On creating synergy....

[Velociryx]

I’ve played the game mentioned above out, and will give a general synopsis here, to be followed soon by more detailed notes with each segment.

In general though, here’s the score:
Began with a huge planet, lots of erosion, average water and native life, playing the research hound, Zak. Started off on a cozy little island, big enough for eight bases spaced three apart….some would call this too small to be viable, but I’m quite happy with it, and I think it’ll do splendidly for these purposes, so off we go….

Early game beeline:
Since there’s no pod scattering, the early game mobility techs are pretty much unimportant to me for the moment. Centauri Empathy IS important, however, and in an attempt to get out of the habit of gunning for crawlers really early, I decided to make sure I got SotHB first….to that end, I went with Centauri Ecology as my free tech so I could build formers while scoping things out, then to biogenetics, social psych, coasting into SotHB and widening my tech lead.

From there, it was back to the diehard builder stance, with Planned coming just in time to help fill up the continent, and Wealth/Crawlers arriving just when I needed them (and had a number of coastal tiles terraformed up). I find that this beeline actually serves me better than a straight shot to crawlers, as it gives me the free tech from secrets (which I can’t quite get first if I go straight for crawlers), and it gives the formers more time to work.

Thanks to a bit of advanced planning, I had one of my earliest bases start work on the ME, switching to the EG as soon as the tech became available and snagging that project shortly thereafter (along with the HGP, by the way!). Those two projects in hand, I wrangled flex out of somebody (Santiago?) in trade, got myself elected governor, and started building crawlers mostly, but also some sea formers to start making those shelf squares pay, while switching to Market to pick up faster tech and money for rushing of crawlers.

Once the mineral counts were where I wanted them, I determined that it’d be possible to completely surround my island with an array of 12 fringe bases, and so set about creating the necessary pods, timing the founding of my first fringe base to fall just after the completion of the Planetary Transit System.

After the resource restrictions came off, it was a short stop to pick up Plasma Armor (getting lasers and impact weapons in various trades), and I was on my way to MMI and Fusion!

At this point, leading in tech and population but being dead last militarily, everybody decided they hated my guts. Well….everybody ‘cept Morgan (who had a treaty with me, and had a military only a half step above mine) and Lal (who died TWICE at Yang’s hands, escaping in a pod the first time but finding his way into the ol’ punishment sphere the second)

The festivities began when Yang sneak attacked me, taking out two sea formers. That same turn, Santiago called up and demanded 300 EC. She was none too happy when I told her to go play in traffic and promptly joined forces with the Gaians against me.

Miriam (who had been giving the Gaians a royal pasting for the course of the entire game) decided she didn’t want to be left out of the fun, and called me a godless dog when I sank two of Yang’s attack foils and two of his transports. So she joined the fray too.

Morgan was actually doing well, research wise, snagging most of the projects I either didn’t want, or didn’t have the tech for yet, and I was okay with that, but had to draw the line when he started work on the HSA.

Probe foils were built, and soon I was working on that project as well, completing it one turn before Morgan in what turned out to be quite a contest, with the AI actually cashing in units and crawlers in an effort to speed build the project!

Of course, I got caught in my efforts to steal the tech, and now, EVERYONE had declared vendetta against me.

Just for grins, when I got Planetary Economics, I convened the council and tried to pass the Global Trade Pact to give them more money….the dummies wouldn’t pass it!

So….with the whole world suddenly out to get me, and my core bases held with an army of…..ready for this….

4 Scout Patrols and 4 Trance Scouts (the fringe bases had infantry based probes (plasma + trance), plus a handful of rover prototypes (synth, plasma, laser, impact, and gatling)….oh, and I still had my indie scout and a unity rover too! Can’t forget those!

And a fleet presence that amounted to one laser cutter and three gatling foils, I figured it was about time to make use of the industrial might I had been so carefully building…..

In short order, I had several strong patrols in the water, more on the way, and found myself working on the CBA and CF.

