Galactic Empire Help Message Database Version 3.2c LEVEL5 {} HLPINDEX {*** Help is available on the following commands and topics:  Commands: abandon abort admin attack buy cloak cls decoy destruct flux freq help impulse jammer jettison maintenance mine missile new orbit phaser planet price rename report roster rotate scan sell send set shield spy team torpedo transfer warp zipper  Topics : battle class communicate cybertron galaxy moving planets scoring sector starting strategy wormholes Issue the help command as follows;  help []  topic = one of the command or topic words above. } T HLPSTART {*** Topic: Start playing Galactic Empire When you begin playing Galactic Empire you are first given an Interceptor class ship. The Interceptor is ideal to begin your quest into the Galaxy. You can seek out an ideal planet to colonize, claim it, and transport down a basic compliment of colonists and supplies. After starting your colony give it some time to grow. Your planet will soon be large enough to generate taxes and cash in your pocket. With this cash you can purchase larger and larger ship and expand your empire. Beware the Cybertrons, they are bent on destroying all human life in the Galaxy and are tough (but not impossible) to beat. Cybertrons may be vicious, but they do have a code; they will not attack an Interceptor or Freighter unless provoked. Good Luck and enjoy the game. Further hints are available under other help topics. } T HLPGALXY {*** Topic: Galaxy The game takes place in a universe with millions of sectors and thousands of known planets. Each sector is 10000 by 10000 parsecs square. The entire navigable galaxy is 6000 by 6000 sectors numbered from the center of the galaxy to the edges. Sectors are mapped on a two coordinate system giving a galactic map that looks something like this; +--------------------------------------+ |-3000,-3000 +3000,-3000| | | | | | | | | | | | 0,0 | | | | | | | | | | | |-3000,+3000 +3000,+3000| +--------------------------------------+ Each sector is measured 10000 by 10000 parsecs square measured from the top left to bottom right as follows; +--------------------------------------+ |0,0 0,9999| | | | | | | | | | | | 5000,5000 | | | | | | | | | | | |9999,0 9999,9999| +--------------------------------------+ } T HLPSECTR {*** Topic: Sector In each sector there may be between 0 and 9 planetary bodies. Each planet has various environmental and resource qualities. The best planet has very good resources and a very good environment. Sector 0 0 is governed by the Galactic Command and is a declared neutral zone. This policy is maintained by the Enforcer Planet. A single hostile action by any player in this sector will be met with a swift and preemptive strike from the Galactic Commands top secret weapons base on The Enforcer Planet. Sector 0 0 also has the first planet Zygor, the leaders in state- of-the-art weapons and ship hardware. Zygor manufactures the various ships and the weapons they carry. It is also home of the Galactic Monetary Reserve Fund, the only duly authorized financial institution in the Galaxy. Planet number two in Sector 0 0 is Tahanian Station, a embarking station for colonists and mercenary soldiers. This is also where you can purchase food supplies. Once out of Sector 0 0 it is a free for all, and you have to decide how to best defend yourself and your planets. } T HLPCOMMU {*** Topic: Communications Each ship has a communications console with three separate transmission channels. You can set each to a specific channel or to the HAIL setting which permits you to receive all general hailing messages. If you create alliances you can set one radio to an agreed upon channel and have a private and secure communications path between members of your alliance. Use the FREQ command to change the communications frequency. Note that if the frequency is set above 32000 then it is determined to be a Hyperspace communications Packet Code and transmissions will be sent via Hyperspace to anyone with the same packet code anywhere in the Galaxy. } T HLPNAVIG {*** Topic: Moving (Navigating) All directional information in Galactic Empire functions on a 360 degree compass and is strictly two dimensional. The major bearings are illustrated as follow; 315 0 45 \ | / \|/ 270----*----90 /|\ / | \ 225 180 135 BEARING - Bearing is always used to indicate where a particular ship or planet is in relation to you. It is relative to the direction you are facing and expressed in a number from -180 to +180. If a object is bearing -90, it is to the left of you, if +90 it is to the right of you, if 0 it is directly in front of you, and if - or + 180 it is directly behind you. HEADING - Heading is the relative direction of the other ship. It is used to indicate when a ship is facing toward or away from you. A heading of 0 means the ship is facing toward you, while a heading of 180 is away from you. GALACTIC HEADING - This is the absolute heading in the galaxy. A galactic heading of 0 means you (or the other ship) is facing north up. } T HLPPLANT {*** Topic: Owning Planets In order to build up wealth you must colonize planets and maintain them. Planets are claimed by simply going into orbit around one and using the ADMIN command. You should be choosy at first about which planets you put a population on, as surviving on a poor planet can be very difficult and require frequent supply runs. Planets are rated on two factors, resources, and environment, with the following categories, POOR, MARGINAL, GOOD, and VERY GOOD. The resources factor rates the natural resources of the planet. A rating of good or very good will insure that your population has plenty of natural resources to use in the establishment of the colony, and the manufacture of goods. The environment factor rates the hospitality of the planet and how difficult it will be for a colony to survive. A rating of good, or very good, will insure that the majority of there efforts go toward producing goods and not simply surviving. Once you have claimed a planet you need to establish a population on it. This is done with the TRANSFER command to shuttle items from your ship to the planet. Once a colony is established they become an somewhat independent society. Anything you transfer to the planet belongs to them, you cannot transfer it back. If you wish to retrieve items from a planet you must purchase them from the planet at the base price. Type HELP PLANETS2 for more information on planets } T HLPPLAN2 {*** Topic: Owning planets (Section 2) It is a good idea to leave some additional items on a planet besides men. They are; FOOD - If you fail to leave food on the planet you will find your men and troops all dead when you return next time. It is a good idea to leave a case for each 10 men & troops you have. TROOPS - Troops are mercenaries who produce nothing but serve to defend your planet from outside attacks and prevent domestic revolts. They must be fed well, and will fight to the death when attacked. FIGHTERS - Fighters will defend your planet from both ground troop invasions and fighter attacks. They provide a primary defense force for your planet. Your troops will not be called into action unless the fighters are all destroyed. ION CANNON - This is a large defensive cannon which will attack any hostile ship that is in orbit around your planet. It will fire once every few seconds, and can destroy a ship in just a few blasts. An attacking ship won't stay long with an ion cannon firing upon them. You can have multiple ion cannons, but only one will be active at a time. Type HELP PLANETS3 for more information on Planets } T HLPPLAN3 {*** Topic: Owning planets (Section 3) There are several other factors you may adjust when you establish a planet. When the planet is first established your colony is instructed to divide their efforts evenly between the manufacture of each of the commodities a planet can produce. You may wish to alter this to provide for faster population growth, and food production. Additionally, you can tax your planet at a specific rate. The harsher the tax the less the productivity. Tax is your principle source of income for purchasing supplies for your ship. This tax is kept in the planetary bank until you arrive to collect it. Your colony will produce all the supplies you need for your ship if managed properly. These goods are cheapest at your own planets as Zygor charges three times the base rate for goods. The cash you spend on supplies goes into the planetary bank and is used to purchase more raw materials when the Galactic Command supply ships come around. You can decide to sell supplies to other players if you like, and even mark up the price to other players. If you wish to be selective in who can purchase from your planets you can establish a trade password for your planet and only those who know the password can buy from you. This is also useful in establishing an alliance with other players where you all would set your planets to the same password and agree on the price to charge each other. Non-members will be excluded from trading with your alliance. Remember that the better your planet, the more attractive it is to marauders. Nothing can take the place of a well rounded defense system and frequent supply runs. Leaving a planet un-checked for more than a few days may spell disaster for your colony. } T HLPSTRAT {*** Topic: Game Strategy Your ship is equipped with nothing when you first enter the game, you are not in any eminent