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Wayne's developing quite a talent in this game for posting about stuff I already wrote up but haven't actually posted yet. Time for me to talk about Average-Guardian Specs immediately after he just did it - among other things.
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Nov 30, 2018 18:34
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Match the Master: 2396, Part II The larger a ship is at the moment, the more efficient it is in terms of the payload/BC ratio. We can build a no-shield version of this with 34 total bomb launchers for just 507 BC, and that's a tempting option. However, this ship is literally impervious to nuclear missiles, which is what four of the other five current are still stuck at for their bases. The Meklar have Hyper-V Rockets, which would only do 2 points of damage each; it would take 50 missiles instead of the default 17 without shields to take one of these down. Our tech advantage is such that the Ranger is therefore nearly a magical destructive force. Splitting up the weapons into all four groups lets me use only what is necessary. As it concerns damaging their bases, we get 3-12 damage depending on the attack roll, while most of our foes have Class II Deflectors, which will have only a fairly minimal mitigating effect. An average attack should do 5.5 damage each through those, taking out a base in 9 hits - 14 for those who have Duralloy. The Mrrshan have only Class I shields, while the Meklar have Class III. That means I should be able to expect each one of these cruisers to take out 2-3 bases per turn; they'll take about 2-3 years to build each, but I won't need many of them to flatten planetary defenses. Of course I'm still waiting on our next weapon in order to put an anti-ship design into service. War Assessment It's time to take a closer look at our strategy moving forward, now that we're starting to build our first warship. Several considerations need to be blended together. ** We are STILL expanding. Many systems on the frontier are thirsty for drones. Most of our existing systems are still held at half-full to supply them. ** Holding them down that far limits our tax-paying ability to fund maintenance of ships, and also drone supply for invading enemy systems. So these two points are in conflict. ** We have sufficient technology to wipe out the other empires with ease, except as it relates to ground combat where they are pretty much all ahead of us. ** Though I did not mention it as a rule, it would seem counter to the spirit of this game not to invade at least to the point where we assimilate all available enemy technology. ** We also want to keep researching to some level in order to improve our tech for taking on the Guardian. Average-difficulty Guardian Specs ** Mk. X Battle Computer, 2 Maneuverability - same on all difficulties. It isn't going to miss much against a ship of our tech, but it also doesn't move super-fast around the map and can be cornered to a degree. Everything else scales with difficulty. ** 6000 HP ** 1 Death Ray, 25 Stellar Converters. That's 26 dead ships per turn unless they are cruisers. Battleships are prohibitively expensive at our tech level, and probably something like 10 cruisers a turn would go down to the beam weapons. ** 12 Plasma Torpedoes, 45 Scatter Pack X launchers. The torpedoes absolutely wreck anything at close range, which is a good argument in favor of keeping your distance. Unfortunately we are not going to have any weapons with enough range and damage to really do that. The missiles will have 5 launches of 450 warheads each, 15 damage a crack. That's 33,750 total damage for those of you scoring at home ... and most of them aren't going to miss, although Scatter Packs don't have as good of onboard targeting as standard missiles. Just a +3 here which is the same as the much-earlier tech Stingers. This is the best argument in favor of using a bunch of small ships to crack this, because they'll take out a lot of vessels but much of the damage will be wasted. ** Class VII Shield, 5 Beam Defense, 5 Missile Defense. Military Design Strategy I think our best bet is small ships with mass drivers. Those would knock the effective shielding down to 4, and they do 5-8 damage so actual impact of 1-4 there. The Guardian is mostly an anti-capital-ship platform in terms of it's weaponry, hence the recommended conventional wisdom for an early-game assault - which I've never actually done myself, this will be a first - calls for a massed flotilla of fighter-class vessels to make those powerful weapons overhit and waste most of their damage. Who cares about a Death Ray when it can only take down one piddling ship? The missiles will also misfire slightly more often due to the defensive bonus smaller ships get. Such a design should also be effective against our much more lowly natural enemies. Not overly so - heavy lasers might well be better at the moment, or missile boats featuring hit-and-run tactics. But they'd work in sufficient numbers, and then any remainders don't have to be scrapped/rebuilt; I'd just turn them against the Guardian. Another option would be to focus on Weapons research; two tiers from now is when the Thotimx Special, aka Anti-Matter Torpedo, would become available. But if we don't get it, I would have poured a bunch of effort into it with minimal return. Economic Strategy The key item in this area is when is it best to start boosting planetary production en masse to provide more drones for invasion convoys and ship-building capacity. How much do I keep putting in research to continue cost and size-reductions to make our fleet ultimately more efficient and effective. Etc. I don't know what the right answer is here. Usually my bent, when I'm not certain in this kind of decision-making, is to basically split the difference. So I'll start gradually building up more planets soon, while still having a significant amount send their drones out to keep expanding our economic base in the furthest reaches of the galaxy. In other words, some of everything, so that we progress some on all fronts and don't put all our eggs in one basket.  Matrix 146 seems a good rally point on the edge of Human space.  The Humans don't have Tundra tech yet, and may never get it. Certainly I don't expect them to have it soon enough to attack here, so base-building ceases.   I'll show where in a bit, but these ships will head off to form a second front. It seems best to me to attack the Humans and Psilon/Mrrshan/Bulrathi simultaneously, rather than re-route ships to one and then wait for them to come back to the other. I don't normally do this - but then again, I don't normally colonize 60-70% of the galaxy before fighting either. This doesn't appear to be exactly the situation where normal strategies apply. Now that we have enough reserve for at least the moment, shifting these planets to building ships again has the added bonus of potentially getting Colonizers out a bit faster due to the 'stored' production if we find enough suitable locations.     Here's our rally point over here; Matrix 128. I haven't yet decided who I want to attack first, but this should be a decent starting location regardless of who it is.  Another example of why it's a good idea to have extra in the reserve ...  Now we can get two bases built instead of just one. All the better for hitting the Mrrshan ships as they approach.               They're not all there yet, but the need for micro is starting to extend to more and more of our recently-colonized systems.     The train stops here ... for now.  2396 Five hostile encounters. For whatever rounding reason we only got one missile base at Matrix 118 ... but it was enough. The Mrrshan fighters had only standard lasers, so only the cruiser was even potentially a threat. And they retreated fairly quickly. Compare that to the way they cleaned our clocks in the Bulrathi-Impossible setup!! Three of the others were with the Psilons, the final one with the Meklar - who joined the 'we hate the Borg' parade with a war declaration. I think that was due more to them signing an alliance with one of our enemies though. Also a pair of systems scouted, and two more colonized - and a merchant donation to our reserve was nice, ensuring the balance there will be healthy for a while. A lot of stuff happened, basically.
