Custom Race- Best Stats?

[Rubbrduck]

Playing my first Impossible game now... meh, this is EASY.. ;-)

I went with

Huge galaxy, Organic
Creative, LHW, RHW, Dicatorship, +1 Science, Telepathic
-ship offense, -ground combat, Repulsive... picked Warlord as the evolution mutation.

Essentially, traded out Omniscient (not so needed after all) and Artifact world for Telephathic.

Started out a bit slow and met enemies early, but that was really a good thing, as I managed to absorb the Alkari empire pretty quickly - with three frigates alone, two with Ions and one Mass Driver.

After getting about 2/5 of the galaxy, they've all declared war on me (since I'm repulsive? maybe this would have been different with -bc instead), but can't crack any colony defenses.. Just for fun I made an "overtaker" battleship with troop pods, transporters and disruptors and all sorts of defensive goodies, just to fly around and assimilate the ships blockading... buahhgah

[vmxa1]

Rubbrduck did you use Prewarp or Avg or Adv tech start?
When absorbed the Alkari, what do you mean? AFAIK you can not assimilate a race as a tele with out a capitol ship (crusier or larger)? Do you mean you sent troops?
Repulsive mean no diplomacy, but at the stage you were at it would probably not matter, they would likely go to war anyway.

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Rubbrduck
Creative, LHW, RHW, Dicatorship, +1 Science, Telepathic
-ship offense, -ground combat, Repulsive... picked Warlord as the evolution mutation.

After getting about 2/5 of the galaxy, they've all declared war on me (since I'm repulsive? maybe this would have been different with -bc instead), but can't crack any colony defenses..

Just my perspective, but why take Warlord? I guess it really does not matter as you have won if you got to mutation.
Warlord give you extra experience for your crews and more CP. I would think those are not required at that stage.
Anyway what prevented you from beating the defenses at a planet? What did they have and what were yu attacking with?
Post a game at that point, I would like to see what is going on.
One of the problems at impossible is if you take a fun race like the one you have, it have less productive values. This means the AI taces can often get a big jump on colonization and leave you in a hole. You get to jump on a nearby race or two and then find someone that has a monster fleet with better tech and you got problems. The best way to avoid that is to crank out those CB and CS's.

[Rubbrduck]

Oh, it was them who could not crack any colony defenses, not me.. ;-)

It's progressed a bit now, they've started making nasty battleship stacks (20+) with phasors on, which can take out a fully buffed colony, so I've resigned to using Doomstars with stasis fields and teleporters..

Warlord was just to get Ultra-Elite crews really.. hehe.. fond memories from Master of Magic ;-) No purpose at all really, the game is already won sort of, so I just mess around...

I started out on Average, figuring that they, given their impossible production bonus, would have pulled ahead much quicker in pre-warp...

The Alkari were gobbled up by three Cruisers, made at my starting colony.. They really had more ships than me, but not enough to defeat my missile defenses, and not enough to spread out on all their colonies.... so I just picked one colony at a time, when there was only a Starbase present, and then insta-bought a missile base... shockingly easy ;-)

I tend to play very defensively though... and building almost no ships before getting to the higher techs..

[vmxa1]

Rubbrduck watch out for the phasors late inthe game as they can not do anything to a planet that has a Barrier Shiled and Class X with top armor.
It is a sad sight to watch the BB still there and twitch in auto combat.
I love phasors, but I switch some ships to Disrupters when I get them. They can crack that planet. Sometimes a single DS with a stellar is good to have if you play that late into the game.

[Kaptain Ken]

Besides, a DS with stellar is just fun to play with. Get rid of those annoying little planets or difficult enemies.

[Old n Slow]

I, too, am working through my first potential success at Impossible. With v1.2, I used Uni, Sub, Creative & RHW; low grav, -10 ground, -Food. Started Pre-Warp & got off to a decent start with about 5 systems, when the neighbors came to visit. The Sils, Klacks, and Saks (First, Fouth, and Second in Pop) decided to start pounding me from turn 120-180 or so on (don’t remember exactly). The Sils attack about every other turn, and the rest give me about two in ten turns respite -- on the other hand, I’ve kept up a steady state so far.

True to my moniker, I’m now around turn 310 or so. Took out Orion, but a space flux came on & I couldn’t set up a colony -- the Trilarians moved in (I’ll be back). Finally have Doom Stars & am finally getting some of the nicer techs. Gained a couple of systems, but one was bombed back to zippo. Biggest plus for me was a Gaia (+a Ultra-Rich) in a nebulae -- the enemy came with their class VII shields armed with heavy laser cannons -- only to fall to ground batteries (twice my defending ships were wasted away). Now of course the system has a few Titans defending with hard shields -- Two AI’s are throwing away their fleets at this chokepoint, letting me get even and start to pull ahead.

