Report is here:

http://www.dos486.com/civ4/adv37/

The Plan: another cultural victory. Quelle surprise! But with tech trading off, and a large map, Space will be pretty tedious & time consuming, as well as opening up the door to a cultural defeat.






Starting dilemma: grab the third clam, or keep the rice in the BFC and waste the clams? Seeing as we have Agri as a starting tech, not Fishing, I’ll keep the rice and settle in place. Pigs revealed, so it’s AH and worker first. An early map reveals lots of FPs, rice & stone to my west. Looks good for a couple of cities. Meet Ragnar on T12: at least aggressive AI isn’t on, but he can be a pain, and he could be really close. Hmmmm. Wonder who else is out there?

Went Fishing-Mining-BW after AH (no ponies), and got a Settler out on T42, having discovered truffles in Thebes BFC the previous turn (1f, 1c). Nice.




Not great production, by the stone and plains forests will do, seeing as we’ve got a lot of food and plenty commerce potential. My worker was gamely employed roading up to Memphis in advance of my settler (seeing as Thebes was all forest). BW failed to reveal copper. Off to archery then, but we’re ok for fogbusters, so Mysticism is squeezed in beforehand. Whipped Stonehenge at Thebes in 1800BC.

Founded Heliopolis for the rest of the FPs (two wasted), and barbs were becoming a bit of a hassle by the time I wanted to found by 4th city (marked as 5 on the map):




I made the mistake of going straight to IW when it would have been better to get Pottery first: to give my workers something to do, and for the commerce boost. Got a useless Classic Literature quest (9 Libraries) and met the Buddhist Carolus Magnus and Capac in BC475 thanks to an exploring WB.






4 picks up Iron, 6 is for copper (stupas) but mainly to be my Artist farm. Seeing as Ragnar is settling towards Thebes, 7 will be for iron, clams, and rice to the capital southeast. Vicky the pagan met in BC 100: she is worst enemy of Ragnar, which is good news for me. Buddhism spread to Memphis and I adopted immediately, as I had too much food for my happy cap. Vicky founded Chrsitianity in 1AD (heh!) and I met Sitting Bull a couple of turns later. I get my first GS in 150AD (lame!) and found an academy in Thebes.

Meet Monty (200) and Hannibal (250). Agree to the latter’s request to dogpile the struggling SB in 450. Next turn, Raggy goes after Vicky. I would also dogpile her at Raggy’s request. Both were phony wars, save for me losing my exploring WB. (I would eventually buy peace for cash with each of them.)Much to my surprise, Capac asked me to dogpile our fellow Buddhist, Charlie. This war was to rage forever, and their constant requests for military assistance were a PITA.

I used a GS to found Taoism in 1075, and built Angkor Wat in Memphis for culture and hard-as-nails priests. Went to Music belatedly, but some pre-chopping helped me get Sistene in a jiffy:




Those priests got me a prophet for Dai Miao. Then it was off towards Liberalism, picking up Sankore on the way. Nationalism claimed, Free Speech was adopted, and Hermitage built in Memphis. I decided to gamble on an early tech shutdown, even though my culture push would be fairly lame (only two religions and seven cities): the AI was rather weak as well thanks to no tech trading, and the wars weren’t helping them in that regard either. I took Gunpowder for (limited) peace of mind, and started to work the culture slider around 1500AD.


Raggy had another go at Vicky, and started laying on some smackdown, and he kindly gave me a chance for some MMS points (I was also ‘at war’ with Monty on Hannibal’s request). The Vikings would eliminate Vicky (1710) , and I finally met Huang in 1705AD

I got the Food Stores event in 1804 which gave me +3 with Ragnar, but I was not amused to see this…






…when the hairy bugger went in WHEOOH in 1834. Was I going to perish a handful of turns short of victory?





Nope. And he asked me dogpile as well, the sweetheart. Thebes went Legendary in 1848, Memphis in 1858, and Heliopolis in 1860. Helio would have got its last bomb a turn sooner if I had researched Engineering


[

Adventure Thirty-Seven is now open for reporting. Please post your reports in the Tournament Discussion subforum.

Plan going in was for a space victory, thought that would be an interesting challenge against big AI's and without tech trading. Conquest sounded harder but also a lot more tedious, while cultural wouldn't play much different from normal (could only get a cathedral for each religion in 2 of the 3 cities but that's really not too big a deal if you can manage diplomacy, you'll be slower but still ahead of any AI culture or space most likely).

Well, I moved 1N to get the 3rd clams, and wound up missing the pig that was initially hidden. With the limited city variant, I prioritized exploration more than usual with several warriors. Had good luck with them surviving a long time, which translated into crazy hut luck. Popped AH very early, then Writing, and IW (!) after despairing over the lack of horses/copper anywhere near the start. Also eventually got a Woodsman warrior to 10XP and snuck him to safety in Viking land for later Heroic Epic.

Took a very long time before 2nd city up (1760BC):

The lake tile irritated me enormously; founding on that space would have have been better, trading plains for grasslands. I had never played a tectonics before and was dismayed at the huge swaths of brown everywhere. Despite a generous amount of land available, it was hard to come up with 6 other good sites. I was looking for mostly cities that could grow to full size and work 15+ cottages.

With few happiness resources anywhere close, low commerce, Ragnar and Huayna as neighbors, no tech trading, and Industrious, building Oracle for Monarchy seemed like obvious move. It's funny - HR is sooooo valuable, but since the AI is willing to trade it at monopoly I never research it myself. That was done in 1200BC, still only at 2 cities. Next order was a Settler for the west:

Like other parts of the map, you couldn't get the awesome FP sites you see on other scripts - they all came with significant plains/desert. With a limited amount of territory I figured +1 health from the HG would be valuable, which bumped this site up in priority. And of course I wanted the names to line up for city #4:

500BC for 4th city, seems kind of slow. This of course was meant for early-game production, I thought I was going to need it because I was planning on taking Nidaros for one of my sites:

So much better than any other option in the long term (although I was probably going to raze it and move 1N). I had two spots staked out in the SW jungle, about the only other place you could find mostly grassland city sites.

Stupid quest RNG never gets the variant:


I really hope someone follows my original plan of attacking the Vikings because I didn't. First wrench was thrown in when a barb city popped up where I was planning my jungle outpost, so had to wait for military to move over there. I wasn't sure how close Huayna was and didn't want to risk him taking those sites while I fought Ragnar. Took until 520AD to raze the problem site:

It was on the best square for a city, but as the signs show I moved it 1N to reduce overlap with the other site to the SW. Anyways, during these events Ragnar got to Feudalism and kept founding cities in the land between our capitals; these events convinced me that war for Nidaros was going to cost more than it was worth, especially since my 4 older cities were all dependent on my army for civic order. Just moving the force into position would cause problems like old-school war weariness. Finally, Ragnar adopted Huayna's Buddhism and I had the chance, so I could get both of them to Friendly and not worry about defending myself.

So I decided to take this for a final site:

Moai went here and it was a fine compromise, but I could have founded it way earlier if I didn't have the silly idea about war. That also made for silliness as I prioritized HBR and Construction before Literature, with the result of Elephantine building a big army before the Heroic Epic, and tragedy as the late Lit cost me the Great Libary by a single turn to Huayna (who was cleaning up many other wonders, and was clearly the leading AI. No one had Alphabet for long time so I couldn't see techs, but from throwing EP at Huayna I could see he was easily researching 1.5 to 2 times faster than me).

Meanwhile Ragnar had been warring with Victoria and I didn't meet her for quite a while. As soon as I did I DOW'd for brownie points. The Viking roughed her up real well, they were at war for a millenium and Victoria was easily the weakest AI when that was done. Long period of peaceful building followed, heading up the Liberalism line. Sankore went up, and I self-researched Nationalism to use a GE on the Taj. (Huayna had Mausoleum, so definitely wanted to deny that to him). Despite Huayna's superior GNP, he spent quite a bit on the lower side of the tree, enough for me to plan the Democracy slingshot. Then in 1500AD I see H-man is going Education, and this is gonna be close:

Good thing ties go to the player. I had a GE stored for another golden age but fortunately that wasn't needed.

Diplomatically, I was still missing contacts. I sailed a Trireme past Sitting Bull and Qin to meet Hannibal (who was also advanced) but couldn't get open borders to keep going. Thus I didn't meet Monty until 1620AD by sending a caravel west around the world, but this was a major coup - I could get gems and dyes from him despite being Annoyed, and that was enough happiness to finally retire HR for representation and US as needed (Shared faith and wars kept Ragnar and HC Friendly despite the loss of fav civic.) After finishing the game, I came across a post at CivFanatics explaining that there is a current bug that the AI is effectively always at Cautious for resource trades, so that's why Monty was willing (geez, what is it with those Firaxis programmers? My programming concentration was in AI, so I have some idea about how hard making effective AI's for a game as complex as CIV (not to mention signifcant changes with patches/expansions); as a result I'm willing to forgive a lot of terrible AI city management, tactics, etc, but they seem to have a weird tendency to introduce simple errors in patches.)

