Turn 2152

[Kody]

Enigma can you send me your turn 2152 asap?

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All minerals lost to support have been fixed, so we don't have any units draining minerals.

From the looks of things food is no longer a major issue for any of our bases, so we'll only need to build farms on top of nutrient bonus in the near future. You can acomplish alot of things with 47 terraformers.

Terraformers should build boreholes where shown in the following land planning picture.
http://apolyton.net/upload/files/Kody/LandPlanning.jpg
Mine rocky (that isn't a designated borehole site), and road+forest as much as possible to push out fungus.

A 1,1,4 ship is wandering the southern oceans mapping the believer's coast. Another ship is puttering around near the north pole looking to pop unity pods (need to put something expensive in can we get free minerals to complete when we pop it next turn).

We're going to stockpile about 75% of our total production next turn so we'll have some extra money to spend when we decide to start the last two boom bases.

Buster offered us environmental economics. We declined for this turn as we need both SOTHB and environmental economics to leapfrog to neural grafting. Otherwise all our accumulated tech gets wasted on a tech we don't really want.

Pop boom will finish in michanpolis and vevtopia next turn, so tech rate should be over 200 labs per turn.

To keep golden age in the two growing bases pysch next turn should be set to 0% and vanderburg and Voltariograd should set 3 doctors.

New Moscow was interesting, I wanted to build a plasma garrasion there. However, we may need to build an extra ship there depending if our the data angels wins the bombardment war. So I set it up to do both.

If the data angel foil loses, cash the crawler in for a plasma garrison (it's a proto-type). Move the 4 mineral crawler to a forest instead. So 10 minerals is accumulated per turn. No loss of minerals overall, and we get an extra turn of stockpile. The turn following after that one, move crawler back to 4 mineral mine and can build an crawler immediately. Very efficient and we get more stockpile energy.

If the data angel foil wins, move the crawler to a forest and harvest an extra two minerals. That gives 14 minerals per turn. So we can build another laser foil in our following turn.

I'm not sure if I've forgotten anything.

[Snowflake]

Thanks for the summary Comrade Kody. I have not looked at the save yet, just a couple questions based on the summary:

We're going to stockpile about 75% of our total production next turn so we'll have some extra money to spend when we decide to start the last two boom bases.

What does this mean? Are we not going to produce anything in 3/4 of our bases? Or are you talking about the stockpile bug?

New Moscow: Why move the crawler from +4 min to a forest square? Is it going to crawl in +2 min or something else?

Oh one question for my own learning. When you pop a pod and it gives you free mins to finish a production, does it always do it in the base where the foil belongs? Or is it random?

One general comment: I think we should continue the practice of posting the save before end turn. And the save should be posted in the forum for some time before we post it in the public forum if we have time within the 48 hours. This way it will give people a chance to review it and changes can still be made in some cases.

[Enigma_Nova]

What? I've been asleep for the past 18 hours. I haven't started the damn turn yet.
Let me fire up the SMAX engines and see what I can do...

[Snowflake]

Wow 18 hours huh? I wish I have a clock like yours.

[Enigma_Nova]

Okay... I'll ignore everything in this thread and go about seeing the details of my parallel turn.
I perform too damn many reloads while I see what is possible and what isn't. I'm quite new to a no-save game like this, and it will be my main problem as a turn player.

RELOAD COUNT: 5
1: Decided not to accept Environ Econ
2: Tested to see whether probe would be transferred
3: Stupid accidental space bar strike
4: Didn't notice a crawler belonged to a different base
5: Former mishap

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Opening up my testing editor, seeing whether transferring foil with probe team on board will also transfer probe team.
It is a success! The Cargo is transferred along with the ship

Probe team to freedman's park, foil to freedman's park.
Probe boarded foil (pressed L)
Foil moved one square south
Turned foil over to the drones. (With probe team on board)
Presuming their Unity foil is somewhere in range, they can daisy-chain the transports.
Probe SoftHB, send to us, we get Neural and start the MMI dash

Artillery fire, our ship attacks Angels ship.
It is a success! one Angels ship is destroyed.
Our own ship is only 40% Damaged.

Pushed a probe ship closer to the Angels

Minerals bonus for Jamski Prison! Creche completed next turn!
(Opted for a creche and not a node because Creches are more inherently useful)

Saving in case I make any more stuffups.

