teukros

It was in the news just a few days ago that Stephen Hawking has proven that "information" cannot disappear, so that any matter that enters a black hole will _eventually_ re-emerge (but in a "mangled" form). It blows my mind a little bit that he could prove such a thing to be true and I have no idea how he could do so...

There is no space outside of the Universe, so the Universe does not float through space. Neither is there any time outside of the Universe, so the Universe does not evolve through time. It simply Is. Today's APoD is pretty nifty - it is all about evidence of the existence of dark energy, and that the Universe will expand forever. http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap040801.html Also, from Ned Wright's Cosmology FAQ: Is the Big Bang a Black Hole? The Big Bang is really nothing like a black hole. The Big Bang is a singularity extending through all space at a single instant, while a black hole is a singularity extending through all time at a single point. http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~wright/cosmology_faq.html

I use the diplomats on those pesky planets that have a garrison requirement of 1.

For some reason I could never get into the Imperial swing of things, but I'm sick of Mon Mothma A few days ago it finally clicked: The Empire must use terror, suppression... and constant vigilance. Screw the diplomats, if the garrison requirement for a world is > 1, have a General with high Leadership on hand (make sure the Emperor stays on his throne!) and deliberately provoke an uprising! Then send in the troops, declare martial law, suspend civil liberties, round up all suspected criminals and sympathisers, and hold public executions. Works wonders. That and the judicious reprisal (with nuclear warheads) will pacify the populations of most worlds amazingly quickly! They'll never love you, but they'll be peaceful, and that's all that really matters. It's also very important to have an espionage droid on EVERY controlled world, running espionage missions at ALL times. It's tedious, but forewarned IS forearmed! (cue Imperial March)

I know, it's too big... I need some recommendations.

Well I'm trying to get back into Rebellion after a long absence and I see that there are models for the MC40, MC80a, MC80b, and MC90 (among others; very very cool). So I'm inspired to replace some of the reb ships with these more canonical types. But I'll need cards to go along with them and that's my question: What are the best (i.e. most realistic) cards for the MC40, MC80a, MC80b and MC90 (and where can I find them)? Thanks!

I've found that the T.I.E.s and T.I.E. Bombers are next to useless. Does anyone know how maneuverability affects combat? Does a fighter with maneuverability of '8' have twice the chance of hitting another fighter as one with a maneuverability of '4'? or is it more complicated than that? Maybe I'll add '4' to the maneuverability of all Imperial fighters to make things more realistic. And restore the armor that was stripped from them by giving them each a shield rating of 10. Actually it should be 20 for the T.I.E. Bomber...