Anyways, I pressed max cottages everywhere with no real need of heavy hammers (Ragnar was locked into Friendly and no other AI bordered me), in 1700 I engineer-rush Ironworks in one of the jungle cities. It was the best late-game production site I had (several levee tiles) but ironically had absolutely zero hammer tiles early on - I think I whipped the granary and then it stayed at 1 HPT until Universal Suffrage. However I kept the towns for a long long time. Just keep repeating "research is always the slower part of a space race"...also, I couldn't feed a workshop-heavy approach as I was unwilling to research Communism, and a food corp would be pretty trivial with the lowered per-resource yield on Large maps plus few resources from the 7CC rule. 1700 was also a crucial time as, just before I lost visibility on Huayna's research, I saw his Physics time go from 3 turns to 48 without anarchy. A couple of turns later I had confirmed that he had indeed turned off research and was aiming for a culture win. I was worried about this pregame, with tech trading off there was an real chance of an AI getting culture before I could finish the tech tree, but Huayna was not the strongest contender I've seen. His 3rd city started at about 5000 culture and was only at 300/turn, and I was pretty sure that 150 turns would be enough. He had 3 religions but was handicapped by the plains-heavy terrain, especially since he didn't tech Biology. With time I've decided that this is one of the more problematic parts of the tech tree for AI's - they always go for the free GP at Physics and Communism (ok) but often ignore Biology, which is certainly a better overall tech for your civ than Physics and often on par with Communism.

When Steam Power was done I found that I had no coal. Scan the map, oh good Ragnar has some extra, and already has the prereqs for SP. I would have killed for tech trading at this point, if only to gift him the tech so I could get coal. I wound up checking the tech or resource trade screen every couple turns, only it was all for naught due to the same bug I mentioned earlier, Ragnar was still Friendly but "didn't like me enough" to trade strategic resources. No one else had extra sources and all were quite a ways from steam power anyways.

In foreign relations, Monty had been at war with Hannibal before I met the former but it didn't seem like either was gaining an advantage. As previously mentioned Han was one of the more advanced AI's and eventually got a Rifles vs. medieval units tech edge, then proceeded to lose the war Sheer numbers of knights and trebs started taking core Carthiginian cities, and Monty never let up until Hannibal was wiped out. Ragnar eventually DOW'd Bull and Qin joined in on the fun, and the two of them carved up Native American pretty efficiently. I wanted to join in to refresh my relation + with Ragnar, only to find that I couldn't since I had cut deals with Bull earlier at Qin's request and he still refused to talk to me! So instead of a truly phony war declaration, I had to walk a warrior all the way through Scandanavia to enter Bull's borders Then I got this message:

Uh, I think you've put the cart before the horse there. Not that I cared as she was beyond pathetic, and had no chance of even reaching me as Ragnar's lands blocked her. Not surprisingly, Ragnar moved in for the kill on Vicky once he was done, leading to this horrifying image:

Why yes, that's 200 units, putting the Shaka/Cathy stacks I slaughtered in Epic 24 to shame. Good thing I didn't try to fight him earlier; even though razing to Nidaros would have really clipped his wings, I think he would have been strong enough to keep DOWing me and causing major problems. Instead I piggybacked on him, singing DP's when he was not at war and declaring on anyone he fought.

My research path was definitely suboptimal; originally I had planned to go Internet but abandoned thoughts when it became clear that I might only get Rifling out of it. Huayna's culture push knocked him out of the tech lead and Hannibal was getting wrecked as described above. Those were the two AI's who were doing well and who I hoped to leech off of, with their declines I had a huge tech lead. Nice to not have competition for the modern wonders, but I became more worried about a culture loss since I would have to self-research everything. The abortive Internet meant that I delayed Labs much more than usual (bad) however I did get the TGD earlier than usual (good since coal plants were not an option). Overall - since I was repeating "research is the slower part" - not a great outcome.