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Nov 30, 2018 18:34
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Thotimx posted:Wayne's developing quite a talent in this game for posting about stuff I already wrote up but haven't actually posted yet. Time for me to talk about Average-Guardian Specs immediately after he just did it - among other things. That's me, where  meets  . ...  I started just wanting to point out just how many shots at 1 point of damage it would take, but if "brevity is the soul of wit" I clearly have no soul. I don't think I've ever built a bomber larger than a destroyer. I decided on the Gunship as much for logistics as strategy (it's easier to mass-produce one design that can beat fleets and planets than mix up what my planets build, and it seems more Borg-like to smash with raw power than specialization) but that'll definitely do the job. Back to the bears, update 6 was here if you didn't see it when Thot got us to a new page, here's #7. The sheer number of Silicoid ships limits how much land I can grab in my "fight to the next Vote" window-- we've gotten in trouble before overextending yourself on offense and having your gains reversed-- but it's a satisfying amount nonetheless.  MOO1 Impossible Bulrathi Challenge #07It's tough to balance that aggression, defense, and teching (since on Impossible it's pretty easy to fall behind), but I think we pull it off here. Taking Cryslon puts us in contact with the Psilons at long last, though they don't seem to know that....
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Dec 1, 2018 19:36
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Match the Master: 2397, Part I  Starting here because I'm going to stop sending transports from a few other systems now.            It will now probably become an annual thing needing to keep our ships in place at systems where AI warships have shown up.     When doing that maneuver of redirecting them to the planet they are technically already at, they disappear from the Galaxy Map. I can still select them from the Fleet list, which does select them - but it looks like I'm selecting empty space, as in here. I will make use of this to get ships out to the proper scouting destinations. This is the latest answer to the 'what you have learned from this game' question; I didn't know selecting these 'sent back to where they already are' fleets and then splitting them up was possible in this manner.  When giving some of them a destination, the fleet icon magically reappears, as seen here. Once confirmed, it disappears again - even though there's still a ship there.  Off to the Tundra system the Meklar chased us off last year. They have colony ships that could head there at any time, but I think our speed will win out - at least initially.  A Toxic system that still interests only us.   Final back-filling Colonizer is now away.  Holding pretty steady at 16 candidate systems. The donation we received has greatly increased our minimum transfer amount; this is enough to tide many small systems over for several years.        This is the only planet that needed more than the minimum allocation.
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Dec 1, 2018 20:14
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Match the Master: 2397, Part II Colonizer complete, the primary matrix switches to Ranger duty.  Three core systems switch to maxing out production, done with drone transfers. Matrix 103 and Matrix 105 are the other two.       These last two will handle Colonizers for the most recently-scouted systems.    These poor worlds will naturally be primary sources of population, as much as is possible, for use as shock troops in the coming war.     Feels like it's taken forever to get this system built up. Probably just because of how long each turn goes now, but more terraforming begins.  And more.  More.  Not quite yet, but next year it'll be time.       The Psilon transport convoy continues to inch through the nearby nebula. We don't have any drones in place to send here yet, but I'm keeping a close eye on an annual basis. Right now I think we'll probably be able to keep it, but that's still very much an open question.   Last year we just kept up with terraforming enough for the population. As soon as we get ahead here I can switch back into doing some more factories.  The list grows longer, as I expect it will be doing almost every year for a while.  2397 Multiple hostile encounters as usual. We scout a Barren Ultra Rich in the far upper-left - that'll be another priority build for us to get another ship out there. For the first time in about 15 years, we don't expand our territory. The Collective weeps. Also, our first Ranger-class bomber is finished, and we have the Mass Driver! It'll be time to design our first anti-ship craft now. I hemmed and hawed over the next Weapons choice a bit, ultimately going with the expensive Fusion Beam over the Neutron Blaster simply because I want to move up the tree and get the most cost and size reduction I can. Strategic Sage fucked around with this message at 09:44 on Dec 3, 2018 |
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Dec 2, 2018 20:51
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Thotimx posted:We scout a Barren Ultra Rich in the far upper-right Upper left.
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Dec 3, 2018 09:09
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The Collective readies for war! Too bad the battles won't be as epic as the build-up has been, considering how inferior everyone else is.
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Dec 3, 2018 20:14
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Match the Master: 2398, Part I  Pegasus? Not a very Borg name, but whateverish. I'm not even close to putting a mass driver on a fighter yet; they take up 98 space and those have 54 total. But on a destroyer I can fit two, the only real choice being between a Mk III computer and a Mk I shield for the rest of the room. That's no choice at all. So this is our initial space-superiority ship. I'd like to make two of these so we can scrap half of them at a time per usual at some point in the future, but I have to wait until I can get rid of another design slot as I'm full again. Wayne posted:I decided on the Gunship as much for logistics as strategy (it's easier to mass-produce one design that can beat fleets and planets than mix up what my planets build, and it seems more Borg-like to smash with raw power than specialization) The Borg are more about efficiency, whatever that means in terms of specialization or not. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. They'll happily spend months working on an initiative that has a small chance of like a 1.5% increase in effectiveness, so obsessed with perfection they are.                  Pretty much holding steady; 16 eligible donor systems remain. That's less than 30% of the empire at the present time. Of course with the high granularity here - I just love that word, in case you can't tell - many of them only actually need a transfer once every handful of years so I don't need to actually do that many annually.      We've got a few more sizable transfers to deal with this year, due to drone convoys reaching a few outlying matrices.    Lost some cash this year but that's what the savings from the merchant donation are for. Without that, we wouldn't be able to have as many ship-producing worlds; more of them would have been needed to fund the reserve otherwhise.
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Dec 3, 2018 20:50
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Mis-statement corrected, thanks for pointing it out. Decoy Badger posted:Too bad the battles won't be as epic as the build-up has been, considering how inferior everyone else is. True, at least until we fight the Guardian.
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Dec 3, 2018 20:51
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Thotimx posted:Of course with the high granularity here - I just love that word, in case you can't tell - many of them only actually need a transfer once every handful of years so I don't need to actually do that many annually. You might love it, but AFAIK you are using it wrong. High granularity means more detailed, so you could send more precise amounts to the planets. 
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Dec 3, 2018 21:09
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Heh. Good point. I feel pretty silly.
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Dec 4, 2018 08:39
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Match the Master: 2398, Part II The long journey to that new ultra-rich Barren, literally on the opposite edge of the galaxy, begins from where the Borg themselves began.   This will likely become a tempting target for the Psilons. It just doesn't seem right to leave it totally defenseless. I might well get away with doing that, but ...  I'm thinking I want about 20ish or so Pegasus anti-ship destroyers to every Ranger bomber-cruiser I build. I'm not sure of the exact numbers but I'm going to aim for a mix of something like that until we get closer to being ready to attack.    Two more join the queue of maxing-out systems this year; this is one, Matrix 119 is the other. On the bottom half of the galaxy we really have no need for further drone transports at the moment. That's not the case at the top just yet, so the switching-over will not happen as quickly there.   A cruiser was almost finished here, so the production switch will jump-start our fleet a bit.   Figuring out how many systems should build ships and how many should research is really a matter of guesswork and another issue I'll probably just split the difference on. For now, big ones build, smaller ones study, and we'll see how that shakes out.  Our 'second homeworld' is finally on it's way to being an industrial center.  It's borderline, but I don't think this is in range of Sol ... and bases would build so slowly I don't think they are worth the expense anyway. Pay taxes and grow foot soldiers, that's the job here now that terraforming has finished.  Similar situation here - the human system of Yarrow is just off-screen to the right - but this is still in one of our major growth areas in the top-middle of the galaxy so it will be a drone-sending system for now.   A prime candidate for going full-max soon ... but perhaps not just yet, depending on what transpires in the colonization push.  This figures to be the staging area for our first attacks, and it is working on looking the part now.   Adding to the string of terraforming systems as promised.     Left too much waste around last year here it seems. Terraforming time now.   I've become fascinated by the slow-burning economic struggle here which will determine the military one. 3-4 years until the Psilon transports, now visible, arrive. We'll have more drones by then - I'll probably also do reserve transfers to make sure we have some missile defenses to thin out their numbers. I still don't know who'll prevail though. I think it'll be a close call.   Soon terraforming will come here as well, and the drones have already produced as much infrastructure as they can use.  Starting to get ahead on terraforming for the first time at Matrix 140, so the industrial process resumes.  This was the big recipient of aid from the reserve the last couple of years. It should be off the roll call of eligible matrices now with this kind of building.  10M drones are about to arrive, and will change the situation here considerably.  There is yet more fruit of the funding transfers. Once they get above a few million drones, there is a significant benefit.  Stretching pretty close to the most-recent acquisitions now.  Settled only 3-4 years ago, Matrix 157 is exploding here. 2398 We are only chased off two systems this year, and found our 60th system - yet another Inferno Rich and the last one well behind our front lines as it were. Improved Space Scanner comes in, which will allow us to stop guessing as to where the enemy ships are going and also give us increased detection range of course. Battle Computer V is next, we are current at III for our existing capabilities and that improvement would give us a match for the defensive specs of the Guardian.
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Dec 4, 2018 21:27
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Match the Master: 2399, Part I  I wanted to take a brief look at what our competition is doing, now that we have Improved Scanners and don't have to guess nearly as much. The Psilons have three colony ships out right now. All of them are doing the same thing; heading to systems we don't have picketed. There are only six unscouted places left - not including Orion - so that means they are on their way to half of them. They are still at Dead Environs so I expect them to get 1-2 of them and miss on the same number most likely, depending on what's there. They are still moving very slowly as can be seen.  The cybernetics are putting nearly all their eggs in this one basket. The target is Obaca, a barren system of 45M max. It looks like are finally going to expand beyond their starting two systems a full century into the game.  We are actually going to get there a year earlier, but I'll be very surprised if they don't just destroy/invade and take it from us. All we'll achieve here is a small delay in them taking the system, barring some sort of highly unusual happenstance. Still, a good demonstration of how much our speed is helping us.  These are the only Bulrathi colony ships I see, and clearly they won't be troubling us anytime soon. They might go somewhere after reaching Phyco, but by that time there will be fewer possibilities left for them. They do have a few Claw-class cruisers out apparently on scout duty to interfere with us. Humans and Mrrshans aren't players at all, both completely blocked off from reaching any unclaimed habitable systems. It appears that the door is still open to us taking at least our share of the remaining systems on the leftward rim of the galaxy.      This should be the last drone convoy required in the area around human territory. Until, of course, hostilities commence.  From one poor planet to another.  These should arrive at the same time as the Psilon troops according to our information, and should be sufficient to ensure a successful defense.     This is the arid planet that I was a couple years late in getting a ship out to. So far, there is surprisingly no indication that anyone else wants it.  I can now say with assurance and confidence that we are over-the-hump when it comes to reserve transfers. Eligible recipients are down by a full half this year to just eight, a fraction of the Borg Empire. I'll still be trickling out funds to a few of them, but this is now a minor concern and shouldn't be much effort from here on out.     Back to Ranger duty.
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Dec 5, 2018 21:13
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Match the Master: 2399, Part II       Another Ranger-producer, as, for the first time in vaguely recent memory, we need no Colonizers beyond those already built.   Time for another system to start maxing out.   Here as well. There's nowhere left nearby that needs drones.   And a third one. It's close, but it appears we'll have other, closer sources in the area by the time we need them.  There's still a sizable section of terraforming systems of course.      These small, hostile systems are crawling their way towards relevancy step by painful step.  Getting our third artifacts system into the research business is more significant. It's not a lot right now, but it'll be substantial soon.  It appears that I over-terraformed here.  The countdown is now specific; four years until the invasion force arrives.   The slower growth of hostile systems is hard to predict. Matrix 139 is another one where we are just waiting on more drones to mature.  7M drones and almost ready to start shifting resources into shipbulding.     There's still a handful scattered about, but the ranks of new, fledgling colonies are rapidly shrinking.    A big drone convoy is about to arrive, jump-starting this frontier world which is the current tip of the spear at the bottom of the galaxy.    We've now clearly reached the point where managing the horde of growing systems is the heart of the micromanagement struggle. 2399 Three more skirmishes with our Recons, and the Council meets again. Everyone votes Humans, pretending it will do them any good as we have 19 of 33 votes. They aren't pleased with our abstention and we get a warning from the only race that isn't at war with us. 'Withdraw or die'. We will be coming for them before too long. We've now made it through an entire century of play, with probably close to three thousand screenshots by this point. And how many more, one wonders?
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Dec 6, 2018 20:57
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The year-at-a-time updates really give that impending invasion some real tension. Too bad you don't have a supermajority in the Council to start Final War yet.
