Hiver players, how do you early-game tech up/ratchet up your economy?

[Pherdnut]

I used to do well in this game but I think I've forgotten some things. Current tech focus is:

* All available fission engine upgrades so I can spam gates at nearby colonies sans tankers along with sending out occasional gates with tankers much farther away.

* Sniper cannons or best laser upgrade if unavailable for VN defense

* That early tech that boosts planet production 20%

* Terraforming/cruiser to biodome cruisers - usually have a couple easier colonies with lower tech colonizing by the time I get this. Afterwards I try to build biodome cruisers in quantity and colonize in large batches to reduce costs until I have enough colonies that I only need to send 2 to 4 for a decent start without tanking my budget.

* Point defense, mass drivers, particle cannons, first level of armors available, fleet command tech for fleets of 5 cruisers, and eventually heavy lasers or torpedoes but usually start building a couple fleets before then.

* Salvagers -> miners so I can start grabbing resources from planets I'll never be able to colonize.

* Then Fusion -> FTL economics -> best freighter upgrades and I start building up trade as I go. Usually have 5-7 planets and a lot of gates by this point.

Inevitably it just seems like I get bogged down and the AI starts to outpace me while I'm dealing with excess swarms (they really get out of hand on spiral maps) or AI on all sides paying constant visits to my sans-colony gates.

[fox5s]

I can give you my general build path. However, a lot depends on the size of map, exactly what techs you have available, and how much trouble your opponents are giving you.

ALWAYS start with Waldo Units, then Cybernetic Interfaces, and then, if it's available, Expert Systems. Cry a bit if you don't get Expert Systems. The Industrial Output they all provide is too good and they should be your first techs no matter what species you are playing. Then I usually fret about whether I should risk AI research this game. Generally, it's not worth it for Hivers.

Things split up a bit after that. On a smaller map I might get a weapon tech next (Sniper Cannons or the best available Laser are great choices). On medium or larger maps I'd probably get Gene Modification and then Suspended Animation.

I honestly wouldn't bother with the Fission propulsion upgrades. They take too long all together and are totally replaced by Fusion Power. They don't don't speed up your strategic speed and you don't need the extra range. Just build tankers to go with things. You have the IO for them. Only Humans and maybe Zuul care about the Fission upgrades and only if they are having issues with the length of their node paths.

After Suspended Animation I'd probably either be checking whether I got PD or getting some more Terraforming tech. Probably DE CnC around here. If I need more weapon tech, getting Shaped Nuclear Warheads to check for Heavy Planetary Missiles is a good way to go. DF Racks are solid as well.

Going up to Cruisers, CR CnC, then Salvagers and Miners are a solid route at this time. If you haven't found too many dead worlds you can probably delay or skip Mining.

Around this point I'd either go for Fusion Power or check for Armor Piercing Rounds and/or Stormers.

FLT Economics and Freighters are good around here. And probably push to the IO bonus right before DNs.

Then it's about time to start thinking about Antimatter Power, picking up the best missile tech you have unlocked, or your armor techs.

All the weapon tech I've mentioned can be delayed if you aren't being pressed. But you'll eventually want everything I've mentioned.

I like suspended animation but Hivers can technically delay or even ignore most of the Terraforming tech (until they need the ones to expand their Hazard Rating) since they can just brute force colonize a planet when necessary. Their colonizers give THE most Infrastructure when they land (2 per DE) which can allow you to drop a ton of them and give the colony a jump start. You don't really need Biological Transfer for Hivers. Eventually, you will want to come back for it (if only to check for Arcology Construction) but it should NOT be any kind of priority. Hiver Colonizers and pop growth from having a gate in system is so good that you can get away with minimal terraforming investment for quite a while.

A lot of my advice is situational. For example, bump the weapon tech I've mentioned up in priority if it looks like you are going to be fighting a lot early. Or bump up the Terraforming tech in priority if you are on a bigger map.

I hope this helps!

[xjulep]

Waldo, cybernetics, foundries, fusion, cruisers, salvage, mining, strip mining. Then strip mine every nearby planet. If you have a spare 3-4 years get some biotechnology for colonists.

You don’t need weapons or combat fleets until an enemy empire is within 10 years of genociding you. CR colonizers are overkill because hivers are second best at colonizing anyway.

[fox5s]

Originally posted by xjulep:

Waldo, cybernetics, foundries, fusion, cruisers, salvage, mining, strip mining. Then strip mine every nearby planet. If you have a spare 3-4 years get some biotechnology for colonists.

Forgot Expert Systems but that is otherwise an acceptable research order.

[DrEkpyroticus]

Ah, the Hivers. Hands down the best race in the game with the most frustratingly complex opening.

Getting early industrial and colonization techs is definitely paramount in every game. Every poster has talked about this and it's solid advice so no need to rehash at length. However, those range-extending fission techs are also very important as I'll talk about in a bit.

I've noticed a tendency in other Hiver players to try to do too much, too fast. Although it seems like you should absolutely scramble from turn 1, a more measured pace will help you achieve your goals faster overall.

Manufacturing and maintaining an enormous number of tanker/gate combos for a maximum early push is a mistake. This is where those starting range-focused fission techs play in your favor. Wait to dispatch ANY gates until you can reach a reasonable number of planets without tankers on those upgraded fission drives. Then hit every planet in range of your home world. When they begin to arrive, repeat the process to the next set of reachable planets all the while building not a single tanker. Just gates. After exhaustive testing, I can tell you that this leapfrogging frees up an incredible amount of early income for research and colonization and only delays your initial exploration of any given planet by a handful of turns. This is a big part of where you get the early-game income to tech fast as the Hivers.

There are other benefits to a leapfrogging approach versus a 50-fleet push. When your exploration is done in waves, each new set of gates can take advantage of your current technology. No barebones fission ships having first contacts scores of turns in and antagonizing the enemy with their inferiority. Also, with this approach there is no overharvesting or overspending necessary. You'll actually find yourself with alot more in savings and more techs than you would normally have at that point in the game while preserving resources for later when they're far, far more important.

The second slow-and-steady approach to getting ahead early regards colonization. Even as the Hivers, you want to wait to grab a single colony until you can turn the first one into almost instant income. If your first colony requires 10% or more of your early income to get rolling, you've hamstrung yourself. Be choosy. Remember that if you like, you can colonize as many worlds as you have gates in a single turn later. But those first few colonies are really important. With the income you saved on tankers and gates along the way, it is alot more manageable to throw colonizers at a planet to get it to profitability instantly than it is to pay any continuing development costs. Colonize methodically and put that upkeep you've saved into research.

In the early game, once you have a few colonies developed then it's time to DEcentralize your production for a little while. Your home world will be providing the bulk of your research capacity for quite some time. Centralized production with a few dedicated forge worlds is the Hiver strategy for later. Until it's truly time to ramp up production, build as little as there as possible while you build up its resources and let your gate network work for you.

Even if they have a manageable hazard, a sound strategy is to mine size 1 and 2 worlds with less than 6k resources versus colonizing them. In all stages of the game, those resources are far better off on your forge worlds than they are on small, difficult to defend planets.

That brings me another point about making bigger early gains: unless an uncolonized planet is extremely valuable in the near future or you're playing a very small map then don't defend gates at empty planets. Sending even three early Hiver destroyers to defend empty planets raises initial savings costs to over 100k and adds alot to your ongoing upkeep. Roll the dice and put that money elsewhere. In the unlikely event that the gate is destroyed, better to have spent another 25k and ten turns to have that early capacity than to have gone to the expense of defending it in the long run.

And the last point I think I can make regarding doing better earlier is don't spend money on an attack you can't guarantee will result in a gate deployment. Hiver attacks against enemy colonies are expensive since the vanguard generally has to go with every ship necessary. Until farcasters, your enemy has forever to prepare for you and mostly alot more flexibility with what to do about you once you're there. The Hivers have the ultimate ability to defend. Exploit that until more often until you've teched up to their ultimate attack.

