Morgan on a small island

[Kurvivor]

For some time i was extremely unsatisfied with my level of play. After some training attempts with lower difficulties, i decided to try at Transcend, again.

Setup: allfactions random, except me as Morgan, big map, lots of water, all types of victory allowed. Off we go:

I have landed on Unity Wreckage, wich feels somewhat fitting. That's a first for me - and i  finally learn just what it contain. Neat.
I have started building in former-colony pod pattern, trying co cover up my island with bases ASAP, with occasional scout for mindworm duty thrown in. Some time later i spread pretty much all around, most of bases on the island's shores.
It is really nice to have the scout chopper. I discover aliens (Caretakers) to my south pretty soon, pirates in the seas as well, and Believers to the north-west.
For some bizarre reason, i accidentally start Vendetta with Caretakers, then they contact me for a truce. A pity i do not manage to contact Believers the same way. Eventually i kill the chopper at some mindworms, probably Isle of the deep.
On the island i also find a single Alien artefact, which i use to quicken construction of the human Genome Project. Other early SP (most importantly, Weather Paradigm) go straight past me.

Some time after, i get a needed tech and set sail to the sea, with one military foil and some foil probe team. I mean to upgrade them to trance, but keep forgetting - and they keep getting eaten by aliens despite being trance anyway.

Other factions are Usurpers (on the same island with Miriam, and devouring poor believers), Cult (on the islandway to the west of mine, and for some reason friendly to Usurpers, who are at war with essentially everyone else), Cyborgs tot he south, and they are quite developed.
There is a borehole cluster on the island next to me, and uranium fields some way to the east (the island contains only them), so i immediately send colony pods to both of them.

Several things happen.
Unfortunate unity pod incident results in pirates' base being uplifted next to borehole cluster, blocking me from claiming them myself. After losing quite a bit of time (and energy) i manage to total thought control it (first Planetary Conquest, lol). From the other hand, now my base island is twice as big, although it is connected quite thinly.
I try to be nice to aliens, but they refuse to be bribed. That seems counter-productive of them. As my human compatriots keep demanding from me to join on the Vendetta against both alien factions, i do just that. But joining isn't the same as actually waging a war. I kind of decide to just mount a defence with minimal troops and couple of probe teams.
To be continued.

[bvanevery]

and they keep getting eaten by aliens despite being trance anyway.

The key to fishing Artifacts out of the water, when your transports can only move 3 squares, is to stop your movement next to the pod you're going to pop.  You have to pop it next turn.  Also the pod cannot be in fungus.  If you've set it up this way, and an Isle of the Deep appears, you will be able to move one square away from the threat.  The Isle's movement is very predictable, it will head for the nearest living breathing pulsing city, not necessarily you.  Sometimes it won't move at all.  So what you do, is veer away from civilization.  Sometimes you'll get tagged anyways, because of terrain or sea fungus in the way or attractors you don't know about, but most of the time you'll survive to fish another pod out.

Of course at the beginning, the civilization the Isle heads for is often your own.  So you need to be ready when it lands.  Also if you've got Sea Formers working your coastline, you don't want them in the middle of an operation when you pop a nearby pod.  In any given turn, it's best to commit your coastal naval movements after you've popped pods, so that you know what's coming.

To pop pods on fungus, you either have to use a Trance Resonance transport so you survive the attack, or you just need to suicide unwanted transports.  At some point you may not feel like supporting various units anymore, or it'll just take too long to bring them somewhere useful, so you might as well go suicidal with them.  Even if you start next to sea fungus, a movement 3 transport isn't going to be able to move again once you go there.  So in this case, you don't have to be next to the fungus on a previous turn.  You can just ram it.

Similar tactics work on land with Rovers.  You have to stop right next to a pod that's on open terrain.  When you pop the pod next turn, if there's a mindworm you can either attack or move 1 square away.  Rocky terrain stops your movement, as does fungus obviously, so you pop those with suicidal scouts.

Of course another way to do these drills, is to send multiple units.  A transport does the popping, a ship does the killing.  But popping pods with only a single unit, allows you to cover more territory more quickly.

