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In which I play Realms Beyond Orion Imperium 28 Chapter 4: Spurts and Starts, in which the Mightie Humans Breed like Sakkra, and Warr Briefly upon the Same, and Patiently Builde upon their Pierless Knowledge, and Claime the World of Gion, and Generally Acte like Total Jerk-Offes, But Everybody Loves Them Anyway
2502: Advanced Soil comes in, yay!
 VGA SEAN CONNERY POSSESSES A GREEN THUMB. Improved Terraforming +60 is next; that will be another 360 million humans (and all the attending production) when it arrives. 2503: IIT 5 arrives. IIT 4 is the only choice. 2506:
 Is it really necessary for everybody to express how displeased they are with my rapid growth? By the way, take a look at the Psilons' tech:
 Notice that they've done this with default factory controls (in the 2500s!) and only four worlds. Impossible brains are always scary. They offer to trade me pretty much anything on the list for IRC 4. Sorry, I'm not foolish. 2507: Ah, here we go.
 So RIW 40% is mine. Impulse Drives pop this same turn. Star Gates are next. The bugs call me up to complain about my spies. Too bad. Relations are still "Neutral". I've gotten what I need from them, I turn off the espionage. My Construction is up to tech level 31 now. 2508: Psilons, Darloks, and Klackons stop by to warn me about my size again. I'm sorry, I can't help it if you guys suck. The Sakkra are down to "Unease" and are at war with everybody except the Darlok. They are no longer allied with the shifters. If they decide to go to war I can always bomb a world of theirs or two. 2511:
 BC VIII is the way forward.
 I go ahead and pick this up for Class X Planetaries. It might come in handy. I give the Bulrathi Zortium armor in tribute. I don't really want the Sakkra to smash them. 2512: My spies hit the Sakkra. I pick up Graviton Beam and frame the Darloks. Then, my spies hit the Klackon! I choose Computers, get BC 5, and frame the Psilon! What an excellent turn for my spies, not only do I get two techs but I get to tick off the only enemy races that don't hate each other! IT+60 is in the percentages now. 2514: Klackon warn again. Still at "Neutral". The Sakkra diplomat is still gone, although they haven't made any motion to attack me yet. We have an emergency at Ursa:
 That's 50 million troops incoming (at warp 1, still -- the Sakkra have only retros!) It does not look too good for the bears. Oddly, the Sakkra fleet remains in orbit with 39 missile bases up? 2515: Spies hit Sakkra with Planetology the only open field. I get Controlled Barren. Spies hit Klackon again on Force Fields, they get the Personal Absorption Shield! Hardly any spending on espionage, but I'm cleaning up pretty well. I gift the Bulrathi the Ion Rifle. They do not ask for my shiny new absorption shields. Both the bears and lizards have Zortium and Battle Suits; the lizards have Absorption shields versus the bears' Personal Deflector shields. The bears now have Ion Rifles to the lizards' Hand Lasers. That's still +20 to the bears. They're going to need every bit of it, though. Ursa's population is up to 12 million! As long as Talas exists in Sakkra hands, they're going to keep sending troops. Ursa might not fall this time, but surely it won't be too much longer before the bears cave. Ugh, maybe I should just bomb Talas out now. 2516: 15 million bears at Ursa and 39 missile bases. If the bases just shoot down the troop transports the Bulrathi are golden -- but then why don't they shoot down the lizard ships that are in orbit? I have three techs in the percentages: IIT 4, IT+60 (at 27%!) and Fusion Rifles. 2517: About time, you scaly cold-blooded bully.
 Ursa sits at 16 million teddies. The lizard ships are no longer in orbit. The bases remain intact. I'm really not sure how this works for the AI -- surely those ships should never have had orbital control -- but my guess is that, like last time, the bears will simply shoot down the invading troops, and live to see another day. Oh well, time to bomb Talas and make everybody love me again.
 No, I didn't scrap these. They'll do a little damage, although I don't expect them to win (or even do much at all) against the scatter pack bases and Class X planetaries at Talas. However, I should get a few of their ships. I'll build a better bomber after the battle. Class XV planetaries are in the percentages now, too. 2518:
 By circling around the planet, my F-bombers avoid the slow missiles and do a piddly amount of damage to the bases before finally blowing up. The repulsor battleship is still invincible against these fleets, although the incoming missiles might do it in. I kill a few of their ships with that resiliant ARS/repulsor and retreat. This is enough to boost relations with everybody to at least "relaxed" again. Except the lizards, of course, but they do not figure.
 Ah yes, the space monsters. Where is this one appearing?
 Awww. Right by Kholdan and Sssla. What a tragedy. Paranar, Helos and Draconis are my nearest colonies, although they're a ways away. IT+60 sits at 39 percent. Oh, and of course Ursa survived the lizard attack. Why on earth the lizards keep invading while the bears' missile bases are intact is a mystery to me. 2519:
 Time to irritate the rest of the universe some more. I pick Universal Antidote over Bio Terminator. In other news:
 2519, the year the bugs went off their meds. They've managed to tick off everyone else though, including their former allies the Psilons. (Or maybe that was my spies' fault...) A look at the state of the art bug tech:
 I fart in their general direction. 2520: Spies steal Jammer II from the Sakkra and blame Emperor Dorkquan. I haven't designed any new ships yet, I have Construction, Force Field and Weapons techs all about to pop. 2522: IIT 4 pops. Good, I have a lot of factories to build yet after terraformin'. Tritanium Armor is the only choice. I said I'd build a better bomber, and here it is:
 Crypto can build almost 200 of these a year. Hee, hee. 2523: Spies steal Controlled Dead from the Sakkra.
