Sun Tzu Told Me To
Rehash
You can see in the image to the left that "New Tokyo" is working on a "Colony Ship", "New Earth" is working on an "Intelligence Center", and "New London" is working on a PDS to be used as garrison for our future colony to the east. If you look close, you can see one of our "Colony Ships" is headed in that direction, now. From the previous session, you can see that we are still researching "Shock and Awe", so that we can build battleships, but our economy is still in the red. We really need to concentrate on that in addition to military, because we won't be able to afford battleships or anything else for that matter, otherwise. Also, you can see that our two "Construction Ships" are busy working on "Warp Lanes" that will connect our empire.
Our Second Neighbor
On the very next turn, we met the other civilization, who was also annoyed with us because of conflicting values. Of course, we expected as much, but we don't need any stinking allies, anyway!
Do Your Job, Will Ya
On that same turn, one of our scout ships discovered another destroyer among some space debris, so our economy took another hit! We are back to losing 3 credits per turn, uggh! Meanwhile, "New Earth" finished building it's "Intelligence Center", so I decided to build a "Training Compound", which will provide +2 experience points to all military units built in this star system, next.
I know our economy is really hurting right now and we really should be building an extraction Facility" on the gold resource west of "New Earth", but the resource has to be within our cultural borders before we can do it. To add insult to injury, it costs 150 credits to build a "Star Base"(Increases Cultural Influence / Border Size), which we do not have. At this point, all we can do is hope our scouts come up with something, anything, to help our economy! Consequently, we may have to drop our research down further to avoid going bankrupt, if they don't do their job. Do your job, scouts! What do you think we are paying you for!?
Outer Planets
A couple of turns later, "New London" finished building the PDS, so I put her to work on an "Interplanetary Beacon", to increase it's influence growth. As mentioned earlier, increasing the size of our borders will allow the outer planets in the system to be populated and worked. I immediately sent the PDS to garrison our future colony to the east, which will take 7 turns to get there, but the "Colony Ship" arrived on the same turn, so it will be left undefended for a short while.
Ouch, That Hurt
"New Paris" was founded on the same turn and our economy took a huge hit, as a result! We are now losing 7 credits per turn, instead of 3! With only 14 credits in holding, we have no choice but to drop our research down to 80%, to prevent bankruptcy in two turns. Now we have 4 turns to work with, as our deficit is back down to 3 credits per turn. I put New Paris" to work on a "Mag-Lev Network", immediately, which will somewhat offset the new expense of it's support, until the system can hold it's own.
He's Right, You Know
As you can see in the image to the left, only "New Earth" has an established economy and in fact is nearly supporting our entire empire, single handedly! At this point, it might be a good idea to stop colonizing new star systems, until our economy has had a chance to catch up, but I prefer to push the limits as far as they will go, without breaking our backs. With this strategy, all victory conditions should be open to us later on, so we won't be boxed in and taken by surprise. I am reminded of what the famous Chinese general and military strategist, "Sun Tzu" once said, "Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win."
Now, All I Need Is A Map
"New Earth" finished constructing it's training compound and rather than add to our deficit, I decided to build an "Advocate of Survival" to spread our values to the rest of our empire. Also, one of our scout ships discovered a map of the surrounding area, which allowed us to see more of our competitor's colonization efforts. Not very helpful, but still ...
Oh, You Just Wait
Herodotus gave us his "Wealthiest Civilization" report, that listed us in last place during the year 2306 AD. Don't worry, he'll be working for us, soon!
Our economy may be struggling right now, but that is to be expected, because we are in the expansion phase of our empire's development. Once we are done with this phase, our economy will be much better off.
On the same turn , "New Tokyo" finished building it's "Colony Ship", so I put her to work on a "Mag-Lev Network", which will help rescue our economy from ruin.