Turn 42

The final turn of the game before I ended the game due to referee fatigue.

This was a fairly quiet turn as all sides considered the implications of the interdiction of the Clanger homeworld.

The only combat in the turn is an attempt by the Fleet to remove the Jerandi People's Republic from their last world. They easily defect the space defences at H16 but their ground forces are unable to overcome the defending marines. However the Jerandi are unlikely to be able to resist another such attack.

Outline plans from the players revealed that the Picans planned to move their battleships to deal with the perceived threat from the Fleet (to which they would send 4 battleships) and Worati (1 battleship to be sent). However both defenders would have been able to defeat the attacks. This would have left the Fleet and Worati in the ascendency for the next few subsequent turns and it would remain to be seen how the Federation would do on defensive.

My final ranking for the empires (an admittedly somewhat subjective list and ending with the empire I reckoned to have the best chance at dominance in the cluster in the long term) was:

1. Jerandi People's Republic
2. Kallikanzaroi
3. Caffeinians
4. Regul
5. Drahmini
6. Chroniomancy Of Iyanden
7. Gobbanean Prinicipalities
8. Clanger
9. Saggitarians
10. Worati
11. Auron
12. Strata Inc.
13. Kellesonians
14. Picans
15. The Fleet

Turn 41

This time the Picans do turn up for the party and join the attack on the Clanger homeworld. In addition to the Picans, the Kellesonian vessels that had imposed an interdiction on E9 moved over to D9 and joined the attack. The defence of the Clanger homeworld was improved by the arrival of some Regul but this didn't prevent the destruction of all the space defences and leaving the Clanger homeworld interdicted and in a lot of trouble.

Gobbanean Principalities reached Tech Level 5 in Communications while the Kellesonians reached Tech Level 7 in Communications. The Picans made Tech Level 5 in Archaeology and Strata Inc. achieved Tech Level in Weaponary.

J3 will turn out to be the only uncolonised world.

Turn 40

The Federation make their move and attack both Clanger homeworld and E9. In the classic lack of co-ordination shown by every alliance the attack on the Clanger homeworld did not have the back up of the Picans that the rest of the Federation expected. Unsurprisingly this lack of support led to the attack on the Clanger homeworld being repulsed. E9, on the other hand, was easily interdicted withut loss to the attackers.

In the meantime the Gobbanean Principalities developed Tech Level 5 weaponary and the Kellesonians achieved Tech Level 6 in Communications.

Turn 39

The Clangers spent this turn nearly wiping out the Jerandi People's Republic. They completed the capture of K20 and also attacked (and captured) I20. As a result the Jerandi only have H16.

The Aurons mopped up another Kallikanzaroi world at G14. This didn't stop either the Aurons, who reached Tech Level 5 in Computing or the Kallikanzaroi, who reached Tech Level 5 in Weaponary, from also doing a limited amount of research. For the Kallikanzaroi in particular this breakthrough would mean that taking their homeworld would be quite hard for many turns to come.

Some other people were mainly focused on research however. Strata Inc. reached Tech Level 7 in Communications with the Worati breaking through to Tech Level 5 in Power Plant (the first empire to do so).

Turn 38

The Clangers continued their attack on the Jerandi People's Republic by interdicting the new Jerandi capital at K20. Although the Jerandi People's Republic had taken advantage of the respite provided by the attack on the Kallikanzaroi the improvements in the Clanger ships (from new technology discoveries) had overtaken these improvements and the Clangers took no losses whilst establishing their interdict. In addition the Clanger had now reached Tech Level 7 in Weaponary.

By this point the Federation (Kellsonians, Picans, Gobbanean Principalities and Strata Inc.) felt that it had done enough research between them to switch production over to producing ships. Far from having ignored the wars in the south of the map they had been biding their time. By using freighters to move ship components the federation was able to build ships using the best technologies from across their empires.

The Fleet used its Tech Level 6 in manuever drive to develop a system defence boat capable of a speed 25, the best ship speed attained in the game. This vessel also had Tech Level 4 computer so had it been involved a battle it would have acted before anything else.

Turn 37

The Aurons attack and capture E15 (and in the process cause the Kallikanzaroi to withdraw their surrender offer).

The Clangers attack and capture I19.

In the rest of the cluster however the major activity was the achievement of Tech Level 6 in a technology by three empires:

The Tech Level 6 Planetary Defence is the last breakthrough in that technology. That allowed the drahmini to select a new favoured technology and the immediate doubling of all research (new and existing) in that technology. When they heard about this several players misinterpreted this as implying that all the technology categories had a upper of 10,000 points (which was the level at which I had set the Tech Level 6 breakthough for Planetary Defence). The Drahmini's new favoured technology was Archaeology.

Turn 36

The Clangers now turn their attention back to the Jerandi People's Republic and attack both H16 and I19. The attack on H16 is merely a probe and fails, but the attack on I19 is success and establishes an interdict arond the world.

Due to a lack of follow-up the Kallikanzaroi capital at E13 is still merely interdicted. However it now has 90 Tech Level 4 marine companies.

Strata Inc. reaches Tech Level 4 in Power Plant.

Turn 35

An interesting turn for the Caffeinians as they are given M8 by Strata Inc. and lose M16 to the Fleet.

The rest of the map is relatively quite on this turn.

The Picans reach Tech Level 5 weaponary.