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I haven't played SMAC in years, and I guess all the faction leaders decided to take their revenge for being stuck in a mouldering old shoe box all these years ...
Setup was SMAC-X with original factions, transcend difficulty, abundant life, blind research, look first, spoils of war, and intense competition.
I, as CEO Morgan, started next to a river which I greedily built my first base upon. My 2nd base had a mineral special, critical to building WP, my first SP.
Turn 5 -- that's right -- turn 5 -- there's Miriam. Jeez. Lots of 1-1-1 and 1-2-1 Infantry, and heavy losses find Miriam in an escape pod to Garland Crater on the far side of the map. No quick surrender, just "Die Heathen!" right to the bitter end. Everything hinged on a Monolith, rocky area, and 2 roads. She couldn't dislodge my 1-2-1's from the rock adjacent to her capital, whilst they could repair at the nearby monolith using the road she had built.
Morgan's starting armor tech may not seem like much, but 2 points of armor is DOUBLE everyone else's. Even the Believers can't cut through it with just a Scout. Combine that ability to survive with a nearby monolith and you've got a prickly problem.
Deidre is right behind her, has been expanding like crazy, and hates my guts. I stole Green from her and after some lucky trolling eventually hit her with worms to bolster my pathetic laser infantry hordes. Once again, after heavy losses I got her. That was unfortunate, because AI-Deidre is a natural ally of player-Morgan for all but the early game, but it had to be done. As consolation Gaia's Landing brought me Empath Guild and HGP.
Never underestimate the power of "Green". Mindworms are to early SMAC like horses to early humans, a source of speed, wealth, security, and exploration.
I had a huge continent all to myself, but had fallen way behind in tech. Base 2's mineral special and the bloody sacrifice of artifacts I'd have rather linked brought me WP and VW (barely), but Yang built CN and to my horror Zak got HSA. Lal got the Library, so that wouldn't bail me out, either. I was afraid I'd lose out on important SP's (those I hadn't lost already) if I stayed behind technologically, but luckily IA came early, and hordes of supply crawlers represent a kind of "just-in-time SP" which proved extremely valuable for sniping them the turn after a probe stole the prerequisite tech.
Sea probes are bad against AI before air cover because AI always knows where you are, but at the cost of grievous losses I finally achieved tech parity, plus a couple techs of my own. Then somebody discovered Spaceflight and shared it with everyone else but me, and prototype nukes start appearing all over the globe.
I've never had a game go so long with mineral & energy restrictions; I would eventually build a huge energy infrastructure, a line of fusion supply ships bringing back 2 energy to the Supercollider, and the higher the techs went, the more expensive they became, so that I was going bankrupt in a way; at 2 energy per tile there's no way to keep up with the progressive cost of techs, which stubbornly held at 8 turns per tech until the restrictions were finally cast off. (IIRC EE finally arrived via artifact.)
I was at war with all but Lal, of course, and had three TF's, one against the technologically pathetic Spartans to the East, one against the scattered, distant forces of Miriam to the West, and one against Yang to the Northeast.
The Spartan and Believer campaigns were long, slow, barely-fought affairs, for Yang was the main threat. Still I made steady progress and gave many conquered bases to Lal for the trade credits.
Beware Yang with missile tech. He had a bunch of sea bases, as sometimes the AI spews under some mysterious set of circumstances, but this time around I didn't mind so much, as they were the reason I gained tech parity at all. Now, though, I had to take every last one of them through a rain of conventional missiles. All the worms on trolling duty went in as reinforcements and still I was short on units. Finally I gained a beachhead, a big coastal city plus a small outpost on Mount Planet, and I knew it was all over for the sadistic Chairman.
Or maybe not ... I was so used to always having the HSA I was totally unprepared for probes. First Yang steals my tech, then he steals the base, which means another tech. Yang grabbed up the Plasma Shard, giving his fighter aircraft parity with mine, but worse he also got 8-res armor ... horrified, I watched as half his bases switched to building 8r AAA defenders.
Around this time global hell breaks loose. Miriam decides to kick off a nuclear war, starting with Zak. Yang nukes Lal, Lal nukes Miriam, and Miriam nukes everybody: Zak, Yang, Lal, and eventually me. All SP's owned by Lal, Zak, or Miriam are incinerated. Sister Armageddon didn't have any bases close enough to Yang or me to get ours. She would go on to use enough nerve gas on Zak to rack up 130 years of sanctions.
I was building conventional missiles, the first time in history I'd ever done that, scared to death of another faction, the first time in history post-Air Power that's ever happened, and thankful for the nuke Miriam dropped on Yang, another first.
It isn't often an AI opponent makes you respect it, but the AI's Yang fought with infuriating alacrity, building large numbers of fighters to thwart the textbook air cover tactics, lots of probes to throw at bases I captured, and there were roads everywhere, making ZoC tricks nigh impossible.
I finally beat the old bird, of course, but not before building a proper army to do it with, not some "two worms and a fusion chopper" half-measure. This was the best post-Air Power fight I've ever encountered.
It was also interesting from the standpoint of tech. I kept my tech priority locked on "Explore" after D:AP -- maybe that did it -- but somehow I beelined to Secrets of the Manifold, building Manifold Harmonics about as early as is possible to build it, way before supertensile solids, IIRC even before robotic assembly plants. MH, the Vats, and Teletubby Matrix made the power graph look as vertical as I've ever seen it -- flat during the energy restriction years, then suddenly straight up. Another first.
On balance I can see why I liked this game back in '98 ... all these years later it's still surprising me.
