Green Witch Maritime Research and Privateer Inn

[Hercules]

In the absence of name suggestions I hearby christen our research and probe thread, the Green Witch Maritime Research and Privateer Inn.

As Cuspidore made a quite a number of interesting observations on techs from the Chart Room, I copied the post here. It might be good practice from here on in to keep all our chats on tech in the one place. If we can.

I might copy over the others too. Might edit it to remove rum influence.

I've never made to much of a study of bee-lines, so I don't know if there is any inherent Pirate advantage in research offerings coming into play here, but barring that, I would think that our chances of getting SoHB first
would be kind of slim, what with the University's free tech and NetNodes and the Borg's research bonus, not to mention Miriam starting out with one of the prereqs and likely a running start on the energy/labs production. If either one of our EggHead fellow humans wanted to go that way, I doubt we could beat them. It's going to be a while before we are able to do any terraforming at all, so unless there are a lot of handy energy specials waiting for us, our research will be kind of slow. Since we are starting with 2 techs, our research costs (currently listed at 35 , will be noticibly higher than those with only 1 tech, which will aslo slow us down. I guess that if we were to go for SoHB, we would in effect be betting that the others would all go for Centauri Empathy(sic) and would waste their first research on that.

I am pretty sure that the bee llines are not necessarily the same for each faction. I believe that the game mechanics choose research offerings to withhold (i.e. techs that you have the prereqs to research but are not offered) on a strict rotation: each tech is offered for two turns and withheld 1 turn and that each tech is assigned to one of three groups of techs; one of these groups is withheld each turn, rotating through the groups each time you choose, so that you can be confident that a tech will not be withheld twice in a row.
There are a two wrinkles in this schema: (1) the rotation advances when you acquire techs by other means, like trading, stealing or pod popping, so if you get 2 techs on the side between research, you will have the same group of techs withheld; and (2) that there is always at least one tech offered and that it is also predetermined in some fashion (perhaps depending on your faction's research preferences or some such); whatever this sequence of 'wild card' techs is, it will lead to a particular tech being exempt from the withholding rotation and so always offered until you research it, at which point another tech will become the wild card. I don't know all the details of this theory, and it does have a few skeptics, but I have been keeping track (albeit imperfectly) of tech offerings in PBEMs for quite a while now and have not seen any evidence to refute it. To the extent that I am able, I will try to keep track in this game too and share whatever insight and suggestions devolve from it. (pardon the ramble if you are already true believers and I have been preaching to the choir).

In addition to SoHB or just going for CentEmpathy(sic), we could consider going for techs that will be unlikely to be researched by others, thus guaranteeing us trade goods and relying on those trades to get the 'normal' techs. This strategy has some risk associated with it, particularly if we turn out to be unable to get any essential techs that way, but as long as we have ships out there (if we lose our initial ship, we are in trouble and I at least, will be cursing Googlie for dropping out our spare), we should be in a position to make a lot of early trades (we may want to consider not trading others' commlinks too readily, keeping a trade monopoly as long as possible), and the risk is probably not too bad.

I'm incllined to vote for CentEmpathy(sic), but I'm not adamantly opposed to one of the other approaches.

[FlameFlash]

Still stand true to the Centauri Empathy as our first tech... I'll vote for others when others are actually offered... but going for the 3res armor this early seems wise as a next step.

Give us an edge over the others fungal-wise and then aim for Ind. Automation.

[Hercules]

Discussion copied from the ChartRoom


Flashflame :

Terraforming needs to be a top priority first... then move on to something else.

I like the idea of after Cent Emp go Aquafarm and aim for 3res armor... I usually can get it rather quickly and it generally will give us an edge over the other human factions who won't be aiming for military tech so soon.

From there Ind. Auto is always good, because unlike our landlubber friends, we get supply foils which can act as both early warning systems and boosts to energy and research (after building, detour them to our headquarters.)


One Secret Project we should really aim for is whatever one it is that gives us bases with 3 starting pop... it'll greatly help against that -1 growth... later the cloning vats should be a priority...


Makahlua :


CentEmp, followed by IndAuto for the Planetary Transit System - and IndAuto is good for lots of things Are there any other SP's we need early - knowing that -everyone- will be trying for them?

We do need Demo/Planned for good growth, but maybe we should also run Demo/Green for a bit while still pod-popping and gather a few IoD's? Once grown, they are great transports and especially if Independent, can do a good chunk of exploring -without- getting caught in fungus (and probably have a unit or two handy for grabbing land pods!) Green's still not -urgent- tho, just a thought for when it's handy



Foolish Icarus:


I suggest Adaptive economics. Aside from the energy grid, we'd also get technologies for thermocline, aquafarm, merchant X, free market, and be at a convenient location for going after the either the techs that get rid of the production restrictions or ind automation. These are also fairly good techs to trade with. Do the other factions also start with 3 colony pods?