I tried to make up with Morgan, but he wasn’t having any of it, so I began contemplating making him my submissive trading partner…..

Soon as the choppers were flying, I sprinkled a few at fringe bases to take the tedium out of constant naval patrols, and thanks to the arrival of the choppers, I was able to pull an odd ship off of the patrol routes here and there to construct an attack fleet to go party with Morgan.

My initial fleet consisted of 3 Chaos Foils (recently upgraded to fusion reactors, too!), a probe foil (not upgraded to the new reactor), and a fusion transport with four 8<3>2*2’s in it. These, along with four “Thunder-Class” Assault Choppers (8-1-12*2) and a single “Dragonfly-Class” Anti-Air Chopper, headed out with a new fusion sea colony pod to found a base I simply called “Staging Area” about three spaces from Morgan’s coast.

The following turn, with rovers loaded and ready, the choppers flew out and emptied out a nice, lightly held coastal base.

Rovers moved in, and we had our beachhead.

The following turn, some additional choppers began making their way toward the staging area, and the attack proceeded in earnest. As the battle drew out, Morgan was able to put AAA defenders in his bases, and they began to MUNCH my choppers, but we had the industrial might to keep pressing the attack, and in fact, we could crank them out faster than they could kill them, so conquest was pretty simple. Choppers attack (even if I had to use 2-3 to be rid of the AAA defender)….once the AAA defender died, MORE choppers attacked until the base was empty, rovers move in to claim the prize.

Some notable combats though, including the TOTAL destruction of the Morgan Airforce (‘bout twelve planes, sitting under the protection of two AAA garrisons), along with some dozen planes belonging to everybody’s favorite Chairman.

Sunspot activity prevented a quick submission, but I did take advantage of the time to kick Morgie off of his starting continent completely, demanding his surrender as soon as we could talk again.

Surprisingly, I still had to take one of his coastal bases to force a submission, but the odd thing was that, Dee landed on former Morgan soil asking for a cease fire. When I refused, she surrendered too!

I promptly gave Morgan all but one of his bases back (keeping one to maintain a presence on his land….my “fort”), and made plans to take the now elite attack force down to visit Miriam….after all, my lovely pet Dee needed some more bases, and Miriam had plenty! It’s only Christian to share, so I figured I’d send some Chaos choppers and Battle Buggies down her way to see if I could convince her that sharing would be in her best interest.

And that’s where the game is now. Me, Morgan, and Dee pacted together and having wild seaside parties on a regular basis, the defense scheme mentioned above in place having COMPLETELY locked the bad guys out of my continent, and my spare units from that defense being utilized on the attack (along with several reconfigured garrison troops I got back when I gave up all the Morgan Bases I had conquered).

At present, the choppers are in one of Dee’s bases near Miriam’s continent, making sure that the two closest bases remain nice and empty, one transport (with the aforementioned 4 battle buggies) is one turn off the coast and under the protection of a AAA foil (not that there are any enemy planes in the area anyway, having been smashed by the choppers on the scene, but hey….I’m a careful guy!), and two more transports are further back, each loaded with four 6-<3>-1*2 garrisons inherited from those Morganic bases.

I think we’ll all be home by Christmas….Miriam doesn’t have Fusion or AAA yet…

-=Vel=-

[Avenoct]

Vel, I read this late last night, before you played it out, and I think the second two 'strategy' posts really round out the theories and practices of Doctrine: Defensive. Excellent! Could this be an appendix to your new guide? Or maybe there could be a strategies guide that talks about this, and other approaches to the game? That could be a nifty collaborative effort...could include synopses all those discussions about 'rush-building', ecodamage strategies, etc.. Just a thought.

-Happy Crawlering,

Smack

[Fitz]

I started a new game based on your philosophy here last night, and it was certainly interesting. The one thing I found was that since I was going rather fast (played to 2195 in 1 hour) it was sort of hard to keep track of all my plans and use my former in a coordinated and useful manner. Any how, here is a synopsis, minus years because I'm doing it from memory:

Playing the drones, random huge map, seems to be largely land from initial explorations.

