Battle of the Ivar Nebula

Battle of the Ivar Nebula

I'm going to keep my part of this write-up fairly short.

The game started a little bit fast. The Empire players starting position was real close to my homeworld, and he thought he could take me out quick with a couple of SSD's. Actually, it almost happened. Three things saved me: 1) He made mistakes 2) I got lucky 3) I had experience with the Killing Floor add-on. To make a long story short, I killed his SSD's with an Instrumentality and a Cat's Paw (if I remember correctly.) I then moved the Instrumentality and 2 cat's over to his homeworld and one move before I took it, he quit. Pick ran killrace on him and I didn't get any benefits from the Homeworld addon. It didn't matter too much, since he didn't have many ships at that point. Once the Empire was gone, I was free to expand in that direction with no resistance. On my other side was the rebel player (Peter Doherty) who was an ally throughout the game. The pirates for most of the game plagued him. He served as a cushion between the pirates, and me and I did my best to assist him with minefields. I think he would have done much better if he would have utilized my mine laying ability more. He laid mines like a madman himself, but he could have had 4 times the amount if he would have let me lay them on his behalf.. Peter survived the game, but his score wasn't too impressive.

The biggest advantage that I gained (aside from eliminating my Empire neighbor early) as making an alliance with the Bird player (John Labadie) and getting a cloaking minelayer from him. They had obvious benefits for me... just as it would for the Crystals.

John and I made a totally useless alliance with the Borg player (Dirk Eichler) as well. I have never gotten so little out of an alliance. He refused to participate as far as I could tell. He never chunneled us, he never fought with us, and he even went so far as to offer me fuel at one of his bases, which he had set to "force surrender", then he took my ship!!!! I will keep my eye out for this guy and I won't ally with him again.

I spent a LOT of time doing battle with the Fascists(Mike Smith), who were on the other side of the Empire's space. They had an alliance with the Crystals, which really slowed me down. I'm not sure if Mike was the original fascist player or not, but he did quite well. I love to play against someone who is good at a given race...it's so educational. I have never been very successful at playing the Fascists, so I learned a bunch. Same goes for the Crystals (Sergei Didenko), though he took over the crystal race in the middle of the game. Eventually, I went into defense mode and did pretty well at covering the map with my mines. I believe the crystal player had the most contact with all of the races in the game, so I will let him finish the story.

Thanks!

Battle of the Ivar Nebula

I have come in game on 49 turn. At this time the Crystals had union with the Fascists and the Solar Federation. At once I wrote off with the allies. It appears that the union with the fascists stood from the very beginning of the game and the distance between homeworlds was only 150 ly. Before my arrival Crystals were played by The Q. There were very many ships with useless properties. After finding - out of conditions it has become clear, that triumvirate Crystals - Fascists - Feds is in a condition of war with the Robots from the side of the Fascist and with the Lizards and the Birds from the side of the Feds. Then we did not know about an alliance of the Robots and the Birds. The position of my race on a map was rather stable. It was a riddle for me why the Robots, the Lizards and the Cyborgs did not attack me from north and from west through the border of the map. Started webbing of the Fascist became an unpleasant unexpectedness for the Robots. Some inconvenience was delivered by the cloaked ships of the Birds transferred to the Robots, however web mines did the business.

As the Robots, the Birds and the Lizards were at the war against our union, I started to look for some more allies among possible enemies of our enemies. The Privateers (Serg Chekir) has responded to my offer. At that time the Birds had let him down and began to attack. The Cyborgs conducted battle actions against the Pirates. The Pirates has agreed to my offer about the union. However to involve abilities of his race completely was impossible for us. I protected him by the web. In which the ships of the Birds were caught. After the capture of the Dark Wings they were transferred to me, were loaded by torpedoes and went webbing territory of the Pirates and the border again.

On 79 turn the anonymous letter with the offer has appeared to finish this game. I think it was the Cyborgs. As then there were letters from the Birds and the Feds with the refusal of the end of game. The Fascist, I and the Pirates were also against the ending. After 80 turn the trench warfare began. Me and the Robots showered each other with mine fields. The Feds became active and has become to fill with mines tightened to him minelayers. The Pirates began to restrict the Rebels and the Cyborgs. Only with the Birds he could not cope with. To develop approach on this direction to him in any way was not possible. It is a pity, that Resolutes did not catch in my webs. I needed them very much. :)

At the end of the game the Robots have begun approach to my territory from northwest. However it was necessary to him to do it much earlier. At the moment his approach to me began there had already been a lot of minelayers and sweepers.

At the end of game the leaders increased the score, simply by construction of bases.

Thanks.