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Gothar
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Canberra, ACT, Australia
Nov 2000
time: 05:13
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I am new at alpha centauri and need some help. I got some pack from the store which had the original plus alien crossfirein it. I played the original a bit with the uni and won a game by conquering. But i'd like to play crossfire with cybernetics.
I get the following social modifiers to start with
+2 efficency, -1 growth, +2 research
I plan to use Democratic
+2 efficency, +2 growth, -2 support
I wanna go green to get mindworms
+2 efficency, +2 planet, -2 growth
I wanna go knowledge to further improve research
+1 efficency, -2 probe, +2 research
I most definetly wanna go cybernetic since i get no negative effects
+2 efficency, +2 planet, +2 research
This gives me a massive + 9 efficency and + 6 research and +4 planet but it also has -1 growth, -2 support, -2 probe.
Is this good - will i be able to transcend with it or is growth and support more useful then efficency and research. Thanks
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Sikander
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Boulder, Colorado, United Snakes of America
Jan 2000
time: 22:13
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Gothar,
Probably you will already have the game won or nearly so by the time you get to cybernetic. There are many SE combinations (too many to be exhaustive about in a reply), and many of them are useful or at least workable. To get the most out of them, consider a couple of factors:
1) When will I have the tech to use a particular setting, and what will my needs be by that time?
2) Which settings will accentuate my strengths or minimize my deficiencies?
Support is important early on (before clean technology) if you plan on building a lot of units per base.
Morale can give you a qualitative edge over your opponents, and can be particularly important for psi-combat.
Economy (especially +2 or better) can have a huge impact upon the amount of energy you produce.
Efficiency determines how much of that energy you keep, and also how many drones your bases produce.
Planet determines how much pollution you produce for a given mineral output, and also effects your combat chances with native lifeforms.
Growth is pretty self explanetary, but keep in mind if you manage to get +6 growth, your bases will grow 1 population per turn as long as you have at least 2 extra food.
Now keep in mind that all of these factors are modified to some extent by faction bonuses, facilities, special projects etc. All of this complexity is daunting as hell at first (or in my case after quite a few games when I began to realize that I was not really mastering the game, but adding more techniques to play it) but this is what makes this game so great. There are so many ways to play it, and play it well.
If you haven't seen it already, I suggest having a look at Vel's strategy guide. (Look for the topic 'Signed, Sealed, and Delivered') It is a fairly comprehensive guide to the game, and it contains useful tips for playing each faction. You may also want to peruse some of the threads here (be selective, there are a million of them) as there are some truly excellent players who are (or have) posting excellent strategies. Welcome to what may well become an obsession. 
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VoodooChild
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Atlanta, Ga. USA
Aug 2000
time: 05:13
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There are two schools of thought that I have seen when it comes to SE choices, Roleplayers and Opprotunists. Roleplayers like to use SE choices that fit the faction and keep those settings all game long. Opprotunists like to taylor their SE choice to what will work best at the moment. I am an opprotunist, but you should determine what style you prefer and also what kind of player your wish to be (builder/hybird/momentum) before deciding what SE choices are for you.
Reguardless, there some things you should know about SE choices. Each category of effects (Population) usually have more than one impact on your soceity. Efficency for example will reduce the inefficency of your bases, allow you to buld more bases free of drone problems, and allow you to manipulate your energy allocations with less penelties. There are also caps to some of these effects. At a +4 Efficency there are no penelties for extreme allocations, so you could have 100% energy / 0% luxury / 0% science if you wanted. Now a +5 or higher Efficency will help reduce your bases inefficency and drone limits, but unless your empire is huge there will be better things you can do with your SE choices.
When playing the Consciousness, I find that -1 pop to be quite harmful to my early expansion efforts, so I like to turn that around as quickly as posible. Planned is the answer that works for me. The net effect is +1 Pop, 0 Eff, + 1 Indus, +2 Tech. This option is great for me untill I start to have significant inefficency problems.
I usually don't switch to Democracy until I am done with my expansion (to keep those 10 startup minerals), but then again I am a builder. If not running Planned, you could run Police State and produce lots of units to go forth and capture bases to make use of one of your other special abilities.
With a tech faction such as the Consciousness, I am not a big fan of running Green. You should have a lead on most other factions when it comes to tech, and will have better weapons, armor, and special abilities to create your army. Why ignore all those advantages to go hunt worms? I instead like to increase my Industry (build stuff quickly) or Economy (pay to rush stuff quickly) to make use of my tech advantage. Wealth will do a little of both and is nice to run until you get Knowledge.
There is a lot of interesting variations that can come from Factions and different SE choices. This is one of the reasons why I find AC to be so much more richer than its Civ counterparts. My advice to you is to play the game, try new stuff out, and learn from what works and what doesn't. Also keep in mind that if something doesn't work for you, it may have been when you ran that option that messed up your game instead of "this choice sucks" Even Fuddy has its uses. 
happy gaming
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Ogie Oglethorpe
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Marietta, GA
Dec 1999
time: 05:13
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Gothar,
A couple rules of thumb re: Se choices. Law of diminishing returns
For the most part each SE choice has a magic value that brings in huge beneifts. Typically going higher than that gives diminishing returns (with some caveats depending on your play style)
That being said to my mind the magic thresholds are as follows, anything more than these you may want to consider another SE choice to bolster otherwise lagging attributes:
Growth - +6 Pop Boom as discussed by Sik Cloning vats (SP) make this irrelevant
Efficiency - +4 Paradigm Efficiency - Allows no penalty in allocation of energy between lab/econ. Can be huge when your racing up the tech tree to slam all energy towards labs
Support - +4 (I think) - Allows support of 4 units or base size whichever is greater. Typically support is only critical pre-clean reactors. After clean this becomes a non issue
Police +3 - 3 units can be used as police units (each eliminate a drone) and police effect doubled meaning 6 drones eliminated by 3 standard garrison units. If units are equipped with non lethal methods then effect can be astonishing and huge bases can be had without any drone quelling facilities. OTOH builder factions by default will have built as many facilities as possible making police a non-issue.
Planet +3 - Maxes out chance to capture native life. Also maxes out effect of fungus production w/ Manifold Harmonics SP. Additional planet rating only effects PSI combat. Choice of T-forming and trance/empath abilities for units make this somewhat less valuable.
Research - No real optimal, the higher the better
Probe +4 - Immune to subversion. Hunter Seeker SP makes this a nonissue.
Industry - No real optimal the higher the better
Econ + 2 - Allows each square +1 energy. Higher econs are important if you are counting on pact mates for trade energy income but typically threshold is +2.
So knowing these, you need to ask yourself what style do you intend to play.
Conquering factions tend to shoot for good support, Police, and probe (perhaps industry and/or planet)
Building factions tend to optimize Econ, Research, Growth, and efficiency.
I'm sure I'm missing something but, hope this helps
Og
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mark13
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Northampton, England
Sep 2000
time: 05:13
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A couple of corrections to Og's thread:
The probe threshold is +3 not +4 - this is only really an issue pre-HSA.
Just a quick nitpick on the police rating - any +4 rating with non-lethal methods quells three drones, not the four advaertised. This is because the non-lethal method doesn't actually double the police effect, it allows you 1 more drone quelled.
Growth - you don't generally go for a straight +6 - +4 with a Children's Creche will do the trick, as +6 isn't possible w/o future society models.
A couple of models to remember if you want to achieve certain effects:
Pop booming - Demo/planned/CC - also, make sure you have enough drone-quelling facilities to compensate for the inevitable extra drones. Also, make sure you ahve at leats 2 surplus food - a base will not grow if only one surplus is available. Unfortunately, you cannot do this as the Consciousness unless you ahve a Golden Age also - that is one of their main factional disadvatages.
Efficiency (allows any level of Econ/Psych/Labs ratio without penalty) - Demo/Green - Demo/Green/Knowledge if you are playing as the PKs, to compensate for the -1 effic.
A small piece of advise though - do not switch to demo unless you are sure you can handle the extra support costs. Afer that, always run demo. The extra +2 growth is sooo useful, and you will need the +2 efficiency if you are to run a big empire.
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Gothar
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Canberra, ACT, Australia
Nov 2000
time: 05:13
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Thanks for all the help guys. I am doing pretty well. But the usupers are giving me a real headache. They have lots of bases a won't make peace with me. Any suggestions on how to deal with annoying enemy factions. I destroy a whole lot of units and new ones come next turn.
