Master Of Orion Iii

[keenduck]

For those not following the Master of Orion series (MOO), Master of Orion III went gold Jan. 24th and will be released (hopefully) on February 25th.

Rather than brave the official forums full of whining about the month of waiting, I came here. :)

So, anybody play the originals (MOO I and MOO II)? I still have MOO I on my hard drive and still play it a lot. Pretty much like a lot of good old games (Civ III wasn't better than Civ II).

More Info:
http://moo3.quicksilver.com/ - Developer's Site
http://www.orionsector.com/ - Fansite

[Kevin]

I still play MOO and MOO II, mostly MOO II though. MOO III is mostly new people developing it (I think there is one guy on the team that worked on the earlier projects could be wrong on this point though) and I am a little leary of that. Some of the changes they made worry me a bit, some of them are things I like (I like the idea of starlanes and they seem to be going back to the MOO version of the resource allocation as opposed to the MOO II way, which I like). It will be awhile before I take a look at it though. Those games eat a lot of time for me, and I don't have the time to invest in it right now. I am actually glad for the delay, the time was used streamlining things and not because it wasn't a working product. This will help avoid major game altering patches (though I still expect 3 or 4 patches). We'll see. But I won't be getting it before there are plenty of reviews up about it.

[Taeme]

First, I am definitely looking forward to MoO3. Supposedly the graphics are a little worse, but the betatesters I know of (from SA) have said the game is very solid and enjoyable.

I played MoO1 and MoO2 extensively, but in different eras. After MoO2 came out, I played a ton of MoO1, since I stunk at MoO2! I have probably beaten the game with every race several times. It's amazing how huge the differences between the races was in that game. The Alkari and Mrrshan were terrible, and some of the other races had ridiculously huge race bonuses.

I got MoO2 when I got a new computer (years ago) and I've played it, like the first, extensively. It's strange. MoO2 is just ... wow, so broken. The game is so insanely easy except on, I think the hardest difficulty, it's funny. At first I found the game difficult, but years of playing Magic and other mindgames got me sharp enough to exploit every weakness in that game. It's shocking how easy you fall into traps like over-spending your taxes or under-exploiting planetary development in early systems. Things like "Oh, that one is rich radiated, but that poor terran looks ok ..." I didn't catch myself making the mistakes when I was younger.

MoO1 and 2 were both rather easy, and I'd have to say -- I love both of them. They're actually pretty different and I've wasted enough on both of them to say I don't think 2 was worse than 1. Just different.

[WarBlade]

I'm looking forward to MoO3. It will be the first game purchase for me since LoD. :lol:

I played MoO2 extensively, developed a tactic that could "crush all opposition beneath my heel", setting stupidly high scores on the upper difficulties and mourned the lack of a final patch to solve some remaining bugs. Nice game though. I really loved it.

I never played MoO, nor for that matter did I ever bother to download it's predecessor (Yes there was an Orion turn-based strat game with some corney name that escapes me for the moment - think it had "Antares " in it - that preceded the Master of Orion series). I also played Master of Magic a lot (MoO's sister game with Elf and Orc armies, sorcerers, giffins etc.) and I still drag it out from time to time for a play.

It's a pity Simtex keeled over. They made fantastic games. Another victim of feature creep. :(

[Virgil Tibbs]

So, anybody play the originals (MOO I and MOO II)? I still have MOO I on my hard drive and still play it a lot. Pretty much like a lot of good old games (Civ III wasn't better than Civ II).

MoO 1 and 2 were lots of fun. I played 2 mostly and liked that slightly better, although some of the changes between 1 and 2 I did not like (a bit too heavy on the micromanagement in 2).

My biggest problem with MoO2 was that I unfortunately developed a strategy that just about always wins against comps, even in impossible mode. I suppose if I ever get back to the game I'd better use some good old fashioned Diablo "variant" thinking to put the challenge back in. :D

The strategy is two-fold:

1) use a custom race. I pick the least significant drawbacks that fit my heavy research style (LG homeworld, -10 combat, -10 spying). For benefits I usually either use one of these two:

creative, subterranean, large home world, cybernetic... these guys start of kind of slow but pick up steam due to the high population.

creative, democracy, large homeworld, artifact homeworld... especially if you start at low tech, these guys advance fast. The drawback is, until you build lots of spies, you will be getting tech stolen by the turn. And sometimes some pinheads will blow up your space station, which can slow you down early on. If you get lucky and one of the other races has the subterranean trait, try to conquer some of their people and transfer the alien colonists to your own worlds. This effectively gives you the trait free with only the cost of building some alien control centers.

