| Subject: Game 31 - Restrspective |
Author:
Don
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Date Posted: 02:06:55 15/07/08
I apologise for the delay in this retrospective. Firstly I am between ISP’s at the moment and for the last week and a half I have been unwell, with some pain killers that provide an interesting effect on my mental state – is that a final attack by PBS?
In hindsight I have written in too much detail, and apologise for that, but it’s too late to change now.
Well I shouldn’t have been playing this game, but I expected this was going to be a low Industry/credits game, which tend to be simpler so I decided in the end to play. I’m optimistically aiming for completing the game by around turn 15. Peter had told us it would have a unique setup in that most aspects had been randomly generated so I was keen to see the result as well.
Turn 0:
Setup is good with over 28 planets visible from my Origin. Fortunately I started with a high INT officer on my comm box as 11 of these are beyond the normal comm. Box range. However I have also seen the Priern Home world just 47 away. I notice that 1 planet is planet number 3027, meaning there are potentially 2,000 planets and needing 300 planets to win depending on numbers of other planetoid types in the game. I can see worm holes but no asteroids yet. Yikes, that’s a big ask and it will take more like 25 turns rather than 15 turns.
Turn 1:
The trick on the first turn is to take the closest 4 planets as they will usually have high levels of IND, and also use high comm range ships to take some of the furthermost out planets to hopefully reveal more planets. Also you need the shortest range ships to take planets further out and in range of their targets for the following turn.
I’ve decided to leave the Home World for now, as every ship is needed for planets – the planets taken early get the best chance for long term growth and generation of income and early on I am paranoid about taking every planet I can see from my Origin, especially those inside 65 range, before anyone else can get to them – I find a healthy dose of paranoia useful for playing DOS, or does the game just make me paranoid?
The closest 4 planets have only 4600 IND and POP revealing that this will be a VERY low IND game, confirmed by the few other planets I have taken or scanned. In this game Factory ships (+2,500 IND for most mines) and Hospital ships (+2,500 Pop for most planets) will be very important. While a Factory will generally be more useful than a Hospital, the Hospitals may be needed to boost population levels on planets to let mines be built.
Well I know Tony is playing, but also that Steve Bowler, Fabrizio and Brian Sudlow aren’t playing this turn. I scanned a scout of P5 Tcheubba so that is only 2 players I know of so far. Looks like a new player is looking for allies in the messages.
Someone has already reached 15 ships, so they must have captured a Rebel, which means they had a decent size warship to start with. With low Pop it is hard to build mines, I only have the 2 on my Origin. I’ve built another comm box and small transport, probe and spy so I have 3 extra ships for taking planets. I’m planning to next turn drop one comm box, capture a planet with the small transport and use the new small transport to move to the dropped comm. Box ready fro next turn meanwhile leaving the new comm. Box at the origin.
Turn 2:
In the end I do leave the first comm box where it was dropped, and use the ST to take a new planet, and carry the new CB to another new planet, building 4 new planet taking ships – leaving the Origin with no CB. A risk that shouldn’t be too bad this early in the game, but it enables me to maximise my planet taking. It works and I receive the Hospital ship special ability for most planets. I also set up long range plans for my small fighter so it can maximise its planet taking and return to Origin to work the Home World.
I’ve built only 2 mines due to Pop restrictions on planets – someone else already has 4.
I can see 7 DLS ships – 2 of which are Rebels, already looking quite numerous. The only other player I see is a scanned ship of P8 Silent Assassin. The name sounds hostile so I will add him to my Enemies list. I also scan a planet over 600 from Silverfall.
New SA for all players is announced, limiting the number of ships that can be built. This will be a sever limitation, but won’t have any impact for quite a while due to low IND levels everywhere.
Turn 3:
Still leading planets (27), and am leading mines (6), but miss out on Factories – probably a tie and I miss out on % of planets or something.
This turn I build my 2nd Bulk Carrier and 2 Hospitals. My IND/POP at my Origin goes from 26963 / 25490 to 24461 / 17215. The Hospitals will prove pivotal in keeping my Origin able to build ships. The problem with many of these special ships in this game is their size and the amount of IND required to build them. Hospitals are size 25, big but not the worst – certainly worth it for a few of them.
