Forest - The Best Terraform

[Fitz]

Originally posted by b&i_c
I'm for not using specialists until base limit has been reached then. It just seems like a total waste putting a crawler in a city radius square when you could just as easily (and more cheaply) put a worker there.

Here is an alternate, non-specialist way to look at it:

If you put the crawler on a square inside the base radii, you can use that same worker to work another square inside the radii. Then you have a crawler and a worker! Better than just a worker, wot?

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

b&i_C,

It's been awhile since I espoused the virtues of specialization and since I was one of the original proponents many moons back let me give a little background.

First off let me say whole hearted forest are great especially in the early game. However they do reach a point wherein they become less useful vs say other more specialized forms of t-forming.

A heavy specialist approach offers a number of pros and some definite cons so lets start with the cons.

1. Heavy on t-forming time. Comparitively speaking I'll give examples of forest vs. condensor/farm or condensor/farm/soil enrichers. Forest are a mere 4 turns per square (3 w/ WP) vs. condensor farm of I believe 4 for the farm and 8? for the condensor. (3& 6 respectively with WP)

2. Further the forest expand on their own whilst the others do not.

3. The heavy t-formed land makes eco damage more susceptible in bases.

Pros

1. Energy!!! Energy is the key to any game much more so than mins. Sure mins have their purpose but after the first 10 mins I'll take energy over mins every day (granted I want enough mins to field a formidable fighting force but you get my point). Energy is accomplished by taking otherwise worker citizen and transforming them into specialsits. I've proven and written on this extensively to say that in the first phase of the game (librarians and technicians availaible) Generally forestation is a better approach for the reason listed above. Once beefier specialists become available tho' then the pendulum swings the other way and a specialist approach becomes much more favorable. Trouble with this is by the time you get fusion 99 times out of 100 you've got the game in hand anyway so it's no biggy.

2. Efficiency who needs it. Specialists offer their contribution to final energy forms econ or labs indpendent of efficiency loss.

3. Starvation who cares. Labs and/or econ from the specialsit still accrues even under starvation conditions.

4. Drone issues. If your a specialist you don't riot. That is stricty reserved for worker bees. Often times the best means to stave off a drone riot is to simply take enuff workers fromthe field convert them into the best specialsit you have and then buy the appropriate facility and/or 1/1/1 police unit. Caveat bases with less then 5 pop points allow only doctors/empaths/transcendi. A doctor is useless empaths are OK but transcendi WOW. Of course this is extremely late game.

Now onto the comparisons.

Hybrids on tree farms vs. Condensor/farm/soil enricher with 4 rocky roaded mines
fusion power discovered.

Assume max base population of 16 (say your either Lal or got Ascetic Virtues SP)

Hybrid trees
16 * 3/2/2 or 3/2/3 if +2 econ ignoring base square then output is 48nuts/32 mins/32 or 48 energy all in all not bad. Your 16 population will eat 32 nuts leaving you an excess nutrient total of 16. Remember in total you've worked 16 squares.

Condensor farm/soil encicher

Condensor farm Soil enricher
6 nutrients ea worked/harvested by crawler
4 rocky roaded mines worked/harvested by crawler

All 16 population points engineers

total of but 10 squares used

output = 4 excess nuts/20 mins/80 energy (48 econ 32 labs)

All in all the specialization route affords much higher returns on energy. Unfortunately it comes late in the game. It does behoove you though to start the paving over of you forest towards high one resource crawlered squares immediately upon discovery of fusion or shortly before.

One caveat IF you have a number of trade partners either through submissives and/or playing nice nice then trade energy is calculated based upon energy from worker bees not crawlers nor specialists. Trade energy component may outweigh the benefits of specialists.

In the beginning tho' I mostly agree forest are the way to go. Get a 2 nutrient square forest 2 others and get your bases to a stable drone free size 3 ASAP via growth or the PTS.

Og

P.S. White E. Damn I've been away such a long time I miss the good debates +2 research you say. Looks like I need to check that thread out.

[KrazyHorse]

I always found that the best solution was to improve the squares which were rolling and rainy (or at high altitude even those which were flat and rainy) and to completely cover the rest of my area with forests.

[Avenoct]

Why this Recurrs...

Well, I must say I love the way the Topicstarter frames his position, and funny thing is, had he said that in the middle of the discussion this would be twice as long a thread as each 'side' tried to tell the other that it was right and the other then must be wrong. Ogie, you are a SMAC God IMHO, and I'm one who's always glad when you chime in, even though we've mostly all been through this complicated argument many times. Of couse Forests Rule! There are so many reasons why they do. Experience will lead most people to use them heavily in the beginning of a game. But at a certain point comes a choice.....continue with forests, or ....
Oddly enough I switch to specialized squares...condensers, almost never mines, boreholes, (and when I can ) energy parks, because I need the nutrients as I start filling up my core base squares with boreholes. Though I do make the occasional all-specialist bases, especially if I'm running or plan to forever run Free Market (to home my army to this base..no drones), I have yet to sucessfully max out my specialist use. Instead, I'm forced into it, but obviously I don't reccomend that as a strategy! The real choice in my situation comes down to Crawlers, as well it should. In the beginning I'm crawlering a whole lot of forests (yes I am embarrased) for minerals to get my production beyond 10 for every base and about 15 or so for SP bases. When boreholes come into play, or some nice mines, that's not an issue, and too many of my base squares are covered in crawlers for my workers to get in and do there thing. I use a few crawlers to finish some Secret projects, and hopefully I've founded an energy or mineral or nutrient park somewhere out of base range at this point and I send them over to continue crawlering back to their base of origen. Also, I can't tell you how great it is to send a few crawlers out when making new bases. Have them home to the base and speed the construction of necessary garrison/ facility products. After all, where do you really need fast production the most? On the frontier! Nine out of Ten times. Better yet, if you really need to, you can cash those crawlers instead of rush-buying (or in addition to) the critical things on the frontier. Crawlers there are a buffer in many ways....

Experience will teach you what works best for you, and I do think that's different for everyone with these 'everyone IS right' arguments. I do suggest trying extreme strategies if you have the time. When I've succeeded in having mostly specialized squares, it's been 'the best'. When I've developed Hybrid Forests early enough, I've been convinced that nothing could be better (especially in the Monsoon Jungle). The only limit on both strategies is the ever annoying rocky square. Build a base in the great desert before on a rocky plateau..trust me...chuckles....

Oh, forgot to address my header...I'm always glad when this topic presents itself...it recurrs because it is both central and unanswerable to SMAC strategy. It rears it's head in many forms 'Crawlers Rule!' or 'All Specialist Bases for Victory'...because all these things are intertwined in the most subtle and important aspect of the game. Get the most FOP's you can, quick as you can, and you win (with a few notable exceptions, the main of which is getting everyone elses FOP's instead of developing your own). Easy right?
-Smack

[Iskandar Reza]

i still say that if you've got a rainy square, farm it and put enrichers on it.


if it's flat and rainy, farm it and crawl it

if it's flat and rainy with nut bonus, farm it and crawl it

if it's flat rainy with other bonuses, work it

if it's rolling rainy wth a river, work it.

if it's rolling rainy with nut bonus, farm it and crawl it

if it's rolling rainy with other bonusesm work it

if it's just rolling, forest it.

if it's just flat, forest it.

[Blake]

I have little doubt the "strongest" terraforming strategy is maximum density of boreholes, and every other tile farm+condensor.

However a nice comprimise to reduce MM is using mostly forest, then for every base add 1 farm+condensor (crawled) and one borehole. As former time allows add more boreholes and condensors, in approximately equal ratios.

Another handy hint: Boreholes can be built anywhere, just lower the tile you want to build the borehole on, one lower terrain will ALWAYS allow you to build a borehole on that tile. Consider a borehole costs 24, and a lower terrain 12, your only increasing the terraform cost by 50%, which really isn't so bad. I've experimented with maximum density boreholes (you gotta pre-plan the city layout), and it is very powerfull. But utimitaly using a mixture of forest, borehole, condensor is almost as good.

The place non-forest terraforming really shine is when you have the WP, and it's a double-blind game, even without crawlers you can easily use condensors to build a city up to size 5 and support several libarians. If you get a city with 2 nut resources, for a total of 14 nuts you can support a size 7 city with only 2 workers. That's a lot of lab points (especially for Yang!).

[Provost Harrison]

I generally tend to use forests on low lying moist terrain that isn't that interesting otherwise and arid land. I generally tend to use wet squares for food, but it depends on the nature of the base to be honest with you...

[Iskandar Reza]

Originally posted by Blake
I have little doubt the "strongest" terraforming strategy is maximum density of boreholes, and every other tile farm+condensor.

However a nice comprimise to reduce MM is using mostly forest, then for every base add 1 farm+condensor (crawled) and one borehole. As former time allows add more boreholes and condensors, in approximately equal ratios.

