Thanks to TradeWars legend Hekate, I'm able to present a fully intact archive of [twlinks.com](/files/Site%20Caps/TWLinks/index.html). The old site is back online with as many working links as I could salvage. As part of the restoration, Hekate also sent copies of [TW Nationals 2004](/files/Site%20Caps/TWNationals2004/), [Terra](/files/Site%20Caps/TERRA/), and [old](/files/Site%20Caps/TWLinks/index.html) [copies](/files/Site%20Caps/TradeWars2002UsefulLinks/) of twlinks.com. To celebrate, Hekate shared an old interview that I'm posting here (from the old website, Black Sun): **How and when did you get started in Tradewars?** In 1993 a friend gave me a modem (2400 baud), installed it on my 8088, and got me signed on a Local DLS BBS named Dreamscape. He and a few others took me into this game of TradeWars, told me what to do, made me evil, sent me twHelper, and somewhat guided me along. It wasn't until 1996 when I got tired of dying on local BBS's that I ventured out in search of learning, where I ended up on ECN. Shark (author of TWATS) was game op and they had some good competition. Over time I hooked up with TheGuru and Angel who then took me to FAMENT in 1997. My first game there I was corped up under a great CEO named Monday. Just prior to that time, bbs.paul.com died and those "great" players moved to FAMENT - so there I was, playing with the best of the best. I left TW in Oct. 1998 and went on "Vacation" for a couple years, returning after TWGS was released (somewhere around end 2000) **Who has been your major influence/influencers in the game?** My play has been influenced by MANY great players over the years, but the ones that stick out are: SHARK - he guided me with use of his helper TWATS and personal tips along the way ANGEL - who invited me along to FAMENT and gave me the chance to corp with some of the best HVS players of all time. She also taught me lots, although I don't think she ever really liked me Jack Box - for being my first main corp mate. We played and learned together for many years before parting ways. hELLCAT - he'll never know how much I learned from him just by watching him play. hELLCAT's gotta be the most influential in my TW career. I was honored to corp with him many times and be the "backup" picking up peaces and reminding of those little things...like....don't forget you got a photon on board...or...you may wanna get more figs! (as he's flying around with 3 figs on ship) heh probably the most fun player I've corped with. **Who do you normally corp with?** I have corped with many great players (and taught many players) over the years. I've had two permacorps of my own and currently have joined up with TimboRulez to help run Star Endeavors. **Who have been your favorite people to play with over the years? why?** I couldn't possibly list all my favorite people to play with/against - or this would be 30 pages long. But the highlight players are: GraveDigr - Above all, my favorite corp mate. He quickly became my right hand man after accepting him to a TWLeague training corp. He rose to being the only player to date to win all 4 main tourneys in a row. Jack Box - for being there attitude and all for as long as he was. The years were enjoyable Xide - for being Xide, great player, great scripter, great guy overall...and the silly things...like killing corpies by accident (hehehe) Vader - he gets the job done, doesn't complain much, and is fun to chat with - in or out of TW **Are there any individuals you would like to play with but never had the opportunity?** I think I have played with just about everyone I set out to play with. I like to corp with everyone, especially those that have a desire to learn the details of the game. I have more fun teaching then just playing. **Any Major games you have won? when and with whom?** BOTE 03: Blue Adept, Phoe6e, Angus Thermopyle, Big12ozHog, Nudo, Reaper USO 02: Xide, Gravedigr, hELLCAT, Hekate, Speedy, Rave WTC 01: Prestone, The Reverend, Res Judicata, hELLCAT, Hekate, Gravedigr (+16 others) **What programs/helpers are part of your TW arsenal?** SWATH, ZOC, and TWX trio **Where are the main servers you play now?** I play where the tourneys are, or where good games may be - no specific server is home **Which servers are your favorite to play and why?** In today's tradewars I don't have a favorite server. **Any advice you could give to a newer player just entering TW?** Keep an open mind and gain any knowledge you can from EVERYONE. Don't get an ego that your better then everyone else - cuz there is ALWAYS someone better you can learn from. **What would you like your legacy in TW to be after you are gone from the community?** Gone from Tradewars? Are you nuts? It's not possible! I guess I'd be best known for teaching those willing to learn...and hosting the 2nd longest lived tradewars site... www.twlinks.com **Are there any TW projects you are a part of that you are excited about?** Most of the main helpers have some sort of idea feature I had input on. I also help JP directly on how players would react to changes he has in mind and if the change is for the better of the game. **Any last thoughts you would like to give?** Port ROB formula is ohhand/.9 Ports ALWAYS give you exactly 90% of actual amount

I've never heard of [this](https://web.archive.org/web/20050000000000*/https://goffconcepts.com/products/windows/gath/index.html). It's currently free. To be honest, I'm thinking it might have to stay free to compete. Would anyone buy a helper anymore now that TWXProxy is open source, and sites like [Grimy Trader](https://web.archive.org/web/20050000000000*/https://www.grimytrader.com) will hook you up with what you need?

