Andromeda Strained

Exploration and conquest in a spiral galaxy.

Game Parameters

Up to 16 players will be allowed. Intermediate and Advanced skill players are welcome, so if you are a rookie then beware!

Map Size: Large
Density: SPARSE
Player Positions: Distant
Acelerated BBS Play enabled, no other check boxes will be checked.
Random Events will be Off. (added Dec. 18)

Gens will occur on a fixed schedule three times a week.

PRT Restrictions

CA will not be allowed.
JOAT CANNOT take the OBRM or NAS lrts.
IT is also banned as a PRT for the regular players. (added Dec. 18)

Other Restrictions/Rules

The game will be played in a galaxy remapped to a spiral. A sample game with the map to be used will be available to anyone who requests it.

Travel across the space between the arms will not be allowed except by gating. If you don't have a gate on the other side, you will need to fly along your arm to the core and then up the other arm.
Ships will not be allowed more than 25LY from the nearest edgeworld into the gap between the galaxy arms. (added Dec. 18)

The Host will be playing a neutral and technologically advanced race inhabiting the core area known as the Grol. To put them in the 'technologically advanced' status, 50 turns will be generated prior to the active players being allowed to submit turns. The Grol will be acting as a universal trading partner as well as a 'travel assistant'. They will provide technology, minerals, unarmed ships and usage of stargates to anyone in the game - for a price. The Grol will be establishing gates at the end point of each galaxy arm, but will remain in the core area otherwise. The Grol will not get actively involved in any conflict except to defend or reaquire their starting worlds (should a player decide to attack them).

Chaff will not be allowed.
The split-fleet dodge will not be allowed.
All other cheats will also be banned. If you aren't sure, ASK.

No player will be allowed more than a single ally and a single NAP.

The victor will be the race whose overwhelming might and majestic fleets cause the majority of the others to quail in fear and beg for their worthless lives.

Race files will be due on or before the first of January. Slots are available on a first come-first served basis with preference given to players of Who Needs Super Stealth, Locked in the Closet or The Crucible.

Please direct all questions and comments to me here so that everyone can view them and reply.

Please send passworded race files and the password to jaysmith@xprt.net.


[Mod edit: added 3 additional rules, see red text.]

[Updated on: Sun, 18 December 2005 07:53] by Moderator

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The_Crowd wrote on Fri, 02 December 2005 09:53

I don't see how I could. Playing HE in this game isn't going to be easy - there's no doubt. Just remember though that this is all about the Pop. Players will not be given the opportunity to set production prior to those 50 years, so all you will be losing as HE will be the resources gained from pop that's 500k instead of a mil or so. Jay

Possible idea, let HE set initial orders. But this poses some issues with perhaps giving them a large initial advantage (minerals, tech).

Hmm... The lost research into energy is no big deal, it's the pop difference that hurts.

Here's another idea. Maybe let them move the default colonizer ships (claim ONE other world blindly, with no default orders), but not set the planetary queue or change tech or move the scout. They could use the starting 3 colonizers, one to colonize and the other 2 to go round trip moving pop (hey, every little bit helps, lol, 25 trips * 2k col = 50k transported over 50 years). This would help to even out the post 50 starting pop with possibly 2 worlds at ~ 66% - 80% capacity depending on growth rate and immunities or no. Perhaps the host does this for the HE player(s) to speed up getting the game going and for ease of enforcement, he just picks a random world one hop away.

A weaker form of the above is to lump all 3 colonizers into one fleet and colonize one world (3k starting pop). This would yield a bit extra pop at the end of 50 years depending on growth rate.

Even with this pop aid, lack of gates will cause big pains to HE through out the game, as this is a rather gate oriented game.

Anyway, those are my ideas in providing a viable HE starting position

[Updated on: Mon, 05 December 2005 12:41]

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Hi!

The_Crowd wrote on Tue, 06 December 2005 05:54

Yeah, IT is going to be a pain. And since huge gateable missile fleets would dominate the map and skew things horribly, I think the best thing to do is ban them.

Good idea IMO . IT gets just too much advantages in such an uni.

Without IT, chaff and with big distances between planets in a large sparse I'd chose IS for this game . Those distances would just make them landing with more pop, and the Jammer 50 would also make wonders against missiles. But the protection of their flying orgy would be quite more difficult, as the no-chaff rule is also excluding the freighter chaff.

