Other ways to climb the tech-tree

[Solver]

This is what I've tried while being Zakharov, several times. Climbing the tech tree in untraditional ways. For example, I ignore Field Modulation and Advanced Subatomic Theory, and their branches. I get Centauri Psi, a late mid-game tech at the same time I have the Chaos Gun, and so on. I'm building the cloning vats pretty early, getting units that are uncommon at this time of the game.
These ways are pretty good for Transend victory. I'm running Market, and despite my drone problems, still fight Sven, taking his sea bases. Most of my bases produce at least 15 energy per turn, so tech advances are coming out in an amazing speed.
This is not to say that traditional ways of research ain't good; this is to say there are also other possible ways to direct your research in, for example getting the nice Wave special ability, and Wave X choppers are pretty much amazing.
Anyone tried this?

------------------
Solver the "Running Beer" - http://www.aok.20m.com

[knowhow2]

Lately I tried shooting for the transcend by getting the nut/min/energy restriction techs (GS, Eco Ecg, Env Eco) first and then aim for the lab improvemnet SPs (App Rel & Un F T). Also building ME and WP early get the high energy imput and for getting the early possibilities to build Boreholes. Still, with all these playing Morgan on random huge map, at year 2216 I'm not half the way on the tech tree. What am I doing wrong?

,,,,,,

[Solver]

Perhaps you don't get enough bases, and don't concentrate on lab research facilities enough, it might be so. Also, trade techs with others.

------------------
Solver the "Running Beer" - http://www.aok.20m.com

[Misotu]

Knowhow2, you're perhaps not making the best use of crawlers for energy? I notice that Solver was talking about 15 energy per base, but that's actually pretty low if you're working an energy strategy ... I'd be looking for figures more like 90-150+ in my bases, although I don't play Morgan.

You mentioned the restriction-lifters, followed by the lab improvement SPs. But in fact the most important tech - especially for Morgan - is Industrial Automation because of Wealth and crawlers.

What SE settings are you running? As you know, these affect the game dramatically.

Edited to add: Also, boreholes are fine, but very expensive in terraforming time. There are much better ways to increase your energy (and therefore lab) output. Are you playing SMAC or SMAX? If SMAX, then I would certainly consider tidal harness/thermocline combinations. Much more cost-effective.


[This message has been edited by Misotu (edited May 12, 2001).]

[Net Maverick]

Misotu, if you can spare the time, I have a few questions regarding your post:

1) You mentioned not using crawlers effectively to harvest energy...the question that's bothering me is HOW you use them efficiently. In one of my threads, many seem to agree that crawling boreholes is a waste of time...and I'm convinced now that it isn't as great an option as I thought it was. The only other thing I can think of that surpasses boreholes in terms of energy production are energy parks...do you by any chance create these? They seem to take a long time to construct, and I'm not certain that they are worth the effort. Or do you build trawlers in coastal/sea bases and harvest energy from tidal harnesses?
2) I'm curious about your energy high bases...are they land or sea bases? I can hardly find a method that can produce 90-150+ energy with land bases, save for energy parks, and it is also difficult to visualize a strategy for sea bases, since tidal harnesses only produce 3 energy(note: SMAC version). Assuming you have 10 workers planted on tidal harnesses (30e), you'll need about 10 crawlers to get 120 energy, if your commerce income doubles your input; and although this task would be made easier when satellites arrive, it's still a costly maneuver to pull off...and this is not even counting energy lost to inefficiency. How many bases do you have with energy production that's that high? If it's one, I can certainly understand getting the requisite number of trawlers required for this strategy, but if more than half your bases are this rich...well, I'll be simply amazed.
3) Most of my land bases(size 10, no crawlers) are producing 30-40 energy after Hybrid Forests are constructed...is this number acceptable for an energy strategy?

Thanks in advance.


[This message has been edited by Net Maverick (edited May 13, 2001).]

[knowhow2]

all,

Just to clarify my game. I had a few crawlers (4-5 at the best bases and 2-3 at the other bases), 15 bases most of them 4 or smaller. SE settings FM/W/D. 70% lab 30% cash,

,,,,,,,,

And not being really close to anyone I'm not being attacked much. Almost sure that I did most things right. Well I guess I need more practice.

