posted 05-28-99 07:42 PM ET            

If you have any direct questions about how to do specific (or even somewhat general) things, I'd be glad to answer them.

posted 05-28-99 08:32 PM ET            

Hey, this happened to me in CivII, too, for a little bit. You gotta get the hang of things. Here are some secrets to success:

1. Expand, expand, and when you're done, expand some more. You want as many cities as possible.

2. If you have treaties with everyone and everyone basicly likes you, switch to peacetime SE Choices, like Free Market and Democracy.

3. Get some early SPs. On my first base, I usually build in this order:

1. defender
2. former
3. pod
4. pod
5. Recycling Tanks
6. SP

If you follow this with your early bases, you usually get a few of the SPs.

posted 05-29-99 12:16 AM ET            

In general, build and maintain good cities and communications (road system). Don't expect that you are going to be able to immediately go out and conquer the world. In my experience at least three other factions have landed in areas that have considerably better resources than mine. They are going to shoot up like earth weeds and start throwing their weight around. To grow and defeat them requires patience, guile and ruthlessness -- but don't let the ruthlessness show too soon or they will go for your throat.

Some principles:

1. Research, research, research. You've got to stay close in this. You are in real trouble if another faction gets a lot of units attacking with better weapons than your basic defence.

2. Explore with three goals in mind:

a. Get those goodie pods. I'm beginning to think that the decisive factor in the game may be the conjunction of "alien artifact" and network node.

b. Indentify good regions for expansion.

c. Learn the terrain for strategic purposes.

3. Use the terrain strategically with the following goals in mind:

a. Deny access to your territory by the other factions. You can't be 100% successful in this but you can really cut down on attacks and spying by finding bottlenecks and placing units to block them.

b. Maintain what military strategists call "internal lines of communication." This means try to be sure that you can get units to any point on your perimeter faster than an attacker can. Where geography and resources permit expand like a balloon -- in a circle.
I would violate this principle, however, to get a really juicy piece of real estate, recognizing that I may have to scramble like hell to hold on to it.

c. Discover the other factions' strategic weaknesses that can be exploited at those times you have gathered enough military strength to take their bases.

(By the way, if you have a chance to build a base at a point where it opens access between two bodies of water (i.e., they are separated by just one square of land) do it unlesss there are overwhelming counter factors. This generally does fantastic things for your lines of communication and overall expansion. The AI seems completely oblivious to these opportunities.)

d. Superior placement of your units, especially for defense. Artillery, for example, is much more effective when elevated above the its target.

4. Stress fundamentals in building your bases. You have to walk a fine line between generating colony pods for expansion and generating the resources to keep existing bases happy and capable of RESEARCH and defense. If left undisturbed by other factions (remember principle "3.a." above) I develop according to the following plan:

>Basic defense unit.
>Former.
>Recycling vats.
>Children's creche.

At this point I check to see how things are going. If I face the likelihood of drone riots soon, I build a recreation commons. If I've developed an enemy I build some kind of military unit; otherwise I build either a colony pod or some sort of faster unit to encourage exploration. After that, if the drones aren't restless, I build the

>network node
>recreation commons

This provides the basics for healthy development. From this point on building decisions are judgement calls that have to be based on your style of playing the game. (I don't know what other people are experiencing, but I don't find the governors very effective at the higher levels.)

I tend to lay back and try to maneuver the other factions into wasting their resources in fighting each other while I develop solid bases that will be production powerhouses in another hundred turns.

Of course, I take every opportunity that presents itself to take over foreign bases. Expansion is the absolute key to the game; I just like to do it as peaceably as possible. But then in basketball I prefer rebounding to shooting. You may prefer constant, active attack. That should work fine too as long as you maintain healthy research-oriented bases and don't get too many other factions on your case at once.

posted 05-29-99 02:22 AM ET            

The changes in levels are really changes in variables in certain equations - for example, on the recycling tank lining material (easiest) level, if it takes you ten time whatever to build or do something, the AI factions take X times ten times whatever, with the value of X being what determines the AI "level"

So if you play at the easiest levels, you gain techs with less research, build stuff with less resources, etc. than the computer AI. At the Thinker and Empath levels, the situation is reversed, and they need less stuff than you to do the same things.

So the tactics that work at an easy level get you killed at a harder level.