(posted on behalf of RammaR) The new script site, [www.grimytrader.com](https://web.archive.org/web/20050000000000*/https://www.grimytrader.com), is up and running! I will be out of town for the next week so I wanted to get the site published before leaving. The script library is fully operational and supports TWX 2.02 / 2.03, Swath, and Zoc or Attac script formats. Uploading scripts is easy if you have some you'd like to publish. The forum area isn't added in yet but will be the next focus as well as a user rating system for the scripts. Thanks to everyone who provided input and ideas, but especially to CK who's been very patient as I've learned. -RammaR-

There aren't too many people who have done more than Xide. But even in retirement, he's making one of the biggest contributions ever... [the complete source to TWX Proxy!](https://web.archive.org/web/20050000000000*/https://www.twxproxy.com/) I wish you well, and believe me, we ALL understand.

big12ozHog has released the ST BOT, a multifunction bot script for TWX. Download available at The Lost Traders Tavern's Script page ([https://tavern.homeip.net](https://web.archive.org/web/20040000000000*/https://tavern.homeip.net)).

Hauck Minogna wrote, "Please put in files section or where ever it'll get nice exposure :P Only thing is not to put my email there if that's ok, I hate spam. I tested it all the way down to a win98 rev1 333Mhz directX 8.1. " Download mapper.zip [here](/files/The__Mad__Hatter's__TW2002__File__Archive/Player__Utils/Dos-Wintel) to try it out. Don't forget, you must be a member of the site to use the file area.

Ok, my biggest problem is opening the games on time. I'm a forgetful soul, so I've written a little script to do it for me and scheduled it. The game tonight will open by itself tonight at 6. No more late openings! wooo

**Macros, I guess I am writing this as the master hC is unavailable. I learned the best combat macros playing with hC during WTC2001. I have since trained several peeps in the Art of Combat with zoc/twx The focus of this article will be ZOC user buttons and RES-Macros.** **First off current version of ZOC has 32 user defined buttons. 20 user defined Fkeys, 32 Auto Replies and 32 Auto Macros. We shall cover the 32 user defined buttons, using my set up as example.** **Ok 32 buttons here is a view of standard.zoc in the zoc/options folder. err well I have 31 here, leaving 1 button for on the fly use.** ``` [OPTS_MACROS] UserDesc#00="game" UserDesc#01="XPORT" UserDesc#02="SD" UserDesc#03="Voids" UserDesc#04="Ansi" UserDesc#05="Zone" UserDesc#06="Buy EQ" UserDesc#07="Buy Ore" UserDesc#08="Kill Port" UserDesc#09="Move" UserDesc#10="PAIR" UserDesc#11="Mega Buy" UserDesc#12="Sell" UserDesc#13="MEGA" UserDesc#14="LAND 38" UserDesc#15="NS Dock" UserDesc#16="STOP" UserDesc#17="a999" UserDesc#18="SD1" UserDesc#19="SD2" UserDesc#20="SD3" UserDesc#21="SD4" UserDesc#22="SD5" UserDesc#23="SD6" UserDesc#24="SD7" UserDesc#25="SD8" UserDesc#26="SD9" UserDesc#27="Tdrop" UserDesc#28="HOLO 2" UserDesc#29="CASH" UserDesc#30="Photon-Move" UserDesc#31="Pdrop" UserValue#00="rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr" UserValue#01="x1^Mq" UserValue#02="uy^M.^Mc" UserValue#03="cv0^Myyq" UserValue#04="cn1qqd" UserValue#05="^RUN=SCRIPT everend_zonedeploy.ZRX" UserValue#06="$ss2_BuyDown^M30^M0^M" UserValue#07="$ss2_BuyDown^M10^M0^M" UserValue#08="pay20000^M^M" UserValue#09="$ss1_Move^M" UserValue#10="^RUN=jackalpair.txt" UserValue#11="^RUN=SCRIPT everend_class7.zrx" UserValue#12="^RUN=_port_negotiate.ZRX" UserValue#13="^RUN=_megarob.zrx" UserValue#14="l 2^Mc" UserValue#15="x42^M" UserValue#16="$sx^M" UserValue#17="a999^M^M" UserValue#18="ay9999^M^M ay9999^M^M " UserValue#19="any9999^M ^M any9999^M^M " UserValue#20="anny9999^M ^M anny9999^M^M " UserValue#21="annny9999^M ^M annny9999^M^M " UserValue#22="annnny9999^M^M annnny9999^M^M " UserValue#23="annnnny9999^M^M annnnny9999^M^M " UserValue#24="annnnnny9999^M^M annnnnny9999^M^M " UserValue#25="annnnnnny9999^M^M annnnnnny9999^M^M " UserValue#26="annnnnnnny9999^M^M annnnnnnny9999^M^M " UserValue#27="^RUN=_tdrop.zrx" UserValue#28="qqshl 2^Mc" UserValue#29="tcyf99999999^M^M" UserValue#30="^RUN=SCRIPT everend_photonandmove.zrx" UserValue#31="^RUN=_pdrop.zrx" ``` Ok that is a partial view of standard.zoc file which is the backend of zoc buttons. The way to manually add a button is much different then editing this file. However, you can edit this file and save/reboot zoc to take instant affect. Adding a Macro go to Options-JumpTo-Buttons <img src="/static/img/add.jpg" /> Click Add <img src="/static/img/macro_button.jpg" /> Ok name your button then add the macro make sure you choose "TEXT TO SEND" thats it, now you have a new button. Ok procedure is same to add an Fkey however you just type in the macro <img src="/static/img/fkeys.jpg" /> Ok my sample LIST from Standard.zoc file The most common used macro in TW is ATTACK I have 9 attack buttons for FED or DOCK. Notice I have spacing in my macros, a double space will send a SPACE to TWGS. The purpose of this SPACE is to abort display. Various messages will be displayed while in combat in TW. Some of these messages and displays are time consuming and take up lots of screen Take for example landing on a planet with 30 planets in sector. When you use l to land you see all 30 planets listed below. If you use l with double spaces you tell TW to Land but dont display planet list. example `l 30^M` will land on cit #30 without filling up your screen with the full sector list of planets Another use is in combat, where you attack and blow up some one. if you use double spacing after each attack, if you kill some one, you wont get the DISPLAY Message that you killed them, thus eliminating the SCROLL after KILL message. Example `ay9999^M^M` Now remember RES always attacks with 2 or more shots at same time so my standard attack would look like this. `ayy9999^M^M ayy9999^M^M` Notice also I have 2 'y' in this sample. The extra `y` is for BEACONS, if you were to attack me with a beacon in sector your macro would hang up on the beacon, giving me time to POWER-UP. Whereas if there is no beacon the extra y will not effect the macro. WARNING WARNING IN FED if you use `ayy9999^M^M ayy9999^M^M` and miss your target the second wave might SHOOT A FED, hence you DIE. Recommend not using extra Y attack macro in FED, I use it mostly in my Fkey set up for planet battle. Ok back to display messages, you get a BIG LONG message while Pbusting planets for EXP. You can use spaces to speed up this macro to be 99.99% untouchable at dock ok sample bust macro for dock `quy.^Mcl zdy uy.^Mcl zdy ps` This will bust 2 planets and land back on dock. Notice there is no planet scanner on ship If you have a planet scanner, you must use exact CIT numbers. This gets tricky as you can be vulnerable at dock. Another factor to consider is when entering a SECTOR with CANNONS. If you warp into cannons you get a new PROMPT/PAUSE from being HIT by sector blasts. To remove this you would use a macro like this. Example `m8834^M^M` Double Enter characters will keep you moving through combat messages when being hit with cannons. So mothing its important to have lots of ENTER KEYS to keep your macro moving fast. Well that about does it for this article. Take a close look at my buttons you will see how I use ZOC buttons to run TWX scripts as well. Enjoy Res Judicata

The purpose of this article is to provide information on finding and invading bases. There are two major sections. Section one will cover methods for finding an opponents base and section two will cover methods of taking it once you have found it. Finding a base: The key to finding an opponent's base is to start early. On your first day in the game you should complete as accurate of a ZTM as possible. Once this is complete you'll want to process the data for a list of dead ends in the game. These will be the most likely base locations. With a well organized team, you should be able to send ether probes to each of the dead ends within 3-4 days. For each sector, place avoids on the sectors where ether probes are destroyed and then probe the target dead end again. You will want to repeat this until the probe is either able to make it to the target or it is unable to find a path within x hops. If it is unable to find a path, record the sector for manual checking later. Once you have probed the entire list of dead ends, if you still have a large supply of credits, it is often best to send probes to all of the unexplored sectors in the game. If it takes multiple days to do this or you have multiple people doing it, make sure you trade your avoid lists so you don't have to waste probes on places where you already know there are enemy fighters. Once you have completed your probing, run a CIM script to record the ports currently visible for future reference. The next step is to visit the blocked dead ends. This can be a dangerous thing to do. To maximize your chances of survival, it is best to use a macro to kill enemy fighters. A good macro for this purpose would be "m**any9999**f1*cd" where * is an enter. If you have trouble with being photoned, adding a transport at the end should remedy it. When going out to check on these sectors, make sure you drop at least one fighter in each sector you pass through. This will help stop other people from probing for your base, allow you to eliminate possible base locations, and give you twarp points closer to areas you wish to explore. If there is a base you cannot find in a dead end, begin expanding your search to those sectors your probes hit. Order your search in such a way that you give