The Void - Tick 42 Cycle 1

 Prospects of war.

Red circles indicate my two largest fleets, a growing 45 ship fleet on my homestar to the north and my 31 ship fleet I sent south east early on. Both fleets will rendezvouz with Explorers next cycle ahead of a potential redeployment to the C++ front.

I'm really considering going to war with C++. I know I can win his border black hole and he doesn't have any big fleets at the border (neither do I) 

Reasons to go to war

1. Snaring the border binary

2. Threatening and potentially winning the 150 NR super binary to the south.

3. I need to attack someone eventually.

4. I have better science than him (and all my neighbours) which means I've probably had a better start 

Reasons not to go to war

1. I don't have any allies.

2. I don't have the fleets at the front line to execute the war.

3. I don't have any specialist tokens saved up. 

4. I would need to spend on industry when I want to be spending on economy.

All in all, it doesn't make sense right now. I don't have the fleets at the front to execute a war successfully and I don't want to kick one off at the wrong time for a 5 NR black hole. I am going to work on the basis that I will go to war with C++ but without actually starting it yet. 

Diplomatically, I've had some responses from General Kenobi indicating he might be planning to attack C++ and C++ asking for a peace between us. I need to probe these conversations a bit further and see if they reveal any better paths. I still won't start a war this turn but I might back a horse there. General Kenobi seems brash which could be a liability. C++ more measured. I need more information on who is stronger of the two and watching their tech for another turn might reveal that. Luckily, my logistics and movement of fleets to the front line is broadly identical whichever one of them I plan to attack so I don't need to make this decision yet.

As a note, we're heading into the weekend now so you might see a time jump from here to the next blog/updates may become more concise out til Monday.

The Void - Tick 36 - Cycle 1

More empires on the horizon and the first small decisions.

My North

I've opted to stop expanding NW. Racing that way with my Explorer risks getting it in trouble and I don't like the idea of squeezing myself into a narrow band of stars between two empires. The Explorer is racing back home to pick up ships on my capital to deploy wherever I need them.

My West

I've reached out to C++ here but no reply yet. I have a decision to make next turn. I'm going to kill his inbound carrier on Amenhotep and I'll also need turn have my own black hole to see what's going on. I can then choose to grab the black hole giving me good visibility and denying him it. It's something I'm considering depending on a) if/how he replies and b) what I see with that black hole next turn

My South

There are some big hyperspace leaps down there that make it a nice natural border. I've added another Explorer to grab the black hole/nebula/binary to the south. That might help me establish a bridgehead if needed and will give me good visibility on whatever threats are down there. 

This Explorer will immediately drop ships on the treble star and then race back north to meet up with a carrier carrying 31 ships. I want it ready to race west if I do kick off a border spat with C++

I am wondering whether I have a map edge border to the south/east. The answer is probably not but the longer I go without encountering anyone the more I'll think it's a possibility.

The Void - Tick 24 Cycle 1

 I am not alone. The new cycle has arrived and I get $284 courtesy of my Banking 2, and 14 economy (just 4 new economy...) 

My star count is up to 16 and I've caught sight of my first neighbor. I thought I'd encountered this pseudonym before, but a check back through my games shows I haven't - maybe in Neptunes Pride. There is a guild called the Neo Holy Roman Empire that has two players I know to be active Vik Ia and AuronaNitsua and a very good fresh player Detlef, who I think no longer plays.

Anyway, I hit up the HRE and I get a 14-minute reply that has some thought to it. That's enough for me to move mentally from 'potential first target' to 'potential collaborator'

I also see HRE spent 3 of his starting tokens on an Explorer and what's interesting is that it's heading 16 ticks west of where I see him right now to an unknown star.  That suggests a) something has caught his eye b) he won't have a fleet right behind to beat me to my target (20 NR) star.

Ignore his line of approach to his newly captured star the Explorer is departing from. Thinking about it, logically it makes much more sense for him to have come from the right of there. Also, I changed the route of my southern carrier to go direct to the binary.

