class III and IV shields, Mass Drivers, and an alliance with the Humans. Not good; a vote at this point could potentially be disastrous as I do not have contact with anyone except the bears, who I can¡¦t ally with unless I want to cede them an Ultra-rich planet. I can¡¦t even ask him to break his alliance with the humans since I don¡¦t have contact with them.

The Pirates event occurs in the Incendius system. Send the SS Prebuild to put a stop to their nefarious ways.

Mentar and Centauri reach max factories. Research programs have funding restored, begin slow build up of missile boats for picket duty.

2390: A armed human colony ship drives of my scout covering Collassa, then vanishes without a trace. Maybe their alliance with the Bears ended? Either that or they have something like mark 5 engines, as I spot another Human colony ship in the middle of my territory. Next turn when it moves, this does not seem to be the case. Two more human warships and another colony ship detected by Deep Space Command. Breakthroughs on Inertial stabilizers and controlled toxic are imminent.

2395: Inertial Stabilizers come in, start on Iridium fuel cells (range 6). I finally get another spy into the Bulrathi Empire, revealing that their alliance with the humans has indeed expired.

2396: Controlled Toxic comes in, kick ass. Start on Enhanced Eco Restoration; Soil Enrichment was unlocked but I need to cut pollution first. I can now mount a toxic colony base and reserve fuel tanks on a large hull. Design the Toxic Avenger class colony ship. Rigel chops its prebuild into four of them; perfect, as I have four worlds that I can now colonize, I believe.

2397: Four toxic avengers built. Rigel will build another next turn in order to settle the Inferno world of Talas.

2398: Settle Crypto, a rather crappy size 20 toxic with no specials. Gion sends 11 million colonists. This triggers the first election, and it¡¦s me vs. the Bears. Everyone abstains. I have 7 votes to the Bulrathi¡¦s 6 and can safely vote for them to boost relations.

Next turn, another election takes place, which is very strange but whatever. The results are, of course, unchanged.

In 2400, the Psilion peoples settle two new worlds, Zhardan and Berel. BOTH are Ultra-Rich. Battle Computer Mark III comes in, start on mark IV. Deep Space Observation now detects a Klackon world; perhaps contact will occur soon?

2401: Talas and Aquilae settled triggering the 12-system outstripping all other races message from GNN. Contact made with the Klackons. I sign a 500 BC/Year trade agreement (in hindsight, not the best choice since the Pirates were still active) and trade Inertial Stabilizers for Improved Eco restoration. The Klackons control five star systems to the galactic northeast.

The SS Prebuild and her escorts wipe out the Pirates the next turn, so I suppose it doesn¡¦t matter anyway.

Merculite Missiles come in a couple turns later, opening up Graviton Beam, Hard Beam, and Fusion Beam. I decide on Neutron Blasters though.

2407: One of my scouts exploring systems newly in range stumbles across the human world of Crius, and is surprised to find 23 missile bases fortified on the world. I guess that another feature of this difficulty?

2410: Class IV deflectors come in, start on Repulsar beam.

2411: I screw up again and one of my prebuild ships gets built by accident. At least this time it is a current design:

The first Newton Class Battleship is sent to Zhardas, to keep an eye on those shifty Klackons.

A scout wanders into a Klackon system, and falls back in the face of 127 medium ¡§Avenger¡¨ type ships and nineteen missile bases. Deep Space Observation notices that the Klackon fleet numbers in the hundreds, at least. Fortress command requests additional resources for base construction, and High Command concurs. There are two points in which the Klackons could make an incursion into Psilon space: Talas and Zherbus. Zherbus is building bases and orbital weapons platforms very quickly, and is a core world, easily reinforced. Talas is far more vulnerable, although the SS prebuild and her escorts remain active nearby, they are unlikely to make much of an impact against the bugs. In the event of war, the Newton-class vessels in spacedock orbiting Rigel and Pollus can be completed within a year.

Reduced waste 60% comes in, start on Auto-repair.

2413: Range six comes in, start on sublight drives. Contact with the Meklar Domination made, and they are still doing a little 2-planet challenge down in the corner.

2414: Enhanced Eco Restoration comes in, start on Soil Enrichment.

As an aside, this has been a very odd map with some strange tech trees. The Bulrathi and I are the only large empires; the other races seem to have had the misfortune of starting practically right next to each other, if the distribution of yellow stars and the example of the Meklars and the Bulrathi are any example. No one seems to have planetary shields; but no one has any bomb technology above nukes either, with the exception of the Meklars who have fusion bombs and class V planetary shields; yet they are too small to be much of a threat. They have factory controls III and a couple of Eco techs, so I presume that their production is pretty decent, though. The Stats screen shows that they actually have a slight edge in power and even in technology; I wonder if their colony turned out to be an artifacts world? That might explain things.

2419: Neutron Blasters come in, start on Fusion Beams. Scrap the SS Prebuild. Kepler classes Heavy Cruiser designed: Duralloy armor, mark IV shields, mark III computer, 3 Neutron Blasters, 2 Merculite missiles, 2 nukes, inertial stabilizer, and a battle scanner. Einstein class battleship designed: 10 Heavy Blast Cannons, 15 neutron blasters, 2 nukes, same specials and computer equipment. Will probably be re-designed once auto-repair finishes, however.

GNN lists me 5th in fleet strength. The Meklars are first. I actually check the map and the Meklars now control 5 worlds; they must have allied with the Bulrathi and used their planets to refuel at some point <doh>.

Battle Computer Mark IV comes in, start on Improved Space Scanner (only choice besides various levels of ECM)

Automated Repair comes in, start on Zortium armor. GNN reports that I am now second in tech, behind the Meklars. Scrap the Einstein design, replace it with the Mendelev class, which has the inertial stabilizer removed with an auto-repair system in its place. I also manage to fit another neutron blaster and an additional nuke into the hull while still having the space to keep speed 2.

2425: Election! The Meklars vote for the Bulrathis this time, but my percentage of the pop is almost enough to block an election by myself (10 out of 33) so I am not yet concerned.

2426: The Klackons and the Bulrathi threaten me, saying I¡¦m getting too big for my britches.

2427: Sublight drives come in, start on Fusion drives. Repulsor beam comes in, start on Class X planetary shields.

2430: Soil enrichment comes in, start on Improved Terraforming +30. My current plan is to win peacefully through shear population growth. If the next election does not go better, I will probably end up going to war against someone, though.

2431: Improved Space Scanner comes in, start on ECM mark IV (ECM generators are my only choices). A scout locates Sol; it seems likely that the humans only have two planets. Trade inertial stabilizers to the Meklars for Battle Suits. Sign a non-aggression pact with the Klackons.

So much for peace:

4 Bulrathi Battleships and nine cruisers are detected by Deep Space Observation. Their destination is calculated to be Escalon, the poor world and the weakest link in my defenses. First fleet under Admiral Eggbert Brainius onboard the flagship P.S.S. Isaac Newton is dispatched from Zherbus with 9 Copernicus1 missile boats 10 Keplar Heavy Cruisers. Planetary reserve resources transferred to Fortress Command, with the objective of constructing additional 2-4 missile bases. I am confident that I can crush the Bulrathi offensive, but their alliance with the Meklars is more of a problem. The Meklars yanked their diplomat when I broached the subject and he has not returned. The shipyards at Rigel and Pollus are now working at full capacity. Fleet Intelligence is given clearance to resume espionage activities against the Bears and the ¡¥Bots.

Deep Space Observation reports that the Bulrathi fleet will arrive in 2435.

2435: The Bulrathi Battle Fleet arrives at Escalon. Fortress Command has finished construction of 11 battle stations. The Bears have no bombs, but I have no planetary shields. They are armed primarily with Mass Drivers. Worse, the Isaac Newton is an older design, and only has Class II deflectors. Fortunately, at speed three, it is the fastest vessel present. So begins the first battle of this Imperia.

The Newton¡¦s superior speed proves to be quite useful, and the Bulrathi Dreadnoughts are picked apart by the Keplars. 4 cruisers and 9 missile boats lost, 9 Tooth-class cruisers, 3 Punisher Dreadnoughts, and 1 Bulldog Battlecruiser destroyed. No declaration of war or even a relations hit takes place during the following turn. Fleet Intelligence reports that the Bulrathi have learned the secrets of Controlled Radiated; The bears must be contained now to keep them off those radiated worlds. First Fleet will be rebuilt and muster at Centauri. Deep Space Observation detects numerous Tooth-class cruisers moving toward Rana, but no larger designs.