Centauri Empathy= 4 tech beeline (admittedly, less if we manage to get secrets of the human brain first)
Adaptive Econ=4 tech beeline. I am not trying to be overly critical, nor do I believe Ad. Econ is the only way to go, but how valuable is empathy going to be with Guild disabled? What am I missing?

John D Muller:

Is it possible that too much rum and/or too much yo ho ho and/or too much whatever has gotten some of us mixed up between Centauri Ecology and Centauri Empathy ?

I confess that I meant to say Centauri Ecology in my last post; I can't speak for Herc, FF or Maki, but perhaps they were following me down the garden path in 'Ponics Hold #2 (where the loco weed is).

Apparently Foolish_Icarus has not yet had enough and so has retained a very un-piratelike degree of lucidity, wondering what the H the rest of us are talking about.

It looks like my likely candidates for the first tech would be Centauri Ecology for Formers, Social Psych for RecComms (and the SoHB Gambit), BioGen for Recyclers (andthe SoHB Gambit) - those would be my leading candidates for the first tech. There are also Industrial Base, Applied Physics, InfoNets and Progen Psych, which IMhO, are less immediately useful, not to say that they are bad techs, only less helpful in getting started.

Atlantian:


As for the jump for SotHB, i am completly for it. When not being The University (not the ACDG University, but the normal AC University), In a bad start i have a 50/50 chance, and a good game I know I have good chances. I focus on nothing but that. All my bases have Stockpile on. My social engineering is switched to 100% labs.

As for choosing techs, I agree with what you guys have been choosing.

[Flubber]

While pirates aren't great at academics, we see the values other place on technology and booty is booty no matter the form. I saw technology discussions spread about this forum but just saw this spot for it.

I saw that we should get centauri ecology next turn and I applaud that choice. I also saw Johnd state that people had agreed on social psych as the next choice and its another fine choice. Considering it as part of an overall strategy it says to me that either

1. We plan to allow at least one of our bases to grow (not build pods) such that an early rec commons would be needed or useful and soc psych is a goal in and of itself

2. We hope to use it as trade bait as it is a valuable tech that some others may not research first

3. Eth calc and Gene splicing are the early goals-- again fine goals


There are any number of good tech choices at this early stage and it all depends how philosophically, we want to play this faction.

I am usually pretty agressive both trading and probing with the pirates but I can be the peaceful trader. While we can be flexible, our early tech choices will determine which directions our faction will head. Personally I usually head for plan nets ASAP (after getting formers) both for probes and to move up the ind auto beeline but I know that there are many viable plans.

So what I am looking for is not only what individual techs are next on the list but what the longer range plan would be that makes you suggest that tech. I work from the assumption that soc psych was decided as the next tech before I came aboard


Side note-- I almost NEVER go for SOTHB early for the "extra" tech as I find the increased cost for future techs and the time spent going down this line delays other key techs that I view as more important. Now as the pirates I see value in the trance ability to increase unit survivability as we explore aggressively, so for the pirates, I see SOME merit in this line but only if you see trance as something very worthwhile even absent the extra tech possibility.

AS for the uni beating us to SOTHB, if I were on their team I would want to beat with a textbook ANYONE that suggested anything other than formers and Ind auto as a beeline.

[Makahlua]

Just peeked in the save - we do have CentEco (yay!) but our choices were: ProgPsy, Biogen, InfoNets, and Laser. Looks like the game's chosen for us This may differ when the Cusipidore plays it, but what's our backup choice? I'm thinking either ProgPsy (leads to res armor & weaps -and- would be a good trade b/c I doubt anyone else will pick it) or InfoNets (only one more tech to PlanNets & foil probes ) Biogen's not crucial since our Domes act like RecTanks, and well we have nothing to use lasers on...yet

Thoughts? (b/c I could be talking out my (*^(&^ here )

edit #1 : And reading the Uni's Paper, they say they have/are working on SotHB - has the Cuspidore seen that notice in game or is it propaganda designed to make us give up?

Edit #2 : Just playtested it a bit, it's possible but until I see the message I won't beleive them ^_^

[Hercules]

Same with me. When I opened the turn I had the same tech choice as Maki.

I would go for Info Net at this point in time.

Also I'll post in the 2103 to 2110 thread about micro change of 1 worker at ' Rita.
to the Nut to speed up increase to size two.