Terra Invicta

[Geezer]

Started my first game as The Resistance wo I can get the tutorial tooltips.  My first goal is to take over Kazakhstan since it has a good boost capability and my son was born there.   :)

Longer term goal will be to take over Russia for some mission control capability and to merge it with Kazakhstan.  Also my daughter was born in Russia.   :)

[Geezer]

RNGesus hates me!  I have failed at least 5 missions in a row with a 75% chance of success on each!   

[Jarhead0331]

For those of you who are playing, I'm curious if you've found any creative strategies that work in the early game. My impulse thus far has been to focus on recruiting councilors who specialize in persuasion and who generate influence in order to seize control points. These tend to be academics, celebrities, and activists. The best viable strategy, at least the most obvious, for the early game seems to be to just try to take as many control points as fast as possible so that your faction can begin directing national development in spots across the globe. I can't really think of anything else viable.

As a secondary objective, I also invest in the sciences, although I'm still too new at the game to have developed particular strategies as far as what technologies are best to invest in. My approach thus far has been to invest most heavily in those techs that will further the overarching goal of swaying public opinion and taking control points. 

I have no idea how these strategies will play out in the mid or late game, or whether other strategies would yield different, but equally successful results.

Thoughts? Ideas?

[ArizonaTank]

For those of you who are playing, I'm curious if you've found any creative strategies that work in the early game. My impulse thus far has been to focus on recruiting councilors who specialize in persuasion and who generate influence in order to seize control points. These tend to be academics, celebrities, and activists. The best viable strategy, at least the most obvious, for the early game seems to be to just try to take as many control points as fast as possible so that your faction can begin directing national development in spots across the globe. I can't really think of anything else viable.

As a secondary objective, I also invest in the sciences, although I'm still too new at the game to have developed particular strategies as far as what technologies are best to invest in. My approach thus far has been to invest most heavily in those techs that will further the overarching goal of swaying public opinion and taking control points. 

I have no idea how these strategies will play out in the mid or late game, or whether other strategies would yield different, but equally successful results.

Thoughts? Ideas?

There may be better strategies, but initially I did the same as you. But as I came closer to my cp cap, I let go of some of the politicians and replaced them with space/scientists and operations folks. The operators to start blocking rivals, and protecting my key peeps. One guy I got good use out of, was a business tycoon who was great at stealing organizations from the rivals.

Although I will say it is hard to cut the cord to a guy you have been using alot. After all, you have probably invested quite a bit in their skills, and then you just cut them loose...hard, but necessary.

[Jarhead0331]

For those of you who are playing, I'm curious if you've found any creative strategies that work in the early game. My impulse thus far has been to focus on recruiting councilors who specialize in persuasion and who generate influence in order to seize control points. These tend to be academics, celebrities, and activists. The best viable strategy, at least the most obvious, for the early game seems to be to just try to take as many control points as fast as possible so that your faction can begin directing national development in spots across the globe. I can't really think of anything else viable.

As a secondary objective, I also invest in the sciences, although I'm still too new at the game to have developed particular strategies as far as what technologies are best to invest in. My approach thus far has been to invest most heavily in those techs that will further the overarching goal of swaying public opinion and taking control points. 

I have no idea how these strategies will play out in the mid or late game, or whether other strategies would yield different, but equally successful results.

Thoughts? Ideas?

There may be better strategies, but initially I did the same as you. But as I came closer to my cp cap, I let go of some of the politicians and replaced them with space/scientists and operations folks. The operators to start blocking rivals, and protecting my key peeps. One guy I got good use out of, was a business tycoon who was great at stealing organizations from the rivals.

Although I will say it is hard to cut the cord to a guy you have been using alot. After all, you have probably invested quite a bit in their skills, and then you just cut them loose...hard, but necessary.

Yes. This is exactly my plan. Once sufficient control is established and councilors with influence are no longer top priority, I was planning on replacing them with others who have skills more appropriate for the next phase of the game.

[Ian C]

For those of you who are playing, I'm curious if you've found any creative strategies that work in the early game. My impulse thus far has been to focus on recruiting councilors who specialize in persuasion and who generate influence in order to seize control points. These tend to be academics, celebrities, and activists. The best viable strategy, at least the most obvious, for the early game seems to be to just try to take as many control points as fast as possible so that your faction can begin directing national development in spots across the globe. I can't really think of anything else viable.

As a secondary objective, I also invest in the sciences, although I'm still too new at the game to have developed particular strategies as far as what technologies are best to invest in. My approach thus far has been to invest most heavily in those techs that will further the overarching goal of swaying public opinion and taking control points. 

I have no idea how these strategies will play out in the mid or late game, or whether other strategies would yield different, but equally successful results.

Thoughts? Ideas?

Watch out for hostile takeovers by the AI. Guard your best assets: I spent most of my game building a solid base of CPs in nations, the U.S.A being a tough nut to crack, but I eventually got all of it and was able to cut loose a lot of smaller nations with less resources, to free up my CP cap limit.

I left the U.S. undefended for a little while, while my counsellors were on other ops, and two groups then took the entire nation in a sudden revolution. It was a stunning move by the AI. It left me reeling, trying to salvage other minor nations I had CPs in.

Another tip I read about is to turn a rival councillor from another group to join you. If you do this, you have access to all intel on the other organisation. Locations of their councillors, projects, everything.

[Geezer]

Brand new to the game so take this with a large does of salt.

