How do you know when you are a newbie?

[Aloofi]

How do you know when you are a newbie?

1- When you start colonizing the system next door, and in turn 80 you find out that your colonies have no population.

2- When you ask yourself who the hell is that guy with a 1930s hat that is telling you that your best ship have been blown out by some race you didn't even know existed.

3- When you expend half an hour trying to find the spy buttom.

4- When you conquer a tiny enemy planet with a mighty fleet, and then order your fleet to conquer the next closest planet, and when you are there you find out that your zillion troops were left behind back at the first planet.

5- When after being crushed by the AI, you restart a new game, this time with all technologies researched, and you say to the AI between your teeth "now I'm gonna kick your ***", and then design a Dreadnaught with the best technology avaliable and order its construction right away in your homeworld, but by turn 10 when your Dreadnaught is half built, a lowly enemy Escort comes and glass your homeworld.

6- When you discover that transports have only half maintenance cost and then send a troop transport loaded with fighters to raid an enemy system.

7- When you try to find out why your escort that is exploring 10 systems away from your closest resuply facility is moving only one little square per turn.

8- When you lose your patience trying to change the atmosphere of a Hydrogen Gas giant to None.

9- When you try to unmothball those expensive Battleships that you mothballed in orbit of a planet that only have 3 mineral mining facilities in it.

10- When you try to recover those mines that you just deployed at the wrong warp point.

.

[mottlee]

I'm no "newbie" however I have done some of these http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon8.gif

[edit] spelling

[ May 21, 2003, 17:56: Message edited by: mottlee ]

[Gryphin]

How do you know when you are a newbie?
1- When you start colonizing the system next door, and in turn 80 you find out that your colonies have no population. <font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">-Well, I just did it in the Phun Challenge. I found it on turn 32 because I was desperate for minerals.

2- When you expend half an hour trying to find the spy buttom.
<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">-Um, Is there one?

3- When you conquer a tiny enemy planet with a mighty fleet, and then order your fleet to conquer the next closest planet, and when you are there you find out that your zillion troops were left behind back at the first planet.
<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">-I hope I never do that again. Especially in the Phun Challenge where planet capture is the only way. No Glassing allowed.

6- When you discover that transports have only half maintenance cost and then send a troop transport loaded with fighters to raid an enemy system. <font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Is this true? Is it true for Colony ships? If is does not apply to Colony ships then you could exploit a “feature” and build your colony ships in Transports.

I wonder if you are no longer a newbie if you write replies reminiscing about the days you were a newbie.

[Aloofi]

Come on guys, this was suppose to be funny!!
These are some of the things I have done, and I'm pretty sure some of you have stories to add to this thread.
Or are you going to tell me that you never tried to recover a mine? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

[Ruatha]

Originally posted by Aloofi:

Or are you going to tell me that you never tried to recover a mine? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif <font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Ofcourse I've tried it, it was mine after all!

[ May 21, 2003, 21:21: Message edited by: Ruatha ]

[Gryphin]

Yes I did but it was not one I placed there. An AI surrendered to me and I wanted to remove them for humanitarian reasons.

Took several turns and searching the forum to figure it out

[ May 21, 2003, 21:37: Message edited by: Gryphin ]

[Power Man]

How about sending in your Huge 20+ ship fleet to attack a planet. You end up with almost half your fleet gone and the planet still in enemy hands.
Why ?

Most of your fleet were sweepers or support ships with no wepons. They all took off for the corners leaving too few actual fighting ships to take over the planet or even knock out the defences. (which turned out to be WAY More than you expected.)

[Fyron]

6- When you discover that transports have only half maintenance cost <font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">They certainly do not in stock SE4. Some mods have maintenance bonuses on such vehicles, but stock does not. Only bases get maintenance bonuses in stock SE4.

[Narrew]

hey!!! how can I colonize a planet with no population?

and, I am still so new, that I am making these mistakes, just not brave enough to admit it yet.

and yea, where is the spy button?

[Ed Kolis]

If you mean send population to a colony that has none, you need to load some population on a transport (any ship with cargo storage will do) and drop the population at the colony. You have to own the colony, though - you can't send population to an empty colony that someone else owns, for some reason. And you can't just dump population on a planet that NOBODY owns - that's what colony ships are for.

The spy button is located on the Empires window (click on the little white alien guy). It will be grayed out until you actually meet some other races.

[Narrew]

how did the planet get zero pop in the first place? I mean can you colonize with no people on the colony ship?

[Ragnarok]

Originally posted by Narrew:
how did the planet get zero pop in the first place? I mean can you colonize with no people on the colony ship?<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">No you cannot. You have to load population onto the colony ship first. I bet what you did is ordered the ship to "move to" the planet and then colonize. If the ship is in orbit of the planet you built it at and you select the "Colonize" button instead of the move to order, then it will automatically load the population. But if you select "Move to" first and then do the colonize button, you have to manually load the population onto the ship. We've all made this mistake many times. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

[Krsqk]

Even "oldies" can make this mistake when they use their colony ships as scouts. Select the ship; click "Warp"; select the destination; ship moves on it merry way without a single soul on board except the captain, who's screaming at Central Command to get some bodies up here... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

It's almost as much fun as designing mine sweepers with mine laying components. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon8.gif

[teal]

Originally posted by Gryphin:
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif"> 6- When you discover that transports have only half maintenance cost and then send a troop transport loaded with fighters to raid an enemy system. <font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Is this true? Is it true for Colony ships? If is does not apply to Colony ships then you could exploit a “feature” and build your colony ships in Transports.
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I usually put my colony ships in transport hulls for two reasons. 1) I usually like the transport picture better on the shipsets I like. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif and 2) If you change the name of your colony ship class often then it keeps your opponent guessing as to whether any particular ship is a colony ship or a mine laying transport... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif The colony ship and transport hulls cost identical amounts.

[Gryphin]

teal,
Reason 1) Ok, I'll go with that.
Reason 2) I could be wrong but I expect that most folks don't think about what is on board that Transport. They will treat it the same no matter what since it could be a juicey pop transport, a mildly dangerous mine layer, or a lone suicide troop ship out looking for a new colony for easy pickings. Keep in mind that Destroyers can be a colony ship. Once I have Light Cruiser that is the only hull I use for my colony ships.

[Loser]

Originally posted by Gryphin:
Once I have Light Cruiser that is the only hull I use for my colony ships.<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Is there any reason, any advantage to continue using Colony Ship hulls?

[teal]

Originally posted by Loser:
Is there any reason, any advantage to continue using Colony Ship hulls?<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Keeping in mind that I totally suck at empire design... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

In my latest game I found that only my homeworld could build a LC colony ship in 2 turns, all the rest of my worlds required 3 turns. But they could build a colony ship hull colony ship in 2 turns. But I don't think I bump up my construction rate as much as I should. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

[ May 22, 2003, 13:33: Message edited by: teal ]

[Mark the Merciful]

OK, example from my most recent King of the Hill game.

Having built three of my bright shiny new minelayer class, only then did I realise that I'd designed it without engines...

And I remember thinking, when doing the design, that they seemed to manage an impressive amount of cargo space.

[Aloofi]

In Proportions you have no choice but to use the Colony ship hull, which have a wooping 1800 Kts http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

More newbie things i did:

1- I built Mineral Mining Facilities in 23% mineral yield planets. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif
2- I wasted good mineral planets building research facilities.
3- I let my fighters run out of supplies.... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif