The diplomatic situation is interesting, with all those wars going on - and probably good for us! Both declarations against us appear to have been Erratic from races that were already at war with at least two others, so we may be lucky and and not face too many actual stacks. The main issue is that the Humans are allied with the Meklar - I'll probably NAP the humans, maybe tech trade with them first and see if they can be persuaded to break alliance.
Despite the fact we're still building, I'm tempted to spy on the bears, hope to exploit their racial weakness.
BTW, have we found Orion yet? I'd rather not waste a scout if it's avoidable, and a quick search didn't find any reference in the reports.
I've sent/sending as of the save scouts to everywhere that's currently in sight and unsettled, so we don't have its location yet.
Thanks. I thought I'd seen an unallocated scout during my initial scan, but I will double-check.
I completely failed to get to any actual turns yesterday - work has become very busy - but I think I'll have a good window to play early this evening. If that looks like it's not going to happen, I'll let you know. Even that probably means I won't get a report done until tomorrow, which is a bit of a slip .
It may have looked easy, but that is because it was done correctly - Brian Moore
Sorry, no in-character stuff. I've been trying a couple of different ideas, but nothing quite worked - or at least, not in a form short enough to include in the report! Maybe later ...
T2370
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Offer humans a NAP, to try to delay any pull into war from their Meklar and Bulrathi allies. They accept.
Offer them a tech trade ... sub-light drives are better than nothing, and they get Controlled Toxic too . Variant satisfied.
They won't break their alliances though .
Weak as the cats are, they are on the other side of the Bear-Human-Borg alliance, so lets set up minimal trade and be friendly (I should either not have done this or been consistent and done it with the Sakkra too ).
I send pop to fill up some of our small, hostile worlds - hey, one of them is R, one UR, and I will be focusing on pushing their development a little. We badly need more IT, as has already been said, but I'm not putting any RP into it until we've got the techs already lit done.
I don't send pop to Respect, just in case the bears are incoming (and also because its neighours are building fighters).
T2371
-----
Class II deflectors in. PDS only choice.
Humans dissolve our NAP! Well, maybe I gained a turn.
Mrrshans offer more trade! The variant says yes .
Of course, I could have designed a faster fighter last turn ! I have to drop the BC to get full defense though. Anyway, no incoming bears.
T2372
-----
Found the colony of Snuggles (Kulthos). Except that I somehow forget to change the name .
The Humans declare. Well, dammit, I should have traded with the cats, that was a bad error .
Explore the Toxic world of Proteus. I guess we try to colonise it, although I suspect the apes will now beat us to it.
T2373
-----
Quiet. I start terraforming our hostile worlds that have decent pop, 10BC at a time.
T2374
-----
Omicron is an asteroid field, while the cats have a colony on Arid 35 Aquilae.
T2375
-----
Vote time. Meks v Sakkra.
Meks 7 for Meks
Lizards 7 for Lizards
Humans 3 for Meks
Bears 2 for Meks
Cats 3 for Lizards
I abstain, and forget to note our vote quantity ...
We explore the Tundra of Jinga, which is still out of range.
T2376
-----
Deep space scanner is in, and we have IRC3 at the next level.
Unfortunately, our human enemies get a boost to their combat techs.
T2377
-----
Battle suits in. Only Zortium available.
T2378
-----
Quiet. Lots of micro dealing with terraforming and trying to get our rich/ultra worlds up.
T2379
-----
Found Empathy (Proteus). We're first to 12 planets. That's not going to help our popularity.
T2380
-----
We have a Meklar colony ship incoming at Kulthos (secretly Snuggles). I hope the NPGs we have there can handle it. Looks like we have bears at Love, which is building bases. I thought they were heading for Joy, so did not put ships over Love, but several worlds could get NPG fighters there with a Reloc if needed. I hope I haven't left it too late.
The trade with the Humans was a poor decision which - somehow - the AI hasn't made me pay for. Yet. Well, sub-lights aren't bad in themselves, but handing an inevitable (with hindsight) enemy access to all our hostile worlds isn't great.
We have a lot of worlds that have just MAXed out - and I have put them on reserve spending as a placeholder. Tech will also need adjusting - Merculites are being a bit slow to come in, and I was working on Radiated to clear it in the hunt for more pop. We do have a few RP in Computers, but I had to draw that down to almost nothing to keep Planetology lit. Note that our current Force Fields and Construction choices were our only options. I would much rather have had something economic in Construction, but we've been stiffed there on a couple of rungs now.