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Garth Vader
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Saskatoon, SK, CA
Oct 1999
time: 22:13
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I use Police state with Morgan, Gaians, UoP, Hive, I don't use it with the Believers, and I don't play anybody else much.
I like to have a garrison, 2 formers, and a military unit from each base. Without +2 support I would be paying an extra 2 minerals each turn, even if a base was making 10 minerals, which in early game it wouldn't be, that would be the same as -2 industry.
I run green/wealth with Morgan. Green/knowledge with gaians/UoP. That offsets the effeciency problem with them.
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Gothar
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Canberra, ACT, Australia
Nov 2000
time: 05:13
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Yay i did it. I transcended at my 2411. I had built or captured every sp on planet and had my allocation on 80% ecconomy. 20% research was making 1997 energy a turn with every base except the one building the ascent. And was getting a discovery every 2 turns. I had research trancsended thought 4 times and was using democratic/ free market/ knowledge/ cybernetic and playing as the concious. Next time i'll try it on a harder difficulty rating. At one stage i had 777 council votes at had a brotherhood pact with two other factions. I probley could have got the diplomatic victory but though It would be better to transcend.
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Sikander
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Boulder, Colorado, United Snakes of America
Jan 2000
time: 22:13
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Garth,
You and I must be the only people who post here who do not use FM. Oh sure, I have used it a few times, and I take a look at what it would be like almost every game, but I almost never end up using it. In my growth paradigm, there is a short period where it would work, but between the loss of police, and the 80 credits it never seems worth it. I use:
1) Planned
2) Planned / Wealth
3) Demo / Planned / Wealth
4) Demo / Green / Wealth
5) Demo / Green / Knowledge
6) Demo / Green / Knowledge / Cybernetic
Planned is great early for the growth and industry, and Wealth for the industry. I go Demo for the pop boom and efficiency. Once my industry is firmly established, and I have built all of my early game SPs I use Knowledge for the Research and Efficiency. Cybernetic merely takes this trend to it's logical conclusion. Playing the University (which I love to do) you end up with an abusive +6 Research.
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Gothar
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Canberra, ACT, Australia
Nov 2000
time: 05:13
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I find free market quite useful. But then again i've yet to go for an all out millitary assault game. I prefer to try and make peace with the AI. However in higher diff levels I find this becomes harder. I even tried player on the second highest with the usually peaceful enemy factoins and they were aggresive. It could just be that i'm getting better and the AI tends to pick on the first placed player. What would be a good combo for military actions. I'm thinking police state might be usefull for the +2 support rather then democracy which I usually use. What do you guys think?
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Gregurabi
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Lorain, OH, USA
Jun 1999
time: 05:13
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It depends so much on the faction you're playing, the technology that's available, the type of assault you're planning, ....
I typically go with Democracy somewhere after my initial expansion and stay there forever. I might switch to Fundy for brief periods if I'm getting a lot of enemy probe teams; Hunter-Seeker is a must-have. I usually avoid Police State because I can't handle the inefficiency.
I'll usually try to run Free Market as long as possible, once I'm in a fairly comfortable situation (i.e., not being pounded by H'minee or Marr or Miriam). But this changes as soon as Doctrine: Air Power becomes available, because needlejets are always considered out-of-territory as far as pacifism drones are concerned. So depending on how badly the inefficiency hurts, I'll usually switch to Planned or Green for the post-Air-power, pre-punishment+clean era.
Once I get the tech for Punishment Spheres, I'll build one PSphere (or sometimes two if I'm spread out on a large map) in a city with good mineral production. Then I send all the air units there and re-home them (don't do this while you're running Wealth, because re-homing units under Wealth makes them lose morale). Once all my air units are supported by a PSphere-enabled base, I can go back to FM without suffering pacifism drones for the planes. Then when clean reactors become availalble, I'll upgrade some of the planes to clean, to free up some minerals in the PSphere base.
(The problem here is that I can't produce a new plane/chopper without taking the drone hit in the base that made it. So I either make all new air units in the PSphere base, or I have a few dedicated plane-making bases which have redundant Doctor/Empath/Thinker specialists, so that when a new plane comes off the assembly line, the drone hit won't send the city into riots. Of course, I immediately fly the plane to the PSphere base and re-home it before sending it out to the front lines.)
Of course, there are always exceptions. If I'm playing Morgan, I normally do not use FM; instead, I'll use Demo/Green/Wealth to get the +2 Econ without the police and planet problems of FM. This may not be optimal for energy production, but I'm not a pure builder (more of a hybrid). And of course there are other factions that either can't run FM, or who could do so, but there would be no point.
Another hint for warfare, in case you hadn't already discovered it: get Neural Grafting and Mind/Machine Interface and build some Drop/Amphibious infantry units. I find that 6^~-3-1*2 works quite well if I have fusion reactors; without fusion, you might have to skimp on the armor to make them affordable. This is a very flexible assault/holding unit. It can airdrop into a land base that's been emptied by your air force, as long as the base has no Aerospace Complex. If the base does have an Aerospace in it, you can drop onto a road 3 tiles away and walk into the base. If the base is at sea, you can't airdrop in -- but the AI often builds sea bases right next to land, and you can airdrop onto the beach next to the sea base and then march in due to the amphibious ability. Plus, with decent weaponry and the infantry +25% bonus, you can actually attack a defended base with this unit. (You get a -50% penalty if you attack on the same turn that you airdropped, but that may be OK if the defender is a rover/artillery.) With plasma armor, the unit can often withstand a counterstrike if it's inside a base with Perimeter Defense and Aerospace Complex -- and if you've built the Citizens' Defense Force and/or Cloudbase Academy SPs, then your newly captured bases will automatically have these benefits. Finally, if you need to take a remote sea base, you can load these guys into a transport and attack just like normal marines.
(In case you didn't notice, the MMI tech is just gross. You get Choppers, Drop Pods, two SPs (one of them being among the most powerful in the game), the "Diplomatic" victory condition and the Thinker specialist, all at the same time. Get this tech at all costs. Try to get it first if you can; but the AI doesn't know how to use it very well, so even if you fall a bit behind, you can catch up very quickly once you get it.)
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Fitz
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& Anarchist
Mar 2000
time: 21:13
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quote:
Originally posted by mark13 on 11-23-2000 09:58 AM
Still, getting back on-topic, I love social engineering, it is one of the things which makes this game truly great. But has anyone ever found a use for Police State outside of playing the Hive? It seems that the efficiency penalty hurts too much to bother with it - and the bonuses aren't exactly game-winning. The police bonus you shouldn't have to bother with anyway - and the support penalty becomes a non-issue unless you have a truly large army....
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I use Police State/Green all the time. Once you have a huge army (usually at base size for me), add Power and go on the rampage. I usually start this around size 8 or 9 (without Power), to avoid building anymore drone controlling facilities with the extra police, and spend those minerals instead on more units (and a few extra crawlers for nuts). Once the bases have grown a bit (like to hab limits) and I have insane army at my disposal, switch the extra crawlers you were using for nuts to grow to minerals (or energy if you think like that), add Power, and you're close to unstoppable. The industry hit is usually overcome by the extra minerals crawled in, you have plenty of support for all those units, and the morale is great, and you still don't have to build the most advanced drone control facilities (or waste specialists on Doctors/etc.).
Of course, this tactic is only useable if you have some time to start it up 
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Enigma
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Midland, MI, USA
Feb 2000
time: 05:13
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Wow, I have never been much of a fan of power or PS except with the factions that these SE settings don't hurt (Deidre/Aki, Yang/Domai). But it looks nice for a size 8-9 base that is a LOT of minerals saved. Maybe even enough to make up for power's deficiencies... +2 support is all that really matters for the years before you pop boom and I never get around to pop booming with momentum factions, and with hybrid factions I usually dont attack much before airpower anyways. It seems this works better for hybrid factions since they are the only ones that will be pop booming early enough for this to be valuable and would have such a support intensive army. As a momentum faction I never bother to pop boom... maybe +4 support would make it worth it. And for Miriam fundy/green/power looks beautiful too- have good efficiency to allocate all of your energy to economy, have the magical +3 morale, AND have the magical +4 support. Miriam can hit a lot of important numbers with that SE.
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mark13
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Northampton, England
Sep 2000
time: 05:13
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Yep, quite simply, FM is handy because it cuts in half the amount of time it takes to get to the mid-game. Even once you get to EnvEco, forests will be producing 2-2-2, with crawlers jacking in the extra energy. At this point, depending on what size world you play on, tech should be at 4 turns at the very least. If you are worried about war, plasma/perimeter is enough to combat most AI forces, but for that extra security, I like to keep an impact/missile rover in handy.
