note: this faq is about
playing multiplayer moo2 more effective. of course, if you can
play multiplayer moo2 more effectively, then your regular moo2 becomes
more effective as well!!
also, most of these strategies here are based upon a regular organic
rich world with average tech level. and yes, it's hard to follow
these strategies without having your turns on in the game. the
t stands for turns here in the faq.
Credits:
I like to thank everyone who helped me learn moo2, especially the people or fellow moo'ers from kali gaming network room 597 who helped me practice this game. And I would like especially thank certain people more for sharing strategies with me and help me gain experience faster than other players, people such as
Cybersaber, INver, Silentwolf,
Clang, Dirt-Bag, and Zircon, and bunch of others I'm not sure about!!!
what is so great about moo2 you say??
1/3 of the fun is choosing a good effective custom race.
1/3 of the fun is building a stable empire.
1/3 of the fun is the tactical combat.
to say the truth?? sometimes i just like playing moo2
for the fights, and as long as i could get a good fight out the
game, i wouldn't mind losing.
parts of this faq:
7. startup strategy for colonies
8. teching strategy and timeline
note:
i did not put in the dos setup into this faq, because i figured it would
not be necessary for everyone who plays moo2, since the dos setup is
only for moo'ers over kali gaming network.
so for now, if you would like
to figure out how to do the dos setup for moo2,
then visit http://www.pixelexiq.com/moo2/
and click on the dos setup button.
or visit http://members.xoom.com/kfizzle/moo2/
and go to the multiplayer gaming page. i'm not sure which button
it is on the top.
um, well, im not exactly the type
of person who goes in order,
cause when writing this fact,
i went in order of which interests me most.. so..
bear with this faq..
well i think its quite simple. the strategy of this game is to win, and by whatever means possible other than cheating. the game is actually based on same principles of paper, rock and scissors. basically, there are tech races, production races, and blitz races. blitz races are paper, production rock, and tech races are scissors.
tech races actually don't do quite
well, till late in game, when they are flooded with imense techs.
then they are unstoppable almost.
the best way to play this game,
is to play a race as fast as possible, and not make any mistakes.
the idea is to keep expanding, without losing any tech time. of
course, that doesnt mean you should not build any defense of any sort,
so as that an enemy may easily walk over you. the idea of win
at this game, is balance.
but then again, dont feel bad
over losing every now and then, because, a lot of this game depends
on the universe distribution, or the rolls of the stars and systems
in the each individual maps of the games. not exactly everyone
will start out with a sweet start all the time, and no exactly everyone
gets the best sectors all the time. and to say the truth??
sometimes this game is quite unfair, and there's a lot of unbalance
in the moo2 map rolls.
so, the best way to win, is to
choose the appropriate race, and to play it out as best as possible.
well, the best way to win at this
game is custom races. and there's a lot of good, strong race picks
that makes the most differences in gameplay.
these race picks are in order
of strength, or at least, the way i feel about them.
unification
creative
lithovore
aquatic
tolerant
subterranean
democracy
omniscient
warlord
telepathic
custom races and race pick strategies:
these are good races that are known to work, of course, any race is
good as long as the key components are there. and also, the smaller
the map, the more homeworld advantages help, and the bigger the map,
the more race advantages help. for example, in medium ladder,
uni sub aqua with rich & large homeworld works out nicely, where
as in large, it is preferable to have the same race with +1 production
over rich & large homeworld.
but sometimes, having two homeworld
advantages doesn't help that much either, especially if you would use
a homeworld as your main building colony, yet if you have an artifacts
there, it would be wasted for the time being when you are building ships.
unification government
tolerant, +1 production, large
aquatic, +1production, +50% growth, rich, large
aquatic, subterranean, +50% growth or +1 production
subterranean, +1 food, +1 production, large
creative, aquatic, large
aquatic, omniscient, artifacts, rich, large
aquatic,
telepathic, rich, large
democracy government
lithovore, rich, large
aquatic, +1 BC
creative,
aquatic
regular government
subterranean, lithovore, +50% growth, large
subterrnean, aquatic, +100% growth, rich, large
tolerant, lithovore
tolerant, +1 food, +2 production
aquatic, +100% growth, +2 production, rich, large
creative, aquatic, +1 production, artifacts, large
creative, lithovore, rich
telepathic, lithovore, artifacts, large
telepathic,
feudal, aquatic, rich, +50 ship offense, omniscient
the universal races of moo2 are
unitolerant, and demolithovore.
notes to follow:
when choosing a race, it's preferable to choose multipliers, especially if the map is quite big.
the mutlpliers sequence-
for tech races: democracy, lithovore, subterranean, +money, +research, artifacts
for production races: unification,
tolerant, aquatic, +production, +food, rich homeworld
universal multiplier is +growth.