Crius (human) gets hit with the Irradiation event. Sucks to be them.

2440: The Meklars offer a 750 BC/year trade pact. I agree. Construction scaled back; looks like this was just a probe. I will await the result of the next elections. The alliance between the Bulrathi and the Meklars has ended in any case.

Trade Enhanced Eco to the Meklars (they already have reduced waste 40% and several other Eco techs, so I don¡¦t think it will make a huge difference) for fusion bombs.

Zortium armor and Terraforming +30 come in. Start on Atmospheric Terraforming and Reduced industrial 5. Contact made with humanity. Sign a 500 BC trade pact with the humans, as well as a non-aggression pact. Trade inertial stabilizer for Improved Terraforming +40.

2449: Finish Fusion Beams, start on Anti-matter Torpedoes.

2450: The stupid Klackons and Humans abstain. This means war, Mr. Bear. Or, it does once I finish the current round of Terraforming. Wondering where the Darlocks are, I notice that Nazin is a bloody shade of Red. Looks like the bugs ate them, although they are still around somewhere.

ECM Mark IV finishes, start on Battle Computer Mark VI

Fusion Drives finish, start on Impulse drives. A wealthy merchant gives the Darlocks 1500 BC.

2456: Everyone threatens me, saying I¡¦m getting too big. Commission two warp four designs: The Hisenberg Battlecruiser and the Galileo heavy cruiser. 8 Battleships, 25 missile boats, and 25 cruisers move against Bulrathi Rana.

2458: A heavy cruiser overhauls and destroys a Bulrathi armed colony ship trying to settle on one of the Irradiated worlds. A Bulrathi squadron, including three Battleships-the Punisher class has been redesigned and now has class V shields-intercepts my strike force at Rana:

The Isaac Newton is destroyed, but the Mendelev class proves along with fire support from the cruisers proves too much for the bears. I BDZ the colony; there is no way I can launch an invasion against the Bulrathi ground troops at this point.

2462: Atmospheric Terraforming come in, start on Terraforming +50. Rana re-colonized. The Bulrathi response has been uncoordinated and weak. Deep Space Observation detects a human flotilla on an approach vector. 200 fighters, 11 cruisers, and 108 frigate-sized vessels are detected escorting a colony ship. ETA-Six turns. I am not worried so long as the Meklars do not intervene. Continue Terraforming my hostile worlds as I wait for the humans to arrive.

2468: The human fleet is massacred. Class X planetary shields come in, start on Personal Absorption shield. The First Fleet sets a course for the Bulrathi world of Kronos, with 14 cruisers left behind to defend Rana.

2471: The Bulrathi armada meets my fleet in the skies over Kronos:

Casualties are horrific. My fleet is nearly wiped out, with only 2 Mendelev class Battleships and three Hisenberg dreadnoughts. The Bulrathi¡¦s Punisher dreadnoughts proved to a be a dangerous foe; their shield-piercing weapons and mark V deflectors gave them an edge that I was only able to offset with auto-repair and the much greater speed of my battlecruisers. The 44 Tooth Heavy cruisers inflicted a heavy price on me as well. I will try a ground assault, and see how bloody it will be. I know that the bears have a better rifle and there own innate advantages, but I think I have better armor, shields, and battle suits. ETA: Three turns. I expect to hit them with around 150 million troops, vs. 50 million defenders.

2474: Two Punisher Dreadnoughts try to retake Ranna; the garrison is quickly reinforced with two Heisenberg Battlecruisers and they are destroyed. 152 million troops hit Kronos, taking about 50% casualties as the Bulrathi GROPO techs are very obsolete. Of course, I lose another 30 or so that can¡¦t actually fit on the size 50 planet. On the plus side, I capture Mass Drivers, Dotomite Crystals, and Class V shields. The biggest prize, controlled radiated, remains undiscovered.

2475: Election is again inconclusive, although the Meklars have passed the Bear in pop (gee, I wonder why) and are my opponents in this election. The Darlocks cast their two votes in my favor; Fleet Intelligence reports that the Darlocks are at war with the Bulrathi.

