another MOO2 newbie

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by vmxa1


I should have responded to this one. This is a specialized race and needs to be played very agressively.

I would suggest you consider making it with -spy and using those three picks for LHW and RHW.

Its normal picks are HG/+10 GC/+20 SA.

im trying to play with the premade races first, before customizing them. I had perhaps not such great planets nearby. I ended at war with the Klackons. Had I been patient i suppose i could have beaten them, but I sent a fleet of 2 BBs and a CA out looking for trouble, and they killed it with a Titan and two BB's (and I was behind in tech) I may start that up eventually from an earlier save, but ive started a new game as the Silicoids and its seems much easier - less micromanagement, at any rate.

[vmxa1]

The stock bear race is very slow. Winning with stock races, other than a few of the better ones is not easy at hard or impossible.

It takes some care if you have 8 players. Once you get ready to roll, then it goes very fast. It has been some time, since I used the sillies, but I recall them as a difficult one to play.

Having the Klac as your neighbor is not going to be pleasant.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by vmxa1
The stock bear race is very slow. Winning with stock races, other than a few of the better ones is not easy at hard or impossible.

It takes some care if you have 8 players. Once you get ready to roll, then it goes very fast. It has been some time, since I used the sillies, but I recall them as a difficult one to play.

Having the Klac as your neighbor is not going to be pleasant.

Ah, well, that puts a different context on our discussion of what level you play on.

So far Ive found the sillies much easier than the other races ive tried, but then im playing in a huge galaxy with only 5 players, so theres been plenty of time to build up. Ive only recently made contact with the Darloks and Trilari. I have a fleet of 3 phasor armed BBs who have just take out a space crystal and and a space dragon. I think war with the Trilari is approaching.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by lord of the mark


Ah, well, that puts a different context on our discussion of what level you play on.

So far Ive found the sillies much easier than the other races ive tried, but then im playing in a huge galaxy with only 5 players, so theres been plenty of time to build up. Ive only recently made contact with the Darloks and Trilari. I have a fleet of 3 phasor armed BBs who have just take out a space crystal and and a space dragon. I think war with the Trilari is approaching.

took trilar and two other stars, then made peace. killed the guardian and colonized orion. Next, war with Bulrathi?

[vmxa1]

You should post a screen shot or a save so we can see what you are talking about.

[lord of the mark]

I finally won, at Antares, after passing up several council wins. First win on hard.

I'll try to post my last save (but its very late in the game) here.

[vmxa1]

Cool, was this the same game the unload issue came up in?

[vmxa1]

Ok I terraformed the planets and was able to unload the marines. So I guess it is the games way of telling you you have all the marines allowed at that time.

It starts with 4 for a barracks and add 1 ever 5 (iirc) up the pop limit. All the planets in that system had marines (more than 4), so you either had to increase the pop or let some turns go by to be able to add any more.

Since I unload the first turn, I do not see this msg.

[vmxa1]

Feedback :

1- move pop from industry to research when the planet has nothing to do. I leave 2 on ind unless I have a sci leader. Then I leave only 1. This put it at 7400 RP instead of 3K.

2- too many ships being build. Many of the planets had not done all of their terraforming, this is why you could not unload troops.

3- not enough spies. ounly had 10 and the next turn someone stole something. You did not have any of the spy techs of note.
Many techs could have been stolen from others:

Battlestations
Planetary Missiles
Fighter Garrisons
Telepathic training
Stealth suit
Zeon and Pulson missiles improving you defenses a ton
Heavy Armor
Urridium Fuel Cells

After adjusting the pop you go from around 700bc to over 1500 extra per turn, so splurge and get spies.

4- buy those cheap builds, you have tons of cash

5- Leaders are not in the best systems.

Nimrazz to Orion as it is the only one that will build ships, if any does.
Grogg to Morrig it has 5 planets
Chung to Ynarl it has 4 planets

6- ships redesigned

Tornado I
delete Aug engines, you are going to be the attacks and do not need the extra priority or speed. No one will be able to stand up to your attack anyway.
delete black hole
delete phasors with the FX
change Phasor to add CO AF
You now have 40 phasors in that ship.

