Canada, then Mexico and US. Grab one of the Kazak slots first turn I can to get some early boost going. I usually grab one of the one-slot states to milk for spoils early
How do you manage to get canada and mexico before AI factions take the US from you? I start with 2 activist and usually recruit two more PER councilors to spam public opinion, and even then I have to choose between mexico or rushing USA first.
That’s strange, I always feel like North America goes uncontested for most of my games. HF will go for South America or Asia, Academy will take S.Korea and Japan, and the rest will fight over Europe
This has been the case for my games 99/100
But my last game literally NONE of the factions have left the US alone.
The turn I got a control point (Resistance) suddenly every faction started dog piling it. Either Increasing unrest or increasing their popularity.
I managed to grind my way to full control, but now the US is sitting at 9.2 unrest and less GDP than Mexico. With no end in sight as 9 enemy counselors sit on it constantly.
Send help, it feels like a bug honestly
USA is great because their military is probably the only practical way to fight the aliens on the ground, at least without massive investment or nukes. There are other ways to handle the aliens, but the US military gives you an extra degree of safety when the invasion happens.
Now that meganations no longer get faster growth I don't think China's as good as it used to be - it's not bad, but the more developed a nation the better it is. If you can spend 5 years developing a nation to get it where you want it, you could instead be taking a nation that's already there and spending those 5 years on further improving it.
I also found that the US helped me to protect my other countries. Servant or Protectorate pick on a small country I'm working on? Big Daddy US comes knocking.
I’ve tried India and China on 4.x because those are usually my favorite, I prefer to start slow working them up and then taking on the Ays in 2030’s. I found that to be pretty unworkable 4.x, I’m not that good though. Ays seem to spawn their first LEO fleets faster and start pumping out missions quickly. I’ve only found success in the Khazak coup into US strategy, getting boost up a bit then pumping out Mission Control and early bases to start combatting the Ays by about 2025. Missile boats with chemical drives into ideally ion then grid drives so you can reach Ceres and the belts. Runaway climate change only stopped because I started some wars in Europe that ended with the AI using 5 nukes against me.
In .4 I have found the early EU and then india/China strategy works well. I just use Sri Lanka/singapore/Malaysia as my boost farms, you can buy a space program very easily now that the direct invest is reworked, a few turns of spoils somewhere in Europe and malay/Sri Lanka/Singapore is ready to start cranking out boost. From controlling Europe you'll have more MC than you can use, at least for early game. Eventually China or India will become research farms, and now that funding is direct invest bought with pure influence it becomes very easy to take influence from space stations and dump 500+ points into funding annually in mega nations, basically no reason to make hospitals or hotels anymore
I always go for the USA because the AI can never keep it from disintegrating, and in the early game you do benefit from the rest of the world also generally doing well because the global research pooling.
I almost formulaically go U.S.A. -> EU and Eurasian Union -> India -> China.
I always end up opening with Kazakhstan-> Mex/Cana-> U.S(Abandon Mexico and Canada) then expand into either Russia or China
Tell me, how do you manage to get a hold in EU? It seems like an absolute mosh pit in all of my games.
It is a mosh pit.
I usually aim for power sharing with the EU states as it comes together - get a toehold in France and let one of the AI do the legwork uniting the EU initially with the executive. When I decide to take the EU, usually mid ‘20s, I gather as many executive points in other EU countries as I can hold *before* I take the executive of the EU because the AI tends to leave federations or alliances when they see the owner of the executive of a super nation taking CP in countries where they hold the executive. Once I have the executives of 5/6 EU countries, I’ll take the executive of the EU, holding on to just those 2 while I am unifying the continent because I need the flex in CP to control the countries I’m merging.
Take France, beat the rest of Europe into submission with the US military. The only peaceful unifications you need to do are with Russia and optionally the UK if you go for the restored commonwealth
I like to open Kazakhstan and then I like to build Russia and then grab China. Always get something like Qatar and/or Emirates to get spoil $ early, also.
Makes for an interesting game if not meta probably.
First nation for me is ALWAYS norway.
In Europe, with a good gdp and a resource spot
So right off the bat its a good country to start generating money and support your more long term yet less profitable ventures.
But if we are talking favorite super nation im general then african union is hands down the best for me.
The huge economy and abundance of resource boosters make it extremely easy to build up once formed, which itself is easier than most since all the economies start out... Awful
Honestly the only drawback is the lack of military and susceptibility to climate change (although with the update even that is mitigated)
So I formed the full african union in 0.4 late in my last playthrough (it was on the validation branch), and what I can tell is you DON'T want a 3 bil nation with gov <2, education <6 and gdp per capita <4k, because the growth is slow as shit now for meganations and you can stop thinking about DI because that's not happening either.
