Gigantic Learning Experience

NOTE:I played Gal Civ back at university and picked up GC:2 when it was released.

I find games like these fantastic to play and have wasted many hours on the likes of Civ, MoO and Birth of the Federation, although i've never been that good at them, i thourougly enjoy getting my ass kicked .

About a month ago i got DA, but was unable to play it due to a heavy work schedule. Then one Wedensday i got a day off work and ripped off the DA packaging and go down to buisness.

I had been reading these forums when i could at work to hear about the game and the new aspects to it. I decided to go head first and try an epic game. Gigantic Universe, Abundant Colonizable Worlds, the rest Random (apart from the AI - which i set to Challenging, the setting below what i played GC:2 on - seeing as it had been many moons since my last game on DL).

There are some details and screenshots missing as i never intended to write an AAR about this. The game as of writing is not over so Screenshots will follow . Also im writing this AAR off memory so it won't be as detailed as some of the other fantastic AAR's you cna find. Enjoy the AAR and any feedback on my tactics and gameplay are most welcome.

The Begining

I went for a custom race, as i always do in these games, i called them the Fatal Consulate (after my corp in eve-online

). My special Abilities was Breeder and i went for Soldiering Attributes and finally Advanced Propulsion techniques tech. I turned off Tech Trading and Surrendering, two annoying aspects of the game for me.

The game started and looking at my starting planet of 'Revelations' i noticed PQ12 with no bonus tiles situated on the far west of the galatic map. I started exploring and managed to pickup a handful of planets early on ranging from PQ6 to PQ10.

My technology focus early one was propulsion up to impulse drive and from then on i wanted to focus on social techs such as research and manufacturing. I always tred a fine line when playing games like this, in any strategy game building up tech early on can be dangerous and essnetially leave you with your pants down, but then the rewards are so worth it if you pull it off.

I assigned my home colony some research slots and factories just to get me going. I've always had my home planet turning into a bit of a forge in every game, its just habbit unfortunatley.

Finally my aim was to focus on Research, moving the slider to 50%, Social at 40% and Military at 10% (enough to crank out colony ships for me to rush buy them after a few turns). This was a bold move and relied on my survey vessel picking up anomolies in space that would return bc.

Got any sugar?
I then bumped into my first neighbour. The Korath.

Wonderful, i thought, just as i was finishing the tech that granted me Factories, i met one of the two worst races to try tech against early on. They were also colony rushing with some intensity and located south east of my borders.

A survey ship picked up a PQ 18 high gravity planet not too far from me however and along with one or two others (PQ 10 and 13 respectivley) i decided to switch to high gravity colonization immediatley, simply to avoid the Korath grabbing them, right under my nose.

My current colonies were starting to get underway, with high social output and a factory built on each one to hurry social production along the way. I had two research focused planets, one shipyard (my homeworld), A population planet (with two factories, starport, and three farms and then the rest entertainment networks) and the rest (3 remaining)were a combination of entertainment and economic buildings.

I then bumped into the Torians, located directly south of me, the Dregnir located South East of me (near the Korath), the Altarians were located to the north east of me, and finally the iconians were to the east.

It was heating up to be a bit of a 4 on 2, with the Korath and the Dregnir being the unwelcome neighbours of the galaxy. I had done alright so far, finishing off heavy gravity colonization and moving onto some research into Missiles, granting me harpoon tech.

This allowed me to begin production of some defensive ships to stop any early transport rush from the korath or dregnir whom had already began to demand financial support.

Having grabbed the high grav planets (PQ18, 10 and 13) i felt a certain sense of comfort. Analysing my borders that comfort soon escaped me.

The situation was fantastic from an action perspective, the north had Iconians and Altarians in close proximity. I was already focusing on gaining their trust, offering one a financial treaty and the other a research, moving their view on me to 'close' immediatley.

The Torians were stuck almost, to their east lay they Korath and Dregin empires, to their north was me, and i had already accumilated a lot of the worlds apart from the enviroment specifics that i had not researched.

