I poked around a bit. I don’t think I ever played MOO, but I did play a couple of games of MOO 2 a year or so ago. I don’t remember enough to apply that experience to MOO. I did decide I better read the manual if I want to play a game in earnest! I got the general gist of it, but I wasn’t making good choices.
The UI was so sluggish. Is that the way it is for everyone, or is there something to configure that could make it better?
I think Control-F12 increases cycles in DOSBOX, which should speed everything up. Try it a couple of times and see if that helps.
I seem to have it in full screen or not.
And while in full screen I don’t seem to be able to tab or W out to the OS.
Scrolling through the map is…counterintuitive to what’s done these days. Seems to be very slow as well.
Ah, I remember. You cllick on where you want the center to be… clicking and dragging doesn’t seem to work, because that’s not what he implemented!
In the research screen the = key will equailize output.
IIRC Shuffling popn to new colonies is a good thing.
IIRC Pushing money at new colonies is a good thing.
Copy protection seems to be active in the gog version, but the manual doesn’t have the ships? hmmm.
There is an option to split the combo. I did it last night, so I’m sure. That’s how I saw the first is just 11MB. Just click the button called “Options.”
After the installer downloads, run it. Then before you click install, you’ll see the options button in the lower left. So the whole package downloads, but you can choose to install only one. Then delete the installer. Viola!
No I’m downloading a single file to Firefox. Its called setup_master_of_orion12_2.0.0.16.exe. Its about 162 MB.
No I’m downloading a single file to Firefox. Its called setup_master_of_orion12_2.0.0.16.exe.
This is the first screen. Options is in lower left.
Tip for complete newcomer: at start screen, hold down ALT and type TUTOR. This will take you to a tutorial that I believe is undocumented.
Sorry if I mislead you. I thought the issue was the install, not the download.
Memories. It was a long time ago.
First game out and I achieved a Hard medium 6 win by council. I did have a couple of combats. It wasn’t a win without firing a shot, but it was fun. The bears and cats tried to make war, but they couldn’t penetrate my core colonies. After a long false war, I ended up with peace only to have the damned lizards make an end run. I convinced the mechs to make war on the lizards which made the lizards accept my peace offer and by the time the council came up, everybody hated everybody else and loved me. easy-peasy.
After years of running tanks over spearmen in civ, it was…it was incredible to me when I realized you could win this game w/out going to war. I probably had the game for months before I figured out that you didn’t have to bomb everybody into submission. You could defend your borders and give away tech and money and GET THE OTHER GUYS TO VOTE FOR YOU…I can’t communicate what that did to my brain. I laughed out loud for 10-20 minutes. My wife couldn’t figure out what had happened to set me off.
The civ diplomats didn’t pass the believability test to me. The French were the English were the Egyptians were…whoever, but in Moo that damned pompous lizard still hacks me off and that stupid bear and how dare that treaty breaking cat call ME untrustworthy…After reading Emrich’s book, I knew it was just a random number generator behind some screens, but at some primal level, I believed that I was interacting with something intelligent.
If you get to a certain tech level, it’s just hard to lose, but there is so much to like here. They created terrain with the different types of planets. I don’t think anybody has done an unpredictable limited tech tree quite as well as this one. The tactical battle engine has some really nice parts. The interface for things like global planetary shields or more factories is so simple and well done. The exponential growth of popn and factories and…You just wish the computer players could survive the end game a bit better.
This is the one that took a the nice little hobby of computer gaming and turned me into an obsessive gamer. Pat Traynor’s faq made me aware that there were folks even MORE obsessive about this than I was and I’ve never looked back.
And it STILL makes me smile that I can win without firing a shot. Thanks for picking it. That was fun.
Episode 2 in my Mrrshan Hard / Medium / 4 game.
The Bulrathi immediately departs from the planet they just conquered. Only 6 million invaders survive, so I send a counterattack force from my home planet and hope that there are no fleets or transports outside my scanner range heading to the planet. 50 million Mrrshans, 1/12th of the entire population, land on the planet; only 8 million of them survive. A turn later a new large invasion fleets appears on the scanners, there’s no way I can actually hold the planet. But in the assault I gained the Duralloy Armor tech, which fills an absolutely crucial gap. I’m sure this is a great comfort to all the Mrrshan mothers grieving for the sons who’ll never return from the field.
