4X The Unsurpassed Brian Reynolds' Alpha Centauri thread

[Average Manatee]

I just want a 4x with even more terraforming.

 

[Cael]

"Resources exist to be consumed. And consumed they will be, if not by this generation then by some future. By what right does this forgotten future seek to deny us our birthright? None I say! Let us take what is ours, chew and eat our fill."
- CEO Nwabudike Morgan, "The Ethics of Greed"

"Don't be transphobic. Be intolerant of difference. Kill the fatphobes! Believe all wymmyn!!!"
- every fucking present day game developer

 

[Cael]

I just want a 4x with even more terraforming.

Call to Power 2 is your game, then.

 

[RaggleFraggle]

Yes, it is absolutely impossible to replicate today, because it was made in the tail end of bygone era where games could be made by people versed in history, philosophy, hard sci-fi, people who read literature and watched movies for adults. Replicating the writing and world-building of Alpha Centauri today would be like asking Somalians to build a space rocket, the basis is just not there.

Yeah. I’ve noticed that modern scifi peaked in the 90s and everything since has been crap.

 

[oldbonebrown]

Thoughts about recycling tanks and when to build them?

 

[Average Manatee]

Thoughts about recycling tanks and when to build them?

Recycling tanks are 40 minerals and produce 1/1/1.

Rec commons are 40 minerals and save 2 pops from being drones. If those two pops work forests its 2/4/2 (or 2/4/4 w/ +2 economy). With only 1 pop its 1/2/1 or 1/2/2 w/ economy. There is 1 energy upkeep. Generally build rec commons before recycling tanks if you can save even one pop from needing to be a doctor.

Colony pods are 30 minerals, you get 10 back immediately to spend on a unit (assuming support isn't -2), and produces 2/1/1 or 2/1/2 w/ +1 economy. You do temporarily lose a pop at the place you built the pod but get it back when it deploys. Generally this can be said to be an advantage because its easier to control drones across multiple smaller bases, but if you're trying to get to 5 pop to unlock specialists it is a downside since each pop is more expensive in food to produce than the previous.

Generally the strat is to focus colony pods and use that to keep your base pop low enough that you don't really need rec commons for a while. Everything else aside from formers and a token defense/police force can wait until you've reached some kind of natural limit to expansion. DO remember to rush rec commons if you have one base that is going to be stuck for 40 turns making an SP, it's gonna grow in the meantime and you'll have a lot of useless doctors that actually make it take longer going straight for the SP as opposed to planning for growth. And rush the recycling tanks there too since it will pay off in the timeframe that the SP completes.

I don't think anything else really competes since most of the rest are multipliers that are only efficient after you've grown a good amount of pop.

 

[imajia]

I tried Pirates and they really seem kind of shit.

Spoiler

1. Sea mining as already discussed is shit. You basically have no minerals even with the Pirates boost. Additionally foil chassis then makes every unit 2x as expensive. So realistically its like you're taking a -50 to -66% mineral nerf compared to other factions, which gets much worse compared to bases with boreholes/mineral resources. This also means you can't really get SPs, at least in Thinker mod where AI is relatively competent at them.

2. The only upside I can find is that planting seaweed is awesome. Its quick (5 turns), it spreads automatically, it's 3 food base and 4 food with an aqua farm. That's much better than farm + condensor (16 turns total).

3. Unfortunately you have -1 efficiency. This pretty much nukes your ability to collect energy from squares once you've expanded (and you need to expand a lot). In my game I spent a lot of former time placing tidal harnesses that was wasted. I think you want to pretty much just do seaweed past the first few bases and grow grow grow.

4. You need to take a *lot* of territory to keep up. You're running full specialists only and buying everything you have with credits.

5. You kind of really need the SPs that give -drones or +talents to avoid revolts before you get crawlers. Because you need to be size 5 to run specialists, and then you need to feed size 5, and do it without drone revolts. And you have a cool -1 growth to slow your growth towards size 5 as well.

6. Unfortunately with double cost supply crawlers your ability to snowball once you get them is screwed hard.

7. Your seaweed is stuck at 4 food, so you can't really develop past that. This means each base needs more space, which means you have to simultaneously ICS while also spreading out further.

Do I think I can win? Yes, I kept even with Deidre on tech (who is assblasting the entire rest of the map). But with basically any land-based faction playing 100% economy the whole game I'd be swamping her, and beating AIs in wars isn't really proof of a good faction just that you understand how to beat AIs in wars.

Cyborgs definitely seem the most broken (excluding the aliens).

Drones are good IMO because the economic development just swamps everything. Having 25% more bases or 25% more infrastructure will make up a -20% research penalty, and you can always trade/steal/war for techs. -1 drones automatically is always great pretty much all the time whether you're conquering or just trying to power up economically. AI might suck in vanilla though but I expect they'd do well in Thinker. Though a lot probably comes down to initial tech choices, Deidre seems to take off every game because she starts with Ecology and I bet that everyone else suffers in relation to how slowly the AI is to research that tech.

At least in vanilla SMAX I find it quite easy to win with the pirates:

- build sea bases only with either 2+ resources or on the coast on an island (to build boreholes later) - don't build only seabase
- you can pop pods like crazy. Which will give you a lot of money to rush build or artefacts to rush SPs/Techs
- they grow like weed. Together with rush buying you can plaster the map with your bases
- if you go green you can make use of the native naval units

If anything, they are a nice variation of the other factions. Base defence sucks, though.