INTRODUCTION:
Many guides exist on the Net for the various races of VGA Planets (created by
Tim Wisseman- Thanks, Tim!), but I've found that the Crystals are often
overlooked, or even worse, ignored. This is an overview of strategies and tips
that I've collected from as many sources as I could find, with some personal
experiences and experiments thrown in.
IS THE CRYSTALS THE RACE FOR YOU?
Who plays the Crystals? Well, for one, those players who like to use strategy
instead of brute force. You will have to be careful, and efficient. You will
be the Spider, spinning your webs, and enticing flies into your proverbial
parlor! If you like a style of play which allows you to mount offensive forays
early on in the game, or prefer a very aggressive strategy involving fleets of
Carriers, then the Crystals probably won't be the race for you. If, however,
you enjoy carefully laying traps and out-thinking and out-maneuvering your
opponents, then you may well enjoy what the Crystals have to offer. The
Crystals are a thinking man's race: you have to be twice the forethought as
the other players, and the satisfaction of outwitting your enemies is twice as
sweet. There's nothing quite like sending a strike force against an enemy made
up of ships that were previously theirs!
WEB MINES:
The Crystals are justifiably famous for one thing: Web Mines. They are the
blessing and curse of the Crystals, for not only do they provide their major
defensive and offensive weapons, their creation will drain from the Crystals a
huge portion of their money and resources. The key to using the Crystals is to
set up a healthy economy, and use that economy to create sufficient Web Mine
fields. The fields must be placed and used carefully, or you will be wasting
precious resources that will be needed elsewhere. As you can see, the
effective Crystal player must be a master strategist and economist at the same
time!
When you place your web mines, your best tactic is to create small
overlapping fields instead of one massive one. The reason for this is
straight-forward: many small fields are much more difficult to detect and
sweep, and enemy ships caught in overlapping fields will lose 25 kt of fuel
for EACH field that they are in. Web mines are in some ways more effective
than the regular version, because they have a better chance of hitting an
enemy ship (the Host default is 5% per light year travelled). A ship hit by
them only takes 10% of normal mine damage, but the ship hitting them loses 50
kt or 1/6th of their fuel (whichever is greater), and will set the ship's
speed to zero, so that they lose another 25 kt of fuel at the beginning of
the next turn for simply being in the field. Cloakers will find themselves at
a distinct disadvantage, since they run the same risk of hitting a web mine
cloaked as uncloaked. The damage that they sustain from a web mine hit will
usually damage the ship enough to prevent re-cloaking anyway. As an added
bonus, web mine fields will drain the fuel from a ship even though that ship
is in orbit around a planet! Enemy ships trying to sweep your web mines must
be within the web mine field, if the Host leaves the default setting.
WEB MINE PLACEMENT:
Now, where to put your web mine fields? Around planets to stop sneaky
cloakers from waiting there in ambush. In main trade routes to protect your
ships, or in an enemy's trade route to disrupt their shipping. The disrupting
power of a well placed web mine field plopped in the middle of an enemy's
territory can be frightening (hence the need for a good cloaking ship or two!)
To lay them in your territory, place the web mine field, wait a few turns,
scoop them up again, and move the field somewhere else. Keep your opponents
guessing where your web mine fields are located. You will need to have a
couple of web-tending ships to keep your webs in good shape and to capture
fuelless ships, especially if fuelless ships are configured by the Host to be
able to move.
