mil. dea and diplo questions

black mole · March 9, 2003, 00:12

What use do military DEA's have besides unrest reduction? I haven't built very many of them since I figured entertainment would be better if push really came to shove, and the manual gave me a negative if vague impression of their usefulness. I've been generally trying to do a single government, bioharvest or mining where they are especially effective, and otherwise industry and/or research unless I definitely need entertainment. I get technologies periodically referring to some sort of scanning equipment to be build in military dea's, but I can't recall seeing any of these actually built.

Also, does anyone know why I've seen military buildings and developments seem to have drastically different stated costs in PPs at different planets? This might relate to above, but most of my best industrial systems have no mil. DEA's, those are where I've seen the cheaper costs, and I wouldn't think zoning military would make things worse (stupid military bureaucracy!).

Does anyone know what does it take to have get contact with a race? Is it straightforward proximity as in prior MoO games, or other factors? Are outposts effective in this? I began the game in a large section of galaxy that had only one entrance. I took one side of this and built-backwards, someone else already had the other side. I've now busted out, and haven't yet built any colonies or outposts, but I already have contact with a new race with only my fleets outside the sector where I've always been.

Before I found the first race, I had about half a dozen events occur where my translators were spitting out gibberish and supposedly off the races I had 'met'. I'm also playing as the Ithkul, and I'm fairly sure I customized my race with bad starting diplomacy. Both races I've met so far have had -150ish starting relations and -50 causus belli. Is this what bad diplomacy as the Ithkul does for you, or was all that translator gibberish spammed out over the entire system even to the people I hadn't met yet? Does being Ithkul have its own diplomacy hit in addition to whatever specifics you customize?

vmxa1 · March 9, 2003, 05:20

I think you must be within two jumps of one of their planets to have contact.
I-kools are disliked by all from jump street. I can't image why since they eat all other races that share a planet with them.

black mole · March 9, 2003, 06:39

What exactly is a jump? I've seen the phrase elsewhere, but don't remember its definition. Does two jumps mean that there is one planet between you and the desination planet by starlane travel? I checked, and I know I can't actually reach any of their planets from any of mine in only two terms. Do outposts work for this proximity requirements?

I found mention of the Ithkul's eating disorder on a different forum since I made my last post. I can see that being... distressing...

Arkasian · March 9, 2003, 14:49

It seems that you must have discovered one of their worlds AND they must have discovered one of your worlds for diplomatic channels to open up.

nskripchun · March 9, 2003, 15:24

Yeah, AI seems a little screwy sometimes... at least there could be some warning.

In the game I'm playing now, the AI went from full Alliance to total war with me in 1 turn... it was annoying.

No diplomatic threats, no warnings... just a sudden change, and all of sudden my entire border with them is lit up with battles.

canamrock · March 9, 2003, 17:00

Remember that it's mood that sets the AI actions. Unfortunately, you must keep attention on their Casus Belli bars regularly to see the stuff coming. Even so, they do seem to have somewhat random reactions at times. Like when they get all pissed one turn, and then start bowing to you the next.

Gateway103 · March 9, 2003, 22:03

Use of Military DEAs
- Reduce Unrest
- Increase cap size for allowable buildings. Note, Military DEAs DO NOT increase cap limit of Orbitals on colony, as originally planned. Instead, Orbital cap is limited to 3 per planetoid, which includes planets and moons. I.e. a solitary planet can have 3 Orbitals, while a Gas Giant with 3 moons can have at most 12 Orbitals.

Race Contact
- Must have a Established Colony (i.e. Pop >=1) two jumps away from one of their Established Colony, note you do not need to have visit their systems before. Newly established outposts have Pop = 0.1, so they will not work until they grow up to Pop >= 1.
- A jump is define as an unbroken segment of Starlane, i.e. between 2 systems. The length of the Starlane do not play a factor here, and Wormholes are considered as one Jump as well.

-Gateway103

bakalov · March 10, 2003, 11:00

Some governments like despotism have a boost to their military activity. I think that this affects the output of the military DEAs. I had a planet with both military and recreation DEAs in the same region, and the military one was reducing 3 times more unrest ....