I A G O' S W A R M A N U A L for playing TradeWars 2002 v1.03 and v1.03d "The winds of Hell, have a sulphur smell," Reads a card from the late Iago. And the brownish haze, on the warmer days, Reminds him of Chicago.. -Jim Bianchi (Iago) sysop, Garbanzo BBS (707) 539-1279 o o o I'd like to acknowledge (among others) Joel Downer, Albin Gersich, Fred Polli, Dan Roseen, Leonard Adolph, Steve Genardini, Stephen Whitis, Dave Myers, Woody Weaver, Eugene Hung, Kris Lewis, David White, Jason Boyd, Jim Pittman, Mark Cothram, and, of course, Gary and Mary Ann Martin, the author(s) of TradeWars 2002. I'd like to thank you one and all for provid- ing much of the mat'l for this file and helping to make the game of Trade- Wars a most entertaining diversion. Much of what follows was obtained from the files TWTIPS12, TWINFO, and from monitoring the FIDO and RIME TradeWars conferences. And from playing the game itself. CONTENTS: (IAGO1) HISTORY QUESTIONS TACTICS EVIS ISS MORE ON SHIPS ALIGN AND XP CHANGES 5XP SELL/STEAL (IAGO2) (IAGO3) ATTACKING QUICK 'N DIRTY BUGS REFERENCE MORE BUGS PLANET CLONING BUG USING BUGS MAPPING ATTACKING FERRENGAL COLONISTS =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ HISTORY ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= The latest release of TradeWars 2002 is v1.03d. Many sites are still running v1.03; this older version has many ..ah, bugs, in it that are cons- idered to be extremely destructive to game play, most notably the infamous planet cloning bug and the multiple colonist jettisoning bug. v1.03d fixed both of these in the course of improving the DESQview timeslicing. The new v1.03d mods are supplied as an archive containing only the four executable files: TEDIT.EXE and TEDIT.OVL and TW2002.EXE and TW2002.OVL. Since there is no player data stored in these files, they can be installed (dropped in) over a running game with no loss of loss of player assets or points. Aside from resetting the game defaults in TEDIT (initial holds, ftrs, creds; base moves, etc), the only thing required to be done is to reenter the reg code for the game. --- First I would like to give you a brief history of the Trade Wars games. This will help you and others understand where the game has been and where it is going. Trade Wars first game into being as a programming assignment for the Unix system. (Authors unknown.) Much like the great old DND game Moria first came about. Then it was ported over to the IBM world and Chris Sherrick and Alan Davenport had a go at the game and we had TW 500 and TW 1000 (there may be a few other numbers in here...memory fails me at times). These games were the jewels of BBS door games. Everybody played them. BTW, the style of play in all of these games remains pretty much the same, the look, feel and playability. This very echo used to be filled with information on these early games. Then for some reason Chris and Alan parted ways. Chris teamed up with John Morris and they have gone on to TW 1114 (I think is the last version number). They have many features new to the game, multi-node play, etc. But the game still retains the TW look. Alan Davenport came up with Yankee Trader. That game was also in the TW tradition and also had the same playability. Only this time instead of battling the evil Cabal, you had the Xannor after you. Alan's game was a big hit, and still is in many parts of the country. He is still upgrading and improving the game and his latest version is YT35. Alan's game Yankee Trader soon took over this echo. It reigned surpreme for a long time. Until Gary Martin's version, TW2002 hit the BBS's. This game too, had some improvements and captured the fancy of all the TW and YT players that it soon took over this echo. But like all the others before it, it had the same look, feel and playability of the original Trade Wars game. His evil alien race were the Ferrengi. He added planet defenses and a different way of moving planets, and some nice ship types. All in all a nice improvement upon the game. Now this game holds the attention of the echo. So to answer your question, all of the above are the REAL Trade Wars. None of them are clones, just natural progressions of one of the finest space/ war trading strategy games. The credit for concieving this great game goes to some anonymous programmers who are more than likely stockbrokers some- where with no time or thought to what they started. Everyone else has made improvements. Even Gary Martin who DID NOT CREATE THIS GAME, only improved upon the original concept. The game you are asking about is TW2002, and the latest version of it is v1.03d. Gary Martin may or may not finish this beta version (v2.0) he is slowly and reluctantly working on. And from what I hear in this echo is considering reneging on his one time registration fee, and perhaps going to charge for this new version. Tis not enough that he let us all sit here for 2 years waiting for an updated game (read the docs). Or that he felt an obligation after getting so many $$$'s in registration fees for the game that he would not or perhaps could not fix the over 100 bugs in the game. Must stop now, or I shall say something that perhaps I should not...why burst your bubble. Anyway I hope that answers your questions about Trade Wars, who created the game, where it has been, and where it is going. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ QUESTIONS ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= To answer some of the most often asked questions: Question: If I am a CEO and I buy a Corp Flagship, then I quit the corp, do I get to keep the flagship? Wondering if corp members could all be CEO for a day and buy flagships and then rejoin the corp, each retaining the prize ship? (1) Yes, you can keep the FlagShip when you quit, but (2) no, no one with a FlagShip is allowed to join a corp. --- 1. To rob, you need to have -100 alignment or lower. Then, in a sector with a port; (P)ort (R)ob (R)ob credits or (S)teal products. 2. To figure how much you can likely get away with when you steal, it's your experience divided by 20, for easy figuring. The real numbers are less, but use this one. For robbing, its your experience times 8. 3. In version 1.03(d) THERE IS NO WAY TO KILL A FED! PERIOD. No MATTER what the odds are, whether or not you p-missile, etc... Maybe in an earl- ier version you can, but not 1.03!!! Stardock, Class 0, or Sol are POSSIB- LE, but VERY difficult. 4. ISS means Imperial Starship. You need +500 alignment to get a Federal Commission (required before getting an ISS). But then you can turn evil and keep it if you're skillful enough. 5. Colonists do regenerate as they're removed from Terra. 6. The average amount of colonists for peak production is 1000 in each group (+/- 1 in Ore, +/- 6 in Org, +/- 12 in Eqp). This will make 55 fight- ers a day. 7. "Computer Upgrade" is a HOAX. It DOES NOT EXIST! PERIOD. The Combat Scanners showing an opponents shield level is NOT the fictitious upgrade. 8. To track someone talk to the Grimy Trader in the Tavern. Ask him about TRADER. He'll say I can tell you : answer no. Then he'll say "Well, is it a particular trader your interested in?" Say yes and enter the name. 9. To get the password to the underground ask the Grimy Trader about MAFIA or UNDERGROUND. Once you have the password, the StarDock command is "U". 10. To lower alignment, go to sector 1. Land and take colonists. Go out of Fed Space and (J)ettison the colonists. In v1.03 games, you can (Q)uit the game then go back in and repeat as necessary. In v1.03d games, you can do this only once per game day. 11. To have an invincible planet, get 16390 ship shields and put them on a level 5 planet. 12. To get the extra 32 holds, get busted stealing 365 holds of Equip or 660 holds of Organics. --- If you take damage points (from any source) while carrying a ptorp, it MIGHT go off sympathetically. If it does, the only effect on you will be that all the remainder of your turns for that game day will be lost. ALWAYS carry a cloak when you're carrying a ptorp. If you take damage points (from any source) while carrying an adet, it MIGHT go off sympathetically. If it does, the effect will be to destroy your ship entirely. Like blasting caps, adets are useful but dangerous when mishandled. Generally speaking, you do NOT want to carry a ptorp or an adet "just because." --- * Originally by David White - How can I find Stardock? Type "V" at the main Command line, ask another player, post a universal announcement, use Joel Downer's FINDSGA, included in TWUTIL10.ZIP, or use Dave Myers' CLASSZER (in LDTxxx.ZIP). - What is FedSpace for? Any players with a non-negative alignment, less than 1000 experience points, and less than 50 fighters can log off overnight in sectors 1-10 and the Stardock sector completely safe from being killed by other players. - What are the tricks to stealing? A player with -100 or lower alignment can steal credits and goods from ports. There is ALWAYS a chance of being busted while trying to rob a port, but some good guideline ratios are, your experience / 20 = holds you can steal your experience * 10 = credits you can steal. - What's the "steal/sell" cycle? With a full load of equipment (or any other commodity), dock at a port that buys that commodity and sell it to them. Then steal it back, and sell it to them again. Repeat. - What's the "holds bug" A player with -100 or lower alignment who gets caught stealing 365 units of Equ. or 660 units of Org. will be fined -32 holds (meaning the player will GAIN 32 holds) and will lose 10% of his or her experience points. This trick can be repeated up to a maximum of 32 holds more than the maximum amount of holds allowed for that particular ship (e.g. 182 holds for an Imperial StarShip (ISS), 102 for a Starmaster, etc.) These holds will be lost as soon as the player ports, unfortunately, unless the technique below is used. - How can I keep an extra 32 holds on my ship? Using the above technique, get the maximum + 32 holds on your ship. Go to earth and get a load of colonists. Port, and steal ONE unit of organics (or another commodity you don't plan on using any time soon). Continue to your planet and drop off the colonists. You will now be able to trade and steal/sell with 32 extra holds PROVIDED you do NOT try to buy, steal, or pick up organics (or whatever commodity you chose) and you do not get busted or destroyed, and you do not S)urrender your cargo to the Ferrengi. - What's the "shield bug?" A planet with a level 5 citadel and 1639 or more planetary shields cannot be successfully invaded by other players. - What's the fighter overloading trick? Join a corporation, then go to the same sector with a corp member with at least as many shields/fighters as you want. Transfer a negative amount of fighters/shields to the corp. member. Repeat as often as you like up to a maximum of 32,767 fighters/shields. This trick is especially useful with a Scout Marauder, which fights at 2:1 odds. Docking at a port, however, will cause the excess shields/fighters to vanish. - What's the shield overloading trick? Use the above technique, or transfer a negative amount of shields to a citadel that already has as many ship shields (planetary shields * 10) as you need. Docking at a port still causes you to lose any extra shields, however. - What are the rules to successfully Transwarping (T-warping)? Transwarping your ship to a sector that contains at least one of your fighters is always safe. Blind ship transwarps are possible only if the destination sector is completely empty of ANYTHING. Blind planetary transwarps are not possible. Ship transwarping costs 3 units of Ore per sector jumped, and planetary transwarping costs 400 units of Ore per sector jumped. Transwarping takes 1 turn regardless of distance traveled. - If I'm busted, can I ever return to that port again? Yes, your name will be removed from the port's records in 14 days or as soon as another player is caught there, whichever comes first. Until then, do not try robbing OR trading at that port. - When can I be commissioned? You can be commissioned if you have an alignment of at least +500. - Can an evil player have an ISS? You must be commissioned to purchase an ISS, but after you have it, you can become evil and still keep the ISS. Running into any of the three Federals (Zyrain, Clausewitz, Nelson) however, means certain death. - Can I kill the Federals? No. Zyrain, Clausewitz and Nelson are indestructible. However, you can trap them in a dead-end sector by placing a fighter right outside the dead-end, since Federals will not travel into a sector that has deployed fighters in it. As long as the fighter stays there, all three Federals can be trapped, though Captain Zyrain will automatically warp out of the sector to rescue players who qualify for protection in FedSpace. - Can a non-CEO have a Corporate Flagship? You must be a CEO to purchase a Flagship, but you can quit as the CEO of your corp. and keep the Flagship. You will not, however, be able to join another corp. - Can I be killed while my ship is cloaked? No, while you are cloaked, you are absolutely invulnerable until your next login (contrary to the documentation, cloaks do not lose their effect- iveness over time.) However, if some player were to figure out which sector you were cloaked in, he or she could mine your sector. The mines would explode as soon as you logged back on. - What are all the settings for my planetary defenses? Examples: Military Reaction level: 20% -- 20% of all the fighters on the planet will attack (at 2:1 odds) any player who moves into your planet's sector. The remaining 80% of the fighters will attack (at 3:1 odds) only if the player attempts to land on your planet. Quasar cannon sector level: 30% -- 30% of all the Ore on the planet will be used to fire on a player entering the sector with your planet, causing 1 point of damage to the player per 3 units of Ore used. Quasar cannon atmosphere level: 60% -- 60% of all the Ore on the planet will be used to fire on a player who attempts to land on your planet, causing 1 point of damage to the player per 1 unit of Ore used. - What are the hidden options in the Stardock? "U" -- Underground, where players with 100 or less alignment can change their name, and post and collect bounties on other players. "+" -- Library, useful only for determining which ships are currently being used by the Ferrengi. Data on alien derelicts is useless. "B" -- Single's Bar, where you can get robbed. Nothing more. - What is the computer upgrade the Grimy Trader talks about? It doesn't really exist. It's just a hoax. - What is the secret message in "Vulcan Thunder?" The secret message (if it exists) seems to have something to do with the characters "9C." Gary Martin has hinted to its existence, but as of yet, no one has found any significance to it. - What's the secret to winning Tri-Cron? Contrary to what the Grimy Trader says, the winning numbers seem to be completely random. - What is Computer Interrogation Mode (CIM) ? From your "Computer Command?" prompt within TW, using the numeric keypad, type -200, , , , , , to get a : prompt. From there, typing "I" (without the quotes) will give you information on all explored sectors, and "R" will give information on all explored ports. ("Q" will quit CIM and "F" will give a path-calculator similar to the one on your ship's computer). To use the information, open a capture file for both sets of info, then use a utility like TWVIEW or TWASSIST that reads the data and arranges it into something useful. --- You should be aware that as long as you have a positive alignment you will be assessed a 10% "tax" if you have 50,000 creds or more on your ship each time you log in to the game -- NOT just once each game day -- and in return, you are given some neato positive align points. Depending on how you feel about paying taxes, it may be desirable to pay the 10% Fed Tax whenever you log on, in order to get the positive align shift for use in obtaining a Federal Commission (and getting an ISS). =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ TACTICS ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * by Joel Downer Question: In a new game, what should be your goal in the first few days? Let's assume a corporate strategy, for a corp of 3-5 players, to keep this simple. (That's what I've usually been playing these days anyway.) Let's also assume that we're playing a game with *no* treaties or rules about the shield bug. I plan on playing evil wherever I play. I expect to find the StarDock the first day of the game -- if it isn't displayed in the Game Status screen, I or one of my corp-mates will run FINDSGA to locate it. As soon as we find StarDock, we trade in our Merchant Cruisers for Scout Marauders (with the trade-in value of the average Merchant, you can buy a Scout with 25 holds and a density scanner, and have a little left over with which to go out to dinner ). The Scout is the single best ship in the early stages because of its move rate. My choice from that point depends on the game configuration. If FedSpace is open to squatters, my teammates and I will spend the first 3 - 4 days parking in FedSpace and working trade pairs to build up experience. I like to use the evil Imperial StarShip, so I will try to upgrade to a StarMaster the second day, a Mule the third or fourth, get my commission by the fifth or sixth day, and keep the StarShip from then on. My teammates will typically turn evil by the fourth day (after you have about 375 experience, stealing will be *substantially* more profitable than trading); one way I'm likely to get a quick commission is to coordinate logins with one of my future teammates so that I can blow my *future teammate* up. Objectives for the first 4 - 7 days (depending on the turn rate): to get myself into an Imperial StarShip with slightly less than 1,000 experience, and to get the team members who *won't* be in StarShips stealing in Star- Masters with at least 1,100 experience. We do *not* usually set aside turns for exploration; when we need to find new trade pairs or dead ends, we use ether probes. Objectives for the next 2 - 4 days: to build a well-concealed planet and stock it with 3,000,000 colonists. I will deploy a fighter in a dead-end sector and create a planet there. I will frequently ask my future evil teammates to deploy fighters and mines *in the sector immediately adjacent* to the dead-end. The fighters and mines protect the planet; I enter and exit the sector using TransWarp. Objective for the succeeding 1 - 3 days: to assemble the corporation in final form. I dump colonists to turn evil, start stealing conservatively, and "bust planets" (create and destroy empty planets) to try to build my experience up to 2,250, where I can steal 150 holds. My teammates steal aggressively. Objective for the succeeding three weeks: to build a planet to level five, preventing our enemies from building or defending a planet to a level II citadel. We use ether probes and search aggressively whenever new citadels appear in the game status screen (find as many uses as you can for TWView's OFFLINE program, using version 0.91 if you can; you also may want to look at my FINDHOLE utility). Because of my p-missile capabilities, I can destroy *any* planet that doesn't have a level II citadel at a trivial cost. We upgrade our single planet aggressively, placing the maximum defenses on it at any given time (32,000 fighters; 1639 shields the day it turns level V). If the relative strengths of the teams in the game justify the move, we may invade Ferrengal and either (a) destroy it, or (b) defend it, to prevent our enemies from seizing a ready-made level III citadel. End-game objectives: If we have a level V citadel, and we can prevent our enemies from building or defending a planet, we expect to control the game. We continue to steal full-speed, and stockpile money in our shield-bugged citadel until the combination of our stealing and treasury interest is overwhelming. Through this process, we probably spend 95% of our turns stealing from ports. We use the five-point stealing cycle, but we don't otherwise worry about experience unless our score is low enough to interfere with our stealing. We kill only when absolutely necessary: we expect competant opponents to stay cloaked unless they have a reason to *want* to be attacked. --- * by Stephen Whitis > Can someone tell me a successful way of earning money and ruling the > universe in the shortest time possible? The info below doesn't discuss using holds-bug, but if no unbug utilities are running, you should consider it. Later, after you have a citadel, you should run CMH bug (again, assuming no unbug utilities are running.) Read the FIDO-TradeWars echo daily. You'll learn a lot there. When you ask questions, try to be specific, and try to read the FAQ first. Save a copy of the FAQ for later reference. Get a copy of TWAssist, TWView or a similar utility and use them. You can't be competitive in a quality game without them. These are utilities which parse out the ton of information and make it useful. See the end of this section. Also look for TWTIPS12, a collection of tip files for TW's which covers most of the bugs and basic strategy. If possible, try to join a game that hasn't been going long. A game that's been around for awhile is hard (or impossible) to succeed in if the players who were in it at the beginning are any good at all. You might learn some things in that situation (that's how I started) but to win, you really need to get in near the begining and PLAY EVERY DAY. DON'T SELF-DESTRUCT! There is always a better solution. You don't get to start from scratch if you self destruct, and you'll have to sit out of the game for two days, so it's not worth it. If you don't know where stardock is, and get stuck in an escape pod, attack a port at the end of your turns for the day. The next day, you'll start in a scout. DON'T ATTACK ALIENS OR FERRENGI! They are a distraction. Attacking, or running from Ferrengi ships will put a grudge against you, and you will probably regret it later. Don't give up. Everyone gets blown up from time to time, and when you are learning the game, it can happen quite often. Learn from each mistake, ask questions, read the FIDO-TW echo, and come back for revenge! The docs are available throught the game, at the main menu, and some sysops have them available for DL. Capture them, read them. But beware that the docs are sometimes wrong. Fedspace includes sectors 1-10 and the sector with Stardock. No other sectors are fedspace, regardless of the fact that someone may have created a beacon which claims a sector is fedspace. The first day you play, your #1 goal is to find the stardock. Use the V command at the main menu to see if it's listed. If not, run FINDSGA (distributed as part of TWUTIL10.