-- Galaxy FAQ --

From: slothoub@cs.utwente.nl (Frans Slothouber)

Date: Thu, 05 Sep 1996 00:00:00 +0000

--  Frequently Asked Questions about Galaxy --

Galaxy FAQ
             Version 1.0
           05 September 1996

This document can also be found on:
http://wwwtios.cs.utwente.nl/~slothoub/Galaxy/FAQ.html

This document is public domain and can be free distributed.

Introduction:

A game master usually gets a lot of questions about Galaxy, simple
ones, but also rather difficult ones.  Beginners are usually confused
on how to interpret the rules, and come up with questions such as "can
I produce more than one product on a planet?".  As soon as players
become more experienced they come up with far more detailed questions
about the exact working of the Galaxy code.  This FAQ tries to give
answers to both kind of questions.

This is the first version of the FAQ, and there are no doubt many more
questions to be answered.  If you can think of any, think you have a
better answer to the ones listed here, discovered an error, created
another FAQ, please send a email to, slothoub@xs4all.nl, and I'll
include it in the next version.

Frans Slothouber.

Questions Answered in this FAQ:

0. General
  0.1:  What is Galaxy?
  0.2:  How can I join a game?
  0.3:  How long does a game take?
  0.4:  Where can I find more information about Galaxy?

1.  Technical
  1.1:  What is the sequence of Events?

2. Production
  2.1:  Can I produce more than one thing on a planet?
  2.2:  If I research technology on one planet can I also use it
        on other planets?
  2.3:  I have this -very- tiny planet and I use it to produce
        drive tech, will this have any effect?
  2.4:  Do I have to repeat the P order to state what a planet has
        to produce even if I want to make it produce the same
        product?
  2.5:  My planets have very low resources, what do I do?
  2.6:  What largest ship I can produce at planet X?

3. Transport
  3.1:  Can I transport and unload cargo onto a planet in the
        same turn?
  3.2:  Can I unload cargo and send the cargo ship to another
        planet in the same turn?
  3.3:  I have 100 cargo ships, I want to use 50 of them to
        transport COL to planet X and 50 to transport CAP to
        planet Y, how is this done?

4. Battle
  4.1:  War and Peace.
  4.2:  Where can I learn more about Strategy or Tactics?

5. Ship Design
  5.1:  What are the best ship designs?

6. Tools
  6.1:  What is GalaxyTV?
  6.2:  Is there a battle Simulator?
  6.3:  Where can I find more tools?

---------------------------------------------------------------

0. General

0.1:  What is Galaxy?

Galaxy is a play-by-email interstellar wargame for several players
created by Russel Wallace somewhere in 1992.
  A game usually has somewhere between 10 and 80 players and one Game
Master that runs the game.  Each player gets to play one nation.  The
game is set in a Galaxy filled with many planets.  Each nation starts
with one populated planet.  The other planets are empty.  The goal of
the game is to conquer the whole Galaxy by colonising the empty
planets and killing the other nations.
  A game runs several turns a week.  Players send in orders before
each turn.  These orders tell what the player wants his nation to do,
and after each turn runs each player receives a report that states
what happened that turn.
  When you play a nations you can do many things.  You can design your
own ships.  Each ship has many parameters, drive, number of weapons,
shields, and cargo capabilities.  These can all be tweaked to create
many different ship designs.  Populated planets can be used to build
the ships you designed.  The ships can be used to transport cargo and
colonize planets, or to fight battles with your neighbours to take
over their planets.  Ships can be improved by technology research.
  Experienced players do not operate alone, they use diplomacy to
create a pacts with other players, and attack their enemies together.
Back stabbing, double deals, and other treason are of course also
possible, no-one is to be completely trusted, and you will find that
Galaxy is a good simulation of real-world politics.  It is also very
addictive :)

0.2:  How can I join a game?

Watch the newsgroup rec.games.pbm for announcements, or

0.3:  How long does a game take?

Depending on how many turns are played a week, a Galaxy game can last
from 6 months till 2 years.  Preparing orders can take than an hour a
turn.

0.4:  Where can I find more information about Galaxy?