2478: Klackons and Human threaten me again. Anti-matter torpedoes complete, start on Auto Blaster.

2479: I get my first successful infiltration of the game, select paleontology, and get¡KControlled Radiated! Excellent. That¡¦s the good news. The bad news? Well, the Meklars, who have the most powerful fleet in the universe, have withdrawn their ambassador and declared war. Even the humans look like they may be leaning towards the Bulrathi camp right now. I try bribing the Klackons, but they still won¡¦t ally with me. I bribe the humans up to relaxed; they still won¡¦t break their alliance with the Bears though. Most of the Meklar fleet is in transit, escorting slow colony ships so I believe that I have a few turns in which to strike.

2480: Ursa¡¦s high orbital falls to the First Fleet. A Bulrathi colony ship snuck by me and settled Collassa; a Heavy Cruiser BDZ¡¦s the planet, rectifying that error.

The fleet is ready. The soldier is prepared. It is time for

GROUND ASSUALT!

2481: Incedius settled. Ukko settled. Terraforming +50 discovered, start on cloning. 162 millions soldier en route to Ursa, ETA 2 turns. Deep Space Observation detects a Meklar fleet moving to attack Rana. I can¡¦t really tell what size their ships are as I haven¡¦t played with or against the purple color scheme (although it is hella cool! but they have at least one battleship, the rather ominously named Annihilator, as well as 60-odd ships that are either destroyers or cruisers in size. ETA: 4 turns. By then, Rana will have its shield up along with, hopefully, a couple of bases. But the only fleet elements are covering other recently conquered worlds. No reinforcements are available. Fleet Command orders First Fleet split into two separate commands. The newly created second fleet, consisting of the ships guarding Kronos, will be tasked with mobile defense.

2483: Impulse drives researched, start on Ion Drives. Steal Improved Industrial 6 from the Bulrathi; oh well. Should have picked weapons and hoped for Fusion Rifles.

2484: 172 million Psilions land on Ursa, and by the battles end only 19 survive the fury of the Bulrathi. The demoralized eggheads capture Gattling Laser, controlled inferno, improved industrial 8, and fusion rifle from the factory complexes. Battle Computer Mark V comes in, start on Improved Robotics V. Deep Space Observation detects another, albeit somewhat smaller, Meklar fleet en route to Kronos, ETA 3 turns. My much faster fleet can travel to Ranna, (hopefully) defeat the Meklars there and still make it back to Kronos before the other Meklar attack arrives.

2485: Colassa founded, although it will soon fall as a Bulrathi Grizzly defeated the 5 Galileo-class cruisers protecting the colony ship. Either way, this triggers the 18-system GNN report warning that if I am not contained, I will soon control the galaxy. Right on cue, the Klackons break their Non-aggression pact with me.

2486: The Second Battle of Ranna:

The Ajax and Tornado class cruisers seem to be primarily bombers, armed with large racks of fusion bombs. The Annihilator and the Nexus are straight up brawlers armed with fusion beams. All have class V shields.

In the end, I cannot defeat the Ajax siege cruisers, and they pound the missile bases into dust. I am in possession in the planet at the end of the battle, having destroyed all other vessels besides the Ajax class ones. The problem is, that other fleet will now be unopposed when it reaches Kronos. The remains of the second fleet, three Battlecruisers and three Ptolemy cruisers head for Kronus. I will have to send some of the ships guarding Ursa as well. Ten Ptolemy cruisers dispatched.

2487: The additional reinforcements prove to be enough, and the enemy fleet is broken, with only some of the Ajax Siege Cruisers making it out alive. The humans cancel our non-aggression pact. I sign a peace treaty with the Bulrathi; I have bigger fish to fry now. Construction begins on Da Vinci fast battleship, mounting anti-matter torpedoes and heavy fusion beams. It should do better against the Repulsor beam mounts the Meklars are using.

I sit back, building up my defenses and waiting for the two main Meklar fleets to make their move. Both consist of about 120 ships each. Next target will probably be Meklon itself. In the mean time, 2 Ptolemy and 2 Da Vincis are dispatched to intercept 28 Meklar cruisers heading towards Gorra. The planet has 20 missile bases, but they have not been upgrade, and does not yet have a planetary defense shield, I problem I will try to rectify before the Ajaxs arrive.

