World War AC - Page 2

Tokamak · July 12, 2001, 14:38

JustinSane: Hmmm.... I was experimenting with alphax.txt before I made SMAC Down, and one of the things I tested was the disable unit parameter (specifically, the native units). I thought that I loaded up a clean alphax.txt before making the scenario, but apparently I did not.

According to the scenario editor documentation, the game will default to whatever *.txt files are in the same folder as the *.sc file, but in my experience, this is simly not true. The scenario seems to 'remember' what the files were when it was made, and then sticks to that. You can alter faction.txt files in mid-game using the "reload faction" option, but I don't think an analogous command exists for the aplha.txt files

Come to think of it, I may have also turned global warming off, as well. I guess I'll have to get started on a 'patched' version to adress these issues. No biggie. I can do that when I make the non-Crossfire version. Hopefully, both files will be ready sometime late tonight.

All: I 'm a little uneasy about posting multiple files to Apolyton. Does any kind hearted webmaster out there have some extra space?

Also, the "official" SMAC Down is already in the works. I have some pretty wierd ideas that I'm testing out right now. The wierdest is to have a significant alien force act as a third power, adding a whole new dynamic to the gameplay. I'm sure that this is a great gimmick. I'm not so sure that it is sound game design. We'll see...

Here's what I'm trying to accomplish with the custom map: the "hostile" borders should be broad, without any natural choke points. Every Ally should share a land border with at least one Coailition faction (maybe two). I'd also like to place some interesting landmarks in the 'no man's zones,' to make holding onto your perimeter more important. The AI should be channeled towards the enemy by judicious placement of special resources.

Any thoughts or suggestions? I'm not exactly a professional, so your advice is at least so good as mine.

Cybergod · July 12, 2001, 17:27

Tokamak, related to AX version, if you are using share tech with infiltrated factions then all the Yang/Miriam/Santiago Coalition need to do is do the Empath Guild or infiltrate everyone to get EVERYONE's techs, so there is not much of a way of getting around it, except by disabling probe teams (bad).

BTW, I don't think that the aliens' addition would really sink in. This would completely deconcentrate the point of the scenario/mod.

Cybergod · July 12, 2001, 17:29

[commenting on above post]

OR disable the Empath Guild project!

death_head · July 12, 2001, 17:57

The Empath Guild messes with my mind

Tokamak · July 12, 2001, 18:06

Yeah, the inflitration thing is a problem, but not a fatal one. In the games that the bad guys got the governorship you end up falling behind in tech, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Most people (myself included) have never played a game where they weren't at least on tech parity with the AI (and usually, they're signifiacantly ahead of the AI). It's a different kind of experience for a different kind of game.

Actually, the badguys -always- get the governorhip, because the stupid Allies won't vote for each other!

I guess I'll have to auto-pact them to each other. That way, it will just barely be possible to vote Lal in if one of the Allies gets the Empath Guild.

I hear you about the aliens. I have some compelling ideas regarding them, but I'm afraid of disrupting the flow of play. I think I'll make them "optional" (ie release two versions of the game)

death_head: I was concerned that the AI wouldn't be able to handle a rover rush. I'm glad to hear that it defended itself just fine.

Blake · July 12, 2001, 19:35

Great scenerio!
I'm up to year 2164.

The first thing I did was grab doc flex and built a foil to go ally hunting, then researched to ind auto (I found morgan and the scum immeditately declared vendetta, I toyed with the idea of invading his island and taking all that terraforming for myself... but deciced it went against the theme of the scenerio).

Upon getting Ind Auto I started operation VW (basically mass crawler production), and I'm happy to say it suceeded, I JUST beat the spartans to the VW, altough I used the crawler upgrade bug (well, some dont even consider it a bug..). I then started on the PEG (taking the idea from Vel, I'd researched to it as a backup if I missed the VW, as it turned out I got both, as well as the empath guild)

I'd been running planned, which was what ticked morgan off, but with the VW I switched to FM, and repaired my relations with Morgan, the only tech of value I got from him was Biogenetics and Ethical Calculus, and I had to grovel on my knees before he would sign a pact. Atleast he didn't demand cash.