In the early 1900's more wars flared, starting with Charlemange on HC. Charle had been an afterthought most of the game, but he had finally pulled ahead of Huayna, and an Infantry + Arty stack captured one border city. I had high hopes, all 3 of the culture cities were near Holy Rome, but the stack appeared to get confused, divided up and wandered between two of the legendary-to-be's, and eventually swarmed by Huayna's older units and wiped out. Ragnar joined in but I didn't think this would help (it was a long ways from his border to the culture cities). One thing of interest though:

I had no aluminum, and no option to found the corp (no coal). At the time of this picture Pi-R was about 3000 culture and should get the aluminum at its 5000 border pop (once Ragnar took the Inca city just out of view; I already had some culture in the tile 1N of the Al). However it was too late - all of the Aluminum parts are the early techs, and you can see that those are already underway. If I had a great artist left over it might have been useful, but there wasn't any other way to grab the aluminum quickly without trashing my techrate (had to stay in Emancipation). I had some spare workers helping railroad along Ragnar's attack path.

With just Genetics and Ecology to go, Ragnar made peace and went to free religion, dropping to Pleased. There's a slight chance for a DOW, and he went to enough on our hands right away...help! I just had to hope, and consider desperation plans like moving the Palace to Heliopolis (farthest city from him). But no war came, leading to this:

That's syncrhonization! Many of those parts could have been done a while ago, but I kept postponing what could be postponed, to have the cities build Wealth to sustain 100% research. Did a fair amount of last-minute balancing as well (chopping, starvation workshops, switching to Caste for workshop bonus + using culture slider after last tech to balance Emacnipation anger) to get that result. Most of the time I don't enjoy micromanaging a lot, but for some reason going to great lengths to shave 1 or 2 turns off a space win. Maybe it's all preparation for a game where that will actually make the difference between winning and losing. So a fully equipped ship launches in 1942 and lands in 1952.

Huayna finished with 2 legendary cities and Tiwanaku at a little over 40000. It took longer to finish than I thought when I first saw him going cultural, but Tiwanaku never really got over 300 cpt as far as I could tell; there was also a brief time when he went back to teching before resuming culture. Don't know what the AI was thinking by doing that; also he appeared to not bomb with a great artist late in the game, which could have made things interesting; I may have been dreading a 2nd great artist bomb if Tiwanaku was around 45000 culture. On the other hand, the resumed teching got Huayna to Rifling and probably saved him from being quickly run over by the other AIs. Out of curiosity I played ~10 turns after the win to see what Ragnar did with his war preparations, and it was HC yet again. Monty had piled on during the first war and never let up, making much progress, and it actually looked certain that one of them would take his last culture city before it hit legendary despite going the long way across his empire.

Just for fun, here's a power graph:

Wonder if anyone will try Conquest? Could be a wild ride...Also I'm amused by the times where my level is perfectly horizontal. Although I've seen something this in other games where I was safe from attack, usually pop growth + tech discovery does something to power. I wonder if it was truly flat or if I had small changes that are just not visible due to the Viking/Aztec behemoths.

Thanks to Sulla, this was fun and relatively quick game. Looking forward to other reports, as noted there were several weedy decisions on my part so I'm expecting that I'll be beaten easily unless no one else went space.

I'm not sure if this is the right place to post something like this, but I've been working on a MoO1 redesign project. It's a bit difficult to get feedback on art forums, so I find that posting my projects on specialized forums often results in a deeper discussion. People who really care about the game are more likely to speak up if I commit an atrocity in the form of a redesign of a character or whatever, and while I have my own style, I still want to be faithful to the source material.

So, here's the link:

Master of Orion 1 redesign project (Plus some ideas for turning it into my own franchise.)

It's a bit of a text wall at the moment, but if you want you can just look at the pictures and give me feedback on my take on the aliens. I had problems finding good reference. I'm playing the game on DosBox, but usually I prefer to dump the graphics from the game myself. It's generally faster than ripping by 'print screen'.

I've been looking around and saw that people have done some work with the lbx files, but mostly concerning the headers. The images may have been done using Deluxe Paint AGA. the game is from '93 and uses 256 colors.

Byte editor - image dumping

I had a little breakthrough when I figured out how to take screenshots from DosBox (Ctrl + F5 if you make a capture/ dir). This preserved the palette, which allowed me to check whether biplanes or chunky pixels (in this case 1 byte per pixel) were used. I picked a simple still image, a radiated planet. I get a lot of hits on the right pixel values in COLONIES.LBX (this is where the image is stored, it seems), but some kind of compression have been used. I color coded the bytes in my editor, and any value over 127 is green. I was guessing that some RLE like ByteRun1 had been used (there are very few 255), but the dark green (>127) values are... strange.

