Non Lethal Methods and Yang

[Ned]

Does anybody disagree that one of Yang's, as oppose to anyone else's, most important earlier technologies is Intellectual Integrity? This gives Yang "non lethal methods" enabling Yang, running "police state" to have 3 police units pacifying 6 drones. This enables Yang to grow his bases to size 7 without Rec. Centers, Holo's, Research Hospitals. or Doctor specialists. This is quite an advantage!

[Blake]

I cant disagree with that, and I usually make it a point to steal IntInt as soon as possible. I don't research it myself usually, because Planned is so important, and once you have planned you are but 3 techs from ind auto.

However a pirate strategy I was playing around with was making a bee line to IntInt, basically sven has great difficulties with drone control, mineral poor bases so rec commons hard to build. Poor effic, = less bases = more drones. Bases more spread out (to take advantage of specials) = more energy lost to in-effic, compounded by poor effic. This leaves sven with no easy way to control drones. By getting non-lethal methods you can control 2 drones for a cost of 1 mineral row. Also sven can trade for other techs if need be. Also on the IntInt bee-line is democracy, which really helps sven to turn a profit, sven does not benefit from Planned much, and his crawlers are expensive. So the ind-auto bee-line isn't very good. Once you have the tech up to IntInt some great possibilities present themself:
Gene Splicing: Turn those kelpbeds into high-quality specialist income, and council votes.
Planetary Economics: Get that trade pact in place, and watch the income roll in, sven can easily win the gov if Lal is not around, and with his multiple treaties can really rake in the trade income. Especially good if you got PEG to0.

[Sikander]

Blake,

I agree with your comments regarding Sven's strategic considerations. I like to build the HGP, and then (with aqua-farms) I can split Sven's minions into a 50/50 split between specialists and workers. This allows GAs for either pop booming or economic reasons, and allows for the exploitation of those shelf squares (9 fop with aqua farms and tidal harnesses). The specialists as you know avoid the inefficiency loss that energy production suffers, which is a real help considering all of the reasons why Sven is prone to such losses. Finally the Specialists at a minimum don't aggravate drone problems, and of course can actually help them.

Without running Police State (and there are plenty of reasons not to for Sven) the use of a lot of police is a mixed blessing until clean technology, as each unit cuts into Sven's already thin Mineral surplus. Fortunately Clean Tech is on the same path as Gene Splicing and Democracy, both of which are very useful techs for Sven.

[Garth Vader]

Yes I do disagree with that. First getting planned and ind auto are more important because running PS/Planned/Wealth rocks, plus everybody wants crawlers. Second, using that many garrisons really bleeds your industry through support. Where as a quick beeline to my SE suggestion gives you +3 industry.

I am not saying I don't use a police garrison, but I only use one, and I don't make any special effort to get that tech.

[Blake]

When playing Yang I make it a priority to steal IntInt, I rarely research it myself, the reason being PLANETARY NETWORKS is the MOST important tech for yang, this gives him Planned, which is a no-loss SE setting for Yang. It gives probes, which means if your research is behind you can catch up. You have to assume you wont be able to trade much as Yang.

The other reason why I don't research IntInt is because I don't need it early. I'm a Builder. So every base gets 2 Scout Patrols and 2 Formers (2 formers is why Yang can outbuild "builder" factions), still leaving industry untouched. These 2 scout patrols let my bases grow up to size 2 or 3 which is as high as they can grow with forest. In my SP building bases I have 3 scout patrols, one probably supported by a nearby base. Once WP is done I probably have IndAuto so I start the condensors, and crawl them. If I don't have IndAuto I just work them. Now at this stage my bases grow beyond 2 or 3, so I start looking for improved methods of a drone control. Usually this is a rec commons, bringing my content pop up to 4, so once a base grows to 5 I turn one into a specialist, at this stage my research takes off. Having non-lethal troops would not improve this strategy at all, the only bonus being I wouldn't need a rec commons. But with +3 Industry a rec commons is cheap for Yang.

