Crawlers?

[Imp]

Heya, I've always played Alpha Centauri lightly, and while *sometimes* on the 2nd to easiest setting, I've been able to grasp most of the units, options, and read-outs. But what about the crawler? People here constantly reference to the crawler, but I've never used it. What are it's chief benefits? I've also never seen the AI use it, except once, and I still didn't know what they did with it.

Thanks for your time.

[Solver]

Hm, the AI is stupid not to use them even on harder difficulties.
First of all, let me mention that you definitely need to read Velocyrix's SMAX guide.
Crawlers are units that let you harvest single resource from any spot on the map, if it's not used by workers or other crawlers. Say, you build a Crawler from University Base. Now, you can send it anywhere on the map, and when it arrives at the spot that produces high nutrient/mineral/energy, you can just press O, and start getting that resource in University Base, for example 4 minerals per turn. This is why a size 4 base can easily have 20 minerals and 30 energy in it, just with a few crawlers.
There are, in fact, no drawbacks of using these. So do.

[Fitz]

The drawback is when I come along with my choppers and annihilate your crawlers, leaving you with no resources.

[Solver]

Pretty arguable drawback:
1. When you get Bio-Engineering, just making defenders and stack them with Crawlers (add AAA later).
2. It's better to have those crawlers for 70 turns, and get them lost then, rathre than not have hem at all. However, of course, if you're relying on crawling heavily, guard them! I use to upgrade my crawlers to Resoncance-3, Trance, to help vs. worms, later stacking them with others.

BTW, in my current game I've also used armored colony pods. Had a second wave of expansion (had formers create a land bridge from ym continent to a second one), so when moving through fungus I used colony pods with Resonance-3 (again, for that 25% bonus), and Trance for 50% more, and these could sometimes even withstand two worm attacks, given I also cashed in the Neural Amplifier. Just look: attacker has 3-to-2 better situation, but Resonance (almost) negates it, Trance gives me advantage, plus the Amplifier.

[Earwicker]

Originally posted by Fitz
The drawback is when I come along with my choppers and annihilate your crawlers, leaving you with no resources.

Very true, but first the enemy has to come within striking distance. If your crawlers in a remote location and out of harm's way, it can be quite difficult to sneak up with a chopper to knock them out except in a suicide mission.

[Clear Skies]

Originally posted by Earwicker


Very true, but first the enemy has to come within striking distance. If your crawlers in a remote location and out of harm's way, it can be quite difficult to sneak up with a chopper to knock them out except in a suicide mission.

That depends - if the crawlers have little or no armour, it might just be possible for the choppers to get there and back without actually crashing. I figure a chopper can go four turns without refueling before crashing, so I think that two turns to the crawler, including its destruction, and then two turns back to your closest base should work.

[Earwicker]

Right, but if there's an escort around (or probe foil), the end of that second turn the chopper will be vulnerable to destruction or mind control. Hence the suicide mission. Still, it would be a worthwhile venture if the chopper discovers and tears up several crawlers at an energy park.

[Horus]

Yes it would be worth it. Even if the crawlers are quite basic (i.e low mineral cost), one would loose turn advantage if,say 5 crawlers were destroyed. At a certain point of a game one gets such an industrial capacity that the procuction cost is less concerning than the turns it takes to manufacture the 5 lost units.

I guess one could conclude the obvious and say that at that given point, one would be wise to put armour on crawlers.

But a one two one trade of crawlers vs. choppers with best weapon is not a good deal, nor is a jet with best weapon worth to sacrifice for a crawler. So one needs to eliminate the AA before an attack or to hit and run (not possible with jets).

[Rynn:]

Originally posted by Earwicker
the chopper will be vulnerable to destruction or mind control.

I always thought air units were immune to probe action unless on the ground - is a chopper vulnerable when it is between turns? (ie, assumed to be "on the ground" between hops)

Must admit, I haven't scenario tested it.

R.

[Ned]

Since I have not played MP, I have never seen massive use of crawlers by an opponent. However, I would consider attacking them first a high priority - strategic warfare. Copters and fungal missles would do the trick. Ned

[WhiteElephants]

Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! As resident cynic, and user of crawlers, I feel I must chime in here. I think there are some real runaway assumptions being made here, that is if we're talking about a human opponent.

