BATTLE MINES

Yawning you awake, stumble from your bed to the window of your tiny metallic apartment, and gaze into the hazy wasteland beyond. The eternal clanking and whirring of heavy equipment shares the air with wisps of dust dancing as far as the horizon, where an ominous, alien outcropping punctuates the view.

A camel-mounted merchant beneath the rim of your windowsill has begun discoursing with vigour on the abnormally low cost of unprocessed bauxite, when a shrill sentry cry cuts your collective breath short. Tiny black pinpoints have struck out suddenly from the dark lump at the edge of the earth, their linear trajectory making the target only too clear. Warning sirens blare, the earth trembles, and the world becomes a deafening roar as your Battle Mine's own cannons return fire.

Quick Start

Battle Mines is a complex game, so you will need to read the manual through once or twice before you understand everything that is going on. The following guide however, should be enough to get you started.

Battle Mines is very much a building game if you want to do anything fun, and to build you must trade. A general goal is to improve your rank, among your peers and on the scoreboard. This is achieved by various means, the most immediate being constructing buildings, followed by conquering your neighbors, improving your industrial output, building new hulls onto your Battle Mine and advancing your tech level.

Click through the various pages available to you, and you will notice many maps (you are always the middle tile on the big maps), and often an inventory panel listing what objects you have at your disposal.

Objects

In BM, everything costs Aluminum, Steel, Glass or Enriched Uranium to do. The cost may be paid using these refined materials, or with their equivalent base material (in a 1 to 4 ratio): Bauxite, Pig Iron, Sand, or Uranium Ore. Some things cost Diamond, but Diamond has no equivalent base.

Costs
BASE MATERIAL		REFINED MATERIAL
4 Bauxite	=	1 Aluminum
4 Pig Iron	=	1 Steel
4 Sand	=	1 Glass
4 Uranium Ore	=	1 Enriched Uranium
? Coal	≠	1 Diamond

Some unusual cases will require X of a specific object, and the individual objects themselves have specific properties and applications, but for general costs this 4 to 1 ratio is always applicable.

In addition to material costs, most things cost a small amount of Coal to do. (Examples: Building a building, firing a cannon shell, powering a building.) You will notice your Coal supplies dwindling quickly, be sure to trade for more. Everything, especially warfare, costs Coal to do, so you will always want a good store of coal available.

As an example of spending objects, consider the cost of building a Warehouse.

Cost: 1 Aluminum ( +1 Coal )
Equivalent cost: 4 Bauxite ( +1 Coal )

Or an Academy:

Cost: 1 Glass + 1 Enriched Uranium + 1 Diamond ( +1 Coal )
Equivalent cost: 4 Sand + 4 Uranium Ore + 1 Diamond ( +1 Coal )

Other possibilities: 4 Sand + 1 Enriched Uranium + 1 Diamond ( +1 Coal )
And: 1 Glass + 4 Uranium Ore + 1 Diamond ( +1 Coal )

The way you get new objects is by waiting until Production, which happens four times daily. You'll want to log on once or twice a day to spend whatever objects you've accumulated. See the times for Production on the Communication page.

Be careful, if your inventory is full, it will overflow next time the weather is rainy or stormy. You want to avoid this by spending what you have, or making enough space by building Warehouses. Check the weather forecast on the Communication page to help avoid overflow.

Sample Inventory

Trade

To obtain materials you don't produce in your home land, you must visit the Trade page, and trade out of your inventory (visible at the bottom of most in-game pages). If you post a trade and no-one takes it for a few turns, try sweetening the deal, or asking people what they think is a reasonable price. (Then haggle.)

If you're really stuck for an object, try using the Black Market at the bottom of the Trade page. The Black Market improves the more contacts you have; Consider fighting your way inland (possibly via idle players) to make more contacts and expand your opportunities.

Buildings

Check out the Construction page. Here you'll find a list of buildings you can construct. This is what your materials will be primarily spent on. If you are mining Bauxite or Pig Iron, you could take the opportunity to build another Mine. This will give you more raw materials to work with after next production. If you mine Sand, you may want to build a Greenhouse to start growing Food, though that will cost you an extra Power every production. Alternatively you may want to build a second Refinery (you start with one), and start getting two Refined Materials each production. That will take more Power, you'll have to keep your Coal topped up.

Overall you want lots of Mines (which give you more of whatever you mine), and Cannons (for fighting). Cellar and Warehouses are important too, for when you run out of space in your inventory of objects. For these important structures, plenty of Bauxite/Aluminum and Pig Iron/Steel are the required building materials. Later you will want an Academy, (the gateway to Tech and serious warfare,) which costs one of each other refined material. (Enriched Uranium, Glass, and Diamond.)

Sample Buildings Manifest

Politics

The one Food in your inventory at the start of the game may soon rot. Food is important because it allows you to change your government type. Visit the Policy page, and choose a government. The default, Anarchy, is good for discouraging attacks, but Bureaucracy, Fascism, or Theocracy are all viable early governments. It's not a life-or-death decision, glance at the Governments section and choose which appeals best to your persona.

War

Uranium is the deciding factor in most wars. If you want, you could early on build a Cannon and attack some idle neighbor in the hopes of gaining an early vassal. (Vassals are like slaves, the enslaver of a Vassal is called a Master. Your Vassals will pay you tribute every cycle.) Idle players have this symbol: (Ø) on their map tiles. That means the player hasn't been around, so his land is ripe for the picking, (possibly..) to be sure, you could visit the Espionage page and dispatch a Spy. Spies let you find out all about a contact's land, so you can judge whether you would be able to defeat your foe or not.

Spies can see if you have no coal or Cannons, and without those you cannot fight, so always keep at least 1 coal handy. (You need some Ammunition to fire from the Cannons too; Anything besides Coal and Items counts as Ammunition. Read all about Combat when you have time!)

War is a reality of the game, and you may soon be attacked or want to attack someone. Unlike many MOGs, players in BM are rarely a lot more powerful than one another. It should only take a week or two to amass sufficient arsenal to make even advanced players tremble. Local warfare (with players close to you) requires Cannons, Coal, and ammunition. Uranium Ore and Enriched Uranium do extra damage if used as ammunition; Everthing else does regular damage. For distant warfare (with players further away) you need only one Coal and one ICBM for each fight. If the fight is a draw at first, one distant player may keep attacking until his opponent runs out of ICBMs or Coal.

The Map

If there are spaces on your map you can't see (No Contact), you need to build an Outpost between you and that square (using the Foreign Affairs page.) Then you'll be able to see and trade with your distant Contact. An adjacent Vassal or Master will also act as an Outpost, as will Sea of Rust tiles, if you build a Dock.

Sample Map

Starting Goals

Your goal during your first week should be to amass (at least) the following buildings:

5 Mines
6 Cannons
10 Warehouses
2 Refineries
1 Academy

This achievement will require plenty of Bauxite and Pig Iron.
Diamonds, Enriched Uranium, and Glass/Sand should be obtained for the Academy.

You should also try to obtain these items, and maintain their levels in your inventory whenever possible:

10 Coal
3 Enriched Uranium
1 ICBM

This will ensure you are fulfilling your end of the military stalemate. Don't let your neighbors walk all over you!

Strategy

Newbies and players that have been hit hard recently will want to adopt a militaristic stance, to scare off attacks until they get started / back on their feet. Invest in cannons, not warehouses. (You cannot be attacked by someone with 4 times as many buildings as you. You want to flesh out this gap with buildings of war.) If you have at least one Coal, one Enriched Uranium, and an Academy, then to non-Communist spies, it looks like you're armed to the teeth. On the other hand, when you build your Academy, you lose one free n00b Power each production, so time it wisely.

Keep as much coal in your inventory as you have Cannons, if you can, and some cheap objects that can be used as ammunition. Keep your firepower high, and munitions policy to Defcon One until you learn more about these settings. You may want to set your Least Valuable Object to Coal if you mine Uranium Ore. (Your LVO will be thrown away be default when you don't have enough space to hold all your objects, protecting your more valuable materials.)

Remember, nobody really wants to get nuked, because the cost in buildings is high. Cold wars are all about stand-offs. Strike when you're sure it's to your benefit, or when the reward is sufficient. (With 4 productions a day, this may take weeks or even months. Then you may have a flurry of war, followed by another lull where you lick your wounds.)

If you get knocked down hard and are being tithed, get your hands on the Food to revert to Anarchy. Build military, fighting off any Fascist states that take advantage of your misfortune. When you have the basic Academy, 1 EUR, and preferably 1 ICBM, convert to a militaristic government until you feel comfortable to settle back into a regime of production and trade.

The mid-term goal is to construct buildings, and once your buildings are along far enough you'll start manufacturing items with nifty effects. Beyond that, you can start pursuing long-term goals, like Hull Upgrades and Tech Levels.

The strategies I've listed here might not work for you, and there are almost certainly others. Your objectives, be they peaceful and progressive or militaristic, can only be decided by the you, the player. The best approach to playing is to experiment, have a fixed goal in mind, and use this document to determine all the steps required to meet that goal.

I haven't even touched on very advanced topics such as the Senate, Leaders, Apocalypse or Diabolical Machinery, but these elements are bound to affect you sooner or later.

Get a feel for the interface, investigate every option on the menu, chat in the comm room, and finish reading this documentation when you have time.

When you reach Tech Level 2, you will be able to join general discussion in the Comm Room. Until then, direct questions your nearest high-ranking player, and let me know if they are too unfriendly. Direct bug reports to me, Rasteroid.

Have fun!

Game Overview

Battle Mines is web-based and strategic, part real-time part turn-based. Trade, diplomacy and warfare occur in real time, while the resources and materials to fund this activity are produced every cycle, nominally four times a day. The interface shows maps, various subdivisions of statistics and commands, and carries an event log and chat capability.

Your world is a desolate wasted Island in a Sea of Rust, but buried beneath the cracked soil lie the means of rebuilding: A wealth of ore beyond any man's dreams. Your nation controls a sizeable area of the globe, but (frankly) desires to enslave its neighbors and further its influence.

The tool to aid your rise to power?

You control a fully functional Battle Mine, a monstrously robust and complex piece of mobile machinery, with the ability to mine the landscape, and carry equipment and minerals in its mighty hold. You will construct buildings to augment its power, and cannons to wage war. You will make policy decisions to guide your empire, and trade constantly with the very people you seek to dominate. You will manage production, send forth spies, incite revolts, weather natural disasters, and terraform the very land, all to aid your inexorable advance. You will gape in terror as distant rivals aim their Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles at you and push their red buttons, then later discover that it is indeed better to give than to receive.

Welcome to the world of Battle Mines.

Now there are several issues I must address.

This game makes extremely liberal use of some scientific terms. I don't profess to be an expert in what these terms all mean, but they sure as heck make it sound cool.

Don't get discouraged when you first start playing. New Players have to wait some time for resources to build up, compared to Veterans with their hulls, tech, and most importantly, experience. You may end up being a vassal for a while, not uncommon at all, but you are protected during your first week. Have patience, build up contacts and resources, and soon you'll be in the big leagues trading Diamonds for ICBMs like they were nothing.

