Introduction : Hints
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Hints - Hints to help you play Empire better
Level: Expert
Military and the Demobilization of Same
It's generally a good idea to put demobilized military on active reserve.
You should also consider whether you need an enlistment center to generate
more military. You can't enlist more military than you have military
reserves. The "nation" command will tell you how many military you have.
Be careful, as many players have lost their countries through carelessness
with their military at the start of the game.
Actually, the enlist command cannot activate more military than you have on
reserve. Even then they have to be in sectors with an efficiency of 60% or
greater. Enlistment sectors can produce as many military as they are capa-
ble of, but will never produce more than one-half of the civilian populace
there. So you need to keep moving them out, or demobilizing them, etc.
Also, the more military you have in an enlistment center, the more military
get trained per update.
Any civilian may be enlisted (no restriction on the efficiency of the sec-
tor). No more may be enlisted than the number of reserves. Enlistment
costs mobility whereas while demobilization costs cash. Military can only
be demobilized in sectors with a 60% efficiency or greater. No more than
one-half the number of civilians in a sector may be enlisted in one
"enlist" command, but if it is issued many times, virtually all civilians
in a sector may be enlisted.
One thousand reserves is enough for now, although I figure I always put
them on reserve when I demobilize, at least up to 10,000.
So you don't need to push for more reserves now, but might as well put all
demobilized military on reserve.
You make back the cost of demobilizing military in just two or three days I
think, so I generally demobilize the military I don't have any use for, and
put them on reserve.
Depends on how you want to use them, I guess. I figure with 200 jet trans-
ports at 127 mobility, I can land 20,000 military in an enemy country in
one night, so I'd say 20,000 is a safe upper limit for reserves. I've
never needed more than that.
Distribution Hints
When distributing stuff to a warehouse, set the thresholds in the sector
that is sending to or receiving from the warehouse to the amount that you
want left in that sector. Don't set thresholds for the warehouse itself
(unless its also distributing to another warehouse)
The minimum threshold for distribution is one. A threshold of 0 means no
distribution of that commodity will take place.
Something to Remember about Technology
An education level of five is required to build technology. After "easy
tech", the tech you build is put through a logorithm with "tech log base"
(see version).
War Zones
It makes it much easier if the player doesn't have to do anything to keep
his country running, but can instead do the things that are of interest.
There's also the problem of what to do in an invasion. I guess if invaded
I just accept the damage, and don't try to fix it until the war ends.
In a war zone I generally follow one of two basic plans. If I'm the
invader, I either leave the sectors as they are and let the country being
invaded fall apart, or if I can do something to make it worse for the
enemy, I sometimes do that. I sometimes designate conquered sectors to
agribusinesses if they need food, banks to reduce shelling damage, enlist-
ment centers for military, forts for firing and attacking, harbors to get
ships in, warehouses to collect, move, and distribute supplies, airbases
for planes and bridge heads for easy movement.
When being invaded, I also generally postpone any long term development and
just concentrate on the basic sectors types for combat (a,b,c,e,f,h,w,#,*)
I've found it's a mistake to worry about long term development in a war
zone, until the battle is over. I will let a war zone be completely
wrecked in order to achieve victory. So you need to keep your home area
away from any war zones.
So far the method of treating war zones and peaceful zones differently and
keeping them separated has worked pretty well. The mistake I made in the
past was to try to develop a war zone before the fight was over. Now I'm
willing to completely wreck the area to win, and in fact you pretty much
have to. The guerrillas take several days to get rid of even when the war
is over.
I mostly turn the sectors in the front lines into forts, enlistment cen-
ters, banks, and bridgeheads. Then maybe some warehouses, airports, and
harbors within range of the front lines. And maybe some radar stations.
Work Percentages are Important!
I've found it good policy to produce a large surplus of food and aim to
have at least 100 food in each sector, when I have enough. Actually I now
put 990 food in each sector, except for aggies (100) and warehouses (9990).
Before moving civilians, check the work in the sector the civilians are in.
If it's less than 100%, DON'T move any of them out. The reason: work in
the destination sector will drop to the same level as the starting sector.
It's a good idea to check after every update, to see if any sectors have
work less than 100%. "cen #0 ?work<100" is what I use. If work is less
than 100%, workers won't work at full efficiency, and if it gets very low,
the civilians may revolt and you'll lose the sector. Build lots of happi-
ness, and keep extra mil in sectors with work less than 100%. That seems
to help.
Definitions and a Good Thing to Remember
"World tech" and "world research" refers to the technology and research
made by other countries which will automatically leak to the less developed
countries.
If you let education get higher than happiness, then find work going to 0%
in your sectors, don't say you weren't warned....
On Nuclear Devices
Just a note on nukes: in this version, there is a nice balance between
nukes and economics. A player can do a lot of damage with nukes, but it
costs a LOT. So it's rare that a country is completely annihilated by a
nuclear attack, as used to be the case in PSL Empire.
SEE ALSO
Overview, Introduction