What would you do?

[D4everman]

This is a hard choice, at least for me. Let me tell ya what happened....

As the UoP (Hey, they're my favorite. I even replaced Zak's pic with my own...of course i'm in front of the Eiffel Tower in it, but I digress) I started off on a random map, Talent level. Shortly after establishing a few bases I found Miriam was right next to me. I didn't want a fight, but I knew I'd have one if I didn't give in to her demand for energy. I gave it to her, knowing she'd be back. Meanwhile I began building impact rovers. Deidre was nearby and sold me a map of Believer territory. Perfect. Miriam only had about five bases, and one was on Mt. Planet. I put my rovers near the border and waited for Miriam to get belligerent, and kept building more of them as I expanded away from her. You see, Miriam was caged. Both Dee and myself blocked her land expansion. A few turns later she's sending colony pods through my territory to try and reach the other side of the continent. (That I wanted for myself!) I asked her to get out of my territory, she says we'll find out whose territoty it is, I take four of her six bases. (and probed the colony pods, using them to add to my own expansion...Miriam hadn't gone fundy yet) She surrendered pretty quick. I've learned that its best to blitzkrieg Miriam when she gets uppity. Her attack bonus is useless if you can keep her on the defensive.

Meanwhile Lal is threatening me and Cha Dawn is getting too big for his britches. Dee asks for a pact against the Cult, and I agree if she'll help me against Lal. Basically we just teamed up to kick everyone in the ass. Lal had a vast expanse to cross reach me but he did with a lot of probes. It was all I could do to keep killing them before he did some daage. (he managed to destroy one recycling tank.) But the tide turned. Dee went after Lal so hard it scared me. She had an army of demon boiles and basically took all but three of Lal's twenty something bases! I managed to snag UN HQ (Becasue it had the CDF in it!) but it was close. I had to move my transport through a stretch of water I call "Yang Alley". Yang had skimships out the wazoo and I lost two escort vessels, but I made it. I managed to get HSA by the skin of my teeth. Now I was the 500 pound gorilla on the block. Dee and I were directing our attacks against Yang and Cha now. I was the Planetary Governor, I had out teched everyone and I was making a mint in energy credits every turn! Then....

I don't know who, but my guess is Morgan. Someone framed me against Dee. (I got the message but it didn't say who.) Dee's forces in my territory weren't automatically recalled either! She started rampaging through my lands instantly. (But only attacked formers...stupid AI.) Now after Dee made short work of Lal I began building tons of copters and empath shard troops (and prototyping tanks) figuring that since she's number 2 now she'll turn on me sooner or later....but the frame up caught me off guard. I had to use most of my cash to rush buy troops and attack her bases on my border. I took three of them and then she asked for a blood truce....but should I agree to that? Heres why:

A) If I agree it will only give her time to build up more forces and renew the fight later. And Dee is tough in this game. I may be numero uno on the power scale, but so was Lal and you know what happened to him.

B) If I don't agree I'll have to devote all of my time to crushing her or making her surrender. (I won't settle for anything less! She's too powerful to give her a break in a fight!) But Yang will most likely take advantage of the situation. He'll either bulk up his army making his defeat harder to get or he'll (gasp) pact with Dee against me!

C) is there anyway to find out WHO FRAMED ME!? I really think it was Morgan. He's been rattling his saber at me but he's far too weak and distance to do much.



D) Maybeeeee...I could pact with Cha Dawn against Dee. They've been duking it out for awhile. The one thing about losing my pact is the commerce is gone and its crippled me. I'm trying to launch as many power transmitters as I can, but Cha has a decent amount of bases. If we team up and assuming he does ANYTHING we could probably beat Dee down into submission.

What do you experts think? I await your suggestions. Now I've got to go prepare dinner. (didn't eat last night playing this game!)

[Avenoct]

D4:
I'm no expert, especially concerning Smax, but I'll put in my two cents as I think you're in a strategically interesting situation.

