STARWEB EMAIL DISCUSSION GROUP (THE SEDG) (Sponsored by Flying Moose Technologies' Starweb Analyzer - http://www.flyingmoose.ca) VOLUME 63 Aug. 5, 2002 CONTENTS Feature Article – Merchants – Boon or Bane by Elliot Hudes Questions – Final turn score push; First Contact scenarios SEDG Web Page URL The Swap Corner Correspondence Editor's plea – My backlog of articles for the SEDG is depleted. Anyone with an interesting article for the SEDG would likely see it in print soon (will that get you to pick up a pen or keyboard?) Regale us with tales and bravado from recent games. Tell us what it's like to play in some variants we haven't discussed much. I would welcome more articles on multi games, the time travel variant, partner games and anonymous. FEATURE ARTICLE Merchants – Boon or Bane by Elliot Hudes I realize that I have been remiss in my duties to provide articles on how to play each particular character type to the best of their abilities. I guess I have found the Merchant position to be the easiest to play and the safest character to be. So why go into the details? Even a Newby can play their first game as a merchant and rank well. And yet, I've seen merchants come in dead last too. So, where to start? Let's begin with their special ability. Merchants have the ability to doubly load their ships with metal. While in this state they cannot fire their weapons (but they are not at a total disadvantage as they can still jettison their cargo and fire on the same turn). This appears to be a fantastic advantage to potential allies especially early in the game when you have few ships. After all, early in the game when your homeworld has only 2 mines you will need 28 ships going out for metal and 28 ships arriving with metal each turn to keep the homeworld building at full potential. This is a minimum of 58 ships. Since you start the game with 30 builds and 2 ships you are a long way from self-sufficiency in the ship building department. In fact, by turn 3 you may be dropping homefleet to ensure that neighbors do not claim border worlds when you meet. This cuts down on your ability to haul metal back to your home base. Early in the game you meet many players on your borders. Some are friendly; some are aloof, quiet or downright nasty. There is a lot of suspicion and paranoia at this time in the game and nobody wants to be the player who loses the arms race. Besides, it's smart to employ a character that will only need 28 ships to haul your metal AND he might supply some of the keys and ships to get you established. This is why a friendly merchant is usually in high demand and makes allies easily. There is a downside. A merchant doesn't need a lot of clients before he can potentially run away with the game and score enough to win early. Sure, Berserkers can compete by dropping huge numbers of PBBs but they often need to do this after massive ships are available to be destroyed. Large wars often cripple or delay berserkers from doing this unless they (and their allies) are willing to give ground while they score. A merchant with 3 allies can score so fast that a game can end on turn 12 before anyone can compete. First, the obvious trick merchants use of gifting their HW to an ally, the Empire Builder being the obvious recipient for the 42 points/turn it will be worth by turn 7 although Apostles like them too for conversion. He now has 4 HWs he can haul metal for. If you only brings 30 metal to each one he is hauling 120 per turn worth 960 points per turn. If he is doing this for each HW by turn 8 then by turn 13 his score is 6000. On turn 17 he hits 10,000. An alliance of 4 empires is easy to attain in any game and frequently there are only 2-3 merchants in a game making 5 or 6 client homeworlds a reality. I've made this complaint many times before that the merchant scoring should be curtailed to only 4 points/metal. Rick (FBI CEO) says this is a failing of the players. Why would they let a merchant haul 30 metal worth 240 points to their HW unless they could supply equal points for them? This is impossible as it represents at least 10 worlds worth 24 points each for an Empire Builder or 8 Ancients/Pyramids to the Art Collector or 5 new plunders per turn for a Pirate and even more worlds for an Apostle. The bottom line is that a merchant cannot pay back equally for the points he receives for his hauling services. Yet, players still use them. Here is why. Camaraderie and loyalty - once you ally with a player you will not turn on them. Once you give them full hauling rights you cannot easily ask him to stop (unless he volunteers to slow down which is a strategy many merchants use to keep their friends and ensure the game doesn't end before it gets interesting). As I've stated, it's an arms race early in the game