SMACX AI Growth mod

[bvanevery]

I'm going to keep playing this mod for the foreseeable future and I feel no need to try any of the other mods out there (none of which I have played before).

Well that's high praise!  Thanks!

I thought Zak would be my pal but he never gave me any tech even when pacted,

He's a real jerk that way.  Nothing I did.

and he ended up in long-time alliance with Miriam of all people.

Yeah Miriam's new arch-enemy is now the Cyborgs.  She complained about them in the SP videos so much, I thought it was more appropriate.  Now granted, Zhakarov can never choose Theocratic either, so he can still get on Miriam's bad side.  But Miriam can choose Knowledge, so she doesn't have to get on Zhakarov's bad side.  I suppose that means if the University is strong and the Believers are weak, an alliance between them can work.

I'm slowly grinding Lal down but Zak's research is just ridiculous.

Funny you should mention that.  I'm playing as the Believers on a different continent.  My empire's fine, but I didn't take Zak's Monsoon Jungle driven empire quite seriously enough.  I was building a land bridge to stomp him in the midgame, but I slacked.  The Free Drones were pestering me and I carved a nice round empire out of their territory.  No value in it other than not being pestered.  Meanwhile Zak got the Hunter-Seeker Algorithm and later Fusion reactors.  I'm pursuing my policy of only researching with AI default foci, so I am unlikely to learn Fusion Power on my own.  It could spread to others eventually and then I'll get it through the Planetary Datalinks, as I've been a SP powerhouse.  Right now though, Zak gave some units to others, and they're pummeling me with Fusion Gatling Speeders a bit.  I'm just better than them though, so even with only Fission I'm doing fine.

What to do?  Well I've been sending out unarmored Marine Gatling Cruisers, zipping around with the Maritime Control Center.  My hope is to eventually board a Fusion unit, then reverse engineer all sorts of nice Fusion troops.  So far no luck though.  I had one battle against a Fusion ship ages ago, when I first thought of this stratagem.  That 1 ship wiped out my Fission fleet!  It's taken me a long time to get around to going at it again, because, well, you know, Industrial Labs and all that.  I mean why attack when there's no profit in it?

Zak has started wiping a distant sea base I took from him, using his air force.  If I lose it it's no big deal.  He's been working on Conventional Missiles since forever.  Don't know where or if he's launching them.  So far I haven't been hit at least.  It's really annoying when the AI shoots a base full of Artifacts with CMs.  I've often quit games when that happened, or at least save scummed them.  Quitting is usually because other things are going wrong, but actually this time I'm doing fine.  I'm just technologically backwards.  Theocratic Socialist Knowledge Thought Control, so -2 RESEARCH.

It's about 2360 now, I just got photon armor and chaos gun, but it feels a very marginal advantage and I feel as though I'm just doing everything I can to keep him from running away with it. Very great fun!

Yeah if Zak has pushed that far ahead, you'll have to think a bit.  Lift a finger and all that.  And lucky for you, I just made Trance units cheaper.  So hopefully you're not going to be able to run him over with mindworms so easily.

Here are the particular things that I'm not as fond of, mentioning just to make my feedback as useful as possible.
1) I was surprised to see magtubes come out so early. It's certainly useful in home territory, but it makes invasions so much easier because it eliminates maneuver. Once I take the first base, I just pick which square I want to attack the next base from and I'm there instantly. I get extra attacks because I spend no movement points. I would recommend removing it to a good deal later in the tech tree.

I actually like mag tube warfare which is why I put it earlier.  With a big fleet of Formers it is kinda overpowered though.  It's also not easy to balance in a .txt only mod, as this Ultimate Strategy does become available sometime.  I'm not willing to take mag tubes out of the game.  It would really suck to have to push units manually all the way across a Huge map, which is what the mod is designed for.

I suppose I could make mag tube construction more expensive?  Since it is so valuable, that's not unreasonable.  Let's see... yes, the cost is independently adjustable.  I can most definitely do that.  Question is how much should it cost.

Rest later.  A pizza calls me!

[bvanevery]

2) The removal of the infantry bonus vs base seems to have rendered infantry without a purpose.

They're cheaper to manufacture than Speeders.  I guess you haven't been put under enough pressure yet to notice and care about the difference?