Please don't create and play multiple accounts, especially with the resources of several funnelling into one. This will imbalance the game and rob other people of their fun.

If you are idle for longer than you've been actively playing, your Battle Mine will be lost. (See the section on Idleness below for more details.)

Please have fun, and don't explicitly try to destroy the service, even if you're sure you could easily. I'd much prefer you point out the flaws to me, Rasteroid.

Interface

The Battle Mines interface consists of two sections. Pages which can be accessed by anyone, and those only accessible to players who have logged in. Several pages have maps. All pages listed here are linked from the menu on every page; The style of the menu can be changed on the Player Options page.

Lots of things in the game are clickable for more info, including anything on a map, people's names, any object in your inventory, and any building in a list.

Menu Bar - Accessible to all visitors

Home - This page is where you log in to the game. Recent changes in the mechanics of the game are also listed here, so take a look for updates now and again.

New User - Click here to create a new Battle Mines account. One per person, please!

Documentation - This page. Integral to productive Battle Mining.

Ranks - The austere overlords of the Battle Mines universe are listed here. Bounties are available on highly ranked players, so be sure to kick their asses as time and uranium permits!

Graphics - Check out all the nifty buildings of Battle Mines. Imagination augmentation.

In-Game - Must be logged in

Communication - In the Radio Room, you can chat with other players, communicate privately with contacted players (those visible on the map) and Rasteroid. You can see the events that happen in your empire which you don't directly experience. Also important on this page is the weather forecast.

Construction - The primary function of this page is in constructing new buildings. Here you can also activate Aid packages, feed Uranium Ore into your reactor, and work on those god-awful Diabolical Machines.

Academy - If you have an Academy constructed, and are not in the throes of Anarchy, this page can used to access Research and Terraforming options.

Policy - This simple form determines many aspects of how your empire functions. Not the most interesting page to look at, but you should be familiar with all the options available. Available at the bottom of the page are some statistics predicting what will happen during next production.

Senate - Here you join your fellow Battle Miners to vote on issues that affect the world.

Summit - The World Leaders gather here to mull over matters of state. Those left outside.. well, you'll see.

Player Setup - Set important personal information and change the name of your current home here.

Maps - Must be logged in

Trade - At the Trading Post, you can offer trades and accept other offers. Click on trades to accept them. Click on your own trades to cancel those offers. You will spend a great deal of time on this page, as trade is the life-blood of your empire.

Foreign Affairs - If you have access to any maps, you can see them here. This is also where you build Outposts out of Glass, which give you contact with distant players. (Those not among the 8 directly adjacent to your map tile.) The map here shows which players are already hosting your Outposts, and you can read which have built Outposts in your territory. Here you can move your land, if you are adjacent to the Sea of Rust.

Espionage - This is where you spend more Glass, sending out undercover operatives to spy on your enemies. Special spy activities, like Palantir smuggling and inciting revolt are also available here. The map shows where you have spies and palantirs in place.

Warfare - Though used relatively sparsely compared to the Trade page, the War Room is where the fun really happens. You can attack your enemies, and after combat you can bribe your masters or vassals with Food, to shorten or prolong the duration of vassalization.

Communication

The Communication page is the hub of the game. Here you can see the events that have taken place in your empire recently, message other players, and check what the weather is like in the world of Battle Mines.

Communication works according to these guidelines:

You can only post as many global messages each cycle as your Tech Level divided by three, plus one.
A star [*] indicates the message is new, or has not yet been read by the recipient.
All communications are lost after 3 days. This page has a 100 message limit.
You can't use < or > symbols in your messages.
Messages have a character limit that varies with my mood.
For more extensive communication, visit http://rasteroid.proboards54.com/

This list is reproduced at the bottom of the Communication page.

Starting Out as a New Battle Miner

When you begin playing Battle Mines, your land emerges from the Sea of Rust. Here you will be able to mine one of the five basic resources, with an initial Production Modifier of zero.

Starting players receive a mine, cannon, refinery and warehouse for free. They have an inventory of 4 Sand, 4 Bauxite, 4 Pig Iron, 1 Uranium Ore, 10 Coal, 1 Food, and one refined material of whatever type your tile produces. This may cause overflow the very next production, so spend some objects right away!

Policies are set to defaults when a player begins. (See the policies section above.)

New players are protected during their first week, they cannot be attacked by anybody, unless they attempt an attack themselves.

Production Events

Four times a day, production happens. The times are listed on the Communication page. Production is when your Mines, Refineries, Greenhouses and Factories produce objects, in an order logical to assist one another. Several other things may happen, each appearing as a seperate event.

The order of events during production is:

Change the weather
Obliterate the idle
People digest
Horsemen events
In rainy or stormy weather, inventories overflow
Random Events - Good the less you have, bad the more you have ^^
Calculate production Modifier
Powersinks consume Power
Seats of Power consume Power
Mines produce (with Production Modifier)
Food is produced
Refineries produce
Factories produce
In windy weather, Sand blows away from Sand miners
Corruption - 20% chance each Informant and Agent steals a common object
Banks accumulate compound interest
Palantirs Explode
Calculate and award tithes
Revert low-building empires to Anarchy, Syndicalists randomly
New Pollution and Fallout are calculated
One free Coal for those with no Coal

These may appear in a different order on your events list, but truly this is the order they occur in.

Objects

Most pages of the interface show your inventory towards the bottom. This is a list of all the objects you have, and the space you have to hold them. If you are in danger of overflow (see below), your Free Space value will be negative.

Sample Inventory

There are 3 kinds of objects:

Base Materials (Column 1), which are the objects mined straight out of the ground.
Refined Materials (Column 2), which come from a refinery.
Items (Column 3), which are manufactured in a factory.

The base materials which can be mined from the earth are:

Coal, Bauxite, Pig Iron, Sand and Uranium Ore.

These will be produced each cycle. They can be refined into:

Aluminum, Steel, Glass, Diamonds, and Enriched Uranium.

With a factory, these can be turned into items, which are:

Palantirs, Aid, Diamond Drills and ICBMs.

Food is another item, but it grows naturally, depending on the environmental conditions of you land.

All costs in the game are listed in refined materials, however, any refined material expenses may be paid with 4 of the corresponding base material. For example, a building costing 3 Steel could be built with 2 Steel and 4 Pig Iron, or 12 Pig Iron. The exception is diamond. To build anything requiring Diamond, Diamond must be used.

Research is the only exception to the preceding paragraph. (See the section on the Academy.)

The order of value for objects is:

Coal, Bauxite, Pig Iron, Sand, Food, Uranium Ore, Aluminum, Steel, Glass, Diamond, Enriched Uranium, Aid, Diamond Drill, ICBM.

The abbreviations used for these in certain places are:

COAL,BXT,SAND,PIRN,FOOD,URO,ALU,GLASS,STEEL,DMND,EUR,AID,DDRL,ICBM

In some cases (Corruption and Banks), the most common object in your inventory will be used in a calculation. In the event of a tie, the most valuable object will be used.

(Note that Coal and Items can't be used as munitions in warfare, but one coal is required for each shell fired. See the sections on Warfare and Combat below.)

Mining and Production Modifiers

Mining happens during production. Each player presides over a tile which produces a certain type of resources. Some are more plentiful, some more scarce.

Your Battle Mine has three Perma-Mines, which cannot be destroyed. You may build five additional mines on any tile.

Production rates per mine:

Coal - 2 per cycle per mine

Bauxite, Pig Iron, Sand - 1 per cycle per mine

Uranium Ore - 1 per 4 cycles per mine

More mines will aid in the production. For example, with a full compliment of eight mines (3 intrinsic + 5 buildings) two Uranium Ore could be mined each cycle. For Uranium Ore, a credit from an unused mine is remembered in consecutive turns, so your mines are always productive. (ie. 1/4 URO production will be remembered.)

The final amount you mine is also affected by your Production Modifier, or PM for short. Your Production Modifier is affected by:

Base Land bonus
Government type
Industry style
Pollution (Unless you mine Uranium Ore)
Diamond Drills
Weather
The Senate

(See the respective sections for details.) These effects are cumulative, for example, if you have a +3 bonus due to government, and a +1 for having a resource-rich tile, your overall bonus is +4. Each level of bonus represents a 10% chance of extra or less production, each time production happens. For example:

Production Modification +2: For each base material produced, there's a 20% chance that another will be produced for free.

Production Modification -1: For each base material produced, there's a 10% chance it will not actually be produced.

Production Modification +11 (with Laissez-faire): For each base material produced, there's a 100% chance that another will be produced for free, and a 10% chance of another on top of that.

Production Modifiers will not drop below -10. Normally, a maximum of 10 positive PM will contribute to production, though Industrial Policy may change that. Any positive PM score will be considered in rank calculation. Positive Production Modifiers may be referred to as Bonuses.

Growing Food and Trees

In this barren world, Food is of understandable importance, used to further political ends such as changing governments (yours or your enemy's), and for bribery to shorten or prolong vassalage. It trades highly on the Black Market.

Your people will be given Food to eat in various situations, however, they can only eat up to 5 Food each cycle before they become full. After this, no activities involving feeding your people will be successful, until they digest at the start of the next cycle. For each Food your people eat, you get +1 PM for the next Production only.

Everyone has a chance of growing one Food each turn, if you have a positive total % chance based on the following conditions:

0% base grow chance
+50% if you have an active Greenhouse.
+50% if the weather is Sunny or Rainy.
+25% if the weather is Windy.
+5% for each Sea Tile to which you are adjacent, if it is not Rainy or Stormy
+5% for each Sea Tile to which you are adjacent, if you have a Dock and it is not Stormy
-5% for each level of Pollution you have
-5% for each level of Fallout you have
-25% if your mined resource is Uranium (due to radioactivity of the soil.)
-25% if your mined resource is Sand, and you have no access to water (due to aridity of the soil). Water is provided by any adjacent sea tile, storms or rain.
x1.5 if you have a Dome. (Multiply summed value by 1.5.)

If your total % chance of growth is greater than 100%, the extra amount goes into another random check to see if you grow a Tree. (For example, if your % growth was 150%, you would have a 100% chance of growing Food, and a 50% chance of growing a Tree.) There is a limit to how many Trees can be grown. Click here to read about trees.

If you have growth beyond 200%, the surplus chance will go towards an additional Food.

(There's an easy calculation of all this as it pertains to you on the Policy page.)

If there is any Food in your inventory at the start of production, there is a 25% chance that at least one and possibly more will rot and be lost.

Refining and Manufacturing

Once you've gotten some materials out of the ground, you'll want to start changing them into more useful/tradeable Objects. This is where Refineries and Factories come in.

For each Refinery you build, you can produce one refined materials each production. It takes one Base Material to make a refined material, except for in Coal's case, where 8 Coal are needed. You can only refine from the base materials you mine. (A Uranium miner cannot refine Aluminum.)

Similarly, if you build a Factory, you can manufacture once, using any materials at your disposal. All players can manufacture all Items.

One refine costs one Power, the second costs two, the third three. (Total: 6.) The Factory uses three Power when it manufactures.

Each Uranium Ore that is refined into Enriched Uranium causes one extra Pollution in addition to Pollution from Power.

If your buildings are not powered, they will not do their jobs! Check your firepower, or put more Fuel in the Reactor!

To enable Refining and choose an Item to manufacture, you must set them on the Policy page.

Power

Power represents the energy required to activate certain buildings during production.

Powersinks claim their power first during production, and will always take ANY available power first. Setting Power Policy and Firepower in the policy section will defend your energy reserves, but other buildings will not get any either. Seats of Power come next, if their power cost cannot be paid material maintenance will be required. Greenhouses, Refineries, and Factories all require Power, and unlike the first two can be switched on and off via Policy.

Power is usually provided by Coal. (1 Coal = 1 Power). It can also come from the fuel of a Reactor. (1 Fuel = 1 Power). By default all available power will be used, but restrictions can by placed on the use of Coal or Reactor Fuel by setting the Power Policy.

All players are provided one free Power from their Battle Mine. If you are using an Academy, that one Power is lost.

A Windmill or Solar Panel, when active, will save one Power for each building used during production. These savings apply to Powersinks, but the Academy will still usurp your Battle Mine's free Power. Power which is saved is not used up (in the form of Coal or Fuel), and causes no Pollution.

1 Coal used during Production = 1 Reactor Fuel = 1 Power
(Causes one Pollution)

Overflow

Overflow occurs during production when the weather is rainy or stormy, or roughly half the time. If the Free Space value in your inventory is negative, you are in danger of overflow.

When overflow happens, every object must be stored somewhere, or it is lost. Your Battle Mine can hold 15 objects by itself, but it will quickly become necessary to construct warehouses to hold additional supplies. Whenever you have more objects than you can hold, the cheapest items (according to object value order and the Least and Most Valued Object policy settings) will be discarded.

The overflow of objects is affected by one other rule: Overflow will never take your Coal if it would cause Coal levels to drop below your Firepower, unless it is all you have. Read about Firepower in the Policies section.

Overflow contributes directly to Pollution. (1 Overflowed object becomes 1 Pollution.)

Trade

Battle Mines is a game where you produce one type of resource. There are five different fundamental types in the game, as well as refined versions, and special Items. You cannot survive with only what you have, therefore you must trade with your neighbors to realize your intricate plans.

Trades are offered on the Trade page. A trade is a given quantity of a given tradable object, in exchange for a quantity of different objects. The trade is broadcasted to your contacts with the hope of acceptance. Trades can be made and accepted in real time.

Trades that are not available because they would cause problems with supply or firepower are italicized on the map. These trades are invalid and cannot be accepted, but they may become valid later.

Your trade will be invalidated due to either supply (how much you have) or Firepower (policy setting.)

Trades are shown on the map, with abbreviations. The offer is first, then :, then the requested objects in return. An (R) indicates the trade will be offered again after it is taken. (Keep in mind though that the trader's inventory may not support the repeated trade.)

All players can normally offer two trades, but your Government type and the buildings you have may affect this number.

If you have an Office Tower, you can engage in Global Trade on the table below the main trade map. These trades work exactly as above, except you need not be in contact with the Leader you're trading with.

The Black Market

You can obtain almost anything on the Black Market, for a price.

At the bottom of the Trade page is a small table. Fill it in, outlining what you're looking for, and what you're willing to trade in exchange for it. Submit the form. Three-fingered Ramul will quote a price to you which he deems fair. If you want to take his offer, hit the "Confirm" radio button and submit again, or change the deal as your needs dictate.

Ramul will take objects offered to him one at a time until he is satisfied that an equitable agreement has been reached. Food is very highly valued on the Black Market, and Ramul will always ask for it regardless of other selections. It can only be sold, not bought. Ramul will not request Coal that would drop you below your Firepower.

There are two Ramulgorithm settings which can be used to haggle with Ramul. Setting the Ramulgorithm to Selfish will cause Ramul to desire less expensive objects, setting it to Greedy will make him prioritize more expensive objects.

Setting Choosey will cause him to take all of one object before moving on to the next, while a Picky Ramul will go through all the objects available to him taking one at a time, then go back to the start of his options and start again.

The Black Market is never a good deal. Worse yet, as you rise in Tech Levels, your citizenry will begin to shun criminal elements, driving them from your empire. Making purchases on the Black Market will consequently become even more costly.

On the other hand, Black Market prices improve when have a lot of other contacts on your map; Ramul can work more cheaply if he has ready access to his half-brothers in your neighbor's empires.

Construction

Most of the objects you acquire will be spent on constructing buildings.

The map square you inhabit has the capacity to support a certain number of buildings. Building is instantaneous, it requires only that you have the resources on hand required to construct the building. Once built, buildings can be destroyed by various things such as warfare, random events, or sabotage.

The limits for number of buildings are: 15 Warehouses, 10 Cannons, 5 Mines, 2 Refineries. All other buildings can only be constructed once. Other factors, like research, may change how many buildings you can build.

Building costs are listed in refined materials, but like anything may also be built with 4 of the same in base materials - for example, a building costing 2 Steel can be made from 8 Pig Iron, or 4 Pig Iron and 1 Steel. All buildings also cost 1 Coal to put up.

See the section below on Buildings for details on individual buildings.

Sample Buildings Manifest

Scrap

It's possible to scrap buildings in order to regain some of the cost of construction. Available on the Construction page, it costs one Coal to scrap one building.

Upon scrapping, for each Refined Material the building cost, you get back one scrap Base Material. Diamonds cannot be reclaimed by scrapping. For example, if you scrapped a Mine (cost 2 Aluminum) and an Academy (one Glass, one Enriched Uranium, one Diamond), you'd get back 2 Bauxite, 1 Uranium Ore and 1 Sand.

Scrap is also left over when buildings are destroyed in war. Buildings destroyed by means other than warfare or direct scrapping will leave no scrap. (Ie. Doomsday devices, random events, sabotage, land movement or terraforming.)

The Map

Battle Mines takes place on a Cartesian two dimensional grid. (Remind you of something?) One coordinate on this grid is your home, your land, your nation. You have up to 8 neighbors possessing similar facilities with whom you may trade, connive, and war. With Outposts, you may also have up to 16 additional distant neighbors with whom you can trade, and conduct Distant Warfare. (See the section below on Outposts.)

Players close to the edge of their island will see the Sea of Rust nearby.

Sample Map

As you advance, maps of the entire world will become available on the foreign affairs page.

Your new tile is created when you first join the game. New players will start close to one another, such that they may trade and war and variously entertain themselves. The map is built to expand outwards concentrically, so new players may not have many neighbors to start with. (Reducing the risk of warfare, but also limiting trade.)

Any tile which you can see, either as a direct neighbor or via an Outpost, reveals certain information about that tile. The information (in order) is: Tile name, player name, Tech Level, idleness (a small icon slowly changing from green to red next to their name,) government (dark red border if hated), industry, resource type (with innate land bonus in brackets). More information will appear after that, depending on which section of the game menu you're looking at.

You will not necessarily stay in your map tile, so don't get too used to it. You can exchange lands with people by winning (or being defeated) in combat. You can also move your entire land tile into an adjacent Sea of Rust tile on the Foreign Affairs page.

(Note: Whenever I refer to "neighbors" or "directly adjacent" players, I am talking about the 8 players very close to your tile on the grid of the map. This includes diagonally adjacent players. These players can always be seen and traded with, outposts notwithstanding, and you engage in local warfare with them. Distant contacts are two squares away, and cannot be seen until you build an Outpost. Read on for details.)

Tile Characteristics

Map tiles have a name, Pollution and Fallout level associated with them, as well as a Production Modifier from -2 to 2. All buildings, outposts and monuments are fixed to the land they're in. None of these land exchange with a player's Battle Mine. Spies on the other hand, are fixed by player, and do follow.

Each tile produces one of the following resource types: Coal, Bauxite, Pig Iron, Uranium Ore, or Sand. This also determines the type of material that is refined. There is a production modifier associated with this tile, initally zero.

If the weather is windy, players on Sand tiles will lose one Sand to a random neighbor during production. Their crops suffer from aridity.

Players on Uranium Ore tiles are immune to Pollution's negative impact on Production Modifier. Their crops suffer from radioactivity.

Pollution

Pollution is an attribute of map tiles. It is a byproduct of overzealous production. It affects your Production Modifier, reducing the amount of raw materials you can extract from the ground. It also makes it more difficult to grow Food. An easy Pollution overview is available at the Bureau of Statistics on the in-game Policy page.

Clicking your name anywhere will bring up your View page, there you can see your current Pollution level. It is also reported in events each Production.

Your Pollution starts at zero, but it can get quite high. Each production, your current Pollution level will be subtracted directly from your Production Modifier, up to a maximum of 5. Your chance to grow Food will be reduced by your Pollution level times five percent (Pollution x 5%).

Uranium Ore production (its PM) is immune to the negative effects of Pollution, but Pollution still affects Food growing rates on Uranium Ore tiles.

How Pollution is made

During production, several things contribute to Pollution: Refining, Manufacturing, Overflow, rotten Food, and random events. Also, empires that produce excessive Pollution will spill some over to their neighbors. For every 10 Pollution an empire has (rounding down), it will add one to each neighbor's Pollution.

At the end of production, a new Pollution level will be calculated using the following equation:

New Pollution = ( Old Pollution + Production Pollution ) / 2

Where

Production Pollution = Food Rotted + Overflow + Building Pollution + Industry Pollution + Spillover Pollution

A clean Industry setting may in fact subtract from your Pollution, but your Pollution will never drop below zero. Other events may affect your Pollution as described in their respective sections, or in-game context.

So, in summary: Your current Pollution reduces your next Production's PM. During Production, several things may add to your Pollution. Finally, at the end of Production, your new total Pollution is halved, rounding down.

Note: Pollution is tied to the land, like buildings. If Land Exchange occurs, your Pollution will change to the Pollution of your new home. Pollution will max out at 100.

Fallout

Fallout is an attribute bound to the map tile, similar to Pollution. Like Pollution, it reduces your ability to grow Food. (One level of Fallout reduces grow chance by 5%). Fallout however has no impact on Production Modifier.

Fallout goes up when there are accidents involving radioactive materials. This includes atomic warfare, and Reactor mishaps.

You refine one Uranium Ore into Enriched Uranium
An Enriched Uranium shell (fired from a cannon) impacting on your land increases Fallout by one.
An ICBM impacting on your land increases Fallout by two.
Losing your Reactor in combat increases Fallout by four.
Destroying a monument increases Fallout by five.
Other events may also impact your Fallout.

(For example, being hit with 2 EUR and losing your Reactor would increase Fallout by 6.)

Fallout is part of the land; It comes with you during movement, and is exchanged during land exchange.

Fallout spreads quickly, but dissipates slowly. It dissipates more quickly when there is a lot of it. For a detailed description read on. :P

Each production, if an adjacent neighbor has higher fallout than you, your Fallout increases by the difference in Fallout between your tile and the neighbor's, divided by two (rounding up). The most heavily Fallout-ridden player is used in this equation.

Once this has been done, Fallout for each tile is reduced by the quantity of original Fallout, divided by ten rounding up. This will be 1 for low levels of Fallout, 2 if a tile has more than 10 Fallout, and so on. Uranium Ore tiles, however, only ever lose one Fallout per cycle.

