It was great fun to play some MOO again, but the holidays and other factors consumed so much time I was not able to complete the Grinch's campaign against those horrible Whos. So I will report as incomplete (played through 2409), and sometime soon I will finish and update with what might have been. Now on to the fun!
As a MOO noob, I have always had difficulty with playing the Darloks. Just how hard do you dare to push their spying talent, given the risk of negative -- sometimes disasterously negative! -- diplomatic outcomes? I ended up taking the passive approach and only sending in my agents against races with whom I was already at war. Given the difficulties I was having overall, and how many wars I got into, the agents were kept fairly busy.
I opened the game at The Hideout, and checked the galaxy map for info. Psilons, Humans, and Silicoids in this game...ouch. Sakkra and Bulrathi, OK. Clusters of yellows to the SE and SSW, likely to have early competition for planets from those areas. Need to move fast.
Sent out my scouts and guessed on one of the red stars in range for my colony ship. A few turns, and I got my next inkling this was going to be on the hard side of Average. Both reds had hostile worlds, and the only planet in initial range was at the blue (!) and was poor. Ack! I hate poor worlds for the initial colony, I never seem to get them developed. (As of 2409 Aquilas still has only about 50 factories....)
The difficulties continued to stack up -- the rocks quite close by and threatening to take many of the available worlds early, lack of early clean up techs in the tree, erratic AI civs as ticking bombs, xenophobic AIs, the one stable race I could have had good relations with (Humans) being my main competitor for the south-central systems.... This game was definitely tougher than the Average rating suggested.
I ended up fighting with everyone I met, although by 2409 I still had not met the Psilons. Silicoids were first, when they colonized fertile Esper immediately south of the Hideout and threatened ultra-rich Kailas. No way could I allow them those planets! I was able to claim both worlds, sending an invasion force against Esper and then beating back multiple counter-attacks against both worlds. Thank goodness for the traditional wimpy laser fighter and slow Silicoid population growth. Eventually we got peace, and I kept both worlds but got nothing further south. I got three tech steals during the war for the Grinch's bulging bags of loot.
Sakkra were next, although they were never much of a threat. When I finally gained contact in 2375, they had only 2 worlds! Sssla and the rich barren world of Tauri which they had beaten me to by 1 turn.
I considered sending transports, but slow speed and things heating up further south decided against it. Of course, the erratic lizards promptly declared on me anyway.
Next war was against the humans. They were allied with the Sakkra and I figured they would probably declare on my anyway, and they were threatening to claim the entire south central region -- 6 excellent planets I desperately needed for growth. So I started sending troops against each world as the AI's ridiculous immortal colony ships planted everywhere. The honorable apes hated me, of course, but what can you do? I could not let them have all those worlds, which they were beating me to by 1-2 turns each (grrrr). The fighting was ugly for quite a long time, worlds gained and lost and gained again, but eventually I had all 6 and the humans asked for peace. The south central region was mine.
I also got a bunch of tech steals from the apes, more loot for the Grinch's sleigh!
I even managed to reach Herculis 1 turn ahead of the human colony ship, finding another artifacts world. Got Robotic Controls III from it, which enabled a key improvement to the empire's productivity. Painful to spend heavily on factories during the war, but I managed to get my core worlds built up to the new maximums.
Next war was with the Bulrathi and overlapped the human conflict. The erratic bears went nuts and came after Kakata, where I had turned back their colony ships by a single turn years before. I had very little defense, so the planet got pounded for a while and took a couple whacks from large (40-50 million) bear assaults. Lost a LOT of pop, shipped in most of the population of my second planet (which had been raided for troops over and over again...I never seem to find better uses for poor worlds) to reinforce. But I eventually destroyed the bear ships once I got planetary shield V built at Kakata. Fighting at Draconis and Kailas was nastier as the nebula made my better shield tech useless, but an expensive deal with the Sakkra (Robotic Controls 3 for Hyper X missiles, ouch!) was just enough to hold the line.
As of 2409 I have 16 planets and am in the process of turtling up with plantary shield V and lots of bases. I am still working on more speed (sublight drives), been in the percentages for ages and not yet in (39%!). I believe I am in a winning position, but just ran out of time.
OK, the theft list:
ECM I (2363, from Silicoids)
Class II Force Field (2364, from Silicoids)
Range 4 (2366, from Silicoids)
Battle Computer 2 (2384, from Sakkra)
Reduced Waste 80% (2391, from Humans, and my first clean up tech!)
IIT9 (2394, from Bulrathi)
Death Spores (2394, from Humans)
Anti-Missile Rockets (2395, from Humans)
Fusion Bomb (2401, from Bulrathi)
ECM II (2402, from Bulrathi)
Gatling Laser (2402, from Humans)
Total of 11 steals at 2409, no double since I have not won yet (but hopefully will eventually). Likely to be a pitiful total compared to others, and much of it was junk. But there were a couple gems, primary RW80% -- desperately needed clean up tech, fully half my RC3-maxed worlds' output was going to Eco spending! FF2 saved me spending my own RP and got me to the critical Planetary V just in time for the Bulrathi assaults. Kept hoping to get Bulrathi planetology as they had Controlled Toxic, but it has not happened as of 2409.
