favorite fraction?

[Alinestra Covelia]

I have to say the Hive, although I'm starting to get tired of Corner victories (ones which are conquest intensive even if the end victory is not a Conquest one).

I tried playing as the University on Transcend and got five layers of arse kicked squarely by the Spartans. **Humble Allie** I'm going to make it a personal crusade to get good with a Build heavy faction like the Uni during this holiday.

[gwillybj]

22/7
I like pie . Any kind of pie. Well, maybe not all; I don't like rhubarb pie .

I like playing as Morgan just to keep him off the bottom of the power graph. Or as Yang or Miriam to keep the wars from starting too soon. I stopped playing Lal, Zakharov, or Deirdre because I couldn't avoid Transcendence (and I don't want to turn it off in case another faction might actually do it first). Which leaves Santiago. I've been trying a few things, but always seem to end up no better than third, and much of the time as low as sixth .

[Earwicker]

I enjoy playing all the factions for variety's sake and to find their strengths/ weaknesses -- so I go for random and see what comes up. I will usually restart if I'm the Aliens. I have a great time playing as the Drones, with their bigtime production bonus (and he's the one who has to be the Hacker because of his tech penalty). But my favorite factions are the planet-friendly ones: Gaians and Cult.

[Iskandar Reza]

prolly most of you know which faction i prefer to play, albeit all the difficulties i'm having with that faction.

[Killjoy]

The Hive most definitely is my favourite (strong industry, strong military, and if played right strong research. All adds up to one hell of a tough faction to beat), although I'd agree with Alinestra about getting tired of the conquest intensive victories — even if it that isn't the goal.

I find the University is too easy, and that the Spartans can't seriously compete, on Transcend. I've recently started to seriously play with Morgan, and find the faction challenging, and a whole lot of fun! The Morgans could possibly be my second favourite faction!

Sadly, I don't care for the SMAX factions.

[Misotu]

I like the builder factions. No surprise there. Principally PK. Well, they're the easy ones No drone problems. Try dealing with PK inefficiency though, that's a neat one. I just love the way the old hands describe the PKs as the "easy" faction. Yeah. Right. Easier in terms of micro-management, but try the inefficiency for a while guys. You'll get a bit of a shock.

Otherwise it's Gaia, CyC or, more recently, I've been experimenting with Morgan. The Angels are fine, but too boring. UoP is strong, but the drones make them tedious.

[Googlie]

RF:

Prolly Staples - I saw the cd-packaged versions there (no box and no manual) yesterday at CDN $9.99

I'll play any faction - I think in all my PBEM's I'm everyone but the Pirates - and they are a great faction for an OCC win.

My current SP challenge is to play the Pirates without ever building a land unit - so no formers nor crawlers to improve land squares, and no rover chassis vehicles. Makes for a whole different strategy on siting your bases.

G.

[Ned]

All the factions have their plusses and minuses. The best factions are, in my view, Aki and Morgan. Aki's +2 efficiency and +2 research are unbeatable. Aki can run Demo, Planned, Wealth with a 20% Pysch boost to put her bases in GA. The result is +2 efficiency, +2 industry, +2 economy (the all coveted +1 energy per worker), +1 commerce, and to boot, +7 growth (including Children's Creche's and minus Aki's -1) which places Aki's bases in permanent pop boom!

The only downside to these SE choices is the -2 morale.

Morgan, in turn, can run Demo, Green, Knowledge to yield +6 efficiency, +2 green, +2 knowledge, and with a 20% Pysch boost to place his bases in GA, +2 economy and +2 commerce. Note, there is no negative morale in this combination. However, income is maximized. War can be waged (no negative police.) Wealth and Power! (Sounds like the United States in WWII.)

Ned

[Chris Collin]

The aliens are the best factions for an easy win. appart from them i think Aki is the best followed by Zaharov. Technology is power. One game i played with the believers (the worst factoin i think) and the University had built mid/late game every secret project before anyone else had discovered the techs to build them.

Personaly I like the Drones becouse they are not that good but not as bad as the believers. The are a challange to play. (its strange though that they can choose free market and not green economics when their agenda is to free the working classes)

[senatus]

Believers, since I've gotten into their heads via Spartan Chronicles .

Seriously though, I like 'em because I like to play hybrid. With +2 support, you can expand horizontally and grow vertically (using Demo / Planned) at the same time. Choose FM and / or Wealth when you need the tech, and you won't be too far behind... -KNOWLEDGE is, IMO, a minor penalty. Go Demo/Green once you hit Hab limits, and keep expanding - it's the Orange Tide.

Otherwise, when I want to simply crush the enemy, I'd choose University - their minuses are a joke if you hold the tech lead and get VW (must) and HSA (want). But why bother playing a faction you can easily win with? (In SP, that is).

[Alinestra Covelia]

quote: Originally posted by Killjoy on 04-20-2001 04:08 PM Sadly, I don't care for the SMAX factions.

I agree. The two alien factions are interesting to have as antagonists, but they are far too powerful for human play. The other factions are largely elaborations on existing factions (Cybernetic Consciousness are an upgraded University - Cha Dawn is a militant Deirdre) or lowgrade experiments with game mechanics (I like the idea of the Pirates, but found their style of gameplay very restrictive indeed).

Aesthetically, too, I believe that the SMAX factions practically scream "gimmick" at you when compared to the fully rounded personalities of the SMAC leaders. I occasionally play against the two alien factions plus CyC when I want to challenge myself in single player, but I don't use them for anything else.

[WhiteElephants]

What the heck, I'll third that notion on the SMAX faction. Don't like em'!

I generally play Gaia, and have experimented with Morgan.

I like Gaia because of her efficency bonus and her ability to pop boom rather easily. A freebie mindworm here and there never hurt either.

As for Morgan, I don't know why I like him I'm not very good with him. The money I suppose.