In both cases I leave the extra point to improve my score slightly.

2) trade with everyone you can: by giving any comp race (except repulsive ones, of course) two tech advances, they will become very open to trade and research treaties. I usually give out useless techs such as security stations, dauntless guidance, ship labs (forget the name), death spores (which the comp never uses), etc...

If you can get 4+ races onboard the treaty train, it gives you a huge edge in cash and research (I always play 8 player so this works well for me).

After doing all this it's just a matter of doing a lot research, expanding to easily available colonies, and avoiding wars until you are ready (pretty easy, because trading partners tend to stay very friendly... only the repulsives will give you trouble).

Tibbs

[WarBlade]

My tactics are a little different . . .

I love the idea of a cybernetic race. I take it a step further and build The Borg. :D

Cybernetic, Telepathic, Industry +1, Farming -1, Unification Government and Uncreative IIRC.

The tactics are fairly straight forward. Build up, colonise, make contact. The Industry bonus gets the first colonies happening quickly, while the farming penalty hardly has any impact at all considering the half and half food requirements of Cybernetics.

I deviate from Star Trek's Borg in that I always make a uniform agreement from the outset. You get four negotiation attempts upon first contact and almost always fail one. That's ok. I only want three. Trade, Research, Non-Agression Pact. And from then on your victim is on near-permanent 'ignore'.

Military, and this is where it starts getting silly. I get Assasult Shuttles at all costs. It's the ultimate weapon. I make two classes of ship; a combat vessel and an assimilation vessel. Asimilation makes up the bulk of the force and Combat has more to do with missile defence and space monsters. The assimilation ships are packed out with Assasult Shuttles and whatever defences I can find. When large packs of Assault Shuttles bear down on the enemy, the enemy will always run or self destruct. Silly eh?

Well that is except for the Antarans . . .

And there's the key. Right around the time the races are gaining Zortrium Armour, I'm intercepting Antaran scoutcraft and assimilating them. After the fight I simply sell them off and 1 to 3 pieces of Antaran tech becomes mine. All I really need is Xentronium Armour and Damper Fields. A year later in game time I'm fielding Battleships of near-Antaran Calibre while the other races are becoming strong enough to repell Antaran vessels a couple of hull sizes smaller. A complete walkover ensues.

And that's it really.

Being uncreative is kind of fun. You have to play the hand you are delt and some of the results are hilarious. There was one game I had where no races developed targeting computers of any kind until well after Neutronium Armour started geting around. So I fielded missile boats packed with missiles or torpedoes while the other races continued building their same old cliched junk piles with all the heavy duty beam armaments that could barely score a hit at point blank range! :lol:

Being uncreative is hardly a problem either considering you can research your own limited options and steal everything the enemy ever puts in their ships. Telepathic yields a spy bonus and Unification Governments making spy defences very tight allowing for more spys to be distributed afar much earlier and I can usually assimilate a fair bit before the enemy battle fleet turns up. Most of the technology advances are stolen from the other races.

Cybernetic helps my ships last the distance, giving time for the Assault Shuttles to do their work.

Telepathic means I don't have to bother much with troop transports.

Unification means I can mix and match the races to exploit the best abilities of each, like adding Sakkra to a world just to flesh out the population and maybe have them as farmers. Androids are as good as any race too because I don't get access to the 'hapiness'(name escapes me) bonuses anyway. I often wind up three races represented in most colonies.

I usually give out useless techs such as security stations, dauntless guidance, ship labs (forget the name), death spores (which the comp never uses), etc...