I'm going to break into some conversation. Enough to convince the eloquent HRE that I am present, paying attention, and invested (qualities you'd prefer in an ally to an enemy) whilst not yet revealing too much of my hand that I'm super active. I'm one of a few 'super active' players in the game and if HRE is another top dog then fast responses will soon get their ears pricking. 

Aside from this, expansion is broadly going well. I see a new binary star and nobody else. I need 19 more stars to reach 'par' for my opening position and I think I'll probably get that. There are 12 I have high confidence of getting at this stage and we'll see about the rest.

I plan to build another Explorer this cycle but I don't know this turn exactly where I need it. It's possible I'll build it on my Homestar to rapidly redeploy a force to any contested borders.

The Void - Tick 12 Cycle 0

 After two turns the galaxy is starting to take shape. I control 8 stars and I see a further 34. As the galaxy is 35 stars per person this means I'm now seeing some stars that I likely won't be the first to reach. 

Red squares indicate binary stars. Blue squares indicate black holes. Green squares indicate stars that are Asteroid Fields, Nebulas OR have NR over 35. These are the stars I'm most interested in. 

Two binaries will be nice, though they are only 89 and 99 NR. The black holes are also helpful for quick expansion and are helping me plot the optimal routes out to the frontiers. The only issue would be if someone beats me to those ones at the border. A border black hole is great if you control it but a liability if your opponent has much better visibility than you. 

I'm now running an Explorer and my noble Pathfinder who I've named Jeronimo. Infrastructure wise I added 1 banking on Tick 6 and another on Tick 12, enough to get me Banking 2 at Cycle. I only have 100 credits left which would be enough to get me 4 upgrades. That's not a lot of economy but with infrastructure costs so high I felt it was more important to add science. 

I'll be researching Terraforming 2 after Banking 2. Banking 3 is actually going to be more valuable than Terraforming 2 but the problem is I won't be able to get either by the end of the next cycle. Doing Terraforming next will mean I have it for purchases in Cycle 2 and by my math I'll have Banking 3 by the end of Cycle 2. There's not a lot in it but I expect this to be a competitive game and I really want to optimise research timing, since I can't trade with anyone else. 

It's too early to say whether this is a good starting position or not. A lot will depend on how I do on expansion versus my neighbours. 

The Void - Starting Out - Tick 0 Cycle 0

It's been a long time since I covered a game, but I've decided to fire back up the blog to cover the ultimate Solaris experience which is an anonymous 32-player game.

I've won 32-player matches 2x before, with a further two 2nd place finishes but I come into this game having finished 16th in my last two games this size. Two of my worst results ever. I'm looking to put those bad results behind me and win, or at least podium here. 

The rules (highlights)

• Anonymous, extra dark galaxy. Nobody will know the shape of the galaxy or who is playing.
• Speedy turn-based rules mean that 6 ticks pass every 6 hours.
• Huge 1k+ star galaxy. Very rare wormholes (Estimate: 5-6 pairs). Common asteroid fields, nebulas, and black holes but rare binaries. No pulsars to hint at the galaxy shape.
• Slow research and expensive infrastructure will slow down development.
• No experimentation. Crazy expensive scanning, very expensive weapons and specialists, and expensive terraforming and manufacturing tech. Banking and hyperspace are standard costs. 
• Players start with level 3 scanning, level 3 weapons and level 2 specialists.
• All tech, credit, and specialist token trading is disabled. Players can ally with up to 3 people to travel across their stars and scout.
• Disabled War Machine, Saboteurs, Scramblers, Worldbuilders, Financial Analysts, Trade Ports, Stellar Engines, Stellar Beacons, Stargates, and Research stations. 

What I expect from this ruleset is a long game where players will have to manage constrained resources and choose carefully what to research and when. The special stars (AF, nebulas, BHs, etc) will have strategic importance for at least the first hundred ticks. Binaries will have game-long utility. 

The other players

With it being anonymous, who knows what opposition is out there in the galaxy. Historically these big custom games have drawn a very competitive lobby though. It's likely there are multiple 32-player game winners out there. All you can look at is who has past form and that's 

LeDazz (6) CRISPR (5) ArtisticDodo (4) Luckyfish (4)  Necria (2) Highscore (2) Royluc (1) Atomsun (1) Karmadrome (1)  Innoble (1) Solfyre (1)  Cryptious (1) TheLastHero (1) Q24H (1).  

