Musings on the game

[Kataphraktoi]

Dunno. Alot of stuff my smax copy does is not replicatable for some reason, although i can always replicate it(i use a cd rip)

i blame it on user error... (here comes bt!! )

[Snoddasmannen]

Wow, reading through the threads in the Gaian private forum is very interesting. I can't find any threads about our small little raid around 2164, it would be interesting to see what you had to say about that. In fact, all the gossip about Sparta was very interesting to read.

Illuminatus, I am a little disappointed that you saw through my early diplomatical PM assault so easily I can't remember exactly why we did it, but it was actually sanctioned by the Junta. Or at least by Kassi I thought it would add more fun to the game, maybe it did.

[Zeiter]

Although I have yet to look at the Morganite and Data Angel forums and guage the other side of the issue, I think I have enough understanding of the general course of the game to give a list of the most pivotal moments for the Spartan team. In chronological order, those would be:


1.) The PTS raid on the Morganites.

If our 4-elite-impact-rover task force hadn't been detected off the Morganite coast one turn beforehand, we could have easily laid waste to Morgan Mussels and Morgan Industries and ended the turn with our rovers neatly stacked, invulnerable to probing. Then, next turn, we could have easily proceeded to capture and obliterate Impaler Polymers and the HGP, effectively knocking the Morganites out of the game and giving us a huge advantage. I imagine it would have altered the entire course of the game and its strategy and diplomacy between the Gaians and Angels.

Unfortunately (for us), the Morganites (I assume) happened to detect our task force just in the knick of time and were able to rush a stout defense over to the western Morganite coast. Only by upgrading our elite impact rovers to amphibious gatling did we have a very good likelihood of just being able to take out Morgan Industries and the PTS. We did have a chance, if our rovers had performed outstandingly in battle, of ending the turn with the PTS destroyed and 3 of our 4 rovers stacked and ready to go next turn. But we had some battles go less favorably than we were hoping, and in the end we had to self-destruct 3 of our 4 rovers which were left stranded from each other and vulnerable to being mind-controlled. We then lost the cruiser and the other rover, which had ended its turn still onboard the cruiser, due to the rather silly but understandable mistake of self-destructing a nearby rover on land, not realizing that that would take out our cruiser ajacent to it.

On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the most successful and 1 being not accomplishing anything, our PTS raid was about a 6, I figure.


2.) The Angel's masochistic orgy of self-destruction after our infiltration raid, circa 2190.

The Angels obliterating half of their bases was a total over-reaction. Our initial intention was simply to infiltrate and, if the Angel defenses were woefully weak (which they were), land a small force of about 4 units (with copious air-support) and destroy the Angel capital, along with the Cyborg Factory and Virtual World SP's. True, just letting us walzt into there wouldn't have been a good idea either. Instead, the best course of action would have been to self-destruct only that base on the west coast and maybe one more base or two, so as to make progressing into the mainland and gaining a foothold impossible.

As it turned out, though, the Angels obliterated something like 8 bases, removing their faction as a threat to us and allowing us to concentrate on other targets--namely, the Morganites. So, in effect, the Angels' actions did succeed in staving off continued air harassment and a larger invasion. But at what cost? It also, interestingly enough, directly prompted the conquest of the Morganites, in hindsight, and, along with the Morganite failure to prepare any kind of serious defense, was a pivotal point that assured a Spartan triumph over the 3 other factions.

On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being accomplishing the utmost of what we set out to do, and 1 being not accomplishing anything, our raid on the Angels was about a 14 or so, I figure.


3.) Blitzkrieg conquest of the Morganites.

Around 2194, after the Angels were no longer a huge threat to us, we had 3 courses of action available to us that, at first, had roughly equal support each among the team. One option was to finish off the Angels, building up our forces, planting a base on their western shore, and marching in. Having no huge manufacturing centers in southern Arcadia yet, that plan was going to take some time and yield less than stellar acquisitions, especially considering that the Angels had begun a crash-program of militarization.