preference to sectors with fewer warps in. For example, you would want to check a sector with 2 warps in over one with 5 warps in. Also, keep watch on visible ports with a CIM script. If you know the enemy is continuing to build bases, sectors with blocked ports give you a good place to start looking for new ones. So long as you are methodical in your searching, you should find bases relatively quickly. Invading a base: Once you have found an enemy's base, you quite obviously will want to deny the enemy the use of it. There are three basic ways of doing this. The first is to invade the planets and capture everything in the sector. This has the benefit of giving you whatever the enemy had, but is often too expensive. The second method is to try to collide the planets when extern runs. This is much cheaper than invading but is far less sure. The third method is to block enemy access to it by way of your fighters or planets. This method is risky because you are forced to put a sizable amount of your own resources in a location known to other players. To help you decide which method is best, you need to evaluate your enemy. If your enemies are experienced players, it will be difficult to block them from the sector. If your enemies have more resources than you, especially fighters on the planets, it will be difficult to invade. If your enemies' planets are level 4 or higher, they will likely not stay around until extern for a collision attempt. Often times your best recourse is to do some combination of methods. For example, you can invade two planets and try to collide the other three at extern. Alternately, you could try to block the enemy from the sector until extern and then attempt collide them. Another factor that needs to be considered is whether or not the planets are shielded. If they are not shielded, you can use photons to bypass any cannon settings or military reactions. If they are shielded, you will need to take into account what ore they have. If shielded, you will most likely need to get podded mothing one or more times. The first step once you have found enemy planets is entering the sector with them. If they are not yet shielded, the best method is to launch a photon then enter the sector while the wave is in effect. This will prevent you from taking any blasts from any quasar cannons the planets might have. This too you should macro with something along the lines of "cpy*qm<sector>**". Once you are in the sector, press "L" to get a planet scan of the planets. If there is no one in the sector, land on and claim any level 0 or level 1 planets. If there are no level 3 planets and you have enough fighters to kill the sector fighters, exit the game and re-enter to get to the fighter prompt and kill the sector fighters. Make sure you drop one of your own. If the planets are shielded, entering the sector can be trickier. While a photon will still disable sector fighters, the quasar cannons on the planets will still fire. Assuming no death limit, the best method is to disrupt all mines and then enter the sector in a cheap ship with around 1100 fighters. At this point a lot of things can happen. The goal is to get the planets firing small enough blasts so that you can enter the sector and kill the fighters. Be warned, every time you fire at the sector fighters and you do not kill all of them, the quasar cannons will fire at you. The formula for sector quasar cannon damage is figured as: (sector percent * total ore) / 3. From this it is easy to determine how much ore is left on a planet after you have had two blasts. The formula for this is: percent = (1 - (second hit / first hit)) * 100. To find the total ore on the planet before that blast was fired, you use the formula: (sector blast * 3) / (percent / 100). You then subtract the amount of ore that was just used for the last blast from that number and you have the current amount of ore on that planet. If you take that times the percent it is firing at and then divide it by three you will have the strength of the next quasar blast. It is often useful to add 50-100 damage on to this, as there will likely be colonists producing ore. The basic goal of mothing planets is to drain as much ore as possible using the fewest fighters possible. As each circumstance is different, you will have to determine what is optimum for your current situation. Keep in mind that each person is only allowed to be podded twice each day. The third time will #SD# them. Keep in mind that a planet needs at least 200 shields to block a photon. It is cheapest to drain a planet of some ore and then land to destroy a few shields. Once it is below 200, you can treat the planet as an unshielded planet. Keep in mind, however, that when you destroy the last shield on a planet, the atmospheric cannon will fire on you again if a