OSG 26 - The Bearperor Returns

[Ianus]

First a review of the empire. Things look to be in great shape! We are colonizing well, tech is looking good, and we actually have a navy! From discussion with my teammates and having time to think I can say that I really dropped the ball on research at the start. I was so intent on building factories that I managed to cripple our empire’s early Planetology progress, which is made even worse by just how important Controlled Dead tech looks to be. It will not happen again!
Erratic Psilons eh? That should be enjoyable! The good news for now is that even though there are Psilon ships entering Bulrathi space the brains only have 4 planets, and as RefSteel points out they are pretty spread out. Now I realize that ONLY 4 planets of Psilons is a lot like saying its ONLY a three alarm fire, but it could certainly be a lot worse. Also Erratic Psilons may be a blessing in disguise, as Emperor Tacheon may find it hard to do research when he is fighting a bunch of wars. So that will become a crucial tactic down the road: keeping the Psilons at war. Of course, how to do that is another issue. Since spectator wars are off the table we will probably have to go to war ourselves and then draw in some allies. Which means that we will need some allies. To that end, and since the brains and the rocks are already off on the wrong foot I think that we need to buddy up to the rocks as much as possible. And the Sakkra too whenever we get into contact with them. That leaves the Alkari (and Psilons) to play war games with, which should be plenty at least for a while. This makes having and holding those Dead worlds AND doing it peacefully even more important to avoid annoying our hypothetical allies. Anyway, on with the show:

2350: Wait, what are all of these ships doing here?! Those weren’t here last time I looked! I decide that Porridge has been ours long enough and dispatch all but one lone Honeybee down to Primodius in hopes of stalling the Silicoids long enough. I send the Nose from Ursa up to Dolz to have a look at the Psilon Corona design before probably routing it down to the southeast to have an eventual look at the Alkari. Other than that things look good. I send Reserve funds to Porridge and leave everything else the same.

Also, Emperor Tacheon refuses to break his alliance with the birdbrains. I just had to ask. I also expect to be seeing a lot of that grumpy mug in the future.

2351: What excitement! Our heroic scout at Primodius runs off ANOTHER incursion from the Silicoids. Emperor Granid (or whoever): well, it didn’t work the first 9 times, but I have a really good feeling about number 10! I spend a long time debating about settling Dolz, and then once I decide to do so I spend a long time pondering about what to name the colony (I don’t usually rename planets), and just when I have decided that a minimal 30 world feels quite Dolzey I am struck by brilliance and rename it: Dither. Brilliant! We also scout Endoria, a well established Sakkra colony just south of Mentar. Its starting to get a little crowded around here! And CATASTROPHE! A virus wipes out all 100RP from our work on Irridium fuel cells. I don’t know that there was overflow RP assignment, but at least it wasn’t Planetology or Construction, the two fields we are actually working right now. [I’m sure that Ref could make this into a hilarious bit of flavor, but I’m just not up to it right now]. And now the turn actually starts!
I send 27 million colonists from Sanders over to Dither. Now that the colony is founded I can see the Alkari Sparrowhawk in orbit of the purple star to the east. I dispatch my lone Honeybee to see about chasing it away. I’m pretty certain that the Psilons are en route to Dither, so we will see what happens there. I notice that there is another Psilon Corona headed to Artemis just south of Ursa. You know, if you don’t maintain your scout blockades this is what happens!

2352: Go planetology go! Onward to Controlled Dead! That 3100RP price tag is painful, especially with the 134RP I am currently producing. Next turn the last colony ship completes though, plus Reduced Industrial Waste 80 has almost a full bulb.
There is definitely a bug in the game about displaying explored planets outside of scanner range. Now that my scout is flying from Endoria to what must be Sssla the planet displays as uncolonized, but it displays as an actively scanned planet rather than reading “last reported as a Sakkra colony” as it should.

