2147: Pre-planning discussion and build/movement orders

[Googlie]

Unit Movement

• Pegasus: E x 1 then NE x 1 , drops off Rolling Thunder II and loads the 2 longstriders (will end turn then as it is in the fungus)
• Hunter: E x 1, then evaluate whether it can get to open water or needs to retrace north to exit
• R-112 - will try to move East, if the blocking Gaian mindworm is gone
• Invincible: E x 1 then S or SW to follow the coastline
• Hermes: NW x 1 then W x 1 and SW x 1 (don't ant to end its mps at the north pole as the gamecrash bug might trigger next turn)
• Shinsengumi pops the pod to its NW
• Warwag (or the infantry scout in RG) kills any mindworms that emerge
• Chiron Knights commences the trek from Minas Tirith to Vladivostok (reaches in 2149, with its Elite 3 mps)
• Sparta Command's former moves uproad to NE of OA to help rush the mine there for Vladivostok's crawler to work until needed for SP building
• Fort Buster's former to 75:19 to forest the rolling/moist tile there for GH to work (growing too quickly at GH, needs less nuts and more minerals)

Build Orders

• Sparta Command: a crawler
• Vladivostok: a transport (to be changed to a crusier transport in 2148)
• Minas Tirith: Spartan Kel (for both garrsion duty and some firepower if Yang gets too close)
• Fort Buster: a crawler

Worker allocation

• Fort Buster: relocate temprary 2-0-1 worker to the mineral special 1-3-0 tile

Other Considerations

• Sparta Command: we need another garrison unit there to replace Spartan Kell when he moves north to join the invasion fleet. Perhaps RG's new hoplite can go there and RG build another for internal garrison duty?
• Minas Tirith needs a Crypteia (perhaps move GH's there after its current one completes in 5 turns?
• Minas Tirith need connecting by road (perhaps that's a more worthwhile task for Sparta Command's new former than joining up with the 2 NE of OA - it actually won't make much difference 'cos when it's finished its move there they'll have 2 to go, and the turn it can start helping will be 1 to go anyway [altho' it might spur completion that same turn])

Any comments? Anything I've missed?

[Maniac]

Sounds great!

Shinsengumi pops the pod to its NW
Warwag (or the infantry scout in RG) kills any mindworms that emerge

I've been thinking about those two units as well, and I'm wondering, how would you feel about switching their roles? I don't know how realistic it is this could happen, but I've had a look at the worst case scenario: the pods encircles the unit completely with worms.
Popping with Shinsengumi could result in 6 worms. Warwag could probably kill two of them (and then have too little HP left for a third attack), and the RG garrison one. But that still leaves three, and it's possible Shinsengumi might not be able to retreat.
Popping with Warwag could result in five worms - one less as a square is occupied by Shinsengumi. Shinsengumi and the RG garrison could kill the worms on (53.9), (54.10), (52.12). That leaves (51.9), (52.8). But those would both be on the NE side of Warwag, so the unit could safely retreat SWwards when attacking in the native life's turn.

Besides that there's also the consideration that those units are scheduled to move to Vladivostok in the near future. Warwag moving to the pod would be moving somewhat in the right direction, while Shinsengumi moving a tile NW would be a tile in the opposite direction.

A third consideration that just struck me: Shinsengumi could possibly get a morale upgrade when it has to fight a worm. Though of course if we soon switch to Fundy, that's not that big a matter.


Edit: What tiles would you let the road highway between Sparta Command and Minas Tirith run on?

[Maniac]

Worker allocation suggestion:
Move the SC4 1-2-1 forest worker to the 2-2-0 crater farm tile.
As a consequence the base will produce one more surplus nutrient, and have 16 nuts in the nutrient tanks MY 2148. Which is in this situation the required amount to grow immediately back to size 2 after completing a colony pod.
We could then hurry the SC4 CP for 18 credits MY 2148, and have it operational MY 2149. It could then move eastwards and be picked up MY 2154 by SNC Hermes, which is the exact year that transport will arrive there, if it has no delays.

[Googlie]

Turn opened, and some early moves made:

• Hunter moved E x 3 and is staring down a Hive Synthsentinal on the shore
• Pegasus dropped off Rolling Thunder II - which moved to the suburbs of Sector Craterwest - and the 2 longstriders boarded
• Hermes moved W x 3 and now has another opportunity to podpop next turn
• Vlad's crawler moved to the mine being constrycted NE of OA - only 1 mineral getting crawled, but that was all it was going to get anywhere else (unless we wanted 1 nut - too late now anyway)
• Shinsengumi popped a min special in RG's radius
• R-112 managed to move 1 tile East, so the Gaian mindworm has moved

Build Orders

• Vlad changed from stockpile to a synth trance Speeder supply ready for Hermes podpop next turn (although we'll have Doc Init next turn, so maybe we want to put a cruiser trannie there for instabuild?)
• A synth trance speeder supply at Minas Tirith for Invincible podpopping - see below
• Supply crawler at Fort Buster (whose worker now reallocated to the forested min special tile)
• Another former at Sparta Command

Worker Allocations

• Fort Buster: as mentioned above
• SC4: as Maniac suggested - from the 1-2-1 forest tile to the 2-2-0 rolling crater farm tile

Questions:

1) Invincible can pop that pod and have enough to move 1 tile away from the coast if an IoD. And if the latter, it'll disgorge any mindworms on the Gaian shore and wait there that turn, so I recommend popping the pod

EDIT: I scenario tested it - we lose the ship every time, so scrap that idea. I'll move it down the coastline as originally planned

2) Warwag's orders? I suggest West and North to see the extent of the earthquake addition to our landmass (it has 3 movement points, being Elite)

3) Sparta Command grows to size 3 in 4 turns. Should we

• stall its growth by changing the worker from a 2-1-0 tile to a 0-1-1 tile

or

• start - and eventually rush - a rec commons there (as there's no loss to inefficiency at an HQ, I always try to grow it as large as possible)

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Googlie [*]Shinsengumi popped a min special in RG's radius

May I suggest mining that to move up to the top of our terraforming priority list?

Vlad changed from stockpile to a synth trance Speeder supply ready for Hermes podpop next turn (although we'll have Doc Init next turn, so maybe we want to put a cruiser trannie there for instabuild?)

If we stick to plan we can use that OA crawler for hurrying the cruiser transport. So personally I'd definitely prefer a 0-2t-2 crawler: half the minerals needed for the MCC!

2) Warwag's orders? I suggest West and North to see the extent of the earthquake addition to our landmass (it has 3 movement points, being Elite)

When do you want to to start invasion of Zakharov? As Shinsengumi has moved away from Vladivostok, the earliest possible date has been delayed to MY 2152. First letting Warwag explore would delay it even more. As Zak can no longer build the Virtual World and will probably complete the Merchant exchange MY 2149, every year we wait is a year lost of controlling those rich Uni resources, without any promise of gaining a great SP by waiting a little.
Could Rolling Thunder II not explore those surroundings?

3) Sparta Command grows to size 3 in 4 turns. Should we

• stall its growth by changing the worker from a 2-1-0 tile to a 0-1-1 tile

or

• start - and eventually rush - a rec commons there (as there's no loss to inefficiency at an HQ, I always try to grow it as large as possible)

Currently Sparta Command has no b-drones, so it can safely grow to size 3 provided there's a second garrison soon. So how about simply building a hoplite there? We'll need some more of those to escort the soon-to-be-built colony pods and to compensate for extra b-drones.

[Googlie]

Originally posted by Maniac
May I suggest mining that to move up to the top of our terraforming priority list?

will do

If we stick to plan we can use that OA crawler for hurrying the cruiser transport. So personally I'd definitely prefer a 0-2t-2 crawler: half the minerals needed for the MCC!

done

When do you want to to start invasion of Zakharov? As Shinsengumi has moved away from Vladivostok, the earliest possible date has been delayed to MY 2152. First letting Warwag explore would delay it even more. As Zak can no longer build the Virtual World and will probably complete the Merchant exchange MY 2149, every year we wait is a year lost of controlling those rich Uni resources, without any promise of gaining a great SP by waiting a little.
Could Rolling Thunder II not explore those surroundings?