It may have looked easy, but that is because it was done correctly - Brian Moore
While my drones ejaculate in my spermatheca enough genetic material to last for the next biological cycle, my mother feeds herself to the workers that she has generated early this year, her last contribution to our family's growth. She has transferred her consciousness by now, and there's no need to waste her still nutritious flesh. Her last thoughts being of horrour and despair of being eaten alive concern neither her nor me, because her consciousness transfer has happened before thus sparing me, her, and the thousands of Mothers that I hold in me of that experience. This same ritual has happened for the hundred thousand generations that have gone by since the Great Mother learned to transfer her knowledge alongside with her memories and consciousness to her successor Mother Queen.
The link between the direct mother and the new queen is always stronger than that with all the others, perhaps hinting at a yet imperfect technique of consciousness transfer, or perhaps at a biological weakness of treating one's offspring irrationally warmly that still lurks in the interactions among the genes that we've inherited. Obviously the workers and the drones - who cannot communicate telepathically - share not this privilege.
Thus, her - using the relatively large share of mental focus of my brain that I allocate to her - and I have pleasant discussions on the state of the galaxy while I feed on the corpses of my drones. Species are infesting planets everywhere but, to our puzzlement, none of the species has generated a telepathic conscious Mother. They all obey their biological algorithms without much organisation, or even empathy, like workers and drones.
2380
As we chat, our sister queens in the colonies join in into the conversation telepathically, from light years away. We are very few still, and need to grow. The closest animals to have started spacefaring are physically strong but mentally very weak ursines that have so far refused any opening. There is clearly no hope that a Mother will develop from their two planets. Conveniently, my Mother has left a concentration of light ships very close to their homeworld to defend our youngest colony and sister Queen. We decide to take their fertile grounds for a new sister queen.
The Sakkra at least give us some hope: in the long past ancient reptiles on Kholdan seem to have have developed genetically in a mother/clones structure, in an example of parallel evolution. But it is impossible to say if the Sakkra could do the same, and they act rather erratically, lowering the odds of a positive outcome. We send physical envoys using technology, how rudimentary. They give us some hope as they accept our offer of toxic terraforming in change of an improved terraforming technique (+20), which we immediately transfer to our sisters to implement. Hopeful, we start a small exchange of goods with the Sakkra despite their erratic behaviour.
2381
A small bear fleet attack is repelled easily, but that gives us an opportunity to scan their ships revealing risible armour tech and shields. A plan forms in the minds that we share in my brain. A chat with the felines from Fieiras leads to an apparently disadvantageous exchange: deep space scanners for ECM 1. But this spares us from having to deviate from the latest computer techs. And it leads to a tiny hope that the felines, who have matriarchal societies, could develop their genetics towards a telepathic society to make us feel less lonely in the galaxy. But we don't delude ourselves: the odds are infinitesimal.
2382
A scout ship sent to Ursa confirms that their armour is outdated and that their missiles are slow.
Our engineering workers implement a new missile and we decide to jump directly to a more powerful version, the stinger.
In our push for efficiency we design the tool to take care of the ursine animals, the Bumblebee: a small craft holding just 1 nuke, 1 ecm and the best engines. A last attempt at diplomacy with the backwards Bulrathis leads to no openings, and we start construction of the Bumblebee on most of our colonies, stopping research for the moment.
2383
The Sakkra rekindle our hopes by spontaneously declaring thankfulness for our treaty, and we find that they are allied with the Mrrshan. But from their planets no thought that we can dream in our dreams reach us yet... Yet, becoming friends with the ones might lead to friendship with the others.
2384
With a last whiff of my pheromones, that transmit the inevitability of my telepathic orders, Kholdan Bumblebees start their voyage to Ursa ready to even waste their biologic material in space for the greater good of our family. My workers on Kholdan go back to research, all in personal shields, so that the future invasion be likelier to succeed.
2385
The sister queens of Kindness, Peace, Gratitude send their Bumblebees then move workers back to research as well.
During summer, a happy event occurs. I detect in one of my eggs a new queen forming. The pheromones that I happily emit are so inebriating and powerful that they lead to the workers having fake mating rituals among themselves.
I immediately set her apart of the other eggs and start her training, transferring memories and consciousnesses into her as her brain develops. I start from the most ancient Mother Queens, that remain silent most of the time in the chorus in my brain, to minimise the loss of information in the following generations. This is a complex matter even for our telepathic minds which will last for the next few years.
2386
The Bumblebees from Love, Hope are sent to Ursa. Respect sends the outdated, slow NPG2s as well. Joy (UR), Unity ® have finally completed their terraforming cycle - they maximised population and factories - so they turn back to reserve building. All reserves are spent to help our youngest sister Queens on Khultos, Gratitude and Empathy. Kindness sends workers towards Hope anticipating the transports leaving.