My Scatter Pack V research completes around 2410, and I start building large 4*Scatter Pack V missile boats to go along with my missile bases. And not a moment too soon, because the Bulrathi main fleet hits my home planet. And then hits it again, and again, and again. They’re beaten back with heavy losses, but usually take out 1-2 bases or ships on each run.
Almost too late I realize that the Alkaris are quite hostile, and that there’s no way I can fight a two front war. I start buttering them up with techs and small bribes, and a few rounds later have a trade treaty and non-aggression pact going. A bit later the Sakkras turn up (whoa, is that the best theme song in the game or what?), and I repeat the exercise. The galactic council convenes for the first time, and I quite predictably am one of the options but don’t have a 3rd of the votes myself. Both the Sakkras and the Alkaris abstain, so there’s a very real chance they would have voted for the Klackons instead if my relations with them were any worse. I can handle one of them defecting, but not both. So I need to keep them very happy, or risk losing the game by election.
I always keep a minimal level of spies in all opposing empires, just to get up to date reports. A couple of ticks on the espionage slider, no more. During war time I switch them from idle to espionage. In the 40 years of war my spy in the Bulrathi Empire has stolen 3 techs: Hand Lasers, Improved Ecologic Restoration, and Sublight drives. Two of these are again crucial techs; since I missed all the pollution reduction and cleanup cost techs but do have Improved Robotic Controls 3, half my planetary budgets have been going towards ecology. That single tech steal increases my effective production by something like 25%; since my espionage costs are 1% of total production, this is an amazingly good deal. The sublight drives will also be handy, since I haven’t been getting any propulsion tech except range increases.
In 2462 the Bulrathis come asking for peace. I decline at first, but they offer 700BC to sweeten the deal. After a bit of consideration I accept – we’ve been stalemated for 60 turns, I’m not in a position to win any battle outside my own worlds against their ship designs without heavy losses, and anyway would actually want to take planets by assault rather than bombing. They’re exactly the wrong opponent to fight at this time.
60 more turns have passed, and again I’ve gone 5 minutes over the half hour time slot. I would have stopped anyway, but the peace deal makes for a natural place to stop. I’m not quite sure where to go yet. My infrastructure is in a very good shape, all planets at full terraform, population and factories. It’s either tech up with no obvious goal, or attack. The Alkari have just canceled our non-aggression pact, so they’d be the natural target. But all of their worlds that I’ve scouted are in too harsh environments for me.
I’m still settling into the routine in my first “serious” game.
For me, the real strong points of MoO are research and the ship builder. Everything is a little bit too abstracted for my tastes.
It’s not bad, mind you, I just guess shuffling around dudes like you do in Endless Legend is a wee bit more “personal” than just ticking sliders up and down, even if the two have basically the same result. EL’s population shuffling would totally work with sliders!
But I can live with it, considering it’s age the UI holds up amazingly well, imo. The only thing that bothers me a bit is that the game forces you to constantly play with all the sliders. It’d be cooler to have “slider profiles” you can load (select) on any planet and/or return to after a period of terraforming or industrial buildup. But it’s not too terrible.
As for my actual game … I thought I was doing well with six star systems, four of them maxed out >100 population … until I met the Silicoids with 18 worlds and a fleet … let’s say their two ship scouting force mopped the floor with 10 of my warships of the line. I’m gonna have to see whether I have any hope of surviving this one. (They DoWed me, btw.)
rezaf
Compound-interest a-la-moo:
If you have a rich or ultra rich planet close by, colonize it.
Invest any excess BC into it. Make reserves. The money will pay off. Keep doing this. If you have an artifact planet, invest into it.
Before starting a new trade, top off any normal planet as well to make your economy size bigger. That way you can get larger trade values going.
IIRC microing tech research was better. Once you reached 1% breakthrough, I normally took out all but one tick and invested it into something else.
Booted the game up about two and a half hours ago and realized a few minutes ago that I’d unintentionally burned the majority of my evening. First game ended in a ragequit after losing one of my best planets to a supernova because I forgot that I needed to allocate reserves until it was too late. Hadn’t saved in about an hour. My Klackons were stuck in an endless stalemate against the Sakkra anyway, mainly because I couldn’t get inferno colonization to backfill my corner of the map for all the otherwise delicious rich inferno planets I had. Oh well, there’s always next time.
MOO is my all-time favourite game. Heres why (sorry for the self quote, I can’t be bothered typing this again):
Tips
I’m also a fan of the Emirich/Hughes strategy guide. I’ve highlighted all the crucial bits, heres a quick rundown of some of the most important stuff in the guide thats hard to figure out by playing the game:
Most important tip in the whole guide:
When you start a new turn and get a screen notifying you what a colony has completed building, you can adjust the production sliders NOW on the notification screen. That might be obvious in 2014, but it wasn’t obvious to many players at the time.
p37+ Hotkeys
F2/3 cycle through all your colonies
F5/6 just colonies that build new ships this turn
F7/8 just colonies with enemy ships enroute (with Improved Scanner tech)
C Displays spies caught
Alt-M Display 5 parsec grid on map
B Decommission bases on a planet (to reduce maintenance)
p80-87 RESERVE
When you’ve built the maximum number of factories in a colony, spending more money on factories instead puts money in the the galactic reserve. Transfer reserve money to a fledgling colony to speed up its growth.
p88-91 Population
Similarly, sending population to a new colony greatly speeds up growth. Population grows fastest when the planet is a 30-70% of its maximum population, so when a planet is near its max population, ship some guys off to a new colony.
p135 Missile Bases
Bases can end up costing alot of money. Try building about 1 base for every 10 million population (+ shields) on each planet. See hotkeys above to decommission bases
p153 Land Invasions
Population transported off colony for a land invasion has a big impact on your economy. That population transported offworld will no longer be able to work factories. So send invaders off Poor/Fertile worlds to minimise economic impact, or send invaders from your closest colony, and reinforce that (now depopulated) border colony from a Poor/Fertile colony back in the heart of your empire.
p194 Ship Construction
Shields aren’t much use on small and medium ships. On small/Medium ships you’re better off improving Beam and Missile Defense stats (eg by giving them high speed) rather than adding shields.
Best or second best available armor is a good deal on any ship (but not double-hulled armor).
As your tech rating gets higher, old tech gets miniaturised. Outdated engines take up less space than the latest (fastest) engines. So for Warships where speed is not a premium, consider reducing the ships top warp-speed in order to fit more weapons on board (see Appendix B). Note that all the ships systems (eg guns and devices) also require power, so experiment with changing the engines AFTER you’ve outfitted the ship with all its gear.
p228+ Diplomacy
If you offer a deal to another race and they reject it (eg Peace Treaty), wait at least 3 turns before offering again. They don’t like being bugged over and over.
If you make a Peace Treaty while you have warships enroute, those warships can be told to retreat when they reach their destination. As long as you don’t destroy anything, you won’t be penalised for breaking a peace treaty.
The AI is quite logical in their reasons for declaring war on you, but heres a few unexpected factors to consider:
p254 If the AI has a much greater Fleet Strength than you (eg 4 to 1) they will see you as weak and may attack you even if you have good relations otherwise.
p255 Erratic leaders have a straight 2 percent chance of declaring war each turn
p256 Other races become jealous if you have colonised more than 25 percent of the available stars in the galaxy
p256 Massing fleets on the enemies border will make them nervous. A fleet is considered “on the border” if it can reach one of that players colonies in 2 turns. So a large fleet that is very fast needs to be parked well away from your borders to avoid upsetting people.
p257 Genocide and Biological Warfare upset every AI player, not just the player targeted
p258 Alliances last longer with Pacifist, Honorable and Aggressive AIs. Don’t expect alliances to last long with Ruthless, Xenophobic or Erratic Leaders.
p320
Medium and Large maps are the most fun. Avoid Huge maps. Avoid Small maps unless you’re after a specific type of challenge.
