Part 9: 2400 - 2425

This was right on the borderline between one big or two small updates: I decided to just cram it into one, so it's pretty long.

Episode I: 2400-2425




At the start of a new century, we appear to be holding in there ... mostly. Fleet is about what I want it to be or a bit high, definitely competitive. We're staying close in technology, but the Silicoids are starting to run away production-wise, mostly because they just have more territory. The Darloks have dipped recently and I'm not sure why. We've almost caught them for the #2 spot but there's an increasing threat that the rocks are just going to run away with this.




As can be seen we managed to get a small increase in trade to 300 BC with the Darloks and Silicoids; also a Non-Aggression pact with the former. Tried to get one of those with the Alkaris but they refused. Basically just doing everything I can to get them potentially on my side against the Silicoids. The Darlok relations are pretty stagnant, due to them naturally gravitating towards Unease and the fact that they are Xenophobic. Still a little above the middle, but boy is it a slow process.

The latest reports we have are all within the last decade, most more recent. The Alkaris have developed the Fusion Bomb, which is a lot more powerful than the starting Nuclear variety. Other than that they don't have much. The Darloks and Silicoids both surprisingly have limited range still. The Darloks have added Class IV Deflector Shields and Robotic Controls IV. That last one could get them back in the game, at least for a while. They never got level III so they were behind in the production game but now they should see a major boost. The Silioids have notably gotten Automated Repair System, which could make it quite hard to take down their large ships. They also have acquired Sublight Drives, which we are currently almost to as well.




The Map shows a couple things here; the latest Silicoid planet is the red one on the far left. They are up to seven planets now. That's dangerous territory. Also, we can see fleets all over the place which is the main reason for showing this. That's courtesy of our new and improved scanners.





Here we can see the other new feature of these scanners; we know where they are headed, and how long they will take to get there. Also note that this Kraken is the first capital, or Huge-sized ship, that we have seen. If they've put automated repair on this thing that could be trouble, though it's pretty unlikely they've gotten a ship that big built since they picked up repair capability. Even with basic armor, that means we'd need to do 90 damage/turn just to equalize with the repair capability(15% per turn, times 600 HP). I have no idea what they have on the ship, but ... Kronos has a couple Colony Ships, 6 Whales, this is headed there, and there's another cruiser-size ship called the Polaris going there as well. They seem to be massing there, and it's either for defense or, more likely, to make a bigger push at Arietis.




We'll need some more bases soon but the cost there is minimal; the fleet is taking a bit of a bite now though. Much higher and I'd start getting a little more worried. The trade deficit's still there and healthy but it is trending upwards and we're maxed out on all the deals.




The Psilon Fleet, such as it is. I'd scrap the Starfighters but we're paying very little for them and they still make for good targets to soak up damage. One way or another though they are eventually going away.




We're closing in on a few more advances. Looks like Sublight Drives will be first, Weapons is the Mass Driver, and Force Fields the Class IV Deflectors. I definitely won't be building any more ships until those come in; they'll take our combat abilities considerably. Construction is another reduced-waste tech, and we've got a while to go on the vital Radiated Colonization but making progress there.



2404, and the new engines come in.





The last three here are new. Fusion drives would increase our speed from Warp 3 to Warp 4; range is always beneficial but I'm ok with where we are at range 6; and the Warp Dissipator is a special that decreases the speed of enemy ships, eventually rendering them immobile. Good, but generally not worth it in my opinion. Also worth considering is backpedaling for the Inertial Stabilizer at a fraction of the cost.

Fusion Drives are good enough, and the cheapest option that pushes us up the ladder. We've also got the Mass Driver now, got lucky as we had a pretty low shot at it this early.




The bottom three are all new. The most interesting is the Graviton Beam, first we've seen of its type. This is a 'streaming' weapon, described as a tractor-repulsor beam that literally rips ships apart. The streaming part is what matters though; it carries 'extra' damage over from one ship to the next. Most weapons can only kill one target; no matter how powerful a weapon is, it can only take out one ship, no matter how small. Not so with streaming weapons, making them quite good against smaller ships. Since we're mostly going up against the Silicoids here and they are going big, that's not a real major concern. The Alkaris and Darloks have mostly small ships though, so it'd be more useful against them ... or us. If the Silicoids get a weapon like this? That'd be real bad for us.

The others are pretty straightforward upgrades, the Stinger Missile and the Fusion Beam. I'm taking the missiles here: it's going to be important to have better missile bases soon.

Also, we've now got a small chance(6% this year) of popping the Radiated tech ... and the Silicoids have moved most of their ships away from us. Looks like we are going to win this round of brinksmanship. The Darloks are building a lot of ships, and with good reason: a Human-Silicoid-Alkari alliance has formed. Sigh. We've got to get the Darloks on our side eventually or this could go bad for us anyway. Solve one problem, and another takes its place. But first things first.




What's all this? The Alkari have sortied basically their whole bloody fleet ... to Tyr. Guess they've improved their range. The red line is how the game indicates a rival fleet incoming. The function keys can cycle through planets and fleets, etc; F8 and F9 cycle forwards or backwards through planets that have incoming fleets, which can be quite useful. We're not at war with the Alkari, but a non-aggression pact wouldn't even help here(since it's one of our colonies). Pretty sure they haven't even scouted it yet. They're just getting desperate I think what with nowhere to expand and can finally reach other systems now ... but they are allied with the Silicoids still. Maybe I can get them to break that off.

I ask the Silicoids first but they 'do not consider my offer a fair one'. The Alkaris say that they 'have considered our offer, and rejected it'. Super. They've got 125 strike craft, 3 large ships, and a colony ship. Moving the fleet there is a waste of time I think: we'll take heavy losses at best. I should be able to crank out another couple of missile bases before they get here. This looks like an invasion but they'll usually declare those beforehand. Here it seems to just be a desperate colonization effort ... and we're in the way. Superb.




Reduced Industrial Waste 60% has come in. Zortrium Armor boosts protection by 100%, another 50% on top of what we get from Duralloy. That'd be good ... but we're about to hopefully get a couple new planets before long and our factories are still very expensive. Reducing those costs will accelerate growth there tremendously. Improved Industrial Tech 6 is the choice here.

It's now 2407. Two years after the Silicoids refused to abolish their alliance with the Alkaris, they did it of their own accord, grabbing one with the Sakkras. One thing that is not great about the Master of Orion diplomatic AI is the way they switch around alliances faster than most people change socks, esp. before things really heat up. In this case it's in our favor, but it still makes you scratch your head.




Sweet!! Although there are still things that could blow it up, as happened with the Kronos Plan, it's great to see a plan come to fruition.




Last three are all new. Cloning cuts the cost of growing extra population in half(10 BC from 20 BC per); Atmospheric Terraforming turns hostile planets into standard ones, increasing both size and population growth; and Advanced Eco Restoration slashes the waste cleanup to 10/BC, which is half what we are currently paying. The last two are both very good, but I elect to take a step back instead and get Terraforming +40M. Since our initial 10M we haven't grabbed any of these. The waste budget is pretty small right now so we can afford to wait on the Eco Restoration. Probably Atmospheric Terraforming comes next, but the flat-rate increase will boost all of our planets, not just the hostile ones we want to grab.




Now we've got a new ship for this last land grab, the Colonizer R. Notice it's got Warp 3 due to Sublight Drives. Warp Engines are pretty cheap to build, a strange design decision if you ask me. It would cost only 11 BC less, 674 BC, to build a slow Retro version. So why not get there faster? We'll build one of these each at Imra and Mentar.

Also, our research spending will go back to being mostly equalized with a bit extra in computers, like it was before this push for radiated base. Meanwhile we've got the weakest fleet in the known galaxy as everyone seems to be on another shipbuilding kick, but we've taken the lead in technology. Lots going on, and the Alkari fleet is just two years away ...

A year later, a second fleet is following it now. What the heck are birdbrains(literally) doing?!? The answer better not be 'kicking our arse' ...

Here they come. It's 2410.




Planets come with their own Battle Scanners, so we can see what they have here. Nothing special except for those Wareagles. Given that we still have weak Hyper-V missiles, they are probably going to tear us a new one. Could have brought the fleet here to take them out ... but that would have meant leaving Arietis. Six missile bases isn't bad, but almost certainly not enough here. Let's see what transpires.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ns5...eature=youtu.be


That was ... shocking. I thought their bombs would do a lot more damage. The lasers couldn't do a darned thing, which is why the smaller ships retreated ... they were useless. Two cruisers for two missile bases. More ships incoming so we'll keep building them, but I'm quite pleasantly surprised at that outcome. In retrospect, one reason is probably the computer tech; they don't have any battle computers developed, so their aim sucks(even when bombing). That must have been what saved us, because those fusion bombs can cause ... problems. Still surprised they didn't do more damage than that however.

Didn't stop me from giving the Alkari ambassador a piece of my mind though. In response to my threats, they deliver this message from Emperor Skylord:




That'll do. Let's just toss that right in our fund for building up the new planets we're about to acquire. Also, if they can hit Tyr they can hit Imra, so I get going on some bases there as well.

The Silicoids are back at Arietis ... with another lone colony ship. Srsly? GTFO. Also, we pick up our latest shields.




Two new ones here. The Class V shields are self-evident, but I love me some Repulsor Beam and that's where we are going. Basically anything that only has a range of 1 is useless against a ship that has one; it'll just push them away before they can fire. That can make them incredibly annoying to go up against. The Alkari fleet that just showed up would have been nearly useless if we had these; their Gatling and standard Lasers would have been completely nullified, though the Heavy ones still can reach you. Of course if your enemy relies on missiles or something then it doesn't matter, so a lot depends on the enemy.




We made it!! First new planet in over half a century.




And then I discover that they've done it to us again. A Silicoid ship is headed to Willow, and they're going to get there before any of my ships can. It's far enough that they must have strapped reserve tanks on the thing. Damnit. It isn't a great planet ... but still.