[Kurvivor]

Continuing
As it turned out, aliens decided to take initiative instead. They started invadingfrom their different directions. Every one played roughly the same. First they bullied me, offering truce for tech - then attacked anyway
Fortunatrly, i managed to build Citizen's Defence Force (buying it mostly, out of the Caretaker's nose), and with 3-res armor, i could beat them off pretty handily. I was trying to capture some of inveding units, but they always went in pairs, and died in the same turn as well.
I tried to probe Caretaker main base with foil teams,  but apparently Headquarters provide much better defense from them then usual.

As a response, Caretakers mind controlled my east base. After cooling off from my rage, i decided that was an opportunity to get some techsfrom them. I pulled out resonance laser and air power. That could only mean one thing: peanut butter jelly Nerbe gas R-laser penetrator time.
That would also handle the problem of prowling Usurper boats as well.

I started expanding to the seas. One destination was north - where i was blocked first by aliens, that  got out of the pod and ate my float probe team (that popped it) and a new city. Another was a far shot - sargasso sea, roughly on the opposite side of the world, past the island of the Cult. I ffigured that it was better to have more cities then less, more votes and more energy income are good...

i have been holding onto Democracy/Free market due to the money fetish. However, that also meant i was kind of struggling to strike aliens back. Fortunately, Caretakers seemed to be absorbed with pirates and cyborgs (with even Cult joining in the fun), and only sometimes did a flyover, destroying several convoys/formers. No big deal, especially since i striked back with nerve gas (who needs to make peace with those jerks anyway?)

[Kurvivor]

Continuing
I continue to hold my research focus in Explore and Discover. I do not have the best sciense, though - that'd be Cyborgs. They are ahead of me in tech, and, while they do share it from time to time, they still get secret projects i want. Such as: Hunter-Seeker, Planetary Energy Grid (that almost makes me hate them), Maritime conctrol center (they haven't given me cruiser chaiis yet, although i asked...). Only thing that makes me respect them is the fact they do gift me some techs from time to time.
Pirates are kinda worse. They also have Pact with me, but never share tech - and they lend from me from time to time. And i want some of their bases. Most importantly, Svensgaard elected himself governor - but as i am second to him in population, we will see about that...
Miriam is puny and irrelevant to the south pole. She keeps having clashes with Cyborgs (that will end really badly for her), and is so weak that she doen't shy away from talking to me. I gift her tech, just to see how long she will survive.
Cult is weak, although fairly active. Somehow it took to attacking Caretakers, however ineffectively. Cha Dawn refuses to talk with me.

Regarding Usurpers. I have nerve gassed all their cities in range, and destroyed their water cities at "my" side of their island for a good measure. They have some standing army, mostly jets, and also some garrison units, but i outproduce them heavily, so, although they sometimes succeed in hurting me, that does not stick.
I begin to draw up a plan for dealing with them. First, i have encircled them from right side, up to the very top, where i found and claimed Manifold Nexus (on a little island next to their mainland). Second, i have built a small fleet of SAM missile floats (most "cost effective" ones) to attack their sea expansion where i haven't gassed them. Third. i have built Planetary Networks, which will allow me tp quickly put cities with 3 population, Command Center and Perimeter defences on their shores, quickly set to produce next wave of invasion (in form of socouts, who are then upgraded to the needed state). Naturally, i will have to mount those colony pods on speeder chassis.

I have little doubts on my success. Usurpers are weaker then me, they don't even have a single Secret Project!..

[bvanevery]

The Cybernetic Consciousness does have this annoying tendency to come up with techs and Secret Projects that one has not.  It is especially a problem when they're an ally, you want to keep them that way, and you don't particularly want to be a Fundamentalist government to pull off a probe team framing.  Also when they're on the opposite side of the map and you can't reach them easily to steal.  Keeping a team nearby "ready for theft" sometimes works, sometimes just gets killed by patrols.