Uh oh. The Klackon Hordes come a¡¦knocking at Talas; fortunately I paid a lot of attention to that world because of its strategic position. They will have some trouble penetrating the shields on my heavy cruisers, and have no deflectors of their own meaning I can use scatter packs. I totally obliterate them, losing a few cruisers to the Heavy Ion Cannons mounted on the Paladins.

Steal Battle Computer Mark II from the Bulrathi, and get to blame the Meklars for it. The Meklars have broken up their uber-fleets and sent several squadrons piecemeal towards Ukko, which is near the rendezvous point for my northwestern world, so I can reinforce it quickly. Deep Space Observation detects a new design, designated Tormentor. No further information available at this time.

Speaking of Ukko, it gets hit with the Plague event on the next turn.

2495: First Fleet hits Meklar, routing the sector fleet, but the Meklar must have gotten Class X planetary shields as my Merculite missiles don¡¦t even scratch them. Bombs and torpedoes do little better, and I can only destroy three of the planets 23 defense installations before having to fall back.

2497: The 35 or so Ajax cruisers manage to destroy two of Gorra¡¦s 32 missile bases before being obliterated. Cloning finishes, start on Gaia Transformation. The Humans declare war on me. The Klackons are the only ones besides the beaten Bulrathi who have not done so yet; but their ambassador has not returned yet so I suppose it is only a matter of time. This is practically like a final war almost. Well, seeing as how I¡¦ve never actually fought a final war I don¡¦t really know what I¡¦m talking about, oops. B)

Deep Space Observation Command detects a Meklar flotilla on an intercept course for the home world. The Pollus and Rigel Shipyards are mustering their new ships there anyway, and the capital will have little trouble building cruisers and fortresses on its own, although it will hurt my research to do so. EYA: 8 turns. The main Meklar assault fleet will hit Ukko next turn: 1 Annihilator Dreadnought, 38 Ajax Siege Cruisers, 8 Nexus Heavy Cruisers, and a single, presumably armed, colony ship. Ukko has no defensive installations. But it doesn¡¦t matter; I wipe them out, losing only 2 Kepler classes second-rate cruisers.

Auto-Blaster comes in, start on Pulson Missiles. I should have researched these earlier; my missile tech is getting pretty out of date.

2499: And suddenly it becomes irrelevant. The election pits me vs. the Meklars. This time, only the Humans vote for the bots; the others vote for me. Combined with my own 20 votes, I easily win the election. Party on Mentar! WOOOHHOOOOO!

-I'll try and get the pictures up later.

[Selentine]

Ok, my scribbles look like Linear-B at this point. I'm not going to rehash everything because others have laid the groundwork by now. This is still pretty long

I note that the nearest enemies are at 9 pc, because I don't believe they can be at 7 pc--maybe they occasionally can. I also note the abundance of red stars.

Is there any way to know from the map whether a planet is in a nebula? I couldn't tell re: Rigel and Escalon. If I knew Rigel was and Escalon wasn't I may have done things differently. Instead I saw no difference and I wanted to move coreward and gain access to the stepladder of likely-habitables from 5:00 to 8:00.

My starting scouts went to Rana and Zhardan, which I thought were most at risk. On Impossible, I've seen AIs take a third planet in 2306, so I like to block as many planets as possible by then. On Hard this is not necessary and I should have scouted Rigel, since with the planet numbering I would at least know whether to land at Escalon. I screwed up.

I then sent a bunch of scouts other places and wrote down what they were, but you all know by now.

My notes say "It will be almost 2330 before we get there (to Rigel)--a HUGE loss--but still an easy won game." I was already demoralized at this point, knowing I could not help but win, yet knowing I couldn't get the fastest win after landing on Escalon.

I have notes for where Mentar was, trying to decide at what point to switch to shipbuilding, 2310 48/55, 2311 52/60--at this point I switch.

Bulrathi colony ship bounces off my fearsome scout at Rana in 2311, '15, '18, and over and over until I get too bored to keep writing it down. Maniac makes the good point that Bulrathis don't make small fighters; if blue was Alkari/Meklar/Klackon/etc. it would be more pressing to secure this border. I didn't take that into account at the time

In '29 I decided I would be able to hold Rana and went for it. This is another wrong decision. Just taking Rigel wins the game, it may as well be Orion. My notes are sparse in the '30s because of my disgust. It seems I took Rana in '39 or '40, having first taken Centauri and then sent fighters to Rana once it was within range.

