OSG 32-B: Two birds with one game

[RefSteel]

Report:

-2430-

I should be soaring above Paranar, at the Volcanic Preserve and Geothermal Resort, and instead I'm listening - half-listening - to some functionary squawk at me about "our gratitude" and the stupid "emergency," and the Presumptive First Talon Elect and something about "another universe." I stop him there.

"This other universe: Is it something our scientists and engineers discovered? Is there a way to weaponize it?"

He blinks awkwardly with the eye that's facing me, swings his head around to look at me with the other eye, and blinks with that one too, even more awkwardly. "Um?" he asks me.

I wave a wing at him. "We'll discuss it with the techies later. Go on." And he does, about repulsor beams the Presumptive Elect had promised in his campaign speeches, and about the Robotic Controls and Gaian Conversions promised by the previous first Talon to increase our factory counts into the ionosphere, and ... I stop him again. "Listen. Bub." I'm trying to be polite, here. Polite for me. "I don't have time for this. I'm in for ten years because you need me, but I don't really plan on doing this again. I'm only coming out of retirement once, okay? And what I'm hearing is this succession that's supposed to last until we take over the galaxy is running short on qualified candidates, you hear me? So I'm going to go ahead and change up some of our research priorities."



I'm not even sure what weapons we're researching - stinger something, he said, which sounds like something a bug would use, not us birdies - but it doesn't even matter: All I really want right now is some better miniaturization so we can make ourselves a better fleet. That and some transports moving. We don't have near enough birds up on Thrax, and it seems like we have to chain them all the way around the far edge of the galaxy to get there. Aren't there some really nice, terran-class planets right near there? Waste of space if they don't help. I want to get them contributing ASAP.

Oh, and I'm having the boys throw shipyards up everywhere remotely near a front. I'm not into this whole dance with "factories." Maybe at Thrax, once it's finished something to swoop in and steal Simius, but other than that, we can worry about "infrastructure" and "employment" and whatever when we've taken over the galaxy. You want employment? Go to the shipyards and the weapons labs! We can always use more talons up there!


-2431-


Yeah, whatever, cat. Come fight me. You think even your gunners can hit my new stabilized Kestrel design? This war is not going to be a problem. I mean, not for me. The Mrrshans may regret it, but whatever, that's their look-out. I mean, look at it: The Silicoids just snuck Simius out from under them with a brand-new colony. And before I had a chance to do it, too! Well, you know what that means. Or, wait, you don't? Come on. You know me. What do you think it means?

(Well, for now it just means I'm scrapping what's left of our sub-fusion starfleet. No point having ships flying around like they're ... I don't know, something slow. Like non-Alkari. But in the long term you know what it means. And if you know me, you know that when I say "long term," I'm talking - tops - like four or five years.)


-2432-


Finally got that weapons research done, so I've got some new designs. Our new scanner ship is armed to the teeth because why would you make a ship that's going into battle and not put a million guns on it? The other new toys are updated SpaceGull 4s: Stabilized fusion bombers, loaded to the nines.

Also I guess we can use the new stuff the weapons engineers invented, stingersomethingsomething, I don't know. I told the boys to go see about building a fusion rifle because a bird-portable multi-use long-range thermonuclear device sounds a lot cooler to me than like stinging things, but you know. Also we could have had some new bombs or some junk, but it doesn't really matter; it's not like we're going to be really researching much for the rest of my term. SpaceGull muster points's at Zhardan. First-wave Talon muster point's here at Altair, then we'll pick up with more of those at Zhardan too. We're sending combat transports too: Not "will be" - they're already loaded and launching.


-2433-


Over 250 fighters and almost as many bombers - and one of those scanner things, just to see. Not bad for a first wave, but I'm not going in with just this fleet. It's getting supplemented from right around Zhardan while half our core worlds are turning right around and sending more in just about the opposite direction from where they just launched these. I don't have time to wait around; we've got a galaxy to conquer here.