*), a utility written by Joel Downer which often helps locate it. If that doesn't work, try posting a public msg asking for the location (or private messages to traders in any ship other than an escape pod or the default merchant ship. Players in scouts may have gotten them due to getting an escape pod blown up.) Warping over long distances, with ANSI on so you can tell which sectors you haven't visited yet, will usually help you find it, as it usually has one or two warps in and five or six warps out, and that makes for a fairly high-traf- fic sector. If you have to look for it this way, the sectors you explore will be useful later, and perhaps you'll find some good trade pairs. Don't explore randomly. Turn on ANSI, and travel down long paths with lots of red (unexplored) sectors using the autowarp. As soon as you locate the Stardock, trade in your ship for a scout. It won't have a lot of holds, fighters, or shields, but it has a high turn ratio. If you drop your fighters in the sector just outside the sector containing stardock, you can pick them up after trading ships. Fighters don't have much trade in value, so that saves you some money. Buy a scout (for the high turn rate), maximum holds (25), and you can probably afford a density scanner, which is worth the money. Don't buy anything else the first time you are there unless you've already been trading while you hunted for stardock. Try to put a little money in the bank on stardock, for emergency use. Eventually, have 100,000 there. If you are planning on playing Evil (recommended) then find a port which will buy Equipment and sell Fuel and Organics. You want it to be adjacent to a port which does the opposite (sells Equipment, buys Fuel and Organics.) Trade at these ports, and at the port which sells Fuel/ Organics, use half of your holds for one, half for the other. Always bargain prices, and you should be able to get 2 experience points each time you make a deal. That will raise your experience pretty fast (it's called triple-trading, since you trade three types of equipment during each set.) You need experience to be able to Steal effectively, so triple trading can help you get that experience. You can triple trade whether you are evil or not. It takes some practice to get 2 pts per trade regularly, especially in a scout with max 25 holds, but it's worth it. Use the V command at the main command prompt. If ships are allowed to stay in FedSpace overnight, then plan on using FedSpace until either you turn evil or (if planning on staying good) you can afford to cloak nightly. You will be protected there if you have 0 or higher alignment, under 1000 experience, and less than 50 fighters. Until you go evil, FedSpace is your safe haven when you aren't playing. Just save your money, don't buy a lot of fighters and shields. If the Ferrengi want to rob you, let them. You do want to buy holds, though. In the early part of a game, when you are using Fedspace for protection, you can drop extra fighters (over the 50 ftr limit) in a sector outside of fedspace, to pick up later. Someone *may* kill them, and if you leave them in a major space lane (such as the route to Stardock from Terra and back) the feds will remove them. But it's an option I find useful. Don't go evil until your experience is at least 375-400. Then you can jettison colonists or post bounty's in the underground to turn evil. You need to have a -100 or less alignment to Rob/Steal. Some players prefer to keep trading (or triple-trading) until their experience is much higher, say over 1050, so they can steal-sell 70 holds in a starmaster. Once you've turned evil, FedSpace isn't going to protect you, so start cloaking every night. (In some games it may not be needed, but in general, plan on it. Once you start running a Steal/Trade system, you can easily afford it.) If you divide your experience by 20, you have a good idea of how many holds of equipment you can steal without getting caught. Exp / 15 is a little more risky, but still pretty safe. Regardless, there is *always* a chance of getting busted. If necessary you can steal equipment several times to fill your holds, and sell it all at once. To run the Steal-Sell loop, start with equipment in all of your holds. Go to a port which buys equipment. Sell your equipment. Steal equipment (5%-6.6% of your experience or so) until your holds are full. Sell it again. Just keep doing that, and always bargain prices. Your experience will go up as you do this, so eventually you will be able to steal more at a time. Five point trading means selling your equipment for 100% best price every time. It's maximum profit, and raises your experience five points each time you sell, so it's worthwhile. It will be explained elsewhere in the FAQ. I keep using the scout until I have enought experience to steal 70-85 holds at a time safely, and then move to another ship. Usually your choice is between a starmaster and a corp. flagship, if you are head of a corporation. If not, the starmaster is almost always the best ship. For advanced players, the evil ISS is the way to go. Whenever you buy a new ship, you should have enough money to buy the ship, maximum holds, a new density scanner (or holo scanner), and a cloak. Otherwise, you should probably stay in the ship you are already in a little longer (unless it's an escape pod. Never stay in an escape pod. You can trade it in for a scout right away, and you should.) When you buy a ship you plan to keep for awhile, buy a holo-scanner. Cloaks don't fail unless an external utility is causing them to, and you should cloak nightly unless you qualify for fedspace. Even in games where cloaks do fail based on a low %, use the cloaks. But if they can fail, you may want to move to a dead end to cloak. Use the density scanner any time you are moving to a sector you haven't visited, and use it when the surrounding sectors are unexplored. It will tell you when a port is adjacent, and help locate dead ends, planets, and other ships. If you (or a corp. member) plan on using a ship with transwarp you should drop single fighters regularly. Especially in dead ends, where they will tend to survive longer. These fighters will also slow your opponents who try to Eprobe to explore. I drop them even when I don't plan on using a ship with Twarp capability. Once you've located stardock, don't use a lot of turns exploring. 95% of the time (or more) you want to be making money with your turns. This is very basic, but many players use turns warping around, chasing aliens, or being sidetracked by Ferrengi. Use your turns to make money. To explore, spend money on Etherprobes and use them. The database utilities will allow you to get a list of sectors which not only have you not explored, but which no sector you *have* explored has a warp to. By eprobing these sectors, you will gain info on at least two sectors. If you use the computer F command with ANSI on, you can look for paths with lots of unexplored sectors, which is useful mainly in the early stages of the game when you haven't explored very much. In a corporation, usually only one person needs to do much exploring... The other players just make money. Eventually, you'll need that money! Your long term goal is to develop a well defended planet, while keeping your opponents from doing the same. Ideally, your planet will be shield bugged. In games where shield bug isn't allowed, you want max shields and 32,000 fighters on the planet. With a well defended planet, you can stock money in the citadel, which will gain 4% interest a day. When that amount is high enough, no one without a similar source of income will be able to harm you. If you can shield bug a planet, you probably only need 1. If you can't, you may need a few, but most players build more planets than they need, and when a planet is partially developed, it's high-risk. An opponent might steal the level-4 planet, Twarp it away, and then all the work is in their hands... --- * by Jim Bianchi Teamwork is the key to winning games. A four or five man corp can easily clear 2.5 -- 3.5 million creds/day once established. To start, one of the corp members should, after SD has been located, spend most of his time there, where he has easy access to a source of eprobes. (Note: Dave Myers' TWFT and the mapping routines in TWASSIST may modify this somewhat.) Using the eprobe mapping routines in PWRMACS or TWFT, this person maps the universe, providing data to the other members on paired ports. Meanwhile, the other members should pound ports, triple trading them right down to the ground if possible. The objective is obtaining xp and creds, NOT exploring. The creds should be funneled to the member who is at SD, either directly, or through the galbank. As the universe approaches 100% mapped, the members start building up their own galbank accts. Ships: The usual policy seems to be to, once SD has been found, go there and trade in your merchie for a ScoMar, a dscanner, max holds and enough to get started trading again. This should prob be the course the mapper should take, as he'll need to physically investigate places where eprobes have been destroyed. The rest of the crew should prob stay with a stock merchie until they can get into a StaMas with max holds (as soon as they have the necessary creds). With close teamwork, transferring ftrs and shields is easy between corp members. (It is possible to tfr a neg amt of shields or ftrs to temporarily overload a fellow corp members ship while you trade in the one you have and buy another.) Esp in the early stages of the game, every cred saved when buying ftrs/shields can make a difference. However, don't let not having a close-by teammate stop you from buying a new ship. And ALWAYS buy at least one ftr with your new ship. I once got a new StaMas, a few shields and max holds, and zero ftrs. On my way out of SD to the sector where I'd "parked" my ftrs fm the old ship, I entered the wrong sector number and ended up running into 'prox 50 offensive ftrs left by someone else. Fortunately, my pod was functioning normally.. Good vs evil: For the first few days, game parms permitting, you should plan to park overnight in FedSpace. You can stay uncloaked in Fed- Space overnight as long as your xp is less than 1000, the number of ftrs on your ship is 50 or less, your align is +1 or greater and the number of squ- atters in the FedSpace sector you end up in is less than the nr posted on the V screen -- otherwise, when the extern pgm runs, you'll be towed out into space (nothing else will be done to you by the Feds). Under some circumstances, this can be exploited to aid in exploring the universe in the very early days of a game. If the Feds tow you out to space for one reason or another, you will usually end up somewhere on one of the MSLs. In a low turns game, this can be used to give you a "running start" on exploration. Log on very soon after midnight, however, to get yourself into a more protected area where you won't be attacked by other traders. In a game with no squatters allowed overnight in FedSpace, there seems little need for remaining good (unless, of course, you WANT to be). Recom- mended ways of turning evil are: jettisoning colonists, killing good play- ers or game generated good aliens, placing a hit contract on another good player in the underground, cursing the grimy trader in the tavern, blowing up starports and blowing up planets. Once you have -100 align you can start robbing creds fm ports (use xp x 7 = creds to rob in any single attempt); or stealing product (use a max of xp/20 = nr of holds to steal). Each suc- cessful robbery will gain you xp and neg align points. A tactic that has been used VERY successfully in one local game in- volved four corp partners who started the game as above. The "mapper" early on discovered Ferrengal. Further mapping, combined with some course plotter investigation revealed that Ferrengal was in a dead-end tunnel and that there was an empty sector behind it. By the time this was discovered, the leader was almost done with mapping the universe, so he bought an ISS (buying his pos align with creds supplied by the rest of us). Then he bought a ptorp and a gtorp (several gtorps, actually), used the ptorp to temporarily neutralise the Ferrengi ftrs while he moved THROUGH that sector without otherwise disturbing them to get to the one BEHIND, where he fired off his gtorps and placed ftrs so that each of the rest of us, as we in turn bought our commissions and got into an ISS, could twarp there. In this way, our planets were (more or less) safe from detection dur- ing the critical phase while they were upgrading, as they were in a dead end tunnel with Ferrengal as the "front door." We each then turned evil by dumping colonists and busting planets (and killing good aliens/players when avail). One of us juggled his align so that it was only -1 (so as not to drag down the xp of the others in the corp). Upon logging in each day, the normal increase of one align point was sufficient to bring the align up to neutral (0) and allow safe access to Terra for colonising the planets. Us- ing twarp, it was possible to bring out nearly 1 million new happy campers each session. To get down to neg align again, this person would jettison one hold of colonists each day at the end of his play. As the corp grew stronger, Ferrengal itself was eventually invaded and added to our list of corp planets. By this time, we had each of the five sectors in the tunnel heavily mined (99) and those sectors with planets had 30,000 defensive ftrs (the rest only had 5000). We've successfully blockad- ed SD several times with ftrs/mines and have caught just about everyone at least once. The game is rather boring for in spite of us leaving taunts and hints in the Tavern conversation, there is NO organised resistance. There are NO other planets and the only other corp folded a week ago. The vast majority of the ftrs and mines in the universe are ours. We have six L5 planets, each w/1638 shields (by agreement they are not invulnerable). One tactic we use is to build a class 4 (ssb) port in the same sector with our planets and as the port is completed, move a planet one sector up the tunnel to support construction of another class 4. In this way, we can each run sell/steal in a totally secure area and cancel each others busts if necessary. Hey, four or five players, each in an evil ISS (150 holds), can make a LOT of creds when all they need worry about is hold replacement when getting busted. I log in to the game, fill my holds w/equip, lift off and run sell/steal at the port that is right there for 66 turns (on a bust free day), land on the planet and deposit my 'prox 700,000 creds inna tre- asury. It's almost boring! It is perhaps a commentary on the quality of the local competition that when one of us is busted, we LOOSE more xp than the highest ranking non-corp player has TOTAL! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ EVIL ISS ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * by Jim Bianchi The ISS (Imperial StarShip) is considered to be the most potent ship in the TradeWars universe because of its combo of 150 holds, twarp drive, and the ability to carry and use a photon torpedo. It can also carry a lot of shields (2000), ftrs (30,000) and mines (150). A player who is "good" can just ignore most of what follows. Much of it is concerned with avoiding the three Feds, who will repossess an evil ISS on sight. To get an ISS requires the player to have a minimum +500 align and to go to the FedPolice sta at SD and apply for a commission, after which their align will automagically increase to +1000 and they'll be permitted to buy an ISS. To get the initial +500 align, you can kill other evil players or game generated traders ("Annoyances" or Ferrengi), create planets or starports or you can "buy yourself good" by posting a bounty on an evil player in the Fed Police sta at SD. The first method is expensive in terms of ftrs and shields used and can be somewhat uncertain. The second and third methods are simply not cost-effective for these purposes and can potentially result in assets that can be exploited by hostile forces. The last method, posting a bounty on evil players, is the way most seem to do it. When posting a bounty on an evil player, of course, it's nice if you know definitely where one is, for then you can go and kill him, then run back to SD to collect it. BTW, if you blow away a player who has a "good" align, you might want to check in the UG to see if there has been any hit contracts placed on him; or if he is evil, at the Fed Police sta to see if there are any bounties. It's expensive and not really cost effective, but I once found myself dab in the middle of Ferrengal, taking out Ferrengi ftrs by the bushel, as well as Ferrengi assault traders. When I finally managed to disengage, my pod was functioning normally and I was headed back to SD. I noticed when I did "I" that I now had something like +600 align and enough creds to get an ISS straight off, which I did. On the way back to my home sector, I was jumped by four angry Ferrengi who "have been looking for you, HooMan!" Fortunately, my pod was functioning normally.. (They're STILL looking for me ..diamonds and Ferrengi blood feuds are forever.) --- * Originally by Joel Downer Keeping an Imperial StarShip when evil: Avoid FedSpace as completely as possible. *Never* travel through sector 1-10, and only travel to the StarDock using the strategy described below. Be *very careful* in all areas adjacent to FedSpace, and spend as little time on the Major Space Lanes as possible. Deploy single toll fighters wherever possible when you travel. The Feds cannot travel through sectors with fighters in them, so (a) when you're in a sector with a fighter in it, you are *completely* safe from the Feds, and (b) the more fighters you have scattered outside the Major Space Lanes, the less the Feds will be able to *travel* outside the Major Space Lanes. Imprisoning Admirals Nelson and Clausewitz would be wonderful, but an evil StarShip captain should *never* try it him/herself. It's altogether too dangerous. Travel by TransWarp whenever possible. When you *must* travel by convent- ional warp, use the following pattern: move-deploy-scan, deploying a toll fighter immediately in each sector you enter. Whenever you visit the Star- Dock, buy a full complement of ether probes and cloaks: ether probes are necessary for blind TransWarp, and cloaks can bail you out if you get stuck somewhere (even Zyrain can't attack a cloaked ship!). Carry at least 750 shields and keep mine disruptors, in case someone tries to mine you to death; don't carry more than a few thousand fighters -- they won't help you if you run into the Feds. Find out how many entrances the StarDock has -- usually, it'll have one or two. If it has one, the approach to the StarDock is pretty simple: fire an ether probe into the StarDock, blind TransWarp into the *completely empty* sector nearest SGA. Deploy a fighter immediately, warp in, and do your business. If you see one of the Federals at or near the StarDock, put off your business until he leaves the vicinity -- you may want to restock your shields or holds at Rylos or Alpha Centauri. Don't try to deploy a fighter AT the StarDock; DO deploy a fighter at Rylos or Alpha Centauri when you go there. *NEVER*, unless you have some special reason (e.g., hiding