Game Discussion, Turn 2121 - 2140

[Zeiter]

"If I can get the former there with its remaining 2/3rd point, maybe the CP will find it easier to move there too" (Notwithstanding the order I put the movements in for the narrative)

Ah, yes, that wasn't a bad idea. Oh well, as it is, we can go with Maniac's suggestion. That way we won't have lost any former turns anyway.

I assume then that if we are cultivating a farm on the eastern crater tile, then we won't be building a base there later. Which I think is just great. 3 crater bases (N, W, S) would be plenty.

And then if we rush the former at Sector Cratersouth, then we'll get that nut tile forested just as quickly as if we had the other former move down there.

I agree with Maniac that popping that pod with Rolling Thunder is a good idea. It won't be able to attack anyways, so might as well pop it with the last movement point.

UK and Ireland, eh? Sounds cool.

[Googlie]

Originally posted by Maniac
I guess I could take over turnplaying again until end September or so

I'm back in Vancouver on 22nd September, so could resume then

(But even as I type this I'm leaning towards taking my laptop with me anyway - I'm in a few PBEMs that I don't really want a substitute playing and it's just a bit long for a hold to be put on the games)

G.

[Googlie]

2128 suggested Orders (for discussion)

• Change to Planned
• Call Lal and try to sell him Planetary Networks
• Rolling Thunder - 1 tile west then 1 southwest to pop that pod (and if we get a completion bonus it'll be the probe team at OA)
• SC3's Colony Pod - 1 south and establish SC4 there in 2129
• Tomcat-1 - follow Crater lakes 1 tile northeast then 1 southeast and commence farming there same turn
• Chiron Knights - follow that small river 1 tile southeast to its source, then 1 south to heal at the monolith
• SCC Invincible (currently 70% healed, in 2128 will be 80% healed) - remain at anchor to get another 10% healing
• Shinsengumi (currently in Santiago Citadel carousing with the local girls) - move up the Eurotas to OA and (only if the Rolling Thunder podpop did not produce a completion pop the pod immediately north of OA - otherwise wait one turn before popping that pod

Some general points:

we'll start next turn with 44 ec's

changing to planned (10 mins per row instead of 11) will cost 40 and have the following effect on production:

Santiago Citadel's recon rover (name? - whose choice is it - Dissident's?) to within 1 mineral of completion - should we rush it with the handful of ec's we'll have left?;

Olympus Academy's probe team (next year) to 4 turns to completion - is it worth a completion podpop on that few minerals (1.1 rows), or should we delay that Rolling Thunder podpop until we have an expensive facility in production? (same with the proposed Shinsengumi podpop?)

Our next colony pod looks like being SC3's in 9 turns (can be rushed after the pop grows in 6 turns). Do we plan to send it south with a probe team in the trannie to found a base in no-mans'-land in 58:32 then proceed to the Great Collective/Social Engineering Den region to infiltrate Yang?

If so, then it should swing round the known-but-unrevealed Hive base to pick up R-112 unless we intend just to let it continue exploring until it runs out of land (which may have happened by then anyway)

Or do we plan to send R-112 - after an upgrade to laser weaponry - north to Yangland to pose a "force-projection" threat there (it is Elite, after all)

If Invincible has its full 4 movement points next turn (I'm not sure what 80% status has) why don't we just send it northeast to get those last few unexplored coastal tiles uncovered, then rest for 1 more. It'll have the same effect as resting one more now then uncovering in 2129.

We need to beef up our navy. We're letting our big advantage (doc flex) go wasted right now, which means that we need coastal bases to take some of the load off Gythium Harbour. After SC4 let's discuss where the next few bases should be (so many competing locations - eastern coast, westen coast, pushing our Hive border south, etc etc)

Another alternative for SC4 is to move the CP 2/3rds to 55:17 (where we were going to move the former to) and next turn found SC4 there (it can utilize the 2-2-1 farmed tile the former just completed northeast of SC3) Tomcat-1 would then need further orders, though - perhaps farm right where it is now?

Thoughts?

[Maniac]

Thoughts?

Looking good in general IMO. I'll use it as the orderlist if I have to play the turn and if no one has objections. Here are some notes I have on certain points:

Originally posted by Googlie
SCC Invincible (currently 70% healed, in 2128 will be 80% healed) - remain at anchor to get another 10% healing

Wasn't 80% health the maximum a unit could get when repairing outside base?

Santiago Citadel's recon rover (name? - whose choice is it - Dissident's?) to within 1 mineral of completion - should we rush it with the handful of ec's we'll have left?;

As it's a prototype we're building, that would be very costly I think.

