simple teraforming question

[BustaMike]

You mean like this... +1

[gwillybj]

Re: Re: Build Road First

Originally posted by HongHu
Is the effect of different improvement and/or river cumulative? In other words, if you have a rocky river square, it will take you one extra turn for road even without anything built. The question is if it will take you two extra turns if you build a mine first?

No, it's still only one extra turn. It doesn't seem like much at first, but consider the long run and how much more that one Former can do by saving that one turn, and multiply that by how many Formers you have... It adds up.

Also, I thought of an exception to "road first" but couldn't get back to edit my post:
If the square is Rocky and you intend to reduce (level) it to Rolling, do that first, then build the Road before anything else. You will save one turn. It's easier to grade the Road through Rolling terrain than Rocky.

The extra turn still applies if you have The Weather Paradigm.

It does eventually disappear later in the game when you have more "Centauri" techs and/or Elite Super Formers. If you have The Weather Paradigm, the Super Formers don't have to be Elite. But by then you're already in the habit of "road first"

[Adalbertus]

gwillybj, Road first has another advantage: It's easier to bring in reinforcement. If you're using three formers to change a rocky square to Farms+Condensor, you save one turn by building road first (good timing assumed).

[Flare]

~Shrugs~ The road first rule also helps out when you want to bring in reinforcements to speed up the terraforming. Send in a former to road then gang tackle the needed change. It saves a lot of time. I have formers that are dedicated to road building.

[Flare]

+ 1 post!!!

[Flubber]

Originally posted by BustaMike
You mean like this... +1

exactly

[Flubber]

On "road first" -- I did not know about the extra former time but had usually built the road first for the reinforcement, gang former and quick escape reasons

[Snowflake]

Originally posted by Flare
+ 1 post!!!

Flare!

[Snowflake]

Originally posted by Flubber
On "road first" -- I did not know about the extra former time but had usually built the road first for the reinforcement, gang former and quick escape reasons

Ok further question on "road first" for speeding reinforcement by ganging former. Suppose you let a former build road, before he is finished will that give you the road benefit for the nest former? If you have to wait until the road is finished then this former is available for whatever the next reinforcement. Why need another former then?

[Snowflake]

Other simple questions. Anybody has a list of simple rules that a beginner can browse through so that she won't waste her precious turn advantage simply because she is not familiar with all the rules? For example, a base cannot be built on xenofungus (Can a base be built on a river? rocky area? ) and a forest cannot be plant on rocky area, the first colony pod should not be rushed unless you have more than 1 population, you have to save some money for SE changes, etc. Any more like these? I know all of you guys may not even need to think about these stuff because you already know them by heart but I have made a lot of this kind of mistakes I guess because I'm new and always act too hasty.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by HongHu
Other simple questions. Anybody has a list of simple rules that a beginner can browse through so that she won't waste her precious turn advantage simply because she is not familiar with all the rules? For example, a base cannot be built on xenofungus (Can a base be built on a river? rocky area? ) and a forest cannot be plant on rocky area, the first colony pod should not be rushed unless you have more than 1 population, you have to save some money for SE changes, etc. Any more like these? I know all of you guys may not even need to think about these stuff because you already know them by heart but I have made a lot of this kind of mistakes I guess because I'm new and always act too hasty.

are you new to the genre? some of these like not building a new colony pod (settler) too fast are familiar from Civ2. Others are more SMAC specific (like it taking longer to build a road where there are improvements)

I seem to be smashing the AI on my first really extended game at librarian level, so i probably wont be asking for additional tips till i get stuck on the next level.

[Flare]

The first former gives the full terraforming time. the second cuts it in half. ech additional terraformer subtracts 1 turn from the terraforming time. For roads, try two formers.

[Flare]

You can put a city on a river, but not a rocky or xenofungus square.

[Flare]

Hey, HongHu. Is this better for me?

[Flubber]

Place bases on the most arid land available since the underlying terrain is irrelevant to base square production EXCEPT

1.specials and landmarks will increase base square production
2. Placing a base on a river will increase energy production in the base square
3. as stated previously, you cannot found a base on fungus or rocky squares

So found the base on the flat arid square and work the moist/rainy rolling one



Other advice

1. Crawlers are good
2. Crawlers are GOOD
3. CRAWLERS ARE GOOD