also, artifacts is a less preferable pick without large homeworld.
negative picks:
normally, the best negative picks
to choose are repulsive, -ground combat, and -ship defense for maximum
pick points available. if you can't choose repulsive, then choose
a race like unification and aquatic, and get -food and -spy instead
for negative picks.
the worst five picks:
uncreative-
the inability to choose good technologies
hurts a race more than anything else. i never tried to beat an
ai with this pick yet.
feudal-
the inability to tech at regular
speeds hurts a lot in keeping up with other races. but nevertheless,
feudal can beat an ai
cybernetic-
this pick is deadly. it is only good with a race that is tolerant. but this race makes colonies harder to choose, since you cannot colonize certain poor or ultra poor colonies without the right building techs such as robo-miners.
also, the reason why this pick
is in my 5 worst picks list, is because if a cybernetic colony is blockaded,
the race does not build at all, because it thinks of production as food.
this pick is only good for ship repair.
-money-
this pick sucks because to play
efficiently in a game you need to build, and all buildings have costs
to keep up with. the reason why this pick sucks is because it
restricts a player from making big fleets beyond the command points
availabilty.
-growth-
this pick hurts a lot in the beginning,
40-50 turns in average game and 20-30 turns more in prewarp games.
but this -growth problem can be fixed by getting cloners as soon as
possible. it is preferable that you also choose this type of pick
only with tolerant.
lowg gravity-
this pick is almost as bad as -growth. in all moo2 maps, all the systems are basically normal gravity. then there are some high gravity planets, but lowg gravity planets have the least existence. so it is harder to play lowg gravity races than high gravity races. basically, lowg gravity races mean -ground comabt, and -25% performance for the empire, considering you colonize all other worlds as normal gravity with exception of homeworld being lowg gravity. otherwise, you can fix the gravity problems once you get gravity generator.
what hurts most about this race,
is the -25% performance. the best way to compensate for the -25%
performance until gravity generators are discovered, is to choose a
pick such as lithovore with it.
normally, whatever race you choose would matter on game setup.
the smaller the map, the more homeworld advantages help. the bigger the map, the more race advatages help.
that concept is the same thing
with tech age. example: advanced game is a democracy haven.
it's best to play at impossible levels, because then you get more monsters worlds.
monster worlds are essential in
the game of moo2.
prewarp age works out nicely for tech races, and growth races.
average tech age is basically what most of the strategies involved in this faq would be about.
advaced tech age is all about
strategy, and i dont like playing those. plus they take away half
the fun in game of building an empire.
growth and production races are the most basic races in this game.
they can exist in any map size and do well.
tech races are better off in bigger
maps, since they stay out of contact a little bit longer then.
the galaxy richness matters.
i seriously recommend that you never play an average rich galaxy, it
will spoil all the fun out of moo2. almost as if beat it out.
mineral rich age is great for building fast, while organic rich age
is great for growing fast.
random helps out ai a lot.
antarans supposedly crash mutlplayer games, especially when they attack colonies. i never checked it out though.
i prefer tactical combat over
strategic combat. tactical combat is another half fun of moo2.
strategic combat prevents you from scouting surrounding colonies, you
need to use outposts to scout. but strategic combat makes ais
incredibly harder. in strategic combat, the numbers make the most
difference. in tactical combat, the ingenuity of a player makes
the most difference.
basically, this is strategy for
as soon as the game starts.
colony bases:
when the game starts, first thing you do is build two colony bases in your homeworld.
as long as the planets are small poors or better, i go ahead and colonize them.
normally, i go ahead and build colony bases if they can be made within 13 turns or less, always if it's a unification race.
if my race requires food, i go ahead and make a freighter first before the colony bases, so i do not have to worry about them later.
depending on race, you could actually tech research labs first, then get reinforced hulls and automated factories, then build the colony bases. it really depends how you play, but i prefer the 2 colony bases first.
once you get the colony bases made, start researching for research labs.
normally, only time i tech first
then build colony bases, is when i have a good tech race that techs
fast.
research:
now, you could either house at your new colonies, or you could start saving up production.
if you save up production, then you could pop in the research labs on top of saved production when you discover them. the saving production idea in the startup game helps build faster with lesser pop. it takes about 9 turns to build research labs or automated factories with a unification race i believe.
i normally save production everywhere except my homeworld where i house, while im teching reseach labs.
then i pop in the research labs everywhere, and keep researching reinforced hulls, and then finally automated labs. on my colonies, after the research labs are done, i still keep saving production until i get automated factories.
once i get automated factories discovered, i pop in the factories everywhere on top of saved production, and start housing everywhere once automated factories are done.
