A post in the Meklar vs. Klackon thread says it takes a long time to reduce a planet to Max10 pop from 100, from waste buildup.

I just ran the start of a normal difficulty Klackon game where I've handicapped myself by never cleaning up waste (it's a pain -- I have to move all the Eco sliders on all planets to zero manually at the start of each turn). Kholdan reached 10/Max10 at 2307, and that's without building any extra factories, and also shipping pop off the planet every turn starting at 2303.

I ran two tests on Normal, with Klackons and Humans, scapping all ships at 4700, production into weapons research only (with Eco at 0), and the results were the same:

year pop max
2300 50 100
2301 50 66
2302 51 45
2303 51 31
2304 51 21
2305 47 15
2306 45 11
2307 43 10
2308 41 10

It looks like the planet auto-cleans somewhat when the game auto-resets the econ slider back to clean or max. It still only takes one turn to clean up the planet in 2309, and bring Max back to 100, so I'll have to be careful not to screw up my handicap game.

Hope I'm not stepping on toes by starting the reporting thread, but if I don't post now I won't have a chance before Jan 11.

Pre-Game Analysis

I always enjoyed the xCC challenge in Civ 3, mostly because I don't have the time or patience to be micro-managing dozens and dozens of cities, yet hate not playing the best game I can. So when Zed came up with this scenario, I knew I had to give it a whirl. First, let's look at the scoring options:

The base score is calculated via your ending date to encourage finishing as quickly as possible. I tend to be rather conservative in my game, waiting until I can strike with decisive force. To get a higher score, I will probably have to step out on a few limbs. Since each year translates to one point, all of the bonus scoring can be looked at from that perspective.

+50 for settling Orion without exceeding 5 planets: This seems like a red herring to me, designed to throw player off track. I imagine some will try and go 4CC until they have the tech to kill the Guardian, and that will probably cost them more than 50 turns. I do not intend to get this bonus.

+50 for triggering final war at the first possible opportunity: Wow, that's a lot of points for a random happening. I'm sure there will be some games where an AI rises to power quickly, especially with the Silicoids in the mix. A combination of expansion and early alliances could lead to a very early first final war before player is ready. Some people will also probably never get this option. I intend to take it if at all possible.

+25 for avoiding final war entirely: Consolation prize if final war never comes.

+15 for extermination victory: This may seem like a no-brainer, but if it would take more than 15 turns to go from conquest to extermination, than taking this option is the better one. That is if Final War has not been declared.

I do not intend to incur any penalties for colonizing past five planets. I will take the final war option if at all possible; even if it will extends my game more than 50 turns, it will be worth it for the challenge. And that's my philosophy for this game: enjoy the challenge and novelty of the 5CC, and place the scoring priority a close, but distinct second.

Now, looking at the starting map, we would appear to be alone in the NW quadrant, as the two yellows to our south are very unlikely candidates for an AI homeworld. There are six of the generally habitable star types within easy reach. We might get lucky and find a not-too-hostile rich in all the blue stars to the south. Scouting will be of paramount importance in this game, as I will have to choose my four other planets very carefully. As for the rest of the planets in my space, my strategy will be one of denial. I will maintain a starfleet, and prevent as many colonies from taking root as I possibly can. This will undoubtedly lead to early wars, and could speed final war. Not that that matters to the borg.

Looking at the racial mix, the clear threats are the Silicoids and Klackons. Those rocks could be particular trouble if they are close to me, as that will force me to keep a bigger denial-fleet to protect hostile worlds.

Game

There are two stars in opening range, the red to the north and the yellow to the south. The yellow has better odds, so the col ship goes there. The scouts head for the second yellow and the red 5 parsecs away. Normally I don't build scouts first turn, but I will be here. If that yellow star turns out to be a marginal world, I want to know what my other options are. Oh, and thank you Zed for cleaning up the fleet screen for us

When she colony ships arrives, it finds a Terran size 100. Well, I probably won't find four worlds better than this, so I decide to take it without waiting for the scouting reports. The first batch of scouting reports come in, and I'm not very excited. There's a size 90 ocean world south of Volantis that's already in range that I will probably grab. Unfortunately, the stars to my East and North are all medium size, with one each Dead and Ultra Poor, although one is fertile. Much more interesting reports from the blue stars. There's a size 45 Tundra rich and a size 85 Fertile Arid SE of Volantis. Even better, they can both be reached without range tech, though I will need the environment tech for the Tundra. There's also a size 40 ultra-rich nearby, but it is radiated and I don't want to wait that long for my fifth colony. This will be a nice option later if I should really need to take another world (provided I have the planetology tech to get it). My plan is to stick with the southern planets, which will give me two size 100's, a size 90, a size 85, and a size 45 rich.