Fury

delete science pod, delete aug eng
add HEF/Reinforced Hull/Nullifier ( I would prefer Stablizer)
Phasor add CO AF
Now has 24

Armageddon

Well I would not even build this without convertor tech as all I want it for is to destroy planets.

add Pod Hull
add CO to phasors
change FX to F
now has 63 phasors.

[vmxa1]

Just wondering how you manage to not have any ship leaders so late in the game? Even as a Rep I get some.

[vmxa1]

7- I missed this but you do not have Warp Interdictors. It looks like Lighting fields was picked instead. These are critical devices to prevent anyone from jumping on you before you can react.

You have Darloks in the game and they have stealth ships. This means that if you did not have Loknar, do not get Omni for evolution, you best eliminate them. They can sneak up on you even if you have warps.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Feedback :

1- move pop from industry to research when the planet has nothing to do. I leave 2 on ind unless I have a sci leader. Then I leave only 1. This put it at 7400 RP instead of 3K.

2- too many ships being build. Many of the planets had not done all of their terraforming, this is why you could not unload troops.

3- not enough spies. ounly had 10 and the next turn someone stole something. You did not have any of the spy techs of note.
Many techs could have been stolen from others:

Battlestations
Planetary Missiles
Fighter Garrisons
Telepathic training
Stealth suit
Zeon and Pulson missiles improving you defenses a ton
Heavy Armor
Urridium Fuel Cells

After adjusting the pop you go from around 700bc to over 1500 extra per turn, so splurge and get spies.

4- buy those cheap builds, you have tons of cash

5- Leaders are not in the best systems.

Nimrazz to Orion as it is the only one that will build ships, if any does.
Grogg to Morrig it has 5 planets
Chung to Ynarl it has 4 planets

6- ships redesigned

Tornado I
delete Aug engines, you are going to be the attacks and do not need the extra priority or speed. No one will be able to stand up to your attack anyway.
delete black hole
delete phasors with the FX
change Phasor to add CO AF
You now have 40 phasors in that ship.

Fury

delete science pod, delete aug eng
add HEF/Reinforced Hull/Nullifier ( I would prefer Stablizer)
Phasor add CO AF
Now has 24

Armageddon

Well I would not even build this without convertor tech as all I want it for is to destroy planets.

add Pod Hull
add CO to phasors
change FX to F
now has 63 phasors.

points 1, 2 3, 4, 5. Yeah, I do all this micromanagement stuff. The save I sent you was just before the game end, so i was getting lazy, esp since i was so far ahead. At that point i was just clicking next turn till I had enough ships to beat the Antarans, for the most part. I would have posted an earlier save, but didnt have any. (I will note that the procedure for managing saved games is inferior to that in civ2 - in particular the name I give the IN GAME is NOT the name the file has in Windows, in contrast to Civ2, and, IIRC, SMAC. Thus in games i save "silicoids - hard" and in Windows, its just Save6.gam - makes it harder to manage saved games)

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Just wondering how you manage to not have any ship leaders so late in the game? Even as a Rep I get some.

they all were lost in combat, in particular in premature attacks on Antares, IIRC.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by vmxa1
7- I missed this but you do not have Warp Interdictors. It looks like Lighting fields was picked instead. These are critical devices to prevent anyone from jumping on you befor yu can react.

You have Darloks in the game and they have stealth ships. This means that if you did not get Loknar, do not get Omni for evolution, you best eliminate them. They can sneak up on you even if you have warps.

your feedback on techs and ship design is appreciated.

[vmxa1]

I played a game with your settings and I see now that you probably can do anything you want in that game. At Hard with only five players, the AI was so backward, they never even threathen me, let alone attacked.

I already had nearly twice as many systems as the AI when I finally met one of the races.

Refitting the ships in effect doubles the number of ships or better. Then add to them the hull and mods and you are close 3 or 4 times the power.

I like to redesign ship constantly so I am getting full value for the current build. I may not refit older ones in games that it is just not needed.

Yeah the names you give in game do not appear outside of the game.