The only reason I've been able to find for building them anymore is if I'm attacking a base filled up with AAA + ECM units, which is rare.

If AAA or ECM units are not actually getting built, I would consider that a problem.  I haven't done a lot of long term testing of 1.50 to see how that plays out.  I did just make Trance cheap again like the original game, which could have an effect on the force mix of AAA and ECM built.  If you post a game with a .SAV attached that "didn't have AAA or ECM units" among the defenders, I'd like to see that.

In my current game with Zhakarov so far ahead, he's most definitely building AAA ships.  Haven't noticed land units yet.  I'm not in land contact yet, I stalled on my causeway building.  I don't think the AI will build much in the way of a specific defensive unit, unless it knows you have a lot of the corresponding offensive unit.  Since I don't even have C5 Doctrine: Air Power yet, it would be reasonable for the AI not to bother yet.

Again it makes invasions less complicated because I can just build a bunch of rovers or hovertanks and attack whatever units and bases are in front of me without discrimination. I think it would be better to be forced to build a diverse task force and to have to be attentive to which targets are attacked by rovers vs infantry. I do like the +25% base defense bonus, so I think restoring the infantry bonus vs base at 25% or even just 15% would be beneficial.

Well yeah, it would benefit you, the human player.  Not the AI.  The AI isn't going to make great use of infantry against your bases, I don't think.  I don't think you the human, are the one that needs help.

What is actually needed for greater AI challenge, is to make sure enough ECM units are getting built.  It's always going to be possible for the human player to game this though.  Get the AI worried about Speeders, then hit 'em with the air force.  Humans are smart that way.  Stock AI unfortunately is dumb enough to be vulnerable to such change-ups.

I don't think the Thinker or Will To Power binary mods have the AI combat sophistication to do any better at this point either.  Lotta decompilation and reverse engineering necessary to write better AI algorithms for this.  In short, a lot of work.  I know Tim (aka Alpha Centauri Bear, WTP author) doesn't quite have the personal resources to take that kind of change on.  Haven't kept up with what Indukto (Thinker author) has done about combat AI, if anything.  Historically, he focused mainly on colonization and terraforming AI.

It makes sense for base defenses to be better suited to destroying large tanks and jets rather than infantry.

Actually in futuristic simulation terms, it doesn't.  This isn't WW II.  "Infantry has to be better in cities" is a pure hand wave.

Artillery is extremely effective in real cities, as was proven by Iraqi forces cooperating with Iranian forces in Tikrit a number of years ago.  They decided they didn't want to deal with their American counterparts anymore, took the gloves off, and shelled the crap out of the city.  Lotsa collateral damage making Americans unhappy, but it sure got the job done.  Got ISIS on the run that way.  If tanks in the future just wanna blow stuff up, that'll work in cities just fine.

Although urban combat is 3D, tanks can be designed to handle that circumstance better.  One problem with Cold War tanks thrown into urban problems in various places, whether American or Russian (i.e. Chechnya), is that these tanks were designed to fight other tanks on the steppes of Europe.  That's a fast moving, mostly 2D problem.  In urban combat you need things that can fire up or down.

Please do observe whether the cost of infantry vs. speeders vs. hovertanks matters to you.  Maybe there's not enough difference to force you to think, especially by midgame.

[bvanevery]

3) +2 Economy is very easy to achieve and maintain via SE choices. I think I ran it the whole game as the Spartans, which just felt weird. It's too good to pass up though, so I'm having a hard time envisioning a scenario in which I wouldn't run it the whole game.

Play a faction that doesn't allow you to choose Democratic.  That would be the Cultists, Hive, and Usurpers.  Not the Spartans.  Spartans can't choose Wealth though, so that means you were Democratic Capitalist through midgame at least.  You were at a disadvantage with mindworms and you probably didn't do a good job popping all the supply pods on the map.  I guess that didn't cramp your style enough?

I think the penalties should be increased or else the Economy bonuses removed from a couple of the SE choices.  I do think it would be fine to allow +2 Economy (obviously for a non-Morgan) achievable with a Future Society choice, combined with an early choice. Hope that makes sense.

It's totally non-sensical to remove the ECONOMY bonus from either Capitalist or Wealth, so that's not gonna happen.  Cybernetic is at least midgame, sometimes early late game depending on your faction and research foci, so I don't think that's the issue.  The issue would be how easy it is to perform economically in the early to mid game.  Democratic is responsible for that ease.

