Matrix Games Forums

Following questions about ship design. The Manual indicates that mulitiple computers will up scan range, and multiple generators will provide more power, so that energy starved weapons will recycle faster.

1.) Will Multiple Engines make your ships;
a.) faster?
b.) more manuverable?
c.) or just waste space?

2.) is there a way to figure out the balance between generators and weapons?

3.) will mulitple layers of armour provide more protection?

4.) What is the real difference between bolts and torpedoes?

btw - love the game.

ps does anyone remember whether the big endians wore low heels or high heels?

I can't be specific on all of your questions but I do notice that with more engines the ships are faster. As far as determining how many generators are enough, I just watch the ships performance after configuration. If the charge readouts for the ships components start draining too quickly and are not being recharged fast enough then I immediately reconfigure for another generator.

Hey JSGumby,

1) Multiple engines will DEFINITELY increase your travel speed on the big map, and if I'm correct its a very direct cumlative relation so if standard engines move you at 1 parsec/month, 3 would move you 3 parsecs/month. I'm not sure how this factors into tactical combat, however.

2) Grizpin had it right with the generators, its a lot of test and see but keep in mind that things like shields and energy based weapons are going to need a LOT more power than a ship with just armor and missiles.

3) Yes, every layer, unless I missed something, is that much more dame you can absorb before taking internal damage but at 2 slots a set and the fact that not until much later in the game does it regenerate, it may not be worth devoting TOO much space to.

4) Hmmm, I could be wrong here but the biggest difference I would guess is the range. Bolts are short range bruisers that will take a fair amount of power while Torpedos are the longest range weapons in the game, require no power, BUT have a very narrow arc. While Bolts start off with limited shots, later on you can have infinite shots BUT the Torpedos will always be limited to 20 shots before a re-load. Lastly, while a Torpedos retain an 80% accuracy rating as long as the target is in their arc, a Bolt weapon's accuracy varies from 75%-100% depending on the distance between the firer and target.

Multiple engines really increase speed and are very useful in the exploration stage. Of course, you also get better engines available as you step thru the Ages. However, the tradeoff in slot availability, especially important in the later stages of the game, is something to consider. I go with 1 warp engine.

I prefer both shields and armor and a balanced attack capability. Fighters seem to have better overall attack capability in the endgame as opposed to torpedoes or missles.

As to figuring things out (like generators and weapons), consider slowing the game way down and occasionally pausing
during combat. You can get a lot of useful clues by examing your opponents ship capability.

JSGumby,
I use 2 engines while I have rocket engines, but then go to 1 with electromechanical engines onward. Usually I make one of my first scouts have 2 engines while the other gets 2 computers so I can get a good glimpse of the immediate neighborhood. I never mess with armor and always go for shields early. Forget bolts, fighters, and torpedoes as they are worthless. I go for beams right away and then standoffs and if I get around to it waves. Standoffs are long range powerful weapons that usually kill your opponent before you get into beam range. I go with 2 forward shields on frigates and larger for attacking worlds. I usually wait until the singularity age before going for stealth techs as subspace computers negate early stealth. Use several generators for each ship except scouts. Also make sure you use enough engineers on your ships. I start with 2 for scouts and add one for each new ship class and I skip security on ships.
Eric Larsen

i've spent the last couple of weeks playing some games primarily to sound out which ship configs work the best for me. here are some of my conclusions/insights.

first off, it really boils down to the the initial config of your first scout. this is potentially the most important config you'll make, so it better work.

i found that you have three potential basic options:

1. two rocket engines - most definitely makes things go faster. an absolute killer in the easter egg hunt phase. if you get 2-3 ships up very early, you can all but whitewash a 150 star galaxy in 200 years or less. if you play at the beginner level, i'd make this a 'must'. once you get up to fusion age and get the warp engine, you can dispense with them -- or mount them on larger ships for a 'strike' type ship. cruisers with 2 transwarp engines still don't turn worth a hoot, but move with amazing speed.

2. two computers - in a beginner game, i found this pretty pointless. you are better off building a 2nd or 3rd computer on your planet to boost the radius of sensors. if you play in a 50 star galaxy, though, it might be all but mandatory. in a 100 or 150 star galaxy, all planets are sufficiently close to give you a few to explore even with one electric computer.

in intermediate level, the sensor range seems to be a bit nerf'd, and now packing two computers really seems to be a much more necessary proposition.