if you instead house everywhere
from beginning, and build research labs and automated factories as you
discover them without saved production, then you could gain a good 5-7
extra pop i believe, depending on race.
landing the 1st colony ship:
when you are about to land the 1st colony ship, you may want to land it on a 2+ planets system.
it's best to look around first, and then land it where you think it is suitable.
sometimes, it's hard to find a good system around, and you may have to op once or twice to find a decent system. if you op more than once, then you may have as well lost the game, and it might be a good idea to ask for a restart of game. sometimes just opping twice could mean loss of game.
that's why sometimes it doesn't hurt to colonize 1 planet system, especially if it is a good planet, such a natives planet. nevertheless, landing the planet, really depends on your race. it saves valuable time of building ops,
that you could had used instead to research.
some telepathic players land their
1st colony ship right in the same system as the home system, though
i do not recommend that.
what's next?:
there's a lot of paths to follow after the startup game is completed.
you could expand, do a tele/creative
blitz, go after monsters, etc.
teching strategy and timeline:
just about all the techs available in this game are tradeoffs.
the way ill describe the techs
to reseach, will be in tech combos.
t20
research labs, reinforced hulls, automated factories.
biospheres, cloning centers or soil enrichment
t50
space academies, battle pods
fusion rifles or fusion beamers, battle scanners
neural scanners, super planetary computers
spaceports or fighter garrison, robo-miners
t90
augmented engines, ion drives or ion pulse cannons
deuterium fuel cells, merculite missiles, atmospheric renewers, zortium armor (regular path)
tritanium armor, pollution processors (blitz/monster path)
deuterium fuel cells, merculite missiles, pulson missiles, zortium armor (tolerant path)
tritanium armor, mass drivers, inertial drivers, warp dissipators (quick warpd path)
mass drivers, intertial drivers, warp disspators
t125+
emg missiles, autolabs or cybertronic computers
personal shields or stealth sutis, warp interdictor
neutron blasters or neutron scanners, gravity generatos or tractor beams, jump gates
antimatter drives, transporters
android workers, galactic cybernets
moleculatric computers
and it just keeps on going like
this!!!
normally, you tech the basics first- research labs, reinforced hulls, automated factories.
after that, you either go cloning center/soil enrichment path, or super planetary path, or robo-miners path.
if you need to explore, you could also get deuterium fuel cells before choosing one of these paths.
if you need quick early defense,
or want to blitz, or nab a few monsters, you could go the pollution
processors path.
importance of the regular technologies:
research labs-
this is teh first technology you always want to research, without these, it would be harder to research other things.
it provides +5 research and +1
research per pop.
reinforced hulls-
you need this to increase the
hull points on any ships. without these, it would be easier for
enemies to blow away your ships easily.
automated factories-
you need this to build things faster, since it provides +5 production and +1 production per pop.
after building these, you may
want to build your 2nd colony ship.
deuterium fuel cells:
if you want to explore a bit further, you may want these, but you don't have to get these right away.
also, getting tritanium armor,
or fuel cells, you get missile upgrade mods, that let you configure
your nukes to heavy armored, or fast missiles.
biospheres:
it is better to get biospheres over hydroponics, because biospheres give you 2 extra pop at every colony.
with these extra pop you could
make more food than bydropnics, better yet, you could use the extra
pop as you like.
cloning centers:
depending on your race, you may
want this to expand your pop faster. and normally, this is better
than choosing +growth for race picks. you want these for sublithovore,
or tollithovore, or unisubterranean, or uniaquatic races.
soil enrichment:
if you do not make 4+ food per
pop at your homeworld,. then you want these. normally, unification
races already add extra food, and sometimes you do not need these for
unification races. no food requiring, or lesser food requiring
(cybernetic) don't require these either.
neural scanners:
this adds +10 to all spy activities.
super planetary labs:
this is like research labs, but
better. it gives +10 base research, and provides +2 research per
pop.
spaceports:
this increases the empire BC income
at wherever this is built, by +50% more revenue. anything built
after this, helps you make more money.
robo-miners:
this is automated factories, but
better. it gives +10 base production, and provies +2 production
per pop.
augmented engines:
this adds a good +5 movement to
all ships. it also provides better defense against beaming weapons.
ion drives:
you need these drives, so you
could move at speed of 4 parsecs per turn.
space academies:
you CANNOT SURVIVE WITHOUT THESE. you need these to build any type of ships, especially if they are BEAMING WEAPONRY ships.
these upgrade the crew of any ship being built at a colony from green status to regular status.
regular status means +10 both ship beam offense and defense.
these also increase a ship's status by the turns, as a ship is docked at a colony with these.
i'm not sure what the algorithm
is though for how the crews are upgraded per turns.
fusion rifles:
you need these to protect your
colonies from ground attacks. it gives +10 ground combat.
fusion beamers:
you need these to fight creative races, especially if the creative races have shields on their ships.
this is probably the best weapon
to fight a creative with in early games, because fusion beamers have
the enveloping modification, that can be easily used to wear down any
shields on all sides.
battle scanners:
you NEED these also, because this
adds a +50 beam offense to any ships these are put in.
tritanium armor:
these are teh best early game
armor available. it adds a +10 ground combat also. it increases
the hull and structure points on a regular titanium ship by 2 times.
pollution processors:
these reduce the pollution to
50%. these are great if you are going to blitz an enemy, because
you could use automated factories, and pollution processors in your
homeplanet to build full-figured battleships in about 15 turns, and
cruisers in 10 turns.
merculite missiles:
these are better missiles than nuclear. by time you get zortium armor, you get full mods on these. these missiles cause a good 14 damage while a nuclear missile makes only 8 damage.
if you get either pollution processors, or these missiles, you get full mods on nuclear missiles, so you could use mirved nuclears missiles to take out monsters.
also, these are a creative's best
buddy, because it upgrades the missile bases.
atmospheric renewers:
these reduce the pollution to 25%. these are better than pollution processors.
otherwise, these are quite cumulative
with pollution processors.
pulson missiles:
these are better missiles than merculite. these make a good 20 damage per missile, and they are faster, and harder to shoot down.
normally, only time i get pulson
missiles, if when i choose pollution processor path, and even then maybe,
or when i am tolerant.
zortium armor:
these is the best armor to get in midgame games. for early game you need tritanium armor. these also adds a +15 to ground troops, and they take 2 hits to go down also i believe.
it increases the hull and structure points on a regular titanium ship by 4 times.
also, if you are a creative, you
reach tolerant status by researching zortium armor, and you also get
a +1 production per pop race bonus.
mass drivers:
these are the best early beaming
weapon. it does not lose damage when shot, and you can get armor
piercing modification on these.
inertial stabilitzers:
these add turn movement to ships,
and also provide a good +50 beam defense.
warp dissipators:
these are one of the most deadly weapons, because with these on the battle arena, enemy ships cannot retreat.
these help most in the missile
warfare, where you shoot all your missiles, and run for it, while the
enemy ships just stay waiting their ultimate fate.
emg missiles:
these are also very deadly, because these causes missiles to target all damage to a ship's drives.
so, using emg missiles, you could use 2 mirved nuclear missiles to fully destroy a zortium armored battleship with reincforced hulls. it takes 1 mived merculite missile to do the same thing. only drawback is, it increases the weight of the missile a lot, and if you do not have enough defense missiles in front of the emg missile, the missile could easily get blasted away in space.
emg missiles are quite cumulative
with warp dissipators.
cybertronic computers:
these add +100 beam attack to
all ships being made. cybertronic is quite cumulative mass drivers
with full modifications.
autolabs:
these provide a 30 rps in every
colony where these are built. these are great if you have a lot
of colonies to build these on.
timeline:
normally, a game is over by t125 or so, because by then people start fighting each other like crazy.
by t25, if you haven't landed your 1st colony ship, then you might want a restart
by t55, a telepathic race blitz.
by t60, you want to think of early blitz defense
by t70, you may want to think of building a defense
by t90, you may want to have some sort of a defense, possibly a battleship.
by t110, upto galactic cybernets can be researched by some people.
by t120, if you do not have any battleships yet, you may as well quit the game.
by t160, if you leave a democracy race alone, then you are as well as fried chicken with ranch sauce.
by t200, all production and research
techs can be done researched.
this part will include information
about how to expand, and do other sorts of colony things.
building colony ships:
you get your 1st colony ship for free in average tech games.
to build your 2nd colony ship, it's best to build it after getting automated factories.
to build your 3rd colony ship, it's best to build it after getting cloning centers or soil enrichment.
after that, you could figure out
when to build colony ships as needed.
of course, with certain races,
such as unitolerant, it may be a wise idea to build and expand first,
and then tech later on. and then expand as colony ships are needed.
rich planet expansion:
normally, it's best to expand
off the richest planet in a system. this way you can build faster,
and with fewer pop.
natives world:
if you find a natives world, then you may want to colonize it, even though, it's a little bit slow to grow pop in natives world. natives world farmers give a good +2 farming per pop, and they can be multiplied with government.
natives are treasure chests to
tolerant races, and other unification races.
one man housing:
basically, when you house, it's best to house with one person, especially if you are a polluting race.
also, normally most people do
not house till they get automated factories, because they save production
in the beginning of game to easy build research labs and automated factories.