Not true. They do use death spores rarely. It's easily defeated though, if androids are acceptable. I must say it's very strange being left with a colony with no inhabitants if you force the enemy out after they kill the people. IIRC you have about 6 turns to re-inhabit the vacated world before all the structures on it cease to exist and it becomes a bare planet again. (It could be 10 turns)

[Kevin]

I used to go the tech route, but I now go the produciton/population route.

Unification, subter, -1 farming (unification has a bonus that complete negates that), +2 production, and depending on the other negatives I take, a large home world, or a rich homeworld. You can even get away with a +1 production because of the uni advantages.

You go for tech that makes you build faster, auto factories, robo miners, deep core miners, and the stuff that helps you research so you don't lag to far back, spying tech, and pollution control tech to help with the massive amounts of pollution that huge work force will make. You steal what you don't have, you use missle boats early since you ignore the computer tech until later. But when you can make a titan class ship when they are first available in like 10 turns when it takes other races 20-30, that is huge, you can swarm everything, you can take Orion with just some well designed cruisers and battleships (missle are pointless against it though) and the tech advantage that gives you is huge. But even tiny poor planets will have so much production that you can produce anything from anywhere. You make artificial planets and if you are willing to spend a little money (which you get tons of from all the trade goods you can make) early you can buy a couple of the production plants, and in about 20 turns have a fully functional, fully terraformed planet that can not start making you money or weapons and you only had to spend a couple of thousand from the treasury on some early building stuff.

It makes CPU's on impossible a joke to defeat as well. I don't bother to assimilate anyone since I can have my own people have the planet up and running after I have wiped them all out. If you go with warlord for the genetic mutation then you can huge huge huge fleets at the end of the game too. Of course you can often win with just battleship stage tech since you can just keep pumping out the ships and you always get Orion and nice armor first.

I have also seen that being repulsive against the CPU isn't that big of a deal since they seem more tolerant of you spying on them and having little skirmashes with them. It seems that if you had any treaty and you get caught spying you are attacked instantly, and I seem to get more random declarations made against me by races that I have a treaty with as well. Of course you do lose money and you do lose research points, especially the early ones, but I haven't had any real troubles because of that. It seems I get more megawealthy leaders if I am repulsive as well. I guess they are hiding from the tax collectors or something.

So, I guess with all the various replies there are several strats that can let you just munch the CPU if you want

[Virgil Tibbs]

So, I guess with all the various replies there are several strats that can let you just munch the CPU if you want

Wow, looks like the computer is dumber than I thought. I suppose it begs the question, what sort of tactics work well in human vs. human games? I have to admit, the assault shuttle strategy would probably kick my ass, as my ships rely on heavy armor, battle scanners (with those and a fair targetting comp almost every weapon hits at long range, even against races with the +50% defense), heavy beam weapons (with some point defense for missiles), and the cybernetics bonus if I have it.

It seems with the "Borg" mentioned above, that although you have a very good advantage (probably one of the best) early on, you'd need to win before the end game. I don't think assault shuttles would work well against a combo of lightning shields and the ultra-small point defense techs (like autofire pd phasers). Also, once morale bonuses start getting really high (with all the the tech they are about 80% IIRC) unification gov't would be a draw back.

Unfortunately, the one time I tried playing MoO2 multi-player it crashed constantly and the turn waits were painfully slow. :(

Tibbs

[Drasca]

I get war declared against me for spying I didn't do (framed) far more often than spying I do. If I have a treaty or two with, oh say the Psilons, and they're spying on me as well (usually), they don't seem to mind too much.

Regardless, Moo2 can be easily steam-rolled with an uberfied, umm customized race :D

The big three are obvious: Creative (triple tech), Subterranean (+max pop = +max everything else, except feeding them) and Telepathic (+spy, instant colony/ship capture, & diplomatic bonus). I find next most useful are Omniscient (know everything! beeline to best planets and counter enemy ship movements), +combat / spying, and +research combined with democracy (uber research bonus), +industry with unification (spy, capture and conquer for tech).

Aquatic, Cybernetic, Tolerant, and warlord are all also useful, but cost vs benefit is a little high for me. Cybernetic, requiring industry on every planet for natural growth is rough. Food can be transported, but not industry.

