Now for the general strategies in this game, and how they stack to each other in a One City Challenge...
INDUSTRY: an INDUSTRY Score of +5 denotes a society that’s completely industrialized. Meanwhile, an INDUSTRY Score of -3 denotes a society that’s completely agrarian. This is quite important in a normal play-through, and crucial in the One City Challenge. After all, Project Stacking makes the Empire Of One City Challenge even possible in the first place.
GROWTH: a GROWTH Score of +6, as well all know, denotes a society whose agricultural/healthcare tech is completely modern. Meanwhile, a GROWTH Score of -3 denotes a society that’s pretty much entirely feministic/hunter-gatherer based. This is unanimously recognized as being what pretty much determines whether or not you can win at all, since Workers are the very Salt of the Empire. This becomes even more true in the One City Challenge, since numbers are just no longer on your side.
TALENT: although not shown in-game, this determines whether we have either an extra Talent or an extra Drone for every four new workers. This is important to remember because Talents are the veritable “cream-of-the-crop” (Intellectual Elite) when it comes to our citizens. Because if either Talents = Workers or Talents > Workers and Drones = 0 are/is (both) “true”, then Golden Age (I.e. further GROWTH + & slightly more Energy produced). Also, if Talents < Drones is “true” (ignore Workers/Specialists), then Drone Riot (I.e. nothing but Stagnant Nutrient output ever gets produced by the city in question). This is critical in a One City Empire Challenge because to have a Drone Riot then means that your nation will produce absolutely nothing.
RESEARCH: this pretty much determines how much your Energy is truly worth, since you need it to ever produce scientific achievement.
ECONOMY: this only determines how much Energy gets produced by your country at face value. Higher Scores here can definitely help, but are otherwise not crucial.
More on the “advanced” strategies in a moment...
Now for the general strategies in this game, and how they stack to each other in a One City Challenge...
INDUSTRY: an INDUSTRY Score of +5 denotes a society that’s completely industrialized. Meanwhile, an INDUSTRY Score of -3 denotes a society that’s completely agrarian. This is quite important in a normal play-through, and crucial in the One City Challenge. After all, Project Stacking makes the Empire Of One City Challenge even possible in the first place.
GROWTH: a GROWTH Score of +6, as well all know, denotes a society whose agricultural/healthcare tech is completely modern. Meanwhile, a GROWTH Score of -3 denotes a society that’s pretty much entirely feministic/hunter-gatherer based. This is unanimously recognized as being what pretty much determines whether or not you can win at all, since Workers are the very Salt of the Empire. This becomes even more true in the One City Challenge, since numbers are just no longer on your side.
TALENT: although not shown in-game, this determines whether we have either an extra Talent or an extra Drone for every four new workers. This is important to remember because Talents are the veritable “cream-of-the-crop” (Intellectual Elite) when it comes to our citizens. Because if either Talents = Workers or Talents > Workers and Drones = 0 are/is (both) “true”, then Golden Age (I.e. further GROWTH + & slightly more Energy produced). Also, if Talents < Drones is “true” (ignore Workers/Specialists), then Drone Riot (I.e. nothing but Stagnant Nutrient output ever gets produced by the city in question). This is critical in a One City Empire Challenge because to have a Drone Riot then means that your nation will produce absolutely nothing.
RESEARCH: this pretty much determines how much your Energy is truly worth, since you need it to ever produce scientific achievement.
ECONOMY: this only determines how much Energy gets produced by your country at face value. Higher Scores here can definitely help, but are otherwise not crucial.
More on the “advanced” strategies in a moment...
Now for the "advanced" strategies...
TALENT (assuming that it determines the level of the people's general satisfaction with the ruling regime)…
+1: +1 Talent/+4 Workers (Lal's default)
0: The Default Overall Satisfaction Rate
-1: +1 Drone/+4 Workers (Zak's default)
RESEARCH: Clearly, this only determines just how "enlightened" a society truly is. +5 denotes the most science inclined empires, whereas -5 denotes the most scientifically reluctant cultures.
