Star Wars Supremacy [solve]

Star Wars Supremacy [solve]

Here's the walkthough for "Star Wars Supremacy"

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::Radon::
radon@myrealbox.com
radon@gamebox.net
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Star Wars Supremacy
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Yes it's a Star Wars game. And, yes, it's a strategy title. As many of you
have found out, however, it's also bloody hard work. Andrew Borelli attempts
to explain all.

Reviewed: PCZ #64, 68%

Supremacy is one of those funny games you either love or hate. For the Star
Wars aficionado or the space opera grognards, there's really one heck of a
game here. But, sadly, many people are turned off by the quirky interface
and mountainous volume of resource management before they get to the meat of
the game. Given a chance, the seasoned Supremacy player can lose whole days
playing this game. But, truth be told, Supremacy can be overwhelming for the
beginner, especially after watching the AI pound another one of your planets
unopposed. Here we'll attempt to clarify some of the more murky details of
gameplay which you'll need to understand in order to succeed. We'll also
provide you with the necessary foundation you'll need to build a solid
overall strategy. Supremacy is too non-linear to try and pin down the one
tactic that always works. The game always starts in an almost completely
random fashion, so you must instead know how to adapt proper basic
strategies in order to capitalise on winning situations ancover from poor
ones. That's what we hope to provide here. With patience, practice and a
little luck, you'll be on your way to galactic dominance. Probably.

The basics
The biggest complaint most gamers have with Supremacy is that the
long-winded interface makes the game cumbersome and unplayable. Getting used
to it is the first step. Firstly, remember that you can drag-and-drop
anything you want from one window to another, as long it is a legal move,
and there's usually more than one way to move something around. The trick is
to figure out the quickest
way to get it there on the screen.
For example, let's say you've got five squadrons of TIE fighters on
Coruscant and you want to move them to a fleet orbiting Chandrilla, a nearby
planet. You could open up the system defences window and click on the
fighter tab to see all available fighters. Then you could click on the fleet
where you want to send
them to bring up the fleet window. What then?
Well, if you like you can drag-and-drop each TIE fighter from Coruscant over
to the fleet window.
This is perfectly valid, and the fighters will move to the fleet. Or you
could click on each fighter with the CTRL button depressed, selecting as
many as you want. Then you could right-click the screen, bringing up the
unit menu. The final step would be to select Move and click on the fleet in
the other window. Ta-da!
Either way, the fighters are on their way. You can use the same principle
when you want to move characters,
ships, ground units or whatever. (And remember, troops and characters don't
need starships to move from one
friendly planet to another, although in some cases it certainly is quicker.)
One thing you don't have to do is repeatedly use the Show Idle function of
the GID.
Early on in the game, you should have a good mental picture of where your
important stuff is.
While Show Idle is a useful assistant, it's a wasted step if you already
know where things are.
If you're getting overwhelmed, ask your agent to help you.

The agent
Most of you will probably want to handle resource management yourself.
However, remember that
your agent Ð the droid who appears on the lower portion of the screen
(IMP-22 for the Imperials,
C3PO for the Rebels) Ð will automatically handle as few or as many tasks as
you like.
If you're uncomfortable with constantly having to manage facilities, or if
this is your first
time in a larger galaxy and you're getting overwhelmed, let your agent do it
for you; don't worry, we won't tell anybody.
Keep in mind, however, that the agent probably won't handle things as
quickly or as efficiently as
you can by doing it yourself.
Take heed of all the advice (and there's a lot of it) your agent has to
offer.
Read it all over once just to get a feel for what's going on, then you can
decide
whether you want to continue receiving advice, and if you want verbal cues
later on
as additional messages pour in; and lots of them will.
Pay close attention to incoming messages. Some of them are very routine, but
others are vitally
important. You especially want to take note of when training facilities,
construction yards and orbital shipyards are free for additional tasks,
when there's trouble on one of your planets, when units arrive at their
destination, and when something happens to a character.
Finally, do take time to skim over the manual. Yeah, I know, real gamers
don't do that.
Deal with it. In all seriousness, give the manual a quick look. It's
actually pretty
well-written, and describes a lot of the important stuff in detail.

