Yang the Chatty Kathy

[bvanevery]

I can't believe I took 5 days to complete a game with Yang.  It wasn't continuous play, but it was an awful lot of hours per day.  Could I have spent 40 hours on that game??  I hope not, but 16..20 hours certainly happened.  There's a reason I quit games when they're not going well.  That one went well... but this time, I will endeavor not to belabor some things.  Like eXtermination.

The start of this game is working against me in that regard though.  I'm on what looks like an island, in a "pinch" on the west coast.  Decent agricultural land with a pod next to me.  The Garland Crater is immediately north and very obvious on the radar.  I move 1 colonist to flat moist terrain in order to improve it next turn when I settle it.  There's a pod next to me as well, so I need to choose a unit to pop it.  I plan to send my 2nd colonist straight north to the Crater, so I do not use it for pod popping.  Instead I use my scout, even though I'll lose the ability to strike back if there's a mindworm.  I pop a minerals deposit, making this a very good capitol location!  But also a mindworm, so I move my 2nd colonist north as planned.  The scout takes the mindworm hit and of course it does very little damage as this is Turn 1.

I choose Discover, Build focus on the premise that I'm going to want to crank out a lot of Secret Projects with this land.  This is only reinforced by my 2nd settlement, which scores a Monolith, a minerals deposit, and access to 2 of the interior squares of the Crater.  I've got 2 really good cities to build SPs from, and a 3rd will surely get a lot of minerals from the Crater, in time.  I get Biogenetics and decide I don't need lots more cities, I can build up the ones I've got and colonize slowly.  I settle my 4th city on the east coast next to a Monolith.  That city I will use to make more colonists; the other 3 will go vertical.  I build Recycling Tanks in all 4 cities, rushing them as my money allows.

I build as many Formers as I can support with my Police State.  Got the money for that from a popped pod earlier.  I also got a Battle Ogre so my capitol doesn't need much in the way of garrison units.  Nevertheless since I got Social Psych, I plan to build Recreation Commons in the 3 "Secret Project producing" cities.  Rather than stock with the usual scouts, which lowers production.  Once I have more bases, I'll have them take over the responsibility for all these Formers I built.  But for now, working the land is the most valuable thing I can do.

I got Svensgaard's comm frequency from a pod.  We sign a Treaty and trade a bit of tech.  Not much because I'm not giving him SP techs though.  Later on when I have something more expendable like Information Networks, I contact him again.  We end up doing a lot of trades and an alliance.  He gives me contact to Santiago, which gets me to Domai, which gets me to Roze.  Treaties and trades all around, and lots of getting back to Svensgaard, to sell comm frequencies and so he can pull maps out of them.

I end up with a lot of world map information, and looky looky, Roze is just south of my island!  She's stillborn with only 2 cities on a tiny island.  I will honor our Treaty for now, if only because I've got Secret Projects to build.  And I haven't gotten Doctrine:Mobility out of Svensgaard yet, nor any kind of armor.  But once I get all this stuff done, she's toast, one way or another.  Maybe I'll try bullying her into giving me Planetary Networks.  She's already Seething though, so that could just start a war.  Which is fine as long as I have the troops to immediately invade her.  Probably won't take much... but I'm wary of needing to kill her all at once, because her probe teams can be deadly at retaking cities.  Despotic Police States seem to be especially vulnerable to that.

Cha Dawn and the Caretakers are in the game, but presently unaccounted for.  I could make ships to go find them, but Secret Projects are top priority.  Domai has started on The Merchant Exchange and I don't have that tech yet.  Otherwise no one else has begun anything.

[bvanevery]

Despite my Discover, Build focus, Domai completed The Merchant Exchange before I ever got the tech.  I completed The Human Genome Project, The Weather Paradigm, The Virtual World, and The Command Nexus.  I have decent tech due to a lot of trading with Svensgaard, handing him cash when I came up with it.  Unfortunately that means he's got tech too, but he's a happy ally for now, and he's somewhat far away from me if he does turn on me.  Can't really complain as I'm Unsurpassed.