photon wave is not currently active. If there is a death limit in the game, using the fewest figs possible may not be feasible. If you have someone one #SD# from being eliminated, this is the person you want to start off testing defenses. When there's a death limit, instead of trying to get into the sector with as few fighters as possible, you want to try to get in with as few deaths for people not within one death of being #SD#. This normally involves sending in full interdictor cruisers to eat the ore down as quickly as possible. Since the people you have doing this are close to being eliminated, you will want to make sure that they are safe. When a cannon kills you, your pod always goes to your previous sector. For more information on where your previous sector is in different circumstances, please refer to the article on that subject. In this case, the sector you are moving from next door is your previous sector. To that end, you will want to put several shielded planets in the sector you are moving in from, and make sure you are not invading from a one-way sector. You want enough planets that it would take the enemy multiple attempts to enter the sector and kill the pod of the person who just got killed by the ore. Also, you will want to make sure you have a path of your own fighters at least four to five hops out from where you are invading. If you are killed ship to ship and do not have that many sectors claimed, the pod probably will not flee and the person attempting to invade will end up #SD#. Sometimes it is possible to drain an enemy's ore using very few fighters to do it. There are two basic methods to do this. The first is if any enemy has an interdictor on their planet turned on, but no cannons. In this case you can attempt retreat from a sector fighter at no turn cost to you. The interdictor will hold you, using 500 ore from the enemy's planet. Since the cannon is off, you will just be held and put back at the sector fighter prompt. You can repeatedly attempt to retreat until you drain all of an opponents ore. The second method is a little trickier and requires at least two people invading at once. The upside to this is it can be done on a planet with active sector cannons, so long as the interdictor is turned on. To set up, Player A will have fewer fighters than player B and will drop off of the corp with player B. Player B will make sure there is an empty sector that player A can potentially flee to. Player B will then fire one fighter at player A. Player A will attempt to flee, but will be stopped by the interdictor on the enemy planet. No cannons will fire. This will use 500 ore off of the enemy planet for each repetition. Please note, both of these methods will only drain the ore on planets with active interdictors. It will not affect planets in the sector without active interdictors. One of the hardest planetary setups in terms of getting into the sector is several planets with mild cannon settings and several million offensive sector fighters. Since sector offensive fighters will attack with 1.25 * the max fighters and shields a ship can carry, the mild cannon blasts are enough to allow the sector fighters to finish off the ship entering. To counter this, you must first get enough ships with fighters in the sector under the sector fighters to either drain the cannons or kill the sector fighters. To do this, you will need to drain the cannons enough that the ship with maximum fighters and shields can survive all of the cannon blasts. You will then photon under the sector fighters, probably wanting to tow second ship full of fighters into the sector with you. You will want to do this until you have enough fighters in the sector to completely drain the planets of ore. Once that is accomplished, you must drain the sector cannons to the point that a ship with at least 1.3:1 defensive odds can enter the sector and live through the cannon blasts. Now you will need to have player A enter the sector in the ship with the best odds that can enter the sector and survive the cannon blasts. Once this person enters, he will wait at the pause after the cannons fire. Player B will then transport into one (or more) of the empty ships in the sector and fill up player A's ship with fighters. He will then transport back so that he is not able to be photoned. Player A will then hit enter and the sector fighters will attack him. Since he has at least 1.3:1 defensive odds and full fighters, he will survive the fighter attack. Player B will then transport back into the sector and refill him. Player A will then fire one fighter at the sector fighters. This will trigger the sector cannons to fire. Player B will then continue to refill him as he does that until the cannons are empty. At this point, it is a simple matter of killing the sector fighters to