World War AC

[big_canuk]

Hi all:

Haven't played single player in a long time, but I thought I'd give this a try to try out some of the new strats and tricks flying around. I'm using stockpile in queue, and will use upgraded crawlers. Haven't yet.

My strat looks very similar to Vel's, except, hoping I would get the EG, I went for the PEG, after Cent Empathy (I got the idea from Vel's 1st post, and the Idea that I could trade for restriction lifting techs. Its now 2134, and I just built the EG, and traded like crazy, and gave most techs to all my allies. I still have only 3 scouts. I will build probes now, I think.

I only got Gene Splicing on the restriction lifting beeline, but hopefully will get the EE's from pactmates soon.

I did some detailed reporting, but am giving that up now. I will just do the 10 year thing from now on.

Sounds like, from Vel's experience, I may be a little late, with my military, though I do have about 10 10+ min bases.

I'm thinking on a run for the VW, and the PEG simultaneously, with a switch to planned to build them. But that will further delay my military. Hmmm.... might have to go back to here if that doesn't work.

Here is the game log:

2101
to 50/0/50
move worker to forested nut sq
explore SW along river
former to 17,36 (road to next base site)
change to a CP
rps/turn 10.8

2102
former makes road
scout and cp toward enery special
Note: very beneficial for Uop to get 4 energy with base plus 1 worker: at 40/60 or 30/10/60 makes 3:1 split for 5 rps (nn +50% rounded *up*)
to 40/0/60 for breakthrough in 1
rps/turn 12

2103 tech ind base, choose Ind econ
scout to 97,21 (didn't make it)
CP to energy bonus square
rps/turn 12

2104 New CP to 104,20 (made it)
build base on 96,18 (energy bonus) Monitoring Station
rearange workers
former to 102,20
labs to 30/0/70 for breakthrough in 1
rps/turn 15.6

2105
tech ind econ, choose plan net
switch to FM and 40/0/60
scout inv monolith at 98,24
former road
CP to 102,22
switch to 50/0/50
rps/turn 16.8
next turn Univ Base will be 10.8 to get tech at 25rps

2106
scout to 101,25
base at 102,22 (thought about moving this puppy further along, but...) Otkreitia Discovery
former to 100,24
hurry formers at mon station (8 ec)(1 ec left)
17 rp/turn tech in 1 (25rps for tech)

2107
3 SPs started (all HGP) [added edit: by others of course]
tech - plan networks, take IA
formers built at Mon Station, switch to CP
former to 99,25 and build road
scout to 104,28
se to 40/0/60
cost = 54!, tech in 2 (25 rps/turn)

2108
Miriam starts the WP
Forest on 94.18
scout west
OD builds former, continue another
new former to 101,25
hurry CP at Univ Base (16 ecs, 3 left)
tech cost 54, accum 37, per turn 25.4

2109
UBase builds CP switch to crawler
tech IA take Biogen
can't switch to wealth, not enough ecs, drat!
Hive gets SotHB, drat
switch all bases to crawlers (eye to switching to wealth in 3 turns, so no mins will be lost producing anything prior to wealth)
scout to top of river, 101,29 (discover borehole)
former to 99,27 (another borehole, must be cluster)
tch cost 86, accum 6, per turn 25.2

2110
scout to 100,32
CP to 99,25
oops, scout out of territory so both UBase will drone riot. Let it cause labs more important than production
tech cost 86, accum 31, per turn 25.2
CP 1 active
Formers 3 active
scout 1 active
crawlers 3 in prod

4 pop
6 tech

10 score

2111
kopernick observ built on 97,23 Nut bonus and river, switch to crawler
scout to 97 31, back in territory
stop recording individual moves
Yes, biogen in 1
tech cost, 86, accum 57 t/t 31.2!!

2112
tech biogen, take soc psych
switch to wealth
switch to 50/0/50
same tech/turn 3 more ecs!
tech cost 128, accum 0, t/t 36

2113
hurry crawlers at OD, and MS
t c/a/t 128/36/36

2114
UBase, crawler, to CP
MS crawler to CP
OD crawler to Former
hurry crawler at KO, 19ec

2115
t c/a/t 128/108/36

2116
social psych, take SotHB
hurry former at OD 2ec
hurry CP at MS, 8 ec
t c/a/t 168/13/36 only 11 short of 4 years