2353: Run away! This is the topmost red star in the northeast corner, just to be clear. I guess that the Alkari won’t be getting up to the corner any time really soon. Our final Colony Ship is produced and Reloc’d up to Sanders, saving a turn on its journey to Drakka. RIW80 enters the percentages at 1% and I switch Ursa over entirely to research.

2354: Well the Silicoids try AGAIN with their two unarmed colony ships at Primodius, and my heroic Scout and his backup of 19 laser fighters run them off again. Also the Sakkra have 20 bases and a large ship at Sssla.

2355: A quiet turn. My colonists and the Psilon ship will arrive at Dither on the same turn. Not what I wanted to happen. RIW80 is at 22%.

2356: Yes! All research to Planetology!
Ok, something really really weird is going on here!

First of all Emperor Tacheon has lost half of his planets. They also don’t show up on the galactic map.

Then, when I check the Races screen I have apparently met the Sakkra, even though I did not get any message to that effect. I can talk to Emperor Tyranid the Aggressive Technologist, who is in an alliance with both the Psilons and the Alkari. I’m not sure how he can talk to the Alkari, but whatever. He is also at war with the rocks.

And finally after exiting the Races screen I can see Tyranid’s planets, including the two which until just last turn apparently belonged to the Psilons. Also Endoria now correctly displays “last reported as a Sakkra colony” as it should. But the Map screen now shows 4 Psilon planets and no Sakkra planets again. Weird! We will see what happens next turn.

2357: The game is seriously wigging out now. First the Silicoids return to Primodius with the same two colony ships for like the 15th time, and are repelled again. Then the Psilons attack at Dither with 10 Heavy Lasers and gain space superiority AND shoot down 9 or 10 of my incoming colonists. So in desperation I threaten them. The result?

Um, ok I guess… Thank you for filling a HUGE early hole in my tech tree and pulling all your ships back from where I’m sure you were about to clobber me. I realize that the Bulrathi are a bit intimidating in person, but this is a hologram and I’m pretty sure you could flatten me if you wanted to. Although to be fair you do only have two planets…
Another result of this bug, the ships incoming to the Barren worlds which last turn were displayed as Sakkra turn out to be Psilon, which means that they will be retreating from my mighty scouts. Rahrgh! [Player’s note: If this threat ruins the game for anyone, I’m sorry! To be fair I believe that we could probably hit the brains at Iranha with good results]
Finally I am OFFICIALLY introduced to Tyranid the Aggressive Technologist. He and Tacheon are made for each other.

2358: We settle Hefalump in the far north, and I discover that through poor ship management I sent a colony ship to the wrong place, and so I missed out on naming our last planet. The ship is on its way so the next player can rename it as they like. Dead tech is nearing the percentages too.

2359: A quiet turn. Controlled Dead enters the percentages at 5%. The Psilons retreat from everywhere, and that is about it.

2360: And the Silicoids are back at Primodius with the same 2 Colony ships, but this time they have brought some friends. Three large Sharks sporting a 5-rack of missiles and a laser or two. But after a nail biting battle involving dodging all missiles due to AI stupidity, the ultimate sacrifice made by our heroic Scout pilot to absorb a laser salvo, and incredible dodges and hits by our fleet of Honeybees, I manage to hold the planet with the loss of only 10 fighters and our scout. Seriously that pilot is the greatest hero I have ever known!

And so I hand over control of our empire. We are actually in pretty great shape, at least according to the graph.

For the next emperor:
• Controlled Dead is at 24%, but only because I have sacrificed all of our factory building to get it there
• You have 4 turns until the Silicoids can turn around and return for Primodius. With Nuclear engines our travel time is doubled, but you can only fit combat speed 2 OR a shield or computer on a small laser hull. I can’t decide which is better so I leave it up to you.
• We have a major AI love-fest going on, with the Silicoids playing pariah and everyone else in love. The Sakkra are even allied with the Meklar, and one way or another a council vote isn’t far away.
• Good luck!