Part 24: Episode III: 2400 - 2425

Episode III: 2400 - 2424




Our economy is ok, but still a bit behind. That leaves us with a technology situation where we aren't even quite keeping pace with the Silicoids, much less the Psilons. If we mobilize now, that will get even worse. There's no indication this will turn around unless we make it turn around and there aren't many ways to do that. Once we get to the last three open systems near us, we'll have to think about striking out against one of the smaller empires.







Meanwhile tensions are rising. The yellow flag just to the left of the cursor here is Seidon. It's a Bulrathi world but both Psilon and Silicoid transports are en route. War may be coming very soon. The three great empires are split with Silicoids on one side, us on the other, and Psilons in the middle. Even if we both attacked, I don't know that we could take them though.




The two we are close to getting are Inertial Stabilizer which is basically just a stepping-stone, and the Planetary Shield which will help us in a defensive sense.

Both advances came in a couple years later, and we moved on to Sublight Drives(only choice) and Class V Shields(IV was the only other option there).




Another two years, and we get three of these notices. Just like reaching the factory or population max, it's informational to give you a chance to change things up if you don't want more bases built somewhere afterwards. As I think I mentioned, any DEF spending automatically goes to shields first, then bases if you've built all the shields that you can. By default, like other similar situations, it will dump all of your defense spending into research unless you change it.




The Silicoids take Rana, an inferno planet I had my eye on. We're down to two options here, and this is a miscalculation on my part. I assumed by now they'd have a lot of escorts ... but it was only a colony ship with heavy lasers! Of course no way to predict that but perhaps I should have sent a small amount of ships to protect it. Oh well.




2411, and the next wave of techs begins. Our ecology budgets aren't bad, but this will further reduce them by a third. It's also something nobody else has; the Silicoids don't need it but it reduces their advantage over us, and the Psilons are still at 80%. Next up the only option is Andrium armor(150% bonus, next after Duralloy, which we have, and Zortrium, which we couldn't get).




We aren't the ones doing the most taking over of the galaxy. Check your reports, catface.




You've got too much space as it is. Not good news.




2413, and more weapons. Moving the tech forward is top priority right now, and besides I find the torpedoes to be the best choice in this group; versatile. Most importantly, we have Stinger missiles. The Psilons are already at least two generations ahead of that according to our reports, but it does make things slightly less inadequate.




This is huge, because we're the first to get it. Could put us over the top in production(temporarily, of course). Sublight Drives also came in. The Advanced Space Scanner was one selection.




This was the second. We probably won't use it, but it's an excellent anti-small ship device. Once again the decider is moving up the ladder. Refitting and building new factories didn't stop another one from coming in the next year ...




A pause here on a couple of planets to get colony ships out to a pair of small rich worlds. The only next-tier option was Cloning(cutting our cost for accelerating pop growth in half). Not too exciting but it is what it is.




This was also noticed. We have 33 missile bases on Ryoun, so we might be ok here. All depends on how advanced these ships are. Naturally I will set to work building more as soon as the new factories are ready.

Most planets were done with the expansion in 2-3 years.




Crap. Wasn't our best planet but a pretty good one.




Good luck. We're going to need more territory soon: theirs will do. However, we've actually fallen further behind in production which makes no sense, and the Psilons have a fleet coming to Ajax. Looks like they've decided our planets are the place to expand. They are very wrong.

It took only a year to clean up Romulas, and it appears the planet has shrunk from 70M to 65M in size. That's not much of a hit.

One weird thing about these incoming Psilon ships: they are moving at warp 1, or at best warp 2. It's as if they decided not to scrap their old ships, and instead send them to us for the blowing up. Our Stingers will be pleased to oblige :P. Also, almost all the alliances are gone. Sakkra-Silicoids is the only one that remains: the Mrrshan are at war with the Psilons also. They choose their enemies ... poorly. We sign a Non-Aggression Pact with the Silicoids, but they don't want an Alliance. We're all going to need to gang up on the Psilons soon, and even that may not be enough. We also bump up our trade with them to 1.8k.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meIZExboe4o



That was rather anti-climactic. For that many missiles we didn't do a huge amount of damage to their cruisers though.




Andrium Armor is in; Tritanium armor is only a little cheaper than cutting our waste spending in half. We aren't paying very much as it is, but half of not very much is still savings.




Here it's time to give some overdue love to our ground troops. We have Class V shields so class VI would just be more expensive and not bring all that much to the table.

And then ...




Same nominees, same Sakkra indifference.




The Bulrathi do pick a side, but their opinion really doesn't matter much.




The rocks' growth has definitely slowed down.




Having recently gotten involved with a war against the Psilons(they're at war with almost everyone now), the Mrrshan cast their lot as well.




Taking the population lead is good for the Psilons and bad for everyone else. We're not far behind with 13, but can't afford to piss anyone off so we abstain. Wouldn't have been enough to put either side over the top anyway: the galaxy is too divided.