Two formers for one job

[Sprayber]

Does anyone do this? Would you consider it a cheat? I must admit that on occasion if I really want something done faster, I do this. Not for small stuff like farms or solar collector. But for raising and lowering land.

[Closey]

I usually do that. Well, at least if I've got a few formers to spare. Depends on how many I've got running around and what they're doing. I mainly use this method when building boreholes, drilling up rivers and such.

Don't really consider it a cheat, I mean, two units should be able to finish things faster than a single one. I know I would be able to, let's say, dig a hole in the ground faster if I had help.

[Blake]

I sometimes even use two formers for tasks like building roads and planting forest

I don't see why anyone would possibly want to use two formers for tasks like boreholes, gangs of four is barely sufficent! In SMAC I like to have gangs of 8 formers cruising around converting the world to the borehole&condensor cause. (In SMAX the slowdown becomes intolerable )

Btw, how could gang forming possibly be viewed as a dodgy tatic?

[mark13]

Same as Blake here - I usually have at least three fungicidal formers together clearing that horrible dollop of fungus nearby. I can't see how this is possibly a cheat - it's been around since the original Civ, and has never been frowned upon.

[knowhow2]

Cheating? No!

In my current game (being Hive on Huge Map of planet) I raised myself to victory by formers, tons of formers raising landbridges to reach other continents. I often use 5-8 formers for each landbridge job.

,,,,,,

[Fitz]

Sprayber, I don't see how anyone could consider this a cheat. As john points out, you can either get 2 terraforms in 2 squares simultaneously by putting the formers in two squares, or the same two terraforms sequencially (in the same time frame) by doing one square with both one after the other. You still get the same number of terraforms overall in the same amount of time. You're just changing from simultaneous to sequential.

Think of it this way. A former does one turn of work in one turn. There is no change in this rate, regardless if it works with others or not.

Now it is a cheat to click on a former that has already moved and give it terraforming commands, provided that conventional wisdom is correct and it then adds one turns worth of work to the forming project. That's because you gain a turns work this way. The former already used it's turn to move, and then you get a free turn of forming.
[This message has been edited by Fitz (edited May 03, 2001).]

[RedFred]

Cheat, no. Common practice, yes.

Slightly off topic, but another thing every micromanager should do is double check the progress of every "remove fungus" and "plant trees" former. Often the forest will spread on its own to the tile you are trying to improve. Unless you click on the former it will continue to be tied up until the amount of turns has passed that it would normally take for the improvement. You can gain some turn advantage by moving your former on to another task.

[Fitz]

I thought it automatically stopped the following turn, or the same turn, it it has orders to build something that exists in that square. Are you sure?

[WhiteElephants]

I'm pretty sure I've had the same thing happen where I'm removing fungus and a forest grows over where I'm removing it and the former keeps working till he's done the required amount of turns for it to plant a forest that is already there.

Myself, I like to have about 4 formers building together. Sometimes one or two will finish a road and the rest start on the improvement I intend to put there. Generally, I can't afford such luxuries until the mid game.

[mark13]

I tend to have rover formers for roadbuilding - whilst ordinary formers have to move and then build the road the next turn, rover formers can get straight on with it, thus effectively doubling their productivity. Of course, the ordinary former can then move along the new road and plant the (say) forest....thus saving a turn's terraforming.

[Misotu]

Yes, that's a good point Mark. It's true that gang-terraforming can gain turn advantage, and I use it a lot. For sea formers it's a no-brainer, because of their 4 movement points. For land formers, though, it requires a little more planning. Sending a single former in first to build a road becomes more vital as the size of your former gang increases.

Consider this:

4 individual formers can build 4 forest squares in 5 turns (one turn to move to the target square, 4 to build a forest)

4 gang formers can build 1 forest square in 2 turns (1 to move, 1 to build)

4 gang formers can build 4 forest squares in EIGHT turns.

So you do have to consider the fact that infantry formers use a turn to move to the target square. When you terraform in gangs, although your productivity comes on-line sooner, this is really only useful if you can use it/need to use it quickly. Otherwise, you are in fact gaining turn disadvantage
[This message has been edited by Misotu (edited May 03, 2001).]

[Velociryx]

What Misotu says is dead on, the first thing you need to ask yourself when determining how you go about terraforming is "how soon do I need the productive capacity of the target terrain tile?"