2117
CP at UBase, switch to crawler
MS builds CP, switch to crawler
OD former switch to crawler

2118
hurry CP at KO, 16 ec
t c/a/t 168/85/34.8

2119
KO builds CP, continue CP
t c/a/t 168/118/33.6

2120
OD builds crawler, continue crawler
Budushii Dvor founded at 99,27
t c/a/t 168/152/30.6
+16ec/yr
CPs 2 active 1 prod
formers 4 active
scout 1 active
crawlers 5 active 4 prod
5 bases, 6 pop

6 pop
8 techs

14 score

2121
SotHB, Cent Eco, not offered, took Eth Calc
killed first MW, 80% damaged, whew
climactic research founded at 96,30
hurry crawlers at UB and MS
t c/a/t 221/19/48 only 10 short of 4 yrs

2122
UB builds crawler continue crawler
MS builds crawler switch to former
hurry CP at KO
build Mendelev College at 94,26 leave at scout because of below
Run into another worm, so back up and set to L
t c/a/t 221/68/55.2 tech in 3!

start reporting only highlights

2124
build Gagaril Memorial on 100, 32

2125
eth calc take Cent Emp
switch to demo

2127
t c/a/t 270/132/62.4

2130
cent emp, take prog psych
t c/a/t 321/48/70.8
+32 energy/year no extra facilities
CP 1 active
formers 11 active, 4 in prod
scouts 3 active, 2 lost
crawlers, 16 active 5 in prod
9 bases
15 pop
11 tech

26 score

2134
prog psych, take ad econ
build empath guild
trade for bunch of tech
give away most of rest
make 4 pacts
researching ad econ, 3 to go
t c/a/t 361/25/115.2
10 bases
30 votes, 20 pop(EG)
score:
pop 64
com 40
tec 15
sps 25
tot 144

just found another worm, and rather than attacking at 4:4, I set my scout on alert [shift]L. We'll see if it works. It sure worked great with my former in a base. It killed a 20% damaged worm, only getting 10% damaged itself. wow.


edited to add:

One of the reasons I have time to do this is because Googlie is on vacation in England/Scotland for a couple of weeks, slowing down a lot of my games (Thanks, G.).
When he gets back, his site would be a great one on which to hang these scenarios. He's always looking for traffic!

bc

[Tokamak]

Hey! Thanks for the report! Stuff like that might be useful. I haven't digested it yet (but I will!).

Let's consider this a dry run for Vel's qualitative comparison project.

[Avenoct]

Tokamak, thought I'd post here instead of email, just in case anyone else had the same problem. I can't get the (Brilliant-Nice-New and Improved) Smac version to load! The download was successful and I read the well written readme, but the file wasn't recognized by AC as either a scenario or a savegame (I tried changing the .se to .sav, etc.). Sorry for the bad news. However, I'm on a macintosh, and we all know that file conversions can be frisky at times, so don't mind this unless others also report the same.

-Smack (who's still interested if a fix should come about)

[Tokamak]

I just tested it on my system, and it failed to load there, too.

Wierd. I guess I must've somehow gotten the files crossed up. I'll fix it.

[Tokamak]

There... it should run just fine now. I tested it twice.

I don't know what went wrong, but at least it's fixed now.

Check your e-mail.

Cybergod: I sent you a fixed copy, as well.

Sorry for the screw up! Keep me posted if things still don't work.

[Avenoct]

Works like a charm! Glad I posted the error then and we caught it before more copies went out. Thanks again, I'm heading in mostly blind (trying to forget the above posts).



-Smack

[Tokamak]

Is your quote from 1984?

I hope so, 'cause I could really use 100 ec

[JustinSane]

After a couple more tests, I've come to the conclusion that yang is pretty much defenseless against a hard, fast worm rush from the cult. Much more critical than support from high weapon rovers are probe teams, or the newly captured bases mind-controlled. On an unrelated technical note, Miriam does not have the correct -1 planet rating in this scenario. I think native is clearly the way to go. One tactic that has been very effective in this scenario, and most other games where your attackers are mind worms, is the use of garrisons with the highest defense value you've got as cover for the worms. When attacking as the cult, instead of bee-lining for missles, I usually bee-line (after getting centauri empathy and neural grafting) for silksteel armor and comm jammers, to guard the worms.
I don't think that you intended for Yang to be so easy to take out with a rush, so I've got a couple suggestions for correcting that, if you release another patch, or for your official release. First would be moving the secondary hive base south, about as far south of the headquarter base as it currently is north. Second would be giving a clean, high morale trance defender in the headquarter base, The Hive. That base is just too vulnerable, considering how critical it is to the success of the coalition. It's almost always got one and often two secret projects in it by the time it falls, in addition to rendering all remaining hive bases on the continent useless for economy and research due to murderous innefficiency. This last problem could be partially corrected by a sea base in between the gaians and hive with another headquarters, so that if The Hive falls, the remaining bases are still productive. Removing all fungus in Yang's territory would also slow the attack down. I'd also consider removing the monolith by the hive, or moving it to the side closer to the ocean than the player. It's an important outpost for the attacker. Anyway, it's still a great scenario, and even after disposing of yang, it's still tough for the Cult to finish and win, since Miriam is pretty fierce about using rovers to counterattack mindworms before they get close enough. The Cult are also weak at research. Hope this helps to balance everything

[Tokamak]

JustinSane: Thanks! That's good to know.

