The power of the Ancients is yours to command, Master of Orion 2 : Holiday edition

A little bit of smash at the end to knock out the Antarans. Turns out the missile boats were more important than the beams. Though the real issue is I did not get the beam upgrades, give us 15-20 turns and the beam ships would have been devastating. Also we would have had another 200 population to work with. But I was a bit over time with all the micromanagement. Hence the hasty attack on Antares that almost went sideways. Did not matter either way we had mass ship production and were churning out about 2 Titans a turn. Good memories of playing this game.
Credits song - Soundtrack of Moo2
/ francisjohn
/ discord

[@markdescalzo9404]

Naturally those titans come in pairs...

[@luipaardprint]

He’s just milking them for all they’re worth.

[@MakeaBlaze]

1:06:31 the best part is I don't think Francis even realizes what he's done!

[@christophemalgouyres]

"A little Overkill" looks like a fitting summary for this channel. Welcome back Francis!

[@MrJamesstarr]

Around half way through the 2 episode, @Francis John could of just turned on auto build and used taxes. By that juncture, it just about reach the victory condition because his production level was so high.

[@kiwiman4916]

You can setup dosbox to have cycle up and down on a key with higher stepping than default like 65k. So you can go to 5k in combat and then back to 70k. (with default kept at 70k)

[@sp00nerist]

Priapus… something about hardened tech… ;)

[@myrcutio]

puts a new spin on the scifi classic "Rods from God"

[@ShadowWolfTJC]

From what I've heard about the Orions, they were indeed the race that had waged war against the Antarans in ancient galactic history, and had defeated the Antaran menace by using a device that trapped the Antarans' star systems within a pocket dimension. Since then, the Orions had vanished, leaving only their home system behind, defended by their ancient yet powerful Guardian ship, plus maybe a few artifacts on some planets, including from the Alkari and Psilon homeworlds (which start with artifacts on them). To my knowledge, the lore remained the same with the reboot, Master of Orion: Conquer the Stars. Further lore from the infamous sequel, Master of Orion 3, follows below, including maybe a few retcons: You've been warned! Unfortunately for the Orions, sending the Antarans' star systems into their pocket dimensional prison had caused a ripple effect throughout hyperspace. These hyperspace fluxes made warp travel so dangerous as to be impossible for any races that weren't trans-dimensional (like the Trilarians), resulting in the downfall of not only the Orions, whom had sought to find a way to undo its effects, but also many other ancient races, and that echoes of this original event would periodically resurface, even showing up during the time that Master of Orion 2 takes place as a random galaxy-spanning event. Ironically, once the Antarans had figured out a way to escape from their pocket dimensional prison, they had the foresight to use their "prison's" isolation to their favor, as more like a fortress or chokepoint, as barring a technology that could've returned the Antarans' systems back into the galaxy, only a Dimensional Portal would've allowed access to and from the Antarans' prison. (Speaking of technologies that could've undone the imprisonment of the Antarans' star systems into a pocket dimensional prison, if you had asked me, methinks it would've made for a nice plot point for a hypothetical Master of Orion 4 that would've been a direct sequel towards Master of Orion 3, made in order to, say, create another hyperspace flux to not only defeat the Antarans, but also another, even bigger threat to the Master of Orion races (whether it's the Mizara, the Polarids, the mysterious creators of the Antarans, and/or whatever force is growing near the galactic core that had the Antarans fearful), only that the Orion races would've been spared from the hyperspace flux's effects, since they had adopted the more reliable jump lane system found within Master of Orion 3 and Conquer the Stars. Methinks such a scenario would've made for a win condition, involving an Orion race attempting to invade the Antarans' pocket dimension to clear out enough Antaran resistance for Loknar, the Last of the Orions, to then warp in the ship that had originally imprisoned the Antarans to undo their imprisonment, not necessarily to save the Antarans, but to save the galaxy from an even greater threat.)

[@asureaskie]

Shat's just Shatting out cruisers.

[@mrShift_0044]

"Auuwhyeap, we got 3 tech levels more advanced since this ship came about... we gotta... shat it out and about

[@RoskildeJonas]

Never heard of this game but enjoyed the series. So cool too see how this game has clearly influenced multiple of games I have played and enjoyed. Hope your holiday was great

[@andreastyrberg7556]

Suprisingly fun to watch Master of Orion. A game that I just happened to not play when it happened for some reason - but now like that I have got a view on through Francis eyes

[@SandoAquaMonster]

I know it physically hurts, but there's something about the crunchy audio of that era of games that just hits different.

[@genehenson8851]

Aaaaannnddd your back. I’m always glad to see you taking holiday but legitimately miss not having a video.

[@hillolbarman]

A 1 minute and 30 seconds worth of comments, in which people are just re-imagining their favorite moments in their good-old days, and feeling happy, is one of the purest thing that there is in this internet. Hats off to this community. And to you Francis!

[@vineheart01]

Yeah usually these kinds of games i rarely ever actually see the "End Game" screen. Simply because you can usually tell that you won hours before it actually happens.

MoO 1 was pretty good about that: the other guys usually folded voluntarily by that time.

[@yuppieisnitch]

I really wish you would grab some subterranean pops and upgrade all your planets.

[@juzzam3]

1998 was the golden year of games

[@gabimolko]

I was really looking forward to this. I hope you're having a blast during your holidays

[@Originalsunrunner20]

Francis, Can you please fix the noise floor (every time you talk there's a pshshs sound). All your older videos didn't have this issue. I think it started with Rimworld Anomaly

[@Dragoncri]

So, fun little trick that I didn't see. Those spinny little gyro destabilizer? Is one of the most powerful weapons in the game. Three or four battleships loaded with them, even the level they're researched, will destroy the Guardian. Bypassing shields, armor, and attacking structure directly. Super cheesed many games with that.