The key to winning at the tougher levels is expand fast - build LOTS of cities, and get lots of resources into production as fast as possible - that's one thing that the game AI ignores - if you build 15-20 cities in the first 50 turns or so, you are off to a good start.

posted 06-01-99 09:47 AM ET            

I would suggest accessing the Datalinks and reading the topics in the "Basic Concepts" category (which will probably be a review) and the "Advanced Concepts" category.

posted 06-01-99 04:39 PM ET            

Build - during peace time and the inner bases (the ones farthest away from the fighting) during war.

Conquer - during war and only during war unless u r going to attack first and quickly.

Explore - only really during the begining of the game even though i never use it.

Discover - only when u want to push out some techs faster (for me it really only gets me 1 or 2 turns ahead in tech) but like explore i almost never use it.

And one more thing u play the spartans so use force to keep others in check and use the phrase "attack, attack, and when in doubt attack some more" - General Patton

P.S what i mean by use the phrase is if some one attack them attack everyone early on this is not guaranteed to work though but eventually u will get use to no one liking u but also take everyone elses advice into mind because i know the spartans r not that easy to play but i wouldnt consider them the worst or among the worst either.

posted 06-01-99 04:51 PM ET         

That is:
1) build the Weather Paradigm
2) drill a bore hole by 3-4 of your early cities that have good farm land
3) work the boreholes and build EVERY Secret Project

I do usually loose a few early SP, but I have most of the later ones. If you are in a SP race build supply crawlers in 2 borehole cities and send them to the other cities.

posted 06-02-99 08:20 AM ET         

play with Unity Servey on (this will let you see the land masses (not the exact terrain).

posted 06-02-99 10:56 AM ET         

Series II hit one nail on the head. Broadly speaking, for the first 3/4 of the game minerals are king, then the focus should change to energy, if you are going for Transcendence or an economic victory. For a military victory stay with minerals throughout.

Why? For the SPs, base improvements and more specialized units you need minerals (I know you can hurry build with energy, but that's a lot harder in the first 100 turns than the alternatives below)

For the Transcend and Economic end game you need energy (but you should be getting collateral minerals with most energy anyway) to purchase Threshold and Transcend, or to corner the energy market.

The key to minerals (and ultimately energy) is that most overlooked unit, the crawler, and its workshop designed cousin, the sea crawler (the AI can't build these, as it can only build the basic shown units). Get as many crawlers going per city as you can 'cos they can work at great distances from your base and still contribute. (Also, any base bonuses you are getting for minerals or energy apply to all squares worked by that base, not just within that base's radius).

Some general tips I've found useful.

-: I never degrade my HQ base via colony pods.
-: I don't insert the alien artifact into a network node. I store them to use for fast tracking that SP I really need.
-: As soon as energy production in a base gets above 4 or so (and if I have the tech) I'll build an energy bank.
-: I never use the Governor nor automate formers. the AI's best decision is worse than your poorest IMHO.
-: I only ever build (on land) forests, boreholes, sensors, roads/magtubes ( a base with two boreholes and centauri preserve, tree farm and hybrid forest is (if my memory serves me) at 0 eco damage.
-: Never be afraid to trade a tech. If in a pact, gift the odd tech to your partner. They will reward you in wondrous ways.
-: Get the Citizens Defence SP if you can (assuming you are not Yang), otherwise build perimeter defences in your bases whenever you can. Same with Tachycon shield defences.

There's lots more, but others will chip in with their favorite strategies.

One bit of advice that I am still following myself - read all the strategy posts in this, and the Apolyton forums. I learn something new every visit.

posted 06-02-99 08:04 PM ET            

That is the appropriate use for alien artifacts. In the early game, when the early SP's like Weather Paradigm, Human Genome, Virtual World, etc. separate the men from the boys, I may use alien artifacts to build an SP, if I have no choice, other than to let someone else get that SP.

Later in the game, when you have a lot of cities, and technology takes a lot more research, to me it is totally unsound to use them for anything but connecting to a network node. 30 cities/30 network nodes + 30 alien artifacts = 30 free techs.

You don't have to worry about other factions building SP's if you're so far ahead technologically that you're finishing an SP that they don't even have the tech to start yet. Supply crawlers and alien artifacts and energy credits can all be used to rush an SP, only alien artifacts can be used to gain free techs. Trading techs in the early game is excellent - by the mid game they have nothing to offer me.

You get the same benefits in your military - when other factions are prototyping their first chaos weapons (attack = 8), my worst garrison units already have shard weapons, neutronium armor (a = 13, d = 8) and a selection of special abilities. Technology is the key to the game in every area, so squandering those alien artifacts for anything other than getting free techs should carry a life sentence in the recycling tanks.

posted 06-03-99 01:46 PM ET            

I too play Spartan and am loving every minute of it. Attack, Attack and attack some more. But rest some do not over extend your self.

