How to flip a planet

You shouldn't have built the Mind Control Center.  That's the reason.   The MCC doesn't work as advertised:  it PREVENTS defections.  But it more than makes up for that fact by giving you +100% income.

Sorry, but I build the MCC only when all other things failed. I sthere a certain number of rounds I have to wait ?

What is the ratio internal/extermal influence I have to reach ? The wiki says the number in parenthesis should be bigger than 4 ?

Yes, you only need to get that ratio up to four. Unfortunately, once you get above four the planet-flipping is entirely random. It could happen the first turn, or the tenth. I've seen a planet stay at 80 for more than a game-year (48+ turns) before it finally flipped.

As tetleytea said, in the version you are playing the MCC prevents planets from flipping; it's not an absolute, but I'd guess 10-20 times less chance per turn to flip.

Some races have a natural resistance to flipping, but I don't think the Drengin are one of them.

There is a building (with a name I can't remember right now) that completely prevents the planet from flipping. If the planet you're trying to flip has that, you're out of luck.

Thank you to both of you for the quick reply, I just assumed I was missing something vital. If there is no adhoc flip once you get above the number of 4 it explains a lot. I thought from the documentation the MCC would do the trick.

I'll try to be more patient in the future

Re-education center. 

But this building can be victim of a spy

I concede - I had assumed  that a ratio over 4 made a larger chance of flipping as well - not the case?

Jonnan

Correct; not the case.

Kellmar-indeed. 

All these influence starbases I've been over paying - {G}. Fired, all of you!

Jonnan

Want to know something truly hilarious? Counterintelligence centers can be disabled with spies as well. Now THAT takes talent

I feel stupid - the only thing I can think of is dropping a spy on the cic while it's being built?

Jonnan

I capture planets through influence a lot. Speed of planet flipping is at least partly linked to influence (global race influence plus local influence). Local influence is based on radius of typical starbase. Putting a starbase very close to planet seems to help. While I sometimes get an early defection, building up the starbase to the max(both influence and diplomatic trees) definetly helps. Unimproved starbases are useless except for range extension and calculation on galactic influence for an influence victory(in unoccupied space, a lone starbase gives you the area). Global influence affected by restaurant of eternity and influence starbases and especially total population. Some races start out with more than others. You can see global influence level from the influence chart at the bottom of the screen. It is much tougher to flip a planet if the other race has much higher global influence.

Exactly. Especially if you place it the turn before it gets built, the AI doesn't put a very high priority on removing it.

Attilla - unless something drastic changed in 2.0, global influence doesn't factor into flipping. Other than empire-wide buildings, nothing on planets a few sectors away will affect the local influence map. Your empire influence ability will, but that's not the same thing.

Putting an influence base in empty space is another myth. Percent of influence is based on the total influence being generated on the map, not the percent of the map that is your color.

 

 

 

This STILL has not been fixed in 2.02?? Or are we talking about DA only?

DA only.

I've read several players I think of as 'authoritative' say similar things about both flipping and getting the 75% needed for an influence win. But my subjective experience still seems to disagree. I emphasize "subjective" because I'm not into doing my own methodical notes & analysis, so I have nothing like a spreadsheet that tracks the pace of all my past flips vs. the external influence on the worlds that flip. It might be the same kind of 'normal' tricks a mind plays on itself (the stuff that makes eyewitness testimony often nearly useless). But I tried being tight-fisted with the starbases for a while and ended up still pouring on the inf starbases when I'm actively trying to flip worlds. The flips *feel* like they come faster when my local influence is intense.

I also once had to do what I thought of as wasting time putting influence bases in the middle of nowhere before I could get an influence win even though I controlled the vast majority of real estate (and population) in the game (played with tight clusters, maybe half or more of the map was empty space). It really *looked* like the win criterion was about territory on the map, not UP totals.

Putting influence bases in the middle of nowhere does not affect planet flipping, but is useful to win the game as an influence victory. When you have close to the required portion of the galaxy under your control, influence starbases, and to a lesser extent, regular starbases extend your area of influence and up the percentage used to calculate influence victory. I have added influence starbases and flipped back and forth from game screen to victories tab and watch the percentage influence go up. The influence victory in this tab is based on geographic spaces--you need to control the empty spaces without planets as well as occupied space. An amusing other effect of influence: In TOA, weopons and defence bonuses can occur only in your area of influence. Influence starbases can extend your area of influence around someone elses planet(put in before war starts.) A really crazy part of this is when United planets votes for the rule that on declaration of war, all ships must move back to their own space. If you put in a powerful influence starbase near a planet and declare war with your ships within the influence perimeter you created around the planet, then your ships stay AND your oponents ships are expelled from the space around their own planet! Ships in orbit remain, but nearby fleets are drive away leaving the planet easier to take in the first move after declaring war.

It turns out you are right. I just ran a test game and cultural victory is tied to map area, not total influence. Pretty obviously, too, when you intentionally set up a game to demonstrate it. Nothing like having 95% of total influence and only 35% of map control.

Most likely the test runs I did for this were flawed in some way; I can't see something that fundamental being changed between versions or even expansions.Probably the data I had based that on was flawed in some way. Unfortunately, that was a computer or two ago, so I don't have the data to look at.

Damn, this means I have to go back and check a LOT of my influence math again. If you don't hear from me for a few months, you know what happened

Frakkin' data. Stuff's always intefering with my ideas about how the world works...