For those of you who aren't yet familiar with my lunatic "Meklon Gambit," here's how it works: For my fist move ... I scrap my colony ship.
I told you it was risky! This move would be suicide with any other race, and it's not guaranteed to be much better for the Meklar. I'm sacrificing population, development of my second colony, and (on a normal map) critical early scouting reports and blockades for one single-minded purpose: Building early factories on Meklon! I've already cut my annual ship maintenance to zero, and by immediately plowing my new-found reserves into the homeworld, I get a huge boost to production in the critical early years. Especially since I'm nonetheless building Newscouts on the side (I'm not sure if I'd have built so many so soon if I were running my Gambit initially, but I wanted to do as much as possible the same way I did in my original game, to avoid accidentally taking advantage of knowledge I'd gained by playing it through once already) this boost won't necessarily justify the loss of that first colony ship - this isn't a Super Ultimate Trick For Winning, but a risky trade-off that often comes out behind - but with the Meklar advantage in factory controls, it at least has a chance to work out.
One thing about this gambit: If it does work out, it's going to take a while!
This image is from 2329, just before I finish my first colony ship. Yes, this means Meklon, as shown here, represents my entire empire up to this point! When I played a semi-normal opening for this game, I had already colonized Paranar and Zhardan by this date, and had another colony ship en route! On the other hand, I also had just 116 factories on Meklon; in this replay, I have 264, and still haven't maxed the planet's population (quite). A normal game of course would fall somewhere between these two extremes, probably with the first home-made colony ship en route, and Meklon and one other colony going strong, with ~200 factories on Meklon and a few more on the colony. We'll see what version comes out ahead later on, but do keep in mind that this starting set-up is unusually good for the Meklon Gambit for a couple of reasons ... and it's still looking pretty dicey on the 30th turn of the game.
A couple of decades later, things are looking up a bit, as the last colony I'll be able to grab without war or seriously advanced technology is established, a couple of years earlier than in my original game, in 2350.
Population levels are still low, and Paranar's development has been hurt by its late formation, but Meklon itself is doing pretty well under the circumstances.
Ten years later, GNN would report an event whose full impact I won't know at least until I read everyone else's reports on this Imperium. The Klackons and Psilons developed very differently here than in my original game, but I don't know how much of that was luck of the draw, and how much was a result of this:
Certainly this didn't explain everything: I couldn't have gotten the diplo event as the Klackons just did with the Brains ... because I still didn't have contact with anyone! Unlike in my original, highly improbable game, the propulsion-poor bugs did not pull in an early Range 6 tech this time through, and I was completely isolated.
It was difficult to compare my progress between the two versions of the game, as they followed very divergent paths for many decades. Tellingly however, in spite of the 2381 event in my original game that turned Kakata rich, my empire actually finished maxing out (including RC3) sooner in my Gambit game than in my original one (tech pace was similar but not identical, largely because of different priorities). It "only" took a few dozen years to pull ahead. Honestly though, a truly normal opening, - building up to 200 factories before building the first colony ship (without scrapping the one you get for free!) - would probably come out ahead of both of the loony ones I tried. We'll have to see. Someday, I might revisit this gambit again in a larger galaxy, where the faster colony ship construction rate would be most valuable, but even then, the slow-down of the population growth curve would be costly. It was fun to try though, at least!
Having played up to 2390, I could have just called it quits, having already played out the game once, and with sufficient data for a basic comparison (I have more specifics from various dates in both games if anyone's interested). The game was already looking very interesting and different though, with Psilon scouts appearing in the first half of the century - no doubt fueled by a Klackon alliance - the bugs' lack of range 6 tech, and ... you know, Kakata not going rich on me. I therefore went on, just to see how different the game would be, and wound up establishing contact with the bugs when I developed Range 7 just a few years later.
Now, this is intriguing! The Klackons are running a 2PE when I meet them in 2394, but those transports en route to the blue star mean they're invading a neighbor I haven't met - and based on that assassination event among other things, I have a feeling it means there are Brains all over my side of the galaxy! This is definitely a game I want to play out at this point!
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Next: The Fun Begins