In '43 I finally bother to take Rigel. And then I decide Gorra is ripe for the picking, and Mentar is stunted, so why not build up for a while and then build future colony ships on the rich world? hahaha

In '47, my feeble empire was Rigel 50/0, Mentar 53/80, Escalon 33/67, Rana 49/14, Centauri 67/63. "Still 0 tech" it says.

In '50, I have enough facs to want 3/1. Really I should have wanted it in '47, but I forgot I was Psilons or something. 3/1 not available. I realize I have enough facs to want 80%, and try for that, but it's not available either. I go through the second half of the century lamenting their lack, which was no good for my morale.

In '51, Bullies are aiming at Gorra, but I have it blocked with laser smalls. "Gorra will wait. Rigel will make (colships) -> Gorra, -> dUR (Pollus)"

In '54, we meet the evilMeklars. In '57 my empire is up to Rigel 91/109 Mentar 89/148 Escalon 75/96 Rana 62/56 Centauri 71/scribble. Apparently scribble was close to 140, because I switch Centauri to colship production (for Gorra), suddenly noted as urgent.

In '59, two Meklar colships with a large escort show up within my feeble scanner range. They're taking Gorra. "Let them have it, they can't hold it".

"I am not playing carefully, and after Xing pop, fail to fix ECO"

I elect not to try to kill the Meklar colony ships. If I did one interesting thing this game, it was conceding Gorra and Pollus to the Meklars so I could pillage them later.

In '61, I meet the 2PE Klackons at 7 pc.

In the '60s I get the first round of techs, no need to get into specifics.
Meklars have DSScanner Shield2 Tundra R6 M6 (and possibly some stuff I had and therefore didn't bother to write down).

In '71 I am consciously allowing Gorra and Pollus to build up before I invade, while I work on Warp 2, NPG, and PDS.

In '72 Escalon rebels. I am at peace with the world and there's no way Meklars could have induced a rebellion in those few years since contact. If I had to get a random event, why couldn't it be neutronium? So while I was short on pop anyway, needing to send huge numbers at Gorra and Pollus, I now lose another 100+ (it will take 62 to kill the 42 rebels).

In '73 I am "dying for breaks" 5-12-19-xx-3-10. NPG hits, and "I guess I take M8s" expresses my regard for the choices. There are two good missiles in the third generation, so I prefer to take HL, NPG/IC, then M10/SP5. Doesn't always work out

In '76 I design a "feeble huge", BC1+BS S2 Warp2 Spd2 60 NPG 21 Nukebombs 1 M4x2 (to keep in reserve should I want to retreat). I decide this is too feeble, and go for smalls, NPGs and no computer. 100 get sent to Pollus and 144 to Gorra (all from Rigel). I'm working hard to get PDS, pushed it to 34% which is blue-moon-emergency for me. 82 Psilons (Titanium, PDS, HL) vs 56 Meklars (Duralloy, HL) win at Gorra but with only three survivors, and my only pillage is Duralloy.

"need RC3, like silicoids, no men"
60 from Rigel are en route to Pollus, but the stoopid nebula makes this SO SLOW as my notes subtly mention. And I know 60 won't be enough so I have to send more, and finally take it with the second wave in '87. Yes, that's right, I finally took Pollus in 2387. At least I was rewarded with Range 6 & 7, Barren & Tundra, Hyper-V, and RC3.

I design a less feeble huge now, though I don't have the specs recorded, and I build a bunch of them between 2387 and 2411.

Pillaging RC3 gave me the choice between BC3, BC4, and ISS. "I NEED ISS. Take ISS then worry about BC." I lean on ISS for my own sanity; seeing dozens of enemy fleets in my space with no idea where they're headed is too worrying.

So in '88, my empire is now Gion 51/35 Rigel 119/218 Mentar 97/220 Pollus 12/235 Gorra 38/70 Escalon 89/170 Rana 75/150 Centauri 85/180. Pretty modest and I should have had these planets in the 50s, and all these techs plus 3 facs/pop by 2385. In the replay I could also have had Berel and Aquilae by 2385, but I was dozing when Duralloy hit and didn't make a LR colship immediately.

