Frustration

[Littiz]

Is there anything more frustrating than starting close to Santiago?!
Man!
She hasn't stopped a SINGLE moment!
I had to use *every* possible trick to counter her attacks, nonstopping for decades...
I have librarians, crawlers, good terraforming, research bonuses, while she keeps building units and units to overflow me... and STILL she outtechs me!!!!!!!
The game cheats, I say....
I surrendered, somehow she got even planes faster than I did.

Next time I'll devote my game to Santiago's obliteration.

(sorry for the rant, ehehehe)

[Senethro]

Let me guess, she had the monsoon jungle?

[BlackCat]

Ehrrr, why don't you just roll over her ? Don't be nice to her just because she pretends to be a lady.

[Kataphraktoi]

Originally posted by BlackCat
Ehrrr, why don't you just roll over her ? Don't be nice to her just because she pretends to be a lady.

Even Jamski loses to the AI once in awile...

[Commy]

Sometimes it is just impossible to get an attacker off your back...

I haven't had this happen with the Spartans, but I have had it happen with miriam, the hive, and worse of all, the aliens, who tend to have 3-4 stacks of 5 or more 4-3r-1 units every 10 or 15 turns concentrating all on one base...even collateral damage doesn't always stop all these stacks, especially when they tend to hide in fungus and come very, very early in the game...since I don't use crawlers (a personal rule), sometimes it can be difficult to quickly produce lots of military units while hoarding all the SPs...without instabuilds, it's kind of a pain...

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by Commy
Sometimes it is just impossible to get an attacker off your back...

I know, my comment was just to add some salt in Littiz wound

My "fun" experience was as Aki on a small island placed in the middle between the two aliens. Every 2-3 turn a transporter came from one side or the other - sometimes arriving at the same time - that kept me busy until air

[Littiz]

ehe, I have given up with that game.
Finally I accepted that in the early game one must focus on expandig rather than growing.
I thought I learned it already, but it's never enough... I always find myself with less cities than my enemy....

[Marid Audran]

One of my recent games during my SMAC revival phase had me play the Gaians. I was settling in for what I thought would be a nice, long game. After founding my second city, The Flowers Preach, and researching a few 1st-level techs, Miriam arrives at my door.


"Give me Biogenetics."
"Fine."
"Runt. Give me Centauri Ecology, too."
"F*ck Off."

Next turn, Miriam storms The Flowers Preach with her scout infantry.

Realizing I was a bit rash, I'm quickly in the process of prototyping a foil transport back at Gaia's Landing so I can load up a colony pod and find a nice uninhabited landmass to build in peace. This little air-tight escape plan of mine is dashed when Miriam arrives at my doorstep with a couple of recon rovers.

The whole game was over in under forty turns.

Pop-up: Your faction has been PWNED by the Believers. NOOB!

As the old saw goes, pride goeth before the fall.

The next game, an almost identifical scenario happened next door with Morgan. This time I caved in to his demands. I bode my time and by about M.Y. 2180 or thereabouts, when I happily accepted the CEO's terms for surrender, his army in ruins.

I founded a base in the middle of a desert island non-adjacent to water and called it "Morgan at Elba," gifted it to him, then probed away his last continental base.

It was good to be queen that day. Also eradicated Zak in the meanwhile.

[Illuminatus]

My worst defeat: playing with the University only to be eradicated after two turns.

I moved the scout patrol to explore the surrounding area. The first thing I produced was a former (finished in second turn) and moved it east, to mineral bonus. However, directly west from University Base were several xenofungus squares and a mindworm spawned after my second turn just slid across fungus and entered the empty University Base. My faction was effectively eradicated by a preboil mindworm.

[Littiz]

Even the experienced players get their surprises, it seems
The game is growing on me, it shows layers and layers of elements the more I play. I'm now in a new transcend game with the gaians, and so far, I'm doing great, first time I've raised terrain as a purely tactical mean, too... we'll see!

@Marid Audran: I read in one of your posts (which I can't locate right now) that you have created two factions to replace the aliens. Are they available for sharing, maybe?
From your comments I thought they must be cool and balanced. I'm definitely interested, if possible

[Marid Audran]

Littiz,

I've attached my factions in .rar format that should respond to most decompression programs. Just unzip them into the SMAX directory. I've created no unique .wav files for them, unfortunately. The faction graphics aren't mine, rather I cribbed them from existing factions at networknode.org. The factions uploaded at the database there tend to be wildly skewed, poorly conceived, or obvious clones of original factions (or all three), so I demurred from using them; however, some of the art is cool.

To use these two new factions in play, edit the alphax.txt file and erase the entries for the Progenitor factions under #NEWFACTIONS, and replace them with:

AGRAR, AGRAR
MERCANT, MERCANT

Now, as for the factions themselves, the first are called the Agrarians of Ceres. They are something of a hybrid betwixt The Gaians and the Hive. They share the communist values of the Hive but lack the military ambition. They share the botanical and terraforming expertise of the Gaians but lack the rapport with Planet and the efficiency of their scientists.

#BLURB
Before vast sky-lines of glass, steel, and metal, before industrialization, before arts, sciences, and cultural landmarks, there was one demarcation that separated and defined the era of humankind. Agriculture. Before organized agriculture, human society was largely nomadic, eking out an fringe existence for which survival was all that mattered, or could be hoped for. After agriculture, civilization could begin. In a virgin world, history will repeat itself. And the most civilized will be the ones who will first fill the bellies of the hungry, and then shall fill Planet with its children.
^
^ -- High Councillor Wren Norbury
^ "A Cultivator's Journal"

#DATALINKS1
^LEADER: {High Councillor Wren Norbury}
^BACKGROUND: {New Zealand Agronomist; Unity Terraforming Engineer}
^AGENDA: {Planned society; Harvest of Planet}
^TECH: {Centauri Ecology}
^

#DATALINKS2
^+1 POLICE: {Populace feels secure with citizen militas}
^+2 GROWTH: {Nutrient surpluses and high-yield farms}
^-1 INDUSTRY: {Limited space for factories}
^-25% base penalty when attacking: {Lack of aggressive military paradigm}
^Robust EFFICIENCY: {Communal values; Emphasis on family}
^GROWTH penalty doubled for GREEN economics: {settlers find co-habitating with fungus difficult}
^All Formers include free Fungicidal Tanks upon discovery of Synthetic Fossil Fuels
^{May not use Free Market economics}

The AI play the Agrarians with a SE preference towards Planned, and will get irked if they encounter you running Free Market/Planned.

The second faction are called La Marchand Marine, but are known informally and collectively to the other factions as merely The Mercantile. Their background is the U.N. Peacekeeper Navy, when one of her former Admirals (Etienne Peraud) decided to resign his commission in order to start a new faction with a few investors from the Morganites, seamen and technicians from the Pirates, and personnel from Peraud's own fleet. They are a water-based faction best described as Morgan on the sea, however, they have unique traits, as the datalinks show:

#BLURB
While Svensgaard indulges in his Jules Verne and Bluebeard fantasies, the real power of Chiron's oceans remains untapped. Beneath Chiron's fungal expanse is a cornucopia of energy, the envy even of Morgan from his gilded terraces! All that's needed are the right tools and proper industries. Do you, as I, dare to dream?
^
^ -- Fleet Admiral Etienne Peraud
^ "Merchants at Stern" Lecture

#DATALINKS1
^LEADER: {Admiral Etienne Peraud}
^BACKGROUND: {8th French Republic; Ex-Peacekeeper Admiral}
^AGENDA: {Oceanic Energy Monopoly}
^TECH: {Industrial Base, Doctrine: Flexibility}

#DATALINKS2
^+1 ECONOMY: {Aquatic Conglomerate}
^-1 GROWTH {Long merchant expeditions away from families}
^120% Tech cost: {Cramped labs; research grants at a premium}
^125% Probe cost: {Computer techs behind latest encryption techniques}
^150% Hurry cost: {Difficult to network industries at sea}
^Extra DRONE per five citizens: {Sea-weary traders miss comforts of home}
^Penalty doubled for PLANNED: {Regulated economies breed mass smuggling}
^2% INTEREST on energy reserves: {Trans-aquatic loans}
^+1 ENERGY from fungus squares: {Attuned to xeno-energy resonance}
^Bonus mineral from shelf squares, sea former/colony pod prototype costs waived, may eventually terraform trench squares: {Nautilus roots in French Navy}
^{May not use Knowledge values in Social Engineering}

The AI play the Mercantile with a SE agenda in Wealth, and get irked if they encounter you running Knowledge or Power.

Hopefully you may find them of use; I have, and use them as permanent replacements. Have fun!

[Marid Audran]

n/t

[Littiz]

Thanx!
And congrats, from the details it seems a true quality work
Will try in the next game

[Kirov]

They look quite curious, I'll give them a go soon. If I apply them to my main copy of SMAX, do I have to change it back every time I play PBEMs? My mod copy is currently used for SMAniaC, and I have no room at the laptop to set up a third one.

[Kataphraktoi]

Not if your played faction is normal. say i load up our H2H with your faction having +5 industry or somethin. wont effect it. But if i load when my faction has +5 indust...you wouldnt be to happy mm?

I just copy+paste the whole folder for mod play