AAR: A pilgrimage through fire and steel - [Complete]

[ete]

HGP finished, next a command center at that base since it'll be pumping units for a while and I can afford a few turns wait now.


Picked off a recon rover, located that Battle Ogre. The heavy foresting will make it much harder to kill.


Perfect pod. That'll get my best base into the war much faster.

Though.. comparing our relative production rates, this is scary.


The combined effect of the Machine Mandate's bonus, the AI cheating bonus, and my Indust penalty means everything I build requires literally twice the minerals.. from 5 per row to 10.

I need to trade 2:1 just to stay even, and with their larger empire (leading the territory and military leaderboard), probably at least 4:1 to make any headway. Trading like that with only lasers for weapons is going to be nigh impossible, with only Probes giving me hope..

Oh dear.

[ete]

Still, it's nice when things work out like this.






I'm not risking a war with Sepsu. His powergraph is terrifying, and giving that base up would leave me wide open to the next part of the war. Anyway, the next few turns will let me probe and hopefully do a lot more damage than I'll take.




Free Fundamentalist!

I'm actually not certain whether it's worth it over democratic right now, but it'll be interesting to see how this goes.

Really shows how poor a choice it is usually when you're not sure you want an SE option even with it's penalty removed.

[ete]

Exactly what I need right now. This'll let me trade very efficiently with the Machine Mandate troops so long as I'm careful with my rovers, hopefully letting me push them back.




The AI screwed up here and destroyed the forest that was under them, losing that all-important 50% defensive bonus. My worms died, but did plenty of damage to let a recon rover clean up.


Battering down that isolated base, but it's production is insane, even with no teraforming. I shudder to think what the bases with loads of forests are pumping out.


In situations like this, maneuvering and terrain are the key to victory. Stay on rocky or fungal squares, try to hit the foe while they are not. Ideally with rovers outside of bases and infantry with.


And don't throw away probes.


Battles like this are exactly what you need, hitting units out in the open with rovers gives you great odds, and since healing is so easy in SMAX you're usually just up a unit.


Excellent. I'll be cashing in an AA to instaprototype this, impacts on frontlines are needed immidiately.


Was not sure about this.. but I do love NLM, and it'll help me fastest. Starting on seabases would be nice, but requires more minerals than I can afford to direct to infrastructure right now, and as much as I think unlocking nut/energy/min caps is great, forests are okay for now. I can steal polymorphic software if/when I want it, and armor is not worthwhile. If the AI is attacking you, you're not winning from that battle. Hit first. Missiles would be nice later, but impact is all you really need right here.


Worth risking a unity rover to take out something that'll bombard your more valuable troops.


My base to the east is under a bit of pressure, sending a couple of rovers to reinforce.

[ete]

Probed it off the machines.


There's an undocumented feature where the first unit you prototype gets a +1 Morale bonus, which combined with Command Center, a Monolith, and Fundy's +1 Morale lets my first Impact Rover be elite. I'll be sending it to fight immediately, and it should start to really turn the tide.

And attaching your Monoliths by road is also a good idea.




Finally the big man, the powergraph leader, contacts me. And he's close enough to be warning me off.

This is bad, because someone much more dangerous than the Machine Mandate is right there. And good, because I just got impact and have some hope he's not yet, so for a brief time have the chance to beat him in direct conflict.. but definitely not while fighting the machine mandate. I could try to switch alliances.. but.. I feel like beating the MM down a bit more may make them give up, and I don't want to risk the machines turning on me later.



Navarro is behind Sepsu in votes.. but is much, much more popular with the other factions.

[ete]

Some battles from one turn.


Sepsu's getting annoyed about my one scout .

[ete]

I've taken the Machine Mandate HQ, those Impact Rovers really helped. They tried for peace, but I want a full surrender.




Taking their HQ reduced the cost to buy this unit by 4/5ths, excellent .


Grabbing another AA.


Wow, these units are cheap.


Not an important tech (except vs heavy native), but worth getting nonetheless.


Quite costly for a small base, but getting the defender makes it likely worthwhile. I should force them to surrender soon the way this battle is going, and focus on preparing for Sepsu.

[ete]

I knew it was coming, but still lost some worms to the initial attack.


Had a recon rover teleported in to nearish their bases, should get some good scouting at least, maybe upgrade it and try to take a base.


War against the machines is going well. With Impact Rovers you can kill loads without taking much damage, and they're all infantry so don't have the speed to hit me back.


An area I had a worm teleported to a while back.


Only two defenders in that base... going for the upgrade.

[ete]

Crushing with Impact Rovers, weeee.

















And so the war of the machines ends. I had hoped to demand one more base, but it was rejected even after I gifted a couple of extra techs not shown here. I've found gifting techs before demanding bases tends to help the chances of getting the bases considerably in general, and makes them more peaceful after.

[ete]

Base has two defenders, my elite impact rover takes out both but runs out of move. However..



The base is just undefended next turn, and I sweep in to take that lovely size 7 jungle base!

[ete]

Just as police was starting to be a problem for all those old Machine bases .


It's time to start seriously teching towards Tree Farms, and unlocking min/energy restrictions on the way ready for sea bases.



Got this from an Alien Artifact, glad to have Empath Song up


Mass upgrading to Police Infantry is one of the best investments available, I think. Every base just got one more drone control, for under 100 credits!


Slightly risky.. But I figure the rovers will be there first.


Here comes my army, Sepsu!

[ete]

A new base, to take advantage of that rocky mineral square. Fitting name, too.

[Lord Avalon]

Good stuff, but this

There's an undocumented feature where the first unit you prototype gets a +1 Morale bonus...

is incorrect.

On p.82 of the manual in the second paragraph under "PROTOTYPES," it says:

On the upside, all prototype units get a +1 to morale, since new technologies are usually put in the care of elite forces.

[ete]

Ah, I had a feeling someone would come up with something like that. I checked only the datalinks.

[Sigma]

Quite a turnaround in just a few years! Whats your Energy production look like? That war looked awfully expensive.

[ete]

Quite a turnaround in just a few years! Whats your Energy production look like? That war looked awfully expensive.

My energy production is pretty low right now due to Planned and having a load of bases far away enough that inefficiency is killing their production. I'm planning to switch to Green after a few more turns of high growth, which will quadruple my per turn profits but drop my Indust and bring growth from +2 to -2, but allow me to start rushing and afford maintenance for a lot more facilities.



As you can see, mostly it's being eaten up by inefficiency and facilities. I've not had much energy free to rush for pretty much the entire war, and have been saving for probe actions where I had a chance. The army was produced purely on minerals, plus the few units I stole. Forests and a few mineral squares really helped even the odds.