3. two generators - i pretty much bought into the need for at least 2 generators per ship a loooong time ago. it's possible to bop around with just one, but your ability to move on steady basis is greatly retarded and for that matter -- powering your shields becomes a very dicey proposition. any early-era single powerplant ship i've ever tried will either get blown to bits eventually or winds up back in spacedock every 2nd or 3rd system, which i find uneconomical.

so...

all this leads to my current early game strategy, which pretty much works out as follows:

i config my scout with 2 rocket drives and 2 generators (and 2 shields when i got them -- i usually give myself the shield advantage and start with a pair of laser shields) but only 1 computer. i send this ship on it's way to explore the nearest systems.

for my first research project, i pick the gunboat -- yes, the gunboat and not the electromagnetic drive or the optical computer (or the lab or the type 2 freighter...

if you play it right, you have a good 8-10 years at the start of the game where nothing much can be built, so why not pick something early on that will get you the most 'bang' for your buck? by picking the gunboat, i get the extra loadout slot that the scout doesn't have and now i can config ships with 2 computers, 2 drives and 2 generators -- these are AWESOME easter egg hunters!

how you proceed from there is pretty much up to you. i tend to stay small at first, build 3 ships and then find as many artifacts as possible (even if they are useless -- you are denying them to your opponents). my next research items usually are the EM drive, the lab, type 2 freighter (keep in mind that the EM drive is the functional equivalent of an freighter expanded by approx. 0.5 magnitude -- so you get a little boost out of that early on, which can be useful) and then the optical computer.

the downside to this style is that you will have a fairly small and weak domain for a while, which will run into debt and negative income for a goodly while (i would use the money found by my ships to construct new facilities and routes -- this eventually gets your economy up and going). this also tends to lead to a prolonged atomic age (lack of funds to build the age labs is usually what holds me back most often -- but not always. it really comes down to how much money your closest systems make). some people might find that to be a bad thing -- i do not.

keep in mind that by going over the majority of the map, it's more than likely that i will have scooped the most artifacts and that most other races are generally stuck in the atomic age with me -- so that i have time to reasearch a goodly portion of the technologies i want and need and when my economy starts booming, i'm ready to tear through fusion and anti-matter in record pace.

anyway, my 2 cents worth...

gren99,
You've come upon some interesting opening-game gambits but I think you're missing something. I always start my research with the optical computer because it can help out on ships to make them see and fight better but also on your world so you can research a little faster early on before you get labs and research centers. Then it's the electromechanical drive so that not only my warships speed up but also my transports. Then I research laser shields to protect my ships from those early sentinels that use beam weapons and are rather tough cookies. Then I go for the beam weapons until I get advanced lightning beams. Now I've gotten in all the important techs that now allow my ships to traverse the galaxy and hunt artifacts without constant returns to the homeworld to stock up on expendable weapons (pack rockets, torps, or standoffs).

The first thing I do is check my neighborhood. If I only see one star system I immediately configure my first ship with an extra computer and pack rockets so that I get an immediate widening of my view of possible stars to explore. If I see more than one I configure my first ship with an extra rocket drive with the extra pack rockets so that it can move faster. I also immediately build another scout and configure this one with an extra computer at first if I still want to expand my horizons if I didn't with the first ship. After I've got a good view of stars around me then the extra computer becomes an extra drive. After I get shields researched I drop the extra computer or drive and go with another generator.

After these items are researched I usually start enhancing my world with labs and nano factories and start improving my transports. I also try to get the informant and then spy built early so that when I start finding alien worlds I can then start spying on them to see how they stack up and most importantly to see how many wisdom artifacts they have. I sort of size up my competition and start thinking of what race goes first. I like to get my spies all over early so that I can steal money or do sabotage early on before they do it unto me.

