Clean up your act

[lbores]

I try to get Non-lethal and Clean asap since I play University mostly.

I then make clean, nonlethal police garrisons asap. Is this a good idea or ...?

What about Clean? I maintain a cadre of 'dirty' to use as cannon fodder but always try to keep my forces clean so that I can have a large force without paying exorbitant upkeep. Keeping in mind that I play Univ and have VW, HGP early, should I switch to Dem asap or Green or ...?

[KMadeleine]

I tend to play as Lal, so I don't need police units until quite late because I have a lot of talents. Even then, police aren't as effective as facilities are, because PK can't use police state. When I do need police, I definitely make clean cops.

Clean I recently fell in love with. As Lal with green and democracy, I can only support 2 units even with the Living Refinery, so as soon as I have the cash and the tech I upgrade my rover formers to be super and clean. By that time I've usually cleared out the fungus anyway, so I don't need fungicidal as much as need to not pay support.

[Kinjiru]

I use Non-lethal very selectively. It can be extremely useful, but very much on a case-by-case basis. (1-1-1 Drop, Non-Lethal can be very useful in late game MP!)

I use clean on almost every unit, excepting those I plan to sacrifice. Over time, the mineral savings are just unbelievable. Keep in mind those, that you can make some units clean, that don't need to be (it's either probes or crawlers, I can't remember which).

[The Mad Monk]

Crawlers are the intrinsicly clean ones (be kinda silly otherwise, wouldn't it? )

[Misotu]

Probes are also "clean".

[Dimension]

He meant you just need to make sure you're not putting clean reactors on units that are inherently clean.

And as far as that's concerned, both probe teams and crawlers both give you the option of adding a clean reactor.

[AzNtoccata]

I'm not sure, but if you have 1 unit in a city and it riots, and you can only use 1 police, and you move a non-lethal unit into the city, does the non-lethal unit take over the garrison's job?

[Lord Maxwell]

Using non-lethal is off course better than using normal garrison, as they do double police duty.

But Ibores, you should be running free market far before you get clean reactors. And on fm you don't get any police benefits at all. (FM with 10-20% psych alotment is better than green or planned most of the time, especially as you get more research with it. And maximising advantages is what this game is all about.

[Aredhran]

I use 1-1-1 police units ("Cops") as cheap garrisons (they only cost 1 row), in every city. They can easily be upgraded for more specific defense, should the need arise.

[Skanderbeg]

I don't use police units, because that seems to dangerous for me. If they were killed (for example by conventional missile), it get TWO problems at once:
Loose of garrison, and additionally drone riots (because the police effect falls away). And the riots will not allow me to rush-build a new garrison.
For my opionion, it's more safe to control drones by facilities as recreation commons or holotheaters.

"Steelborn, Starborn"

[Blake]

I also use a "Cops" unit 1-1-1, police which gets upgraded to clean later. When you look at the relative merits compared to a rec commons:

Clean Cops
2 Drones quelled
Cost 2 rows
Upkeep 0

Rec Commons
2 Drones quelled
Cost 4 rows
Upkeep 1 energy/turn

And there you have it, if you can use police keeping a cop unit at each base is very economical.

And the idea of them being taken out - a rec commons can get destroyed by a probe in a single action. In order to kill a cops unit the attacker must first bash his way through all of the armoured garrisons.

Ofcourse I usually use both, cops are great in small and captured bases, and can be upgraded to usful units in a pinch.

Oh, and the game always uses non-lethal units before standard units for pacification.