MY2100 - 2140
Since I have a tech lag and an industry bonus, I decide to use synthmetal sentinals as colony pod escorts. Right about the time I set down my fifth base, Zhakarof shows up in my territory. We promptly call a truce, but I'm nervous because he seems to have a broadshared border. Also, at this era it looks like I may have to give up on the ringing with sea bases, as there seems to be LOT of land mass. However, once I get to 6 bases, I duly set three to SPs, letting the others go on expanding since my tech lag means I can neither prototype nor build crawlers/probes yet.

MY2140-2170
Free Market at last. Normally I avoid this like the plague, but this time I want to bump up my income/tech speed. Once it is on, I keep expanding while heading for Crawlers. Indications are that Mount planet is too my west, so I expand that direction. As I expand, I find a coastline to the south, east and west, with possible land bridges to the west and south. I carefully chokepoint bases at key points, praying it wont screw me up if they turn out to be penisula.

Zhakarof sells me Lals comlink, and I promptly call him up. Hew is slightly more forthcoming as a trading partner, but not for anything other than foundation techs. I do get secrets of the human brain (aloowing trace) but rather stupidly ignore this critical ability at the moment.

Researching Doctrine Mobility allows me to protype a Synthmetal Rover at my HQ. It moves to a southerly pod, which unleashes an earthquake. I curse as I am sure that this has created a large connection just out of sight to a southern land mass. The next pod the rover pops teleports it adjecant to one of lals bases. Instantly two extra drones at my HQ due to FM, so I disband it since there is no way I can control the drones.

Finally, the tech tree allows Industrial Economics. Crawler expansion begins. About this time, I nab the Weather Paradigm and Virtual World. I immediately begin searching for bases that need network nodes to control drones, since I STILL don't have rec commons. Just as crawlers are starting to reach optimal levels, I get wealth, and the PTS a few turns later. Expansion phase three is entered.

MY 2170 - 2195
The slow rate of research once again defines that I must expand quickly. Expansion shows that the coastline is completely mine to the south, west, and east. One sea base protypes a foil, causing instant drone riots (cursed Free Market) which is disbanded and replaced with a probe foil. The probe foil scouts out my initial sea base expansion, then goes to ensure that the coastline is fully mapped out. Meanwhile, that coastal base begins cranking out bases every 3-4 turns, speeded by a few convienient pod pops by the probe foil.

Mindworms are becoming a serious threat. I belatedly remember that I can't attack effectively because of FM, and upgrade a few key bases to trance defenders as MWs approach. Start saving 400 ec to upgrade them all en mass (5 -10 turns from 200 to 400), but keep finding other important things to spend it on. Trance defenders become the default for new production.

Add democracy and start adding Children's creche's once I get Intellectual integrity. First two sea bases go down when Zak, who has been amazingly quiet, calls me up to offer a Pact if I help him agianst the Hive. I promptly accept, and get his map. The continent I am will be easy to suround (including his portion) right up to the chokepoint where his border meets lals. Zak has me to his south and lal to his north. He also has a large portion of the Uranium flats right across my northern border, but I already have CPs going that way to push him back, so that isn't a problem. I start building probes to send through Zak to lal to steal some techs, knowing Zak will buffer me. Also plan to switch to Knowledge as soon as I get Cyber ethics. Yang is to the south-west, right across a short stretch of ocean from my Volcano bases, so I plan to get my sea bases there asap.

MY 2195+ (plans for the future)
I am researching or just got plasma steel. I plan to lift the restrictions, grabbing impact if I can't beeline, and then head straight for clean.

Diplomacy wise, I will switch off Wealth once Zak starts getting antsy, to knowledge if I can, nothing if need be. The bonuses are small when running FM and playing Domai. And the penalty is making me vulnerable to MWS. Probe actions against Lal and the Hive to start with, buying up lals sea base to my North-north-east if I can, which is right where I need to put my northernmost sea base of my east coastline.

Will continue to mass produce crawlers, concetrating now on placing primarily along the vocano are (West-South coastline area) while filling in the remaining continental areas. Sea bases (currently coming from a East coast base) will start being produced in the South coastal bases asap, but I only have two rather new bases there.

Comments:
Free Market is giving me a huge boost right now, probably in the 40-60 ec /turn range and techs every 7-9 turns. I will abondon it if needed though.

It is very hard to keep track of my plans for a colony pod, crawler, or expansion plans for some reason. Maybe I was playing too fast or just too tired. But I think concentrating on the Doctrine : Defense to make sure I was doing the right thing instead of doing it all by instinct was making me feel a little out of control compared to normal. However, I plan to continue this over a few games, on the basis that if I can train myself to do it instinctually, I will become a much better player. Keeping myself flexible to the situation at the same time might be hard. Given that my old style of playing was about as flexible as a Seqoia tree, anything could be an improvement.

-Fitz

[NorthSwordsman]

Fitz,

It sounds like you are experiencing the same thing I am right now- trying to learn a new playing style in place of the old inflexible one. I know the feeling, bud. It's maddening to keep track of all this... sigh.... let me know how it turns out, I'd like to compare the end result with what I have. I tried it as Morgan... blasted worms! They were driving me nuts at FM.... From early indications, there is something to be said for this playing style. Is it practical? maybe. Does theory match up with the real world? sometimes.

[Fitz]

My old style worked very well, but had some huge disadvantages. I focused on minerals and let energy languish until the mid to late game. I built almost everything best/best, avoiding shells because I it would cost way to much to upgrade everything to best/best from shell. Obviously, selective upgrading is the key.

Also, I went pure infrastructure and very little military. Basically, I allways built a facility if there was one available after initial expansion/defenses. Works fine against the AI in lower levels, but not so well against humans or Transcend AI (especially on huge maps). I also stopped expanding at the beruacracy limits.

This meant that if I repelled the computers initial bungled invasions, I would leave them to get way to powerful until I was building facilities faster than tech. Typically I would launch an offensive around 2300 - 2350. Slow, and takes forever to mop up, but invariable you roll over the computer. Not always before reaching transcend.

I like the idea of having coordinated armies, instead of sending over a boatload of rovers and performing a late game rover rush on the AI.

[death_head]

Same problem here. I could never figure out what was worng with my game, until I realized that not all facilities need to be built...even in the early game, if I have enough anti-Drone structures for a long time, now I can actually switch emphasis to something else for a bit

[NorthSwordsman]

Fitz, it sounds like our playing styles are very similar! .

One thing I am learning that using Vel's system he outlined here... being Morgan, running FM, I'm pulling in the credits hand over hand, tech likewise. I'm beating the AI to nearly every single Secret Project. Denial strategy works fine, Apparently this system favors builders like Morgan... naturally! This is a good way for those who favor Morgan above others to operate.

It came to the point where I am at around 2290? (late 2200's anyways), and I'm bored with it- it's a cakewalk. Vel, you are a genius at this!

Now, if only the system would work as *well* for momentum players as it does for builders.

I'm assuming that this works excellent for hybrids, even through I haven't really tested it as such. Has anyone else?

NS

[Fitz]

If you want a challenge, try it with Yang or another faction that doesn't allow +1 energy per square easily (the Cult). Yang has the obvious advantage of support (with police state) allowing more terraformers and highter industry (especially with planned) allowing quicker building of shells/formers/crawlers, so he shouldn't be terrible.

I plan to try this when I'm staying at a friends house for a week. We always play LAN games or hotseat, and I want to see if it allows a cakewalk with another good human player, especially one who loves military units and usually harrasses me unmercifully.

[NorthSwordsman]

Hmm... I think I will start a game with YangieBoy tonight and see what happens. If it is a valid model (there isn't much doubt, is there??) then Yang should just EXPLODE across the surface of Planet leaving shambles in his wake.....

I'll let you know how it goes.

[Velociryx]

Further refinements:

First, my apologies for the delay…been into the guts of the final edits and formatting for the SMAX guide, and it pulled me away from here for a time….well, that and another interview opportunity! Whooo-Hoooo! Who knows, if I get enough of those, it could mean good tidings indeed for my books!

Anyway, I’m glad to see that you guys are experimenting with the Doctrine: Defense game, and I’m glad to see it’s working out for you!

Smack: Excellent idea, re: a “level two” type guide with all manner of advanced discussions in it!

Fitz: I know it’s probably too late to impact your current game, but on a continent that size, I’d recommend a slight shifting of the basic idea – turn all the bases on the broad shared border between you and Zak into “fringe bases,” and if the continent is truly massive, then you might be better off treating your coastal bases as fringe, and not expanding into the sea….of course, if you can do it and handle the b-drones, then go for it….I was just wondering about expansion time….if the continent is really HUGE, it might take too long to set all that up. Anyway, same basic principles, ‘cept instead of foils, use rovers but you’ll want to armor them up, so it’ll be a bit more expensive….then again, you’ll have more minerals in land fringe bases as a rule, so that should just about even out with the added costs.

Northswordsman: Yep….one of the principle advantages to the interlocking defense is the ability to run Market for an extended period, and in absolute safety. No matter what the rush-crowd tells you, the fact is that if you’re talking about the early to mid game, and assuming a similar population level, there’s NO WAY they can keep up tech-wise with a Marketeer, unless they’re running FM themselves, and if they’re rushing in the early game, they’re not.

About the best a rusher can hope for (with labs at or near max, +4 effie), is tech every seven turns. Marketeers can get tech in four (easily) or less during that same period in the game, and this, in fact, is why people who favor the rover rush ALSO favor playing with pod scattering on. Their beeline sees them getting rovers and foils quickly, meaning they get more pods than somebody pursuing the beeline mentioned above, and many of those pods contain free techs or AA’s which allow them to keep pace….in fact, it’s the ONLY thing that allows them to keep pace.

One of the good things about playing hotseat games is that it allows some on-the-fly comparisons with my allies.

In a hotseat game about a month ago, I was playing Morgan, running Dem, FM, Wealth and raking in tech in four. My ally was Santiago (who started in the Monsoon jungle, btw), running Dem, Green, Nothing with labs at 80% was also getting tech in four, but she had almost triple my population!! Of course, that comparison is just a general guide, but the fact is that a Marketeer can keep pace technologically with a MUCH larger empire, and if the populations are even close, then the Marketeer will bring in more tech (and as a bonus, the +4 effie crowd with labs maxed has NO money for rushing, which sees the Marketeer pulling WAY ahead in the long run, since he’s got the steady influx of income to continue rush-building every turn).

I’ll be interested to hear how your games play out…and I’d imagine with Yang and Domai’s industrial might, they’ll be able to get everything set up really quickly, although in their cases, specialist bases might not be such a bad idea, since they’re a little energy shy (Yang) and research shy (Domai).

I think you’ll find that any faction can excel using the system described above, but it’s really too slow, developmentally, for a Momentum player to make effective use of it (by the time he gets set up, Builders and Hybrids are also set up—assuming they’re pursuing a similar approach—and his attack will likely fail.

And as to those further refinements:

1) As mentioned above, if you find yourself on a really massive continent, your best approach might be to forget expanding into the sea, and just treat your coastal bases and any shared border bases as “fringe.”

2) In order to begin improving the mineral counts of your (sea) fringe bases, once you’ve accumulated the first row of minerals toward your clean sea formers, you might want to consider rushing those as well—earlier, I recommended against rushing anything but the initial infantry based probe….in truth, it’s probably more effective to have the sea former as your first build, rush it, then rush the infantry based probe right after. It means a larger initial investment in each base, but you’ll double your fringe base’s mineral counts MUCH more quickly.

3) Select a few (well defended) sea bases for further development, and make that development purely along mineral lines (subsea trunkline, eventually genejack factory and robotic assembly plant). Even with their relatively small number of starting minerals, you’ll see these bases rocketing upward quite nicely in their total mineral counts by the late game, and this will enable you to run your entire war effort from those bases, allowing your core bases to focus exclusively on enhancing infrastructure, launching ODP’s and sattelites, or other good stuff like that.

OoO

Coordinated Military:
Fitz brought up another good point, and I thought I might try my hand at expanding on it here.

In most games where you’re worried about an early to mid game rush, they take two forms:
1) An “unscouted” rush, where the player builds an attack force and send them out without knowing exactly where his opponent is, or
2) A “scouted” rush where the attacker finds an opponent first, and then builds an attack force to go cause trouble.

If it’s the first case, then the player using the methods above has nothing at all to fear. The attack force is likely small (1-2 transports and maybe a destroyer escort), and the attack units will likely be all rovers.

This is the kind of force that simply gets sunk on the high seas by the method outlined above….when the attacker draws close, he won’t be able to land, thanks to all the coastal crawlers, and he’ll find himself in range of at least one, probably two defensive task forces. Even if the attacker manages to sink one of the destroyers, the other two will ride out and kill the enemy attack ship, then sink the trannie. And the attacker can’t run, either, since your destroyers will be able to outrun him.

In the second case, it’s probably a mid-game attack, and so we’re talking about both sides having air power.

There’s probably an enemy sea base in the neighborhood used to shuttle choppers closer, allowing them to strike out, and there are two possible outcomes:

1) If your HAC patrols indicate the presence of a nearby sea base (borders on the water), then a quick rush toward the base will empty it, allowing one of your task forces to move in and capture the base before the attack can even be launched.
2) If the attacker managed to move his forces out of the base before you knew it was there, he’ll get first strike, and his own choppers will sink one of your navy task forces and prolly blow away two choppers. The good news is, he’s done, and on your turn, your choppers in neighboring bases can move in and return the favor, then proceed to take his sea base.

Also, there’s the possibility of a suicide chopper run. Keep in mind that his choppers will be at least 30%, and probably 60% damaged when they pop up inside your LOS. Yeah, he might get lucky and gain first strike, again, taking out a task force of your boats and maybe two of your choppers, but then he’s done and you’ll wipe them off the map with your Air Superiority Choppers nearby.

In any case, the battles will occur in and around your fringe bases, and not at your all-important core.

And, when you’re ready to make offensive moves of your own, you’ve got all the raw materials right there. The fringe bases you selected to focus on increasing their mineral counts can build clean transports and infantry/rover shell units in a single turn, and these can be upgraded to the configurations needed en route to wherever you’re going. Also, you’ve got your pick of escorts (destroyers, which can be upgraded to best armor and AAA), and several choppers. It’s easy enough at that point to build a few sea colony pods out toward your enemy and move your well-balanced attack force within striking range of the enemy.

In any case, when you ARE ready to make strikes of your own, they won’t be like the attack forces you intercepted. They’ll be balanced, well-rounded attack forces, capable of dealing with any number of threats, and capable of dealing out a LOT of damage to the enemy. Also, they’ll be easily replaced, thanks to your constant attention to industry.

::sigh::
‘k…..I gotta get back to tweaking the SMAX guide proof, but when I logged on here this morning, I was quite pleased to see that others were experimenting with the interlocking defense system, and please, let me know how the games turn out for you!

-=Vel=-

[Verrucosus]

Peacekeepers Adopt Doctrine Defense

U.N. Headquarters, Commissioner's Office, MY 2116


"The Secretary of State for Research is here to see you, Commissioner."

"Show him in, Sarita. ... Ahh, Dr Kakani. What news do you bring?"

"Commissioner Lal, I am proud to inform you that our researchers have made a breakthrough."

"Already? The Assembly has allocated funding for Secrets of the Human Brain only three weeks ago!"