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Dec 6, 2018 23:01
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Thotimx posted:The Borg are more about efficiency, whatever that means in terms of specialization or not. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Hmm, in theory, but aren't they the guys whose every military vessel is "Death Star, but a square"? Single-minded threat mitigation, that's what I'm going with.  This is part 7, going up to (I think) 2404. I really was trying to rally a military response to the Meklar in the fewest available turns (Guava Bombers would let me use local planets to invade, but at the cost of taking more turns to fly reinforcements in, which is a real conundrum) and ultimately decided to just, y'know, wing it. I probably missed the perfect answer but I think I have a good one. Master of Orion - Klackon Assimilation #07As mentioned, only 4 turns because of the immense amount of micro required here: deploying colonists both to invade and to resupply planets that are themselves invading; coordinating rally points on 2 theaters of war (so you can't just Alt-R) and around nebulae; and oh yeah, still some colonizin' going on too.
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Dec 7, 2018 09:43
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Wayne posted:Hmm, in theory, but aren't they the guys whose every military vessel is "Death Star, but a square"? Single-minded threat mitigation, that's what I'm going with. In one of the movies it was "Death Star, but a sphere!" ...wait.
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Dec 7, 2018 16:28
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Match the Master: 2400, Part I We're starting to pull away from the Psilons in technology now. Also, don't get excited about our fleet strength; nearly two-thirds of that is still Colonizers/Recons. That means we're only really competitive with the Humans & Psilons on that score. Remember that fact, it'll be important later.  They're having a harder time catching our spies these last few years, which is a very small but welcome boost. I'm sure the Humans will join the war soon. Decoy Badger posted:Too bad you don't have a supermajority in the Council to start Final War yet. Ehh, all that would actually give me is them attacking more and sharing their tech with each other. I can do without that  .  Along the left you see there are still five unscouted systems. There's a decent chance that I can get those knocked out within the next decade, which would give us a final number on how many total systems are required for victory in this galaxy. Current territories: ** Borg/Klackon - 60 ** Psilons - 6 ** Humans - 5 ** Bulrathi - 3 ** Mrrshan - 2 ** Meklar - 2 None of them gained any ground in the last five years, but that looks like it'll change a bit now with the Psilon & Meklar poised to add more territory.  Despite the relatively lull in new systems lately, we do yet have ten Colonizers out there. Some of them will find useful destinations. And we have the beginnings of a fleet, though that's all it can really be called. Tech advances since have improved our miniaturization so that we can fit 30-some bomb launchers on a ship instead of the Ranger's 26, but I don't plan on a re-design there. It's good enough to handle what we need and I want to spend any slots that come free for the anti-ship role.  The armor will give us miniaturization and improved ground troops. I don't know that it will do much else, since it actually won't be useful IMO to put it on our ships, at least not yet. The reason is math; a destroyer would improve from 18 to 27 HP. Against 15-damage missiles like the Scatter Pack X from the Guardian, it would take two shots to kill on either way. That will still help, but the next terraforming which is getting close to prototype phase will be even more useful - and create a need for even more obscene levels of micro.  The reserve is holding fairly steady at the moment, as our base maintenance costs. Ship maintenance is slowly rising, which I would hope and expect to continue as the Borg mobilize. Collective Data, GY 2400 ** Matrices - 60 of 94(+6) ** Projected Completion Year - 2457 ** Projected Completion Date IRL - April 2 ** Operational Drones - 1.945 billion(+334M) ** Production - 6932 BC(+1503) Territorial growth is only a fraction of what it was - though I still pulled five systems ahead of Wayne. That's a minor factor though in the face of his massively higher production, which is still a decisive edge. Economic growth was nearly 28%, which is as high as it has been - striking that balance between expansion and buildup will continue to be an annual question, the answer to it constantly being tweaked. The gross number of transports is almost identical to last time; 95M on 27 convoys. We're on the doorstep of our second billion total population, seeing 21% growth there. The projected in-game completion year continues to fall, but the actual IRL calendar one does not. That's because I switched to assuming that I'll have to split years into two updates as I have been, which of course doubles the time.  I noticed an interesting situation here with the Psilons. We don't have Mentar and Zhardan scouted, so I don't know what they have - though I can pretty darned well guess on the former. But Rigel has no missile base defenses and the fleet is all pushing left. Nothing is headed in this direction at all that I can see.  The eggheads are still on Retro engines, so anything they send this way will take a while to get here. I think it may be time to attack and grab Rigel, hopefully snagging some technology with it. Their ground troops will be better than ours, though I hope to get Duralloy Armor soon and take one bite out of that. The main question in this endeavor is population; do we have enough of it to make it worth taking down 40M superior troops? I think the answer is yes. Not by much at all, it's probably just barely time, but the sooner the better as it gives us a chance to get better toys with which to improve our situation.  In order to get enough drones to fight this initial battle, we'll need to take them from several matrices, some of which are moderately distant.  These two will start things off, and later I'll add more with the goal of coordinating the timing so they all arrive the same year. We'll pay a price here in lowering our ship-producing ability from these planets, but that's unavoidable.  Meanwhile, the more mundane transports will continue elsewhere.        I want to over-supply here a bit as we are hoping to push further towards the lower-left soon. The other possible source worlds are going to be sending their drones to Rigel, so this seems to be a good place to bolster our numbers from.     There are a LOT of different fleets flitting about here. The amusing part is the biggest concentration there is at Lyae - which is Toxic. They can't land on it anyway, but they sure do want to hang around it. Because reasons.  A tiny Inferno which was never important for extending range, but its time has now come.  A few systems graduated from needing reserve assistance, but some like Matrix 145 here also rejoined, having received a new influx of drones needing 'gainful employment'. Overall we are down one to 7 eligible matrices.   Short and sweet. We're now building up the reserve again, slowly but surely.
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Dec 8, 2018 23:08
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Wayne posted:Hmm, in theory, but aren't they the guys whose every military vessel is "Death Star, but a square"? Ehh, you see those most often for sure, because they are the ones involved in large-scale engagements. However they do also have these things:   Etc.
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Dec 8, 2018 23:13
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Those little spheres are the science ships from Voyager, right? Man but it's been forever since I saw that show anywhere besides SFDebris's "reviews." Where's the other one from? Going off the end of your update, I have to say, I always do that little tick in the Reserve, but it's almost never been as helpful as it is in this Bulrathi game. While I think a lot of focus is going on how I handle offense (I remember some guys (Jade was one I think?) way back in this thread talking about how they don't like the ship designer or have issues deciding what fleet composition to have), defense is big too: reserve spending to rush-build the shield and bases and having a mobile fleet with a lot of missile boats is extremely effective when you're at parity. I've never made a Scatter Pack Cruiser before and by the time this game is over I'll have done two, and they're probably my MVPs (Yao Guais technically do more work countering those Repulsor Beam ships and smashing planets, but any ARS battleship does OK this stage of the game).  MOO1 Impossible Bulrathi Challenge #08Pretty much as soon as the peace treaty with Sedimin expires he re-declares (in MOO2 he probably would've demanded Cryslon back first, I mean, that is if he wasn't Repulsive; other AIs tend to do that). That wouldn't be so bad... except that I expected he wouldn't do that, and already launched the fleet to go after the Psilons, since despite how advanced they are they also have a hole in their missile tech. At this point the only thing that could cause me problems is the diplomatic house of cards falling down and that's a possibility thanks to Klaquan being Erratic.