I also start researching the colony pod and fertility drugs just before I leave the atomic age so that I can start expanding the population base and increasing my research/production base. It's good to colonize early and often, but make sure to protect those weak colonies early on as they are easy prey. If I find instant colonies or instant population artifacts then colonizing becomes easy. Nothing like putting an instant poplulation artifact on a scout or gunboat and sending it to patrol the colony system just before the scout takes off to actually colonize the world. Then as soon as the scout colonizes the world that instant population artifact kicks in and now you've got some decent production times as I make sure it's got 100% engineers and then I start to build that world's infrastructure until I'm done with it. Then I switch the population to other pursuits. I start to shift to security as I meet aliens and figure they may know where my worlds are and can start spying on me. I add navy when I feel aliens can start attacking my worlds and to have trained navy personnel for new ships as I start a ship-building frenzy.
Eric Larsen

since my gameplay expieirience was a bit different than yours, i opted to play a whole game through using some of the settings you outline -- which meant intermediate difficulty, no advantages and random events on.

and witht hose settings, you got a good point -- the optical computer is absolutely vital as your first research project. my scout kept getting hammered until it got it's first optical computer (it took 3 trips to clear one system!!).

after that, i researched the EM drive and the gunboat and quickly fell back into my routine (shields, lightning beam, type 2 freighter, lab, informant, spy, nano tech, nano facotry...).

i still cleared the entire map in 200 years game time, but i also had 8 races on the board, so that kinda helps speed up exploration.

in the end, i took about 600 years gametime to conquer all (which is about how much time i normally take to do so) and in the process completely 'researched' the tech tree (something like 92% of all technologies).

as i see it, the real crucial things to get here are instant starship, instant research artifacts as well as the 'spy' technology. i researched 'spy' very early and just plain went nuts stealing stuff from my opponents -- in fact the only two freighters i researched were the type 2 and the type 10.

the difference between what you outline and what i outline can be pretty much summed up by one thing: shield advantages.

having shields early on gives you a MASSIVE advantage over anyone else that allows you leap far ahead of everyone in galaxy exploration -- which is where the strategy i outline above works quite well.

without this advantage, you play at a somewhat more leisurely pace early one, but also tend to avoid all the finacial pratfall that i encountered in my particular method.

OK, here's a very long dissertation on this game from notes I have kept over the last year of playing about 1 game every 2 weeks:

One very important thing I have noticed, at least in the Advanced level, is that the time it takes to research various tech's varies at different times.

I have now adapted my strategy to this. I start with the auto-build feature off. My scout has 2 drives, 2 rockets, 1 gen, 1 computer. I research Lab first, with the population shifted 70% science. Then shift pop to 70% engineers and build any freighters for scout-cleared planets, plus 2 Lab's. Then I shift pop to 60% science, research Def Beams/Light Beam/Nano Tech/Nano Fact (all the while building nothing but my scout is clearing planets). Then, shift pop to 70% Engineers, build 3 Nano Fact's, more freighters, 1 lab. Then, with 3 labs/fact's, shift pop to 50/50, turn auto-build back on, research Optical Computer/E-Magnetic Drive. Note all this time I have only 1 scout, now with 3 forward lightning beams, 1 def beam, 2 gen's, 1 drive, 1 computer. Easter Egging is slow going at first, as it takes time for ship refit with the planet pop shifted to research. A necessary evil. But have faith (see below).

OK, now at a crossroads - my next desired tech would be a shield. But in checking the 4 possible shield tech's, invariably, one is HALF the duration to research as the other 3! Each game the type of shield varies. Sometimes this doesn't happen at all, sometimes 2 shields are shorter.

Next, I desire Type 2 freighter, as I am running short of cash (from the early population swaps as I researched or built). Note I never build Surface Mining Facility (takes too long to build for too little return, takes up too much space. More on Deep Mining Facil. later.)

If I hold out on the freighter, and follow the short research times, I get: Ram/ Informant/ Spy/ Colony Pod/ Fertility Drugs/ Assult Pod. Then, the choices for Gunboat or Type 2 Fr are the shortest they've been. Whichever one I go with, the next round the other one has a very long research duration. I then have to wait thru several shorter tech researches (Self Destruct, Nuclear Mines, my next weapons family - Waves, Bolts, Fighters, Standoffs in that order if there's time) before going back to the leftover long one.

At this point I have easter egged all the possible systems before bumping into neighbors (about 20 if I go w/8 civ's in 150 stars), all w/only 1 scout (once I get my scout over 50% combat exp, with 2 shields, 2 lightning beams, Optical Computer, Electro-Mag Drive, easter egging goes fast - with 5 engineers/15 navy, repairs are made to minor damage in transit to the next system, so my scout is away from Sol for 4-8 systems or more in a row).

At this point I get a colony started. I build Def Laser Beams, Type 1 spacedock, w/100% engineers.