Once I get to those higher techs though, particually clean reactor I turn all those garrisons into Clean,Police. With 3 per base, a tree farm, and VW or HoloTheatre I'm ready to pop boom, you can't pop-boom as Yang without having basically every worker on the field bringing in energy, which probably means lots of forests and a few boreholes, crawlered food. NOW having 3 non-lethal troops, a rec commons and holo theatre let's my bases have 10 content workers. So I boom my bases to size 10, or higher if juggling specialists allows. A Hive pop-boom is a fearsome thing indeed, and very easy*.

So to summarise, a hive base wont grow above size 2 or 3 while working forest. You can afford to have 2 scout patrols per base, and 2 formers or attackers. No need for non-lethal at all.

You only need non-lethal police as Yang if you want to pop-boom, in order to pop-boom you need extensive infrastructure. But you wont have this early anyway. So my opinion is that IntInt is an important mid-game tech for Yang, but just a "nice" early game tech.

* for Yang to get a GA you need holo theatres and treefarms at minimum, research hosp. for pop>8 or so.
Then you need several boreholes per base, these are the only non-FM way to get energy of the scale needed to GA.
OR: Get hybrid forest, the +1 energy per forest and +50% pysch makes GA possible without boreholes.
In my experience it is easier to have lots of boreholes than hybrid forests, this is because Hybrids are so expensive they should be rushbuyed, Yang is cash poor but support heavy, so should have lots of formers. The oppisite applies for Morgan.

[Ned]

Blake, I think you make my point for me. You suggest that Yang is "cash poor," when actually, due to the non lethal methods, Yang's bases can grow to size 7 without Rec. commons, Holos or Research Hospitals. This "saves" 7 energy credits per base. THAT is equivalent to FM in terms of economy for the same size bases.

This suggest that every effort should be made to grow Yang's bases to size 7 as early as possible. This suggests a mixture of forests and farms, plus Aquafarms.

[knowhow2]

I must say this has been most interesting to read. I seldom consider garrisons as drone control. But I do have a question, when you guys talk about "garrisons" does that only apply to infantry or does rovers counts? Because in a MP I m playing right now I had a drone riot in a base. I parked one rover in it and immidietely the drone riot stoped. How come?

[Ned]

KnowHow2, Yes, any land vehicle with an offensive weapon acts as a garrison. Ned

[Aginor]

OK, I've played a LOT of Yang, and I've come around on this question...

I used to think that hitting IntInteg fast after PlaNets was the way to go. Because you're right in that the cost savings from not building the Rec Commons, the Holo Theater, and the Research Hospital early are HUGE. I find I'm rarely all that cash poor as the Chairman, since I use what I do get to rush build stuff early on so I can get as many revenue-producing bases up as fast as I can.

Really, the big advantage to having Police State without penalty on Transcend is the ability to just keep slamming out bases after you start getting Bureaucracy drones. See, by the time you get to around 10-12 bases on a Standard map, you can't build any new bases that will quickly have than one productive worker without building an SP - be it the VW as Zak, the HGP or the PTS. Otherwise you're stuck building the Rec Commons before you can even make the base productive, and that takes time or money you don't have to waste.

Yang (and to a lesser extent Santiago and Lal) don't have to care and can just expand with a will early on if they get the space without worrying about building the infrastructure to race for early projects. It leads to very different base structure, so you can expect to see heavily terraformed Deirdre, Zak and Morgan land, while Yang is too busy building bases in the first thirty turns to stress Formers (or use them for anything other than roads until after 2130, really).

But...the difference between three and six content citizens isn't that huge early on, especially since you've got to do A LOT of terraforming as Yang to have any shot at pop booming bases. If you've got Crawlers a size 3 base can build a Rec Commons at a pretty good clip, and you won't see the other size of size 5 much until you have IntInteg through theft or your own slow research. Now, don't think this means I ignore Non-Lethal Methods - my usual garrison is a best-armor ECM unit and 2 Police Infantry at interior bases. No need for Trance units - there isn't any Mind Worm that can kill 3 units, and if it kills one I turn around and kill it for the 20 or more credits.

(A 7 Mineral unit for 20 credits is a great trade, folks.)

Also...I've gotten in the habit of racing to IndAuto as Yang and slamming up the PTS by 2150. Obviously, that doesn't include getting to IntInteg early. Most games against the AI you can get the PTS and the Command Nexus up by 2160 and just turn the world into your very own slaughterhouse. In MP PBEMs starting strategy isn't too relevant, as you usually end up playing accelerated starts (to save yourself a month or better of play time).