AH, THEY'VE ENCASED THE THREAD IN CARBONITE. IT SHOULD BE QUITE WELL PROTECTED - IF IT SURVIVED THE FREEZING PROCESS, THAT IS. Man did I disappear from sight. That's what nursing school will do to you. But now I have two months, all to myself. I've been playing a game, off and on, with my usual gaming buddy for the last seven months or so. I'm playing with my settings which I described earlier in the thread (last year). The most important changes, in the early game at least, are probably that Coruscant's industrial base and defenses are all much improved, and the Rebs cannot build any Neb-Bs (they can, however, build the "Alliance Escort Carrier"); but balanced against this, Jerjerrod's Diplomatic Base is lowered to 40 and Piett's is eliminated altogether. So when we began the game I identified the Sessawenna, Corellian and Sluis Sectors as the sectors to concentrate on, with the objective of turning them into a secure and defensible base to operate from while I developed the Rim Sectors. Imperial systems in the remaining Sectors would be defended with Gencore shields and starfighters if possible but with nothing other than a token defense in mind. Things went well in the Corellian Sector and it was not long until the entire Sector was SOLIDLY Imperial. In Sessawenna as of turn 300, two of the systems are still neutral, and one is a member of the Rebellion. I've got Jerjerrod working the neutral systems and nothing much else going on in Sessawenna. The Alliance is not making much of an effort there, either. I've got two Carracks and two Galleons sweeping the Rim clockwise from the Abrion Sector and two Carracks and two Galleons going counterclockwise from the Xappyh Sector. If I had the troops to garrison every undeveloped system on that side of the Rim I'd be in good shape. I do not have those troops because of a catastrophic screwup I made, sometime between turns 250-275, in the Sluis Sector! Sometime in the first hundred turns I thought I was headed toward an easy victory. Before long there was only one remaining system in the entire Sluis Sector in open revolt - I can't even remember which one now, perhaps the Praesitlyn System. I was developing industry on Sluis Van, Sullust and Mon Calamari with large and extensive shipyards on Sluis Van (of course) and Sullust, with troop training facilities on Mon Calamari. From early in the game the Sluis Sector was a key part of my strategy. I had my Carracks and Galleons starting from there and I wanted to gather Imperial Army Regiments there before sending them on to the Rim. Every other Imperial Fleet was ordered to Bpfassh. All new ship construction was ordered for fleets either present in or en route to Bpfassh. I intended to wait until I had at least a couple of VSDs and an ISD (or two) at Bpfassh before moving on Praesitlyn. After all, first impressions are important. That was sometime in 2003. But my buddy and I were both busy. I was in school, he was getting married! Months later (back in April or May sometime) we both loaded it up again for a night's diversion... I was still waiting for SDs to arrive at Bpfassh. In the meantime I would concentrate all of the Sluis Sector's non-essential Imperial troops at Bpfassh, where they would be safest. I went to Mon Calamari and checked out the garrison requirement. Only one regiment, very good. I could see that there were more than six regiments present on the planet, for six were actually visible, and the scroll bar was also visible, showing that there were more than six there. And Mon Calamari had more regiments being raised locally. So I picked up those six regiments and ordered them to Bpfassh... DISASTER! Only six regiments were actually present on Mon Calamari, and I had just removed them all!! There were additional regiments ordered to be raised, but they didn't help! Mon Calamari joined the Rebellion and FOUR OTHER IMPERIAL WORLDS, including Sluis Van and Sullust, went into uprising, killed the troops stationed there, and declared neutrality! And the sentiment in all other systems in the Sector became much more rebellious! I had lost ALL of my industry in the Sluis Sector and whatever was under construction in those three systems was destroyed! This is the sort of thing that can happen when you leave a game and then return to it months later (especially if you're short on sleep when you resume). I acted quickly - I took everything at Bpfassh and scooted over to Mon Calamari to retake the system. This went over like a lead balloon in the Sector, and I think I lost one additional system. Since then, that dark night of Calamarian and Sullustan treachery, we were unable to resume play until last night. Needless to say my development of the Rim was not my top priority any more. In fact, it was positively stifled. I knew that if I somehow retook the Mon Calamari Sector, I would still have a game. If not, the Imperial cause was lost. I had already ordered Lord Vader and Emperor Palpatine to the system. They would join Bin Essada and Pellaeon. But would they get there in time? The alarms continued to come in from my toeholds in the Dolomor and Farfin Sectors; one of those systems was defended with only one Gencore, and it was blown away by THOSE DAMNED CORELLIAN CORVETTES! The three or four remaining systems were defended with two Gencores each. I moved most of my fleet to Mon Calamari (which had no Gencores at all) and left only two VSDs and two T.I.E. squadrons at Bpfassh to turn back an approaching Rebel fleet! Many anxious turns later, Lord Vader had had success in the critical system of Sullust, and the approaching fleet had turned out to be a single Corvette. I thought I had a chance at getting every neutral world in the Sector to (re)join the Empire, and one of the two Rebel worlds had just gone into uprising. It seemed like the Empire had weathered the storm. And then shipyards across the Core completed the large projects they had been working on. I still had a surplus of material for new projects. And the Lancer had recently become available. I ordered a new fleet for the Sessawenna sector of 12 Lancers and 2 ISDs, and a second new fleet for the Sullust system consisting only of 12 Lancers. And there was one resource rich world in the Rim that already had one functioning construction yard and many more had just been ordered for that world. And then to cap it all off three of THOSE DAMNED CORELLIAN CORVETTES attacked the Bpfassh system - and every one of them was destroyed. And then, something happened to the connection between our two computers. We both got the message "Your opponent has left the game". It hadn't been saved all night. When (if) we replay those fifty turns in a day or so, I will have to do basically the same things I already did. Not like I have a lot of options. Most of the Star Fleet is divided between Bpfassh and Mon Calamari, which are under siege. My opponent, on the other hand, now knows quite a bit more about the Imperial dispositions than he did a little while ago, and his forces are small, fast, mobile, and can strike pretty much at will (one of my "toehold" systems - either Ketaris or Wistril, I think - was attacked by nine of THOSE DAMNED CORELLIAN CORVETTES - he thought it might be enough to bust through the two shields). It sux.

