Various tips

[timotheus4]

Throughout my wanderings of SMAC, I've come across a number of good strategies. I'l share them with you over the next few weeks. A little at a time, when I have time...

I play mainly as the UoP. I'll explain why later.

[Jamski]

Well... I'm looking forward to this one actually.

Can timotheus4 beat the famous no-roads strat?

Find out next week

-Jam

[Urban Legend]

For multiplayer? Why give away your advantage?

[CEO Aaron]

Strategy number one: Use formers to improve terrain. :P

[UnityScoutChopper]

HAHAHAHA!!! COE AAROn, you don't play REAL MP much do you! Real MP sharks never improve terrain, so noobdy wanst to capture ur bases!

U r so fdumb! All of you!!!!

USC

[timotheus4]

I play as Zak because of the tech superiority. You can do so much that others can't. You can build most of the SPs before others even research the tech for them. You can blast them away with plasma shards, versus their plasma garrisons. Tech superiority is the key to the game. More later.

[Urban Legend]

I'm going for a roadless strategy. But of course I'm taking Sven.

One of the mistakes I made early in SMAC is to build roads all over the place, this is not civ, you don't get the trade bonus.

Maybe later on, a roadless land game but use airlifts instead just for kicks.

Too bad I don't play multiplayer, too difficult to coordinate the time for play.

[Minute Mirage]

Originally posted by Urban Legend

One of the mistakes I made early in SMAC is to build roads all over the place, this is not civ, you don't get the trade bonus.

I actually tend to build roads in almost every square when gang-terraforming.

[Flubber]

timotheus4

First off welcome to the forum. New posters and new ideas are always welcome. If you read through some of the old threads you will see a bounty of ideas.

Some of the flippant or sarcastic responses are references to another recent new poster on here that proclaimed their superiority and then proposed tactics that most regular players considered downright stupid before getting banned for a stream of insults at everyone that disagreed with him.

I see you like the university due to their research bonus . .. many people do. I play them a fair bit myself. If I have a monolith or a rolling rainy square I will forgo centauri ecology eatrly in order to beeline to industrial econ (( if not, first centauri ecology and then on to ind auto). I usually play them builder style in hopes to obtain a tech advantage with SE choices being DEmo wealth with turns in both FM and Planned. After pop booming I may often go green to maximize labs while grabbing some IODs and wormhunting.

Thats my basic university strat--Its actually pretty typical of many players on here. Does yours differ?

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Minute Mirage


I actually tend to build roads in almost every square when gang-terraforming.

I agree. it saves terraformer time to have the first terraformer start a couple of turns early and get the road down to save time for the remaining terraformers. I do end up with a lot of squares without roads though (usually forested squares)

My road methodology is pretty simple actually

1. I build roads in each and every DIRECTION in which I plan to expand, not in every tile, but enough to craete a highway so that colony pods don't waste time going 1 tile at a time

2. All mines get a road. Aside from the mineral bonus, in a ground war, it means my troops have quick access across the better defensive terrain

3. Any gang terraformed square is roaded

4. bases on the frontier will usually get a one tile road outward in the direction of possible threats/worms allowing my rovers a full attack on approaching enemies and a retreat into the base on the same move

[Urban Legend]

I just found out that land bases take territory priority over sea bases. Taking the sea folk, I build all my colonies near small islands and to my dismay have 2 of them losing all of their land territory to land bases.

So to keep my territory, outer bases are best built on land. I retire in disgust and have to rethink my tactics.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Urban Legend
I just found out that land bases take territory priority over sea bases. Taking the sea folk, I build all my colonies near small islands and to my dismay have 2 of them losing all of their land territory to land bases.

So to keep my territory, outer bases are best built on land. I retire in disgust and have to rethink my tactics.

Its even worse if you have built a borehole and then see you can't get its benefits because of some land base 6 or 7 tiles away

A painful lesson-- Sven must get some land bases

[Jamski]

Someone else's landbases are nice to get

-Jam

[spartak]

someone got scared away.

[Mead]

Originally posted by Urban Legend
I'm going for a roadless strategy. But of course I'm taking Sven.

One of the mistakes I made early in SMAC is to build roads all over the place, this is not civ, you don't get the trade bonus.

Maybe later on, a roadless land game but use airlifts instead just for kicks.

***

I questioned the value of roads a few months back and received a considerable amount of advice that suggested that my approach was folly. Some was unkind, but the majority was constructive and enhanced the dialog.

To test out my theory I played a SMAC game as Zak on Transcend and Huge map.

I, despite several temptations to modify my strategy, ensured I did not build a single road other than those on mines to enhance their mineral production. (I was really tempted to build a few roads, particularly from my SSC to its energy park, but held off to fully test my theory that roads were more trouble than they were worth).

I found a few things.

First, the game took a much, much longer time to finish because (I think) of the lack of roads. It took much longer to expand and develop my empire. As others forecasted, it took longer for my formers and CPs to get to where I wanted them. It also took longer for my crawlers to get to where I needed them. Lost time meant lost 'turn advantage', meant longer game. It would probably meant defeat if I was playing against a human player who used roads.

Second, even though I restrained myself to build only on mines to enhance their production, a rudimentary, patchy, road network emerged. This might not happen as much in my current games because I am using boreholes a lot more now (2-3 per base).

Third, as I expected, the lack of roads greatly enhanced the defendabilty of my empire. The few times one of my AI opponents landed an invasion force on my shores I was able to destroy them with Air Power well before they reached any of my bases. This was because there were no roads for them to use to quickly get close to my bases.

Fourth, once I went on the offensive, I was able to use their own road and mag tube network to explode through their empires, taking their entire empires very quickly (Santiago's in two turns, Yang's in 4-5 turns). Because they had such a well-developed road and mag tube network it enabled my invasions to be completed so swiftly that they had little time to adapt and react.

Please note that, like many others, I like and will use the 'chop and drop' tactics on the offensive. I will also make use of the drop abilities of my units for general transportation. Once I get 'drop' almost all of my non-police units will be 'drop/AAA' units. The police ones will be either 'police/clean' or perhaps well-armored 'police/AAA'.

Short opinion on roads what are they good for, based upon my test.

They are ESSENTIAL for quickly developing your empire even though the lack of them makes defending your empire easier for an assault.

Someone, I cannot remember right now who, made an excellent suggestion. It was to allow a road to be made to your empire but destroy part of it, and make that part a chock hold (a kill zone).

My current thoughts is that you should make roads but be ready and willing to cut/destroy them if you face an invading opponent that you need time to deal with.

I should comment that my opinions of what I should do can, and will, be changed if experience and reality indicates that they need to be modified.



Mead