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Just for fun, I wanted to see if it was possible to defeat the guardian and the antaran home world using (and even researching) only a single tech tree category. I made exceptions for the four "pre-warp" fields that give you three or four techs each, and allowed for refitting after getting tech from Orion. To accomplish this goal, I first used the cheats a bit to see which categories it was possible with. Obviously sociology, genetics, and computers were tossed out. Those fields would basically limit you to lasers and basic nukes. And it doesn't matter how good your computer is, basic lasers are not going to scratch Xentronium.
I couldn't do it with construction. I still think it may be possible, but I'm not sure how. You can't use assault shuttles on the guardian unfortunately...
I was able to accomplish a guardian kill using only power tech. With megafluxers, interphased drive and overloaded eccm proton torpedos, you only need seven or eight battleships full. Watch out though, if you don't kill it the first turn, you'll probably lose all your ships.
Chemistry is obviously a simple matter of numbers.... build enough mirving pulson battleships with adamantium armor and the guardian is toast.
Physics I thought would be easy. Boy was I wrong. All those beam weapons are pretty useless without a halfway decent computer, even with battle scanners. Stellar converter would be great... but without at least titan construction you're out of luck there. Of course as with all things, throw enough ships at the guardian, and your plasmas will win. I had better luck with maulers though, and a time warp facilitator to get even closer to minimize range penalties.
And of course, who can forget magnetic fields. This allowed by far the most elegant guardian kill... you only really need one battleship, with a subspace teleporter and a stasis field, along with a couple of gyros. Of course that'd take forever so throw in a few more battleships full of gyros. The nice thing here, like with chemistry, is that you have both offensive and defensive technology. A phasing cloak combined with a stasis field is amazingly effective... one on one this combo beats phasing cloak/time warp facilitator, due to the cloak running out faster for the time warper... and of course the research required is halved.
Depending on the technology I get from the gaurdian, the antaran homeworld can be either trivial, or next to impossible.
After using the cheats to test, I played through a few quick small galaxy games, using a telepathic blitz to take out the other seven races (save some random toxic colony) in 100 turns or less, then just using all their homeworlds to research my chosen field. I had varying degrees of success with the antarans... I figured going for power first I'd have no chance against that star fortress... since ion cannons don't work on the antarans, and I'd need an awful lot of proton torps in a short time since I had no defensive tech (I passed on energy absorber... its not very helpful anyway). But I struck gold at Orion, getting Xentronium, damper field, and if I remember correctly reflection field. Loaded up with those, I didn't have much trouble.
With chemistry the opposite happened... I got nothing I could use in my missile fleet... neutronium bombs?? Please. I really had to flood the antarans with my ships.
The physics game was a disaster... I kept trying to reload to maybe get Xentronium and/or damper field, but no luck. Without that, I just gave up rather than build fifty-odd ships... and then watch as their puny titanium hulls get evaporated 10 at a time by that crazy star fortress.
Fields was interesting. No xentronium or damper, no death ray, but then again... I didn't need them. What I did get that was nice was the BHG. I took out the antarans with a scant two battleships. One equipped with phase cloak and BHG, the other with phase cloak and two stasis fields. A few movement turns, one turn to black hole the harbinger and lockdown, next turn hit the fortress, lockdown again, one turn to recloak and release the enemy ships, two turns later boom... game over. Very nice. I also had a third battleship with two more stasis fields in case of more antaran ships, but the game had gone quickly and there were none.
Anyhow... if anyone can come up with a way to beat the guardian with construction, or if you've got better ideas for physics or power (mine depended heavily on luck of the draw at the Gaurdian) post em. And I suppose you could optionally include electronic computer in the prewarp tech exemptions... it is only 50RP and you DO get all of the techs in the category. Of course there's only one... but hey.
I couldn't do it with construction. I still think it may be possible, but I'm not sure how. You can't use assault shuttles on the guardian unfortunately...
I was able to accomplish a guardian kill using only power tech. With megafluxers, interphased drive and overloaded eccm proton torpedos, you only need seven or eight battleships full. Watch out though, if you don't kill it the first turn, you'll probably lose all your ships.
Chemistry is obviously a simple matter of numbers.... build enough mirving pulson battleships with adamantium armor and the guardian is toast.
Physics I thought would be easy. Boy was I wrong. All those beam weapons are pretty useless without a halfway decent computer, even with battle scanners. Stellar converter would be great... but without at least titan construction you're out of luck there. Of course as with all things, throw enough ships at the guardian, and your plasmas will win. I had better luck with maulers though, and a time warp facilitator to get even closer to minimize range penalties.
And of course, who can forget magnetic fields. This allowed by far the most elegant guardian kill... you only really need one battleship, with a subspace teleporter and a stasis field, along with a couple of gyros. Of course that'd take forever so throw in a few more battleships full of gyros. The nice thing here, like with chemistry, is that you have both offensive and defensive technology. A phasing cloak combined with a stasis field is amazingly effective... one on one this combo beats phasing cloak/time warp facilitator, due to the cloak running out faster for the time warper... and of course the research required is halved.
Depending on the technology I get from the gaurdian, the antaran homeworld can be either trivial, or next to impossible.
After using the cheats to test, I played through a few quick small galaxy games, using a telepathic blitz to take out the other seven races (save some random toxic colony) in 100 turns or less, then just using all their homeworlds to research my chosen field. I had varying degrees of success with the antarans... I figured going for power first I'd have no chance against that star fortress... since ion cannons don't work on the antarans, and I'd need an awful lot of proton torps in a short time since I had no defensive tech (I passed on energy absorber... its not very helpful anyway). But I struck gold at Orion, getting Xentronium, damper field, and if I remember correctly reflection field. Loaded up with those, I didn't have much trouble.
With chemistry the opposite happened... I got nothing I could use in my missile fleet... neutronium bombs?? Please. I really had to flood the antarans with my ships.
The physics game was a disaster... I kept trying to reload to maybe get Xentronium and/or damper field, but no luck. Without that, I just gave up rather than build fifty-odd ships... and then watch as their puny titanium hulls get evaporated 10 at a time by that crazy star fortress.
Fields was interesting. No xentronium or damper, no death ray, but then again... I didn't need them. What I did get that was nice was the BHG. I took out the antarans with a scant two battleships. One equipped with phase cloak and BHG, the other with phase cloak and two stasis fields. A few movement turns, one turn to black hole the harbinger and lockdown, next turn hit the fortress, lockdown again, one turn to recloak and release the enemy ships, two turns later boom... game over. Very nice. I also had a third battleship with two more stasis fields in case of more antaran ships, but the game had gone quickly and there were none.
Anyhow... if anyone can come up with a way to beat the guardian with construction, or if you've got better ideas for physics or power (mine depended heavily on luck of the draw at the Gaurdian) post em. And I suppose you could optionally include electronic computer in the prewarp tech exemptions... it is only 50RP and you DO get all of the techs in the category. Of course there's only one... but hey.
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