Oh, speaking of which: The kittens won the three-way scrum with the rocks and bugs for control of Simius orbit, so I'm sending some of the boys up from Thrax to chase them off. There'll be plenty more to replace them.


-2434-


Looks like Simius is a nice little world covered in cold steppelands and a couple million sentient rocks, so Regulus is going to supply some avian population. With laser pulse rifles, defensive shields, and duralloy servo-assist combat armor. Also, see that little cluster of golden ships and transports near the center of the galaxy? That's what my invasion plan looks like the year before.

I got a call from that crazy lizard guy, I forget his name, so I sent it to holomail. Come to check it out, and it looks like he's upset about something.



Yeah, that's a war declaration. Sad story. I wasn't planning to bother taking over those Sakkra worlds, but I guess since he insists, I'll have to come up with a way to do it! So here's what that looks like:



Those fleets and transports up in the upper left corner of the screen are still converging on their orignal targets, up past my original staging star of Zhardan. On the other side of the screen, with Rigel one year's fusion flight away from my second staging star of Crypto on the other side of Alkari space, it's still sending ships over there, including the bombers that just reached it: It was my secondary staging colony for the Crypto sector war fleet. Meanwhile nearly everyone else within two years' travel is building new ships and getting ready to send ships down to Beta Ceti, my staging ground for our latest target of opportunity. Here at Altair, we're getting some research done, but I'm sure we can start contributing more ships soon. This is my third different major target and my third new staging star in the past three years! If we were getting in on this one from Altair, we could have used Volantis as a secondary staging star, just for more versatility. Wasn't necessary here though. Well, I guess you could say it's never necessary.


-2435-


Here's Exis, my first big prize, getting its defenses removed. The reason you can't see the Shark cruiser except in the ship specs is that by this point in the battle, the Kestrel 4.1s had already ended its existence. We've also got another space battle this year right next door, but it goes more or less the same way. Then it's just a matter of waiting for the trans... wait, hang on, I'm getting a priority message from Bulrathi space, and it's on a private encrypted frequency; that'll be one of our spies. The boys already have their instructions, so if they see a weapons lab...



Oh, yeah. Like taking high-energy talon-held ionic accelerator weapons from a bearcub. ... I gotta work on my metaphors. Anyway, this calls for a rush job: We want every troop on every transport we've got outfitted with these things so they can wreck those Silicoids' rocky orifices with emphasis. Exis falls like a rich, ripe plum, and then that second target I mentioned going after simultaneously: Keeta!



Easy as snapping the nose off a maid when you're baked in a Trojan Pie. And it looks like we captured some rocky tech I don't care about while we were at it!



I knew because I don't care about any of the rocky techs. I'm sure somebody'll appreciate doubling the power of our theoretical shield arrays in case somebody ever builds something with a shield on it, right? Anyway, I got another holomessage. Check out captain obvious over here:



Yeah, I'm feeling your might already, Carnax. It kinda tickles. We just conquered two of your planets; don't you think we already know we're at war?

So I was thinking of consolidating my fleet up there, but forget that! We didn't lose a single ship up there! This is obviously overkill. I leave a few defenders behind at each of my new worlds to clean up stragglers, get 'em started on their atmospheric terraforming, and send the rest of each fleet off to explore some of our other enemies' worlds.


-2436-


Here's what the cats have defending Simius. It maybe looks scary until you realize all our mainline combat ships can fly circles around those missiles, and even dodge the mercs the bases are firing. Then we're down to the Cheetahs that can't hit the broad side of an aviary. Most of the fleet retreats, the rest die like the bases, and the planet only had three, so I don't even know if I'll bother conquering it; it's been in cat paws forever, so it's obviously pretty mineral-poor.

So that was the Exis fleet. Here's where I sent the one from Keeta.