I allocate a share of my mental capacity to assess telepathically the Bulrathi technologies. Some ancient Mother Queens are momentarily silenced from the chorus in my brain, losing their share. They nevertheless agree to this gladly, as this will result in a richer dialogue in some years with the expansion of our family to a new sister in Ursa.
2387
Laslty, the escort of Respect is sent towards Ursa, barring a handful of NPGs for defence.
To help my daughter Queen in planning, I send a scout towards Sol, to check the defences of the primates. Like the ursines, they haven't ever sent dreams towards our dreams.
2388
The battle of Ursa is even easier than anticipated. The outdated NPG2s are targetted first, surprisingly, showing that these animals really had no hope for further mental development. The bears thus waste their best shots while our Bumblebees bomb their motherplanet, and our NPG fighters slaughter their fleet with but a small loss of outdated ships. We could have done it with probably half the Bumblebees.
Having explored the planet, we immediately arm the drones from several colonies to invade Ursa. We send most of the bombers back to be sure not to overdo the bombing should a new missile base pop up.
There are some diplomatic news. Most races in the galaxy won't speak with even our technologies - much less our minds - but the Sakkra keep showing promise by accepting a pact of non aggression! Will their Mothers become our sisters? ...Unfortunately they're not allies of the Mrrshan anymore, showing that they are probably too erratic to reach the heightened mindset needed to communicate telepathically. I feel so disappointed and lonely - despite the chorus of Queen Mother minds singing in my brain - that the pheromones that I inadvertently exude lead an entire generation of workers to commit suicide.
2389
The scout worker, insulated from the pheromones on Kholdan thankfully, reaches Sol and reports 33 missile bases with bad armour (50 hp) and missiles (3 AUs/turn - probably the same as the Bulrathi). These primates seem to me to be candidates for the same treatment that we have reserved to the bears. Their outward friendliness is clearly a fake, as they seem to ape our telepathy by monkeying with FTL communications in the same way that a computer would. But of course it will be up to my daughter Queen to decide on the matter.
The telepathic report from Ursa is now ready:
They are backwards indeed. We can probably deal with them in a planetary invasion despite their physical toughness - I decide to not bomb their factories and try to conquer their techs in order to have exchange possibilities with the other races.
To maximise the odds of invasion, seeing that our technological efforts haven't yet given fruit at 52% odds, we decide to send a second invasion wave from the closest planets. Respect sends troops towards Ursa too, despite being a young colony - the odds of success need to be maximised.
2390
Right on time (70%), my engineering workers implement personal shields. We can only study planetary shields V, a good addition to our toolset.
How time flies. My daughter Queen is already shedding her wings after her mating flight. I perform the last telepathic mind transfer that I must, and I am momentarily double, in flesh as well as in her mind. Abhorring this waste of resources, and not wanting to confuse my young daughter communicating with her in double, I gladly give myself as food for the workers, like all our ancestors have done since the first Great Mother, knowing that I will exist forever in her brains and our successors' - as long as we can assure that our offspring be an everlasting species!
Having shut down the organs that allow telepathy, to avoid transferring the horrible pains that I'm now feeling, I utter the ritual salute using the ancient tool of physical words made of sound as my last act: may you exude the Great Mother's scents.
Notes
2 waves of assault in flight to Ursa, on average the first one should make it, but feel free to review my calcs. If you end up with too many clones you can send some back to Respect.
The humans might be a good next target.
The 4 ongoing wars have brought absolutely no effect, I expect them to end soon.
Planetology has some RPs from before, but with this amount of planets IRC 3 would also be a very good addition.
If we can actually grab and hold Ursa that would be awesome. I haven't done any detailed calculations on the invasion, and I don't like the Bears having Ion Rifle, but with them lacking shields and armour this is definitely a chance worth throwing bugs at!
We may have some issues around the vote in 10 years time. Looks like it will be us v the Sakkra, and that means that all three of our current enemies will vote against us, leaving the cats as the random factor ... of course, things could be different by then.
It may have looked easy, but that is because it was done correctly - Brian Moore
It looks to me like the first wave probably won't quite be enough, but the second wave should take the planet unless they get more groundpounding tech in the interturn or something. Should be fun! (I'll try not to lose the vote.)
