YEEHAA! I did it! I did it!

[Taqwus]

For riots...

* Yes, use UPCs / Fate Shrines / TVFs. One per system should be standard, even in core systems you wouldn't expect to get unhappy. The Applied Psychology tree is pretty cheap, and it's vital if you want to be a conqueror.

* Check your Happiness Type. In my view, peaceful is the easiest to manage, since you even get happiness points for colonization and so forth. Neutral strikes me as the toughest, because doing just 'bout anything annoys your worlds.

* Your culture type, as well. Most are neutral to happiness... I don't recall if any has a penalty (and Artisans has a bonus), but if you chose one... there's even more need for UPCs, et al.

* Yes, troops calm riots. Even unarmed troops, and those are cheap to train if you don't have a nearby invasion force.


A nasty thing to do if you're dealing with a packed enemy sphereworld: hold it hostage by making it clear that you could readily obliterate all 40B (say, bring in a load of heavily escorted planetary bombers), and threaten to do so unless it's handed over to you. A human player might realize that if it's surrendered to you, he has a *chance* of getting it back intact (via PPP or whatever), while if it's torched (colony napalmed to death, after rendering it Deadly and 0/0/0), then there's practically *no* chance of getting it back and in working order in a game of remotely reasonable length.

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-- The thing that goes bump in the night