A few questions

[Malanche00]

Hey, I've been browsing this forum for awhile and just recently got back into the expansion. (seems like it always pulls you back in).

Anyways I had a few questions for everyone, they're mostly opinion, I have a solid grasp of the game and most of the strategies but I wanted to know what the better players thought.

1) I finally got a good game going with Morgan and loved having the huge economic boost from FM and Wealth but after a point everyone started attacking so I had to go on the offensive. However I hated having to switch from FM to Planned/Planet because of the energy losses.

Is there any way to carry out a full scale air war in FM without having to deal with the pesky drones or am I stuck Punishment Sphering a few bases to massbuild air units and make them purely military factories? In the game I just switched to planned and finished out the game that way.

2) Typically, I terraform forests over everything, with scattered boreholes and the one nutrition square for every base. I know you can build energy parks and the like but are there other ways to add more spice to my terraform plans without the huge investment in the parks?

Also, when there are rivers traveling through your territory (0m-2000m) do you usually just forest them or put something else on them? I also saw a space that was a "ridge" along with whatever else, do "ridges" offer special bonuses?

3) I've just moved up to Thinker as Lal (who has become my new favorite faction, poor Gaians), and have done wonderfully but I just noticed the Pirates and Aliens have gotten Air Power. I know how to beeline to IA but I always have trouble getting to Air Power. I am a few techs away from AP and I think i'm going to get in trouble soon. Where can I find the beeline for AP and should I just probe someone for that tech?

I was shocked when I saw they had AP because I thought I was cruising ahead of everyone else. I have nearly every SP and I have Domai on the ropes...

4) As a hardcore AC fan, should I look into getting Civ3/4? ALso which one do you think was better?


I realise this is long, longer then I anticipated but the forum has been slow for awhile . Any other added advise would be great.

Mal

[Malanche00]

Ha, I just saw my first question was answered in another recent thread

[Flubber]

Re: A few questions

Originally posted by Malanche00




1) I finally got a good game going with Morgan and loved having the huge economic boost from FM and Wealth but after a point everyone started attacking so I had to go on the offensive. However I hated having to switch from FM to Planned/Planet because of the energy losses.

Is there any way to carry out a full scale air war in FM without having to deal with the pesky drones or am I stuck Punishment Sphering a few bases to massbuild air units and make them purely military factories? In the game I just switched to planned and finished out the game that way.

The Punishment Sphere is probably the most typical way or an all specialist bases.

Personally I sometimes build dedicated military factories. I select a site that is arid and rocky and mine the crap out of it having the prospective factory build nothing but crawlers. Build 1 or more morale enhancement facilities and if the single worked can work, place him on a mine. Produce /rush military from this base regularly-- Rinse/repeat. No rehoming issue

[Leon Trotsky]

Re: A few questions

Originally posted by Malanche00
1) I finally got a good game going with Morgan and loved having the huge economic boost from FM and Wealth but after a point everyone started attacking so I had to go on the offensive. However I hated having to switch from FM to Planned/Planet because of the energy losses.

So let's see:
* You are Morgan
* You are at war with most factions

In that case, you don't really need Free Market. Economy points above +2 mostly enhance your commerce income, which, I presume, is minimal in your case.

Originally posted by Malanche00 Is there any way to carry out a full scale air war in FM without having to deal with the pesky drones or am I stuck Punishment Sphering a few bases to massbuild air units and make them purely military factories? In the game I just switched to planned and finished out the game that way.

Flubber answered it quite neatly in this and the other thread.

Originally posted by Malanche00 2) Typically, I terraform forests over everything, with scattered boreholes and the one nutrition square for every base. I know you can build energy parks and the like but are there other ways to add more spice to my terraform plans without the huge investment in the parks?

Condensers to feed more specialists.

Originally posted by Malanche00 I also saw a space that was a "ridge" along with whatever else, do "ridges" offer special bonuses?

One extra mineral per square.

Originally posted by Malanche00 3) I've just moved up to Thinker as Lal (who has become my new favorite faction, poor Gaians), and have done wonderfully but I just noticed the Pirates and Aliens have gotten Air Power. I know how to beeline to IA but I always have trouble getting to Air Power. I am a few techs away from AP and I think i'm going to get in trouble soon. Where can I find the beeline for AP and should I just probe someone for that tech?

If you play Peacekeeper, you start off with Biogenetics. that's one less in the way to Air Power. I would research Centauri Ecology, -->Industrial Automation, then Social Psyche, Ethical Calculus (Democray! Yay!), Gene Splicing (+3 nutrients/square), then Mob/Flex, and lastly the Conquer component of the tree. Of course, if you feel endangered, you may want to get Mob/AP first, which are in the way to AP anyway.
Still, I don't think I can suggest any path that long. You will have to choose depending on the circumstances.