Rapid fire Death Star Laser and Gravity Well Projectors on a Corellian Corvette!? Dude, it's the Netherland's Secret Weapon! Is it codenamed "The Flying Dutchman"? Sorry, couldn't resist...

Yeah but who wants to see B-Wings turning with T.I.E. Interceptors? I think you're right, that shields help some... the T.I.E. Bomber and the Y-Wing do have the same maneuverability rating (4)... no idea about the actual numbers though, just guesses. E.g. with shields of 15 does that mean that the B-Wing can take a hit from a T.I.E. Fighter (LC=5) and a hit from a T.I.E. Interceptor (LC=eight), but that it can't take two hits from T.I.E. Interceptors?

I tried something similar with the B-Wing by bumping its shields all the way up to 15 but it didn't seem to make a damn bit of difference, the T-I squadrons still swatted them like flies. Maneuverability seems to be everything in this game as far as fighters are concerned...

So I just posted over in the "Damned Corellian Corvettes" thread: "The Y-Wing is a very underrated fighter-bomber. Its maneuverability is just one less than the X-Wing's (4 instead of 5) and it packs a considerable punch. It can't dance with the T.I.E. Interceptor (maneuverability EIGHT) but then again, that's not what it was designed for." But, the two games X-Wing and TIE Fighter left me with a deep prejudice against the Y-Wing. In X-Wing if you're flying a Y-Wing it is against impossible odds (overheard many times while I was playing the game: "I hate Y-wings!") In TIE Fighter the only time you see the Y-Wing is when it is attacking your capital ships, platforms etc. in HUGE numbers (overheard many times while I was playing that game: "I hate Y-wings!") The T.I.E. Bomber on the other hand... is a flying coffin... Dude, this is how I'm using my Y-Wing Starfighter squadrons. All 113 of them. Before I have a fleet liberate a system (through bombardment - gotta love it) I make sure that the Y-Wings are stationed in the closest friendly system. The second the system is liberated I send the Y-Wings there and they provide more than an adequate defense while the GenCores are being built and any loose diplomatic ends are being tied up.

The Y-Wing is a very underrated fighter-bomber. Its maneuverability is just one less than the X-Wing's (4 instead of 5) and it packs a considerable punch. It can't dance with the T.I.E. Interceptor (maneuverability EIGHT) but then again, that's not what it was designed for.

95% assumption. My source is the aforementioned X-Wing game intro.

They had a very limited number of X-Wings, - all but two of which were destroyed IIRC - which would have been state-of-the-art at that time (Cf. the intro to the original "X-Wing" game). How long had the Y-Wing been in large scale production? 5 to 10 years? Before that, the Z-95 Headhunter was cutting edge... the original T.I.E. fighter was revolutionary when it was introduced (put an overpowered Solar Ionization Reactor in between two cheap-ass engines and a couple of laser cannons, put a chair with a rudimentary flight control and targeting computer on top, and surround the (unpressurized!) pilot with enough armor plate so he doesn't fry in a tenth of a second... riiiiiiiiight); with a skilled Imperial pilot, nothing could dance with the T.I.E. until the Y-Wing came along. So my reasoning is that immediately post-Yavin the X-Wing is not really out of the prototype stage and the problems associated with large scale production haven't been solved yet... also, I want to see the Alliance player building some Y-Wings before the X-Wing becomes available for manufacture. Yeah, well in the early game the Rebels would spend a lot of time running. That's the way it should be IMO. But the inability (in the game) of Rebel starfighters to Hit and Fade unless they're hauled into an Imperial System in the belly of an Escort Carrier will force me to make those ugly things available for manufacture again. The Corellian Corvette is wonderfully suited to Hit and Fade missions itself btw - and with its speed, maneuverablilty, anti-starfighter defenses and, last but not least, its planetary bombardment, it never becomes obsolete. Wow, talk about going full circle.

