Learning more...

[Bryan Jarvis]

Hi, everyone -

As Davin and Genny know, I've been playing in the "player vs robots" world and truthfully, I've
been just accepting the suggested moves.

I'm starting to get the hang of some things, and I plan on becoming more detailed on the next
game.

I see all the commands, but at this stage I'm not sure what sequence of commands are best
for initiating combat - what kinds of fleet ships, how many? - so many questions really.

It would be interesting to have an experienced player watch over my shoulder, so to speak,
and chirp in my ear about things I can do or should be doing.

The same goes for building new classes of vessels (or modifying the default ones)
The instructions say you _can_ and _should_ but I don't think I have enough experience
to build a new class of ship (mostly how many of what type of engine and such).

I have some suggestions from what I've seen so far as well...

Thank you!
Bryan

[Davin Church]

Have you read any of the technical magazine articles I've written, particularly the ones about ship design?  They're available from the Galac-Tac page of the web site if you'd like to look through them.  I have one more article that's not there that was written but the magazine hasn't been published yet - it's about "initiating combat".  But as for ship design, everybody likes to do things differently, so the best bet is to just leap in there and try things out.  Especially in a solo game, there's no harm in messing up really badly and starting over with better ideas next time.

In general, combat is easy.  Send ships to a contested location with Attack or Secure orders.  They'll fight and you'll see what happens.  By trial and error, if nothing else, you'll begin to see what works and what doesn't in various circumstances.  Most combat in Galac-Tac is one-sided: warships vs. non-combatants.  And most of the rest of the combats are overwhelmingly resolved one way or the other (dozens to hundreds of ships vs. a few, for example).  Only in very few circumstances will there be any difference in outcome based on HOW you do your combat, and you'll learn about the ins and outs of that over time.  Many times you'll just be sending in one tiny ship with guns to blow up one cargo vessel, and there isn't much sophistication needed for that.

Genny or I are available any time you have specific questions, but it's often better if you at least try to figure out strategies yourself.  You may come up with something completely different than has been tried before.  And you may surprise yourself with how well your own ideas pan out.  In Galac-Tac, there is no right and wrong way to do things, so almost anything works in some particular circumstance or another.  So there is no arbitrary "best" to be working towards, especially when you play against other humans.  Figuring things out as you go is part of what the game's about.  ;-)

[Bryan Jarvis]

I've read everything I found, so far.

There's some good stuff on the early tactics - building your economic base and all.
But transitioning to the mid-game is where I have most of my questions.

This morning I made the "mistake" of attacking a neighboring production center
and lost a large fleet.  So, maybe a surround-and-drown tactic is better - capture
colonies to starve the enemy of PV and ad that to my inventory instead...
So - off to try that strategy!

I am unclear a little on how to capture a star - I sent my fleet to attack and if
it wins, do I just move a loaded freighter over and issue he Colonize command?
Or are there intervening steps - Destroy? or whatever.
Do I need to leave my fleet there to defend the area until colonized (I guess that
is probably a Yes)

All these will become clear to me with experience, but I'm trying to shorten the
learning curve as much as I can since I'm literally years behind most of the other
players..

Thanks for your patience,
Bryan

[Davin]

Keep in mind that you're fighting robots now instead of humans, and all they do is set up huge platform-based defensive fleets in their PCs.  Attacking a robot-run PC or HW requires a monstrous fleet, while their colonies are relatively undefended.  This play style is very different than what you'd expect of a human, so while you might make strategic plans like you suggested against a robot, doing so with a human player is (a) unnecessary and (b) won't work.  So don't assume that you'll play the same way in a human game vs. a solo game.

To capture someone else's star, you must first Destroy it, and then Colonize it.  (Like other stars, don't forget to Chart sometime before Colonizing.)  However, none of those commands will work with any enemy ships left in system (after any combat is over).  So you must destroy all their ships there and keep them from bringing in reinforcements while you Destroy/Colonize.  Once it's yours you then only have to worry about defending it against someone doing the same thing to you.

[Frank Geyer]

I found that the "undefended" colonies for robot positions  had at least one carrier with 6 fighters.

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[Davin]

Actually, that's just a Sentry to catch Scouts.  It's never more than a single small carrier that's only there one out of four turns.  That's why I called them "relatively undefended".