HAB (determines how tall your cities can get before they need special facilities [also not shown in-game])…
-3: Size 4 maximum (Morgan's beginning era/early planetfall years default ["premium comfort"])
-2: Size 5 max
-1: Size 6 max (Morgan's default if he controls The Ascetic Virtue, and no Habitation Complexes)
0: Size 7 (the standardized default for most nations)
+1: Size 8 cap
+2: Size 9 (Lal's beginning years default, and default for most Ascetic Virtue nations without Habitations)
+3: Size 10
+4: Size 11 (Morgan's default with the Habitation Complex Facility)
+5: Size 12
+6: Size 13 (Morgan's cap with both The Ascetic Virtues and Habitation Complexes)
+7: Size 14 (the standardized default for those cities with the Habitation Complex)
+8: Size 15
+9: Size 16 (Lal's cap until he can get the Habitation Dome Facility and/or unless he gets the Ascetic Virtue)
+10: Size 17
+11: Size 18 (maximum HAB Score possible until the Habitation Dome Era)
>+11: 255(!)
IMPORTANT: Increase HAB Score by +2 for the nation that possesses The Ascetic Virtues, if applicable. As mere examples, +2 is now the default for most nations. For Lal, it's +4. As Morgan, it's -1. Add in the Habitation Caps if needed. (i.e. Then Lal gets +9. Morgan gets +4; and the others get +7. With the Habitation Complex, just add The Ascetic Virtues if needed. Now it's +11 for Lal; +6 for Morgan and +9 for everyone else.
Without getting into too much math, here are the HAB Bonuses from the all-important Base Structures...
Habitation Dome: +255(!!)
Habitation Complex: +7
The Ascetic Virtues: +2
EFFICIENCY: this determines how much Bureaucracy an empire has. Higher values mean less Bureaucracy; and lower ones denote more. -4 denotes societal collapse outside of the One City Challenge, and anything >+3 is like a free person's dream come true.
Here are the rules...I'm too deeply invested in my own mod, which fixes many game mechanical dysfunctionalities of the original game, to bother to do a 1 city challenge with straight SMAC and original factions. But I might be willing to do a 1 city challenge with my own mod. I don't see why it would be any easier than the regular game. Should be harder. I always play Huge maps, that's what my mod is designed for. I don't understand why any victory conditions would be allowed to be disabled. Progenitors are a non-issue in my mod because I rebalanced them to be the same strength as other factions.
8. Only the Diplomatic & Economic Victories can be disabled.
9. No ridiculous map sizes/dimensions/dimension discrepancies, except crazy small for the military victory
12. Regular game’s factions only; Progenitors are strictly forbidden!
Here are the rules...I'm too deeply invested in my own mod, which fixes many game mechanical dysfunctionalities of the original game, to bother to do a 1 city challenge with straight SMAC and original factions. But I might be willing to do a 1 city challenge with my own mod. I don't see why it would be any easier than the regular game. Should be harder. I always play Huge maps, that's what my mod is designed for. I don't understand why any victory conditions would be allowed to be disabled. Progenitors are a non-issue in my mod because I rebalanced them to be the same strength as other factions.
8. Only the Diplomatic & Economic Victories can be disabled.
9. No ridiculous map sizes/dimensions/dimension discrepancies, except crazy small for the military victory
12. Regular game’s factions only; Progenitors are strictly forbidden!
I only play, and design, on Transcend.
I suppose in my mod, the availability of Clean Reactors from the start of the game, could make a 1 city challenge easier. There's always an "out" for managing your SUPPORT at the beginning of my mod. However, they do cost more than regular reactors, and the speed hit of making the more expensive ones, does matter. Generally speaking, the Clean Formers help the AI more than they help the human player, as the stock AI has a big problem with running itself out of SUPPORT. This alleviates it.
On the other hand, supply crawlers, condensers, and thermal boreholes aren't allowed in my mod until late game. This would make it harder than stock. Even if you get the Weather Paradigm, you're still not going to be doing supply crawler abuse early. Also I made them more expensive, so players who want to pump out oodles of them to make a supercity, are penalized by that.
Oh, and all Secret Projects are substantially more expensive, and often come later, than in the stock game. That makes my mod harder.
Here are the rules...I'm too deeply invested in my own mod, which fixes many game mechanical dysfunctionalities of the original game, to bother to do a 1 city challenge with straight SMAC and original factions. But I might be willing to do a 1 city challenge with my own mod. I don't see why it would be any easier than the regular game. Should be harder. I always play Huge maps, that's what my mod is designed for. I don't understand why any victory conditions would be allowed to be disabled. Progenitors are a non-issue in my mod because I rebalanced them to be the same strength as other factions.
