Confessions of a former eco-wimp

DilithiumDad · October 26, 2001, 17:07

...or how I learned to stop worrying and love industrial pollution.

One thing I love about these forums is that once in a while, even after two years of single and multiplayer experience, I will read about a strategy or gambit that radically alters the way I play every game. That happened most recently with the new eco-damage formula. I must confess to having been brainwashed by the whole "green is good" paradigm expressed in the game interludes. I was spooked by losing huge bases to mile-high stacks of mindworms in the late game, and a few times when I lost echelon mirrors and boreholes to fungal blooms. I always kept ecodamage to a minimum and avoided it completely the whole game if I could. I believed that eco-damage was cumulative like it said in the manual. I built lots of Centauri Preserves, even in multiplayer. Sometimes I chose Green Economics just to reduce eco damage.

When the new eco-damage formula came out, I didn't accept it right away. I even tested it with the Scenario Editor and found that it didn't apply. But then I tested it in some real games. Sure enough, fungal blooms RAISE the threshold for ecodamage, not lower it! Each bloom increases the number of minerals you can harvest before eco-damage. Then, every Tree Farm and Hybrid Forest you build increases the number of clean minerals for your whole faction. It was quite a revealation. Now, instead of limiting mineral production when eco-damage appears, I designate a New Jersey base and start polluting massively. I go Free Market to increase eco-damage. I borehole to the max. Then after three or more fungal blooms I massively build Tree Farms and eco-damage is gone for the rest of the game! It's quite a turn around, really!

Has anyone else undergone a massive change in play style since testing the new eco-formula, or was everyone else already a big fan of industrial pollution?

Googlie · October 26, 2001, 17:32

DD:

I've always played a style that attempts (not always successfully) to get at least one borehole per base. Once empath shard choppers are available you can build massive treasuries with the mindworm planetpearls. Then, as you say, it is suddenly controllable thru farms and preserves until finally gone (although I've seen it make unexpected reappearances just before transcendence - a sort of Planet's last kick)

G.

Lefty Scaevola · October 26, 2001, 19:58

None of the above. I build up rapid mineral production at one base to get one fungus bloom, then build tree farms Centauri preserves etc, to raise my safe mineral number upwards.

yavoon · October 26, 2001, 20:03

yah I make lotsa boreholes, and mines and everything, well before tree farms and preserves. I get burnt too tho. especially if I'm PK cuz I luv to run free market w/ them. its not that the eco damage comes quicker, its that my units cant initiate the combat nearly as easily. so it can get tricky guarding ur investment(formers/improvements usually) w/ 1-2 trance garrisons from a pop or an IoD that drops off 2-3 worms. then of course, if I'm runin free market/wealth, oh man, sometimes I wna just hit the computer screen.

Drago Sinio · October 26, 2001, 23:19

"New Jersey base"?

On behalf of all my 300 plus years of New Jersey ancestors, and myself, please feel free to kiss my New Jersey ass at your earliest convenience.

DilithiumDad · October 26, 2001, 23:43

Jersey has some lovely spots along the water gap the Jersey shore --but then there's Newark, Rahway, Jersey City etc --better known as Cancer Alley! And I love it! I am taking a pro-pollution position here!

You get two "free" fungal blooms before you get worms. Then there's only one. Then you get the interlude about planetmind taking over your body during a Council meeting and that's when you get your first angry worm. If you are Free Market/Wealth, you'd better have an empath unit! Especially as Believers!

SITS · October 27, 2001, 00:46

Quote:

Originally posted by Googlie
DD:

I've always played a style that attempts (not always successfully) to get at least one borehole per base. Once empath shard choppers are available you can build massive treasuries with the mindworm planetpearls. Then, as you say, it is suddenly controllable thru farms and preserves until finally gone (although I've seen it make unexpected reappearances just before transcendence - a sort of Planet's last kick)

G.

Have you tried attacking a stack of worms with a worm of your own? I found if I attacked the stack with an ordinary unit then I have to take them out individually but with a worm the whole stack goes.