Olympus Academy's probe team (next year) to 4 turns to completion - is it worth a completion podpop on that few minerals (1.1 rows), or should we delay that Rolling Thunder podpop until we have an expensive facility in production? (same with the proposed Shinsengumi podpop?)

Either's fine with me. But if we want to pop them, we could always temporarily switch to a pressure dome, NN, rover formers or so, and if no materials pod switch back to probe team. If the switch back is done in the same turn, we don't lose any minerals IIRC.

Our next colony pod looks like being SC3's in 9 turns (can be rushed after the pop grows in 6 turns).

Just for the record, if we switch to Planned, that base will grow even sooner.
(Btw, I'd like to have a look with the simulator what the growth speed effects of going Planned would be. Could I please have a copy of your IIRC partially updated simulator you worked on? It would probably take less work to bring it up to MY 2128 date than my latest simulator which I didn't open anymore since 2122 or so. )

Another alternative for SC4 is to move the CP 2/3rds to 55:17 (where we were going to move the former to) and next turn found SC4 there (it can utilize the 2-2-1 farmed tile the former just completed northeast of SC3) Tomcat-1 would then need further orders, though - perhaps farm right where it is now?

Personally I'd prefer to stick to the southern option. I'll refer back to the original discussion thread for why.

The southern option would produce 5-4-2 nuts/mins/energy after a nutrient forest is completed. The eastern option would produce 4-4-3. Meaning comparing to the northern option one more energy, but one less nutrient and thus slower growth.

However if we build on the eastern option SC2 can no longer work that 1-2-1 (and possibly soon 2-2-1) tile, and would have to work a 2-1-0 tile instead. If you add this second SC2 worker to the two crater options, you get a production of 6(soon 7)-6-3 for the southern option, while only 6-5-3 for the eastern option. Taking that SC2 worker into account, the southern option is more productive on nutrients and minerals while equally productive on energy.

[Zeiter]

Either's fine with me. But if we want to pop them, we could always temporarily switch to a pressure dome, NN, rover formers or so, and if no materials pod switch back to probe team. If the switch back is done in the same turn, we don't lose any minerals IIRC.

Actually, I don't believe that's the case. I always thought that retooling was always taken into account, even if production was switched back the same turn. That's because retooling is immediately calculated per each occurence, instead of per each turn that the production is changed. So, watch out about switching production.

I'm fine either way with popping that pod in light of the fact that the probe team is relatively close to finishing anyway.

Wasn't 80% health the maximum a unit could get when repairing outside base?

Yes. SCC Invincible only needs to repair for one turn.

I would also like to stick to the southern crater option. And are we still going to found a Sector craternorth base too?

If I remember rightly, planting a base at the Rio Grande Delta was also a coastal base option. So these are our coastal base options:
*Southern base near Yangland and the Fungal Pass
*Rio Grande Delta base
*Eastern base - south
*Eastern base - north
*Something else...

We need to beef up our navy. We're letting our big advantage (doc flex) go wasted right now, which means that we need coastal bases to take some of the load off Gythium Harbour. After SC4 let's discuss where the next few bases should be (so many competing locations - eastern coast, westen coast, pushing our Hive border south, etc etc)

That's true, we haven't beefed up our navy yet (although we are utilizing our advantage somewhat in that our SCC Invincible allowed us to contact Yang, and our soon-to-be-built transport foil will ferry probe teams and CPs.) Although I think we must analyze how beefing up our navy would help us at this time first before we decide to schedule any further shipbuilding. Being in favor of a bigger navy just because we are the only ones who have the tech can sort of be like favoring building hordes of 2-1-2 artillery just because we have the tech. We need to consider what a bigger navy is going to do for us, and then we need to see if there might be something else that might be more worthwhile to build at the moment. My opinion would be that more CPs, probes, and maybe 1 more naval ship should be our build priorities. If we could get 1 ship exploring to our east (our current SCC Invincible) and a new ship exploring west, then I think our navy would be perfectly adequate for the time being. And, most likely, GH can build that next foil for us. So I don't know if getting another coastal base built immediately is absolutely necessary.

However, the coastal base to the south near the Fungal Pass has several advantages in addition to the ability to help build our navy. It pushes Yang's border back, it will be very productive, it oversees a choke-point (the Fungal Pas), and it's coastal. Therefore, I would advocate our CP placement in the west to go in this order:
1. Sector Cratersouth base (on its way)
2. Fungal Pass base
3. Sector Craternorth base
4. Rio Grande Delta base

Our base placement in the east should go:
1. Eastern coast base - south
2. Eastern coast base - north
3. Several bases in the Messenian Plains.

