Here's a quick post before I leave town. Expect no further posting until Monday or Tuesday.
Turn 32The Rica, now under the command of admiral EuchreJack, arrived at Malurain and has begun terraforming the third planet in the system.
Turn 33No new events. The Martynov has reached the edge of its range near the Deneb system and will begin exploring the sectors nearby.
Turn 34The Rica completed terraforming operations on Malurain III and has begun terraforming Malurian I.
Turn 35The Martynov had a look inside the nebula we found a while back. Despite interfering with sensors it's an otherwise harmless astrological body.
Turn 36Malurian completed a third automated farm. The maximum food production in the system is now 80, I'm going to stop building farms now and complete our food production by building an aquaculture center when we're getting closer to 80 population. For now it's more factories.
The Martynov continues exploring empty space...
Turn 37We've finally completed terraforming all the habitable planets in the Malurian system. Now the population can grow to its maximum. We're sending the Rica to terraform the planets in the Mintaka system for lack of a better task for it to do.
Back on Sol, our automated farm upgrade has completed. We're scrapping 2 farms that are now extraneous. I'm ordering the construction of another colony ship while we await completion of our construction research. We should be well prepared for when we can reach new colonies.
I'll just let you know when the Martynov finds or does anything interesting at all.
Turn 38No significant events, Malurian reached 40 population this turn.
Turn 39The Rica arrived at the Mintaka system, we've begun terraforming the second planet in the system. This is a very large jungle planet, and will take some time to complete.
Turn 40No significant events. The Martynov is almost done charting the space along the Ferengi border, additional exploration will continue toward the north near Betazed.
Turn 41No significant events, in fact the game summary says "no events". I've decided to send another offer of friendship to the Selay, perhaps they're in a more friendly mood.
Turn 42The Martynov picked up another Ferengi ship, or rather the same ship as before in a different place.
I've added an image of the partially terraformed Mintaka system. The population grew on its own a little since we've met them.
It's still out of our range, but it does tell us a little more about the location of the Ferengi Alliance. Perhaps we'll finally meet them soon.
Back on Sol, we've completed the construction of another colony ship. The USS Smith A. It's been sent to Mintaka to assist in terraforming operations. The Sol system is now upgrading its databanks, this will be a fast build due to only having one structure.
Turn 43Contact!
The Ferengi Alliance is only interested in trade, it would appear. Whether this is true remains to be seen. We made contact by hailing the vessel we've been seeing on our scanners. It was a scout ship much like the Martynov. There was no battle. The Martynov has also identified another unknown ship just out of range. (I'm putting who they are in spoilers for now.)
It's the Trill. An enormously important minor race. They are very friendly to both us and the Ferengi. Plus getting them as a member will automatically give us any ships they've built, so it's a free navy. Finally, their special racial building provides a +30% research boost across all 6 techs. Together, this makes them one of the best minor races in the game.
It's also possible that their system is out of the range of the Ferengi, which means we have a shot at getting them as members. The bad news: that ship we identified can blast the Martynov away in a single turn. This first contact is likely to be lethal.
We also had the breakthrough in construction we've been expecting. We'll now shift our focus to propulsion, so as to make use of our new colony ships.
In other news around the empire, the Smith joined the Rica at Mintaka, I've ordered it to begin terraforming operations. Also the Selay replied to our friendship treaty, they're still uninterested in trade for the present. In Sol we're going to begin upgrading our factories. The databank has been brought online to provide a little bit of internal security in case the Ferengi get any ideas about our military secrets.
The Smith is available for anyone who wants to be admiral-ed.
For RealsI'd like to keep playing, even though 11 turns may seem like a lot not very much has happened with this update. We scouted all the space between us and the Ferengi, so we'll have an idea about any expansions they make in our direction. That and a little terraforming has been our only measurable progress. I'm stopping because of our first contact and potential first contact. I'm going away for a few days and I'd like you all to post regarding how you'd like us to proceed. Please understand that it is extremely important that you are clear about how much role-play vs game-play I should put into this LP. I need as much feedback as possible here.
Regarding the Ferengi.
We don't need to sign any non aggression pact with them right now. With no systems between their territory and ours we aren't in competition for any resources beyond the Bandi as a member race. And frankly we've done all we can there for now. It would be useful to sign one just to get their territory revealed on our map. But that's slightly cheaty, and 50% of those who responded to the poll said to play without that kind of knowledge.
Furthermore, we can now use the Intelligence screen to get additional information about our enemy. This is, as I've said, slightly cheaty. And I'd like to clarify what I mean by that. I never cheat, I never tell the game to reveal systems or give me credits or anything like that. Everything I've described is part of the vanilla game and is intended to be used by players. The difference is that it's information given to me as a player that a "real" person in the Federation wouldn't necessarily know. The intelligence screen is full of that kind of information by default, you don't even need any spies. A quick glance has already told me how many systems the Ferengi own, how many have dilithium, and the relative progress of their research, economy, and military relative to our own empire. I even know how many member minor races they have, all without any "spying". We would be entirely within the bounds of the game to make use of this information, but it is, as I've said, "slightly cheaty" from a role-play perspective.
Regarding the "Mystery Ship":
I trust most of you opened that spoiler and know what we're dealing with. If you haven't, you'll be a little lost.
Honestly we're very close to getting the Betazoids as a member race. But considering the potential benefits, it's actually worth bribing the Betazoids the rest of the way into joining us. Then we can immediately build a shipyard and delay scouting with the Martynov, just so we can make contact as fast as possible. Then I'd be very generous with the bribes until we have an affiliation treaty with them, at minimum.
Doing so may be a critical moment in the history of our empire, it could make us or break us. However, making this decision would place this LP firmly in the realm of "gameplay focused". As far as the people of the Federation know, we have no idea what that ship represents, and making any decisions with this knowledge would set a very strong precedent for the remainder of the LP. This is why it is incredibly vital that you discuss among yourselves what kind of LP you'd like this to be and then to make it 100% clear what you want.
I will, of course, be reading all your comments. I will also reset the current poll, without changing the topic, to reflect this.
Next post won't be until Monday at the earliest, probably later.
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Topic: Lets Play: Star Trek TNG Birth of the Federation: Turns 173-175 *WE'RE BACK* (Read 58469 times)