the path to your planet), remove your fighters when you're done in a sector. Forget about the 200 credits. You won't miss them. *BEWARE OF MARKER BEACONS*!!! Marker beacons and wandering aliens are the two greatest dangers to blind TransWarp. Never place them, and destroy them when you can. Don't take unnecessary risks with corbomite. If someone leaves you bait -- e.g., if a hated enemy parks in a major transit sector with 0 fighters in a Scout Marauder -- politely decline the invitation. Well, not *TOO* politely. Leave 99 mines in the sector to let him/her know you still care... ;> When you choose stealing sites, look for places where a port that sells equipment, a port that sells fuel ore, and a port that buys equipment are in close proximity. TWView and my "EVILPAIR" utility are both useful for finding these ports. --- * Quoting Dan Roseen Here's some evil ISS tips we have in our trainer: EVIL IMPERIAL STARSHIP (EVIL ISS): A trader that received a Federal Commission and bought an ISS will have an evil ISS by keeping their ship and changing their alignment to negative. Keeping an evil ISS requires taking precautions to ensure that you don't move your ship into a sector with a Fed in it, because any one of the three Feds will destroy your ship immediately if this happens. The following precautions will help you keep your evil ISS by helping you avoid the Fed ships (keep in mind that the precautions listed are 'above and beyond' normal precautions like carrying cloaks and protecting yourself against fully mined sectors). - Deploy a defensive fighter everywhere you go (do not attempt to deploy a fighter in Federation sectors 1-10 or the Stardock, in fact avoid these sectors as much as possible). In most cases, deploying the fighter will be the first thing you do after you have scanned the sector and moved into it. Toll fighters should rarely be used because many traders will either pay them and leave you mines for when you transwarp, or destroy them anyway. The Feds will not move into sectors that have a deployed fighter or a mine. - Be sure you have a transwarp drive. Use your transwarp drive as much as possible for your transportation. Always carry fuel when going into suspicious territory. - Know how to blind transwarp. Blind transwarping is usually safer than single-stepping your evil ISS through sectors without deployed fighters, and more efficient. - Always have MORE than 37,000 credits on your ship. If you have no fuel to transwarp out of a hazardous situation, you will be able to build a class 4 port, steal enough fuel to transwarp, and continue with your turns, hopefully ending up in a safer location, and won't have to use another 25,000 credits to replace the cloak you would need to use if you cloaked hoping you might be in a safer situation later in the day. Since all ports under construction have products when they are first created, you can immediately steal the fuel you need (you are evil, you don't have to wait until the port is open for normal trading). After stealing the fuel, you can easily destroy the port to deny its use to hostile forces and increase your own xp and negative align. Initial Port construction DOES NOT REQUIRE a planet in the same sect- or. Upgrading (and "opening for business") DOES. - v1.03(d) BUG: A trader must have more credits than the cost of the port in order for TW to let the trader create the port. For example, a 30,000 credit port would require 30,001 credits or more onboard, even though only the 30,000 credits would be used for port construct- ion. - Use a good TW database utility. In addition to the regular advantages a TW database will give you, a TW database program will help you tremendously in avoiding sectors that Feds can move in. - Always use your scanner unless you are absolutely sure that the next sector is safe (e.g. if you have just been there and you know there is a fighter or mine in the sector). Be aware of the different densities of the Fed ships. The Fed ship densities are: Captain Zyrain . . . . 489 Admiral Nelson . . . . 462 Admiral Clausewitz . . 512 - When going to the Stardock, first attempt to send an etherprobe there to take a preliminary look for Feds. If you see any in the vicinity of the Stardock, try to hold off your business there until a later time or date. When at the Stardock, fill up on etherprobes, cloaks mine disruptors, and mines so you can make as few visits as possible. - Use the two class 0 ports that are not in Fedspace sectors (Rylos and Alpha Centauri) as much as possible when you want to get class 0 items. (Holds, ftrs, shields.) - If you must go to the Stardock, and other traders seem to continually have Zyrain trapped at the Stardock (or other Feds) with deployed toll fighters, you can either try desperately to get into TW immediately after maintenance or you can release the Feds yourself. To release them yourself, create a route of mines from the Stardock where there are fighters. You may be creating a tunnel for the Feds to move in so you will need to make sure there are not any ways for the Feds to get out of this tunnel and end up in your face. And then go next to Zyrain's sector (remember you MUST be in a sector that has a fighter and a mine) and destroy the fighter. Then go to the next sector away from the Stardock and disrupt the mine. Continue this, until you lead the Fed away from the Stardock enough to where you cannot run into him when going around him to the Stardock. You may have to cycle throught the command prompt many times until he warps into the sector you want. You can safely watch him move into the desired sector with your scanner since you will still be in a sector that is protected by a mine and/or fighter. You may want to block his path to the Stardock while you are at it, however, if you have made it safely to the Stardock and get off the Stardock and notice a Fed has moved into the sector, realize that he won't attack you at that moment, but you are strongly advised that your next move is to transwarp immediately out of the Fed's vicinity. - Have at least one other trader without an evil ISS that can help you. If you have an ally you can trust, your ally can help move Zyrain to different parts of the universe by starting to attack a trader that is safe in Fedspace, and then changing their mind when Zyrain warps in to protect the trader. A corp partner without an evil ISS can help with this also, and can additionally help with things like getting colonists from Terra, buying mines from the Stardock, etc. - Realize that without a trusted helper, and without a safe home, that a lone evil ISS will most likely have very difficult times against good competition, because the the trader needs to cloak or have a safe place to rest the ship. - Your helper can also help you out considerably by trapping Admiral Nelson and/or (preferably 'and') Admiral Clausewitz so they cannot move about the universe. They can be trapped with deployed mines and/or fighters. Captain Zyrain will transwarp over a trap when a Fed-protected trader needs his protection. - If you are going into an enemy sector that appears to be of some special value to your enemy, and you suspect it to have one or more other warps into it, and if you cannot check out the contents of the other warp(s), use a photon when going in so the fighters remain in the sector. Your enemy may have one or more of the Feds trapped in an adjacent sector and if you destroy the fighters you will be in a very precarious position. --- * by Joel Downer Some additional comments. First of all, as I probably said in EVILSTAR.TXT, if you're not comfortable with ether-probing and blind TransWarp, don't use an evil I.S.S. I have had people disagree with me, but in my personal opinion (a) intelligent use of blind TransWarp is necessary to keep the ship against any competition worth beating, and (b) blind TransWarp is the biggest reason to buy the ship in the first place. It can save you 15-18 moves a day -- even more if you're following up destroyed probes in search of a planet. Without blind TransWarp, the I.S.S. is a less efficient stealing ship than the StarMaster; with it, the I.S.S. is much *more* efficient. (And yes, I'd be willing to argue that with anyone who disagrees. ) Second, the main difference between playing in an evil I.S.S. and playing in another ship is that you've got to pay more attention to every move and choice in the evil StarShip. I assume you already density-scan wherever you go, and I know you're comfortable with database utilities. You also have to make a lot of cost-benefit decisions. For example, if you don't have good competition, it's always wise to deploy a fighter in the sector where you cloak, because (assuming you're not in an MSL) doing so virtually guarantees that you will not have a Fed waiting for you when you log in. Against a smart enemy, though, the fighter may do more harm than good. Is it safe to cloak at your stealing site? Maybe not, even if your ship is named "The Merchant Marines" (it's possible to track "The Merchant Marines" using date docked; it's just harder and more expensive). Is it better to cloak a couple sectors away, with no fighters in the sector? Against the very shrewdest opponent, you may even want to take the precaution of TransWarping on your last turn and cloaking in the sector to which you TransWarped. Why? If your enemy creates a multisector trap for you, and you're forced to retreat as soon as you uncloak, you will retreat into the *last sector visited*, even if that sector is halfway across the universe. Sound arcane? By an interesting series of coincidences, that feature of the game saved my ship once when I was playing against an extremely devious enemy named Tony Cichan. An intelligent enemy will probably make the elimination of your StarShip one of his/her top priorities. If you don't have teammates, you will have to show extreme care around the StarDock, and *extreme* care if you need to invade a planet -- what better defense for a planet than herding Clausewitz and Nelson into the sector and trapping them with a fighter? An enemy may also create planets directly off FedSpace, banking on your reluctance to travel through sectors 1-10 -- someone did that to me in the last game I played, and I barely caught on in time to keep him from putting together something defensible. What you're doing is assuming an enormous vulnerability in exchange for a ton of freedom. Against a weak enemy, you'll have no trouble covering up the vulnerability. Against a good enemy, you've got to do everything you can to exploit the freedom, because the vulnerability will nag at you. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ MORE ON SHIPS ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * by Jim Bianchi Wanna provoke an arg on one of the Tradewars conferences? Write a msg of type: "the very best ship is an xxxxxx." Second only to calls for inf- ormation on the "bugs," that topic seems to take up most of the bandwidth there and it's a pity, really, because after the first few exchanges, there is never anything new in the way of using xxxxxx ship, or real detriments in one type or another ship shown (with the exception of the Tholian Sent- inel). What is the "ideal" ship? For each stage of the game, this author is convinced that there is an ideal choice or range of choices, but in this as in most things, there is ample room for alternatives and outright disagre- ement. For instance, I prefer the CorFla to the ISS, esp when playing alone. Perhaps it's because I've had four of them shot out from under me by Ferrengi on a blood hunt (and those things are EXPENSIVE!) and maybe it's because I like to be able to warp around and not worry about running into a Fed and loosing my ship. Another very serious thing to consider is, is this a game in which bugs are allowed? If so, the obvious choice is a ship most of us would never consider otherwise: the Havoc Gunstar. It is inexpensive. It can carry enough firepower to adaquately defend itself. It has twarp capabil- ity. It can be swopped in a citadel. And when "hold bugged," it can carry an impressive payload. Since you needn't be evil to run the Corporate Mega Holds bug, a CMH bugged HavGun is the ship of choice for use in games that allow exploitation of bugs; at least until an ISS can be purchased. Since I play almost exclusively in non-bug games (where bug use isn't engaged in by agreement or bug use is monitored), my choice is the CorFla. I like it. It's like a StaMas with twarp and 15 extra holds. When starting in a new game, I tend to think that the basic default "merchie" is much underrated. It can have fifteen more holds than a StaMas, and while it doesn't have near the ftr or shield capacity of a StaMas, these things aren't (or shouldn't be) very important in a just starting game anyway, when the objective is to make creds and xp. (Leave the "shoot 'em up, bang-bang" to the kiddies). I first try to improve my merchie to max holds, then max shields. I figger that, by the time I loose it to enemy action -- as I eventually always do -- the universe has become too danger- ous to warp about in without some serious protection and I get into a maxed out StaMas, or if I'm CEO and have the creds, a CorFla. The ScoMar has the benifits of having a much larger base turn rate, and the highest combat odds of any ship in a non edited game. It is these odds that make the ScoMar the ship of choice in bugs-allowed games, for if it is overloaded with ftrs and shields (up to 32767 of each), it is nearly unstoppable and is capable of (two times out of three) destroying SD and most of the other class 0 ports. In a non bug game, it still possesses a large base turn rate and this makes it attractive to many who prefer to go see for themselves, as opposed to sending an eprobe. The StaMas has what is generally accorded the best ratio of firepower and cargo carrying ability to moves of any of the other ship types. If a secure area is provided (preferably containing a class 0 port), the ColTra, with its 250 holds, can prove a real money maker for one who is sufficiently evil to be able to sell/steal 250 holds at a whack. The only advantages that I can see to a Missile Frigate are that it is cheap, can be had by anyone, and can carry a ptorp. It is only nominally a trading ship. Here are the shipspecs: --- * Originally by Jason Boyd Min Max Max Max Max Max Max Max Max Cost %Mv Hold Hold Odds Ftrs perAt Shld P-M Mine G-T Bcn L P T ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ esc pod 0 free 50 1 5 .8:1 50 10 50 0 0 0 0 Y MerCru 1 26300 100 20 75 1.0:1 2500 1000 400 0 50 5 50 Y Y ScoMar 2 13200 200 10 25 2.0:1 250 250 100 0 0 0 10 Y Y MisFri 3 28800 100 12 60 1.3:1 5000 2000 400 10 5 0 5 BatShi 4 40500 83 16 80 1.6:1 10000 3000 750 0 25 1 50 Y Y CorFla 5 71000 100 20 85 1.2:1 20000 6000 1500 0 100 10 100 Y Y Y ColTra 6 54400 58 40 250 .6:1 200 100 500 0 0 5 10 Y Y CarTra 7 59400 67 40 125 .8:1 400 125 800 0 1 2 20 Y Y MerFre 8 36200 150 30 60 .8:1 300 100 500 0 2 2 20 Y Y ImpSta 9 128600 83 40 150 1.5:1 30000 10000 2000 5 125 10 150 Y Y Y HavGun 10 29500 125 10 40 1.2:1 3000 1500 500 0 5 1 5 Y Y StaMas 11 48000 133 30 70 1.4:1 5000 2000 1000 0 50 5 50 Y Y ConSte 12 40500 100 20 70 1.4:1 5000 2000 750 0 25 2 50 Y Y TkhOri 13 36000 133 30 60 1.1:1 750 250 750 0 5 1 20 Y Y ThoSen 14 27000 90 10 50 1.0:1 3000 1000 1000 0 50 1 10 Y TauMul 15 53600 83 40 150 .5:1 300 150 500 0 0 2 20 Y Y L P T: Long Range Scanner, Planet Scanner, TransWarp Drive. Only the Missile Frigate and ISS can carry a ptorp. The Feds will destroy on sight an ISS used by a player with neg align, no questions asked. (Just make sure they don't SEE you..) --- * by Leonard Adolph I figured out hold cost some time ago. Just for fun, here it is again. SUM(216+20*(x-1),a..b) Where a is the number of holds on your ship and b is the number of holds desired. Add up all values for the formula (SUM) replacing x with all values from a to b. The above formula works in a program called Ultimate Calculator. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ ALIGN AND XP CHANGES ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * by Jim Bianchi To get the initial +500 align required for a fed commission (and an ISS) you can kill evil players; you can kill evil game generated chars; you can post bounties on other evil players; you can build ports; you can build planets; you can upgrade ports; or you can pay taxes. The surest method is prob to post a bounty on another evil player. You get +1 align for each 1000 creds posted. This is esp effective if you have found an evil player who is vulnerable -- you can go to SD, place the bounty, blow up the evil player, and return to collect the bounty you post- ed (plus any other bounties on that player). Your align goes up for posting the bounty in the first place and again for killing the evil player. To gain neg align, you can kill good players; you can kill good game generated chars; you can post a hit contract on a good player in the under- ground; you can destroy starports; you can jettison colonists; or you can destroy planets. The formula for the amt of align shift when killing other players or game generated chars is: Same align -- you get 1/4 their align subtracted from yours Different align -- you get 1/2 their align added to yours You can land on Terra (or any populated planet) with empty holds, take on a load of colonists, warp to the closest non FedSpace sector and jettis- on them for a shift of -1 align per hold of colonists jettisoned. In v1.03 games, you can repeatedly quit the game, come back and do this again and gain neg align each time. In v1.03d games, you can only get neg align once per game day. The fastest method is prob to post a hit contract on another good player. You get -4 align for every 1000 creds posted. This is esp effective if you have found a good player who is vulnerable -- you can go to SD, place a contract, blow up the good player, and return to collect the contract you posted (plus any other contracts on that player). Your align goes down for posting the contract in the first place and again for killing the good player. If you go to the underground and repeatedly attempt to enter and give the wrong password each time, eventually you'll be knocked unconcious and all creds you have stolen (deposit all creds in the galbank or leave them in a citadel first). Keep attempting to enter and you'll be killed and ret- urned to the BBS. The next day, when you log into the game, you'll be in a ScoMar, with 0 align and 0 xp. All personal and corp assets will be undist- urbed. If you are a CEO and have a CorFla, sell it first, get a ship with minimum holds or use your existing ship to "moth" an enemies planet and get killed in an pod. To gain xp, you can kill anyone; triple trade; create or blow up starports; create or "bust planets." For evil traders, the latter course is prob the fastest and surest method. You buy a gtorp (25,000 creds) and an adet (15,000 creds), "take them outside and set them off." Which is to say that you use the gtorp right at SD and then land on the newly created planet and destroy it with the adet. You'll get 75xp for creating the plan- et and 50xp for destroying it, for a total of 125xp. The align change will be +10 for creating it and -50 for destroying it for a net change of -40. Total cost per iteration: 40,000 creds. It should be noted that once you're evil, planet creation shifts align by -10 instead of +10. Blowing up ports is an effective way to gain both xp and neg align. You'll get 50xp and -50 align for each port destroyed. I typically use 1000 ftrs from an ISS, CorFla or a StaMas on ports with no shielding. I've enco- untered a few with "class one" shielding -- on these I use 2000 ftrs. I've not been zapped yet. Typically, I loose 'prox 55-80% of the ftrs when at- tacking "no shielded" ports, and from 40-75% when doing the "class one" shielded ports. One way to gain xp, pos align and creds is to attack Ferrengi ftrs, assault traders or Ferrengal itself. I once found myself dab in the mid- dle of a cloud of Ferrengi ftrs. When the smoke cleared, I'd knocked down close on 5000 ftrs and was in my trusty pod, headed for SD, with more than enough pos align to get a federal commission and sufficient creds for an ISS. Wheee! Unfortunately, this was my first ISS and not only didn't I know how to drive one, I couldn't fight one effectively, and got bounced by several angry Ferrengi on a blood hunt on the way home. I finally got there in an pod. Had I had this file then, things would've gone quite dif- ferently. At any rate, as a means of gaining xp, align and creds, deliber- ately attacking Ferrengi isn't acceptable for many reasons, most having to do with the cost/benifit ratio. The bounties paid you for killing Ferrengi ftrs simply aren't enough to cover the replacement cost of the ftrs you expend. And there is always the chance that your attack won't succeed and YOU'LL be the one in an pod -- in which case, you'll have to add the repl cost of the ship you were in to the equation. However... One possible way to rapidly shift align and xp toward zero and make a lot of creds in the process is to run several CT hold bug loops. This involves buying a ColTra and nothing else (except possibly a cloak) and getting busted attempting to steal 365 holds of equip or 660 holds of organics at eight different ports. Each time you do this, you gain 32 holds, but loose 32 align points. 8 x 32 = 256 + the original 40 holds = 296 holds. Optimally, one will plot a "robbing course" involving eight ports with SD as the terminus. When you reach SD, you sell the ship to the shipyards for a truly incredible number of creds. Apparantly, it's that last "bust" (the last 32 holds) that really puts you over the top. NOTE: the holds gained in this way will disappear if you port normally, or if you jettison cargo or are bounced by the duty Ferrengi. You CAN sell them at the shipyards, however. Hmmm, lessee, an pod w/33 holds is worth.. 'prox 750,000 creds can be obtained in this manner.This "CT hold bug loop" is best utilized by at least two corp players who run the same loop and "cancel" each others busts. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ 5xp SELL/STEAL ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= The sell/steal cycle is a procedure whereby you sell a load of equip to a port, steal it back, then sell it to them again. Repeat as necessary. For those players with sufficient xp to steal 150 or 70 holds at a time (3000xp and 1400xp respectively) the sell/steal cycle should prob be the major source of income since it offers the greatest return for the least effort. You use one turn to sell the equip, you use another to steal it back. The theoretical max selling price of 150 holds of equip is 25,000 creds, but in reality, this is seldom seen. In my experience, about 22,500 creds is more commonly obtained, making each move in an (evil) ISS worth 'prox 11,250 creds. 5xp (and 2xp) is the amount of xp gain given for getting the current price for the amt of equip you're selling spot on (100%) or nearly spot on (99.xx%). The next segment discusses ways to calculate this "best price," and obtain 5xp per sale. --- * Originally by Eugene Hung All ports have a BEST price, which will get one 5 experience points if one bids that exact number. The best price is determined by the number of holds, if uneven, then the best price is usually a fraction, though I am not sure, since I always get holds in groups of 5 and 10, up to my maximum. Some ports have just ONE best price, those are the easy ones. Let us say one is in a StarMaster with 70 holds (the most useful ship for robbing and attacking). Get a psychic probe to help determine the best price. The first time, either accept the port's initial offer for no exp- erience, or bid a little higher than what they offer. The psy-probe will tell you how far you were off from the best price, then you steal the 70 equipment back, and use your calculator to figure out the best price and nail it on the head for 5 exp. each time. However, most ports have more than one best price (which I will explain). You must use a different strat- egy for this, which is an extension of the strategy I just previously out- lined. Ok, so you have a psychic probe, and have just found out ONE best price. Port again, and look carefully at the initial offer. If the offer is within 20 credits or so of the previous time (when you sold 70 equ to them at an absurdly low price), the best price is the same as last time, and so you should bid your calculated best price from last time. You may be off a credit or two, but eventually you'll figure out the best price through the probe. Now, let us hypothesize that inital offer is substantially different than last time (around 50-90 credits). That means the best price has MOVED. But, after lots of testing, I discovered that the best price can only MOVE up or down in multiples of a certain number, n. THAT NUMBER IS THE NUMBER OF YOUR HOLDS. Thus, going back to the example, the port's best price can fluctuate up or down multiples of 70. Knowing this, you look at the initial offer, see whether it went up or down from last time, estimate how many multiples of n it went up or down, and bid the best price plus 70 * roughly how much it went up or down. This is a little confusing, so I'll illust- rate: Let us say the port offers 9600 credits for 70 equ. You accept the offer, and figure out with your psy probe and calculator that the best offer was 10199. You steal the 70 equ back. Now you port again. If the offer still is around 9600(9580-9620), bid 10199. Voila, 5 exp. If you continue to steal-sell, and the offer varies very little, this is a one- price port. However, if the offer ever deviates by 50 or more, it is NOT a one-price port. So let us say the 2nd time, the port offer 9665(65 more than last time). Since you have 70 equ to sell, the port's best price must have gone UP by 70 credits(since the offer went up around 70 creds). So one bids 10269, or 10199 + 70. You steal, and port. The port offers 9510 credits, or 90 below 9600. That's around 70 below the original best price, so you bid 10129, or 10199 -70. You steal, and port. The port now offers 9650, around 50 above 9600, so the best price is probably 70 above this time, so it's 10269. You steal, and port. The offer is now 9385. That's roughly 210 credits(70 * 3) below, so you bid 10199 - 210, or 9989 credits. As you can see, ALL THE BEST PRICES ARE RELATED by the NUMBER OF HOLDS. This strategy also works in other ships, such as a Corp FlagShip with 85 (bid up or down multiples of 85 from the first figure). There is a flaw, though. One may not estimate the number correctly. In the previous example, what if the port offered 9635? One could not tell whether the best price was the same, 10199, or 70 up, 10269. IN CASES OF DOUBT, OVERBID. What I mean by that is, bid the higher figure, in this case, 10269. If it WAS 10269, I get 5 exp. If it was 10199, the port will raise its bid by 20-21 creds(30% of # of holds), also raising the best price by 21 credits(30%). THE BEST PRICE CHANGES through overbids, by 30% of the difference between the bids, towards your offer. So, let us say we misestimated, and bid 10269. The port now offers 9655, which means we were over by 70, so we bid 10199 + 21(30% of 70), or 10220. Bingo! Realize, if one UNDERbids, the port will immediately accept the offer, and you will get only TWO exp, for being 99.31% off or so. So always choose the higher figure, when in doubt. And if you overshoot by 140, the port offer goes up by 40 or so, so the best offer goes up by 42 credits(30% of 140), and you should bid 98(140 -42) credits less to get the best price. --- That is the theoretical basis behind the 5xp sell/steal algorithms seem in Polli's Powermacs and Myers' TWFT (with improvements, of course, but that's basically it). Personally, I'm tempermentally incapable of sit- ting at a keyboard running sell/steal for 67 moves, getting 5xp each time, so I depend entirely on the Powermacs or TWFT, each of which is capable of obtaining 5xp for each iteration. I've lifted off planet with full holds (150 in an evil ISS), run sell/steal at a port in the sector and with the exception of the first sell ("only" 2xp), have gotten 5xp each time I've sold, using both Powermacs and TWFT. I can't speak for TWHELPxx, for aside from a brief period when I was starting to learn the game, I've not used it. By all accounts, it is a fine pgm, however. --- * Originally by Joel Downer The basic steal-sell cycle works as follows: find a port that's selling equipment, and steal or buy 150 holds. (When you're using ports identified with EVILPAIR.COM, it's actually smarter to buy, rather than steal, your first load. Don't risk making a port angry with you when you may need to buy fuel ore there the same day!) Move to a port buying equipment -- preferably a port at 100%. Sell the equipment for the best price you can negotiate (see the section on the five-experience point trick, below). Now, port and *STEAL BACK THE EQUIP- MENT YOU JUST SOLD*. Sell the equipment again, steal it, and repeat the process until you're caught or out of turns. When you get caught, you'll lose 13 holds (out of 150) and 10% of your experience. Sometimes you'll be caught more often than you like, but if you steal a sensible amount (no more than one hold per 15 experience points), you'll typically make more than enough to compensate for the trouble. Important: When you get caught, write down the location and the date. You won't be able to port there for at least 14 days without getting busted again (even if you just port to *trade*, you may get nailed). After a couple of weeks, you can go back and work the ports again. The five experience-point cycle works as follows. The first time you dock at a port, accept the port's first offer for your equipment. Write down the offer, and using a calculator and the results from your psychic probe to calculate and round off the best price. (E.g.: first offer was 19,200; psychic probe reports 96.69% of best. Best price = 19,200 / .9669 = (int)19857.2 = 19857. Steal back the equipment and dock again. If the first offer is within half your number of holds (75 in a StarShip) of the first offer from last time (19125 - 19275) bid the number that you calculated last time (19857). If the offer is substantially higher or lower, adjust the best price by a multiple of your number of holds. If the offer is 19,325 (125 higher), bid 150 higher; if the offer is 265 higher, bid 300 higher; if it's 700 higher, bid 750 higher. When in doubt, overbid. If the port refuses your initial offer, you can still often get the five experience points; just understand that the best price will *change*, by 30% of the difference between your offer and the original best price. Example: The port offers 19,278, and you bid 20,007. Oops! The port tries to barter, telling you that you guessed wrong -- evidently, the best price was still 19,857. Your error has changed the best price by 150 * .30, or 45 credits, so the *new* best price should be 19,902. This approach will not work at every port. Some ports don't seem to have a best price; at others, the initial estimate with the psychic probe will actually be a few credits low or high. If you master this technique, though, you'll be able to get five experience points on *every sale* at many ports, and on *most sales* at many others. Price guidelines: *very good* equipment-buying ports will pay 22,000 - 23,500 credits for 150 holds of equipment. Spending tons of turns looking for the perfect port can end up *wasting* money, though, because every turn in a StarShip is worth at least 9,000 credits. (What's more, tooling around in a StarShip when evil is *dangerous*!) I'm usually content to work a port that offers 20,000 for 150 holds, and I'll sometimes put up with ports pay- ing as little as 19,000. Ports that only offer 16,000 - 17,000, however, are taking things a little far... =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=[ end part one ]=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= IAGOWM1.ZIP This is part 2 of IAGO'S WAR MANUAL for TradeWars 2002 v1.03 & v1.03d CONTENTS: (IAGO2) BUGS MORE BUGS PLANET CLONING BUG USING BUGS MAPPING ATTACKS FERRENGAL COLONISTS =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ BUGS ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * by Joel Downer This is Joel Downer's Top 14 Bugs list, covering the major bugs with the exception of the planet cloning bug. Planet cloning will not work in version 1.03d, and makes playing 1.03 a pretty useless endeavor. Sysops can upgrade to 1.03d without reseting the game, and that is highly recommended. Well, giving a list of *ALL* the bugs in 1.03(d) would be impractical: there are over a hundred of them. What I can do, though, is list the thirteen or fourteen that make the biggest difference to the game. 1. THE STEAL-SELL CYCLE: Stealing equipment from ports is a very good way to make money in this version. You can sell equipment to a port, steal it back, and repeat the cycle without leaving the sector for very substantial profits. 2. THE HOLDS BUG: If you tell the game that you want to steal 365 units of equipment or 660 units of organics (never mind how many holds you have), and you don't have high enough experience to get away with stealing that much, you will get busted and *gain 32 holds* rather than losing any. To learn the value of this bug, try buying a Colonial Transport with base holds, "holds-bug" until you're up to 282 holds, and sell it back at the StarDock. 3. THE (CLASSIC) MEGAHOLDS BUG: Using the holds bug, it's possible to load your ship up to its normal maximum plus 32. Unfortunately, if you try to use those 32 extra holds, you will lose them the first time you dock at a port. The megaholds bug is a solution. Load your ship with colonists, and steal *one unit* of fuel ore or organics from a port. Drop off the colonists on Terra. As long as you don't get busted, surrender to the Ferrengi, jettison cargo, or try to trade or pick up the commodity you used to "lock in" the extra holds, you can keep them and use them for trading or stealing. 4. THE (SUPER) MEGAHOLDS BUG: So, max + 32 isn't good enough for you, eh? Another bug allows you to load your ship with any number of holds, if you have the patience. First, use the "classic" megaholds bug to get up to max + 32. Now, fill your holds with colonists. Your next job is to lose most of your holds. One way to do this is to surrender repeatedly to the Ferrengi, but the most turn-efficient way is to get busted repeatedly: trying to steal 364 holds of equipment can take away 32 holds a pop. You must not throw away *all* your holds, but the more you lose, the faster the process goes. Once you're very close to zero, go to a port where you haven't been busted and steal one unit of a commodity you don't want to trade (probably organics or fuel ore). You've just created some "imaginary holds"; you can now go back to Sol, buy some *real* holds, load those holds up with colonists, and start getting busted again... 5. THE CORPORATE MEGAHOLDS BUG: This bug allows you to lock in "artificial holds" like the ones created by the megaholds bug, but it can create *any number* of holds (up to 32,767), it takes only a *few* turns, it doesn't cost nearly as much experience as the super megaholds bug, *and* it can create tons of free equipment on your planet. To use it, you need a teammate and a citadel that's safe to park in. Your planet must have some equipment on it, though not nearly as much as it will have when you're done. First of all, make sure that your teammate is in the citadel and that her ship is *unlocked*; her holds should also be empty. Unlock your own ship (they are locked by default) by (R)emaining in the Citadel, and saying (Y)es when it asks about trading ships. Once you've unlocked your ship, you can immediately go back into the game. Now you need to use the (A)ll command out on the planet's surface to take all the equipment you can carry. Go into the (C)itadel, (E)xchange Ships, say (Y)es to confirm, (L)eave the Citadel, and (D)isplay the planet. Go back into the (C)itadel, (E)xchange, say (Y)es, (L)eave, take (A)ll, and (D)isplay the planet once more. Strangely enough, you'll now have twice as many goods loaded onto your ship as you have cargo holds. If you wanted, you could now leave the planet and "lock in" the extra holds the same way you did with the Megaholds and Super Megaholds bugs -- but let's get greedy. Start repeating the last key sequence -- "CEYLAD" -- to load your ship with more and more equipment. Something strange will happen every time you change into your teammate's ship and take (A)ll: his ship will be loaded with a *negative* quanity of equipment, and equipment will magically be *created* on the planet. I usually continue this process until my ship has about 25,000 equipment on it, and my teammate's has 25,000 empty holds. I can now "lock in" my holds with organics, pick up some fuel ore, and TransWarp around the galaxy selling excess equipment. I could use my teammate's ship for moving colonists or trading anything *except* equipment. 6. THE SHIELD BUG: A Level V citadel with 1639 or more planetary shields is impossible to invade. Attempts to destroy those shields are futile. That's all, folks. 7. FIGHTER/SHIELD OVERLOAD BUG: Ships have built-in limits for fighters and shields -- the Scout Marauder is only supposed to carry 250 fighters and 100 shields. If you use negative numbers when transferring fighters and shields through the corporate transfer menus, however, those limits don't apply. If you have a teammate *take* you a negative number *from* you instead of giving you a positive number, he/she can load your ship with up to 32,767 shields and 32,767 fighters. (For a faster way to overload with shields, try using negative numbers in your citadel. ) However you do it, be warned: if you dock at a port with extra fighters and shields, you will lose them! 8. SO MUCH FOR STARDOCK!: A Scout Marauder, overloaded with 32,767 fighters and at least 20,000 shields using the methods outlined above, has very good odds of destroying StarDock or any of the Class 0 ports. Just load the ship up and attack: *DON'T* break off your attack until you're out of fighters, and you have about 2-in-3 odds of success. 9. THE MORONIC FERRENGI: The game makes neutralizing the Ferrengi very, very easy. All you need to do to insulate yourself against their attacks, for example, is carry one fighter and many shields. When a Ferrengi attacks you, he will only do 0-2 damage points at a time. Even worse: to knock the Ferrengi completely out of the game, all you have to do is destroy the fighters in their home sector and deploy 3,000 of your own fighters in the sector. From that point on, they won't regenerate, even if they still own Ferrengal: all that'll be left are the Ferrengi already wandering around the galaxy. In the first few weeks of the game, this tactic costs less than a million credits. 10. THE INFALLIBLE CLOAK: Buy cloaks. They're a great bargain. In 1.03d, it's impossible to attack a cloaked ship, and regardless of what the docs say, cloaks *do not* fail. Compared to the cost of being blown up, 25,000 credits a day is trivial. 11. SHIELDS AND P-MISSILES: The docs are also wrong about the effect of shields on the p-wave. P-missiles *do* work against shielded planets. They also work against shielded ships and ships parked in FedSpace. 12. THE USELESS SENTINEL: Don't buy the Tholian Sentinel. Period. The Sentinel is supposed to have 4:1 odds when defending a planet against an invader. This feature doesn't work. If an invader attacks the *ship* first -- rather than trying to land and *then* attacking the ship -- the Sentinel only gets 1:1 combat odds. 13. MANY FERRENGI AND ALIENS: When a sysop rerolls the game with BIGBANG, several files (including CONVO.DAT, WALLDAT.DAT, and, most important, FERRENGI.DAT and ALIENS.DAT) are not properly initialized. Some new games will be swarming with powerful aliens and Ferrengi. Sysops should remember to delete these four files when restarting games. 14. THE "6666" BUG: Always set your military reaction level to 0% if you have more than 12,000-13,000 fighters on your planet. If an invader attacks without a p-missile, the invader has more than 26,000 fighters on his ship, and your MRL is greater than zero, *all* of your fighters will attack him and will be destroyed -- even if you have many more fighters than you should need to kill the invader. Again, this list is *anything* but complete: it's just an attempt to outline the strategically most important bugs. Hope it's useful. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ MORE BUGS ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * by Joel Downer Many people have asked me about a complete list of TW bugs. I've never prepared something like this, and I doubt I ever will. What I usually post in response to that question is a list of the fourteen most tactically important bugs in the game -- bugs like the shield bug, the megaholds bugs, the holds bug, steal-sell, the fighter overload bug, etc. Gerard Droege and I also prepared a list of more minor bugs last year, in response to a request from Gary Martin. We tried to skip the most obvious problems (already listed for Gary by Kris Lewis), and come up with some of the more obscure errors. At that time, in a few hours of brainstorming, we came up with 52 bugs (again, not including the most obvious ones). If we had more hours and lots of energy to repeat the process now, I would estimate that we could double the length of the list. I recently found this list on an old archive disk. After I sent it to Gary, I backed it up and forgot about it. I received word from Kris that Gary had fixed all of the problems on the list in "just a few hours" of coding. Given that assertion, I'm surprised to see some of the same problems cropping up in the 2.0 beta. I think that reposting the list now might be helpful to the beta team, and might satisfy some curiosity on the echo. Additional bugs in Version 1.03 compiled by Joel Downer and Gerard Droege 1. shield overload using negative numbers in citadel. 