I had the blackout last week and my Internet service was just restored late last night, just before I had to leave for work. How's that for an excuse for taking so long to follow up? I've been thinking about my modifications and I'm going to make the Escort Carriers buildable to both sides again, and I'm going to make the X-Wing Starfighter's and Mon Calamari Cruiser's Research Levels 1 and 2 respectively. The way I have it now, the early game is just too predictable for the Alliance player, who is forced to build the same things over and over again. Y-Wings and Corellian Corvettes. Y-Wings and Corellian Corvettes. Rinse and repeat ad nauseum. Though it was the Emperor who was nauseated when he had his task force of 3 VSDs, 3 ISDs, a Carrack and a Lancer return to a system which I had just liberated (before I had a chance to build shield generators) only to find it defended by 113 squadrons of Y-Wing Starfighters. Very amusing, the sight of a half dozen Star Destroyers running from Y-Wings! In reply to your question, I already have a B.A. (in Geography and Urban Planning ), I used to work as a computer tech, but now I am heading into Nursing School.

When I'm playing the Rebs I start out building Y-Wings (in my game the X-Wing is not available at game start but the construction and maintenance costs of the Y-Wing are reduced by one each) and then switch over to X-Wings as soon as they become available for large scale production. I don't bother with the B-Wing or A-Wing at all. The B-Wing is a big fat sitting duck (even with shields pumped up to 15 ) and the A-Wing rocks, no question, it's a sweet little space superiority starfighter - but my starfighters MUST have proton torpedoes! If I were playing against a human opponent I'm sure I would be forced to build A-Wings to counter his TIE Defenders, but against the computer, the X-Wing Starfighter can dance with the TIE Interceptor any day of the week, thankyouverymuch.

Antilles and Andrimetrum did eventually start a successful uprising on Berchest, and then they exceeded all expectations by convincing the Caridans to throw off the Imperial yoke and declare neutrality! Drayson dropped everything and headed over from the Sluis sector and he was able to negotiate Carida's entry into the Alliance. As a result of this the entire Fakir sector was Allied! But then I seemed to settle into my usual pattern. Trying to balance building industry, refineries, mines, troops and (most important of all) Planetary Shield Generators on all Alliance systems, watching the Empire taking half of them (usually the ones with one Shield Generator and the second one already constructed and on the way ), and then gritting my teeth and digging in to develop the Rim and build 18 Mon Cal cruisers by turn 1500 or so. I've got to be doing something wrong

I'm looking forward to checking out your TC. Me, I've got to register for classes at CUNY next week. Or is that QueueNY? Rather than give it to Page, I eliminated the Troop Training Research ability from Rieekan (and Covell to balance things out). Makes Troop Training Research nice and slow... just like I want it. If I do upload my TC I'll just leave the cards untouched, anybody will be able to replace the Escort Carriers on both sides and the Reb Neb-B cards with anything they want. OTOH I'm encountering a weird bug. It seems that the Mon Cal Cruiser is hardwired to come in at Tech 2? If I set the Mon Cal to Tech 1 and the X-Wing to Tech 2, they both come in at Tech 2. I tried to set the Neb-B to tech zero (regardless that I made the card unbuildable) but it didn't make any difference. I wonder if I should find an MC-80 card and put that in the default Mon Cal card's place...