Another option was to move against the Gaians. They had become the next-strongest faction, and there was a school of thought that we henceforth needed oscillating wars with all the other factions against whoever was the next-strongest at the time, until all factions were subdued. However, the forces for this invasion would have to be built from scratch, or we would have to wait to transfer our southern Arcadian forces over near there. Furthermore, the Gaians had no easily-accessible coastal bases, leaving few viable strategies for invasion.

Throughout our deliberations a constant factor that weighed on my mind was the fact that the Morganites would obtain fusion power by MY 2199 or so. At 2194 we had a monopoly on the technology, and I wanted to make use of this temporary but extremely significant superiority and initiate an attack before the fusion power tech would proliferate in MY 2199.

Thus, we settled on invading the Morganites. We would be able to pull together for Operation Golden Dawn our southern Arcadian forces, a team of units from northern Arcadia that could be produced in 5 years from a crash-militarization scheme, and two teams of units from Laconia that could be, likewise, produced in 5 years from a crash-militarization scheme there. We would attack no later than 2199, hopefully before the Morganites acquired fusion power.

In all, we would attack with something like 25 land units and roughly that same number of air units (about half of which were tacticals and half of which were bombers or choppers). These forward-operating military forces would, in fact, outnumber even the entire Morganite home-guard (Something like 22 land units and 13 air units). In addition, our units would be more high-tech and of better morale (most would, in fact, be elite, thanks to a switch to power before the invasion). Our advantage would be strengthened even more after mind-controlling Choke on This, capturing some Morganite land forces and the bulk of the Morganite air-force. Thus, we had not only local numerical superiority, but in fact numerical superiority throughout the entire theater of war.

At the time the Morganites were economically advancing at a serious pace. When considering mineral and energy credit production together, the Morganites arguably rivalled the Spartans economically at the time. After getting fusion power and preparing a defense, with nearly equal economic and labs production, they would be tough to deal with, especially in conjunction with the Gaians, etc. Yet I also had a sense that if we could achieve a decisive conquest over the Morganites and obtain their economic power for ourselves, we would have the game pretty much sealed up.

Indeed, I think the successful execution of the conquest of the Morganites was THE decisive moment of the game at which victory for the Spartans was assured, given relatively competent gameplay thereafter. After the invasion, even before obtaining the cloning vats, we had a population in excess of 200. We had a global mineral production of nearly 600 per turn and an EC production of 300 per turn. We also had an entire continent ripe with opportunities for unimpeded economic development where there had once been a feared foe. And we only had roughly 1 and a half opponents remaining, if one were to consider the Angels to be roughly half an opponent at the time. Spartan development and increase in lead would only accelerate thereafter, even if both remaining opponents were to unite in perfect harmony to oppose us.


Factors that helped Sparta win:

1. Strategy of early exploration/foreign contact/pod-popping.

2. Early infiltration of the Morganites.

3. Military mobility (MCC + elite rovers + early acquisition of air power). In fact, we never had a really "big" army until about 2195 or so, when we really started cranking up military production for the Morganite invasion. Until then, we had offensive task forces of about 5-10 elite, high-tech units, plus some aircraft, that were charged with the tasks of the University invasion, the Peacekeeper invasion, the PTS raid, the Angel raid, etc. This was only possible because we could re-position our units to the necessary theaters quickly, as needed.

Edit: 4. Making constant use of what offensive military forces we had. We became so eager to do so, that declaring war on someone became almost an obssessive-compulsive disorder. In fact, after the Morgan invasion the plan was to take our (rather undamaged) invasion force south and attack/infiltrate the Gaians. But we couldn't help but attack Yang along the way, drawing us into a war with the Hive. (Although attacking Yang did have a strategic purpose--we needed that sea-lane clear of Yang's bases so that the other factions with infiltration on Yang wouldn't be able to spot our invasion force sailing through those straits.)