danger as sector 0 0 is a neutral zone. You are provided with a light freighter and an amount of cash with which you must decide what you are going to do. On Zygor you can purchase shield systems, phaser systems, missiles, torpedoes, fighters, decoys, and ion cannons. Note: some of these may not be available or useful on some ship classes (see HELP CLASS for more info). On Tahanian Station you can purchase colonists (men), troops, and food. Your first goal should be to secure an income for yourself, and therefore provide a source for taxes you will need to expand your empire, and keep your ships fully stocked. To do this you should purchase men, troops, food, and some fighters. Locate as good a planet as you can find and colonize it. It is advisable that you steer clear of other ships unless you know they are friendly. An alternative, albeit somewhat immoral, strategy is to purchase weapons and lie waiting for other ships to leave sector 0 0. When they do mount an attack and upon destroying their ship, gain what remains of the supplies on their ship. After several successful attacks you may have enough to colonize a planet or two. When you do colonize a planet you should redirect the majority of the effort to producing men, food, and troops, and gaining cash with which you can purchase larger and more powerful ships and expand your empire. Remember, these are only a couple suggested strategies, and others are only limited by your imagination. } T HLPBATTL {*** Topic: Battle Strategy The flexibility of Galactic Empire precludes an exhaustive discussion of all the strategies involved in user versus user battling. Some suggestions are simply put forth here to get you started. When in a potential battle situation make sure your shields are up, and keep moving. The easiest target is a ship with shields down, sitting still. If you have a cloaking system use it sparingly as it consumes incredible amounts of energy, it is most useful in covering a retreat. If you have incoming torpedoes you can ditch them easily by making a jump to light speed provided you have warp drive. This does not work for missiles though as they too can go hyperspace. Launching decoys does not guarantee that the incoming missiles or torpedoes will be destroyed. Launching more decoys than incoming weapons increases the chance of destroying an incoming weapon. When launching an attack try to get close to the target and use the faster torpedoes as they will have less time to react. Type HELP BATTLE2 for more information on battling } T HLPBATT2 {*** Topic: Battle Strategy (Section 2) If a target goes to light speed be prepared to make the jump with him and use Hyper-Phasers as soon as you pass warp 1. If you get hit with a Hyper-Phaser immediately go into a series of 180 degree high speed turns as your opponent will have difficulty locating you. Go out of light speed in another sector and immediately cloak as a last ditch effort to loose your pursuers. Form alliances to help protect each other from marauders. Remember two ships are twice as powerful as one. When you are under attack you cannot EXIT the game to avoid your attackers. If you hang-up while you are under attack your ship will be destroyed. Remember "Death before Dishonor"!! If you are damaged try to make it back to sector 0 0 or to one of your own planets where you can get your ship repaired with the MAINT command. Remember the cost for everything is much more expensive in Sector 0 0. When you kill another ship you will get some of his goods on his ship. This can be very helpful when you are running low. Type HELP BATTLE3 for more information on battling } T HLPBATT3 {*** Topic: Battle Strategy (section 3) Planetary Battles..... Planets can defend themselves with troops, fighters, and ion cannons. If you have no troops or fighters then your planet can be easily overrun. FIGHTERS are Nova Class Battle Fighters commanded by a fully automated tactical computer. They have inboard and outboard photon cannons capable of powerful and deadly offensive and defensive attacks. When pitted against troops the fighter is deadly, capable of taking out between 10 and 50 troops in a pass. When pitted against other fighters they are fairly evenly matched. TROOPS are trained mercenaries, and serve no other function than the defense or attack on a planet. The consume food, maintain there skills, and mostly play cards. But when needed they will fight to the death. ION CANNONS are the very powerful fixed focus, ion-plasma transmitters, capable of taking out a Star Class ship with only a few strikes. They are strictly defensive weapons controlled by a fully automated system. When the planet comes under attack they will automatically locate the attacker and