Don't worry about the Sakkra ships; they're all just armed with heavy lasers. Don't worry about the bases here on their homeworld either really; nuclear missiles are slllllllllllooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwww. Then we defend Zhardan from a couple more of their heavy laser boats, almost in our sleep, and take care of that other space fight on the other side of the galaxy, and then while the transports are coming in, take a break to review the lab reports, where we get even more good news! Our brand-new robotic factory controls will mean like a hundred and fifty five new factories around the empire - all of them at Thrax and Exis - and more to the point, it lets us send out way more transports without cutting too deep into our combat production capacity! And we're going to need a lot of transports, believe me. That other space fight I mentioned? It was here:



I got sick of defending places against these stupid bugs, with their big terran planets so close to what ought to have been our back lines. These are the guys who've been attacking us since before we had first contact, remember! So I went ahead and blew up all the defenses at their homeworld. We're not bombing it though: Like I said, we need transports here! Oh, and then there's this GNN guy. Get this joke:



I guess that wealthy merchant knows how to pick the winning side, but it's not like that's difficult at this point, and come on; does it really look like we need another 1.3 trillion credits?

-2437-


Here's what the Klackons have defending Morrig. Against almost a hundred fifty SpaceGulls and about a hundred Kestrels, it's all pretty much scrap. Oh, and Fierias makes it three different aliens' homeworlds whose skies we've taken for ourselves in two years flat. I'm not bothering to send any 'sports up to the catworld though; it's too far off with the nebula. I don't mean we're not going to take it, you understand; I just mean we need a couple years to get the situation on that side of the missing galactic core to stabilize.

Oh, and we get another last-minute spy hit on the bears, but it's just a merculite missile design. We've got something wayyyyy better. So no new boost for our troops this time, when the first, smallest wave hits Kholdan - just the boys I could send over from Regulus next door. That softens up the defenses all right, but they couldn't take the planet fighting almost five to one. For that, we have to wait 'til next year!


-2438-


Hey, check out Talas! Just one of the four new planets where we took orbit this year - one of them's Cryslon, in the nebula, by the way, so that's every homeworld but Ursa cleared in just three years - but Talas is pretty special with those amazing Artifacts on the surface from the Ancients or whoever. Kind of far for me to send transports there right now, but when we do, I'd love to get a look at all the high-tech ruins!

Another one's the Sakkra colony of Kailis: I bypassed their poor old Zoctan colony to get there, only to find out the minerals at Kailis are just as poor! I almost feel bad for them. Not enough to call off my attack on their homeworld, of course, even if I could. Not enough to keep me from conquering Zoctan now that Kailis showed it isn't really a better choice. But you know, almost!

Okay, so ground wars. Our boys from Regulus, way back when, finally hit Simius and just take over. We outnumbered them almost six to one, and - you know - we're better. Then our second transport wave hits Kholdan.



Yup. Looks like I sent in just about the right number of guys. Also, we make the news again.



This is what it looks like when you're dominating the galaxy. Been too long since we saw one of those growth warnings from the Ancients' GNN reporting service. Although I'm pretty sure this is going to be the last one.

Anyway, we got some random junk from the Klackons.



I mean, fusion beams are okay, but we're working on making a version our soldiers can carry around on their backs! And technically class V deflectors are an upgrade, but it's an upgrade I never plan to build for something else I never plan to build, and the other stuff - some kind of specialized colony-preservation tech for infernos, and a bulkier, dumber neutron gun than the one we've already got - is just a bunch of chaff.

Oh, and it looks like the bug queen is calling too! I wonder what she wants!



Huh. I mean, okay Ixitixl, sure, no doubt we're at war now, but I guess I must have missed something in there - are you telling me after I bombed out your homeworld defenses and Morrig's and Yarrow's, and my first wave of 25 million birds died to kill off about 38 million of your homeworld's bugs, until just now when we actually conquered Kholdan, we weren't already at war?"

I do stop spying on the buggies though. There isn't really any point to it anymore.


-2439-


Terrible news at Sssla: The lizards have managed to build a huge Dragon dreadought, with double-layered duralloy armor! With only 22 Kestrels in the system and 24 bombers to fly interference for them, we fall just short of destroying it before it defeats our local fleet! That leaves the giant ship in orbit to shoot down thirty of our incoming transports!