Of course, I like to just play for style sometimes. An "Oriental" type: Feudal Warlord, with a production problem, but with spy bonuses and possibly +population growth and/or +farming. An agricultural feudal society with spies, antiquated industry, and focus on military.

[WarBlade]

It seems with the "Borg" mentioned above, that although you have a very good advantage (probably one of the best) early on, you'd need to win before the end game. I don't think assault shuttles would work well against a combo of lightning shields and the ultra-small point defense techs (like autofire pd phasers). Also, once morale bonuses start getting really high (with all the the tech they are about 80% IIRC) unification gov't would be a draw back.

Actually the Shuttles really come into their own at the end of the game. As soon as the Guardian is defeated, Death Rays come into play and from that point on you can nullify your enemy's onboard security completely, so you only need one shuttle to get through to take the ship. The Telepathic Race advantage also means you can keep the ship around to assist ie. you assimilate the enemy ships and then use them against the enemy in that same battle. At the very end of the game you can assimilate an entire enemy battle fleet of 100 ships in the space of about 2 or 3 combat turns. :blink:

Autofire PD Phasors don't get a look in either. The enemy just turns and runs without firing a shot (unless you're still on slow engine tech), so the real trick is to get the Assimilation Carriers close enough to get them before they run. At the end of the game teleporting ships and those time compression generators (whatever they're called) added to the fastest engine tech quickly fixes that. Transporters on enemy ships are fun too - Just wipe out the marines with death rays, slip the Assault Shuttles in and then leap frog those same forces to a second enemy ship with what was their own transporters! :blink: Add in Tractor beams and it's theoretically possible for one ship to capture 3 enemies in the space of a combat turn! :blink:

[whyBish]

I'm with you warblade, uncreative is fun, and a good way to skill up.

No idea why people play creative, you never need more than one of the techs on a level, and in M.P. creative races get wiped out well before they pick up research speed... you are essentially giving up 8 points for no gain (one tech + two useless techs per level, but not getting tach any faster than others). Better off if you like the research path is to go + research/artifacts world and pick the techs that are actually useful. But in any case the research races are usually out-researched by those with a building races (unification, + prod, tolerant, subterranian etc.) since those races can pump out far more with fewer civilians so can afford more researchers.

With spies, if you are even in tech, the side that can pump out twice++ the ships will win.

Also assault shuttles are a great leveller if you are behind in tech (esp. warfare tech). But the counter is usually troop pods and security stations (early game)... the +20 to combat is nasty, not sure what the equations are, but a slight advantage in combat rating leads to a mauling. That's why antaran ships with their 100 rating are so hard to capture without mass assault ship fleets or late game tech. Late game counters to assault ships with death ray support is more problematic... but if you have left the game go on that long as a productive race then you have made a mistake anyway (i.e. the research races will womp you).

Anyone that hasn't tried uncreative in moo2 should give it a go, you learn a lot of tactics, both in how to attack/defend/build an empire, and especially in ship design and fleet design. :)

[Drasca]

I do love playing +industry based races, but I don't think it is so invincible or clearly superior in all aspects. Neither is creative for sub-max tech, since if one is creative the they don't have to (not that a human player won't) focus resources to gain max researchable tech. In exchange for losing +industry or other, they gain the possibility of not needed up to 6300 production points (63 max spies * 100 production cost) per opponent. However...

Once +morale bonuses kick in, the difference between Unification and Democracy governments (+industry and +research respectively) isn't by a large factor. Maybe .8 vs 1.0, so 20%, other things given equal. I don't usually go for creative myself when competitive against a creative race, since tech is relatively easy to level, harder to gain advantage against. But a decent tech advantage effectively negates the numbers one. Let's see, 3 Battleship class ships with several autofire phasers, cybertronic computers +100 beam attack and inertial stabilizers +50% beam defense vs 14 LR beam ships w/o intertial stabilizers or decent computers +beam attack. Uh, I'd bet on the tech advantaged one-- who can hit and avoid being hit.