I think you should take the truce. Now, admitting upfront that I might not, I think it's the best advice. As a human player, you can build better with less, than the AI. If you are truly threatened on two sides (assuming Yang is a threat?), you'd probably better assure yourself of crushing one enemy at a time.

One thing to ask yourself though, what kind of victory do you want? If you just can't stand the idea of losing bases, play defensively, but if you like the idea of a conquest victory, maybe now is the time. If halfway through defeating your first enemy, Yang comes calling, you can probably afford to lose a few bases, even burn them to the ground before he gets there. If Dee really has 20+ bases, you'll have plenty to work with to later turn back against Yang. Of couse, this is a silly plan, but its usually not too hard to just roll over an AI, especially one that only recently aquired most of their bases.

But, if you hole up and pick your fights, as any intelligent strategist would have you do, you have many options. Are you already at war with Yang? It might be worth trying to frame one of the other factions against one of your two enemies, or against each other. Along with the truce, offer up some tech or some cheesy bases. Or do likewise if you can get on speaking terms with Yang.

Sure, if you accept the truce, this 'Dee' character (I'm a Smac player you see) is going to build troops. With an AI that big and that close, you are eventually going to have to take them out, whether you try to do it now, or later. I've no idea of your military strategy, but I'd spend about 10 turns of the truce cranking out a very nice army, gather them, then probe Dee to piss her off and go to town. No AI faction can resist a determined human attack, or at least they shouldn't!

Since you were taken by surprise, buying time is probably your best bet. During those 10 turns, try to get some probes headed to the other factions. What do you have to lose if the probe fails and Morgan declares vendetta on you for trying to frame Dee? Not much. And make plans for Yang. Either buy him off or prepare to burn down some border bases. Do whatever it takes not to let him actually take a base. If you are swift with Dee, you can then turn on Yang, finish the war, and return to rebuilding.

That's my .02.

-Smack

[D4everman]

Well, Smack, as I was cutting the veggies for my famous home made beef stew I gave it some thought and decided to take the truce. I have better tech than Diedre and I think I can have enough troops to give her a real bloody nose when the truce expires. If bad comes to worse I might be able to pact with Cha Dawn later. Oh, and I'm going for the trancendence victory.

Probing Morgan or anyone else would be a waste of time. Morgan doesn't have anything I want and he's too far away to be a real threat. I can contain Yang. He might be able to get one or two of the bases I took from him back, but I don't really care about them that much. As usual, they're distant and aren't in good places.

I'm embarrased, but Yang did one of my bases on my mainland earlier in the game! It was way off on my far coast and after building the initial defender I set the queue for facilities instead of troops. Unfortunately I forgot to upgrade the single impact defender in it! Yang rolled up with some gatling armed rovers and took it and then he renamed it "Plex Anthill"!. Well, it pissed me off. I set upon the base with several chaos troops and took it back renaming it "Yang Must Die!".

Its not so much as I just to lose bases....I get emotionally angry at the AI sometimes as if Yang was a real person. I guess I need to get out more.

[Tai Mai Shu]

Yeah, I just love it when the AI renames your bases as part of it's game of psychological warfare It's soooooo irritating whenever that happens that you just want to go strangle their leader in person.

[Avenoct]

Probing Morgan or anyone else would be a waste of time. Morgan doesn't have anything I want and he's too far away to be a real threat

Yeah, that's what you'd think, but the AI isn't that smart. Sometimes if you get 'em riled at a distant enemy they spend their last nickel trying to get there.

-Smack

[EtheMind]

It's an interesting strategic scenario. If you go for Trancend, there's little reason to waste recources into combat unless you are by far supereme vs the enemy. Which doesn't seem to be the case this time. There's no way of finding out the framer though. I think it could be just about anyone. They tend to do that even if in Treaties, and even when in good mood. None of this probably makes a lot of difference, judging your gaming style you're already done with the gaming. SMAC all day long, missing few dinners, so what? Maybe we both need to go out more...

Sometimes if you get 'em riled at a distant enemy they spend their last nickel trying to get there.

That's true. And good thinking Smac if you want to take some extra resources off from AI. They have tendency to send out some idiotic crusades to the dar side of Chiron despite the obvious failure.

