External Affairs Function's Office

[Maniac]

I'll respond here to Impaler's unit suggestions in the IAF thread:

Laser Cruiser

IIRC in a previous chat you mentioned the possibility of for example a sea former being in the square just east of Alexandria, thus denying us access to Alexandria. That makes me think of a worst case scenario.
Suppose that there is indeed a sea former in front of Alexandria. Also suppose that PEACE became careful and for example has two garrisons in Alex. Our current plans are to attack with one impact cruiser, an impact marines and an amphib impact rover. In that case we would need the cruiser to disable the sea former. We would need the impact marine to destroy the first garrison. And the rover to attack the second garrison. But what if the rover is heavily damaged in the attack? Then we would have no unit left to take Alex, leaving us vulnerable to attack. Therefore I was wondering if it wouldn't be better to send the laser cruiser due south after all, to assure that almost nothing can go wrong?

If we want 2 Probes in our attack

The one in BB and the one between AP and LL should make it IIRC.

***

As for ship names, what should they be?
Suggestions already made are (IIRC) Alpha Pi, Beta Pi, Love Boat, NodeRunner. Others could be for example "CCS Impaler" - the prefix of course meaning "Cybernetic Consciousness Ship.

[Maniac]

I'll post a screenshot guide to deriving information on other factions, using the PEACE infiltrator information of MY 2141.

First select the faction profile of a random faction in the commlink menu. For this tutorial I will use the Hive:



After clicking on "faction profile" you get our standard information screen. As you can see the CyCon icon is highlighted and in colour in that center bottom box. However as we were then pacted with PEACE, we can select the PEACE icon in our faction profile screens. Click on the icon indicated by the red arrows:



Now you should see the faction profile of the Hive, this time viewed from the perspective of PEACE. We can now see some more information regarding their techs, bases, energy reserves etc, as the Hive is pacted with PEACE.



And thus ends the tutorial. I hope it was of use.

[Googlie]

WARNING !!!

AI assumes Human powers

Similar to the AI offering bribes on behalf of human players in Council elections, the AI will also declare Vendetta on humans' behalf when a Pactmate is attacked.

thus (even though you seal a Pact this turn with the Hive) if and when you attack a PEACE probefoil and/or base the Hive and PUT (PEACE longtime Pactmates) will, via the AI assuming responsibilty, declare Vendetta on you.

All your units in their sphere of influence - and all theirs in yours will be returned to the nearest base. You might want to alert the respective factions that it is not you who has declared vendetta (they will only know of it when they open their turns)

G.

[Drogue]

That is important to know. Therefore we must send a message to the Hive and PUT that this war is not against them, but that this is a game thing.

[Maniac]

Drogue, I hope you don't feel offended by my message in the VoyForum , but I feel this is a team game and that therefore most decisions should be taken together if possible.

[Drogue]

I am not offended, though I do need to clarify some things.

Firstly, I do accept that I went to far in telling them about the war in the first place. However as EAF, it was my job. Admittedly the consitution is not ratified, but that allowed the EAF to talk and work for thr good of the CyCon if he feels it is needed. Without a constitution, the EAF's job would seem to suggest he can discuss with ambassadors from other factions. I understand you feel I went to far, and on that occasion, you could be right, but I did it because I felt we needed nopt to surprise the Hive. And we got infiltration info out of it. And I did release the chatlog afterall.

I was not accused of cheating either, just of releasing too much info. HongHu may have done that. But she hasn't been cheating, as it is not against the game rules. Tass thought she was a CyCon spy at one point.

I do not mean to keep anything from the CyCon. I think we should make decisions together. But when a decision needs to be made, and no-one else is on the forums, the person withnthat job should be able to act, IMHO. That is what I did.

I do accept where I may have gone to far, and I toned it down after that, because I saw there was a few objections. I have never been accused fo cheating though.

As for the "general feeling of cycons", the only you disapproved and 2 thought it was the right action (Corellion and DBTS) IIRC. Telling them the war was bought forward two years was to stop them being surprised when we attack, since if we attacked before they were expecting it, it really doesn't help our credibility. It would have all been fine except Impaler's conversations with Kody soured things too much. We had already lost credibility, but attacking at a different time than they were expecting would have made things worse. We didn't lose anything by telling them that, and we saved a possible alliance.

In short, I have never been accused by anyone of cheating, but of giving too much information, by Impaler and Maniac for telling the hive about the 2 years before, and by Maniac for telling Jamski ages ago about the war. To my knowledge neither Tass nor Googlie has ever investigated me, and no-one has accused me of cheating.

[Maniac]

I didn't mean to imply at all you cheated, if you thought that. Just that you sometimes released information without first mentioning it and asking if it's all right.

Admittedly the consitution is not ratified, but that allowed the EAF to talk and work for thr good of the CyCon if he feels it is needed. Without a constitution, the EAF's job would seem to suggest he can discuss with ambassadors from other factions.

Of course. But IIRC the constitution also states that major decisions have to polled, or at least commonly agreed to. Telling about war plans seems rather major IMO. The EAF of course has emergency authority when there is time pressure or so, but being asked a nasty question in a MSN chat doesn't count as an emergency IMHO. As Impaler and I suggested, you should just answer that you are not authorized to reveal such information without prior consent of the Collective.