For example, Fred has 3 Fallout, his most radioactive neighbor has 11. After next production, Fred's Fallout will be: 3 + (11 - 3)/2 - 1 = 6. There must've been a big battle somewhere nearby!

Fallout never drops below zero, in spite of external forces such as Green Industry.

Outposts

Outposts (available for construction on the Foreign Affairs page) allow you to extend your area of influence, and interact with distant contacts. They cost 1 Glass and 1 Coal to construct in the land of an adjacent player, 2 Glass if that player's government hates yours. (See the section on Governments.)

Normally you can only see 8 (or less) neighbors, but with an Outpost in another player's territory, you can also see 3 particular neighbors of that player. (Unless outposts overlap, or your Outpost is on the edge of existence.) With complete Outpost coverage, you would have up to 24 contacts, near and far.

The contacts revealed by an outpost may not be as expected. If you set up an outpost in an orthogonally adjacent neighbor, the 3 neighbors of his that you can't usually see are revealed. If you set up an outpost in a diagonally adjacent neighbor though, you will get contact with one distant diagonal player, and two neighbors orthogonally adjacent. You will NOT get the two closer diagonally adjacent ones. In effect, each Outpost will reveal a maximum of 3 new contacts.

This needlessly unprofessional diagram illustrates how outposts work: The diagonal OP (outpost) reveals the red tiles, the orthogonal one reveals the yellow.

You will be able to see these distant players revealed through Outposts, though they may be unable to see you. This means you can accept trades they put up and send spies and ICBMs their way. (But not the reverse, unless they can see you.)

If a nation where you have an Outpost declares war on you, or you on them, you lose the Outpost.

Having a Dock, available for construction as a basic building, causes adjacent Sea of Rust tiles to act as Outposts for you.

Adjacent Masters or Vassals also count as Outposts.

Land Movement

If you are adjacent to the Sea of Rust, you can move your entire territory for 5 Coal and 1 Enriched Uranium on the Foreign Affairs page. (The five Coal is to dig a really deep hole. Detonating the Uranium at that level clearly induces tectonic shift. The science out there people, don't be afraid of it.)

All foreign Outposts in your land are destroyed. You lose Outposts you are no longer adjacent to.

Due to the intense vibrations of tectonic shift, all your buildings containing 50%+ Glass are destroyed without leaving scrap. This includes: Greenhouse, Telescope, Office Tower, Customs House, Solar Panel, and Dome, as well as the Anarchist, Bureaucratic, and Technocractic Seats of Power: Downtown, World Trade Center, and Supercomputer.

The Sea of Rust

The Sea of Rust surrounds the world of Battle Mines. Players on the edge of the map enjoy its main benefit; Each Sea of Rust tile to which you are adjacent increases your chance of growing Food by 5%.

The sea, however, is a mysterious place, vast and uncharted. Tales are told of ominous shadows shifting beneath the surface, indistinct and vague. Old mariners mutter of an island which appears on no map, where untold wonders may be found.

If you are brave and steadfast, exploring these rusty waves may yield secrets as yet unknown to the pasty landlubbers you leave behind. Don't be afraid to move your land straight out into the open sea. Be sure to carry plenty of Uranium and Coal so you don't get stranded.

Aside: In this portion of the game, I am attempting to develop a little bit of mystery, a storyline, a plot. That means that undocumented game rules will apply at my discretion. There isn't a ban on asking questions over the comm, but it's not really worth it, the secrets are very minor and easy to figure out over the regular course of play. More on this sort of thing in the Final Note.

Warfare

Going to war with another nation brings glory and fortune, in the form of vassals, tithes, and bounties. Of course, should your opponent defeat you, the accolades are all theirs.

Warfare requires careful planning. Double-check your policy settings before and after warfare. You may be unable to attack someone, for several reasons (all of which are nullified by the Red Horseman). They are:

You joined the game less than a day ago.
They joined the game less than a week ago.
It's the weekend, and the Senate has decreed no wars shall be fought on this day.
Their government is the same as yours. (Exceptions: Anarchy and Theocracy)
They are already your vassal or master.
You are a vassal with more than 4 cycles of vassalage to go, trying to engage in Local Warfare.
You are holding a Palantir of theirs.
You have more than 4 times as many total buildings as them, and they have not yet been idle for a week.
You have no Coal.
For Local Warfare, you have no cannons or ammunition.
For Distant Warfare, you don't have an ICBM.

Successfully declaring war on someone will destroy diplomats and outposts from both sides. Domes on both sides will shatter, becoming implicit losses in building count. These things will happen regardless of the events or outcome of the battle.

Warfare occurs instantaneously. There are two types: Local warfare and distant warfare.

Local warfare happens with tiles neighboring your own. During combat, the warring states will fire a Cannon volley at one another using up Coal and ammunition, while destroying their opponent's buildings. There will either be a draw, or a victor will emerge.

Distant warfare is similar, except instead of cannons and munitions, you need only one Coal and one ICBM. If one is fired at an enemy, the enemy will return fire, creating a tie. If not, the strike is one-sided (and victorious).

The victor of warfare gains the vassalage of his vanquished enemy for 8 cycles (modified by certain factors, see below), and if the warfare was local, the opportunity for a land exchange with him. He may also receive a bounty on his opponent. Read the section on the IWI and Bounties for more information.

After the war, both sides will reclaim some scrap from the buildings they lost in combat. Read the section on Scrap for details.

Warfare can be observed only by the directly adjacent neighbors of the participants. If only one of the participants is adjacent to you then from your perspective, you will be unable to see whom he is fighting. Spies improve the quality of battle reports.

Combat

Combat involves a single exchange of weapon fire with another player. Local Warfare is fighting against a directly adjacent neighbor, and uses cannons. Distant Warfare is against a player two squares away, and uses ICBMs.

Local Warfare

The object of Local Warfare is to shoot at your opponent using your cannons, doing more damage to his buildings than he can to yours with the simultaneous return volley. As many cannons as dictated by your Firepower will fire. (See firepower below.)

Setting your Firepower to more than the number of cannons you have will have no effect, you will only fire as many shells as you have cannons (and Coal, and shells).

The order in which they fire objects in the inventory is determined by three policies: Least Valued Object, Most Valued Object, and Munitions Policy. (See Policies below.) By default, they will start with the cheapest (Bauxite) and work up to the most expensive (Enriched Uranium). Each shot consumes one unit of ammunition, and one unit of Coal.

Coal and Items cannot be used as ammunition. All munitions except Diamond are consumed in the assault; Diamond immediately becomes a part of your enemy's store of objects via scrap.

All munitions have a basic 50% chance of striking. Several factors may change combat accuracy: Weather, Government, and specific buildings. Also, every three buildings you have increases your opponent's accuracy by 1%. A complete list follows.

Base accuracy: 50%
Theocracy with Church: +10%
Theocracy against opponent with Church: +10%
Telescope: +10%
Syndicalism: +10%
Supercomputer: +5%
Each 3 buildings your opponent has: +1%
Windy or Stormy weather: -10%
Bureaucracy: -15%
Opponent has Castle: -15%

If the Pale Horseman rides, all shells will find a target.

Misses cause no damage. Even a single one-sided miss will still break Domes on both sides. (Domes are hard to miss.)
Regular munitions (anything but Uranium Ore and Enriched Uranium) destroy one random enemy building.
Uranium Ore destroys two enemy buildings.
Enriched Uranium destroys four enemy buildings. If at least one Enriched Uranium impacts, each Diamond Drill in the target's inventory has a 50% chance of being destroyed after combat. An Academy is required to be able to fire Enriched Uranium. An Enriched Uranium shell will increase the victim's Fallout by one whether it hits a target or not.

Distant Warfare

To engage in Distant Warfare, you need one Coal and one ICBM.

Only one ICBM will be used at a time. If your opponent returns fire, the war is a draw. (You are free to attack again if you have more ICBMs.) Otherwise, you are victorious.

ICBMs are 100% accurate. Each ICBM destroys six random buildings and causes 2 Fallout. Each Diamond Drill in the victim's inventory has a 50% chance of being destroyed after combat.

Determining the Winner

In Local Warfare, the winner is determined by:

A) Whoever has buildings left.
B) Whoever did the most damage. (That is, successfully destroyed the most opponent buildings.)

These criteria are applied in the order shown. Ties are possible, in which case there is no victor.

In Distant Warfare, damage doesn't matter, only whether your opponent returned fire or not. If he did, the war is a draw. If your strike was unilateral, you win.

Vassalage

After being defeated in combat, you are must pay tribute to the dominant player for a period of time. This is called vassalage.

A new vassalage lasts eight cycles after combat is lost. (Two days.) It will never increase above 16 cycles. (Four days.) If another nation defeats the vassal in combat, before the previous vassalage ends, the remaining duration will be turned over to the new master. The length of a newly gained vassalage may be affected by external factors, but it will always be at least one cycle, and not more than 16. (Four days.)

A master can pay one Food to increase his vassal's thrall by one cycle (up to 16) by bribing his people. A vassal can pay one Food to reduce his vassalage by one cycle, though he cannot cancel it entirely. (These bribes use the Food up; it doesn't go to the other player's inventory.) Bribery cannot be used if either side has closed their borders. If the people are full, having already consumed 5 Food this turn, they cannot be bribed.

Masters and vassals cannot engage one another in warfare. Vassals cannot initiate Local Warfare against any other player until they have worked off all but 4 turns of their Vassalage. Distant Warfare is permitted, as it cannot be lost.

Masters will tithe random objects from their vassal's inventory each cycle (after production). On the turn the vassalage expires, tithing still happens. Each random object is chosen out of the whole inventory, not its categories. Stock up on bulk if vassalized.

The following factors affect the number of items tithed:

Base tithe: 1 object
The master is Fascist: +1 object
Governmental hatred: +1 object
The vassal holds the master's Palantir: +1 object
The vassal has more buildings than the master: +1 object
The vassal has twice as many buildings as the master: +1 object
The vassal is not idle: +1 object per 40 objects in inventory (rounding down)
The vassal has been idle for 7 days: +1 object per 20 objects in inventory (rounding down)
The vassal has been idle for 7 days: +2 objects
The master has four times as many buildings as the vassal: -1 object
The vassal's government is Anarchy: -1 object

If tithe level goes below 0, tithes are not reversed, only avoided.

The Most Vassals a player has ever had is recorded (instantaneously, not at production.) This counts towards your score. However, as news of your feats grows old and stories begin to sound more like fish stories, your reputation will fade. This translates to everyone's Most Vassals score decreasing once every four weeks, on Sunday.

Land Exchange

You have decided to leave the place you inhabit, and switch territory with your defeated opponent, bidding adieu to your old land. You coax the mighty treads of your behemothic contraption into motion, and the pressure of your victory forces your opponent to do the same. Your Battle Mines pass each other, one in glory, one in bitter bitter defeat. Both of you must make the most of your new land with its new neighbors.

The choice to perform land exchange after successful warfare is a policy decision which must be set BEFORE combat. (See Policy.)

After land exchange, you immediately lose any Outposts which are no longer adjacent to you. As buildings are part of the land, you will lose your buildings and gain control of your opponents'. You will also exchange Pollution, Reactor Fuel, and anything else land-related. Only objects, along with your Battle Mine and its intrinsics are transported.

If you successfully land exchange with an opponent of higher Tech Level, while they hold your Palantir, you gain one Tech Level and they lose one. The exception is Anarchy, which cannot steal Tech Levels or have them stolen.

Remember, if you do a land exchange, you are necessarily moving into a territory battered by warfare. Try to carry some Aid and Steel with you so you can build cannons and defend yourself when you arrive!

Fireworks

After any combat that is not a draw, fireworks will be set off by someone in the Battle Mines universe.

The impressiveness of the fireworks depends on the rank of the victor relative to the rank of the loser. A low-ranked player defeating a high-ranked player will cause a more impressive display of fireworks. In addition, some factors affect fireworks as multipliers:

There is a x2 multiplier for each combat participant who is a Leader, unless they happen to be the Global Leader, in which case the multiplier is x3.
There is another multiplier equal to the cube root of the total number of buildings destroyed in combat. (More damage to either side, bigger fireworks. Also, local warfare carries the potential for much more overall damage, making its fireworks larger.)
There is a x1.5 multiplier on official Battle Mines holidays.
There is a x1.1 multiplier if the governments of the warring states hate one another.

Minor fireworks will be visible only to the participants of combat, but large displays will be visible globally. There are titles for ardent pyrotechnicians.

Roamers

The lookout reports a mysterious shadow lurking in the wastelands.

Within the reinforced walls of mighty Battle Mines reside the citizenry of the land, protected and content. Other creatures however endure, and even thrive in the wastes outside. Collectively they are known as Roamers, but under that blanket term there are several varieties each with different characterstics.

Roamers spawn in their favourite environments where they become immediately visible on the map. They will move along with moving land, but some can swim off the land. If a land moves overtop of them, they will thence appear. Roamers reside (conceptually) outside the Dome.

Each Roamer has a number of hits they can sustain which increases as they feed. Roamers are always at full health; after taking any amount of non-fatal damage, they are restored to full hits following the encounter. Visible roamers can be attacked on the Warfare page in a procedure known as Potshots, the normal goal of which is firing cannons at the Roamer to inflict more hits than they can take, thus slaying them.

Potshots are similar to local warfare in terms of physical requirements and accuracy, but they do not affect outposts, diplomats, and other player-based elements. Buildings will usually remain unharmed, excepting of course Domes, for which proper scrap will be provided when destroyed. You can attack roamers on your land, or adjacent lands, but only the geophysical host will reap any rewards if a roamer is defeated. Base shot accuracy is 50% as per local warfare, additionally you receive a +20% Accuracy bonus for shooting at a roamer on your own territory.

A list of known roamers follows, together with their general characteristics.

Don the Sage
Don the Sage is a man of legend. He wanders throughout the world to his own inscrutable ends, but is always ready to lend a friendly smile and earful of arcane knowledge.

Frequency: Unique and omnipresent.
Movement: Don moves only on the land, and fairly ponderously at that.
Behaviour: He's known to withdraw by his own means if he feels trapped.
Combat: The sage cannot be attacked. (That would be mean.)
Special: Don extends the Weather forecast of his host by 4 cycles.

Rats
Like the rats of our day and age, these rapscallious rodents breed in abundance, and have no regard for human property. Unlike our mundane vermin however, these monsters have aquired the mutation of accelerated growth, and the ability to attain truly monsterous proportions, given ample sustenance.

Frequency: Rats are common in the less industry-choked corners of the realm.
Movement: Rats move on land only, but are speedy. They will retreat from Fallout.
Behaviour: They are adept at sniffing out and devouring Food, which causes them to grow. They will be stopped by Fridges, but not Domes.
Combat: Rat carcasses are nutritious and delicious, but should you fail to destroy them, they are bound to retreat in terror.
Other Roamers: Rats are nothing but Godzilla-chow.
Special: When they attain a certain girth, rats will begin to breed. Watch out for population explosions!

Godzilla
Only in the dusty movie reels of a bygone era can the history of this terrifying behemoth be studied. Once confined to silver screens, denizens of the new world know all too well the towering monster made flesh, and that he is truly a force to feared!

Frequency: Godzilla is unique and uncommon, but he is more likely to appear in heavily polluted tiles.
Movement: He will generally move to adjacent areas of high pollution.
Behaviour: Godzilla smashes buildings like they were cardboard. It's just what he does.
Combat: Godzilla will take at least 16 hits to put down, more if he has been feasting on fresh rat. If you fail to destroy him he'll come after you with blood in his eye!
Other Roamers: Godzilla savours nothing more than the taste of rats, which add to his strength. Beware!
Special: A player visited by Godzilla has most of his map tile obscured and his borders automatically closed.

The next roamer is so cool it gets its own section!

Tetsujin

With sufficient academic savvy, your technicians can learn the process of manufacturing Tetsujin, the incredible metallic men! They can be used to shuffle goods around at will, and dispatch spies to distant lands. They take on special characteristics, depending on what objects are loaded on to them. Tetsujin cost 2 Steel and 1 Aluminum to manufacture in a Factory, once researched in the Academy.

Unlike other Roamers which move of their own accord, Tetsujin receive a base of three tile moves per cycle. This number is reset at production. Tetsujin are controlled from a special page available only to their owners. They may also spend moves loading or unloading objects, or fighting.

with research in the academy, travelling through the sea of rust is possible, though dangerous. At a cost of two moves your Tetsujin navigates the murky depths, where scrap aplenty is easy to come by, but so is a swift demise. Carry an Aid to better your odds.

Loading or unloading a Tetsujin takes one move. If you leave your Tetsujin on an opponent's land, they too may load your it with goods if it has moves to do so, but only you can unload your own Tetsujin. The inventory of a Tetsujin is not like a player's inventory, rather it is like a stack. Objects must be put on and removed in order, one at a time. Objects cannot be loaded until their Tech Level is researched, and the maximum number of objects that can be loaded on the Tetsujin's stack is equal to his creator's Tech Level.

Tetsujin can also load Spies, costing one Glass and one Food, but once a Spy has been loaded nothing else can be loaded onto the Tetsujin. Spies unloaded on foreign soil take up residence in the nearest building. You can only load spies into your own Tetsujin.

Fighting pits the number of hits your Tetsujin can take directly against those of another Roamer. If one side can take more hits than the other, it will win, at which point there is a 50/50 chance the loser will be destroyed, leaving objects behind as with Potshots. Fighting costs three moves.

In addition to their three base moves, Tetsujin can take four hits, and carry one object. This table shows how certain objects affect Tetsujin, all of which are cumulative:

Bauxite increases the number of objects this Tetsujin can carry by one, Aluminum increases it by two (to a maximum of the creator's Tech Level).
Pig Iron increases the number of hits this Tetsujin can take by one, Steel increases it by two.
Uranium Ore increases the number of moves this Tetsujin can make each turn by one, Enriched Uranium increases it by two.
Sand causes the Tetsujin to give a Spy report on the land it is visiting, Glass makes it a Communist-class Spy report.
One or more Diamonds lets the Tetsujin destroy Domes by fighting with them. Domes are always destroyed by combat.
Coal can be burned to reset the Tetsujin to full moves, but only when it is on top of the stack.
Aid allows your Tetsujin to travel under water more safely.

In addition, holding a base object of the same tile resource the Tetsujin is in will boost its hits by one. Holding a refined object that matches the tile will boost its hits by two.

Frequency: Each player can have one Tetsujin at once, so in busy, high-tech areas, they may be quite common.
Movement: Tetsujin are controlled from a special page available only to their owners. They are initially restricted to the land, but further research makes them watertight and submersible! It costs two moves to travel in or out of water tiles.
Behaviour: Tetsujin may come bearing objects, or enemy spies. Their intent may be good or ill, depending on the will of their master.
Combat: Tetsujin leave behind whatever they were carrying, whether destroyed in hand-to-hand combat or by cannonfire.
Other Roamers: Tetsujin can try their luck against any roamers! Only Godzilla will actively attack them.
Special: Empty Tetsujin are black, those with objects are blue, and those with a Spy inside appear red on the map.

Policy

Policies let you determine how to run your empire. Some policy changes cost resources to make. Be especially careful of your policy settings before and after combat.

At the bottom of the Policy page you will find the extremely useful Bureau of Statistics, where estimates for next prodution are given.

Border (Default: Open)

You can close the borders of your nation at a cost of 1 Glass, unless you have 4 turns or less left on a vassalage.

While the borders are closed, your enemies are unable to place new Spies and Outposts in your nation. Old Spies in your land are not removed and may be upgraded, although they are unable to perform any Spy missions (Inciting Revolt, Sabotage, or Smuggling Palantirs). You are still able to place Spies, Outposts, and perform missions at will.

You cannot perform bribery, nor can it be performed on you. You cannot engage in regular trade while your border is closed, though the Black Market is still accessible to you. You can reopen your border at any time, free of charge. If you are idle for one week, your border will reopen automatically.

Closed borders do not affect corruption due to smuggling activities, and any tithes will be delivered strictly according to schedule.

Land Exchange after successful warfare (Default: Off)

This policy simply decides whether you will perform a land exchange after being victorious in combat. Observe that this includes combat not initiated by you.

Firepower (Default: 5)

Firepower determines the maximum number of cannons that will fire in Local Warfare. It must be a number from 1 to 20.

Firepower also acts to guard your Coal supply, according to your potential combat needs. Greenhouse use, Refining, Manufacturing, Trade (both regular and Black Market), and choice of item to overflow are affected by this. None of these activities will reduce your Coal below your Firepower. If you want to refine/trade/overflow away all your Coal, you must set your Firepower low in advance.

Munitions Policy (Default: Defcon One)

This policy determines the order of use of munitions in warfare, both offensive and defensive. Just because you have approved the use of atomics, does not mean you can use them unless you possess the correct ammunition.

Defcon One: Enriched Uranium, Uranium Ore, value ordered objects (LVO first, no MVO at all).

Moderate Atomics Approved: Uranium Ore, value ordered objects.

Conventional Arms: value ordered objects.

(See the section above on Objects for value orders. ICBM warfare is not affected by this policy.)

Mining Enabled (Default: On)

This determines whether your mines produce or not.
You may want to switch off mining to avoid overflow.
If you are idle for a week, mining will be enabled.

Use Greenhouse (Default: On)

This policy determines whether your Greenhouse will operate during production.
Having your Greenhouse active doesn't guarantee Food production, only increases your chance by +50%.

Refine Materials (Default: Two)

This policy determines how many of your refineries will operate. (If they exist.)
If you are idle for one week, it will reset to two refines.
Note that you can only refine materials from whatever your mined resource is.
Materials will not be refined if the action would reduce your Coal below your Firepower.

Item to Manufacture (Default: Hull Upgrade)

This policy determines what Item your Factory will try to produce. Manufacturing can also be disabled here.

Items will not be manufactured if the action would reduce your Coal below your Firepower.

Capitalists will see the option to use their Factory as a Refinery here.

Use Base Materials over Refined (Default: On)

This policy decides whether you will use Base or Refined materials (by preference) in the payment of any expense in the game. Setting this policy to "On" will not prevent the use of refined materials, it will merely use base materials by preference. This policy applies to Item Manufacture as well as real-time use.

Power Use Policy (Default: All Power)

Use of various types of power during production can be restricted if desired. By default, all available types of power will be utilized, but by setting this policy you can use only Reactor Fuel and save Coal, or vice-versa, or use only "clean power": That from Windmills, Solar Panels, and your Battle Mine itself.

Setting Power Policy will defend against the drain from Powersinks.

Least Valued Object -or- LVO (Default: Mined resource)

This policy allows you to choose which object you value the least. If your inventory is full causing overflow, this object will be discarded by preference over any other object in the value list. This also means it's the first ammunition used in warfare (unless you choose Coal, Food, or an Item as your LVO, which are not usable as ammunition).

If you leave your LVO set to Default, it will be whatever you are currently mining.

References to value order are affected by your LVO.

Most Valued Object -or- MVO (Default: Not set)

Your Most Valued Object will be conserved at all costs: It will be the last object to overflow, it will never be fired from a Cannon, and Ramul will never ask for it.

Industry Style (Default: Nominal)

The general industrial/economic habits of your nation affect your production. Conservation is expensive, but excessive Pollution will choke off your production at high levels. It costs one Aluminum or one Steel to change Industry style.

Laissez-Faire

Laissez-Faire industries receive a +6 Production Modifier, but also +3 Pollution and +1 Pollution for each neighbor who is also Laissez-Faire.

Laissez-Faire industries Production Modifiers cap at +15 PM.

Nominal

Nominal industries receive +1 Pollution for each neighbor who is Laissez-faire, but -1 Pollution for each neighbor who is Green.

Nominal industries Production Modifiers cap at +10 PM.

Green

Green industries receive a -4 Production Modifier, -2 Pollution, and -1 Fallout.

Green industries Production Modifiers cap at +5 PM.

Green industries can grow 3 extra Trees.

Government

Government is another policy decision, but such an important one that it gets its own section.

Government (Default: Anarchy)

Your government starts out as an Anarchy, but it can always be changed for Food (assuming the people aren't full). Government style conveys a small bonus in one particular area. Everyone in contact with you can see what type of government you are.

Each government hates another type of government. Also, all governments except Fascism hate Fascism, and Fascism hates all governments except Fascism. Hatred is always mutual, never one-sided. Hated governments have a dark red border on the map. If you try to build an outpost in the land of a government type which your government hates, it will cost 2 Glass instead of 1. You will collect an additional tithe item from vassals your government hates. Changing to a government type which your current government hates costs 2 Food, not one.

Governments of the same type cannot war with each other, except for Anarchies and Theocracies, and governments that hate themselves.

Syndicalism is a special type of government which you can only select if your record Most Vassals is at least ten.

If you ever have three or less buildings and are not in Anarchy, your government will revert to Anarchy at the end of next production free of charge. At the same time, Syndicalism will revert to a random government (not including Syndicalism).

Anarchy (Underdog bonus) Hates: Fascism
Seat of Power: Downtown

Anarchists pay one less tithe object than usual.
Anarchists receive double scrap.
Anarchists can attack other anarchists.
Anarchists cannot steal Tech Levels, or have Tech Levels stolen.
Anarchists can make one less Trade than usual.
Corruption is doubled for Anarchists.
Anarchists gain none of the usual abilities that come of having an Academy. That is: No building advanced buildings, no Enriched Uranium in combat, no terraforming or researching Tech Levels. Advanced buildings can still be used as long as they exist.
With a Church, Anarchist Informants gain the ability to suicide bomb.

Bureaucracy (Trade bonus) Hates: Monarchy and Fascism
Seat of Power: World Trade Center

Bureaucrats can offer twice the number of trades they would normally be allowed, after other bonuses.
They receive a plus one (+1) Production Bonus if they possess a Customs House, and another plus one (+1) for an Office Tower.
Bureaucrats are ill-equipped for combat, receiving a -10% accuracy modifier in local warfare.

Capitalism (Refining and Bounty bonuses) Hates: Communism and Fascism
Seat of Power: Bank

Capitalists can use their Factory as an extra Refinery. Item to Manufacture policy must be set to "Refine".
Capitalists receive a minus two (-2) Production Modifier unless they have an Office Tower.
When Capitalists collect a bounty, they receive a prize one level higher than normal. For example, instead of 2 Diamond Drills, they would get 2 ICBMs.
All Spies including Diplomats hosted by a Capitalist are able to cause corruption +10% of the time.

Communism (Espionage bonus) Hates: Capitalism and Fascism
Seat of Power: Reinforced Bunker

Communist Informants and Agents get an extra 50% chance of survival whenever they would otherwise be slain, on top of other bonuses. (Spy deaths include: Hiding place destruction, sabotage, inciting revolt, Omniscience.)
Communist Spies report not only all buildings, but the complete inventory of their target.
All Communist Spies including Diplomats can cause corruption, but with -10% frequency. (They are trained for survival, not embezzlement.)
When a bounty is collected on a Communist state, the prize will be one level lower than normal. For example, instead of 2 Aid, their new master would get 1 ICBM.
Communist Spies can be demoted and removed free of charge.
Communist Diplomats will not be excuted on the outbreak of war, instead escaping to become Informants.

Fascism (Cruelty bonus) Hates: Everyone except Fascism
Seat of Power: Reichstag or: Whitehouse

Fascists receive +1 tithe item from each of their vassals.
Fascists get a +3 Production Modifier if they are hosting no Outposts in their land at production.
Fascists vacating an area on a land exchange employ scorched earth tactics. They leave half (rounding down) the warehouses, mines, and cannons destroyed, as well as one random advanced building (excluding Landmines).
With a Church, Fascist Informants gain the ability to suicide bomb.

Monarchy (Leadership bonus) Hates: Bureaucracy and Fascism
Seat of Power: Castle

Monarchies receive a +1 Production Modifier for their first vassal, +2 for their second, and so on cumulatively.
Monarchies get +1 Senate Vote for each Outpost they own.
Monarchies are insusceptible to revolt and corruption.
Exercising mercantilist trading policies, Monarchies receive an extra trade if they possess an Embassy.

Syndicalism (All-around bonuses) Hates: Everyone
Seat of Power: Statue

Syndicalism (specifically, Anarcho-Syndicalism) is a special type of government achievable only if the citizens are incredibly proud and well-satiated. Once this is in place, the feats of any one mere government are eclipsed. Such perfection cannot be expected to last however, as the people will quickly lose their fervour, due to the intrinsic weakness of the human spirit. (Hey, it's a bleak world.)

Only players with a Most Vassals score of ten (10) or more can change their government to Syndicalism.
It costs 4 Food to change to Syndicalism.
Syndicalist governments will revert to a random non-Syndicalist government at the end of production unless 4 Food is present. If the Food is available, the people will consume it and maintain Syndicalism.

And now, the benefits:

+10% Combat Accuracy, +20% Food Growth, +50% Informant/Agent survival
+1 Trade, +1 Tech Level (14 Max), +3 PM
Collects +1 Tithe object, and is immune to being tithed.
Immune to revolt.

Technocracy (Tech bonus) Hates: Theocracy and Fascism
Seat of Power: Supercomputer

Technocrats create a deflective shield around their advanced buildings, which ensures they will be the last ones destroyed in combat. They will ultimately be destroyed however, if no other buildings are left.
If Technocrats construct a Dome, their shield is enhanced to prevent ANY warfare, and their Border is effectively closed. This super-shield causes your Production Modifier to drop by 2, and cannot be disabled. Stormy weather interferes electrically with the effect, reducing it to the normal functionality, whereupon the Dome will be destroyed first in combat as per usual.
Technocrats are always effectively one Tech Level higher than they should be. The actual Tech Level will be listed, but they will have powers one beyond. This gives them an ability at effective Tech Level 15 that no other government receives: Omniscience.

Theocracy (Warfare and Luck bonus) Hates: Technocracy and Fascism
Seat of Power: Launchpad

If theocrats have a church, they gain a +10% accuracy bonus in local warfare.
If their opponent has a church, they gain another +10% accuracy.
Theocrats are lucky. Any negative random production event has a 1/3 chance of not happening. This includes Food rotting, Sand blowing away, even acid rain. Beneficial events will come up more often. Maybe there is someone up there after all!
Citing ideological differences, theocrats can attack other theocrats.
With a Church, Theocratic Informants gain the ability to suicide bomb.
The fundamentalist Theocrats are always effectively at only 2/3 of the Tech Level they should be, rounding up. The actual Tech Level will be listed, but they will have powers below what they should. This means the effective maximum Tech Level available to Theocrats is only TL 10.

The Senate

The Senate allows democratic decision-making to impact several aspects of gameplay. On the Senate page, players can cast their votes on various issues, the outcome of which will change the rules of the world. The Senate is led by an elected Speaker who receives special privileges. The results of the latest vote are linked from the Senate page.

The Senate convenes, and votes are tabulated, 3 times a week: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, at noon server-time. The results take effect immediately.

All players get at least one vote on all senate issues, unless they are usurped by a master's Embassy. A veteran player (at least half as old as the oldest player) gets two votes for the Speaker. Other factors (ie. Diplomats) may affect votes for regular issues, but the Speaker vote is special.

Players MUST visit and submit to the Senate page between each convening to have their votes counted; this is called attendance. Idle players' votes do not count, but can be usurped by an Embassy.

In the event of a tie on any given Senate issue (between any two winning options), the default ruling of non-action will take effect.

Senate Issues

Following are the issues which can be voted on.

Speaker for the Senate
Players can vote for any of their contacts to be elected Speaker for the Senate. Players cannot vote for themselves. If they lose contact with the player they were voting for, their vote remains fixed to that player until they change it. Ties for Speaker are resolved by superior Rank. Players get only one vote for Speaker, other bonuses do not contribute as with other issues. Veteran players get two votes for Speaker.

The Speaker receives these privileges:

They get unlimited messages to all on the Communication page.
They can send messages to anyone in the world by typing the player's name.
All players can respond to the Speaker, who appears near the top of contacts on the Comm page.
Their vote for all issues except election of a new Speaker is worth 1 + 10% of the total number of votes. (Ie. With 40 votes, excluding idlers and including Diplomats, the Speaker's vote on non-Speaker issues is worth 1+4.)
After the senate convenes, the way the (previous) Speaker voted on each issue is revealed.
They are a global leader, able to trade with anyone. (See Leaders.)
The Speaker for the Senate needn't renew his vote, it will always be made.

Human Rights
Moderate: No change
Strict: All Vassalages start at one less duration.
Lax: All Vassalages start at one more duration.

Subsidies
No subsidy: No change
Environmental Subsidy: Players with below average Pollution get +2 PM, those with above average Pollution get -2 PM.
Industrial Subsidy: Players with above average Pollution get +2 PM, those with below average Pollution get -2 PM.

The average Pollution is rounded to the nearest integer; players with Pollution equal to the average receive no net change.

Arms Race Regulation
No regulation: Diabolical Machines cost the usual amount to advance, 15 Materials
Weapons Taxation: Diabolical Machines cost 20 Materials to advance.
Weapons Funding: Diabolical Machines cost only 10 Materials to advance.

Peace In Our Times
Sunday is safe: No attacks on Sunday
The weekend is safe: No attacks all weekend
No day is safe: Attacks are possible any time

Landmines
Defensive Landmining: Landmines will detonate when land exchange is forced on the loser of local warfare
Ban on Landmining: Landmines will not detonate, and new Landmines cannot be constructed
Offensive Landmining: Landmines will detonate on ANY land exchange

Production Time Adjustment
This issue changes the times at which Production occurs. Changes will take effect the cycle after the Senate votes.
Each option represents a one hour time shift for Production time, though it will remain evenly spaced by 6 hours.
The final option, Random within 6 hour time blocks, is different. If the Senate chooses this option, production will occur at a totally random time once within the six hours from midnight to 6 AM, 6 AM to noon, noon to 6 PM, and 6 PM to midnight.

Judgement of the Senate
Judgement of the Senate is a special issue, deciding whether to condone or denounce a particular type of Government. A government that is condoned never experiences hatred. A denounced government is hated by everyone, including itself. The decision of the senate surpasses any other ruling.

The issue is in two parts. First a choice to Abstain (from judgement), Condone, or Denounce. Then there is an option to choose a type of government, or none. The two decisions are resolved independantly of one another. If either part fails, no judgement will be passed.

Leaders

At the top of the world in their mega ultimate fortress of rocktastic bitch-slappery, the world leaders compose themselves and enter into deepest thoughtful discussion with the other masters of the universe.

Leaders are superior Battle Miners at the top of the scoreboard. The primary priviledge of Leadership is the ability to offer trades to players all over the world, appearing just below the normal trade map on the Trade page. If Global Trades are redundant to the map (ie. The Global Leader is a contact of yours) they will not be repeated. These are known as Global Trades.

An Office Tower is required to offer Global Trades (ie. The Leader must have one), while an Office Tower or a Customs House can be used to accept them.

There are two classes of Leaders: Governmental and Global Leaders. Governmental Leaders are the top ranked player for each Government, however they can be upgraded to Global Leaders. Global Leaders offer trades to everyone in the world, while Governmental Leaders offer them only to people who share the government that their leadership is tied to. (Note: The Leader of Anarchy is technically a Representative, but has all the powers of a Leader for these purposes.)

The number one ranked player is a Global Leader.
The Speaker for the Senate is a Global Leader.
The player controlling the highest level Monument is a Global Leader. (If there is a tie, this position is left unfilled.)
The player with the most Monuments is a Global Leader. (If there is a tie, this position is left unfilled.)
The player with the most Palantirs is a Global Leader. (If there is a tie, this position is left unfilled.)
A Governmental Leader with the Seat of Power World Trade Center, while not a Global Leader, is able to offer trades globally.

New Leaders are calculated each production. The Leaders receive access to a private communication channel. (It's green.)

Leaders can visit the Summit page to gain a broad overview of the world's demographics. Non-leaders are forced to remain outside and, well, entertain themselves. A board of all Leaders is listed there.

Spies

Spies are the wily ones you dispatch to your enemy's land in order to observe their strength and the threat they pose militarily.

They come in three flavours. Informants and Agents infiltrate the enemy empire silently, and hide in the buildings the other player has constructed. Diplomats boldly introduce themselves, are welcomed into the safety of the Battle Mine, and housed in the Frontal Observatory. This luxurious division of the Battle Mine is more comfortable than the cramped inner-quarters, and possessed of splendid view, but rather exposed in times of great catastrophe...

All Spies have special attributes, and can perform missions in enemy territory on your behalf. Agents and Diplomats cannot be used until they have been researched in the Academy.

Summarized here, you can read the Details below:

Informant (Cost: 1 Glass)

Reports on host's status
Can smuggle Palantirs
20% chance to steal most common object each turn through Corruption
Invisible to the host
May be killed when their hiding place is destroyed
Vulnerable to Omniscience
Can perform suicide bombing

Agent (Cost: 1 Informant + 1 Glass)

Must be researched in the Academy
Reports on host's status
Can smuggle Palantirs
20% chance to steal most common object each turn through Corruption
Invisible to the host
May be killed when their hiding place is destroyed
Vulnerable to Omniscience
50% bonus chance of survival upon any kind of death (except DDD)
Can perform sabotage
Can incite revolt

Diplomat (Cost: 1 Agent + 1 Glass)

Must be researched in the Academy
Reports on host's status
Can smuggle Palantirs
Prevents loss of objects due to Corruption from owner to host
Visible to the host
Executed if the owner and host go to war
Immune to Omniscience
+1 Senate Vote per Diplomat

An Informant may be dispatched to a contact for 1 Glass, and upgrading any Spy costs the same. This action never fails, unless the target has no buildings at all for the spy to hide in.

Informants and Agents are invisible to their hosts, but Diplomats are visible in a list on the Espionage page.

Having any level of Spy in a contact's domain allows you to see what buildings he has. You can also detect if there is any Food, Enriched Uranium or ICBMs in his inventory (but not how many). The spy can very roughly estimate coal levels: 10 or more, 1 to 10, or 0. (If an empire has no coal, they are ripe for the taking!)

Informants and Agents have a 20% chance of stealing the most common object in a victim's inventory. This is known as Corruption. Corruption is prevented when:

The victim has fewer most-common objects than visiting Spies
The victim has dispatched a Diplomat to the owner
The victim is a Monarchy

Whenever a player has a building destroyed, any Informants or Agents hiding in the building may be killed. This includes buildings destroyed by warfare, random events, or anything else. Each Spy hides in a random building, so if a player with 5 Mines and 5 Warehouses terraformed their land, the 5 Mines lost would cause a 50% chance for each Informant in the player's land to be slain. Scrapping buildings will not kill spies.

If a player loses their last building, all Informants and Agents (regardless of survival bonuses) perish with no place to hide.

Diplomats are welcomed into the protective interior of the Battle Mine, so are not killed by Omniscience or when Buildings are destroyed. Diplomats however are summarily executed when their hosts and owners go to war. Each Diplomat is worth +1 Vote in Senate.

All spies will report if a host nation performs a land exchange, or engages in warfare.

There are three missions spies can perform:

Smuggle Palantir (Any level of Spy)
If you have your own Palantir in your inventory, your Spy can smuggle it into a host nation at no cost. See the section on Palantirs for details.

Suicide Bombing (Informants only)
If you have a Church, and your government is Theocracy, Fascism, or Anarchy, your Informants gain this special ability.

Sending a suicide bomber costs 1 Enriched Uranium. Your Informant is always lost.

A suicide bomber will take out between zero and four Mines, Tree, Warehouses, and Cannons. In addition, World Trade Centers will automatically be taken out. The victim's Fallout will increase by one. There is a 1 in 10 chance your victim will fall into Anarchy after such an assault.

If any damage is done, religious organizations within your borders will openly claim responsibility for the attack, revealing your identity to the victim and adjacent neighbors.

Sabotage (Agents only)
Special Agents can perform sabotage. The cost is high: One Aid to pay off the guards, one Enriched Uranium to make the explosion, and your spy could be killed (50% chance).

The result is the destruction of one completely random building from among all your victim's buildings. Their Fallout will increase by one. There is a 1 in 10 chance your victim will fall into Anarchy after such an assault.

Adjacent nations will get reports of the mysterious explosion, however your Agent will conceal his identity at all costs.

Incite Revolt (Agents only)
At the cost of 1 Food and risking the life of your Agent (50% chance), your victim's government will be changed to a government other than Anarchy or Syndicalism of your choice. Your identity will not be revealed. This action will not work if your victim's people are full.

Palantirs

Palantirs are items made in factories, but have special properties. They cannot be traded, tithed, overflowed, or fired out of a cannon. They cost one Glass to make, and they do take up one space in your inventory. They are named after their creator.

If one of your own Palantirs is in your inventory, you can smuggle it into the inventory of anyone that you are spying on. You cannot smuggle other people's Palantirs.

If two Palantirs are ever in the same inventory at the same time, both are immediately destroyed.

If one of your own Palantirs is in your inventory, your factory will not produce another. (That would be counterproductive; both would be destroyed.)

Players holding one of your Palantirs cannot attack you. (If you are holding someone else's Palantir, you cannot attack them.)

Vassals of yours will pay one extra tithe object if they hold your Palantir.

If you land exchange with someone holding your Palantir, you may be able to steal a Tech Level. See the section on Land Exchange.

If you are holding your own Palantir, you can see the Firepower, Munitions Policy and Land Exchange policy of other players who are holding one of your Palantirs on the View page.

The player with the most Palantirs in the world becomes a Leader, unless there is a tie in which case the position goes unfilled.

Assassination

How does one get rid of those pesky spies?

Informants and Agents may die naturally when the building they are in is destroyed. If all your buildings are wiped out, every Informant and Agent in your land will be killed. Another good way to be rid of spies is Omniscience.

Diplomats are executed when their owner goes to war with their host. These individuals are the honourable dispatches of trusted neighbors, and can't be taken out on a whim. If war is not an option, an empire must act by nefarious means to achieve their ends.

The Seats of Power Downtown and Reichstag / Whitehouse allow you to perform an assassination on the Espionage page, which will slay one diplomatic guest.

The cost is one Glass and one Food if you have a Downtown, or one Glass and one Diamond if you have gone the fascist route.

There will also be political repurcussions. If you have a Diplomat with the victim's owner, they will be immediately seized and executed. If not, a random Diplomat of yours with another player will be slain. Failing that, your nation will collapse into Anarchy.

Tech

High Tech Level is the mark of a seasoned Battle Miner. It is shown for each player on all maps.

If you build an Academy and your government isn't in anarchy, you can research Tech Levels at the Academy. Your Tech Level starts at zero.

Advancing a Tech Level costs 15 of a certain object, a cost which (unlike most) cannot alternatively be paid in base or refined materials. It must be 15 of the specified object. The object corresponds to the value-order of all objects, indexed to your current Tech Level.

Each Tech Level you gain adds one to your score. It also gives you a new innate capability, which applies whether you have an Academy or not. Some sections of this manual specify what abilities require Academic research to indulge, others await your discovery.

You may have a Tech Level stolen if you are land exchanged by a nation of inferior Tech Level. See the section on Land Exchange.

Note that an active Academy uses up your BM's one free Power each turn. The scientists of the Academy really suck back the juice with all their computers and experiments.

Terraforming

Terraforming allows you to change the resource mined on your tile to any base material you choose. It is a function performed on the Academy page, and must be researched there before it will be available. You can terraform to the same resource in order to re-roll your land bonus.

Terraforming costs one of each refined material. That is to say: one Enriched Uranium, one Diamond, one Glass, one Steel, and one Aluminum. You must possess an academy before you can terraform.

Terraforming will also change the land bonus on your tile to a new random value between not -1 and 1, but -2 and 2.

Due to intense subterranean nano-activity, terraforming causes all underground structures to be destroyed without leaving scrap. This includes: Mines, Cellar, Bunker, Borehole, Landmine, and the Communist Seat of Power, Reinforced Bunker. Trees too are destroyed, their roots mangled and useless.