The image width and height is listed as 84 * 102, which means the black border might be included. If it were, it would be RLE'd early on because the encoding should start in a corner right? Something like (127+84, 0) I can't see much zeroes at all. Maybe I'm totally off, or I'm very close and just need some inspiration.

Edit: I just noticed that index 1 is also black, so it's possible that some transparent color switch is used. There are a lot of 1's. The purple 122's does not seem to be compressed much. With RLE I wouldn't expect to see so many of them in a row.

Edit: Here's some info on the headers.
MoO lbx header info

Don't blame Griselda for not having the files up, because I was lazy and didn't get around to creating the game until today. My bad on that - shhhh! Here are the game details, which should be up on the RB Orion website in the next few days.

I've a couple of ideas for an Imperium, but all the intro states is that the sponsor announces it.

Also, is it possible to have mini-imperiums, such as joke games? I.E, games that are not meant to be won, but played for some experience or to see how long the player survives?

First of all, I did not play Imperium 19 up to the end. I managed to conquer the Humans who being the 2nd biggest power in the galaxy put me into a dominant position, together with conquered Orion in 2600:

Screenie shortly before I conquered the last human colony:


To my shame, I waited exactly for one AI to take a dominant position and then jump her. The Humans never stood a chance.

The start of the game was quite easy thanks to an ultrarich planet nearby. Phantos built colony ships, my main planet LR Lasers and I quickly snatched most of the galaxy. By 2425 I had settled the southern half of the galaxy peacefully with only one planet successfully contested against me by the Sakkras.



At that time it also became clear that I only had one real rival, the Humans:



Whom I gobbled up as soon as I got a Huge design on my hand and got dowed by them, the first war took them down quite a bit:



The rest was mopup and I eliminated the Humans after I conquered Orion. With no real enemy, I decided not to playout the last 200 years whilst I could do nothing more then beat off backwards AIs..


All in all, a great game, I throughly enjoyed and I am sorry if my conquest of my sole blood enemy the Humans enabled me to bypass the idea of this game. To have a high-tech-level challenge down the line. The Silicoids enable massive expansion, the Bears or the Cats would have been better for a longer game, I think.

I'm starting an Always War PBEM game if anyone is interested - note that we are also using T-Hawk's permanent Golden Age mod so that we have lots of units to kill. Details at CFC.

The game currently has 5 players (ideal number) but 1 cannot open the save and might drop out and another is MIA so I might have 1 or 2 spots opening up shortly.

2300
With nothing to worry about insofar as hostile planets go and no eco spending needed, I just need to worry about having the range and speed to reach all these untouchable worlds. I drop Cryslon down to 3 factories/yr and put in 7 million credits fully into Propulsion. I send my colony ship to the nearby white star. As for my scouts, I send each one to a nearby yellow star in the east.

2301
My scientists have theorized a way to increase the round trip range of our ships by one parsec they insist that they would need decades to finish it with the current funding. I assure them that more funding will come after the underclass has been fully employed. A 60% unemployment rate is nothing to ignore, though it is better than last year's 62.5%.

2302
What luck! The planet orbiting the white star (posthumously named Rayden) is quite habitable, the colonist eagerly land and take in the wondrous alien soil. Early atmospheric studies show that there is little rain, making the whole planet an arid wasteland. Ah well, nothing a little sludge and grime won't fix right up! Though many of my people want to find their riches in this new land, I think it would be better to wait until the home world has more to send. And my push for more factories is working, the unemployment rate has dropped to 57%!

2304
This calls for a celebration! Not only have we gotten a report back from one of our scouts that the yellow star Volantis has a planet that is almost an exact copy of Cryslon, but Cryslon has reached an employment rate of 52%, the highest it has been in over a century! Encouraged by this, I requisition that one scout be built each year to explore the galaxy, to boldly go where no Silicoid has gone before.

2306
The scout sent to Vulcan has found that it is a harsh place to live, devoid of life. All this place needs a good toxic waste dump or two to brighten it up.

2308
"Good news, everyone! I have now decided to send one million people to Rayden each year. Those million will be decided by the traditional way... a raffle! This will be a boon for both those who go, and those who are left behind. Those who go get to see a new world and maybe find the riches there, those who stay will likely find less competition in the job market, and maybe an opening or two."