Cthulhu maxes population (with help from Volantis) in2323. Time to see what planetology tech are available. Or I could pull some serious and dump the investigation money to the range slider by accident. Range 5 there. My only option Planetology-wise is Improved Eco. I'd have rather drawn +10, but that's better than Barren. Before I begin research, though, I need a col ship to get Nitzer online. Once that's done, I will be reasearching the tech from Cthulhu at a rate of 100BC per turn. That will ripen the tech in about 9 turns. If Tundra is not in the tree, I will need the extra production to keep climbing the Planetology ladder.

Nitzer is founded in 2334. I decide to take Charis's growth formula out for a spin. Volantis is at 86/100, and Nitzer is 2/90, so according to the equation, I should send 39.68 or 40 colonists to maximize total growth. Sounds good to me. Colonizing Nitzer did not bring any other worlds into scoutable range, so that will have to wait until Tundra tech can be researched.

I catch a minor break when Improved Eco pops a couple turns after it went to the percentages. And now the moment of truth:





And a huge sigh of relief is heard issuing from the ruling palace on Cthulhu. This tech I will be researching full bore to get my last two worlds up and running as quickly as possible.

My first sighting of another race comes in 2342 when an unarmed Silicoid col ship tries to touch down on that radiated ultra rich. My scout yips ferociously, and the rocks run in terror. Guess I'll need some protection there sooner rather than later. I do not intend to let the Silicoids have tha world. So I design a medium gunship, LR tank and 2 lasers, produced out of Volantis alongside factory construction. Tundra comes in 3 turns later, and ooh, we can nab both +30 and Enhanced Eco, which I will be researching in that order after Cthulhu builds the colony ships for my last (hopefully) two worlds.

2351 marks the first declaration of a race getting to 6 worlds. It is the Silicoids, of course. I've been shipping the LR lasers off to the UR every turn, and now have a fleet of 18 there/en route. I'd like to get that to 30. Overkill? Not with the prospect of the rocks owning the planet.

Anraq is colonized in 2354, and the col ship I've been building alongside factories at Cthulhu completes the same turn, and will land at the last planet in 2361. Volantis is almost maxed out, and Nitzer is developing nicely, though it will be slowed a little by seeding Anraq and Willow. I decide now would be a good time to check my options in the other research fields. Let's see, Scanner, IIT9, Class II, and Gatling Laser. No choices, heh. IIT9 will go a long way towards helping the last worlds develop, so I decice to research that before opening up all fields, which will also give Cthulhu a chance to max out. GNN reports in 2357 that I am dead last in tech. Not for long. Volantis and Cthulhu are maxed out and ready to churn out some serious RP

IIT9 pops, and blah, my only choice is IIT8. A turn later, Willow is colonized. The Glorious Meklar empire:



Scanner pops, and my only option is BC III. Range 5 completes, and my only option is Nuclear Engines. What is this, the no-choice tech tree?? Oh well, at least now I can send some LR lasers out for a little scouting of the surrounding neighborhood. Silicoids come back for that planet with 3 mediums and 3 col ships, which are handily defeated. It's now within range, so I deploy a better warship, this one with new gatling lasers, normal laser, Class II shields and MK I computer. The rocks are packing missiles on their ships, so this should be able to handle that. In the mean time, I'm now researching Class III and Hyper X's. No Ion cannons, but I will be going after those Fusion Bombs next. Then this little gem hits:



Could have been worse, though, if it had hit my planetology and wiped out progress towards +30. Nitzer maxes both pop and factories on the same turn in 2371, and takes over warship production from Volantis. Meanwhile, my scouts have found Kholdan in the south, and another Ultra Rich radiated world as well. Looks like the rocks have already colonized the toxic in that nebula, probably putting them within range of the Steppe worlds close to home. Time to post some sentries there. My rich world will be at full capacity in a few more turns, so that will help out the ship-building effort.

