Players: Klaus Borek (Li-Halan), Dag Stålhandske (the Hazat), Hans Gravander (Decados until turn 5), Peter Liptak (Decados after turn 5), Patrik Pecival (Hawkwood) and Mikael Hansson (Al-Malik).

Map: it’s War 1.0 with some revisions to make Aragon and Delphi more attractive. Aragon received a few one-hex islands and Delphi got two fertile valleys.

Universal warehouse off, plague on.

The first 16 years, 4956-4971, was a period of relative peace in the sense that there was no conflict between the noble houses. Other conflicts abounded however. The Hazat, for instance, were at war with the rebels, the Vau, the Stigmata Garrison, the Imperial Guard, the Imperial Fleet and the symbiots. Apart from these minor wars, the period was characterised by two things: city trading and the triumvirate.

City trading means that one player gives up some cities and remove all forces from them so another player can conquer them. In return they change roles so another city can be taken by the one who gave up one. Typically one trades cities in such a way that you concentrate your cities to one or a few planets. The advantages of such planetary concentration are many, improved security, improved logistics and more tax income. The disadvantages are that you must trust the player you are trading with and that you must disband any garrison (=zero movement) units. If you trade away all your cities on a planet where you have a noble, that noble is, of course in a very vulnerable position. It should be noted that in It’s War 1.0, which we are playing, there are no house scepters, only what is called imperial scepters in Nova 2.1 and later. As a matter of fact, Richard developed the idea with house scepters to specifically counter city trading.

In slowgame city trading occurred along the following patterns:

House Li-Halan traded all their cities on Aragon and Delphi for the Hazat’s respectively house Hawkwood’s cities on Kish. House Decados and house Al-Malik, however, were unwilling to trade their cities on Kish, except for the church which house Al-Malik traded away, in exchange for a city on Istakhr.

The Hazat traded away all their cities on Kish, Istakhr and Delphi in return for all Li-Halan’s, Al-Malik’s and Hawkwood’s cities on Aragon. With the Decados they traded away all their cities on Holy Terra plus some cities on Severus in exchange for all Decados’ cities on Aragon. As a result, they were alone on Aragon.

House Decados was persuaded by the Hazat to trade their cities on Aragon for some cities on Severus and all of the Hazat’s cities on Holy Terra. They also traded all their cities on Delphi for all of house Hawkwood’s cities on Severus. They also traded a factory on Istakhr for a city on Severus.

House Hawkwood traded away all their cities on Aragon, Istakhr, Kish and Severus in return for all cities on Delphi.

House Al-Malik traded their cities on Aragon and Delphi for all of the Hazat’s and house Hawkwood’s cities on Istakhr. They also traded one more Istakhr city from each of house Li-Halan and house Decados. They were not willing to trade away more cities.

All of this city trading was not concluded by the end of the prelude period, but all agreements were made. Promises concerning the safety of lone nobles on planets dominated by other houses ("hostage nobles") were exchanged.

The other important thing during this period was a very far-reaching agreement between the Hazat, house Hawkwood and house Al-Malik. It was called the Treaty of the Grand Triumvirate. The complete treaty is rather long and complicated. Most important was that the triumvirs promised not to attack each other, to help each other if one was attacked and to research quickly while co-ordinating their research with each other and share all technologies. Later they also agreed that they should all vote for Al-Malik to become regent. House Hawkwood should have the imperial fleet, the Hazat should have the Stigmata Garrison and house Al-Malik the Imperial eye. The treaty would last for twenty turns. This was later changed to 22 turns.

Aragon was completely in the hands of Hazat with no cities belonging to any other player. There were also a "hostage noble" from each and every other house. The planet was extensively colonised, but suffered from lack of trace and lack of land.

Byzantium Secundus was pretty much as it was from the beginning, with some cities conquered from rebels, the imperial guard and the imperial fleet.

Delphi was completely in the hands of house Hawkwood with a hostage noble from each house. Without advanced bacteriology the development of this planet was limited by the food available.