I manage to scan a close in planet of an NPC not far away – IND / POP of 4600/4600. I see 3 players at the Trading Planets – first actual contact this game. P6 Anla Shok, P7 House Jajcal, and P27 Thelsamar which are respectively, Rangers from Babylon 5, one of the playing positions in another space PBM, and Dwarven town in WoW. Yes I check out the names of players I come across to possibly get some idea about them.
I also check out the names of the new players asking for contacts in the game. It seems that the name and email of Dale corresponds to someone involved in Pbm/strategy games. P12 seems to have been involved more in RPGs and maybe that explains their early drop out.
Unfortunately something then happens which changes the nature of the game for me. It’s announced on the message board that I have Hospitals which will label me as the planet leader to most people, and with a low resource game where Hospitals are far more valuable, that really labels me as a target. For the next two weeks there are several messages about this topic, and when I try to steer people back to concentrating on DLS, I am again targeted. At this stage I am really not enjoying the game at all. I know I haven’t upset anyone as I have only just met people at a Trading Planet. Looking at the posts, I’m guessing they were mostly from a couple of players. I try to bluff it off hoping that it was someone seeing my player name, and don’t actually know about the Hospitals.
Last turn someone had 22,000 antipoints and this turn a player already has a ring. Hmm, early for both.
Turn 4:
My Origin location is announced as the location of a DLS Battle station. Basically I feel that my game is over. Clearly they do know about the Hospital and scanned it last turn which would show it had just been built and its location.
Tony gained the help of the Imperial Scholars last turn. This turn he gets a ring. The attacks on me come to an end. Hmmm, looks like they were only a diversion to prevent people from trying to capture the ring of Player 26, who is now identified as Robots of Dawn. Thought he wasn’t playing if it is the same person as last game. (I also develop a grudge against Robots as I now read the book “Robots of Dawn” by Asimov. I really regret reading that book, and have lost some respect for Asimov – I don’t recommend anyone else read it. I fully blame Robots for that :)
Tony was allied to player 2, and receives the message player 2 has no more ships – ie player 2 has already been knocked out of this game.
Piecing things together it looks like P26 and presumably others attacked player 2 (presumably NPC) knocking him out but in the process P26 took a lot of damage, earning him the Imperial Scholars who rewarded him with a Ring, which he defended by broadcasting information about my Hospital gained from a lucky ship scan. The ring gave him the lead and Flagships. So the group that was already tough enough to destroy an NPC Battlestation now has Flagships, free access to P2 Origin to build over and know that I am planet leader. [I’d be interested to know how close or far from the truth this was]
My gameplan had to change. I’ve added Defence and Flexibility, with plans to improve Offence soon. This turn I have built two Laser Cannons to pick off any Search Bacons or Comm boxes that may appear nearby (defence), Monitor to enable mobile ship building(flexibility), and finally the CB to provide long range visibility at the Origin on a permanent basis (more defence). This takes its toll and I am now down to IND/POP of 19,199 / 14,039 at my Origin.
In special ships, I’m on 6 mines and the leader is on 10 – I can’t start 10 mines even with extra Pop yet. Meanwhile I got Academies (most ships) and Colleges (largest increase in new planets – first time this game), but both are size 35, and I can’t afford the IND to build any yet.
I run into my closest neighbour, Stingray, and offer to fight off DLS so he can take a planet. (Gee, I’m such a nice guy, how could he attack me later??? :) I also scan yet another planet close to an origin (4600/4600), this one I am to find out later is of a DLS Shadowstation. The previous close planet was near the Origin of P30 who would also have been a close neighbour so that gave me some extra space to expand into.
Meanwhile there have been a few new players announcing themselves. I make contact with P12 (Titan), and P17 (Sunglasses). Both seemed to be genuine people (I checked Google for any references), and it would seem that P12 was more into RPGs so DOS may not have suited. Turns out P17 played way back when I used to play previously but in America. And I finally move to the Home world.
Turn 5 – 10
Tony gets yet another ring from Imperial Scholars in turn 5, yikes 2 can make you susceptible, and then I get one in turn 6. Damn! Fortunately for me Tony received the Flagships for his first ring and continued to receive them for the next two turns, keeping them away from my enemies.