After refit, I then send my scout out to find out about other civ's from the pirates. I never fight the pirates early (set always to challenging). If they refuse info, I flee (its backfired and I've lost my only ship to Torpedos, tho). I then build spys for any home planets I find out about, using my new colony. I shift my population on Sol to 50% science, 25% engineers, 25% security, and only build on my colony. I turn auto-build off to insure this is my choice. I then steal whatever wisdoms I need. I am at this point into about 18 Atomic age tech's, so, again using my colony, build the Age Lab.

Around this time the colony is transformed to a planet. I build my 2nd ship on planet 2 - Gunboat of course!

The first Fusion Age tech's researched are then: Research Center, Replicators, Replicator Facility, Deep Mining Facility.

I initiate diplomacy with my discovered neighbors. I offer a few lab/factory tech's (I am always way ahead technologically but behind in ships, and, as noted by others, the aliens never use them anyway), then offer to trade for the remaining shields, to put me closer to Single Phase Defl., plus better freighters (the aliens inevitably are ahead in freighter types too - I almost never have to research freighter types).

If war is declared on me, I always bribe my way out w/tech's, then money, then as a last resort, systems I would lose anyway or with a pirate I got no info from.

My 2nd world then gets 3 Rep Facilities, 3 Deep Mining Facil's, and 3 Research Centers (its always Huge typ 1). Rounded out with 4 shields, 2 Laser Beams, 1 Def Wave, Protected Cities.

My next tech's are Fusion Gen, Laser Beam, Single Phase Defl, Graviton Dr, Fusion Mines, Cloning, Bio Computer, Protected Cities, Type 2 Spacedock, etc.

I send my 1st scout to its 3rd colonizing mission (also Huge Type 1). Meanwhile, with Fusion Gen, Graviton Dr, Single Phase Defl, Laser Beams, my Gunboat goes on a pirate-eradicating experience-building mission. If I still haven't located enough aliens, heres another chance. My 3rd colony duplicates my 2nd world. Once my 2nd world is 100%, I move my wisdom artifacts there and the population is 35 sci/ 35 engr/ 30 security. This buys me time as the aliens have to build spies on my 2nd world to get at my wisdoms! I can now go back to Sol, with 80% Engineers, 20% Security (protects my money and tech's) and replace the Nano Fact's and Lab's w/ the newer equivalents, plus 2 or 3 Deep Mining Facil's., then have room for shields and weapons. Meanwhile my 3rd colony is building mines for valuable systems (over $15 or so), and eventually a pair of frigates (my 3rd and 4th ships). Once world 3 is 100%, and Sol has been updated, I juggle the wisdoms around between my 1st 3 complete worlds, which are my research worlds. I turn Auto-Build on for the game's duration. I set the 1st 3 world's pop's all to 35 Sci/ 35 Engr/ 30 Sec (need the Engr's for tech/spacedock upgrades, ship re-fits).

By this time I am anti-matter, and once Terraforming is in hand, I colonize only financially advantageous planets, even if Small/Very Small Type 5 or 6 (if they are worth $12/year instead of -$8, it makes a BIG DIFFERENCE in my civ's cashflow, to where I can get by on a much smaller slice of the galaxy). On these smaller planets I only build Repl and Deep Mining Facil's (with shields and weapons of course), 80% Engineers/20% Security, then I build all my ships, freighters, mines, on these planets only, to free up my 1st 3 to research all the time.

I build about 4 frigates, in 2 fleets of 2, plus my 1st scout and gunboat, which by now are for colony duty only. Frigates hunt pirates and defend systems.

As soon as a colony turns to planet, its time to colonize again - keep it rolling. I dont use the colonize menu now, rather check out high-return systems on the map ($20/year and over), especially if there's less than 4 planets, 1 of them is a real producer!

I skip right to building cruisers as soon as possible. Anything less is a waste in the advanced Singularity age, when both a cloak and detector are mandatory.

I typically don't espionage, as I'd end up with Missles or Torpedos too early (those are last for me). I'd rather trade and build up goodwill, and save the spying for essentials like wisdoms and money.