Svensgaard went to war with Santiago and the Caretakers, dragging me in.  I haven't had time to get any probe teams down to Santiago, although she's somewhat nearby.  I have no idea where the Caretakers are.

I just recently completed The Command Nexus and am working on a round of Plasma sentinels for all my cities.  I brought a Probe Team to Roze's pathetic little island of the 2 cities.  She had the nerve to summarily declare war on me!  I guess she doesn't have any concept of how weak she is.  Or she thinks if I destroy her, she's just going to restart somewhere else?  Well, maybe I will not kill her at all.  Just let her sit there and stew.  I don't have troops to take her out yet, but Svensgaard has Nonlinear Mathematics and I figure it's only a matter of money to him.  Or Santiago probably has it and I'll get around to stealing it soon enough.

I switched to only Build focus for a time, because Svensgaard had Explore techs I wanted to buy from him.  Now I think I will switch to Explore, Build as I'd like to get The Empath Guild.

The Monsoon Jungle is somewhat south of my island, past Roze.  That may be too far to be of much use, but with a bit of work I could probably make a land bridge to it.  Invading Santiago may be a higher priority though.  I said I wasn't going to fool around with eXtermination this game.

[bvanevery]

A long time ago, I sent a Probe Team out on a Transport.  The intention was to get down to the Spartans and either steal from them, or infiltrate them.  As I neared their coast, I ran afoul of a Spartan impact foil.  That was unusual becasue she didn't actually have coastal cities, they were inland.  I managed to get my Probe Team off the boat before she sunk it.

I was on a tiny island with 2 supply pods, both on fungus.  One of them had a river running through it, but it was a 2 square river covered in fungus.  I figured it would be best to try to enter the river on the non-pod square, then use the river the next turn to take the pod.  This would maximize my movement for escape.  A decent plan, but that non-pod square sprung a mindworm on me!  I retreated, but I couldn't get away from the clump of fungus, as I was up against the coast.  The mindworm only needed to move 1 square through the fungus to kill me.  Miraculously, it didn't, and I survived to try something else.

I wasn't sure if that mindworm had faded into non-existence, or was just waiting next to that pod to kill me.  So I thought heck, what about the other pod?  If I die, I die; it would be quite awhile before another Transport would be coming.  So I popped the 2nd pod and whaddya know, I get a slow Transport!  My ticket off this island... if only Santiago doesn't sink me immediately.

I weighed my options.  Just send the slow Transport west to grab a sea pod?  Or continue with my original mission of trying to steal from the Spartans?  I chose the latter.  Slowly, slowly I crawled towards her coast.  I hoped that she had cruised off somewhere else, or run into the Pirates, who are at war with her.

My luck held!  I made through a fungal patch on her coast without provoking an Isle.  I landed my Probe Team next to an inland city of hers.  She hadn't built a Probe Team in there, so I was free to go.  I had already traded with Svensgaard to be as far ahead on techs as I could be.  She had been working on The Empath Guild, same as the Caretakers awhile before.  I stole the tech!  Then with 1 Artifact and a pile of cash, I rushed it that very turn.  Next turn I voted myself Governor!  Ha ha!     Suck it aliens, suck it Sparta!

To put that maneuver in perspective, I'm only just now rounding the southern tip of my island with a flotilla that includes a Skimship Probe Team.  For fear of being summarily sunk by Santiago.  That chancical survival basically got me a Secret Project.  The last tech I reasearched myself was Gene Splicing, and they're taking an awfully long time to get.  Even though I'm Unsurpassed, have got cities of substantial size, have got Network Nodes in all of them, am working on a Research Hospital in my capitol, etc.

I've got some conquest forces moving south to get on boats and bother Roze.  Not sure if I've really got enough to do the job, and my road network is not really good enough to carry the load either.  On the other hand, Roze is helpless, so I keep pressing forwards.  Invading Sparta, that's going to be awhile.  I have 2 inland cities that have gone to size 7 and they're spewing colonists every few turns.  I don't really have any good land to settle those colonists on, I would prefer sea bases.  So I may use those colonists to pump the population of my coastal cities a little.