Getting down to it
The first thing to remember when you start a new game, regardless of what
side you choose, is that you're probably
outnumbered. It might seem weird to think of the Imperials as lacking ships,
but remember: Supremacy does not mimic
what you remember from the movies, so unlearn what you have learned.
Supremacy randomly creates a new world whenever you start the game, so check
out the galaxy on the GID.
See where your important characters are (for the Alliance, mostly everyone
begins on Yavin), the size and
location of your fleets, and where your facilities are. Does the enemy have
friendly planets dangerously
close to your own? Is there an opportunity to take or sway a facility-rich
neutral right off the bat?
Are you badly outnumbered in one system? Analyse where you need to expend
resources, and where the
enemy might be caught off-guard.
Identify where your construction yards are and immediately begin
 constructing more. This is time-consuming, but it's vital to your survival.
In the meantime, begin a two-fold
campaign of expansion: first, rush your best diplomats to the nearest
planets containing facilities and start
swaying them to your side. At the same time, take the orbital shipyards you
do have and begin constructing
fighters (Rebels) or small capital ships (Imperials) to defend your planets
and hunt for or even harass the enemy.
Once you've got the planets that actually contain facilities on your side,
get those new facilities to work
cranking out ships and ground units. Try to bunch up facilities on several
planets; six shipyards spread out
aren't as useful as six on a single planet. This makes for a tempting target
to the enemy, but that's why
 you'll want to protect your resources (more to follow on this). Plus, as
soon as you can build advanced facilities,
don't be afraid to slowly scrap the old ones one at a time and replace them
with advanced models.
While that's going on, you'll want to explore the Outer Rim, either by
sending probes or by sending
transports filled with units. The latter is preferable if you've started
with transports, or managed to
build some quickly, because you want to begin colonising good prospects (ie
planets with large amounts
of resources and energy) for the purposes of mining and facility production.
Eventually your core worlds
are going to be strapped for energy and you'll need to send new facilities
somewhere else.
Don't ignore neutral planets that have no facilities. While these planets
can wait to be swayed, you'll
want to send diplomats to these worlds as soon as possible. As either side,
it's bad if the enemy gains a foothold in a system where you've got the bulk
of your resources. Besides, remember that you can always construct
facilities on one world and send them somewhere else by using the
Destination command, so these worlds will become important soon enough.

Construct and conquer
As soon as you can, try to build up one or two planets in each system with
at least two or three construction yards. Then select other planets and
start sending new training centres and orbital shipyards there. (You'll need
 more construction yards after a while, but you'll also need other
facilities first.)
First and foremost, you're going to need capital ships and fighters Ð and
fast. It's also a good idea to garrison worlds where your resources are
located, so make a point of training troops and sending them out as quickly
as you can. For the Alliance, Army and Fleet regiments make great garrison
troops; Mon Calamaris are best, but come later. For the Imperials, Army
regiments are your best bet to start; Stormtroopers are even better until
you've done some R&D, but they're time-consuming to build. Don't forget to
place fighter garrisons over your planets too. If the enemy does bounce in
with an invasion fleet, your fighters might drive them off or destroy them.
Naturally, capital ships are best at this, but at the start they can't be
everywhere.
Basically, never let a facility lay fallow. Keep on top of everything, or
have your agent do it. In the beginning, you need to be producing the right
equipment at all times. Stop building and expanding and your opponent will
crush you like a grape under a sandcrawler.
Once you've got sufficient numbers of troops and ships, the temptation will
be to overrun undefended neutral worlds, but try to resist doing this. Sure,
you'll take the planet, but (especially on higher difficulties) there's a
good chance an uprising will occur and you'll have to tie down troops and
characters to quell it. While it still might be worth the effort to invade a
planet rather than sway it diplomatically, consider carefully the
consequences of your actions. Getting tied up putting down uprisings all
over the place while your opponent continues to expand is the surest way to
get wiped off the map early in the game.
Do, however, group forces wherever and whenever you can. While you must keep
some fast ships and fighter groups around to screen against a raid in a
system, you want to create one or two powerful groups consisting of good
capital ships, lighter Ôscreening' ships and as many fighters as you can
carry. If you intend to start invading planets, don't forget to take at
least three units of ground forces with you.  //end stop//




Resources
Resources are the key to this game. Without them, new units and facilities
don't get built, damaged capital ships aren't repaired and fighter squadrons
don't get replacements.
Resources are the reason you want to send diplomatic envoys anywhere you've
got a shot at swaying the population. The more planets that are on your
side, the more resources come pouring in. Naturally, the closer these
resources are to the core, the more units you want to dedicate to defending
them; if the enemy blockades a resource-rich planet, your raw resources
aren't going anywhere.
Of course, you'll need mines and refineries to harvest these resources and
make them useful. Identify planets rich in raw resources, colonise or sway
them, then send plenty of mines and refineries there.
Take a look at the three gauges at the top of the screen: the raw resources
gauge (represented by a mine icon), the refined resources gauge (refinery
icon), and the maintenance points gauge (wrench). What they tell you
provides a picture of what you need to build. If you've got a lot of raw
resources, but no refined materials, you need more refineries. If you've got
no raw resources, you need more mines (surprise!). Maintenance points are a
different story Ð each pair of mines and refineries produces 50 maintenance
points, and you want to make sure this number at least remains above 100.
Produce as many maintenance points as you can.

Mines and refineries are vulnerable to orbital bombardments, so consider
shield generators if they don't
already exist on your resource-rich worlds. They can also be sabotaged, so
keep some troops and fighters
on the planet as security forces. (Naturally, you can also sabotage or bomb
your opponent's resources - hint, hint.)
Imperial players take note: when you get a message stating that smuggling is
taking place on a world,
that means some of your resources are being diverted to the Alliance player!
There are two ways to combat
smuggling: either send a diplomat to increase your popularity on that world,
or start building TIE fighters
(because they're cheap and can be built quickly) and send them to the planet
in question.

Special Forces
Special Forces units can make the difference in Supremacy, but many players
find them impossible to use at first.
Too often, the wrong combination of units and characters spells disaster,
resulting in the loss of SpecForces
or, worse, dead or captured characters.
Remember that the Special Forces aren't sufficient on their own. Firstly,
SpecForces units are nowhere near as
large as their ground force counterparts, so don't think of them as a whole
army. Secondly, they don't work very
well unless a competent character is leading them.
When you decide to send Special Forces out on a mission, make sure your
intelligence about the target is updated.
If the target is very heavily defended you might not be able to carry out
your primary mission until a secondary
one destroys some of the defending units. Assuming the target is defended,
send an average of six to ten SpecForce
units on the mission, along with one or two characters who are good at
espionage and/or combat. Use one of the
characters and about half the SpecForces as decoys (don't know how to do
this? It's in the manual!), and use
the rest to actually complete the mission. If the mission is still failing,
chances are the target is too heavily
defended. Try an espionage mission (again, use decoys) followed up by some
sabotage runs against defending units.
Then try your mission again. Remember: sabotage is a wonderful tactic both
sides will want to employ, especially
against capital ships. Capital ships take a long time to build until your
production really gets rolling; destroying
some of your opponent's capital ships early on forces him to waste time
producing more and leaves his worlds open
to attack. (Similarly, you can cause the enemy a lot of grief by immediately
targeting his construction yards -
if you can find them.) Only Imperial Commandos (Imperials), Infiltrators
(Rebels) and a number of the characters
can perform the sabotage mission.

Research
Research is another critical function in the game. Research happens
automatically in each field (facilities,
starships and ground troops) as long as you have one of each type of
construction facility located somewhere.
However, this process is very slow and completely random until you get
R&D-capable people to work.
This is critical for both sides: the Rebels need more powerful capital
ships, while the Empire needs better
fighters. Both sides will want strategy-enhancing ships like Interdictors or
CC-7700s, and more efficient transports.
Immediately identify which characters are R&D-capable as soon as they come
into play and get them to work.

Leaders
As soon as you've got a new character in play, check out what he or she does
best. If the character has good leadership
abilities, get that person assigned to a fleet quickly. Leaders can and will
make the difference when fleets duke it out
or when you're invading a planet. Even outmatched forces will do better in
combat - assign Daala as a commander
and watch how much longer those puny TIE fighters stay alive.
Even if there are no fleets or ships nearby, or if you've got no use for a
character at a particular moment, don't be
afraid to assign him to a planetary garrison command. Your ground troops
will do much better if the enemy shows up,
and if you have a commander assigned to the planet your fighter garrison's
performance will be similarly improved.

A few simple but effective Star hints that you should take into
consideration.

Practise on the easy setting first - it's easier to understand the interface
this way.
Switch off C3PO. In fact, get rid of all the 'droid noises, which are more
irritating than the interface.
Select the Very Slow time setting - this gives you more time to think about
strategy.
Make good use of the encyclopedia - it's the best way to increase your
knowledge of the 'other' side.
Don't rely on your knowledge of the films. A lot of the events in the game
match those of the films, but they don't always conclude in the same way.
Clear your mind of Hollywood Ð this is different.
Spend time learning about the different ships, troops, facilities, planets
and characters. They're all good for different things, and they're not
always true to the films.