Ah, good. I have access to Range 7. Not enough to reach Kholdan, but enough to secure a neutral zone of unoccupied planets around me. Even better, a few turns later when IIT8 comes in I learn I have access to the mighty automated repair special! However, lack of planets is already having a noticeable effect on my research curve. Hyper-X's come online in 2381, showing that I have Scatter V's as my next option after I nab Fusion bombs. Hmm, not many beams here. May have to go the missile boat route. Couple turns later, I nab BC III and begin work on Improved Scanner.

Willow maxes out in 2393, providing a significant boost to my research economy. +30 should pop any turn now, which will improve my economy even further. I'm now almost 100 turns into the game, coming up on 200 base points. And I realize my game plan may have had a fatal flaw. By settling close to my homeworld, I nabbed very good planets, and got my empire up and running rather quickly. However, until my range improves, I'm not going to be able to reach the far side of the galaxy. I'm going to have to prioritize propulsion tech heavily, or turn in a very poor score. Probably both +30 pops the very next turn, and wow. My Meklars have access to +40, Soil Enrichment, Controlled Toxic, Controlled Radiated, and Enhanced Eco? Unusual. I think Soil would help me the most, so I go for that. I now have sentries posted at all of the critical worlds around my empire, so after terraforming completes, I can devote even more to research, leaving my rich world on warship production/reserves. Didn't mention that I was building gatling's at my homeworld for the north? Oops

Improved Scanner comes in, which doesn't reveal any new info, but does open the door for RC IV. At least our tech tree is well-suited to the scenario. Wonder if that's not purely by chance...

2400 rolls around, and I'd say I'm in pretty good shape. Nitzer, Volantis, and Cthulhu have just maxed out, and Anraq will follow suit next turn. I have sentries posted at all key worlds around my empire, making a nice buffer. Range 7 should pop any turn now. In fact, next turn it does. Both Range 8 and Fusion Drives are available. I can now design an LR gatling with Nuke engines, which will be useful in guarding a couple worlds on the fringes. Anraq can build 6 per year. With Willow maxed out, I can pull 1562 RP a turn; not too shabby for a 5PE.

Spot Klackon col ships heading out; they must have learned a range tech. Too bad for them I got there first. I almost feel like a petulent two-year old, stamping my foot and clutching those planets even though I can't have them My scouts find Fierias; their homeworld is 9 parsecs away. and HOLY COW!! There's an artifacts world in the corner, SIZE 100 I bet Zed threw that in to tempt us. Now it's decision time. The world is at Range 10. Thus I would have to colonize two whole worlds to get there, incurring a 50 point penalty. Would nabbing that world shave 50 turns off my end date? That's a tough choice. I already made one mistake in choosing Range 8 over Fusions; now I'm praying that I get Impulse Engines so I don't have to go back for the Fusion Drives. Even worse, I've been operating under the assumption that unlimited range was always available, when it is in fact not. So, I may have to capture a planet to get at the right-hand side of the map. Hmmm... no, I'm not going to colonize that artifact world. However, I will still have to guard it heavily, lest the Klackons manage to nab it.

2413 sees the invention of RC IV, with Advanced Scanner as my chosen tech. 2416 marks the date the Meklar's learned Fusion bombs, and then decided to try and make beams out of the same stuff. Auto repair was learned in 2418. But most importantly, Range 8 comes in at 2420. Nuts, I do have to go back for the Fusion Drives before Range 9. I finally gain contact with both the Klackons and Silicoids.



Looking at the map, another fatal flaw in my plan occurs to me. My blockade of planets may never allow the vote to happen! That's a lot of worlds I'm not allowing to be colonized. We'll see. If it comes to it, I can let the rocks colonize the radiated and tundra near me, and then destroy the colony. Rather dasterdly, but this isn't exactly an honorable rules set I am ahead of both species in tech, production, and population. Spying is opened up to see what we can learn from these backwards people. Also of note, both are at war with the apparently OPE Kitties. I can probably save the cats from the bugs, but not the rocks. Both races have Inerial stabilizer, and the Klacks have a surprising amount of computer tech. However, the bugs have yet to learn any missile techs. If they don't soon, I may order up an early bombing run on Kholdan