First, your not going to be far and away out teching a gen-u-iene hu-man being, but end up somewhere in the ball park of one another, so simply building a handfull of chopers and flying them in there probably isn't going to cut it (you do build interceptors and SAM rovers don't you?). After all, if your not using a mass of crawlers yourself, destroying your opponents is only going to bring them down to your level of lab, energy, and mineral output.

Secondly, you have to have a pretty good idea they're using a lot of crawlers to begin with or you wouldn't think of doing this at all. To know they're using crawlers you either have to be doing fly-bys every turn through, most likely, the heart of their empire or have infiltrated their data links. While probing the AI is a walk in the park, most humans are going to give you as hard a time as possible. Sure, you can build the Empath Guild, but someone somewhere is going to be gunning for that one too, unlike the AI.

Third, if someone is using massive amounts of crawlers, and your not, chances are you are the target and not them. I would also expect swift retaliation if I ever managed to get the jump on anyone using the mass crawler approach.

Not to mention the political atmosphere of the game -- who's pacted with who and can you fight a sustained war against two humans?

Hey, and if your all that far ahead of the crawler player anyway, why not simply take them over or Planet Buster them off the map?

[Ned]

WE, I have had my own crawlers attacked and have defended them as best I could with interceptors and SAM rovers. But the attacks will go on forever unless you eliminate the threat

(Just as an asside, one of the best defenses against the AI attacking your crawlers it to cloak them.)

This being said, the flip is also true. If I am at war with a strong neighbor, I start it by attacking his or her infrastructure. If the enemy uses interceptors, I respond with my own. But this is war of attrition is best obviated with a fungal missle, which works whether there are crawlers or not.

Regardless of whether the opponent is human or not, such two-party wars that only destroy infrastructure without one side prevailing are ultimately harmful to both participants. Surely, humans in MP games realize this and avoid wars with equally developed human opponents.

[Ghost:Rosenkrantz]

Originally posted by Fitz
The drawback is when I come along with my choppers and annihilate your crawlers, leaving you with no resources.

Then: when Fitz's gunship squadron arrives, they notice these crawlers were immune to their powerful (R-bolt?) gun...
The gunships were forced to switch to another method of destruction, using their psionic skills. Which caused them to lose?

Cause your crawler were equipped with PSI-defense shield!

(A bit out in the game, though)
PSI-units will suffer most toward other PSI-units . So if Fitz got a squadron of PSI-attack/defense choppers he would be very lucky!

Am I right? (or did I miss something?)

[cbn]

Good debate here but I am with WE on this stuff. It is not that easy to get your air units in among the crawlers. The safest approach a human might use is to crawl toward the pole. For example I might have a bunch of crawlers bringing resources from the noth pole area since I was situated in the north. To get to my crawlers you would have to get your air units in range. This might mean crossing an area where I have bases, sensors, interceptors etc. Even absent a pole start a human will put the bulk of their development away from the enemy.

It would be foolhardy to the extreme to bunch a whole lot of crawlers within air range of an enemy. In fact I try not to bunch them at all unless they are in areas within the depths of my territory. If an attacker can get at them there I have bigger problems than the loss of a few crawlers. The other use is as a sentry or ZOC placeholder. Send a former out to mine some squares on the frontier and send some crawlers out there. Armored on a rocky square they are decent defenders and actually bring in resources while providing sentry duty.

Sea crawlers provide the same service. While far less defensible and more expensive, it can be worthwhile to have these trawling as far off your coasts as possible. I would much rather get advance notice of an invasion force when a trawler disappears. If you think of them as support free sentries (and they can be armoured the same as military) that actually bring in resources -- well the value is obvious.


Crawlers can be vulnerable-- Plinking formers and crawlers using a suicide chopper run is a sound tactic since if unarmoured you can kill so many. But the key is often that early use of crawlers means that the crawler-user grows, builds and researches faster. ON average a crawler-user will beat you to key techs and therefore will have better weapons to go with their better infrastructure. So the opponent's focus may be more on survival than on offensive actions against those crawlers

[Ned]

Guys, If range is the issue, one would simply have to construct an airbase or base in range. Your airforce can then be brought to bear without, however, the fear of immediate counterattacks in kind, based on the assumption that if his bases are out of range, so are yours.