When the initial enemy scouts came knocking I upgraded nearby formers. I'm not too fond of black ops but this game I've built dozens of infantry probes, and 3 bases are on full time probe production (4 including my HQ, which is building skimship probes)

I knew I'd have to prepare my defenses and decided to space bases 2 tiles apart along a river which ran parrellel to the border between me and yang/miriam (each base was built on a sensor ofcourse), I made sure to carefully forest the sides of the river to prevent probes from speeding in, and stacked the bases with atleast a couple of probes, and paired up plasma armour military or former units along the forest barrier (one idea I'm particullary fond of is pairing up military untis with a crawler).

The main attacks started at about 2155, I probed away the initial units, getting some veterans courtesy of Yang, the main enemy attack was focused on the borehole area, which I fortified with the probed units and plenty of probe teams.

This turn (2164) I by chance probed a hive 5-3r-1, trained infantry unit, which was hiding in fungus. This was cool because I didn't have any of those components (except the chassis

), so I'm doing some big-time reverse engineering. Previously the best weapon was laser.

I havn't lost any bases yet, but now swarms of hive and believer infantry are attacking my river defense perimeter, which is lightly fortified compared to the borehole area, when the gatling weapons start turning up I'll really have something to worry about. Also I burnt all my (700) cash on probing and rush upgrades, altough thanks to the VW, PEG and pact with Morgan I'm making a tidy ~100 energy per turn.

My current bee-line is towards D:AP, which should arrive within the decade, hopefully by then the sunspots (grrrrr) will clear up so I'll be able to use my Empath guild and get eco-engineering from Dee (I forsee many SE quickies, yessss). Hopefully I'll be able to keep a monopoly on the commlinks and prevent anyone from calling an election, until I can bribe the others to vote for Lal.

BTW, wouldn't the planetary datalinks be the most awesome SP imaginable for anyone which manages to get it? Prehaps it should be disabled.

Tokamak · July 12, 2001, 20:01

Blake: I found your report to be very interesting. You're taking a much more proactive stance than I have, and it seems to be working well. Congrats on the VW! That's a real accomplishment in this game.

Even though the AI is set to "cooperate with player," they can still be real PIAs. Oh, well.

Sunspots, you say? I thought I turned that off. *sigh* One more thing to fix tonight. You can fix the sunspots for now by using "edit scenario parameter" command and setting the "spot turns to go" field to zero. Don't worry, no-one will consider you a cheater

I'm not too sure about the Planetary Datalinks, either. It would be a good way for the Allies to recover if they fall behind (ie lose either the Empath Guild or the election), but it could also become outrageously overpowered. I'm definately thinking about trimming it for the offcial release.

Blake · July 12, 2001, 21:23

Well, actually this is my second try

The first time I played in a simialler way, but without sea scouting or the SP's. I found myself falling way behind in tech, unable to run FM because of the lack of VW, I didn't have rovers, and yang and miriam probes were having a field day. Also I had got the reload "twitches", reloading to replay a turn is cheating and after doing that a few times I realised that any victory I gained was actually worthless anyway.. and I had heaps of new ideas to try...

So I restarted and decided, regardless of cost (to my expansion and research) I WAS going to get the VW, that (with the later addition of the PEG) put me in an excellent position to build up my probe armies, and throw cash into bribing and upgrading units. I also applied virtually all of Vel's combat strategies, like upgrading formers for defense, and liberal use of infantry probes.
I have a sneaky suspicion that one of my strategies is going to be building a fully fortified highway down to one of yangs (or miriams) bases and hitting it with infantry probes to get tech, it'll be my own not so subtle channel into the federations datalinks

Tokamak · July 12, 2001, 21:36

I found that the Xenoempathy Dome allows for some very useful tricks. I ended up building a "throw-away" base just a few squares from one of Yang's outposts, in the middle of a fungus field. That base then devoted itself exclusively to probe production, sped up by cash and a fleet of donated crawlers from the other, more prosperous bases.

This "training station" could then launch multiple probe attacks per turn against Yang. Thanks to the Xenoempathy Dome, even an infantry probe could get there and back in one turn. The ones that survived to reach elite were armored and sent to hot spots on the frontier (actaully, the hottest spot at the time was that base!).