Once I have anti-matter tech's on my ships, I become much harder to push around (up till now, no amount of supplication was too much). With jump gates, it becomes a cakewalk. Raid my system? My 2 new cloaked cruisers, 1 with 3 phasor bolts, 1 with 3 energy waves, are there. Raid more systems than I have fleets for? My small planets are building mines. Threaten my latest colony? Switch to 100% Engineers, delete Deep Mining Facilities, add generators and weapons, have other planets build mines for this colony, and I'm up to snuff way before the enemy has arrived, with my 1st 6 ships jumped to patrol it while my new cruiser fleets are counter-raiding the attacking alien's best systems. This is the best part of the game for me.

I note that weapons vary in their effectiveness with ages. Beams are best at first - long range and infinite. Torpedos and guns can be the first weapons too, but you must strategize your egg hunt given the shot counts. Waves and bolts are useless till anti-matter, at which point they are the best. Fighters and Standoffs are great for multiple-ship fleets. I pair a new, unexperienced ship with fighters or standoffs with an experienced ship with close-ranged weapons. The enemy alien/pirate is distracted by the fighters/standoffs while my short range ship moves in for the kill. The long range ship gains combat experience risk-free. I can then reconfigure fleets and pair new ships with the more experienced. When I have cruisers with 30% or more combat experience, I load an appropriate artifact (2 shots per turn is great for standoffs or torpedos on a cruiser! Likewise, Overload Weapons W/O Damage is great for 3 waves or beams on a cruiser).

I never federate unless totally desperate and outnumbered. Otherwise I'm too far ahead by Singularity age. I don't enter into alliances with a race at war with everyone (or anyone, for that matter) else in the galaxy. I seldom enter alliances, actually, as it usually leads to a senseless war (well, the designers got that version of history right!). Sometimes I risk war, and if attacked while in a bad strategic situation (ie, while upgrading my ships to anti-matter-age generators/shields while only having Type 1 spacedock), will attempt to buy my way out, usually successfully.

Overall, I favor colonies over ships early on, until I have at least 5 planets (first 3 Huge or Very Large for research, then 2 smaller "gold mines" for production), and avoid war as much as possible until I have cruisers and jump gates. I always build a replicator facility first on a new colony. I try to minimize the amount of freighter routes serving a new colony, in case I'm attacked early and lose it, it minimizes the loss. Thus, I have to weigh the economics of the planet with its location and size and type. I also never build more than Protected Cities. By the anti-matter age, I am relying on my ships to protect any planets that well developed. I'd rather have an extra Deep Mining Facil. on the planet and use the cost of domed cities for (almost) another cruiser. That's what the game is all about after all!

To colonize later in Singularity Age, I put Jump Drives on my 2 smallest ships, pick up a distant valuable system either thru raiding or from the ashes of someone else's war, then get a colony there quickly. I have to hang on while the colony is developing, but once it has 2 cities, been terraformed to Type 1, has shields, generators, weapons, and a jump gate, I can then start buying/threatening for surrounding systems, plus I now have a very strategically-placed jump gate to cover a distant part of the galaxy. This is also a lot of fun to pull off.

I think I mentioned cloaks above. In Anti-Matter Age, my cruisers all have an e-mag cloak, 3 shields (2 fore, 1 aft). In Singularity, 1 fore shield gets replaced with a cloak detector. Cloaked enemy ships are very difficult to fight, even when yours are evenly cloaked. Its riskier to only have 2 shields, but the cloak helps a lot, especially against un-cloaked enemy ships. Cloaks are the best standoff defense there is. I love watching enemy standoffs search for my ships then fade away. Aliens rarely use cloak detectors, so my cloaks always have a real advantage. I can also see what weapons they are carrying ahead of battle.

SideshowBob,
I liked your rather long dissertation on SUDG tactics. I tend to research along the same lines as you but I tend to do less diplomacy. A lot less. I don't believe in no stinking supplication, I believe in total subjugation!:eek:

I found that I can outbuild the aliens in ships and outfight them as well. I find I can outstrip them in raiding resource systems and also in patrolling their raids and destroying their raiders. I never build more than one of anything on a world except for shields, generators and weapons when necessary.

My favorite strategy is to build a large fleet quick because some alien will and will want to attack one of my worlds or colonies. When they show up it's wipe out their fleet time and then I go world killing. I find it much quicker to kill a world with a good-sized fleet and unhook a bunch of resource systems at once than to try and pick them to death one by one. I wait until I'm in the fusion age first before I go world killing as I usually have a tech advantage that's far enough ahead of the aliens that I get the job done fairly inexpensively. I'll lose a small ship or two each time early on but that's a great trade for a alien world turned toast and possibly cashing in on a few wisdom artifacts in the bargain.