Of course, that doesn't help with the other hundred and fifty seven. We conquer their home world handily enough, and take everything of value - so mainly the one thing:



Cutting our empire-wide factory waste by a quarter helps us out a little with basically everything. I guess the bio-toxin antidote we picked up will be nice to have if anybody ever starts deploying death spores like the ones we also stole, and a warp dissipator might be useful if ... no, let's be real, we don't need it, okay? Oh, and we learned about some of their cute, old-fashioned terraforming techniques. Whatever. Much, much more importantly, I just sent another call to holomail, and this one's from the Bulrathi. Rather than showing you the call itself, I'll let you check out the results, in all their glory:



Ayyyyyup. Guess who's at war with the entire galaxy! Oh, also, guess who doesn't care even slightly! Problem for my successor to deal with, right? If your definition of "problem" is really, really loose, I mean.


-2440-


The Dragon's still hanging around at Sssla. But I sent a real fleet this time. We lose barely more than 10% of our fighters taking down the dread. Of course, now we've got a bunch of bear cruisers on the way....

We also can make gaian planets now with advanced soil enrichment, so that's fun. And another year, another major assault on a Klackon world. Ho hum. I guess this one's a little special though:



Yarrow was the last one. Sorry, buggies: Not sorry.



This may come to a surprise to somebody somewhere, but I doubt it: Guys? We're winning.



Also we have a pretty nice little starfleet. We can build even more obviously, if we happen to feel like it. We can do whatever we want to, really.



And there's our galaxy! I mean, not officially yet, but give it ten years. It will be.

Have at it, First Talon Haphazard! I'll be on Paranar if you need me.

...

Take my word for it: You won't need me.

Executive summary: If you don't have time to read the report, just skip to the last screenshot I included. It's worth a thousand words.

Roster:

RFS-81 - (Thanks for getting us started and helping to get us to this point!)
haphazard1 - Has Got This!
Coeurva - (Thanks for playing with us, even if only briefly, and contributing some great turns too!)
RefSteel - Just played - and not gonna see the save again.

[haphazard1]

Nice report, RefSteel, as always.

I am halfway through my turnset -- so much is going on, so many things moving around, each turn takes a while. Our biggest problem at the moment is a lack of troops -- with all the transports I am sending to conquer worlds, and then our new advanced soil Gaia planets, a bunch of our worlds are sitting mostly empty. Morrig is typical --36 pop on a world that can now hold 190. I need to get some regrowing going.

Anyway, I expect this game to be over Real Soon Now, with the council meeting in 2450. Not sure just how many races will still be around to vote, though....

[RefSteel]

Heh - sounds like you're continuing the previous First Talon's policies! Have fun with it as long as you enjoy tracking all the complexity! If not, you can always just build defense ships and/or bases everywhere and win in a landslide in spite of everyone else voting against us. We just need two other races (three including us Alkari) still alive for the Council vote to happen. Or of course we would win without it if we can get the number of non-Alkari races down to zero, in case that becomes ... uh ... necessary....

[haphazard1]

As he returns once more to the office of First Talon, the latest leader of the Alkari people goes through the now-familiar process of reviewing all the information available once the tedious security clearances have all been dealt with. Steelbeak has left the empire in good order. At least, as long as one is not too worried about the diplomatic situation:

The Alkari are not very popular with the other younger races these days. That might have something to do with the Klackons no longer being around in the galaxy...or the fact that Alkari troops occupy the homeworlds of the Sakkra and Silicoids.

The Great Plan is proceeding very well indeed.

The other races no longer have much technology we do not, with two significant exceptions: the Bulrathi have discovered Anti-Matter Torpedos, and the Silicoids have Improved Industrial Tech 6. Hopefully our spies -- or our soldiers -- can acquire these technologies for us.

Throughout the empire, planets are engaged in applying the new Advanced Soil Enrichment technology. So for the next handful of years there will be much spending on planetology, then fresh growth and factory construction. Research and fleet building will be paused for a while as these more urgent priorities are completed.