[D4everman]

Diedre made up my mind for me. Less than four turns after our truce she sneak attacked me! Now, I expect that from Miriam or Santiago or Yang....not the Gaians. Oh well. She almost took a base too, but her troops used their movements to kill the defenders allowin me time to move a new unit into it. Dee didn't count on the probe teams I had built prior to the HSA. I had a lot. I used them to sabotage her bases and drain reserves, several times a turn. With so many probes I knocked out the perimeter defenses of a lot of bases and then stormed in with Shard squads and helicopters. After losing six bases the Gaians surrendered. (Oh, Dee asked for another turce several times, but no way, man. She stabbed me in the back. Death or surrender were the choices I offered.)

Of course Yang took advantage of the distraction. He raised the land connecting him to my territory. I lost two sea formers lowering it again by his needlejets. But I managed to do it. Morgan was on cue, declaring vendetta for my green economy. Then Cha Dawn plopped some troops near one of my bases. Then he took Miriams only remaining land base. I asked him to get off of my land he declared vendetta. I only had to destroy one of his bases to make him surrender. I even gave Miriam one of Dee's old bases.

Then I asked Dee to declare vendetta on Morgan. She was pacted with him and refused unless I handed over 8700 Energy Credits! I decided I didn't need her help. The one base that Morgan had taken from the Peacekeepers had the Merchant Exchange in it! I went after it but before my shard tanks could get there Dee declared vendetta on Morgan and took it herself. (Hmmmm...strange how she refused to break her pact with Morgan one turn before but then after I clicked on the base saw the ME and sent troops there she changed her mind in ONE turn. Methinks the computer decided to thwart my possession of the ME.)

Anyway, I took Yang's HQ and a few sea bases. He's pretty pissed. Morgan is no real threat and Dee's eating him alive anyway. Yang was getting to be a threat, but I just built the Space Elevator and dropped in on three of his bases. I don't see anything that can stop me from Transcending (unless the AI suddenly grows a brain) all I have to do in the meantime is destroy the Hive, which should be as easy as pie now. (unless he manages to finish his planet buster before I get to that base) By finding out which bases he has that don't have aerospace complexes I just send some drop ranks there and eat away at him. Death to Yang!!

[EtheMind]

You make it sound like the AI really thinks. Wish I had more games like that. I only play Trancend and yes sometimes AI is a challenge. Much because of its optimal landing position and inherent advantages that happen to support their geopolitical situation well. But in the long run AI builded factions are far too inefficient in any manner to pose a theat to victory, at least in most cases.
That seem to have developed rather interesting game I may say. I especially have to wonder Deirde's actions against Morgans despite of their pact. It's also fascinating to see an AI with such an offensive capabilities.

[D4everman]

You make it sound like the AI really thinks. Wish I had more games like that.

I'll admit that when I ***** and moan about the AI beating me its more due to the "advantages" it gets at higher levels than any real "thinking." Thats why I start several new games at once. I don't mind too much if the AI has to bend some rules, I just don't want to feel cheated. This current game was perfevt. I was at a disadvantage from the start. I had to eat crow for a long time until I was poweerful enough to fight back and still I could have lost...if the AI could think.

But it can't. If it could AI Yang might have done something to counter my orbital insertions. He didn't. Yang still put a hell of a fight, but it paled in comparison to Morgan! Morgan had TWO bases left and he held me and Diedre off for a long time. Eventually she wore him down. (I saw Diedre use a ton of probes on his bases until the Perimeter defenses went down...just like I would have done! )

I got tired of jerking around with Yang. Knowing that if I destroyed him at this point the game would end in a conquest victory I decided to end it. But his last few bases were far away. So I repealed the UN charter! Miriam and Cha Dawn came cheap. Miriam wanted only SEVEN EC for her vote and Cha only 28! I nuked his cluster of far bases and took the last land base with one tank! Ahhhh, catharsis.

Thus the UoP has united humankind under one banner. The best part was nuking Yang.