Okay so I have given a bit of thought recently to victory conditions, and I have come up with a tenative plan for what I am calling "Stealthy Space"
The basic problem with a spaceship victory is that, if we assume the basic layout of the world currently, once I start building Apollo and the spaceship programs, then Broker and dsplaisted, and Dreylin, and whoever, are going to nuke me and/or otherwise attack me to prevent the ship from arriving.
I definitely need to bone up on my spaceship mechanics - I typically don't play much into the late game. I am aware of T-hawks path, but I think it might not be as viable in this game, because I can't beeline the optimal spaceship path for the above reason of being too obvious.
So something like this is my basic plan:
1) Tech Path
a) Avoid "giveaway" space tech. I'm thinking this is stuff like Ecology / Genetics, though I see that they have "military" uses as well
b) Try to delay Fission worldwide.
2) Spaceship Part Production
a) Save 1-3 GPs for late-game Golden Ages
b) Slow-build Apollo Program, optionally leaving it in the queue in a city with 1t left, assuming I get Rocketry soonish.
c) Kick off the Golden Ages, and ideally complete the whole shebang within 10t max from the time Apollo is created.
d) So it looks like the biggest part is (are) the engine(s), which is 1600 hammers, and has no doubler. So I assume that I'd do that in Green Township, which currently does 50 base hammers. It would gain 14 hammers in a golden age (and I have flexibility to add more if needed). So 64 hammers, * 25% forge, 25% factory 50% coal 50% lab 10% state property is 160%, is 166hpt. Adding 2 engineers and workshopping one of my 2 dye tiles brings it up to 72 base hammers, which is 187hpt, or 9t. I think I could probably get it to 8t with some overflow or whipping. It seems like, if I have all the techs, that I could find 14 other cities to build the other parts in 8t. I have the option of the space elevator of course, but that seems like a pretty big giveaway (though maybe I "hide" that too?). I can do Ecology (8250b) afterwards probably, since the Life Support is cheap (1000h but 100% with copper, so 260% increase - maybe a 4t build? Have to do some analysis on that.
3) Espionage
a) Focus on Espionage producing buildings (Mausoleum, Intelligence Agency, Security Bureau) to ensure a good ept range, which does a few things:
b) Prevent people from seeing my research / city builds
c) Allow me to sabotage things like the Manhattan Project, if necessary
4) Diplomacy
a) Ideally, if I could get 10-15t cool down NAPs with everyone (or at least the major players), by the time anyone figures out that I am making a serious push to space, I'd have those in place to cover most of the building time / flight time.
b) I think I need to take out shadyforce now. Reasons - extra land, lengthen the distance from my core to my borders, buy more time.
This is a game mechanics question, right? So I should be safe in soliciting opinions on my plan for the space race in case I'm missing anything, right?
The basic problem with a spaceship victory is that, if we assume the basic layout of the world currently, once I start building Apollo and the spaceship programs, then Broker and dsplaisted, and Dreylin, and whoever, are going to nuke me and/or otherwise attack me to prevent the ship from arriving.
I definitely need to bone up on my spaceship mechanics - I typically don't play much into the late game. I am aware of T-hawks path, but I think it might not be as viable in this game, because I can't beeline the optimal spaceship path for the above reason of being too obvious.
So something like this is my basic plan:
1) Tech Path
a) Avoid "giveaway" space tech. I'm thinking this is stuff like Ecology / Genetics, though I see that they have "military" uses as well
b) Try to delay Fission worldwide.
2) Spaceship Part Production
a) Save 1-3 GPs for late-game Golden Ages
b) Slow-build Apollo Program, optionally leaving it in the queue in a city with 1t left, assuming I get Rocketry soonish.
c) Kick off the Golden Ages, and ideally complete the whole shebang within 10t max from the time Apollo is created.
d) So it looks like the biggest part is (are) the engine(s), which is 1600 hammers, and has no doubler. So I assume that I'd do that in Green Township, which currently does 50 base hammers. It would gain 14 hammers in a golden age (and I have flexibility to add more if needed). So 64 hammers, * 25% forge, 25% factory 50% coal 50% lab 10% state property is 160%, is 166hpt. Adding 2 engineers and workshopping one of my 2 dye tiles brings it up to 72 base hammers, which is 187hpt, or 9t. I think I could probably get it to 8t with some overflow or whipping. It seems like, if I have all the techs, that I could find 14 other cities to build the other parts in 8t. I have the option of the space elevator of course, but that seems like a pretty big giveaway (though maybe I "hide" that too?). I can do Ecology (8250b) afterwards probably, since the Life Support is cheap (1000h but 100% with copper, so 260% increase - maybe a 4t build? Have to do some analysis on that.
3) Espionage
a) Focus on Espionage producing buildings (Mausoleum, Intelligence Agency, Security Bureau) to ensure a good ept range, which does a few things:
b) Prevent people from seeing my research / city builds
c) Allow me to sabotage things like the Manhattan Project, if necessary
4) Diplomacy
a) Ideally, if I could get 10-15t cool down NAPs with everyone (or at least the major players), by the time anyone figures out that I am making a serious push to space, I'd have those in place to cover most of the building time / flight time.
b) I think I need to take out shadyforce now. Reasons - extra land, lengthen the distance from my core to my borders, buy more time.
This is a game mechanics question, right? So I should be safe in soliciting opinions on my plan for the space race in case I'm missing anything, right?