Things became worse for them and well infact the rest of us when the Korath Launch a suprise offensive into Torian territory. Overnight multiple transports and support ships crossed the border and began assaulting ground and air positions.

The Iconians were the first to respond, declaring war on the Korath along with their close friends the Altarians. I was asked to assit the Torians in their efforts, but i opted to sit back. Now as not the time for a dog fight with the Korath, it was inveitable yes, but my wepons tech (which was now the focus of my research having discovered the proximity of the Dregin and the Korath) was still behind that of the South eastern threat.

aars

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Sounds like it's shaping up as a classic Good vs Evil conflict. Some map shots would help, so I hope you can post some soon!

How does your relative research, military, etc stand wrt the other races?

Also, were the Torians weak wrt the Korath? You don't need much to provoke them, but if the Torians spent too long to develop a military they would be easy victims.

What are your objectives? The name of your race sounds a tad ominous...

Keep us posted (if you'll forgive the pun)!

Hydro

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A bit of an In Character Analogy of the situations not exactly

Reports had been sketchy, some civilian news networks report massive victories for the Korath all across the Torian border, others said that the fighting was still taking place.

The Fatal Consulate sent a scout or two and confirmed the worst, the Torains were massivley under prepared and ultimatley their only hope lay in the Iconian and Altarian response, which comming from the nroth, would take a long time to make any impact.

The next few months would be crucial for the future of the galaxy. The Korath suprise attack was a success but now Torian forces had been scrambled, they were forming up and true resistance would be met, or so The Consulate hoped. Iconians and Altarians would hopefully elviate enough pressure off the Korath to allow the Torians to fight back. Who knows maybe this could end in disaster for the Korath.

The Newly assembled joint Altarian and Iconian task force was now heading for the Korath border, the northern most Korath worlds were near the Dregin / Fatal Consulate border, however the Consulate would have no trouble sleeping over the Altarians and Iconians using their space to get at the Korath.

The fleet moved in, around 15 warpships ranging from Frigate (Medium) to interceptors (small) crossed over into Korath territory. A Korath welcomnig commitee lay waiting, suprisingly small, but still an obstacle.

The Altarians launched their attack first, leeping ahead ofthe Iconian fleet. The Korath were able to hold their ground, but the oncomming Iconian mass would soon cause a problem.

Suddenly however, one of the Iconian vessels at the rear came under fire, one volley insenerating the unshielded hull, before a second atomoised what was left of the disabled craft. A second vessel soon followed it and a third.

The Iconian admirale screamed at his ensign for a response. The one he got would shatter the universe.

"Dregin sir.. its the Dregin!"

Out of character note, more to come

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Thx for the feedback hydro and so soon!

Unfortunatley, no screenshots are available up until the point of the game i am currently at (which is quite far advanced into this war). I have begun to assemble a libary now of them and will include them once im up to that point in my AAR.

I had never planned on such an AAR but this game has been so much fun and eventful i felt it had to be wrote

.

The Torians were essentially unlucky, in that the Korath and myself acted quicker and got the worlds sooner, leaving them very weak. Their military rating was at the time the lowest with the Koraths being second, only to the Dregin.

There will be another post without screenshots, after that as much info will be provided as possible.

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This will bring you up to speed with events, and after this post i will be able to include screenshots of the game. As i now have an extensive collection.

The fact that the Dregin had now entered the war presented serious issues for myself. Them and the Korath always come out on top in my games, their early aggresive nature seems to have the AI beaten every time, and i must admit myself included on the odd occastion.

I was trying to scout out Korath and Dregin positions, difficult to do on a gigantic map with only sensor's II. That was to be my next research aim once i had completed photonic torps and PD combo's (missile offense and defense respectivley).