Setup was SMAC-X with original factions, transcend difficulty, abundant life, blind research, look first, spoils of war, and intense competition.
I, as CEO Morgan, started next to a river which I greedily built my first base upon. My 2nd base had a mineral special, critical to building WP, my first SP.
Turn 5 -- that's right -- turn 5 -- there's Miriam. Jeez. Lots of 1-1-1 and 1-2-1 Infantry, and heavy losses find Miriam in an escape pod to Garland Crater on the far side of the map. No quick surrender, just "Die Heathen!" right to the bitter end. Everything hinged on a Monolith, rocky area, and 2 roads. She couldn't dislodge my 1-2-1's from the rock adjacent to her capital, whilst they could repair at the nearby monolith using the road she had built.
Morgan's starting armor tech may not seem like much, but 2 points of armor is DOUBLE everyone else's. Even the Believers can't cut through it with just a Scout. Combine that ability to survive with a nearby monolith and you've got a prickly problem.
Deidre is right behind her, has been expanding like crazy, and hates my guts. I stole Green from her and after some lucky trolling eventually hit her with worms to bolster my pathetic laser infantry hordes. Once again, after heavy losses I got her. That was unfortunate, because AI-Deidre is a natural ally of player-Morgan for all but the early game, but it had to be done. As consolation Gaia's Landing brought me Empath Guild and HGP.
Never underestimate the power of "Green". Mindworms are to early SMAC like horses to early humans, a source of speed, wealth, security, and exploration.
I had a huge continent all to myself, but had fallen way behind in tech. Base 2's mineral special and the bloody sacrifice of artifacts I'd have rather linked brought me WP and VW (barely), but Yang built CN and to my horror Zak got HSA. Lal got the Library, so that wouldn't bail me out, either. I was afraid I'd lose out on important SP's (those I hadn't lost already) if I stayed behind technologically, but luckily IA came early, and hordes of supply crawlers represent a kind of "just-in-time SP" which proved extremely valuable for sniping them the turn after a probe stole the prerequisite tech.
Sea probes are bad against AI before air cover because AI always knows where you are, but at the cost of grievous losses I finally achieved tech parity, plus a couple techs of my own. Then somebody discovered Spaceflight and shared it with everyone else but me, and prototype nukes start appearing all over the globe.
I've never had a game go so long with mineral & energy restrictions; I would eventually build a huge energy infrastructure, a line of fusion supply ships bringing back 2 energy to the Supercollider, and the higher the techs went, the more expensive they became, so that I was going bankrupt in a way; at 2 energy per tile there's no way to keep up with the progressive cost of techs, which stubbornly held at 8 turns per tech until the restrictions were finally cast off. (IIRC EE finally arrived via artifact.)
I was at war with all but Lal, of course, and had three TF's, one against the technologically pathetic Spartans to the East, one against the scattered, distant forces of Miriam to the West, and one against Yang to the Northeast.
The Spartan and Believer campaigns were long, slow, barely-fought affairs, for Yang was the main threat. Still I made steady progress and gave many conquered bases to Lal for the trade credits.
Beware Yang with missile tech. He had a bunch of sea bases, as sometimes the AI spews under some mysterious set of circumstances, but this time around I didn't mind so much, as they were the reason I gained tech parity at all. Now, though, I had to take every last one of them through a rain of conventional missiles. All the worms on trolling duty went in as reinforcements and still I was short on units. Finally I gained a beachhead, a big coastal city plus a small outpost on Mount Planet, and I knew it was all over for the sadistic Chairman.
Or maybe not ... I was so used to always having the HSA I was totally unprepared for probes. First Yang steals my tech, then he steals the base, which means another tech. Yang grabbed up the Plasma Shard, giving his fighter aircraft parity with mine, but worse he also got 8-res armor ... horrified, I watched as half his bases switched to building 8r AAA defenders.
Around this time global hell breaks loose. Miriam decides to kick off a nuclear war, starting with Zak. Yang nukes Lal, Lal nukes Miriam, and Miriam nukes everybody: Zak, Yang, Lal, and eventually me. All SP's owned by Lal, Zak, or Miriam are incinerated. Sister Armageddon didn't have any bases close enough to Yang or me to get ours. She would go on to use enough nerve gas on Zak to rack up 130 years of sanctions.
I was building conventional missiles, the first time in history I'd ever done that, scared to death of another faction, the first time in history post-Air Power that's ever happened, and thankful for the nuke Miriam dropped on Yang, another first.
It isn't often an AI opponent makes you respect it, but the AI's Yang fought with infuriating alacrity, building large numbers of fighters to thwart the textbook air cover tactics, lots of probes to throw at bases I captured, and there were roads everywhere, making ZoC tricks nigh impossible.
I finally beat the old bird, of course, but not before building a proper army to do it with, not some "two worms and a fusion chopper" half-measure. This was the best post-Air Power fight I've ever encountered.
It was also interesting from the standpoint of tech. I kept my tech priority locked on "Explore" after D:AP -- maybe that did it -- but somehow I beelined to Secrets of the Manifold, building Manifold Harmonics about as early as is possible to build it, way before supertensile solids, IIRC even before robotic assembly plants. MH, the Vats, and Teletubby Matrix made the power graph look as vertical as I've ever seen it -- flat during the energy restriction years, then suddenly straight up. Another first.
On balance I can see why I liked this game back in '98 ... all these years later it's still surprising me.
It seems that, by the late game, the AI are either so tech-barren, militarily impotent or generally peaceable as to be, well, boring.
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