[Kurvivor]

Continuing
Surprisingly, plan goes off without a hitch.  An addendum to it goes as “mind control empty cities or at least escape pods”
I found a city off on the peninsula, separated from usurper area with forest. That proves an advantage: probe team after incoming probe team are bogged down and destroyed. There is some resistance by aliens, as I advance on their cities, at some point successive jet attacks destroy all my interceptors that are on air cover duty
On sea, however, they have no fleet to speak of, and so a rout ensues. In the process some of the pods spill on small islands, where I promptly capture them with foil probes. Last usurper effort comes when they mind control a single captured city back. It has to be destroyed - rest is just a mop-up

Meanwhile, I have to switch to Green from Free market - pacifism drones are too hard to handle

Globally, Pirates continue to harass Caretakers and take their sea bases. Aliens find some time to throw some needle jets at me to destroy my supply crawlers. Cyborgs raise their activity as well
I start to be bothered with their technological progress - I have to play catch-up with their Secret Projects now, and do not always succeed

I repeat invasion of the Caretakers the same way. Since they have Secret Projects, i take care not to destroy them; that results in not taking their capital (with Merchant Exchange), and Cult grabbing it. That is frustrating: I tried several times to capture it from sea by probe; every time it got stuck on fungus and got blown up by artillery. I arrange to capture it from Cult - and Cha Dawn attacks me and blows it out of the water again... then I accidentally destroy the city...

[bvanevery]

Meanwhile, I have to switch to green from free market - pacifism drones are too hard to handle

Did you mean from Free Market to Green?

[Kurvivor]

Meanwhile, I have to switch to green from free market - pacifism drones are too hard to handle

Did you mean from Free Market to Green?

Yes, of course

When Cult attacks, Cyborgs and Pirates intervene. Truthfully, they cannot do much - at best, they can destroy some formers around inconsequential base. They do have Planet Buster, but it is out of range of my important bases. Some time later, me and Pirates take several sea bases of their and they go back to peace.

Caretakers are mopped up: I take all bases that have SP (except for Decision: Manifold that was accidentally destroyed), and Caretakers grab two south bases
Among my projects there are now Pholus Mutagen and Empath Guild. I try selections of the Supreme Leader: I am voted in before casting my own vote
Huh
I guess having next two most powerful factions as my pact brothers helps

I veto the voting, as I want to win by Transcedense

[bvanevery]

They do have Planet Buster, but it is out of range of my important bases.

Watch out.  I've seen the AI build a new sea base, transfer a nuke the next turn, and annihilate one of my cities the next turn.  I thought I had done such a good job clearing out a safety buffer with my X Needlejets.  I quit that game.  I learned that chemical weapons alone don't wipe an enemy out.  You really have to wipe out their entire civilization if you're going to go down that road, as otherwise they'll keep coming back, like mold.  Bases you wiped out already, they'll build new ones where they were.

[Kurvivor]

Not much left, so i guess i will finish this report

I have dedicated majority of my resources to SCIENCE (10% econ, 20% psych, rest to science), resulting in tech every two turns. Cyborgs managed to stay ahead of me, but i was eventually able to finish several of SP they started first (most importantly: Network Backbone,, Clone factory, then Space Elevator).
My relationship with them started to deteriorate. Every time i asked for a tech, i got told off. Eventually i built a bunch of enchanced probe teams, to get through Hunter-Killer, and probed them (pretending to be Cult).
That netted me no techs, loss of Pact with Cyborgs and a war with a Cult.

Frankly, i didn't care much. Pact was low enough on totem pole. In fact, next time i contacted Cha Dawn, he just surrendered to me.
From the other hand, Aki-Zeta continued to view me worse and worse - discounting even the fact i was running Cybernetic!

Seeing that she was ranked first in military, i set several of my cities to military production: one to AAA mariune ships with best armor/guns aveilable, couple of cities next to the Manifold - to Locusts (intermingled with Biology Labs and Brood Pits), and around 3 former Usurper cities to missiles (conventional ones) and several others - to the best AAA hovertanks i could get (IIRC, with Sophorific gas pods). There were also several SAM choppers bing made.

