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First Seven Days by Bo Ver. 1.0

Postby Brand on Fri Aug 22, 2008 10:59 pm
Overview

The decision you make the first seven days can make a big difference for someone with a free account. If you have an upgraded account, you can build a base any time you have the credits. But you can never build more than 9 bases if you have a free account. So if you can get 10 of 11 bases before your free 7 day upgrade runs out, you are way ahead of the power curve.

Priorities

You will get sick of me saying this, but you need to build up your economy. You need to build it quickly. You need to build it efficiently. Everything else relies on your economy.

This guide is designed to build your economy so you can build bases.

Once you are out of your seven day free upgrade, and no longer have newbie protection, you need to focus more on defenses than this guide recommends.

Also, if you have paid for an upgrade, this guide doesn’t apply past building base 8. If you are continuing with an upgrade, stop at base 8, shore up your defenses and then continue building bases up to base 11.

Timeline

Day 0 and Day 1 Build up first base and techs. Build first OS.
Day 2 through Day 4 Continue to build OSs, start and build bases 2 to 7
Day 5 Continue to build OSs, start and build base 8 and maybe 9
Day 6 Build another OS and start and build up base 10 and maybe base 11

Build order for the first base

My build order for the first base not including urban structures and energy facilities that you will need to add as appropriate is:

Metal 1
Metal 2
Research 1 and start researching Computer to 2
Metal 3
Metal 4
Spaceport 1 fill the TR with someone nearby. If you can, it makes a huge difference
Robot 1
Shipyard 1
Metal 5
Metal 6
Spaceport 2
Robot 2
Shipyard 2
Metal 7
Spaceport 3
Robot 3
Shipyard 3
Metal 8
Spaceport 4
Robot 4
Shipyard 4
Metal 9
Spaceport 5 fill the TR with someone nearby. If you can, it makes a huge difference
Robot 5
Shipyard 5
Spaceport 6
Research 2
Research 3
Research 4
Research 5
Research 6
Research 7
Research 8
Shipyard 6
Shipyard 7
Shipyard 8

For a total of 441 cr worth of buildings plus the cost of urban structures and solar/gas plants

Techs

The minimum research you will need is:

Computer 1
Computer 2
Energy 1
Energy 2
Energy 3
Energy4
Energy 5
Energy 6
Energy 7
Energy 8
Stellar 1
Stellar 2
Stellar 3
Stellar 4
Warp 1

For a total of about 300 cr of research (I don’t remember how much exactly, and I have research commanders at all of my research bases)

Boom

The cost of the outpost ship is 100cr, and the second base costs 50 cr.

This means up to this point you spent just over 900 credits to build your second base.

Chances are it will take a few hours to build your outpost ship and wait for it to travel to your new asteroid. While it is traveling, build another OS.

Now you start the boom.

Throughout the boom process you continue your focus on building more bases while increasing your econ so you can build more bases.

To do this you will only build up your new bases to MR 9, RF 5, SY 5, SP 6 giving you an econ of 31 from each new base and two more TRs. If you haven’t filled out the TRs from your initial base, start self trading for the extra credits.

5 bases built as above with all TRs filled with self trades will give you 250ish econ

It is important that you do not build up your bases past these recommended levels. These particular building levels have been picked because the increased econ from the building will pay for itself within a day.

Also, as you approach day 6 take a look at your income and compare that to how much you will need to build bases 10 and possibly 11. For a free account it is better to have 10 bases and drop out of newbie protection with sub par buildings/defenses than it is to have 9 built up bases.

Shore up defenses

Build 1 fighter at each base to prevent piracy of your TRs. Don’t build more defensive fleet until day 6, and then only if it doesn’t get in the way of building bases 10 and 11.

I don’t build defenses below plasma turrets. I try to not build defenses lower than ion turrets.

Plasma turrets require Plasma 1 and armor 6. Plasma requires research labs and energy tech you already have and laser 4.

To get plasma you only need to invest an additional 100 credits in research. This is a great deal and should be researched after you have started your 5th base, when the 100 credits is only half of your hourly income.

Ion turrets require Armor 10 Shielding 2 and Ion 1. Shielding requires Energy 10 and a level 10 RL. Ion requires Energy 12, Laser 10 and a lvl 12 RL.

Ion turrets require significantly more to research. Only plan on building ion turrets if you definitely won’t have enough for base 10 and/or 11, or if you definitely will. If you are not sure yet, hold off because you can build ion turrets anytime, and won’t be able to build bases 10 and 11 after your free upgrade expires.

Once you have your 5th base colonized and are researching to get ion turrets. You will once again be waiting for credits to build up to colonize your next bases. Keep building OSs and sending them out to colonize.

Raiding in the first week

If you diligently follow what I wrote above, and lose a little sleep the first night to make sure your build queues never empty you will definitely get 10 bases, with no luck (good or bad) involved. The math proves it. I’m not going into the math here…

Base 11 is another matter. By my calculations the only way to get to base 11 and have defenses in place when you come out of newbie protection is to gamble a little, research the techs, and build 2 corvettes early on day 2. At that point your income, if you have been fortunate will be in the 30 range. Armor 2 and laser 2 will cost a total of 20 and each vette costs 20, computer 4 will cost 10 more and a command center costs 20. This sets you back 2 or 3 hours.

But what you want to do is send your corvettes out and scout for the bases of people who quit the game on day 3 with a tiny econ and no defenses. I made 12k( that is 12000 credits) on day 3 off of the same type or people I am talking about. You will more than likely make enough credits to make up for the loss of building the corvettes and the command center.