[Ned]

NM, Others may tell you better, but there are several ways to go about this. First is take a base, such as the HQ, and crawl/trawl energy/nuts from across the continent to it. Build here first. Also build here all lab enhanncing SP's. Finally, POD boom this base to size 22+ ASAP.

POD boom means moving a Colony pod from another base into it and pressing B. The base grows by 1.

Also, try to build up commerce income my Pacting with Morgan or the like. Get a submissive and build it up so that cities match 1-1.

Finally, run FM or its variant, Wealth + GA + (Green?).

The latter allows both a +2 economy and strategy of pod popping with 1e-3r-6 crusiers.

Ned

[Solver]

Mis,
I was pursuing mineral standpoint. I'm ucrrently playing Moregan with energy standpoint, habing an average of 100 energy per base.

------------------
Solver the "Running Beer" - http://www.aok.20m.com

[johndmuller]

Net Maverick, the energy enhancing facilities really add up; as I understand the benefits, you could get the same energy you cited with 1/2 (EG & FL) or 1/3 (EG, FL, TF & HF) the workers/crawlers with the added energy (from the listed facilities). Then there are specialists, and trade and various other stuff.

[Misotu]

Net Maverick, sorry for the delay in replying to your post.

On your questions, others might have differing views but my approach seems to work pretty well. Bear in mind that I'm not talking Morgan - for Morgan, all the numbers would be higher. I generally play PK or Gaia and more recently a few games as UoP:

1) Crawler use. Using crawlers effectively can actually be done in many ways. In the early game, I will even use a crawler to take just 2 energy to a base - not ideal (I'd probably take 2 mins early on), but bear in mind that as UoP I will often have Ind Automation by 2112-2116. So those tiny snippets of extra energy can actually have quite a dramatic effect and later in the game, when I have more terraforming in place, I can move them to somewhere more productive.

But generally, here are some ways to use crawlers effectively:

*Build the Merchant Exchange*, an under-rated SP. Although it's a tough choice, I will take the ME rather than the Weather Paradigm in most games if I get the option. Immediately, every energy crawler gets +1 over the normal value of the tile. So for UoP or PK running FM, a forest is worth +3, forest/river +4. Compare this to a borehole, and you can see that it's a very cheap way to gain energy, in terms of terraforming time. Later in the game, it gets even better when you build a hybrid forest. I don't build many of these, but I would certainly build a hybrid in the base with the Merchant (usually my HQ) if the terrain had obliged me to use forest extensively.

Use solar collectors on land. The higher the better, of course. But I will actually build solar collectors on land that is only 1000m+ if I have the Merchant. What I tend to do is combine them with a Mirror, which as you know gives +1. You only have to build 1 mirror to enhance 8 collectors, if you encircle it. Now, even on a tile that is under 2000m, you get 5 energy per tile (+1 FM, +2 collector, +1 mirror, +1 Merchant). Drill an aquifer, or use an existing river, and you're talking 6 energy. Build a few more mirrors into the pattern, and the take per tile increases by +1 each time.

It goes without saying that you crawler an energy special and enhance it appropriately with solar, or a forest if it's under 1000m high.

I do raise land sometimes - it depends. If I don't have the Merchant, then I will probably have to unless I find a handy mountain ready-made.

Raising land, building mirrors and solars does take a long time, it's true. But once they are built, they trawl in the energy every turn to the end of the game with no further work or maintenance required. So it's worth building them as early as possible. The best way to do it is to get a team of terraformers together - I usually group mine in teams of 3-6. One goes ahead to build roads, so that the "gang" can move into position without losing a turn. You can build an energy park quite quickly if you throw formers at it. It will cost you support, and that can be hard to fund early in the game. But it is worth it in the long run, and you spread the support cost over a number of bases using - heh - crawlers for the minerals to cover it in the early days.

The Weather Paradigm helps with all this, of course, but it's not necessary.

I usually find that my bases have crawlers pulling in minerals in the early years, in order to build improvements. I use forests a lot, so as my population grows I choose to reduce crawlered minerals in order to avoid ecodamage. These crawlers gradually move closer to my HQ over the years, and when they are no longer useful for minerals, they nip in, are rehomed and then sent off to gather energy.