Once you get to D:AP, you have two choices - to switch away from FM and roll the nearest faction, or continue building, and transcend by 2260. (hopefully) With all that extra energy coming in from FM, coupled with several TF/HFs....well, you do the maths.
The downside - police. If you are playing a drone-friendly faction (drones, PKs) this won't be a problem until size 3. Any other faction, though, and you will need a rec. commons before your base hits size two. However, you shouldn't have a problem rush-building them, with the obscene amount of energy coming in, and you can always limit the size of the base by churning out colony pods.
Once you hit size three, your bases should be working three forests - and getting 8 minerals per base for your trouble. Once you have the VW, you can afford to go to size 5, and with the amount of energy you are bringing in, 10% psych allocation is more than enough to quell any extra drones that will arise. Then, you are set up for life.
Mark13
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Enigma
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Midland, MI, USA
Feb 2000
time: 05:13
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One thing about SE I haven't seen mentioned and I think is fairly important is pop booming for factions without the ability to run demo/green or have negative growth.
If you don't have SMACX ignore the following, it will not work in SMAC.
Morgan and Yang can not run planned and demo respectively, and therefore cannot achieve the +4 growth and that social engineering tables that- when combined with a children's creche can create a pop boom. So they need to take extra measures to achieve a pop boom- a golden age.
A golden age happens when a base is-
A. Over size 3
B. has no drones
C. half or more of the workers or talents
Once these conditions are met, a golden age begins.
The next turn after the golden age begins the base gets +2 growth and +1 economy.
The +2 golden age growth combined with the +2 growth from children's creche and democracy/planned will be enough for a pop boom!
I find that the easiest way to achieve a golden age at a few isolated bases that are ahead of your growth curve is to crawler in food and turn a bit less than half of that base's population into doctors/empaths. This approach also needs the HGP to be truly effective, otherwise it is almost impossible to get the necessary talents without a psych allocation.
When you want to pop boom on an empire wide level allocate 10-30% of your economy to psych. There is a cutoff on how much psych energy any base can use, 2* basesize. Facilities like treefarms, holo theaters, research hospitals, hybrid forests, and nanohospitals all add a bonus to psych. It takes 2 psych points to change a population point to the next level of happiness, the levels go from super drone to drone to citizen to talent.
Sven and Aki can also pop boom this way although they need to go through Dem/planned/creche/ AND golden age. This can be a pain... unless planned is part of your normal SE settings try to prepare all of your bases for a pop boom with the necessary facilities (control/hab complexes) and allocate a big chunk of energy to pop booming.
This method is not by any means easy. The earliest I have pop boomed with Morgan was about year 70- that is with complete isolation on my own small continent. Lal can pop boom the moment he gets the proper settings.
Still I think that pop booming like this can help Yang, Morgan, Sven and Aki compete with the faster growing factions...
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Sikander
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Boulder, Colorado, United Snakes of America
Jan 2000
time: 22:13
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Ogie et al,
Regarding Free Market:
My problem with FM is that there is a narrow window in my growth paradigm for it. This is early on, before I pop boom and before I can really handle building a lot of facilities like Rec Commons. (I use a very heavy specialist approach, which severely limits the benefits of FM later on, as my average size 16 base would only receive 5 energy from FM.) How do you quell those Population 2 drones and run FM in the first few years?
My usual University game starts much like Vel's. I take Centauri Ecology first, and immediately crank out formers, then police garrisons (or sometimes another former if one of my first two bases has lots of minerals, using the free scout as my second cop). I beeline for crawlers, then SoTHB, then Restrictions Lifted, Clean, then Fusion. (Like Ogie does).
I would like to receive FM's energy before my pop boom stage (when I must necessarily run Planned). If I start building Rec Commons early, I have to give up on Recycling Tanks (at least in most of my bases) as well as getting a later start on my crawlers and early game SPs.
Once I begin to pop boom, it is too late for FM, as by the time I am finished (running Demo, Planned, Wealth) my society has converted to almost all specialists living in size 14 or 16 bases.
How do you do it Ogie? (btw, thanks for those Lal challenge saves, you really took off in a short period!)
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22-11-2000 15:04
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