My initial moves were pretty focused rather than just grabbing easily available control points.  As mentioned above we went to Kazakhstan first for the Boost capability.  We then focused on Russia to get some Mission Control and, more or less, start rebuilding the former Soviet Union.  It has a decent economy and lots of nukes to discourage anyone else from considering nuking our territory.  We have a couple of councilors who specialize in operations that have been picking off rival councilors as they pop up, and otherwise stirring up trouble for the other factions.  We have a non-aggression pact with the Humanity First faction since they are closest to us in alignment.

We are lagging a bit in influence due to having a couple of assassins and we are also a bit behind on science.  The former just means we have to pick our countries carefully.  The latter means we have been content to let the other factions set the early research topics.  My hope is we will be in a good position to take the lead when the space race starts soon.

We're also probably behind on picking up organizations, but the hope is we'll be better positioned to get some as more become available.  I've read they are a key part of the game.

Next steps will involve consolidating our holdings and improving what we control while looking for ops to thwart the other factions.

We did just crackdown and then purge an opponent from North Korea (I forget which faction) as I've read having that one nuke is a pretty safe way to nuke an opponent without triggering mutually assured destruction for the world.  It also takes a nuke out of an opponents hand.  Speaking of nukes, so far nobody has gone for the US or China.  Unlikely we'd ever have enough cap space to take either but we should be in a position to keep anyone else from controlling them for now.

[ArizonaTank]

Also, watch out for the AI turning your folks a few game years in. Some of my best folks had shaky loyalty. I had to find a council member who had "inspire" to keep my guys in line.

[Ian C]

Also - early game it's a good start to control nations that have 2 control points. If you get the first control point, it locks out other organisations from the nation because the last control point of a nation is the one that can't be won by an outsider takeover.

so far nobody has gone for the US or China.  Unlikely we'd ever have enough cap space to take either but we should be in a position to keep anyone else from controlling them for now.

The U.S. is difficult to control. Once you get enough Influence and support to take it over, the other control points are fairly easy to win. However it's vital you place a few councillors on guard duty otherwise the AI does bad things to take it off you...

[SirAndrewD]

My strategy was first....to do a few restarts until I got some good RNG on start position stats and councilors.   ;D

Good old Civ style.

But, what has worked for me thus far was taking Central America then Mexico and Canada.   That while doing lots of public campaigns in the US.  After getting all 6 US control points (Got one lucky turn where I nabbed three at once, one on a 7% chance) I abandoned everything but the US and then pumped all my work into stability, public support and fortifying my nodes. 

The US actually is quite disunited and not too stable at start, makes it vulnerable to Coups.

Once I had the  US I worked on my Admin score on my councilors to get enough cap to steal Kazakhstan away from Humanity First.  I'm now fortifying there, meet my cap one point under, and control all the boost.

It's the start of 2024 and I have a moon base and control the science race with the US's might.  I really need a military councilor with high command but I'm trying to slog through without one. 

My main concern now is that India is in control of the Servants and there's some weird flora and fauna popping up there.  I've got some of my agitator councilors on the ground there now and it might be time for some light regime change. 

Seems like the open went well.  I won't like I watched a lot of videos, especially the ones by Perun before I even installed the game, so hopefully the info gave me a leg up.

The tutorial in game is very lacking compared to what Youtube has available.

[Geezer]

Just finished up the first year of my first game.  Took me just under 8 hours according to Steam.

We continue to build up the Eurasian alliance and hope to add the Baltic States as soon as we figure out how to get them out of the EU.  We're still fighting for complete control of Belarus.  Had to abandon a few of the Asian minor countries to stay under the cap.  Also about ready to add Finland to our group.  I believe there is a way to get all these countries united somehow so that one Defend mission will cover them all.  No idea how to do that yet.

We turned a councilor from the Initiative and have been able to keep good tabs on their activities.  We just assassinated one of their councilors along with one from the boot licking Servants.  Our non-aggression pact with Humanity First has held up although they don't seem to be doing particularly well in the game.  Maybe I'm just not understanding what they are up to.

We had to take control of a global research project to push through Mission to the Moon as none of the factions seemed willing to start it.  It just completed and we immediately sent a probe there.  We should have enough boost to get at least one base started after the probe sends back it's findings in a few more days.

"You're going to the Moon!"  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98qw86DsdZ0

[Geezer]

A new video on how to deal with the alien threat level.  First 8 minutes are mostly spoiler free and then he dives into the details:

Tried wrapping it with the Youtube button but it didn't work for some reason.  Shows a broken link even though clicking on it takes me there.

[Jarhead0331]

^fixed it for you,

[Geezer]

Great, thanks.  No sure what I did wrong.

[SirAndrewD]

Going to tear into this one after lunch. 

I really feel like I'm starting to get underwater though.  I know I made the decision to take the US and eat my cap with it, but it's putting me in a situation where the Servants are running wild with mind contro....er....public support in the far east. 

I was shocked when I saw India go from 80% support for my faction (I'd been running campaigns there) to 70% support for Servants and total control overnight.   Their popularity is over 70% in China and growing.  Scary portents indeed.  I don't want to go hog wild and send in the Army but I can't let the Servants get China. 

In space, that's where I'm kinda stuck.  I've got three moonbases and researched mining, but still can't really extract anything.  They're just kinda thee.  I heard it's pointless to build space stations in orbit early, but I've got ALL the boost in the world to play with and don't want it to just sit there.  2025 is coming and maybe the game is in a really early state but I just don't felt like I've done enough.