Solstice AI challenge

[Chaos Theory]

I didn't think I made it that hard, but I have a hard time gauging its difficulty when I made it. I'm happy to see this hasn't been forgotten, though.

[Mart]

I feel like some challenge. I'll try it

[Senethro]

Another one for the beaten and broken.

What rules have you changed? The lack of techshare with infiltration was very upsetting.

Also, forgot to use the rusty old stapler. Very poor show.

[Mart]

Game starts in a quite interesting way. Terrain is wonderful, if only that was inuf for those energy fattened AIs. I sense some locked conflicts, Svensgard is very much sure he is not going to sign peace with some other factions. Domai refuses to trade Biogen...
Has anyone won this one yet? I haven't seen any victory reports here

[Chaos Theory]

Originally posted by Senethro
What rules have you changed? The lack of techshare with infiltration was very upsetting.

What do you mean by that? Did you need to infiltrate to get tech sharing, or were you completely unable to share in the AI's techs? This mechanism has never worked as advertised for me. In unmodded SMAX, Roze appears to need infiltration to share techs, despite not having such an entry in angels.txt

[Darsnan]

Originally posted by Chaos Theory

Did you need to infiltrate to get tech sharing, or were you completely unable to share in the AI's techs? This mechanism has never worked as advertised for me. In unmodded SMAX, Roze appears to need infiltration to share techs, despite not having such an entry in angels.txt

In the SMAX manual it states that the "Angels gain any technology known to 3 other infiltrated Factions".
In the angels.txt file it states "techshare, 3". Looking the "TECHSHARE" parameter up in the "SPECIAL RULES" Section of the alphax.txt file it states, "TECHSHARE = When used with SHARETECH, requires one to be spying on the other factions (by probe, Empath Guild, Governor, or Pact). Parameter is ignored.". Since that makes things as clear as a Progenitor's opening comments, why I looked up the SHARETECH rule, which states as follows: "SHARETECH = Gain any technology known to # other players", which I think means that a Faction endowed with this feature would automatically get any tech known to "x" number of players, without having to infiltrate, have Empath Guild, be Governor, etc... Or to phrase slightly differently: if someone were to create a Faction with the feature "sharetech, 4", then I'd assume that such a Faction would then automatically get any tech simultaneously known to 4 other Factions, regardless of infiltration, Empath Guild, etc. Extrapolating on that then if a Faction were given a parameter "techshare, 4", then instead of just getting the techs for free (as is the case for the "sharetech" parameter) why now the player must go out and gain infiltration in some fashion in order to receive the specified techs.
My take on the subject.
Anyways, one of my upcoming Challenges will star the Angels, so if anyone is interested, they can play that Challenge as well and see how the Angels special features come into play.
My $0.02.


D

[Senethro]

My problem with the techshare was that having infiltrated 5 other factions (the cyborgs acquired HSA and locked me out), no tech was being share with me. This led to the Buh-lee-vurs walking over me with chop'n'drop.

[Chaos Theory]

My intent was to allow techshare, but only with infiltration. I'll see what I can do to actually enable that.

[dacole]

how is the vinalla smac version comeing might be interesting to try this!

[Datajack Franit]

Why can´t you just use the stupidity of the AI to your advantage?

[Chaos Theory]

Originally posted by dacole
how is the vinalla smac version comeing might be interesting to try this!

Ready in time for the other solstice! I *think* it works...

Edit: glitch in scenario fixed

[Chaos Theory]

If these scenarios are too difficult because Miriam swarms you, there's a simple change I can make to delay her attack significantly. If some of you want this, I can post these alternative scenarios.

[Blake]

I'm trying this challenge (the SMAX one). It's pretty cool, I got both VW and WP, and after miriam got the empath guild and won the election Aki offered me a pact vs Miriam for tech and heaps of energy.

I tried getting cheeky and founding bases on Morgans land, but he kicked me off pretty promptly (but not before I probed an impact rover). I do have a base in Domai land.

Then Miriam showed up with probes, and a bit later elite x impact rovers...

I think I'll start over. I hadn't played SMAX in ages, and at the start didn't bother to assess my available tech (like I didn't realise you start bee-lined to ind.auto, heh.)

[Blake]

Okay second try, at 2154 the state of the game was thus:
At the start I switched to Planned then Wealth, and expanded to 9 bases, at which point I started building crawlers. Then I built/rushed the WP, VW and CN - the latter two built in the same turn. This trio of SP's should be very useful.

Swen offered an Alliance versus Morgan, and I took it. I had a probe in morgan lands (on a road near the magtubes) and took a magtube to one of his bases and yoinked non-linear mathematics.

The elections were called much earlier this game, and Morgan won them.

Some time later, Aki offered me a pact, the condition being declaring vendetta on Domai. I agreed, as The Drones have some tech I would like.. eco.eng and so on. This game I teched to int.int in order to get police and thus reduce drone control costs. With CN and police scout infantry I can slap down a new base and start pumping out artillery infantry and junk like that.

At 2180 the Data Angels became Fundamentalists, utterly convicted of their need to stop the Lords Believers from gassing everyone off the face of planet - by any means nessecary (except actually resorting to gassing too). The new SE being the somewhat powerful Fundie/Planned/Wealth - with Creches nearly standard the morale penalty is negated, +2 industry and +3 probe provide for excellent military production.

I buy D:AP from Sven as one of our last friendly communications. The Infamous Freedom Flitters immediately go into production, these skittery flying contraptions armed with an impact weapon (quite possible duct taped on) arrive just in time to thwart a prong of the Believer impact rover attack.

The Believers mount a massive invasion, halted at two chokes only by the use of freedom flitter ZoC blocking, their main thrust must go through Coder's Pit, which is crammed to the gills with impact rovers and missile artillery.

In 2194 Aki gifts fusion tech (after gifting Eco.Eng and Env.Eco). In 2195 Miriam builds the CBA, looks like Domai will get the CF. Miriam gasses one of my bases of the map, I'll probably need to remove all the garrisons. If i had AMA I would switch to FM and institute a punishing regime in a hearthbeat...

[Chaos Theory]

I edited in a fix to the scenario in the first post's attachment that (hopefully) allows Roze to techshare as intended. To implement this in a scenario already in play, you need to start the scenario editor (Ctrl-K), reload the Angel faction file with the provided one, and of course exit the scenario editor.