The Gecko Traders

[LWE]

The Gecko Traders

This is going to be an AAR of a Gecko Megacorp. I'm using a couple of mods, chief of them Glavius' AI, the Utopian Dream, and the mod that fixes the extremely low rate of admiral levelling. The game was started in 2.2.3 patch, ended in 2.2.5. Small galaxy, 2 FE's, 2 Maradeurs, one-two (don't remember) extra AI's.
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As cutesy as they may look to our human eyes, the Xu'Lokako lizards underwent several wars and coups in their way to being ruled by the Conglomerate. Providing most luxuries and necessities of life, as well as respecting the traditional spirituality of the planet's Gecko inhabitants, the Conglomerate was able to appropriately iterate accurate methods of empowerment in order to professionally productize fully researched goods and services to the population of Jurandar.

The Conglomerate executive decided to globally enhance their business potentialities by searching for more intelligent life in the Galaxy, in order to provide them the unique opportunities afforded by the Xu'Lokako (tm) products. They were far less interested in the discovery of once-existing sapient life than the hired scientists.

Still, the discovery triggered a boom of renewed interest in Conglomerate-sponsored universities. Prappi Tropp was especially eager to become one of the science ship commanders - even while receiving half the usual wage.

The Conglomerate continually cultivated real-time synergy by focusing on Alloy production while not neglecting exploration.

The Ruined Science Nexus, while fascinating the Xu'Lokako scientists, was, for now, to unprofitable to attempt to restore - at least, according to the Conglomerate departments' calculations.

Unfortunately, further exploration "south" and "west" was blocked by hostile entities, while there was no hyperlane way "north" or "east" of the Jurandar star cluster.

At least, the Conglomerate was able to distinctively integrate extensive value by incorporating a planet delightfully similar to Jurandar, the Xu'Lokako home, while continuing to improve employee living standards by cleaning slums.

The confrontative Mirovandia raiders were, sadly, unsuitable as clients for the Conglomerate (tm) products. The Xu'Lokako gods of trade and prosperity didn't smile on the Conglomerate so far.

The Conglomerate Board of Directors decided not to sponsor the expensive Habitable Worlds initiative, but focus on short-term profit instead.

Funding for more Yuht research was reluctantly granted.

The scientists finally discovered the nature of hostile entities to the "south". The Board of Directors decided to collaboratively reconceptualize premium strategic theme areas by concentrating research on ways to effectively fight the hostile automata preventing expansion to new markets.

The Conglomerate efficiently utilized business applications, credibly optimized standardized metrics and prayers to the gods of prosperity in its goal of serving all its employees (meaning all Xu'Lokako population). Few of them would even think of disrupting the process of holisticly delivering interoperable leadership to the growing Conglomerate space empire.

Remember: Your budget for implementing should be at least three times your budget for utilizing! It sounds improbable, but it's entirely true!

- Prappi Iza-Za, Chief Manager for Jurandar Planet, "100 Rules for Successful Customer-Directed Channel Orchestration"

 

[stnylan]

Some unfortunate neighbours there.

 

[Nikolai]

Hemmed in. Unfortunate.

 

[LWE]

It could be worse. I could be blocked by Marauders (or even Fallen Empires) from both sides.
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Unfortunately, some Xu'Lokako didn't appreciate everything the Conglomerate did for them, resorting to piracy and robbery. Of course, such violation of private property couldn't stand. The Ru Armada was founded to patrol the Conglomerate star lanes.

On a side note, the need to patrol is annoying, since I prefer to have my fleets in one place. It's like interface elements moving around. Good thing you can suppress piracy with building space ports and fortresses.

As the reinforced Conglomerate Star Fleet approached the system with hostile mining drones, it, surprisingly found that the drones had aready been destroyed by someone else. Soon, it sighted an exploration ship...

The Voor Technocracy was a star nation of roughly the same technological level as the Xu'Lokako.

The Conglomerate offered the Voor their finest goods, blessed by Cha Chingg, the goddess of Prosperity, and Tikki Tok, the god of Time. But the Voor were elitist and smug. They scorned both the gods and the goods. Even being gifted some of them for free didn't change the Voor attitude.

