Master of Orion 1+2

[kyrub]

The type of start defines the game in MoO, so you may be quite right. Difficult start, bad setup for your race = hard game. Too easy a start, boring game (to me). En plus: Silicoids fare better in larger universes, because they have more potential to grab planets.

There's +- general concensus among veteran MoO (I do not count myself as a true MoO vet) that playing Silicoids well requires a very risky and quick development which potentially brings you to a loss of a few planets to invasions. But the final gain usually outweighs the loss. In the midgame, you suffer to hold on the planets, but you have to make the most of it. And as you say, Silicoid bonuses are gone in the endgame, so you need the fully developped planets in highest number to dominate. Not easy.

(Adv. Terraforming, you are right, I forgot that.)


I know this question is probably useles, but are you effective in quick grabbing of planets? Scout blocking, factories maxing, eco research to reduce price of Colony pods etc.? These are quite crucial game concept, otherwise you'll never tackle the impossible level.

 

[Destroid]

Just won a silicoid game (small, average, 3) without too much trouble. Was able to expand more and out populated everyone most of them game, with the production advantage allowing me to prevail. Cloning is very powerful you can easily add 20 million population per turn if you max it.

I find races with production advantages (Silicoid, Meklar, Klackon) generally easier to play than those with combat advantages, although an aggressive landing Bulrathi can be pretty hilarious early game as your enemies will really struggle to capture their colonies back.

 

[octavius]

I guess I've overlooked the power of Cloning, then.

 

[octavius]

So what excactly govern the rules for bombing planets in Master of Orion?
Early in the game tha Alkari had a fleet around one of my planets and bombed it several turns in a row.
Now I have fleet parked around one of their planets but the bombardment screen does not come up after the second turn at the planets. There were two Alkari ships there the second turn, and it took severl turns for my two regular battleships to destroy one of them. In the meantime my two bomber rained nukes on the planet for several turns, but at the start of the next turn the population had not decreased (it was halved in the initial attack, though).
So what am I missing here?

They might have good enough shield tech that you don't have any weapons in the fleet that can damage the planet? Been a long time since I played it so I don't know if that's how that works exactly.

I think I found out what the cause was. Apparantly the game only checks the weapons in weapon slot 1 for the purpose of bombing. As I wrote on GOG:

There must be some bug that sometimes prevents you from bombing planets.
In my recent game I'm paying the Sakkras and my neighbours the Bulrathi declared war. I sent a Bomber to one of their recently colonized planet. I only get the "new planet explored" message, but no option of bombing it, despite it having 0 bases.
My bombers have Heavy Lasers in weapon slots 1-3, and 35 Fusiom Bombs in slot 4.
On a hunch I designed a Bomber with 35 Fusion Bombs in slot 1, and the lasers in slots 2-4. And now I could bomb the planet! Un-fucking-believably stupid!
It's possible it is mentioned in the manual, but in any case it's not exactly logical...

 

[DwarvenFood]

Master of Magic is the best game ever.

If it was a bit more balanced and had a less braindead AI, it would, um, it would be even better.

edit: I've just imagined what it would've been if MoM'd had a sequel just as better as MoO2 was to MoO2.

I'm crying now

Did you use kyrub 's patch / mod ?

 

[hoverdog]

Master of Magic is the best game ever.

If it was a bit more balanced and had a less braindead AI, it would, um, it would be even better.

edit: I've just imagined what it would've been if MoM'd had a sequel just as better as MoO2 was to MoO2.

I'm crying now

Did you use kyrub 's patch / mod ?

of course.

 

[octavius]

Another bug/undocumented designe feature/failure to RTFM has bitten my ass in MoO1.
Currently playing the Sakkras and being at war with the Klackons. They sent a huge fleet towards one of my planets, but when it got to my planet it didn't attack. It's not in orbit either, but heading back home.
Same thing happened with the second fleet they sent, arriving one turn later.
How is this possible? They don't have Hyperspace Communication, but even that would not have explained it, I think.

 

[Destroid]

I don't know, but there are a lot of features/abilities that you need to read the manual to know about. One thing it could be is that you can't land troops on a planet that you cant colonise.

 

[octavius]

I don't know, but there are a lot of features/abilities that you need to read the manual to know about. One thing it could be is that you can't land troops on a planet that you cant colonise.

I skimmed the manual, but couldn't find anything that explains this thing. And I've triple checked that there really is a state of war.
The planet is a desert planet, so it is a planet the Klackons can colonize.

This is bloody annoying, since I had invested a lot of resources in preparing for this battle, which I'm not even sure I would win. But it would at least reduce the Klackons' fleet much more effective with 33 Missile Bases on my side, than if I should take the battle to them.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

octavius

I don't know about MoO, but in MoO2 you could invest in sensor technologies that allowed you to detect what other planets had to defend themselves with before you arrived, and communication technologies that would allow you to order the fleet to turn around. If MoO has the same and the AI is decent, they might have freaked out at your defenses and called a retreat.

 

[octavius]

octavius

I don't know about MoO, but in MoO2 you could invest in sensor technologies that allowed you to detect what other planets had to defend themselves with before you arrived, and communication technologies that would allow you to order the fleet to turn around. If MoO has the same and the AI is decent, they might have freaked out at your defenses and called a retreat.

In MoO you have Space Scanners that tell you the targets and ETA of all enemy fleets, as well as the number of missile bases on any planets you have explored, within range of the scanner. But I suspect that like in most strategy games the AI automatically knows all this, without the need of scanners or exploration.
There is a Hyperspace Communication tech that lets you change a fleet's orders mid flight.

For some reason this bug (or whatever it is) only seems to affect one planet, as the Klackons attacked another of my planets with an even bigger fleet.

 

[octavius]

Just won on Hard as the Sakkras. Their fertility bonus may not be the best of the racial bonuses, but I like being able to have almost limitless manpower with which to quickly colonize and to replenish losses.
The Klackons were my main enemy throughout the game, and apart from an early grab of two of their planets I never captured any of their core planets. But I gobbled up all the other races and eventually won by outbreeding the Klackons.
My most satisfying game so far, since there was no tedious mopping up phase, and no use of ultra cheesy Black Hole Generator tactics.

 

[kyrub]

There is an Imperium game starting on this last MoO active forum on internet in a few days if you are interested:
http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/showthread.php?tid=5814&pid=344565#pid344565

Imperium is a game where several players play on the same map with the same starting conditions - and share their experience. There are often some extra rules, that make the game more interesting, harder or that give some extra scoring system. Imperiums have long history and led to several discoveries of hidden in-game mechanics.


...Black hole Gs are definitely overpowered. But you'll find other overpowered stuff that can outsmart BHG, like (drums) *High energy focus". A ship with HEF and a good late game beam = space domination as one vet once said. The problem is not BHG being overpowered, but rather, other things being under-powered IMO.

 

[octavius]

There is an Imperium game starting on this last MoO active forum on internet in a few days if you are interested:
http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/showthread.php?tid=5814&pid=344565#pid344565

Imperium is a game where several players play on the same map with the same starting conditions - and share their experience. There are often some extra rules, that make the game more interesting, harder or that give some extra scoring system. Imperiums have long history and led to several discoveries of hidden in-game mechanics.

That sounds interesting. Will probably try it if it isn't too extreme.

...Black hole Gs are definitely overpowered. But you'll find other overpowered stuff that can outsmart BHG, like (drums) *High energy focus". A ship with HEF and a good late game beam = space domination as one vet once said. The problem is not BHG being overpowered, but rather, other things being under-powered IMO.

HEF is that good? Because it allows you to move out of harm's way from other ships' lasers and still be able to fire at will yourself?

 

[octavius]

The Alkari is considered one of the more difficult races to play, but I found their defensive bonuses to be extremely useful.
I tried playing very aggressively and attacked the Klackons the first chance I got and captured one of their planets. But my measly fleet of fighters was so heavily outnumbered by the Klackon vengeance fleet, that even the defensive bonus did not help.
Do the AI races start with a large fleet?

Anyway, I decided to reload and play a more traditional, cautious game. Since my home planet was located quite near the centre of the galaxy, and having the whole north-east corner on my own, and with the superior Propulsion of the Alkari, I was able to expand quickly.
When it was time for war the other races had no chances against my fleet of fast, manouverable fighters armed with Pellet Guns. Large warships hardly hit them. And missile bases only chipped away a few of my fighter bombers.
But the Mecklars, which were the top dogs for a long time, adopted quite well, and started making ships with Energy Pulsars. But I hastilly made some medium ships with Repulsor Beams to counter the ships with Energy Pulsars, and switched production over to medium sized fighters instead.
After that it was just a matter of sending a fleet of some hundred fighers and bombers on a campaign to reduce the number of opposing votes.

So why are the Alkari regarded so poorly?

 

[kyrub]

HEF is that good? Because it allows you to move out of harm's way from other ships' lasers and still be able to fire at will yourself?

HEF is major, it allows you to wipe the enemy before he even moves.
Back to Black hole generator: it is overpowered when used against MoO AI. However, (in multiplayer if it existed), it would be super easy to counter BHG with anything with range >1. AI is sleepy in MoO, that is why BHG is so powerful. ---- Black Hole Generator and Subspace teleporter, now, that is another story. That trumps even HEF, if it has the first move, that is.