2312
"Well, folks, it seems my push for more jobs has done better than expected. Starting next year, we will have more jobs than people to fill them. Now I'd hate to see a brand new factory sit idly by, so I will stop the Rayden Raffle for now. Next year, after a final push to make scout ships, I will have factories construct more colony ships. More planets means more homes. More homes means more jobs."

2317
"You see sir, by diluting the rocket fuel with hydrogen by a certain percentage, our ships can increase their range by a third."
"Then make it so."

2320
Our second colony ship has been made, so I send it to Phantos. It's frozen surface belies the richness of it's core.

2322
Wonder upon wonders! Guradas's planet seems to be inhabited by aliens. Of all things, they look like lizards! Quite advanced too! I will have the scout hide in the asteroid field and check up on them from time to time. It feels great to see that were are not alone in the galaxy.

2324
Just as I receive confirmation that the colony ship to Phantos has safely arrived and has begun construction, I receive word that an alien craft was spotted near Endoria. A large one too! It must have been some sort of colonizing ship, similar to our own. Could the Guradases lizard people be more advanced and farther spread than just Guradas? One of my aids seems to think this might be a colony of an intergalactic civilization, like our own Rayden and Phantos. I think it might be right, as all reports show that all of the Guradases lizards are all in the same general area rather than spread out as one would expect.

2325
Final evidence that the large ship is of Guradases Lizard design has shown itself. One was seen by our scout ship landing on Guradas and Guradasese Lizards shifting in and out.

2327
I've started a similar raffle on Rayden to send people to Phantos. Now, I actually hope that Rayden will soon have the same 'problem' as our homeworld.

2331
With our newest colonyship, I decide to send it to Helos in hopes of contacting the Guradases Lizards. Those on the colony ship are ecstatic at the prospect of contacting an alien race.

2335
I receive this news with mixed feelings. A new small ship is spotted at Endoria. It's flying patterns are not at all like the Guradases Lizards. Very bird-like. All evidence points to a new alien species. But with all this good news, there was some horrifying news. The ship appears to be armed. The scout quickly fled. And across the galaxy, a completely new small ship design is seen orbiting Celtsi. It seems that not only are we not alone, but that aliens are everywhere!

2336
With the settling of Helos, radio broadcasts were picked up and sent. Our best linguists were able to work with the Guradases Lizards until a common language could be constructed. I couldn't wait to speak to their leader for more than a few garbled words. We found that they called themselves the Sakkra and that Guradas was indeed a colony of theirs. I had the opening words of the Sakkran leader recorded for posterity.

2337
As another colony ship lifts off, I send it to Drakka. I hope it will stretch us out to the East to meet the other Alien Civilization. I send a message to the Sakkra asking if we can have official open trading between our peoples. He hoots serenely and heartily agrees. He shows a great interest in our medical supplies and grieves that we have no compatible food stuffs. My economics team figures that our trade routs could eventually bring 50 bc a year, but there will be a deficit of -15 bc as advertising agencies translate and modify themselves to fit a new market.

2339
Cryslon has reached 200 factories. It has started celebrating "We love our immortal Despot". I, in turn, instigate a crop and breeding program. The quicker we can fill the factories out, the better. My newly created Department of Growth calculates that we will have an extra 2 billion in just this year alone.

2341
Again an alien ship was seen at Endoria. But this time, our scout picked up weaponry. Charged weaponry. The scout quickly retreated, but not before it also picked up a scan of another ship entering the area - a large ship.
In more uplifting news, my scientists bring me news of a fully working Nuclear Engines. These engines allow a ship to move double the speed of our current ships.
Later in the year, we receive strange messages from Endoria. The Sakkrans are able to tell us what these messages say. They have had some dealings with these aliens. I have provided a fully translated and unscrambled message. The Alkari don't seem to be the most personable of people.

2342
Two Nuclear engine based Colony Ships launch from both Cryslon and Rayden. I send one to Whynil to help cut off the Alkari's expansion into our territory. My people may not be violent, but we won't let a Poisonous Rockcrawler into our beds. The other is sent to Vulcan so that we can expand more to the southeast.

2344
I send word to Farseer, the leader of the Alkari, for a trade agreement. With the help of a Sakkran adviser, we agree to a small amount of trading for each of our peoples.

