Weird SMAC screenshots

[Blake]

Evolutionary pressure against IE users .

png's are often a bit smaller than gifs and sometimes a lot smaller. They are almost never larger at the same quality (but people don't always reduce images to indexed before saving to png's when they should, but generally speaking a gif will be 20%-85% smaller saved as png. Yes, an image could be like 80kb as a gif and only 10kb as a png. The improvement isn't usually that large but 50% smaller isn't unusual).

[binTravkin]

png's are often a bit smaller than gifs and sometimes a lot smaller. They are almost never larger at the same quality (but people don't always reduce images to indexed before saving to png's when they should, but generally speaking a gif will be 20%-85% smaller saved as png. Yes, an image could be like 80kb as a gif and only 10kb as a png. The improvement isn't usually that large but 50% smaller isn't unusual).

Especially if there are shadow elements..

[Straybow]

"Using a unit equipped with marine detachment to attack a base can result in this:"

"Mindworms popped over my former:"

I can't tell what you're refering to in either pic.

Look at the units in the selected square.

Errr, did a maroon unit attack a cyan base, or a cyan unit attack a maroon base??

[Leon Trotsky]

I was Domai and captured Svengaards' (sp?) units inside a base.

[Straybow]

I don't have SMAX and don't know the faction colors so that is only partly of help... lemme see...

OK, I get it. The Marine Detachment allows the capture of units but not bases, and normally only works for ships and whatever units they may transport. Right?

[Blake]

I actually had a look at that png posted above and it's corrupted, not to the extent that it can't be loaded by some programs but others complain or wont load it. Firefox loads it without complaint. Internet Explorer starts loading it then aborts. The Gimp loads it and suggests it's corrupted.

Optimizing the screenshot above (After decorrupting it) gif gets it down to about 134kb and png to 114kb. Interestingly pngcrush can only get it down to 154kb, while The Gimp saved it as 114kb. (hey! i find this stuff fun :P)

And note it's size as uploaded above is 270kb because it's saved as rgb rather than indexed - this is why png's are often larger than gifs...

*Blake is one of the few fools on the internet to actually bother optimizing the images that he uploads...

[binTravkin]

So the situation was:

Leon Trotsky had a pirate (his faction) naval unit near a Drone base which had a naval (attack) unit in it. The naval attack unit was ordered to attack, it took heavy losses and Marine Detachment stepped in.
As game assumed all the other units in base were 'loaded' onto the attacking unit (a standard assumption in sea combat if there's land units on the same square), it also captured all the other stack.
Then as game saw the entire base square was now occupied (in a battle operation, which is important because if you just placed your units into that base, game wouldn't recognise that) by Pirate units, the base automaticallly went to pirates.

It can be thought of the incredible valour of Pirates when they get pissed off because some coward dock-sitter attacks them from safety (they were just 'hey look at those cowards - they can't face us in open sea so they sit in a dock and shoot! Let's get em!') and hence the Pirates get an instant boost in morale, furhtermore they manage to take the ship in the dock, which even more boosts their morale and they go on crazy rampage in the streets managing to catch the defenders at sleep (thus getting all their weapons and equipping themselves with em - resulting Pirate units).

[Leon Trotsky]

Well, that's not exactly what happened (I hate having to tell you). In fact, I was Domai, and equipped one of my Privateers with Marine Detachment (that's probably the source of confusion, since one would assume that it's the pirates who often use that ability). I attacked a pirate base, and when the defender unit was critical, all the defending stack turned to my side. Note that the base remained in the hands of the pirates, and if I wanted to enter it with another unit, a combat would arise between my two units. I had to move the ships away and self destruct the garrisons, since disbanding them would help my enemy's production (go figure).

[binTravkin]

Even more funny!

[PJayTycy]

Originally posted by Leon Trotsky
I had to move the ships away and self destruct the garrisons, since disbanding them would help my enemy's production (go figure).

You had a transport foil in the base, so you could have moved the col pod + rover + scout to the monsoon jungle

[Leon Trotsky]

I knew someone would point that out. In the situation depicted in the screenshot I did as you say. The fact is that it didn't happen just once - almost every pirate base I attacked resulted in its garrison captured. It was my very first SMAX game, so you can imagine the impression I got from this expansion...

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by Leon Trotsky
I knew someone would point that out. In the situation depicted in the screenshot I did as you say. The fact is that it didn't happen just once - almost every pirate base I attacked resulted in its garrison captured. It was my very first SMAX game, so you can imagine the impression I got from this expansion...

Well, one explanation could be that you plays like the AI.

You attack a base having four defending units with one unit ? Really, who would do that ?

The best way is to have choppers and noodles clear the way, a ship to conquer the base and maybe a transporter with defenders following up if it's dense.

Though, this error could maybe be abused in an sensible way in tricky games - need some thoughts

[Darkstar]

Er... I often attack the AI bases with 1 unit. The AI won't respond for a while, and I'll have reinforcements popping along soon enough.

Capping the garrison with a marine is a common item for ship versus base. As long as there is a transport in that base, you've got a marine's chance of catching all the land units. Fun fun.

You can get 1 free lab by having a Bio lab and a Punishment Sphere in that base. I forget if it shows up in the first column though.

Also, you can get +1 Planet with the right secret projects, even if you don't have the Manifold.

[Chaos Theory]

A Bio Lab grants 2 labs. A punishment sphere halves that (and other labs sources). Therefore, if everything is displayed properly, a base with both does indeed produce an extra lab point, but that's not unusual.

I'd like to see an example of how you have +1 Planet from a project or projects.

[binTravkin]

I'd like to see an example of how you have +1 Planet from a project or projects.

I've been having impression that Pholus Mutagen does it, but it has been so long I've last built it, I can't remind..