max populating:
just because most people save production in the beginning, doesn't mean you have to also. you could gain a few extra pop of 5-7 by housing since beginning of game, and building things as techs are discovered.
the fastest way to gain pop, is keep all colonies not full. that way all colonies will pop even though some colonies may be building somethign or saving production.
did you ever notice how empty colonies pop incredibly fast??
the only colonies that i might
consider keeping full, are the battleship factory colonies, or an artifacts
planet.
saving production:
to save production, after building something for a few turns, simply take the building off and put housing in.
this way, the turns used to build something will be saved, until you put in another thing to be built.
you could put trading goods too instead if you do not want to house.
but please make sure you don't
cheat while you are trading goods. (credit cheat)
outposts:
outposts help you expand further, and let's you explore further.
but, if you build and outpost first on a colony, and then build a colony ship or base on the outposted planet, it changes the outpost into a marine barracks.
basically, that means if you want to avoid wasting time for building marine barracks on a colony, just build an outpost first on a planet, then put down the colony ship or base.
these tactic works great with
regular and feudal races, because every new colony requires a marine
barracks before you can build anything else.
poor planets:
what is so great about poor planets??? what is so great about ultra poor planets????
what is so great about them??? they can't build anything!!
but, they can be easily used as
research planets, farming planets, and they can be used to build housing
and expand pop!
android workers:
android workers are the best type of androids out there, if you ever get that far in a game.
android workers provide a good +3 production per pop, and can be multiplied by government.
they each require one production to sustain.
these guys are also tolerant, in case you didn't know that.
so if you are a polluting race, and want to make a tolerant battleship factory, then on a monster or rich planet, make all the population android workers, and take out all your regular pop, and the planet will become tolerant just like that.
since these guys are tolerant?
they also add extra space to certain planet types, but it doesn't let
you increase your regular population, since the extra space can only
be used by android workers.
easy build with robo-miners:
once you get robo-miners, you could use 3-4 pop to easy build everything that is not much important (production and research buildings) if you are a unification race, and 5-6 pop if you are a regular race.
what's so great about this technique?? you could use all your other pop to research, while you easy build.
not even that, with easy build,
you can build all your starbases in about 10 turns.
population marks:
normally, you know you are doing
very well in game, if you have 100 pop by t100.
what my build que list would look
like if the game advanced upto autolabs:
automated factories
marine barracks (dictatorship/feudal races)
robo-miners
space ports (you get money for building everything after this)
cloning centers (if the planet is empty)
pollution processors (blitz races)
atmospeheric renewers (polluting races)
autolabs (30 rps per turn)
research labs
superplanetary computers
missile bases (creative races)
warp interdictors (only needed at 1 colony in a system)
biospheres
star base
space academies (if it's going to be a battleship/beamer ship factory colony)
marine barracks (unification/democracy races)
radiation shields (creative races)
fighter garrison (creative races)
housing
before you build any ship i seriously
recommend you build a space academy first.
essential components:
well, now it depends what type
of ships you are making. here are some essential ship components,
that you want to put into your ship as soon as you have them.
reinforced hulls:
these increase the hulls points
by 3 times. these are essential on big ships, and certain small
ships.
heavy armor:
normally, most people do not get heavy armor, but instead get automated factories. creative races use heavy armor instead of reinforced hulls.
heavy armor is the same thing
as reinforced hulls, but armor piercing weapons cannot pierce through
heavy armor.
battle pods:
these are very essential to any
ship, because they not only add more space to a ship, you could gain
extra speed with these on a ship by leaving the ship empty.
augmented engines:
these guys are great, because
these increase your ship speed. so with these, sometimes it's
easier to run away from enemy missiles. also they help you raise
your ship beam defense.
battle scanners:
these are a must on all ships
that have beam weapons. why?? it is because of the same
type of reason you must have space acadamies before you build any ships.
these guys increase the beam offense of a ship by 50%.
inertial stabilizers:
these are must on all ships, because
these components help increase all ship beam defense by 50%. these
also help ships turn more.
warp dissipators:
these guys are great, because these components stop enemy fleet from retreating as long as one of your ships have warp dissipators on them.
what most people do, is use warp
dissipators to stop enemy from running, while you shoot all your missiles,
and retreat all your big battleships. this way, the enemy cannot
fire your battleships, but they still lose all their ships because they
cannot run away from the missiles, until they shoot down the ship with
the warp dissipator.
extended fuel tanks:
i believe these help increase the range of a ship's travel, by about 2 parsecs. you will need these to go after an enemy if you do not have good fuel cells.
other option, is to build outposts, and moving on like that.
normally, i never put these in
my battleships, so i could get maximum space on a battleship to put
firepower into them. i use these only on scouters.