But again, if the crawlers are heavily armored, or defended by interceptors, Fungal Missles might be a better choice.

[Imp]

Can someone link me Vel's guide? I've looked around, but all I have are outdated links and inefficient pages. I found an old v1.0, but the forum posts are all about v3.0

Help....again please?

[Misotu]

Earwicker: "If your crawlers in a remote location and out of harm's way, it can be quite difficult to sneak up with a chopper to knock them out except in a suicide mission."

Yes. But you know, impact choppers are dirt cheap. I am very happy to undertake suicide missions to knock out crawlers!

SMAC Fanatic: "I think that two turns to the crawler, including its destruction, and then two turns back to your closest base should work."

Well yes. But at 18 mins for an impact chopper, are you really going to care? Crawlers often congregate in groups, so I think it makes much more sense to accept that the chopper is dead, and knock out multiple crawlers with it.

Horus: "But a one two one trade of crawlers vs. choppers with best weapon is not a good deal"

Dead right Crawler-bashing choppers are the cheapest available - usually impact/fission but might be a different config if you need more range from fusion. No need to send best-weapon choppers on this kind of mission ...

On the issue of heavily-armoured crawlers ... well. These babies are expensive to build or upgrade. You have to ask yourself whether, in an *MP* game, the cost would be worth it. Against the AI, of course, you can do whatever you like since you probably have energy/mins coming out of your ears ...

[Clear Skies]

I wouldn't mind knowing what happens when you move a crawler from one base to another. The window comes up saying 'convoy nut/min/enrg to (basename)' but I don't see any difference in that base's production. What is actually meant to happen?

[Chowlett]

If you select one of "nut/min/nrg transport", then the base the crawler is homed to will lose 1 of the appropriate resource per turn, and the base the crawler is in will gain one per turn. I've never used it myself.

[cbn]

Ned

On the range issue-- My point is that any heavily crawlered area should be inside your empire to avoid the easy plinking that you speak of. Any time I put a bunches of crawlers together, air units will have to pass through a ring of bases to get to them and there is no way you will be able to plunk down a base in easy range. Again, a typical strategy is to crawl the pole area with bases in every direction. In the ideal world (rarely happens) you could have an empire that is "deep" in every direction such that your crawlers are completely out of everyones air range (except for suicide choppers on their last legs).

The fungal missle is a good idea but is one that works equally well to ruin bases production.

Misotu

I agree with you completely on the value of the suicide attacks of those impact choppers. They are the main reason I will not bunch crawlers unless I feel I have reasonable security. The best defense for a crawler field is distance to provide notice of the incoming choppers. Even 1 turns notice of the threat can allow crash armouring of 4 or 5 crawlers in a wall toward the threat. However this type of expenditure to protect the crawler field would make the attackers day-- One feint and the defender has spent a chunk of money. More cost effective might be some interceptors that could scramble or even a SAM chopper patrolling to take out incoming threats.

I guess the key is notice of the attack. If the attacker CAN sneak in a chopper, carnage will ensue. And the reality is that any defender that has the resources and military to efectively patrol and defend all the approaches either

1. is so far ahead that their victory is almost certain OR
2.is making a tactical mistake in defending infrastructure as they should be funnelling resources into attacking that of the enemy--it is always easier to attack it seems

[johndmuller]

Whatever happened to Peaceful Coexistence? to the Greater Chironian CoProsperity Sphere? A little Machiavellian Quaker MBA analysis might suggest that it was better to spend that pittance on your own crawler than on the otherwise useless impact chopper. After all, it is player #3 who is the real winner when you and player #2 take cheap shots at each other.

[gwillybj]

If, by chance, you do happen to get your chopper into your enemy's energy park, wouldn't much more damage be done by taking out the Echelon Mirror instead of the crawlers, since he now must send up a former to rebuild the mirror

[Fitz]

Originally posted by cbn
But the key is often that early use of crawlers means that the crawler-user grows, builds and researches faster. ON average a crawler-user will beat you to key techs and therefore will have better weapons to go with their better infrastructure.