The Meklars learn Soil Enrichment techniques in 2422, adding another boost to my economy, although neither Anraq or Willow benefit from the tech. Enhanced Eco, which I'm going back for, will stop some of the waste cash hemmoraging. Now check out this weed:



The rocks are sending a single col ship at a world guarded by 30 warships. But wait, it gets better. That world is Ultra Poor. The green to the south is the same size, fertile, and guarded by only a single ship Looks like the rocks need to research Basic Strategy tech

Get my first tech steal in 2430, BC II from the rocks. Yes it takes our relations down to Troubled, but I don't much care as we are ahead of them in every category but planet count. Next turn, we follow it up by stealing RC III. Why am I stealing computer techs? All the better to pick the AI trees clean with, my dear...

Anraq rebels in 2423. Arrgh. At least I reclaimed the planet.



Fusion Beams, Fusion Drives, and Enhanced Eco come in about the same time, a turn or two after I stole Range 4 from the rocks, and this gem from the bugs



Time to see what kind of glass maker I can construct.



Yeah, that should work nicely, especially against the bug's nuke bases. Anraq can make 50 a year. Advanced Scanner comes online in 2442, revealing information on the lands to the south. I'm almost to 2450, the halfway point in the scoring system. I can pursue one of two avenues: a)start looking at what planets I need to invade to reach the other side of the galaxy, trying to minimize the penalties or b)commit to unlimited range being in the tree. Plan B has the greater reward potential, but also great risk, in that I might have to resort to plan A if range isn't in the tree, and lose time (and therefore points). In the end, I decide to go with the concept over scoring potential. This is a 5CC, and dammit I'm going to stick to that unless I absolutely cannot. I am prepared to make one concession for scoring and challenge, however. I decide to pull my scouts back from a few worlds with the intention of letting them be settled to trigger the vote and (hopefully) Final War. That should also, in theory, speed up the AI tech progress, which I can hopefully take advantage of through spying.

I wait until I have 500 bombers accumulated over Anraq, then dispatch them to Kholdan. And whoa, where did that fleet come from???



All the scanners showed was a few of the medium ships in the 124 stack. Must have come up from the south, and arrived this turn. I manage to destroy all the bases with a little collateral damage, but it cost me half the bombers. Good news is it appears those are all laser designs. Well, I was planning on building a new line of warships anway... Range 9 comes in, and I have Star Gates, Range 10, and Ion's available. In keeping with Plan B, I choose the Ion Drives. Hopefully, Range 10 won't be necessary. Oh yeah, and the range increase puts me in contact with the OPE Mrrshans. Wow, they've been concentrating on missile tech and have merculites. Probably the only reason they are still alive.

Wait, what's this? The Klackon fleet is moving to Vox and will arrive in 3 turns? And my bombers just arrived at Nitzer and can return to Kholdan in two? Anybody see where this is headed? I also took the opportunity to design a modest warship



And score another point for AI



And the next turn



There's one 5-point penalty that I won't be incurring Two turns later, my little glass makers turn Proteus into a marble, cutting the Silicoids off from my core area. Amusingly, this also eliminates all of my contacts I guess that was the ultimate "talk-to-the-hand" gesture Oh yeah, somewhere in there I scored Atmospheric Terraforming, and was overjoyed to learn that Advanced Soil was in the tree. Darn good list of Planetology techs for the cyborgs. The Silicoids finally managed to scout that Ultra rich radiated, but my first Devastator just rolled off the lines from Anraq.

The Klackons get the derelict event in 2460, and they still have two sizes 115 and 70 in their backlines. But still, this is Average. I allow the bugs to colonize the dead world to the north of me, and the rocks the ultra poor steppe, hoping to kick off the vote. Besides, now I can resume my spying on them Ion drives come in, and of course I take High Energy Focus.

Hmm, lots of Klackon col ships heading for my backlines now. That's ok. My ships are MUCH faster, and I can easily smack down those little colonies. Especially with my new Megabolt cannons Ooh, and I have both Pulsons and Scatter Pack VII's available. I decide on the Scatter's, but hindsight I think the Pulson's would have been the better choice. Still too defense-oriented in my thinking. The Silicoids have now colonized the non-fertile steppe to my east, still no vote. They're also going to nab the 80 Arid up north, while the bugs will get the size 95 in the corner. Not that any of these are going to become permanent establishments Amazingly enough, nobody has re-colonized Kholdan or Fierias yet.

