Getting back into MOO

[shallow_thought]

I've been enjoying reading both this and RFS-81's thread. I'll probably be playing MOO again over the next couple of weeks - it's my goto game when on holiday: easier to pick up again after putting down than Civ IV and much less of a strain on the laptop. But playing casually on planes, or in half-hour bursts here and there - Psilons or Klackons on hard is just about my level under those conditions.

Will have to try taking it more seriously once I'm back.

[haphazard1]

Glad you have enjoyed reading about my bugs, shallow_thought. I have also been following RFS-81's game with interest. Maybe we can get enough activity going for a succession game?

This game has been going well so far. Having shaken most of the rust off, next game will step back up to impossible. Probably another strong race for that one, humans maybe. If that goes well I will try one of the middling races. Cats on impossible is a ways off yet -- I am not as brave (or as good a player) as RFS-81.

[haphazard1]

Found time to play 41 more turns. A lot has been happening in the galaxy....

I continued expanding to the north along the western edge of the galaxy. The three planets in the northwest corner turned out to be all hostile, but two of them were ultra rich. Both were unusually large as well: an inferno 40 and a radiated 50. The third planet was a standard toxic 10; pretty crummy planet but another world is another world. Fortunately I was about to finish Controlled Radiated when my scouts reported back, so the timing was good. I colonized Paranar just north of the nebula and it gave me the range to reach the ultra rich worlds using long range colony ships.

With the three northern worlds plus the two radiated worlds I had found earlier, my bugs now controlled 16 systems. The other races were getting unhappy over my continuing expansion, but I signed some increased trade deals to help keep relations positive. The Darloks and Psilons were too stunted to be much of a worry; the Silicoids were lagging in tech and also not much of a concern. The Meklar were potentially a much bigger problem: they had enough worlds for solid production with the Meklar racial bonus and much better tech. Sub light drives, fusion bombs, death spores, class X planetary shield (I only have planetary V), and repulsor beams plus lots of production -- the cyborgs could be a serious threat if they decide on war. And being erratic, they could do so at any moment.

Shortly after I colonized the northwest, the Mrrshan settled a planet north of the Meklar and we finally had contact. This is one of the rare galaxies with strong cats: they controlled 11 worlds and owned the entire east. They also had pretty decent tech overall, with the kitties' usual loads of weapons techs plus some good planetology (soil enrichment, up to Controlled Toxic, and better terraforming than my +20) and decent computers. They were a big threat, and were their usual ruthless militarist selves.

Well, three turns after diplomatic contact they declared war. As the two dominant powers in the galaxy, I guess we are going to fight this out immediately. I was not exactly unprepared for war, although I had been thinking it would be with the cyborgs. But I had defenses on my border worlds and had started building some war ships, which now moved to the one Mrrshan world I could reach: Kronos. It had 90-some pop, so along with the warships I sent invasion forces from three worlds.

My ships took about 50% losses clearing the skies and bases at Kronos, but there were no obstacles to the troops when they finally arrived. The first wave faced twice as many cats, but I had a slight edge in gropo tech:

Their ion rifle kept it from being a complete slaughter, but my bugs were killing cats at about a 5:2 ratio. Plus I had a follow up wave with 30 more bugs due the next turn. Kronos was mine. Sadly I only got one tech, a useless range 5. The cats had quite a lot of stuff I would have loved to get.

I still do not have any better clean up tech. But I am currently researching Reduced Waste 20% to get around the problem by just not producting much waste. The cats do not have any clean up tech either. The Meklar do, but they do not like me much and want way too much in trade. That has been the biggest hole in my tech tree; I have had a pretty good mix of other tech types even though my tree has been very sparse with few choices at most levels.