8. Only the Diplomatic & Economic Victories can be disabled.
9. No ridiculous map sizes/dimensions/dimension discrepancies, except crazy small for the military victory
12. Regular game’s factions only; Progenitors are strictly forbidden!
I only play, and design, on Transcend.
I suppose in my mod, the availability of Clean Reactors from the start of the game, could make a 1 city challenge easier. There's always an "out" for managing your SUPPORT at the beginning of my mod. However, they do cost more than regular reactors, and the speed hit of making the more expensive ones, does matter. Generally speaking, the Clean Formers help the AI more than they help the human player, as the stock AI has a big problem with running itself out of SUPPORT. This alleviates it.
On the other hand, supply crawlers, condensers, and thermal boreholes aren't allowed in my mod until late game. This would make it harder than stock. Even if you get the Weather Paradigm, you're still not going to be doing supply crawler abuse early. Also I made them more expensive, so players who want to pump out oodles of them to make a supercity, are penalized by that.
Oh, and all Secret Projects are substantially more expensive, and often come later, than in the stock game. That makes my mod harder.
I’m all for attempts to make things more challenging/fun for experienced/skilled players. However, I’m not (quite) yet good enough. Besides, I prefer to play the game the way it was originally intended; so I’d rather stick with the more “official” patches and fixes. In a normal play-through, pumping out massive streams of Crawlers eventually makes your cities too powerful for words; so I prefer to save that tactic for the One City Challenge, as you don’t really have much of a choice there. My best scores were done on Huge maps as well; so I’m not stopping you from doing that either. The best reported score ever was on Transcend Difficulty (the player in question amassed an absolutely “are you serious?!” mark of >45,000 VPs; which translates into a truly ridiculous Alpha Centauri Rating of >4200% on Transcend). Therefore, your decision to play on Transcend Level definitely makes sense. By comparison: my highest score ever was 11,504 on Citizen; so convert to 431% in the “Holo-book” section. Obviously, the proper RNG easily lets one get obscenely high scores in a regular game; and even a One City Challenge allows for high markings as long as you can perfect your “preferred” strategy.
For context, here’s the Oodles level Transcend score:
Now for the wartime strategies...
MORALE & POLICE: Maximum scores here denote completely regimented societies. These nations can declare martial law outright with double effectiveness no matter what; and other countries can do nothing to them conventionally.
SUPPORT: A maximum score denotes the most cost-effective imperialistic regimes. These nations can support up to four units per city for free in cities of sizes 1-4; and sizes 5 & above can support up until their city size for free. Any units after the cap never require more than a single excess Mineral to maintain.
Clean Reactor: these units never require Minerals to maintain. I rarely use them however, because 1) they're expensive to build, especially for about the time when you get them [i.e. Chiron won't stop until the game ends outright], and 2) I can get enough SUPPORT/POLICE/MORALE Mark by the time that I can build them that doing so is really unnecessary. I also have enough INDUSTRY and Minerals to produce regular units fairly quickly anyway.
Non-Lethal Method: This one's useless if your POLICE Score is <-1. Even then, I'm likely more than tall enough to make Drones irrelevant by this point; so I never use this. Otherwise, "cops" are always twice as effective; so imagine this with not only the abilities applied to your troops outright, but a POLICE Score of +3 as well. I mean, what kind of totalitarian wouldn't "just ask" for -3 Drones/+1 Cop until 3 "cops" instead of only -2 Drones/+1 Cop until the cap, or -1 Drone/+1 Cop until the empire's "police cap"? Yes. You read that right. All three "cops" would "suppress" an utterly ridiculous Nine Drones instead of the "just the norm" of 1-8! Simply put; even your most disgruntled, low-ranking subjects could never even question you. Admittedly, this would make The Telepathic Matrix kind of useless, since the +2 Probe Team Morale rarely makes an actual difference. (I almost never use Probe Teams anyway.) [In other words, this ability is reserved for only the most authoritarian rulers. Otherwise, there's not much real use to it.]
Nerve Gas Pods: yet another UNACCEPTABLY ridiculous ability; step #1) then get rid of the UN Charter first please, step #2) be prepared to expend more Minerals, step #3) have at it!
Now for the wartime strategies...
MORALE & POLICE: Maximum scores here denote completely regimented societies. These nations can declare martial law outright with double effectiveness no matter what; and other countries can do nothing to them conventionally.
SUPPORT: A maximum score denotes the most cost-effective imperialistic regimes. These nations can support up to four units per city for free in cities of sizes 1-4; and sizes 5 & above can support up until their city size for free. Any units after the cap never require more than a single excess Mineral to maintain.
Clean Reactor: these units never require Minerals to maintain. I rarely use them however, because 1) they're expensive to build, especially for about the time when you get them [i.e. Chiron won't stop until the game ends outright], and 2) I can get enough SUPPORT/POLICE/MORALE Mark by the time that I can build them that doing so is really unnecessary. I also have enough INDUSTRY and Minerals to produce regular units fairly quickly anyway.
Non-Lethal Method: This one's useless if your POLICE Score is <-1. Even then, I'm likely more than tall enough to make Drones irrelevant by this point; so I never use this. Otherwise, "cops" are always twice as effective; so imagine this with not only the abilities applied to your troops outright, but a POLICE Score of +3 as well. I mean, what kind of totalitarian wouldn't "just ask" for -3 Drones/+1 Cop until 3 "cops" instead of only -2 Drones/+1 Cop until the cap, or -1 Drone/+1 Cop until the empire's "police cap"? Yes. You read that right. All three "cops" would "suppress" an utterly ridiculous Nine Drones instead of the "just the norm" of 1-8! Simply put; even your most disgruntled, low-ranking subjects could never even question you. Admittedly, this would make The Telepathic Matrix kind of useless, since the +2 Probe Team Morale rarely makes an actual difference. (I almost never use Probe Teams anyway.) [In other words, this ability is reserved for only the most authoritarian rulers. Otherwise, there's not much real use to it.]
Nerve Gas Pods: yet another UNACCEPTABLY ridiculous ability; step #1) then get rid of the UN Charter first please, step #2) be prepared to expend more Minerals, step #3) have at it!
Now for the wartime strategies...
MORALE & POLICE: Maximum scores here denote completely regimented societies. These nations can declare martial law outright with double effectiveness no matter what; and other countries can do nothing to them conventionally.
SUPPORT: A maximum score denotes the most cost-effective imperialistic regimes. These nations can support up to four units per city for free in cities of sizes 1-4; and sizes 5 & above can support up until their city size for free. Any units after the cap never require more than a single excess Mineral to maintain.
Clean Reactor: these units never require Minerals to maintain. I rarely use them however, because 1) they're expensive to build, especially for about the time when you get them [i.e. Chiron won't stop until the game ends outright], and 2) I can get enough SUPPORT/POLICE/MORALE Mark by the time that I can build them that doing so is really unnecessary. I also have enough INDUSTRY and Minerals to produce regular units fairly quickly anyway.
Non-Lethal Method: This one's useless if your POLICE Score is <-1. Even then, I'm likely more than tall enough to make Drones irrelevant by this point; so I never use this. Otherwise, "cops" are always twice as effective; so imagine this with not only the abilities applied to your troops outright, but a POLICE Score of +3 as well. I mean, what kind of totalitarian wouldn't "just ask" for -3 Drones/+1 Cop until 3 "cops" instead of only -2 Drones/+1 Cop until the cap, or -1 Drone/+1 Cop until the empire's "police cap"? Yes. You read that right. All three "cops" would "suppress" an utterly ridiculous Nine Drones instead of the "just the norm" of 1-8! Simply put; even your most disgruntled, low-ranking subjects could never even question you. Admittedly, this would make The Telepathic Matrix kind of useless, since the +2 Probe Team Morale rarely makes an actual difference. (I almost never use Probe Teams anyway.) [In other words, this ability is reserved for only the most authoritarian rulers. Otherwise, there's not much real use to it.]
Nerve Gas Pods: yet another UNACCEPTABLY ridiculous ability; step #1) then get rid of the UN Charter first please, step #2) be prepared to expend more Minerals, step #3) have at it!
Heavy Artillery: this one's kind of dicey, since regular Infantry units are just so much better at directly attacking enemy cities outright. However, you can certainly use this to get the defenders' health bars into the red; making it a lot easier, for your Infantry troopers to clean up the mess.
Cloaking Device: "unfair occupation" is made practically irrelevant with this ability. Only use however if you have lone Infantry units lurking deep inside the enemy's territory.
AAA Tracking: this only works for conventional aerial warfare.
Amphibious Pods: this has absolutely got to be my favorite ability, by far. Basically, I'll even take the +25% cost to build these in exchange for a greater combat advantage.
Air Superiority: you'll need this one in order to defend yourself from enemy conventional air units directly.
Now for the wartime strategies...
