by chadisfred
So, I've played a few rounds on the board and on iOS. Now that I have a general understanding of game play and pace, I decided to try out a science-only strategy to see how that would play out.Preface:
I did not win the 6v6 play, ended up in 4th. I played an all human match and did not go with an alien race more suited to research (We are still playing human only on Eclipse nights — Players are still learning just as I am, so i figured i'd stick with humans as I want to try in bring this strategy to the board)
Tiles:
I first expanded 2 inner tiles in front of my home tile, trying to set the warps to force opponents through the galactic centre to reach me. Of course, this was wishful thinking and only worked slightly. Worm hole generators ended up being a major hindrance.
I then expand the rest of the game with outer tiles to remain as far from battle as possible.
Economy:
ideally I was looking to maximize science. I realized early on that utilizing this science-only method could lead to a robust economy due to how quickly I'd reached advanced economic tiles. My economic priorities were science, money, then materials.
Researching:
The first thing I did was look to get advanced science economy, followed by orbitals, then look to other advanced economy tiles / artifact keys, and finally into monoliths.
I was fortunate to get advance labs quickly, which I followed up with orbitals as soon as possible. I then realized I'd required more resources, so I'd colonized as many material plants / researched advanced mining as soon as I could. From there I'd gone for the artifact key, advanced economy and good ol' advance robotics / quantum grid.
Rational / Results:
getting as much science / money in the beginning helped greatly. I'd been able to get orbitals quite quickly which allow me to immediately start getting VP / additional science / materials for building more orbitals and then more monoliths. By the 7th round I had the strongest economy and the lowest influence pay (due to quantum grid / robotics which were easily obtained). Artifact key was also beneficial in allowing me to quickly start my building phases as materials were the resource I lacked the most often in the beginning.
I felt very confident I was on my way to victory having made diplomatic relations with my 3 neighbouring races. SO HOW DID I MESS IT UP. Well, I didn't build any defence. I should have built star bases with maxed out plasma missiles and +2 role, but I didn't… One of the neighbouring races attacked me, going against our diplomacy, and stole two primary resource hexes. The final 2 rounds were spent spending / upgrading / and then building anti-plasma missile set-up dreds which allowed me to destroy the offending neighbouring races dreds. HOWEVER, I had neglected to research neutron bombs as I'd figured I would not have to take over any neighbour tiles… A critical error.
There you have it, just thought I'd present this on here, get some feed back for how I'd played it, recommendations for building a defensive colony.