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We want booms, we want tech, we want crawlers.
Ultimately we want MMI first, then Cloudbase.
Labs 60% for a little extra tech

Roko crawler moved to energy hotspot
Moving minerals to Roko (dammit Kody we need that Hospital STAT), Crawlers recentralising at Roko. Most probable location to build the Cloudbase.
Hmmm... Roko has an Ecodamage of 10. 31 Minerals.
(Don't ask me about my super fantastic crawler ninja style)
I'll rush the hospital, and get 15 ECs from the stockpile bug -IN THAT BASE ALONE-.

Moving crawler from a min mine (vevtopia) to 2 nuts nearby.
Now Vevtopia has enough food to keep booming
Moved a rokossovky food crawler to crawl those mins.
22.28 has no crawler on it.
Michanapolis is size 6, and will grow next turn.

RELOAD, didn't notice central planning crawler, which can be used most productively.
RELOAD clicked on a former cancelled accumulated terraforming

Posting this now, turn is 20% done

[Enigma_Nova]

Moved some units, producing a whole lot of crawlers.

Turn done light is activated, but I still want to shuffle some crawlers around, and reactivate formers.

Turn is 60% Complete.

[Enigma_Nova]

Some time later, Turn Complete!
I made a mistake in one of our bases, so had to move a scout patrol from elsewhere. Not such a big deal but it hurt a little.

Now I'm ready to read the reports above, and see what I missed.
(PLEASE tell me I won't have to shuffle crawlers to the Hospital for a 3rd time)

[Snowflake]

The biggest (and perhaps only) problem I see, is the reload. You are not allowed even one reload. If you made a mistake, whether it is because of an oversight, or it is because of a misclick of the mouse, you have to live with it. (Remember that's what happened with the turn I did?) You cannot be our main turn player until you are able to finish your turn without reloading.

[Enigma_Nova]

Yeah, I know. It is the greatest error.

[Snowflake]

One question, what is the effeciency loss by setting lab to 60%? And how much does it speed up our tech rate?

My understanding is we are currently researching env eco and we may not want it to be completed before we can get both env eco and SotHB from Drones or probing so that we could switch to Neural grafting.

[Kody]

What does this mean? Are we not going to produce anything in 3/4 of our bases? Or are you talking about the stockpile bug?

Due to productions being completed that amount of our production also goes into stockpile.

New Moscow: Why move the crawler from +4 min to a forest square? Is it going to crawl in +2 min or something else?

Because of the 10 mineral carry over. It it crawls the +4 min, then 2 minerals are lost as the crawler will completely fill the minerals till completion and you'll have 12 minerals per turn.

Oh one question for my own learning. When you pop a pod and it gives you free mins to finish a production, does it always do it in the base where the foil belongs? Or is it random?

It happens at the nearest base.

One general comment: I think we should continue the practice of posting the save before end turn. And the save should be posted in the forum for some time before we post it in the public forum if we have time within the 48 hours. This way it will give people a chance to review it and changes can still be made in some cases.

Where do I attach the file. Apolyton doesn't let me delete my uploads anymore.

[Kody]

Opted for a creche and not a node because Creches are more inherently useful

Actually I would agree it would be useful at any base other than Jamski Prison. Jamski Prison will be getting it's 2nd super drone soon and hence it won't be very useful to boom it. Rather a research hospital or a most expensive crawler would have been better.

Moving minerals to Roko (dammit Kody we need that Hospital STAT), Crawlers recentralising at Roko.

I did the same thing, so I'm not complaining.

Most probable location to build the Cloudbase.

Most probable location for cloudbase is either Vanderburg or Voltriograd. I'll probably choose vanderburg to spread our SPs out between bases in case we get PBed later.

The reason why Rokossovkygrad isn't good is because many of the crawlers around Rokossovkygrad happen to be on mines, condensors or solar panels. Also there aren't nearly enough forests near Rokossovkygrad for crawlers to wait on before a SP rush. You would perfer to pull crawlers off forests than mines condensors and solar panels.

Vanderburg and Voltariograd happen to be around several bases that build crawlers fast and have more forests that are being crawled. So it'll be easier building and getting crawlers to those bases. This is stuff I learnt from the Hive SP rushes back in the 30's.

