Imperium Fifteen: Megafrost's Rushed Game

[Megafrost]

I've been pressed for time with finals, so my report is going to be much less detailed than usual and have fewer pictures.
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I started off sending my colony ship blind to the east, while sending a few scouts elsewhere. I colonized Esper, and then built scouts to blockade all the nearby systems. Afterwards I had Kholdan growing population and sending any above 50 to Esper.

In 2310 I had Kholdan put one click into research, opening planetology and propulsion. I made the obvious choice of Controlled Barren over Improved Eco, and given the Meklar's very close proximity I chose range 4 over range 5. I had both my planets put all their budget into research since they were almost full already. When planetology hit percentages, I had Kholdan switch to colony ship production. Controlled Barren popped in 2318 and, given the lack of dead planets around, I chose Controlled Tundra over Controlled Dead. Range 4 popped one turn later, and I went for the Nuclear Engines over every other option. Then I opened every other field, choose Deep Space Scanner, IIT9, Class 2 shields and Hyper-V rockets. But I was beelining planetology, since that would be my best bet for raising productivity.

I settled Willow in 2323 and Ryoun in 2331, establishing contact with the Xenophobic Expansionist Meklar. I debated for a while whether or not I wanted to work on our relations or not. But if I didn't make friends with them, the Humans almost certainly would. We agreed to 25 bc per year trade treaties. Having scouted both of their worlds earlier, my scanners allowed me to see everything they had.

It was, well, take a look.



Pitiful factory counts. No missile bases. Those ships? Scouts and colony ships. They have no military power, and they're slacking on factory production. What are these Meklar doing?!

In 2335 I settled my 5th planet of Moro. Same turn GNN revealed the Humans were out to 6 planets. Not a good sign. I settled Beta Ceti in 2340. Poor, but with my lack of factory construction, that would not be important. I noticed in 2341 that the Meklar built their first missile base. Slackers.

Controlled Tundra pops in 2350. There's still no Terraforming technology, so since I haven't seen any toxic planets, I choose Controlled Inferno over Controlled Toxic.

I grab Aquilae in 2357, establishing contact with the Ruthless Expansionist Mrrshan. As with the Meklar, I establish trade treaties. Better that I try and make a few friends than to give the Humans no competition. I grab Rotan in 2362. Controlled Inferno pops in 2368, and I choose Terraforming +40 over Bio Toxin Antidote.

I settle Artemis in 2371, and then in 2373 I get one of the worst randoms ever.



On my only planet building colony ships. Eurgh! In 2375 I grab Kulthos and Toranor, making me the first to 12 planets. The council also meets that year (couldn't pick a better date for the first council), where I'm against the Humans and can safely throw my vote their way, though I only have 5/23 votes. I grab Yarrow in 2377, Aurora in 2381, and Xendalla in 2388. In 2393 the Aggressive Ecologist Bulrathi establish contact with me, which means they have range 6 fuel. Again, I establish trade treaties.

Terraforming +40 pops in 2395. I could go cloning to advance, but I've seen three unclaimed toxic planets, so I go back for Controlled Toxic. I grab Argus in 2396 and Drakka in 2397.

The 2400 election rolls around. I have 10/32 votes, not enough for a veto but getting very close.

Meklar declare war in 2409. In response, I up my spy spending and switch to espionage. They don't have too many ships right now, but what few they have are huge, and they have auto-repair. I dial up the Mrrshan and ask them to declare war (since I don't want their alliance dragging them into war with me as well), but they ask for 1200 BC, nearly the entirety of my piddling savings. I can't risk having no funds, so I say no way.

In 2410 Controlled Toxic pops. With war on my heels, I choose Bio Toxin Antidote so I can fend off those death spores. I settle Proxima in 2411, triggering the 3/8 GNN message and establishing contact with the Pacifistic Technologist Humans. They grabbed most of the planets in the southeast corner, apparently having using a temporary alliance with the Mrrshan to hop-scotch and grab up the planets.

Meklar, not much for phony wars, send an attack force.



Anti-missile rockets? Oh that's not good, I may not be able to take down those ships I-- wait a minute, those are pitiful weapons... they can't possible have enough to hurt me that much. I play out the combat...yep. They only took down 4 missile bases before retreating. And I'm just running on class 3 shields here.

I grab Bootis in 2413. Being a dead planet, I don't think the Meklar are likely to target it. I accidently click past a GNN report, but looking around reveals that Kholdan is plagued. It's late enough in the game that that isn't likely to hamper me too much.

Meklar return for another strike in 2416, this time bringing a huge design with 15 or so death spores. Ouch! But they still run out of ammo before destroying all my population before having to retreat. I hope this doesn't continue much longer, I may not be able to take many more attacks. I grab Vulcan and Guradas in 2417, and Tauri in 2418, triggering the "merging" message. The Meklar attack me again in 2420, reducing me to 2 bases.