claim the sector. Please note, this is difficult to impossible to do with the enemy online and actively defending. Once you have the sector, direct invading is the surest way of taking an enemy's planets. Fighters on planets get 3:1 odds when defending, or 2:1 odds when attacking with a military reaction level. Ships in the sector with a planetary defense bonus get four times their normal defensive odds. Planetary shields get 20:1 odds. A cannon firing in the atmosphere either does 2 damage for every ore used if the game is MBBS mode or does 1 damage for every 2 ore used if it isn't MBBS mode. Once you know these odds, it's just a matter of doing the math to see if you can invade the planets. Normally, if there are a small number of planetary shields, it's advantageous to eat one atmospheric cannon blast to drop the number below 200, then photon in to finish off the shields and kill off the fighters on the planet. Keep in mind, once you kill the shields, the cannon will fire again and any offensive fighters on the planet will attack. That being the case, make sure you kill off the last shield while in a photon duration. If there are a large amount of shields on all of the planets, it is often best to drain all of the ore from the planets in the sector before attempting to land, since it will take few fighters that way. If you don't have enough fighters to directly invade all of the planets, you need to evaluate if invading some of the planets are worthwhile. If they are, and you can take them, do it. If they are not, you can try to collide the rest of the planets at extern. Colliding planets is far from a sure thing. At extern, there is a 10% chance of a collision of planets in a sector for each planet over the maximum. That means, if you have ten planets over the maximum in a sector and extern runs, you are guaranteed a collision. This is the best amount to overload someone's sector to try to get a collision, if you add more planets the odds of you colliding the planets you are aiming for decreases. Even if you do everything correctly, you are still dependent on luck. Also, leaving planets until extern to collide them can give your opponent the opportunity to move them if they are warpable. There are three methods for collision that will work in most cases. The first method is to leave the sector in enemy hands until right before extern, then photon under their sector fighters, create ten planets, then transport out to another ship. You can do this method without ever having claimed the sector, but the downside is that you risk being killed by sector defenses. Also, you have to make sure the sector one hop out is clear of mines and nav haz so you do not set off your photon on the way in. The second method requires you to claim the sector at some point during the day. You then get a lock on the sector with a planet but do not engage. Just before extern you engage your lock, lift off of the planet, create ten planets, land back on the planet, and warp back home. The upside to this is that you don't have to worry about photons or sector defenses. The downsides are that you first have to spend the resources to claim the sector, and then you risk colliding your own planet if you mistime it or mess up your macro. The third method is to claim the sector and then lock you opponents out of the sector until extern. Attempting to lock an opponent out of a sector is a risky move at best. There are only two ways to guarantee success. One is to have enough shielded planets with large enough sector blasts that they are unable to spend enough pods in one day to get in. The other is to put enough in the sector so the opposition does not have enough fighters to make it through. The first method is fairly self-explanatory. For the second, a good combination is often a large number of sector fighters combined with a planet with an interdictor generator. Be warned, the invasion tactics explained above can also be applied to your block. If you do attempt to lock an opponent out of a sector, you should only be doing it for one of three reasons. The first is that you need more time to generate more resources to take the rest of their planets. The second is that you wish to hold the opposition out long enough to make a collision attempt at extern. The third is that you are wishing to entirely lock your opponent out of the game. Before you attempt any sort of invasion, make sure you have it clear what your goals are and that you can achieve them. If you attempt an invasion and fail, you are normally much worse off than when you started. To help you succeed in an invasion, it is best to do all of your planning and setup before you ever begin. Once you commit yourself to an invasion, speed is key. The faster you are able to act, the less time you give your opponent to stop you.