Another handy hint: Boreholes can be built anywhere, just lower the tile you want to build the borehole on, one lower terrain will ALWAYS allow you to build a borehole on that tile. Consider a borehole costs 24, and a lower terrain 12, your only increasing the terraform cost by 50%, which really isn't so bad. I've experimented with maximum density boreholes (you gotta pre-plan the city layout), and it is very powerfull. But utimitaly using a mixture of forest, borehole, condensor is almost as good.

The place non-forest terraforming really shine is when you have the WP, and it's a double-blind game, even without crawlers you can easily use condensors to build a city up to size 5 and support several libarians. If you get a city with 2 nut resources, for a total of 14 nuts you can support a size 7 city with only 2 workers. That's a lot of lab points (especially for Yang!).

well put, Blake. exactly my point. why build forests when you can have these. you can just crawl everything, and change all workers to specialists

[Iskandar Reza]

i mean why terraform all forest?

[b&i_c]

Well I guess this sounds like a pretty good idea then, especially the part where Reza said what to work and what to crawl. I think I'll try using specialists more in my next game.

[n.c.]

Um, crawlers and formers are not free. In other words, when I read "just crawl it," I'm thinking of several turns lost, plus a unit I need to defend.

While people are building (and manuevering) huge #s of those, I'm building units and improvements. Here's the n.c. approach:
-only 4 to 7 ocean squares
-at least one nutrient bonus
-all forest save three boreholes

And why wouldn't you build the TF and HF? They are great, but less so with every non-forest tile. I also can't understand why anyone would take on more eco-damage. Mindworms and fungus growth are a huge pain. I imagine the latter is far moreso with these complex terraforming techniques.

The only time I make significant use of crawlers is to build two or three out-of-radius boreholes per city. The crawler stays on returning energy unless I need help with a quick build order. The other exception is if I am close enough to the Monsoon Jungle, but even then I am wary since it is tough to protect them.

(Sorry if this is harsh; I am almost exclusively a resident of the Off-Topic.)

[theohall]

Why Crawlers vice TF and HF? How many Crawlers can one build in the same time it takes to build a TF or HF? Usually several. All of those crawlers then provide returns which can significantly reduce the time needed to build TF and HF gaining the benefits of both worlds.

[Fitz]

n.c., I agree that the protection of crawlers and terraformers can be a pain, but you'd be suprised at how well a combined terraforming/crawling program really works.

And incidentally, if you are truley combining across an empire (ie some forest bases some non-forest) the Tree farms and Hybrid Forests in the forested bases will probably negate the majority of the eco-damage in the non-forested bases (ie - there is a "faction wide" effect of these facilities).

Try it some time. Make half you bases, preferably away from known enemies, crawler/terraforming intensive, and the other half forested, and compare and contrast the effects.

-Fitz

Incidentally, long time no chat nc. I kinda dropped out of Off Topic a few months ago, since I found a new online roleplaying game. Good to see you are still around.

[WhiteElephants]

Yes, on top of what Theohall stated you generally crawler minerals from forest squares first until you can bring in +4 mins from a mine road on a rocky tile. So what this does is speed up production above and beyond what a base without crawlers would be building in the long term. Therefore your initially losing turns, but those turns are then recovered because the base would have a higher production of mins.

Also crawlering out of radius boreholes is quite inefficient as your losing the other half of what your crawlering. In your case, minerals. Rather than build one out of radius borehole, why not build two tidal harnesses on the sea and send out two trawlers to bring in the energy? Toss in a thermocline transducer (or whatever it's called) and your bringing in 8 energy as opposed to 6 at half as much terraform time cost. The only cost involved would be the trawlers, which become cheaper with fussion power.

It's also unrealistic to have built three boreholes as that too involves considerable terraforming time. On top of that you would probably already need a tree farm and hybrid forest in place to handle the outrageous amount of eco damage produced. Given the above considerations I would think that you wouldn't have this set up until the end of the mid-game or early late-game. Post fussion power I imagine, a nice time to build trawlers instead.

N.C. -- I didn't think you harsh at all. You off-topic types aren't as bad as you think.

[b&i_c]

It is called a Thermocline Tranducer.

Well n.c., if you build a HF, then you get rid of all eco-damage caused by terraforming, so that point is kind of moot.

Yeah, crawlers are a huge thing to defend, I wouldn't put them on a frontier base especially during war time, but in your central bases, you don't really need to defend them.