The United Enforcement Authority - Guide
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[edit] Overview
The UEA excels at developing a strong early-game economy, and boasts an excellent ship list.
[edit] Strengths
- Excellent ship list:
- Mobility
- Several UEA ships have hyperdrives
- Pax Class Jumpship can carry other ships with it through hyperspace
- Early-game economy:
- Cities produce double income
- Contraband can be converted into supplies, ordnance and food
- Natives produce 2.5x tax income
- They start with a Redistribution Center on their HW, which gives them all the food and supplies they want.
- Income from Training Centers
- Psi-Opps Hisser device allows for heavy taxation
- Capturing:
- Good at disabling ships; UEA small and large weapons do 4x damage to control systems
- Each detonating Gravitonic Minefield does 25% damage to the control systems of all ships within (including your own), regardless of mass.
- Good at capturing prisoners; need less strength to force a surrender in a ground assault. Also, the AU-147 Arresting Unit can capture personel outside of combat.
[edit] Weaknesses
- Slow growth rate causes the UEA to stagnate later in the game
- Undercities, Tank-O-Tronic Cloning System A and Hawkins Institute (with prisoners) will offset this.
- Income from training bases does not scale well
- Cannot sell contraband (but they can buy it)
- Always on Contraband Lockdown with a range of 100ly on Sergeant and Law Dog, is often more a nuisance to you than your enemy
[edit] Insectoid
- Insectoid natives will attack UEA forces on sight
- Insectoid planets can give out distress signals containing the Universal Friendly Code to other players.
- Comments of Tim Wisseman on this (Host 194): "The Insects will blab your UFC (after eating your troops brains) to one enemy player some of the time if you are in a fight with them. If you are the UEA you should avoid all bug planets, they are bad bad news stay away from bug planets.
The Insects transmit that message to one player at random 20% of the time and the message is never sent to the Cyborg." - UEA Assault Craft Have the capacity to kill Insects. Each PA-245 Battle Mech kills 1250 Insectoids.
- Best way to kill bugs is to take troops. One trooper kills one bug and the trooper stays alive.
[edit] Fighters
Fighters are expensive but have good stats. If you are in a low resource game they are a good option if you want to save minerals. I recommend using wings of 0/5/5 as this keeps the fighters mobility and has (without any T1) the best firepower for their costs. Those wings are usually a little weak against cheap enemy fighters but are good against ships. You can include the type 1 fighter if mobility is no issue (e.g. they jump with a PAX). Then a 4/3/3 wing provides additional firepower. Those wings can deal better with enemies wings attacking them.
[edit] Special Builings
- Hawkins Institute
- Redistribution Center Converts contraband into supplies, ordnance and food (details here)
- Training Center You get money for the training (details here)
[edit] Strategy
The UEA is definitely an early-game race. You need to make the most out of your strong economy in the first several turns. Your first priority will be to get all of your colonists into cities; since UEA cities produce double the income, this is the best investment you can make. Cities can hurt your long-term growth, so try not to put more than 20 cities on any single planet (2,000,000 colonists). Beam down supplies from your starting ships in order to build more cities. Also, consider buying some cheap contraband to be used with your Redistribution Center. Recycling the contraband can produce extra supplies for building cities, along with more food.
Once you reach planet tech 13 (high priority) start building undercities. For every city you should have one undercity. Not only will this conteract the negative growth from cities completely but it will give you up to 1.3x times the normal growth rate (achieved at only 30 UCs). So if you're wanting to have optimal growth a population of 20 million should have 100 cities and 100 undercities. 40 million should have 200 of each. Just remember to build them in pairs. These cities will NOT hurt your growth one bit! This can truly make the UEA a late game player. It's also important to remember that undercities take priority over cities (i.e. if you have 200,000 colonists, one city and two undercities then you get no city income, just UC income!)
Note entered by Creator, Greg Bahr: I would like to offer this as a suggestion to the early game economics of the UEA. The true key to UEA early game economic and military might is the Redistribution Center. Put all your money into it in the first turns, buy the cheapest contraband there is. You will have tons of food, supplies, and should be able to recover 33-50% of your MCs. In a game where food is in high demand, you will grow with the fastest of them. This gives you a strong power base to strike early. Also, the high amount of food counters the effects of cities on growth. With the large amount of food and supplies, max out cities to your population, the double income will give you even more of a boost.
Note by Jason von Argos: Greg's advice here is good, in fact, you can use low contraband prices through much of the game to get food, supplies and ord when and where you need them. Early in the game the large amounts of ord you get following Greg's advice will allow your Maxims to lay lots of grav mines, with which you can not only help defend your space, but can also use to restrict the movements of hyperjumping races. Just be aware that if you leave large amounts of ord sitting around in your bases, someone with a good spy rating might come along and blow it up, along with your colonists and potentially other useful things in your base.
Amorphous Worms are a key native to hunt out especially if the price of all contraband is high. The free contraband can provide massive amounts of food and ord. The food can supply your colonists if you should opt to build fewer farming worlds to leave real estate for more training colonies (see below).
Once you've taken care of getting your colonists into cities, you should start to take advantage of your next economic advantage: training centers. The UEA makes money by training troops. The formula is quite complex and difficult to understand; unfortunately, more troops does not always mean more money. But a good place to start is a single base with 100,000 colonists, 1 high guard (important!), 40 training centers, and plenty of food. Your income from this base will start off small but will rise as the number of troops increases. After 8 or 9 turns the base will be producing 1,000 MC per turn or more. See the UEA TC Analysis for more details. It can be very lucrative to actually have many training colonies on almost every planet. Junk planets (low minerals, low soil/inadequate climate) make great candidates for training worlds.
Although these sources of income provide a nice economic boost in the first two dozen turns, they will eventually be dwarfed by the growth of other races. Consequently, the UEA needs a close ally in order to survive the later stages of the game. Your Pax Class Jump Ship is one of the most sought-after ships in the game; you should try to sell its services (retain control of the ship, if possible) to other races. The UEA is also quite good at capturing prisoners. Try to sell prisoners to races with Labor Camps in return for a share of the profits. Without another source of income or strength, the UEA is doomed to stagnate and be overrun by high growth races. Contested They do not need an ally, they can become a late game powerhouse by themself Lord Lancelot 16:32, 16 November 2006 (CET)
It is important to remember the potential growth available from Public Space Ports. With their Hisser ships combined with Complex taxes and the double city income the enforcers should be getting much more income than most others in the early game. Some of that should be spent investing in PSPs as it can help you "keep up with the Jones's". They will take a while to really pay for themselves, but the compound interest on your new colonists could mean the difference between a late-game superpower and a mid-game flop. Imagine comparable populations as others with twice the city income. This requires patience and the sacrifice of some of your early game income. The free colonists could very well offset the growth penalty of building many more cities. You also need to be willing to leave the majority of your population in one place to take full advantage of this investment.
From a military standpoint, the UEA is outstanding. You have several powerful warships at your disposal, and you have both fast warp ships and long-range hyperspace ships. Your mobility is second to none; use it to strike where your enemy's defenses are weakest. Use the Ranger as a mobile base of operations, escorted by a Pax and a large battle group of other ships. The Ranger's incredible scan range will peer deep into enemy territory, showing you where to strike next.
Enforcer weapons do extra damage to control systems. You might try capturing enemy ships by disabling them with Ion Cannons in combat and then using your Incarceration Beam. An Arbitrator Class Strikeship armed with 3 Merculite Rockets and 3 Ion Cannons is an efficient ship (used in large numbers) for capturing/disabling.
[edit] Weapon Preference
This is a section dedicated to the choice of weapons for the UEA player focusing on taking over ships with system damage taking advantage of their 4x system damage bonus.
[edit] Small Weapons
| Small Weapon | Sys:Blast | Sys:Tick | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|
| Laser | 4 | .4 | |
| Pulsed Laser | 4 | .52 | |
| Disrupter | 4 | .225 | a no-no if your wanting to capture personnel! |
| Streak Missiles | .8 | .28 | Negative Sys:Blast - no good. |
| Phasor | 2 | .18 | |
| Positron | 4 | .27 | |
| Meson Gun | 10 | .8 | Overall they seem to be the most balanced. Cheap, good sys damage, low damage to other systems. However before you get exotic techs ... |
| Xenon Beam | 5 | .33 | |
| Tachyon Gun | 3.2 | 1.2 | Tachyons are great to have for their long range but you should have some exotic techs up and running for their poor shield/armor drain. |
| Plasma Gun | 3.5 | 1.6 |
Sys:Blast: A high ratio is what you want to avoid as much damage to the ship as possible.