I didn't really plan the player going native. The default player faction is the University, which really needs Free Market to capitalize on its strengths.

Trance garrisons are a good call. As on "overkill" solution, I think it's possbile to give all of a faction's units Trance as a freebie.

This news bothers me, since my 1/2 complete map features a vast fungal forest that helps define the borders. A native faction might just have too good a time. I'd been thinking about making the enemy HQs start out further, but doing that on my new map will mean that I'll basically have to start over

BTW, just how many worms did you have?! In my simulations, Yang usually has 10 -12 bases by the early 2140s, all sizes 5-7. You must've slapped together a truly horrific force to overrun all of that!

I'm not sure if this is an inherent flaw in the basic scenario, or just an isolated situation restricted only to the Cult. Can the University pull off the same trick?

[The Commodore]

Here! Me!

I rover rush the Hive, and got lucky. Had him off by 2150.

Most idiotic thing is, I lost...silly me, I forgot that Miriam was probe-happy here...she probed away my best bases.

It helped that I got the Borehole Nexus first. Well, to be honest, it was the monoliths around the Nexus that helped so much. UoP always does have the potential to be a great rusher, with its mighty research.

If only I had looked at Miriam...

[JustinSane]

I suppose going with the Planet Cult did create an entirely different scenario than was intended. I don't think giving all enemy units trance would really be justified though... perhaps a couple free trance defenders would be sufficient? Unless the fungus forest leads to coalition bases, I'd not be too concerned that it would imbalance the native factions. Even if they can successfully damage one coalition member with a rush, they are still left with a faction aproximatly half as good at research as the university. (-1 econ means no free market, and no free net nodes or +2 research either) And to reply to your question, my native force was actually surprisingly small. 1 spore launcher, 2 mindworms. However, by the end of the attack I had about 15 infantry, either 1-1-1 or laser infantry, and some probe teams (last 2 or 3 bases on the continent were mind controlled to save time. Green/fundamentalist rules ) Yang doesn't end up with 10-12 large bases if you take out his headquarters in the mid-20's. There was another base that fell before that as well; also a colony pod I believe. Since yang has roads between all his bases, and they are spaced 3 apart, it was a perfect situation for the worms to move into a base, heal, then take out the next one. Yang also never did get decent weapons, so counter-attack wasn't a threat. Seizing the command nexus really helped too. This first attack was slightly atypical though, as yang was quite late to get armor or probe teams, so scout patrols were feasible as suicide attackers, even with the perim defenses. Subsequent tries usually led to taking yang out around 2155, or ten years later.

[Tokamak]

Okay, against my better judgement, I took an hour off amd cruised the boards.

JustinSane and The Commodore: Thanks for testing the rush for me. Justin, thanks to you, I will studiously keep all monoliths away from the front from here on out. I'm a bit conflicted on how to handle the rush game. On one hand, the scenario was intended to present the player with a credible threat throughout the whole game, up to and beyond the HabDome era, allowing us to see situations almost never seen in traditional games. On the other hand, 'momentum' is a valid playstyle, and I don't want to arbitrarily make it impossible. The deal is, if a momentum player hasn't already decided the game in the first few decades, he has already lost the game. I think that, while I personally enjoy the game more when taking a slower, 'builder' approach, it is poor game design to try and force this playstyle on others. A good scenario should allow some tactical vermilsitude.

Giving the Coailtion bases a Trance (and maybe an ECM) garrison at the start is a good compromise. However, I found that it isn't as easy as just pressing shift-F1. Soemone needs to have the relevent techs before I can design a unit, which is neccessary to make the editor able to create the unit in question. I can't just give a faction a tech, and then take it away when I'm done, because tech costs are based on techs -learned-, not possessed. This would unfairly hamper whichever faction I gave the tech too. Even worse, Trance requires Secrets of the Human Brain. Giving this to someone sets off the 'secret discovered' flag, meaning that it won't properly give a free tech to its discoverer any more.