Klackons, Humans and Psilons are the easiest races to play, Mrrshans are the hardest.
I played a medium/hard/5 ai game today with the Mrrshans. I named my leader ‘The Queen’ and begun the game.
Met the Silicoids first and established trade routes. The Bulrathi came next. Had a great start, being surrounded by 6 hospitable worlds.
I noticed that the Bulrathi leader was erratic, so I set my spies to upon him to espionage. Took some time, but then success! The Queen purred down the line once she had heard we had stolen the Inertial Stabilizer technology from the Bulrathi.
Mrrshans excel at weapons research and Scatter Pack missiles were available, so I went for those early on for my missile bases. I also had good choices in other research areas - Improved Robotics, Eco Restoration, Soil Enrichment and Planetary V Shields. So I diverted away from weapons momentarily to pick those up as it seems the other races did not get these options. I met the Meklar and Klackon. Meklar were Xenophobic but I managed a trade deal and they entertained swapping techs. Klackon were erratic so another target for my spies!
Bulrathi declared war because of my spying activity but he was largely inneffectual (seems the Klackons were taking a liking to his worlds too). I made Huge Gauss cannon ships but they got destroyed easily during an ‘accidental encouter’ with the Meklar - their Tractor Beams just pushed my ships away. So I decided to hide behind my missile bases again until I got Scatter Pack VII. This time I went with Large Scatter Pack VII ships. They devastated the few Bulrathi worlds around me.
On a high, I threatened the Silicoids with attack and they turned around and declared war on me! So be it - sticks and stones will not break my bones! I took his nice Ultra Rich world in the north and turned my fleets towards his southern home world.
The battle was surprisingly short since he had no answer to scatter packs. One world after another fell and my troops discovered a bunch of new techs. Funnily enough everyone else was at war with him already - Meklar relations improved and we became allies; Klackons stayed happy enough even though my spies were stealing techs from right under their noses. Soon all the Silicoid homeworlds were mine and a vote came up. I scored the vote of the Meklars and the Alkaris (who I never met the entire game) and that was enough to make me supreme ruler! All Bow to The Queen!
Thanks for the tips, everyone. I will most likely need them soon.
I started my first game as the Humans on Easy on a Medium size map with 3 opponents.
I sent out my scouts right away to the yellow and green stars nearest me to find a place to colonize. The green star actually had a better quality (higher potential pop) ocean planet than the yellow one did (desert) so I sent my initial colony ship there. I am a little lost so far, but kept sending my scouts around to all the other red stars near me as the other yellow/green ones were a little too far away while I try to research propulsion a bit more than the others to extend my range for more colonies. I have one purple star also that sounds like it could be good so will scout that next. I built one combat ship, but mostly have my ship building idle this early and I am not sure if that is smart or not. I also sent 15 pop to my new ocean plant from my starting planet to help jump start it. Once the new ocean planet gets up to speed a bit, I will build another colony ship to send to the desert planet. Should I be always creating ships of some sort to scout more and/or send with my colony ships and station on defense on all planets this early in the game? I guess I will learn once I play more games :). I did start building a missile base at home at least for some protection and know that is important to do for defense help.
This early, there seem to be a lot of End Turns without doing anything while ships travel, but that normally tells me I must be doing something wrong ;). Also, the research screen is totally confusing me so far. The manual says the little light bulbs will start to fill up and then give you a % chance to unlock the next technology level in that specialty? I have yet to see the light bulbs fill yet (it seems), yet I unlocked a couple research targets and got the graphic and option to select the next one to work on. I am only doing like 11-12 RP per turn so maybe that isn’t enough to actually see progress yet graphically. Also, even though I appeared to unlock a research target a couple times through the research discovery screen that comes up, all of the numbers on the right are still 1 on the tech screen which is the current tech level I assume.
I will have to dig into it a bit more when I get home from work today. Still, after fully reading the manual yesterday, I am impressed by a few of the design mechanics that I did not expect and am excited to get a chance to exploit them in a game.
