Important - think about this because decisions needs to be made.

[Kody]

Buster wrote:
In case there is doubt - I am not concerned about whether we get Flex or not - I am concerned:

a) That we get flex soon
b) That we get MMI not long after the others preferably before
c) That we get env. econ. fast
d) That we do not overly prolong getting b or c by going about getting one of the others in an inefficient manner.

To state it in plain words:
a) To plan we need to know where the others are, how far they are & what they are doing. Flex is key in this, tech steal will probably soon get difficult so that is not my main concern.

b) you are a sitting duck if you're late for MMI - the others are sitting ducks if you are early.
Invasion fleets are nice & you can do some damage - even take out someone once in a while but it is expensive and takes time & is usually easily repulsed unless one is out there very very early (already getting a bit late). Once chop & drop enters, borders start moving very quickly if opponents are close.
Whatever millitary you built before will at this point have limited value as the new units are so much more capable.

c) env. econ is where it gets possible to really take off on growth & base output. Getting it late means you will fall behind very quickly and instead of having the choice to go war if a good chance is there - war is now your only chance to even out the difference.

So the point is getting both - not sacrificing one to get the other. In a two player team it is best done by one going for obne & the other for the other.

I so far understood you would aim at env. econ. while we went for flex/mmi. This fits well as we will be significantly faster than you on research. It is not internal distribution or nervousness that is the reason this. If you backstab us at some point we are in deep **** anyway and I will personally rather loose a game than go back on a deal.

It simply fits well with the techs we currently each posses & with research speed. It does however mean that you need to look at research not from the point of "what would we like soon - lets start on that" but longe term "how do we both get to the major targets the fastest". This can be difficult in a demogame if you have lots of members with short attention spans where it tends to go 1, 2 many as far as future techs are concerned.

Making a longer term plan is a good thing too. Be carefull of "oh now we got rovers - lets make some and invade". You will need a lot and transports (which are not then sent all over the place pod hunting). To have any chance of success you need to land with a sizeable force, well before the opponent acquires airpower. While you are building this fleet you will be not building a bunch of other stuff - so either you really bet it will work & put enough into it to make it so or (as normally happens) you end up sending an annoyance rather than a real threat.

Sending an annoyance force can have its uses to - but here the point is another. You want to maximize damage with minimum investment & is less concerned with keeping what you may take. If not done properly you often do not get much damage for the bucks put into it.

Anyway - the whole thing I am getting at is that I try to plan well ahead - and dislike having to rethink my strategy for reasons that are avoidable - one of the main ones getting lured off the track that will get you there in the end because something that just came to notice seems attractive to pursue & while pursuing it noticing something else etc.

All that said I understand conditions can change and opportunities arise and you need to adapt to that, like when meeting pirates. My main concern is that there is agreement on the large lines of where we go and how to get there and that we stick to it - unless a really good reason not to arrives so when some comment that indicates we are not thinking on the same lines come up or which seems out of alignment with the overall plan is made - sorry if I am overly zealous in getting it clarified.

Whether you do flex or soc. psych is not much of an issue - that you have a more far-reaching plan, that it aligns with ours and that you can be expected to stick with it is. Details can be adjusted as we go.

Kody wrote:
I'll try and get the hive to commit to something. The current plan was to go for flexibility.

After that there's still a fair amount of doubt. It becomes a question of whether to try for impact and attempt to invade the university, or to stay in builder.

Personally I would perfer to stay in builder mode, this view is shared by one or two others. However, I've been repeatively told by the other half of the hive that if we invade the university within the next 30 years we will have a stunning victory.

Sadly, while I can read as much as I like about strategies and do calculations. There's nothing that can replace experience, so I've been mostly trusting what my teams mates have been saying.

Then again it's our most experienced player voting to stay in builder mode, and now you're suggesting it too. It'll looks like there's going to be a few polls about this, coupled with a few debates. I'll see if I can get the ball rolling tomorrow. It's long overdue that the hive decided.

Edit:
When I say builder I mean go after the restriction lifting techs.

Also I decided I might as well start the ball rolling tonight, but I need to think about the information before I can come up with a poll and describe both sides of the argument.

If we decide to go attacking. That means getting flexibility, mobility and impact. After that it'll probably be back to restriction lifting.

If you have any more input to give on this subject, feel free to give it. Additional information will be considered during the polling and may affect our decision.

Tomorrow I wrote a for and against and we'll have ourselves a little poll. I'll probably try and talk to most of you via MSN too.

[Snowflake]

I think what Buster said about we getting flex from Pirates while they getting mobility and we send flex to them is feasible. Further discussions will be needed regarding whether we are going to pursue tech steal while we work on restriction lifting in the same time, or we are going to focus on an early invasion of the univ and make them our research pet.

[Kody]

Added Note

Buster wrote:
Its good to make up one mind and personally I think the time for going agressive has passed - until we get to the air era.

Early pushes are best done simply by going impact weapons & ships and then sending off the horde. You can probably do a uni invasion still - but I doubt if you can do it at the same time you are pulling off the SPs you are also planning to grab.

By the time you get Flex - you still need to build your ships, load you units & sail them across. This assuming you have some sort of weapon - which you currently don't and for such an attack going with laser is very hopefull indeed - you realistically need impact, so that has to get researched too & then the rovers built.

It works best before the others have had time to get defense - probes etc placed and while their production is still small so that they cannot easily scramble a defense and have not started really looking out for agressors.

Personally at this point I would wait - mainly because once air arrives it is a whole new scene and by now it is not that far off.

Indications are that uni is close enough that bases are within plane range of the drone west coast and that at that time we can simply drop over there - needing maybe no ships at all or just one to get the first units in.

If it is like that and we arrive at air power at the same time - we need no fancy plan just larger numbers of hardware & producing large numbers is exactly what your faction & mine excel at.