The neutral challenge

[Barnacle Bill]

I got to thinking about “playing as a neutral” after a recent discussion in another topic about switching sides, etc… Another inspiration is the various science fiction stories where a planet (usually Earth) first discovers interstellar travel and finds the galaxy already full of big established empires, but nevertheless rises to great power status itself because of some cultural or technological advantage vs the alien empires (for example, the rise of the Terran Confederation at the expense of the Vilani Imperium in the history of the “Traveller” roleplaying game universe). Also influencing my thoughts is how “Non-Player Races” work in Starfire. There, the NPR does not know about warp points until a player enters their system and contacts them, but thereafter are “activated” and can 4X right along side the players. In other words, they act like an SE4 Neutral until “activated”, then like an SE4 AI Player. So, I thought it might make an interesting challenge to play that way as a human, and see if human smarts vs the AI is enough to win against that sort of head start. I’m in a game where I’m doing that now. I intend to post a formal set of “rules” for this single-player scenario later, but I thought it might be interesting for some folks to read about how it is going so far.

It has not gone as I figured, largely because of board placement. So, lesson #1 for this scenario is start over if you land in a corner, because they might not ever come activate you otherwise. I began in a corner, and after I fully exploited my home system and got bored (no contact YET!), I began very cautious exploration (I expect there will be a “limited activation rule” for that situation). My home system is very near the galactic SE corner, and has three warp points (E, S & W). The one to the E is a dead end – planets but only the one warp point. The one to S has planets but only two warp points, the one to N that connects to my home system and one to W that connects to a black hole system. The black hole system has two warp points, the second of which is N. The E warp point from my home system connects to an asteroid system. The Asteroid system has three warp points, the one to my home system, one S to the black hole system, and one E to “out there”.

So, I’ve colonized all the rock planets in the three systems and converted all their atmospheres. I’m just finishing up colonizing all the ice planets. I’m remote mining everything I can’t colonize via mining satellites. Tech-wise, I’m up to battlecruisers & level IV on the various ship systems, and have monolith facility III’s & research facility III’s everywhere. I’m about ready to come out onto the galactic stage, since they won’t come in after me.

I do know a little about “out there” because I had to do some switching to troubleshoot RCE’s, and because I set the game up to be able to see all scores. There are 8 AI player races, all ahead of me except for ships (because I have a huge mothball fleet – probably won’t allow that before “activation” in the “rules” for future games). They’ve pretty much filled the galaxy, and are fighting wars and making alliances and having a grand old time, unaware of the danger lurking in the dark corner. There were originally 5 neutrals. Two more appeared in mid-game, one of which later disappeared from the score window but still appears in the players window (I think that means it got killed). I assume the mid-game appearances reflect planetary revolts. One of those times I had to go fix an RCE, the race causing the RCE was an “ancient” race and partnered with another race (at war with them next RCE) and the galactic map showed a presence by the partner race in the system connecting to my asteroid system. So, I expect they will be the host for my coming out party. However, I fixed the data file causing the RCE’s several years ago (game time) and haven’t peeked lately. When I Last looked, the AI’s had lots of dreadnoughts and war fleets of over 30 ships. So, my strategy with my 9 BC’s is going to have to be to avoid war and try to pick off one planet at a time under Non-Intercourse, hoping the AI victim has bigger fish to fry on other fronts. I think I’ll need a lot of mines & sats, too. As I get more of an industrial base, I can expand the fleet and get more aggressive.