I can think about changing Democratic, but it has to be considered against 3+ years of playtesting.  You're not the only one making money from it, the AI is making money too.  It may be that the AI doesn't use money as effectively as a human player, particularly since I made mind control 2x more difficult for most factions.

You should realize that the total amount of ECONOMY available in the SE choices, is actually less than the original game.  In the original you could get +2 from Free Market, +1 from Wealth, and +2 from Eudaimonic, for a grand total of +5 from SE choices.  In my mod you can only gain +4, but you have much more flexibility about how you do it, and all the Future Societies are available by late midgame.

I don't believe in the serious penalties attached to Free Market in the original game.  The -5 POLICE penalty, in particular, is ridiculous.  There's no reason for a capitalist pig society to be afraid of using police at all!  Heck in the USA we've got the Prison Industrial Complex.  It's a big moneymaker.  I won't go for this kind of stupidity, and I know where it came from.  Firaxis wanted to generalize the parameters of Civ II's Republic and Democracy governments.  Well, this isn't Civ II, and it's a mod of whatever SMAC was.  We don't have to tie the economy to squeamishness about making war.  Modern day China certainly wouldn't.  Police State Capitalist is basically modern China.  Don't let the single party state fool ya, they're paying lip service to Communism.

[gehennaliving]

I'd like to respond just in the spirit of discussion, not in the spirit of dictating your own mod to you - you've obviously put exponentially much more time into than I have, and as I said above, I'm enjoying it immensely.

First just to clarify the AI *is* building plenty of ECM and AAA units — what I was talking about was a base full of both AAA and ECM units together. With these bases speeders and jets were both getting slaughtered so I had to recruit infantry just to reduce the defenses. I said that it's rare for the AI to have a base with multiple of both types of units. Typically, if it has ECM units I will reduce it with aircraft, and if it has AAA units I reduce it with speeders. I'm finding the AI to have either ECM or AAA on the vast majority of defenders and ships, and a fair number of normal land combat units.

Now, about the infantry. I'm seeing unarmored fusion chaos infantry is cost 50, unarmored fusion chaos rover is 70, and unarmored fusion chaos tank is 80. Surely the infantry should be 1/2 the cost of rovers and 1/3 the cost of tanks (that being their ratio of attacks) to still make sense to build them, assuming infantry has no other advantages? In other words, why would I not pay 20 more minerals to double the attacks, or 30 more minerals to triple the attacks, all else being the same?

Also, I've found that the AI is still building lots of infantry units. In my current game (2360), a quick headcount of combat units (not garrisons) shows Zak with 30 infantry, 8 rovers, and 1 tank. Miriam shows 64 infantry, 2 rovers, and 1 tank. Assuming those numbers are typical (and they are, from my limited experience - especially Zak) it would seem that any bonuses given to infantry would therefore benefit the AI *more* than the player, the player being highly unlikely to build such a lopsided amount of infantry. If the goal is to benefit the AI, maybe removing the rover's open terrain bonus would be more beneficial than nerfing the infantry. After all, the rovers are compensated by their number of attacks and movement points.

Just some things that are coming to mind, again in the spirit of discussion only. Please keep up the good work!

[bvanevery]

4) Lastly, and this may be luck of the draw on the maps I've played, but the Alien factions feel very weak, like positively weaker than most of the human factions.

Which one, Caretakers or Usurpers?  AI Usurpers have a history of kicking plenty of ass, including in my current game.  I don't see any problem with them.  AI Caretakers have a history of underperforming.  Now I can use their +1 PLANET to extremely powerful effect as a human player, but I don't think the AI really knows how to do that.  Heck I think the privilege of directed research makes things really easy too.  But Caretakers in the hands of the AI, definitely has been weaker than other factions.  It may not be possible to resolve this, as any bonus given to them, is just something the human player would exploit.

The only AI-specific leverages I have, are faction personality and research foci.  Maybe the Caretakers have an ineffective combo.  It would definitely take some fooling around and luck to hit upon something that works better.  We can definitely see that Conqueror Marr doesn't have any problem, he just steamrollers things.  I've also seen games where the Caretakers didn't suck, so there may not actually be a problem worth solving.  Different factions do better in different starting conditions.

