Discovering SOTHB and Thought of Trans

[LtDonny]

First of all, yes I am a little newb (cause I quit for like a year), but how do the University researchers discover Secrets of the Human Brain so fast? I tried it, and it took me 50 turns. Also, how do you research all the technology by MY 2600? Deidre (sp?) discovered everything and about 13 Thoughts of Trancendence. Could you help me on what strategy to research (whether it is the whole thing or what ones to focus on)? Thank you!

[Illuminatus]

University is a predisposed research team, and AI tends to charge towards it because it is scripted to do so.
Advice- take Centauri Ecology and then charge towards Industrial Automation.

[Impaler[WrG]]

MY initial thoughts are that your not using Directed Reserach and your not chossing Discover as a Priority.

Recomend you learn to play with Directed Research, its the standard used by 90% of the comunity and provides the players with the most strategic control (alowing you to pummel the AI when you know what your doing).

With Directed Reserch you get SotHB in only a few tecs.

Late game you want to be bosting your Efficeincy and Research ratings, putting 50% or more of your energy in Labs and get ALL the reserch bosting facilites in your bases. You can then easily blast past the AI and transend.

Lastly recomend you take a look at the ACDG for SMACX, its a good learning oportunity for anyone as you will be watching and perhaps even helping some of the greatest SMAC minds in the world play a highly competitive game over the course of months. Check it out over at the Democracy Game forum.

[Illuminatus]

Yes, Gaian team is good for learning:

[Pythagoras]

I dont know you're level of expertise, so forigve me if this is too basic:

Check out your "Social Engineering" screen by hitting E. This is where you decide how your society's economy, politics , and social values will be set up. Each choice has drawbacks and bonuses to several characteristics/stats of your society such as strength of economy, research capabilities, how cheap it is to support military units, etc. At the very bottom you'll notice three bars dividing the energy collected by your society into three areas: research (to be put toward research)/ economy (ie free cash which facility upkeep is deducted and you can spend on variosu things) and psych (energy allocated toward the happiness of your citizens).

You can increase the overall energy harvested (and therefore energy divided into research) by choosing a social engineering schema that increases the "Economy" stat. You can increase the effectiveness of your research dollar by upping the research stat. You can increase energy by building facilities that increase the energy produced by the base. These include energy banks, fusion labs, quantum labs, to name a few. Also improving the tiles you have workers assigned to with formers with solar panels or tidal harnesses (for the sea) will increase the energy harvested by your economy. In shorts, a strong economy leads to strong research.

So after that you'll want to make things as efficient as posible. Remember more cities means the oppurtunity to get more energy. However the more cities you have and the farther they are from your base, the more prone they are to lose energy due to inefficiency. Efficiency is another stat that can be improved with social engineering.

Other than that, turn off blind research by custimizing the game rules and beeline straight to the tech you want.

[sammy1339]

Also, the most important thing, in my opinion, is that you have to keep expanding - some newbies just stop after they have 10 bases, but if you just keep churning out colony pods, supply crawlers, and formers, there's no way you won't get all the techs by 2600 (or 2300, or even 2200 if you are good.)

[Enigma_Nova]

/me is heaps good

Here's a good strategy:
Get Formers and Crawlers.
Use these to build a massive military infrastructure.
Ensure you micromanage them, since they do stupid things if you let them be automatic.

Go to Nonlinear Mathematics // Foils, and see if you can't finish the wars you've started.
Get to Environmental Economics, then beeline to Mind/Machine interface.

Once you get MMI, you can take out pretty much anything.
If you can't, beeline to superstring theory.
Knowledge is much easier on your troops than Wealth, and with 8-weapons you can 0wn the competition.

[LtDonny]

Thanks for the fast response and tipes, guys! It helps me get almost 2/3 of the technologies in the games. I appreciate it.

[Jamski]

Just to get your worried - people have got ALL the techs before 2180.

Quite... impressive...

-Jam

[GeoModder]

If you still call that impressive, then it must be a rare thing Jam.

[Jamski]

Well, its possible to transcend faster, but it doesn't require that you get all techs.

-Jam

[GeoModder]

As Uni or Morgan then I suppose?

Must be a very peacefull game then with an ICS, but don't think I could do it.

Hey, are extra points gathered here if one is able to win on Transcend on a small map? I'm about halfway now, and tech competition is about over with the AI.