Yep, Hab Complexes would be useful right about now.  If it goes on too long I'll pop some Artifacts.  I'd like to steal Secrets of the Human Brain from the Caretakers first though.  That's the only tech I don't have.

Cha Dawn was the last holdout faction that I hadn't found, that The Empath Guild put me in touch with.  She's not friendly but we're not at war yet.  Meanwhile, Domai decided he likes me enough to ally with me, perhaps because we're both fighting the Caretakers.

[bvanevery]

Cha Dawn eventually declared war on me.  Domai got a map out of him.  Turns out he's straight west of me on a similarly sized island.  Guess I have a new primary invasion target, as he's closer than the Spartans.  Also the Pirates are near the Spartans and likely to keep them somewhat contained for awhile.

I don't have a map of the Caretakers yet.  I know where 1 of their cities is, past the Pirates and the Spartans.  I suspect that the center of the Caretaker empire, is toroidially on the exact opposide side of the map from myself.  That makes Skimship Probe Team missions especially long to complete, with a great risk of being sunk for the effort spent.  I've got 1 en route anyways, hoping for the best.  Last I looked, the only tech to steal was Secrets of the Human Brain.  Turns out Cha Dawn has it as well, so perhaps I'll grab it before probing the Caretakers.  Then I'll be able to steal their map, which at this point would actually be of value to me.

I finally brought up enough units to take 1 of Roze's cities.  I took care to move in stacks of units so that she would not be able to counter-probe me, and also to garrison the taken city with 2 Probe Teams.  Fortunately she surrendered.  I have left her only her capitol.  Well at least she won't have to rebuild her HQ!  The AI can be so stupid about that.

My interior cities around The Garland Crater are coughing up citizens so fast, that I've started putting new bases on my island.  They're not optimally placed, in that they don't have a full radius of city resources available to them, but they are covering substantial gaps in my initial settlement pattern.  This may be sub-optimal someday, but it doesn't matter right now, and my coastal cities are otherwise disposed.  I'm going to need to improve my small navy to go after Cha Dawn.  I think a land bridge will take to long, it's not worth the number of Formers I'd need to make.

Just as soon as I get Tech Parity with everyone, I will pop my Artifacts.  I think I have 6 in cities already, and 1 coming by water from the south.

[bvanevery]

Well I didn't pop Artifacts, because I researched Industrial Automation on my own.  Then Doctrine:Initiative, so I've had SPs to build.  I did steal Secrets of the Human Brian from Cha Dawn, and I did steal the Caretakers' world map.  I've settled a bunch of cities on my island and have gotten big, complete with Tree Farms.  I've almost finished clearing fungus off the southern tip of my island, where I'll put my last city.  I might like to do some bridging projects to nearby islands, if only to give Roze some room to grow into.  I will not make any new Formers though.

My landlocked cities are producing 6-1-1 Marines to make coastal assaults, or amphibious 1-3-1 units to do the final taking and holding of such cities.  I suppose I'm going to need probe teams too.  My western coastal cities are producing either Trance Destroyer Transports or Missile Cruisers.  Eastern coastal cities are producing Fungicidal Sea Formers.  The intent is to invade Cha Dawn to the west.  I am a Wealthy Planned Police State, so it remains to be seen how effective my missiles are in combat.  Hopefully effective enough. 

We were in a blackout for awhile.  My ally Svensgaard has researched Doctrine: Air Power, but he's seething at me.  I expect that the next time I talk to him, he'll dump me.  I'd like to get the invasion of Cha Dawn underway before talking to him, but that could require luck.  My research focus is Explore, Build, so I don't expect to be getting Advanced Military Algorithms any time soon.  No Power, so he won't like my politics for a long time, and will probably end up at war with me.  A pity because I'm totally compatible with a Power society once I've got that tech.  I could of course pop a bunch of Artifacts, but I won't bother unless my invasion isn't going as well as I'd like.  Knocking off Svensgaard isn't the worst thing I could be doing with my time, as he's the next closest faction after Cha Dawn.

My budget is 50-10-40 and my big cities with Research Hospitals seem to do a pretty good job at research.  I'd say I'm much more centralized and "on it" than my previous game, whee I had to get to a major land mass before really setting up.  I did a much better job of early spreading this time.  It took me until pretty late in the last game to have a ring of heavily populated cities around my capitol.  In this game, I've managed that pretty much from the beginning.

[bvanevery]

The invasion of the Cultists is a rout.  My Missile Marines instantly destroy Cha Dawn's feeble synthmetal defenders.  He doesn't have any probe teams to trouble me, he never learned that tech and everyone hates him.  I'm not making Marines anymore as I don't need any more beachheads.  All I need to do is supply enough missile rovers to penetrate the interior, and enough plasma garrison units to hold the ground.  I'm not making cruiser transports anymore, as I've got enough for the gap of water between us, and no substantial naval threat.

I'm working on a land bridge to the Cultists, but that won't get completed until long after the invasion is over.  I'm also bridging to other nearby islands, because I can.  I'm not settling new cities as there is no need, and my existing cities haven't run out of happy room yet.

I bought Doctrine:Air Power from Domai for a mere 125 credits.  Good ally!  Svensgaard hasn't contacted me, despite us "touching ships" several times.  His official attitude is Noncommittal.  Maybe the upswing in my military output, makes him not want to get on my bad side.

I completed The Planetary Energy Grid and have started on The Planetary Datalinks.  I have not popped any Artifacts.  I will pop 'em to get a new SP to work on, but so far I haven't needed to.

[bvanevery]

Weeell the coastal landings were a rout.  Somehow Cha Dawn is coughing up an awful lot of units from his island interior and is spamming me with them.  I didn't reinforce my coastal cities with armor fast enough and nearly lost one.  Did manage to get stabilized but I find my Missiles don't chew up his units quite so easily now.  Maybe the ones I blew away on the coast were untrained?  Maybe my Wealthy social choice is hindering my progress.  Logistically I'm limited to the speed at which my old garrison units walk up to a rendezvous point with a cruiser transport.  It's taking time to bring stuff over.  Even old Scout units do prove useful though, because Cha Dawn throws mindworms at me.  The Scouts tend to die, but they inflict a wound on a counterattack, and then someone else finishes off those awful creatures.

I could end this by building an air force, but I'm still more interested in building infrastructure and schlepping over all my old units.  As it is I just have the 1st plane I made running around, sinking stuff at sea mostly.  I'm not losing ground, I'm just not advancing.  Cha Dawn's east and south coast are mine, except for his capitol, which has a pretty big horde in it.  My Marines that attacked there, they just bounced off some mindworms.

I will complete The Planetary Datalinks in a few turns.  Nobody has challenged me for it, or any other SP.

[bvanevery]

My industry finally kicked in, as did my slow walking troops.  Also the land bridge to Cha Dawn is halfway done, which shortens the distance the ships have to move.  I even made some missile rover artillery and some untrained missile penetrators.  I'm too cheap to build an Aerospace Complex when there are no enemies worthy of bombardment anywhere near me.  I have enough units to finish off Cha Dawn, so I need something else to do.  I'm making supply crawlers as I do have a lot of mines that are going unused.  I haven't popped any Artifacts because Santiago got Adaptive Doctrine during all of this and I want to steal it.

The Pirates finally broke our pact.  I hope he gets pissy soon because that will give me something new to do!

I discovered The Manifold Nexus west of the Cultist island, so I'll go colonize it.

[bvanevery]

I never did get to The Manifold Nexus.  Too busy.

I popped all my Artifacts.  I've built piles of Secret Projects, most recently The Theory of Everything.  I've got mag tubes all over my main island.  It looks more like a continent now, because of all the surrounding islands I've attached to it.  I have not managed to connect to the conquered Caretaker or Datatech islands, although I'm still working on those.  Of all my technical acquisitions, Super Formers have eluded me.  I'm still pursuing an Explore, Build focus.