Not that any decent player would have only heavy assault ships. But clearly a few essential techs will turn the tide in battle. Whether its the +beam attack, the inertial dampener/stabilizer, radiation shield for planets, autofire phasors, or other. Be creative. Numbers does not guarantee victory. If you're concerned with early production competition? Research based players beeline to +industry facilities, automated factories, Robotic Mining, and support: pollution processors, hydroponic farm, soil enrichment. Between experienced players of their style, the battle is made to become level ground because each can counter the other.

I don't advocate pure tech will guarantee the game (maybe against computers), since that can be leveled with tech stealing (spy, conquer, diplomacy). Nor +industry racial bonus (countered with +production facilities & tech). Industry and Research are pretty solid squared against each other production-wise, late game, +morale bonuses countering the government bonus. Early +industry and +population bonus is curbed by farming needs (unification helps that luckily), but one still needs decent planets for farming and to build freighters to support less arable planets. Yes, tolerant makes a great early-mid game +industry bonus too, as well as +pop, but that -10 in racial picks means one can't pick much else. A decent government, uni or democracy, costing 6 and 7 respectively iirc from a max total of 20

Personally, my favorite "uber" research combination includes the following positive traits: Subterranean (6), Democracy (7), +2 Research (6). Lots of researchers gaining from both +2 racial and +50% governmental bonuses right from the get-go, late game leaving planets with +1000-2000 research points. (note the absence of creative trait). I have a major tech advantage and tend to steamroll over all those primitive races, leaving Psilons and a few submissive races alive to steal tech I'm missing from.

I'm suprised no one mentioned tractor beams through all this. They negate the beam defense bonuses, allow boarding, and computers tend to auto-destruct the turn of staying immobile finishes!

Ah enough Moo2 for today... I'm salivating over the Moo3 box and store display. I can't wait for tomorrow!

<b>Edit: Make that wednesday. Bah!</b>

[whyBish]

Well, I can't disagree... if the game goes long enough the research based player will win out, but with the group of people I played against, the games never got past the first 2000 RP project or so. It may just be a factor of opposition and game setup. We played Huge/8 player (6 comp 1v1 human) pre-warp & usually organic rich. I can see that if playing 2player 1v1 in huge the research side would probably have enough time to pass the industrial.

Perhpaps we can duel after you get sick of Moo3? ...sometime in 2010? ;)

[whyBish]

... Forgot to ask... did anyone end up doing a Jarulf and figure out how spying actually worked. There seemed to be a (moving) sweetspot to the number of spies to get good results. Pumping spies *seemed* to reduce results...

[Haider]

http://www.ina-community.com/forums/showth...30&pagenumber=1

My opinion on the game is quite similar. MoO 3 plays more like a (bad designed) Database application, than a game.

[Tommi]

I am working on the game at the moment. 4 hours behind, and still I can't figure how to produce ships. At some point I couldn't figure how to vote: I couldn't find yes/no buttons in the Orion Senate. Finally, the game decided to crash and I lost the whole game. Am I doing something wrong? :blink:

[Haider]

For ships you must first design one with using Shipyards/New Designs. Then you must drill down to the planet where you want it built. There you must open the Economics tab, open the Military Tab and fill the Queue with up to three ships of your new design. When the ships are produced (if the AI wants them produced) you have to go to the galaxy map, select the system, where you have a Mobilization Centre, select "Deploy Task Force" and construct a task force containing your ships. Now you can actually use them. Isn't it easy? ;)

[Drasca]

Game setup does change everything. Going organic rich, huge, 8 player and pre-warp is a big incentive to play +industry races. Have no doubt, I do love +industry/unification/subterranean race types. They just tend to always be behind in the tech curve, and the player compensates for that --with spying, pirating, ground assault, etc.

Organic rich means difference between those with and without +industry is enlargened hugely. So many mineral poor planets... Prewarp in combination to that means early farmer's gambit expansion favoring +industry buiding colony ships a large advantage. That or early conquest: outpost / troop ships with missle ship escorts. Enemies are close enough by to take over quickly and easily. The tech edge gained by +research early on would be negated by time it'd take to build colony ships. Maybe. I should do a demo run of the first 100~ turns and see how each setup pans out.

Still, I'd like to see you play whyBish. It'd be fun.