In the case of resource specials, the answer is almost always "ASAP" but when it comes to more mundane tiles, it depends on what you're doing. If you are mining a rocky tile, and you've got a crawler coming to completion in two turns to work that tile, then it is clearly to your benefit to gang-terraform that tile to get the mine up and running the same turn (or before, freeing the formers for other duties)the crawler arrives on scene to start reaping the benefits. On the other hand, if you've got a brand new, size one base, and that base's solitary worker is already working a tile, unless the tile you're terraforming is just worlds better than the one the worker is currently using, there may not be much urgency or gain in gang-terraforming that particular tile.

Tips when planting forests:
Send a lone former on ahead, and have him lay down a road, following a path that gives preference to flat tiles, as it only takes a single turn to build said road on a flat tile.

When "planter-formers" follow later, only forest the road tiles, allowing the passage of time to spread it (your trees) to the adjacent tiles. Not only will the forest spread help wipe out fungus, but by sticking to the road only, you don't get your valuable formers bogged down in places they really don't need to be.

From humble beginnings:
When I am terraforming, the first concern I've got is making sure there's a tile in my new base's production radius that nets me two nutrients. If there's already a tile that does that, I move on to road-building and forestation, but if not, then the first order of business is to get a farm up to speed the base from size one to two. That initial base will get (in this order)

1) A farm (if there's not already a 2N tile in the base radius)
2) Former moves to an adjacent flat tile (if available and builds a road)
3) That former plants a forest
4) Look for my next base site and road-build to that tile, prepping the tiles along the way as needed (ie- when my former gets to the base square, he drops a sensor array, both as a place holder for the base, and for a permanant 25% defensive bonus that can't be sniped out from under me once the base is built), and once the former is inside what will be the new base's production radius, I take stock of the tiles there. As above, checking first to see if there are any tiles present which will net me 2n. If not, my former builds a farm for the base-to-be, and plants a forest. That's about all the new base will need, so he's ready to move on and prep another base site.

In this way, I not only ring my initial bases with sensor arrays to warn of rogue units heading my way, but I ensure that my future bases have an extra layer of security, and by keeping a cadre of formers (well....only one former in the very early game, but of course that number expands as my number of bases grows) operating on the fringes of the slowly expanding empire, it gives me an early warning of approaching badguys, be they worms or some other faction. Layered security for the bases. Formers on the outskirts, bases ringed in with sensor arrays, and the initial bases themselves, cranking out the raw materials needed to grow.

-=Vel=-

[Fitz]

Vel, that implies that you expand very slowly. By the time a former is done with farm/forest/road to new site/sensor, my intial base the former came from has cranked out 2+ colony pods, one's been placed on the site before the former can get there to sensor it, and it's already cranked out a colony pod too.

I've only twice successfully used the sensor tactic. Once, I went strait to sensors (not even roads to speed up the pods), only coming back to terraform tiles when I had 10 more sensors than bases (which were only about 3-4, since I timed it badly). The second time the first 10 bases did not get a sensor array, but the remaining 30 or so did once 10+ formers managed to catch up and start getting ahead of the game.

That second example was very unusual for me, since I typically stop at the beauracracy limit for +2 effic.

Therefore, to me, your tactic is a huge loss of early game turn advantage unless you build a lot of bases. Either you are very slow, or you don't get those all important first two terraforms in (or roads between bases)
[This message has been edited by Fitz (edited May 03, 2001).]

[Blake]

quote: I'm pretty sure I've had the same thing happen where I'm removing fungus and a forest grows over where I'm removing it and the former keeps working till he's done the required amount of turns for it to plant a forest that is already there.

That's sounds like a Union thing


On a slightly different note can anyone confirm or deny that building ANY improvment over a forest or kelp tile slows growth? I'm sure that kelp grows faster if you don't build a tidal harnass. Also I'm convinced that forest+road spreads very slowly compared to virgin forest.

[johndmuller]

Gangs of formers generate turn advantage in Vel's lingo. If it takes a former 2 turns to start a kelp farm, 2 formers can make 2 kelp farms in 2 turns. If they do it together instead of each working a separate plot, you can get production after just one turn while still getting the same effects after 2 turns (assuming nearby plots). If nearly all of your terraforming starts bearing fruit a turn (or more) sooner, it can add up.

