Non-foil transports

[#endgame]

These look like they could be fun, but has anyone seen them to be of any use?

[Maniac]

Cruiser transports: Of course! +2 movement points!
Land unit transports: They are cheap and can be used to allow other units to move to and from sea bases that border a coast. You can also give them the drop ability and after you have orbital insertion you can transport a bunch of non-drop units over the entire world. One other SMAC veteran (Ogie, Sikander, can't recall) also has regularly advocated them for use in war (gives the units in the transport one extra movement point in a way) or terraformation (formers can move around faster).

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

That would be me.

I advocate land transports tho' for more than just war.

They serve inavaluably in allowing a trucking corps to allow peace time activities as well.

Want to move that crawler to a base and you want to upgrade it and cash it in all on the same turn thereby scooping a faction and getting an all important SP. Use land transports.

Want to allow your fleet of formers to move into a square and build a road thereby allowing the rest of your fleet of formers into build a borehole. Use a land transport.

Want to move a colony pod and set it in the same turn. Use a land transport.

It only takes a few no more than 2-3 in your empire to help you in both war and peace time.

War time use allows builds of el cheapo best weapon- 1-1's to be brought right up to a base door step.

OOh and by the wway once mag tubes are built the land transport is invaluable in removing otherwise exposed units back to rearward bases.

[Sarxis]

Oh yeah! Land-trannies are awesome!

I'm not only the Land-tranny Club president, I'm also a client.

[Frankychan]

I've made these!

Sea-based: My Planet-Buster Subs! While these are EXTREMELY expensive, due to the resources of the PB's, they are heck of a lot of fun to play. The only junk thing is that if you have a fully loaded sub stocked with busters and it's attacked, its dead. But I just love the idea of parking my sub at the coast of my enemy, then launching my nukes.

Land-based: I've tried experimenting with this, but haven't had much success. I usually just wait until mag-tubes and that is sufficient for me.

Air-based: Holy crap, THAT was a disaster.

[CEO Aaron]

Originally posted by Anun Ik Oba
Oh yeah! Land-trannies are awesome!

I'm not only the Land-tranny Club president, I'm also a client.

Uh, in the world outside these forums, tranny is short for transvestite, not transport.

[Hercules]

Yeah but any decent human player is going to be monitoring your activity, unless you have some thing secret to tell us.

[Mr. President]

I only use foil transports and later cruiser transports. Gravships and planet busters remain my favorite tools of statecraft.

[Method]

the only non-sea transports i'll use are infantry ones in sea bases for ease of movement. I tend not to use them for actual 'transportation' simply because they have such a low transport capacity and movement penalty (they do have a movement penalty, right?) that it's usually easier just to walk there

[#endgame]

Wow. So many replies in such a short time.

What about putting an infantry in a rover transport. Rover speed with +25% vs base? Does it work, or is it too expensive?

[Sarxis]

Originally posted by CEO Aaron


Uh, in the world outside these forums, tranny is short for transvestite, not transport.

Theres... an Outside?!?

Why?!! Why was I never told!?!? My life?!?! Wasted here!!! (And actually, its short for Transexual... but that's debatable.)

[Enigma_Nova]

I wonder if it is possible to load a transport into another transport.
If you could get enough capacity, you could have a rover chain spontaneously appear!

[#endgame]

I don't see why not. The usefulness is limited because the cargo of a nonfoil, noncruiser transport is always 1.

A chain of transports could be used to quickly lockdown an area.

An impact infantry with no armor could be backed up with a rover transport with good armor. Wouldn't it also doublestack the square, preventing probing?

Things that could be fun:

Ground transport + Repair bay = Medic.
Ground transport + Carrier deck = Mobile airbase.
Ground transport + Cloaking = Fun (Wonder if you could fit a probe team in one of these)

But if you can get enough that all your attack force can hide in ground transports, then they will never know what nasty thing will come out of the boxes all around his base.

Needlejet/Chopper/Gravship transports can only load/unload at an airbase (I think), but can be almost as good as psi gates.

[Lazerus]

unless he moves next to them and right clicks on the transport to see whats in them .... the units should survive if the transport is attacked though right ?

[Enigma_Nova]

I think the transport is designated as the defender and all cargo is lost.
In othe words you'll have an arse of a time unloading all your units at end turn then reloading them.

BTW apparently Rover transports get only 1 movement point...
Well it's still good to make a Defence Transport and load it with a high attack rover.
Let the transport take the hit while the rover runs stuff over.