At long last, Bio Toxin Antidote pops in 2421. I trade it to the Mrrshan for NPGs, and then trade them ECM 2 for hand lasers. With the NPGs in my possession, I design a small fighter with NPGs and start building some and sending them to Ryoun. I grab Omicron in 2422, bringing me in contact with the Pacifistic Ecologist Sakkra. I establish trade treaties.

Taking another look at the diplomacy situation, I realize... EVERYONE is allied with the humans! Eep! I ask the AIs to change their minds, but the only thing I manage to do is get the humans to declare on the Meklar. And they use the power of their alliance to bring everyone to war against the machines. So I ask the machine for a cease fire, and they accept so long as I give them Bio Toxin Antidote. Since I don't use death spores anyways...

The 2425 elections roll around. I had asked the Meklar for peace since I wanted some support to make sure I wasn't at risk of losing the election. But my voting power had grown to 17/40, so I had nothing to fear. Immediately after the elections, the Mrrshan declared war on me. So asking around, the Sakkra agreed to declare on them.

I claim Paranar in 2427, the final planet in the galaxy. Here's a look at the layout of the galaxy.



So yeah, can you see where this is going? The Mrrshan don't have sufficient shielding to protect from NPG attacks, so with a huge stack of 500 ships, I start to invade some of their worlds. First, I invade Kronos in about 2438.



Made much less painful by my recent acquisition of Cloning. I managed to loot Death Spores from the factories. Nuts. In 2443 I invaded Seidan, where I looted the rest of the Mrrshan tech tree, including Range 7, Inertial Stabilizer and Merculite Missiles. In 2448 I invade Rayden, an artifacts world!

The 2450 election rolls around. I have around 50% of the total vote.

In 2458 fusion beam pops, miniaturizing my fusion bombs enough to fit onto a small ship. Of course I can't use them against the humans, but the Meklar will do just fine. I invade Misha in 2466 and Tyr in 2468. The Humans declare war on me and manage to bomb out all my factories on Kronos. I invade the Meklar's final world of Meklon in 2470.



I try to send my ships over to Kronos to save it, but they're using large ships with anti-matter bombs and repulsor beams, so I can't touch them. Kronos is bombed to oblivion in 2473. So in 2474 I send my ships over to Fierias and turn it into glass.



The point here is to reduce my opponents' voting power as much as possible before the election. My bombers can just reach Sssla, so I send them over to glass it on the same interturn as the election.



Humans have unanimous support, but I have enough voting power to take a Conquest victory, which I do. Inevitable, given my insanely huge land grab.

This was an interesting variant. I sorely missed the factories when trying to research ahead of all my opponents, but my planets seemed to stand themselves up very quickly. Furthermore, there didn't seem to be much importance to rich or poor planets. Very interesting.

[timmy827]

Nice job. My test game on this map was fairly similar with a huge landgrab to the north. I abandoned it and souped up the starts in the NE corner, in hopes of some of those races making a play for the NW, but it looks like it didn't really happen in any of the games submitted so far.

[RefSteel]

Well played, Megafrost! It was interesting to see a couple bits of bad luck that at first seemed potentially crippling (Kholdan going poor and the Meklar sending a multi-huge fleet with anti-missiles) turned out to be almost irrelevant - I assume you just started building your ships out of Artemis and researching from the homeworld, not worrying about the poorness since it couldn't build industry anyway, and of course AMRs don't matter when the ships they protect are armed with warmed-over turkey stuffing. The Meklar never seemed to research decent weapons in any of the games I've read so far (including my own, of course). Great job establishing yourself in a dominant position and playing it into a decisive victory!

Nice job. My test game on this map was fairly similar with a huge landgrab to the north. I abandoned it and souped up the starts in the NE corner, in hopes of some of those races making a play for the NW, but it looks like it didn't really happen in any of the games submitted so far.

Hmm... Have a look at the galactic map though. (The one from my epilogue presents the case pretty clearly, with our tundra+ planets circled - the non-circled purple star up there just has asteroids) - there's a huge gap in the north-central galaxy that can't be crossed without Controlled Dead + Extreme Fuel Cells or Controlled Toxic/Radiated. No matter how nice their local terrain, there was no way the AI could cross that before a player pushing planetology could get Inferno, LR ships for Aurora, or both, and expand up there like ... bugs. I suspect making the planets just north of the player more hostile and the ones in the far north much less so (i.e. a pathway for colonization by the Bulrathi and/or their allies) would indeed have made this map far more challenging.

[sargon0]

Lets paint the galaxy red! Nice land grab and comfortable win despite some setbacks with events and xenophobic neighbours, well played.

The galaxy did feature some strange planets including early dodgy fertiles which gained another fertile bonus with gaia!