Still it seems automatic to win in 75 turns from the position I had in 2388, however badly I'd blown the opening. Since not everyone won this quickly, there may be some interest in how I handled it.

The Meklars are unable to retaliate, except by wheedling the Bullies into an alliance. Bullies then declare in 2390. For the next zillion turns, I am being pestered by total joke fleets, but I have to burn mental CPU cycles dealing with them plus building up my planets to where they should have been 20-30 years earlier.

in 2393, I steal Anti-Missile Rockets from the Meklars. This is my first steal. I have been spying on them since deciding to let them borrow Gorra, and on the Klackons since contact since the Klackons couldn't hurt me from that range. Miserable luck.

The Meklars are attacking with stupid ships like NEXUS Def 1/1 Att 1 HP 150 Sh 1 Sp 1 7 M6x5+2L, and the Bulrathis with WARBEAR Def 1/1 Att 3 HP 100 Sh 2 Sp 1 7GL+M4x5. These things can't bombard, but they can destroy a lonely missile base or two. So they go to a planet, and I can't tell which planet they're aiming at, and they orbit it, and before my smalls chase them away, dozens of blimps are en route. So then I need my fleet to shoot the blimps out of the sky, while the stupid larges are pestering some other planet. And over and over.

In 95, the Klackons declare, unprovoked. "SO BORING"
In 97 I finally learn Dead Environment. I take Berel in 2400, which prompts the vote: Humans 4= Darloks 4= Klackons 2- Bullies 6- Meklars 3- Psilons 7/25. I'm not at all worried about 2424.

Meanwhile I have met the fearsome HUNTER, Def 2/2 Att 0 HP 18 Sh 0 Sp 1 2GL. I don't quite have Shield 4. My priority after finally getting Dead was 5/1, which hits in 2405. This increases my net by roughly 1BC/pop/yr. "ISS next for sanity" is interspersed between "CHAOS w/o ISS" and "'10: I CAN'T THINK" in legible caps.

Rana, Escalon, and Centauri are all pestered in the 240x's. I don't take any consequential damage, except to my brain.

"'11: NO hit. '12 CANT THINK at all. MISCLICK N." I really hate hitting N when I mean to hit M. "NO HIT"

ISS finally does hit the next year. I have notes suggesting how I shuttled my fleets to stop all incoming nuisances once I learned their ETAs. "Time LOW. need POP."

In 2415 one of my huges is defending some green planet, probably Centauri, from Meklar missile boats whose strategy is to unload while taking casualties, then retreat. They are so nonthreatening I hit A, as I have been doing the last 20 years. Except this time, the game decides to lock up. AUTO is still green, and I can move the hand, but nothing happens. I have to reload from continue, but fortunately I only lose a year and a half, back to 2414, and don't lose a breakthrough.

In 2415 redux, after not hitting A and not locking up, I steal TF+30 from the Meklars (and choose Soil) and finally hit Shield 4, making the pests even more useless. I really loathe Gatlings, because not only do they do no damage, they do it four times and battles against multiple Gatling stacks are unspeakably slow.

Sub-Light soon comes in. My notes are hasty and scrawled, as like Patroclus I was less interested in taking notes having made the odds-on but losing gamble early. After stealing +30, I apparently left Rana and Centauri on ECO to breed, and then noted how careless I'd been.

I also have the lucid note "82 v 44, 47 WIN IS BC2 S3 - total ZERO". This must have been a Bulrathi planet (from my intel notes), Kronos from the rest of my notes. "forgot NO NO NO NO @ Gorra". I seem to have left a newly launched ship, which was relocated to Gorra, AT Gorra, when I needed to direct it to the front to cut off more pests. After thirty-odd years of pesterment, concentration is hard to maintain.

To show how far behind I am, I get Neutron Blaster in 2423 and Auto-Repair in 2425. Oh, and I had 11/30 to block the vote, as anticipated.

"tired of gnats. huge red stacks -> esca. need base." Yes, one base to stop their 1000+ gnats. Before I was just using ships to cut them off and leaving Escalon undefended most years, which only enticed them to send more gnats.