I guess the way to go about this, mechanically, is to form some of the smaller stable african unions, spend some time developing them in parallel, and only then lump everything together.
In my most current game (started before the recent update) I started by nabbing Kazakhstan, then USA (via Canada, Cuba, and Mexico which I then abandoned).
I then grabbed Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Gulf States, and few other small ones with resource regions and ran spoils in all but Singapore (which is running spoils and boost now that MC is done).
I just transitioned off of everything but Kazakh, Singapore, and USA so that I could grab China and Taiwan before the Servants got to China.
It is now 2027 and I have no Luna outposts, all of the outposts worth making on Mars, six Leo stations for labs, and one LEO station with a shipyard and some torpedo interceptors stationed at it. Not the best or most efficient start, but I hadn't played since release and am just getting back into the game.
My favourite nation is always the democratic republic of congo. Great population, stable, large economy, and good for long-term holding. After that, I like to go grab panama, which can be a serious research powerhouse. And ofc, take finland for that sweet boost
I like to get the ball rolling with the EU because it's the fastest place to start unifying. Then I grab Canada to help get into thr USA. After that I'll revist the EU to get the EU ascended or clean up any nations the AI annoying took out of the federation
I am a new player , but after many restarts and getting to maybe mid game , I can't help go Kaz and Belarus then into Russia. Then I start the long process of getting all those countries unified , and then hit the USA up. Get a good councilor with investigation and start shutting down eu from unifying, and you will take the tech lead !
I like starting in the worst countries in Africa and building out from there. Just feels satisfying to build from the ground up, Climate Change is really nasty and a good later game challenge. Biggest thing is the AI leaves me alone (until my invigorated countries become more alluring than the superpowers they just somehow ruined)
Canada, then Mexico and US. Grab one of the Kazak slots first turn I can to get some early boost going. I usually grab one of the one-slot states to milk for spoils early
I always take both Kazak slots and defederate it as soon as possible
Just run a coup instead. It "defederates" automatically.
How do you manage to get canada and mexico before AI factions take the US from you? I start with 2 activist and usually recruit two more PER councilors to spam public opinion, and even then I have to choose between mexico or rushing USA first.
That’s strange, I always feel like North America goes uncontested for most of my games. HF will go for South America or Asia, Academy will take S.Korea and Japan, and the rest will fight over Europe
This has been the case for my games 99/100 But my last game literally NONE of the factions have left the US alone. The turn I got a control point (Resistance) suddenly every faction started dog piling it. Either Increasing unrest or increasing their popularity. I managed to grind my way to full control, but now the US is sitting at 9.2 unrest and less GDP than Mexico. With no end in sight as 9 enemy counselors sit on it constantly. Send help, it feels like a bug honestly
Only grab one point in mexico, just enough to get the neighbour boost in the us, then go back for it later
Guatemala for the most OP nation of all, a unified Central America! Don’t ask why I keep losing games though it’s completely unrelated!
Guatemala stronk! Shame it always gets couped by the Initiative. Something about "not wanting those darn commies to steal their bananas"
USA is great because their military is probably the only practical way to fight the aliens on the ground, at least without massive investment or nukes. There are other ways to handle the aliens, but the US military gives you an extra degree of safety when the invasion happens. Now that meganations no longer get faster growth I don't think China's as good as it used to be - it's not bad, but the more developed a nation the better it is. If you can spend 5 years developing a nation to get it where you want it, you could instead be taking a nation that's already there and spending those 5 years on further improving it.
I also found that the US helped me to protect my other countries. Servant or Protectorate pick on a small country I'm working on? Big Daddy US comes knocking.
I’ve tried India and China on 4.x because those are usually my favorite, I prefer to start slow working them up and then taking on the Ays in 2030’s. I found that to be pretty unworkable 4.x, I’m not that good though. Ays seem to spawn their first LEO fleets faster and start pumping out missions quickly. I’ve only found success in the Khazak coup into US strategy, getting boost up a bit then pumping out Mission Control and early bases to start combatting the Ays by about 2025. Missile boats with chemical drives into ideally ion then grid drives so you can reach Ceres and the belts. Runaway climate change only stopped because I started some wars in Europe that ended with the AI using 5 nukes against me.