building ships:
well, now that we have the few components summarized, building ships depends on how you want to attack an enemy.
normally, whenever you take any
ships, it is a good idea to take a few little ships along also.
scouters: (frigates)
extended fuel tanks
battle pods
augmented engines
warp dissipator scouters:
battle pods
augmented engines
warp dissipator
reinforced hulls (if it's a destroyer
instead of frigate)
monster killers: (frigates)
battle pods
1x 1 fast nuclear missile
1x 1 fast mirved nuclear missile
1x 1 fast mirved nuclear missile
creative monster killers: (destroyers)
battle pods
1x 1 interceptor with either fusion beamer or mass driver upgrade
note: speed must be 18+ and you
do need fusion drives
any battleships:
battle pods
reinforeced hull
augmented engines
inertial stabilizer
battle scanners (beam ships)
warp dissipator (if you want to be mean and ruthless)
7-9+ pd beam weapons with full modifications (beam ships)
a lot of regular beam weapons (beam ships)
a fair amount of heavy regular beam weapons (beam ships)
twice the amount of mirved missiles, put in regular fast armored missiles to protect the mirv missiles
good amount of mirved fast armored missiles
maybe about 2-4 emg mirved fast armored missiles (make sure they are protected by best regular fast armored missiles!!)
note: emg missiles are useless
against ground targets and star bases. emg missiles work best
only against ships. so if you have emg missiles on a ship, it's
best to have no mirved missiles on there, except protective fast armored
missiles in front of those emg missiles. emg missile ships are
enemy ship killers, that's all.
these are some strategies about
how to fight an enemy, etc, and how to build ships etc.
f9 button:
what does this do??
It tells the distance between two systems.
It's good for colonizing, and also planning on attacks.
It helps you figure out where you need to build outposts.
By the way!! Also try out
f1 and f3 buttons while you'’re at this!!!
space academies:
YOU CANNOT SURVIVE BEAM WEAPON
WARFARE WITHOUT THESE.
wormhole to enemy:
if there is a wormhole near you that leads right away to an enemy, it's best to save some production at every colony, so that in case the enemy does come through the wormhole, you should be able to build some quick defense ships.
sometimes, it's never a bad idea
to blitz the enemy yourself, using the pollution processors path.
teleblitz:
why, it's quite simple.
you research the basics, use the pollution processors path next. build a cruiser and go take over enemy.
if you want, you could build a
battleship too, but do make sure you attack before t60.
creative defense:
normally, creative is a slow race, but they have nice defense all the time, because of missile bases.
if you think you may get pranced
on early in game, it doesn't hurt to use pollution processors path after
getting cloning centers. otherwise, i would get deuterium fuel
cells, and explore, while i take super planetary labs path.
full modifications:
to get any full modifications
for a certain ship weapon, you have to research in the tech's tree 2
more levels. this way you get a 3 level refinement (1st level
was getting the weapon) on the weapon, and you get full modifications
for it.
laser warfare:
before you build a battleship, make sure you have space academies built at the battleship factory first.
then before you even put the weapons into the ship, make sure you have full modifications on all beam weapons you are putting in.
also do not forget to put in the
battle scanners. those are very essential, as much as space academies.
missile warfare:
well, you just want some fast armored missiles in the first four volleys.
then in the next four volleys you want fast armored mirved missiles.
if you like, you could put in two volleys of emg fast armored mirved missiles instead of the regular four mirved missiles.
you do not need space academies for missile ships, but it is a good idea to build space academies first, because
what if you had to refit the ship
from missiles to beam weapons?? then space acadamies would definitely
help.
runaway scouters:
with missile warfare, it is good idea to carry around little runaway scouters.
what basically this means, is that while you keep moving the runaway scouter away from the enemy, you shoot all the missiles on your regular ships, and then you retreat your regular ships.
this way what happens is, that the missiles will still go after the enemy as long as you have at least one ship on the battle arena.
even better, have a warp dissipator
scouter along with your runaway ship, so the enemy cannot runaway.
boarding:
if you happen to have higher ground troop combat level than the enemy, then you might want to board an enemy ship every now and then.
this technique normally works best against star bases, because they are always immobile.
boarding is great, because you can easily steal enemy ships this way.
this technique also always works
against ai star bases, because the ai never hits unarmed ships carrying
big mean ruthless marines.
raiding:
raiding is the same thing as boarding.
the enemy has to be immobilized otherwise you cannot raid them.
what raiding does is destroy enemy ship structures instead of taking over the ship.
if you get lucky, maybe one of
those gunshots will hit the enemy ship's drive's warp core, and cause
the ship to explode.
ship repair:
in case you didn't know, all ships at your colonies or outposts get repaired right away.
this doesn't include returning ships though, who may get attacked the moment they arrive back to home.
but, you could always attack an enemy, and build a outpost into their system, and get your ships repaired the next turn.
it takes one turn to repair any ship. normally, they repair the moment they return to your bases.
if you have advanced automated
repair, then the ships can repair themselves anywhere without having
to come back to a base.
scrap and tech:
if you have an enemy ship captured,
and if it happens to have a certain technology that you do not have,
then take the ship to one of your colonies, and scrap it through the
fleets screen. it will give you new technologies right away from
the enemy ships.
blockade:
what's so great about blockade?? it slows the enemy down because teh enemy cannot buy things then.
what's more great about blockade, is that it doesn't let the enemy population to leave the system, or let anyone into the system.
but that's nothing, this blockade includes all food transports too. that means, people in the enemy colonies who do not have enough food, colonists will die every turn.
of course, you cannot blockade without declaring war first.
this strategy works best against
creative races.
suicide:
why would i want to commit suicide like the evil mr jim jones says??
well, it's quite easy. take this example.
i'm playing a tournament with four people in the game, and suddenly i find a creative race prance on me.
now if i know that i have no chances against my enemy, and it wouldn't help me much to play the game, since i will lose anyway, at least what i could do is kill off all my population so the creative enemy cannot take over my empire, and that the other two players in the game will have better chances of winning.
a creative race with a big empire
is simply unstoppable, so it is best that you kill off all your population
before you ai in the game.
the quick easy to way to commit suicide-
fill up the smallest colony in a system with as many people it can handle. then move all the other population into this small full colony from the other colonies in the same system. it will ask you then, do you want to move all population even though the smaller colony is already full, and say yes. et voila, all the population you just transported from the bigger colonies to the smaller colony in the system dies instantly.
to do this suicide, you do not
require freighters at all.
the harder way to commit suicide-
okay, you need to commit suicide on a system that doesn't have any more small full colonies.
well, simply move all the population in the colony to farming, then check and see how many freighters you have available to move people out first. move these people out to another system, to a small full colony, and when it asks the question, when the people will arrive, they might die off, still send them or not? say yes.
the moment these colonists leaving arrives at the other system, will die off since that colony cannot handle anymore people.
after this, if you still have a few more people left in the colony?? make them research instead of doing anything else. you do not need them to farm, because if they need to be killed off anyhow.
remember, you do not want to transport
too many people, so that other colonies cannot receive food through
transports anymore.
committing suicide works best when playing against creative and telepathic races.
also, suicide is a good strategy if you are about to ai while you are in a war. normally, most KALI hardcore moo'ers do not take over enemies that are not in war.
what's great about suicide, is that the enemy will not be able to expand their empire off your hardworking back.
also, suicide is the only strategy,
where a tiny planet ever makes any difference in game, and is important.
selling buildings:
selling buildings in a colony is almost the same thing as committing suicides.
if you know that the enemy is coming to take over a system, or colony, then you may want to sell the structure in the colony, before the enemy takes it over. this way you could make money off selling colony structures, but you will make more tax money also, since you do not have to pay for maintenance.
you could also sell buildings, simply if you do not require them anymore, or to decrease taxes.
you can only sell 1 building at
a turn.
hidden ships with refit que:
did you ever know that you could actually hide ships?? even big fleets if you wanted to?
basically, after a ship is built, and is fully complete, refit the ship into the same type of ship.
this way, the refit will only take 1 turn to build, and you won't have to save production to rebuild the ship.
then what you do, is that you simply put a different type of building on top of the refit in the build que, so that you could save production, while the ship still stays in the colony with the refit que.
this way, not only can you hide ships from an enemy, but you can also decrease ship maintenance costs, and keep your taxes lower.
drawbacks??
if the enemy takes over the colony, then your ship is gone along with it.
if the enemy destroys the starbase, then your ship is gone.
if the enemy destroys the starbase with spying, then your ship is gone again.
also, the ship in refit does not
increase it's crew status, since the ship is not available outside to
gain ship crew points from the space academies.
marine barracks:
you need to build marine barracks first thing in an enemy colony taken over.
why?? because otherwise the ground troops that you just landed on the enemy colony will tire out, and the enemy colonists wil rebel and kill off your marines on the colony.
if you have marine barracks on
the enemy colony, then your marines will not tire out and give up.
alien mangament center:
you need these to assimilate enemy
population into your empire at a good speed. these make the assimilation
process twice as faster.
why fighting monsters is quite easy.
use the frigate stucture mentioned above in ship structure, and use this many of these sorts of frigates to attack a monster with.