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Dec 9, 2018 09:50
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Match the Master: 2400, part II     This will be the last missile base for Matrix 107.       Borderline whether I want this size of a planet to be a shipbuilder or not, but I don't need to make that choice until it has grown more.   This should be the end of terraforming here, as we will be able to start pushing that activity past this group of small hostile planets and further down the colonization pipe, as it were.   Here the process is already done, and we're nearly there on factories. These systems are about to get their feet firmly under them - until they nearly double their size when the next terraforming advance arrives.  On the super-tiny systems the agonizingly slow wait continues.    I miscalculated on the industry here last year, and so must yank everything out of research to make up for it.  With the first incoming drone convoy set to arrive soon, it's time to clean everything up and boost the infrastructure to accomodate them. Then we'll be better prepared to mount missile defenses.    It's with a considerably degree of chuckling that I present our latest ship-builder. It will take Matrix 140 7 years to build a destroyer, and another 7 years for the thing to reach the front. But what better option do I have? Terraforming and industry have surpassed drone growth now, so it might as well play it's part, meager though that part is at present.  As the terraforming bug spreads further into the 40s, we'll make rather shorter work of the process at better systems such as Matrix 141.    Some in this range aren't quite there yet, but they are getting close.           2400 Three more systems are colonized, though we'll probably lose the one. Still, this gives us enough range to probably scout the remaining outliers along the left rim, and puts us over the two-thirds mark in terms of total system count; 63 down, 31 to go.
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Dec 9, 2018 20:56
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Wayne posted:it's been forever since I saw that show anywhere besides SFDebris's "reviews." Where's the other one from? Voyager as well, and they both among others were used in the Armada games. As far as the tick in the reserve, I used to do that but I prefer controlling where the funds come from. I.e. rather than siphoning off even small amounts from developing systems, I choose to directly pump whatever I want/need from the industry slider in a maxed-out world so I can select the source.
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Dec 10, 2018 10:05
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I guess that makes sense, since you don't like boondoggle strats (pre-building battleships). I figure that if you want ships (and you do), and if you want money in the bank (I definitely do for one), it makes sense to have your productive planets just put a little in the reserve while also putting progress toward your next fleet. This update wraps up the Bulrathi game, but I'll have the "failure reel" and recap episode to finish it up a few days from now. I haven't recorded it yet, so let me know if you want to see anything (like the promised battle against Klaquan I skipped because it'd be an anticlimax now or a run at the Guardian). I'll also start the MOO2 Bulrathi run in a bit as well, and since it wouldn't make sense to post here, you might want to subscribe if you want to watch that as it goes up.  - MOO1 Impossible Bulrathi Challenge #09It definitely feels good to open the series up with a win (well, after I went like 1 for 6 on trial runs  ). Managing the diplomacy and picking my fights at the right time in the right order were the big keys I think. Having the races like me (fostered by beating up the pariah state Mrrshan and a bribe + trade with everybody) got me out of a couple jams, like breaking up the Silicoid - Mrrshan alliance and badgering Klaquan into letting me keep Spica (with that plus Fierias really being the turning point, I had enough "good planets" to win the tech race since there weren't any runaways). ARS fusion beam battleships are kind of cliche but it was hands-down the best available play, and as mentioned I was honestly and pleasantly surprised by how powerful scatter pack missile cruisers are. The fact they seem to be low-priority targets really helps (you all probably saw I'm really cautious about minimizing losses), which is weird since they have ammo. I guess it's the lower damage : fragility ratio compared to bombers and gunboats.Really, the biggest takeaway is how different any given game of MOO can be just based on RNG. I think if we could round up enough serious players somewhere on the Internet it'd be cool to do a "best of 3" on hard maps like this one just to see how things shake out. Anyway, lots of fun and I definitely look forward to MOO2! And maybe depending on how long the Borg challenge takes I might start the MOO1 Alkari run after that.
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Dec 11, 2018 09:55
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Match the Master: 2401, Part I  More to feed the grinder. This gets us to a little over 60M attacking, with 42M on Rigel. That's not nearly enough yet.  I'd prefer not to pull from an Artifacts system, but I think we have to in order to make this work. Approx. 72M now on the invasion force.   The last system in the lower-right that needs more drones.  We probably aren't far from being able to stop some of these systems at the top of the galaxy from continuing their leftward push of population, but I don't think we've hit critical mass yet.     Step by step, the Borg slowly approach the end of the colonization phase.  The fate of this, along with other systems that the Psilons are heading to, will be determined by their climate. They will get there first - but if they are Inferno or Toxic, we'll be able to claim them. Radiated/None, nobody will, Dead or better and there's no way we can stop the eggheads from acquiring them.   They aren't headed everywhere though; this is one example where we might be able to snag it unless it's useless.  Despite it still being a significant journey remaining, this destination is hot enough that we can be confident nobody else will be interested.    No guarantee of keeping it, but no opposing colony ships are headed here yet so we'll at least get this poor ocean system temporarily.  We're down to six eligible matrices - and first two here were just colonized so it would otherwhise have been half of that. I skipped sending funds out to Matrix 162 because I expect the Meklar to destroy it.   
