Masochistic 1.04

And where is the strategy to beat it?

Rush 2 Incredible AI. Then rush minors. Then only 3 genius left with much less number of planets. That's for 'Rare' planets.

~SDC~

I'm not sure I will ever beat it. The buying star bases strategy is the best idea I have seen. I plan to spend my time at lesser difficulty.

~SDC~

But what if you're playing against 5 incrediable AIs Ellestar? I actually think it's easier to play with all the AIs at Incredible than some Incredible and some Genius because the Incredible AIs will take over the weaker ones fairly quickly (and then turn on you).

~SDC~

My tiny rare masochistic is with 5 incredibles.

I did basicily follow the plan though of rushing two
and the minors and then convinced one of the majors
to take out the other two while i snuck in and took
the systems, leaving me with just one major while
I had the majority of the systems, just a matter of
time and we were very 'close' friends.

On my gigantic abudant, I did use two genius, but I
may stop doing that cause at least in 1.04, they do
seem to surrender rather quickly to an incredible,
and that can be more pain then its worth.

So you research directly to Transports and then take over their planets before they have defenders?

Pretty hard to do with masochistic, even on tiny. You have to pray that your survey ship gets a +ATT bonus to remove the extra colony ships (and sometimes frieghters) in orbit and most times I try this the major races HAVE already built defenders (despite me using 100% research to transports and then 100% military to build them). I can sometimes capture a minor with this strategy if they're very close to me.

Paul.

~SDC~

I managed to cream the Alexians with a +1 surveyor before they had defenders in my last game but the rest needed heavier firepower so it was the old frigate rush. They seem to be less willing to buy in cash in the latest version so they were ripe for conquest.

How is buying SBs cheap in 1.04? I only managed to buy a one-module SB by offering up 3 trade goods, a whole host of mid-high techs and lots of cash.
[Message Edited]

So then what did Ellestar mean by "Rush 2 Increadible AI's" I mean that's pretty damn hard and he says it, as if is only the choice to do so needed and nothing else...

I don't think I've ever managed a rush without BCs or frigates on an Incredible Major yet. They research deflectors almost immediately and they always seem to have at least one defender before I can Impulse and Transport.

Sometimes you can get lucky and rush one but if you're unlucky and they build that defender before you get your transport there or if your survey ship fails to get a +ATT bonus then you suffer for it as you didn't spend your time chasing resources or going for the initial trade goods. Also this fails very badly if the major race has expanded at all. This strategy works better on a close minor with a higher chance of success. They still may get the defender built first though.

Paul.

~SDC~

Know what you mean ... I went from 1.02 hard to 1.03 Painful. It was touch and go for a while. With just now upgrading to 1.04, think I will stay at Painful for the next game.

My too.

~SDC~

I have never been able to rush a major on maso. But since it can be done, I'll probably have to do more experimenting with it.

I haven't seen a problem with the genius surrendering to the incredibles that early either. My tiny masos have pretty much turned out to be similar - whoever is closest starts demanding money then they attack me. I get to try to withstand the star fighter and battle cruiser rush with my axes. The biggest difference on the latest 1.04 is that the attack seems to come earlier as the tribute demands start out really high - 1500+

~SDC~

I tried something this morning:
Tiny maso 1.04.
I had 2 planets, class 14 + Soil enhancement = 15, and 19 +SE = 20.
The Drengins invaded, and they got planets of PQ 19 and 26 immediately.
I wonder how that is possible. They hadn't built the Terraformer, so at best they could rush buy Habitat Improvement and have a +7% PQ pick, for a total of +17% over the +10%. Even a +27% from rushbuilt terraforming wouldn't account for such an increase.

Therefore, it seems that at maso, the ai gets a PQ boost. That's interesting, because it means a class 15 planet in their hands will be class 19. You probably don't want to let that happen. I'm interested in seeing if anyone can beat the ai on maso tiny/rare now (they always manage to crank out 4 or 5 constructors, 2 more than I can do with leases, while at the same time outresearching me by 8 techs when I have just researched trade).

The AI had +20PQ on maso for 1.035. Based on your report, this has probably been upped to +40PQ in 1.04. ZaH previously reported the maso bonuses for us by pouring money in espionage in the early game.

It is still winnable by having a good start, playing good alignment, gobbling up minors and rushing frigates.

That is the part I don't like in your statement. I guess I'll have to use Ctrl N.

Another strategy I am trying out on Maso (5xIncred) now...Culture-flipping.

The AI does indeed get a +40PQ bonus. Use this to your advantage:
- Allow the AI to colonize your nearby worlds. This will give the planet an immediate base PQ boost.
- Invade 1-2 such worlds with a +1 Hero & 1-2 TR's if at all possible. The AI will usually settle new worlds with only 100-200 pop; a single TR can take them out, and two is guaranteed. (Frequently this isn't possible because either the AI researches Shields and produces enough Defenders/BattleAxes to defend, or you lack a +1 combat bonus for Hero.)
- Get your trade routes working. Use your initial 2 on a Major. If adjacent/between 2 AI's split the routes evenly between them if Torian, Arcean or Altarian (i.e., neutral-good). Use both routes on the Drengin or Yor (i.e., evil). If caught between 1 evil and 1 neutral/good, or between 3+ AI's, pray to the PC gods.
- Negotiate with Minors. The Major AI's will quickly outstrip you in Diplo ability. You will probably not even be able to swap techs with them at all, much less get a good deal. Minors, however, will concentrate on defense. You can generally gain a +10 to +20 diplo skill over them (UT/Diplomacy). Use them to research your combat techs.
- Forget trade goods. You will never complete one before the AI does.
- Build a SB in or adjacent to the target sector. Income is more vital early game than other needs; bulk it up with defense and trade modules. Count on your trade routes to keep your neighbors at Cool-Neutral. If they turn Wary, you're going to war in 5-10 turns. Unless Allied, you will not be able to convince another AI to help you. Preare to defend and, if things go bad, cough up a planet to settle peace.
- Research UT/AdvTrade/CntrldGrav. Acquire InterstellarBusiness if possible.
- Constructor-rush. Build your SB Influence modules. Keep on good terms with as many neighbors as possible while your sector influence builds. If at war, destabilize any enemy empire with planets in the target sector. Hopefully, a system will culture-flip before long. When it does, Congratualations! You've got a +40PQ planet...before your own improvements!

I'm currently pursuing this strategy on a Huge/Uncommon/Tight Cluster/5xIncred game. So far I've survived 'till Sept 2183. I have 3 planets, 3 SB's & 4 sectors under my control. But I'm alive!:HOT:

~SDC~

First, yes the AI does get a starting PQ ability of 30% (If I remember correctly)

In reference to Def Zep's post,

I wouldn't be so pessimistic about the maso. It has its weaknesses..As for the strategy of letting the AI colonize your nearby planets and then invading, I wouldn't do that. You should find the AI also gets a huge ground defense bonus. You're going to lose a lot of pop early in the game and that's very very bad since then you'll never be able to outproduce the AI. By the time your populations level out you'll be dead. The AI is kind of "dumb" in that it doesn't really use that PQ bonus though. It'll only colonize planets of 15+. But you can colonize planets down to PQ 13 and get them up to 15 fairly quickly. That's how you get to out-produce the AI eventually. And if you pick the +7 PQ ability you can colonize down to PQ 12. This is especially important on uncommon maps like yours. I'm playing a maso game right now (huge, uncommon, tight, 5 incredible AIs, same as yours) and in the initial grab the AIs only got 2-5 systems each, while I've got over 25. By 2190 I had first place in economy, research, and production.

As for the diplomacy, I don't know what you mean by it. You can trade for techs with the AI even 1-1. You just gotta remember two things: 1) Get diplomatic translators no matter what the cost and don't sell them to anyone (I'm often willing to put myself in debt for 20 turns just to get them first).
2) The AI values different techs differently, don't even try getting military techs from them (like battleship, dreadnaught, etc.) since you'll pay way too much. And the minors won't be able to provide you with much in terms of new techs past turn 50 or so (they're just a good place to sell your tradegoods).

~SDC~

I think tiny/rare is always winnable if you can land your initial colony ship on another planet. My strategy is to research heavily toward Universal translator, then toward Deflectors, then Battle Armor, Space Militarization, InterStellar Tactics. At the same time I establish contacts with everybody ASAP. If in the corner I may build a scout. By doing heavy accent on research I can trade my tech for other tech. In particular, I usually buy something of shields, basic environment and impulse drive and trade for other. I don't bother getting any trade/culture techs. I invest remainder of the spendings from research into constructor and cash it as a transport at the homeworld when I get impulse drive and start to build another one. Some of the spending excess goes into social, so that I build soil enh and habitat + maybe entertainment network. Transport immediately heads toward the closest race with one system. Survey ship serves as escort. I usually place it on stand-by, but not too close to the target system. As soon as I get to frigates, I buy whatever production is required to complete frigates,
switch to 100% military and start to build another transport and frigate. 2 frigates go to the target system, and the first transport times its arrival to the target in sync with frigates and I get another nice planet. (In some cases invasion fails and I have to send second transport). Next transport goes to the next closest race, by the time it arrives I have few more frigates and so on. Further on my fleet keep growing and I quickly conquer everybody. Optinally one may get alliance victory with some good races.

If I can only get one planet at the start it's hard, but possible, especially if there's a minor race nearby which can be conquered early with star fighters. But in general the strategy is the same. Key point is to concentrate on research in the beginning.

I believe the AI maso bonuses are racial bonuses so once you conquer the planets, the planets lose these. So you get a PQ15 planet instead of PQ21 under the AI. Don't forget that the AI gets influence bonuses as well so I don't think it is easy to execute an early culture bomb.

IMO, the best gambit is still to rush frigates and win through superior tactical map moves.

In a maso huge, I once started very close to the
drengins, I cornered them into only 3 systems
on a huge abundant and quickly took them out with
3 transports, a corvette I got from an anonymly and my
hero

I still lost though, huge hates me, i swear, ive lost
like 5 games on it, but at least I got the satasfaction
of crapping all over the drengin(normally my most
painful opponant)

I won on large(mas difficulty with red on genius;rest incredible) map but it was a dogfight. I am trying now to win on huge but it looks bad.

My only cheese concessions are saving and refighting battles and rerolling until I get a great starting sector.

My race the Capitalists: Federalists, +10 economy, +20 research; +20 diplomacy; +5 pq; +25 luck.

But huge is too much work, so I think medium/large will be my future on the Mas difficulty.

Do not enjoy maps that are too small.

alexti, I think you can win a tiny rare if no ai gets 2 systems. When they do, they tend to culturally overwhelm everyone, and the Alexians or Carinoids will defect to them sometime soon. I think the best strat I found (which doesn't work but gets me alive for longer) is to go for +2 speed on tiny/rare/maso in order to hopefully settle the lonely yellow star first, and get my attack ships to target before they have time to build defenses. Transports are such crawlers that I need + speed in order to have any hope of invading something. Actually, + speed also helps establish trade routes faster, which can prevent some people from attacking you as soon as oterwise.

#19 Markissimo,

Thanks for your comments. All valid points.

In regard to the culture approach, it is workable. I am currently at August 2185, and have taken over two planets through culture-flipping. I took my first planet by an immediate TR assault sometime around turn 20. The AI did get both a ground combat and influence bonus in both these cases, but by careful husbanding of my resources (and using 2xTR's as advised above), I was able to effectively double my Empire from 3 to 6 planets.

Fully agree with the "PQ bonus pick/colonize 13's & 14's/outproduce AI" strategy. It is still one of the most viable in 1.04.059. However, after many (unposted) games of it under 1.01 & 1.02, I'm simply bored with it. I now deliberately refuse to take any +PQ picks, no matter what their cost or %. (I've also edited out the +PQ random events from my GalCiv directory so they can't show during colonization, and do not build "The Terraformer" if first to research it. Just me...YMMV.)

(For this reason, I also generally take no diplomatic or trade route bonus picks. I want to see how the game plays out without such advantages.)

In regards to obtaining any specific trade good (Diplo Translators) - once again, there is no guarantee of that. In my current game, the Carinoids got the Translators in March 2178 (turn 3). (I defy any human player to research Diplomacy and build them by that time.) And then were promptly conquered by the Drengin, rendering this good out of the game forever. I am unwilling to implement or follow a strategy that relies on such extraneous factors - not because they can't be effective, but because (from game to game) they can't be assumed. I prefer to "follow the basics" and build an approach around what I know will be available to me each and every game, like the above with TR's, SB's & first-tier culture modules.

Apologies if my respose is too critical. I appreciate your comments, and your MV score (and strategy board contribution) speaks for itself.


#21 Ray,

I culture-flipped a PQ22 from the AI which (pre-settled, when my scout explored it early game) was PQ16. It did not revert, but has stayed PQ22. Have you had a different experience?This is the first time I have forced a culture-flip in the game, and I am not sure if this is an exception, or I have been blessed by the gods of PC incongruity (bug, perhaps?)

~SDC~