It's worth noting that Police State/Planned/Wealth as Yang is the strongest Social Engineering option in the game - it puts you at -1 Economy (which is negligible - it means -1 Energy just at the HQ), +3 Growth, +3 Industry, +2 Police, +2 Support, and -2 Morale. Strong, no? It's worth pressing on to get IndAuto ASAP for that.

Also, you can go straight for IndAuto as Yang. Try this: InfoNet -> PlaNets, then IndBase -> IndEcon -> IndAuto, then you can immediately get CentEco. You should be able to polish off the whole tree in about 35 turns if you use CPs to build The Hive (or other base) up to size 5 and then convert all its workers to Librarians every other turn (provided you can get a surplus nutrient in the box when the citizens work). Then it's time to get Formers out, build Crawlers, cash them for the PTS, and then go HOG WILD with Colony Pods.

At that point the game is over...but you can play it out just to see how badly you can slaughter the computer with this kind of position advantage.

[Iskandar Reza]

Reading this thread made me want to play Yang. I've never played Yang. Inever realised how powerful he could be.

[Ned]

Aginor, I agree that Yang with Polic State, Planned and Wealth is one of the best combinations the game has to offer. However, I have run into definite cash problems if I get IA long before I get Intellectual Integrity. What happens is that Yang overbuilds expensive facilities while his bases remain small. Compounding the problem is that one has to have expensive rec commons, holos and research hospitals to grow the bases to add income. Add these expensive facilities these to most of Yang's bases and you will find you are completely out of money, so much so that you will either have to sell facilities or decrease research. I have actually been in this situation with Yang. It is not pleasant. Ned

[Sikander]

Ned et al,

I admit to having played Yang only twice, and probably not particularly well at that. But perhaps a terraforming / specialist strategy would be useful to overcome Yang's money woes (as described by Ned). By using condensor / farms, and either crawling them (if you have IA) or even working them you should be able to create some cash flow by using specialists. Since Yang has some trouble Pop Booming it seems best to use crawlers if possible. Another bonus here is that by using specialists the need for Rec Commons / Holo Theatres is reduced. (Really, once you have crawlers there is no need to have any workers at all in the extreme case, though you will obviously want some for high production squares like boreholes eventually.) Of course you will want the WP so that you can build the condensors early, but you will not need to lift nutrient restrictions in order to get the 4 nuts. Certainly Yang's support with PS works well with a terraforming sttrategy as Blake points out.

One problem with this strategy could be the difficulty in getting your bases up to 5 pop in order to have a choice of specialists. Yang is well suited to getting around this though, as he has excellent growth running planned, and excellent industry also. Simply grow your bases by crawling Nuts, or pod boom by crawling Mins and / or Nuts to a small base which will quickly grow back to two pop. (The PTS strategy of disbanding and rebuilding a base will also do well for this.) It is interesting that both Blake and Aginor are advocates of fairly early crawler use by Yang, as it wouldn't seem to be Yang's bag, baby. It does seem to be a strong strategy though, especially if you can get IA as early as they seem to.

[Blake]

It is actually quite easy to build up a size 5 city for Yang, assuming you got the WP, Yang has an excellent chance of getting the WP, he has +1 industry and +2 police,support going for him, so you can have a size 4 base with 0 minerals used on support, not bad really. The main thing which would stop you getting the WP is someone else cashing in AA's.

The map settings I tend to use are:
Huge/High Erosion/Arid , and either high or low native life.
No pod scattering.
Directed Research

This is somewhat different from low erosion, high rainfall and pod scattering on, and would change my opinion of the value of IntInt somewhat.

So resources are pretty thin, no income from pods and very limited terrain for base growth. Thus Cent.Eco is a very high priority for me, and I start planting forest. Bases with a nutrient resources get building pods, bases without build a couple of formers then a pod. One base with a nut resource is grown or pod-boomed up to size 4 and used to build the WP, and pre-crawler I also use probeteams to hurry the WP if I think I am falling behind (probe teams not needing support, and very handy to have lying around).