[Velociryx]

Ahhh....I should have seen that....indeed yes, on the particular kind of map I am most fond of, slow expansion is pretty much the order of the day. That works best on Huge planets, arid conditions, high levels of fungus, and high erosion.

What that gives you is very few 2n squares, forcing you to get a bit creative in the early game to even feed your people and grow decently, lots of flat tiles, facilitating quick road builds, and I've noted that forests tend to expand quite nicely on their own in those conditions.

So....the result is this: When you found a base, in almost every case, your worker is only giving you 1n from turn one, meaning that the base won't grow to size two for something like 24 turns....rush the former on turn one or two (assuming a bit of cash from worms or a nearby pod gives you the ability to do so), and your former has plenty of time to work before the base even grows.

Of course, there's a lot of variability here, and if you get lucky enough to find a nutrient special on that sort of map, then it puts you in the position of being able to launch a faster expansion, and in that case, I'll generally just do roads and the sensor (keeping my bases three spaces apart, so I can let a couple of my bases share the nutrient resource...switching out from one to the other to facilitate rapid growth from 1 to 2, and then having the workers allocated elsewhere for pod building.

On a more standard map, however, I generally shoot for 12-15 bases in the first fifty turns....

-=Vel=-

[RedFred]

[In response to an earlier question] Yes, Fitz, I am sure about the 'union thing' as Blake puts it. It is something to watch for when you are removing fungus or planting forest. One thing I am not sure about is late game fungus spreading. If you are already trying to make fungus in the tile in question, I haven't observed whether the former can recognize if fungus suddenly appears.

[Fitz]

RedFred, the reason I asked about the union thing is that a former crew does stop when you stack many on a square and one completes the job. But now that I think about it, the total former time on that job just reached 0, so it makes sense that it would stop in that case and not in the one you are decribing.

Vel, I really like your style, having gotten it to work, I just find it very hard to implement in conjunction with fast expansion, even on a huge map. The second time I tried it and got it to work, I was doing the 'ring a continent coastline" thing, and bases were only two squares apart. Even so, most of my first bases were left out of the sensor loop.

However, maybe I should try slower expansion in SP games. If I wait to produce a colony pod until a base site is already prepped for it, maybe the AI will have a chance by the mid/late game.

Incidentally, I'm thinking of playing a govorner challange, but haven't had the time to yet. Wasn't there a thread about that once?

[Velociryx]

Hiya Fitz, and thanks! It's a bit tricky and....off from the norm I guess. Takes some getting used to, and a good bit of practice to make it work consistently, but I find the advantages to be enormous indeed.

People are quick to point to the 2:1 difference in attack/defense factors and then naysay any and all defensive techniques, but I've got a fair amound of faith in my base defenders in general, and the multiplicative value of bases and base enhancements can more than overcome a comparable tech level X-Weapon, and the math supports this. Drop a plasma-armored trooper inside a base with a sensor and perim bonus and see what happens when the x-missile rover comes calling....and, to make the attack more realistic, give the attacker a 2-3 "step" morale boost over the defender, but also give the defender commjamming (figure a good defender will be ready for the obvious)....the x-rover is just so much scrap metal, despite the 2:1 "advantage" it has. The reason there's a 2:1 difference in attack and defense strength is because if that ratio was 1:1, it would be just plain suicidal to even consider attacking a defended base! But anyway, that's off topic...or, perhaps not off-topic (since part of the topic deals with sensor arrarys and the abovementioned is partly why I do it that way), but it's definately something of a tangent...LOL

Okay, it's a stream-of-consciousness day, what can I say?! As to the terraforming thing - again, quite right, that methodology would be slow and plodding on a "normal" world, but on the hellish, Dune-like planet settings I enjoy, that's about as fast as it gets, colonization wise, and under those conditions, I can even gang-terraform away a fungus square or two before I have to worry about my base growing! LOL....Those pre-game parameters can totally change the flow and tempo of your game! (what's really cool about playing under these conditions is it lets Yang get freakin' HUGE--I'm usually playing Morgan or Zak--as AI Yang almost always seems to start off near the Jungle, which is always a great landmark, but on an arid world, it's just outright broken!) Very fitting then, that the Yangster should have it, as it actually adds an element of danger to the game in the first 50 turns or so.