After I was consistantly draining 80-100 credits every turn from Yang, I thought I must be really hurting his cash reserves. Then I checked the inflitrator's report. He was making 300+ credits every turn! That sure burst my bubble...

Tokamak · July 13, 2001, 04:31

It's been a productive late night for me (well, as productive as a night playing a computer game can get, anyway). The "patched" version of SMAC Down should be attached with this post.

LOTS of bug fixes. Native units should work properly now. The random events will no longer plague you. Dee, Morgan and Lal no longer have a +3 Planet score (I have NO idea how that happened!). I made some other minor adjustments. They're all detailed at the end of the readme.

I've run into some trouble making a non-X version of the game. As predicted, the "techshare" syntax doesn't work with SMAC. However, my faction.txt (being an X document), doesn't list what the older "discover tech" syntax is! Without that, I can't finish. Does anyone out there with SMAC know the exact syntax for this power? It should be somewhere in your faction.txt

Work is going well on the custom map. I've already laid out the basic groundwork for the first continent. If RL doesn't interfere too much, it'll be available within a week. This would be a good time to post any ideas that you would like to see in the new version.

Also, I reiterate my request for hosting somewhere. With both X and non-X versions coming out, along with alien and non-alien versions of both of these, PLUS the inevitable bug fixes, I might really be abusing Apolyton's hopitality by posting all my files here.

Blake · July 13, 2001, 07:23

As of 2174 I have D:AP, fusion power, env.eco, and a brand-spanking new HSA (Bwahahahah, nothing can stop me now!). The only problem is I'm too busy upgrading my military to missile fusion to rushbuy those tree farms! (let alone fusion labs) Best thing is the evil alliance is still researching HEC, meaning I have the D:AP monopoly for a few years, wahoo! In fact I have the best technology of any faction...

As I research D:AP I had a really tough descision to make, the lineup of incredibly attractive tech included:

Orbital Spaceflight
Centurai Mediation
Neural Grafting
Planetary Economics
Adv.Eco.Engineering
Organic Superlube

Goddamn this scenerio has some hard choices

I REALLY wanted AEEco so I could start some serious terraforming, Orbital spaceflight for nutrients, and ofcourse so I could wave PB's at my enemies, Cent Med for the free roads (and easy probing)...
I took Neural Grafting, because ultimately the military advantages of MMI and bio-engineering are just too good to not have.

---

At 2195 I have clean chaos gas choppers, and believe me, miriam and yang know it! Unfortunately currentely Miriam, Yang and Santiago are holding the race for the Cloning Vats, and I'm not invited, short of a (VERY!) lucky probe action I'll lose the CV to one of those buggers. And Yang called the election, and now everyones favourite chairman is govoner of the not-so-free world. Also Lal got his scrawny ass kicked off the face of Chiron, altough he escaped in a pod. Dee and Morgan, altough not researching very fast are still both alive. About the only techs I've got have veen Adv. Sub atomic theory from Lal, and Adv.Eco.Eng from Morgan.

Anyway, I can see no alternative but to wipe Miriam and Yang from my continent, this should be easy said as done, because sophoric gas chaos choppers make VERY short work of even silksteel defenders, and I still have the monopoly on D:AP, so no advanced air defense for the evil alliance, and I have my whole empire producing either chopper shells or drop infantry, and the drop infantry I'll be using will be drop scout patrols, plasma armour just cant stand up to elite chaos infantry anyway, and drop scouts are cheap.

The main blemish in my plan is the fact most of the enemy SP are on the FW sea continent, which means I wont actually gain a terrible lot from the yang/miriam purge (other than quadrupling my population, which is always handy...). Seeing I've got choppers coming out my ears a switch to green was in order, and then I cranked econ to 100% for rush buying.

I've never actually done a full scale chop 'n drop before, so I'm quite excited.

The research rate of the evil alliance is still going to be phenominal, I wouldn't mind betting I'll have to 'crawl my way to transcendence.

My nastiest suprise so far was when Yang bagged the XenoDome, and suddenly a hoarde of rovers came screaming up the fungal highway, luckily I had the aircraft for ZOC blocking.