Around the galaxy, there are incoming Sakkra transports near Zhardan but a sizable fleet is waiting to blast them before they can land. No other major threats appear to be incoming to our worlds. Alkari fleets are in orbit over multiple alien worlds; the First Talon orders up waves of troop transports for invasions. It will take a few years for the transports to arrive, even with our engine technology; best to get the ground assault birds on their way.

Time to get to work, the First Talon decides. There is still much to do in order to complete the Great Plan....

2441

There are several skirmishes throughout Mrrshan space; our pilots clear the skies of the kitties' worlds and take out the occasional new missile base to keep the way clear for incoming troop transports. There are also a couple skirmishes with the rocks, with similar results. Our planets nearest the fronts are running low on population; ecology spending is ordered to help replenish the local populations. We will need more birds for invasions, and also to maintain our voting veto block in the council.

Our spies get a penetration against the Mrrshan, but only in Planetology; we get the only such tech the kitties have that we do not: Controlled Barren. Even outdated techs boost our overall tech level.

More troop transports are ordered to head for Mrrshan and Silicoid worlds, with ecology spending to refresh the source worlds. Tens of millions of Alkari are committing themselves to carrying out the Great Plan.

2442

More skirmishes in Mrrshan and Silicoid space, keeping control of local space for our incoming transports. A larger battle takes place over the former lizard homeworld of Sssla, where the Bulrathi have sent a sizable fleet:

We take losses, but destroy the entire bear fleet.

In Mrrshan space, our troop transports begin to arrive at their targets:

Our birds manage to take Selia, claiming the out-dated Deflectors 3 tech in the process. We now have all the kitties' tech.

At the cat homeworld, the fighting is hard. The shortage of available troops near the front allows the cats to hold on...barely.

But another wave of birds is already nearing the system; it will fall next year.

Still more troop transports are ordered up, for Silicoid and Sakkrra worlds as well as Mrrshan. And yet more ecology spending across the empire -- we need more birds! Far too many of our worlds are like Morrig: transformed into a Gaia paradise with a population cap of 190 million, but with only 36 million birds actually living on the planet. A lot of regrowing needs to be done.

2442

More skirmishing, more invasions. Alkari forces are on the move throughout the galaxy -- so much is in motion, so much is happening, that the Talon worries important things may get forgotten. It is too much for one bird to handle, even with an extensive staff to support him.

Alkari forces enter the Silicoid system of Aquilae, finding it to contain a rich barren planet with a dozen missile bases. These are bombed out, and still more troop transports are ordered. Every system in the galaxy will be Alkari!

The rocks fight desperately at their homeworld of Cryslon, but just enough Alkari were sent:

Of course, follow up waves were already in motion. A nice prize is looted from the rock homeworld:

We had been researching this tech ourselves, although not spending much on it since we hoped to acquite it from the rocks. Our only new option, sadly, is IIT5. Our Construction tree really has been terrible this game, much like our Propulsion tree.

And speaking of alien homeworlds and follow up waves:

Only the Bulrathi still control their homeworld; all others are now occupied by the Alkari. The First Talon has not moved against the bears' planets so far -- he has his claws full (and then some) with the cats, rocks, and lizards. And with the ongoing shortage of bird troops, even with massive ecology spending, ground invasions of the bears does not seem like the best use of limited resources.

2443

More fighting. The Mrrshan barely hold on to Draconis, but another wave of birds is due next year. The Sakkra are less successful defending Kailis, and we barely manage to conquer it. Only one lizard planet left, and ships are on their way to Proxima. More troops are dispatched to Silicoid worlds as well. Hmmm, bears have a few ships moving around. I think we have enough Kestrels to handle them.

2444

Alkari ships take control of the Proxima system from the lizards, and find that the poor Sakkra really got screwed on planets in this galaxy. Zoctan and Kailis are both poor, and Proxima is ultra-poor. Ouch. Still, the lizards have laboriously constructed 126 factories here. Too bad the planet is going to be bombed into oblivion, as it is not worth conquering.