Finally, all of that settling near me has brought on the vote, 2470.

Darloks: 5, abstain
Silicoids: 7, themselves
Bulrathi: 4, abstain
Klackons: 3, Silicoids
Me: 17, Silicoids

Darn, if either the Darloks or Bulrathi had voted, we would be at war. Oh well. Now that the vote is being held, time to get rid of these extra colonies floating around. Heh, got the Silicoids attention too, as they come calling for peace. "We are the Meklar. Diplomacy is irrelevant. Peace is futile"

2475, and another vote is held. This time, the Bulrathi do not abstain



Bring it on! The Bulrathi have settled the hot potatoes near me, bringing me in contact; I think that's what did it for them. The first few turns of the war saw nothing interesting. The other races were too busy trying to juggle the hot potatoes to actually strike against any of my planets. I needed some faster ships to force damage before retreats, but both propulsion and shield techs were about ready to pop, so I held off.

2481 comes, and work on High Energy Focus is completed. And now the moment of truth...



:mad:

My gamble did not pay off. Now I will have to invade and hold worlds to get to the corners of the galaxy. Started work on Range 10, which would be the extent of my reach. Looking at the map, I'm guessing Fierias and Spica will give me what I need to reach out. 2484 saw the invention of Advanced Soil, and I chose +60 for my next tech there. OUCH! Glad this didn't happen to me...



Now that my techs are in, it's time to design a new ship:



I went with a large hull this time, so I could cover more planets with my fleet. Fierias was taken in 2489, incurring my first 25-point penalty of the game. This puts me in range of every planet on the southern side of the map except 3 right along the fringe (when I get Range 10, that is). My first offensive was at Vox in the South. The AI's shiny new Class X planetary shield dramtically reduced the effectiveness of my bombers, however. It took to 2496 to eliminate Vox, same turn Range 10 came into effect. I needed something with more punch. Unfortunately, I didn't have anything within my arsenal. I did design a faster, two-bomb bomber and built them out of Anraq, but I sorely needed some new bomb tech.

Well, I completed my Scatter Pack research in 2503, and the only option it opened up was the Gauss Autocannon. Bah. Well, let's give these Pulson missiles a try... The space amoeba also decided to make an appearance, up North near Firma. One more turn, and I'll have glassed that planet myself. The lifeform was destroyed in 2509 by the Bulrathi when it tried to enter their space.

My assault on Spica was an absolute disaster. I completely underestimated how many bombers I'd need to destroy the bases; as such many of my first wave transports were cut down, and given my disadvantage on the ground (the AI had more gropo techs), I needed 3 waves and tons of troops to take the planet. And all I got was Duralloy, ECM I, Sub-Lights, Controlled Dead, IIT7, and some other crappy tech I didn't bother to note. I had been hoping for the anti-matter bombs the AI had researched, but oh well. I had the planet by 2514. Way out of the running for any sort of decent score on this one. As it stands now, I'm at 2600 - 2514 + 50 - 25 - 25 = 86 pts. I'll actually be lucky to break even on this one. Claiming Spica put me in range of all but 2 planets, both on opposite ends of the galaxy. However, I could reach them both with LR bombers. Ha! Has anybody ever put LR tanks on a bomber before???



2518 marked the year that a squad of 666 (hey, production chose that value, not me! :P ) bombers and megabolt ships began The Great Purge. First up, the Klackon's; their last planet was just within range of my fleet. At this point, I shut down research completely; I needed to finish this soon if I was to get a positive score. My bombing on the bugs was successful in 2521:



The Silicoids had 5 planets in an arc in the middle of the galaxy; my next goal was to try and take these planets out in rapid succession. That would leave the Darloks and the Bulrathi in the corner, and I was already well on my way to assembling a fleet to deal with the Bulrathi. Cryslon with its Class X shield proved too much for my little bombers to handle on the first try. Wait a second, Class X!? I noted that before, but didn't consider one vital piece of information. I'm in final war mode!!! This is distinctly NOT GOOD. Now the Darlok's and Bulrathi will be much harder to take. I did manage to glass Ursa in 2526, but at the cost of 200 bombers. I MIGHT have enough for the rest of the Bulrathi worlds (only 3 of them). If they don't all have the Class X shields built. Only Cryslon had one with the Silicoids; let's hope the bears weren't any smarter with their defense planning. But they were. I have no choice but to hold at Ursa until more bombers are built, especially the LR version to take out Uxmai. I took some consolation by destroying Cryslon in 2528:



Thankfully, the Darlok's only had a Class X shield at Nazin. Ten years after the Silicoid's demise, the GNN robot made one final report before he was decommisioned to the scrap heap.



