Capturing planets

[Basilisk]

I find that it is very hard to capture a planet... is it just get as many colonists as you can and send them??
What are good strategies???
I'm talking about in MOO1

Thanks

[vmxa1]

It is a function of your tech vs theirs and racial traits. Take traits first. If you are say Klac and go against Burs, and tech is equal, you wil need more troops than they have pop. If it is a 40 pop planet, you will need to send at least 60, I would send more as I want to have near the pop max for the planet left after the fight.
If you go after a lessor race then you can get buy just a bit more than they have to capture. This will leave you will very little remaining citizens.
If you have better tech such as Rifle or Armor then you can reduce the number sent. With a big lead in tech, you can sent 20 troops to take a 100 pop planet. You should still always send at least as many troops as the max pop for the planet, if you can. You would like to end up with the planet already filled.
So if they have ground combat racial bonus, they are harder to beat at ground combat. If they have better tech for ground combat, they will be hard to beat and hence you need more troops. If you have any of those things, you can get by on less.
You can also do a little bombing, if need be, but I hate to lose those factories.
One trick to let you get a extra round or more of bombing/beaming is to not kill of the guarding fleet so fast. Instead of using all you ships to combat the fleet let some blast the planet. This presume, the fleet is not able to hurt you and you will not destroy the colony.

[Urban Ranger]

You can always use biological weapons, but that's not recommended.

[Garth Vader]

Research ground combat techs. If I can't win with a decent win/loss ratio I will usually just wipe out the planet and re colonize.

[vmxa1]

I hate to give up on the factories, so if need be I will sent a second round of troops to capture it. I never use bio weapons, no reason, I just don't. Plus if they have factories, I may get new tech. If they do not have better tech than me, I will not be having trouble with the ground battle.

[Garth Vader]

I usually only do that for one planet, and only if I want tech. If I do I will try and get it in one round, sometimes I have sent double the planets population to ensure victory.

To try and do more than that is a waste of population. Unless you are Sakkra with advanced cloning!

[vmxa1]

GV you maybe correct in most cases, but I like to play on a small universe in Moo, so the planet may represent the one I need to stop a vote or may be the only one I can get now. Otherwise, I would be ahead in tech and have it easy.

[Basilisk]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
You can always use biological weapons, but that's not recommended.

lol yes I found that out the hard way - all of a sudden all my 'friends' declaring war on me

Thanks for all you help guys...

One more thing though, I find that it's really hard to get the AI to sign treaties with me, from NAP's to Alliances - is it because I'm supposedly more powerful than them (bigger, most tech etc)?
Even though I'm more powerful than them, they often beat me in ship battles....

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Basilisk

One more thing though, I find that it's really hard to get the AI to sign treaties with me, from NAP's to Alliances - is it because I'm supposedly more powerful than them (bigger, most tech etc)?
Even though I'm more powerful than them, they often beat me in ship battles....

Last part first. What do you mean by more powerful? If you mean you have more planets and lose battles that is one thing. If you mean you have more or larger ships in that battle that is another. Battles come down to tech and design. I have had tens of thousands of ships show up for battle with my few large ones and I waxed them. They had poor design and I had HEF with pulse phasors. If the fleets are equal then you can still win with better tactics (you do not want to let the computer handle the battle for you). I would liek to see a save file where the battle occured if you would attach one to a post.
Treaties are not my style. I almost never use them in Moo1. That does not mean you should not, but I do not like them. They tend to sign trade treaties and as soon as they start making me money, they go to war. I do not like to have reseearch ones either as I know I will pull ahead anyway and steal anything they have, so why help them?

[vmxa1]

To finish up on treaties. Races have a starting base for each race. This means Saks and Mrrs will have a hard time dealing with each other. Leaders personality has a modifier. Tech gifts are +5 perm modifier and breaking oath is perm negative. Wars also have modifiers, but not to core. Temp modifiers can be things like NAG and Allies, trades exchanges and the like. Every time you contact the AI you are hit with a -10 modifer, regardless of the outcome. If they have a treaty with someone you just attacked that will affect it. What it comes down to is:
Core reaction - their temp modifier, 2*leader personality, d100 roll, game level. Actions that will hurt: Council vote (abstain), Spying, Having too many planets, massing fleet on their boarder, attacking a player with out a declaration, genocide, destroy things of theirs, bio weapons used. So as you see a lot goes into it. The bottom line really is that once all or nearly all planets are colonzed, every one will be very tense and must go to war to get more land.

[ravagon]

Originally posted by Basilisk

One more thing though, I find that it's really hard to get the AI to sign treaties with me, from NAP's to Alliances - is it because I'm supposedly more powerful than them (bigger, most tech etc)?
Even though I'm more powerful than them, they often beat me in ship battles....

You should be able to ask for NAP's when the other races attitude towards you is relaxed or better. Not quite sure about the level for an alliance (although the AI's seem to manage it quite nicely early game before they could have achieved it ).

If you're referring to the power bar on the status screen - don't. That simply counts the number of ships and their combined firepower, and hence is quite irrelevant.
If the opposition had a couple of thousand medium ships packed with gatling lasers against your dozen large ships with level 3 or 4 shields and scatter pack-5 missiles they would have a far greater fleet strength even though they could barely scratch a single one of your ships.
As posted above - better designs and (generally) higher techs determine the outcome of a space battle. Not fleet strength.
Put a battle computer on a scout early on and send it to an AI's staging point to see what their ship stats are. Then tailor your ships/fleet to match/beat it - usually their designs will be retained for quite some time.

[Basilisk]

Yea I've been playing quite alot in the last few days, finished 3 games in medium and large galaxies - a lot is more clear to me now, Psilon definately give a major advantage with the tech. I was taking 100 pop planets with 50 pop, and not losing more than 3.
Crazy.
Might have to up the difficulty past easy

[Virtual Alchemist]

One effective tactic for capturing planets in MOO-1,
without depopulating your own, is to gradually build up
a big invasion force by convoying colonists between
friendly planets over several turns.

To illustrate, say two friendly planets (A and B are 2
turns away from each other, with a max population of
100). Say each planet contains 90 pop.

Turn 1 - send 5 pop points from A to B and send 5 pop
points back from B to A.

Turn 3 (just before the turn 1 convoys arrive), send 10
pop points from A to B, and 10 pop points back from B
to A. (ignore the warnings about max planet size -
you will send the next wave before it arrives.)

Turn 5 (just before the turn 3 convoys arrive), send 15
pop points from A to B, and 15 pop points back from B
to A.

Continue until the two planets are exchanging 50 pop
points (the max for a size 100 planet.) Then send 2
waves of 50 pop each to the target enemy planet.

The friendly planets should still contain 90+ colonists,
because the 45 pop convoy arrives just after you send
the 50 pop attack force.

Very effective...
VA

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Basilisk
is it because I'm supposedly more powerful than them (bigger, most tech etc)?
Even though I'm more powerful than them, they often beat me in ship battles....

Hey Basilisk, what were those battles? What numbers/types of ship? Were they tactical or not? If not, enough said. If you find that you are having your hands full in battles, but winning, do not kill all of the worst ships they have, let them retreat some. The AI tends to not scrap a ship design that is obsolete, if it has a bunch left. This can keep them from making new and better designs right away. If you are crushing them, then it does not matter. Oh, are these battles at their planets and if so do they have missile bases? If you get into one of those fights attach the save game here, I would like to see what is going on.

[Basilisk]

Yeah I've improved somewhat now... I think that I just wasn't upgrading my ships enough...