Alkari troops conquer Trax from the rocks, and follow up birds take Draconis from the cats. Whynil resists our invasion this year, but more birds are on the way. The cats also barely hold at Talas with 4 pop left; again, more birds are incoming.

The bears create some trouble at Sssla with three larges and a huge; just not enough ships to go around. Our forces are spread too thin, and not just the ground troops. I shuffle some ships around and order up some additional construction at Exis to bolster our fleet. There are also some lizard transports incoming to their former homeworld, although they may not arrive before the Sakkra become extinct.

2445

More fighting, more problems from being spread too thin. The rocks manage to get space superiority back over Trax and bomb it, killing 2 million of our people. I order up more Kestrel 4.1s at nearby worlds and shuffle fleets, trying to cover everywhere that needs defense.

In the north we capture Talas, and surprise! The cats apparently researched some new tech this past turn, because we capture something. And a very useful something it is:

Finally we can be alerted to incoming fleets and their destinations.

Our troops also capture Whynil:

Good riddance to the felines, and thanks for the parting gift of scanner tech!

Checking the other races' techs, I see that the Bulrathi have developed Sub Light Drives. Faster bears are a threat; more ship construction is ordered.

2446

More fighting. Our regrouped fleets manage to destroy several Bulrathi and Silicoid ships, but the rocks break through at Zhardan and bomb our planet, killing over 10 million birds. More shuffling is ordered; with the enemy ships destroyed this turn I think we are getting the situation under control again.

Our troops take Aquilaea from the rocks, leaving them with only a single world: Rotan in the far northwest corner. Fleets are on their way there.

In the southwest corner, we finish bombing out the ultra-poor world of Proxima:

Good riddance to the lizards.

With the Mrrshan and Sakkra eliminated, our fleets in their regions are able to redeploy to bolster our forces against the bears and rocks. Lots of ships on the move.

2447

More skirmishing with the bears and rocks. We destroy more of their ships and reclaim control of our skies.

2448

ZZZZZZ. A vacation on Paranar sounds really good about now.

2449

Our spies break into a Bulrathi research center and steal Sub Light Drives. Obsolete, but still helpful for tech level and miniaturization.

With the council vote set for next turn, some final ecology spending helps max out population. Most of our planets (planning ahead) have already hit their population caps.

Our fleets arrive at the rocks' last world, and find it is a tiny inferno planet. Not much of a world, even for the rocks. The Silicoids have actually been shipping troop transports towards Aquilae. Not going to do them much good now.

I could bomb out the planet, but eliminating the rocks would make it impossible to win via council. So the Silicoids get to live.

The galaxy in 2449:

I think we might just possibly win this one.

2450

A bit more fighting, blowing up a couple Bulrathi ships. Then the high council meets. Nominees are Grunk of the Bulrathi and us. 49 votes total, so 34 needed for victory.

Silicoids - 1 vote for Grunk
Bulrathi - 4 votes for Grunk
Alkari - 44 votes for (of course!) us.

And that's the way it is. The Great Plan has been fulfilled, and the Alkari dominate the galaxy.

I have the 2449 save, just in case anyone wants to play on for an extermination victory or to have fun with late game toys and conquering the Guardian and such. Our economy is huge, and still growing as we add factories. Our worlds still have quite a lot of room to grow in production, although most are maxed for population. Our total economy was over 17000 BC and still climbing, so researching almost anything would not take all that long if desired.

It has been fun playing with all of you, and I look forward to finding out what Team A has done with this galaxy. I hope we see everyone again for future SGs; I have some ideas in mind for a more variant oriented game, but we will see what people might like to try.

[haphazard1]

Been reading Team A's thread. Looks like they may get a diplo win in 2425, if they can grow a bit in time and get some friendly votes. Their rocks are more advanced than ours -- I think they got a couple additional worlds early and grew faster/teched better than in our game.