"Lying ETA @ Esca". Stoopid nebulae. So the gnat stack smashes 62 factories, by far the worst damage I took all game.

My troops (unnumbered) conquer Bootis, for which I get IIT8 and SP5, but no Battle Comps. My 2429 intel report (techs AIs have that I lack):
H: EC1 BC3 IIT7 Inf BTA WD W5
K: EC2 Inf
B: BC34 Tox
M: EC3 RC4 PSV IR
(Darloks: no contact)

2433 brings Zort and 2434 brings BC3. EC4 is the only way forward in comps, and useless, so I abandon research there. One click, I guess, because I'm about to get virused for 93 RP in that area.

I start building ARS Zort huges, which will crush all enemies except the evilMeklars. 2436 brings Soil. "go->FB, need AMB, must kill purple." haha. As though AMB was in our tree.

I now steal W5 from the Hoomans. This is very, very good since now not only can I send troops at a reasonable speed, the double jump in prop tech brings kilotons of miniaturization.

In 2442 I take another blue planet which was not Arietis (Phyco IIRC), and win BC4 but not Tox.

"12 (SP5) bases @ ARI, 180(missiles/rd)x2(damage vs S4) = 360 only, cleared easily (by ARS huges)" I prefer to use dreadnoughts which can keep sweeping the front forward rather than weenie stacks which take losses and require reinforcements. I'm not sure it's better, but it's certainly less hassle.

In 2443, FB hits at 7%. "Still NO BOMBS! augh! need AMTs to crack purple?" This was desperation, as AMTs are such a bad joke I'd never taken them when trying to be serious. I take them here and really, they're a bad joke, even when stuck with nuke bombs vs PSV, don't take AMTs, you'll regret it.

In 2445, I steal Dissipator, but I still can't land on Toxics.

I have not made any attacks against red, orange, purple, or green, and I genocide them all within twenty years. I am that far ahead in tech and I have fast drives. This is a Psilon-style victory, sitting on my ass until I could crack planets without taking casualties.

"46: their M6/8s are killing my bases. Meklar 22 M6s = useless"
MoO is usually a defender's game, but this game was extreme. For more than 50 years now, popgun missile boats have been sniping at me, with no significant success. Meanwhile I have been at war yet unable to scratch the evilpurple planets for 70+ years thanks to no bombs and no stingers.
At least now I have HFBers which are slightly less futile than the HBCers against PSVs.

I have 14/31 in the next vote, with Darloks abstaining as we still have no contact.

My pre-2445 fleet is Def 1/1 Att 4 (BC3+BS) HP 1200 Sh 4, Warp 3/5 (after stealing W5) Sp 2 10-11HBC 10-11NB 30Nukebombs 4SP5x5 ARS.
My post-2445 fleet subs HFBs/FBs for HBCs/NBs and adds the Dissipator.
These are not scary ships but they're basically immune to Hyper-blah Rocketboats, which is all that's being thrown at me.

In 2450, the Human SoD consists of BATTLESHIPS Def 0/0 Att 3 HP 600! Sh 4 Sp 1 14M8x5+14M8x2+GL and DESTROYERS Def 2/2 Att 2 HP 18 Sh 2 Sp 1 M8x5. They don't have planetary shields, so they put up no resistance.

I now have a percentage on exoskeletons. It might have been smarter to take exoskeletons and cloning before the final cleanup. That would be slower in gametime but faster in realtime.

In 2453, my 160 rout 110 at Darrian and my 42 rout 19 at Meklon. I write RIP. But to my horror, purple has taken Toranor in the far corner! So their million useless pests keep flitting about at Warp 1 a while longer.
I let them land and bombard whenever possible, since they'll then find themselves out of refueling range and disintegrate.

In 2455, with EXOs(finally), my tag team conquers Ursa (finally). My remaining notes are extremely sparse. No one has useful missiles. No one has a useful number of bases (it's Possible after all). No one has a useful beam weapon. No one has bombs. Only the non-factor Darloks have spores or Merculites. This felt more like an endurance test than a game.

My final save, as my totally superfluous Torpers are about to vaporize Toranor, is actually in 2466, not 2465. At least 20 turns too slow.

Selentine