Ultimate Start - NOT!

The other thing to note here is that the income is glitched. Its 30% higher than it should be. I have zero clue how these glitches happen, and if you CNTL-N from a glitched map all you get are more glitched maps.

OMG, talk about a blast from the past. Good to see you around. You were an inspiration to me when I was just starting out.

But this is most likely the ctrl-n issue that's been around for quite some time. I'm not sure what version of the game it came in on but I think it was DL v1.3. It's ctrl-n itself that causes this. In this case the AI reverts to cakewalk and the game scores as if it's cakewalk but the game actually get's reported as Suicidal (or assumedly whatever difficulty level you selected).

The rise in income is the first indication that this has occured and is simply because you get an income bonus at cakewalk. This happens every so often when you use ctrl-n. You're correct, once in this mode additional ctrl-n's will not change anything.

Basically when using ctrl-n to select a start keep an eye on your initial income. Once it goes up exit and come back and start another game from the main menu because the current game is toast.

Also not totally sure if the screenshot is from DL or DA (or even TA) but I've still never seen both a precursor mine and precursor library in DL although it has been known to happen rarely in DA.

Hopefully, we'll see you around more. Welcome back.

Its DL v1.4. Thanks for the welcome.  I actually played another Metaverse game under a new character the other day using a mixture of some of your strategies and mine. (Went Evil for the first time, also played v1.4 for the first time). I had a great startup but unfortunately my map ended up having only 3 Wep resources and very few high PQ planets and I didnt get any Events until after the 3rd year so I didnt get the score I was hoping for.

Well 685K certainly isn't chicken feed. For a DL game that's probably the 3rd or 4th highest score ever achieved.

DA has significantly more planets and so tends to score higher although I've been told the economy is somewhat more difficult and so is morale. I'm actually still playing v1.4 as well but I have long since purchased DA and also have bought TA. As to why I haven't quite moved on there are a bunch of reasons that I've mentioned elsewhere that are too numerous to go into here but I guess the biggest one is that I feel that I've just barely gotten to the point where I've almost mastered DL. But DA and TA are both on my agenda.

Well, for the time being I'll tinker with DL for a while. My rig has its hands full trying to process on a DL gigantic map (Takes 7-10 minutes to loadup a mid-late game save game)and Im in no position to upgrade. I imagine DA with more planets might be too much for it.

Oh, and I found out when you get a glitched game. It seems if you load up a saved game, then CNTL-N, then the new game will be glitched.

That will do it but they also occur randomly as well so anytime you do ctrl-n it's best to keep an eye on the income in your starting planet screen and check that it doesn't go up.

As you saw it's awfully annoying to get a nice start but then later find out the AI does nothing but drool.

I didnt know you previously Killzone, but welcome back regardless.

Sentient species taste better...