If so, then it should swing round the known-but-unrevealed Hive base to pick up R-112 unless we intend just to let it continue exploring until it runs out of land (which may have happened by then anyway)

Hopefully R-112 won't run out of land, and will instead meet another faction down south. Then, we could bring it back up north, and maybe pester Yang into demanding a withdrawl so that we can instantly retrieve it and bring it back to one of our bases without having to make a lengthy naval voyage to pick it up.

I think switching to planned will really help us to get our future bases planted more quickly.

/me gives his to the plans after listening to the strategic planning session on his audiofeed transmission from Sparta Command.

[Googlie]

ooh - 2128 turn's up - that was fast (I'll play this one more turn before leaving)

[Googlie]

2128 movement

• Called Lal, and sold Plan Nets to him for 25 ec's
• changed SE to Planned
• Tomcat-1 up lakes and commenced farming at 55:17
• SC3's Colony Pod to its designated site (53:19) - will found base next turn
• Shinsengumi thru OA and popped pod to the north - a minerals special on a rocky tile!!
• Rolling Thunder west and southwest to pop that pod - got an Alien Artifact!!
• As Invincible had its 4 movement points restored (at 80% healed), finished mapping our southern coastline - she's now ready for re-assignment
• Tried for a quick mindworm kill by moving R-112 into the southwestern fungus instead of back west into the forest - couldn't enter (and didn't scare up a mindworm either)

Some other points of interest:

Our recon rover (after changing to Planned) will complete next turn. (name?)

Sparta Command's former is just 2 turns from completion - do we want to rush? (it also will grow to 2 pops in 2 turns, so do we want to leave the new rover there as garrison?)

SC3 will grow to 2 pops again in 4 turns (and the CP will be 3 away - we should save some ec's to rush that when ready)

[Maniac]

Perfect timing: Just got home from work.

Originally posted by Googlie [*]Shinsengumi thru OA and popped pod to the north - a minerals special on a rocky tile!![*]Rolling Thunder west and southwest to pop that pod - got an Alien Artifact!!

Do I smell an opportunity for a secret project?
Edit: On second thought, since we know Zak has Gene Splicing which we can steal from him, the Weather Paradigm (the most useful SP at the moment IMO) has much lost in value IMHO.

Re your points of interest; I'll have a look at the turn soon.

[Googlie]

Originally posted by Maniac
Do I smell an opportunity for a secret project?

Certainly OA has a lot going for it as a base for SP's:

• it's inland
• it's got 2 monoliths in its base radius (one currently being worked by SC1)
• It has that min special just 1 tile north
• there are 5 other rocky tiles within its radius (albeit some shared with SC1)

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Googlie
Sparta Command's former is just 2 turns from completion - do we want to rush?

Sounds good to me. (I assume we'll still have enough credits left to hurry a SC4 former next year). The cost should be 5 credits.

(it also will grow to 2 pops in 2 turns, so do we want to leave the new rover there as garrison?)

Sounds good too to me.

SC3 will grow to 2 pops again in 4 turns (and the CP will be 3 away - we should save some ec's to rush that when ready)

We could also send Shinsengumi back to SC3 for garrison duty. Having a look at the fastest route back, there's only 2/3 chance it could make it back in time before SC3 grows though.

Btw, a little micromanaging observation: I noticed that due to going Planned, one energy is lost due to inefficiency in Gythium Harbour. Therefore I'd like to propose to switch the 1-1-1 worker to a 2-1-0 square. We gain an extra nutrient, but don't lose energy anymore.

[Googlie]

Can do. In addition, how about resetting the sliders to 50/10/40 (no loss to inefficiency and 6 ec's per turn and next tech in 10) - we'd still have enough ec's to rush SC4's former next turn

versus the current:

60/10/30 (-24% labs and - 12% econ) giving us 8 per and next tech in 12

[Zeiter]

I still consider the WP to be quite attractive. Condensors and boreholes way before everyone else would be very helpful. And the +50% terraform rate isn't too shabby either. Ideally, it would be great to be able to deny the Morganites the HGP, but if that isn't possible, then the WP would make a fine alternative.

We need to mine and road that rocky min tile ASAP!

Things are going great.

[Dis]

I'd love to have Weather Paradigm. That might actually help us since we won't be getting ind. automation before the other human factions. but being able to build it is another matter.

[Googlie]

Well, no-one commented on my suggestion re: the sliders, but to me it made so much sense that I went ahead - I trust that it meets with retro-active approval!!

[Kassiopeia]

You have mine, certainly.