Team A did not push for Controlled: Dead as early as we did, but many things were similar (not surprisingly). They did not get attacked by the bugs early, as we did at Denubius. Events are quite similar; rather than plague at Denubius they got the Nova event at Volantis.

They did get some terrible tech luck, with IRC3 not popping until they maxed it out. The screenshot of IRC3 sitting at 99% is just painful.

[haphazard1]

Hmmm, things did not work out for the 2425 vote for Team A, and it looks like the galaxy is exploding into mass war. Sounds kind of familiar, doesn't it? It would be interesting if both teams end up winning by council vote in 2450.

[RefSteel]

Beautifully finished, Haphazard - and thanks for playing along, Coeurva and RFS-81! Now off to read the other thread....

[RefSteel]

Team A did not push for Controlled: Dead as early as we did, but many things were similar (not surprisingly). They did not get attacked by the bugs early, as we did at Denubius. Events are quite similar; rather than plague at Denubius they got the Nova event at Volantis.

They did get some terrible tech luck, with IRC3 not popping until they maxed it out. :eek: The screenshot of IRC3 sitting at 99% is just painful.

True, although we didn't push for Controlled Dead at all: I think we got Toxic before they got it; we pushed planetology much harder than they did, while they emphasized Computers much more heavily. Er, much more heavily. I agree IRC3 at 99% is painful, but it only had like two or three chances in percentages to hit before they pushed it up there! Similarly, our getting attacked at Denubius early was in part because we went a couple of turns without a ship there, opening it up for a Klackon scout. Each team got unlucky when those decisions didn't work out, but it wasn't all luck in either case.

It would be interesting if both teams end up winning by council vote in 2450.

Absolutely! I think it should be possible to clean up the galaxy in less than 25 turns from where they stand, so they could win extermination early, but that might take some pretty serious dedication. Looking forward to seeing what they can manage there!

I'm curious how team B is doing. Their thread was much more active while we were struggling through the first round, and now it feels like we are just about finished. The B squad hasn't popped in here to gloat yet so they must still be playing.

Wait, why would we gloat? Or talk in their thread? They're still playing, and hopefully having fun with the game! I like their idea of getting an Impossible SG going after this one, although I doubt if I'll have time to do much playing.

[haphazard1]

Dark Savant's latest update has more evidence that Team A's rocks did better than ours: Whynil was a Silicoid world in their game, rather than the cat colony it was in ours. Probably one of those early AI alliances gave the rocks range to get that far to the northeast, and they poached the world from the kitties.

Sakkra getting to Controlled Radiated and making a play for the radiated worlds is also quite a difference. Our lizards never advanced that far, being stuck with the two poors plus the ultra poor in the southwest. Maybe our Bulrathi were stronger than Team A's bears, and squeezed the lizards a bit more? We had to fight repeatedly to keep the rocks off the radiated planets, but no one else ever advanced enough to threaten those worlds. Interesting to have it confirmed that the tech was in the Sakkra's tree.

[Ianus]

This has been really fun to compare the two games. I love watching RefSteel set a goal and make seemingly impossible progress toward it during his turns. I'm also really impressed by how quickly you conquered the galaxy! We started offensive war much sooner but we definitely didn't push hard enough to make gains. Looking back at our game and seeing how quickly Team B pushed across the galaxy makes me think that if we had gone 100% war production when we started conquering the Klackons we could have accomplished the same even more quickly. But as Dark Savant said it is hard to commit to a switch from a builder mindset to a conquest mindset and forego development. I think RefSteel said it best that he imagines the game going on indefinitely against larger and stronger opponents. I would like nothing better than to hit some threshold and have the galactic map zoom out to reveal that we are really just one small part of a Huge+ galaxy full of massive empires. I VERY strongly dislike MoO2 but I think that they had the right idea with the Antarans. Anyway, this was really fun! Maybe after the Easter weekend we could put together another SG, or even an Imperium, or both! I have a fun Imperium idea but it has to wait for Imperium 47, because... reasons
Let's take a couple of days and brainstorm, and then get things rolling next week!