2. Alien % alignment bug in V-Screen in early game. 3. All evil aliens appear as annoyances instead of by true rank. 4. Good aliens' rank is unrelated to true experience. 5. Cloak is 100% reliable (vs. what the docs say). 6. Permanent p-missile -- if you quit the game while a p-missile is in effect, the q-cannon will sometimes fail until another p-missile fired. (?unverified). 7. holds bug (stealing 365, losing -32 holds) 8. p-missiles are not affected by planetary shielding system (vs. the information in the docs and the menu screens). 9. player kicked out of the game when blown up destroying a planet (as if ship was destroyed; actually in *** Escape Pod ***). 10. player kicked out interrupting sector display invading Ferrengal 11. TEDIT frequently hangs when accessed directly after TW in local mode (locking up computer). 12. game flakes out after players have more than 10-12 billion credits 13. kill-kill cycle for experience and credits 14. repetitive colonist dump 15. cost for changing name follows no reasonable pattern -- always resets to 100 credits when player exits game 16. Repeated insults after unreasonable price -- you keep getting "Make a real offer" stuff even when you get back to negotiating 17. Port quantities change when thrown out of port (violation of law of conservation of matter . . . ). Evil player can use this bug magically to "create" commodities that otherwise aren't available (excellent for moving planets out of contested areas). 18. Allowed to steal from port under construction (bug?). 19. 5 point stealing cycle 20. Ability to protect yourself from Ferrengi by carrying 0 fighters a many shields. 21. integer overloads on alignment (when placing large bounties and killing many fighters), with prices at Class 0 ports and in hardware emporium. (When carrying millions of credits, Class 0 reports that you can buy a virtually random number of fighters and shields between 32,000 and -32,000, depending on amount and ship type.) 22. Corporate planet scan must be done twice to get correct information. 23. Corporate planet scan confuses current planet record about level of credits: makes the game think that current planet has same credit level as the last planet on the list. 24. Quasar cannon only consumes half as much ore on atmosphere fire as it should. 25. No way to interrupt ship catalog -- end up getting 19 ship lists. 26. Ether probe "forgets" current sector and self-destructs without reaching objective. (Plot course, move, then fire. It'll get mixed up virtually every time.) 27. Ether probe that cannot find target clears avoids without prompting the user. 28. Downloading CIM information before plotting a course and doing a port report causes game to crash. 29. "planet-busting" for experience 30. can't interrupt failed course plot (e.g., with {Esc} key); takes up to 1.5 minutes on some systems. 31. BIGBANG forces sysop to reinsert code (bug?) 32. BIGBANG doesn't always reset aliens list, Ferrengi, or tavern conversation 33. Getting murdered in the underground resets experience, alignment; doesn't disturb assets. (bug?) 34. Federation-posted bounty in the log is extremely inaccurate (small percentage of final bounty). 35. Sysop cannot cloak ships using TEDIT. (May not be a bug, but it's *VERY* annoying. 36. Space bar aborts *display* of planet scanner, but doesn't abort the scan. Scanners turn out to be an enormous nuisance. 37. Player penalized for not attacking an enemy when he/she is carrying zero fighters (and cannot attack). 38. Possible to steal from port that hasn't been finished yet. This may not be a bug, but combined with the fact that upgrading a port under construction directly increases *quantities available to steal* from the port, it makes the game silly sometimes. 39. Docs bug. For some strange reason, the help files suggest that it is possible to create more than one port in a single sector. Unless we're all missing something important, that's not so. 40. Last six characters of personal messages and corporate memos are truncated. Quite confusing for new players. 41. Every time a player who has the rank Fleet Admiral (but who does not have 32,000 experience) does something to earn experience he/she gets "promoted" to Fleet Admiral again. 42. "Scan sector" from citadel rarely works, even when enemy forces are deployed in the sector. 43. When a player is destroyed by a corbomite reaction when destroying another ship, the name of the player/alien/Ferrengi piloting the other ship is lost and replaced by the name of a Nebula or other random item. 44. When a player carrying colonists is accosted by Ferrengi, his/her amount of holds is decremented, but his/her number of holds of colonists stays the same. (Ends up with more holdsful of items than holds.) 45. (May be bug and may not be.) When a player tries to warp to a distant site that is avoided (accessing the course-plotting system), a warning system repeatedly interferes with the warp. On the other hand, the avoids system will *NOT* warn a player about a warp into an adjacent avoided sector. (This feature is hardest on novice players.) 46. Mail and log items frequently scroll off a 24-line display, despite built-in pause feature. Best guess: the counter function miscounts three-line items as two-line items. 47. When a CEO is deleted for non-play, the corporation continues to exist. All players can desert the corporation, and at least for a time, the corporation continues to exist *with no members*. 48. Player can frustrate traces by the Grimy Trader by naming his/her ship "The Merchant Marines." (bug? certainly *useful*...) 49. Player can acquire list of unexplored ports by changing ship name to "The Merchant Marines," and doing a Trader Trace on him/herself (again, lends itself to some *very* handy applications...). 50. Overflow in Tavern prices. When a (silly) sysop sets a very high date, players are *paid* for asking for the Underground password and eating and drinking in the Pub. 51. When a player is deleted from a game by the sysop, and is parked in a citadel at the time of deletion, his/her ship is still considered available for trade. Furthermore, if the planet is destroyed, the message "[PLAYER NAME] GOT BLOWN UP TOO!" appears in the log. 52. Players can neutralize the StarDock as a trading point (one solid attack with 4,000 fighters in a BattleShip will do it), and it can be upgraded. This element is primarily important because of the steal-sell cycle, which evidently won't be an issue in the next version anyway... =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ THE PLANET CLONING BUG (v1.03 only) ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * by Joel Downer SUMMARY 2002 version 1.03 (and before) has a problem with corporate or personal planet scans run from citadels. Running a scan from a citadel makes the game think you're on the *last planet listed on the scan*, rather than the planet you're actually on. Usually, this confusion is temporary. However, if you upgrade the citadel of the planet you're on immediately after you do the scan, you can make the confusion permanent, "cloning" the last planet on the list and everything on it (including, most important, the fighters and treasury). By "reconfusing" the planet and repeating the cycle, YOU CAN CREATE AS MUCH MONEY AS YOU LIKE WITHOUT SPENDING TURNS OR CASH. HOW TO DO IT To use this bug, you need two planets with citadels, at least one *below* level 5 (as a level 5 citadel may not be upgraded). The bug works best when the two planets are in the same sector so that you can move money back and forth without spending any turns. Both planets *must* have a citadel or upgrading *from* a citadel won't be possible. Tip: Say you have five corporate planets. Two, in sector 50, have level 2 citadels. One, in sector 283, has a level 4 citadel. Two, in sector 847, have level 5 citadels. If you do a corporate planet scan from a citadel, the game will think you're on a level 5 planet and won't let you upgrade. The solution is to go to sector 50, claim the two planets *personal*, and do the cloning bug there with the *personal* planet scan. The other planets won't appear on the personal scan, so you can do the whole thing from the same sector. The planet that appears last on the list (either your personal or corporate planet scan) needs to be ready for upgrade -- it must have all the colonists and materials necessary. Let's say for future discussion that you have *personal* planets with two level 2 citadels in the same sector. (This strategy will work just as well with corporate planets, we're just trying to keep things simple.) The second one on the list has all the goods needed to go to level 3. The first planet that appears on the list is stripped bare. Put all your fighters on the second planet's surface, put all your money in the second planet's treasury, and put all your shields in the shield bank (you can do this even if the planet isn't level 5 yet). Blast off the planet and land on the first planet. Go into the citadel, access the computer menu, and do a personal planet scan. When you quit the computer menu, the game will tell you that you have money on the planet -- the exact amount you put on the second planet! Don't get greedy and try to remove money from the treasury right away, or it will disappear. Instead, start the *upgrade* on the planet. Doing so starts it on its way to level 3, but it also permanently changes the planet so that it's identical to the other planet. (The only things that aren't "cloned" are planet number and location, if the planets happen to be in different sectors.) Now comes the fun part. Take all the money out of the treasury, take the shields from the shield bank, and pick up your fighters from the planet. Leave the planet, drop everything off on the *second* planet, and DO THE WHOLE PROCESS AGAIN! Because you're making the first planet on the list *think* that it's the same as the second planet (which hasn't been upgraded), you can "start an upgrade" on the first planet as many times as you like in a single day. If you move everything you've got to the second planet before each upgrade, your money, fighters, and shields grow at a geometric rate (100,000, 200,000, 400,000, 800,000, 1,600,000, 3,200,000, 6,400,000, 12,800,000, and so on...). LIMITATIONS Be forewarned that having more than a couple billion credits on your ship, or more than about ten billion credits on a planet, will make the game extremely unstable. The game may even crash and prevent you from landing on your planets. If you're going to use this bug, use it to make a couple billion credits at a time; spend them, and *then* create more as needed. Other than that, this bug has precious few limitations. Using a macro, you can go from 100 credits to about 10 billion (the most you can safely make without risking a complete game crash) in about five minutes. You can also use this bug to "instant-upgrade" planets from level I to level IV, so it could be a way to create a large armadda of TransWarpable planets; but the money is by far the most important issue. If you have a billion credits when no one else does, you should be able to dominate the game completely in a matter of a day or two. HOW TO PREVENT THIS BUG If you're a sysop who wants a successful game, or a player who wants serious competition, you will definitely want to fix this bug. Luckily, a fix is very easy to come by. 2002103D.ZIP is an authorized update to 2002 that completely (as far as I have been able to determine) fixes the planet cloning bug. (I have heard rumors that there is a way to clone in 1.03d, but I have heard no confirmation or evidence, so I currently regard those rumors as false.) 1.03d is a "drop-in" replacement that doesn't require a game reset and adds DESQview timeslicing support to the game. It is incompatible with older utilities that modify the .EXE's and .OVR's of the game, but newer, 1.03d-compatible versions of these utilities are now available. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ USING BUGS ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= There is a "religious war" which has sprung up regarding the use of the various bugs in TradeWars 2002. Some people call bug use "cheating," but think nothing of zinging about in the universe with one ftr and max shields or running sell/steal or using any of a dozen or more other ack- nowledged bugs. Others quote Ender Wiggins, saying, "Use what they give you." Be this as it may, it is surely not improper to make reference to these things in order that forewarned may be forearmed, at the very least. Many otherwise inexplicable happenings can be shown to not be cases involv- ing sysop intervention with TEDIT or AEDIT (which is true cheating), but instead merely someone taking advantage of yet another relatively unknown bug. Also, since about the only (semi) valid charge regarding these things is that, by and large, they are undocumented, documenting them will, at least in my eyes, remove this last impediment to their use. With that said, lets examine some of the more useful and popular bugs and how they might best be used: --- * Originally by David White To get and KEEP the hold bug of 32 additional holds; 1) Get busted robbing 365 holds of equ. to lose -32 holds, leaving the ISS with 182 holds. 2) Go to Earth and get a load of 182 colonists. Your inventory should show 150 total holds - 182 colonists. (The bug we'll be taking advantage of is, if you were to port NOW, you wouldn't technically lose any holds; instead, you'd be ask if you want to buy -32 of whatever product was being sold.) 3) Before taking your colonists to your planet, stop at a sector with a port that sells a product you DON'T PLAN ON USING ANYTIME SOON (I usually choose Org., since I'll want Equ. for steal/selling, and Ore for T-warping). 4) Port, choose S)teal product, and choose the product you don't plan on using. (I'll use Org. in my examples). It'll ask "How many holds to want to swipe [-32]?" Just steal 1 unit of Org. You'll get the usual "Success!" message, though the Org. won't show up on your inventory. 5) Continue to your planet and drop the colonists off. At this point, you can safely port and deal with Ore and Equ. using 182 holds. The one unit of Org. you stole earlier will keep your extra 32 holds from being lost. Especially useful, you can now steal/sell 182 holds of Equ. or Ore. (You can also continue to steal credits from ports, transport colonists, etc. without losing the 32 holds.) However, do NOT try to buy or steal Org. (or pick it up off your planet) or you'll drop back to 150 holds. (Always answer 0 when it asks "How many holds of Organics do you want to buy? [-32]?") I don't know why, except TW thinks you have -32 holds of Org after you stole 1 unit, and that will be ruined if you try to get more Org. If you really want to be dealing in Org, choose another product for step #4. Also, do NOT try jettisoning anything. This seems to also clear out the -32 holds of Org., leaving you with 150 empty holds. Unfortunately, you can't rob 365 equ. and get an ADDITIONAL 32 holds. :) --- * Originally by Joel Downer The bug that makes this trick possible is *not* the infamous holds bug, which allows you to gain rather than lose cargo holds when you try to steal 365 units of equipment. You can use the holds bug to load your ship with max + 32 holds, but if you want any more, you'll actually have to *buy* them. HOW TO OVERLOAD YOUR SHIP WITH HOLDS: To load a ship with extra holds, you must be evil. You may choose any ship, but the best choices are the Imperial StarShip (because of TransWarp drive and combat capabilities), the Corporate FlagShip (because of TransWarp drive), and the Scout Marauder (because of turn rate and combat odds). If you're using a FlagShip or Scout Marauder, you can get a lot done with relatively little money. If you're using a StarShip, or if you want to load *any* ship with more than 250 holds, you'll need a great deal of money. The best way to start is to get your ship to max + 32 using the holds bug: let's say you're now in a FlagShip, and you now have 117 holds. Go to Terra, and pick up a full load of 117 colonists. Now, find the nearest port that *sells* equipment. Try to steal 364 (*yes, THREE HUNDRED SIXTY-*FOUR*) holds of equipment. You will lose 32 cargo holds, but, due to a bug in the game, you will still be carrying 117 colonists. Next, find a port that sells organics (you don't want to use fuel ore, because using fuel ore will make your ship incapable of TransWarp; you might choose differently if you're overloading a Scout). Steal one hold of organics (what you're actually getting is -64 holds of organics, but don't worry about this). When you're done, you will have 53 cargo holds, and 117 holds full of colonists, with zero empty holds. Now you can go to Sol and buy 32 more cargo holds: doing so will leave you with 85 cargo holds, 117 holds full of organics, and 32 *empty* holds, for a total of 149 cargo holds. You can pick up more colonists and repeat as often as necessary. I'm not aware of any limit on the number of cargo holds, but two warnings: (a) the price of holds increases geometrically as you buy more and more -- buying a thousand holds would cost millions upon millions of credits, and (b) you need to think carefully about how many holds you can effect- ively *use*. The caveats about this trick are the same as for loading your ship with max + 32: if you surrender to a Ferrengi, get busted, get blown up, or try to buy or sell the commodity you used to "cement" your extra holds (usually organics, sometimes fuel ore), you'll lose them. Obviously, if you're using a heavily overloaded ship for the steal-sell cycle, you're going to lose a great deal of money each time you get busted, because you're going to have to repeat all the busts and repurchase all of those holds. However, (a) with the right combinations, the risk can be *very* worthwhile, and (b) I can think offhand of many other interesting uses for this bug. --- o by Jim Pittman DG> What is the CT megahold loop? To do a proper megahold loop, a la Nightstalker, you run the obbing spree option on the TWVIEW OFFLINE to set up a closed loop of 8 ports starting at Stardock. Then purchase a CT plus 18 holds. Hit each of the 8 ports stealing 365 eq or 660 org, getting busted for -32 holds each time. You will then have 282 holds on your CT and can get around 700k for it when you trade it in at Stardock. Have a team mate run a loop before you log on again and you can do it each day. I like to start my day in a Starmaster (or a Scout) for the turns, do some trading, waste some aliens to rebuild exp and -align (you lose it when you are busted so much), then when I'm down to CT turns, run my loop. You can usually run two different loops per day with CT turns, see how many after you have set up your loops with OFFLINE. That gives a two man corp almost 4 million a day, depending on what they do with the Starmaster. Then, when you sell your CT the second time (or third if you have the turns) be sure to buy a high turns ship to start the day tomorrow. And don't forget the cloak. --- o by Leonard Adolph JV> Hey, I'm new to this echo, and missed the post on the -32 holds bug... JV> Could you explain this one to me? Thanks. If you are able to steal (-100 alignment or lower) you can attempt to steal 365 holds of equipment or 660 holds of organics (the amounts are a little variable but those are the numbers I first learned and still use) at a port that has at least that much available (usually selling the stuff). If your experience is not so high that you could actually get away with those amounts you will be busted, fined -32 holds and penalized +32 alignment. Now the good stuff. Find 7-8 ports where you can do this quickly and do it in a brand new Colonial Transport. With 8 ports hit this way you will end up with 32 holds more than the ship can normally hold. If you port your holds will fall back to the maximum the ship can carry. However, if you trade in such a ship in the Shipyards you will be paid over 700,000 credits for it. To run a complete route you will need to have your alignment down to at least -324 before you start. You will be penalized +32 alignment at each of the first 7 ports leaving you with the -100 needed to hit port number 8. --- o by Jim Bianchi One thing not mentioned above (or anywhere, for that matter) is that it IS possible to steal product from class 0 ports. Typically there will be only 1 or 3 holds of each product on the docks but hey, you only need one hold to "lock in" your new holds. Next time you're evil and pull up to a class 0 port (ANY class 0 port), hit "P." You won't be offered ob as an option, but if you hit "R" anyway, you'll be offered the familiar "rob/ steal" menu. Knowing this can make holds bugging really convenient at, say, Terra, where you have a source of colonists (and a place to put them when you're done with them) and a port from which you can get both the single hold of product needed to cement in the new holds and the new holds them- selves. Another alternative