Sorry for taking so long this time; here's the report at last! Beginning with:
Part 1:
2390
I am Klackon. I am a drone. I am my mother the hive queen and the greater mother who is OSG-36 on Kholdan, my omnipresent species guide, queen unto all. I speak for Klackon, for Klackon am I. I seek your friendship ever, marveling now at the green and black of your expressive eyes, focused and watching and thoughtful, framed by the soft orange of your fur, rippling in the faintest breeze. Fascinated, I long to speak and hear and see more of you, to share something of Klackon with you, to learn what you would share of yourself with me.
Beautiful is the knowledge you share! Never have I known any rocket technology: Only Merculite missiles, which for the defense of threatened worlds are like my chitinous carapace for stopping weapons, where your rockets are like the beautiful wind-tousled hairs that make up your fur. Please teach me the secrets of these rockets; I am very eager to learn! Teach me the most advanced and complicated rocket ideas you know, that we may remain the longer discussing them in each other's company! And in exchange, what shall I teach you? To build a carapace like mine with forcefield technology? No, do not mar the softness of your fur! To extend your reach and claim new worlds or bring battle deeper into the space of our mutual enemies? No, do not put your pilots in such danger! To speed your ships through space at nuclear speeds? No, throw not away your lives in haste! Rather accept the secrets of terraforming technology, that you might grow stronger and more numerous across all your worlds, preparing their surfaces - and perhaps more factories upon them - for a time when we will share planets as well as secrets and words!
Ah, if only I had stayed longer and asked to share in the rest of their rocket technology! I miss the Mrrshan people already, so willing to talk of their pretty toys with me! Their four worlds huddled in the corner of the galaxy are so peaceful in comparison with our dozen - soon to be at least thirteen - spread out along the galactic rim and pressing toward the heart of the galaxy! I long for more contact, more friendship, but the time is not right to return to the cats; so I know by the scents spread in the air by my mother the hive queen. Yet, seeking other friends, I find only the Sakkra might be willing to talk with me. It is not necessary to make an exchange with them under the rules of the omnipresent species guide upon Kholdan, yet it may be possible just the same, and perhaps the lizards will be friendly!
Lovely is the light upon your scales and the pinkness within your tooth-filled mouth! Charming are your gatling lasers and deuterium fuel cells - like toy versions for the pretty larvae of a new-hatched brood of the irridium cells I use myself - the knowledge of which perhaps we will share one day if we can find nothing better to talk about! Yet surely even you who have learned to build death spores yourself cannot truly wish to share that knowledge with the rest of the galaxy! No, let us talk instead of factories, of the industrial technology that would allow me to build factories in just four fifths of the time it presently takes me! You surely need no sublight drives to hasten you across the peaceful years of drifting through hyperspace, nor merculite missiles whose explosions might rain soot in your beautiful eyes or down on your shimmering scales. Better to protect your fine endoskeletal forms with the strength of duralloy armor: Secrets of construction research like those you share in return! Let us talk of construction together, sharing secrets as long as we can, as long as we dare! Let us sieze the day together, for who can know what tomorrow may bring - with an emperor as ... unpredictable ... as yours?
2391
I am Klackon. I come in friendship and in peace - and in numbers: One hundred and thirty five million of me. I come to embrace your ways and help you to embrace mine, to share your home with you, this delightful Ursa you call home. You have not - quite - filled it yet to capacity, and I will show you how to give it room for twenty million more, and then we will be together here! Why do you use ion fire to bring down my personal shields? Is this a ritual of greeting unfamiliar to me? I shall answer with laser fire to cut apart your planetary fortifications, and you will see I am peaceful and friendly and ready to share in your ways!
Ah, at last you run to me, roaring, your muscles bulging beneath your fur! I feel you taking me in your embrace, squeezing, and I return your hug with all the strength of my duralloy battle suit, but you are stronger than me still! What joy! The celebration is so great that we tread upon the fallen on both sides: Bulrathi crumpling here and there as while some of me have my ichor squeezed out, more than three of me squashed for every two of your people who die twitching on the ground, for we defer to our hosts gladly.
I can feel my life leaving me, the last of me on this planet to die in this orgy of blood and ichor and greeting, and it is well: Thirteen of your millions remain, and the ritual of greeting ended, I know you will live in peace with me ... when the rest of me who are coming arrive: Almost ninety million more of me.
2392
I am Klackon. I am a soldier. I am my mother the hive queen and the greater mother on Kholdan. Would that you could be Klackon too, but it was not to be. You did not eat the corpses of my others and your others as you should, but buried your dead in the ground and set fire to the bodies that had been of me, and you showed that there is not friendship here but war. So I brought war to you and killed all your people upon your world, and must find such friendship and sharing as I can among the ruins while I consume the fallen bodies, mine and yours, as is right for my strength and my unity.