recently i was asked to prepare an article on base building. i was actually quite surprised by the request. normally i am considered merely a good scripter and much less a tactician. however, i do know a thing or two about it and i am glad to write for whomever will read. since this is about base building, i will leave the finer points of base defending to someone else, keeping in mind that the two subjects overlap somewhat. also, since the basics of planetary citadels, fighter odds, quasar efficiency, etc. are discussed in detail elsewhere (e.g. https://tradewars.fament.com/Cruncher/Tradewar.htm) i will let the reader do his own homework on those subjects. i suppose the best way to go about this is to recount the evolution of my own thinking and practice when it comes to base building. keep in mind that when i say 'evolution' i mean it in the scientific sense. most people think that 'evolution' is the continuous improvement of something, e.g. a species or a theory or a society. however, 'evolution' merely indicates change. for example, species evolve, but it is natural selection that determines which of the new species will survive. in fact, the quality of the dominant species may be more brute and primitive than the previous. say for example if stronger but stupid apes evolved at the same time as weaker but smart apes - the situation may be such that the stupid apes could exterminate the smarter apes. evolution is no guarantee of improvement. natural selection tends to produce some improvement, but there is a certain amount of luck involved, and a great deal of opinion about what 'better' is. so i say all of this as a disclaimer to my article. the 'evolution' of my thinking and practice of base building may not be an improvement at all, so i leave it for you to test. when i first started playing tradewars, i preferred to build bases in deadend bubble areas. just briefly, a 'bubble' is any group of sectors that can only be accessed by means of one entrance - naturally this means that there are usually deadend sectors inside a bubble. assuming stock planets, i took the good advice of better players and built type H, O, and L planets at the same time in any given sector, often in more than one location to improve the chances that one of the bases survives. the type H is a slow builder, but it is invaluable for defensive purposes later. the type O is a bad planet defensively, but it makes organics at 2:1, which is great for cash if you have an organic buying port in the same sector. the type L planet is a fast citadel and early defender, but i didn't get much use out of it other than that. playing this way, i won very few games. after a while i began to understand the use of warpable planets (level 4 citadel). i started writing scripts for planet-drop and planet-warp-photon - tactics that helped me start winning more games. the basic idea is to bring the awesome power of your planet to bear upon players hitting your fighters, and make them take quasar blasts if possible. it wasn't until much later that players started getting good at beating planet-drop tactics (with good macros) and exploiting planet-warp-photon by making me use a lot of fuel ore and eventually by landing on my planet when i warped adjacent to photon them. i also learned that when games are MBBS mode, you can make a pretty penny doing megarobs and buydowns. basically the concept is to move your planet over a port, buy all the products off of it and rob all the credits back - voila, free products! look for more information on this in another article. another trick that is very important is the citadel beamer. once you have a level 1 citadel, you can install a beamer. with a beamer it only costs you 1 turn and 10 fuel ore per hop to fly your ship anywhere in the game. that means if you are colonizing in your imperial starship, you can get to terra for only 1 turn instead of 4. this is a huge savings - take advantage of it early. back to base building - like i was saying, i didn't win a lot of games. what was the problem? well here's a few for starters: 1) i put a lot of colonists on the planets. why is this bad? well it isn't bad in and of itself, in fact it's good, just not good for you! if you load up a planet with a lot of colonists, but you cannot defend it from invasion, then you are in effect, colonizing for someone else - the player who takes your planet! trust me, 5000 sectors is not a very big universe - you will be found sooner or later. 2) i spent a lot of effort working the type O planets for organics. type O planets have almost no defensive ability because of low fuel ore production and long citadel times. in addition, you can make almost as much money - if not just as much - selling fuel ore off of the type H planets you are building, with the added benefit that the fuel ore has a defensive quality in level 3+ planets if you decide not to sell it. 3) i was building in large bubbles. the problem with building in large bubbles is that your opponent no longer has to search 5000 sectors to find you, he only has to search 100 or so. your base is a needle in a very small haystack. chances are your opponent will find you quickly! so i started building in 1 or 2-deep bubbles, i.e. bubbles that are very small. i also stopped building type O planets altogether, and i started winning more. why? well first of all, it's easier to defend two planets than three - no more H-O-L - just H-L. second of all, the list of 1 and 2-deep bubbles is a lot longer than the list of larger bubbles, making my base a needle in a larger haystack. third, i only brought in enough colonists to start the citadels. often, i wouldn't even bother bringing in enough colonists for both the H and L - i would bring them in for the citadel on the L, then move the colonists to the H and start the citadel there too. why spend lots of turns and fuel ore running to terra for them, when you have enough on another planet in the same sector? what did this do for me? well now i can build bases with minimal effort, saving me turns to go hunting or cashing or better yet - support my red corp-mates in their efforts