Base Score: 2600 - 2538 = 62
Final War Bonus: 50
Extermination Bonus: 15
Penalty for Planets Beyond 5: 2 x -25 = -50
Final Score: 77

Bah. I had hoped to do better than that. Then again, not having unlimited range really hurts under this scoring system. Anybody who did not claim five planets early will no doubt have a slower growth curve. Orion is pretty far away from the homeworld to make it a reasonable grab. It will be very intersting to read the other accounts come reporting day, to see if the slower growth of those who went with less than five planets cost them more than the extra two penalties cost me. However, as I said in the opening, my primary goal for this Imperium was to enjoy the challenge and novelty of a 5CC, which I did. Kudos to Zed for a creative scenario

Once, not long ago, in a land not to far away, an old man received a breadmaker as a Christmas gift, several Christmases ago. And the old man, being a fickle eccentric, promptly put the breadmaker away and forgot about it.

The old man really was fickle. He loathed the taste of plastic. He drank only from cans or glass bottles. He stored his leftovers in expensive glass dishes with glass lids that had rubber seals. He used no plastic cookware, nor tableware, and never drank from a plastic glass. Something about the taste of plastic offended the old man greatly. Plastic was mysteriously absent from the old man's kitchen.

So one day the old man is reminded of the most expensive of gifts, the Great And All Powerful Breadmaker. And he is chided for leaving it to collect dust. The old man, being a gentle sort, promised to dig it out and try it.

The old man followed the directions, giving the breadmaker not one, but two burn in cycles, while he gritted his teeth and quietly mumbled about the skull splitting noise produced by the infernal machine. He had read all the warnings, and listened to others talk about how to make bread in this most marvelous of time saving devices. Never turn it up to dark, always leave it on light or it will burn. The old man dropped in all the fixings to make bread in the machine, and promptly left the house to avoid the racket.

Upon his return, the bread was done, and the house had a slight peculiar aroma, almost like that of bread. But there was a faint aroma, almost like that of a Barbie doll, condemned to burn in an eternal hell. The hideous odour of warmed plastic. The old man cracked a window or three, and gathered up his fresh butter and honey, and sat down to eat a slice or two of bread.

Upon the first bite, the man knew there was something horribly, no, terribly wrong. It was not just the smell of warmed plastic, it was the taste of warmed plastic, and it was in his bread.

So offended the man was, that he threw his slice out the back door, followed by the loaf of bread. He then launched into a expletive laden tirade against the infernal machines of the modern age. So loud, so powerful his angst, that his lovely wife had come running to see what was wrong, only to go running back out of the house covering her precious innocent ears, and reminding the cranky old man that he would need to fill up the swear jar.

Every creature in the house fled from the old man's wrath. Some under the sofa, some under the bed. Some of the kitties had climbed to the top of the Kitty City and had then hid in the rafters. Only one of the old man's animal companions had joined the old man in his ire, and that was his parrot, who joined in by calling the offending breadmaker a "****sucking piece of monkey ****." And then bobbed his head up and down and bounced around his cage.

The old man, while old, was still capable of a great deal of violence. He brought out one of his largest cast iron frying pans and let the offending breadmaker have it. Once, twice, thrice, he smashed the infernal machine that had so sorely offended his taste buds. He spat on the kitchen floor, still trying to get the awful taste out of his mouth, and cursed some more. He grabbed the breadmaker, and tossed it's sorry carcass out the back door. The old man then grabbed his trusty side arm, and exited the house.

The breadmaker was dragged mercilessly through the yard, and set upon a stump for execution. It was cursed at some more, as the old man stomped around the yard. The harsh shrieks of an agitated parrot drifted out the open windows. "Mother****ing ass goblin!" the bird shouted.