the destroyers mentioned here
are the creative monster killing destroyers mentioned earlier
monster type number of frigates needed number of destroyers needed
amoeba 6 1
eel 6-8 monster cannot be killed
crystal 8 2
dragon 10 monster cannot be killed
hydra 13 3
note: make sure you have ship
initiatives on otherwise you cannot kill any monsters.
these are little stuff in moo2 that helps if you know them.
to understand how the population
and colony sizes work, simply place the planet size for the x.
planet sizes: (or x values)
1- Tiny
2- Small
3- Medium
4- Large
5-
Huge
colony sizes:
colony type multiplier
gaia 5x
terran 4x
arid 3x
swamp 2x
others (x+1) while (tiny=1x)
tolerant colony sizes:
colony type multiplier
gaia 5x
terran 5x
arid (4x+1) while (tiny=4x)
swamp (3x+1) while (tiny=3x)
others
tiny x+2
small x+2
medium 2x
large 2x
huge 2x+1
aquatic colony sizes:
this pick upgrades tundra and swamps to terran, and
ocean and terran environments
to gaia.
subterranean colony sizes:
this pick increases all colony
sizes by +2x.
regular food per pop:
planet type food per pop
gaia 3
terran 2
arid 1
swamp 2
ocean 2
tundra 1
desert 1
barren 0
radiated 0
toxic 0
note: remember that aquatic upgrades
the food status of all the planets it upgrades.
pollution algorithm:
pollution = (production - 2x)
/ 2 where x is the planet size
creating custom ais:
to create custom ais is quite
easy.
first, start up a hotseat game and create as many races as you would like.
then, after the game starts, save the game on first turn.
go start new game in multiplayer network game, an load the save you just made.
choose the race that you would like to play, and start the game without any other player joining the game.
and voila, after the first turn, the save turns into a one-player game.
normally, if you do not have a
network, you should still be able to start up a network game is you
use windows moo2.
1. Last Race: clicking on last
race freezes game.
2. Anataran Bug: when the Antarans
attack games freezes.
3. Credit Cheat: whenever you build anything, if you dont put anything after teh que list,
you get money paid to you for building something. So you get 2 things (construction and
money) for the price of 1 (construction). To cancel out Credit cheat, simply put housing at
end of build que list, or put a build on repeat. If you put trading after a que list, the credit
cheat still takes place.
4. Leader Bug: whenever you don't have any ships, and you click on ship leader tab in
leaders screen, game freezes.
5. Artifacts Bug: whenever you find an artifacts planet, you better end your turn right
away before anyone else, otherwise that arti planet will dissappear. This includes
monster planets too.
6. Colony Button: sometimes when you click with mouse on the colony button in the
middle, game freezes.
7. Loading save & clicking name: sometimes when you load a save game, and if you click
with mouse on the middle of your emperor name, the game freezes. Click on the race
shield to avoid this.
8. Switching People: when you switch people around from a colony to another colony in
same system, say you have a pop clicked on, and youre about to move him to the next
colony, but you press escape before you do that, that pop will dissappear in the colony
that your mouse was on. And that pop wont be recognized in the game at all. So when you
are at the colony screen, do not press escape before putting down a pop someplace. To
fix the problem, just click on
your pop in the certain planet where the bug is taking place.
12. Automated Factories: if you move your mouse on top of the automated factories in the
planet screen, the game freezes.
9. Battle Screen Edge: sometimes the game freezes, when you take your ships during a
battle, to the edge of teh battle screen. I have only encountered this problem when using
battleships.
10. Double Monsters: sometimes there are more than one monster at a monster planet, so
after you destroy the first one, there's a second or third stronger monster also at the same
system.
11. Ressurrection: sometimes when you fight a monster, and after you win, the next turn
the whole battle ressurects. And you fight the monster again with the same fleet you had at
teh first fight, except the monster fighting again is only stronger. Random might have
something to do with this. Don't
know.
13. Soil bug: after you finish building soil enrichment on a colony, then when you try to
move people from farming to other jobs in colony, sometimes the soil enrichment bonus
dissappears. To correct problem, go to the planet screen, double click on farming to see
how much farming is done, then in the colony screen/planet screen, double click on the
farmers.
To execute the PC codes you must
hold ALT button while typing. I'm not sure about how to do the
mac codes.
PC Codes:
canbeonly1 -alter the counil vote
crunch -finishes building assignment
einstein -gives you all tech
events -disable random events
iseelall -omniscience
menlo -complete current research project
moola -1000 BC
score -see your present score
Macintosh Codes:
asimov -forces game to play itself
bell -reveals races for diplomatic relations
davinci -omniscience
edison -gives you all tech
finish -complete current construction project [colony screen]
gates -completes current research project
intel -antarans attack
score -see your present score
trump -1000 BC