The Orion Nebula

Hyperios, capturing Antarian ships the first time they appear is entirely possible. It just takes your entire fleet to do it in the early stages of the game!

As soon as a ship is sighted I save the game. I then refit as many ships as possible that can make it to the defending system. A few ships have to have tractor beams and be able to take a few hits. A couple frigates need the scout lab. All other ships ideally have troop pods.

It may take a few rounds to take the ship. Be sure to disengage your tractor beams before ending each battle turn, or the enemy will self destruct...they don't like being immobilized.

Yeah.

also USE TROOP PODS!

TP+shuttles will give you about 3 times as many marines. I have actually built ships designed for nothing but troop combat. And it works surprisingly well against computer players too. Non-creative AI races tend to have weak ground combat ratings.

anyways... I tend to build two types of ship. Missile launchers and boarding vessels. I never really use anything else. I only use Missile ships to distract Antarans. Antarans always target ship with most powerful weapons first. In this case my missile ships are the only ones that really have weapons.

I usually have:
Tractor beams(sometimes as few as 1 the number of beams needed is a function of the enemy ship size, early-mid game Antarans rarely use anything bigger than destroyer.)
Assault shuttles(Antarans CAN'T target these if you close to point-blank range before launching)

battlepods(+space)
Troop pods(+marines you'll need LOTS)
Heavy armor
reinforced hull(not needed but they make it easier to not get blown up)

Also if your troops fail, you can immobilize them with tractor beams to force them to self-destruct.

I always used to wish the Antarans attacked me as their first target exactly to capture their ship - I found their first ship to be the easiest to capture and had a near 90% success rate in the games I got attacked.

It is a bit of time since I used to play this race, and I am not so sure how well this race would be online as I mostly used it in single player games against the computer. The race picks are far from common too - leaving two picks unused...

Setup (Patch 1.31): Impossible, Huge, Pre-warp, average Age and minerals.

Race traits:
Democracy (7), Creative (8), Large HW (1),Low Gravity(-7), Ship Defense (-2) ---> (Yes, there are two picks I did not use - my higher score due to not using all the picks may have been the cause for the Antarans high frequency of attacking me the first time(?) ( I would later use the two picks together with the 4 from Evolutionary Mutation to become telepathic)

All research and building is mostly set in stone up to turn 50 from here... Set max research for electric computer, and sell star base year 0, sell marine barracks year 1, then focus on Research lab, which is bought completely already as soon as research complete (~turn max research for Automatic factories which is also bought as soon as possible, then focus research towards soil enrichment/cloning center, set up soil enrichment first while continuing research for Holo simulator then planetary supercomputers. (buy both), Now research for Robotic Factory and continue directly for Assault shuttles. The research should finish at about the same time as the first Antarans attack... From what I can recall, I only needed one Destroyer class ship with Cargo Pods and Assault shuttles - send shuttles and get as far away from the Antarans ship as possible.

A successful capture of the Antarans ship should likely gain you victory also in online games as well as any game against computers - the next priority would be research everything that increase spying to defend against tech theft...

Hmm...?

Democracy 7
Creative 8
Large HW 1
Low-G -5
ship def -20 (?) -2

You get 110% score, 1 pick left with those choises.

From what I can recall, I only needed one Destroyer class ship with Cargo Pods and Assault shuttles - send shuttles and get as far away from the Antarans ship as possible.

I doubt that you recall this correctly.

From what I can recall, I only needed one Destroyer class ship with Cargo Pods and Assault shuttles - send shuttles and get as far away from the Antarans ship as possible.

I doubt that you recall this correctly.

Um yeah.... he'd have had a pitiful ground combat rating. Heck would he have even had one above 10?

( I would later use the two picks together with the 4 from Evolutionary Mutation to become telepathic)

I have never been able to do that.

only up to 4 picks.
Has anyone else benn able to do this?
If so, is there a limit?

Can you have -10 picks, and pick 14 char pts. later?
granted that would be rather crazy.
I have never been able to gain more that the 4 with Evo Mut.

( I would later use the two picks together with the 4 from Evolutionary Mutation to become telepathic)

I have never been able to do that.

only up to 4 picks.
Has anyone else benn able to do this?
If so, is there a limit?

Can you have -10 picks, and pick 14 char pts. later?
granted that would be rather crazy.
I have never been able to gain more that the 4 with Evo Mut.

I've honestly never tried it. I do know that the game "remembers" how many points you have unspent. but I'm not sure if it'll actually let you spend more than 4.

Well, try it with alt-einstein if you don't believe him.

There is also the well known converted lithovores bug:

Converted Lithovores When you are lithovoric and research Evolutionary Mutation, you can drop the "lithovoric". All you do is turn cybernetic on and off when you get to the race screen - then you have 14 new race picks to spend.

http://masteroforion2.blogspot.com/2005 ... -bugs.html

I did indeed remember a bit wrong about the race setup and a few other things A couple of years since last time I played..

The setup seem to be as follows:
Democratic (7)
Creative (8)
Artifact World (3)
Low Gravity (-5)
Spying -10 (-3)
keeping 2 picks for getting Telepathic with evolutionary mutation...

The focus is quite close to what I wrote in the previous post, except for that also did research all the low tech technologies as soon as they could be completed in only one turn always starting with freighter fleet.

This race start with 30 reseach points / turn compared with the 18 points/ turn from the large planet version from the other day.

The antaran's ships are equipped with quantum detonator. That means 50% chance of selfdestruct when captured by opponent.

On a related note. An AI ship self destructed on me during its turn. It wasn't in the process of being boarded. I think it wanted to retreat but was immobile and so self-destructed instead. Never saw that before.

There is also the well known converted lithovores bug:

So, was this fixed in version 1.40?
Or planned to be fixed in the next mod?
Will Evolutionary Mutation be permenantly restricted to 4 picks only?

I've had the game hang a couple of times in combat with v1.40. The last time was it seems when it was the turn of a ship I had just captured. I think the other times were also related to captured ships. I seem to recall this bug being in the original game though.

Yes.

This bug is also in 1.31. Seems to be some issue with the autocombat when ships are captured or in stasis....at least sometimes.

I think LB would need further info....when does this bug occur exactly? I haven't figured out yet.

Yes.

This bug is also in 1.31. Seems to be some issue with the autocombat when ships are captured or in stasis....at least sometimes.

I think LB would need further info....when does this bug occur exactly? I haven't figured out yet.

In my case it was a small battle, I believe I had three ships - the AI had 3 ships - 1 battleship and 2 cruisers (or destroyers). I had just captured the battleship and it was the AI's turn when it hung. Maybe this is related to the AI wanting to retreat (or self destruct) a ship that was just captured. I mentioned earlier how I saw an odd case where the AI self destructed an immobile ship that wasn't in the process of being boarded - I think it wanted to retreat it in that case as well.