As a MOO noob, I have always had difficulty with playing the Darloks. Just how hard do you dare to push their spying talent, given the risk of negative -- sometimes disasterously negative! -- diplomatic outcomes? I ended up taking the passive approach and only sending in my agents against races with whom I was already at war. Given the difficulties I was having overall, and how many wars I got into, the agents were kept fairly busy.
I opened the game at The Hideout, and checked the galaxy map for info. Psilons, Humans, and Silicoids in this game...ouch. Sakkra and Bulrathi, OK. Clusters of yellows to the SE and SSW, likely to have early competition for planets from those areas. Need to move fast.
Sent out my scouts and guessed on one of the red stars in range for my colony ship. A few turns, and I got my next inkling this was going to be on the hard side of Average. Both reds had hostile worlds, and the only planet in initial range was at the blue (!) and was poor. Ack! I hate poor worlds for the initial colony, I never seem to get them developed. (As of 2409 Aquilas still has only about 50 factories....)
The difficulties continued to stack up -- the rocks quite close by and threatening to take many of the available worlds early, lack of early clean up techs in the tree, erratic AI civs as ticking bombs, xenophobic AIs, the one stable race I could have had good relations with (Humans) being my main competitor for the south-central systems.... This game was definitely tougher than the Average rating suggested.
I ended up fighting with everyone I met, although by 2409 I still had not met the Psilons. Silicoids were first, when they colonized fertile Esper immediately south of the Hideout and threatened ultra-rich Kailas. No way could I allow them those planets! I was able to claim both worlds, sending an invasion force against Esper and then beating back multiple counter-attacks against both worlds. Thank goodness for the traditional wimpy laser fighter and slow Silicoid population growth. Eventually we got peace, and I kept both worlds but got nothing further south. I got three tech steals during the war for the Grinch's bulging bags of loot.
Sakkra were next, although they were never much of a threat. When I finally gained contact in 2375, they had only 2 worlds! Sssla and the rich barren world of Tauri which they had beaten me to by 1 turn.
I considered sending transports, but slow speed and things heating up further south decided against it. Of course, the erratic lizards promptly declared on me anyway.Next war was against the humans. They were allied with the Sakkra and I figured they would probably declare on my anyway, and they were threatening to claim the entire south central region -- 6 excellent planets I desperately needed for growth. So I started sending troops against each world as the AI's ridiculous immortal colony ships planted everywhere. The honorable apes hated me, of course, but what can you do? I could not let them have all those worlds, which they were beating me to by 1-2 turns each (grrrr). The fighting was ugly for quite a long time, worlds gained and lost and gained again, but eventually I had all 6 and the humans asked for peace. The south central region was mine.
I also got a bunch of tech steals from the apes, more loot for the Grinch's sleigh!I even managed to reach Herculis 1 turn ahead of the human colony ship, finding another artifacts world. Got Robotic Controls III from it, which enabled a key improvement to the empire's productivity. Painful to spend heavily on factories during the war, but I managed to get my core worlds built up to the new maximums.
Next war was with the Bulrathi and overlapped the human conflict. The erratic bears went nuts and came after Kakata, where I had turned back their colony ships by a single turn years before. I had very little defense, so the planet got pounded for a while and took a couple whacks from large (40-50 million) bear assaults. Lost a LOT of pop, shipped in most of the population of my second planet (which had been raided for troops over and over again...I never seem to find better uses for poor worlds) to reinforce. But I eventually destroyed the bear ships once I got planetary shield V built at Kakata. Fighting at Draconis and Kailas was nastier as the nebula made my better shield tech useless, but an expensive deal with the Sakkra (Robotic Controls 3 for Hyper X missiles, ouch!) was just enough to hold the line.
As of 2409 I have 16 planets and am in the process of turtling up with plantary shield V and lots of bases. I am still working on more speed (sublight drives), been in the percentages for ages and not yet in (39%!). I believe I am in a winning position, but just ran out of time.
OK, the theft list:
ECM I (2363, from Silicoids)
Class II Force Field (2364, from Silicoids)
Range 4 (2366, from Silicoids)
Battle Computer 2 (2384, from Sakkra)
Reduced Waste 80% (2391, from Humans, and my first clean up tech!)
IIT9 (2394, from Bulrathi)
Death Spores (2394, from Humans)
Anti-Missile Rockets (2395, from Humans)
Fusion Bomb (2401, from Bulrathi)
ECM II (2402, from Bulrathi)
Gatling Laser (2402, from Humans)
Total of 11 steals at 2409, no double since I have not won yet (but hopefully will eventually). Likely to be a pitiful total compared to others, and much of it was junk. But there were a couple gems, primary RW80% -- desperately needed clean up tech, fully half my RC3-maxed worlds' output was going to Eco spending! FF2 saved me spending my own RP and got me to the critical Planetary V just in time for the Bulrathi assaults. Kept hoping to get Bulrathi planetology as they had Controlled Toxic, but it has not happened as of 2409.