Holy Terra was divided between the houses. The Hazat had promised all their cities on Holy Terra to house Decados. By this time, however, only two cities had actually changed hands.

Istakhr was dominated by house Al-Malik. Having been promised all the cities belonging to the Hazat and house Hawkwood house Al-Malik had not yet taken them all. Al-Malik had only traded two cities (one each) with Decados and Al-Malik, so these were present in some strength.

Kish was dominated by house Li-Halan. Having been promised all the cities belonging to the Hazat and house Hawkwood, house Li-Halan had not yet taken all of them. Li-Halan had only managed to trade one city with the Al-Malik (a church) and none with the Decados. The situation was thus quite similar to Istakhr. One important difference, however, was that while Istakhr had food in abundance, Kish being a jungle planet was lean on food when advanced bacteriology (which allows arboria) was not yet discovered.

Severus was not dominated by a single house. Decados had traded for some of the Hazat’s cities and all of house Hawkwood’s cities on Severus. All of house Hawkwood’s cities were not yet taken, however. The Hazat, on the other hand had conquered almost all of Vau’s cities and built many cities with the engineers (Vau workers can be disbanded to engineers) conquered. As a result, the Hazat held the most cities on Severus. More importantly they had the most and best troops. The conflict with the Vau had given many units experience and even allowed the Hazat to capture some Vau military units, including three fighters with 30(!) movement points.

Stigmata had not seen any city trading and the building of new cities was somewhat hampered by the lack of metal. Some new cities had appeared however and the Hazat had conquered two cities from the Stigmata Garrison.

It is interesting to note that only the Hazat and house Hawkwood managed to become alone on their planets Aragon and Delphi. This was probably because these planets were considered rather poor. Aragon lacked land and trace and Delphi lacked arable land before development of arboria.

Technologically the freighter had just been developed by the triumvirate but none had yet been built. The same thing was true about the close assault tank. House Li-Halan and house Decados had done some research but had only maybe three, four or five technologies. Still, the only superior technology unit the triumvirate had was hunter sub.

During this prelude the Hazat and house Al-Malik had planned and prepared a furious attack on house Decados. The attack was begun by house Al-Malik and followed by the Hazat. It was most successful. When Peter got the turn it was horrible reading. They lost twelve cities, four scepters and two nobles before they had the chance to move. Two of the cities lost were the only laboratories house Decados had, so they lost all their technologies. The Hazat’s air force, strengthened by captured Vau fighters was especially successful since Decados had neglected air defence.

House Decados rapidly lost their ability to resist on Severus. On Stigmata, Istakhr and Byzantium Secundus they managed to put up a more resilient resistance, but apart from a few counter-attacks on Istakhr, they lacked the ability to do anything else. On Holy Terra the Hazat kept their promise and gave up all the cities that had been promised to the Decados in exchange for cities on Aragon (which had already been taken by the Hazat). Likewise, the hostage noble on Aragon was promised that no harm should befall upon him despite the fact that the Decados held no similar hostage.

When the Hazat and house Al-Malik planned the attack on house Decados they were afraid that house Li-Halan would also attack house Decados (Hawkwood had already stated they would remain neutral) and thus rob them of some of their loot. Instead they found that in 4973, house Li-Halan attacked house Al-Malik. Quoting the relevant paragraph in the Treaty of the Grand Triumvirate house Al-Malik immediately demanded that the Hazat and house Hawkwood begin war upon house Li-Halan. They both complied. On one turn the Hazat captured all but three of Li-Halans many cities on Severus. Once again failure to build a good air defence proved costly. On Istakhr Al-Malik halted the Li-Halan offensive. House Hawkwood was not in a geographical position to contribute much to the effort against House Li-Halan, but they did sink a sub on Byzantium Secundus.