USEFUL SHIPS:
The ships available to the Crystal player range from the tremendously
effective to the dismally useless. The main bonus of the Crystal ships is the
comparatively massive cargo space- ideal for all of those torpedoes that you
will be shuttling about. The backbone of your fleet should be the Emerald and
the Ruby, along with accompanying Opals. If these ships are your backbone,
then the Diamond Flame and the Crystal Thunder will be your fists. In a
Shareware game, the Emerald is one of the most powerful ships available, as
well as being one seriously armed freighter. The Ruby can lay one heck of a
mine field, and with its two engines, can be used for tow-capturing as well
(explained in greater detail later). Many ignorant players have ignored the
disruptive capability of a single Ruby, to their later sorrow. To be
effectively offensive, you will need to beg, borrow, or steal a good cloaking
ship. The Privateer's Meteor Class Blockade Runner is ideal, due to the
Gravatronic engines, followed by the Lizard Class Cruiser and many of the
Bird's cloaking ships. The threat of a cloaking web mine layer will make most
players sweat! Opals make good scouts, especially in the Early turns- use them
to drop 1 clan per planet until you find a really rich planet to colonize
properly. The planets with single clans on them will additionally extend your
radar range, and let you know if anyone is sneaking through your territory. As
well, Opals can drop small and effective web mine fields, as long as they have
at least Mark 4 torpedo tubes. The Diamond Flame is a fairly good ship, but is
deadly when coupled with a Crystal Thunder. In such a combination, with the
Diamond Flame attacking first, you can take out most other ships, such as a
Virgo. The Diamond Flame will take down the enemy ship's shields, and the
Crystal Thunder will mop it up. Be careful with your Crystal Thunders- you
don't get to make free fighters, and a full carrier is a huge investment of
resources. Don't be reluctant to try some battle sims, using the WinPlan VCR
Sim, or any of the other available sim programs. You will find that your two
Big Ships are nothing to sneeze at. When you create your battle groups, don't
forget to set the friendly codes properly on your ships to set up the
appropriate battle order. When building your ships, don't bother putting beams
other than X-ray lasers on your ships. You will be using the beams mainly to
capture enemy freighters, or to knock out enemy fighters, for which an X-ray
laser is just as effective as a Tech 10 beam. If you feel that you need a
little extra power in your beams, use Blasters.
Don't forget or ignore the Onyx. Your race loves hot planets, the hotter the
better. 100 degrees is ideal. Don't use the Onyx singally, or it will take
forever to raise the tempature of a planet. Use them in groups of at least
five, with an Emerald and a web mine field or three to guard them as they do
their work. If you find useful Natives on a planet stocked with tons of
minerals, just cook it. Not only will it be better for your own colonists, but
if you lose the planets, other races will find the planet almost useless.
BATTLE GROUPS:
If you follow the wise strategy of having standardized Battle Groups, a good
choice is 3 or 4 Opals with a Ruby or an Emerald. The Opals will have a Mark 4
torpedo tube, while the Ruby or Emerald should have Mark 4 or Mark 8 tubes.
The idea is this: the Emerald or Ruby will be able to carry a pile of
torpedoes, which it transfers to the Opals as needed. The Opals take short
runs away from the main ship to lay their small, overlapping web mine fields,
afterwards returning to the main ship for more torpedoes and fuel. If the main
ship has Mark 8 torpedoes, so much the better- it can lay a large mine field,
which can be scooped up by the Opals to be laid elsewhere- the Mark 8
torpedoes will thus be converted to a much larger amount of Mark 4's.
Naturally, the latter tactic is useless for the Shareware player; another good
reason to Register! When the Opals of your web-mining group drop their mines,
make sure that they are at different locations to achieve the overlapping web
effect. You may want to throw the occasional normal mine field in the middle
of your web fields for that extra punch.
CAPTURING SHIPS:
The Crystals (as well as the Privateers) have the wonderful ability to board
a fuelless ship by towing it (note that you will probably need a ship with two
engines to do this, depending on the Host configuration). This will allow you
to take immediate possession of any ship caught fuelless (in your web mine
fields or not), so that you do not have to tow it back to the nearest Starbase
to force a capture. If your web mines take the last of a ship's fuel, you will
receive a message that the ship is now harmless and out of fuel. If you
tow-capture repeatedly with the same ship, watch your crew numbers. When you
tow-capture, the crew of your towing ship will be divided to provide the crew
for the new ship. Some races will have a percentage of their crew turn traitor
and join you: 100% of Privateers, 90% of Feds, 70% of Colonials, and 40% of
Empire crew members will stay on the captured ship. If you let your crew
numbers of your ships drop too low, you run the risk of being easily captured
in the event of a battle. Replenish your crews at starbases, using the Fix
Ship function. As the game hits the ship limit, being able to capture enemy
ships gives you a distinct advantage!
HINTS TO THE WISE:
One tactic that will lose you the game quickly is to be too aggressive early
in the game. The Crystals need to be patient, in order to develop their
economy before tackling other races. Don't reveal the location of your
homeworld or location for as long as you can- hop from planet to planet in one
turn jumps, avoiding being caught in open space. When your location becomes
general knowledge, the weaker cloaking races will generally tend to steer
clear of your territory, as they will have much easier prey elsewhere.
You will probably not want to play the Crystals in games where regular mines
are able to destroy web mines, if players can mine-sweep your fields at a
distance, where your homeworld does not start at 100 degrees, or in games
where the Colonies are allowed to fighter-sweep them away. Playing the
Crystals effectively is challenging enough without these handicaps.
