ACDG6: Operations

[Mart]

Another thing, I forgot to mention. Even if we stop or hinder research for some time, it is not that bad after all. We probably will have soon few more techs from probing, it's quite cheap, if you think about it.
Supply crawlers seem very useful, however. It's just the crawler thing... Getting Ind Auto sooner is better.
Slowed research will not be that slow, once we have more bases/population. Terraforming is important. Later condensers, echelon mirrors and boreholes will require quite a number of formers

[Mart]

Transportation - Roads:

Smaniac is better in use of land transports, the one I get is for 2 rows 0-1-1, carrying 2 units! (1 in original smac) Excellent for former road building. Many tiles need 2 turns or more for a former to build a road on it. What speeds up the process is ability to use 1 move point to enter the tile and the rest for forming, but standard infantry has only 1 move point. When entering the same turn the same tile multiple formers loose multiple former-turns.

In Smaniac we may have:
- 2 formers (cost 4 rows) + 1 land transport (capacity 2, cost 2 rows) (total 6 rows)
instead of:
- 2 rover formers (cost 5 rows each) total 10 rows.

Both would build a road on a 2-turn tile (like e.g. rolling) 1 tile/turn.

There is, however, larger maintenance cost of 1 mineral/tun for the land transport, but that would get "equal" after like 32-40 turns (10 rows vs. 6 rows). And then, land transport are usable for other purposes, like moving military units, etc.

[Hydro]

I think we all agree we really need more formers. I generally like at least 1 per base. If I can get away with it I build it as my first unit, rushing for completion.

Neat idea on the land transport!

Assuming all goes well with the Templar we will have 10 bases, most of which are in or by the Jungle and able to harvest its resources. We can fit a few more bases to the southeast to take advantage of the energy and nutrient specials.

But I do think that is after the majority of the Templar threat is taken care of. Right now we have no military to speak of except for some very useful probes and a very damaged battle ogre. That's not good enough. A few Templar laser rovers will rip through us with little effort, and infantry can waltze up and do what they please.

[Mart]

Ogre cannot be repaired, even on monoliths.
A note for the future, it's useful to disband it for some secret project before it's destroyed in combat. Number of minerals is not effected by the damage level, as far as i know...

[Hydro]

Hadn't thought of that. Any idea what it is worth for disbanding? Maybe toward a prototype? That would be poetic.

[vyeh]

At our current industry, a battle ogre costs 90 according to the datalinks (compared to 9 for a scout).

So you would gain 45 minerals on disbanding.

[vyeh]

We stole field modulation and high intensity lasers from the Templars. As expected, we lost one of the probe teams.

We seized Adonia. We refused a blood truce.

We found a resupply pod worth 25 credits.

We will have a laser rover prototype at Cytosino next year.

We'll use it to attack Aurora.

[Hydro]

Excellent. Looks like our luck held up reasonably well with the probe team survival, and the pod popping. We got lucky with the Ogre attack, too (no damage).

Good job with the prototyping. Now that the Templar are down to 3 bases we have more momentum.

Thoughts on future military units - infantry or rovers? I think rovers may be better since we don't have roads near the enemy, rovers can respond better to field conditions (attack of opportunity), have more attacks, and the best Templar defenders are level 2 armor. Also, after the Templar are destroyed they are a decent fast-response force.

45 mins is a lot for a disbanded BO (about the same as an AA). Right now it is the backbone of our military, but if we can save it for a SP that would be great. I suspect it will die in the line of duty, however, while we get our mililtary up and running.

Did we ever see what happened to the Ghost scout, CP, and probe? Are they still moving east to the ever-expanding edge of our territory? Did the probe (perhaps) do something nasty to us while we weren't looking?

Hydro

[vyeh]

Note we did lose a probe team.

We do have roads running from Faralia and Adonia to Illuminatus and Sands of Time.

There is only a one square gap between Cytosino and Aurora and we're currently building a road there. Next year, the laser rover prototype will be completed. Two years after that, it will be able to attack Aurora.

We can build a transport at Adonia for 18 minerals. A transport plus two infantry units is equivalent to 2 rovers plus the transport can be used to speed up road building during peacetime. Infantry units are cheaper to build and have a bonus when attacking bases.

I think this is our current consensus:

Templars

We do not accept a blood truce or surrender.

Future Builds

After our military needs are met, we build formers.

Next Tech

Industrial Automation

These are open issues:

New Base

Should we establish a base at the bonus nutrient west of Mutatio?

Next Military Unit

Should we build infantry or rovers?

[Hydro]

4-1-2 has a good chance against level 2 armor even with base defense. Plus it gets there twice as fast. After the war is done rovers are good fast responders. For good or ill, I generally only use infantry for tough base assaults (perim defense, equivalent attack and defense). For me mobility is a priority.

I think I agree with Mart that we need to seriously consider bases to take advantage of the 2 energy specials and also the nutrient special. That would put us at 12 or maybe 13 bases after the Templar are absorbed, which will give us significant disorder. We'll definately lose out on the HGP to Cyborgs based on your previous comment on their progress, so we'll have to spend time building rec commons to get basic stability.

Formers are definately a priority after the Templar are eliminated. I like 1 or more formers/base. Other thoughs?

Looking forward, perhaps consider starting an SP? WP is very tempting.

Hydro

[vyeh]

The biggest problem with more bases is energy. At the end of 2134, we have no credits in the treasury.

We were able to build a recreation commons for Purini for 2135. Of the bases we built, only Genesis does not have a recreation commons.

Most of the map is visible and there are not many sea pods. (Two aquatic factions!)

What are we willing to do to build a recreation commons for Genesis:

(1) disband the scout at Purini for 5 minerals (and use 10 minerals of Purini's accumulated minerals to build another scout);

(2) take out a loan from one of our pact mates or treaty partners; or

(3) sell tech to an AI?

I don't like (1).

At this point, I don't think we have any techs that we should avoid trading. Our most advanced tech were taken from an enemy, so we might as well trade them for energy before they lose their value.

We need to know where we will get energy in the short term (in the long term, we have to use farm/solar combinations or crawl energy) before we can plan on building bases. Otherwise we can't let any new base go beyond a worker and a doctor until they are able to build (without hurrying) a recreation commons.

[Hydro]

I think we may be better off letting terraforming work us out of our energy hole as a first step. As Mart said, our terraforming is minimal. Forests in the Jungle help, but a few solar collectors at higher altitude should help a lot. Of course that assumes we build more formers.

I'm not adverse to trading tech, but think that we should sell to all factions if we can. That does help fill a short term hole after we finish with the Templar.

Ind Auto sounds fine to me.

Hydro

[Hydro]

I think we may be better off letting terraforming work us out of our energy hole as a first step. As Mart said, our terraforming is minimal. Forests in the Jungle help, but a few solar collectors at higher altitude should help a lot. Of course that assumes we build more formers.

I'm not adverse to trading tech, but think that we should sell to all factions if we can. That does help fill a short term hole after we finish with the Templar.

Ind Auto sounds fine to me.

Hydro

[Maniac]

That would put us at 12 or maybe 13 bases after the Templar are absorbed, which will give us significant disorder.

It's always possible to go for a heavy specialist/crawler economy. In that case you only need enough happiness to get to size 5, so you can appoint specialists other than a doctor. With a rec commons and hologram theatre, we can already do this.

[Hydro]

By investing in Rec Comomons and HTs we are committing to go Builder. Are we OK with that? To do so we need peace with our neighbors and keeping SE to keep them happy, or at least neutral.

Of course the long term payoff is huge.