I started a game last night (as the Alliance) using all of my changes (which include eliminating the Escort Carriers and Neb-Bs and changing the Mon Cal Cruiser's research to 1 and the X-Wing Starfighter's research to 2) but also Texas_Fett's suggestion for taking (Lieutenant?) Antille's Ship Design Research Capability and giving it to General Dodonna (designer of the A-Wing). Now Antilles is still an excellent character even without that ability (in this game his Leadership is ninety-eight), but Dodonna's Diplomacy Mission ability is far too valuable, early in the game, to use him on Ship Design Research IMO. Eliminating Antille's Ship Design Research ability seems to have a big impact on the game. Fortunately I started with a few diplomatic characters (Karrde, Calrissian and Drayson) but unfortunately I did not start with either Tallon or Ackbar. So there is no Ship Design Research going on and I don't really know when it is going to begin either. So right now it is turn 130 and I have 125 Y-Wing Starfighter squadrons either constructed or ordered to be built.... (one good thing is that in my game the Y-Wing construction cost is 4 and maintenance is 3). And now to (finally!) get to the main topic of my post! The stage was set in the Fakir Sector: Three of the systems were Allied - Mrisst, Obroa-Skai, and Ando (where Calrissian started and, appropriately enough, there was a Construction Yard). The Imperial base in the sector, a mere toehold, was Carida (with 2 construction yards); Berchest was also controlled by the Empire and was under occupation by Imperial troops. The neutral systems were Delaya (with a construction yard, a training facility, and a shipyard), Palanhi, Halowan (with a shipyard), Ralltiir, and Bimmisaari (with a construction yard and a training facility). The Alliance's opportunities in the Fakir Sector seemed to be great! But, it was so far away from the Alliance base in the Jospro Sector! But, Organa, Dodonna, Skywalker, Antilles, Solo and Chewbacca were all still on Yavin, supervising the final details of the Alliance evacuation of the Sumitra Sector. So I had Calrissian make the short journey to Delaya, and then I ordered Chewbacca, Organa, Antilles, Skywalker and Dodonna to all crowd into the Millenium Falcon with Solo to make the much longer journey to Mrisst. Organa and Dodonna took turns complaining about Wookie smell, but everybody pretended that they were only kidding (even when Organa insisted otherwise). When they arrived, Organa, Skywalker and Dodonna all fanned out to Halowan, Ralltiir and Bimmisaari, and Solo, Chewbacca and Antilles went on a "diplomatic mission" to Palanhi (Calrissian had had success at Delaya and was now at Palanhi). The Empire had no diplomatic representatives in the Sector and so the results were predictable. I built Guerillas at Delaya (I also ordered Infiltrators to be built), sent them on to Palanhi, and ordered them and Antilles (with Chewbacca as a decoy) to Berchest to incite an uprising. They failed, but not for lack of trying: oddly, three different Imperial fleets consisting of a Dreadnaught, a Carrack Cruiser, and two Star Destroyers visited the Berchest system and then left again, never attacking anything in the Sector. I was unaware of the first of these fleets, consisting of the single Dreadnaught, but luckily the Incite Uprising mission failed and Antilles and Chewbacca got out about two days before it arrived. One of the four Guerillas was eliminated so there may have been an Imperial general on Berchest, but he was never detected. I replaced my losses and then sent everyone back to Berchest to make a second attempt at inciting an uprising, noticed the approaching Star Destroyers, and evacuated everybody one day before they arrived in the system. Nuts. So Chewbacca is attempting to rejoin Solo and Co., and Antilles is sitting tight at Delaya looking forward to Andrimetrum's arrival (her dossier included a holovid of her being interviewed by Alliance officers so he is _really_ looking forward to her arrival, in a purely professional capacity of course). Meanwhile, Solo, Organa, Skywalker, and Dodonna, thankful for the fusty and oily but now Wookie-free air in the Falcon, joined up with Calrissian and everybody headed over to the Corellian Sector, where there _were_ five neutral worlds. Skywalker restrained himself from whining long enough to convince the Selonians to join the Alliance so now there are only four, but every one of them has an active diplomatic mission as I speak. Next stop: Sessawenna sector!

400 MHz Pentium II 192 MB RAM A 14 GB HD and a 6 GB HD Soundblaster Awe32 (ISA) Matrox Millenium II AGP Creative Labs 3dfx Voodoo2 card (PCI) (with 4 MB video RAM! Woo!) Unisys Ether LAN card (RoadRunner Broadband) 17 inch monitor Windoze 98b Rebellion runs just fine...

I should mention that the AI always seems bound and determined to fully garrison all of its planets with the most advanced (and expensive) troop units available, regardless of anything. So if you've raised the maintenance and/or construction cost of the troop units, it will make the poor AI even more handicapped than it already is...