What I find unbalanced in MoO is the ship mobility itself. There is no downside in designing, being mobile gives you the most important parameters, beam defense, missile defense, the initiative and (!) the ability to "skip around" the enemy missiles. Too good to turn down, all my ships have high mobility. This one thing was not designed well in MoO game. Mobility should have made targetting worse, or something. Pity.

Re:Alkari
I don't know either. I love playing Alkaris. Maybe it is because combat races need to apply their bonus early or it becomes unimportant. Some starts or settings can make Alkari worse, while Klackons or Psilons will rule always.

 

[TigerKnee]

I think the thing about combat races is that a combat strategy is inherently more risky and since MOO is an "FFA" game, it's no use "defeating" one opponent if you take so many losses that the other races in the game can just swoop in and pick both of you off and take your hard-earned winnings for themselves.

If you already have a huge lead you can attack someone with minimal cost to yourself... well, yeah. You were probably already on your way to winning the game.

Edit: Anyway Alkari... they're the best of the combat races IMO, but see what I just said about combat strats.

 

[octavius]

If I'm falling behind on tech a good way to even the field is to invade planets with lots of fabrics.
I'm currently playing the Bulrathi, and the strategy is working well so far, thanks partly due to me being lucky that the first planet I colonized was Rich. I decided to attack the Psilons, since they grow too strong if left unchecked, and they had a big lead in tech. The first planet I conquered was Rich, so with two Rich planets I'm able to produce enough Large ships and small bombers to defeat them.
The Bulrathi seems to have a harder time spying than the other races I've played, so more the reason for conquest, and put the Bulrathi racial bonus to good use.

 

[octavius]

Winning with the Bulrathi was easier than I though, but I got lucky with getting two Rich planets quickly and the Psilons' homeworld being inside a nebula, making destroying their missile bases much easier. With Mentar gone the rest of the Psilon empire fell quickly. The Meklars became the main contender, but again I was lucky that everyone hated the Meklar and voted for the Bulrathi instead.

I'm having the opposite experience with the Darlaks. Everybody hates them, so I had to resort to Final War. I was just one vote short...

 

[SCO]

I expect a full report of how MoO1 is superior to MoO2 once you play that game.

 

[octavius]

I expect a full report of how MoO1 is superior to MoO2 once you play that game.

I'm looking forward to comparing them. But I'm hoping MoO2 will turn out to be superior.

 

[Malakal]

I expect a full report of how MoO1 is superior to MoO2 once you play that game.

I'm looking forward to comparing them. But I'm hoping MoO2 will turn out to be superior.

It is. But its easier since its more advanced - AI cant use most new features.

 

[SCO]

It's not. You end up juggling queues on dozens of planets. Dreadful on the late game, thou it has fun new stuff like capturing ships for tech (or antarans )
Compared to the pure addictiveness of MoO1, it's like a bad case of civittis.

 

[Tagaziel]

MoO2 is awesome. Heh, I remember once when I neglected the space Jews Gnolams (seriously, they're like a sci-fi interpretation of antisemitic propaganda, including crooked noses, yarmulkas, taste for gold and incredible luck) and they ended up growing out of control. Reloading a hundred turns earlier, I responded by kicking my Mrrshan empire onto a militaristic drive. Late into the game my industrial capacity meant I was pumping out cruisers every other turn and Doom Stars at a slightly slower pace. This allowed me to curbstomp the Gnolams initially, but essentially forced my hand into a conquer victory, after I realized that my fleet, pride of the Mrrshan race, was eating through the treasury at a terrible pace.

So I ended up conquering the Galaxy in about one or two decades, including the fucking humans who kept bickering and fighting over planets, not realizing they were losing the war of attrition.

Good times.

 

[kyrub]

I'm looking forward to comparing them. But I'm hoping MoO2 will turn out to be superior.

It is. But its easier since its more advanced - AI cant use most new features.

The very fact people discuss MoO 1 as possibly superior to the second title speaks about its quality. We still forget the game was esentially a work of one man (it was originally named Star Lords), slightly redesigned by the company who bought it. And the features changed by the company, like the trade feature, the Orion plot, the amoebas constitute the weaker part of it. That is simply amazing and it shows how game development has degraded in quality. MoO 2, however, while it radically changed the original MoO scope, did very well with its new conception.


Comparing MoO 2 to MoO 1 is useless, as the biggest similarity between both games is their name. And that they are placed in universe and you build ships. And races have similar names. There it ends.

Master of Magic is more similar to Master of Orion 1. Whole parts of the code were copied from one to another, for instance the diplomatic part. It's pity, since MoO has very modest diplomatic AI and its model, fonctional in the quick moving space, has not sit well with slow and complicated world of MoM, in my opinion. If MoM could benefit of a diplomacy system similar to Civ 2 or SMAC, it would have really helped.