I really love diplomacy when I've got a dozen ships or more and some alien calls up with a ship or two (and a tech age or two short) and says he wants to blow me up real bad. While he sends a ship off to raid a resource route I send a fleet to attack his homeworld or a juicy nearby colony world. Just about the time my fleet comes insystem he calls back up and I reply with "we prefer the staus quo at this time" before he can ever pop his ineveitable question about wanting to get to know me better and would I like to end the war. It's even funnier if he's allied and then his ally calls me up and I give him the same we-prefer-the-status-quo cold shoulder I did the first aliens. Now that's diplomacy!:eek:

I find aliens get real nice with me after that and give me techs, even useful ones sometimes, so why bother trading? I got a kick out of the Frashkins one game when they were still mired in the atomic age while I was in the singularity age and they gave me the federation tech. Like yeah right, like I'm going to take on an atomic ninny when I can just clear them out without much sweat.
Eric Larsen

My strategy is geared towards the "advanced" level, with 7 or 8 civ's, 150 stars, and research speed set to "slow".

At that difficulty level, you have to choose your priorities early. If you build a lot of ships, you can't colonize, as there's not enough funding, and you keep dropping the population on Sol as you crew new ships, which devastates your research, as you only have a Large or Very Large Sol. Thus, colonizing must be a priority early to keep ahead research-wise, until you have 3 fully developed worlds. Once in a blue moon I play "Intermediate", and then I have the luxury of ship building and warring in the Fusion age. Here's some other strategies I use:

Advanced Research Artifacts: In the Advanced level, you only pick up 4 to 6 of these, so I save them for Singularity age weapons. Any earlier they are a waste, as the next age weapon blows away the advanced weapon from the earlier age, plus you've wasted valuable research time. The one exception is Phasor Cannon, as it has the advantage of being unlimited over the Mass Cannon in the next age. But the only way Adv Phasor Cannon can go up against Absorption Shields is to put 3 on a cruiser with the artifact "Double Maximum Weapons Shots".

Pirates: NEVER but NEVER aid pirates in other civ's. Its a waste of money that could go to colonies or ships, and it helps pirates in your systems. Better to subvert a weak civ's philosophy to yours. And once I have Frigates for pirate-bashing, I only go after the ones in the over $9 per year systems. Eventually pirates only show up in the lesser-value systems, and if I leave 3-4 pirates in these systems I am only losing $25 a year or so, and I can focus on alien-bashing. The number of pirates rarely goes up regardless of how many aliens fund pirates in my systems. This seems to be a bug with the game and maybe V 2.0 fixes this, but I wouldn't know since I still cant download it

Threats: If threatened for $1,000 early in the game, I load the build queue with anything it takes to use up my cash down to about $150, then aquiesce to the threat. Then I remove all the items in the build queue and I've only given the aliens $150 and still have my money! This seems to be cheating, and maybe is another bug in the game, again maybe fixed by not being allowed to change the build queues when threatened. Does v2.0 fix this?

Wisdoms: I had also discovered the wisdom cheating method (ie, put all your wisdoms on a ship and park it in a system, then rob the aliens of their wisdoms). The only time I use this is if I feel like limiting the end of the game to Anti-Matter Age or Fusion Age tech's. This changes the end-game strategies. Maybe a suggestion for a future patch is to make it possible to turn certain tech's off (make them unavailable in the game) to change the strategy. Jump Gates come to mind. If I and the aliens can't have jump gates I now have to worry about distance to colonies and valuable systems, and need to think about starship/ fleet placement. Several other games I've played have this option, Stronghold and Age of Kings come to mind.

Research Durations: Durations for various tech's change dramatically each turn. Keep an eye on this. Don't always go with only what you need. See if its duration is too long. If it is, go with something that will eventually be useful but has a short research duration now. The last half dozen games I've played have been with research speed set to "slow" - this strategy is absolutely essential then! I actually think the exclusion of Research vs. Production in this game is a good thing - it forces you to develop a strategy! In Call to Power, research and production occur at the same time, so much less thought goes into what to build. Of course in CTP, you get attacked by opponents relentlessly from the very beginning of the game, and no amount of diplomacy stops them if you are weak militarily, so my SUDG strategy is useless - you MUST build military units early, and a lot of them, even if they are worthless later!