The Pirates did declare war, I think by allying with the Caretakers, so I did not get an explicit announcement.  One turn I just noticed the status had changed.  Domai also broke our pact, and then later declared war by allying with the Caretakers.  The Caretakers and Santiago were fighting briefly but they've kissed and made up.  Wonder what an alien kiss looks like?  So, no one likes me unless I've conquered them.

I've taken 2 Pirate bases.  One was right off my coast, so that was a no brainer.  The other was farther afield, and happened when I was redeploying my old fission ships.  They actually don't stand up in combat all that well, so that was the limit of my expansion.  Too many improvements and Secret Projects to deal with, before building a new navy.  My weaponry has also gone from Chaos to Tachyon in that time, just from popping more Artifacts I find while exploring.  I've got an Artifact sitting next to that far Pirate base I captured, but I haven't been able to get a Transport over there to cash it.  They keep getting sunk.  So I'm finally resorting to building a Transport on site.

I've got a fusion boatload of fission Missile Marines waiting to invade Svensgaard's nearest bases, but I'd like to back them with garrison units.  Those will come soon.  Many bases are building Tachyon Fields now, but one base has completed all of that and is putting out fusion Trance Probability Police.  I will deploy the old fission Plasma Police in field.

I didn't build Genjack Factories because I don't need the unhappiness and I've got plenty of minerals.  If I get Robotic Assembly Plants I'll build those.  With all the Hybrid Forests I've built, I'm not worried about eco-damage.  I will eventually claim The Manifold Nexus anyways.

Seems like it would be pretty easy to vote myself the winner, if only the Caretakers weren't as far away from me on the map as they can be.  I have to wipe them out for a Diplomatic Victory.  I pretty much have to go through the Pirates and then the Spartans to do that.  Domai can be skipped.

[bvanevery]

The invasion of the Pirates has begun.  I am hassled by an alliance of ships, which badly wound but don't destroy my Probability cruisers.  Mostly the enemy ships provide target practice for a small Tachyon air force.  The fission Missile Marines have a mostly unobstructed field of fire.  I'm not making all that many new offensive units right now, just more cruisers and police garrison units.  Many of my cities are still completing Robotic Assembly Plants.

I have connected the Cultist island to my artificial continent and have complete rail lines everywhere.  Still working on the Datatech island, as Svensgaard has enjoyed landing troops right where I'm trying to build my land bridge.  I'm clearing pods from the islands around The Manifold Nexus, and expect I'll colonize it "soon".  I have Super Former capability now, but not any need for them, as they have come so late.  Maybe I'll cash all my old Formers on a Secret Project.

[bvanevery]

Now the combat is not even a rout, it's a sweep.  I stopped making Tachyon Needlejets as I have plenty to just blow things to bits.  Didn't even bother with Copters, figured the Needlejets had better range for deployment.  I have finally re-garrisoned all my old non-police units, leading me to realize that the problem of "where should they stay?" never really goes away.  I always need police units because I've got The Cloning Vats.  Conquered cities grow rather quickly, especially Pirate cities on water that's been developed with kelp farms and whatnot.  So, enter the Clean Fission Scout Police unit.  Often takes 1 turn to build, and provides the policing without providing the armor.  Sometimes I forget that I can make those.  I'm backing every conquered sea base with a AAA Probability Tachyon Battleship anyways.

I'm still only a Wealthy society.  Even though The Cloning Vats would let me choose Power without any penalties, I really don't need the bonuses that Power provides.  My units summarily kill anything in front of them, so I don't need higher Morale.  I've got piles of minerals from my factories, so I don't really need better Support.  Might as well just take the money and the industry bonus from Wealth.

All my coastal cities that are "finished", are building AAA Probability Tachyon Battleships.  They're slow to deploy, but they are gradually sweeping out the world.