Many Moons ago, Jahled wrote: ...the footage of the rebel-alliance victory where the rebel fleet shows up and 'dismantles' the SSD (curious how it seems to fall apart...not explode!). I remember reading with stupefaction that the 18 kilometer long SSD could LAND on a planet (on a *very* specially constructed landing pad, but still). But then I thought about it and it made sense. What could hold anything that size together? I'm no engineer but I don't think you could do it with the tensile strength of the building materials, no matter how advanced your materials and construction methods. The SSD can only be held together by using special "structural integrity" artificial gravity fields. And so I was very impressed with the Rebel victory cutscene, which seems to show the Executor's gravity fields failing - which results in the very memorable way that it comes apart in layers. That scene actually haunted me for a long time after I saw it...

Show me your cards! Maybe we should both upload our mods to the appropriate section (the TC page?), I'd like to examine yours... (but I'm definitely going to make the Antilles/Dodonna change you mentioned above, I'll have to think about Rieekan and Page though... why Page?) My basic strategy was to force the Imperial player to rely more on military assaults and less on diplomacy. However the T.I.E. is nearly useless and reducing the MAT of the Imp. Army troops from 6 to 5 is not that significant. Doubling the MAT of the Stormtroopers hurts but these guys are elite! They shouldn't be used for planetary garrisons! Quadrupling the MAT of the Darktroopers will probably hurt the Imps a lot more. So from my changes the Imps do have a lot to complain about... did I mention that I increased the MAT and MNT of the T.I.E. Defender to 15 and 21? I agree that, "historically", the Neb-B and Escort Carrier should be available to the Imps (but not to the Rebs). But in the game the Neb-B is a munchkin ship. Why would the Imps ever build anything else? I want to see the Imperial player building SDs! Which is the main reason I eliminated the Escort Carrier, to force the Imps to build SDs. But maybe that is not a sufficient reason and I should rethink eliminating the Escort Carrier. Of course the Imperial is basically a glorified supercarrier crossbred with an overbuilt Victory, with delusions of grandeur. The ship is 1.6 kilometers long!!! It can't be cost effective but that's Palpatine for you isn't it? Expensive as hell but impressive as hell too (especially when it is rising over the horizon and driving straight at you). IMO it's just not Star Wars if the Empire's ships don't have that, uh, imperial grandiosity.

Heee. I like giving the Empire things to cheer about. In my game, I have eliminated Neb-Bs (Empire: Yaaay!!!) and Escort Carriers from both sides, and changed the research level for X-Wings to 2 and CC-7700s to 11 (the Alliance only used gravity well projectors recovered from captured Interdictor Cruisers IIRC), among many other changes. The Carrack's turbolaser ratings were doubled (to 10/10/30/30, oooohh) and the Strike Cruiser's costs were lowered to 50 material and 40 maintanence. I lowered the construction cost of Imperial Army Regiments from 6 to 5 and of T.I.E.s from 3 to 1 (their maintenance costs 2). I bumped up the maintenance for A-Wings to 5. I also have Coruscant start with 6 Stormtrooper regiments, 15 Imperial Army Regiments, 12 T.I.E. squadrons, and minimums of 1 construction yard, 1 training facility, 3 mines, 3 refineries, 3 Gencore-1s, two LNR-1s, and 2 KDY-150s.... where the Alliance starts with a Fleet Regiment at Yavin and another Fleet Regiment at the HQ along with 2 Y-Wing squadrons and 1 Construction yard, 1 Gencore-1 and 1 KDY-150. On the other hand, Y-Wings cost 4 and 3, respectively, Jerjerrod's diplomatic base was lowered to 40 and Piett's base was lowered to 0, and the construction and maintenance costs of troop units were increased as follows: Sullustans, Stormtroopers, Mon Cals and Wardroids construction costs doubled, Darktroopers and Wookies construction costs quadrupled, and Mon Cals, Wardroids, Darktroopers and Wookies maintenance costs doubled. I also have the Imps get the T.I.E. Defender at the very end of the game (research level 11) and I make it less powerful than the B-Wing and slightly less manueverable than the A-Wing.