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Dec 11, 2018 10:42
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Match the Master: 2401, Part II Right now it looks like bomber requirements are going to be quite low until we get to the point of taking on the homeworlds. On the Human front, the two systems we have scouted show no bases on one of them and just a single missile base on the second. With two Ranger cruisers already finished, I think I want to build up our Pegasus numbers in preparation for dealing with their fleets.       Cloning is expensive, particularly with no tech to improve it yet. However, we have enough shipbuilders that I think it's worth it to boost back up population on systems such as this one that already have the factories maxed out; the faster to get back to peak production.   It's hard to know for sure when the right time is with many factors at play, but I'm switching Matrix 120 over from research to building more destroyers to fuel the anti-homosapien offensive.    This is one of those years in which our production has reached a threshold where some planets can take an extra small slice out of ecology and still keep everything clean. This is the second planet that hit that, and there will be more - so some extra tweaking and gratuitious planet screenshots.    I didn't notice that there were incoming transports here last year, so some extra terraforming and factory construction is necessary now to compensate.  I intend a 'contribution' to the Rigel invasion force from here, so for now we'll just chill out and mostly do some research.  Someday, decades from now, Matrix 131 may be worth a pitcher of warm spit. This is not that day. Gotta love that single, solitary research point.    Struggling a bit to keep factories up.  An 'obvious' thing occurred to me here - the other races aren't going to attack a Toxic system, because they don't have the tech for it yet. I didn't go back and change the other affected planets because what's one more year, but I've definitely been putting small amounts in base-building on some matrices for too long. There was a point when I wasn't confident war would come before they got this tech, but that's well past. Inertia makes you miss things sometimes. Ahh well.  The Psilon invasion is starting to emerge from the nebula, three years away - a year longer than we thought it would be at first. They'll be outnumbered when they arrive, but with better tech - I still think we'll need bases to thin their numbers.     Soon to be the latest cog in the machine sending drones out towards the left edge of the galaxy as our scouts take the final journeys that way.     Kind of a bizarre situation here, just waiting for more population really. Next transport trickling in is two years out.      Another fairly remote system waiting from drones that have just been sent.   Another example of me not being aware of an incoming transport and not terraforming ahead of time. I fear I may be getting somewhat sloppy with this many planets to check annually.  Time for another puny ship-producer.  How about another one even? 2401 One new planet colonized, but one lost as well as the expected Meklar obliteration of Matrix 162 occurred. For the first time, Borg drones have been killed and the Empire has lost territory. The Meklar should know better than to offend their superiors. A less perfect race might lash out at them in anger, but we are a cold, calculating machine. The Human and Psilon conflicts will come first. Perfection in the form of benevolent assimilation, aka genocide, will come to the machines on our timetable. Also, Duralloy Armor finally shows up - it was up to a 40% chance of discovery. Industrial Tech 5 is the highly un-exciting lone possibility for further advancement.
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Dec 12, 2018 02:43
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I imagine Duralloy's at least going to help tip the odds wrt the incoming invasion on that one Matrix.
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Dec 12, 2018 02:51
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Definitely. The Psilons still have the edge on a per-soldier basis, but that makes the exchange rate more reasonable. Wayne posted:depending on how long the Borg challenge takes I might start the MOO1 Alkari run after that. Go for it - I think we're going to be here for a while. TBH, while I'm going to finish it and I'm glad I did this game, I wouldn't have if I had truly realized how long it was going to take. I was intending to be moving on to MOO2 by the end of the year. On the reserve - no question it is a necessity to have some there. You can't deal with negative events effectively otherwhise, my only quibble is that I don't want unproductive planets being hampered by the contributions to it. .02
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Dec 12, 2018 11:09
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Match the Master: 2402, Part I A couple more spies than usual were caught last year.  Three years until our convoys reach Rigel, and it's time for more additions. Prior to this, the target hold 42M Psilons, with 77M incoming Borg drones. The recent armor additions being magically equipped on the in-flight troops, they still hold the defender's edge as well as possessing the PDS and Hand Lasers. The combination should give them a 70% chance of winning any individual combat, or a expected kill ratio of 2.33 to 1. That means we'd need 98M to have even odds of winning, even if they don't increase their population at all. This puts us over that threshold at 122M, but I'd like a little more to be safe and ensure we have a decent population after the conquest.   I'll probably end up pulling some from rich Matrix 117 as a final boost.   It's going to get a little more complicated out here figuring where to route all the transports. Part of that is which of the last group of systems we end up being able to colonize, another part is where the Meklars decide to attack and where they decide to leave us alone. For now I'm just trying to push more drones further along.    I don't normally like to send drones out from rich worlds, but in this case it is by far the closest option.    I'm sure the Meklar will just colonize this, the system they destroyed. But the attempt will still be made - it's the principle of the thing. You just never know when they might do something idiotic.  A single Psilon Starfighter[i] in orbit here, and the Meklar have a [i]Nemesis cruiser en-route. For that reason, this is one system that we won't be sending drones to, at least not yet. They'd just get shot down before they arrived, or else blown up from orbit most likely.  It's not often you chart a course over halfway across a Huge galaxy. This is our lone Dead Colonizer in service, headed to the Barren Ultra-Rich on the far left rim.  I'm not sure why I didn't notice this before, but I think Matrix 156 is a better rally point than Matrix 146 - it's right in the center of Human space, able to strike at any of their systems in similar timeframe. So I'm moving our ships there.  This year's list has six matrices on it, including one special case. We start out with the newest addition to the Borg Empire.   This is the special case; I want to boost production as much as possible for the next couple of years here to fend off the Psilon invasion as best we can.
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Dec 12, 2018 21:24
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Match the Master: 2402, Part II    A couple more systems are switching to maxing-out this year, Matrix 107 among them. It won't be long until we are ready to deal with the Human fleet, and we actually have the edge against them right now in ground-combat tech; they literally have no advances whatsoever in the relevant areas. Having enough troops to outnumber them and invade is going to be the thing to wait for it appears.   The location of this system made it a long-time drone donor matrix, but with those needs fulfilled industrialization takes over.  More cloning.  Reversing my decision a year ago. Collective's Prerogative or somesuch. It's looking to me like we're going to have plenty of ships on the human front without contributions here, so I might as well try to boost research to improve future designs.  Another system that I decide can forego base-building.    Once I get a few more bases here, I'm strongly considering making Matrix 129 our first ship-builder for the Meklar front. Meklon and Helos are fairly close by, just above and left of the view here.      Two years to go. A sizable convoy - 9M drones - will arrive next year. For this year I need to terraform to accomodate them and get as many additional factories built as can be managed, then we'll try to get some bases up next year. I expect to win the battle; the question is on how much we'll lose in the process.  A growth spurt caught me by surprise here, changing investment priorities.   Wrapping up terraforming here. If we need it, I can start pushing more drones out soon.    A couple more hostile worlds where factories have caught up to population growth, allowing some more trickles to be fed into research.  Others are not there yet.     The terraforming is to prepare for 8M drones set to arrive.    Hoping to do all the terraforming in one shot here.    The main thing I'm wondering just now is whether I've yet reached Peak Micro. I think we're about there, but I'm not sure.   2402 Three new systems settled, and four of the last five scouted. The Psilons are going to get some nice territory - temporarily. All the more important to target them first, before they can develop them and get any crazy ideas about becoming an actual threat. Particularly since they've finally dragged themselves out of the dark ages with Sublight Engines. And over a century into the game, we are the first to scout another Artifacts system. Which we actually might have a decent chance of getting. Grants us the Warp Dissipator. That might be the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen in MOO. A TL 20 artifact pop (albeit one I couldn't care less about), 103 years in, on the opposite side of a Huge galaxy from where we started. I was almost speechless when that came up.
