Questions on cloak, worms, suppliers,skunkworks

[Urban Legend]

Me new to game, won once. Please help me with the answers:

1)Against the AI, how good is submarine and cloaking? Can the AI always see it? Do they have to bump into them? Will attacking reveal yourself? Is it worthwile to send cloak units to sabotage terrain/probe?

2)Whenever I send a land unit after a stack of mindworms which appeared after a fungus bloom, defeating one kills off all the rest in the stack. But it doesn't work with an airunit, which only destroys one. Why?

3)I don't see the point of suppliers when there are better buildings to build. Do you build them when you have no other building options?

4)What does self-destruct do, other than the boom?

5)Taking the university, I don't get the option to build skunkworks and I don't have extra costs for prototyping. Is there a secret project effect I'm not aware of?

6) What exactly is this mineral limit, fungus pop, tree farm, hybrid relationship?

[Chaos Theory]

1) The AI sees all. Cloaking can be useful for ignoring ZOCs, but submarine is only good for fun.

2) IIRC, attacking a normal stack with an air unit doesn't cause collateral damage, I guess as a balancing factor. The collateral damage is just amplified in the case of player vs planet.

3) Building a few supply crawlers first makes all the rest of your buildings easier to build, so much so that they pay for themselves. Also, you can use supply crawlers themselves to facilitate building secret projects.

4) Weapon * reactor / 2 damage to adjacent units not in bunkers or cities

5) What difficulty level are you on? If specialist or below, you don't pay prototyping costs anyway.

6) At the start of the game, after you sum up all your ecodamage due to terraforming and mineral production, you subtract 16, which is the "clean mineral limit". Each fungal pop increases the limit by 1. Each tree farm or hybrid forest after the first fungal pop does the same when built.

[Minute Mirage]

Originally posted by Urban Legend
1)Against the AI, how good is submarine and cloaking? Can the AI always see it? Do they have to bump into them? Will attacking reveal yourself? Is it worthwile to send cloak units to sabotage terrain/probe?

My impression is that the AI knows where your units are anyway, so cloaking is useless against it.

Originally posted by Urban Legend
2)Whenever I send a land unit after a stack of mindworms which appeared after a fungus bloom, defeating one kills off all the rest in the stack. But it doesn't work with an airunit, which only destroys one. Why?

I don't really know why that happens except that's the way Firaxis decided to do it. The important thing is to know that land units are more useful in this case, and to build empath rovers. It's a good idea to use artillery, too.

Originally posted by Urban Legend
3)I don't see the point of suppliers when there are better buildings to build. Do you build them when you have no other building options?

Err... do you mean supply crawlers? They are one of the most important units of the game, and in most cases you should be building lots of them. Read Velociryx's guide or this article in the CGN Academy for more information on them.

Originally posted by Urban Legend
4)What does self-destruct do, other than the boom?

It damages adjacent enemy units. The amount of damage done is dependant on the reactor and weapon value of the self-destructing unit according to the following formula:

Hits = INT(weapon * reactor / 2)

Where max hits delivered can not exceed 10*reactor.


This thread discusses self-destructing among others.

Originally posted by Urban Legend
5)Taking the university, I don't get the option to build skunkworks and I don't have extra costs for prototyping. Is there a secret project effect I'm not aware of?

What difficulty level are you playing on? The lowest difficulty levels don't require prototyping units.

Originally posted by Urban Legend
6) What exactly is this mineral limit, fungus pop, tree farm, hybrid relationship?

The ecodamage formula is described in this column.

[Minute Mirage]

Originally posted by Chaos Theory


4) Weapon * reactor / 2 damage to adjacent units not in bunkers or cities

Actually, cities do protect from self-destruct damage, but bunkers do not.

[Urban Legend]

Thanks! I got interested in self-destruct when I blew up my planet buster that way. Its a big boom.

[Minute Mirage]

Originally posted by Urban Legend
Thanks! I got interested in self-destruct when I blew up my planet buster that way. Its a big boom.

This thread gives some information on the difficulty levels.

Btw, you shouldn't self-destruct planet busters, just attack normally with them.

[Urban Legend]

I didn't pick the crawler tech early and my formers cannot keep up with my pop esp after the pop bloomed.

I make the mistake of using my formers to help clear the site for the new bases so I can have perfect 4 squares spacing, no overlaps. It doesn't work for this game unlike the Civilisations I've played as it will be unworked until the end of the game.

I blew up a buster trying to find out a way to trigger it without a city.

I don't get the ecology rating, my 200 min base has zero, but my 100 min base is in the red, both have all the eco facilities.