I have learned from you to build rockets such as new-hatched larvae might enjoy - feeble even in comparison to those of which we learned from Mrrshan scientists. I have learned of the ion rifles with which you negated our shields. I have learned of your other ion weapons, larger and more powerful, to mount on ships. All this is well. All this is pleasing. Yet it is not true friendship! What, after all, have you learned from me?
2393
I am Klackon. I am a scout, watching over the deeps of space for me. I see the damage you have done to my factories, and I guess at who you are, and though I do not know, I believe my guess is true. I see your war ships coming, and I guess their destination from their trajectory, and I prepare Respect's defenses against you.
I see also the technology you have achieved - which impresses in some fields more than others; you have no engines, no missiles, and no planetary shields - and the humans' too; they do not impress at all, except that they have repulsor beams and very powerful engines indeed. The OSG-36 has dispatched ships already, building many of them anew, on missions all across the galaxy, and sent forward lagging portions of our fleet. I am ready for a confrontation, and I know what I'm getting into. I wish to be friends, oh Meklar people, oh TX-1138. But if you insist on sending your Ajax cruiser and Nemesis dreadnought to do battle with me, refusing to Respect my wishes, I will not mistake for friendship what is in fact your cruelty. Already at Jinga, just this year, I saw your Ajax at work, and saw it had none of the advanced armor like Zortium and Andrium that you have learned to build. If you try to destroy me, Meklar, I will be prepared!
2394
I am Klackon. I am a queen, mother to the whole of a hive, and I am each of my children and siblings and the greater mother who dwells upon Kholdan, my OSG. I speak to you in friendship, TX-1138. I accept your apology.
The gift of good faith you added, teaching us to double the strength of our battle computers, is welcome too, and I accept the truth that 140 billion credits per year is the minimum trade that would have any meaning between galactic powers as great as yours and mine. It is true that the Bulrathi, who made peace with us this year as well, with no gift but with humility, could only afford a trade deal of some 25 BC, but that is all they could muster after the way they have been reduced.
There was another who sought peace as well, but not in friendship: Johann III, the cunning monkey, tried to trick us into a peace that would only allow him to destroy our transports more easily. No gift would he offer; he only wished to try if we would be so gullible as to do as he said. So it was that I refused him. The humans shall not have peace.
2395
I am Klackon. I am a worker. I have lived half a decade aboard the ship that just arrived, that I am consuming now as though it were a queen who has passed beyond fertility so that I may start my future on this world, establishing a base here upon the ice floes of Jinga 6, the only planet in the system that even with Klackon technology can support my life. This world is near to Sakkra space, and I believe they have a colony ship on its way here already, and perhaps other ships besides, and our pact of non-aggression can't turn them around in hyperspace, a year sooner than any of our ships can arrive. Nor do I believe it will stop them if once they enter orbit from sending lizards here who might consume us all as we did to the Bulrathi at Ursa, in a fit of joyous welcoming. Should that happen, then the colony I am building will be theirs, or the others of me who are setting out now to join me here will take it back from them; I do not know and cannot say. But I will name it for my hope that in the end, we may share it together; if we cannot live together here in a spirit of friendship and compromise, then at least one of us can yield it to the other, in a spirit of friendship and...
...Generosity.
2396
I am Klackon. I am a pilot, bred for a specialized role that didn't exist until this century. I fly a scanner ship that tells me the details of the Talas defenses, and others of myself pilot fightercraft that this year have no targets they can hit, or bombers with just two bases to destroy. That is easily done with all the asteroids around Talas - easier still if I would think more clearly about taking advantage of them - and only five bombers are lost before the rest reach the planet.
Many of my millions are already on the way to greet the humans of this poor world and learn all I can from them. I will fly my scanner to Uxmai next, to learn more about their fleet. Some of our other ships have been there already and found their many, many destroyers were swift-moving and armed with lasers - some heavy, others gatlings - but this ship will find more details for me - as another ship being built this year will also be able to do. That is not the ship's primary purpose though. My starships are specialized as surely as am I in my many forms: The Antennae I fly scans enemy fleets as almost its whole duty, but the new ship-to-be has a scanner mainly to make it more effective as a...
...Soldier, protected by my best armor and shields, using my most-advanced targeting system, the scanner included, and of course sublight engines, though not quite the very best possible maneuverability, because I think it better for the Soldier 3.0 to have room for some 26 neutron pellet guns for dismantling my enemies. It would be much more pleasant to fly merchant ships to carry goods and knowledge back and forth between me and my friends, but the human monkeys do not wish to be friends, and so I must change their minds by showing them what being other than friends with me means.
Having to give Toxic to the Merklar.... 
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