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[Borodin]

Nice, Mrylanxus. Thank's for creating that.

I really do wish the Ascendancy team had done more with the AI, or that someone else would recreate the game with improvements in that respect. Otherwise, it's a classic.

hey everyone, been playing this game for sometime and yet i haven't figured how to abandon a planet. it's probly very easy, i just haven't realized it and i believe i have tried every key and way it could possible be. i wonder how close i have been, i even tried to shoot my planet.

btw, this really is an awesome game, although i hate micro-management..

[_r.u.s.s.]

to leave the planet you have to kill yourself

kill yourself
kill yourself
kill yourself

[Oskatat]

go to the 'system screen' (you know, with the planets floating in space), select the planet and at the bottom right corner, click the fleet/planet with the red circle across

always useful if you just wanted that historical dig

also, at some point, you may just colonize some smaller plannets, or when you previously colonized them, and stop upgrading them. Maybe work on it untill you have defences up, but otherwise, it really adds to micromanagement. Next, dont work on more than 8 big planets at the same time (except the beginning of the game). Choose a few plannets for ship construction, make the rest science and ! stop building the science planets as soon as you researched everything ! . You may think more planets for ship construction is good, but if you need that many shipyards in the first place, you are doing something wrong

[El Quia]

Originally Posted by _r.u.s.s.

to leave the planet you have to kill yourself

kill yourself
kill yourself
kill yourself

[Eagle of Fire]

There is no point in abandoning planets. Even planets which are totally black can be terraformed once the right technology is researched.

Abandoning planets only reduce your efficiency in the long run.

[Oskatat]

well, that wasnt really the issue, was it? it was about cutting down micro management. I actually keep small planets. for what? missile bases. dont bother building anything else, it will just give you headaches and make you feel oblidged to improve the planet. Its almost the only thing the ai got right: dont devellop small planets, its not worth your time and effort. Where they miss out on is defensive insight.

And yes, early on, that one science station that you are able to build on your 8 square big planet, after 20 turns since there is only place for 1 factory, will really have a great impact and when you can terraform the whole planet (and automize) it will also really improve your efficiency

[Eagle of Fire]

Its almost the only thing the ai got right: dont devellop small planets,

I strongly disagree. That's one of the major reason why I think the AI in this game really suck: they simply can't do anything right.

I always colonize all the planets which are available for me. I of course colonize the most useful planets first... But leaving uncolonized planets in your systems only lead to big and even bigger problems in the long run.

Here is the list of the bigger problems in order of importance:

• 1: Production, ressources and especially population in strategy games are exponential. Meaning that the better the start of your civilization, the higher the maximum end output will be. This can be reflected in mathematics as a linear graphic. The maximum possible is a straight line from the very start to the very end, while the real output would usually be lower with a lot of curves with human players.
  
  Leaving opportunities behind, those you can accomplish and which can't harm you in the short or long run, simply serve to lower your maximum output. There is no way around this fact, other that you of course don't need the maximum output to win most strategy games (especially not Ascendancy).
  
  Since you practically give out free resources and, more importantly, free research away by not colonizing all the planets that you have at your disposal... You are giving away part of your total production and speed of research.
  
• 2: Not colonizing all the planets in a system right away often lead in having them claimed by an opponent. They can then in turn create an outpost and, if not taken care of swiftly, can be a real pain in the behind. Sometimes you need to take care of a huge territory with a small amount of ships and it's simply impossible or really hard for you to react fast enough, and you get stuck with the problem.
  
  Colonizing all your planets right away nullifies this problem since the AIs in this game are too dumb to colonize the most nearby worlds by force. They prefer to design and send "colonizers" to the nearest uncolonized system to "expand" their territory. This of course lead to even bigger problems for AIs since it is way harder to defend further colonies efficiently, and I always end up grabbing those colonies by force. To return to the subject at hand, it also mean in the early game that colonized planets are virtually invincible up to the point when you can actually afford to build ships which are not purely designed for colonization or for attack/defense. This leave you a long time before you can worry about being invaded, peace of mind and a winning strategy.
• 3: If you look at the definition of strategy games in the dictionary, you will probably see micro management written right next to it. MM can't be removed from good strategy games because otherwise you would end up with an automated action game commonly referred as RTS games. If you really can't stand MM, strategy games are probably not for you...

-EoF

I'd love to be able to play Ascendancy again, it was one of the highlights of my long-ago gaming past, but it doesn't seem to be working. I downloaded and installed the game, downloaded DOSBOX, and followed the excellent how-to guide for setting it up. It worked perfectly, attempting to run Ascendancy exactly how my XP computer does - including the CD check, where it aborted and told me to insert my Ascendancy CD. I'm pretty sure this means I need to follow the alternate DOSBOX setup where it reads off a CD-image, but does anyone know where to find one?

[Mrylanxus]

To bypass the CD requirement, your COB.CFG file (in the C:\ascend folder)must read as follows:

ASCEND00.COB
ASCEND01.COB
ASCEND02.COB

with a CR/LF character at the end of each line (i.e. hit the <ENTER> key).

The file COB.CFG is a DOS ASCII text file. Altering this file within Windows Notepad may result in a file that won't work (since Notepad uses a Windows ANSI standard, unless you change it). I don't know. Because I do not use Windows Notepad for any reason. I use HTML-Kit 292 since its native format, regardless of added extension, is DOS ASCII text. And it will read UNIX/LINUX text correctly which Notepad will not. (I am a Linux and UNIX user and hate Windows...)

Each of the COB files listed above MUST be in the C:\ascend folder. If not, then simply move the files with your favorite file manipulator program.

Some further help is available on my website here:

Ascendency

I will be the first to admit that I need to do some more work on this site, but I think it is at least good. I will never admit it is the bestest and greatest. But I think it may help.

rmfr