2346
As quickly as our colony on Drakka grows, I realize how slowly it compares to other colonies are growing. I restart the Raffle on Cryslon and send 10 million people to Volantis. After that, I'll send 2 million people to different worlds to bolster their population. Rayden will also join in this once it's population reaches maximum.

2355
My scientists bring me a new type of factory that is a tenth cheaper than our current factories. Not only do I send these plans to all our colonies, I encourage the research into new factory construction.

2358
It seems we have discovered another alien race, this one in the East. Unfortunately, they also seem as hostile as the Alkari.

2362
We hear rumors from the Sakkrans that there are pirates attacking trade ships throughout the galaxy. The attacks started around the Phyco system. I also start funneling funds into Rayden to make it a center of research for the empire.

2363
It seems peace soothes the savage bird, as we get word that the Alkari and the Sakkrans have signed an Alliance.

2369
We have found the Phyco Pirate's starbase. I have started a military instillation on Phycos to take out these raiders. My advisers tell me that the pirates don't have the ability to colonize any other stars, so if we keep them in Phycos, we can contain and then utterly destroy them. I plan on sending troops from closer systems to quickly build up the military presence there.

2371
We pick up signals from space that indicate a military incursion by the Sakkras against the pirates. We hope they will help in our quest to destroy the raiders based on Phyco. Especially because there are so many of them.

2372
The screams and pleading echoed throughout the media of the empire. The Sakkran troops landed on Phyco, as predicted. But when our own troops were sent to meet them, the Sakkran troops open fire. Reports indicate that the Sakkran troops were given orders to take out the pirate base at all costs. They seem to have though that the pleads of "We are on your side." and "We aren't the pirates!" were a ruse by devious, cowardly raiders.

The last transmission we received from our colony was a call for help that she knew couldn't come in time. She suddenly started screaming and her body stiffened. Her chest began to glow and a flash of red light cut off the video feed.

The last transmission we received from the Sakkras was that of a commander gloating that he had wiped out a large nest of pirates.

2374
Once more, my scientists bring me a new factory design. This news brings the populous solace. Unfortunately, this solace comes in the mindset of war, not peace.

2376
More war secrets are brought to my attention. A basic EMC for protection against missiles was the first on my desk. A more nutritious crop of crystals was produced in a lab that can let farms be smaller. More troops for the attack, it seems.

2378
In disgust, a small firearm was laid on my desk. A replica of how so many of our people were slaughtered. But with this demonic hand gun, we can now improve our ship's weaponry.

2381
Oh, the Great Crystal... the Sakkras have shown themselves a true monsters. This time they stormed Trax, one of our new colonies. There was no excuse, no reason. Just horror. Now, we will truly prepare for war. No Lizard shall stand!

2382
A stronger shield has been devised, twice as powerful as our old ones.

2385
Militant rebels have taken control of Crius. They say we are wasting time. The accuse us of playing down the Sakkran atrocities and are ignoring their threat. While we are waiting to strike, it is only so we will loose as few of our troops as possible.

2390
My scientists bring me a more effective factory. It can churn things out 50% faster than our normal factories. More for the war machine. On top of this report is a message that the humans have taken over our colony on Talas. We must take it back.

2391
A new spaceship engine has been revealed. This is a close as we can get to light speed, according to all known theories.

2393
The first true war revelation that my scientists have brought me was received with great public cheer. Hyper-X Rockets. The most powerful Rockets know to Silicoidkind.

2396
And now we have Personal Deflector shields. These have brought a better defense for our troops on the ground.

2398
Our Scientists have created a program that can instantly seal up holes in our ships. ARS should be a very valuable tool. With this, I will finally take revenge on the Sakkras. I bring up designs for this revenge. This design will have 8 Hyper-X Rocket tubes, 7 Heavy Laser guns, 8 regular Lasers, and 8 Nuclear Bomb bays. It comes with our best Computers and Battle Scanners. The Lizards will have a tough time getting though the Class 2 Shields and a total of three missile defense. The Lizards won't stand a chance against the EMX Mark I.

2400
A more ruthless scientist showed me an airborne poison that works against all known species save for ours. Great Crystal, what are we becoming?

2401
We have had formal contact with the Aliens in the west. They are insects called the Klackons.

2402
The Bladrov II of the Humans contacted us to invite us to a concil to vote for a ruler for the entire galaxy. I ask if the Sakkras would be there. Bladrov seems surprised at my distaste for them, but says yes, those monsters will be there. I seethed, but attend none the less. It seems the reason why the Humans invited us was because they were the top contender and I was the second. I abstain when the vote comes to me, as to not offend the Humans in some way if I were to vote against them.

