Home » Stars! 2.6/7 » The Academy » How do you like your Germanium? (A discussion of Stars! Race Economy)
| Re: How do you like your Germanium? |
Fri, 10 February 2017 15:09   |
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Quote:PP - Rarely see this race mentioned, though I can imagine that such a race can be very devastating throughout the game.
PP
A mineral packet at warp 13 and a technical reach of 253-ly (84-ly at start, 169-ly the following year) in which everything can be laid to waste without much you can do to protect against it... is a frightening thing.
BUT and as a matter of fact there are several big BUTs:
* ultra driver 13 comes at tech level 24!
* PP is expensive and that's an understatement... it is rather as expensive as not being competitive. An example: for my latest race design as a SD or as a PP (all other things except PRT the same) there are 183pts difference in the race wizard. 183 pts is a really huge difference.
* throwing minerals is very expensive, at least it should be free and without an extra fee
Thus the general opinion is that the PRT Packet Physics (PP) is rather a broken PRT and not competitive.
SD
The difference in pts needed in the race wizard does also show why SD on the other hand is usually used as a very heavy HP design. The PRT is cheap and thus allows for exceptional good economic settings while at the same time with all those blasting mines having a superb deterrence mostly allowing to grow in peace in the long early weak HP-growing-phase until developed, strong and ready to strike.
Quote:ECONOMIC PRTs
CA - IS - IT - JoAT
WAR PRTs
PP - SD - SS - WM
Yeah, the PRTs used to be sorted that way but nowadays with so many more tried and tested approaches and IMHO it rather depends on playing style and what you are doing with the PRTs and how.
CA
If you are the diplo-minded player, CA is, of course, your thing because everybody loves you and wants those terraformers. Another reason, apart from the economic power, that HP-players like to use CA because you have a good chance of peace until you are ready to strike.
IT - JoaT
IT can be played every way: aggressively, defensively, HP, HG...
Together with JoaT, for which the same is true, I wouldn't call them economic or warfare PRTs but rather the most versatile PRTs.
And while PP can be considered broken due to the PRT too expensive, JoaT is on the other range and can be called broken because it is too cheap (when counting in the pts gained from taking NAS).
S-S
Super-Stealth applies to the sneaky minded players and normally the PRT should force you to play aggressively: after all your planets aren't stealthed but your fleets but then again the PRT is rather expensive, the tech boni work only well with good research values and this often enough leading to rather weak economic settings resulting in a too weak design for war. Thus very often the super-stealth player finds himself in the role as a support ally.
HE
Available race designs for the HE show probably the best my point about how difficult it is to declare a PRT to be economic or warlike. In the olden times, there was a fearful 3-immune-hyper-production design which was deemed so strong that it was usually banned (like the CA nowadays). Then the HG-designs were invented and developed and nobody bothered anylonger to ban the 3i-HE nor bothered to play them because they proved to be easy and early prey for those HG-designs.
After years of HE-absence in most games, some time ago ccmaster developed an HE design which is the exact opposite of the old 3i-design, it is very very fast and tends to crush over its neighbours like a tsunami. Glory to the inventive minds of the Stars-players!
Shame that the result is to ban it now in so many games instead of seeing it as a challenge. But I might be biased as an enthusiastic IT-HG-player. If there is a nightmare opponent for a QS-HE, then it is very probably the HG-IT. Or, well, let's say it this way, at least I always had the feeling of having a good fighting-chance when encountering this HE-monster instead of feeling the sheer terror of being crushed by the tsunami.
WM
Probabyl the most misunderstood PRT and as usual due to the players who liked to play it often enough in the past. There is a superb art
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[Updated on: Fri, 10 February 2017 15:16] Report message to a moderator
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