To summarize (finally), the Hivers are very unique among the SotS races in what they can accomplish in a single turn in the mid- and late-games. To get ahead early, however, you have to learn to use their beginning tools with restraint and efficiency. I know this is true to varying degrees for every race except perhaps the Zuul but it's doubly true for the Hivers. With their slow pace, turns are definitely a commodity. It's important to learn when to spend them instead of spending savings, output, and upkeep. And in the opening into mid-game, that's often with this race.

If you follow my advice and find yourself building a slightly smaller preconflict empire than normal, there's nothing wrong with that. Building an economically and technologically competitive one is the goal. Farcasters and sheer industrial might will make up for any early acquisitions you missed out on.

[fox5s]

The leapfrog strategy works rather well and is what I usually end up doing after the initial wave of ships.

I didn't advocate for it in my posts for two reasons. First, it's a bit complicated to explain and I wasn't taking that much time in my post.

Second, and more importantly, it is very map dependent. On a lot of maps and starting locations, you probably can't get to any adjacent systems without tankers initially. Even if you somehow have three systems in you initial range, random encounters can spoil your plans and set you back greatly. I'd prefer to send out an initial wave that I am certain can't be spoiled by Unknown Menaces.

Originally posted by DrEkpyroticus:

There are other benefits to a leapfrogging approach versus a 50-fleet push. When your exploration is done in waves, each new set of gates can take advantage of your current technology. No barebones fission ships having first contacts scores of turns in and antagonizing the enemy with their inferiority. Also, with this approach there is no overharvesting or overspending necessary. You'll actually find yourself with alot more in savings and more techs than you would normally have at that point in the game while preserving resources for later when they're far, far more important.

Two things here. First, making contact with barebones fission ships is hilarious. Second, why would I overharvest and overspend when sending out my initial waves?

You can easily support building 3-4 ships a turn (split between gates and tankers) and be continually sending them out for quite a long time. At a certain point, you sort of stop making tankers because you reuse the old ones after they have deployed their escorted gate. To your point, this method does end up having a rather large fleet upkeep for a while.

Also, if you do decide to leapfrog more conservatively, that makes it even easier to reuse the tankers. I'm still not convinced the extra research time spend on the fission drives is justified.

On the other hand, I may just be stagnant since I generally play against the base AI and can probably get away with more inefficiency than a living opponent would allow.

Originally posted by DrEkpyroticus:

In the early game, once you have a few colonies developed then it's time to DEcentralize your production for a little while. Your home world will be providing the bulk of your research capacity for quite some time. Centralized production with a few dedicated forge worlds is the Hiver strategy for later. Until it's truly time to ramp up production, build as little as there as possible while you build up its resources and let your gate network work for you.

This probably works. I usually dump all the mined resources on my capital since it has more pop and infrastructure than you can even possibly get on other planets making it THE best forge world possible. Plus, it makes the logistics easier if everything is going through that central point. Multiple Forge worlds augmenting it would probably work fine. And other species definitely benefit from more localized forge worlds.

Originally posted by DrEkpyroticus:

That brings me another point about making bigger early gains: unless an uncolonized planet is extremely valuable in the near future or you're playing a very small map then don't defend gates at empty planets. Sending even three early Hiver destroyers to defend empty planets raises initial savings costs to over 100k and adds alot to your ongoing upkeep. Roll the dice and put that money elsewhere. In the unlikely event that the gate is destroyed, better to have spent another 25k and ten turns to have that early capacity than to have gone to the expense of defending it in the long run.

I'm not sure I agree with this point. Smaller planets are indeed more difficult to defend. But they also provide, at a minimum, two trade lanes. And is another point for all your other trade lanes to connect to. Once you get FTL Economics and Mega Freighters going, they can easily account for a HUGE chunk of your income.

Overall, it is interesting to see another player's point of view on the Hivers especially.

[DrEkpyroticus]

First of all, thank you for taking the time to make separate quotes in your responses and for the thought put into the same. I enjoyed reading that.

Originally posted by fox5s:

Once you get FTL Economics and Mega Freighters going, they can easily account for a HUGE chunk of your income.

Somewhere in my ramble, I should have made it a point to say I've been playing with the Bastard Sword of the Stars mod. It actually eliminates trade for all races save the Morrigi and rebalances the economy. (Its mod team did a truly excellent job with it and I couldn't recommend it more.) That changes the context of my point so much that I can't believe I didn't mention it.

Originally posted by fox5s:

I usually dump all the mined resources on my capital since it has more pop and infrastructure than you can even possibly get on other planets making it THE best forge world possible.... Multiple Forge worlds augmenting it would probably work fine.

Exactly. I endeavor to get my home world to twelve thousand resources accounting for the Asteroid mining research. Then I choose three or four more with the best combination of size and initial resources to develop evenly as high as the map will bear. A shipyard and command station at all of them is a necessity, of course. If I can get my secondary forges to ten thousand resources each, I will go back and begin developing my home world again. I also ONLY scrap ships at these worlds to further focus resource gains.

I have been known to use random encounters at the home world as an excuse to push asteroids into my own planet. Or to let quite a number of them get through intentionally if the event is an asteroid bombardment. This is obviously very high risk/high reward but the payoff can be enormous. Full disclosure: I have glassed my planet twice doing this and lost myself the game. But that's out of a huge number of games so...

The Hivers' ability to organize production this way is most certainly their biggest strength. Not only can you move a staggering number of ships anywhere within two turns but it also affords you the luxury of keeping your production centers well away from the enemy.

Two other points I would like to make about Hiver production. The first: To keep costs down, any ship that ALWAYS moves gate to gate should be equipped with basic fission drives and starter weapons for the entire game. Colonizers, asteroid miners, noncombat support ships attached to defensive fleets... It might seem like a small savings per ship but over the course of an entire game the savings are incalculable. The Hivers are the only race for which this is feasible I feel.

The second: Hiver cruisers are deadly at any stage of the game. They have the hardpoints to stay competitive and with maximum hull and armor techs they're as tough some other race's dreadnoughts. Their loss is also far easier to absorb. I believe this is also true for a Tarkan empire that gets max access to fixed beams or a Liir that gets the same for shields and beam turrets/phasers.

Originally posted by fox5s:

Overall, it is interesting to see another player's point of view on the Hivers especially

Me too. Ive seen alot of complaints over the years mistaking SotS's streamlined approach as simplicity. Those people did not play long enough. It is hardly as simple as it looks and there's always a nuance to dissect.

I don't know how much experience you've had with multiplayer but playing against others is one of the best MP experiences in gaming.

[fox5s]

Originally posted by DrEkpyroticus:

Somewhere in my ramble, I should have made it a point to say I've been playing with the Bastard Sword of the Stars mod.

Ah! That explains some of the perceived weirdness. For example, the other reason you probably wouldn't mine out a smaller planet is that you lose a LOT of the resources in the process. The lost resources are instead spent in a sort of one-time overharvest production bonus on the turn you drop them on a planet.

I don't know how the BSotS mod changes this. I honestly haven't messed with the mods at all so everything I'm saying comes from an unmodded point of view. I've heard good things about the two major mods though.

Originally posted by DrEkpyroticus:

I don't know how much experience you've had with multiplayer but playing against others is one of the best MP experiences in gaming.

Some. Not a lot. The roommates I used to play it with usually ended up allying against the AI opponents and comp stomping rather than truly fighting against one another. One of them got incredibly upset when he was losing at anything and had such a defeatist attitude if things weren't going right so it was just easier to ally and avoid that.

We actually stopped playing Magic the Gathering altogether because he was such a sore winner, complaining about so many things that even when he won he was acting like he lost. Not fun.

But, this ends up meaning that while i know some things that work in PvP for in SotS, I don't have all that much actual experience trying it on people. And the game takes so long that I'd find it difficult to play in anything other than a LAN setting if i wanted other people involved.

[xjulep]

Isnt LAN the only way to play MP since the matching servers went down?

[fox5s]

Originally posted by xjulep:

Isnt LAN the only way to play MP since the matching servers went down?

This was before the Gamespy service shut down. But also there are ways to spoof being on a LAN when you aren't.

[Fulano]

Originally posted by xjulep:

Isnt LAN the only way to play MP since the matching servers went down?

They (or somebody) paid GameRanger to work as an alternative over the internet. We've had good success with that program.

[DrEkpyroticus]

Originally posted by fox5s:

I don't know how the BSotS mod changes this.

While the list of mod features and changes is long it's so well designed that it ends up feeling like vanilla++. It adds a few layers of very welcome complexity while keeping the additional micromanagement to a bare minimum.

I think the best part about it is that it restricts trade to the Morrigi and balances the economy to a much finer level than even pre-AMOC had. I was never wholly in favor of the ridiculous economy you could build very early on with the trade system. BSotS forces you and especially the AI to play just a little bit smarter, to plan ahead just a few turns further. This in no way restricts your options though. One the contrary, it opens up strategies that you might not have ever considered before.

For example: My latest game is nearing turn 300 on a 509 star map (There's a pack of modded maps in the Community Hub section) with 4 locked teams of 2 each. In vanilla, this would already be a DN-AM slugfest with stations built at every planet and most tech obsolete and long forgotten. But that's just not the way BSotS works. The AI and I are fighting with alot of mid-sized cruiser fleets and an incoming attack of several dreads is still a big deal. Planets are still being newly colonized. The end of the tech tree is still a long, long way away, Hell, FUSION ships are still combat-worthy. At turn 300. On a map almost 50% larger than vanilla allows.

Past and future strategic choices carry more weight and you have to balance pro- and reactivity instead of just going all out all the time. You'd think that this new pace and management would make for a much slower game with too much micro but, once again, the mod design overcomes that effortlessly. With smaller and more meaningful engagements and a clear victor after just a turn or two, the pace sometimes feels accelerated with actual turns between combats to rebuild and reorganize. I enjoy it very much and recommend everyone try it at least once.

There ARE a couple things I don't like which are pretty minor gripes. BSotS changes the UI colors and I positively hated that at first. Since there's a way to revert the colors that takes just a bit of know-how and I just havent done it yet, this is now a me problem really. Also, a couple of the new weapon models are a bit too big. Small and medium weapons are generally alright but there's a few large weapons that don't look great on every race's ships. I think a fix for this is in the pipeline but this mod's development is a bit slower these days and I'm just tolerating it until it gets fixed. And the last complaint is that some of the new techs have... odd descriptions. I could see how they could be mildly confusing at first but if you're playing SotS in 2023 with a difficult-to-find mod then you're already familiar enough with the game for this to be moot. Then again, some of the old descriptions have been improved greatly so... See? Minor complaints and definitely nothing game-breaking.

Originally posted by fox5s:

Some. Not a lot. The roommates I used to play it with usually ended up allying against the AI opponents and comp stomping rather than truly fighting against one another.

Ugh. I was privileged enough to have a group that were all patient good sports with devious minds and a willingness to RP their empires. I've had MP games run to an ungodly number of turns with no problems. Almost 1700 turns once. Of course this took a year of inconsistent play and some of the original players had been eliminated for hundreds and hundreds of turns but we were going to finish that game even if the end of the world was coming the day after. Probably the best MP match of any game I've ever played. Even if I'd lost it would've been amazing.

Originally posted by Fulano:

They (or somebody) paid GameRanger to work as an alternative over the internet. We've had good success with that program.

Really? That's great info. Thanks!

[DrEkpyroticus]

I'm going to double post for the purposes of retraction. The MP match mentioned above states that we approached a whopping 1700 turns in one game but it was 1100. In considering that exact game for another post I realized my unintentional hyperbole. One of these decades I'll learn to both type AND proofread. I know this probably makes 0 difference but it was bothering me.