"Errr, I'm afraid we have not uncovered those secrets yet. I'm here to present our findings on Doctrine: Defense."

"Where did you get funding for that? If the opposition finds out we've redirected funds again, it will make headlines for weeks."

"There is no need to worry about that. Doctrine Defense is just a little something one of our researchers scribbled down at work. No funding was involved so far. Doctrine Defense is a long-term vision of how we can secure our position on this continent. Here is the datapad."

"Hmmm, looks interesting, it will take some time to study it. I will get back to you when I need more information. Now, I want you to return to U.N. Planetary Trust immediately and get your people to concentrate on your official project. Our scouts need that trance defense technique I promised during the campaign."

"Of course, we're working on it non-stop, Commissioner."

"Thank you, Dr Kakani, Sarita will show you out ... Sarita, no calls for the next hour, please."


~~~


U.N. General Assembly,
Hansard Report on the 23rd Day of the 12th Session (MY 2123), page 13
still: Afternoon Session, Commissioner Question Time


Lal [Commissioner]: "... and I wish to congratulate my friend, the Hon. Member for Temple of Sol West for the excellent work his former teams have done in getting those forests planted. I want the Assembly to know that our formers are the real heroes of our success at establishing our Peacekeeping Society on Planet."

Speaker: "Number 6."

Lal [Commissioner]: "I refer the Hon. Member to the reply I gave some moments ago."

Sherman [Leader of the Opposition]: "Will the Commissioner comment on the resignation by various senior officers, including the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the General of the Army, from his Security Council in protest against his proposed cuts in military spending? Is it not true that these resignations confirm that our military spending needs to be increased rather than cut in favour of ever more formers and colony pods? Should we not prioritise the security of our existing holdings over the need of improving and expanding our territory?"

Lal [Commissioner]: "I am happy to announce that the Commission will address the concerns which the Leader of the Opposition has raised in an accurate, if long-winded, way in its upcoming report on Industrial Automation and Supply Crawlers. We believe to have found a way to reconcile the needs of security and expansion. I would also like to remind the Assembly that the proposed cuts in military spending have been explicitly supported by the Chiefs of the Naval and Air Staffs who have realised the important work our formers are doing not just for our economy, but for our security as well."

Sherman [Leader of the Opposition]: "Is it not typical for the inefficiency of this administration that we even have a Naval and Air Staff while we do not have any ships or planes? Can he ... [Laughter] ... can he explain why, after more than twenty years on this planet we do not even have a Children's Creche while even the Spartans are enjoying their Recreation Commons?"

Lal [Commissioner]: "If the Leader of the Opposition wishes to run for office in the Spartan Federation, I have no objections. It is ... [Laughter] ... it is the responsibility of this Commission to take a long-term ..."


~~~


Err, sorry about that. I wanted to give a dramatised version of my first attempt at Doctrine: Defense, but I guess I got caught up too much in irrelevant details, so I better break this off. Anyway, last weekend I started a game that had excellent conditions for testing Vel's suggestions.

I was playing at Librarian Level as Lal on the Huge Map of Planet and had the central continent all for myself. Even with the fastest expansion paradigm from his guide, it took ages to fill up the continent, about 8 colony pods being eaten by worms. Base #42 was established on the Northern edge of the Uranium Flats in MY 2213. The coastal highway was finished in MY 2221 and my coastal crawlers were in position by 2240. Because building this stuff took so long, I only managed to establish a single sea colony (in the New Sargasso area).

With that many bases, I would have thought that - even on Librarian level - Bureaucracy Drones would run berserk, but they were kept in check by the Peacekeeping talent bonus and (later) switching to Green and giving my Trance Scouts non-lethal weapons.

While I was building my defenses, Yang was beating up Deidre on the L-shaped continent (last Gaian base captured MY 2208), while Santiago defeated Morgan and Zakharov on the Eastern continent (I was lucky enough to finish the Empath Guild and buy Morgan's techs just before he was out of the game in 2202; Zakharov had been reduced early to a single base at the southern tip of that continent, but held out against Santiago until 2220). Miriam was on the Northern continent.