---
I was thinking about the voting, and how the bad guys (seeing they get 2 empires each) get a massive votes boost, how about changing their faction.txt's to have 1/2 normal votes, I *think* this is possible to do. That would put all the factions at a more level playing field during voting...

The human faction starting with the WP is a very good idea, especially seeing there is not a hope in hell of actually beating the AI's to it!

The strongest SP's (Datalinks, Cloning Vats, maybe Cloudbase Acadamy) should probably be set to destroyed.

A final suggestion, how about setting it so destroying bases is NOT an atrocity, then you could take a more brutal approach to warfare (including strategic retreat).

Tokamak · July 13, 2001, 08:11

Gads! I can't beleive I'm still awake... stupid insomnia. I probably pull an involuntary all-nighter once or twice a week

I'm pleased that Yang was able to exploit the Xenoempathy Dome. That's good news (well, for me, anyway).

So Lal got whacked, huh? He was in the weakest postion, so I'm not too surprised. In the sims I've run, the strongest Ally has typically been Dee, who consistanly manages to overun the Spartans, of all people! I still haven't figured out why this happens. If anyone has any insight on this let me know. I very much want to know what kinds of conditions causes the AI to succeed or fail.

If you do acheive "Manifest Destiny" on your continent, youi'll be in a very strong position. I did an INSANE amount of terraforming in the enemies' homelands. Probably, too much, honestly.

Choppers are something that I've been concerned about for a while now. The problem is that the AI adamantly refuses to build these things. The problem is exacerabated by the fact that it doesn't unstand how to move its forces in AAA protected stacks, leaving it very vulnerable to helicopters. For maximum challenge potential, I recommend I self-imposed prohibition on choppers (a few empath choppers for worm duty are probably okay). It sucks to just arbitrarily ignore such a big aspect of air power, but it's the only way to level the playing field.

Also, I've actually gotten more enjoyment out of this game when I didn't build the HSA (although, in truth, Yang has always beaten me to it in SMAC Down). Having to adjust your defenses to deal with massive covert assualts adds a whole new dimension to your strategy.

Nukes are something that I'm wondering about, too. I'll be very interested in how the AI handles them. The Coalition is set to "commit atrocities wantonly," so expect many bases to stay lit up, even after dark

What I'm really worried about though, is that the AI won't know how to use even basic safeguards against Planet Busters (ie Def Pods and Flechettes).

As for your suggestions (which are much appreciated , by the way)...

When the Allies are auto-pacted (as they are in the patch), it is just barely possible to get an Ally into the governorship, IF you have the Empath Guild bonus AND if you've gotten a pop boom done in time. The Allies only have a chance at the election if the player makes it a major prioty, which is both fair and desirable.

The Datalinks will definately be gone in the next release. I don't understand why you want the Cloning Vats and Academy removed, though. I would very much like to hear your reasons!

As for the base destruction thing, it actually did cross my mind, as well. However, part of the fun of this scenario (at least for me) is trying to be the "good guy" in a world controlled by the villians.

Blake · July 13, 2001, 08:51

it's only midnight here

Basically the CV is just overpowered

In the hands of a human player it makes the game much easier, moreso than any other SP.

The CBA is a SP which also has a very dramatic effect on the game, the Areospace complex is a very versatlile facility, and to be given them for free is so good it's almost cheating

In he hands of the AI it has a twosided effect, while making there bases much harder to attack from the air, simply by destroying the CBA base the AI is suddenly wide open to ariel attack.

The thing both SP's have in common is a dramatic benefit to both economy and military, especially when using orbitals.

Both SP's present an interesting challenge in the hands of the AI though.

choppers:
You could always change them like was done in SNAC, for memory:
Movement: 10 -> 4
Cost: +2 (10 -> 12, I think)
tech: MMI -> Homo Superier

And even severly crippled the chopper is still an incredible chassis.

Dee:
What happened in my game was:

Santiago captures gaian base
Dee mind controls it back along with most of santiagos attack force.

And that just repeated, with neither faction gaining territory for any length of time.

