17-04-2001 02:19									#1
	My first transcend game Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

Hello all I just strated my first transcend game woth zak and its been pretty tough so far its like 2150 and i had tons of riots stapled them all I have like ****in 50 yrs of sanctions aganist me and Ive found out what its like to not be the super power. I know the super power The Spartan Federation santi dosen't like me to much she wound't even agree to treaty i found the hive off my coast there actually just across a land bridge from me they have laser troops already proto typed I fear that they are gonna be a big threat in the future.Could any one give me some advice Im getting tech awful fast but im really poor and santi keeps hitting me up i gave her 20 last time she did it I fear im about to go to war help me please im not ready for war with the hive or santi

	17-04-2001 04:58									#2
	Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

I'm not much of a fan of atrocities and in your case it is probably hurting your tech and income because you losing trade energy. Maybe limit your base size or build more rec. commons. The obvious thing to do would be to build the project that gives you hologram theatres where ever you have net nodes. You might also try to put some energy into psych to quell some drones.
As far as being poor you could try to alter your allocations and push some into energy as oppposed to tech and psych on the SE screen. Unless you have a decent efficency rating your probably not going to get much from this though. If worst comes to worst you could also build some empath units and go worm hiunting for cash if you have a decent sized patch of fungus around.
Avoiding war with Santi is going to be difficult because she already is predisposed to not like you and your probably aiming to run knowledge soon. If your already running a SE choice she is opposed to try switching to power or the basic choice you have from the beginning in that catagory. I wouldn't hesitate to start producing weapons of war either. Impact rovers would be my choice at the stage of the game you are in. I also believe that Santiago respects power, so if you had some kind of muscle to flex she might lay off.

	17-04-2001 20:32									#3
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

Thanks for your help well ive leanred a way to get rid of drones a couple of doctors dose the trick nicely i have skunk works now so i pland to bulid them at all of my army production cities santi respescts power but if she attacks me shell have to deal with lal too lal is my pactmate plus i am the leader in tech so prttey much no 1 screws with me the hive is being nice for a change dedrie is to im currently buliding the empath gulid at a non-droned base and im renivating my H.Q what botheres me though is my slugd=sih expanison and millitary production rate i have no navy and not much of an army and not many bases that can produce colony pods quickly any suggestions to help my terriblely slow rate of production maybye balence it with my lighting fast tech discovery rate?

Tyler Messer
"For this is f-u-c-k-i-n-g TOUGH!"

	17-04-2001 22:07									#4
	Got spare money?

Use Police garrisons to handle some of the drone problem, and a 10%-20% energy allocation to psych for a little more. I hope you got the Virtual World.

Send crawlers out to the field to boost mineral and energy production, to make up for the Good Doctors. When building particularly important SP's, assign a couple of nearby bases to crawler production -- essentially doubling or tripling production rate.

Don't build too many skunkworks, since they tie up production and always cost upkeep. New models don't come around that frequently that one or two at the most won't handle it. Send crawlers to the skunk base (ahead of time if possible, like once you start researching MMI) to hurry along prototypes you're really itching for.

Make sure the global trade pact gets passed, esp if you are Governor (Empath Guild will help with that) -- you can't beat the extra energy that brings with it.

	17-04-2001 23:07									#5
	Full PM-box? Change here!

When I am playing for score, I choose yang - by far the best faction in the game(also smacx)

His immunity to efficiency allows you to start the game with +2 police and +2 support(police state) without the -2 eficc penalty. Later, you go planed also for more advantages without any penalty(again). If you're in peace, you go wealth later and build whatever you like WAY before your opponents.

If you're in war, use POWER and enemies will fall like flies. Even better, if you get the cloning vats SP(i think), it eliminates the -2 industry penalty of POWER, getting you to the top quickly.

I'm Yang against all SMACX factions(except pirates, because I'm on his slot :P) in transcend game. I'm building mas a$$ off SPs, prototypes, I got the tech and military lead - although, differently from other diff levels, I did not conquered the entire world hhehehe. I'm sharing the Moonson Jungle continent with the Angels(my pet faction) only, and got only 2 cities outside it. Warring with Caretakers, cult and Drones. Marr's power and tech is laughable by now and the cyber-gal is growing good, it'll be a good challenge for late game

Yang rules!

------------------
-----
Long live THE HIVE!

	17-04-2001 23:57									#6
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

I suppose its my playing style or something, but I seem to be able to coexist with Santiago and Yang; as you mentioned, Yang seems to back off if you have decent strength; I tend to be "respectful" toward Santiago, running Power, giving her techs or even money if I have to rather than endure a war. As opposed to many of the AI, who will sue for (and keep) peace if you take one or two of their bases, Miriam seems to be more relentless; I usually end up having to wipe her out or make her submissive, despite my peaceloving tendencies.

I often SP as one of the warlike factions (in a non-warlike fashion) and this usually leads to a more peaceful game in which (with the SMAC cast)Dierdra would get a very good start and Morgan would do his money thing well (Transcend level). A typical early heirarchy might be Dierdra-Tech and overall lead(Zak & Lal seem to have hard times in these games), Morgan-Money, Yang/Miriam/Santiago-Terr & Mil with me (replacing one of those last 3) running 2nd in most things and 2nd - 4th overall. Perhaps if I played more like the AI does, I'd be doing a better job at keeping up with my responsibility for making wanton attacks on the wimps. However, I like way the play balances this way; it seems to lead to a fairly even game for quite a while and I feel like I'm struggling to hang in there. I'm clearly not a momentum player and I don't think I'm a pure builder either, but it seems to me to be more effective (or more fun at least) for an aggressive faction to do builder things than it is for a peaceful faction to do the war thing.