MORALE & POLICE: Maximum scores here denote completely regimented societies. These nations can declare martial law outright with double effectiveness no matter what; and other countries can do nothing to them conventionally.
SUPPORT: A maximum score denotes the most cost-effective imperialistic regimes. These nations can support up to four units per city for free in cities of sizes 1-4; and sizes 5 & above can support up until their city size for free. Any units after the cap never require more than a single excess Mineral to maintain.
Clean Reactor: these units never require Minerals to maintain. I rarely use them however, because 1) they're expensive to build, especially for about the time when you get them [i.e. Chiron won't stop until the game ends outright], and 2) I can get enough SUPPORT/POLICE/MORALE Mark by the time that I can build them that doing so is really unnecessary. I also have enough INDUSTRY and Minerals to produce regular units fairly quickly anyway.
Non-Lethal Method: This one's useless if your POLICE Score is <-1. Even then, I'm likely more than tall enough to make Drones irrelevant by this point; so I never use this. Otherwise, "cops" are always twice as effective; so imagine this with not only the abilities applied to your troops outright, but a POLICE Score of +3 as well. I mean, what kind of totalitarian wouldn't "just ask" for -3 Drones/+1 Cop until 3 "cops" instead of only -2 Drones/+1 Cop until the cap, or -1 Drone/+1 Cop until the empire's "police cap"? Yes. You read that right. All three "cops" would "suppress" an utterly ridiculous Nine Drones instead of the "just the norm" of 1-8! Simply put; even your most disgruntled, low-ranking subjects could never even question you. Admittedly, this would make The Telepathic Matrix kind of useless, since the +2 Probe Team Morale rarely makes an actual difference. (I almost never use Probe Teams anyway.) [In other words, this ability is reserved for only the most authoritarian rulers. Otherwise, there's not much real use to it.]
Nerve Gas Pods: yet another UNACCEPTABLY ridiculous ability; step #1) then get rid of the UN Charter first please, step #2) be prepared to expend more Minerals, step #3) have at it!
Heavy Artillery: this one's kind of dicey, since regular Infantry units are just so much better at directly attacking enemy cities outright. However, you can certainly use this to get the defenders' health bars into the red; making it a lot easier, for your Infantry troopers to clean up the mess.
Cloaking Device: "unfair occupation" is made practically irrelevant with this ability. Only use however if you have lone Infantry units lurking deep inside the enemy's territory.
AAA Tracking: this only works for conventional aerial warfare.
Amphibious Pods: this has absolutely got to be my favorite ability, by far. Basically, I'll even take the +25% cost to build these in exchange for a greater combat advantage.
Air Superiority: you'll need this one in order to defend yourself from enemy conventional air units directly.
Polymorphic Encryption: realize just how weak Probe Teams really are; and you'll never need this. Only use if the intended goal is to conquer the world outright, without the use of either Planet Busters or Oodles upon Oodles of cheaply built/maintained cities.
Drop Pods: These are basically the futuristic equivalent of Paratroopers. I'll sometimes use them.
Deep Pressure Hull: the far-flung future equivalent of the infamous U-boat; I never use this.
Carrier Deck: the distant future's equivalent of Aircraft Carriers; I never use this one either.
Repair Bay: this only makes sense if your land units are fighting lots of battles on large continents over great sea distances. Otherwise, I never specifically use this.
Blink Displacer: yet another ability at the utterly "are you serious?" level of "ridiculous"; I never bother with this.
Deep Radar: not knowing what's literally less than an inch from your face is downright aggravating. This ability can help immensely with that; but it only applies to land units.
Planet Buster: no words possible, literally; just - simply ~ completely ~ - none
Also important in any case is directly reducing Drone activity via other means. These are the bonuses...
Recreation Commons & Hologram Theatre: -2
Gene-jack Factory: +1
Punishment Sphere: -255
Research Hospital and Nano-hospital: -1
The Longevity Vaccine: -1 if Simple/Green Economy = True, -2 if Planned Economy = True, 0 if Both Statements = False
The Planetary Transit System: -1 if either Base Size = 3 or Base Size < 3 is "true", 0 if Both Statements = False
POLICE...
-5 = Two extra drones for each military unit away from territory
-4 = Extra drone for each military unit away from territory
-3 = Extra drone if more than one military unit away from territory
-2 = Cannot use military units as police. No nerve stapling.
-1 = One police unit allowed. No nerve stapling.