I proceed to pick up the planets around P30 and expand out, also trying to capture those between their and my Origins. I now start seeing a few P9 PBS planets, and unfortunately I start to blunder on to some of P9’s planets. First one has PDU, whew, but have to try diplomacy as often just a couple of planets can lead to war. P9 seems reasonable.
I scope out the Shadow station which hasn’t built many ships yet and set to work building a base near it to launch my attacks, first using Spies to take out the only ships other than the SS that can fire beyond 20 so I can bring in Cocoons of offensive ships that I am building.
The points start pouring inform about turn 8 on, and I am desperate to build up my Special Abilities. I am desperate for +1 to Sec, Tac, Eng, but mostly Sec. Also I’m after Fuel Wells, additional FI phase, and the ability to capture ships or Salvagers. I’m also training heavily in TEC to pick up a few extra SAs.
In turn 6 I finally get most Mines and immediately build 4 factories – need them bad. Also have built my second Monitor that turn reducing IND to 12,000 at my Origin.
Silent Assassin comes on the scene making a bit of noise about being a newbie trying who needs help. Try to assist on the message board, but can no longer post under my player name. Manage to convince him to set up an email account. Can’t help for a couple of turn but eventually can send a factory to his Origin, where I see PBS is already helping him. [Gary did you know who SA was at that stage?] I did remove him from my enemies list though never quite really feel comortable SA though I don’t doubt his story, but as a newbie we need to keep him playing.
My small fighter returns to my Origin in turn 8 after completing a run of taking 7 planets – I’m very happy with that.
In turn 8 I lose the lead in ships after a build order goes wrong and I fail to build a bulk carrier to go with a Cocoon – never to regain that lead. I complete my second trade fleet in turn 9.
I lost the lead in mines around turn 9 which lasted until I reclaimed it in turn 12. This could have been disastrous. Planet taking has been slowing down as I concentrate on building fighting forces. Also ships that can’t warp are running out of space to move to in order to find planets, and the planet taking fleet is needing repairs. I have added a Rebel which I worked out from things others have told me, only needed a Battle Cruiser to capture.
Turn 11 – 13.
I build my 3rd Monitor. A little unsure as to the benefit now as it only provides an enhanced building capacity for 2 more turns, and also remonstrate with myself that I should have been watching the ship build limit effect closer, and built the Monitor a turn earlier. Building it this turn I can only get the benefit of building with it (ie 10 ships/turn) for two turns, until the limit drops to 8 ships in turn 14. where I do get the benefit from it is that I can warp the Monitor to new locations and build comm boxes the same turn.
By now I have come up with a strategy. I plan to build as many planet taking ships as possible in this and the next few turns. By making a big push during this time of low ship building, it will make it harder for anyone else to catch up, or build a fleet to combat me. That should be nearly 40 ships, to be mostly Spies, Battle Cruisers and other cruisers. This level of build never quite eventuates as I end up spending some builds on Trade fleets, and Comm box fleets. And the planet taking drops remarkably, down to just 6 planets in turns 12 and 13. This must be letting the competition catch up.
Turn 11 I finally take the lead and get Flagships. Since Tony had Flagships, someone has had enormous amounts of money which apparently would have given them Flagships. Not sure how they managed it at this stage of the game. I’m also leading points and anti points from the action at the DLS Shadowstation.
However I find a second Shadowstation with a huge fleet in attendance. There was a gap in planets out from my Origin, and in sending a comm box out there into the dark I found the Shadow station lurking nearby, as did P10. The following turn we both end up sharing 4 planets around the DLS Origin. Turns out P10 is Peter Tottenham and we amiably split up the planets, allowing me to establish a base within the 25-30 range out from the DLS Origin – ideal for my new Flagships to operate from. Peter even allows me to keep the insurgent of his I accidentally captured. I leave the Fluffmeister to finish off the first SS, as I move to concentrate on the second.
A lucky planet scan in turn 12 gave me Stingrays Origin – we indeed do seem to be neighbours.