Self-destruct seems waay unbalanced.

[Grail Quest]

I don't see the point of suppliers when there are better buildings to build. Do you build them when you have no other building options?

If you don't want to cheat:

(1) Use them to control population to avoid having to deal with too many minerals mined or Drones from too high a population before you are ready (hence the need for a Hab Complex is mitigated).

Also to work squares that are outside the base radius or specialized squares. E.g., That 0/4/0 mine so that you can work a 2/1/1 rainy square and continue accelerating population Growth.

(2) Instead of committing to a big Special Project, crunch out crawlers. Each basic crawler costs 30 mins, if I remember correctly. Send it out to crawl for minerals, energy, or whatever.
When you have 6 crawlers, cash them all in to do your Secret Project in 1 Turn.
This way, the minerals you are putting into your SP are working for you in the meanwhile, gathering minerals, energy, or whatever.
Also, if you have a few crawlers around, you can cash them in as an emergency to beat an AI to an SP. Only crawlers have full mineral cost value toward an SP or prototype.

If you want to cheat mildly:

(3) Build with Planned Wealth (+2 Industry). Your crawlers cost 24 instead of 30.
When you are ready to cash them in toward your SP, switch off Planned and Wealth, and if possible, switch to Power. Now your Industry rating drops to +0 or even -2. When you cash your crawlers, they contribute 30 or 36 minerals a piece (an increase of 25% to 50%).
Switch back to Planned Wealth to again reduce the net cost of building an SP. You get your Upheaval refund, so the exercise really cost you no energy to do, and all your other builds are still proceeding on the improved Industry rating.

If you want to cheat obscenely and don't mind the micromanagement involved:

(4) If you are at a low difficulty level with no retool penalty, and are sufficiently ahead of the AI that there are SPs inaccessible to them for several techs, you can set every base to build a certain SP you don't mind not having right away. Cash in crawlers per cheat #3 above, and switch the SP to whatever you really intended to build.
This way, you are actually building everything at a virtual Industry Rating of +1 to +4 greater than whatever you have, and can exceed the +5 Industry Rating limit.

(5) This should work, in theory, in the middle to late game when you can stack crawlers with lots of armor and features.
Same as (4): as soon as you build one crawler, cash it in to build an SP, then switch the SP at no retool penalty to the next more expensive crawler, etc... This way, you are mathematically compounding the extra-mineral advantage you get from cashing in crawlers at a higher Industry rating.

There's a ridiculous amount of micromanagement for #4 and #5, but a cute exercise if you're bored or playing a strict 16-mineral limit clean industry game with no fungal pops.

[Minute Mirage]

Originally posted by Grail Quest

(1) Use them to control population to avoid having to deal with too many minerals mined or Drones from too high a population before you are ready (hence the need for a Hab Complex is mitigated).

Too many minerals mined? If you mean eco-damage, that should not be a problem as long as you force the first pop and build tree farms and hybrid forests. And your population can never be too high, since you can and often should turn your citizens into specialists.

Originally posted by Grail Quest
Also to work squares that are outside the base radius or specialized squares. E.g., That 0/4/0 mine so that you can work a 2/1/1 rainy square and continue accelerating population Growth.

In the early game, it doesn't even have to be a specialized square. Most of my crawlers are convoying minerals from forests when the restrictions are still in place.

[Grail Quest]

Too many minerals mined?

In the very early game, prior to Tree Farms and Hybrid Farms.

And your population can never be too high, since you can and often should turn your citizens into specialists.

I don't think it is always the case that Psych from Specialists can save a base from Drone Riots. And depending on the nutrient production, changing a worker into a specialist can result in starvation.

Also, don't you want to float a Golden Age at the base? Talents must exceed Workers + Specialists, so won't having too many specialists ruin that?
When do specialists become better than GA?

[Urban Legend]

I tried out the crawlers and I found out that

1) Convoying is what they are meant to do
2) They do not require support, the game could have told me that in advance
3) They can be cashed for full mineral

So its unbalanced, now I don't know whether to use 3 at all. Instead of building a SP and waiting like what the game is meant to do, you can stock up like in Civ 2 caravans or you can build these instead.

I'm glad the makers realise how unbalanced this is and remove it from Civ III so I won't be tempted to use it. Are there any players who prohibit the use of such tactics in multiplayer? Certainly isn't something to be proud of.

[Minute Mirage]

Originally posted by Grail Quest

In the very early game, prior to Tree Farms and Hybrid Farms.

How often do you get excessive eco-damage in this period without crawlers? With crawlers, you can spread the production more evenly, if that's what you want.