0 = Can use one military unit as police
+1 = Can use up to 2 military units as police
+2 = Can use up to 3 military units as police!
+3 = 3 units as police. Police effect doubled!!
If POLICE > -2 is "true", then *2 "cop" effect if Non-Lethal Methods Special Ability = "true"; otherwise, no effect
originally intended;I think that concept is partly nonsense. The reality of a game production as long and complex as SMAC, is that at some point they ran out of monetary justification to continue tinkering with it. This isn't authorial intent, this is authorial limit as a matter of production resources in the real world. They couldn't sit around polishing things for another person-year they way I did, or spread that effort over an additional 2.5 years. They had to do other things to keep the Firaxis studio doors open. I just lived out of my car with my dog and ate my life, making $0.
Now that I’ve perfected my 1-city strategy on Citizen, I was wondering if anyone had any interest in trying it on a harder level. I likely won’t be able to replicate my 11K+ VPs mark anytime soon; so for now, I’d like to stick to a challenge that most Alpha Centauri players don’t really touch on.
Here are the rules...
1. Iron Man
2. Legal game copies only
3. Proof of your scores and strategies
4. No Time Warp (I.e. can’t use Advanced Starts)
5. No Scenario Editor, except for fairly-assembled custom maps (save them as .MP files!)
6. Regular scoring parameters only
7. No Rare Native Life Forms, unless specifically aiming for complete world domination
8. Only the Diplomatic & Economic Victories can be disabled.
9. No ridiculous map sizes/dimensions/dimension discrepancies, except crazy small for the military victory
10. Don’t brag. This game’s RNG is more brutal than most wish to realize. I’m here to give way unto the discussion of general strategies, not for anyone to gloat about any particular path to victory.
11. If pre-made map, then no edits allowed
12. Regular game’s factions only; Progenitors are strictly forbidden!
Factions...
Believers: your only hope is for the University to be close by so that you can steal the tech needed for a non-diplomatic victory. You must get The Planetary Data-links at any cost. Do not even think about choosing this faction otherwise.
University: sitting ducks for Drones and enemy Probe Teams early on; otherwise, just what exactly is there not to like about this faction? They’ll decimate anything in their path in the hands of a solidly experienced human player.
Peacekeepers: In a One City Challenge, the Diplomatic Victory just won’t work. This makes this faction’s x2 UN Votes lose most of their meaning. Otherwise, these guys are likely the safest for a One City Challenge overall. The only downside is that you can never be a Police State, making early to mid game wars a liability.
Morganites: Naturally, I dismiss these guys for good reason. They can’t possibly pop-boom in the early to mid game. However, you need Energy that’s not getting lost to Inefficiency to ever be able to achieve anything at all. This rule of thumb can make this faction’s extra ECONOMY ups a major help, particularly in the One City Challenge.
Gaia’s Stepchildren: Even more important than producing Energy and/or having a low Labs Cost, the Energy must never be lost to Inefficiency. Also, having only a single city means that interruptions from literally any source can totally shut down all of your production. In other words, the extra PLANET and EFFICIENCY from these folks would help if it otherwise meant that then keeping up with everyone else could really happen because of it. Sadly, it can’t. Save this faction for regular play-throughs and other challenge runs; no good here.
Spartans: these guys mean nothing unless you want to conquer the world, especially in the One City Challenge. Otherwise, give them a pass. They’re no good.
Hive: not being a Democracy whatsoever is going to be a major liability no matter how you slice it. Even getting to be a Police State and have a Planned Economy without drawbacks won’t really help matters. So unless you plan for world conquest, then don’t play as these guys either. Other than that, they are just not any good.
Thus, we narrow down our choices to just the following...
1. University
2. Peacekeepers
3. Morganites
Overall, the University will always be the easiest to play. They can do anything that’ll ever be useful in this game. The Peacekeepers can sometimes have trouble waging wars, but aren’t too bad otherwise. The Morganites are a big magnet for military conquest if a human player doesn’t move with caution. At least it can still work if you’re careful, though...
However, my best 1-city scores have been achieved with the Peacekeepers, and especially the University. So the best decision therefore, is either one or the other. Here are the exact specifics...
University: once you become tall enough to make Drones and enemy Probe Teams a thing of the past, you win.
Peacekeepers: the extra Talents and UN Votes can help if you’d like to win peacefully, but they tend to lose meaning as you advance through the challenge.
Now that we’ve chosen which factions are optimal, let’s take a look at the Societal Models...
Starting off, these are the Political Systems...
Frontier: the default, excluding Yang
Police State: Yang’s default/agenda/best choice, and Lal’s aversion; otherwise, only use this to wage small-scale wars.
Democratic: best choice ever unless fighting a war, Yang’s aversion and Lal’s agenda
Theocracy: worst possible choice, Zak’s aversion and Miriam’s agenda; avoid it, at any cost
Moving on to the Economic Systems...
Simple: the default
Free Market: not that great unless you’re playing this challenge as Morgan, his preference and Deirdre’s aversion; -5 POLICE makes waging wars completely laughable, and the nasty -3 PLANET will absolutely cripple any reasonable attempt at keeping Chiron quiet
Planned: need to use this in any game at least once unless you’re Morgan; in which case, it is simply not a choice.
Green: another excellent choice, especially when Chiron gets too suspicious of the civilized world to ever be completely stopped outright (beware the -2 GROWTH, however!)
Values Prioritization Systems...
Survival: the default
Power: don’t use this unless you have The Cloning Vats; even then, only use this to wage a war.
Wealth: Sparta’s aversion, and no direct RESEARCH/EFFICIENCY bonus; every INDUSTRY + helps however, especially here, and Morgan can make excellent use of the ECONOMY boost.
Knowledge: Miriam’s aversion; otherwise, undoubtedly the best; especially with the Hunter Seeker Algorithm Secret Project
Far Future Society options...
None: the default, and the way of knowing that a nation is not quite at that point yet...
Cybernetic: undoubtedly the best choice; The Network Backbone cancels the gruesome -3 POLICE outright, making this choice have no real disadvantages.
Eudaemonic: kinda silly by the time you get it; other INDUSTRY +’s are good enough as it is; and it’s near impossible to get any taller. Energy lost to Inefficiency doesn’t help either.
Thought Control: the -3 SUPPORT is crippling, so don’t pick this one unless you can get The Cloning Vats. Even then, you’ll only ever be using this to fight any late-game wars.
More on the other specifics in a bit...
Now that I’ve perfected my 1-city strategy on Citizen, I was wondering if anyone had any interest in trying it on a harder level. I likely won’t be able to replicate my 11K+ VPs mark anytime soon; so for now, I’d like to stick to a challenge that most Alpha Centauri players don’t really touch on.
Here are the rules...
1. Iron Man
2. Legal game copies only
3. Proof of your scores and strategies
4. No Time Warp (I.e. can’t use Advanced Starts)
5. No Scenario Editor, except for fairly-assembled custom maps (save them as .MP files!)
6. Regular scoring parameters only
7. No Rare Native Life Forms, unless specifically aiming for complete world domination
8. Only the Diplomatic & Economic Victories can be disabled.
9. No ridiculous map sizes/dimensions/dimension discrepancies, except crazy small for the military victory
10. Don’t brag. This game’s RNG is more brutal than most wish to realize. I’m here to give way unto the discussion of general strategies, not for anyone to gloat about any particular path to victory.
11. If pre-made map, then no edits allowed
12. Regular game’s factions only; Progenitors are strictly forbidden!
Factions...
Believers: your only hope is for the University to be close by so that you can steal the tech needed for a non-diplomatic victory. You must get The Planetary Data-links at any cost. Do not even think about choosing this faction otherwise.
University: sitting ducks for Drones and enemy Probe Teams early on; otherwise, just what exactly is there not to like about this faction? They’ll decimate anything in their path in the hands of a solidly experienced human player.
Peacekeepers: In a One City Challenge, the Diplomatic Victory just won’t work. This makes this faction’s x2 UN Votes lose most of their meaning. Otherwise, these guys are likely the safest for a One City Challenge overall. The only downside is that you can never be a Police State, making early to mid game wars a liability.
Morganites: Naturally, I dismiss these guys for good reason. They can’t possibly pop-boom in the early to mid game. However, you need Energy that’s not getting lost to Inefficiency to ever be able to achieve anything at all. This rule of thumb can make this faction’s extra ECONOMY ups a major help, particularly in the One City Challenge.
Gaia’s Stepchildren: Even more important than producing Energy and/or having a low Labs Cost, the Energy must never be lost to Inefficiency. Also, having only a single city means that interruptions from literally any source can totally shut down all of your production. In other words, the extra PLANET and EFFICIENCY from these folks would help if it otherwise meant that then keeping up with everyone else could really happen because of it. Sadly, it can’t. Save this faction for regular play-throughs and other challenge runs; no good here.