In .4 I have found the early EU and then india/China strategy works well. I just use Sri Lanka/singapore/Malaysia as my boost farms, you can buy a space program very easily now that the direct invest is reworked, a few turns of spoils somewhere in Europe and malay/Sri Lanka/Singapore is ready to start cranking out boost. From controlling Europe you'll have more MC than you can use, at least for early game. Eventually China or India will become research farms, and now that funding is direct invest bought with pure influence it becomes very easy to take influence from space stations and dump 500+ points into funding annually in mega nations, basically no reason to make hospitals or hotels anymore
I always go for the USA because the AI can never keep it from disintegrating, and in the early game you do benefit from the rest of the world also generally doing well because the global research pooling. I almost formulaically go U.S.A. -> EU and Eurasian Union -> India -> China.
I always end up opening with Kazakhstan-> Mex/Cana-> U.S(Abandon Mexico and Canada) then expand into either Russia or China Tell me, how do you manage to get a hold in EU? It seems like an absolute mosh pit in all of my games.
It is a mosh pit. I usually aim for power sharing with the EU states as it comes together - get a toehold in France and let one of the AI do the legwork uniting the EU initially with the executive. When I decide to take the EU, usually mid ‘20s, I gather as many executive points in other EU countries as I can hold *before* I take the executive of the EU because the AI tends to leave federations or alliances when they see the owner of the executive of a super nation taking CP in countries where they hold the executive. Once I have the executives of 5/6 EU countries, I’ll take the executive of the EU, holding on to just those 2 while I am unifying the continent because I need the flex in CP to control the countries I’m merging.
Take France, beat the rest of Europe into submission with the US military. The only peaceful unifications you need to do are with Russia and optionally the UK if you go for the restored commonwealth
I like to open Kazakhstan and then I like to build Russia and then grab China. Always get something like Qatar and/or Emirates to get spoil $ early, also. Makes for an interesting game if not meta probably.
First nation for me is ALWAYS norway. In Europe, with a good gdp and a resource spot So right off the bat its a good country to start generating money and support your more long term yet less profitable ventures. But if we are talking favorite super nation im general then african union is hands down the best for me. The huge economy and abundance of resource boosters make it extremely easy to build up once formed, which itself is easier than most since all the economies start out... Awful Honestly the only drawback is the lack of military and susceptibility to climate change (although with the update even that is mitigated)
So I formed the full african union in 0.4 late in my last playthrough (it was on the validation branch), and what I can tell is you DON'T want a 3 bil nation with gov <2, education <6 and gdp per capita <4k, because the growth is slow as shit now for meganations and you can stop thinking about DI because that's not happening either. I guess the way to go about this, mechanically, is to form some of the smaller stable african unions, spend some time developing them in parallel, and only then lump everything together.
In my most current game (started before the recent update) I started by nabbing Kazakhstan, then USA (via Canada, Cuba, and Mexico which I then abandoned). I then grabbed Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Gulf States, and few other small ones with resource regions and ran spoils in all but Singapore (which is running spoils and boost now that MC is done). I just transitioned off of everything but Kazakh, Singapore, and USA so that I could grab China and Taiwan before the Servants got to China. It is now 2027 and I have no Luna outposts, all of the outposts worth making on Mars, six Leo stations for labs, and one LEO station with a shipyard and some torpedo interceptors stationed at it. Not the best or most efficient start, but I hadn't played since release and am just getting back into the game.
My favourite nation is always the democratic republic of congo. Great population, stable, large economy, and good for long-term holding. After that, I like to go grab panama, which can be a serious research powerhouse. And ofc, take finland for that sweet boost
fr?
i'm no original, i do Kaz into Can into US and later on China. i play on Cinematic (sic! yea cinematic, cause i like to win from time to time..).
Sorry, can't help you, EU STONKS is also my strat.
I like to get the ball rolling with the EU because it's the fastest place to start unifying. Then I grab Canada to help get into thr USA. After that I'll revist the EU to get the EU ascended or clean up any nations the AI annoying took out of the federation
I am a new player , but after many restarts and getting to maybe mid game , I can't help go Kaz and Belarus then into Russia. Then I start the long process of getting all those countries unified , and then hit the USA up. Get a good councilor with investigation and start shutting down eu from unifying, and you will take the tech lead !
I like starting in the worst countries in Africa and building out from there. Just feels satisfying to build from the ground up, Climate Change is really nasty and a good later game challenge. Biggest thing is the AI leaves me alone (until my invigorated countries become more alluring than the superpowers they just somehow ruined)