Turn 13 and I get the Ring location ability. There are 5 unclaimed rings, I must be first or equal first to get this ability which is good news for me, as I really need to stay a step ahead of others with special abilities. With the ring I currently have that would be a total of 6 which I think would just about force people to attack me. So I decide on 2 ring planets to take, and give locations of a ring each to Tony (fluff), Dale (Sunglasses – my ally for some time now), and Tomasz /Craig the Silent Assassin.
I’ve contacted P7 House Jajcal and unfortunately e has dropped out of the game.
Turn 14:
I‘m doing well but now 10 ships behind the leader. He gained 12 that turn. We were only meant to be able to build 8 ships according to the new rules, though when entering my turn I couldn’t remember what it was so I built 10 anyway. I guess the leader captured a Rebel as well (most of us would have had the ability to purchase a ship at the trading planets, which I out to good use, mainly purchasing Cocoons there – costly but saved a lot of IND).
DLS down to 3 Battlestations and I haven’t found any yet. Did find another Shadow Station though.
I’ve increased the planet taking again and got it back to 9 for this turn. Really should be much higher considering the number of unclaimed planets that still exist.
I get the Spy Report special ability, and it is mostly good news, but it shows there are several people at my heels. Here are some of the leaders:
Plyer Ships Planets
1 104 114
4 114 73
5 55 83
9 83 103
11 94 88
16 79 47
18 68 48
27 81 77
99 528 133
The only player close in planets is P9 PBS, but fortunately they are 19 ships behind, however that number may be mostly the extra special ships I have – 9 Factories and 4 Hospitals, make up 13 of those ships. PBS is also only 50,000 points behind me, or 5 Special Abilities, a bit close for my liking. So while PBS is 11 planets behind, the next player, Guluu, is 26 behind – some breathing space, but only 10 ships. I’ve only just seen Guluu a few turns ago and thought he may have picked up a standby position – obviously wrong.
There are a few other players with a high planet to ship ratio such as P16 selah (79:47), P18 Fluff (68:48) and P5 Tcheubba (83:55), all showing very effective use of their ships, better than the leaders, and I suspect if there had been more IND about then they would all have been competitive as well. In fact Tcheubba and Selah are 4th and 5th highest planets at this stage, and while they are strong players, I don’t consider them long term chances due to the small number of ships. The interesting thing is that P5 has over 3 million credits. Unfortunately he has very low points so won’t have been hit by the tax SA yet. One of the reasons I went so heavily for the points is they also provided a major source of income for me with the Special Ability that provides credits equal to my points.
At this stage the clear leader is DLS. I was very concerned early in the game that DLS had a chance of winning this one, though probably not the case now. However I am still keen to make sure we clean up the DLS Battlestations. My memory was poor and I thought we lost the ability to land at DLS Battlestatiosn so I had examined the building limits assuming we probably couldn’t trade, and would have to build the ships beyond turn 15 with our current credits – I didn’t expect DLS to be taken down for several turns. It was me in turn 15 that had the senior’s moment warning that there would be no more trade until DLS was defeated.
That wasn’t the only senior’s moment – I also forgot that Home Worlds don’t move with the Silverfall effect. This wastes the mves of several ships as apart from the Priern Home World near my Origin, I am also accessing the Brungir, and Everiel Home Worlds (and found Lexmons in turn 16).
I also see a few P7 planets, but no one else is taking them so I won’t until I am in a better position to avoid alerting other players to P7’s NPC status. I plan to launch a comm box in range of his Origin, not too far from these planets – I know the location due to an altercation with P8 that resulted in P7’s origin being published.
Turn 15 - 16
Initially another 9 planets, and then 16 planets in turn 16. That’s more like what I need, but I’m only half way to the target of 270 planets. I’m now 29 ahead of PBS (and 28 ships). Stingray is still about 2/3 of my total as is now Thelsamar. I really need to establish a significant break between me and everyone else. In Silverfall, wars are wars of attrition and a good way to lose is to get involved in pointless or ongoing conflict. Also in Silverfall, there is a momentum effect. It takes a few turns to initiate a strategy fully going and it takes a few turns to switch strategies, such as switch from attacking DLS to attacking a particular player. I need to establish as big a lead as possible, before others get the Spy Reports and can act upon it.
Ship builds are still normal for both turns, and in turn 16 Stingray has built 14! That is more than I expect to be accounted for by capturing Rebels. So I decide to change strategy so I can increase my build capacity and start building my 4th trading fleet next turn to support the additional Monitors I’ll need.