One question, what is the effeciency loss by setting lab to 60%? And how much does it speed up our tech rate?

My understanding is we are currently researching env eco and we may not want it to be completed before we can get both env eco and SotHB from Drones or probing so that we could switch to Neural grafting.

He shouldn't have set lab to 60%. Since we mainly use specialists 60% lab setting hinders rather than helps. With the turn I completed out of curiousity (before I reduced tech rate to prevent the tech finishing next turn) I changed to 60% lab and found that I lost more labs than I gained.

Looking at Enigma's turn all he needed to do is set extra some extra librarians and crawled some extra food to vevtopia if he wanted to increase labs.

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Final note, while I know Engima has reloaded etc, so does the new pirate player, so a new hive player should be allowed to reload if he makes any major mistakes that don't break the rules of the game?

Looking at his turn there are mistakes. However, there aren't any critically dumb mistakes, so I would support enigma to play the next hive turn. Depending on his performance with the turn next turn people can decide whether they want enigma to continue playing turns or go back into training.

How does that sound to people?

[Kody]

Why the Rokossovkygrad research hospital was a big mistake

The reason I called the research hospital in rokossovkygrad a mistake was because it only gives us about 11 labs and costs us 3 ecs per turn. Later the amount of labs the research hospital produces will decrease.

It's a case of someone thinking, oh rokossovkygrad is our highest researching base so lets build a research hospital. They didn't realise building it delays our population growth, and base placement by 2 turns.

If the research hospital wasn't built the resources spent building it could have started the pop booming in utopia base and great clustering this turn. After they finish booming they'll give us an extra 30 labs a piece. Much better than 11labs.

Furthermore, the having utopia base and great clustering finish their booms means that we can start expanding again until we bump to the 2nd b-drone limit + 2. So the research hospital has also delayed the next 5 bases that were going to be built.

Finally if you wait another 2 or 3 turns voltariograd will need the research hospital. Quite simply the mountain near kommuniza city will be converted into an energy park and all that energy (plus the energy currently being used by rokossovkygrad) will instead go to voltariograd as it's our captial and doesn't suffer energy loss like rokossovkygrad does.

Rokossovkygrad's lab output will be reduced as a result and the research hospital there won't be as useful.

However, since we were so far into building it's better to complete it now than redirecting.

[Enigma_Nova]

I'd have started pumping crawlers, formers or pods myself. I know a research hospital in science city A isn't as good as having science city B pop up.

I'd opt for PTS booming and large land raising once we get that 2nd b-limit. If the game lasts until we get the vats, we'll be so far ahead that no-one will stop us!

>_< should have thought about designing el expensivo crawler... my bad...
As for crawling food to vevtopia? I thought about that but couldn't see any food close by.

I'm a little shocked as I got a minerals bonus the first time I popped the pod, made a critical error that opted a reload, and got a minerals bonus the second time. ^_^

[Enigma_Nova]

Mark my words, Kody. I will gain strength, I will rise up, and I WILL SURPASS YOU!

[Kody]

As for crawling food to vevtopia? I thought about that but couldn't see any food close by.

Honghu Konghu's crawler outside vevtopia. You can rehome it and have it crawl nuts from a rainy square.

I'm a little shocked as I got a minerals bonus the first time I popped the pod, made a critical error that opted a reload, and got a minerals bonus the second time. ^_^

Excellent, so in future learning from that mistake you'll always remeber to have an expensive crawler or expensive facility ready. Note that SPs never get completed, I tested that extensively a while back.

Mark my words, Kody. I will gain strength, I will rise up, and I WILL SURPASS YOU!

I wouldn't have it any other way.

[Kody]

I'd have started pumping crawlers, formers or pods myself. I know a research hospital in science city A isn't as good as having science city B pop up.

Science cities B and C pop up. You see I figured out that it was too inefficient pop booming one city up. Pysch allocation is needed on odd base sizes. So when you decide to pop boom utopia base and great clustering you should do them together so that you only need to set 10% pysch for 1 turn when it's growing from size 4-5 to allow for the 5 to 6 growth the following turn.

If it was only 1 city there are enough ECs to do it this turn. With 2 cities you need to build creches, then the following turn build 2 network nodes. That's alot of ec's going to rushing those facilities over a short 2 turns.

[Enigma_Nova]

My guess is that you're having all size 7 cities become science cities.
Crawling nuts, filling em with specs.

Then you're preparing crawlers to build the SPs that your tech will get you.
Sounds like a good short-term plan.

In the mid-term, you're building boreholes. I, myself, would probably drill to aquefier on the energy park as well.
I hope our nut bonus squares (with farmcondensors) can supply all our bases until we launch some sats (Which won't be for a while).

[Kody]

My guess is that you're having all size 7 cities become science cities.
Crawling nuts, filling em with specs.

Then you're preparing crawlers to build the SPs that your tech will get you.
Sounds like a good short-term plan.

Pretty much, and yes it is a short-term plan.

In the mid-term, you're building boreholes. I, myself, would probably drill to aquefier on the energy park as well.

I don't think that would be a good idea. There are already three rivers that find their source at the energy park. From my experience with aquefying 97% of the middle continent on the huge planet map. When you have several river sources next to each other rivers will stop flowing. So we'll lose more energy than we gain.

As for boreholes I don't intend to make that many in the short run. It's around time to start preparing the next 4 base sites with roads sensors and forests+roads surrounding them. After those 4 base sites are ready then it may be time to concentrate on more boreholes.

I hope our nut bonus squares (with farmcondensors) can supply all our bases until we launch some sats (Which won't be for a while).

For the current boom bases there's enough food and with surplus to supply roughly 8 size 7 all specialist bases.

After the terraforming for the next 4 base sites has been completed it will be time to consider where to go from there.

1)
We can set 10->40% pysch to overcome super drones and boom some of our other bases. Terraforming will be mainly condensors with some boreholes. This will allow us to be stronger energy wise, and improve future tech rate.

2)
Or we can concentrating on many more bases and increasing our support and number of terraformers/crawlers. Terraformers will be building forest roads, sensors (for new bases), land raising to make new base sites and a boreholes in key places. This will be swarming the map with bases.

3)
Or we can go momentum, build a good military, while with existing terraformers setup new base sites. Expand like crazy onto all already existing land. Raise land to connect ourselves to data angels or university and build more bases there too.

At the moment I don't know which is best. Personally I would attempt to find a combination of all 3. Boom maybe a few bases to size 5, build some military to take over a few bases while still building civilian units to allow us to improve our home ground with lots of advanced terraforming. Finding a balance is the hardest thing to do as it varies turn by turn.

[Enigma_Nova]

Didn't notice all the rivers.
You see, my own random maps have far less rivers than this one does. :/

[Kody]

He shouldn't have set lab to 60%. Since we mainly use specialists 60% lab setting hinders rather than helps. With the turn I completed out of curiousity (before I reduced tech rate to prevent the tech finishing next turn) I changed to 60% lab and found that I lost more labs than I gained.

He didn't use 60% labs, which I'm glad of.

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Engima,

Looking a bit more at your turn.

One thing I will stress. Michapolis shouldn't be left without defence. Both the pirates and the university know where Michapolis is, so some sort of a military unit should be kept in that area at all times.

In the near future plasma armor units should be built in the following cities (in order of priority due to military threat from other factions).
New Moscow (data angels may try to invade here)
Michapolis (pirates and university aware of it)
Static University (pirates and university aware of it)
Yang Base (data angels may try to invade here)

The old scouts from those cities should be shuffled to other cities that don't have guards. Rokossovkygrad should get a 2nd hand scout shuffled to it from New Moscow as it has fungus next to it and there is the possibility of mindworm attacks.

Base at (10,26) and Yang Base may need crimson guards (probe defences). Michapolis had another probe defender built last turn.

Other than the stated issues and the mistakes you sent to me I don't see anything else that would need to be brought up.

I noticed you put a greater emphasis on mineral production while I put a greater emphasis on tech (possibility I'm sacrificing too many minerals for tech).

[Jamski]

Nice update Kody

This is what we need. I'm TRYING to get some pictures uploaded at the moment...

BTW Research Hospital also squashes one drone, so it has some further use.

-Jam

[Kody]

When all the citizens are specialists 1 drone doesn't matter.

[Jamski]

True. Oh well, 11 labs for 3 ec is a good deal, so long as you don't think aboout the 60-ish minerals involved in those 11 labs per turn...

-Jam