Emperor of the fading suns

(Walkthrough)

You would like to be the emperor of all the known worlds? As I thought. Sad, though, that not all are enlightened enough to understand your destiny. The other four noble Houses have the strange idea that one of them should accede to the purple (folly!); the Church seeks to grasp temporal power (heresy!); and worst of all, the Guild seeks to restore-it galls me to say it-a republic! And of course, there are Symbiots ravening the outer planets, rebels defying the rightful rule of the Houses, and the inscrutable Vau watching it all with a sense of amused disdain. All in all, sire, your work is cut out for you if I must say so myself.

Winning the hearts and minds of your loyal subjects
Your first endeavors, sire, should be directed towards convincing your more recalcitrant subjects of your benevolence and the justness of your cause. Yes, I refer to pacification of your home world, where some beneficiaries of your largesse have seen fit to reject your suzerainty. Before you can conquer the planet in your neighbor's system, the scriptures say, you must first eradicate the rebels in your own. Pacification serves two purposes. First, it simplifies defense and frees you from the threat of damaging raids on your cities. Secondly, cities captured from the rebels are essential to your early development as a galactic power. Look around you, sire; the granaries are not over full, and the people must eat (or at least, your legions must; the peasants will no doubt make do with faith, praise be!). Farms are needed, but Engineers are few, as they themselves consume 100 units of sustenance (as well as metal) upon their creation. The rebels, however, usually possess abundant farming lands, and capture of these cornucopias should ease your supply situation greatly. Other cities may fall into your hands this way, but farms are the most essential in the early days of your rise to power, my grace.
You have two things the rebels lack, sire: a Vlad Cruiser in orbit and assault landers for transport. Locate the rebels with scouts. Chastise them with your cruiser. Load your best troops into the landers, blast off to orbit, and land next to the rebel city. Assault the city, sire, and it will be yours. As you will rarely have to use surface movement except to enter the enemy city for combat, you can use any units for the assault, including the slow but powerful artillery. Act swiftly, for the rebels have access to technology fully as advanced as ours, including space flight; wait too long, and it will be Power Legions and cruisers, not militia, that you face.
Oh, sire, if I may suggest one additional step? Before any of the houses takes control of the Imperial Eye, destroy the Eye's forts on your home world. You will take some losses, but the gain of an additional fort and the security of eradicating a future hostile presence far outweigh the costs. Just don't use your cruiser to bombard the Eye's fort; the planet to space (PTS) weapons there might get lucky, and a noble without a cruiser is hardly very noble, after all.

Establishing your own prosperity sphere
Having secured your ancestral lands, sire, it will be necessary to develop the economic base needed to spread your enlightened rule to distant suns. First, you must grow food, to feed your armies and to keep the peasants from revolting. Then, you must gather other resources, needed to build your armies and space fleets. Finally, you must also research new technologies, so that you may carry your blessings to the far corners of the galaxy. The easiest way to increase food capacity is to take farms from the rebels. Engineers should build farms only where especially fertile soil exists, and where exotic plants can be harvested. A more profitable task for your valuable engineers will be to construct mines and wells, to produce metals, trace elements, gems, and energy for your war economy. Fully exploit your home world, but do not waste engineers building marginal harvesting cities; it is better to use your resources to capture rich lands on other worlds. In all cases, scout before building. It is not seemly for a noble to use the sort of language that is common when discovering that a newly built farm makes it impossible to exploit several rich metal and gem finds because the necessary mine can no longer be built. No harvesting city can be built within four leagues of another, sire, so foresight is mandatory.
Maintain a balance in your economy, though food production should always run a good surplus to guard against famine. You do not want to have to deal with the unctuous republicans of the Guild any more than you have to, and producing what you need is the best way of keeping your distance. Conquest is always the best way of expanding your wealth. Take the rebels' cities, for they have no right to what is yours. Capture new worlds, and exploit their resources; bring your enlightened rule to their benighted citizenry and reap the benefits of cities already constructed. Keep an eye on what you consume and what you produce. Shortages should guide your construction plans, so that you never have to curtail production of essential war goods due to the lack of a key component. If you take advantage of the Universal Warehouse, your task will be far easier than if you elect to forego this advantage. If so, you will have to maintain a much larger space fleet, and protect the space routes around and between your planetary holdings. A blockade by the enemy will not make becoming Emperor any easier.

Militarism: the first refuge of the Emperor-Apparent
Sadly, my lord, the wisdom of your cause is not acknowledged by everyone in the galaxy. Eventually, the intransigence of your foes will compel you to wage war upon them. War is costly, demanding, and fraught with risk, but it is also often the shortest path to victory. Your foes, if controlled by the galactic computer, will not be unduly aggressive, though human opponents are usually much more fierce. Use diplomacy to your advantage. Beg, borrow or steal an appointment to a position under the Regency, if not the Regency itself. The Imperial Eye gives you an advance outpost on your opponents' home worlds; the Fleet gives you orbital bombardment and space combat potential. The Stigmata garrison gives you both land and space power, and is very powerful. Use these positions to wage war on your enemies, without dissipating the strength of your house. Captures made by Imperial troops under your command will be the property of your house. Loot the warehouses of the Imperium, using their stockpiles to fuel your ambition. Let them do the dying, while preserving your house troops. Similarly, protect yourself. Garrison all cities. As you take worlds, fortify them and spread your nobles and your sceptors around the galaxy.
Conquest is difficult, but rewarding; why build when you can take? Do not build a plethora of units, my lord, but rather concentrate on a small set of efficient types. Early in your rise to power, armor and aircraft are fine; later, powered infantry legions of various sorts are better for assault work, though the speed of advanced armor units can be very useful. Aircraft, particularly gunships, are very cost effective as well. The more advanced versions of basic units tend to be much better than their less sophisticated counterparts, as quality can offset quantity to a large degree. Captured Symbiot units make excellent assault troops (who cares if they die? They aren't even human, my liege!). Assault landers and capital ships are essential to effective planetary conquest. The landers spearhead your assault by allowing your assault troops to destroy planetary defenses, after which your cruisers and dreadnoughts can pound the enemy into submission. Follow up your first city capture with a cargo ship loaded with armor, artillery, and airpower; this way, you can easily build up forces without damage to your fragile jumpships. As always, my lord, combined arms work better than single types of units. Every garrison should have a militia, artillery, and anti-tank and anti-aircraft units.
You are nearly ready, sire, to embark on your glorious career! But do remember to keep in good graces with the Church; the Inquisition can ruin your scientific ambitions by burning your labs if you research proscribed technologies, and an excommunication can make your troops doubt your prospects for success. By and large, do not tempt the Church; you can trade for proscribed tech, but it is rarely worthwhile to risk researching it yourself. If the Avestite inquisitors confront you, evacuate the offending lab to avoid a war with our Holy Mother Church. You can always build a new lab, my liege; a new soul is much harder to come by....

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