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? Area: TRADEWARS DI ?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
Msg#: 16 Rec'd Date: 03-05-94 20:05
From: Stephen Whitis @1:124/211 Read: Yes Replied: No
To: All @1:124/3114*4 Mark:
Subj: 1.03D NP INFO #3 3/4/94
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The most important advice I could give to an inexperienced player is to
read the FIDO-Tradewars echo every day.
Get a copy of TWAssist, TWView or a similar utility and use them. You
can't be competitive in a quality game without them. These are utilities
which parse out the ton of information you get in the game and make it
useful. While you are looking, keep an eye out for other player
utilities, and TWTIPS12, a collection of tips for players.
These suggestions are by no means definitive. But the information here
will get you off to a good start. Save a copy to refer back to later.
If possible, try to join a game that hasn't been going long. A game
that's been around for awhile is hard (or impossible) to succeed in if the
players who were in it at the beginning are any good at all. You might
learn some things in that situation (that's how I started) but to win, you
really need to get in near the begining and play every day.
DON'T SELF-DESTRUCT! There is always a better solution. You don't get to
start from scratch if you self destruct, and you'll have to sit out of the
game for two days, so it's not worth it. If you don't know where stardock
is, and get stuck in an escape pod, attack a port at the end of your turns
for the day. The next day, you'll start in a scout.
DON'T ATTACK ALIENS OR FERRENGI! They are a distraction. Attacking, or
running from Ferrengi ships will put a grudge against you, and you will
probably regret it later.
Don't give up. Everyone gets blown up from time to time, and when you are
learning the game, it can happen quite often. Learn from each mistake,
ask questions, read the FIDO-TW echo, and come back for revenge!
The docs are available throught he game, at the main menu, and some sysops
have them available for DL. Capture them, read them. But beware that the
docs are sometimes wrong or intentionaly misleading.
Fedspace includes sectors 1-10 and the sector with Stardock. No other
sectors are fedspace, regardless of the fact that someone may have created
a beacon which claims a sector is fedspace.
The first day you play, your #1 goal is to find the stardock. Use the V
command at the main menu to see if it's listed. If not, run FINDSGA
(distributed as part of TWUTIL10.*), a utility written by Joel Downer
which often helps locate it. If that doesn't work, try posting a public
msg asking for the location (or private messages to traders in any ship
other than an escape pod or the default merchant ship. Players in scouts
may have gotten them due to getting an escape pod blown up.) Warping over
long distances, with ANSI on so you can tell which sectors you haven't
visited yet, will usually help you find it, as it usually has one or two
warps in and five or six warps out, and that makes for a fairly
high-traffic sector. If you have to look for it this way, the sectors you
explore will be useful later, and perhaps you'll find some good trade
pairs. Don't explore randomly. Turn on ANSI, and travel down long paths
with lots of red (unexplored) sectors using the autowarp.
As soon as you locate the Stardock, trade in your ship for a scout. It
won't have a lot of holds, fighters, or shields, but it has a high turn
ratio. If you drop your fighters in the sector just outside the sector
containing stardock, you can pick them up after trading ships. Fighters
don't have much trade in value, so that saves you some money.
Buy a scout (for the high turn rate), maximum holds (25), and you can
probably afford a density scanner, which is worth the money. Don't buy
anything else the first time you are there unless you've already been
trading while you hunted for stardock. Try to put a little money in the
bank on stardock, for emergency use. Eventually, have 100,000 there.
If you are planning on playing Evil (recommended) then find a port which
will buy Equipment and sell Fuel and Organics. You want it to be adjacent
to a port which does the opposite (sells Equipment, buys Fuel and
Organics.) Trade at these ports, and at the port which sells
Fuel/Organics, use half of your holds for one, half for the other. Always
bargain prices, and you should be able to get 2 experience points each
time you make a deal. That will raise your experience pretty fast (it's
called triple-trading, since you trade three types of equipment during
each set.) You need experience to be able to Steal effectively, so triple
trading can help you get that experience. You can triple trade whether
you are evil or not. It takes some practice to get 2 pts per trade
regularly, especially in a scout with max 25 holds, but it's worth it.
The density scanner can help you avoid traps, stumbling into Ferrengal
(which will be protected with mines and fighters), and find ports. When
you are looking for a trade-pair, and you are in a sector with a port,
density scanning can tell you which adjacent sectors have ports. That
way, you are more likely to move into the sectors with ports (making it
possible to find trade pairs) than to move into sectors with no ports.
And the density scanner can help you avoid dead-ends, thereby saving you
two turns. (Hoard turns!)
Use the V command at the main command prompt. If ships are allowed to
stay in FedSpace overnight, then plan on using FedSpace until either you
turn evil or (if planning on staying good) you can afford to cloak
nightly. You will be protected there if you have 0 or higher alignment,
under 1000 experience, and less than 50 fighters. Until you go evil,
FedSpace is your safe haven when you aren't playing. Just save your money,
don't buy a lot of fighters and shields. If the ferrengi want to rob you,
let them. You do want to buy holds, though.
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