Part 48: Poll

Ok, here's the situation 22 years in. The three planets of the Silicoid Empire, from bottom to top:

** Cryslon(62M pop, 125 factories, 156 production)
** Drakka(25, 13, 26)
** Crypto(2, 0, 1)

Our next Colonizer will be out next year, and will go to Stalaz(25M, Rich), the close blue star to the right and slightly above our homeworld. That's as far as I've decided what to do.

This will not bring anything else within range to be colonized on the right side. To reach those we'd need to dive into tech. On the left side, the two green ones, in order, are Tyr(10M) and Xendalla(20M), balls of rock and not more. The red one is Tao(70M), the largest system yet discovered in this decidedly unimpressive galaxy.

Also worth noting is that the Darloks were met in the middle of the galaxy briefly, and they appear to be at one of the yellow-star cluster in the upper left. We have seen no other ships, which makes it increasingly likely that the lower-left is empty. Hard to imagine we wouldn't have seen them at Tao by now if it wasn't




Here's our homeworld spending. The Ship and Ind bars will stay at least as high as they are. That's enough factory spending to ensure we stay at maximum production, keeping pace with population growth, and the minimum necessary to finish our colony ship to Stalaz. It's time to make a choice, and I see two options.

** Farmer's Gambit. Keep pumping out Colonizers and go to the left for Tyr and Xendalla, with the goal of hopping to Tao afterwards. The kicker here is that Tao will be right on the borderline range-wise. It could be just out of range, or just inside it, once we push out that way. I've looked at it multiple times and I think we can just barely reach it ... but I wouldn't be at all surprised to see it not quite be in range. The game can be strange with how far things are away at times.

** Start Researching. Under this route we'd put enough into tech this year to get our initial pull, and after that get our range improved. Cryslon would have to do almost all the research lifting, as Drakka is not far enough along yet to provide much of a boost.

So I leave the question to the lot of you: what course of action should be taken? If there's a strong consensus I'll go with it. This question will be open for 48 hours, unless there is an obvious favored choice before then.