I was minding my own business then, building monorail network and joining my landmasses together (my starting island with Caretaker island, former Usurper island with small islands around), until Aki contacted me. She demanded around 900 EC loan, which i refused, of course. She declared Vendetta.

We had two fronts. One was her little sea enclave between my starting island and Usurpers' one, and another was that couple of Caretaker cities she managed to grab.  I ahve spent several thousand credits and captured one of her water cities with probe, then shipped couple of hovertanks over and started to pommel her defences. She asked for peace soon after.
However, she was not done, and several turns later, her probe teams wet and started capturing all those Supply crawlers i had gathering resources around. That was just asking for trouble on her part - and trouble she recieved. I captured her sea enclave, softening it with missiles first, then overrun her toehold on former Caretaker landmass. Sure, she did some damage with gravity copters, but i had my defences in place and eliminated them with a counter-attack (note to self: stop putting air units on defence duty, they will just die uselessly)
When i amassed 5-6 drop singularity squads, i jumped over to her continent and took one of the cities there. That was enough for her to ask for a Truce, which i accepted.

At that moment, native phenomena started to grow in intensity. I have captured with a hovertank an infamous "30 demon boil mind worms stack", which startedf to prolong my turns immensely - and my improvements were eing replaced with fungus. At that point i did not care anymore - there were better then forests )))

Finally, i got the Treshold to Transcedence. All i had to do is buyild that couple of SP. To prepare, i made several Psi-Gates between two main landmasses, cranked up economy (3+K EC a turn), and started producing Supply Crawlers. Well, and also around 3 Voices of the Planet in diferent cities.
Around 3 turns into it, i built the Voice and started Ascent.
Next 3-4 turns, i was pumping Singularity Supplys with 8 armour (antimatter?) into Ascent in Morgan Industries. Cyborgs and Pirates asced for Transcendece tech, and were summarily ignored - Svensgaard dismissed our Pact, but neither declared Vendetta. Couple of turns later i bought the rest of Ascent for around 9k energy credits

Well, that was fun and not all that sscary. Maintaining good relations seems to be the key

[bvanevery]

Somehow your game sounded like a lot of work for a Transcend victory.  When I've Transcended I've typically been so far ahead of other factions' technology that they can't do anything to me.  Maybe that was the case here and I've misunderstood?  I think Transcend is a little boring because it's a lot of waiting around to be declared The Winner.

[Kurvivor]

In this game I was not ahead technologically until the very last leg of the game; likewise with the military. However, my economy and production capacity was enough to correct last one when needed...

[bvanevery]

Hmm now I will re-read your entire AAR to figure out "what went wrong", why you did not utterly dominate the fairly stupid AIs, to completely make Transcendence a cakewalk / boring wait to be officially acknowledged as the winner.  Usually if you are not vastly ahead of the AIs, it is because of some major growth problem early in the game.  The game is winnable with Marines if you really want to.

Ah, well, here's an initial clue.  You don't usually play on Transcend.

For some time i was extremely unsatisfied with my level of play. After some training attempts with lower difficulties, i decided to try at Transcend, again.

Sounds like "not colonizing enough" was not your problem; I often have that problem.  Could you have possibly colonized too much?  It can be a waste of resources if you're not getting good cities as a result.

Seems you spent a lot of effort on war with the Aliens, then basically won the game, except you didn't want to win the game, so you kept playing.

Ok, here's my verdict.  Aki was all the way across the board and completely left alone, so she did research, research, research.  You didn't build much research infrastructure, and spent piles more effort on conquests than Secret Projects?  If nearby enemies that you can conquer build Secret Projects, that's not a big deal.  You can just run over them and then the SPs are yours.  But far away enemies - or worse, friends - are a problem.  They will take SPs out of your hands for a very long time.  When those are important things like The Planetary Energy Grid, it lets them get ahead of you in ways they shouldn't.

In my own current game with Yang, Deirdre built almost every SP in the game that I didn't build.  She was right next door to me to the west, so they all became mine.