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Dec 13, 2018 20:38
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That was certainly improbable, but hooray for more tech.
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Dec 14, 2018 08:38
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What tech level are Orion's goodies, in comparison? I wonder how much the map can be manipulated to support a speedrun - presumably there's some sort of seed that can be changed via emulator memory editing. Small galaxy, honorable diplomats and all artifact planets maybe.
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Dec 14, 2018 13:51
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Decoy Badger posted:What tech level are Orion's goodies, in comparison? There's a Civilization 1 TAS that mostly just manipulates the AIs to leave their cities undefended, such that they can be captured by the player's workers and settlers. Sadly not possible in MOO because colony population always fights back, but success in ground combat is determined by random factors.... I think the equivalent would be something like "there's artifact worlds near the player's starting world that give enhanced range/speed, then the player sends out 1 million soldiers to the closest AI homeworld and takes it, then uses that to take the next homeworld, etc." This assumes of course that the RNG can be manipulated enough to allow for such shenanigans.
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Dec 14, 2018 17:30
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Orion's goodies are always near the top of the tree. IIRC Death Ray(always) plus three other high-level ones, at least TL 40-45.
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Dec 15, 2018 02:06
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Match the Master: 2403, Part I Grahbe yourself some popcorn. I'm not sure who will end up in control of this system, but it won't be us. The Meklar are still incoming, and 39M Psilon transports are coming. From a long ways away. Quite possibly to a destroyed colony where they will die of exposure by the time they get here seven years from now. We'll be letting them fight over this for now and investing resources elsewhere, that's for certain. Meanwhile we are two years out from Rigel, and Matrix 137 awaits the incoming Psilons next year. Things are steadily heating up, and while we'll build a couple more with the recent scouting discoveries, the Borg have just three active Colonizers - and 50+ Pegasus destroyers. The primary focus is definitely now on conflict, not expansion.  Nearby ... my jaw hit the floor when I saw this. What in the name of the Guardian are the Meklar doing?!?! Their fleet just left Matrix 162 after destroying it, and is heading back home, because ... ??? Anyway, the fate of Matrix 161 is up in the air, but taking that off the board entirely we have 65 systems and will be able to get up to four more, including the one we'll reach for the first time this year. Somewhere in the upper 60s is where we'll end up, with less than 30 to be acquired through hostile means. A more exact accounting will be firmed up as the next several years unfold, but we're close to nailing it down.  One more smidgeon to add to our attack.  For a long, long time our population transports ended at Matrix 114; now they start here.       After pondering the situation, I think it's going to be time very soon to shut off the spigot for drone transfers almost completely. Enemy fleets, Meklar especially, are becoming a lot more active on the left side. That makes moving drones anywhere they can colonize risky. We're probably a lot better off just focusing on the Inferno/Toxic systems and leaving the others to just grow or die on their own, until we can get a proper military response in place.  Same approach holds for funding transfers, which is why this is the only one for this year. Elsewhere, investment is too risky because of the chance that we'll lose the system and the costs spent on building it up. Only where it looks like we'll have a chance to make a difference in saving the planet, which is probably going to be few and far between, will we keep throwing money in. Relatedly, I would usually want to have a few spare Colonizers out at this point in order to go after planets like Matrix 162 that they have hit and then abandoned. Right now though I think that's also a waste of resources. We don't need the territory, and the unlikelihood of holding a system they've already visited and destroyed is very high. The new ones that they haven't gotten to yet I will still try to secure but that's it. Everything else goes to the effort of taking their established systems. Once that's been handled, cleaning up the mess can be done without resistance.  Right now all the Human ships seem to be flowing to the right towards Pollus. That makes Yarrow a prime target for us, and they only seem to have about 15 combat destroyers right now. A lack of population to feed an invasion force is the only issue preventing an attack at the moment, but it shouldn't be all that much longer.       I think we have enough Rangers for now on the Psilon front as well.  We do need a couple more Colonizers for the systems that nobody else is headed for yet. Matrix 112 will contribute one of them.   Haven't looked in on this system in a while, but the population at Matrix 115 has recovered to the point where we'll need the occasional bit of industry to finish maxing out.  The second Colonizer will come from here.  Drone growth on systems such as this one will determine how long it takes before we are ready to mount an attack on humanity.
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Dec 15, 2018 03:14
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Match the Master: 2403, Part II    Our latest addition to the ship-building ranks; and of course they don't have to go anywhere, a nice added bonus. We now have 10 matrices that are contributing in some manner to the fleet. The great majority still aren't, but the focus continues to turn in the direction of the military.  Make that eleven. For now, Matrix 164 seems to be the best rally point. Any path further towards the top runs into either resistance from the enemy or a path through the nebula at this juncture. Preparations for the third front against the Meklar are officially beginning, though it will be a long time I think - relatively speaking, of course - before we are ready to to strike here. However, once I start getting destroyers up out here in enough numbers I may be able to do some selective opposition to enemy fleets of opportunity that are small enough. Eventually.     Time to start moving some of these long-term drone sources into more industrial focus.     We have enough for two bases here, without much to spare. Those should whittle down the Psilons some; they have 14M coming and most of them probably still get through. With current tech they should still have a predicted 1.5 kill ratio (60-40 advantage) so if we didn't take any of them out with the missile bases we should still survive - barely, with only a couple million drones left. So we should win this. It is not a complete guarantee though.   The gradually terraforming/growth struggle continues on multiple frontiers. Not much to say about most of these systems otherwhise.  Whenever the population inches forward a single million on these tiny worlds, most of the production must be repurposed to compensate.      Should get this system mostly caught up on factories this year.  Oh goody - more terraforming.  The Meklar are coming - with five cruisers. We can't stop that. A decade from now maybe we could, but for the moment we'll just research.  And also ship out as many drones as we can to somewhere where they won't just get destroyed from orbit. At least, not yet anyway.    I've sent a bunch of drones here so that I could move them on further - and now it's become too hazardous to do that, so I'll just keep them around and build this system up faster I guess.   Incoming drones will more than double the population here next year.  On the verge of becoming useful. This one we'll try to defend if we can, should it come under attack. One of the rare locations where I think it's still useful to try and eventually get missile bases up.  Another system with an incoming population boom.     The Meklar think it's worth taking over a decade to come here. We have a few systems under threat, and we will continue to lose the occasional one for a while. That will be a most temporary situation though, and this is worth noting as the point at which the Borg make a hard turn towards being on a war footing. No longer will our attention be substantively divided. The rest of the galaxy should make their peace with whoever they need to make it with, and see to that bucket list of theirs. We are coming, and we will be merciless. 2403 The final scouting report has been filed. Seidon is a Toxic system, and it took 104 years to scout the entire galaxy. A Huge one. With Deuterium Fuel Cells. The final count of systems is 94 out of 108; the other 14 are 9 with no habitable systems and 5 Radiated. Of course there is a 6th Radiated in our case, Matrix 126, but that's due to the industrial accident incurred by faulty technology. So 94 is the number to hit for total Borg Victory. Additionally, the Battle of Matrix 137 went decisively in our favor. The bases did a better job than anticipated, leaving only mop-up duty for the garrison on the ground.
