All righty then. Looking over the situation, I can already see some major changes from the game that I was playing before. The most obvious difference is the presence of my shiny new Champion, a Human Shadow Frigate which I have christened the Tom Servo and outfitted with two shield modules, two MLRS systems, and four Laser Cannons. My fleet ships should be able to clear away the annoyances, I think, while the Servo deals with the major threats.
Secondly, I appear to have several new installations hovering around my homeworld Command Center - namely, a Mercenary Space Dock, several Cryogenic Pods, and two Human Cities. I've never seen the latter two before, but they're giving me resources with the only downside being an AIP increase if they're destroyed. Since them ever getting destroyed would mean I'm already dead, as the AI would literally be just outside my front door, I'm not too concerned about that, so HEY FREE RESOURCES.
Forrester, fortunately, seems to be quite resource-rich, with five Metal and seven Crystal, and Space Planes are cheap to manufacture. While I send my two starting Scouts out to check out the nearby planets, I set my Space Dock up on loop to fill up my fleet ship caps, as well as building some more Scouts so I can go see what else is out there.
On the research side, I snag Mark II Metal and Crystal Harvesters, as well as Mark II Economic Command Stations. That leaves me with 2000 Knowledge in the bank to figure out the rest of what I want, but I figure that having access to more cash is never a bad thing, and upgraded resources gatherers will allow my Space Dock to churn out ships that much faster without emptying the bank.
Initial scouting reports come in from the three AI worlds bordering Forrester. This immediately looks like much more of a challenge than last game. I like it.
I've named the three planets bordering Forrester Mike, Pearl, and Joel. Mike is nothing special, really, and is the least-defended of the three by a wide margin despite the fact that it has a Fortress. I want to get rid of it even though it isn't really a threat, though, because it has an Astro Train station on it. With one of those stations so close to my home planet, it's likely that I'd be dealing with Astro Trains plowing through my defenses on a regular basis, so capturing Mike is my priority at the moment.
Joel is the planet that sits at the edge of the cluster, providing one of the only two bridges out to the other areas of the map. I'm very probably going to have to take Joel eventually, but at the moment, it's not feasible. Not only does Joel have another Fortress, it's got a Warhead Interceptor, two Starships, and an Armor Inhibitor. Given that I can spam Space Planes (which don't have any armor anyway and so aren't affected by the Armor Inhibitor), I think I'll be able to take it once I get some more resources.
Pearl is the planet leading deeper into the cluster, and is quite intimidating at this point. It's got a Black Hole Machine, Radar Jammer, and a Counterattack Command Post. But I'm going to have to take it eventually, since there's a Core Shield Generator there.
I'm going to start fortifying Forrester and prepare to launch my initial attack on Mike. Capturing it is my ultimate goal, but at the very least I want to get rid of that Train Station.