to cash. with the planets harder to find, they would survive long enough to be defendable, and due to my extra turns cashing, i had fighters to defend them with. if they did get invaded, then at least i didn't lose too many colonists. once my planets got to level 2, i immediately put fighters on them! it will cost your enemy about twice the fighters to take your planets once they are level 2 - so even if you lose your planet, it will cost your enemy more fighters than it did you. you might even have enough fighters elsewhere to go take the planet back. but wait! that's not all. as i began to play against better players i started to figure out ways to find them - and ways that they found me. first of all comes the 'blocked port' trick. picture this: you went out exploring the first week of the game and you know that there is a port in a certain deadend bubble. later you look in your port cim data and discover that the port is not listed anymore - aha! someone has put a fighter over that port, maybe they have a base there! this is one of the most common ways to get found. that is why i started building bases in deadends without ports - a major stealth improvement. then, against even better players, i discovered that it's pretty much impossible to hide in any deadends for long enough to have level 4 planets. so you can either 1) defend them - which i did most often - or 2) find better hiding places. so i thought about it and i came up with this: since most players expect you to hide in deadends, you could probably do better by hiding somewhere else - but where? i started building in sectors with only 2 warps out - sectors that were nowhere near any bubbles. chains of 2-warp sectors are what a lot of players call 'tunnels' and they are very good choices for early bases, just be careful that you don't choose a spot near high traffic areas like the major space lanes, stardock, and class 0 ports. since most great corps have at least two red players to bring in the cash, it is also a good idea to make your base location one of your sdt ports. the benefits are threefold: 1) you can have your red players steal the products you need for planet upgrades; 2) you get increased defenses for your reds as they work; and 3) the beamer on your planet will save you a lot of turns furbing. finally, my latest and greatest lesson of all i learned in BOTE 2002 this year. normally i would build three or four bases and hope that the planets might make it to level 4 so that i can move them if they are found. the problem is that it is very hard to defend four locations. say that you have 200k fighters - if you want to defend all four of your bases equally, thats eight planets - you can only put 25k fighters on each planet. what does this mean? it means that all of your planets are easy to capture! what is the cure? you have to accept the solemn task of destroying your own planets! do you see? you started four bases in hopes that at least one of them survives to be defensible, right? what if three of them survive? you have to destroy at least one more of them - so you can divide your 200k fighters among four planets instead of eight. or - what if you think your opponents have way more fighters than you? you should decide which one of your planets has the best chance of getting to level 4 and kill the rest - it is better to have one planet with 200k fighters and keep it, than to have four planets with 50k fighters and keep only one - or lose them all to multiple opponents! why let your opponents take easy planets? trust me - you can make a lot more money megarobbing in MBBS mode or planet trading in TWGS mode with that one single planet under you than without it, and why should your opponent get to start megarobbing with your planets? spend all your effort filling that one planet up with fighters and shields - then you will have a fighting chance to take other peoples' planets. make them colonize for you! the result, my friends, is that now i spend my base building efforts early in the game to get one level 4 type L planet and cross my fingers that one of my type H planets gets to level 4 also. what do i do with the rest of my turns? load up my type L with fighters and shields! hunt for other players' planets! if you can kill their planets before they get to level 4 - or to level 2 for that matter - then you are putting yourself in a better position to win. like i said before - this is just the 'evolution' of my thinking and practice when it comes to base building. it might not work for you. experiment yourself with different approaches. if you are losing a lot of games, think about what you are doing. if you are winning alot of games, stick with what you have been doing, but try to find better players to test it against. one final tip - a freebie that i learned from dr. bad. it's more of a philosophical question really: "what's in a base?" think about it. is your base sector 1234? what makes sector 1234 your base? if you are out trading in your planet and you finish up all that you have to do, why should you move your planet back to sector 1234? what is special about it? it is just 1 in 5000 sectors, right? to paraphrase the old adage, "home is where the heart is," "base is where your planet is." why waste the fuel ore to move your planet back to sector 1234 without a good reason? if the reason is just that you like that sector, then you need to think again. you may have good reasons to move your planet back to sector 1234, e.g. your planet is part of a defensive setup protecting other assets. i'm not saying it's stupid to have sector 1234 as your base - i'm just saying that you should think before moving your planet back there and make sure you have a good reason to spend that 15 hops times 400 fuel ore per hop - which will cost you 15*400/250=24 turns in a colonial transport to replace. (just remember, moving a planet may take 0 turns, but it's costing you 400 fuel ore to move 1 sector, which is at least 1.6 turns in a colonial transport to replace - don't be deceived by the 0 turn cost.) I want to Thank the reverend for taking the time to write this great article