The old man vented his rage the only way he knew how, by unloading six rounds into the contraption that had so offended him. He then kicked the remains of the battered and bulletholed machine into the scrap pile, and then went inside the house to have a cup of coffee to settle his nerves.

The end.

It's official. Pirates! has eaten me. Arr...

If you haven't played pirates, you're really missing out.

Some screenshots to whet your appetite.







This is a shot of the general sailing screen, You can see the active quests on the top left, clicking on one gets a summary of what to do, but don't feel obliged to do any of them. On the bottom left is the compass that shows where the wind is blowing from. And what direction is north. In this camera mode north is always straight up, but in the chase cam north moves about as you turn. There's a fully functional enviroment sim here--storms happen based on wind and moisture etc, but you don't have to dig into that if you don't want to. I've seen mods that make giant hurricanes, but I'm still having fun without them so I haven't installed any. The other things are pretty self explanatory.

Once you decide to attack someone your flagship does battle with them. The controls are fluid and take about 3 seconds to pick up. 4 turns left 6 turns right, 5 fires the guns, 7, 1, 3 select what to load the guns with and 9 changes the view. 8 is full speed ahead, and 2 is half speed. Although there is no Full stop position, you can face into the wind and get that effect if you really want it. (hint, boats that aren't moving tend to get sunk)

Here we are firing a full broadside at the English, and yes, we did in fact backstab them....





So that's the ship side of things. But that's not all. There's a full economic model here, you can buy low and sell high without any trouble, and since the game is open ended (presuming you bring home enough plunder to stay ahead of your crew's desire for gold on hand) you can do this indefinitely.

Other exciting bits--you can choose to ram an enemy ship if you don't want to fight it out with guns (or you don't want to damage a prize). In that case your crew and the enemy crew go hand to hand, while you fight a vicious duel with the enemy captain. The winner of the duel wins the combat and takes the other ship as a prize. Crew size discrepency and pirate age and skill with the sword are all neatly condensed to an advantage bar--which determines the relative speed of the two combatants. It's a very smooth abstraction method that makes the player's skill the test of whether you take the ship or not. You can take a ship with only 1 crew (although you'll have trouble sailing it) if you're an expert swordsman.




There's alot more than I can sum up going on here, you have 4 nations vying for control of the carribean, and you can gain rank with each, you can be an independent trader/pirate there's buried treasure maps to collect, fields to explore, new settlements to found, settlements to attack and install new governors in, etc etc etc.


Fair warning tho, Don't sit down to play if you have any other commitments later in the day, While no task takes more than a few minutes to complete, you'll find yourself continually saying just one more swordfight, ship sunk, treasure, I'll quit when I've sold these luxuries, raided that port, found my sister, hired a navigator, danced with the beautiful govenor's daughter......


It's seriously worse than moo in the where did my afternoon go department.

After describing the battle with the clone, Shadow asked me if I knew anything of item lottos from my frequent jaunts with AB folks. Funny thing, even after several clone fights with AB friends, I have yet to see a lottery--suffice to say I associate with some of the finest item pushers around (No, YOU TAKE IT ). That said, I did a little digging, and found what has been generally used as a fair method of item lotto.

Not a huge need for this process around here, but good reference material nonetheless.

Lotto Procedure

1) Have the lotto participants each choose a number between 1 and 9.

2) Go to Charsi in A1. Enter the trade screen. Go to the first weapons tab.

3) Starting from the top left, working down the column and then to top of the next column and down, look for a weapon with a numerical bonus to attack rating.

4) Winner is the one who picked a number that matches the last digit of the attack rating bonus of the first weapon shown to have +AR (in the order described above). If the first weapon does not produce a match, keep going. (process could be shortened by evenly distributing numbers from 1 to 9 between the participants).

Note: The numbers 1-9 have equiprobable chance to appear as the last digit on all mods that affect numberical bonus to attack rating. Throw out all zeros, since the bronze prefix has a range of +10-20 (more chance for zeros).

Taken from this post in an old AB thread. Half the comments in the thread talk about the best lotto being to just give the item away. I found one of the statements at the end of the thread particularly funny:

Quote:Funny thing is the times I've seen a lotto (I've not been in them, didn't need the items in question), it's been a case of the lottoees almost forcing the item off on each other.

