DA Starting strategy which doesn't screw your economy

from GalCiv2 Forums

Hey guys, just thought I'd share with you a good way to start that I've found very effective, I didn't originally intend this post to be so long but I guess I had a lot of info I wanted to share haha

The trick to this strat is to power up your secondary planet rather than your homeworld for rushing, which frees up your homeworld and it's sweet, sweet taxpaying population of 8 mil+ to concentrate entirely on economy.

I usually use the torians for this strat because you can produce population to fuel your colony rushes quite easily, and also get up to 12m on your homeworld within the first few turns increasing the effectiveness even further.

Here's a rough guide:

* Homeworld builds nothing but adv. market centers at the start. Don't rush buy them as they build very quickly by themselves, you don't even need a factory as the civilization capital has more than enough industry to quickly build markets. (obviously if you have tiles then capitalize on them, but other than that market centres all the way). You don't even need morale buildings because of the innate. +25 morale in the civ. capital.

* Secondary planet rush-buys 4 factories + starport in the first 5 turns and then starts producing colony ships like mad (divert the asteroids to secondary world for for added production). Don't ever rush buy colony ships, it will only take 4-5 turns to build one using the slider strat below.

* As far as sliders go - for the first couple of turns focus 100% research and get adv. propultion techniques and ion drive (This way you can build 3 speed colony ships with 2 ion and 2 basic life support), then switch to 99% social and 1% military after that. After the first 5 turns your secondary world is already fully developed it will convert the social to 100% military and will produce colony ships as fast as it can, while still allowing your other planets to go max infrastructure.

* Other than those first four factories don't rush buy anything else, your 99% social spending will allow new worlds to get a factory up within 5 turns so you can save your money to soak up the anavoidable spending that goes with the early game. If you do need to research something quickly (like xeno labs) slide research up until it takes a turn to complete and then go back to max production.

* If you're playing torians, try to tweak your tax slider so that your worlds that aren't at max pop are always at 100%, this will mean that your economy runs at a loss at the start but once the initial rush is over you'll have a full population to tax. When you pick your racial abilities max morale and take populists for your party. This will enable you to still run a decent tax rate while still keeping your lower pop worlds breeding at 100%.

* Your homeworld will probably be the second world to fill up and once it's done you can start producing constructors, or more colony ships depending on what's on the map, even without factories it's still no slouch thanks to the civ capital.

* When colonising worlds, try to make the biggest ones economy worlds, the medium sized ones research worlds and smaller ones production worlds, obviously this will vary depending on tiles. Research worlds get a few factories then all xeno labs. Production worlds get all factories. And economy worlds get a farm, 2 ent. buildings and the rest in market centres, only go for more than 1 farm if it's exeptionally big (16+). Later on you'll want big production worlds to churn out capital ships but at the start it's better to have worlds all around your empire producing rather than 1 big one in one spot due to the slow speed of ships at the start of the game.

* I usually try to get 1 economy and 1 research world for every 2 production worlds early. If you're going to err. always err on the side of economy

That's all I have so far.
strategies
16,572 views 22 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Hi!
Secondary planet rush-buys 4 factories + starport in the first 5 turns

That makes ~3600BC. With what will you fund next 10 colonies over next 30 turns?

...and then starts producing colony ships like mad

Where you get the population for fillign those colonizers? Even with Torians and 100% approval has the second planet about 1.5B pop at the time it starts producing colonizers. Well, if you build with the speed you've mentioned below...

Don't ever rush buy colony ships, it will only take 4-5 turns to build one using the slider strat below.

It should take 2 turns. At leat that's the time it takes on my HW to build one. And most of the time I feel I should build them faster...

BR, Iztok

Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I have to agree with many points from the previous post. However, I love the strategy of putting alot towards social, which is something I never really thought of (most of my game I leave the sliders at 33% each), and then once your planet is fully developed, unused social goes toward military. That is an effective strategy, since you can then put more towards research as well... The only thing is you may have to rush buy many ships (mainly colony ships, survey ships, and contructors to steal them from the AI before they get to them) until planets are developed enough to pump them out, but then that is where the focus button comes in. It think it definetely pays in the long run to fully develop those planet tiles as quick as you can. I will incorporate this strategy for future games.
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Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
IMO, one sign of a good strategy game is that there is no "one way" to do anything. In this case, I have an entirely different opening strat that works great for me and I'm sure there are other ways to kick off a new game successfully too.



Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
That makes ~3600BC. With what will you fund next 10 colonies over next 30 turns?


Not that much because after the first couple of turns of research you're putting 99% into social so the factories are partially built when you buy them and don't cost the full amount, obviously you don't rush buy the starport because it only takes 1 turn anyway. Notice after 5 turns in this game I have just over 2700 left after filling out my secondary planet:




Where you get the population for fillign those colonizers? Even with Torians and 100% approval has the second planet about 1.5B pop at the time it starts producing colonizers. Well, if you build with the speed you've mentioned below...


As you can see in the shot below it has about 1B after turn 9 (the build time for the first colony was reduced to 4 turns as the asteroid finished mining halfway through). Keeping it at 100% approval you're producing people faster than you can drain them even when you make a colony ship every 4-5 turns. Remember you don't need to colonise with the full 500, 200-300 is fine, with torians it's up to 1bil on most planets in a few turns anyways. I've tried this start around 10 times now and have never had a problem keeping up with pop, don't underestimate the torians. Note by this stage I was at 12 billion pop on my homeworld, which was about half full of market centers. Although the big gain in cash was due to a 500BC anomoly I found.





It should take 2 turns. At leat that's the time it takes on my HW to build one. And most of the time I feel I should build them faster...



yeah but in that case it takes 2 turns BUT you're focusing 100% on military and then going back to social when you've made one. The beauty of this strat is because of the 99% social 1% military you can be producing colony ships every 4 turns WHILE still developing your planets at 100%, and while keeping your homeworld as an economy world which is a MASSIVE advantage in this game since 12 billion people on a planet full of market centers eliminates much of your early economy problems, also after your second or third colony ship your homeworld will have filled up so you can use that to produce colonies as well.



IMO, one sign of a good strategy game is that there is no "one way" to do anything. In this case, I have an entirely different opening strat that works great for me and I'm sure there are other ways to kick off a new game successfully too.


Absolutely right, and I never said this was the ONLY way, I've just found it very effective with the torians, who often get overlooked in this game.

For those of you who are doubting this strategy, all I ask is that you TRY it and then give feedback, the first poster obviously didn't try it the way I said because otherwise he would have realised that you don't run out of pop on your secondary world at all, and you don't need to spend 3600BC at the start.


Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
This strategy only works with the Super Ability, Super Breeder. You should specify that this is a Dark Avatar strategy.

And yes, it works. Super Breeder is perhaps the most powerful Super Ability.

I have been playing around with the Torians, and if used right I think they are the now the most powerful civilization.

You can play incredibly aggressively as you can almost instantly build up a huge population that can power a massive early invasion.

With the changes to Tech Trading, I think the only viable strategy to win on larger maps at the higher difficulty levels is to go for early invasion, and the Torians can do that faster than any other race.

Other races really suffer when you raise taxes during the 1st year above 50%, as their populations really don't grow very much, but with the Torians you can do an on-off tax program. Do 2 turns with taxes over 50% then do 1 turn with taxes very, very low.

With careful tax control you can both raise huge populations very early, and you can have a very strong economy.

Super Breeder is an incredible super ability. At first I didn't think much of it, but after using it I am blown away.

- Livonya
Reply #6 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Cool, I haven't tried Torians before. So what racial picks do you choose along with it? Industrialist?
Reply #7 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I don't know..... spore ships sure are useful... Mwhahahahaa
Reply #8 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Hi!
(@Wargazmo)
You can afford having a colony ship each 4th turn on the AI level you play. Try that strategy in a maso+ game and you'll get only 1/4 of planets you usually have.

Making your secondary planet a production one means "wasting" a factory on a 300% production tile. That's the output the Civ Capital on your HW has.

Going with pop on your HW from 8B to 12B (+50%) gives you only 22% more money, but gives you lots of approval problems when you want to tax them high.

I don't claim you approach will not work. But on higher AI levels it will not allow a player to compete with AI on (approximately) even footing.

BR, Iztok
Reply #9 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

IMO, one sign of a good strategy game is that there is no "one way" to do anything. In this case, I have an entirely different opening strat that works great for me and I'm sure there are other ways to kick off a new game successfully too.