With the bad guys in charge everywhere else, things could have easily become dangerous for me, but for some reason they did not come after me, although I ran Democracy + Knowledge after 2213, which should have provoked all of them. Yang was desperately trying to establish a base at the Ruins - he did three times, but it always vanished after a few turns. Santiago, even after defeating Morgan and Zakharov, still had to fill the Eastern half of her continent. Miriam had a bad day as well. By 2230 she had 32 Plasma Garrisons patrolling her continent, but had no clue of how to build a boat. Yang and Santiago had good techs (chaos weapons), but, luckily, no Doctrine: Initiative until the 2250s.

Well, the end came in 2261 with the usual sunspot activity around that time. After rush-building hybrid forests and hab complexes in most bases, I switched to Planned, boosted Psych expenditure to control the drones, so the traditional Lal Pop-Boom was underway. MMI arrived just in time before the end of sunspots, so I became Supreme Leader in 2273. My army consisted of 42 Police Trance Scouts and a single Plasma Garrison on ceremonial guard duty at UN Headquarters.

During the Pop-Boom period I had the fun of watching a single Spartan Transport moving up and down my coast looking for a place to land. Because of the sunspots, I could not see Santiago's face.

Although my game might be described as boring in a conventional sense and I did not get to the point of implementing the more advanced features of Doctrine: Defense, I had a lot of fun setting it all up.


I have a question though. If we are trying to keep the enemy off our continent, would it not be better to spread bases more liberally (for beauty's sake perhaps even five squares apart)? The advantage of moving defenders from one base to another in one turn does not really come into play when the enemy never reaches our shore. Of course, with bases farther apart we would need an aerospace complex in each and every base to prevent air drops, but then, we would have fewer bases to begin with.

The disadvantage of having many bases is that we have to build (and maintain) more base facilities for the same amount of basic resources and, more importantly in this context, that it takes a lot longer to fill the continent. Besides, I could imagine that bureaucracy drones could be much more of a problem on the higher difficulty levels.

At least for Lal, who finds it easier to pop-boom and keep even very large bases under control, I am not entirely convinced of the suggestion to put bases exactly three squares apart.


Anyway, I feel that, with Doctrine: Defense our Smacologists really have made another breakthrough. I agree that putting it in the Strategy Guide as a gigantic how-to-note would probably be a bit unbalancing. A sequel to the Strategy Guide, with Doctrine: Defense being one pillar and a chapter on offensive strategy beyond the Rover Rush the other (tips for a war that needs 30 turns to prepare, but just five turns to win), seems more appropriate.

[Googlie]

NorthSwordsman (and others):

Try your hand at Yang from the TAA series (The Axis Awakens)

Download from:

http://googlie2.tripod.com/rynnsgallery/id5.html

(another shameless plug !!)

and test the theories against the tweaked AI (just diplomacy and strategy set up, but 3 researchers slaved to Deirdre - who starts in the jungle - one of whom is Roze - who has ab initio infiltration on all

Your allies will be the Believers and the Spartans and you'll be agin' the Gaians, University, Consciousness and Angels.

G.

[Sikander]

Verrucosus,

One way to simplify this strategy (or at least speed it up) is to use a 'hollow' base placement scheme. Set up all of your bases on or near the coast, which when completed will ring your continent and deny the enemy an easy landing zone, while creating a protective ring against airpower around your crawler carpeted hinterland . Obviously this works best when you feel that you are alone on a more or less round continent, and not as well on a monster of a continent where you can be sure that there are at least two other factions.

[Horus]

Googlie, or someone else who knows, I would like to be punished by the AI in the TAA. But I don't know what to do with the files e.g. TAA_Sparta. It ain't as dot save file and it dosen't show up as a scenario even if placed at the correct map.

[Tai Mai Shu]

You have to unzip it, then play it as a scenario. It's also an Alien Crossfire scenario so it won't work on regular Alpha Centauri.