A 3-immune HE with 5% PGR and OBRM would get in 50 turns about 275k pop on a secondary planet, if it would be colonized with 3k from initiall 3 Spore Clouds, and 464k on its primary. Other races with OBRM and 18% PGR would get about 1000k in the same time (19% JoaT 1200k). So the colonizing seems a good solution to the HE's pop disadvantage, however I'd still reconsider using the HE in this game. Despite an ally are distances quite big for a gateless race.

Maybe you could allow the CA for this game. With so rare planets they've already lost quite a lot on it's expansion advantage. You could allow it, but demand a strong handicap on them. Like: decrease PGR when the race is finished, no TT, bio cheap and an immunity. No TT is obvious, so bio cheap takes 150 points for nothing, and an immunitly lessens their instaforming advantage. Even with such requirements I'm able to put together a playable race, just not so strong and fast the CAs usually are.

Just my .
BR, Iztok

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Count me in. Expected game start coincides close enough to my return from my Xmas trip to Europe (Finland, UK, Holland + Japan!)

The worlds won't be as far apart as Large+Sparse normally means because the spiral remapping will reduce the distance between a star and it's neighbours, so CA would still be very nasty. I say keep 'em banned. They are no fun anyway, I found that out in ARM2. Ultra-powerful but dull as watching paint dry.

Just a hint for the game setup - if anyone does play HE, then the 'setup-host' needs to make sure the default build queue is empty when sending those colonisers on their colony mission otherwise the colony will develop!

Good call banning IT.

IS seems kinda obvious. So there probably won't be any. Except me, maybe, since I seem to have become a IS specialist lately :/ hmmm

PP could be fun - they will get a nice boost out of the 'no orders' start - all that en research will give them some nice drivers early and with IT gone they will be the only 2 planet starting races. Although they are weak against IS so maybe not a bright idea after all...

Will we get a spiral arm each? I assume steps be taken to ensure start positions are fair (it would not be fun if one player got an arm to themselves and everyone else had to share

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Also, can we either ban random events or have the setup-host check all the HW at the end of the 50 year start to ensure none have been hit by negative random events. Took me several minutes to figure out why one of my tests performed so badly... 80% hab HW

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Count me in too. Although any chance of a slightly later start. I think a few people might be back late from the New Year holidays. I don't see necessary to ban IT but maybe ban their infinite gates. Since can't gate across arms, shouldn't be a problem.

I would also prefer one arm per player (or at least same # of players per spiral) and no random events. From the past few games, random events have been too unbalancing. also, there is the issue of chasing MT across arms...

Lastly, any chance you can send me a remapped spiral galaxy as i would like to understand what it looks like.

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PricklyPea wrote on Tue, 06 December 2005 14:03

I asked to avoid in game disputes. e.g. IS croby FF could easily act as chaff (or any FF horde design for that matter).

Ah, that old chestnut.

Say Croby FF has 340 d.p. So against any high accuracy Arm missile it will act as chaff.
In a battle between first shot Arm BBs it will make all the difference.
But in a battle betwen Arm Nubs it won't make a jot of difference.

I would have no problem with someone having a Croby FF horde in the BB era. If they had laser/yaks on them instead of bazookas that might be a different story.

No point trying to draw a line in the sand.
People know what chaff is.
If someone wants to argue about a strange design they are using then it probably means they are sailing too close to the edge.

No chaff sweeping of minefields either ?
So how many DD's can I send across a speed bump minefield ?

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mazda wrote on Tue, 06 December 2005 10:51

No chaff sweeping of minefields either ? So how many DD's can I send across a speed bump minefield ?

If there is no chaff, you can't have chaff sweeping. Period. However, that doesn't mean you can't collision sweep with unarmed ships unless the rules state it. This is just one fine example of the can of worms being opened.

Banning split fleet dodge...now that is a host headache. Frankly, it ain't worth banning IMO. There is a serious disadvantage to breaking apart fleets, so there is no reason to ban it.

Otherwise, nice idea for a game.

-Matt

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mlaub wrote on Tue, 06 December 2005 12:11

Banning split fleet dodge...now that is a host headache. Frankly, it ain't worth banning IMO. There is a serious disadvantage to breaking apart fleets, so there is no reason to ban it.

What constitutes a split fleet dodge?

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PricklyPea wrote on Tue, 06 December 2005 11:30

mlaub wrote on Tue, 06 December 2005 12:11 Banning split fleet dodge...now that is a host headache. Frankly, it ain't worth banning IMO. There is a serious disadvantage to breaking apart fleets, so there is no reason to ban it. What constitutes a split fleet dodge?

Exactly. With or without chaff, you will need to write the rules very clearly, and there could be pages of them. For example, I yoyo cruiser sweepers into main groups, so that I can share fuel, protect them, and easily keep them with the fleet without to much work. So...what if my enemy tries to intercept my fleet, and ends up taking out 1 cruiser?

I have seen so many examples of split fleet dodge being inadvertantly used, that I simply started allowing it in games I have hosted in the past. I say deal with it, learn strategy, or go after his planets. Planets don't dodge.

-Matt

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vonKreedon wrote on Tue, 06 December 2005 12:29

I think that the issue for Chaff is not the design, but the use. If an IS player is fielding a horde of Croby FFs with Yaks, but no missile ships then this is not Chaff.

Soooo untrue. Croby frigates w/Yaks are chaff "and" warship wrapped together, but they are legit. It is much easier, I think, to just draw a line somewhere. Say something like "wolverine shielded or better scout/frigates with Bazookas are not chaff, all else is." Frankly, without set limitations there will always be someone who pushes your interpretation of the rules.

Quote:

OTOH, if this horde of FFs is combined with Doomer BBs then that would be Chaff.

No. Frignaugts can hold up against cruisers/BC's because they are lighter, and move last. This means that r1 frignaughts against r2 cruisers, and r2 frignaughts against r3 cruisers can be a good tactic. Remember, IS weapons are 25% more expensive, so using a tactic that utilizes cheaper weapons is "smart" not a cheat. Makes it tough to say "hey, that's chaff!". Plus, they can use smaller 100kt gates with no damage.

Quote:

About Chaff sweeping, I think you need a definitive pronouncement on this else you could find someone fielding masses of low cost scouts containing just an engine and using them to crash an opponent's MFs. The scouts would not be traditional or freighter Chaff, but they would be a cheap and quick way to take down MFs.

It's called "Collision Sweeping"...

-Matt

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[Updated on: Tue, 06 December 2005 18:18]

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vonKreedon wrote on Tue, 06 December 2005 17:17

Collision Sweeping/Chaff Sweeping/Crash Sweeping... tomAto/tOmato.

Close, but no. "Chaff sweeping" implies the use of chaff to sweep minefields. Chaff is forbidden in this game. He defined chaff as, and I quote, "'Chaff' is any large group of ships designed with the express purpose of attracting missile fire to protect more important vessels...If you put out a bunch with a single weapon and no armor/shields...etc". No mention of "Collision Sweeping" in any form that I can find in the rules, ergo it must be OK to use unarmed ships for that purpose so long as they won't attract missile from more important ships.

Should I muddy the water and mention that unarmed freighters, colonizers, and bombers are yet another varient of chaff, depending on enemy orders? You could read what he wrote different ways, and come to different conclusions about his definition of chaff.

However, he makes no mention of minefield eradication via collision sweeping, and since an unarmed scout/frigate does not fit into any "chaff" catagory by his definition (Attracts no missiles from more important ships, has no weapon), it must be OK to use unless he defines it further.

-Matt "rule monger"

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mazda wrote on Wed, 07 December 2005 02:51

I would have no problem with someone having a Croby FF horde in the BB era. If they had laser/yaks on them instead of bazookas that might be a different story. No point trying to draw a line in the sand. People know what chaff is. If someone wants to argue about a strange design they are using then it probably means they are sailing too close to the edge. No chaff sweeping of minefields either ? So how many DD's can I send across a speed bump minefield ?

Currently in a very enjoyable game hosted by Pirate Lord (115 years in) where chaff is banned. Definition is:

"Chaff is when you deliberately create a fleet of relatively cheap, armed vessels for the sole purpose of being used as cannon fodder."

All involved have acted in the spirit of this definition.

Chaff sweeping is banned. In the spirit of this no-one has, so far as I am aware, collision swept any minefields either.

As to legitimate sweeping activities, I have frequently had DD's sweeping minefields in all manner of configurations. None have complained since my DD's are clearly designed for that purpose and that is their predominant activity. I've sent anything up to about 15-20 DD fleets in to a minefield at a time. It's clearly not chaff sweeping as I'm not following up with an attack the same year, nor are they all diving in at full bore speeds W9-10. It's straightforward to see the difference between aggressive sweeping and chaff sweeping.

Getting back to the general chaff issue, I agree with your statement that

"People know what chaff is."

Hence it is incumbent on each player not to place themselves in a position where others may feel they've overstepped the spirit of the chaff ban.

It certainly seems to be working in current game with not one complaint I'm aware of.


Sulpholobus.

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