Originally posted by SideshowBob
My strategy is geared towards the "advanced" level, with 7 or 8 civ's, 150 stars, and research speed set to "slow".

SideshowBob,
I tried the advanced level several times but just didn't like being hampered with a large homeworld to start with. I even tried the challenging pirates but they seemed a bit too challenging at that level. I like the intermediate game with challenging pirates and normal everything else. At the advanced level you're almost forced to federate to keep up with the other aliens. Plus there's not as many good artifacts at that level. I like the random civilizations so I don't know how many alien races are in the game so I don't know quite how many systems I get to explore before running into the aliens. When there's a lot of races then it's tough to get lots of artifacts but when there's only 2 or 3 other races then it's a field day hunting artifacts.
Eric Larsen

Guess I've played the game a few too many times! I actually get off on the challenge, and find the end-game to be much more fulfilling if I'm challenged. Otherwise it's over before Anti-Matter Age for me. Read on to see what I mean.

It is THE one game I always come back to, so I have to give you designers LOTS of credit:D !

Here's some other tips/questions:

Is there any need at all for Navy on planets? I never do, needing every single soul for the other functions. It seems to me when a ship is "launched", a navy crew is instantaneously drawn from the planet's population, with the planet dropping in population exactly the amount of the ship crew. The only penalty I seem to incur is that the crew must be trained as Navy and this cost is taken from my cash reserve instantly ($200 or so, depending on the size of the ship). This can be troublesome if I'm low on cash the moment before a ship is done. Then the ship is building components and the cost for each is deducted as its built, even if I'm in the red. So now I'm in the red till the ship is built, and I've lost crews and spies pretty quickly in crucial strategic situations like this.

Ship crews - someone mentioned they don't put security on their ships - man, then you've never experienced a major assult pod attack from a civ with "shield ignoring assult pods"!

The last game I played, I was suddenly faced with a triple-federated conglomerate of the opposite philosophy who quickly then conquered the 2 other same-philosophy civ's (who were only atomic-age wimps), suddenly owning 2/3 of the galaxy, with about 16 ships, and then turned Singularity Age with me.

My 7 th world, still a 2-city colony, was attacked twice in a row with about a 7-ship fleet. I only had 1 scout, 1 gunboat, 4 frigates, plus 2 cruisers "on the stocks". I was at first withstanding the first assult well, then they started firing their assult pods (now I know how they conquered and not destroyed the other 2 civ's)! This is the first time I discovered that you get 10 shots per pod in certain situations (when you have "shield ignoring assult pods" or when you load up on security on your ship? Or just the AI does? I certainly never have before. Not sure yet how to get this to happen).

Fortunately, as is my practice, I had 4 security on my frigates, so I withstood about the first half dozen pods, then, once all security was killed off, my ships self-destructed. I lost a gunboat and 2 frigates, and my world was knocked down to a population of 40, but I did manage to destroy most of the enemy fleet. I think 2 got away.

Within a few years/decades, same world gets attacked again, only back to where it was population and defense-wise. This time the attack was mostly cruisers (first time was smaller, older ships). I had prepared better, had 3 Cruisers and 2 Frigates, 8 mines, protected cities, loaded up my ships and world with security, and had researched and built at least the singularity generator and computer. But so had my adversary, and he now had Singularity Torpedo's, along with mucho assult pods as before. I put assult pods on my world, but they only had 1 shot each. This time I lost 2 Cruisers and 1 Frigate, but knocked out or chased home the alien scum's entire fleet again. The battle came down to attrition. My last remaining cruiser was badly wounded and I had managed to bail it out of the battle to save it. My last Frigate and 1 city did battle with the last enemy cruiser. The cruiser honed in on my last city, while my frigate's phasor bolts hammered away. My last city had it's shields knocked away, then as my frigate dealt the cruiser its death blow, it fired its last torpedo, which wiped out my city!

****! Although he has now sued for peace and I've picked up a decent star system for it, now I'm down to 6 worlds to my enemy's 13, only own 1/4 of the galaxy to his 2/3, down to 2 ships to his 7, I'm being subverted to his philosophy (now I can't afford to resist!), and there's only 1 other 1-world, atomic-age, opposite-philosophy civ left! I decided to leave this game and may complete it tonite!!:mad:

I also will be getting Uncommon Valor delivered any day now, so who knows when I'll be back to this game