[Lazerus]

Technically you don't even need a punishment sphere, just make sure the base is size 1 and turn him into a specialist, usually easier.

2) Farm+Condensors+soil enrichers between the boreholes can provide plenty of nuts for packed ICS bases to get specialists. I tend to just stick with forests on rivers.

3) tech predictor
Here's the tech chart i downloaded recently.
Basic things for Air power are - IA, eth calc -> gene splicing (most people go for eco engineering at this stage aswell) then doc mob, applied physics, doc flex, high energy chemistry, synthetic fossil fuels, usually any random tech then air power.

4) Played civ 3 and thought it was awful, dunno bout civ 4 think the requirements are too much for my comp. Play some more smax instead

[livid imp]

Re: Re: A few questions

Originally posted by Leon Trotsky
One extra mineral per square.

Actually, if it is the Pholous Ridge (or whatever the hell it is called), then it is +1 energy.

If it was +1 mins I'd bother to seek it out

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Lazerus
Technically you don't even need a punishment sphere, just make sure the base is size 1 and turn him into a specialist, usually easier.

Exactly-- The point is that the military production base is ALL about mineral production such that you do not care at all for food or energy from it. So it gets nothing but military facilities to increase morale.

They are actually pretty easy to build and I never really fear going to war in FM


AS Morgan-- If I really want to go conquering I would probably adopt green. The eficiiency is a nice complement to the multiple bases you usually have AND you still have +2 ECON. Adding some natives to the military mix can also be quite effective

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Lazerus
.
Basic things for Air power are - IA, eth calc -> gene splicing (most people go for eco engineering at this stage aswell) then doc mob, applied physics, doc flex, high energy chemistry, synthetic fossil fuels, usually any random tech then air power.

If you are one tech away from eco eng, it is often tough to NOT go for that tech . The lifting of mineral restriction can often increase mineral production by so much that it is HUGE factor

[Leon Trotsky]

Re: Re: Re: A few questions

Originally posted by livid imp
Actually, if it is the Pholous Ridge (or whatever the hell it is called), then it is +1 energy.

If it was +1 mins I'd bother to seek it out

You are right, of course. I confused "ridge" with "canyon".

[livid imp]

Re: Re: Re: Re: A few questions

Originally posted by Leon Trotsky

You are right, of course. I confused "ridge" with "canyon".

You are still confused, you mean "crater". As in the Garland Crater.

[Lazerus]

[Leon Trotsky]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: A few questions

Originally posted by livid imp
You are still confused, you mean "crater". As in the Garland Crater.

I wish I were, just for the sake of comedy... but I actually meant the Nessus Canyon (Shouldn't have spoiled the fun - bad me).

[Malanche00]

Thanks for the help everyone.

I luckily stole D:AP from the Pirates and continued to thrash the Urpsors (sp?).

I'll probably try an energy park in my next game. We'll see how it goes.

Any more thoughts would be appreciated.

Mal

[Sikander]

I thought Morgan couldn't run planned. Did you mean green instead?

[CEO Aaron]

Really, while you can prosecute a war of aggression in Free Market, I rarely find it worth doing. The tricks you need to pull to keep your important production bases out of riot really aren't worth the extra energy income, especially when you consider what a pure military powerhouse Morgan can be using more aggressive SE settings.

I have found the ideal military SE settings for Morgan to be Fundamentalist/Green/Wealth. Fundy gives you a boost to probe rating, letting your probe teams make more efficient use of your energy reserves, while cutting into the morale penalty of wealth. Wealth lets you keep your +1 energy per square, a highly useful boost to research and income, and delivers +1 industry, to more quickly replace losses from attrition.

The most important point, however, is that Fundy is cutting the -2 morale of wealth to -1. Why? Because at -2 morale, your command centers, naval yards, etc only deliver half their effect to your troops, but at -1, they add the full +2 morale hikes. This means that instead of pushing out green troops with your command centers, you'll get disciplined troops. But there's more. If your bases with command centers also have children's creches, any morale penalties for negative morale SE modifiers are negated. That means that if you build a creche in a base and produce troops, -1 and 0 morale are identical, effectively eliminating the SE effect.

The ultimate lesson here is that just because your faction doesn't normally relish warfare doesn't mean you don't have a good way to engage in it. When the necessity for war comes, and it will, switch to aggressive SE's, go forth, and conquer. Then you can reap the peace dividend of a compliant submissive faction.