Hey whybish, try the following game sometime:

Game setting: Huge/ 8 or less players, Mineral Rich, your choice in difficulty setting, Avg tech. Antarans attack, Random Events and tactical combat.
Race: Subterranean, Democratic, +2 research. Take a minus in spying, ground combat or your pick.

Your tech will be leaps and bounds over everyone elses. Just as Unification gives +industry a bonus in addition to +2 industry, Democracy gives +research bonus in additon to +2 Research. Straight out cash too. I buy automated factories on a regular basis

-Drasca

btw: Doing a ship capture raid on the Antaran homeworld: using a telepathic race, dimension jumping into the antaran homeworld, capturing their advanced ships and retreating them (because telepathic can control captured ships in combat) doesn't work. I've tried. multiple times.

[whyBish]

I keep clicking on 'Report this post' when attempting to reply :lol:

Yeah, I had an attempt again in the weekend of a democracy/+research /subterranean at the weekend (huge 2/p vs. comp min rich)

It feels like running in glue :huh:
No problem winning of course, but it takes forever to raise speed. It only really picked up once I researched android workers.

I think the problem is that I use housing 'pumps' to colonise, and these don't seem to work well without the industry boost (build any + prod or + pop growth items then set colony to housing. Move off any population above the first unit to keep a high growth rate. Early on you move the population to your own home base until it is full, once colonisation starts you pump workers to the new colonies. Also I sell off the starting starbase & marine barracks to get the first colony base built faster) Home base builds empty scout ships & colony ships as long as possible, next planet to get up to speed builds a couple spies then military ships.

The good/bad news is Moo3 should arrive here tomorrow...

Other points:
Buying stuff ... that is an advantage of democracy, *unless* you compare trade goods vs. trade goods producing colonies. With democracy you get standard production turned to credits *1.5, with unification you get production * 1.5 turned to credits. In a simplistic view this would look as if neither has an advantage in credits! Some influencing factors are however : pollution reduces unification by more (since it is the production that gets 'taxed' by pollution), *personally* my unification races end up with more trade good colonies, morale increases production for democracy govt. but only occurs 'late game' and is also 'taxed' by pollution.
Also at best if you half complete items you need 2:1 credits

Raids: to get antaran tech (apart from the guardian) you need to use assault ships on the random antaran raiding parties. This can be quite difficult as their marines have 100 combat rating and if captured the ships have 50% of quantum detonating. If it works however the rewards are lucrative... if you have a nice spy contingent to keep it that way ;)

+points to research: This only helps if you actually devote population to research (obviously) however when playing democratic I *personally* find it very difficult to allocate units to research... any hints at balance here? Also, out of curiousity, what tech level would you expect to be at around turn 170? 230?

Balancing demo/research with +prod research: This only help *once built* (except microlite construction)... and unification races can also research these. The morale multiplier could help except a) it comes at around the same time as galactic unification and (--> This is supposed to be a B not a sunglass smilie) B) *personally* the game is over by this stage.

P.S. Hope I'm not sounding too dogmatic :)

[Drasca]

Hehe you favor the +industry. I like it too, except when I'm sick of being behind in tech. I did a side-by-side of +industry/uni and +research/demo hotseat game just to compare. There was a *major* difference. My Klackons (custom +industry/uni) had 5 systems up and running while my Elerians (custom +research/demo) had 2 and one outpost. However, Klackons gained 2 techs (partially my fault. style difference) and Elerians had 6 iirc, and met the Psilons. Both were in corners of the galaxy, Klackons got better starting colonizable planet picks, Elerians had early first contact. I played until turn 70-100, then went to sleep. Klackons had production up the yin-yang. Elerians not so much due to more difficulty feeding the population. I expect the Klackons to hit a tech barrier in their growth curve sooner or later, requiring spycraft and a good deal of sneakiness. Whereas the Elerians will be trudging by gaining speed with applied tech and establishing their foothold into the galaxy, trading tech with everyone, leaving Klackons in the dust in that tech respect. +2 research isn't all that great, but fun to play with when put to use. Spying, population growth, tolerant, creative, etc are all potentially better than +2 research. The government and morale bonuses are the strongest I believe.

Its all good. Even the evil.