I’m about 2nd in Pop, with six out of the seven AI’s are officially at war (and will the Darloks be far behind?) I’m about to set up multiple fleets -- need to take out the Bul’s before somebody else does, then get a few more systems up to my perfectionist standards. It is strangely neat to watch my pitiful force, outnumbered three to one shoot up the enemy in the first round.

[Rubbrduck]

I just had an EXTREMELY funny game... hehe... I intended to do a "spying" game, played on Average with dicatorship/creative/+2 spying/charismatic, poor homeworld/-ground -ship, but in the end didn't really use any spies at all... 8 players, Huge galaxy.


However, the "charismatic" trait seemed magical - I would make nonagression pacts and then trade agreements with everyone - and then the foreign relations just skyrocketed. I got off to a slow start, but the trade agreements made me really rich... But the *best* part was - I could demand stuff "5% tribute" and "free system" - and got them for free! Handouts! Nothing like seeing them say "We will do as you command"! I got one system from each, most notably the Klackons and Psilons too, and then made lots of populations and shipped off to my production and research bases. Note that you can only ask for systems within range of your outposts or colonies.

In the end I was sort of looking forward to stomping them with my optimized race planets - But then there was an Orion Senate thing - and they all voted for me! Instant victory!

Definetly an entertaining and very different game...

On half my planets I never even built space defenses...

[vmxa1]

Old n Slow sounds like you are in good shape, but I would warn you that version 1.2 has many prolems and a number of things were broken (plasma cannons/gyro and creative pick).
The biggest thing about it is the surrendering of systems was way out of line.
Put on 1.31 and you have a different game.

[vmxa1]

Rubbrduck now use Repulsive, so you can not demand or trade.
I feel that trading is fine, but the demand function is still broken. It was improved a bit with 1.31, but all you need to 2 good ships and the AI will pay 5% tribute without you lifting a finger.
It reminds me of teachng cards to my kids, you have to watch out so as to not take an unfair advantage.
I would prefer that you could only deman that they stop spying.
CivIII has a similar problem when it came out, you could pound on a Civ and demand all sorts of stuff for peace.

[PDifolco]

Rubbrduck,
I'm trying to do the same kind of game you had : I just uberoptimized it by taking Telepath+Charisma, and get early Xeno Relations. +105% Diplo may allow me to ask them just to surrender (and give me their wives in the deal ) and if they don't want the Telepath ability will do it (converting planets) !!

[Kaptain Ken]

I second vmxa1 suggestions. Enjoy it one time, but then it becomes too easy, use v1.31 and don't ask for systems or even money as the AI is too easy to take advantage of.

[Old n Slow]

VMXa1 -- Haven’t pushed the system surrender much -- only saw it at the baby level (The Saks gave up the second time they came to talk to me!). But in my current game at Impos -- I’m now at war with everyone (someone else took out the buls before I got there, but I picked up the Psi’s (+2 science this time -- I think I’ll keep them).

Plasma cannons? Gyros? There are a number of good weapons, but it seems like there are some ‘best’ weapons depending upon the research path & stage of the game. I’m now using the late game battle tactics of ‘beam them from far away’ and don’t worry.

As far as the creative pick being a problem, I’ll just have to live with it until I happen to see a cheap 1.31 version available. I’ve only played this game for a month or so (it is cutting into my Civ II time as well) even though it has been on my shelf for a few years.

Question -- for those who play slowly (vs the rapid win strategy) and slog through all the techs, which ones do you tend to top out first? I see myself going thorough construction first, and power last.

[vmxa1]

You can download the patch for 1.2 to 1.31 for free.
No 1.31 version exist, only 1.0 oe 1.2.
The patch makes Creative 8 picks and increased the space required for Plasma Cannons and Gyros to effectively reduce their overpowering capacity.

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Old n Slow
Question -- for those who play slowly (vs the rapid win strategy) and slog through all the techs, which ones do you tend to top out first? I see myself going thorough construction first, and power last.

I think the main difference is not so much in the tech choices, but in how they customize and play the races.

Freighters
Std Cells
Colony Ship
Electronic Comp
Research Labs
R Hull
Auto Fact
Bios
Soil or Cloner
Neural
Laser
Super
B Pods
Spaceport
Robos
Space Academy
Duets
Merc or PP
Augie
Irridium
Fusion Rifle
Tach Comm or Battle Scanner
Zort
Antimatter Drive

Your race will determine if you Soil or not. I mean Lith do not have much use for Soil and can not research it.
Scanner or Comm is another, Tele does not need Comm for instance.
If you were to do a OCC start, then you would chance this some.
OCC is one city civ, or for Moo2, you stay on your starting system.