Originally posted by Grail Quest

I don't think it is always the case that Psych from Specialists can save a base from Drone Riots. And depending on the nutrient production, changing a worker into a specialist can result in starvation.

Who cares about psych? What you need is a population of 5, so that you can use meaningful specialists. If your base is starving, you're not crawling enough nutrients. Not that temporary starving should matter all that much, if you have some food in the tanks and can pop boom later when you have more nutrients.

Originally posted by Grail Quest
Also, don't you want to float a Golden Age at the base? Talents must exceed Workers + Specialists, so won't having too many specialists ruin that?
When do specialists become better than GA?

Golden Ages are nice, but if I'm playing a faction that can pop boom normally and use FM, I'd rather use specialists. Note also that it takes some time to have the majority of the population as specialists, so there's time for a GA before that.

[Minute Mirage]

Originally posted by Urban Legend

Instead of building a SP and waiting like what the game is meant to do, you can stock up like in Civ 2 caravans or you can build these instead.

Why is building a SP without crawlers "what the game is meant to do"? The developers put the option of cashing in crawlers for full price, so that's a legitimate thing to do.

Originally posted by Urban Legend
I'm glad the makers realise how unbalanced this is and remove it from Civ III so I won't be tempted to use it. Are there any players who prohibit the use of such tactics in multiplayer? Certainly isn't something to be proud of.

Why should using crawlers be something to be ashamed of? They're a standard unit of the game, and just because the AI doesn't know how to use them properly, it doesn't mean you shouldn't do so. If you do want to have a disadvantage by not using crawlers, you're allowed to do so, but don't except something like that from others, especially in MP.

[Main_Brain]

Crawling unbalances the game.
i dont do it SP and my Lan guys do neither.
Games seem more fun this way to us.

[Urban Legend]

Originally posted by Main_Brain
Crawling unbalances the game.
i dont do it SP and my Lan guys do neither.
Games seem more fun this way to us.

You guys avoid building crawlers at all or certain tactics?

To make it more balance I think is that crawlers should contribute less than 100% when added to SP or to have another unit that contributes 100% but does not have the ability to convoy.

Its just a game so lets do whatever is more fun to you, I will certainly try using the tricks in some games just for kicks but not in other games to make it more challenging, just like playing without reloading whenever things goes wrong.

[Main_Brain]

We dont build them at all.
But in defence of them they are still pretty new to this Game

Fully agree on the last part. Everyone shall play the way he likes.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Urban Legend

Its just a game so lets do whatever is more fun to you, I will certainly try using the tricks in some games just for kicks but not in other games to make it more challenging, just like playing without reloading whenever things goes wrong.

In single-player, anyone can play as they wish-- Beating the AI with no crawlers adds a little challenge-- Winning with no formers or no units or no probes is much more challenging


IN multiplayer the extensive use of crawlers is not unbalancing since everyone can and does do it-- It makes getting to the SP tech the key since pretty much anyone has the capability to build a SP in a single turn .

[gwillybj]

I was working on this post last night when my lousy dial-up disconnected and I couldn't reconnect above 12k. It's probably more irrelevant now than then, but here it is anyway

Urban Legend asked:
1)Against the AI, how good is submarine and cloaking? Can the AI always see it? Do they have to bump into them? Will attacking reveal yourself? Is it worthwile to send cloak units to sabotage terrain/probe?

Chaos Theory replied:
1) The AI sees all. Cloaking can be useful for ignoring ZOCs, but submarine is only good for fun.

Minute Mirage said:
My impression is that the AI knows where your units are anyway, so cloaking is useless against it.

Per Chaos Theory, Cloaking is not for hiding units (despite the Datalinks description including the word "Invisible"), just negating ZOCs (as properly stated in the Datalinks). It allows unrestricted movement past enemy units. It is allowed for Land units only.
Although useless against the AI as to invisibility, does Submarine give Sea units an effect similar to Cloak by negating ZOCs of enemy ships?

A handy ability to combine with Cloak is Blink. A Cloaked Blink unit can glide unimpeded right up to a base and attack, kinda like sneaking up and shouting "BOO!" just before swinging the axe. The occupants get only their units' armor and the +25% Base Defense bonus, because a Blink unit bypasses Perimeter Defense and Tachyon Field. By the numbers, this works best for Elite Rovers and most Hovertanks, especially on a road.

[Chaos Theory]

I've never built a cloaked unit, but I got the impression that they didn't display faction flags, like probe teams. Is this accurate?

Sea units ignore zones of control anyway, so I don't know what impact submarine would have on this.