TECHNOLOGY (CONT.)

• Ecological Restoration reduces current levels of pollution. When the game starts, you can eliminate two units of waste for 1 BC. Improved ecological restoration eliminates 5 units of waste per BC, advanced ecological restoration eliminates 10 units of waste per BC, and complete ecological restoration eliminates 20 units of waste per BC.

• Soil Enrichment converts standard environments to fertile environments that increase population growth rates by +50%, and increase the planet‘s base size by +25%. The conversion costs 150 BC and is automatically built from surplus ecology spending above the necessary amount to clean up industrial waste. Advanced Soil Enrichment converts standard and fertile environments to gaias with double normal population growth and 50% larger base size, for a cost of 300 BC.

• Terraforming increases the effective size of a planet by improving their habitability. The bonus following the title indicates how much the planet size can be increased by. Terraforming costs 5 BC per unit of size increase. Advanced terraforming techniques eventually decrease the cost to 2 BC per size increase. If your planet can be terraformed beyond its current maximum, a ”+“ is displayed next to its POP MAX # on the Control Screen.

PROPULSION TECHNOLOGY

Propulsion sciences are used to develop new and more powerful ship engines, extend ship ranges, and construct special power systems such as inertial nullifiers, subspace teleporters, and high energy focus units.

• Combat Transporters provide instantaneous teleportation of ground troops to planet surfaces at great distances. Colony transports equipped with these teleporters have a 50% chance of landing troops on enemy planets before the transport enters combat in orbit.

• Displacement Devices shift your ships into and out of subspace several times per second, making all weapons (but not Special Devices) miss 1/3rd of the time.

• High Energy Focuses increase the range of a ship’s weapons by three spaces. A fusion beam normally has a 1 space range. Ships equipped with a high energy focus can attack out to 4 spaces with their fusion beams. The ship still takes the normal range penalties for firing beyond 1 space.

• Increased Ship Ranges allow your starships to travel deeper into the galaxy. At the start of the game your ships can move 3 parsecs from colony worlds. Through improvements in fuels, your range increases until eventually you can move anywhere on the galaxy map.