The current state of the galaxy after the conquest of Kronos (next to the cursor):

I have fresh heavy fusion beam warships (now with impulse drives for warp 5 and combat speed 4 with inertial stabilizer) on the way to the next Mrrshan world. Equally fast Omega V bombers will handle any defense bases. Grabbing more Mrrshan worlds plus my current research into advanced soil enrichment to upgrade all my worlds (I have already applied Atmospheric Terraforming to my many hostile planets) should get me close to enough pop to win via council, even without any support from the other races. And the cats are at war with the Darloks and Silicoids as welll as me, so I have a shot at some friendly votes. I am not sure I can get enough done by 2450, but victory by 2475 seems like a pretty solid bet.

[haphazard1]

After a break for Fourth of July festivities, I got back to my Klackons game. The Mrrrshan had nothing that could stop my heavy fusion beam ships and Omega V bombers. The unlucky cats had a huge hole in their tech tree: no missiles! For all their other weapons tech, their bases were still firing nukes. They did manage to put together a couple sizable fleets, and even managed to kill an occasional ship. But mostly the war consisted of scenes like this one:

Between pointy stick research and my spies, I cleaned out all the Mrrshan techs. Vulcan's haul included the cats' ion rifle, making ground combat even more lopsided than it already was. My bug troopers were killing cat defenders at about 3:1.

World after world was taken. The cats were at war with every race in the galaxy, so the fighting was causing relations to soar with all the other races. The Silicoids were so pleased I got this message from their ambassador:

By the year before the 2450 council vote, the Mrrrshan empire was a fraction of its former glory:

The cats did come up with a dangerous ship design at this late point in the war. The Tiger was a huge design, speed 3, with heavy blast cannon and decent computer and shields. Unfortunately for the cats they have zero armor tech, so even a huge was not really all that tough. And with fewer and fewer planets left, they could not really afford to build many huges.

The 2450 council vote arrived, and I was feeling confident. All my worlds had applied the recently discovered advanced soil tech and grown their populations to the new maximums. Reserve spending at conquered worlds had maxed populations on those worlds also. Everyone in the galaxy hated the cats and was at war with them. Piece of cake, right?

You've probably spotted my mistake already: I had stomped the cats too hard. The election was between me and the Meklar, who were allied with the Darloks and Silicoids. Ooops. The Psilons abstained, but everyone else voted for the cyborgs. I was short of being able to win with just my own votes (25 of 43), although I had a comfortable veto block so no worries of losing.

So the game continues. I am researching Terraforming+50 for another 30 million pop on all my many worlds, and I will continue taking worlds from the Mrrshan. By 2475 I should be able to win with just my own votes, whatever the other races do. I could probably just roll over the other races if I wanted to; only the Meklar have even somewhat competitive tech at this point. My bugs will control this galaxy...eventually.

[Psillycyber]

Nice progress! Cracking the first planet is the key. Are you going to leave the kitties on one planet or just wipe them out?

[haphazard1]

Thanks, Psillycyber! Managing all the invasions and troop movements and such can get a bit tedious, but success is fun. Massing enough firepower to break through the Mrrshan fleet at the first world took some time, but the cats' lack of decent missiles made their bases a non-threat. They have a dozen beam weapons, several bombs, gropo weapons -- but not a single missile tech. Nasty hole to have in your tech tree.

I am planning on leaving the Mrrshan one world. My relations with the other races are very good right now due to them all being at war with the cats and liking my attacks on them, so I don't see any reason to damage that with genocide. (Kitty-cide? ) The Mrrshan and the Silicoids have been trading a spud world back and forth on their border; I plan to grab all the other Mrrshan worlds while the cats have control of it. If the rocks then finish off the poor kitties, well, it wouldn't be my fault, right?

One odd item I just found: there is a tundra world in the northeast that has not been settled. I stole Controlled Inferno from the cats, so they have the tech to colonize it. Not sure why they didn't do so.