My intention was to use my advantage of soldering and high population to take any undefended worlds. I really didn't want to get involved but now was my best chance, otherwise i'd risk letting the Torians, Altarans and Iconians just roll over and die then having to deal with a combined threat on my own.

I started pumping troops at my grower colonies (high 18bil pop cap, lots of entertainment networks and a starport for tranports). I focused on keeping my tax rate low, this keeps people happy and happy people make babies, which in turn grow up to be cold blooded killers.

I had roughly 14 tranports each with 1bil of troops on board and a speed of 5 / week. I was positioning them out of sight, just behind my borders to the Korath, but not close enough so that they worry the Korath.

The other project i had been working on was the the escort for my transports. Essentially i was still a generation behind the Korath and Dregin with regards to wepons tech, however i had a massive advnatage in missile defense while they prefered to defend against Iconinan and Altarian Projectile weponary. My first medium sized ship came out of the oven, not very impressive 20 Missile Offensive and 6 Missile Defensive. However it was enough to compete with the Dregin and Korath fleets.

I had churned out about 6 of these and formed two fleets of 3. They would escort the transports to the Korath border and then remove any defensive ships covering target planets.

At this point in time, one of the major random events occured and this one, was quite major indeed. I was just getting ready to initialise my smash and grab along the Korath border when i recieved news that a new power (named the Jaggered Alliance) in the universe had sprung up litterally out of nowhere, taking control of a massive 66 planets throughout the galaxy, 7 of which were mine!

I have to admit, at this point after re-reading the message about 6 or 7 times, throwing my monitor out of the window seemed like the most appropriate course of action, never the less and much to the gratitude of my monitor my common sense kicked in and i opted to carry on playing.

After surveying what i had lost, i came to the conlusion that i had lost 4 economical worlds, including my eco capital Jita. 1 Manufacutring world (that was still very much underdevelopment) and two research worlds.

This left me with a remainder of 9 planets, 2 Ship Factories, 3 research and 4 economical worlds. Most of these still in development. I had also shifted my production away from social back onto Military, the ratio of Military : Social : Research now stood at 40 : 20 : 40 Respectivley.

I eyed my invasion force on route to the Korath border, i could capture back my worlds relativley easily and while the Jaggered Empire had 66 worlds, it didn't have a single offensive nor defensive ship available.

I quickly set my troops loose on the rebellious wolrds. My primary objective was Jita. I assaulted it with 3 billion troops, going up against 12 billion (god damn eco worlds!).

The battle was a resounding success as with my 68 soldering ability compared to the Jaggeds 12 (!?). I lost only 700million troops, leaving me with two transports left over which were quickly reassinged to take out two smaller worlds, this coupled with the other 4 that were on route to take back 4 worlds over to the far west of my empire.

This left me with 7 transports which were remaining near the Korath border accompanied by my fleet. The other colonies within my borders that had joined the Jaggered didn't last much longer and i was back at where i started, minus a few troops and rather a lot of population.

From what i could tell, the other races had all but opted to ignore the sudden arrival of the Jagged Alliance, and i was the only race to declare war and reclaim my worlds. The Korath and the Dregin continued to pound away at iconians and the torians (with the Altarians not reciving much in the way of attention due to the iconian meatshield that lay between them and the Dregin). I began to reassemble my invasion force and i now had sensor 4 and purchased the eye of the universe enabling all ships to have an impressive sensor range and allowed me to cover more of the korath/dregin space with my scouts now that my normal patrol ships could scan my borders.

Korath space was vast, it reached my borders in the north west and spread right the way to the south, all but engulfing the small Torian empire, it reached east as far as the yet to be discovered Terran Alliance.

The center of the universe belonged mostly to the Dregin, with some Drath contingent slotted away between them and the Terrans. To the north of the Drath lay the Yor, whom i had just recently bumped into and seemed to be doing quite alright for themselves.

They seemed to be passive so far, only assaulting minor races, they were now third in military rankings, behind the korath and the dregin. I immediatley began trading with them.

More will follow shortly...

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