and so players vie for the attention of a merchant. If you can hold out and get your own hauling going you can get along without a merchant and if you do hire one you can allow him to haul commensurate with the help he offers you. But wait a minute; I somehow slipped into issues regarding merchants that are negative when I'm supposed to be teaching how to play the merchant to his maximum potential. I guess I can rationalize that this will help a merchant understand the diplomatic and psychological position he holds in the game. If a player wants to trade with you based on equal value that is reasonable. The point inequality between character types doesn't have to be. If a merchant gets too greedy he can make himself a target. On the other hand players may be afraid to call him on this. Say he tries to ally with anyone who wishes his services and won't align with one tight knit group. This makes him the neutral trader and he can haul for many different empires. I've had 8 clients and that would pull in 2000 points per turn easily. In a similar game I had a merchant ally working for my alliance and another alliance of 3 players and neither alliance would turn on the merchant (or fire him) for fear that they would have to supply all those metal hauling ships, have their supply lines disrupted and possible an irate merchant firing at their HWs. Besides, the merchant has their whole map and can give it to the opposition. There are a lot of advantages to joining one smaller tight knit group of allies. There is security and the fun of being involved in their plans of warfare. On the scoring front you have the option of becoming the alliances 'Push Player'. This is the player they will push to the limit to hit the victory score, grab the victory pin and win the game from the competing alliances. If properly orchestrated a merchant can compete with a berserker who is dropping massive PBBs. You can't wait until the berserker starts his bombing runs. Remember that a merchant can consistently bring in 1000-2000 points while a berserker can grab all his points in 3-4 turns. I've seen a one turn drop of 17,000 points for a berserker while I personally have hit 25,000 victory points in an extra long game within the final 6 turns. Here are some tips for success. You can haul up to twice as much metal to an industry world. That means 60 metal per HW. There often are not enough mines within ring 3 of the HW so you must have additional hauling keys for the 4-turn milk run. You often need 4 keys for the inner rings – two going out for metal and two coming in. If the mines in your particular universe are small you may need more. Then at least one key that goes out 2 turns (up to ring 6) picking up metal twice and returns to the HW (also two turns) and can pick up an additional load of metal on the first leg of the return. This gets you 480 points/HW/turn. Next – don't forget the smaller industry worlds. You can still haul to them. Not only that – if you gift worlds of 2-4 industry to the Empire Builder early in the game he can use the industry to build more industry. You don't need the ships from these worlds. Use your HW for major work and invest a couple of industry worlds to building them up. I have successfully taken 2 industry worlds and build them up to 30 more industry by turn 18. In an extralong game they actually produce more ships than consumed and are useful but in a regular length game they net more points for the EB and merchant. So you haul to these worlds also. A 4-industry world will be at 17 industries in 7 turns. This means you can bring it 34 metal and net another 272 points/turn. Similarly, if you can spare the ships the EB can start building industry at HWs. In one game where we were pushing our merchant hard we built one HW up to 100 industries by T25. We couldn't keep our merchant at maximum hauling as there just wasn't enough metal. A HW will jump from 30 industries to 37, 46, 57, 71 industries in 4 turns if you use just about all it's building potential. Sometimes you have the spare ships to do this. Another strategy I've seen used when the goal was to get a merchant scoring to his maximum and there was not enough metal to keep a HWs industry supplied (such as when the industry has been built up) is the concept of using the Antimerchant. It is the net dropped metal, the difference between what a merchant drops vs what he loads that count for scoring at an industrial world. If you have another player present with similar anti-hauling ships they can load surplus metal at the HW and deliver it to a ring 1 world and return to the HW for more. The first 30 metal on a HW are utilized for building. Another player can remove the surplus metal so the merchant can rendezvous to pick up the metal again. This way you can recycle that extra 30 metal to make use of the double capacity each HW has. Consumer goods are highly over rated but in a close game every point counts. You get 10 points the first time you dump CGs at a particular world then 8 and then the amount drops further. Once it's 8 or less the metal is just as worthwhile taken to your HW or other industry world. If you have the HW receiving twice the metal of the industry already then dropping a CG every time you leave a world will net you a few extra points. Also, on the last turn of the game you will not have the time to dump metal from keys that aren't already at a HW. So dumping some CGs will help. Don't forget the really adventurous metal runs! The metal must be dumped onto an industrial world. Nobody said it had to be a friendly one. I have personally seen merchants hauling for HWs left behind for dropped players (which causes the I ship count to rise to the point where only a berserker has a chance to capture it by virtue of a robot attack). And in combat situations you can bring a load of metal to an enemy HW fully loaded. Since you can unload your ships and fire you have the luxury of scoring and fighting. Obviously the status of the military situation may make this maneuver less desirable. If you have enough ships to suppress the industry you don't have to worry about the metal helping your opponent. Similarly, if you are on the verge of capturing the HW you will have supplied it with the raw material you need to immediately start building with your new HW. If the battle is more evenly matched or you are outgunned your allies may not be happy for you to keep the enemy supplied. Then again, if you are the Push Position that may be acceptable. Remember, the only industrial world you cannot haul for is one that is neutral. So it is in your best interest for HWs (yours, allies and even opponent HWs) to be owned by someone. When you or your allies are invaded the strategy of the invading players may be different if they are trying to blunt your merchant scoring. They may invest in a larger AH attack to render the HW neutral OR they may try to destroy the industry (AI or PBB). If the concern isn't a merchant's score then you have the worries of other types of attacks such as the berserker robotizing the HW out from under you. Similarly if you are taking the risky path of bringing metal to an enemy HW and are bent on pushing the merchant's score as hard as possible, avoid attacks that may leave the HW neutral. The only way to stop a merchant from winning the game is to supply your own push position and compete for score OR slow down the merchant scoring. To slow him down you must accomplish as many invasions of the merchant's clients as possible, locate the HWs and neutralize them. If you have enough time you can take the luxurious route of capturing all the worlds around the HW making it difficult to haul metal. Even so, it may take many turns while the merchant continues to score. Even if you take all the worlds the merchant can resort to another tactic. Gift metal. At a HW with surplus metal the merchant unloads his key while another player loads a fleet of 60 with 60 metal and gifts it to the merchant. If properly orchestrated a merchant can gift back the empty key and keep this going for quite some time. A HW with 255 metal will utilize only 30 per turn. The merchant with his ally can continue to recycle metal through gifts for 6 turns utilizing 60 metal and drop 360 metal. At this point the HW will have 75 metal plus what it creates with mines. Let's assume there are 3 mines (could be more). The actual metal count after 6 turns will be 75+18=93 allowing for another 60 metal load to be gifted. On the next turn the metal count will be 66 allowing only 36 metal to be loaded. Following this turn there will be only 9 metal surplus. The final count is 456 metal worth 3648 points. Yes, I have seen this tactic used. If you are concerned about the 255 metal limit – don't be! I have tested this. At a HW at 255 metal already a merchant can still drop 60 metal for points. The industry will build with 30 and you will replenish them in the drop so the HW will continue to show 255 metal. The surplus 30 metal will still count for score but will be destroyed, as the HW can't accommodate them in their storage facilities. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- QUESTIONS - Can anyone answer these? New Questions: These will be pretty obvious to the veterans but often new players don't see the subtleties. It's turn 16 and you think the game will end with the 18th printout (you have two sets of orders left). Aside from the usual mundane way of scoring for each player type, can you come up with some ideas to give the following players an extra push at the end? a) Merchant - (remember, there is no point going out for metal now as he will never have a chance to drop them). b) Berserker - No time to gift, move and deploy a PBB. c) Pirate - no time to move, attack and plunder. d) Empire Builder e) I'm not sure that there are any for the Art Collector or Apostle but I would love to hear your ideas. a) Merchant - Obviously I've given this away in the lead article :-). On the second last set of orders an ally can gift a metal laden key to the merchant at the HW. Also, you can dump some CGs on the final set of orders. b) On the final set of orders you can R attack with any key hovering over a planet with viable population. Another interesting move is to migrate your robots from your HW. You can migrate 30 to a ring 1 world and if you had the foresight to leave one with 60 population this represents an additional 120 points on the last turn per HW. c) Pirate – Declare all your allies to be nonallies – be careful of ambushes but this will allow you to capture more keys worth 3 points each. Also, plunder everything including your HW if you still own it. Have your allies gift you keys on the final turn if they can spare the gift orders (they may be giving the EB or Apostle worlds too). No point gifting a world to the Pirate as there is no time for the plunder. d) Empire Builder – Shoot at all worlds, even allies (having them transfer up the homefleet) so as to capture them. Build industry at every industry world (especially HWs) as the ships are useless but they will score more for you. e) Art Collector – No much you can do except you should make sure you have dropped all your museums. I also tend to drop as many ships as I can spare to the ground at museums in case an enemy or backstabber decide to shoot AH on the final turn. f) Apostle – Aside from continuing with your martyrs or Jihad all I can suggest is to pray :-). New question – This one has no black and white answer. I thought it might be interesting to see players' take on these aspects of first contact. So write in! It's turn 4. W186 (12,30,133,154) [] (Industry=1/0,Mines=4,Population=18,Limit=31) V7:Lesser of Two Evils F4[SOMNOS]=3 (Moved) F197[FLATHEAD]=8 (Moved) F194[]=0 1) So assuming neither player is an art collector what do you think the best first contact deal should be? Does fleet size dictate your opening diplomacy? W186 (12,30,133,154) [] (Industry=1/0,Mines=4,Population=18,Limit=31) V7:Lesser of Two Evils F1[NORTHSTAR]=2 F4[SOMNOS]=3 (Moved) F197[FLATHEAD]=8 (Moved) F194[]=0 2) Still no Art Collector (I don't want it to be too easy). How do you divide this up? W186 (12,30,133,154) [] (Mines=4,Population=18,Limit=31) F4[SOMNOS]=1 (Moved) F197[FLATHEAD]=1 (Moved) F194[]=0 3) I always like the scenario where nobody can hold the key or the world due to lack of ships. Would you do anything differently here? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- STARWEB EMAIL DISCUSSION GROUP - is now available on the web. Look for our new MAPPER'S SECTION on the SEDG Web Page. http://www.accessv.com/~somnos/sedg.htm ----------------------------------------------------------------------- FEATURE - THE SWAP CORNER Buy one! :-) ----------------------------------------------------------------------- CORRESPONDENCE Paul Balsamo writes: Elliot, In response to T. Worthington who wrote: > In StarWeb, which has no such recognition, the idea that "our man >won" is nonsense. You either won or you lost. The fact that you helped >the winner get to the top of the pile only shows you to have been a >mug! Two points: 1. When the other team starts proping one guy's score up, what are you supposed to do? Start in-fighting in your own group to win individually? Do that and you're certain to lose. I always start alliances with the intention that all will do well and one will win, but that goes out the window when the bad guys start inflating one player. 2. Yea, if your guy wins, you technically lose, but I take some pride in the fact that ALL of the guys in the other alliance(s) lost too . I think you can take that as a moral victory. It's certainly better than losing AND having one of your enemies win. Paul John David Gault writes: Re: SW-XM-209 T25 Great game everybody! This game sure supports Elliot's theory that mega-alliances have taken over Starweb. I liked the game when it was more competitive, but joining the big group still seems like the rational thing to do. If there's an answer, I haven't found it. I'd like to experiment with new rule sets and see if they help. Then again, maybe we should just play Masters of Orion. Well, that's it for Volume 63. Don't be afraid to submit articles or suggestions. They don't have to be long. Address your correspondence to Elliot Hudes at somnos@compuserve.com