Diabolical Machines

The ultimate goal of Tech Levelling is the ability to construct Diabolical Machines. As long as you are Tech Level 14, you can work on these abominations of the natural order at will, no Academy required. There are two Diabolical Machines: The Scrambler, and the Doomsday Device (DDD for short).

Progress on Diabolical Machines is made on the Construction page, but unfortunately they are so enormous there is no way to build one all at once; Instead it must be done in installments of 5%.

Each 5% of the machine that you build costs 15 Refined Materials (payable with base materials). The first 5% is of Diamond, the second Aluminum, followed by Steel, Glass, and finally Enriched Uranium. The costs then repeat. In total therefore, you will pay 60 of each Refined Material to complete your Diabolical Machine. Your troubles have only just begun, however.

Any fraction of a Diabolical Machine and the completed machine itself are invulnerable to normal warfare. However, since the machinery is a part of the land, you will lose control of whatever portion you have completed thus far if you are Land Exchanged. Worse, the enormity of the project cannot be concealed, and the percentage of whichever Diabolical Machine you have completed the most of will be displayed to your contacts on all maps.

Diabolical Machines cannot be activated on official holidays.

The details on each machine follow:

The Doomsday Device

The Doomsday Device is a large and terrifying contraption of devastating power. It consume the whole world wiping it clean of anything smaller than a Battle Mine. The air surrounding the hyper-irradiated blast of a detonating device is eerily quiet, outside the dying crackles of research computers and the screams of diplomats swept away along with sections of hull.

Should you succeed in constructing a Doomsday Device, you are at liberty to activate it on the Warfare page. Activating a Doomsday Device has the following effects:

Your Doomsday Device is destroyed.
The world's governments descend into Anarchy.
All buildings, Outposts, Spies and Diamond Drills in the world are destroyed (without leaving scrap).
You lose 10 Tech Levels.
All players within one square of you are vassalized, and lose two Tech Levels.
Players two squares away lose one Tech Level.
Players anywhere in the world already in Anarchy lose one additional Tech Level.
All Battle Mines lose one intrinsic hull point.
Fallout on all map tiles is raised by 10.
Pollution on all map tiles is raised by 20.
Roamers are slain without leaving items behind, unless they have eaten 50 times.
Progress on all semicomplete Diabolical Machinery in the world is reduced by a full 50% (multiplying), rounding down to the nearest 5%.

A Technocracy Shield will cause players exposed to a Doomsday blast to lose one less Tech Level.

Scramblers

The Scrambler is a complex assembly of nanomachines, with enough power to rearrange the map completely. No-one understands quite how or why something like this might be done, but there's a title in it for you.

Scramblers are activated on the Academy page, with the following effects:

Your Scrambler is destroyed.
The map is emptied and reformed circularly at the center of the world using all map tiles, wherever they might be.
Idlers have equal chance of being scattered, concentrated at the center, or at the perimeter.
All Outposts are destroyed.
All tiles are terraformed.
You (alone) have your Land Bonus set to +5.
Progress on all semicomplete Scramblers in the world is reduced by a full 50% (multiplying), rounding down to the nearest 5%.

Omniscience

At Tech Level 14 (+1 for the Technocrat bonus), Technocrats gain an ability accessible to no other government: Omniscience, available on the Espionage page. At the cost of one Diamond, the all-seeing eye atop the Technocrat's Battle Mine focuses its retina and probes the land, destroying any hidden Spies it finds with fricking laser beams!

Agents have a 50% chance of avoiding the Eye's gaze. All Communist Informants and Agents gain a 50% survival bonus on top of that. Diplomats (as legitimate, announced visitors) are left unhurt by the eye, but can sense its baleful gaze.

After using Omniscience, you will be told how many Spies were caught in your territory, otherwise you will learn if any targets remain to be zapped.

Factions

You can select a Faction to join by typing one on the Player Setup page. Your Faction will not be official until it has at least two members.

If you are the first to join a Faction, you become the boss of that Faction. Other players must type the Faction name exactly the same as yours on the Player Setup page, and wait for you to approve them (also on the Player Setup page). If you want to join a Faction, you should message the boss of the Faction to remind them to approve you. Players who join a Faction after the boss are called affiliates.

Factions get their own exclusive communication channel. Members of your Faction will have a yellowish border around them on the map. Members of factions not your own get a red border. There is also a Factions map on the Foreign Affairs page, which shows your Faction members, or if you have no Faction all those who do.

Apart from the above, Factions have zero impact on gameplay. Factions or any other groups of players are strongly discouraged from picking on individual players. The one account per player rule must also stand, don't create dummies to join your faction. This rule may be strongly enforced.

Intrinsics

Your Battle Mine has several intrinsic characteristics.

The first one holds (or hull, in some contexts). Like the Warehouse buildings, each hold can store one object. You start with 15 holds, and can get more by manufacturing Hull Upgrades in a factory. Calamitous events may destroy your holds, and if they ever get down to zero your Battle Mine disintegrates and your account is lost.

The second is called Perma-Mines. These act just like Mines, producing the same amount of base materials each turn, but unlike regular mines these cannot be destroyed. Your Battle Mine always has 3 Perma-Mines.

The third is the Perma-Cannon. Like Perma-Mines, this represents a building which cannot be destroyed, in this case the Cannon. Your Battle Mine starts out with none, as the recoil from a regular shot could damage the hull. Research in the Academy is needed.

Finally, your Battle Mine produces one Power for free each Production. This can be used for refining, manufacturing, or any other application. This special Power is nullified once the Academy is constructed.

Weather

Weather has several affects on the game, the most important being when overflow occurs.

There are five types of weather: Sunny, Cloudy, Windy, Rainy, and Stormy. Depressingly, Rainy weather is roughly twice as common as the other varieties. You can always tell the current weather, and the weather for next cycle on the Communication page. Effects which increase your ability to Forecast the weather are cumulative.

There is a friendly fellow with an uncanny knack for the meteorological wandering around in the world. If Don the Sage visits you, he increase your Forecast by four cycles on the Comm page. He is visible on every map before the name of the player he is visiting. Don the sage, P.S., is a Roamer.

Weather has several effects as it is changed during production (the new weather having the actual impact) and some effects during play in between productions.

Cloudy

No effects

Sunny

Production Modifier +1 for all
+50% chance of producing Food
Solar Panels provide power

Windy

Local Combat accuracy -10% for all
+25% chance of producing Food
Solar Panels provide power
Windmills provide power
Sand Miners with no Dome lose one Sand during production as it is helplessly blown into an adjacent territory. A random neighbor is the beneficiary.

Rainy

Overflow happens
+50% chance of producing Food, but cancels Sea of Rust bonus
Prevents soil aridity for Sand miners

Stormy

Overflow happens
Production Modifier -1 for all
Local Combat accuracy -10% for all
Windmills provide power
Prevents Food bonuses from the Sea of Rust and the Dock
Prevents soil aridity for Sand miners

Apocalypse

Occasionally, one of the four horsemen will ride across the land, heralding doom. Each has a huge impact on the game, both during production and in the cycle that follows.

No-one knows at what time the horsemen will strike, but if you talk to someone very old, like say your grandpa's grandpa or someone along those lines, they may have picked up some snippets of knowledge in their vast life about when the horsemen will appear.

Horsemen production events occur before all others. The Horsemen will not ride on official Battle Mines holidays.

The White Horseman

During production, any master who is not a vassal themselves reverses position with one of his vassals, chosen randomly.
Corruption from all Spies able to steal is increased to 100%.
Everyone experiences a negative random event.

The Red Horseman

All rules forbidding combat are waived. Defeating your master will nullify the existing vassalization. Launchpad owners can attack anyone in the world.
All bounties are worth triple the usual number of prizes. (Ie. Your first bounty is worth 3 Food, not 1.)
During local combat, the attacker's Firepower is always 20.

The Black Horseman

No Food is produced. The people cannot become full.
Your starving citizens will eat one Food at productuction if it is available, otherwise no work will be done at all.
Any governmental change or maintenance costs only one Food.
Agents can plunge a nation directly into Anarchy by inciting a revolt.
Bribery prolongs or shortens a vassalage by three cycles, not one, but still will not cancel it entirely.
Food is worth twice as much on the Black Market.

The Pale Horseman

During production, all Battle Mines have a chance of losing one intrinsic level of hull to acid rain. This probability is equal to:
(( Pollution + Fallout ) x 2) %
For example: maceo has 30 Fallout and 5 Pollution. His chance of losing hull is 70%.
Local combat accuracy is always 100%.

Holidays

Special days of the year are observed in Battle Mines lore, and respected. This translates to no Apocalypse or Doomsday, and beneficial events all day long. Also, fireworks receive a x1.5 multiplier on holidays.

The current list of statutory holidays follows:

January 1st: New Year's Day
January 6th: Epiphany
February 14th: Valentine's Day
February 21st: Rasteroid's Birthday
March 17th: Saint Patrick's Day
April 22nd: Earth Day
May 5th: Cinco de Mayo
July 1st: Canada Day
July 12th: Battle Mine's Birthday (original launch date, 2005)
September 11th: Coptic New Year
September 19th: International Talk Like A Pirate Day
October 31st: Halloween
November 11th: Remembrance Day
December 9th: Hanukkah '93
December 24th: Christmas Eve
December 25th: Christmas
December 26th: Boxing Day
December 31st: New Year's Eve

Ranks

Your score in the game is determined as follows:

Most Vassals
+
Current Vassals (Total)
+
Vassal Status (-10 Points if you are currently a Vassal)
+
Building Score (Total Buildings divided by 10, rounding down)
+
Advanced Buildings
+
Production Score (Production Modifier divided by 2)
+
Hull Upgrades
+
Tech Level
+
Monument Height
=
Score (Set to zero if negative)

Scores are calculated on the turn of the cycle. High Score ties are won by players having the most current vassals, then by whoever was playing most recently.

Your score determines your title, and of course bragging rights. Watch out for bounty hunters though. (Read about Bounties and the IWI.)

Your Most Vassals score is calculated immediately after combat. It will decrease on point every two weeks.

Monuments

Tech 14, DDDs in check, plenty of Hull; What's a Battle Miner to do?

On the Foreign Affairs page for the princely sum of ten of each Refined Material, you can construct a huge Monument to your power in the heart of your empire. Monuments are visible from every map, preceding the player's name. The name of the original builder, and date of construction, are recorded on the base of the Monument itself.

Monuments can also be augmented for the same price. This adds a level of height to the Monument, further increasing its grandeur. The controller of the Monument can augment the Monument, but not change the name and date of the original builder. The height of the Monument contributes directly to the controlling player's score.

Monuments are not affected by warfare, and can withstand the blast of a Doomsday Device, but they are not indestructible. Any level of Monument can be completely destroyed by the controlling player for 25 Enriched Uranium. Carefully controlled atomic detonations allow your Engineers to reduce the environmental impact to a mere 5 Fallout.

The player who has built the most Monuments (in the whole world) becomes a Leader. The player who controls the highest Mo

BATTLE MINES

Battle Mines By Erik Walle

Battle Mines
By Erik Walle