User Guide

Control, p. 135), or diplomacy (see Diplomatic Contact, p. 127). There are two

types of bases: those established on land and those established in the sea.

• To build a land base, press B while a land colony pod is active. This estab-

lishes a new base on the square the pod currently occupies. Land bases can-

not be established on rocky, fungus or monolith squares.

• Sea colonies can only be established by sea colony pods on ocean squares

without sea fungus.

Colony pods can also be used to increase a base’s population instantaneous-

ly—place a pod in an existing base, and press B to increase that base’s pop-

ulation by one.

Location, Location, Location

Your bases should be placed near good resources, with ample nutrients, min-

erals and energy available nearby. When founding new bases, remember that

green is good — the more green in an area (representing rainfall), the more

nutrients may be produced. Green areas of the map almost always make excel-

lent base locations, particularly those that are near rivers, which generate addi-

tional energy and expedite the movement of units around the base.

Placing your bases in useful relationship to each other is a very important com-

ponent of success in Sid Meier’s Alpha Centauri. Put your bases too close

together and they’ll cannibalize each other’s resources, limiting their growth and

economic power. If you spread them out too much, you’ll be wasting much of

Planet’s resources, as well as compromising your ability to defend your territory.

WORKING THE LAND

Each of your bases is a self-contained “city,” with an area under its influence

up to 20 squares surrounding it, up to two squares away. This is called its

“production radius” (see diagram).

Before your base can exploit the resources of any square in its radius, a citi-

zen must be assigned to work it. If a base has a population of five, it can

exploit up to five squares in its production radius, in addition to the square

COLONIZING PLANET

CHAPTER 4