Neptune's Pride is My Downfall

So, after yesterday night’s “Hey, look at this ridiculous Flash stuff!” post, I figured that I should post about an actually interesting game. But what? But what indeed.

Neptune’s Pride.

“Wow, what’s that?” you ask, no doubt with a bit of trepidation in your voice, half expecting me to start extolling the virtues of a mermaid simulation with funky 70’s pimp funk. And my response is “What, you’re too damn lazy to follow the link and see for yourself, bitch?”

Neptune’s Pride is a browser based Space 4x game. Now, since it’s browser based, it’s stripped down, so don’t be expecting Master of Orion 4000 : This Time Shit’s Serious. There is a pay model, but that’s optional (and opens up more options). I’m playing a free game. I figure I’ll AAR this motherfucker, because it’s been awhile.

“Wait…so the game is set in space, yet it’s named after the water dude with the trident?”

Hmm…yeah, I don’t so much get it, either.

ANYWAY, before I dive in to this, a quick description of the game rules.

Once you log in (it uses your Google account for a login), you can browse the free games and join one. You have to wait until the game is full, at which point it emails you to tell you that the game has started (supposedly…).

As for the game itself, you’re presented with a star map in the main view window. There are 8 players in the game, each in a different sector, and everyone starts with 4 stars under their control, one of which is their home star. Each star will typically have a fleet of ten ships orbiting it.

Each star can be upgraded in three areas.

Industry – The higher your industry level, the more ships that will be automatically produced at that star every 24 hours.

Economy – The higher your economy, the more money that will be automatically created at that star every 24 hours.

Science – The higher your Science rating, the faster research will progress.

Upgrading each of these costs a certain amount of money per level. The cost is determined by the amount of Natural Resources found at that star…the more resources available, the cheaper development will be.

The only kind of ship that you actually build ‘by hand’ are Carriers. Without a Carrier, fleets are star-bound, so carriers tend to be just SLIGHTLY important if you plan to actually go anywhere.

The one area you can improve that needs a bit more delving in to is Science and Research. There are 4 areas of Research that you can spend time on.

Weapons – Increases your combat power, which you’d already have figured out were you not a retard.

Range – Increases the distance your fleets can ‘jump’ at once. There tend to be regions of the galaxy you play in with gulfs between stars, so that’s a big deal.

Speed – How quickly your fleets can travel.

Scanning – How far you can see to get accurate reads. This lets you detect other fleets earlier, but also get a better report on the Natural Resource levels of surrounding stars.

Finally, there’s Diplomacy. You can basically engage in a chat with any other player at any time, where you can form ad hoc alliances (there are no formal treaty mechanics in the game right now) or trade. Money and research can be traded, and possibly ships (I haven’t delved too deep in to trading yet).

And there you have it! Combat is pretty simple. Two fleet enter…one fleet leave. Oh, you want details? Fine, whiner.

Combat takes place in rounds, with each side taking turns to do damage, until all ships of one side are destroyed.
The defender always strikes first and receives a +1 weapons advantage.
Starting with the defender, each side does damage equal to their weapons skill (+1 for the defender).
For example:

Defender has 4 weapons skill (+1 for defending) and 10 ships. Attacker has 6 weapons skill and 10 ships.
Round 1: defender does 5 damage, attacker loses 5 ships leaving 5 ships.
Round 2: attacker does 6 damage, defender loses 6 ships leaving 4 ships.
Round 3: defender does 5 damage, attacker loses 5 ships leaving 0 ships.
Defender wins with 4 ships remaining.

Given an equal number of ships and equal weapons skill (including defensive bonus), the defender will always win as they strike first.
The number of ships does not play a role in the amount of damage dealt. Number of ships can be considered as the “health” of each player in the battle.

There you go. On with the game!

The galaxy…Upsilon Brachium. Soon it will be mine. Let’s look at the star map (this is a stripped down, zoomed out view to give an idea of where players are relative to one another). Oh, I’ll actually remember to make screenshots clickable to zoom in and see em all biggy-fied for once. You’re welcome.

The first thing you’ll notice is that several players have more than 4 stars. Well, that’s because I didn’t think of doing an AAR until the game was underway. Also, the email a player is supposed to get alerting them of game start? Two word for that : Bull and shit. So if you do sign up to try the game, CHECK YOUR GAME STATUS REGULARLY.

The second thing you may have noticed is that the Blue player who’s stars are currently circled is in a fairly shitty location. Yeah, that would be me. I don’t know if it’s his pitchfork, but Neptune has certainly planted something deep in my ass.

Now, my initial moves were expansion related. I need a buffer zone around my home star (which is the middle of the 5 stars I currently control). Luckily, a number of surrounding stars are rich in resources, so bully for me. I assembled fleets, built carriers and headed off…in a bit.

When you assign a move order to a fleet, there is a 30 minute delay before the engines ‘spin up’ and the move begins. That’s 30 minutes of real, Earth time. If during that time you cancel the move, it doesn’t happen. If you try to cancel afterwards, too late. Also, fleet travel times are listed in real time as well. So if your first fleet to ‘land’ somewhere will take 12 hours and it’s 4 pm, you won’t be there until 4 in the morning.

Obviously, I’ve occupied an additional star (northernmost). I’m heading for the NW star and both to the West as well, and one to the East (though that one sucks…it’s basically going to be a detection picket in case someone build up long range travel and tries to sneak in on me that way).

All of my remaining money is poured in to developing Economy and Industry. I need ships and I need money. Research is being spent on Weapons. Basically, being stuck in the middle of the map has forced my hand to a more straightforward military strategy, so it’s all about firepower. I’m going to be a mythical effective UN peace enforcement force, packing enough punch that nobody is too eager to fuck with me on their own.

Oh look, a message from the Red player. Seeing as he is the only guy who currently doesn’t threaten me in any way, I’m interested in talking to him as well. He’s proposing that since we’re distant from each other, we should trade. Good. My plan is now formulated, though I’m easing in to negotiations to not appear desperate.

I’m going to completely focus on ships and cash, and use a bunch of that extra money to buy scientific advancements. It’s really the only way that I have any hope of survival.

Of course, since Red’s reasoning for being willing to trade with me was that I don’t pose a thread, he’s likely offered deals to Green, Dark Blue and Purple as well.

So, I log in today and see another message. It’s from Orange. He says he understands being in the middle is tough, and that I am not a target of his for the moment…he wants Green.

I don’t believe him period, but I’ll play along. See, I’ve noticed, as he no doubt has, that Green has 4 stars. That means that player probably doesn’t realize that the game has started, and I want to crush him with his own ignorance. And the same goes for Dark Blue and Purple. I need to remove at least one of them, and do so quickly.

I reply to Orange that I appreciate his words of peace. I also point out that if he were to join Red in an attack on Yellow (something I’ve also pointed out to Red…he has to attack Yellow if he’s going anywhere), he would remove the other currently most powerful player in the game. However, if he chooses to go after Green, of course I’ll join him.

Here’s my plan. Dark Blue and Purple are my primary targets. I need to shut that back door, if for no other reason that to prevent further rapings at the hands of Neptune. I WILL go after Green, but to a small degree, and just to ‘keep up appearances’. Meanwhile, I’m going to cajole and trick until I get Orange so focused on Yellow that he goes for it. That, in turn, keeps Yellow so focused on defending himself from Orange and Red that he can’t even think about attacking me. Let them fight it out while I sweep away the smaller players.

Trickery, bribery AND brute force all rolled in to one?