At this point Klaus, playing Li-Halan, expressed a will to leave the game. However, he apparently changed his mind and continued to play until 4975 when a counter-offensive from Al-Malik cost him his noble and much of his mobile forces on Kish. At that time he lost his will to continue and made suicide attacks with his last two remaining nobles. He was now out of the game and his cities and Li-Halan’s remaining units and cities became rebels. As a result, house Al-Malik and house Decados, who had traded few cities with house Li-Halan on Kish found themselves competing for the complex of cities immediately south of the agora. This was quite a prize, since it contained several scepters. The Hazat and Hawkwood had traded several cities on Kish and did not have very much to compete with, but the Hazat took the time to build hover units and send them to Kish. However, they were never to arrive because Hawkwood had plans on their own.

It had been agreed that 4977 would be the last turn during which the triumvirate lasted. At that time the triumvirate had lasted 22 years. While the Hazat and house Al-Malik were most interested in continuing the Treaty of the Grand Triumvirate, house Hawkwood declined. Especially house Al-Malik feared that this might result in Hawkwood giving away many of the triumvirates technologies for money to house Decados, since house Al-Malik was at war with house Decados on many fronts. The war between the Hazat and house Decados have shrunk to a low-intensity conflict due to lack of fronts to fight on.

Colonisation effort have begun and the Hazat are colonising Midian, Vera Cruz and Cadiz while Al-Malik is colonising Aylon and De Moley and while house Hawkwood are colonising Tethys and Leminkäinen.

Technologically the triumvirate had a great many technologies while house Decados have almost none.

The symbiots had moved some units to Stigmata inside the protective girdle of Stigmata Garrison’s forts, using their space ships. However, they made the mistake of dropping their units in small groups. They had not managed to keep any cities inside the girdle. At least one of their landers and several of their units had been destroyed. On the other hand, no symbiot nests had been destroyed, so nothing prevented them from building more units. On the other hand again, the humans had also increased their ground forces on Stigmata.

Catherine’s comment: So far, it seems that I have made two, possibly three mistakes. First, I should not have began war against the Stigmata Garrison. They are rather active with their officer corps units and quite an annoyance. The gain from what I have taken from Stigmata legion is smaller than the cost. Second, we should have waited one or two more years before attacking Decados so the attack on Stigmata could have been better prepared and so that all or at least more of Hawkwood’s cities on Severus had been transferred to Decados. As it was, when house Decados was defeated on Severus, house Hawkwood could keep those cities. Third, we should have insisted that technologies researched by the triumvirate should not be given to anyone outside the triumvirate, even after the triumvirate expires. It is, however, highly doubtful if I could have succeeded in this. Patrik wanted a shorter triumvirate than 20 years and might not have accepted triumvirate at all if some of its paragraphs would last forever. Therefore I don’t know if I can call this a mistake. I flawed triumvirate is certainly much better than no triumvirate at all.

Even before the triumvirate had ended house Hawkwood attempted diplomatic overtures towards house Al-Malik and, in blatant violation of the triumvirate agreement asked that this message should not be sent to the Hazat too. Comically, house Hawkwood accused the Hazat of "overexpansion" in that letter. The equivalent of giving a speeding ticket to a formula 1 driver. House Al-Malik was not interested. Instead, once the triumvirate ended, the Hazat and house Al-Malik signed a new agreement between the two of them. It was similar to the triumvirate but was intended to last for 15 years with another five years of military alliance and yet another five (total 25) years of non-aggression. This was called the Treaty of the Grand Parthership and in many ways similar to the previous Grand Triumvirate. However, this treaty was, unfortunately for the Hawkwoods, secret.

In the year 4979 Hawkwood attacked the Hazat, stating fear that the Hazat would outexpand them. (During this time the powergraph indicated that houses Al-Malik and Hawkwood were roughly equally strong with house Decados being a lot weaker and the Hazat about 60% stronger than either of house Hawkwood or house Al-Malik.) The initial attack was almost completely limited to space, taking out a third of the Hazat’s transport fleet and many valuable units carried by these, including a large hover contingent intended for Kish. The Hazat were less than well-prepared, having assumed that house Hawkwood would not dare to attack the Hazat without support from house Al-Malik. The Hazat had no space fleet, but immediately began producing a large number of space planes, using their impressive industrial capacity. When house Al-Malik honoured their agreement with the Hazat and attacked house Hawkwood in the year 4981 it was a nasty surprise for house Hawkwood. Catherine sent the message from the book of Daniel, 5th chapter, "Mene, mene tekel, u-farsin" prophesying that Hawkwood would be defeated by and divided between his enemies the Hazat and house Al-Malik.

On the ground, the Hazat immediately assaulted and took two of house Hawkwood’s three remaining cities on Severus. The last one was taken by house Al-Malik the same year. On Byzantium Secundus house Hawkwood managed to take two of Hazat’s Cities in 4981. On Stigmata house Hawkwood lost one city in 4981 and another two in 4982 to the Hazat. With that, they had lost all their mines and thus the ability to build new units. It was only a matter of time before Hawkwood would be completely thrown out of Stigmata. There was delay in this, however, due to the fact that both Decados and Hawkwood soon found themselves with only a sea well and an arborium left. The sea well was hard to capture due to it’s location on water and if the arborium was captured first, starvation and plague would occur. Unfortunately for them, however, Hawkwood’s well was placed next to the shore, so it could be attacked by conventional land forces. On Istakhr, houses Hawkwood and Decados made embittered resistance and often counterattacked. Especially house Hawkwood managed to cause some problems for house Al-Malik by active use of sea forces. However, in the long run, their forces stood little chance against house Al-Malik’s forces without reinforcements and they couldn’t send any. On Kish house Hawkwood attacked a Hazat arborium in 4983, but the next year the Hazat managed to bring in reinforcements to Kish the next year and vigorously counterattacked, killing a Hawkwood noble, Stax’ cousin, in the process. Catherine of Hazat sent Stax of house Hawkwood his cousin’s energy shield and a fish, signifying that his cousin now "sleeps with the fishes". His transport had perished beneath the waves. House Hawkwood also lost their only source of metal on Kish on that turn, preventing them from building new units. On Holy Terra house Hawkwood was much more successful. Since the Hazat had voluntarily left Holy Terra it was relatively easy for house Hawkwood and house Decados to capture house Li-Halan’s holdings when Li-Halan left the game. Al-Malik’s holdings were too far away in Northern America to contest these cities. In 4983 house Hawkwood attacked house Al-Malik's holdings and captured the Al-Malik’s only factory, robbing them of the chance to build more advanced units.

As a result, it seemed already in 4984 that house Hawkwood and house Decados would lose all holdings on Stigmata, Istakhr and Kish. On Aragon and Severus, they had already lost all cities. On the other hand, it seemed that they would win on Holy Terra. As a result, they would find themselves concentrated to the planets in the immediate vicinity of Delphi: Tethys, Artemis, Holy Terra and Byzantium Secundus. This would mean that the war would be rather far from house Al-Malik, leaving most of the fighting to the Hazat.

In space house Hawkwood landed two space planes on Vera Crus and one on Cadiz, waiting for an unsuspecting transport or bulk hauler to appear. The Hazat however, correctly guessed this, (but incorrectly assumed that there were other space planes on Sutek). Therefore they sent no transports to these areas. Through their excellent air force (including three Vau air fighters with 30 movement points!) the Hazat found the space plane on Cadiz’ north pole and captured it with a hover scout unit. This caused the space planes on Vera Crus to enter orbit. In 4984, the Hazat sent in four space planes and took them out.