I’ve lost the lead in mines, but hope Stingray spends his builds on Factories rather than coming after me.
Lost a Cocoon with 3 Super battles to the third Shadow Station while locating a fourth. There seems to be an awful lot of Shadow Stations.
My scans on DLS failed, and the universe starts being drawn in to Silverfall. I hope that some planets will be swallowed up reducing the number required, but to no avail. No one will share scans or locations of Battlestations, but in turn 16 I receive the Find Battlestation ability.
I gain =1 ENG in turn 15 and then +1 ENG and +1 SEC in turn 16– woo hoo, that is a real boost to my fleets. But I also get one of the best SAs – Everlasting Fuel – WOO HOOOOO! That will stop ships needing to warp when low on fuel – a big boost. Few fleets now will have to warp for repairs or fuel, greatly improving their efficiency in taking planets as the following turn results will show. I am surprised that I have received that ability so soon – it is usually one of the very last.
However I also receive one of the 2 worst Special Abilities n the game – Virus damaging fleets with a fleet no. over 50. My other least favourite Special Ability is the one that causes new ships to automatically dock in the Battlestation on being built. That one has caused me a lot of grief over the years.
Turns 17 – 19:
Star Blazers send me a message. They want a Ring and were going to target Cheap Sunglasses’ ring, but has noticed my Factory there. He is checking if Cheap Sunglasses is an ally of mine. I’m 50% larger than him, but a war at this stage will severely hamper my ability to grab planets. I’m looking at giving Star Blazers one of mine, but Tony offers his as he feels 3 rings makes him a target, and he “can’t wait for the game to end”. So the deal is made that Tony gives one of his ring planets to Star Blazers, and in turn Star Blazers will give 2 planets to Tony and leave Cheap Sunglasses ring planet alone.
I’m getting moderate gains of 14/turn and so in turn 19 I try to reach the 200 mark from 168 as Stingray is picking up his pace and taking them at the same rate. I only make 189, dang, but a gain of 21 nevertheless, and a lead of 59. I really wanted to be 50% higher than the next player, however the planets are at the level that if I did nothing, then it would still take the next player 4 turns to reach me at their maximum planet gain. I’m trying to reach a level far enough ahead that the other players will think that it is not worth challenging for the lead, and will wait for the game to end, so I hope I am close to that level. Tony keeps telling me he can’t wait for the game to end. I’m feeling the same way, as I have so many things happening outside the game. Recently I have changed jobs and moved houses so I am feeling the strain. I notice from the Spy Reports that a number of players don’t seem to be very active now, so hopefully they will wait out the time once DLS is gone.
Turn 17 and I receive the Too Powerful – no further help Special Ability. I guess this is really the worst of them all. That explains why I received the Everlasting fuel last turn. There are only about 45 SA all up this game, a lot less than usual.
Someone posts a message that there are only 10 active players left, but I can’t work out who has dropped out. No one is obvious, and there seem to be a number of “quiet players” but they are leading or least in one category or another, so I cannot spot the drop outs.
For the first time ever I get the ability to build Marauder ships for 2 turns. Unfortunately the ship build limit has kicked in, and as there are other priorities, The Marauders miss out. The reduced builds however gives breathing space to my Origin and some other planets, a bit like leaving a field fallow. Last turn (16) my Origin had around 16,500 IND, but by the end of turn 19 it is up to 31,000, and another planet reaches 50,000 IND. Both of these planets have the benefit of Factories, Hospitals, +1 ENT and +1 ADM SA, and an officer with ENT 4 and high ADM.
I’ve started the full on assault on P7 House Jajcals planets, and manage to spot P5 Tcheubba’s Origin, at the same time that I hear from Silent Assassin that he has destroyed Tcheubba’s Battlestation, so I start work on his planets as well. Tcheubba has dropped out and I’m not sure why as he seemed to be in quite a strong position earlier n the game.