Tokamak · July 13, 2001, 09:45

The thing with the Cloning Vats is that by the time I finally get it, I've already maxed out my main bases, anyway. By the time hab-domes show up, Eudaimonia makes pop-booms almost trivial to acheive. I would very much like to see this project fall intot he hands of the AI, though. Since the AI doesn't understand how to pop-boom, it could make a difference.

Good points about the CBA. I remember Vel worrying about it in his guide, too.

I really like the thing about the choppers. It keeps them from totally dominating the game, without making them useless. They server a more defensive role with the shorter range, and the higher cost makes the "suicide missile" a less attractive option. I'm definately considering implementing this.

Midnight, huh? You an Australian by any chance?

JustinSane · July 13, 2001, 10:06

I'm having a blast trying this! It is the most fun single player scenario I've seen

However, it would take a lot of the fun out of it if the stronger SP's were disabled.. After all, if the artificial idiot can't exploit his tech advantage, it might be a bit easy, and the strong SPs basically are the pay-off for high tech. Either way, this is extremely cool

death_head · July 13, 2001, 10:31

I'd still be concerned about the rover rush...I never said I knew what I was doing

Anyhow, I've decided to play the tech game now, so when I get around to it (kinda busy) I'll post a report.

Velociryx · July 13, 2001, 11:22

Okay…lesson learned. Going it alone is a bad plan, as is spending too much time focused on infrastructure. Yang showed up in force with a bevy of Gatling rovers and took one of my border towns. Not a problem, I had some probes handy, so I probed two rovers and used them to beat the attack force back and “retake” the town—destroyed it on the recapture tho, and the damage was done.

The upshot was that I wasn’t even close to gatling technology, so that gave me a boost, and coupled with the researching of Plasma armor a couple turns later put me in (I thought) a good position.

So there I was, racing like a rabid dog toward clean reactors so I could start pumping out an endless supply of whosits and whatsits on the evil empire, bulking up my border bases—no time for infrastructure there! With the best troops I could build (and mixing in liberal numbers of probe teams besides).

Not quite fast enough.

Waves two and three arrived more or less at the same time. It was interesting to see the AI actually appear to coordinate the attack. It was also interesting to get the daylights beaten outta me!

I fought a delaying action, throwing everything (including the kitchen sink) at them, hoping to stall the march long enough to get a few planes in the air but it was no good. In the end, I DID have two jets in operation, and choppers on the way….they served me well, but there just weren’t enough of them to get the job done, so….I got tossed in the tanks.

That’s okay though, I think the core strategy is sound….it just needs a bit of tweaking.

On my next run through, here’s the general plan:
1) Beeline for Ind. Auto, and then straight to Centauri Empathy. Make it a priority to get the Empath Guild before I do anything else. Letting the AI explore for me will save me the time and trouble of building scout foils, and I’ll have better knowledge of the world map without having to pay for it. Auto infiltration will mean that when I use my probes, their first mission can be to steal tech, rather than infiltrate, also saving time.
2) Once more, I’ll run for the VW…never know, I might get lucky. I really liked the PEG, but that’s two techs I’m not sure I need to research right then. My gut tells me to run for restriction lifting from there, but OTOH, it IS a rather off-beat path, and my allies might research a tech or two along the restriction lifting route while I'm heading for PEG. Yep…I think I just talked myself into it. Besides, if I DO get them both, then most of the infrastructure work at my bases is done for me. Drone control, basic labs, and energy stuff, meaning all I gotta do is drop in CC’s and boom away! (building the TF and RH during the boom stage).
3) From there, it’s a beeline for D:AP. With luck and good terraforming, I’ll be able to stall incoming probes long enough to kill them with my garrisoned troops, and if I build garrison units with medium sized guns on the border, I can perhaps kill off any double stacked attackers to probe the survivor, grabbing up better weapons tech that way. That, coupled with getting MMI quickly, should see me developing a medium sized chopper fleet in short order (hey…I just got my tail WHIPPED by the AI, the gloves are definitely off….lol)
4) I have no idea just how big the continent I’m on IS, but with choppers, I’ll find out rather quickly I’m sure. And if I can secure the continent I’m on, I’ll be in a great position to help my allies.
5) I really like the early switch to Market, and I think I’ll stick with that. If I do it right, I’ll be booming to max size early in the game anyway, and while the tech is cheap, might as well make the most of it….besides, a few extra turns breathing room on the Empath/PEG might be what gets me both of them!