might be to later on in the game twarp one of your planets to Rylos or Alpha Centauri to make colonists easily avail and use the class 0 port there for these purposes. Now if I can figger a way to steal ftrs or shields.. --- * by John Fleming Here are some docs on the Corporate Mega Holds bug that I keep on file. The Corporate Megaholds Bug The commands from the planet meny are: CRYY...then...ACEYLD...CEYLAD ...CEYLAD...CEYLAD...etc. Some sort of citadel is required, and you'll need another corporate member in the citadel with a ship with trade capability that's unlocked. The initial CRYY is to leave the game with your ship un- locked, else once you've exchanged, YOUR ship likely will be locked. After you've done this, leave the planet and steal one hold of fuel or organics and the holds are locked in. Don't trade any of the commodity that you use to lock the holds in with. If you jettison cargo or surrender to a Ferrengi the holds will disappear. I'd suggest carrying zero fighters if possible but have carried up to 5 fighters on my Scout. Flee from the Ferrengi until you're ready to lose the holds. You will sustain minimal damage from them. They will block your path, however you can get around them. I have had up to 3500 holds, but probably 32267 is possible. The amount of holds you get is dependent on the amount of equipment you have on the planet. The bug generates some equipment and organics can be used as well, if you're wil- ling to lock in with fuel. You cannot sell the holds but can use them for colonizing planets and trading. I'd suggest starting with trading pairs that trade equipment and fuel only trading as much as you can. Then switching hold configuration and trading equipment and organic pairs more lightly, trading 280 to 500 holds per trade. This will give trading pairs a chance to regenerate product within a few days. Then Steal credits at the ports where you've traded. If you get busted you'll lose your holds but you can CM again. Of course with experience points you could drastically increase profits during steal sell loops. With 5000 experience a popular formula (TWHELP Brandon Bannerman) would allow for theft of 250 holds per turn. Also, you could sell several thousand in one turn. The legitimate max of 85 holds per 2 turns(about 1000 per 9 turns) is increased to 2000 holds in 9 turns by stealing 250x8 holds and selling 2000. This doubles your profits without extra turns however, more turns are available than those allowed a Corp. Flag. The bug is very useful for colonizing and upgrading planets. With 2450 holds you could populate two planets with 2 million colonists each and have room for enough organics and equipment for upgrade in two trips. Of course, Fuel is required too, which would require changing configuration or waiting awhile. Havoc Gunstars are the ship of choice for many of the CMH users. They have Transwarp capability with a fair turn rate. Many ships can be used, all except the Corporate Flag or ISS. I use TWVIEW94 to identify my intend- ed trades for a session. I'll identify about ten pairs for a trading run in a Scout with 200 turns (100 base turn rate). So far I have not explored all possibilitys of the CMH. This should be enough to get you started or at least explain why those guys in the Havoc Gunstars are so rich. I Trader Name : Enemy of the People Deadeye Dick Rank and Exp : 7350 points, Alignment=-5306 Demonic Times Blown Up : 1 Corp # 3, Ghost Shirt Society Ship Name : no really, Ship Info : Sverdlov BattleShip Ported=17 Kills=19 Date Built : 04:04:02 AM Sat Feb 09, 2005 Current Sector : 635 Turns left : 67 Total Holds : 55 - Empty=5001 Fighters : 7007 Shield points : 542 Corbomite Level: 22 Cloaking Device: 2 Ether Probes : 19 Mine Disruptors: 10 LongRange Scan : Holographic Scanner Credits : 81,353 Command [TL=00:52:06] (?=Help)? ... This how your ship will look. Also, saw another combo of commands that I haven't tried: ACEYLACEYLD...CEYLAD...CEYLAD...that may generate more Equipment. You can make 1-2 million easy. --- * by Nathan Clark A variant of the PC bug, one which works in v1.03d, will allow you to restock fuel on a planet as if by magic. This bug is like the PC bug, but can be used with 1.03d. Claim a planet with whatever product you want personal, then land on a planet and enter itadel omputer list planets uit eave ll. If the planet you listed has 10,000 ore the planet you're on will have 10,000 ore. You get as much as you want by repeating the process. It works best with the 65xxx CMH's (for obvious reasons) and only works if you say ll right away. --- But what if there are "unbugging" utilities in use? One of these is TWUNBUG by Albin Gersich (the author of TWCAPD and TWASSIST). TWUNBUG is a superb util for trapping such as the "cloaked ship exchange," the "player #2" and the "heir to the throne" bugs, but the general consensus seems to be that AEDIT does a much better job of dealing with the various holds and shield/ftr overloading bugs. Whatever, here's a msg that shows how one ent- erprising player got around TWUNBUG's holds bug checks. * by TOM ROLLINS > TWUNBUG will assess a holds bug usage penalty. This > could be a warning, getting put into an escape pod, > or getting an escape pod and locked out of the game > for up to 5 days. It will let small usage of the holds > bug go through but not serious usage. I was playing in a TWUNBUG game where I used the Holds Bug as much as I could. I would kill myself by the end of the day (stardock underground, attack Zyrain, attack a port). The penalty was not applied to someone with a "Ship Destroyed" status. In this way I could avoid the penalty (kind of like what people try with the IRS) by pushing it into the future. I would start each day in a scout and do what I could. I had to keep every- thing as corp material so fighters would not turn rogue. My opponents were shocked at how many fighters a "Ship Destroyed" player could aquire in a bug-proof TWUNBUG game. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ MAPPING ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= The latest innovation in TradeWars seems to be Level Diagram generat- ion. The excitement over this was initiated by Dan Roseen's report that Albin Gersich had developed a utility with which he was able to 1) map 99% of the universe, 2) correctly locate SD, and 3) correctly locate Rylos and Alpha Centauri, all within 15 mins of logging on to a new game and without moving from sector 1! Albin is currently refining this utility and it is s'posedly to be released to (rather impatiently) waiting TradeWars gamers as an "early christmas present." --- * by David Myers SH> Ok. I was hoping it would come across on the echo SH> eventually, but since it hasn't I'll ask. What is a SH> level diagram? Just something people made up in my SH> three and a half month absence to confuse me? :) A level diagram is generated when you plot courses from a selected sector (called a root) to all other sectors in the universe and back again. What you end up with are course plots (that I convert into a .SCT file), a series of distances from your root, and a list of sectors that are extreme to your root (i.e., not found on any path to any other sector). What are the advantages of a level diagram? 1) You don't have to move, and yet you can still map most of the warps in the game. 2) multiple level diagrams increase warp coverage in the game approximately as follows: # LDs % total warps ----------------------------------- 1 78-80 2 90-91 3 95-96 3) Since the vast majority of sectors on the extreme lists are dead-ends, you get a handy list of dead-end candidates, useful for locating planets. Alternatively, you can use this list to hunt down your opponent's planets. 4) A level diagram generated at stardock creates a list of extreme sectors that is the optimal list of eprobe targets to insure 100.0% coverage of the TW universe. 5) A couple LDs give enough information to locate stardock and class 0 planets. I've worked out a technique similar to a level diagram that I've been calling a variable root algorithm. A variable root algorithm increases the coverage from 80% of all warps to 93% of all warps and does so in the same amount of time (15 min at 14.4k). So, if I wanted to find stardock in a modern game, I wouldn't use FINDSGA; I'd use the variable root algorithm and my program CLASSZER from the LDTOOLS package. A little about the history of the level diagram: Albin Gersich announced a method to map the galaxy to 99+% completion in 15 minutes at 14.4k, except he followed the announcement with the comment that he would be unable to implement such until later (he used the phrase 'early Christmas present' at one point). This got a number of us pretty excited, and Woody introduced an alternative method that he hoped would obtain about 90% of all warps called a level diagram (this message is in the text file MAPPING.TXT, which should be in both LDT105A and TWFT102A). After talking about the idea *a lot* I came up with an implementation, followed by Woody. Pretty soon, Rick Cooney adapted his macro package TWPLAY to Woody's routines. So the three ways I know of to generate LDs are: (1) via TWFT102A, which leaves you with the course plotter information in a .SCT type format. (2) INSTMAP.ZIP, by Woody Weaver, consisting of Telix macros, a conversion program, and some other tools for those who have no access to Telix and wish to take a LD. (3) Rick Cooney's TWPLAY13, which interfaces with INSTMAP.ZIP If my conversations with Rick Cooney are correct, the latter two utilities leave you with a text capture of CIM reports on courses. Fred Polli says that the forthcoming Powermacs will support a kind of LD generation. I have a series of LD support utilities called LDTOOLS that deal with course plotter info in .SCT format, but not as raw captures (Someone does need to provide some conversion programs for the raw capture people.) --- o by WOODY WEAVER (MAPPING.TXT) The new TWASSIST feature has piqued my mathematical curiousity. For those who just want TW tips, space bar now. For developers or those who might be interested in the algorithms of mapping the universe, keep going. The problem, of course, is to generate the directed graph that is a trade wars universe. Currently, the number of nodes in the graph is 1000, the graph is sparse, with at most six outgoing edges and average between two and three outgoing edges, and is mostly strongly connected (i.e. a path between any two nodes in either direction). What we have going for us is an oracle that will display the shortest path between two nodes. The time it takes to get a response from the oracle is a function of the actual distance, but appears to be more than a tenth but less than a second if the path actually exists. Let's talk undirected graphs, then modify things later. (In particular, for practical results, assuming all edges are two-way is probably useful; it doesn't solve the problem of finding the star dock, as Joel's findsga does, but for general trading/combat issues its a good first approximation.) The level diagram of a graph rooted at r is an ordering of the nodes of the graph by distance from r; i.e. r, then all its neighbors, then all nodes at distance 2 from r, then all nodes at distance three, etc. An edge (u,v) is an external i-edge if u is at distance i from r, and v is at distance i+1; the edge is an internal i-edge if u and v are both at distance i. (Note that EVERY edge is either an external i-edge or internal i-edge for some i.) Okay, here is an algorithm. The first pass is to pick up all the external edges rooted at 1. Set a bit for each node as an extreme vertex. Set a bit for each node as unattached, set the bit for sector 1 as attached, then run s from 2 to 1000 with if s is not attached, plot the course from 1 to s parse the course to get v0=1, - v1 - v2 - ... - vn = s store the edge (vi, vi+1), i=0..n-1 set vi as attached, i=1..n turn off the bit for vi as extreme, i=1..n-1. How many course plots do we have to make? A priori, I don't have an answer; if the graph were pathological and we were unlucky, it could be as much as the size of the graph. Note that we have to at least attach each dead end, this is a lower bound. Let's estimate that we have to make 500 course plots at a 0.75 sec each, or around 7 minutes. At this point, we have ALL the external edges. Moreover, we also know that any edge we are missing MUST be between a pair of nodes at the same distance from 1. Here is some data: the format is "number at distance(internal/external edges)" St.Marys bbs, stellar dispersion from sector 1: 1( 0/ 6) 6( 12/ 21) 14( 2/ 43) 27( 2/ 77) 51( 2/146) 97( 19/290) 177( 47/450) 233( 91/487) 198( 51/345) 112( 15/179) 50( 2/ 75) 20( 0/ 30) 9( 0/ 12) 3( 0/ 4) 1( 0/ 2) 1( 0/ 1) 0( 0/ 0) 0( 0/ 0) 0( 0/ 0) 0( 0/ 0) There are 0 unreachable sectors, 1000 reachable sectors. Average number of warps in reachable sectors: 2.411 Average distance to (known) sectors: 6.99 diogenes.club bbs, stellar dispersion from sector 1: 1( 0/ 6) 6( 12/ 22) 16( 2/ 49) 33( 2/102) 75( 6/221) 140( 36/393) 225( 91/512) 224( 65/436) 152( 19/245) 73( 13/110) 36( 2/ 46) 9( 0/ 17) 7( 0/ 9) 3( 0/ 3) 0( 0/ 0) There are 0 unreachable sectors, 1000 reachable sectors. Average number of warps in reachable sectors: 2.419 Average distance to (known) sectors: 6.51 grateful.med bbs, stellar dispersion from sector 1: 1( 0/ 6) 6( 12/ 20) 13( 2/ 35) 22( 0/ 71) 51( 10/142) 92( 10/250) 150( 43/375) 191( 66/424) 183( 63/362) 142( 22/247) 83( 10/127) 35( 2/ 57) 16( 0/ 25) 7( 0/ 9) 2( 0/ 4) 2( 0/ 2) 0( 0/ 0) 0( 0/ 0) 0( 0/ 0) 0( 0/ 0) There are 0 unreachable sectors, 996 reachable sectors. Average number of warps in reachable sectors: 2.406 Average distance to (known) sectors: 7.33 The numbers are pretty consistent. The point is that this is fairly effective. For SMC, there are 243 internal edges that would be missed, 2168 external edges, so 90% of the internal edges. Now consider the one-way character. Just reverse the procedure! I.e. here, we first clear all the attached bits, then plot courses back from s to 1. We won't have to do as many course plots this time: start with all the "extreme" sectors (since you have to do that anyway) and that will cover everything except sectors with back doors. Just pick up the remaining, and you will have developed the entire level diagram. Now what is missing? The internal edges, since they won't have been seen in any shortest course plot. Its likely that this is a sufficient place to stop: we've used up ten or twelve minutes of bbs time, and we've got 90% of the edges, and we certainly have a good picture of the stellar dispersion from sector 1. (Actually, because you want to buy etherprobes at the star- dock and fire them off from there, it might be nice to do all this from the stardock rather than 1.) This seems to meet all the tactical issues, and then if you fire etherprobes at all the extreme nodes and parse the reports back, you will have a valid map (because you've passed through every sector). What if you don't want to spend the money on the four hundred etherprobes? Because of one-way warps, the level diagram of the opposite directed edges rooted at 1 will have a slightly different structure in terms of nodes at a fixed distance, you can actually gain more negative information about where the internal edges are *not* located. At this point, one could do two things: as you are developing the original sector scans, build the sets of nodes at the same distance, and then do course plots between pairs to see if the edges exist. (These course plots would run very fast, as most of the time the paths would be of length 1 or 2.) Alternatively, one could just repeat the above process of generating the level diagram rooted at another node. Now, the edge would have to be internal to both level diagrams to be hidden; if r and s are your two nodes, and (u,v) is the hidden edge, then u, v have to be the same distance from r *and* the same distance from s, in *both* directions, which should be rather unlikely in these random graphs. Probably best is a hybrid: for each level diagram rooted at r, you get a partition of the nodes (by distance). Combining level diagrams, you simply refine the partitions. Repeat until the size of each partition is one or two, then directly course plot between the nodes to determine if the internal edge exists. Interesting. I first thought about using the silly oracle several years ago -- it is absurd that you don't have direct information about warps, but you can plot all of the warps leaving a node -- but didn't think very hard about it. It easy to see that you can get a complete set of information by plotting 1000*999 course pairs, but a million course plots is clearly a waste of time. Albin, it was very insightful to recognize that this can be quickly done. The other reason that I didn't write the routine is that it would (I thought) take all the fun out of exploration. Now, I find that exploration is rather boring, and that knowledge of the warps is not as important as knowing the location of the ports and whether or not the port has been visited/blocked -- i.e. the etherprobe informat- ion. What would perhaps make the most sense is to have readily available the "map" of the universe, i.e. the warps, but that we can't have set up contacts at a port (i.e. visited it) unless we pay a fee to contact the port administrator, or have an etherprobe pass by (and deposit a permanent transmitter, aka "visiting"). It seems to me that this feature of TWASSIST is very useful and very sensible. --- * by Stephen Whitis >Ok. I was hoping it would come across on the echo eventually, but since >it hasn't I'll ask. What is a level diagram? Just something people made >up in my three and a half month absence to confuse me? :) New technology, the best thing to happen to utilities in a while... TWASSIST should add support for it (I think) in the next release. INSTMAP contains telix scripts and other support for LD's now, as does TWFT. I'm working on something myself. Basiclly, you pick a base sector, then run the utility to create a LD. It plots routes from your base to every other sector and back again. For instance, if you use 175 as the base sector, it plots courses from 175-1 175-2 175-3, etc, and the reverse paths as well. That info can be parsed out into a CIM sector report for use in utilities like TWVIEW and TWASSIST. One LD will give you over 80% of the warp info in a universe. Another with a different base sector can up that to almost 90%, I think. The third would be about 93-94 %. (I'm not sure of exact percentages, which will vary a bit anyway. But you get the idea.) So without ever using a turn, you can locate the deep tunnels, get good estimates on where to find stardock & the class 0's, etc. By doing an LD from stardock, you can figure the "extreme" sectors from stardock. Those are the sectors which, if you were to eprobe each from stardock, you would have explored 100% of the universe, with no probes wasted (assuming none are destroyed on the way). Saves you money and time. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ ATTACKING ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * Originally by Kris Lewis How to calculate the minimum number of fighters to attack with: (his ftrs) * (his odds) (your ftrs) = ----------------------- (your odds) Ex: If he has a Scout Marauder (2.0:1) and 200 Ftrs, and you have a BattleShip (1.6:1), you need to attack with (250*2.0)/1.6, or 312.5 (313) fighters. This assumes no shields on his craft and does not account for the slight random factor in the calculations the game uses. Shields are at 2:1 odds, regardless of shiptype (I THINK. I'm sure Joel or Gary will cor- rect me if I'm mistaken.) Ferrengi ship's odds: Assault Trader - 1.0:1 BattleCruiser - 1.2:1 DreadNaught - 1.4:1 Alien ship's odds are the same as player ships of the same type. --- * Originally by Albin Gersich When you enter a defended sector, the sequence of events is: 1: Mines detonate. 2: Quasar cannons fire at sector level. 3: If there are fighters in the sector: If offensive, they attack. If toll, the player may pay the toll or attack. If defensive the player may attack. After the toll is paid the quasar cannons fire at sector level again. If the player attacks the fighters, after each attack round, even if 0 fighters were used in the attack, the quasar cannon fires at sector level. If the player does get all the fighters in one shot and attacks five times the quasar will fire all five times. Continue until the toll is paid or there are no fighters in the sector. When the ship attempts to land: 4: If the citadel is level 5 and has at least 1 shield, the quasar cannon fires at atmospheric level. 5: If the citadel is level 5 and has at least 1 shield, the player must destroy the shields to continue. 6: If the citadel is level 3 or higher, the quasar cannon fires at atmospheric level. 7: If the citadel is level 2 or highter, the planetary offensive fighters attack. If the ship has 26214 (hex 6666) or less fighters, the number that attack is determined by the military reaction level. If the ship has 26215 or more fighters AND the military reaction level is not zero, then ALL planetary fighters attack and are lost. 8: If the citadel is level 2 or highter, any fighters left on the planet defend. The attacker must destroy them to land. During a photon wave, only steps 5 and 8 are in effect. All others are nullified. If the photon wave runs out part way through the sequence, the remaining steps will be in effect. --- * Originally by Albin Gersich If you are landing on a planet that has a military reaction of anything other than 0%, and you don't use a photon, and you have more than 6666 Hex (more than 26214) fighters, then the military reaction of the planet will react at 100%. The funny thing about this is that all the fighters on the planet will be lost while trying to destroy you, whether they were all needed or not. Normally only an ISS can have more than 26214 fighters, and usually they go in during a photon wave so this bug would not come into play. With the overloading of fighters bug any ship could have this many fighters. What matters is how many fighters the invading ship has left after the shields and quasar cannon. This is when the fighter attack routines go into effect. If the ship has at least 26215 fighters and the military reaction level is non-zero, even 1%, then ALL fighters on the planet will attack at 2:1 odds. When this happens ALL fighters will be lost. Normally only the number of fighters that are required to destroy the ship are lost, or all of them if there are not enough. When this bug takes effect ALL of the planetary fighters are gone, even if there should have been some left. Since the photon wave temporarily sets the military reaction level to 0%, this bug will not take effect if the wave is still in effect when the plan- etary fighter attack routine is reached. From the planets owners point of view, you most likely would destroy his ship so he can not reload, but your planet is now wide open and it cost you more than it should have. From an invaders point of view this bug can foil your plans. Even if the planet has a level 2 citadel this bug will take effect. If you go in with a fully loaded ISS to invade a level 2 citadel and wanted to soak off some of the fighters by landing and retreating rep- eatedly, you will instead be destroyed. --- * Originally by Kris Lewis A planetary Quasar Cannon has two firing levels, both expressed in the percentage of stored Fuel Ore to use to power the Quasar Blast. The first, the Sector reaction level, determines how hard a hostile will be hit for just entering the sector. Usually this is kept fairly low, and inflicts one battle point per three units of Ore expended. The second, the Atmosphere reaction level, specifies how much of the remaining ore is to go into fir- ing on one who tries to actually LAND on the planet. This shot is much more effective, doing one battle point per unit of ore expended. There is an oddity in that the sector firing uses all the fuel ore you exp- ect it to, but the atmosphere shot only takes HALF the expected amount. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ FERRENGAL ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * Originally by Kris Lewis Ferrengal itself is usually a Level 4 planet (Level 3 Citadel - Quasar Cannon). It is usually located in a dead end, and the Nebula name will always be "The Ferrengi Empire". The planet itself usually STARTS with the following: Colonists: 600 per area, 10000 Ore, some (low) amount of Organ- ics and Equipment, 5000 Fighters, 100,000 credits in the Treasury, a Milit- ary reaction level of 40%, and Quasar cannon levels of 30% (atmosphere) and 0% (sector). Destroying or invading Ferrengal by itself will not prevent the Ferrengi from regenerating. The sector defense force must also be neutralized AND replaced. Once destroyed, Ferrengal will NOT regenerate. If the planet is taken over AND the sector defense force is replaced by that of a player, then the Ferrengi are out of the game, aside from the ships that are still at large. Once destroyed, they will no longer regenerate. Taking the planet and NOT deploying your own fighters in the sector is an easy way to get every Ferrengi ship to attack you on sight, and they WILL still regenerate. As an aside, the Ferrengi ships base the number of fighters with which to attack you upon the number of fighters you carry. If you're being hounded, carry a small number of or no fighters and maximum shields. You can then pretty much ignore them. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ COLONISTS ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Colonists are initially avail only at Terra. As stated elsewhere, the optimum amount is 1000 holds of colonists on each product (3000 total). If this figure varies significantly one way or the other from this amt, prod- uction of the associated product will decrease. 1000 holds of colonists will produce 333 holds of fuel ore and 34 ftrs each day. It is a part of many players end game strategy to have a lot of "farming planets" which can absorb the excess colonists as they increase, in order to ..ah, harvest, the ftrs and fuel. After a certain point in the game, it should no longer necessary to buy ftrs except in cases of emerg- ency and the fuel is handy for qcannon and twarping. An interesting feature of planetary expansion (upgrade) is that once an upgrade step has been initiated, all colonists and any remaining prod- uct can be removed from the planet and the upgrade will still proceed ac- rding to schedule. One tactic I've heard of is for one corp member to deliberately pick up colonists from Terra and jettison them -- eventually, the supply will be depleted to the point where there are none left to be used for colonising other competitive planets that may be constructed. The number of colonists on Terra maxes out at 100000 holds. You'd be surprised how easy it is to drain that number down to 0 with a CMH bugged ship. Of course, as soon as you jettison anything, you loose your extra holds, but hey, CMH is free, it requires no turns to do, can be done by good as well as evil players and is fun to do besides. At any rate, the topic of colonist increase/decrease cycles came up on the FIDO TradeWar conference and Leonard Adolph provided this report: --- * by Leonard Adolph I have been asked to look into the rates involved in the colonist increase/decrease cycle. I have found that the colonist i/d cycle is based on 30 days with the base being the beginning of an individual game. Due to rounding and other factors a day may be added now and then, throwing the absolute 30 day cycle off over time. The game begins with the colonist cycle on the decrease with colonists dying off for 10 days. At the end of 10 days colonists begin increasing and do so for 20 days. Now the tricky part: During the 10 day decrease cycle colonists die off at 1% the first day and continue dying off at a sliding percentage that averages out to about .1% change per day. That is on day two they die off at about .9%, day three at .8%, etc. It is this sliding scale that creates periods of seeming stability when colonists neither increase nor decrease. With fewer colonists on a planet the stable period will be longer. During the colonist increase cycle colonists increase from about .1% on the first day up to a maximum of 2% twenty days later, at which time the decrease cycle begins with a 1% loss as outlined in the previous paragraph. The stable period of no colonist change marks the end of the decrease cycle and the beginning of the increase cycle. I am not absolutely positive on the 30 day base being the beginning of an individual game. This is easily checked by others here though as my tests were done local in a game 32 days old and in the second decrease cycle. The colonists in my local setup will appear stable (2895 total on a planet) on days 39 through 42 at 10:30 pm. On day 43 they will increase by 3 and continue increasing by increasing amounts until on day 62 they will drop from 3525 to 3492. The increases and decreases are continuous throughout the day and amounts will vary depending on the time of day. To run these tests I copied out all the .DAT files from my \TRADEWAR directory and did planet scans after which I exited the game, changed the date in DOS and re-entered to redo planet scans. I did this for about an hour and went from day 32 through day 76 with a short break at day 74 to run EXTERN to see if there was any effect (there wasn't). I copied the .DAT files back in so my son can continue with his play. Am I obsessed or what? (Is that Gary chuckling in the background?) :-) =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=[ end part two ]-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= PART THREE of IAGO'S WAR MANUAL for TradeWars 2002 v1.03 and v1.03d Contents: QUICK 'N DIRTY REFERENCE =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= --[ QUICK 'N DIRTY ]-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= This section is for all the interesting little bits that are important enough to be included in such a file as this, but aren't worth a category of their own. --- * by Leonard Adolph Here's another little trick with large numbers of holds: If you locked your holds with fuel ore then find you want to move large amounts of fuel ore, you can. Unload one of the other products to get empty holds and fill them with colonists. Now lock the holds using the product you just emptied, put the colonists back and move your fuel ore. A corp partner figured this one out when I asked him to restock the quasar cannons in a game we have decided to end. --- * Originally by Kris Lewis Density scanner readings: 0 - Nothing 40 - per Trader, Alien, or Ferrengi 1 - Beacon 50 - Destroyed Starport 5 - per Fighter 100 - Starport/Stardock 20 - per Mine 500 - per Planet Any density not ending in a 0, 1, 5, or 6 is a Federal. --- The latest controversy to hit the FIDO TradeWars conference involves the question, "is it possible to positively find a cloaked player (and destroy him)?" The obvious answer is no. (After all, what are cloaks FOR if not to render the user totally invisible and thus invulnerable?) What it IS possible to do is to, using a variety of methods, such as asking the Grimy Trader in the Tavern about a particular trader, analysing high traffic areas, learning the habits of the target as regards favorite places to stay for the night, plotting destroyed ftr patterns, examining sheep entrails, and so on, to make an approximation, a SWAG. But it will, no matter HOW (pseudo)scientific, STILL be a wild ass guess. Unfortunately, as in anything depending on random chance, occasionally someone will guess that so-and-so is in such-and-such sector AND HE IS. And yet another "urb- an myth" will be born about how to find a cloaked trader. Several methods for guessing (fairly closely, but a guess is still a guess) the location of a cloaked player have been put forward, but the best of them is only a guess (what can I say? they ARE). There have also been put forward several schemes that sound good at first, but do not stand up to rational analysis or empirical testing. Among these are: If you suspect a player is cloaked in the sector, hit "A" to attack him. If he's there, the game will respond as it normally does when you go over to combat mode. If you suspect a player is cloaked in the sector, hit "W" to tow him. If he is really there, you'll be notified that towing a ship with ftrs on board is not possible. Hmm, just after I'd finally mastered move-post-scan in an evil ISS, I gotta add two more steps to the dance: move-post-scan-attack-tow. (Parsely- sage-rosemary-thyme.) Needless to say, neither of these work. They've been tested on private games by people I trust and they simply DO NOT WORK. --- * by STEPHEN WHITIS > Does anyone know of a real quick way to get pos align (say 7000+) > down to neg align? How much money do you have? How much experience? Are you planning on running an evil ISS once you turn evil? I know a way an evil player (doesn't matter *how* evil) can turn good, get an ISS, and turn evil again for a few million credits. I suspect a variant on that would work. I'll post the evil version, but as I think about it, I don't see any reason it wouldn't work pretty much straight out for a good trader. If you don't want the evil ISS, you can skip that part. But unless Aedit or something is keeping you from using the evil ISS, I think you should get one. If you don't know the tricks for keeping an evil ISS, then ask, and I'll post about it. I haven't used this, but I trust my source (Joel Downer). The biggest problem is that I might not remember it exactly right... The evil version: Get killed trying to enter the underground without using the correct password. Do this near the end of your turns for the day. The next day, you'll start with 0 exp, 0 alignment and a default ship. Post a reward at stardock on an evil trader... 1000 credits = 1 alignment point, so you'll need 500,000 credits for this. If you know of a easy to kill evil trader, and where he is at, you can go kill him after you get the ISS, and collect the reward you posted (plus anything the Feds have posted on him) before you turn evil again. Once you have +500 alignment, enter the FedStation on stardock, and ask for a commission. That will put you at +1000 alignment. Go buy the ISS. If you need to kill off the evil trader you posted on, this is the time to do it. (If you want, you could have a corp member with 0 ftrs and 0 shi- elds, nothing on board to speak of, waiting, knowing you would kill him.) Now, you've got an ISS, no exp to speak of, and positive 1000 alignment. Stock your ISS with everything it can carry. You can get fighters/shields elsewhere, but get your eprobes, cloaks, scanner, etc now. In an evil ISS you don't want to come to stardock any more often than you have to. Before you start turning evil, post a single fighter at every entrance to Star- dock, to keep the Feds from walking in and finding you there. Once you are evil, if you run into a fed, you lose your ISS, no questions asked. To turn evil again, start busting planets. Buy max planets & max atomic detonators. Build a planet, blow it up. Repeat. This will give you xp and neg align each time you do it. Do that until your alignment is under +100. Then go into the underground, post a bounty on a good trader (preferably one you know where to go kill). In the underground, 250 credits = 1 neg alignment point. You need to reach -100, where you can start stealing. By the time you've busted enough planets to drop your alignment, you'll have enough experience (I think) to rob 150 holds safely. --- Having recently been in a situation similar to the above (a friend was at plus 4000 align and wanted to join my (evil) corp), I'd like to point out that apparantly, there is some threshold of positive align beyond which it is impossible to get into the UG. Not only can't you get IN, you can't even get KILLED there. A nasty looking Corelian will bar your way but that is all he'll do. (Likely there is a similar mechanism for evil players vis- a-vis the Fed Police sta.) Busting planets to get a negative align shift is tedious in the extr- eme and almost prohibitively expensive. You'll pay 25,000 for a gtorp and 15,000 for an adet, making a total of 40,000 creds. This will get you -40 align points. (Or -1 per 1000 creds.) Planet busting IS a good way to gain xp in order to be able to steal. Of course, the neg align is nice, too, but that isn't what it PRIMARILY is for. In order to get to 0 align from +7000, 175 planets will need to be busted. At 40,000 creds each, that works out to seven million creds -- for planets and adets alone. (Not even counting the cost of buying and outfitting an ISS or posting hit contracts on good play- ers to bring your align back to evil.) --- One way to lower (or raise) align is to blow up game generated chars. Aliens "enter" the game via SD. Kill one and another will appear at SD to replace him. On one game, one of the routes out of SD is a one way warp to a sector with only one exit. I've put a ftr trap in the second sector and about once a week, I'll load up on ftrs and go have a look. Typically three or five aliens will be trapped there, unable to go on because of the ftrs and unable to go back because of the one way warp in. Determining which al- iens to blow up so that your align moves in the desired direction is fairly easy by just reading their titles. If you're still unsure, the Crai has a listing of all the current good and evil game generated chars. If you put ftrs in each of the sectors leading out of SD, go blow up a game generated char and return to SD to remove one ftr, eventually a new one will move out. Of course, you have no control over what you get -- it might be some poor slob in a MerCru with 20 ftrs or it might be the three-legged Grand High Poo Bah from the planet Xyzzy in a Battleship with 15,000 ftrs, max shields, and loaded to the gunnels with corbomite. Truly, altering one's align direction by anything over 1000 points is a procedure which is time consumingly tedious, expensive and potentially hazardous. It CAN be done (but not very easily) and it can be done in many different ways (some of them mutually incompatible). It is not a project which should be undertaken lightly. --- * Originally by Craig Randle Getting something for nothing: 1 - Ported at a port, and steal ALL the equipment from it (max holds) 2 - Sell it back after haggling for awhile 3 - Buy the max holds of whatever it is selling, but instead of haggling the price, put 0. 4 - You'll get the good ol' "Nothing is free in this universe" line.. 5 - Then when you go went to steal the equipment again there will be as more than it started with. This could be a fast way to get a port in your home sector LOTS of equipment, and then steal it. Why? Use it to stock planets, for starters... --- For the fun loving among you, if you find an (uncloaked) player and fire a ptorp at him, he'll loose all his turns for that day, no matter where he is -- FedSpace or not. Better still, if you fire a ptorp into, say, SD, and drop carrier while the p-wave is still in effect, you'll have created a "perpetual p-wave" that will remain in effect until extern runs. Anyone who warps into SD will suddenly loose any remaining turns. (This apparantly works for any sector, but it seems like an espescially droll thing to do to SD or one of the class 0's.) Do this right after midnight and you'll have denied use of that sector to all players for the rest of the day. --- TriCron seems to have a fascination for many. When played with ANSI off, with a macro, at 14.4kbps, it seems an acceptable way to get creds to purchase eprobes for the initial mapping of the universe, but otherwise it seems a waste. I b'lieve that one of the earmarks of the relatively unskil- led player is the amount of time he spends playing TriCron, investigating the library, the theatre, the singles bar, the UG or FedPolice HQ at SD. Or trying to track other players by asking ol' Grimy. Now I've investigated all of these things, and so should you -- once. There has been a good deal of effort expended on those animated ANSI screens (that TriCron screen is a work of art!) and it should be appreciated. After you've seen them for the first time, however, turn ANSI off; the display will go a LOT faster, esp at 2400bps or below. A recently discovered bug involves dropping carrier immediately you've lost all the rent at TriCron. When you sign back on, you'll have all your creds back. (You'll also have the sysop pissed at you, but what's that next to the 156,000 creds you needed for planetary defense? ) --- If you run across a hated enemy, do you blow him all the way up? No, you tow his pod to a one deep dead end tunnel and install him there with, say, 100 defensive ftrs in the NEXT sector. When he logs back on, he'll be blockaded and won't be able to move out of the sector he's in. This can be VERY frustrating and may even lead to the target self destruct- ing as it appears that there is no way out of this trap. Esp if he has no one to call on for help. If he self destructs, he looses his ship and any creds on it and he won't be able to get back in for two days. (Which was the purpose of the exercise.) --- If someone has found your pod, and blockaded you with, say, 100 defensive ftrs, take a deep breath and have a glass of ice water. No, have TWO glasses of ice water. There is a way out, but it's gonna involve some work. First, try to holler for help. Call someone who might be able to rem- ove the blockading ftrs. If this is impossible, there is an alternative to self-destructing. Notice carefully what happens when you try to move into a sector with defensive ftrs and you refuse combat (you retreat). Occasional- ly, one of those defensive ftrs will follow you back. Occasionally, one of those defensve ftrs that follows you back will attack you. What you must do is move into the blockaded sector, then retreat. Move, retreat. If the gods smile on you, one of those ftrs will get lucky and blow you up and you'll start the next day in a nice ScoMar. It'll take a looong time, but hey. No one SAID it would be easy. Just keep moving and retreating, moving and retreating. --- For the evil twarpers out there, ALWAYS carry at least 30,001 creds (let's make it easy and say 40,000). If you get stuck in a place you don't want to be, without twarp fuel, stop. Build a class 7 port (sss). All ports under construction have product on the docks (the planet is only needed to upgrade the port and allow it to open for business) and if you "P" and "R," you'll be able to steal more than enough fuel to get you out of there. And since new ports are rather vulnerable, you can kill it rather easily, gain- ing xp and neg align shift at the same time. (You prob don't want to leave a class 4 just laying around for hostile exploitation.) The reason for carrying 37,001 creds is due to an ..ahem, bug, in v1.03d, which requires a player constructing a port to have MORE THAN the amt it takes to build. I just grab 40,000 creds whenever I leave home. --- * by Leonard Adolph Argh! You people are driving me crazy! ;-) I have in the past figured out and posted the formula for cost for holds you buy. I won't bother resubmiting that information at this time. But... When you sell a ship the price paid by the shipyards for holds is: INT (holds * (180 + (holds - 1) * 8.1)) for a ship with 0 kills and 0 portings. The 8.1 figure will decrease with enough ports and kills by a ship. If you don't know what the INT is, don't worry about it. Just drop anything to the right of the decimal point in the answer. BTW, 1821 holds is the turn around point and that amount of holds brings 27,172,962 credits for the holds. The above formula matches the price paid for holds up to 1821 and fails after that. I have no idea why that figure is the turn around point but I suspect it has to do with Turbo Pascal's Longint being divided by 100 (percentage?) and the floating value for the 8.1 in the formula, depending on ports and kills. A ship with 1822 holds, 66 ports and 5 kills brings 25,303,922 for the holds. The same ship with 0 kills and 0 ports brings 27,143,659 credits for the holds, less than what is paid for 1821 holds. If the price of holds in The Mall is set at 17,207 each, the dreaded 1821 (renamed by me) holds bug will be eliminated. That will make the cost of 1539 holds (1821 - 282) more than what will be paid for them in the Shipyards. If maximum holds are modified higher than 250 the price of holds in The Mall should be recalculated higher: 27,172,962 / (1821 - (maxholds + 32)) I have great hopes that the next version of The Mall will price holds the same as in the game. (Neil?) That should help the "good guys" as a ship with 300-400 holds could hit the trading pairs as heavy as steal/sell but as an "evil" I would not want to risk a few million credits worth of holds getting busted stealing 30,000 credits worth of equipment. I *would* follow the "good guys" around though and rob those pairs blind. I have not done much testing on the effects of ports and kills on pricing but I do know that 101 ports drops prices by less than 10% and 9 ports does not affect prices. 