5. Exploiting to good effect our two weak AI neighbors, the University and Peacekeepers (and eventually the Hive, although he was a much tougher nut to crack.)


Ways in which the others could have beaten the Spartans:

1. United Front strategy.

2. Preparing better defenses, especially counter-attack capabilities (especially concerning the Morganites).

3. Infiltration (obviously).

4. Offensive ventures against us (until the last 10 turns or so, we never had any significant defenses manning the home front).

5. Planet Buster attacks against key Secret Project cities.


And, finally a list of "Wha?" moments:

1.) The Morganite subversion of the SCC Hunter.

Militarily, it didn't confer any huge advantage to the Morganites, and in the end it just caused us to move against the Morganites even earlier. In reality, it was quite a pivotal event in terms of shaping the course of our strategy throughout the game.

Our reaction to the event was, "What in the world are they thinking? Are they crazy? Do they have any idea who they are dealing with? If only they knew that they are so dead-meat." Because we already had infiltration on the Morganites and could see that they were woefully unprepared defensively. And we had a small but potent force of elite impact rovers at our disposal in Arcadia after having conquered the University. We knew that, if we could approach the Morganite mainland undetected, we could do some serious damage to them and just about knock them out of the game. At the time, we saw their subversion of the Hunter as tantamount to a death wish.

2. ) The Angel's masochistic orgy of self-destruction after our infiltration raid, circa 2190. Explanation already given.

[Zeiter]

A Spartan's idea of a truce is a few quiet minutes to reload their weapons.

[Chaos Theory]

Originally posted by Snoddasmannen
Wow, reading through the threads in the Gaian private forum is very interesting. I can't find any threads about our small little raid around 2164, it would be interesting to see what you had to say about that. In fact, all the gossip about Sparta was very interesting to read.

As I recall, about that time, we had realized you put a land unit on our continent, and were rather annoyed about that. We knew your transport would have to go through the archipelago to bring back your unit, and figured we'd force you to do so openly, forcing you to acknowledge your presence.

At the time, we were trying to lower the land bridge to Yang, but after you destroyed our units in the area, AFAIK, we were never bothered by Yang again, so trying to sink the land bridge was a boondoggle anyway.

However, your actions caused me to consider the Spartans hostile for the rest of the game, regardless of our actual diplomatic status.

[Mead]

Originally posted by Zeiter
Although I have yet to look at the Morganite and Data Angel forums and guage the other side of the issue, I think I have enough understanding of the general course of the game to give a list of the most pivotal moments for the Spartan team. In chronological order, those would be:


1.) The PTS raid on the Morganites.

I was the Morgan turnplayer during that turn. I still remember a lot of the details.

If our 4-elite-impact-rover task force hadn't been detected off the Morganite coast one turn beforehand, we could have easily laid waste to Morgan Mussels and Morgan Industries and ended the turn with our rovers neatly stacked, invulnerable to probing. Then, next turn, we could have easily proceeded to capture and obliterate Impaler Polymers and the HGP, effectively knocking the Morganites out of the game and giving us a huge advantage. I imagine it would have altered the entire course of the game and its strategy and diplomacy between the Gaians and Angels.

Unfortunately (for us), the Morganites (I assume) happened to detect our task force just in the knick of time

Yes, we discovered it, no one told us.

I had a list of items to due that were agreed upon by the team. Following the list in order, I came across the invasion force when I moved our foil out there, AFTER, I had already given orders to a bunch of formers. By not moving the military units first, I feel we lost the game.

Had I moved the foil from west from our base first, I would have been able to pack the roads with more formers.

Although the thought crossed my mind that if I could have reload the turn, I would be able to better prepare our defenses, I did not. I am relieved to say that I did not ask the team, and none of the team suggested that I reload. We played it the way it was.

and were able to rush a stout defense over to the western Morganite coast.