Again, EXCELLENT scenario! I’d have never believed the AI could put up such a splendid fight!

-=Vel=-

Velociryx · July 13, 2001, 11:57

Alternate plan??

What if….

Can you tell it’s a slow day at work?! LOL….was sitting here plotting and scheming, and I think I may have stumbled onto an unusual way to win the game. I dunno, but I certainly plan to try it out this weekend!

The plan is to forget about the “usual” SP’s entirely. In fact, forget pretty much everything but beelining for the techs necessary to give you the Empath Guild (to contact your allies) and the Planetary Datalinks (to give YOUR side all the tech advantages held by the bad guys).

I have no idea if it’ll work, and I’ll need to study the tech tree up on the wall of the game room for a while to see what all those two beelines will entail, but I think it’s quite doable.

Thoughts and comments?

-=Vel=-

death_head · July 13, 2001, 12:20

Sounds like a neat idea. Unfortunately, by the time you've got yourself up to their former standard, they will be miles ahead because of all the projects. I could be wrong though, I'll have to take a look tonight.

JustinSane · July 13, 2001, 12:33

Vel, on my first run, I tried exactly that. The needed techs are centuari ecology, social psych, SOTHB, Centauri Empathy (for the empath guild) and social psych, ethical calc, doctrine mobility, doctrine loyalty, intellectual integrity, information networks, planetary networks, and Cyberethics (for the Datalinks). I chose the Planet Cult, hoping to defend myself by building mindworms, found I couldn't build them, and got overwhelmed before I even got to intellectual integrity. The problem with this, is that you need to research 11 techs, none of which are weapon or armor.
You're on the same continent as Yang and Miriam. No weapon or armor is a bad thing. The good news is that if you get there, you are only three techs away (progenitor psych, the first resonance tech, and biodaptive resonance) from 3r armor, 6r laser, and sopophoric gas pods. Even the spore launchers could come in handy if miriam goes artillery crazy, and you've already got the perimeter defenses.
It might be doable with a better player (such as yourself) playing the UoP instead of the rather slow researching cult though. I think it also could be possible for the cult, with the patched version allowing construction of native life.
edit: The other good news is that this tech path allows for an early pop boom, if you can find enough nutrient squares. And you only have to go off the bee-line by one tech to lift nutrient restrictions, if you decide to go that route. The other bad news is that Yang starts with doctrine loyalty and miriam starts with social psych. This means their bee-line to Cyberethics is a lot shorter, so you will really have to ramp up labs to have a shot.

Tokamak · July 13, 2001, 13:02

Vel: Your observations about the AI coordinating its attacks match my own. I'm wondering if maybe it happens because the fungus slows down its troops and forces them to coagulate. Is there a lot of fungus between their rallying points and your bases? If this turns out to be why it's using stacks, I'll be sure to adjust the terrain on my new map to harness this effect!

Your choice of Free Market for the early game intrigues me greatly. I still lean towards going Planned at the begginning, but your comments are making me wonder. If I get the gumption, I think I'll run two 40 year games (using the editor to magic the badguys away), and try to quantitatively measure the end difference between the two approaches. If anyone feels the urge to do this themselves, please post the results!

The Planetary Datalinks will be god-awfully powerful in this environment. You'll be harnessing the research of all seven factions simultenously. That's probably worth nearly a tech every turn (with the occasional redunant efforts slowing you a little bit). Let us know how things turn out.

Cyberethics occupies an awkward spot on the tree for your average builder. A true beeline would leave you without Free Market or Wealth (but it would give you Planned). On the bright side, you could make a run for the Virtual World on the way up. The Command Nexus and Citizens' Defence Force are also on the way, but Yang usually gets the CN within the early teens, and the CDF is a so-so project.

All: Has anyone succeeded in "legitimately" aquiring one of the early 180 min. projects? (ie not using the 'start with WP' option'). If so, how?