2405
We can now make NP Guns. I design a small gunner fighter to back up the EMX. With Darrian and Celtsi both building those, we expect about 30 Shards to help with the launch of the EMX assault.

2406
The Klackons recall their ambassador citing our "interference" in their affairs. We suspect that we are in their way for colonization. There is Giennah, mysteriously uncolonized by them. We did want it, but there isn't much we have in a permanent claim.

2408
A plague hits Laan, a Human colony. In response, they ask us for a Non-Aggression Pact. We must decline until we can reclaim Talas. But we do send a small amount to compensate. I also launch our two EMX and 36 Shards to Phycos. Unfortunately, I miscalculated how far away the other systems were, so there are only 21 troops on the way. They will not win and I pray for them.

2410
The top scientists showcase a new Engine, which allows a speed that is a hair's breath away from Light Speed.

2412
After years of ground war and some controversial bombing, Phyco is ours again. I push forth all reserve funds to quickly build up the colony and ship 21 colonists to land in a few years.

2414
Another EMX and a fleet of 32 Shards reach Trax. This colony is more developed, so I must order them to bomb the Sakkras until nearby colonies can stand up against them. This was also the first true test of the EMX, which passed with flying colors. Not only did the enemy's missiles not do little more than scratch our ship, that little damage was quickly fixed up before the next hit.

2416
It seems the Sakkras are very convincing. Both the Humans and the Alkari declare war on us. As it stands, none of our colonies are safe.

2419
Horror on Spica ensues when 7 factories explode. There weren't many casualties, but the populous was unnerved by this attack. I begin funding a massive anti-spy network, taking 16% of the current production going into it.

2424
The Klackons come to us and ask end our great war. Since neither of us had actually attacked the other, I gladly accept. A surprise appeared a week later. A green Klackon contacted me and announced itself as a leading scientist under orders to reveal some of their technology. He shows my scientists the design for a Hyper-V Rockets. We gladly accept.

2425
With a sober heart, I accept Bladrov II as the ruler of the galaxy and inheritor of Orion. As the votes fell, I knew that if I tried to oppose this ruling, I would be at war against the might of the entire galaxy. Even the Klackons voted against me. I would not last to see the next century. This is the only course that will preserve my people. To think, the prophecy that our civilization would last for 500 years has fallen so short.
To ensure the lasting peace of the Silicoid planets, I open borders with the Klackons and let them flood into our worlds. At least we reclaimed Phyco.

******************************************

Well, it sucks that I lost to the Humans, but I knew that no matter what, I wouldn't last 400 years. At least, not but with maybe a few planets about to be invaded. I have the 2424 savefile for confirmation, but here's how my score goes, if it doesn't get disqualifed:

SCORING:

Base Score: 50 points for each planet controlled in 2800AD

**************************************
17 planets * 50 = 850
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+25 points for each of your planets with a population of 220 or greater in 2800AD
+25 points for each of your rivals at "Relaxed" relations or better in 2800AD
+5 points for each "Advanced" tech discovered in EACH field

**************************************
No Bonuses
**************************************

SCORING MULTIPLIER: The following bonuses and penalties are totaled, then applied.

Aggression Penalty:
0% penalty - For invading your Blood Enemy
-20% Penalty - One time penalty for invading any race besides your Blood Enemy.
-20% Penalty - For each race not your Blood Enemy whose territory you invade.

**************************************
I never got to invade Talas, so no penalties either. Unless that wouldn't count due to Talas being mine originally.
**************************************

Survival Penalty:
10% Scoring Bonus - If no rivals ever qualify to become your Blood Enemy.
0% Penalty - If at least four of your original five rivals survive to game's end.
-5% Penalty - For EACH race eliminated after the second. (Less than four rivals left.)
-25% Penalty - Failure to eliminate your Blood Enemy by game's end.
-40% Penalty - Failure to achieve a Victory (of any sort) in 2800. Incomplete games and Council losses are eligible for scoring but will incur this penalty. (You may intentionally retire if things go badly and you anticipate losing more score than this.)

**************************************
Everyone lived. I never even got to meet the Psilons, which I just realized would have made my defeat even more of a quick pounding.
-25%
-40%
**************************************

**************************************
Total points: 297.5

Dismal, ain't it.
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Pics coming later.