How do you terraform ?

[the_rest]

so here is what I terraform:

if the square is flat --> forest
if is rolling and rainy, 1000+ altitude --> farm and solar
if is rolling and rainy, less then 1000 altitude --> forest
if is rolling and NOT rainy --> forest (regardless altitude)
if is rocky with mineral bonus --> mine and go supply crawler there (7 minerals)
if is rocky no mine --> wait for tek and go for borehole
sometimes I cant build borehole then I have to terraform level, and after that check again for rolling.
I never go for Echelon Mirror or Condenser. I terraform up rather then move a former from a square near whater to another square farther inland.

In ocean squares always kelp farm + tidle harness energy.

this is regardless of special terrain bonuses like jungle or messa or garland or mountain or pholus ridge (as I noted in game that is not very usefull, you still get minerals bonus from garland with forest, and still nutrient bonus with forests in jungle, and energy bonus from messa or pholus ridge is not worth compared to minerals bonus from forests).

What u guys think ?

[RGE]

I always put condensers on nutrient resources, so I'll get 7 nutrients from a rainy square, and 10 when I add soil enrichers. Before restrictions are lifted I'd definitely put forest almost everywhere, particularly in jungle. (But I have never started in the jungle, so that has never been an issue for me.) Before mineral restrictions are lifted there's little point in having forests in Garland's Crater, since the extra mineral would be wasted. But when I constructed thermal boreholes in the crater, I noticed that they didn't get their extra mineral either, and that was after restrictions had been lifted. So that was disappointing, but boreholes are still better than hybrid forests.

I'm a big fan of using solar collectors and echelon mirrors to boost energy, both with crawlers and without. For pure energy it would probably be best to just turn everything into an energy park, with rows of ecchelon mirrors giving +5 or +6 to most solar collectors, and then crawl food from the occasional condenser. In my previous game I put up a single row of echelon mirrors at my HQ, and they boosted energy production a lot. Which in turn increased the commerce, since that is based on the energy that the base gets from working its base squares. Supply crawlers bringing in energy is nice too, but that energy doesn't increase commerce. I think I will have to try giving one of my pact mates a high energy base sometime, just to see how high it can get. With three pact mates the commerce energy with a global trade pact can easily outdo the base's own energy production, so I wouldn't want to just sit there and look at 3-2-3 hybrid forests when I could get 4-10 raw energy from those squares. Particularly not if that is my super science base HQ with the Merchant Exchange and everything.

Though I suppose that echelon mirrors don't work very well with an Infinite City Sprawl, since those bases wouldn't benefit from mirrors the way solar collectors would. So if that's the strategy, then I guess it would make more sense to just forest everything until energy restrictions are lifted and you can fully benefit from boreholes. In which case the underlying terrain would be less important, since the pattern would decide where you could fit a borehole. If I have the former time to drill boreholes, I'd certainly have the former time to lower land if it is "sloped". (Terraform down should always allow for a borehole, since "sloped terrain" is determined by checking to see if any of the adjacent land squares are one level lower or not. Coastal squares are thus never considered sloped, even when they plunge straight down into to sea from great heights. Silly game.)

[CEO Aaron]

Farm/Condensers on 2 tiles (worked by crawlers), as many boreholes as I can cram in the base radius, and trees everywhere else. I typically have bases 3 tiles from each other so I can send garrisons from neighboring bases to reinforce in a pinch, with as little overlap as I can contrive, given the terrain. Solar collectors rarely see use, only on very high, wet ground where I feel a forest would be a waste. Echelon mirrors I've never found a good use for, as I hold energy parks in contempt. If you want energy, crawl nutrients and employ specialists.