Again, thanks to everyone for your support on this project. I had no idea that it would become so popular! Without all this input, a 'real' mod would never have even crossed my mind. In addition to praise, though, I could really use some criticism. What could be done to further strengthen the AI? Did I miss any tricks? Should the player have a more reasonable cahnce at snagging the early Projects? Etc, etc. When the new map comes out, I especially will need criticism, since unlike in this version, EVERYTHING in that scenario will be more or less my own creation. The map of Chiron in SMAC was the result of over a year's worth of creative effort made by several very talented professionals. My map will be the result of about a week's worth of effort by a lone hack

I'll do my best, but I'm expecting there to be some serious gameplay issues all the same.

-edit-

JustinSane: Just saw your post. Excellent point about Miriam and Yang. I hadn't thought about that. The Coalition's path up the tech tree seems to be pretty random. Sometimes they hit CyberE early, smetimes they don't.

- I've noticed that the usually-capricous AI becomes much more calculating when it's getting close to Fusion Power. Somewhere around the area of AdvMilAlg, they begin to exclusively focus on the prereqs for Fusion. I'm guessing that Firaxis gave the AI a limited look-ahead ability, rather than coding in any real tech plans. Are there any other techs that the AI seems to be drawn to like this? -

Avenoct · July 13, 2001, 13:48

From the SMAC factiontext:

SHARETECH = Gain any technology known to # other players

(IE 'SHARETECH, 3' to gain tech known to three other players)

Also, since Blake mentioned it:

VOTES = Multiplier for governor votes

(IE 'VOTES, .5' for 1/2 votes)

And of course, the handy:

COMMFREQ = Gets an extra comm frequency (another faction to

; talk to) at beginning of game. (Parameter is ignored)

which isn't too useful, but thought I'd include it.

I'm going back into the game to the SE to see if forcing techshare is possible..

Happy Crawlering,

Smack

Tokamak · July 13, 2001, 13:51

Hmm... I tried 'sharetech,' and it didn't work. Maybe I just screwed up. I'll give it a go.

Avenoct · July 13, 2001, 14:08

You probably already know this, but to make sure:

Make sure to use all capitals (ie SHARETECH, 3 not Sharetech)
Add this to the line that includes other special abilities (ie FACILITY, 1, SHARETECH, 3)

maybe you are using SMAX to test it and its not recognized by SMAX?

Additionally I just went into the SMAC SE and here's what I found:

You can (again you know all this, but just in case it varies SMAC vs. SMAX or somesuch):

In Faction Diplomacy SE:

Force pact
Force Commfreqs with any faction
Force infiltration
Force Gang up on Human
Force Cooperate with X faction
Force make these permanent

Also you can set Faction Strategy to :
Gang up on human player or
Team with human player

I'm assuming you are using these already.

Unfortunately there is NOT a Force Sharetech, but the Diplomatic choices above will in all likelihood convince two or three or however many AI factions to sharetech.

-Smack

Tokamak · July 13, 2001, 14:44

Even pacted AI's just don't trade techs often enough. I original plan was very similiar to the scheme you just described, but the @#$% AIs just wouldn't work together. I even placed 'diplomatic" scout patrols from each faction in the HQ of the others, hoping that the frequent unit collisions would spark more conversation between them.

Ahh, I see the problem now. I was using the SMAX 'techshare' parameter, which is not them same as 'sharetech.' I'll e-mail the finished package to both you and Cybergod sometime later today (probably about five-ish, central time).

Be aware that since sharetech isn't specific to inflitrated factions, teh game will be very different. I'll increase the parameter to 2, but even then, it'll be a challenge.

I guess this is just one more reason to get SMACX

Anyone else interested in a 'vanilla' version of SMAC Down is welcome to e-mail at nsvad@austin.rr.com

Avenoct · July 13, 2001, 15:04

Awwww Drat!

Too bad the AI wouldn't cooperate even with :force-pact, force commfreq, and force-forever.

The Sharetech thing will be interesting....I too anticipate it'll be much harder this way. I'm already anticipating withholding some techs from my hopeful pactmates...I can't wait! Thanks from me in advance Tokamak for the conversion to SMAC, and even moreso for getting a bunch of really experienced players all-riled-up!