Cybergod · October 27, 2001, 07:35

Quote:

Originally posted by SITS
I found if I attacked the stack with an ordinary unit then I have to take them out individually but with a worm the whole stack goes.

Ae you sure? My epath rovers do just fine killing fof stacks of those critters in one go. Maybe you were using air units, which just kill each units individualy, not even causing colliteral damage!

I myself go through a couple of pops but that's it, I don't concentrate on minerals much (energy is the key!!!)...

SITS · October 28, 2001, 00:39

Quote:

Originally posted by Cybergod

Ae you sure? My epath rovers do just fine killing fof stacks of those critters in one go. Maybe you were using air units, which just kill each units individualy, not even causing colliteral damage!

I myself go through a couple of pops but that's it, I don't concentrate on minerals much (energy is the key!!!)...

It might have been an air unit...

Capt Dizle · October 28, 2001, 01:26

Hiya DD, how ya been pal?

I don't know nothing bout eco-formulas. I used to love to cash those mindworm stacks though.

Sikander · October 28, 2001, 04:11

I always more or less accidently used the ecodamage to my advantage. I never really went completely crazy with minerals, but as my empire expanded I did notice that my mineral limit kept rising. I thought it was because of my centauri preserves, which was about half the story.

Blake · October 28, 2001, 04:29

As my (current) avatar suggests I like terraforming - a lot. I have always terraformed very extensively[b] (Lots of Boreholes), mainly because that was the path to perfectionist victory. My terraforming style has changed very little, when the ED formula was figured out I just optimised my play style, and went a lot more mineral focused (but this was from my bases - not terraforming, I used to rarely build GeneJacks etc, now I aim to rushbuy them ASAP and have the clean mineral threshold raised in advance).

Even switching to crawlerless my terraforming is much the same, just a slightly lower emphasis on condensors, slightly higher emphasis on forests, and a strong craving for orbitals.

DilithiumDad · October 28, 2001, 09:03

Ah, Jimmytrick my old nemesis. Now I understand how my Green ways allowed you to outproduce and overrun me.

My use of boreholes hasn't changed much except I am no longer afraid to build two per base. But I terraform mines earlier --every rocky square gets mine/road and a crawler even before Eco Eng riases the limits. As soon as I get Eco Eng, mineral production goes way up thanks to mines (usually don't have boreholes yet). Now I build Genejack Factories in every base that is making at least 15 minerals. After the thrid or fourth fungal bloom, I will follow up the Genejack with a Centauri Preserve if ecodamage is over 10. Bases with Preserves also get Biology Labs and will be used for making Locusts of Chiron (Preserves and Bio Labs each raise lifecycle by one). I used to think that Locusts were too expensive to build, but with this high-mineral, pro-pollution strategy I can build them easily.

Ironwood · October 28, 2001, 18:52

Probably the greatest amount of ecodamage I ever ran was when I was playing Alien Crossfire and I built that project that ups the take from fungus squares according to your green rating (I was running a Green Cyber-Democracy, persuing Wealth as Morgan, I believe). I quickly found that those squares were more productive than any other, had all the factories going, so I simply allowed fungal blooms to take over entirely, and raked in the planetpearls!

bobyk464 · October 29, 2001, 13:00

I highly endorse the methods outlined in the eco-damage paper. After a few bases are up and running, I'll seek out a spot with rocky terrain and mineral bonuses, put a base there, and start racking up the eco-damage. Ideally, the base will have a nutrient bonus on favorable terrain, too. If that situation doesn't occur, then sometimes you have to wait until crawlers arrive and can support the nutrient needs of the polluter base until it's big enough to be self-sustaining.

The planning and invesment it takes are certainly worth the effort. The first fungal bloom is the magic moment you're waiting for, and you know you're "set for life" at that point. Not having to worry about eco-damage as the empire grows amounts to a free license to do whatever you please. You can have hefty industrial output and be green at the same time. And while the Tree Farms and Hybrid Forests are costly, they certainly offer high return on the investment.