commence firing upon the ship. When attacking a planet you are always at a disadvantage, as the local troops and fighters are better supported and fresh. Knowing this you should always plan on commencing a battle with superior numbers. Begin with a fighter attack. If they have no fighters you will overpower the troops rather quickly. If they have fighters you will be in a better position to do battle. After each wave your fighters or troops will return to your ship. If you wish to send them back you can do so. Remember, you will not take a planet so long as 1 fighter or 1 squad of troops (5) exists on the planet. } T HLPCYBER {*** Topic: Cyborgs and Cybertrons Cyborgs are a race of automatons which are bent on the destruction of all humans from the universe. They command a class of ship manufactured specifically for them, the Cybertron. Both pilot and ship function as a single fighting unit and they can be quite deadly. The Cybertron is armed with phasers, and torpedoes, but has no missile capability. They can be deadly in hyperspace with hyper-phasers, but cannot recycle the phaser as fast as most other ships. Cybertrons are prone to battle failure, and they will malfunction occasionally. This is often noted by strange transmissions from their ship. The top speed of a Cybertron is warp 8.0 so they can be out run with a faster ship. They will however continue seeking, and if you stay too long in a single spot, they will catch up. The larger the ship the more cybertrons that will be dispatched to intercept it. It is not advisable to get caught in a sector with a swarm of cybertrons surrounding you. Finally, Cybertrons will not attack smaller ships unless first provoked, so don't mess with them unless you know what you are doing. } T HLPSCORE {*** Topic: Scoring Scores are based upon the size of your empire and the number and class of kills you have accumulated is ship to ship combat. Each class of ship is worth a different number of points as detailed below; Interceptor 10 Light Freighter 25 Heavy Freighter 75 Destroyer 150 Star Cruiser 200 Battle Cruiser 250 Frigate 300 Dreadnought 500 Cybertron 75 Cyberquad 200 Additionally you are awarded as a bonus, a small percentage of the killed players score on top of the ship points. Finally, when you kill another player, his score goes also This means that you can actually knock him down on the top player list making it easier to overtake him (or pass him further). } T HLPWORM {*** Topic: Wormholes Wormholes are fairly rare galactic anomalies caused by a paired spatial singularity. The effect it to create a means of "leaping" across the galaxy to another sector. To navigate through a wormhole you must carefully approach it directly at about 1/4 impulse. You will be pulled into the wormhole and emerge at the terminal sector. If you approach too fast you will simply miss the event horizon. If you approach too slow you may oscillate between terminal sectors. Each time you pass through a wormhole some damage to systems may occur. Passing through a wormhole while severely damaged is not recommended. Wormholes are usually by-directional but an even rarer form of one way wormhole has been speculated to exist. } T HLPADM {*** The ADMIN command permits you to claim and administer a planet once in orbit. If you already own this planet then you can perform several planetary maintenance functions from the Planer Administration Menu. Planet Administration Menu ----------------------------------- 1 - Get accounting report 2 - Collect taxes ($) 3 - Alter work assignments and adjust trade policy/pricing 4 - Rename planet 5 - Adjust Tax Rate 6 - Set Trade Password x - Exit to command mode } T HLPABA {*** The abandon command will release ownership of a planet previously claimed. You must be in orbit around the planet to be abandoned. Issue the abandon command as follows; abandon simple enough. } T HLPABO {*** The Abort command will abort a self distract countdown and prevent the destruction of your ship. } T HLPATT {*** The Attack command permits you to start an attack on a planet with either troops or fighters. Issue the Attack command as follows;  attack [] [tro/fig]  number = number of troops or fighters to attack with; tro = send troops to the surface. fig = send fighters to the surface. examples: attack 100 tro attack 30 fighters } T HLPBUY {*** The Buy command will permit you to purchase goods from one of your own planets or another players planet. Issue the Buy command as follows; buy [] [men/tro/mis/tor/ion/flu/foo/fig/dec/min/jam/zip/gol] []  number = the number you want to buy. men = buy men tro = buy troops mis = buy missiles tor = buy torpedoes ion = buy ion cannons flu = buy flux pods foo = buy food fig = buy fighters dec = buy