These players represent the biggest threats.

I've used Red or Amber coloring for anyone who is very unlikely, or unlikely to be in the game in my view, though of course who knows. There are lots of other very competitive players beyond this list but I think looking at those who have won games this size first is a starting point. I'm also apprehensive about Zorg (0) who would surely have won one or more of these if 32 players were typically turn-based and has a strong 16-player record and will be in the game.

My starting position

I've gone with the pseudonym Baskerville for this game and plan to run most of my messages through ChatGPT to translate them into the style of Sherlock Holmes.

Every player starts with 5 starting tokens and my plan is to prioritize expansion and use 3 on an Explorer, and a further 1 on a Pathfinder that I'll buy after the first turn to cross a divide. I'll use my two new tokens at Cycle to buy a second Explorer. I like Explorers. If you're lucky with discovered Warp gate placements they can be a real asset for early and mid game logistics. The pathfinder loses it's utility fast, but I can have some fun with it and see what adventures it gets up to during the match.

In the run up to the game there was some Discord discussion about Mineral Extractors (MEs) and particularly with WB's disabled I'm expecting some players to go heavy on MEs. I believe I'll get better benefits and early momentum from being first to more stars, so all my tokens go on expansion. 

My early plan is simple, expand fast, capture whatever I can first. Do the necessary diplomacy to avoid any fights that aren't on my terms, and try to decide who I am going to attack first very quickly.

* * 

A final point on these posts. I'll publish all posts post-game but my commitment is that all posts will be wrote at the time, with no retrospective edits, meaning if my judgement is wrong on something or indeed if I get killed, you'll get to read through that happening play by play.

I'll aim to update frequently, but probably not every turn. It depends how much is happening and where the timing falls in my schedule. 

Monoceteris VII - All Posts in Chronological Order

 All the posts from Monoceteris VII game

Preview

Tick 1

Tick 9

Tick 24

Tick 30

Tick 34

Tick 38

Monocerotis VII - Cycle 1, Tick 38 - Victory

And victory. A quick game, and one that won't count for records since my opponent resigned 2 ticks before the end of the second cycle. I hope these posts have been instructive and I hope you can see some of the considerations and I hope this motivates more people to play 1v1's.

A quick soap box on the 2 cycle rule. This is the second game I've won in 1v1's that hasn't counted because it ended too fast. Whilst both were against inexperienced players and were not difficult victories, I should have gained a win and ELO from each of these matches though.

1. One of the things that separates players in strength is the ability and commitment to see out matches. An opponent going AFK and you not going AFK is not a random fluke or some anomaly of the universe. It's because you were more committed than your opponent. Commitment is part of ability and so it should be reflected in ELO. An opponent that goes AFK or quits on cycle 1.5 is also more likely to quit on cycle 7.5 when the going gets tough. 
2. Asgana is now over-rated compared to a random player who has never played 1v1's before. They will both be rated 1200. However, our random player has not lost a game and has not been AFK through parts of a game. They're likely to be slightly better than Asgana. You might only think they're maybe 52% likely to beat Asgana in a match based on what you know, but statistically the odds of a 1200 player beating a 1192 player would be 51%. 
3. I am now under-rated compared to what I should be. This will correct over time (I'll get slightly more ELO on my next win, and the one after until eventually there was no difference) but it will affect my future opponents too.  Beating me will now be worth slightly less, and losing to me will now hurt their ELO slightly more. By discarding this game we push the impact down the road.
4. I don't blame my opponent for quitting, the game was lost on tick 2 and they shouldn't be required to play it out. It's very unlikely they even knew about the 2 cycle rule. 
5. The blog shows the thought process and level of effort put in to a match. I wouldn't usually document it and a lot of these considerations are usually done rapidly in a few seconds, maybe with help of a few checks of the ruler tool, but I still did the work and put in the effort. I should be rewarded with a win in this game. 

Finally, Asgana if you're ever reading this. Thanks for the match. You had an uphill struggle. Hopefully you took something from it.