OTHER RACES:
What will help your game immensely is your choice of allies. Yes, you need
allies: a game where you have 11 enemies will be a very short one. Your major
drawbacks can be offset with a good ally, whether they can provide you with
cloaking ships, free fighters, cloning ships for you, etc. You can offer your
ally the service of having web-mine fields laid for them. Web mines laid in
another race's ID will not drain 25 kt of fuel per turn, but they will take
fuel if someone else blunders into their mine field. Best of all, should an
alliance go sour, you cannot be hurt by web mines that you have put down for
someone else- you are always immune to them and their effects!
The Feds make a good ally for you, as they can clone your ships, and take
those ships, Super-refit them, and then return them to you. The Feds are also
usually grateful for web-mine protection against cloaked ships, especially
Lizard ships, which are immune to the effects of their anti-cloaking Loki
ship.
The Lizards can make good allies, as they can provide you with cloaking
ships, can back up your offensive efforts with their high ground-attack
ratio, and can use their Hiss mission to help you squeeze the last few tax
credits out of your colonies.
The Birds can offer you cloaking ships, as well as providing the much-needed
stealthy Information you sorely lack. The Crystals can always use a few good
cloaking battleships, whether they trade for them, or capture them. The Birds
will prefer to trade them for protection against more powerful races. They can
clone for you as well.
The Fascists have cloaking ships to offer you, as well as the famed Glory
Device ships, which may come in handy in case any enemy cloakers get past your
webs. They can clone for you, and get rid of some pesky Amorphous natives for
you. All in all, not a stellar ally.
The Privateers have good reason to respect you- next to the Lizards, you are
probably their most feared enemy. A few of your web mines can put a serious
wrench into their plans- heck, most races that you ally with will be looking
at your web mines to protect them from the Privateers! They can't hover long
around planets in a web mine field, and they run a good chance of hitting a
mine field every time they enter one. However, as allies, they are very
useful. Best of all, their Meteor Class Blockade Runner is second to none in
the covert mine-laying department. Together, the two of you could strip every
other race of any ship you want! Just think- a fully-loaded Virgo is chasing
your Ruby; you drop small mine fields, robbing him of precious fuel. The Virgo
finally catches up, thinking that he has lots of fuel left... too bad there's
a couple of cloaked Privateer ships at the waypoint waiting to take the rest
of his precious fuel away...
The Cyborgs have their HYP ship, which can zip right past your mines to
whatever planet they have in their range. Note that this is one more good
reason to have those rotating small web mine fields around your planets. The
Cyborgs can offer you cloning, and that's about it, unless you can talk him
out of a chunneling Firecloud or two (fat chance). Not a great ally for you.
The Evil Empire can help you. Yes, they can clone, but better still, they can
provide you with free fighters for those Crystal Thunder carriers. As well,
their Dark Sense can give you vital information, as well as having HYP ships,
should you need to expand your empire more quickly.
The Robots make very good allies. Building fighters in space has obvious
benefits for you, and they can clone ships for you. Best of all are their
Mine-laying abilities. Picture this- they lay mines for you, you scoop them
up, and lay web mines for them. Lots of free mines floating around out
there... cloakers, beware! Together you can make the Echo cluster a very,
very hazardous place. If the host is configured allowing regular mines to
destroy web mines, this is an added incentive for you to stay on the Robot's
good side.
The Rebels are a good ally as well, thanks to their ability to build fighters
cheaply. They can clone for you, as well as using their Rebel Ground Attack to
soften up enemies for you. They have a HYP ship too.
The Colonies are good allies with their fighter-building capability, as well
as their cloning ability. If your host is configured to let them fighter-sweep
web mines, being on their good side is an obvious plus.
SUMMARY:
As a summary, remember these important points: Stay hidden as long as
possible at the beginning of the game. Establish an excellent economy. Build
effective battle groups, laying small, overlapping web mine fields. Don't be
too aggressive too early on. Get a good ally or two. Be sure to read the
guides for the other races to know your enemies; forewarned is forearmed. The
DreadLord Battle Manual is a good place to start.
Most of all, have fun playing the thinking man's race, and be sure to thank
your gracious and generous opponents for all of those free ships!!
This compilation was assembled by M. L. Maurer, in February, 1998. For comments, suggestions, questions, or outright flattery please email me at: [email protected]. Please feel free to distribute freely, but do not make any changes to the text. Thank-you.