It was strange to end up next to them as Morgan, when formerly I would have nearly just given up, only to roll over them with ease.

You ain't playin' with your grandpappy's Morgan though.  He's got +1 SUPPORT, not -1.  Think Haliburton.

Meanwhile, Aliens are only as powerful as other factions.

If you can't destroy any AI faction with any faction you're playing, in a close quarters start, then you're really not an expert at playing the game.  For an expert, any close faction is "food".  This is a big part of why I recommend Huge maps.  AIs are supposed to have some distance before you get into contact with them, so that they can dig in and provide resistance.  And similarly, so you can have fun building your roads and mines and stuff.  The ready availability of Clean Synth units in the early game, does put a stop to immediate Recon Rover rushes, but it's still possible to knock a close quarters neighbor off-balance, cut off their colonization, surround them, out-colonize them, and then finish them off at Mission Year 2200 so they won't rocket outta there.  Out of an expert such as yourself, I'd expect no less.

I am glad they are nerfed from vanilla, as I feel they were too powerful then, but it turns out I kind of miss being scared by being next to them.

Too bad.     You'll have to exercise the CC-BY-NC license and change things to the kind of faction or Scenario you want.  I've never gotten into third party factions, I've only balanced the standard 14.  There are plenty of 'em kicking around, somewhere on this site, including "monster Alien" style factions of various flavors.  Not my thing.

I think that's about it. Again, great job on the mod and I look forward to many more very fun games playing it.

Cool beans!   

[bvanevery]

I said that it's rare for the AI to have a base with multiple of both types of units.

Unfortunately I don't have any direct lever to allocate the original AI's base defense priorities.  I'm only a .txt modder.

Indirectly, I could make AAA and/or ECM cheaper, going back to the complication of them costing 0, 1, or 2 based on the weapons to armor ratio.  This would cause the AI to build more of such units.  Would it build the right mix of such units?  I don't know.  And what's to stop you from smashing them up with mindworms when they don't build the right mix of Trance units?

I could predefine some AAA ECM units, depending on when Neural Grafting / dual unit ability is available in the tech tree.  Turns out that C5 Doctrine: Air Power already has exactly the prereqs needed for this.  I could define an AAA ECM 3-Pulse Garrison.  Question is, will the stock AI build an appropriate amount of such a unit?  That's a serious playtesting question.  It could fail to build it, because it costs too much, or it could obsess about it to the detriment of other units, because it costs too little.  Coaxing a better defense out of the stock AI, is somewhat a matter of luck.

And, will the AI build anything like an AAA ECM 3-Pulse unit in the future, as armor advances and Fusion reactors become available?  There's no way to predefine a Fusion unit in the stock binary.  With Scient's patch it's possible, and that patch is known to work with my mod.  I'm not going to package Scient's patch and require it though, for legal reasons, and because someone really should stick to just the plain game as an offering.  It's the most trivial installation scenario, and it's also a baseline to measure other mods against.

I mean hey, who says binary modding actually improves AI performance, compared to staring at your tech tree and unit costs / weights really really hard?  In principle, someone could binary mod something better than I've done.  In practice, for the amount of work it requires, they might never get there.

Anyways, someone else could exercise the CC-BY-NC license to make a Scient-required version of my mod.

I'm finding the AI to have either ECM or AAA on the vast majority of defenders and ships

You've never seen ECM on a ship.  It's not allowed in my mod.  All ships are fast units.  I can't prevent the use of 3-Pulse armor, but I can definitely prevent ECM, and did so.

Now, about the infantry. I'm seeing unarmored fusion chaos infantry is cost 50, unarmored fusion chaos rover is 70, and unarmored fusion chaos tank is 80.

70 vs. 80 is an unfortunate integer rounding error for that case.  I'd usually expect a bigger gap. 

Surely the infantry should be 1/2 the cost of rovers

Why "surely" ?  It's not just you the human player who designs and deploys units.  The AI does this too.  Costs have to be something that the AI will put up with.  It's been awhile since I was juggling all that, and would have to refer to my CHANGELOG, but I remember something about "what the AI will really make" being a factor in the costs I arrived at.

and 1/3 the cost of tanks (that being their ratio of attacks) to still make sense to build them, assuming infantry has no other advantages? In other words, why would I not pay 20 more minerals to double the attacks, or 30 more minerals to triple the attacks, all else being the same?