Well, then I guess we have to conclude that GC2 isn't a very good strategy game. Both Iztok and Wargazmo agree on early game strategy - you need to beat the AI to as many colonies as possible without tanking your economy. They've just presented different tactics for how to achieve those goals.

More generally, there seems to be nearly 100% agreement that the One Right Choice (tm) at the start of a GC2 game is a colony rush. An actual strategic debate would cover the merits of a colony rush vs. early Galactic Achievements vs. an early military invasion. In practice, the only serious alternative to the colony rush I've seen on these forums is the Korath spore rush.
Reply #10 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

This strategy only works with the Super Ability, Super Breeder. You should specify that this is a Dark Avatar strategy.

And yes, it works. Super Breeder is perhaps the most powerful Super Ability.

I have been playing around with the Torians, and if used right I think they are the now the most powerful civilization.

You can play incredibly aggressively as you can almost instantly build up a huge population that can power a massive early invasion.

With the changes to Tech Trading, I think the only viable strategy to win on larger maps at the higher difficulty levels is to go for early invasion, and the Torians can do that faster than any other race.

Other races really suffer when you raise taxes during the 1st year above 50%, as their populations really don't grow very much, but with the Torians you can do an on-off tax program. Do 2 turns with taxes over 50% then do 1 turn with taxes very, very low.

With careful tax control you can both raise huge populations very early, and you can have a very strong economy.

Super Breeder is an incredible super ability. At first I didn't think much of it, but after using it I am blown away.

- Livonya


QFT!

I didn't fully appreciate the power of this ability until I decided to try it one day with one of my custom races. The 2:1 high tax/low tax approach works very well. The net effects are two fold. You get the same net population growth as a non super breeder with 100% approval. You also get nearly the same cash flow as the AI that runs 49% taxes from the start. Combine that with a rush to planetary invasion and you're rolling in no time. It also means that those newly conquered worlds fill up quickly, which minimizes the economic drain rapid expansion can cause.

I've used a variant of this strat before, but only when I get a nice 8+ PQ planet in my starting area of influence. Seemed to work best with the Thalans and Korx. These were DL games, but I was taking the approach of use the secondary world for production, and making my HW the econ capitol. Super breeders just means you don't have to luck out and get a nice world in your starting area.
Reply #11 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

This strategy only works with the Super Ability, Super Breeder. You should specify that this is a Dark Avatar strategy.

And yes, it works. Super Breeder is perhaps the most powerful Super Ability.

I have been playing around with the Torians, and if used right I think they are the now the most powerful civilization.

You can play incredibly aggressively as you can almost instantly build up a huge population that can power a massive early invasion.

With the changes to Tech Trading, I think the only viable strategy to win on larger maps at the higher difficulty levels is to go for early invasion, and the Torians can do that faster than any other race.

Other races really suffer when you raise taxes during the 1st year above 50%, as their populations really don't grow very much, but with the Torians you can do an on-off tax program. Do 2 turns with taxes over 50% then do 1 turn with taxes very, very low.

With careful tax control you can both raise huge populations very early, and you can have a very strong economy.

Super Breeder is an incredible super ability. At first I didn't think much of it, but after using it I am blown away.

- Livonya



Yep agree 100% with this, the torians are almost certainly the only race that can pull off this strat. I haven't really tried it with other civ's but I doubt it would work nearly as well.

Oh and I did specifiy it was DA in the headline.



Hi!
(@Wargazmo)
You can afford having a colony ship each 4th turn on the AI level you play. Try that strategy in a maso+ game and you'll get only 1/4 of planets you usually have.


I've beat crippling on it, but have yet to try maso so I won't comment, maybe someone with more skills and experience than myself could try it out on maso or suicide and see if it's effective?


Making your secondary planet a production one means "wasting" a factory on a 300% production tile. That's the output the Civ Capital on your HW has.


It's not really wasting it, since you're using it to build your economy and then after your homeworld fills up you can use it to build other things like scouts/constructs, while your other planet keeps colony rushing.


Going with pop on your HW from 8B to 12B (+50%) gives you only 22% more money, but gives you lots of approval problems when you want to tax them high.


It's a lot more than 22%, because remember you've got 8 or 9 tiles of adv. market centers which is an extra 80-90% tax on that homeworld. Add an economic capital later and its effectiveness increases even more.