 The bugs are good for something, after all. 2525:
 I think I'm going to bomb Gion out. Maybe I'll even re-settle it. What do the bugs need with a colony way up here anyway? 2526: And now, the better bomber battle.
 The missile bases fall very quickly...
 ...and Gion is history.
 What a loss for humankind. 2527: Fusion Rifle pops, I select the wonderful Gauss Autocannon as my next project.
 Everybody loves me, baby. I call up the Sakkra and ask for peace.
 SSSSS... THE ENEMY OF MY ENMITY IS MY FIEND... SSSSs....
 SSSssSsss... WHY NOT... YOU HAVE AN HONEST FACE AND/OR PARIETAL EYES
 SsssSSssSSSss... DO YOU HAVE ANY LIFE INSURANCE TO SELL ME??? SSSsss. 2528:
 HEY KLACKONS! GION'T YOU GLAD I DIDN'T SAY ORIONGE? Psilons call me up to kvetch about something. Probably my vast sprawl over the map. Or it could be the puns.
 Also, this is awesome. The Klackons are going to try to take Gion back. Sometime around the middle of the century. I seed Gion from Denubius, my nearby UP world. There will be defenses by the time ol' Rinkitink arrives.
 A number of these will be waiting. 2529: This makes me smile.
 Compare this to the 2337 and 2395 reports. 2530: Battle Computer Mark VIII comes in, IRC 6 is the next Computers project. 2531:
 Stasis Field and High Energy Focus are my next techs. 2536: I up trade with the Psilons to 1225/year. 2540:
 If the Klackons were moving any slower they'd be retreating. Oh wait, they're about to do that, anyway. Was this trip really necessary? 2541: Finally.
This was the only tech the bears had that I didn't. I want it, obviously, because it gets me back in touch
with my good
I also frame my good
Those bugs are irritating. High time I did something else to punish them for their impudence. Like, oh, I don't know, bombing their homeworld.
 Universal Antidote is at 22%. I sure hope that pops soon, I should be able to get some good stuff in trade for it. 2542:
 VGA SEAN CONNERY ANTICIPATES MY DESIRES Improved Terraforming +100 next up. I pick up Class IX Deflectors for Universal Antidote (Psilon), Armored Exoskeleton and Stinger Missiles for Universal Antidote and RIW 40% (Darloks). Tritanium Armor and Gauss Autocannon are both in the percentages. When they pop, I think it's magic time. 2543: And now for some comic relief.
 That sad Flying Dutchman Klackon fleet has traveled across the galaxy to Gion and arrived just in time to see me take over. I think they were hoping they'd travel so slowly they'd wind up getting here in the past, when I wasn't awesome yet.
 Wait, this is the Klackon fleet? The one that was rated #1 in the galaxy (see GNN report, 2496)? The one that defeated the Space Crystal? I shouldn't have even bothered building the ships, class fifteen planetary shield and bases. Wow. Meanwhile, at the other side of the galaxy the adults are attacking:
 Hey, a challenge! If those are nuke missiles, I'm not scared.
 Out of bombs. 'Sall right, I've done what I needed to do here (make everybody ludicrously happy.) Time to retreat.
 2544: Tritanium Armor hits. IIT 2 is the only choice. Ultra Poor Denubius is the last world to finish its Class XV planetary shield. 2545:
 Ah, Carl Frederich Gauss, inventor of the pillbox hat and devastating space weaponry. Select Neutronium Bombs next. As far as a Guardian-killer goes, this is the best I can currently do:
 I need the battle computer, so that means I have to use obsolete engines and an Inertial Stabilizer to get decent combat speed, and I can't do any better than combat speed 3. The Zortium armor is only there because there was 2 space left over that I couldn't do anything else with. It doesn't matter, anything the Guardian hits this with will kill the ship. If I built this thing I wouldn't include the armor; it basically does nothing but increase the cost by one BC per ship. This design still has only a 10% chance to hit; it will do an average of 6 points of damage when it does. A thousand of them will do, then, about 600 points of damage per round. (Thanks to the law of large numbers, it'll be pretty close to that ratio of 0.6 hit points/ship each time.) The Guardian has 85 Scatter Pack Xs (!!!), 45 stellar convertors, 18 plasma torpedoes, and a death ray. So the beams will basically get 46 ships every turn. The torpedoes will get 18 ships every other turn. The scatter packs are the real killers: 850 ships per turn! My Anti-Missile Rockets will be almost completely useless against these missiles at tech level 44. The Guardian has 10,000 hit points. At speed 3 it'll take at least two turns and possibly three to get close enough to the Guardian to hit it at all. Assuming not dodging any of the missile volleys and 905 ships dying every turn, and three turns to reach the Guardian, and breaking out my trusty copy of Excel, I need 6851 of these ships, at a bare minimum, to win. I can swing that at this point -- I can even send eight thousand ships for overkill -- but if I can fit Mark VII computers or combat speed 4 on this thing, I will need far fewer ships, and that will make things easier. (This would be a lot more difficult, incidentally, except that the Guardian on Impossible difficulty does not have Advanced Damage Control or Automated Repair. It does have Advanced Damage Control at Hard difficulty, so this seems like a bug, but it is what it is.) I'm thinking wait for the High Energy Focus -- its light bulb is nearly full -- that should miniaturize the engines a little more. I'd like to put this one to bed pretty soon, though, I'm in a great position. I start Collassa and my Rich/Ultra Rich worlds to work building Star Gates. If I do have to put lame engines on this thing, I'll at least cut down on the time it takes to get them to Orion. Once the gates are built, if I'm not ready yet with my Guardian-killers, I'll set the Rich/UR worlds to building Huge placeholders to load them up a bit.
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