[@mithral07]

My favorite ship was putting a black whole generator, Time Warp Facilitator, warp dissipater and cloak. Move into range and black whole as many ships as you can in one turn, use your second turn to go into cloak. Enemy turn they do nothing because they cant see my ship and can't run away. repeat till all ships have black whole . skip your turn at a safe distance and wait for all ships to die my record is winning a 1 vs 200.

[@johnjohnsin3762]

So, off topic. Playing Rimworld (no anomaly), doing the archonexus ending, what if... you did the archonexus on a combat tile or a worshipful village AND had colonies set to 2+? Could you sell the temp tile and keep your original colony? Maybe some other shenanigans, idk.

[@stower5550]

Hmmm 🤔 running dos box on phone...

[@ThePiachu]

And that's why Stellaris has Empire Sprawl penalty! :D Now we just need to wait for Francis to take another vacation and hit us with Heroes of Might and Magic 3 for ultimate game brokenness and nostalgia bomb :D

[@danii7584]

you know that subterranean is a racial trait, right? invading one sakkra colony and exporting those lizards around the empire might've been quite the boost. but then again it was over anyways.

[@continuitybomb]

Very fun playthrough! Used to love this game, but was never super good at it. Thanks for the vicarious content! ❤️ your channel’s dope btw been watching you for years!

[@dynafire]

haha love the MOOII, I played a lot in the past too. Great strat, more than I ever did.. But I'm slightly disappointed to see no PD weapons.. A small amount (replacing 1-2 missile mounts) can, with your advanced tech, shoot down a lot of enemy missiles making it much safer.

[@lkadfkjdkladfskl]

When I was 16 playing this game with my little brother we decided to terraform the galaxy. As I recall, blowing up a tiny plant resulted in planetary constructing a medium. We would put an outpost on the terrible planet, gift it to the AI enemy and then stellar convert it. I'm pretty sure we got bored before we finished.

[@kirbyk1148]

Cool! About mid-game I am also producing titans with assaults to protect against Antarans. My setup is different from yours though, having heavy armor and reinforced hulls rather than augmented drives. I group assaults in squads of 4 so that I could also target the Antaran support ships, cruisers, destroyers, and frigates. Depending on my tech level, I can vary the amount of assault ships launched at targets to optimize capture. I play Psilons so I get all techs with troop offensive and defensive techs as gravy

[@jfatgelinas]

this game was well designed. tooktip explanation on everything. ui for almost anything of interest.

[@rodbonner7370]

I usually threw at least one pop into farming on any non-rich planet to reduce freighter needs. All poor planets that could farm that was all they did. All my rich planets maintained the fleet. Man I'm enjoying the memories this playthrough is bringing back.

[@phookadude]

Started playing again because of you, got nothing done this week. Did have a great start, the Silicoids were trapped behind me and 2 monster systems and basically super easy picking with my monster hunting missile boats. Left them alive on their 2 worlds as they are the best "involuntary servants" you can get.

[@salemprompthous3820]

As FJ asked; game starts at 3500.0, and each turn increases by 0.1. Meaning there's been about 210 turns, when the year showed 3521.0

[@mofoq]

the galactic council thing is kinda broken too In the past, I voted myself in then defied the ruling that I just voted myself and got into the final war stage

[@spectre312]

What a great game! Reminds me of Star Trek: Birth of the Federation. I must have spent a 1K hours on that also.

[@r3dp9]

I was going to tease FJ about his naming conventions, but given his sense of humor and how young he probably was when the game came out, it's probably on purpose.

[@krissimonis3604]

I remember having teched up so far I could put stellar converters on destroyers, now that was getting silly. also stellar converters don't get reflected I believe by that reflection thing the antarans use.

[@r3dp9]

MoO2 isn't just a look at the origin of many strategy games, it's a look at the origin of many of FJ's shennanigans.

[@alex_reno]

Wow, didn't expect to see my comment highlighted there at the end. Great Stuff as always, Francis.

[@fad3i]

Annnd You're Back! Finally. =) MoO is a masterpiece. Pax Imperia was also good.

[@jefkinbacca]

First antaran attack is always at your capital planet, 1 turn away.

[@MrLoganchurch]

Heh capturetit

[@r3dp9]

Once is a coincidence, but when I say the 'misstit', I knew it had to be on purpose.

[@sharkmanw]

Yeah, that was a good game back then. Still a good game these days.

[@brendanrobertson5966]

Wing Commnder: Privateer next? :D

[@G33KST4R]

Top 5 intergalactic war crimes to fall asleep too

[@randallporter1404]

30:02 "Queeny don't care I'd say."

[@LiterateBast]

I remember fondly these old DOS games, my favorite was the Hero Quest series and min maxing those levels in pickpocketing. I really enjoyed this content. This was all a wonderful surprise. Can't wait for the holiday video!

[@LiterateBast]

Quest for glory sorry lol

[@talo4172]

I think CIV2 had this game as a mod

[@commandline6749]

I was hoping to see the death star :(

[@RobertLutece909]

I don't see how centralizing food production can make sense. It costs 1 BC to use a freighter for that turn. Sure, you're not spending that three to maintain a weather control system, but if you have ten pop you're spending ten to move food. It makes far more sense to have a couple of local farmers on large Terran and Gaia planets.

[@r3dp9]

It's probably a means of minimizing micromanagement more than anything else.

[@someguy-lt2op]

Pointless comment

[@grandfremdling3841]

Very nice

[@ulycination978]

The best space 4x game of all time. Still playing it after close to 30 years since I first bought it and firing up at least a few games every year.

MoO 1 was a bit better, much less micro-management.

[@David-cm4dr]

nice

[@dominiccorley7546]

😊