There are several WWW and FTP sites that contain information about
Galaxy, links to these sites can be found on the galactic traveler
page:

http://www.jacobean.demon.co.uk/gtrav.html

It also contains links to information to games similar to Galaxy; VGA
Planets and Stars.

See also:  4.2 and 5.1.

---------------------------------------------------------------

1.  Technical

1.1:  What is the sequence of events in Galaxy?

The exact sequence of events is a good way to get answers to many
questions about Galaxy.  This is how the Galaxy program computes what
happens during a turn:

o join phase:      Similar ships are merged into groups.
o fight phase:     Enemy ships fight each other.
o bomb phase:      Planets are bombed.
o load phase:      Cargo is uploaded into ships.
o fleet phase:
o intercept phase:
o move phase:      Ships move through hyperspace.
o join phase:      Similar ships are merged into groups.
o fight phase:     Enemy ships fight each other.
o bomb phase:      Planets are bombed.
o produce phase:   Production takes place.
o unload phase:    Cargo is downloaded to the planet.

A number of things follow from this:
(a) Any COL and CAP you transport to a planet during a turn
    has no effect on the production of that turn.
(b) You can upload cargo, send it to another planet, and
    download it all in the same turn. See 3.1
(c) You can bomb two planets in the same turn with the same
    ship. See 4.1.

---------------------------------------------------------------

2.  Production

2.1:  Can I produce more than one thing on a planet?

No you can not.  A planet can only produce one product at a time.  If
you want to produce several products each turns, you have to use more
planets.

2.2:  If I research technology on one planet can I also use it
      on other planets?

Yes you can.  Technology levels are global.

2.3:  I have this -very- tiny planet and I use it to produce
      drive tech, will this have any effect?

Yes it will, even if your planet produces tiny amounts, they do have
effect, since Galaxy internally stores techlevels with more than two
digits after the decimal point.

2.4:  Do I have to repeat the P order to state what a planet has
      to produce even if I want to make it produce the same
      product?

No you have not.  Once you used a P order to state a planet has to
produce something, for instance capital, the planet continues
producing this until told otherwise.

2.5:  My planets have very low resources, what do I do?

Low resources mean that when ever a planet is used to build a ship or
capital, a lot of industry points are wasted on building materials.
This means that the total mass a planet can produce is smaller than
that of planets with higher resources (see also 2.6).

There are two options two solve this problem

(1)  Only use the planet for technology research or upgrading
     ships, since this does not require materials.
(2)  Start shipping materials to that planet. For instance,
     use one turn to produce materials on your home planet,
     this will provide you with enough materials to last 30
     or more turns, and then use a large cargo ship to ship
     the materials to the planets with low resources.

2.6:  What largest ship I can produce at planet X?

The size of a ship you can produce at a planet depends on a number of
factors: the effective industry, the resources, and the material
stockpiled.

The ship mass you can produce is calculated as follows:

effective_industry = (population - industry)/4.0 + industry

effective_industry + materials/resources
  mass =  ------------------------------------------
                    10.0 + 1.0/resources

if the mass turns out to be larger than effective_industry/10
  then the mass = effective_industry/10

For instance

(1) A home planet, Pop=1000, Industry=1000, resources=10,
    no materials stockpiled

effective_industry =  0/4 + 1000 = 1000
mass = (1000 + 0/10) / (10 + 1/10) = 99.0099

(2) A half developed planet,  Pop=750, Industry=300, resources=5
    25 Materials stockpiled.

effective_industry =  (750-300)/4 + 300 = 412.5
mass = (412.5 + 25/5)/(10+1/5) = 40.93

(3) A half developed planet ,  Pop=750, Industry=300, resources=5
    2500 Materials stockpiled.

effective_industry =  (750-300)/4 + 300 = 412.5
mass = (412.5 + 2500/5)/(10+1/5) = 89.46

since this is larger than 412.5/10  the mass is 41.25.

---------------------------------------------------------------

3.  Transport

3.1:  Can I transport and unload cargo onto a planet in the
      same turn?

Yes you can.  There are two different cases:

1) You already own the planet.

In this case you use the option AUTOUNLOAD.  Use the order

O AUTOUNLOAD

to turn this option on.  If you now send ships with cargo to a planet,
the cargo is automatically unloaded that same turn.

2) The planet is empty.

In this case you use both the AUTOUNLOAD option and Routes.  Example.
Your home planet is called Coosy_Home, and some light years away from
it is am empty planet called 111.  If you use the orders:

R Coosy_Home COL 111
  O AUTOUNLOAD

then all your cargo ships at Coosy_home will be automatically loaded
with Colonists, the ships will be send to 111, and their the colonist
will be automatically unloaded.  This all in one turn.

3.2:  Can I unload cargo and send the cargo ship to another
      planet in the same turn?

Yes you can. Just use the U and S orders.

3.3:  I have 100 cargo ships, I want to use 50 of them to
      transport COL to planet X and 50 to transport CAP to
      planet Y, how is this done?

Suppose the 100 cargo ships have the group number 20, then you use the
following orders:

B 20 50
  L MAX COL
  S MAX X
  L 20 CAP
  S 20 Y

---------------------------------------------------------------

4.  Battle

4.1:  War and Peace

A common question is:

"I am at war with everybody.  I send a probe to a planet but
   it was not shot down, how can this be?"

It is sometimes confusing to determine whether or not a ship will be
shot down, or a planet will be bombed or not.  It depends on the
peace/war status of all the nations.  We will try to clarify this with
a number of scenarios:

Scenario 1:
o Nation X has declared peace on Nation Y.
o Nation Y has declared war on Nation X.
o Planet Friendly is owned by Nation X.  Orbiting Friendly are
  a number of armed ships of X.
o Planet Evil is owned by Nation Y, Orbiting Evil are a number
  of armed ships of Y.

Consider the following situations:
o Y sends a probe to Friendly.  This probe is -NOT- shot down,
  since the ships of X only fire when fired upon.
o X sends a probe to Evil.  This probe is shot down.
o Y sends a big armed ship to Friendly.  A battle will take place.
  If Y wins, Friendly is bombed.
o X sends a big armed ship to Evil.  A battle will take place,
  (since the ships of Y will fire first).  If X wins, Evil will
  -NOT- be bombed, since X declared peace on Y.

Scenario 2:

o Nations X and Y have both declared peace.
o Planet Friendly is owned by Nation X.  Orbiting Friendly are
  a is a big armed ship of X and a big armed ship of Y.
o Planet Snoody is also owned by Nation X, there are no ships
  orbiting Snoody.

Consider the following situations:

o Y declares War on X, and sends its ship on Friendly to planet Snoody.
  The following will happen:
  (a) Before any ships move a battle takes place on Friendly.
      Lets suppose Y wins it; planet Friendly is bombed.
  (b) The ship of Y moves from Friendly to Snoody.
  (c) Planet Snoody is bombed.

As you can see it is possible to bomb to planets in one turn.

4.2:  Where can I learn more about Strategy or Tactics?

Get a copy of the Galaxy Strategy Guide from

http://www.IAEhv.nl/users/weertj/Galaxy/galstrat.html

---------------------------------------------------------------

5.  Ship Design

5.1:  What are the best ship designs?

Get a copy of the Ship Design Guide.

http://www.jacobean.demon.co.uk/galaxy/strategy.html

---------------------------------------------------------------

6.  Tools

6.1:  What is GalaxyTV?

Galaxy TV is a turn viewer.  It creates a graphical representation of
the Galaxy that you can use to analyse your current situation and
create your orders.  Many players use this program, though you need a
MS-Windows machine to use it.

http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/t.hughes/

6.2:  Is there a battle Simulator?

Yes there are at least two battle simulators.
You can find one on

http://www.xs4all.nl/~slothoub/galaxytools.html

and the other on

http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/t.hughes/

6.3:  Where can I find more tools?

http://www.xs4all.nl/~slothoub/galaxytools.html

http://www.jacobean.demon.co.uk/galaxy/start.html

--
( Frans Slothouber, Centre for Telematics and Information Technology )
(       www.xs4all.nl/~slothoub      slothoub@cs.utwente.nl          )

-- Galaxy FAQ --

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