Because everything else is not the same.  You may also want armor and abilities, which greatly increase cost.

Also, I've found that the AI is still building lots of infantry units.

Yes I've noticed that as well.  Which speaks to the issue of costs the AI will put up with.  If the AI decides mobility costs too much, then no mobility.  It sure seems to like Gatling Speeders well enough in my current game though.

it would seem that any bonuses given to infantry would therefore benefit the AI *more* than the player, the player being highly unlikely to build such a lopsided amount of infantry.

The AI is not entirely competent at attacking bases.  This bonus does not translate directly into an advantage, because the AI is hesitant when moving forwards, and doesn't know how to build a rail right up to a base.  It is far more likely that the AI will simply lose big stacks of units in disfavorable terrain positions as usual, while the human player reaps the reward of the +25% base killing bonus.

If the goal is to benefit the AI, maybe removing the rover's open terrain bonus would be more beneficial than nerfing the infantry. After all, the rovers are compensated by their number of attacks and movement points.

Do you think human players are pummeling the poor hapless AI by copious use of this tactic?  I seriously doubt that.  It just hasn't risen to the bar of "boy I sure am glad I'm exploiting this" in any game I've been playing.  Much of the time, the AI properly moves infantry units onto defensive cover.  Of course then it stupidly pillages the Forests that were protecting it, and then I kill them.  But eh, so, some AI dumbness is fine.  Good for the human player's ego!

The serious exploit was the mindworms.  1.50 just attempted to plug that.

You're right that mag tubes are the other major exploit though.  Maybe making them as expensive as a Mine would do the trick.

[bvanevery]

Details Spartans prevail at my expense

Spartans prevail at my expense

Here's me getting my butt kicked by the Spartans in the early game.  Make no mistake, even with the defensive advantages I've built in, Recon Rovers are rather dangerous in AI hands.  3 reasons for my utter, abject failure.

• Stubbornly refused to change my research foci from the default of Discover Build.  This way, I try to become aware of what the AI is experiencing when playing the faction.  Well in Aki's case they're often experiencing suckage.
• Will never, ever pay a faction to leave me alone.
• Allied with Lal, had common cause against enemies.  Asked for tech exchange.  He granted me E2 Doctrine Loyalty and cut me off!  "What a pleasant chat".  Tried him again in a few turns, asked for tech exchange.  Made the mistake of asking for a tech swap.  He cut me off because he was working on the Virtual World!  I had the money to buy what I needed from him.  Then, sunspots settled in.
  

I didn't know how to make a Command Center.  Just kept spawning Scouts trying to hold off the enemy.  Didn't work.  Finally researched C1 Doctrine: Mobility on my own, without changing my research foci.  Got lucky with a walk-in somewhere, managed to get C1 High Energy Chemistry with the Cyborg steal tech on conquest ability.  I think that's the only time I've valued that capability in umpteen zillion games, and I had forgotten all about it.  Upgraded my units but it was too little too late.  They took my capitol.

I've been testing making mag tubes more expensive, per the feedback.  Tried them 4X more expensive but that seems to be a bit too much of a drag.  This game was to test 2X more expensive but I clearly didn't get that far!

Did I mention that I had to fight the Free Drones too, and they were even closer to me?  Not militarily advanced like the Spartans though.  I actually beat them off.  Also got threatened by boats of Scouts at sea, from both the Spartans and the Hive.  Eventually sunk one of them.  Surprised they didn't land.

[bvanevery]

Details mind controlled by Pirates

mind controlled by Pirates

Here's the Pirates mind controlling 1 of my only 4 bases in the early game.  It's kinda galling given how much I've tamped down mind control in my mod.  It's not like my capitol isn't 7 squares away.  The AI just loves to take over sea bases, to the point that I usually won't build them, but in this case I didn't see much choice.  I was gifted the Manifold Nexus but otherwise had a completely abysmal start, choked off by fungus.  Never captured a mindworm in my home territory.  Got precious little at sea.

I was holding off Svensgaard's Laser Foils just fine, but... I'm way too runted to have developed Probe Teams.  I have no idea how much money he spent to take the base.  Activating the Scenario Editor, I see he has 418 credits after his action.  Let's see how much he had last turn.  835 credits.  So, that was a bit costly for him, but he could afford it.

I guess my toning down of mind control worked fine.  Can't save me from an abysmal start.  What's with the bad starts lately?  I wonder if I'm willing to go through any kind of heroics to prove myself in a bad start.  I could have used somewhat better tactics than I did, but geez.  Probably shoulda spammed colonists onto miserable land and taken my chances with it.  Oh well, better luck next time.

Lal shares a similarity with Aki in the last game: he doesn't study Conquer.  His foci are Explore Discover Build.  As usual I didn't change them.  Guess the Pirates are dangerous if you're not going to learn armor and weapons.  I actually had a problem like that a couple games ago, where the Pirates made a surprising Recon Rover assault on my land bases.  Quit that game.  Didn't think they had it in them, but I guess they do.  So I suppose you're better off spreading on land if the Pirates are around, but eventually they'll come for you no matter what.

[bvanevery]

Ok I'm forced to admit my Wealthy Pirates aren't working so well anymore.  Once upon a time, their passive Wealth strategy was truly terrifying.  But that hasn't been true for a long time.  They did just give me a stiff difficulty with tons of Synth Laser Foils, and a few Recon Rover forays, but they built no infrastructure at all.  Meanwhile I got R-Lasers, 3-Res armor, and I'm building Tree Farms.  They're obsessing about Transports again.  That's super annoying, it's a problem I haven't been able to put a stop to.  They're refusing to choose Wealth even though they can use it with Impunity.

Back to the drawing board.  Aarg.   

[pcangler]

Glad I'm not the only one having this problem! Had this happen to me in my first AI Growth game. And this was only on Thinker! He built 75 fusion transports, then almost no assault troops to support them. This kind of colossal resource-wasting is hilarious to me.

[bvanevery]

I'm going to try introducing a Clean Transport unit yet again.  I have in the past, but it didn't work out and I rescinded it.  I hope that was then, this is now.

I've also rearranged the early techs so that the Clean Sea Formers comes earlier and is straight on the Pirates' research path.  I think sometimes a bug happens in the original game where the Pirates never design an ordinary Sea Formers unit at all.  Clean Sea Formers is intended as a failsafe, but it can't very well do that job if the Pirates aren't learning the needed tech until midgame.

I hope I can retain the Pirates' Wealth orientation, because if they don't do it, I can't really think of anyone else who should.  They wouldn't even pick Wealth last game, when they knew the tech.  However they were also in a shooting war with me since fairly early (their fault).  They didn't do much for terraforming, nor did they make any infrastructure.  They maintained themselves with Police State Capitalist.  Once they signed a Truce with me, at some point they went Democratic Capitalist.  I hope that fixing their earlier unit decisions, will cause them to improve on a more economic trajectory.  I hope their Build Conquer foci isn't giving the AI too much cognitive dissonance.

[bvanevery]

My Pirate changes aren't off to a good start.

Details Pirates won't settle

Pirates won't settle

They only settled Safe Haven.  They've got 2 Sea Colony Pods they don't appear to be doing anything with.  I hope this is a map dependent bug and not due to my changes.  I did set them up last in the faction lineup.  I wonder if being 7th has something to do with it.

Details could it be deadly

could it be deadly

I wonder if they're cowering in abject terror from that sealurk to the west.  Maybe it took out their 2nd base?

I did start the game with Scient's auto saving debug binary.  I wonder if that has anything to do with it.  I've zipped up all the autosaves.  I don't see that Turn 1 save among them.  I wonder if I'm supposed to use terranx_opensmacx_auto.exe ?  It's dated 5 days later than terranx_opensmacx_debug.exe.

Hoo boy.  Looks like in MY 2110, Svensgaard only had his original Unity Gun Foil, his base undefended, and was building a Clean Transport.  That's not a smart way to start the game.  In MY 2120 he's got a Clean Sea Colony Pod heading north, with a Sealurk just salivating for it.  Did he just have really bad luck this game?

[bvanevery]

Details ultra capitalist

ultra capitalist

I'm changing the Cyborgs around, since there's no particular reason to be considering them Just.  I'm experimenting with allowing them to earn INTEREST per turn.  It was an ability listed in the faction template and I've never tried it before.  I gave them a generous 10% per turn to see just how bad it would be.  Well after 57 years they've probably got enough money to buy the current Planet outright, if they actually knew the tech for Economic Victory!  As expected I'll need to tone this down.  Pity, as I had a decent start trying to possess the Monsoon Jungle.

Details the sea peoples

the sea peoples

The Pirates had their usual terrible settlement of Safe Haven in the middle of the ocean.  However they made a proper beeline for a good coast.  They have 4 Laser Skimships, which doesn't seem unreasonable.  They've explored a good amount of ocean around themselves, and that takes ships.

They have no Sea Formers yet.  They have the Tier 1 techs needed to design such a unit, but checking their Workshop, they haven't done so.  The original game has this strange line for a predefined unit:

Code: [Select]

*Sea Formers,           Foil,     Formers,      Scout,      9, 0, 0, Disable, -1, 00000000000000000000000000
I wonder if that asterisk is more than a formality?  Plus it is marked Disable, so it shouldn't be available.  Could using this predefined unit design slot be creating a weird problem?

My Clean Sea Formers failsafe is now available with B2 Industrial Economics.  They haven't researched it yet.  Instead they have lot of early Conquer techs.  Their focus is Build Conquer foci so they probably aren't going to learn a straight Build tech immediately.  I'll have to watch for whether they get around to terraforming at an appropriate time.  I think their more militant disposition is ok for the early game. 

They have 4 Clean Transports, which doesn't sound horribly outlandish.  I see 1 Holding at Port Svensgaard.  The other 3 are in Barbary Coast, Parrot Landing, and Crow's Nest and they're all Going to their respective cities.  So I guess that's a funky form of Holding.  Port Svensgaard is loading up a land Colony Pod, which would be a pretty good move considering the Monsoon Jungle nearby.

Perhaps there was no problem with the Pirates this game.  The point of failure may be, if the Pirates don't settle their 2nd sea colony pod on a good coast, their development is gonna suck.  Like if they get it killed somehow.  They've really only got this 1 shot at a good start, because Safe Haven is almost always a complete waste out in the middle of a big ocean.

In a subsequent game, by MY 2167 the Pirates had built 4 Clean Sea Formers, with 4 more on the way.  They didn't build any regular Sea Formers although they did know the design.  They built 8 Laser Foils and 6 Clean Transports.  Their empire development was reasonable, with the usual wasted Safe Haven, and a Port Svensgaard next to the Monsoon Jungle.

The Cyborgs with 5% INTEREST amassed 2001 credits.  Still too high.  Cha Dawn made 803 credits from pod popping.  Svensgaard made 361 credits from oceanfaring.  Domai made 258 credits from whatever the working class gets up to.  Santiago was Pathetic.  Zhakarov only managed 250 credits.  As Morgan I've made lots of money from pod popping, since I was given the Manifold Nexus at start.  Nowadays just under 1000 credits as I keep burning it off rushing stuff.

In yet another game, I had the easiest start ever, north of the Monsoon Jungle.  The Cyborgs meanwhile were totally stillborn for some substantial number of turns.  By MY 2184 they had a cluster of 5 cities just south of me, with their capitol and another city waaaaaaaay to the south of that.  Looks like they split their colonists at the beginning and got confused by both the map and the Caretakers.  Despite these woes, they have 680 credits, which probably means 3% INTEREST is still too good.  I have 633 credits, but I've also built 2 SPs and rushed quite a lot of facilities when I didn't have any SPs to work on.  Domai's got 359, Santiago's got 391, Zhakarov's got 649, Svensgaard's got 345, H'minee's got 401.

Details Pirate defensiveness

Pirate defensiveness

The Pirates have not built a single Sea Former, so reinstating the *Sea Formers predefined unit, didn't help.  They still haven't learned B2 Industrial Economics, preferring more militant stuff.  Thus the Clean Sea Formers failsafe hasn't kicked in either.  Given their choice to intersperse themselves between the Spartans and the Free Drones, is their disposition reasonable?  They're not at war with either.  They have built 8 Clean Transports, which is a bit excessive.  They have 14 Synth Laser Skimships which doesn't seem completely crazy.