All my landlocked cities are producing Super Fungicidal Fusion Formers, as I have nothing better to build.  I've been cashing in my older Formers to speed various improvements along.  I'm building land bridges and rails to "wherever" because I can, and because I have nothing better to do.  Moving them on rail networks, and extending those networks, is way faster than pushing sea units to target.  I don't know if I'll be able to build a land bridge all the way to the Caretakers, but we'll see what happens.

I researched Orbital Spaceflight and am building a nuke.  Other factions don't have crap for tech.  I can't believe Svensgaard is daft enough to keep fighting.

I still haven't managed to colonize The Manifold Nexus.  I was trying to make a land bridge to it, but got interrupted by a lot of nice resources popping up out of the water.  With all the mouseclicks I have to do in any given turn, it gets hard to remember to build a transport and put anything on that island.  That said, I think I've got a transport about to be completed over that way, for that purpose.  Guess I need a colonist to go with it.

I still haven't managed to bridge from the Datatech island to my artificial continent.  That 1 city is producing Super Formers, but I had one of those hailstones or whatever that destroyed all my solar collectors.  So they've been preoccupied rebuilding those.  The bridge pretty much has to come from the Datatech side due to nice resources being in the way on the artificial continent side.  I do finally have an unneeded transport en route to pick up spare Super Formers and bring them to the Datatech island.

Such burdens of large empire administration.

[bvanevery]

The war enters a new phase, as I now have captured sea bases touching the coast of the Spartan home island.  I think my air coprs could simply pound the interior cities to bits, and then I can air drop in... if she hasn't built too many Aerospace Complexes.  So my landlocked cities have started to produce Drop Probability Police.  I will have to wait until they are shipped over by transport, as I do not have a land bridge completed yet.  It will be a bit of a footrace between the Super Formers and the transports as to which one does the better job of invading Sparta.  If I do finally make a land bridge, I'll be able to exhaust all those old fission units like missile speeders and whatnot.

I don't strictly need to go after the Pirates anymore, as he's no longer on my route to the Caretakers.  To the extent that my coastal cities produce excess ships though, I will finish him off.

I finally put a colony on the island of The Manifold Nexus.  +1 Planet, whoopie!  I finally also bridged the Datatech island to my continent and have a rail connection to my 1 city there.  If Roze had any brains, she's go colonize all that unclaimed land I built a rail through a long time ago.  It's a series of connected islands to the east, now just 1 big long north-south land mass.  It's not actually all that useful a thing for me to have done, but at the time I started, it looked like a reasonable defensive idea.  My vast fleet pushing southeast, came later.

I'm working on The Pholus Mutagen but who cares.  My eco-damage is zero, and I don't need psi attacks.  Maybe I shouldn't bother with Explore anymore, and just switch to Build only.  Or be different and go for Discover.  I don't really need anything, and there's nothing especially useful I can think to acquire at this point.  Even if the Caretakers figure out Fusion Power by the time I'm invading their home island, I can X them with Hovertanks.  Winning is all about the mouseclicks at this point.

I've played this game over a number of days.  Not continuously, but I do wonder at the total time investment.  Why bother?

[bvanevery]

Know what?  I quit.  I can't pretend to be interested in this anymore.  I do the same things every turn.  The enemy doesn't fight back, there's basically no challenge to it at all.  I've taken over a bunch of cities, and it's clear I'd have to take even more to win the game.  I'm not sure what I should do differently, other than wait around to Transcend or corner the energy market or something.  The moral of the story seems to be that taking over the Pirates is a drag.  It takes soooo long for the ships to arrive!  Even with The Maritime Control Center, even with powerful ships that the enemy can't scratch.  Just too damn long.

I built a lot of causeways this game.  If I built them all in a straight line, maybe I could have bridged to the Caretakers by now?

Yang is not a particularly fast research faction, when he focuses on Wealth.  Yeah, I'm light years ahead of the other players.  But I think I'd need The Space Elevator to conquer the far side of the planet conveniently, and it takes a looooong time to get that tech.