SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

This game just got cooler. I should have realized before now... I could have been gifting the Abbidon on my SW galactic border ships and units to stem the onslaught of the stronger Drushocka Empire till I could reinforce that area. If I did that, I could still keep my trade alliance with the Drushocka and not worry about their ships in my space till I needed to go to war at a later time. Better the Abbidon directly deal with them than me...

Hehe... A new strategy unfurls itself. How cool...

Question, how do I gift satellites and fighters? I have no problem with ships, but when it comes to units it seems to only list my transports in the units list... Strange. Is it possible? If I have to do it via them being stored in a ship, will the gifted empire use the cargo in that ship?

Re: SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

Yes, units can only be gifted when they're in storage on cargo ships.

Aiding allies against mutual enimies is a good stratagy, but sometimes, if the AI opponent doesn't like you enough, they'll refuse any gift.

This was a big part of my game strategy back when I played GalCiv on OS/2. But SE4 just isn't written for this sort of nuance.

Re: SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

Any hopes we will see it on SEV?

Re: SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

An AI that recognizes you have sent it ships for a particular purpose and cares enough about your relationship to use them only for that purpose?
There isn't any AI in the world that does that.

Now, in SE4, if you gift some ships to an AI that you know is at war with your enemy, but allied with you, well naturally those ships are going to wind their way into fleets and towards the enemy. It helps to fly them to a gathering point and use the default design types so the AI knows to put them in its fleets.

Re: SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

Good advice SJ. B4 I gifted the ships, I had fleeted them up and sent them to a planet where that gifted empire could use them mb. I wonder if once they are gifted the last orders I had for them are canceled and new orders are given.

But yeah, at the time, both the other empires were allied to me, but at war with each other. I was gifting to the weaker empire to keep the stronger one in check.

Re: SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

Keep in mind that even if you gift it to another empire it still obeys the strategy you have for it. This means if the enemy has a few of your ships you can set it's strategy to "Do not get hurt" and they will run away rather than attack you. So if you gift ships to someone make sure to design it just for them, so if they turn on you the ships are useless. As you can see I am paranoid.

Re: SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

And, unless you are great allies or there is unique racial tech involved, immediately retrofit any ships gifted to you.

Re: SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

Why?

Re: SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

It prevents the aforementioned "run away, run away!" trick and lets you set your own strategies.

You don't have to chance any components IIRC; just design an identical design and retrofit to that.

Re: SEIV: Iran Contra Scandal
 

For exactly the reason Randallw posted?

You can't retrofit to an exactly identical design, and you better hope the ships don't rely on a bunch of racial techs. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif