Comments And Analysis

Surveying

There are those that advocate doing nothing but sitting still and saving money until you get Tech Level 3, with its Long-Range Sensors (Xr), and then beginning serious survey efforts. There is logic behind this, since surveying without Long-Range Sensors is notably slower; plus you will maximize your short term income, and minimize the cost of survey ship refits. However, that means you waste thirty or more turns when you could be out discovering useful systems. Therefore, I recommend getting your survey fleets out as quickly as possible, and exploring at least the systems around your home world.

How many ships to put in survey forces in the first turn will depend on the strategy of the individual player. One simple method is to send one force through each warp point, with the ships divided as evenly as possible between the forces. This will mean each system will take a while to survey, but all should be done more or less at the same time. Another method is to create a couple of more efficient survey forces, and divide the rest of the ships according to how may warp points there are to survey. If doing this, I would recommend putting 25 to 30 General Explorer and 2 to 3 Planetary Explorer class ships in each of the larger forces (in the first turn you will only have enough ships for two large forces). In the new systems, use the General Explorer class ships to do the rough and detailed warp point surveys, while the Planetary Explorer class ships look at the habitable planets, and then the other planets in the system.

Industrial Expansion

Expanding your industry (IU) is one of the best long term investments you can make. Allocate some funds each turn to expanding the industry on your home world. See the Industrial Expansion discussion for more details.

Home-System Colonization

Unless your home system is very small, it is unlikely that all of the habitable bodies will have been colonized by your limited start-up colonization efforts. Colonize what it left. In-system is the cheapest type of colonization possible (there are no CFN charges).

Use the Bonus PTU (Sky Marshall #2, table 15.06.01b, page 51) from you home world to put 10 PTU on each of the Desolate moons, in decreasing order of their Value. Colonizing the Extreme planets and moons is optional. They provide a very poor return on the investment, but if you expect to get any return, you will need to colonize them early (thus only those in your home system are worth the economic effort). Strategic considerations (the establishment of sensor positions) may lead to the colonization of Extreme worlds later in the campaign. I suggest limiting colonization efforts on such planets or moons to a maximum of 4 or 5 PU.

Don't be afraid to use more PTU than are available through the Bonus PTU on the home world. The loss of the income from one PU on the home world will more than be made up by the large number of PTU which that one PU makes available for use in colonization.

Out-System Colonization

Out-system colonization is the way to empire. No matter how good any home system is, your race will need to spread out to keep growing and keep its income on the rise. The obvious targets for expansion are Benign T worlds, but any T world will do. As soon as possible, start putting population on nearby T worlds.

The amount of population to place on a new T world is a matter of personal opinion, and racial financial capabilities. Some people like to spread modest populations (10-20 PTU) across as many T worlds as possible, so as to "claim" the world for their race. Others like to place larger populations on a few T worlds so that they will reach Medium and larger sizes as quickly as possible.

So, when do you stop adding people to a new T world? Again, this is a personal consideration, however, there is little point in paying for colonization once a world had reached the size of a Small population (151 PU). At that point its population Conversion Factor (Sky Marshal #2, table 15.03b, page 49) changes from 1 to 2.6. Prior to 151 PU on a planet, each new PTU converts directly into one PU. From a population size of 151 PU up, there is a divisor. Thus, you would pay to move 30 PTU of colonists to a planet, but the population would only increase by 11.5 PU. At this point you can get better population increases on other worlds.

To Play Comments

Updated 19 September 2000.