One more thing should be said about the great war against the Hawkwood: it was a fairly honourable one. Despite the fact that the war was no doubt a breach of a minor "spheres of interest"-agreement that the Hazat and Hawkwood had made, generally the combatants stood by their word in agreements made previously. The nobles stranded were allowed to be picked up and taken home without interference. Technology exchanges agreed upon previously were performed despite the war. As soon as the war broke out there was even an agreement between house Hawkwood and the Hazat that neither of them should sign the so-called Holy Writ to get the other excommunicated. Buying excommunication from the Patriarch through other means was OK.

When the triumvirate ended in 4977 the triumvirate’s joint effort had resulted in a great many technologies.. Mastiff Mega Tank, Bulk Hauler and Advanced Bacteriology (which allows arboria) were among the these. With the Treaty of the Grand Partnership the Hazat and house Al-Malik continued their cooperation and even increased the speed of the research. House Hawkwood began to cooperate with house Decados and gave the technologies discovered by the triumvirate to the mantis house. This house however had lost the mojority of their original holdings and could not help house Hawkwood much in their research efforts. As a result the Hazat and house Al-Malik began to outdistance house Hawkwood and house Decados in technologies.

At first all noble houses aimed at getting new and better space superiority fighters and related technologies, space planes, PTS, starbases and various forms of space ships. As soon as the partners the Hazat and house Al-Malik had most of what they wanted, they had a look at the forbidden technologies. So far no one had braved the wrath of the powerful Church by researching forbidden techs, and for good reasons. The church has a fairly impressive space fleet (by the standards of the 4980s of slowgame), some good troops and, worst of all the ability to excommunicate a noble house, resulting in a net loss of 30% loyalty for five years. Also the house rules makes it hard to make peace with the church once you are at war with them.

Catherine of Hazat, however, had no plans to go to war with the church. Her plan was to get the technologies cyberfighter, DNA legion and doppelganger, which are not forbidden by themselves but they are situated "behind" forbidden technologies. You need proscribed technologies in order to be able to research them. This gives you the ability to research the forbidden technology and the technology you need immediately after that. As soon as you have it you can strike the forbidden technology. In this particular case the Hazat first developed wetware deliberately drawing the attention of the inquisition to themselves and proceeded to develop Neurocellular Surgery and gave that non-forbidden tech to house Al-Malik. When the inquisition had reached Aragon, the Hazat removed the forbidden wetware technology and house Al-Malik began researching Viral DNA, Dormant Virus, Cyberpilot, Doppelganger and DNA Legion. For a while it seemed the they would not have time to get it all, but the church did not move its ships in the most effective manner and the last technology was ready just in time in 4989.

As part of the treaty of the Grand Triumvirate, house Hawkwood, house Al-Malik and the Hazat had agreed that Hakim of house Al-Malik should be elected regent and he should appoint Al-Malik to minister of the Imperial Fleet and appoint Catherine of the Hazat minister of the Stigmata Garrison. He should appoint himself minister of the Imperial Eye. On the It’s War map, the ministeries are a lot less impressive than in standard game. On top of this, the Hazat had already captured a few cities from the Stigmata Garrison and the Imperial Fleet. For some reason, the game behaved in such a manner that Al-Malik could not appoint house Hawkwood to Minister of Imperial Fleet. As a result, the players agreed not to appoint any ministers at all until next election. Al-Malik, however, did get the Regency.

In 4987, the Hazat space force invaded Tethys orbit with eight space planes carried by two bulk haulers. They found and shot down two Hawkwood freighters and a space plane in orbit around that planet. In the same year, Stax signed the Holy writ in return for having the Cadiz Dreadnought proscribed by the church. Since Hazat and Al-Malik had the Dreadnought technology but Hawkwood hadn’t it seemed like a good idea. Indeed, if it had worked, it would have caused quite some problems since the Hazat were building two Dreadnought at that time. Unfortunately, the Patriarch does not keep such promises. (I.e. the game has a bug, so technologies that are not proscribed from the beginning do not stay proscribed.) In 4988 the Hazat moved their space force of eight space planes and two Bulk Haulers to Delphi, only to find that house Hawkwood had gathered a cruiser, a starbase, two spaceplanes and a freighter there. In the ensuing battle the Hawkwood fleet was shot down with some casualties for the Hazat. The Hazat fleet withdrew to Tethys. When they landed a small recon force on Tethys in 4990 the Hazat were pleasantly surprised to find that house Hawkwood had had problems producing enough food for their cities and units. Since the Hazat controlled the airspace above they could not bring in food from Delphi. Now house Hawkwood had been forced to disband several garrison units, making it easy for the Hazat recon force to capture many cities, including a farm. That of course made house Hawkwoods food problem much worse. Catherine of Hazat did not wish for starvation on Tethys and promised house Hawkwood that if they brought in food from space, the ship bringing in food would not be attacked. House Hawkwood did bring in food the next year and starvation ceased.