Terraforming on more normalized worlds:
Mostly, it will depend on the terrain you start around, but the first part of the equation in my original post remains the same: The creation of a 2n resource tile.

Assuming you build your former first, you actually don't need forests right away, as you'll get ten freebie mins when you found the base anyway, so you can focus your former's attention on building roads and the sensor after you get the 2n square working.

Even with a 2n square (doing this from memory, so this might not be exact), a base takes something like 11 turns to grow from size one to two, which means that you've got about that number of turns of former activity before the base grows.

Roads at 1 turn each *3 = 3
Travel time for three tiles = 3
Sensor 4
Farm 4 (if needed at either the existing base site or the future base site - if not, use the turns to plant a tree)

That, sadly, is more than the eleven turns or so it takes to grow from size one to size two, but, we're talking about the very early game here, and if you've just scraped together and spent fifty credits to rush build two formers, odds are remarkably good that you simply "ain't got" the cash to rush your pods to completion on the very turn that base growth occurs, so your formers will have a bit of extra time to prepare (of course, if you got it, spend it!)

Couple that (early game cash crunch) with the fact that you will not continue with perfect geometric expansion for very long (cos you'll be wanting to pull bases off of that to begin working on SP's and such), and you should have a situation set up where your formers can keep pace with the expansion you are doing.

Or....not?

-=Vel=-
[This message has been edited by Velociryx (edited May 04, 2001).]

[Fitz]

I finally see what my problem is. I build a solar collector on that first 2n square. If I also build a farm, it's even worse. Also, I think my build order (colony pod before defender) is important in this calculation. I'm pretty sure I also stick to one former at the initial base, and do rush the first couple of colony pods.

I new it was me and not your tactic.

I agree whole heartedly with your opinion on defense vs offense. Once you toss in AAA, Aerospace complex and a sensor, you have +225% to your defenders against air. ECM, perimiter & sensor is +175%. Naval is +100%. Add a tachyon for +100%, and attacking in the late game becomes ridiculous. Just remember a probe defender (probe-1-1) or two to stop the destruction of those facilities. I can never remember is dissasociative wave neutralizes the +50% X-bonus either.

When I have poor morale attackers, I even have problems attacking defenders at 2:1 if they are in forest or rocky with a sensor nearby.

That tends to moot vs the AI of course, since you rarely see 2:1 against them. It tends to be Shard vs Plasma for most of my games.

[Misotu]

Tau Ceti ran a test on diss wave - it definitely does *not* negate the impact of nerve gas, which is a bit disappointing. IIRC though, it fizzles all the other special abilities.

In the late game, the blink displacer does make attacking practical again ...

[Velociryx]

Hmmm....well, depending on the faction you're playing, an early solar collector might be a pretty good thing though, but yes, I can see how that would slow you down! I think I'd almost perfer a forest on a river tile (second best non-special in the game, netting you 1-2-2, compared to a monolith's 2-2-2).


Also, we gotta at least give a mention to "holy grail" sites, which will change even the best-laid plans:

Mineral special on a rocky tile: Forget everything but the food square and make putting a mine on that puppy your TOP priority!

Nutrient resource (on pretty much any terrain) - early game, you can't get much more out of the tile than if you forest it. Later, you'll want a farm/condensor/soil thingy so you can crawl food from it, but pre-restriction lifting, it's hard to top a forested nutrient special

Energy resource on a river tile: Forget terraforming, build your HQ there!



-=Vel=-

[SpacemanSpiff]

I've also noticed how formers will keep working on a task even after it becomes obselete - like continuing to plat a forest, when a forest has naturally spread there. But I've also noticed it in benificial situations, like a drill to aquifer continuing, when an ocean tile has sprung up next to it due to melting ice caps. I couldn't add any more formers to the task, but the one there, kept going and was able to start a river (and it wasn't trivial either - it paralled the shore, not just making a 1 tile river that dumped into the adjecent ocean)

I haven't done any experimentation, but it's possible that this could be abused, not just with making river, but starting two adjacent boreholes that both get compleated.

Spiff

[Sprayber]

The other day I was trying to plant kelp and I hit remove fungas by mistake, well my seaformer went ahead through the motions of removing fungas when there was absolutly no fungas there. Anyone have this happen?