In the later game, I build crawlers in multiple bases, re-homing them to my super-city and then sending them off to the energy tiles prepared by my formers. It's hard to make sure that I have enough terraforming available - if I am falling behind, I bite the bullet and build more formers.

2) My energy-high bases can be either land- or sea-based. In SMAX, more likely to be coastal bases. I use sea energy parks a lot - I prefer them to land in SMAX. In SMAC, land energy parks are far more effective. Sea energy parks are easy and quick to build, but the drawback is that foil supply crawlers are very expensive until fusion reactors. So typically I would wait to build those until Fusion arrives, and then really crank them out. Even in SMAC, though, with the Merchant Exchange each of them is worth +5 energy ...

In terms of energy per base across the whole of the empire. Well, it varies a lot game to game, depending on circumstances. I haven't played much SP for a long time, except for challenges. It is possible to get very high energy in all your main bases though, given the right circumstances and depending on how you play it. I looked up some old games, here are a couple of examples:

The best example I have achieved of effective crawler use was in Travathian's Challenge - the Believers, on a tiny island, huge map, max sea. Yuck. By the end of the game (you had to transcend) the stats were:

HQ: 1007 energy (yeah, one thousand and seven)
Other bases - well, I started to scroll through them all. The top 25 bases were all producing in excess of 100 energy, several at around the 140-150 mark. Then I got bored looking
To get this? Just 524 crawlers

Not a normal game - there's no other way to do that challenge. It is *the* energy strategy scenario. Crack that one, and you will *sail* through Morgan You'll be crying with boredom, but you'll certainly know how to make an energy park!

More usually - a recent example as the Gaians in a multi-player game, I transcended in 2198 with 16 bases. The best was producing 222 energy, the worst 72. Only the worst was producing less than 90 energy, base average was 115.

In other games though, my energy production would be lower.

3) It's hard for me to comment on Morgan (since I rarely play him) and 30-40 energy. I think it could be higher, but it depends on the land, your SE settings - every game is different. I'd have to see the game to be honest.

Long-winded, I know, but I hope some of it's useful. If you email me, I can send you some sample games showing how I use crawlers. I wouldn't pretend to be the world's greatest expert - plenty of people use them more effectively than I do - but sometimes looking at the layout of a game is more helpful than reams of discussion.

cheers!
Mis

Edited to add: my email address is misotu@hotmail.com. Doesn't show up in my profile - Apolyton doesn't accept hotmail addresses
[This message has been edited by Misotu (edited May 17, 2001).]

[Solver]

Hey Mis, I'd see that. Love to see games that others play and see how they perform.

------------------
Solver the "Running Beer" - http://www.aok.20m.com

[Net Maverick]

Ned, Johndmuller, Misotu, and Drago:

Thanks for all the informative replies. They were all very helpful.

[Drago Sinio]

My very simple strategy for energy crawling is to build the ME in your headquarters base, and dedicate two or three nearby bases to building NOTHING but crawlers. You terraform forests & rivers everywhere, and simply keep building crawler after crawler , homing them to the headquarters and setting them to crawl energy.

You will get very sick of moving crawlers around, but your HQ will produce amazing amounts of labs and cash. Naturally you build every lab and economy enhancing facility or SP in the HQ. By the time you build Hybrid Forest you will have literally hundreds of crawlers, each bringing at least 5 energy. In effect your entire empire becomes one huge energy park.
I dont have any data to support it, but I think you get more energy sooner this way, than with solar collectors and mirrors, due to the terraforming time advantage. ( Although there is nothing stopping you from building an energy park in addition if you like. You will certainly have plenty of crawlers to stick on it.)

Side benefits are that when you are ready to transcend, or if you need to rush an SP, you have a million crawlers already built. Also enemies will have to wade through crawler after crawler to get anywhere NEAR your bases to attack you.

[Misotu]

Solver, I've sent you the two game files mentioned in this post. NetMaverick, they are both SMAX so I have sent you an OCC SMAC challenge game which I hope will help. I'll have a look for other SMAC games that might illustrate the point ...