Imperium 14: sargon's game

[sargon0]

Imperium 14 - Ursine Archaeologists

So no attacking planets except by spies or gropo. To send troops needs scouting but missile bases will need removing before ship can do this; could be tricky so better scout early and often! Starting position has Red and Blue in range. Red is far more likely to be habitable but is wrong direction so I chance going for the Blue. Scouts go SW Green & S Red to blockade against southern yellows and start building more immediately. Luckily Blue is Spica (Steppe 70) so I settle and send 17 over 2 turns. Scouts find South: Arid 60, Minimal Rich 30, plus Dead 20 & 50 and Inferno 35, West: Inferno UR 25, North: Steppe 50 – range 4 will reach some but 5 needed for habitable rich. Meet Mrrshan at Tao in 2305 so they must be east of 2 southern yellows. Open tech early finding IER and Range5 (over Range 4). Seed IER from Ursa then let Spica (with 1 factory!) take load until 3 bars on bulb then increasing ticks from homeworld. Ursa returns to factories when percentage close to double figures and IER pops in 2324, choose IT+20 over Dead. Immediately seed Range5 then finish max’ing Ursa in 2327 while Spica does tech & factories. Homeworld then builds colony ships and helps tech as it matures. Zoctan founded in 2333 (20 from Spica) then Range 5 (Warp2 next) in 2335 and open all tech fields with RW80 seeded and BC2, DS2 & Hyper-V (over Gatling) waiting. Gienah founded in 2337 (17 from Spica) meets 2PE Mrrshan (Ruth/Mil) at unease where expected, expanded to other yellow.

Extra range West finds Ryoun (Desert 20) and Celtsi (Terran 90). Chase Silicoids from Ryoun so they probably are NW yellow with 3 AI’s in SW. Phantos settled in 2340 (13 from Zoctan refilled from Spica) opening way to big terran. So the rich or the big terran next? Well the next colony ship arrived before Zoctan founded but scouts report the direct journey to Celtsi can be equalled via a detour to Rana (a fast straight link?) so terran it is. In 2345 RW80 hits and seed IIT8 & Warp2 over 2 turns. Find Silicoid scout at northern Firma confirming them at NW yellow. Actually Celtsi (20 from Phantos backfilled from Zoctan) and rich Selia (17 from Gienah) settle together in 2347, gets me GNN 7 planet message! Seed IT20 over next 2 turns as economy grows. Desert 50 Rha settled in 2354 gets trickle from Celtsi and meets 2PE Silicoids (Agg/Tech) as expected. Next few years see Warp2, IIT8 and IT20 come in with Warp3, ARS & Inferno next but I start by seeding DS2. Meanwhile southern scouts have found an unoccupied terran 85(!), Dolz, which I settle in 2363 meeting 4PE Meklars (Xen/Tech) allied to Sakkra. Selia send 40 to Dolz over 2 turns refilled from Gienah and Phantos. After sitting with 2 planets for decades the cats finally settle a third then quickly 2 more but it is even later before the rocks expand.

With the economy booming from IT20 and rich Selia, I seed Inferno in 2364 over 3 turns then Warp 3 over next 2. Now takes fully developed Ursa to keep tech flowing. Still finding empty planets and rich Incedius (Desert 35) in 2367 and central Klystron (Ocean 70) in 2369 are settled meeting 3PE Sakkra (Pac/Tech). Rich Incedius seeded from close by Dolz but 20 transports start the slow journey from Celtsi to Klystron. I thought it might not survive but gave me an opportunity to scout some further planets. Mid 2370’s see DS2 and Inferno in quick succession, seeding BC2 and Hyper-V (finally!) plus PDS. First Event is Pirates at Obaca (Sakkra) in 2377, saves a few BC on the cheap trade with Meks. In 2379 Warp 3 hit (Warp4 next) and UR Rana (Inferno 25) settled then maxes at +20 six turns later! In 2379 with 12 planet message comes first vote with Silicoids(2), Sakkra(3) & Meklars(3) abstain; Mrrshan(4) for themselves and Darloks(3) for me so I vote 8 (of 23) to cats. After stealing BC3 from rocks I discover HyperV (Ion next) and BC2 (ECM3 next). In 2383 I settle northern Firma (Steppe 45) and central Rhilus (Steppe 55) which meets 4PE Darloks (Xen/Tech) – wow, 4 AI technologists. Map with cursor at Orion:


Reserves help stand up new colonies quickly. After PDS (then DS4), I discover Soil in 2390 (Cloning next) boosting economy (& voting power!) even more. ECM3, Ion Cannon & ARS hit replaced by BC5, SP-V & Zortium. GNN announces Pirates cleared at Obaca. Espionage proving useful against backward opponents, stealing ISS, IIT7, IIT9 & IT10, mostly from Silicoids. After SP-V (Fusion Beam next) vote in 2400 is same as last except rocks have 1 more vote and I have 5 more! Darloks didn’t vote for me this time though. After vote Silicoids actually DOW so I continue to steal – ECM1, IS, Death Spores. Zortium & Warp4 replaced by EXO and Warp5. Second event is Quake at … Omicron (Meklar)! Fusion Beam and DS4 arrive around 2407 and I start producing pre-built ARS huges, two of them, as I await my spies. Oh I see! Saboteurs reveal planet scout info. That was because 7/10 MB taken down at Silicoids Tyr. Meanwhile, not to be outdone, my other spies steal RC3 from Darloks! Cloning gives way to Advanced Soil as 2 more MB go down at Tyr. Invaded Tyr in 2412 with 1 nuke base hitting 1/77 transports and 42 surviving land battle – gain Range7, IT30 and Duralloy. Next year invade Silicoids Crius with 50/52 surviving 1 MB and 37 after gropo. Waiting for pop to arrive at new colonies, spies slowly take down Cryslon MB’s and when our archaeologists arrive in 2417 there is just 2/19 remaining. With EXO arriving en route (Andrium next) overkill is assured – out of 214, 199 land and 183 survive the 130 rocks! Meanwhile all Maretta’s 4 MB are down and 2/11 MB at Paladia which is cat territory. Maretta goes in 2418 giving GNN18 message then Advanced Soil arrives in 2419 and Warp 5 next year. Since Misha has no MB’s my Saboteurs destroy all its 7 factories plus 1/19 MB at Fierias.

With Adv.Soil my pop will grow but vote will be close with so few friends so I aim to take out rocks and hit cats two yellow planets, both 130 pop. I max pop on four of my larger & nearer planets quickly for the assault and launch the 3 year journey. Spies manage to take down a few more MB’s but Paladia has 2 and Fierias has 12 and these are scatter-packs not nukes. Cats have DOW’d but ships circle aimlessly as my nearby rich planets launch new ARS huges to lighten ship cover. As 20 bear genocide rocks, 90/151 take Fierias with 10 losses and 101/144 take Paladia with 8 losses. Remaining pop and preserved factories can stand up worlds quickly but pop is all I’m interested in. So the vote in 2425:


Result: Conquest in 2425.

PS. In my ‘Ship Movement’ article I mentioned straight NS or EW journies were rare but we had 3 early ones here (I did suspect when playing). Rana had 2, straight east to Ursa plus straight south Uxmai and Celtsi to Firma was the other one.

[kjn]

Interesting. From what I can gather we used almost exactly the same tech path; only difference was that I choose BTA over Soil (since the Silicoids had already used Death Spores on me), but you managed to finish 95 turns earlier. I think I managed to hit the perfect tech path for this game, but in a way I was lucky that the Silicoids spored me at Rha just a few turns before I finished Inferno.

However, your AIs seems to have been slackers. You get 12 planets and the first galactic council in 2379 - I got it in 2348! Also, you had 23 votes to 20 in my game, but the AIs were only up to 15 of those votes, while they held 17 in mine! Quite the dramatic difference. To further emphasise it, your Silicoids held four colonies that year - mine had eight in 2348. You certainly managed to capitalise on that, reaching 25 votes to my 11 in 2424-25.

Frankly, I have no idea what causes these huge swings in AI performance. The only AI that seems to have had similar performance in our two games would be the Mrrshan. But it certainly makes me happy with my performance in this game, I felt at times that I lost tempo in explaration, settling and capitalising on gains against the AI.

[sargon0]

It always helps to field weaker opponents! I do not understand the AI lethargy in my game either but and :zzz: are suspected! Looking at a couple of early savefiles:

Rhilus - settled by me unopposed in 2383, scouted and in range of Sakkra by 2324, of Meklars by 2335 (allied to Sakkra), of Darloks by 2339
Klystron - settled by me unopposed in 2369, scouted and in range of Meklars by 2324, of Darloks by 2339
Rha - settled by me unopposed in 2354, scouted and in range of Silicoids by 2335
Mobas - settled by Mrrshan in 2364, scouted and in range of Mrrshan by 2335
Dolz & rich Incedius did remain at LR to AI's until my LR settled them in 2363 & 2367 with Mrrshan & Meklars stuck on range 4 (alliances may have temporarily put them at range of other AI though no others scouted them)

Unopposed just made my game a cakewalk. Your game was much more of a challenge and hence more fun. In such a challenge you will always have difficult decisions and opinions about the path chosen but the result was not in doubt, just the timing; well played.

[RefSteel]

Wow - an impressive, inexhorable sweep to victory! As for the lucky draw, when there's a single, obvious stroke of luck (e.g. Maniac's IIT8 from the ART world in Imperium 10 or my Kakata going rich in Imperium 12) it's possible to try and compensate by introducing a variant, but when the AI goes to sleep, it can be difficult to realize anything's unusual until the game is effectively over (or sometimes, until after reading others' reports on the game!) - the same thing happening to me almost a year ago was part of what prompted me to post my original Meklar Challenge; I knew by the time I finished that I'd gotten pretty lucky, and suspected others might enjoy a greater challenge from the same game.

I'm sorry your opponents didn't give you a more serious challenge, but I think you handled it perfectly, by finishing up the game quickly and decisively. Very well played, as always; I hope the oppotunity to read the other reports has made up for having a cakewalk yourself!