Strategy changes in DA

1) The single most important strategy change is your Super Ability. Your game plan should revolve around it.

2) Your starting planet doesn't get bonus tiles anymore. Hitting Ctrl-N until you get a Precursor Mine on your starting planet is gone.

3) The class-4 planets and below completely changed in DA. Once you get the terraforming techs, those things start to really be useful, and the class-1's will even pass up your initial class-10's you colonized early on if you choose Neutral or get the Terraformer.

4) The colonization techs are expensive, but they are VERY tradable. Also, realize that you can invade inhabitable planets even if you cannot colonize them. Large, uninhabitable planets can make you good money.

5) The ability to build the old, outdated improvements you should most definitely take advantage of. You may want to turn off auto-upgrade in the planet governors, though--the governors tend to screw it up a lot.

6) The changed combat system. The days of "load up on weapons and kill them before they can even shoot back" are gone. Unless you're Super Warrior, of course. Refer to 1).

7) Diplomacy changed a lot. Tech whoring can still be done, but it's different and it's harder. You can't do cheese tactics by starting a war with somebody then immediately extorting peace from them. And you usually don't want to start a war with the Altarians.

8) Mega events. They don't happen much, but they sure change your strategy if they do.

9) Ethics bonuses changed. You no longer just pick Neutral every time. In fact, how they interact with your super ability is an important consideration (e.g. Evil+Super Warrior is a good one).


I don't think engines changed the game dramatically. You still need to research Impulse ASAP, as before.

This is untrue. I get bonus tiles on my homeworld pretty frequently actually.

Okay, I guess I haven't played enough Gold to notice yet. In the beta they sure weren't there.

Also tetleytea, the comabt was changes quite a while ago in DL. The combat mechanics have changed in DA... unless you get the Super Warrior.

tetleytea covered most of the points I can think of, but a couple more:

--Espionage can be a very effective tool, but it can also be neutralized. Spying on your neighbors is now a lot more interactive than bumping up a slider a couple notches, waiting a few turns, then bumping the slider back down.

--Fighting a battle is a LOT more dangerous to your ships. In DL, I would often give my dreadnought classes names like "Fleet-Slayer" or "Nation-Killer" because I could load them up with a ton of defenses, send them in the enemy's general direction, and watch the enemy navy absolutely disintegrate as entire fleets were annihilated at the cost of only 1 or 2 points of damage, tops. However, in DA, the AI seems to like actually arming its ships for once, and degrading defenses means that any capships that try the same stunt would find their defenses hammered down and breached, and come away half-dead after soloing a squadron of enemy fighters...if at all. Likewise, small ships can no longer rely on overkill to minimize losses, since overkill is gone: a dreadnought can incinerate an entire fleet of fighters in one volley if it has enough firepower and a little luck on its rolls.

Some other thoughts (I've played the DA campaign through to completion at 'Normal' difficulty, plus have started a few regular games, all since Tuesday):

-- My 'money rush' strategy (tech climb to Sensors, then build several survey ships and collect anomalies) is now much weaker; you can still get a bit of decent income, but nothing like you used to.

-- Financial management seems a bit tougher -- that is, it's harder to get really rich. Financial drains include productivity hits on semi-terraformed worlds and espionage costs to defend yourself against agents placed by opponents.

-- I really, really like the terraforming concept; it allows for on-going expansion through the game, as opposed to having all the planets occupied in the first N turns. And, as noted above, terraform techs are probably the most valuable to trade.

-- Between terraforming and financial management, it's harder to (sucessfully) expand quickly. Outlying colonies are more prone to being picked off, since it takes more time to build up defenses.

In all, CG:DA strikes me as more balanced and a bit tougher; you have to pay more attention to certain details and factors. More as I play more regular games. ..bruce..

Actually, let me correct myself: Comabt Has changed. Capital ships are now much more leathal... But the shoot first and kill everything before the other fleet can respond tactic was done away a long time ago. I give myself half credit

I'm glad capital ships are more leathal, it was a disincentive to me to spend so much to get larger hulls and find they were only marginally more effective.

I thought about the espionage, but I don't consider it a major change to strategy between DL and DA so I left it out. And yeah, anomalies are definitely giving you less up-front money now, so you can't sustain yourself on 2500bc anomalies anymore. I don't think that's a major strategy change either. Asteroids, too: they sure are the most noticeable difference in DA, but not a major strategy change.

I do hope that asteroids get beefed up in a later release, and the financial management aspects, like was said earlier. I don't disagree that it should be HARD to get really rich (unless you're Super Trader--then it should be easy), but it should at least should be POSSIBLE to get really rich.

Tech rush to sensors is still valid, except that now, since the engine thing and the fact that engine tech costs too much to rush research early in the game for minimal gain, I dont just buy one super fast survey ship in addition to my flagship to shoot around and gobble up three anomolies a turn.


Instead, thats actually what Im rush producing out early game, along with colony ships, so I have an entire fleet of surveys (plodding along at 3 or 4 speed) scouring the galaxy, so Im still pulling in 3 or 4 anomolies a turn. There may not be as many 2500's out there, but there are still plenty of 500 and 1000bc lottery tickets. There also seem to be many more anomolies on the default game settings in DA. Once they are all depleted the survey ships can be pretty cheaply converted to constructors or trade ships( in which case its actually beneficial that they run out of gas far away from my homeworld).


I dont bother with builing mine ships (the one you start with is fine), because its too tough to hold mines outside of your territory anways. Better to let someone else build them then flip them, or otherwise aquire them through conquest.


If theres a resource near my homeworld, Ill try to get a constructor on it, but I dont sweat it if someone else grabs it first. Gobbling up anomolies is much more important to my early game, keeping me out of the red with my defecit spending for as long as possible. If someone else grabs it the resource first, I know Ill have it soon enough . If theres some abnormaly awesome collection of resources in spitting distance, I might assign a bit more of a priority to grabbing them, especially if ones a greenie.


I dont bother with colonization techs, except in rare cases where theres too good of an opportunity to pass up, and I can find a race actually willing to sell the tech to me. Colonization techs are too intensive to research early on and far too situational to justify it. Theyre much much easier to pick up later in the the game, often for free. My "advanced colonization technology" is "planetary invasion".

The only starbase resources I don't sweat it on are the reds and the purples (i.e. military and research). The others are critical in my mind. And if I have to build a constructor anyway, may as well do it sooner rather than later. I can have my home planet building constructors while my outlying planets build colony ships.

I am, however, heavily influenced by whether I later intend to go to war with competitors or not.

Yeah, Im not saying theyre not valuable, and Ill try to pick them up. But if I have to make decisions about whether to do another survey ship to gobble fleeting anomolies which will be worth +2k in the early game, any number of permannent bonuses over its life and then keep the drengin from invading me as a trade ship, or whether to pick up another planet( and another set of tiles to set down banks on) via colony ship....or a constructor to mine a resource that wont approach significance till I max it out with a ton of other contructors , the choice is easy. If Im not in a competitive situation, have more production capacity than I need early on, and I dont have to make those choices, then the point is moot.


I suppose the bonuses your race comes out of the gate with, and the techs you choose to rush at the beginning, influence how much you'll miss the trickle of benefit from the resources.

In any event, I dont see anything as something I dont own. I only see things I dont own yet.