There is, however, a solution. I figured out how to alter the preset units in alpha.txt, and can now confidently create -any- unit I want, including 'impossible' combinations (ever seen an infantry based carrier with fungicidal tanks, grav struts, artillery, SAM, ECM, a deep-pressure hull, and X-gas before? Well, I have. It looked pretty @#$%ed-up!)

I figure maybe one ECM and one Trance unit might be enough to compensate for AI lameness. I'll set them in lurker mode so they don't wander off.

People interested in the 'how to's' of super-units are encouraged to go here , where I've posted my findings. Vel and Smack, if you are reading this, go there! Some of this stuff relates directly to your mods!


-edit- oh, yeah. Lordwraith, I got your e-mail. Smack has dsicovered a few minor bugs in the Classic version of SMAC Down, which I would like to fix before sending it out to you. You'll get it sometime tonight, I promise.

[Tokamak]

Using my new found knowledge of alpha.txt editing, I am very seriously considering giving all AI units inherent clean and police abilities. This will address a horde of inssues with AI incompetence.

By 'seriously considering,' I mean that I will definately add this into the next mod unless someone talks me out of it.

Also, I'm thinking that I'll encourage the Coalition to start using nerve-gas, once it becomes available. I think I know a way to do this.

[johndmuller]

Tokamak, Great Scenario

Its wonderful to see the AI doing more than respectably well. I guess I haven't played Zak in a while; I'm not used to getting so many techs so early, or did you juice it up somehow beyond the 60/40 allocation split?

I'm in my second transcend game - in the first, I wasted one base producing an SP and was apparently a bit overconfident on the offense and then found myself getting waxed by Yang's rovers and a bit put upon by Miriam as well (looked like I was going to lose, although I might have held on; perhaps I'll pick it up again if I want a lost cause challenge). This game I worried about defense a lot more (and tried to make sure I had enough probes); I don't have many bases, but I've managed to take out 4 or 5 Yang rover rushes and approach parity on the military tech side at least. I'm hugely behind on the power chart, but I managed to steal Fusion from Yang and finally made contact with the friendlies and got some tech and $$ to work with, maybe I can turn the corner. Definitely a welcome change from the usual AI play.

You sure seem to know a lot about fiddling with the .txt files; I hope you have the time and inclination to share your expertise with the group in a treatise of some sort; it will be greatly appreciated. If you want a challenge, perhaps you can figure out a way to seed a random map with all the terraforming advantages you give the non-human players.

I'm not saying that your balance is out of whack, just curious as to why the good guys don't do as well as the bad guys while getting seemingly at least as much good terraforming headstart. (I was surprised to see how much, from reading your early posts I wasn't expecting wall to wall boreholes when I finally saw my partner's land - but the bad guys still were way ahead - is it all tech and military?).

Is there a way to keep the SMAC characters when loaded from a saved game - when I went back to continue my game, all the representations had changed to the SMAX characters - the text was still SMAC names but the unit colors and everyone's pictures looked were from Xfire (I think I had become Sven), it makes elections and other conversations a bit confusing. This is only a minor issue in such a fine work.

Thanks again

[Tokamak]

The insomniac creator speaks:

The speed of the intial techs is due to the fact that you are starting with a level three base on excellent land. In particular, the energy/river/forest tile will shave a full turn off of the first few techs, all by itself.

Thanks for the kind remarks, and for the report. I get a real thrill out of people telling me of their experiences while playing my scenario.if you are interested in text file stuff, swing by the Creation threds. In particular, look at the "Basic unit types...," "Adding NEW terraforming...," and "monkey sweats...," threads. I may very well begin writing a Mod-Maker's Manual after I finish the new map, although to be honest, I am not the most knowledgable one on this topic.

I would love to have random maps with ample pre-terraforming, but I don't think this is possible

The bad guys do so much better than the Allies because 1) they start out pre-pacted, and 2) they have twice as many bases than the Allies. Yang, Miriam and Santaigo have nearly identical empires on the other side of the world, coplete with a second HQ.

I kinda went overboard on the boreholes. If you read the readme, you know that I wasn't too pleased with the clumsy look that it gave the map. I'm trying a more 'natural' approach on the sequel. we'll see if it works.

The image switching thing is a general problem with SMACX. It always fixes itself when I quit and restart.

With the woefully small amount of sleep I've been getting, I'll probably be done with the sequel in a few days (but don't quote me on that). Any ideas for the name? I was thinking of something basic, like SMAC Down: 2200, and then having the 'patched' versions increment the year by one each (ie the first bug fix would be SMAC Down: 2201). Naturally, the starting year of the game would be altered to match the name each time.