Starting a New Game

Difficulty

There are five difficulty settings in the game:

  • Tutor — become familiar with the game, enemy AI is decidedly non-agressive.

  • Easy

  • Average

  • Hard — enemy AI has no advantages or disadvantages over the player, the AI is fairly agressive.

  • Impossible — enemy AI gets significant economic boost and is also a psycho.

TODO actual numbers for bonuses, how game rules are affected;

Galaxy Size

There galaxy size affects the number of stars and the dimensions of the galaxy. The number of stars can be controlled by stars_in_galaxy parameter:

stars_in_galaxy small  = 20;
stars_in_galaxy medium = 36;
stars_in_galaxy large  = 54;
stars_in_galaxy huge   = 71;

Cluster is a Large-sized galaxy with stars count from Huge. It has been added in 1.40 and kept in 1.50, see Mapgen Galaxy Size for details.

Galaxy Age

  • Mineral Rich (young) — more blue and white stars, more mineral-rich and lifeless planets.

  • Average

  • Organic Rich (old) — more orange and red stars, more farmable planets, less mineral-rich ones.

Starting Civilization

Determines the level of technology you start with.

  • Pre-Warp — start with a single colony, no ships and no known techs apart from the basic ones. Even space travel is impossible yet but for trans-dimensional races.

  • Average — start with a single colony, a basic space-faring tech and a fleet of single Colony Ship and two scouts. Most multiplayer games are played using this level.

  • Post-Warp — not in the original game, added in 1.40 patch and kept in 1.50. Same as Average only with additional techs. TODO details;

  • Advanced — start with several colonies, a semi-random set of techs and a number of fleets. The exact process of generating the starting position depends on the racial build.

Number of players

A number from 2 to 8. Patch 1.50 adds a random option which results in a number of AIs. The total number of players is still limited by 8 so in multiplayer the number of AIs is limited by 8 - N players.

Tactical Combat

Select the type of combat:

  • Tactical — the standard mode of playing MOO2. You can design ships and combat is turn-based and fully controlled by the player.

  • Strategic — the combat happens automatically by a set of special rules. You have no control over designing your ships, in this mode and you have only one design per ship size. Ship designs are updated automatically by the AI whenever you obtain a new military tech. See Strategic Combat for details.

Random Events

Enable space pirates, super novas, roaming monsters and the like. TODO game/random_events.html;

Antaran Attacks

The bottom button toggles the existence of the mysterious Antarans. When this is off, you can rest easy; the Antarans will not actively seek to attack the colonies of any race in the game. On the other hand, leaving this toggled on can seriously spice up the game, as this powerful race will certainly meddle destructively in galactic affairs. See The Antarans for details.