decoys min = buy mines jam = buy jammers zip = buy zippers gol = buy gold password = optional trade password may be required by planet. examples:  buy 1000 men buy 3 ion buy 500 foo drowssap } T HLPCLO {*** The Cloak command will turn on or off the cloaking system, if your ship is equipped. The cloaking system consumes large amounts of power and you should be careful not to drain all your energy pool. The cloaking system takes a few seconds to charge once the command is issued. Issue the Cloak command as follows; cloak [ON/OFF] Example: Cloak on Cloak off } T HLPCLS {*** The CLS function simply clears the screen using ANSI characters. } T HLPDEC {*** The Decoy command deploys a single decoy. Decoys proceed away from your ship and send a sensor signature that resembles your ship. If a torpedo or missile comes near the decoy the decoy will explode and destroy the inbound weapon. The decoy will self destruct after a period of time to prevent stray decoys floating around in your navigation path. } T HLPDES {*** The Destruct command will begin a self destruct countdown timer that when it reaches zero will destroy your ship. The countdown can be aborted with the ABORT command. } T HLPFLU {*** The Flux command will replace an exhausted Flux Pod from the energy pool with a new one. This command presumes that you want it changed now, and does not warn you if there is still a good percentage of power left in the old pod. The old pod is jettisoned. Your power is restored to full charge automatically. } T HLPHEL {*** The Help command will display a vast amount of information on Galactic Empire. Type HELP for a list of subjects. } T HLPHYP {*** When in hyperspace the normal ships phasers are useless. The Hyper-Phaser however can be deadly. The Hyper-Phaser Beam is very narrow but very powerful and can destroy another ship with only a few well placed shots. Issue the Hyper-Phaser command as follows; phaser [] direction = the heading to fire the phasers at, usually the same as the bearing of another ship given in the "scan sh" command. With the Hyper-Phaser you must be pin-point accurate to score a hit. examples: phaser 4 fire 4 degrees off starboard. phaser 180 fire directly behind you. Note: The Fire Control System automatically switches to Hyper-Phasers when in hyperspace. } T HLPIMP {*** The Impulse command directs your impulse (sub-light) engines and sets your course and speed. Issue the Impulse command as follows; impulse [] [] speed = the impulse speed between 0 and 99 (99 is .99 light speed) heading = the heading from your current direction examples: impulse 5 0 would alter the speed to impulse 5 and not change the heading. impulse 10 5 would alter the speed to impulse 10 and turn the ship 5 degrees to the starboard (right). impulse 10 355 would alter the speed to impulse 10 and turn the ship 5 degrees to the port (left). } T HLPJAM {*** The jammer command will cause a jammer device to be launched. It disrupts all scanner systems on all ships within range of the device, yours included. It is useful for covering an escape or distracting an opponent. Issue the jammer command as follows; jammer Simple enough! } T HLPLOC {*** The Lock command permits you to lock your fire control systems onto a specific ship no matter what its letter designation changes to. As long as the ship is within scanner range the fire control systems will remain locked onto that specific ship. This is extremely useful when in heated battle and multiple ships are in the vicinity. Ship letter designated -A- may become -B- or -C- as other ships move closer to you. The Lock command permits you to stay locked on to the ship as distances and letter designates change. Commands like MISSILE and TORPEDO can be then be used with the Lock option to fire on the ship you have locked onto. Issue the Lock command as follows; lock [] -or- lock examples: lock A would lock onto the closest ship. lock B would lock onto the second closest ship. lock would cause the lock to be released. Note: Once a ship is killed the lock is released automatically. } T HLPMAI {*** The Maintenance command functions when you are in orbit at your own planet or Zygor. The maintenance crews will start repairing your ship and charge you a nominal fee of 200c's at your own planet and 2500c's at Zygor. Leaving orbit early will cease all repairs on the ship. } T HLPMIN {*** The MINE command causes a neutron mine to be deposited at your current location. You specify how long until detonation permitting you time to leave the spot for safety. Mines are useful when you are being tailed by another ship. Beware that they are very powerful and you can also be damaged by them if you don't get far enough away. Issue the MINE command as follows; mine [