"Nah, you take it"
"No, you take it!"
"Please, you can have it"
"No, I insist, you take it"
"You can use it better than me"
"I'd rather see you use it"

Then they lotto it off to find who gets the honor of giving it to the other person.

I got this game for christmas and am still figuring it out somewhat. Looks fun.

About spies, besides oppressometer, is there another way to keep spies away? Also, the spies I've been getting so far in a game I started tend to get killed quickly and seem to always have low cloak/dagger skills, did I miss some way to make them better?

About diplomacy, I have the basics down and can get some empires on easy to like me but are there any suggestions for negotiating more interesting treaties or exchanges? I don't tend to use diplomacy in other civilization/space expamsion games I've played, maybe this time I'll need a bit. Also, what exactly do trade and research agreements do besides share research and trade?

On ship designs, what do the different types of weapons do and what are the different advantages of them? I once again get the basics of ship design but need help with more advanced stuff.

I'll figure out planets, research, economy, and budgets on my own, since they are my favorite parts of other games of this type, so I'll spend more time understanding them.

By the way, yes I'm new. ShadowHM pointed this particular forum out to me from the lurker lounge.

So, who's going to be there? I am in.

Do we have anything to try out? Specific build? GvG?

If nothing, I will probably be playing a variation of elementalist (again). Read that there was a wipe, even the Guilds were wiped and the guild names were not preserved, Arena.net relies on players' manner to not grab the name of other guild.

EDIT: thread from AB forum http://www.theamazonbasin.com/gw/forums/...=554&st=26

If such is the case, I am more than willing to re-create the guild as soon as I log in and acquired sufficient fund. Realms Beyond (RB), right?

OK, so when I read about the new "CoasterCam™" feature, I'm thinking "That's probably lame, but as long as the gameplay is decent, I won't care."

Well, chalk one up for 3D. In a word: Wow.


OK, some background. I loved Railroad Tycoon, Transport Tycoon, and A-Train -- the early "Tycoon" type games. I've been busy with other games, though, so I never got around to trying RollerCoaster Tycoon 1 or 2. Sales seemed to be good, so I decided to, ah, "hop on the train" for the third ride.

I bought Roller3 in the same batch as Half Life 2, so it's been sitting around for about six weeks. I tried it on New Years Day. It's been a blast! Although the gameplay differs, the flavor is very much like the old Transport Tycoon gameplay. (That's a Very Good Thing™. I will have to dig deep to see whether Roller3 suffers the same kind of balance-problem issues as the old Transport Tycoon. No sign of any problems as yet, though.

Now me being a "graphics don't matter" kind of gamer, games like this might start to spoil me. This is a really bang-up piece of work here.


Let's have a peek. Here is the first game in the campaign, with me about halfway through. This is a very open-ended scenario. You pretty much just need to make decent money and you win. There are a lot of ways to get there and lot of little touches on how you can customize your park. Gameplay is simple but not redundant, which is always a winning formula.



The park is populated by "Peeps" -- no not the marshmallow chicks, but a host of AIs, "customers", folks who simulate merriment-seekers. The peeps got a lot of attention: many faces, hairstyles, clothing, and some careful attention to behavior, as well. This is probably the most "living" game of any type that I've played. It lacks the hard edge realism of Half Life 2, but that is a scripted game. This is open-ended, and thus in many ways more impressive.

The real treat was designing my first rollercoaster from scratch, though, and then soaking up the good vibes as it quickly became by far the most popular ride in my park. Hey, gotta love Peeps with good taste!



So there's most of my creation, and now a look from the CoasterCam™:



The best part of the game is riding your own coasters. You really get a feel for the impact of your design choices, including some fairly impressive game physics. Subtleties matter! I'm eating this up. 8)


Here are some more looks at my park, including right before obtaining the Gold victory level. (Three levels of victory per scenario, just like in Railroad Tycoon II.)





The gameplay seems as good as the graphics. I think this title has a legitimate shot at earning a coveted place among my "time tested" favorites list. Too soon to tell, for sure, but it definitely has me excited.


- Sirian

Cheers for all my friends here at RB. Wishing you a prosperous 2005.

I finally created that comparison game that I promised, and uploaded it to CivFanatics. Discussion and file is here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/forumdisplay.php?f=98