In the meantime the tendency on other planets continued. Decados lost their last city on Istakhr in 4987, the same year Hawkwood lost their last city on Kish. In 4989 the Decados lost their last city on Stigamata. Two years later Hawkwook lost their last city on that planet. Thus, in 4991 only two planets were shared by enemies: Hawkwood still had a few cities on Istakhr and on Tethys the Hazat was conquering Hawkwoods cities. On both these planets it was obvious that house Hawkwood would lose. On top of this, the gathering space fleet over Tethys could move to Delphi at any time and attack any ships in orbit (space planes can be transported and attack on the same turn). This made space transport to Delphi perilous for house Hawkwood.

By now it was exceedingly obvious who was going to win. At the beginning of turn 37, year 4992, the Hazat’s move, the score were Li-Halan eliminated, the Hazat: 5094, house Decados:534, house Hawkwood: 1220 and house A-Malik 1831. In other words, the Hazat had as many points as all other houses put together and more than 40% extra. On top of this, house Al-Malik and the Hazat had a very strong alliance so house Hawkwood was in a worse position than indicated by just the points. While house Al-Malik had the regency and actually one more scepter than the Hazat, they had no hope of capturing more scepters. The Hazat on the other hand had good hopes about capturing house Hawkwood’s scepters in the long run and if necessary also those of the Church and League. Leagueheim and Holy Terra was very close to Aragon and other rich, Hazat-controlled planets. Also, the Hazat was by far the strongest on Byzantium Secundus and could probably hunt down and kill all other nobles on Byzantium Secundus with their doppelgangers that were being built.

Therefore, all houses agreed to accept Catherine of the Hazat as Empress. Her reign failed to live up to the high expectations on peace that people held after 37 years of war. Her people considered her resignation to a competent successor when she was beginning to become senile at old age her wisest decision as Empress. The historians beg to disagree and point out that many of Catherine’s reforms brought rich harvest many decades after her death. It was her successors who could reap that harvest. Politics, as Catherine often pointed out herself, is not fair.

The power graph summarises the events of the game fairly well.

Li-Halan’s curve: The Li-Halan grew less swiftly than other houses and was after a few turns the weakest house. This was partially because they had city traded to get cities on the jungle planet Kish. It took some time to take those cities they had been promised. On turn 18 they went to war with the Al-Malik and were attacked by the triumvirate. This caused a rapid decline. After that the last noble suicided and the player left the game.

The Hazat’s curve: Sometime around turn 7 or 8 the Hazat were in the lead on the powergraph. This is somehow misleading however. The Hazat had taken the cities they had been promised in city trading, but had not yet been asked to give up the cities they had traded away. However the Hazat soon had successful wars against the vau on Severus, against the Decados with Al-Malik as allies and against house Li-Halan with both Al-Malik and house Hawkwood as allies. In these wars they managed to take a lion’s share of the opponent’s cities. As a result, the Hazat grew decisively until turn 20 even if they now had to give up the cities they had traded away. With these extra resources and good management they were growing quickly. So quickly house Hawkwood thought they had to do something about it. The curve shows a distinct halt of growth as result of Hawkwood’s attack that was initially quite successful in shooting down or grounding Hazat space tranports. However, the Hazat had superiour resources and were soon back in growth, while stymying house Hawkwood’s growth.