The approval on your homeworld isn't that much of a big deal since it has to drop below 20% to start losing pop I believe, and since you're not taking pop away from your HW it's not too bad. Plus with the 25 moral bonus from civ capital and the natural morale bonuses due to race picks it's not really an issue anyway.



I don't claim you approach will not work. But on higher AI levels it will not allow a player to compete with AI on (approximately) even footing.


Without doing this strat I always seem to struggle economically, probably because I play with anomolies turned to rare. I'm guessing on harder difficulty levels people use anomolies to suppliment their economy and can afford to max out their homeworld with factories.



Cool, I haven't tried Torians before. So what racial picks do you choose along with it? Industrialist?


I think taking max morale and populists is essential with this strat, and with any torian strat in general since morale is so important for them. After taking max morale (3 points) I ususally put the other points in either +1 speed, economy or social production, so far I've found speed to be the most noticable advantage.




Reply #12 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Okay I tried this strat without the torians, and it's still somewhat effective, the main difference being you launch colony ships with 1 pop and then pick up population from your homeworld since the secondary planet can't regrow fast enough.

The other difference is you need to find a better secondary planet than the one in your system, because for some reason the Torians get a 5 tile secondary planet whereas most other races only get 3 or 4 which isn't really enough.




Reply #13 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Hi!
> Going with pop on your HW from 8B to 12B (+50%) gives you only 22% more
> money, but gives you lots of approval problems when you want to tax them high.

It's a lot more than 22%, because remember you've got 8 or 9 tiles of adv. market centers which is an extra 80-90% tax on that homeworld.

I don't have 8 or 9 tiles of AMCs. I have to build them there. And while I'm building them there I'm sacrificing each second/third turn a colony ship, for what? A +2BC better income on my HW, that doesn't mean even a drop in my 3000BC treasury.

Only now I realized why your starting strategy doesn't screw your economy. Not because your HW is producing 50% more revenue than mine. You don't get enough planets to go broke! Discussion over.

BR, Iztok

Reply #14 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
On any map with a decent amount of planets getting enough production to build speed 3/4 colony ships in 1/2 turns as quick as possible should be the immediate primary motitivation.

Early social build of eco buildings seems pointless to me. The early game is all about colonisation I think wargazmos strat is seriously flawed.
Reply #15 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Especially with super breeder, you want to spread your people among as many worlds as possible as fast as possible to maximize the population growth of your empire. Spending early turns building markets on your capital slows this down.

Super breeder will automatically fix your economy anyway. All your planets will grow to their 6 billion limit quickly, at which point it is easy to turn a profit.

I agree with several things in Wargazmo's strategy, super breeder is powerful, 99% social 1% military, and using 100% morale early. But I think it is too slow at producing colony ships.
Reply #16 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
You don't get enough planets to go broke!


That's about the size of it, I think. How many planets do you have at, say, the end of each 3 month period for the first 2 years?
Reply #17 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
If you go the non-hostile route you can rake in some pretty impressive revenue with tourism and trade.

Edit: Oh and just so everyone knows, I'm on "tough" difficulty.
it's a little hard to read so here are the stats:
Taxes: 495
Trade: 297
Tourism: 510

Reply #18 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Only now I realized why your starting strategy doesn't screw your economy. Not because your HW is producing 50% more revenue than mine. You don't get enough planets to go broke! Discussion over.

BR, Iztok


Sorry, but I have to agreed with Iztok on this one. When I play a Superbreeder race on suicidal I ALWAYS go for the +2 speed bonus so I can start with speed 4 constructors ...
Reply #19 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
constructors ...


Whoops typo ... I build cargo hulls which I upgrade to 1 sensor, 2 engines and 1 lifesupport for exploration. I upgrade to colony or constructors as appropriate. (DA v1.5, I also build 1 ferry with 2 cargo pods 1 engine - and MOST of my income is spent on my new worlds)

I think every civ has its own unique strat it works best with
Reply #20 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I think every civ has its own unique strat it works best with


Whoops another understatement ... every civ needs a unique rush strat, military strat, econ strat, and research strat suited to its abilities
Reply #21 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Postscript: What software do you use to make pics of your game screens which you post?
Reply #22 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Wow I can't believe someone dug this thread up.

Just so you guys I was a noob when I wrote this strat and you should check out the one turn per ship strat I wrote for a better starting strat.

like others have said you don't really get enough planets

peace