9 ports is of course what is used to bug a CT to 282 holds and port at Stardock, assuming that stealing at a port (and getting busted) adds to the ports your ship has. I am not sure if it does or not at this time. Also BTW. Just kidding about the driving me crazy part. I enjoy this stuff. :-) --- The source for this is somewhat questionable, so I'm unable to vouch for its veracity. It SOUNDS fun and destroying ports is a valid xp build- ing and neg align shift gaining technique. Of course, the cost of the ftrs required to just blow it up without upgrading first might be less than the cost of the upgrading. It all depends on how badly you want to destroy that port, I guess. I can concieve a situation where denying a port to a hostile force might well outweigh mere cost considerations and boil down to simply "what's the easiest way?" Upgrade Overload bug: Upgrade a port over 32,767 and then blast it. You only need 2 fighters to destroy it, every time. Take the amount the port CAN trade (buy or sell) and divide by the trading percent. Then, multiply by 100 to get R. Subtract R from 32,767 and add 100 (possible decimal rounded off could throw off R) to get U. Then upgrade ore (cheapest) by U. Press PA2. Goodbye port! What this procedure supposedly does is to cause the upgraded product to "roll over" the 32,767 figure and thus go negative. Apparantly the reac- tion level of ports is related to the amt of product avail. If there is a negative amt of product, the defensive capability of the port drops to a really low level, allowing it to be destroyed by just two ftrs. --- For those with a spare level 5 planet and 'prox 53 billion creds just laying about and who still feel threatened by another player/corp, here is what you do. This is MY favorite tactic for taking out opposing L5s too. I do it ALL the time.. If you get over 55 billion on a planet, then you will be locked out of that planet and every planet in that sector regardless of what amounts of cred- its you have on the other planets. When you try to land you will be thrown out of the game. It's a favorite tactic of mine for taking out level 5 pl- anets. I put about 53 billion on a level 5 and twarp it in there. In a day or two the interest will make the whole sector corrupt and no one can ever land on any planet in there. You can't even fix it with TEDIT cause it throws ya out of that as well. --- And with that inspired bit of lore firmly committed to memory, I close this segment. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- --[ REFERENCE ]-- -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- More on holds cost: * by Woody Weaver -=> Quoting Leonard Adolph to Brendan Connell <=- BC> I don't know the algorithim, [for the cost of holds] although I've BC> found that when you get to about 135 holds, each new one starts at just BC> over 2000 credits and goes up. LA> I figured out hold cost some time ago. Just for fun, here it is again. LA> SUM(216+20*(x-1),a..b) LA> Where a is the number of holds on your ship and b is the number of LA> holds desired. Add up all values for the formula (SUM) replacing x LA> with all values from a to b. Good work Leonard, but there is a little more you can say. The constant, 216, varies a little bit; I've seen as low as 200 and as high as 240. Also, you can rewrite the formula without the sum, by using the trick that if s = a + (a+1) + (a+2) + ... + (b-1) + b [ write sum forwards ] s = b + (b-1) + (b-2) + ... + (a+1) + a [ write sum backwards ] so: 2s = (b-a+1)(a+b). Your formula works out to cost = (194+20a)+(194 + 20(a+1))+...+(194+20b) = 194(b-a+1) + 20(b-a+1)(b+a)/2 = (194 + 10(b+a) )(b-a+1) So, for example, to go from 20 holds to 75 holds (b=75, a=20) it would take cost = (194 + 10 (95) ) (56) = 64,064 credits. --- To build a Level One citadel, you need: 500,000 Colonists to support the construction, 300 units of Fuel Ore, 200 units of Organics and 250 units of Equipment. To build a Level Two citadel, you need: 1,000,000 Colonists to support the construction, 200 units of Fuel Ore, 50 units of Organics and 250 units of Equipment. 4 days to build. To build a Level Three citadel, you need: 2,000,000 Colonists to support the construction, 500 units of Fuel Ore, 250 units of Organics and 500 units of Equipment. 5 days to build. To build a Level Four citadel, you need: 3,000,000 Colonists to support the construction, 1,000 units of Fuel Ore, 1,200 units of Organics and 1,000 units of Equipment. 10 days to build. To build a Level Five citadel, you need: 3,000,000 Colonists to support the construction, 300 units of Fuel Ore, 400 units of Organics and 1,000 units of Equipment. 5 days to build. Once the upgrade to the next highest level has begun, all population and product can be removed for use elsewhere and the upgrade process will proceed unhindered. --- Below is given the report as seen from the planet menu. The planet is shielded (and shield bugged), the populations have been adjusted for max production and there is product and max ftrs on this planet. Note that the military reaction is 0%. This is to prevent the "6666" bug having any ef- fect in the event of an invasion and wasting all the ftrs. Since this plan- et is shield bugged, there is no real need for the ftrs -- in fact, I edit- ed them into this screen just to indicate the max nr possible on planet. The max amt of any product on planet is 10000. The max nr of ftrs is 32000. The max population is 6000 (2000 per prod group). Planet #9 in sector 707: Garbanzo Class M, Earth Type Created by: Iago Claimed by: Corp #1, Los Sanfrangeles Trading Co. Item Colonists Daily Planet Ship (1000s) Product Amount Amount ------- --------- --------- --------- --------- Fuel Ore 1000 333 10000 0 Organics 1000 142 7280 0 Equipment 1000 75 5632 0 Fighters n/a 55 32000 13027 Planet has a level 5 Citadel, treasury contains 25000000 credits. Military reaction=0%, QCannon power=100%, AtmosLvl=50%, SectLvl=2% -=-=-=-=-=- TransWarp power = 25 hops -=-=-=-=-=- Planetary Defense Shielding Power Level = 1639 --- The items avail in the hardware store at SD and their prices are: +-------------------------------------+ | Atomic Detonators ..... 15,000 | | Marker Beacons ........ 100 | | Corbomite Devices ..... 1,000 | | Cloaking Devices ...... 25,000 | | SubSpace Ether Probes . 3,000 | | Planet Scanners ....... 30,000 | | Space Mines ........... 1,000 | |

Photon Missiles ....... 40,000 | | Long Range Scanners: | | Density scanner ... 2,000 | | Holographic scanner ... 25,000 | | Mine Disruptors ....... 3,000 | | Genesis Torpedoes ..... 25,000 | | TransWarp Drives ...... 50,000 | | Psychic Probes ........ 10,000 | +-------------------------------------+ Alpha Centauri, Rylos and Terra are the three class 0 ports. At each of these, holds, ftrs and shields can be purchased. The shipyards at SD also sell class 0 items. Hold prices vary according to the number of times you buy them for any particular ship. Ftr and shield prices move up and down daily, with a low of 'prox 134 creds and a high of 'prox 234. When shields are cheap, ftrs are dear and vice versa. --- Building and upgrading starports is a valid way to gain pos align points, as well as having the ports avail for trading/stealing. +========================================================================+ | StarPort Construction | Initial Construction Costs | Import | |----------------------------+----------------------------------| or | | Port Class ³ Ore Org Equ | Credits | Ore | Org | Equ | Days | Export | |------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 1 | B B S | 39,250 | 120 | 120 | 60 | 6 | Import | | 2 | B S B | 41,500 | 140 | 70 | 140 | 7 | Import | | 3 | S B B | 48,000 | 80 | 160 | 160 | 8 | Import | | 4 | S S B | 37,500 | 50 | 50 | 100 | 5 | Export | | 5 | S B S | 34,000 | 40 | 80 | 40 | 4 | Export | | 6 | B S S | 32,500 | 60 | 30 | 30 | 3 | Export | | 7 | S S S | 30,000 | 20 | 20 | 20 | 2 | Export | | 8 | B B B | 50,000 | 200 | 200 | 200 | 10 | Import | | 9 | Not Available | ------- | --- | --- | --- | ---- | ------ | | 0 | Not Available | ------- | --- | --- | --- | ---- | ------ | |------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Ports will initially produce 100 units/day in each category | +========================================================================+ Though ports generally require producing planets in the same sector in order to upgrade, it should be noted that newly created ports always have product on the docks (that can be stolen). +================================+ | Upgrade Starport Production | +--------------------------------+ | 1 Fuel Ore, costs $250/unit | | 2 Organics, costs $500/unit | | 3 Equipment, costs $900/unit | +================================+ --- These are the various ship specifications: The Merchant Cruiser is the standard fare for earning a living in the universe. These craft are moderately fast, well armored and have hard points for many different accessories. Many cartels use the Merchant Cruiser as their only ship type. The Merchant is the craft by which combat specs are rated for a standard. |SHIP2 The Scout Marauder is currently the fastest, conventional drive ship known to mankind. This small speedster can easily outdistance even the powerful Corellian Battleships. It is not equipped for controlling many fighters or shields, but it fights at 2 to 1 odds due to its quickness and small size. This craft cannot carry mines or Genesis Torpedoes. It may be small, but this ship's speed and range make up for much. |SHIP3 Missile Frigates are really nothing more than a retro-fitted Merchant Cruiser. They maintain the same speed and range of the Merchant but can carry twice the firepower. Commanding a Frigate means that you cannot take advantage of much of the additional starship equipment available, but their combat advantages make up for that. The Missile Frigate is the only ship outfitted to carry the awesome Photon Missile. These weapons of destructions can turn StarPorts into space junk in short order. The Photon Missile was also used effectively in the Trantorian conflict to totally destroy the enemy's home planet. |SHIP4 The Corellian Battleship is a dangerous craft indeed! This ship packs the most punch of any ship in the Federation. Battleship's can carry four times the fighters of a Merchant and deliver them with a much higher degree of effectiveness due to their superior combat computers. The shield generators on Battleships are capable of shielding the ship's fighters as well. This craft is one of the more prestigious and powerful ships available today. |SHIP5 Few words can actually describe the sheer awe associated with a Corporate Flagship. Only available to Corp CEOs, this huge craft is the ultimate in power and capability. Not only can it carry up to 20,000 fighters at one time, this ship carries a powerful combination of options that will make any foe turn tail and run. The most impressive capability of the Flagship is the TransWarp Drive. This device enables the ship to TransWarp to any other sector in the Universe provided one of your fighters is already there emitting a locator beam. Without this, a ship can disapear into TransWarp and never be seen again. |SHIP6 The Colonial Transport is a massive structure that can only barely be called a ship. This huge craft is ideal for moving large amounts of products or colonists from place to place. Though it has a standard drive, this ship is rather slow due to the mass involved. Also, the combat computers are rather limited on this craft due to the excessive needs of the navigation computers. The Transport is not outfitted for carrying or deploying mines. Conflict brings the Transport's major weakness to light. Due to the size of the craft, it is very hard to defend against fighters. |SHIP7 The CargoTran is a large ship indeed. Though not as fast as some of its related trading cousins, this ship can move vast amounts of goods. It is typically a pacifist's ship as it does not carry much in the way of offensive capabilities but it's very large array of holds makes up for all of that. The large shield capacity of this craft makes it safe to wander hostile territory as well. This ship is considered by many to be one of the top money-makers in the Universe. |SHIP8 The Merchant Freighter is the ideal ship for those traders that do not want to concern themselves with political matters. It is not a very powerful ship in combat, but its strengths are many. This ship can carry a large number of shields and manages to outdistance most ships. After all, "Those who fight and run away, live to fight another day" still holds very true in the universe as we know it today. |SHIP9 The commercial version of a Federation StarShip is not available to just anyone. This craft is only available to those who are commissioned by the Federation to aid in their cause. StarShips are the most closely guarded technology in existence. They can carry massive assault power and through the use of the TransWarp drive, they can deliver this power almost anywhere. The Imperial StarShip is truly the most powerful ship that a private individual can command. More information about qualifying for a Federal commission is available at a Police station near you. |SHIP10 The Havoc Gunstar is a recently developed ship that owes its existance to new developments in micro-miniaturization. This mid-sized ship is the only one of its size to be able to house a TransWarp drive. Though it doesn't carry a large amount of holds to fuel the TransWarp, it still has a decent T-Warp range and can arrive at its destination packing a moderate fighting force in the bargain. Watch for this ship to become the favorite of the Mercenary legions in the Universe. |SHIP11 The StarMaster represents the latest in technological advances for star travel, meeting the needs of those who desire a ship with great speed and medium cargo capacity. Developed to counter the growing threat of space piracy, the StarMaster posesses a formidable fire control and weapons syst- em, and a high shield capacity. The price for this state-of-art craft is not cheap, but discerning traders will find that the investment will pay for itself in the long run. |SHIP12 The Constellation is the direct offspring of the Correlian Battleship. While not quite as powerful as its distinguished parent, the Constellation makes its own mark with greater speed and range. Traders have dubbed it the "baby battleship", but this "infant" is one of the most powerful and maneuverable ships available in the universe today. |SHIP13 The T'Khasi Orion is the perfect ship for traders who want the speed and cargo capacity of the Merchant Freighter but need a bit more firepower. Offering substantially higher combat odds and fighter capacity, the T'Khasi Orion is an excellent intermediate ship. |SHIP14 Young corporations in need of planetary defense should consider the Sentinel. With its new planetary combat guidance system, this ship's normal combat odds of 1:1 shoot up to 4:1 when defending a corporate planet. When an enemy ship enters a sector containing a Sentinel set in defense of a corporate planet, the hostile vessel must first destroy the Sentinel and all of its fighters before it may land and attempt any action toward the planet. Remember: The Sentinel was designed primarily for Planetary defense, if used for offensive purposes its combat odds are 1:1. |SHIP15 "Big, slow and ugly...", seem to be the words most often overheard when someone is describing the Taurean Mule. Designed in direct competition with the CargoTran, the Mule is somewhat faster and possesses a higher cargo capacity, but it is even more vulnerable to piracy and attack than it's competitor. However, this is still a good ship for traders who have staked out "safe" trade lanes and do not have to worry about enemy attacks. --- These are the game specs for the planetary defenses. The first one, military reaction, is a fairly useless one due to the "6666" bug, which can potentially result in the loss of all ftrs on the planet with zero affect on an invader. For this reason, the military reaction is typically set to 0%. Military reaction level: 0 would be totally defensive, 50 would use half of the fighters on the planet in an attack against an intruder landing on this planet and the remaining half would drop back to defend the Citadel, 100 would use all of the fighters in an assault on the intruder. Remember that your defensive fighters on planet have much better odds than defensive fighters deployed in space. If a Trader tries to blast your planet with Photon Missiles (after blowing up the fighters you had in the sector) then the Combat Control Computer will send this percent of your fighters into the sector to attack. Quasar Cannon reaction level, in the Atmosphere: 0 would be totally defensive, 50 would use half of the Fuel Ore reserve on the planet (for each firing), and 100 would use all of the Fuel Ore remain- ing against an enemy. Remember that the Quasar Cannon is MUCH more effect- ive against an enemy that has entered the atmosphere of the planet. Quasar Cannon reaction level, in the Sector: 0 would be totally defensive, 50 would use half of the Fuel Ore reserve on the planet (for each firing), and 100 would use all of the Fuel Ore remain- ing against an enemy. Remember that the Quasar Cannon is MUCH more effect- ive against an enemy that has entered the atmosphere of the planet. So sho- oting at an enemy in the sector will not do as much damage at that range. The Quasar cannon reaction levels are much more significant. When calculating the Atmosphere setting vs. the amt of fuel avail, remember that due to a bug in the program, only half the expected fuel will be used to inflict the same amt of damage. In other words, assume 1000 fuel and an Atmospheric qcannon setting of 50%. You would expect the first atmospheric shot to consume 500 fuel, but instead only 250 fuel will be expended, and this will do the same amt of damage as would 500. ---