I tried, Endgame (I think) and jtisyoda (I think) concurred on my actions. It's been about a year now so I without checking the forum right now I can't say for sure (they should be open soon to everyone).

I consulted with Ruben and he said protect the SP bases.

I moved two formers up to Morgan Industies as back up defenders, upgraded as many units as I could, relocated probe units for counter infiltration. I also lined the western coast with units to deny a landing site.

If I recall correctly, Sparta had 4 Impact (Non Amphib) rovers on the transport. For the invasion Sparta upgraded them to amphib and Gatlin, through the design workshop.

Did the solar flares that turn give you enough cash to do that or did you have enough cash anyway???

Only by upgrading our elite impact rovers to amphibious gatling did we have a very good likelihood of just being able to take out Morgan Industries and the PTS. We did have a chance, if our rovers had performed outstandingly in battle, of ending the turn with the PTS destroyed and 3 of our 4 rovers stacked and ready to go next turn. But we had some battles go less favorably than we were hoping, and in the end we had to self-destruct 3 of our 4 rovers which were left stranded from each other and vulnerable to being mind-controlled. We then lost the cruiser and the other rover, which had ended its turn still onboard the cruiser, due to the rather silly but understandable mistake of self-destructing a nearby rover on land, not realizing that that would take out our cruiser ajacent to it.

On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the most successful and 1 being not accomplishing anything, our PTS raid was about a 6, I figure.


***

From our point of view on a scale of 1 to 10, it marked the end of the game.


After I played the turn, I was concerned about how it would turn out, particularly, when I saw Sparta was taking a long time to play, and most of them were online, a lot, when their turn was up.

I still feel the sting.
Mead

[fed1943]

I didn't play the game.I just read the Spartan forum(yes all of it)and waiting now authorization to read the other fora.Very,very interesting.I never played DG.I hope to be in the next.
Just tell me one thing,please:the "cap"of 16 minerals to avoid escalating damage,without countermeasures of course,is it gone?
Best regards,

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Mead
Did the solar flares that turn give you enough cash to do that or did you have enough cash anyway???

IIRC the solar flare tripled income the turn after the invasion. So we couldn't use that money. We had to scrape together everything we had and even sold the hab complex at Fort Superiority. Even then we only had enough money to upgrade to gatling rovers instead of missile rovers.

[Mead]

Originally posted by Maniac


IIRC the solar flare tripled income the turn after the invasion. So we couldn't use that money. We had to scrape together everything we had and even sold the hab complex at Fort Superiority. Even then we only had enough money to upgrade to gatling rovers instead of missile rovers.

What really hurt was the upgrading to amphib.

I hoped that by placing units all over the western coast I would deny a landing zone. When the units were upgraded to amphib, it allowed then to attack and land anywhere.

Mead

[Snoddasmannen]

It was not easy for you to know that we could afford that Mead, it was very expensive. I suppose you could have demolished roads and built up even bigger blocks, but that would certainly have been overkill if you were only faced with basic 4-1-1 units. By all rights, we shouldn't even have been able to land units that first year.

And your efforts certainly saved Morgan. If you had done nothing - we would probably have destroyed the HGP and possibly the PEG too. Now you only lost one key base, and one SP, you still had most of your empire left. We were forced to direct a lot of power against you many decades later to finish you off.

You guys played a brilliant builder strategy up to that point I think We attacked you almost out of desperation since we thought you were running away with the game.

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Mead
What really hurt was the upgrading to amphib.

I hoped that by placing units all over the western coast I would deny a landing zone. When the units were upgraded to amphib, it allowed then to attack and land anywhere.

Unit upgrading with the unit workshop at all times during the turn is probably a little overpowered. In the PBEMs I've recently joined, I've suggested to not allow this.

[vyeh]

Eco-damage is not gone

Originally posted by fed1943
Just tell me one thing,please:the "cap"of 16 minerals to avoid escalating damage,without countermeasures of course,is it gone?

No. As the final turnplayer of the DA's, it was very much there.