So I put that first game with the intimitating Silicoid empire on hold and played (and by now finished) another one.
Really showed how much having a good start can snowball into you dominating the game, as in the early phase of the game I always somehow had another fairly good planet in range with the propulsion tech I had at the time, so I managed to crank out a pretty significant empire. By the time I encountered the Silicoids (yeah, incidentally I met a Silicoid AI first again this time around) I found my empire to be actually larger than theirs - and they had crappy planets I never bothered with.
I dunno if this was because I was in the lead (can’t have been the difficulty as I was merely playing on Normal), but I didn’t share the “you can win without firing a shot!” experiency AT ALL. All AIs acted totally erratic and kept declaring war on me all the time. In mid game, when they could hardly even reach my planets (they never tried anyway) this all was a bit pointless and usually resulted in a phase of “cold war” where nothing really happened followed by them proposing to end the war after ten or twenty turns. I tried to make us all live happily together by proposing treaties and exchanging tech and whatnot, but they’d always - at awim - go back to war. In the end game they finally tried to actually do something in those wars, but by then I was dominating the game. At some point, I just said screw this and went for a domination victory, which was quite easy to pull off and resembled whack-a-mole more than anything (as they kept founding colonies on remote planets I had already cleansed earlier).
But even after all these years, the game has retained most of it’s “one more turn” draw, which is an amazing feat. What’s not so amazing is a couple of UI quirks and the hindsight that all the potential this pretty early 4x game showed twenty years ago remains yet to be realized.
Great pick, I’m definately going to play it some more.
rezaf
I never bother building ships early (besides colony ships). Industry is more important. Missile bases combined with choosing missile weapons techs in the early game usually suffice for defense. When your colony has no missile bases it can be vulnerable if there are enemy scouts en-route. It is worth keeping the scout on a new colony for some turns just in case the AI has sent a scout on its way just before you built your colony base - if the AI scout is allowed to stay inside your system it will send transports, no matter whether you’re at peace. If you have a scout there they will always retreat and not cause you problems.
I tend to only build missile bases once my industry is fully built up or unless it is very close to a hostile nation. In the early game 1-10 is enough but towards the end game you want 50+ on the worlds most at threat. Most of the time I just do a few clicks worth on the slider once industry is maxed and it builds up gradually on its own. It is worth noting that ships and missile bases all cost upkeep which will reduce your industry capability by a % across all your worlds. This can be seen at the bottom of the Planets screen.
11-12 research points is very low - the easiest techs are 500rp which would be 50 turns! Sounds like you haven’t invested enough in industry yet. I tend to max industry first before dedicating a planet to research otherwise it is not worth it. The exception is if you have no more habitable stars in range then you may want to move the slider to research before you max industry to get greater fuel range.
1 is indeed the tech level. Techs have levels and they are grouped in brackets, something like 1-10,10-20 etc…the manual has the gory details, but you have to research at least one tech in your current uppermost bracket to reveal the next set of techs available to you in the next bracket (the available techs per bracket are selected randomly; if your race is an expert in a particular tech category you’ll have more techs available). Researching older-bracketed techs won’t reveal new techs.
The early game is usually all about the ‘next turn’ button so you’re not doing much wrong there :)
Thanks!
Yeah, I was only in the first 10 turns so way too early to see any effects. I played a bit more and now have 4 planets and cranking up production and finally unlocked some research and had the levels go up :). I am currently creating another colony ship, but unsure whether it is worth it to colonize a barren or dead planet right now with reduced resources. I will probably wait a bit until my new colonies get up to speed more.
I ran into the evil spy people and they are closest to me it seems; the Darloks I believe they are called. I better keep a close eye on them and do some spy network prevention periodically. I am going to try to send them a tribute and wait a few turns and see if they will negotiate at all. It sounds like most people hate them so that may end up being hard, but I am playing on Easy and as the Humans so I figure it can’t hurt to try. Looking at the summary screen, they appear to have a lot stronger military than I so I may start cranking out some ships and see about creating my first design.