I build P-Spheres to kill off the drones so they will not bother me, true you get a -50% tech, but riots VS. lostech I will take the lostech any day.

posted 06-23-99 04:10 PM ET         

Anyway most of the important points have been covered so my advice is slightly less vital.

1: Try not get carried away with unit design - Units with maximum attack and defence and two special abilities may be fun but cost far more than they are normally worth. If you're defending cities go for one defense unit + maybe one attacking unit rather than one super unit.

2: Get carried away with micromanagement - getting every last mineral and energy out of the terrain is crucial.

3: Don't try and play for six days without stopping for food

posted 06-24-99 07:37 AM ET            

However, the Spartans are anti-wealth, so expect to be poor when you play them. I'd played quite a few games as other factions up to Thinker level before I tried Santiago on my favorite-sized map, Huge. I won, no real opposition, but I started on a continent by myself and it was _so slow_, and I never had much cash to spare.

You see, I usually use Wealth for building industry and energy, but the Spartans are forbidden that, and have a negative industry rating.

For quick conquest, the Believers are much better. Sure, they research slower than anyone else, but their Support and Attack bonuses, great Probe teams, and ability to choose Wealth (which is better for science than Knowledge for most of the game!) mean they can afford to build and support as big an army as they want, sabotage perimeter defences, then just march in. And woe betide the faction that doesn't have Hunter-Seeker, because the Believers will easily steal their tech. And the enemy base that does have HSA is a prime target for their forces.

The Believers also get Elite units almost as easily as the Spartans, and as mentioned, they can afford to support a LOT of them.

If you don't yet like Miriam Godwinson's dour philosophy, then think of Wagner's Valkyrie theme in the Ring Cycle, and imagine her as a Viking Brunhilda seeking to bring the valiant warriors of other factions to Valhalla by slaying them.

Yes, Miriam's picture isn't exactly what one would expect of a Valkyrie, so imagine Kirsten Flagstad instead. In fact, call your faction leader "Kirsten Flagstad", to make the identification easier.

Yang is quite easy to win with, too, because of his natural perimeter defences (he's not so afraid to start next to another aggressor), industry bonus, and immunity to negative efficiency so he can take very inefficient social engineering and not suffer the bad side-effects on resources that every other faction would.

Usually, however, I'm a builder. Initially I favored the University, as many new players do, but I've gradually learnt to appreciate the benefits of the Peacekeepers (that extra talent is handy at higher levels) who can grow big cities easily and who have those extra votes for Governor (to get more energy and instant infiltration).

The Gaians can become huge in the later game, when all the Tree and Centauri techs are known. In the meantime, being mostly on side with Planet is a substantial help, and worm units often give the AI trouble - especially Yang who seems not to realise how dangerous a swarm of worms are when they're huddled next to his bases.

Morgan is an interesting one to play, and quite a challenge if you're used to starting out tough. In Morgan's case, it's better to play the pussycat early, and buy everything in sight. His probe teams, armed with cash, can capture almost anything except an enemy HQ, provided that the target doesn't have the HSA. He can probably bribe another faction to hand over its best bases, too.

Commerce with Morgan is a real rip-off; and once he's rich and powerful (and he easily gets rich), watch out!

One of Morgan's benefits is that whereas other factions need Free Market to get rich fast early, he doesn't. Which means that he can avoid its negative police and planet effects. A Green Morgan is surprisingly beneficial. Usually I'd also use Demo and Wealth, but Police State also works.

posted 06-29-99 01:53 PM ET         

I'm with you, and about the same ratio (3 formers per base) In addition to the above activities, rather than have them roaming idly, I set mine to terraforming upwards around my coastline to expand my landmass, creating an artificial sunny mesa for a mirrors complex, and if nothing else to do I'll plant/harvest/plant forests for the 5 minerals bonus per turn.

They also, like crawlers, make good cannon fodder for enemy needlejets and copters (lure an expensive needlejet to attack a former and after its turn send your interceptor to it hehe

posted 06-29-99 02:02 PM ET         

I am currently planting a 34 square line of forest right in front of a line of cities that divide MY part of the landmass from the Gaians. The forest will stop any speeders of worms so that I can get the first attack.
Once the forest line is complete I will conect all the 'front' cities with roads so that I can shift units easily. The roads will be the center line of my front cities. My cities are 3 squares apart, so reinforcing the front cities with units in other 'front' cities will be easy.

2 squares behing the forest line will be a sensor line so that the sensors can not be taken out easily.