Originally posted by WhiteElephants
Third, if someone is using massive amounts of crawlers, and your not, chances are you are the target and not them. I would also expect swift retaliation if I ever managed to get the jump on anyone using the mass crawler approach.

Talk about making assumptions! Where did I imply in the slightest that I'm not using crawled minerals & energy to produce the choppers? You better bet that I have several crawler parks of my own.

Also, I was being fairly facecious with my comment. Obviously the chopper/suicide chopper tactic works best against the unprepared. I was mostly trying to point out that you had better be prepared to defend your crawlers, all the more so in MP.

Originally posted by Ghost:Rosenkrantz Am I right? (or did I miss something?)

You may have missed that the chopper will have 3:2 odds in a Psi battle, and will probably win. But not against the second crawler Of course, if you're putting armor on your crawlers, instead of building up base defenses, you had better hope your opponents aren't making better use of their money/minerals for offense, and possibly defense too. How expensive are Psi crawlers?
Unless those are base radii crawlers.

[Misotu]

Originally posted by gwillybj
If, by chance, you do happen to get your chopper into your enemy's energy park, wouldn't much more damage be done by taking out the Echelon Mirror instead of the crawlers, since he now must send up a former to rebuild the mirror

Sure. But if we're talking choppers, I might try for that on the last move. Choppers don't make good bombers - I'm not sure what the odds are but I know I get more failures than successes when I've been forced to send them on a terrain-bombing run. I might give it a try on the last movement point. But otherwise, taking out half a dozen crawlers and a couple of formers for the cost of 18 mins would make me very happy

I agree with Fitz on the subject of armouring crawlers though - just too expensive. There are much better ways to spend your money in MP.

[cbn]

Fitz

I made no assumptions about your or anyone's playstyle. I was responding to an original question from someone who obviously knew little at all about crawlers. The discussuion moved to their vulnerability to such an extent that I thought it would be key to point out and reinforce that, despite their vulnerabilities, crawlers remain a great benefit. I fully expect all my MP opponents to have crawlers and (given my relative inexperience) I usually assume that they are using them better than I. In fact I always assume that any tactic I am trying to use is known to my opponent and always attempt to prepare for ant type of strategm I know about. When they pull something I have never seen-- thats when I learn.

To pull it back to this discussion, without even knowing anything about you, I would assume that you have crawlers and are also aware of ways to implement or defend against the suicide chopper raid against crawlers. I will stand by my assertion that it is possible to defend crawler areas but I think it is much more effective to spend those resources in offensive capabilities

[WhiteElephants]

Hey, no disrespect to you Fitz, or anyone else for that matter, but the disscussion started about someone who rarely uses crawlers and moved toward the idea that crawlers are really vulnerable. I got the impression it was veering in the direction that heavy use of crawlers is a death wish -- way too vulnerable, etc., etc. I just thought I'd point out difficulties with the idea that a few choppers would be the panacea, especially if you were refraining from using crawlers yourself.

[Ghost:Rosenkrantz]

Yep !
You're right, my Psi-strategies wasn't too smart...
I take 'em back!

Now... but cloaking them could prove useful. If it was cloaked in borehole cluster , extracting minerals, someone (human) could make assumtions, but what the heck...
On a remote mine maybe?

[Ned]

I mentioned earlier that cloaking crawlers works wonders with the AI. How do you think a humun would react? Just move into an area with a lot of solar collectors on the assumption that they were crawled?

Just as aside, I have heard other hear say a good defense against a PB is to ring a key base with crawlers. Would it improve this defense if those same crawlers were cloaked? Otherwise the PB will just divert to a secondary target.

[Ghost:Rosenkrantz]

Originally posted by Ned
I mentioned earlier that cloaking crawlers works wonders with the AI. How do you think a humun would react ?

I think one (human) might react very aggressive if these crawlers were put together in a cluster of solar collectors.

Well, maybe if they were spread, and some non-cloaked combat unit were to patrol in between these crawlers. Then some enemy (human) unit on a seek and destroy mission, could bump into that combatant before finding the cloaked ones. He has to fight nontheless. I think it would be logical at least.....

[magnwa]

Something I don't get regarding crawlers.. do I have to bring them back to the base to reap the rewards, or do they do it naturally, each year, while sitting at the spot and gathering?

Magnwa