After cent-eco I beeline to IndAuto, I don't think you can research that directely so I grab Social Pysch too. This research can take a while, and I've probably finished WP before getting crawlers. So I get my 2 formers per base to build condensors, these are done in no time, gangs of 4 formers finish a condensor in 2 turns. Then work the condensors, once a base reaches size 5 convert 2 workers to libarians. As soon as IndAuto arrives get crawling the Condensors, I always crawl nutrients in favour of minerals, this supports lots of specialists. Once a base is crawling 1 or 2 condensors I start crawling forest. I build little other than crawlers and formers for a long time, I end up with quite a lot of specialists, and few facilities. I like to drill a few rivers, every bit of energy helps after all. I stop building crawlers once I've ran out of SP's to build. Now I work on facilities, building up to my pop-boom and complete global domination.

So when I play Yang I am far from energy poor, I also have only 2 or 3 workers per base (= no drones), the rest are high quality specialists. My choice of conditions means that the PTS is as much a curse as blessing, I would need significant terraforming in order to stop a base starving.

I can see the merit of ICS'ing and heading to IndAuto, but surely that would require a rainy, low-med erosion map. My strategy pretty much assumes worst case conditions.

If I fail to get the WP... well, I guess I would just build more bases, build the CN and play Yang like most people think he should be played. (+2 support = lotsa military, rather than +2 support = former hoardes)

edit: In reply to ned's reply to my second reply by "cash poor" I mean cash poor compared to a Free marketeer, so I have plenty of cash for facility upkeep, selective upgrades and selective rushbuys (tanks, commons, netnodes), but not enough to throw into rushbuying hybrids at 300 a pop. Now once fusion labs and engineers have come along...
Also my WP centered strategy works equally well on doubleblind, it's just the bee-line to IndAuto could take 150 years. It also works for any faction which can snag the WP, but Hive, Drones, Believers benefit most.
[This message has been edited by Blake (edited April 11, 2001).]

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Blake and Sik,

I couldn't have said it better. Yang screams to be played as a faction heavy on the specialists.

Consider running police a boon with the extra support making an army of formers begging to be put to work making condensor farms (assuming WP of course).

This also plays to his tendency/necessity to ICS like mad. All those size 5 bases having 2 librarians and/or techinicans make a huge windfall in terms of econ or research sans efficiency losses which otherwise would cripple his energy gains from his ICS'd empire. PTS is a very important SP as well as it jump starts his ability to get to size 5 ASAP. If you can get HGP your home free, between the talent and a police unit(s). Of course once you have PTS you are set to PTS pod boom as well.

So I agree whole heartedly his first priority is a run toward IA. (But I guess the same arguement could be applied to all factions going for IA, but for Yang there are some very significant bonuses.)

Ned I think one of the problems/pitfalls you may be experiencing is the mindset that you think you need to build infrastructure with Yang in order to quell drones else the need for Intellectual Integrity and nonlethal (which is a great tech for Yang but to my mind comes into play somewhere in the mid game once Yang is on the offensive and is used to quell captured bases). Yang b/c he is energy strapped needs to shy away from facilities and the maintentance upkeep. Only after wealth is in play and a number of size 5's exist do I normally try to develop infrastructure. The exception of course being recycle tanks. Other than that I may have a sprinkling of rec commons and nodes an occasional creche to get to size 5 quicker, but really until IA rolls around I'm busiest making a garrison, building formers, and of course more pods.

[Sikander]

Ogie,

Good to see you are still lurking buddy!

Blake,

I tried the strategy out to about m.y. 2060 today. No problems at all, except I started on an island just small enough to not qualify for a unity transport. I went for Cent. Ecology 1st, and then straight to Ind. Auto. I had crawlers at about 2055 (I had the WP built about 2050). By 2060 I had raised two corners of my island to connect to two other islands, about doubling my available land area, had built the Command Nexus, and two condensors. I have the VW about 50% completed as well. My island is otherwise 90% forested and mined. I see nothing but smooth sailing ahead, as I am experienced in terraforming, crawlers and specialists.

The Planet I created was huge, low erosion, low rainfall (very advantageous for the human player as the AI doesn't terraform well) medium native life, pods on. Seems a good strategy, though it will be a while before I can lift all the restrictions. Until then I'll keep busy with both horizontal and vertical growth.