Gameplay tips & tricks

[Gandalph]

Atrocities said:
I finally have one to add. I hope it has not already been added.

Tip: You can sort the planets by min, org, or rad values simply by clicking on the word "Values" above each in the Planets Window. The window you use to send colony ships.

This is a very useful tip if your running low on minerals, you can sort prospective planet by mineral value and then deploy your colony ship to that planet. The same goes for Orgs and rads.

To further this tip, if you click on the planets column it orders the planets from smallest to largest, then click on the mins, orgs, rads colomn and you will have the planets sorted by value AND size. This way you can scroll down to the Huge planets with high resources.

[Parasite]

Alneyan said:
A small thing perhaps worth mentioning: red nebulaes grant you the best kind of cloaking, which cannot be bypassed by *any* sensor. This can be used to help your natural paranoia, or to have a nice secure system when striking against another Empire.

There is one sensor that can "see" through Red Nebulas. A Mine can. Placing one or two mines from a ship with a single minelayer can be used for tracking and warning for when ships are going through nebula sectors. Even if they are swept, you still know the sector and possibly timing and direction of the enemy ships. Imagine a system with one mine in every sector. The entering ship or fleet will show the path taken and stop point. This may let you predict his timing and exit points.

[Alneyan]

Hush Parasite! You are giving away one of my little tricks. More specifically, you should lay as many mines as possible on the wormholes, to take down sneaky vessels without enough minesweeping support (I will usually send a minesweeper if I am attempting to sneak in a hostile nebulae).

Of course, it will only work if you lack any treaty with the crafty Empire, and is of no use when one of your allies is busy planting a fleet in that annoying nebulae right in the middle of your Empire.

[Slick]

Here's another one I use. Say I am in dire of need more minerals, and who isn't? I just colonized a planet and the resource percentages are 107%M, 123%O, 160%R and my empire has a Resource Converter III (30% loss on conVersion). I'll make Rad Extractor II's on that planet until it's full then upgrade to level III's. (I believe that monoliths take too long to pay back, so let's leave that discussion for another time.) I can get more minerals after converting Rads, even accounting for the conVersion loss than I can get with Mineral Miners. 160 * 0.7 = 112% which is higher than 107%.

Slick.

[Aiken]

But if your Mining aptitude is greatly tweaked (up to 120% or higher, which is standard for pbw) you get 107% * 1,2 = 128% minerals from such planet, and this number is higher than 112%.

[Slick]

very true. There were two points to make there and I didn't factor in all the various variables on purpose. That was assuming all other variables being equal. First, the quickest way to fill up a planet is to fill it with level II facilities (for min, org, rad, research, intel) assuming unmodified construction rates and no spaceyard, then upgrade to level III after the planet is full. This is because a level II is the most productive facility that can be built in 1 turn. Secondly, that you can pre-calculate your resource income after accounting for resource conVersion. There are several things that I calculate during the game and I normally have the Windohs calculator open during the game for a quick number crunch.

Slick.

[Alneyan]

Slick said:
assuming unmodified construction rates and no spaceyard

I am just nitpicking, but that might be helpful to someone else, so. Your construction characteristic does not alter your planetary construction rate if you do not have a spaceyard on this planet. No matter how low your construction characteristic is, a planet without a spaceyard will have a standard construction rate.

So if you happen to have a lower than 100% construction aptitude, building a Spaceyard I will actually decrease your construction rate, even for facilities/units, which do not require a spaceyard. Population modifiers should work fine without a spaceyard though; the should is here because of an odd bug, but that's another story.

[Slick]

Just for clarification, when I said "unmodified construction rates" I meant that the base construction rates are unmodified from the default values in the data file "settings.txt". Those default values are to be able to construct with no spaceyard up to 2000 Min, 2000 Org, 2000 Rad per turn.

Slick.

[LGM]

Spoo said:
There's no need to use colonizer hulls. Instead use small transports, since they're the same size, have the same cost, and it's not immediately clear to your enemies whether the ship is a colonizer, minelayer, troop transport, etc.

To build upon this technique also use Freighters as your early combat ships. The Satellite launchers have a high probability of absorbing missile hits.

Consider building warships on Freighter hulls the first turn or two. You should with good constructon be able to build such ships in one turn at a homeworld. Then you can switch to Emergency building SY Bases and/or Freighter with Colonly modules.

On your initial Freighter warships, stick a few population on them. This population will be immediately replaced, but this population can be used to exchange breathers with another race as you explore.

[LGM]

Carriers that fight in combat should be classfied as Offensive Ships or Troop Carriers so they will not get the Don't Get Hurt order by default from the Carrier class. This avoids the pitfall of forgetting to change their orders, especially when you upgrade designs.