Spartans: these guys mean nothing unless you want to conquer the world, especially in the One City Challenge. Otherwise, give them a pass. They’re no good.
Hive: not being a Democracy whatsoever is going to be a major liability no matter how you slice it. Even getting to be a Police State and have a Planned Economy without drawbacks won’t really help matters. So unless you plan for world conquest, then don’t play as these guys either. Other than that, they are just not any good.
Thus, we narrow down our choices to just the following...
1. University
2. Peacekeepers
3. Morganites
Overall, the University will always be the easiest to play. They can do anything that’ll ever be useful in this game. The Peacekeepers can sometimes have trouble waging wars, but aren’t too bad otherwise. The Morganites are a big magnet for military conquest if a human player doesn’t move with caution. At least it can still work if you’re careful, though...
However, my best 1-city scores have been achieved with the Peacekeepers, and especially the University. So the best decision therefore, is either one or the other. Here are the exact specifics...
University: once you become tall enough to make Drones and enemy Probe Teams a thing of the past, you win.
Peacekeepers: the extra Talents and UN Votes can help if you’d like to win peacefully, but they tend to lose meaning as you advance through the challenge.
Now that we’ve chosen which factions are optimal, let’s take a look at the Societal Models...
Starting off, these are the Political Systems...
Frontier: the default, excluding Yang
Police State: Yang’s default/agenda/best choice, and Lal’s aversion; otherwise, only use this to wage small-scale wars.
Democratic: best choice ever unless fighting a war, Yang’s aversion and Lal’s agenda
Theocracy: worst possible choice, Zak’s aversion and Miriam’s agenda; avoid it, at any cost
Moving on to the Economic Systems...
Simple: the default
Free Market: not that great unless you’re playing this challenge as Morgan, his preference and Deirdre’s aversion; -5 POLICE makes waging wars completely laughable, and the nasty -3 PLANET will absolutely cripple any reasonable attempt at keeping Chiron quiet
Planned: need to use this in any game at least once unless you’re Morgan; in which case, it is simply not a choice.
Green: another excellent choice, especially when Chiron gets too suspicious of the civilized world to ever be completely stopped outright (beware the -2 GROWTH, however!)
Values Prioritization Systems...
Survival: the default
Power: don’t use this unless you have The Cloning Vats; even then, only use this to wage a war.
Wealth: Sparta’s aversion, and no direct RESEARCH/EFFICIENCY bonus; every INDUSTRY + helps however, especially here, and Morgan can make excellent use of the ECONOMY boost.
Knowledge: Miriam’s aversion; otherwise, undoubtedly the best; especially with the Hunter Seeker Algorithm Secret Project
Far Future Society options...
None: the default, and the way of knowing that a nation is not quite at that point yet...
Cybernetic: undoubtedly the best choice; The Network Backbone cancels the gruesome -3 POLICE outright, making this choice have no real disadvantages.
Eudaemonic: kinda silly by the time you get it; other INDUSTRY +’s are good enough as it is; and it’s near impossible to get any taller. Energy lost to Inefficiency doesn’t help either.
Thought Control: the -3 SUPPORT is crippling, so don’t pick this one unless you can get The Cloning Vats. Even then, you’ll only ever be using this to fight any late-game wars.
More on the other specifics in a bit...
Slight correction: the Free Market Economy is required to win this game at all on the higher levels. Sadly, I had to learn this; the hard way. (That’s another reason to not play Deirdre.)
Therefore, it’s better to suppress Drones peacefully. [At least being Democratic prevents all of that extra cash from otherwise going down the toilet...]
In the long run, this makes having the +4/+5 ECONOMY from Eudaemonia a more crucial choice than one may believe. (Technically though, having the decreased Labs Costs from Cyber-net-ism is still just as viable. Eudaemonia’s -2 MORALE is offset by having your cities equipped with the Crèches anyway. The same goes for Wealth Values, yielding that greatly coveted +5 ECONOMY with surprisingly few disadvantages; as long as your a Democracy & build those Crèches...)
Meanwhile, the Cybernetic Future has no real drawbacks at all if you can get ahold of The Network Backbone.
As crazy as this sounds, having a decreased PLANET Score makes the Chiron Ecosystem more used to your presence; making Wild Mind Worms less, rather than more, of an issue.