Part of their problem is Port Svensgaard got earthquaked, so it's now landlocked.  This and Deadman Tavern cut the Free Drone empire in half!  Port Svensgaard has lotsa garrison troops.

What to do?  Build Conquer is turning out to be a lot more Conquer than Build.  Looks like the only way I'll get the Clean Sea Formers failsafe to work, is to give it with B1 Industrial Base.  I don't like giving a foil design without Doctrine: Flexibility having been learned, but I'm running out of options.

Bizarrely, the Pirates did not design a plain Sea Formers.  This bug is annoying.

After a night's sleep, I've decided the thing to do, is to get rid of the Build Conquer foci.  Explore Build worked better for them, even if they didn't end up learning Doctrine: Initiative.  Their early game is much more important than their midgame.  If they get wealthy enough from all that free ocean energy and minerals, they can probably make bricks fly with their research.  They used to be like that at one point in my modding, really scary.  But these stumbling impediments have crept in, and they are not what they were.

In yet another game, as of MY 2147 the Pirates have not learned B2 Industrial Economics, so no Clean Sea Formers for them yet.  Nor have they designed an ordinary Sea Formers.  Whereas, I got it pretty much when I learned C1 Doctrine: Flexibility.  Could it be that since the Pirates start with that tech, the code that designs a Sea Formers is never triggered?  What happens if I don't give them C1 Doctrine: Flexibility to begin with, and they just learn it like everyone else?  As an AQUATIC faction they're supposed to have some unit possibilities already.

In MY 2171 I bought B2 Industrial Economics from the Caretakers.  Their research foci are Build Conquer.  They swapped with the Pirates, and the irony is they've learned what I was trying to get the Pirates to learn.  The Pirates have sucked me into a war with the Spartans, so maybe their unit development is not crazy.  But this lack of Sea Formers is worrisome and makes me think I might have to give away a ship design in B1 Industrial Base.

MY 2183.  Oh joy.  The Pirates went Theocratic, giving them a -1 RESEARCH penalty.  This makes it slightly harder for them to learn B2 Industrial Economics.  This is just not working.  83 turns and no Sea Formers, ridiculous!  Back to the drawing board.

The Cyborgs with INTEREST 2% made 595 credits, about twice what most factions are worth.  A notable exception is the Caretakers who somehow became filthy rich with 984 credits.  I don't understand that because the Usurpers are about to wipe them out.  I don't think they got a lot of land pods, I think I got most of them.  They could have gotten some sea pods I didn't notice, but I think I pretty much swept the oceans too.  Ok whatever, it's a mystery.

[bvanevery]

If I don't give the Pirates Doctrine: Flexibility, then they don't know how to make ships.  AQUATIC doesn't help them out with that, go figure.

If I give them Doctrine: Flexibility and Industrial Base for free, then they start the game with a Sea Formers design.  Well at least I do, as a human player.  I should check whether the AI players have it, because don't remember having a problem previously as a human player either.

Hmm, AI Pirates did not start with a Sea Formers design.  They had Clean Sea Formers only because I temporarily put it in Industrial Base.  I might have to make that permanent.

I could make a terraforming module have no tech prereq at all.

When I provide a Clean Sea Formers with B1 Industrial Base, other ship designs can be reverse engineered, such as a Gun Foil or a Sea Colony Pod.

Interestingly, if I inspect my Clean Sea Formers unit design, a plain Sea Formers unit is designed as a byproduct.  Suddenly I have that design, when previously I didn't.  I think this is a byproduct of the fake "high bit" abilities hack.  It allows predefined units to be upgraded to those designs, but it also makes the UI behave a bit oddly.

When I provide a Clean Sea Formers with C1 Doctrine: Flexibility, I can reverse engineer a land Former unit.

This is converging on either giving the Foil chassis or the Terraformer module at the start of the game, no techs required.

I decided ships are going to be free for everyone.

[bvanevery]

Details yield of overhaul

yield of overhaul

Ok!  After 43 years the Pirates have built 4 bases and 3 Clean Sea Formers.  They've built 3 Clean Transports.  2 are sitting in port, 1 is out exploring.  That might not be unreasonable and I'll keep my eye on it.  They have built a lot of Clean units and have not run themselves out of SUPPORT.  So far so good.

The Cyborgs have 4 bases and 54 credits, so 2% INTEREST has not proved important for them so far.