I answered "no eco-damage" in the poll. But that's the long-term objective. Is this a case of "the end justifies the means?" - I'll induce the blooms necessary to secure an eco-damage-free future.

Earwicker · October 29, 2001, 16:16

Quote:

Originally posted by Ironwood
Probably the greatest amount of ecodamage I ever ran was when I was playing Alien Crossfire and I built that project that ups the take from fungus squares according to your green rating (I was running a Green Cyber-Democracy, persuing Wealth as Morgan, I believe). I quickly found that those squares were more productive than any other, had all the factories going, so I simply allowed fungal blooms to take over entirely, and raked in the planetpearls!

Yes, the Manifold "Drown the World" Harmonics. Sends late-game eco-damage through the roof the higher your planet rating. Ironic: the less terraforming/ more fungus bases which are most planet-friendly are the ones with the best production and hence the worst damage. Go figure. I was playing as Cha, with +7 Planet, and the world sudenly went nuts. Luckily, I was nearly to Transcend before the sea levels started drowning all my little tree-huggers.

I haven't tried building this since discovering that pops were vaccinations against Ecodamage (I went back to SMAC the last couple of months).

knowhow2 · October 29, 2001, 19:27

I pick the second choice from top. Seems to be the most common choice among players.

Fungal is irritating but industry is important enough. So a balance is optimal.

TeknoMerc · October 29, 2001, 20:39

I also chose B, but like Blake and others, I do at least 1-2 boreholes/base. since I always play TORTURE MOD (crawlerless, tech stag), I tend to forest much more and beeline for restriction lift and satellites.

Spathi · November 3, 2001, 15:15

What is the eco-damage equation? From your comments I assume it isn't the one in the game Datalinks, since IIRC it doesn't factor in fungal blooms at all.

Spathi · November 3, 2001, 15:16

What is the eco-damage equation? From your comments I assume it isn't the one in the game Datalinks, since IIRC it doesn't factor in fungal blooms at all.

Avenoct · November 4, 2001, 10:58

The ecodamage formula in-game is incomplete. The formula referred to was uncovered by Ned, Blake, and Fitz. It was top-ed in this forum for awhile, and certainly should always be. Yet, do a search on 'Ecodamage Formula Revised' with the author's names and it should pop (hehe) up right quick.

I chose the no-ecodamage position because the poll makes the silly dichotomy between No-Ecodamage -VS- Lots of Minerals. As others have noted, One Uses:

Lots of minerals to get to a little ecodamage,

which you use to eliminate ecodamage (building tree farms, etc, after the first pop),

which you take advantage of by having lots of clean minerals and,

No ecodamage.

-S-

DilithiumDad · November 4, 2001, 11:08

What I was TRYING to get at with the poll was whether people are pursuing the strategy of deliberately causing eco-damage in order to reduce eco-damage. It seems that just about everyone on these forums has grasped and accepted this paradox, but that's not reflected in the poll results.

MariOne · November 4, 2001, 14:51

Spathi, if you read the Datalinks formula, where it talks of "# of damages" that's the point where it refers to what you call "fungal blooms". It's maybe rather obscure, but it DOES factor them in.
Apart a couple of minor details (the Planet factor can't get below 1, and eco-reducing facilities also dampen atrocities effects), the fromula in the datalinks DOES report the functioning of EcoDamage pretty well.

The only significant finding of Ned, Fitz & Blake over what you can read in the datalinks, is the effect of the building of TreeFarms and other eco-related facilities after the first pop, in rasing the parameter of "up to 16" that you can read in the formula.

SITS · November 4, 2001, 17:56

Quote:

Originally posted by Spathi
What is the eco-damage equation? From your comments I assume it isn't the one in the game Datalinks, since IIRC it doesn't factor in fungal blooms at all.

If you go to the front page of 'Poly and look for Newsletter #175 you will find a very good article about it. Alternatively you can buy Vel's SMAC/X guide which is very very good and also has details about the game.

If you can't find them then give me a shout...