Smack

Tokamak · July 13, 2001, 15:06

This thread is becoming more and more of a Creation thing, so I've set up a new thread for development and ideas. Discussions about strategies are probably more appropriate here, but either will do.

JustinSane · July 13, 2001, 15:47

The Hive seem to be a bit vulnerable to an early rush in this scenario. Playing as the Planet Cult in my current attempt, I decided to scrape together a few units and throw them at the Hive early, while teching to centauri empathy. I had a couple of mindworms, a spore launcher, and a couple scout patrols. It's 2146 now, and the Hive are no longer on my continent. In the interests of disclosure, I did replay a couple of turns, each time to avoid unpleasant probe action, but still, this was a surprisingly easy conquest, considering how tough my previous attempts have been militarily. My population (mostly captured) is around 55, I've got the empath guild and the command nexus(captured), pacted with each alliance member, and probed the Hive for every tech the coalition has at this point. I'm in sole possession of some beautifully terraformed monsoon jungle as well

I did reverse-engineer rovers after the discovery of planetary networks, and traded for applied physics as soon as the guild finished building, so by the end of the attack I had several actually built military units. I'd imagine that if I'd went with a standard reverse-engineered rover rush build, info net- plan net-applied physics-impact weapons, my conquest would have been even easier. This bee-line is only one tech longer than the centauri empathy line for the cult, and would have left me in nice position to continue the attack against miriam, whereas now I've just got to regroup and exploit my current position, since her army is too big for an immediate attack to succeed. Also, yang probed resonance manipulation away from me, so she's got 3 res garrisons now, in addition to the Citizen's defense force.
My, this post is getting rather long.. Anyway, has anyone tried rushing yang yet? The hive (the headquarter base of the faction) is within reasonable striking distance quite early, especially if you colonize down through the valley with the borehole cluster. Taking this base really seems to dent the research capability of the entire coalition as well, probably because then all of yang's bases on the continent aren't contributing, since their other headquarters is the on other side of planet.

Velociryx · July 13, 2001, 16:28

Okay….I think I’ve got my next go ‘round strategy mapped out. Try this on for size:

Beeline:
Industrial Base
Industrial Economics
Planetary Nets
Industrial Automation
Biogenetics
Social Psych
Secrets of the Human Brain
Centauri Empathy
Ethical Calculus
Doctrine Mobility
Doctrine Loyalty
Intellectual Integrity
Cyberethics

This gives me several key techs, allows for the early market switch to get the extra point of energy from non-river forest tiles, and makes those 2n1m tiles even better!

Early crawlers, which I’ll need in order to beat the AI to the projects I want, and to bulk up my mineral counts to speed the production of probes and garrisons.

From there….I’m not sure. It might be best to go back and research the early armor and weapons techs I missed (stuff they researched before I complete the Datalinks), relying on their own tech sharing to give me the newer stuff they get. Once we’re all caught up, we’ll be able to out tech them easily, because we’ll have access to their technologies as soon as they get them, as well as being able to combine our own research efforts. That should see us getting resource restrictions lifted pretty quickly, and air power not long after.

At least, that’s the theory.

Wish me luck! I’m heading home in 90 more minutes!

-=Vel=-

Tokamak · July 13, 2001, 17:30

JustinSane: Wow, Yang whipped within the first century? I feel strangely sad...

I wonder if maybe the Coailtion would benenfit from having a single member of theirs add Conquer to their list of priorites. The earlier war techs would help (not that that would help against natives). I'd just be worried that the Conquer flag might make the AI less infrastructure-happy.

I'm not so sure that a rover rush would have a better chance. Remember, Yang has those underground bunkers. Or do those help in psi combat, too? I've forgotten.

It's good that the AI CAN be beaten, although I'd certainly like to have seen its demise occur later and more gradually. Thoughts on this, folks?

Vel: Good luck! If you survive the early game, I think you'll a fairly easy run of it during the start of the second century.

All: Has Santaigo started pestering anyone yet? I really wanted there to be a naval war aspect to the game, but if the silly AI can't mount one, then I'll change my design accordingly.