I managed to scan DLS and successfully use the Find Battlestation SA in turn 17. Someone else reports that they have also found the last BS. It has been in my interest to have DLS prosper, as the more planets destroyed by Silverfall the lower the target required, so I finally let up on my pursuit of DLS Battlestations. I send only 1 Spy ship to attack – I just want to get the Tracker special ship. I think the BS will be around for a while as my scan showed it had 80 defence and the officer has a rank of Vice Admiral so I expect a high SEC skill. When my Spy turns up in turn 18, the BS is already destroyed – very impressive. I imagine a lot of people had successfully scanned DLS earlier and knew where to find the BS.
The scan result shows the locations of many Rebel ships in DLS control so to supplement my forces I ty to capture a number of them, mainly with Battle Cruisers. Probably end up with about 50% success, but after a while I am ending up at the same place as another player but with no Rebel in sight, so I drop the tactic. I gained 5 Rebels in 2 turns, before losing a couple in later turns – overall a positive result.
I notice in the scan that there are a very large number of Mines over planets. I had come across some earlier where I had been trying to take some DLS planets. Despite destroying some mines, I still lost ships to even more mines. Anyway I developed a new tactic (new for me) to take these DLS planets. I strafe in to a planet with a Mine that is far enough away I will not reach it until the last movement phase. Since Mines are on ambush orders, the strafe occurs after the ambush would occur, so the ship safely makes it to the planet. And as the Mines are on ambush orders they are cloaked, so as long as the planets have no PDU, I can capture them. The trick is getting them away next turn as they can’t strafe again.
It’s successful the first time I try it, but the ship is destroyed from being in a fleet numbered over 50 due to the Virus SA, so I don’t get to test the departure from the planet. This SA is particularly nasty to me in this game and I end up losing a total of 13 ships by the end of the game due to this special Ability, which is over 10% of my fleet at its largest size of 125 in turn 17.
I have been sharing the Priern Home World with Selah, who I have allied with, in order to avoid attacking his ships. I now offer him the location of one of the other Home Worlds in order to stop sharing the one near my Origin. He accepts. I only manage to visit 1 more time before all officer gathering ships are redirected into planetary conquests.
For the last time I sent Trade fleets to a Trading planet in turn 19, after that they must all pull their weight in taking planets as well.
Next turn I will again go for a large planet grab but also set up for a large follow up turn, with the release of multiple Comm Boxes and building new ones.
Turn 20:
I tried again but still only 21 planets. However this puts me only 60 away from the number required. I’ve released 4 Comm Boxes and build 3 more, all but 2 with officers with good INT.
Silent Assassin tries to scan me but fails. He also doesn’t respond to emails, though PBS hasn’t been responding for some time. I suspect Silent Assassin has gone NPC as I haven’t heard from him for a few weeks.
I manage to find my second Ring, which gives me Guardian ships – very nice.
I search through my fleet looking at all the ships that can possibly take planets, such as Factories, Hospitals and trade fleets, as well as the usual ships. Looks like there are nearly 80 ships that could be used, and starting making lists of all previous planets I have seen but not managed to take that haven’t been taken by others as far as I know, DLS planets and planets captured by other players in the last few turns.
Then disaster strikes. On the day of order preparation, my wife has badly turned her ankle and we believe it to be broken, which is a major issue as we live in a 2 story town house. (Later it turned out to be a very bad sprain – but same effect in the short term). On top of that both wife and young child have developed bad colds. My plan for ending the game in the following turn are put on hold and I have to rush my orders, using the information I have gathered in a scattered and ineffective method, but still hope for another 40 planets (my full plan included suicidal warps to DLS mined planets, which I don’t do as I can’t be sure I can capture enough other planets to make sure – such a plan would cripple my fleet.)
Turn 21:
Only gained 26 planets – well short of what I wanted, but that’s partly due to being attacked by 4 players who take 10 planets between them. There has clearly been some preparation as some of the ships were cloaked over some planets before bombarding planets. There were also 4 scan attempts, Stingray and PBS failed, then my attempt at scanning DLS failed, costing another 10 interceptors making it easier for I presume P13 and Thelsamar to get through – the Spy report proves useful in identifying successful scanners. I, of course, being such a nice guy was concentrating still on DLS. Or trying to gather the latest information on where the DLS mines were – probably more like it.