We transfer a few million from Tyr to Arietis to boost stuff there. The Alkari bribe will be used to accelerate development, and it's time for a new stage of things.




We've got a solid tech lead but nothing new coming soon. I like where we are sitting except for the Silicoids, but I still think we have a decent shot at taking them. Eventually. The main thing right now, aside from building up Arietis, is to balance research and a military buildup. It's time to get serious about adding missile bases. We also need a new general-purpose defensive ship with our new toys. Oh, and the Darloks have the freaking Graviton Beam. Jerks.

Time for a new ship: the Star Streak. I stick with the Destroyer size because we don't really have a reason to go bigger from what I can see. No need for Anti-Missile Rockets unless we are attacking bases which this isn't for; nobody has advanced missile tech at all right now. Darloks and us are the best with the Hyper-Vs which we've had forever; it's really sad frankly. We could have a huge edge there once we get our Stingers. Compared to our last design, it's faster, has more armor, better at pretty much everything. The Mass Driver should do at least as much damage as a pair of Heavy Lasers, if not more. Only a Mk. I Battle Computer on there, since that's all we have right now. Also has our best duralloy armor and new sublight engines of course, with Class II shields. Which I forgot to screencap, but anyway this figures to be the workhorse for the next while.

Time to get rid of the Starfighters finally. Also check out the trade agreements again but I can't increase those right now as they are still maxed. Believe it or not we have a surplus in trade! 37 BC and rising. They pay off ... it just takes a long time.




For the time being, Tyr is still cranking out the missile bases. Denubius is research-focused, and Mentar/Imra will split like this between the two. Once each has a few bases, they'll alternate with one building Star Streaks to get some out there and the other doing bases. There are lots of ways to deal with a situation like this; I'm just trying to find a balance. Need to make sure we aren't defenseless and that we start to gear up, but I'm not building an invasion fleet just yet. Gotta keep investing enough in research to at least maintain equality if not better at the same time.

Roffle. The Silicoid colony ship shows up at Willow ... unarmed. They sacrificed the weapons for the tanks I guess ... so it turns around and runs away from our Recons. Hmm. I guess we get to go colonize it anyway. I just had myself in the mindset of assuming they are armed; I don't think I've seen this before where they had armed them, then went for the distance and took off the guns. Learning a lot of new things this game.

In 2414 the second Alkari fleet reaches Tyr ... and turns around immediately without attacking. This is a function of our successful threat. They'll lay low for a while. Spies as well. That wasn't the goal really, but I'll take it. Tyr will hold where it is for the moment -- 8 bases -- and switch to research. Another year, and first-in colonists reach Willow.




We've got the foundation for success here. Gotta build up our defenses, continue working on the fleet which must constantly be modernized, along with pushing the progress of Willow & Arietis forward constantly. Every planet in the galaxy that can be colonized has been, and war of the hot variety is coming before long whether we would choose it or not.

Tyr and Mentar combine to send a starter-pack of 8M colonists to Willow. The lion's share of the fleet will remain at Arietis, but 8 destroyers make their way there as well. Neither colony will be able to produce bases anytime soon, so the fleet must protect them.

ProTip: The AI tends to ignore planets it can't land on though -- if you can't colonize a planet type, neither can you send troops there.

They could destroy them from orbit, but usually they won't. That makes Willow a lot safer than Arietis which could be under threat if the Silicoids get frisky. A couple years later GNN updates empire production, but I didn't show that since it doesn't tell us anything we don't already know.




Here come the Alkaris again, this time to Imra. They'll find it better-defended than Tyr was when they show up in four years.




In 2420, exactly a decade after it was founded, the Arietis colony is set to terraform! That's a perfect storm of it being a Rich planet, small, trade income boosting it, and of course regular transfer payments from the Planetary Reserve. Willow on the other hand has just three factories; things will take a lot longer there.

Trade deals are upped to 325 BC with both of the other major powers. That almost knocks us down to even, but not quite; still a small surplus. In recent tech news, the Darloks have added Automated Repair, while the Silicoids are the first to get Class V Shielding. We're not to the halfway point on anything new yet.

2422; the Alkaris arrive at Imra, then turn around and go back. Apparently our boisterous rhetoric still carries weight with them.




High Council III convenes to end the next quarter-century, and once again it's us and the Silicoids. Could well stay that way to the end here. Once again the Darloks don't register an opinion. With 18 total votes the veto threshold is up to 7.




Lizards either. We've seen this movie before; I figured some of these might break one way or the other by now, but that could well wait until open war breaks out.




The Silicoids get the support of the Humans, which is enough for a veto block even if everyone else had sided with us.




Birds as well. This could be a result of threatening them having tipped the balance over to the other side. Regardless, the politics of this are not favorable. They have half the galaxy on their side.




We have four votes again, and abstain; if we voted for the Silicoids they would have won. It also would only have taken the Darloks' support to give them the crown, and there would have been nothing we could have done about it. This is a dangerous time.