House Decados curve: House Decados was a slow-growing house but still fairly strong, when the Hazat and house Al-Malik attacked. The curve clearly demonstrates how house Decados plummetted as a result from that attack. Immediately thereafter they slowly built up a position of strength on Holy Terra, while losing cities on all other planets. As a result the curve shows little net growth at all.

House Hawkwood’s curve: House Hawkwood grew fairly steadily, albeit slower than the Hazat, until war against the Hazat began. Almost immediately after that, growth halted completely and somewhere around turn 30 house Al-Malik passed them. On turn 33 they lost the majority of their space fleet in a battle against the Hazat and Tethys was slowly being gobbled up by the Hazat. Space transport to Delphi was perilous.

House Al-Malik’s curve: al-Malik’s curve shows a steady, but slow growth. From turn 20 to turn 27 the growth seemed to speed up, but when Al-Malik went to war with house Hawkwood house Al-Malik lost their cities on Holy Terra which somewhat slowed their growth.

All in all, there was apparently two decisive points in the game. The first one occurred when the Hazat managed to get the largest share of the Decados’ and Li-Halan’s cities. The second one came when house Hawkwood failed to get house Al-Malik to side with them in house Hawkwood’s war against the Hazat. Instead house Al-Malik sided with the Hazat. By the time the Hazat defeated house Hawkwood’s space fleet the game had already been decided. Even a surprising Hawkwood victory here would not have saved house Hawkwood.

If the opponent neglects air defence an air force can be terribly effective. Unfortunately AA guns can be built anywhere and are cheap, so it will not remain effective very long.

A triumvirate-like agreement can be very powerful, but it requires a great deal of trust and much work to actually achieve such a far-reaching agreement. Later versions of the It’s War map contains some specific anti-triumvirate measures.

Attacking the Vau can be a very promising endeavour, they are very passive.

Attacking Stigmata Garrison is not a good idea.

The symbiots seems to be a moderate menace in It’s War.

Expansion on Aragon is limited by lack of trace, which can be alleviated once you discover freighter by purchasing trace from the large stocks on Byzantium Secundus. The landmass is also small. On the other hand, the proximity to Byzantium Secundus with its very large amounts of resources for sale in the agorae is an asset.

Expansion on Delphi, Kish and Holy Terra is limited by lack of food until you discover advanced bacteriology (allows arboria). Delphi has no exotica. Exotica is scarce on Aragon and Istakhr. All in all, Istakhr seems to be the best-balanced planet.

Expansion on Severus is limited both by lack of food until discovery of advanced bacteriology. There is also a lack of energy. Both of these can be alleviated by attacking the Vau that have both good wells and arboria.

Dag’s (the Hazat’s) method to sell all resources that will not be used or transported within the next few turns appears to be superior to the other players’ method to keep everything that they do not need to sell to pay for expenses thinking that it might be needed some time later. Dag’s method allows you surplus money to purchase resources needed from agorae, albeit at a higher price, and also gives the opponent less booty in the form of saved resources in case of a sudden attack. The Hazat often managed to capture three- or even four-figure amounts of resources from enemy cities.

The great leap forward can, with some difficulty, be done without angering the church or losing too many labs. It should be remembered that the church does not appear to move it’s inquisitors completely predictably (i.e. fastest route to nearest lab containing forbidden tech), so it may be hard to know exactly how long time you have before they arrive. Since the best personnel unit (doppelganger) the best military unit (DNA legion) and the best space plane (archangel cyberfighter) can all be reached by the great leap forward, making it rather tempting. This description applies to Nova 2.0. There has been an overhaul of what technologies are forbidden in Nova 2.3.

Lamp of Knowledge and Zebulon’s Spade does not seem to work. Scythe of bounty and Cup of Righteous Plenty does, however.