As for the "general feeling of cycons", the only you disapproved and 2 thought it was the right action (Corellion and DBTS) IIRC

DBTS wrote this back then:

to be honest...i would have like it if drogue asked us first to give the info to the hive...but hell nothing terrible has happened (yet )

Anyway, with the "general feeling" I was referring to the more recent dealings with HongHu. I haven't asked them about it directly so I could be wrong, but IIRC Impaler said he talked to MWIA and laurentius, and apparently they shared the same worry about sometimes sharing too many information without prior agreement.

[DeathByTheSword]

i am ok with the plan of upgrading our cruiser to plasma steel for 210 Ec...workshop upgrade....it will make our cruiser defendeble...and much more powerfull

[Maniac]

I'll make the EAF orders tomorrow. Nothing unexpected has happened, so the orders will be according to our previous plan to capture MVille.

[Drogue]

I do have a few things to show though:

We need to take out this laser/synth foil. It could destroy the defender in Alex:

Also, remember there are 2 other laser/synth foils out there, and we don't know where. We have to be careful of them, they could take out one of our impact ships, or worse, take a base we've taken.

PEACE production data. Should Sealurk Channel become a higher priority because it will finish foil in 2 turns?


Great time to attack Margarittaville, since it is defended by two formers


This shows the production of Liar's Lair. It is building a cruiser probe. Does it need to be a higher priority now?

[Drogue]

Ok, my upload isn't working. I'll send the files to Maniac via email and hope he can post them.

Edit: Or maybe it is. Who knows? Have sent to Maniac anyway, in case they don't work for people.

[Drogue]

Maniac: You ordered the (95,55) Rover to move to (90,55) which doesn't exist. I presume you meant (90,56)? As suspected, with only 1/3 MP left, it didn't make it anyway, but just checking.

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Drogue
Maniac: You ordered the (95,55) Rover to move to (90,55) which doesn't exist. I presume you meant (90,56)? As suspected, with only 1/3 MP left, it didn't make it anyway, but just checking.

Indeed. Sorry for that. Also sorry about not noticing about the Auroran scout patrol.

Regarding your screenshots, I would indeed prefer to capture SeaLurk Channel and Liar's Lair as soon as possible, respectively in MY 2153 and MY 2154. I'll talk more about it in the CyCon-PEACE war preparations thread.

[Impaler[WrG]]

Heres an idea

Lets move the Amphibius rover onto land and up to(55,67) the Sensor Forest north of Triplex. Their is a road their so it can get their with enough movment points to attack and easily kill the Peace former thats siting on the Energy Bonus. Then it can move onto the Monolith and be healed completly before moving into the transport the same turn.

The downside would be that the unit cant then partisipate in any attacks or Captures on that turn so Lair could be asaulted only with the 2 marines and thus not captured on that turn (unless PEACE dose something foolish). If the Mammoth were to move to Pampalona after picking up units in Triplex this would not be a problem though as it would have to spend a turn in the ocean between bases.

Right now it seems best to load up everything in Triplex and then move directly to Lair and capture it in one massive attack, move the transport into the city and sleep everything. Then on the following turn move to the coastal tile 2 spaces east of Little Accident and unload the troops directly onto the Monolith so as to heal them to full health, the Rover can also attack Accident but unfutunatly it cant be captured just yet.

The following turn we capute Accident and attack Henry Morgans Boot and likly capture it as well.

Meanwial....

In the South the Impaler Transport will likly not be able to capture Casablanca in 53. PEACE will likly move another former into the Base giving it a total of 3 defenders. Our Marines can destroy 2 of these easily in 53 but this will likly just be replenished on the following turns as the Sea Formers and nearby crawlers move into the base.

I propose that in 53 we also unload the Probe Team and Plasma Garrison onto the Monolith (if we attack from the south) or some other convenient space if we attack from the North (only possible if that SeaFormer moves). Thus the Plasma Garrison will be in position to make a Land capture when the base is finaly empty and the Probe Team can conduct any kind of covert activity we desire on the following turn.

Once Casablanca falls we can leave the Garrison behind and move everything north through the gap just to the west of Casablanca head either for Lair or Pampalona depending on how things evolve with the Mammoth and with PEACE's response.

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Impaler[WrG]
The downside would be that the unit cant then partisipate in any attacks or Captures on that turn so Lair could be asaulted only with the 2 marines and thus not captured on that turn (unless PEACE dose something foolish).

I agree. And since they're building a probe cruiser, it's crucial we capture that base asap.

If the Mammoth were to move to Pampalona after picking up units in Triplex this would not be a problem though as it would have to spend a turn in the ocean between bases.

As long as PEACE has barques, schooners, etc... isn't it dangerous to leave any unit in the open, especially a transport full of our best units?

In the South the Impaler Transport will likly not be able to capture Casablanca in 53. PEACE will likly move another former into the Base giving it a total of 3 defenders. Our Marines can destroy 2 of these easily in 53 but this will likly just be replenished on the following turns as the Sea Formers and nearby crawlers move into the base.

The good news is that I tested succesfully that non-amphibious units can capture empty bases moving out of a transport. So we can use the plasma garrison for that. The bad news is that if PEACE indeed moved a third defender in, that plasma garrison won't be much of a help. How about then that we send a cruiser south to destroy that sea former, move CCS Impaler to Athena to pick up its boy scout, move further next to Casablanca and let the boy scout deal with the third defender, most likely a former? The former having -50% defence etc probably will lose against the boy scout, thereby emptying the base.