Sys:Tick: Sys damage per tick (assuming you're in range and armor and shields are depleted, this has been modified for accuracy but not point defense):
- Except for Streak Missiles all have a positive system to blast ratio, so they should all feasibly disable a ship before destroying it.
- Swarm mentality: Lasers or Pulsed Lasers should work great for cheap. Once you have small weapon exotics Meson Guns should be worth the extra few MCs.
- Capital Ship mentality: Plasma Guns, Tachyon Guns depending on your range preference...
- Also don't forget that most small weapons have special abilities which might encourage a mix and match approach.
[edit] Large Weapons
| Large Weapon | Sys:Blast | Sys per tick | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|
| 500mm Gun | .64 | 1.7 | high Point defense odds |
| Force Beam | 2.4 | 2.04 | can destroy 100-200 ord units per hit |
| Ion Cannon | 2.5 | .6 | |
| Energy Mines | .6 | 1.4 | high PD odds |
| Particle Cannon | 2.1 | 1.8 | high PD odds |
| Ionic Gun Array | 10 | 20 | 0 PD odds |
- The only weapons worth allowing to capture an enemy ship are the Force Beam, Anti-Matter Gun, Ion Cannon, Particle Cannon and Ionic Gun Arrays. All others would destroy the ship long before the system damage reached 100.
- The Energy Mines would normally destroy a ship first but one should routinely make its way onto your ships because of its special ability to destroy repair units. The repair phase happens before Incarceration Beams work and ships will usually repair 40-80% system damage before hand. So taking out their repair stash can help ensure capture.
- While a 500mm Gun might cause a ship to blow up before reaching critical system damage, they are cheap and when mixed with Ion Cannons and most any of the Small Weapons should disable it. In fact it complements the Ion Cannons well with its high shield drain.
- Swarm Mentality: 500mm Guns and Ion Cannons and maybe Energy Mines. Particle Cannons are also not too expensive.
- Long range standoff: Force Beams and Ion Cannons and of course Ionic Gun Arrays each with a range over 600. Good complements with these are Tachyon Guns.
- Capital ship mentality: Ionic Gun Arrays if they fit. Force Beams and/or Ion Cannons. But these all need exotic techs for shield/armor drain. Armor is usually a non-issue for Ion Cannons and Ionic Gun Arrays due to their high armor arc. Moreover you don't want to damage these nice ships don't you?
- Note: One may consider this satellite pattern: 1 HG, 10k troops, 2500 crew, 5000 colonists, 30 TCs, 1 PP, 10 factories, 50 mines, 1GC (and later 1 redistribution center). Not only that this structure supplies the GC with cash it increases its output due to rebreeding and training immediately and it yields minerals. You need lots of minerals and mainly duranium as later many Enforcers with SLs shall be built. The redistribution center makes it independent from any support from the HW and so can be used to support further spin offs and the Maxims which lay their minefields.
- Note: One may consider to builts cheap Enforces in masses: With a SL and cheap LWs and engines. Tow them with TW Law Dogs (only four high tech engines). Set Enforcer to RAM!, second wave and standoff of 0. This and the LWs are enough for smaller ships. The SL disables the big guy at tick 310 and if it survives a second big guy at tick ~800. And maybe a third at tick ~1500. Set Law Dog not to RAM! and maybe with PTTs and stand off of 1000.
[edit] System damage
The most feared weapon of the UEA is system damage. Along with the weapons bonuses discussed above UEA have the ability to totally stop any ship in its tracks with 3 detonating gravitonic minefields and make it unable to fight with only 4. With the incarceration device any ship that ends the turn at the same area can have its personnel whisked away leaving the ship easy pickins. It's important to remember that ship repairs happen before the device works, so you must prepare ahead of time and know racial repair rates. Some will require 8 grav explosions to end the turn 100+ and others only require 6. If you know where a fleet of ships will end it's next turn you can hyp in several groups of Maxims with a Pax laying minefields around them in strategic locations and blow them next turn and have another fleet of ships with incarceration devices jump in.
[edit] Enemies
[edit] See also
- Stuff concerning the United Enforcement Authority
- [1] Race Guide by David Ouimet, Norman Violet
- [2] Race Guide by David Ouimet
- The United Enforcement Authority - Change Proposal
