Request help with early turn decisions

[Skanky Burns]

but then its pretty easy to re-home enough formers to a base to force the first *pop*

Crawlers you mean?

[CEO Aaron]

30 minerals is ok

Well, sure, if you can swing it. My bases tend to be so tightly packed before I raise mineral restrictions, I don't really have enough room for that many crawlers. Typically, I'll cap out at 3 crawlers per base, except for the one I plan on forcing the pop in. Any more and I start running out of places to put them.

[Jamski]

Crawlers you mean?

Crap, now I'm doing it too

Well, sure, if you can swing it. My bases tend to be so tightly packed before I raise mineral restrictions, I don't really have enough room for that many crawlers. Typically, I'll cap out at 3 crawlers per base, except for the one I plan on forcing the pop in. Any more and I start running out of places to put them.

I assume you're using this spacing :

B-B-B-B-B
---------
B-B-B-B-B
---------
B-B-B-B-B

Where each base can only work 3 tiles?

I use a more relaxed

B---B---B
---------
--B---B--
---------
B---B---B

So there's enough room to get the core bases up to 30 mins

-Jam

[Barinthus]

Jam, your 'relaxed' base placement, is that what's known as three on diagonical placement?

[Jamski]

I think its "2-on-diagonal" placement. I'm never sure if the end square is counted or not. I'm not strict about it though, and if there's fungus or rocks in the way, the tile is left empty.

-Jam

[CEO Aaron]

When you play Morgan, you really don't get enough early former power to enforce any kind of placement pattern, just plant them where there's open space. I actually just plant my bases 3 squares from any other bases. So the crawlers placement issue isn't one of _having_ spaces, just having sufficient formers to have useful places to put them all.

This may be the drawback in MY Morgan game, but I don't go for multiple formers per base until clean reactors become available. Instead, my early production and terraforming is geared solely toward base placement and SP production.

[livid imp]

549 ED?
You guys must be playing a different game than me. IIRC in previous games I get a fungi pop every few rounds at 25 ED, too hard for my formers to keep up with in the early game. At 200 ED I get like 4 pops every round with an increasing number of alien life forms every round too. I don't know how you all do it. I wish I could stand over your shoulders and watch one of you play a game.

So the crawlers placement issue isn't one of _having_ spaces, just having sufficient formers to have useful places to put them all.

Which has been one of my problems. How many formers do you typically build per city? What are your terraforming priorities? If you have the WP, do you slap down a condenser first or forest? etc.

[Jamski]

The formers pay for themselves. If they're costing 1 mineral per turn in support, but mean you gain 2 minerals per turn from a forest... and remember kids, its not how often in SMAC, but how soon you can do it.

Yup, turn advantage is well worth the extra former (rushed of course to save more turn advantage) so you KNOW that when a bas is planted it has good tiles to work, a road link to get the CP there quicker, you know that before it grows, it will have enough food, you have the tiles terraformed before the crawlers are crawling them...

2 formers per base is good, because they can get you the mines and forests faster. I'm just realising recently how vital minerals are in the early game. Its all about production. Forget nuts. Grow to size 2-3 and make crawlers. Crawl minerals to make more crawlers, then produce anything you want almost instantly.

The extra support - even with Morgan - is no big deal. Its better to pay that ONE little mineral to get your terraforming done in time. I want my boreholes in place just BEFORE restriction lifting, not after.

-Jam

[Santiago_Claus]

Liberating this thread to its original subject (opposite of hijacking) I played the prooffered game. I have a story to tell you:

It's an arid little starting position, but lucky breaks with the pods brought 3 nutrient resources. By the time I made contact with Santiago in the east my bases had cranked out WP (allowing condensers on the nutrient specials) and HGP, and I shot into first place on most of the graphs.

When she declared war on me I was ready, with several healthy bases all cranking out units, mostly Gat and Missile Rovers, under CC's and BC's under FM / Survival and after hostile pops and a new volcano Fundy / Weath. After taking most of her land she capitulated, swearing a Pact to serve me, and I settled at last into Morgan's famed Demo/Green/Wealth.

I met Domai early and we formed a Pact to smite the evil Caretakers. Later I would use the landlocked but helpfully bellicose Caretakers to finesse a Pact with the reluctant Data Angels, as well.

Domai and Mount Planet are a lethal SP-sniping combination. Other than that major annoyance -- he built AV in 8 turns, the speedy bloke -- I'm on the exponentially accelerating "Stairway to Transcendence"!

But wait ... I have another story to tell:

At first cheered by the placement of my first base on a river, my optimism would soon be ground underfoot by some terribly unlucky pod-popping. A fungal bloom rendered the north coast of my peninsula totally uninhabitable, and the lack of rainfall in general limited my scrawny bases to trailer-parks.

Barely able to expand, SP's were out of the question, and I watched wistfully as the WP, HGP, CC, and all the other favorites went past my nose.

When Santiago found me her well-armed pack descended on my impoverished nation like wolves on raw meat, and I was powerless to stop her. If only I could have expanded as far as the Monolith East of Pholus ridge ...

It pretty much goes to show that how well you do depends a great deal on luck -- not in the first 100 turns but indeed in the first 10.

[Jamski]

The terrain and specials in the radius of the first base have more effect than anything else that happens in the game.

-Jam

[livid imp]

Agreed. Since this game is all about turn advantage, starting position (including resource specials) is all important. But since 90% of the time we land in spots without such a significant advantage, I am trying to figure out how to stay ahead when dropped on the dry side of the mountain in a patch of fungus. I beginning to be of the opinion that there is no such thing as 'too many formers'. Makes me wonder if the Fundies aren't a better peace time faction than I give them credit for. You could run fleets of formers with their high support.