This attack is of course what I have feared all along. Last turn there was almost 70 planets between me and Stingray, 210 to 141, so it would have take him 5 turns to catch me at his fastest from last turn if I had done nothing, and another 5 to win, assuming I don’t fight back. I must admit somewhat arrogantly I’m a little puzzled by the attack and why the others are helping what will be 1 of 2 players. If this is a serious attack with defeat as their aim, then I think the game will move into Time Bomb territory. However I am guessing, maybe that they are just trying to make me earn the win and aren’t seriously trying to win, in which case why don’t they go after the Ring planets – which is soon answered by an email.
Selah contacts me. I have had him as an ally for some time, which allowed him to share the Home World near my Origin. In a very sporting gesture, he alerts me that he has been asked to attack me by his allies, and is giving me one turns notice, so that I may Break Alliance and be able to defend myself against him. This also tells me the attacks are a serious attack to defeat me. It also shows the attacking parties aren’t limited to the usual alliances, and I expect others will also have been recruited into battle. Robots is 1 player who hasn’t done much for a long time according to the Spy Reports, but I can see a ship he has bought this turn, so I know he is active and expect him to be another one. In fact I can only expect Tony and Cheap Sunglasses to not attack and everyone else is a possible attacker. If just the first 4 perform all out attacks, there is no way I can withstand them as they have 426 ships to my 120. I feel it is imperative that I finish the game this next turn, though there is a chance I will get close, and may for 1 more turn hang on for a little bit to pick up a few more as a very last outside chance, but if it goes longer than that then I am gone.
Of course, from a typically tyrannical viewpoint, I am critical of the strategic decision to attack, as it means 8 other players must play for another 10 turns of effort but only 1 of them will get the win. Can’t they see my point of view, better to start a new game… Well maybe not.
I can see a number of planets have foreign ships above them, and will rely mainly on PDU for defence of those. Tony tells me that next turn will be his last, and Cheap Sunglasses is moving house and will have communication problems later in the fortnight. I can’t get anything organised in time to identify planets for them to defend.
I’ve seen many Detective ships, and customised spies, so I am expecting there are many cloaked ships over my planets. I’m becoming more convinced the attacks will be too strong for me, preventing me from finishing this turn. As Tony is dropping out after this I develop a back up plan, taking advantage of advance knowledge of his impending NPC status. I arrange to purchase from him the right to move ships over some of his planets for future attacks in exchange for a ring planet with a discovered ring. It will cost me 510,000 in score and return in the end less than half that, as it should, and from Tony’s point of view it is his best option. The idea is that next turn I break the alliance with Tony, which also means I will be exposed to Selah’s attacks and won’t be able to defend against him. I notice in the sequence of processing that it says the planetary change of ownership occurs after the breaking of alliance, but I’m not sure of that as my understanding is that it always takes a turn for breaking alliance to take effect.
So my plan for turn 22 is to grab all unclaimed planets, move to any planet recent captured by others, capture any safe looking DLS planet, planets that I had lost to others several turns ago, and after that anyhting. I am using every ship possible from cocoons, bulk carriers, Monitors (that build more comm boxes), hospitals, factories and even maintenance ships. If it can move it is used. Large ships with high SEC officers are used to warp onto DLS mined planets. Any ship that can’t reach a planet of someone else will be used to move to the closest susceptible planet of mine. I do send the Rebels/Insurgents and ships with low defence to Tony’s planets, as I figure I am likely to lose those going to other planets. I up the PDU of planets to maximum possible, but only get half way through that before having to send the orders off.
And I try to find my last ring.
Turn 22.
Whew, it’s over. The major assault I feared didn’t quite eventuate, or rather not as effective as I feared. I only lost 8 planets, including 2 to Guluu – good thing I didn’t return his planet :). Bob was correct in observing Tony’s planet count dropped due to me, (apparently you can BA and capture planets the same turn, and Tony didn’t have PDU on enough planets), but another major contributing factor was the drop in DLS’s planet count. Capturing DLS planets was expensive – I lost 1 Flagship and 2 Cocoons, but still had 109 ships left – better than I expected.
And I found my last ring.
So many thanks to every one out there, and especially Peter Catling – many thanks for yet another great game.
And lastly, Tony asked me to wish you all farewell as he moves on to other past times. As for me I will miss the next game, and not sure when I will be back.
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