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Dec 15, 2018 22:05
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Match the Master: 2404, Part I  The final addition to our invasion force, which will hit Rigel next year. This will take us to nearly 150M committed. If things go as expected, we will have almost a maximum population there after the battle. This gives us a significant buffer should their defenses prove stouter than anticipated. If we do better, millions of drones could end up dying of exposure - but this is preferable to failure. They are, after all, only drones. The will of the Borg Collective is paramount.   Meanwhile, it's time to find out what some of the other systems have in terms of defenses. A single destroyer will be sent to each, and then we'll know how many bombers are likely to be needed for future conquests.  A more sizable group is sent to Rigel, in case of any counterattacks. These deployments will need to be monitored annually of course.   The Meklar have a single ship incoming here. I want to be as ready as we can to possibly fight them off.  While here the evacuations continue.  The Mrrshan are getting frisky again - I don't know if they'll try to actually fight this time, but I want to be prepared if they do.  Ships are still coming in here to be re-routed.   I'm going to stick with just the one missile base here. Rigel was the only reason I wanted defenses, with the Mrrshan lacking the range to reach this far.   Almost back to full population a few years and hundreds of BC later.   Bit of an expensive initial transition to factories here.   Here we'll just grow naturally while getting that Toxic ship out for Seidon. You may be wondering about Gienah, the artifacts system. The Psilons have sent a Colony Ship there, and while it will take nine years, that's still a few sooner than we can get one to it so chalk up another one for the eggheads. At least four nice systems they'll be adding, but with us working on rolling up their established planets they aren't actually going to be able to do much with them.   Here's that Mrrshan attack I mentioned; 80 fighters, 3 cruisers, and 2 colony ships a couple of years out. A couple more missile bases should, I would think, ensure success as they didn't even want to fight one of them last time. I'd normally be intimidated by such numbers - but normally you aren't, a century into the game, facing off against an enemy who can't come at you with anything better than a Gatling Laser. The only thing they have that can even scratch our bases will be the starting nuclear bombs, and our Class IV Deflectors will limit their sting.  Another place where I need a whole bunch of industry all of a sudden now that I'm not sending out drones anymore.    Another transitioning system, but I also find things like this amusing. Matrix 126 has been working on that same missile base for like two decades. It still isn't done.
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Dec 16, 2018 21:06
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Gotta love that weeks-long invasion (in real time) resolving into an utterly anticlimactic 24-4 beatdown.
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Dec 16, 2018 23:35
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Can't argue with that. I was surprised more transports didn't get by our missiles. There'll be more fighting to come, make no mistake.
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Dec 17, 2018 07:19
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Decoy Badger posted:Gotta love that weeks-long invasion (in real time) It's been a completely different experience. I'll take a day or two between sessions sometimes if a game is really hard or involved (I've had some Civ4 games like that) but never one I've played out this long. This video was recorded a month ago, I'd forgotten most of what happened.  Master of Orion - Klackon Assimilation #08Tons of minor skirmishes, but superior Borg technology carries the day. I accidentally waste some Fighters rushing into a Meklar battleship with like 40 gatling lasers, which is exactly the reason I made cruisers my main workhorses instead of frigates. Again, it's interesting to compare AI RNG with Thot's game: it starts the same year (this one is 2405-2409) but the Psilons have barely started creeping into the southwest and the Bulrathi and Mrrshan never really got going. It's a good thing we're the Klackons and I can keep sending out warships because the AI are being unusually aggressive and actually targeting hostile worlds they can't invade (which as noted recently, is very rare). I had some more PC delays (rearranging my setup a bit and adding a case fan) due to adding a little too much ambient noise, but I'll be starting the MOO2 stuff soon. General holiday busy-ness hasn't helped.
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Dec 17, 2018 09:06
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Match the Master: 2404, Part II     There's still going to be constant adjustments in this group, but at least they are starting to do something useful. Research by committee basically.      Out of the frying pan and into the fire with a lone Nemesis two years away. All I know is that they are sizable ships - no clue what their capabilities are. We're about to find out though. Like the Mrrshan, it's only nuclear bombs that would concern us. Hyper-V Rockets are their only 'advanced' weapons systems but they won't penetrate our shielding, and their Anti-Missile Rockets will also counter the bases some. Only Retro Engines, so we should be able to do significant damage before they get in range to drop any payload - but I'm taking no chances.         *Yawn* ... Are we there yet?  Guess not.  Dead Matrix Researching.     Another system with a long, slow climb to make.    Terraforming last year apparently got a bit carried away.    2404 Rigel falls; we lost 89M troops in the invasion, and about 10M more die of exposure as our glorious ground troops were more effective than anticipated. Nonetheless, it is our first successful endeavor, and we capture the Inertial Stabilizer. Not what I wanted, but I may consider its use in our next combat design, whenever that comes about. We also settled an additional system in the upper-left, far from prying eyes, and the Energy Pulsar is our latest technological achievement. More range is pretty much useless; I really wanted another drive system but that wasn't available. Wayne's World Oh, and in case anyone was wondering, I haven't looked at it in detail but Wayne's still kicking my arse. I'm a bit disturbed that he's researching Robotics V when I'm still stuck on II. I am about 6-8 systems closer to the end goal, but his tech is still better and production has kept a similar gap; his economy is almost double mine still and more mobilized for war. I also got a kick out of him acquiring Planetary V Shields when nobody has them in my game. I'll keep trying to put one of these up every time I reach the end of one of his update vids, to keep anyone from thinking I have a chance of winning my own challenge - unless he goes and gets his main battle fleet wiped against the Guardian or something.
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Dec 17, 2018 18:46
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