[Psillycyber]

I had a huge map I was playing as the Sakkra on impossible, and the same thing happened there, except in this case it was a handful of planets all tucked into a corner, and one of them was even a terran world, that went completely unnoticed by everyone else until my victory in 2475. And the neighboring races, the Bulrathi and Psilons, both had had the range and environment techs to colonize the systems for a long time. But they were also in a long and grueling war with each other, and my guess is that, as soon as they got big death fleets set up, they kept merging their colony ships with the death fleet instead of sending the colony ships off on their own like they do in the exploration phase of the game. That's my best guess. It was weird. They weren't even spud worlds that the AIs were trying to colonize, only to trade back and forth. They weren't even trying to colonize them. It must be part of how the AI also neglects the corners of the map and pays more attention to systems that are more in the center of the map.

[haphazard1]

You may be correct about the AIs putting their colony ships into their combat fleets rather than sending them to remote worlds. The cats sent a number of armed colony ships against my fleets as I was fighting them. Pretty heavily armed, too, with multiple neutron blasters.

The tundra planet is also separated from the rest of the Mrrshan worlds by a nebula. I wonder if that did anything odd to the AI pathing routines? Maybe the extra turns required to travel through the nebula did something to the pathfinding?

[haphazard1]

After the game did not end with the 2450 vote, I have continued my conquest of the cats and general mop up of the galaxy. I found another planet in the northeast that apparently had never been settled by the AIs -- an inferno. Very strange, but I built a couple colony ships and grabbed it along with the tundra planet I mentioned previously.

As planned, I conquered all the Mrrshan planets except the one which they were trading back and forth with the Darloks. And sure enough, the shifters eliminated the cats for me. Poor kitties did not even get top billing on GNN for their extermination -- an update on the ongoing pirates event took the headline. The cats had a decent run in this galaxy and were the strongest AI for a long time, but declaring war on me was a fatal mistake. I had been planning war against the Meklar, but the Mrrshan made themselves a priority target.

The pirates event has been annoying. It is centered on a Meklar world, and my relations with the cyborgs are not good so I can not do anything about it without declaring war on them. So galactic trade has pretty much been crushed.

A couple turns after the Darloks wiped out the Mrrshan, all four remaining races showed up one after another and denounced me for being too large and powerful. Relations have dropped significantly, from Peaceful down to Neutral or Amiable, but open war has not (yet) broken out. I am not really worried.

I am mostly just rolling turns until 2475 which should end this one. The Meklar have some good tech and a large fleet still, but I think I can handle them. The cats picked up repulsor beam somehow just before I captured their next-to-last planet, so my latest generation of heavy fusion beam ships has repulsors along with class IX shields, Mark VIII battle computers, and andrium armor. I am researching high energy focus, but do not expect to get it into active service before the 2475 council vote.

[haphazard1]

And the game ended as expected with the 2475 council vote. I had enough votes to win by myself, but the Darloks and Psilons were at war with the Meklar so they voted for me as well. 49 of 59 votes in the final tally, with 43 of them mine.

The rocks declared war on me in 2471 for some reason, not that it mattered. I did take the opportunity to steal the couple of obsolete techs they had which I did not.

The Meklar never did do anything about the pirate infestation in their system. The AI is generally very bad about dealing with pirates.

I finished IRC6 on the final turn, so my production would have approximately doubled (from IRC3) within a handful more turns. I had also completed Hellfire Torpedoes, Deflectors XI, and High Energy Focus. I don't think any wars would have been a problem.

This was a fun game, with a lot of good luck from the RNG. Duralloy early from an artifacts world, lots of habitable planets within range so my propulsion-challenged bugs did not have to pour early BCs into researching range, and mostly a pretty decent tech tree. Lack of clean up techs cost me a lot of BCs cleaning up waste, but I was lucky with other things like planetology, drives, and weapons.

Now that I am back in the MOO groove, time to step back up to impossible. Humans, maybe, to ease into the tougher difficulty? Or maybe even the mighty Psilons? I don't think I am ready for a weak race on impossible quite yet.