Yeah - mea culpa. I keep having this nagging doubt that we've not done enough to safeguard our continent from incursions before we set off on invasion of another

Currently Sparta Command has no b-drones, so it can safely grow to size 3 provided there's a second garrison soon. So how about simply building a hoplite there? We'll need some more of those to escort the soon-to-be-built colony pods and to compensate for extra b-drones.

will do

[Googlie]

Unit Moves

• Hunter moved E x 3 and is staring down a Hive Synthsentinal on the shore
• Invincible avoided the Unity pod and continued south along the Gaian shoreline
• Pegasus dropped off Rolling Thunder II - which moved to the suburbs of Sector Craterwest - and the 2 longstriders boarded
• Hermes moved W x 3 and now has another opportunity to podpop next turn
• Vlad's crawler moved to the mine being constructed NE of OA - crawling 1 mineral
• Shinsengumi popped a min special in RG's radius
• Warwag moved uo the Rio Grande to the fork northwest of Olympus Academy
• Chiron Knights left Minas Tirith en-route for Vladivostol
• Tomcat moved into Rio Grande en-route to mining that mineral tile
• Sparta Command's new tomcat moved to rocky tile NW of OA to start mine there
• R-112 managed to move 1 tile East, so the Gaian mindworm has moved
• Rio Grande's longstrider set off for Minas Tirith

Build Orders

• Vlad changed from stockpile to a synth trance Speeder supply ready for Hermes podpop next turn (although we'll have Doc Init next turn, so maybe we want to put a cruiser trannie there for instabuild?)
• Second hoplite started at Minas Tirith
• Supply crawler at Fort Buster (whose worker now reallocated to the forested min special tile)
• Hoplite commenced at Sparta Command

Worker Allocations

• Fort Buster: as mentioned above
• SC4: as Maniac suggested - from the 1-2-1 forest tile to the 2-2-0 rolling crater farm tile

*************************************************

Pretty much ready to go. Maps and endturn.sav below:

2147 Situation maps:

MY 2147 - the North


MY 2147 - the South

MY 2147 - Hermes off Uniland


MY 2147 - Voyage of the Hunter


MY 2147 - Voyage of the Invincible


MY 2147 - R-112 breaks free

[Googlie]

Originally posted by Maniac
What tiles would you let the road highway between Sparta Command and Minas Tirith run on?

Tomcat 3 has completed its forest, so I'd move it to that tile SE of Tomcat 2, and when TC2 has finished the farm next turn, join it, then they can gang-build to Minas Tirith (after which they can build a road across the peninsula to work the new base to be established there

[Googlie]

One final tweak before sending on the turn.

I've been thinking about Minas Tirith's vulnerability to probes before Harbour's Crypteia can get there, so now that RG is landlocked I'm moving its longstrider to Minas Tirith (road network plus 2 tiles per turn will get it there six turns before the GH Crypteia could get there)

And when GH's Crypteia is completed, we'll send it to Fort Buster, where it can be deployed to any of the 3 ring bases if we get wind of a landprobe arriving on our shores

(which begs a different question - what priority are we placing on getting a decent sensor network up and running?)

[Googlie]

Changes alluded to above now made, and the turn has gone.

Final.sav can be found a couple of posts earlier (the one with the pics in it) - I've updated that original turn.

There was nothing contentious in the build orders, units ciouldn't be recalled, and there was nothing needed to be done with diplomacy, to turn moved speedily along

G,

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Googlie
Tomcat 3 has completed its forest, so I'd move it to that tile SE of Tomcat 2, and when TC2 has finished the farm next turn, join it, then they can gang-build to Minas Tirith (after which they can build a road across the peninsula to work the new base to be established there

I've tried to simulate a road being built to MT by both formers, but as two squares between SC1 & MT are flat (and thus require only one former to build a road in one turn), the formers seem to spend more time moving than actually building roads.
Will have to testplay a bit more I guess.