Surely, the other sentient lifeforms in the galaxy would be more diverse - this was the only hope of the Conglomerate Board of Directors.

To the "south" of the Voor, lay the planets of Kan Jukla, covered in strange nest-like buildings. Will they, under the leadership of their Overlord Star Wing, prove to be more amenable to the Conglomerate goods?

The confusingly named Vool Watchers, located "north-east" of the Voor, were dismissive of Xu'Lokako, claiming that they already have all the goods they need. They were rather patronizing of the Conglomerate spiritual beliefs, referring to them as "on the right track, but primitive". It was clear that no business could be done with them.

Private initiative in colonizing new planets greatly aided in synergistic coordination of Conglomerate expansion, as the Board of Directors invested in new research efforts.

The Conglomerate diplomats noticed that the Voor and the Kan Jukla were at war... could it use the rivalry of the two Erudite Explorers to its benefit?

 

[stnylan]

Very cooped in - will you seek to break out or settle down to be super-tall with Ecumenpoli and Habitats everywhere?

 

[Vilhelm]

It's a shame your neighbors aren't too interested in trade. Perhaps a few hostile takeovers are in order?

 

[LWE]

Very cooped in - will you seek to break out or settle down to be super-tall with Ecumenpoli and Habitats everywhere?

Keep in mind, that it's a Small galaxy with the number of AI's increased, so it's not that bad. Still, the good thing about being a Megacorp that you can "expand" on other nations' planets. Of course, these nations need to be friendly enough to allow your affiliates there.

It's a shame your neighbours aren't too interested in trade. Perhaps a few hostile takeovers are in order?

You'll see The Xu'Lokako prefer to trade peacefully, but they understand that sometimes, some gunboats are necessary for profit.
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It was clear to the Board of Directors: to properly globally evisculate interoperable catalysts for increasing the Conglomerate prosperity while honoring the gods, it was necessary to improve Space Fleet performance. "We need a Space Force!" motivators were seen everywhere on Jurandar.

Unfortunately, the galaxy didn't contain the Covfefe system.

Meanwhile, the Kedeshi Regime, although somewhat... ethically objectionable, seemed to be interested in all the goods the Conglomerate had to offer.

More potential clients. The appearance of the Velutarians was strangely similar to the way the Voor looked, but their attitude and philosophical principles were quite different. The reasons for this strange similarity were unclear. How could genetic material from one nation's planet be transferred to another without these nations knowing about it? Some kind of mysterious extra-dimensional entity? Some unknown god?

Funny how one of these species is Repugnant, while the other one is Charismatic. I guess the difference is in their personalities... or maybe the Voor, unlike the Velutarians, have an unpleasant smell? It's probably both.

The star chart, hung in the Conglomerate Director's office.

It seemed that the war between two Erudite Explorers was quite unprofitable for both parties. For all their arrogance, they both clearly knew nothing about business.

People complain that too many AI Empires have the Hegemonic Imperialists personality, but in my games, the Erudite Explorers are the most prominent type so far. It does make some sense - the Explorer personality also has quite permissive conditions to appear. Tbh my galaxies are usually quite diverse, even if I still hadn't met all personalities in my games.

In a major success for the Conglomerate, the Kedeshi Regime agreed to sign a commercial pact with the Conglomerate. Now all residents of Kesho - well, all free residents of Kesho, given that around 40% of its population were slaves - could enjoy the finest drinks, food, clothing and entertainment from Jurandar.

Roop Zaha-Ni, a talented Corporate Representative from the newly-colonized ocean planet of Minchi, was admired by the locals for leading the efforts to install an efficient water filtration system (which the Xu'Lokako, which felt themselves at ease in both air and water, badly needed). Naturally, the Conglomerate decided that he'd be of more use to the fledging colony.

The Kan Jukla, seeing the mutual hostility between the Conglomerate and the Voor, agreed to pool its scientific efforts with the Conglomerate.

Living next to the Marauders can sometimes be profitable. As the old Xu'Lokako maxim says, "search for profit in the unlikeliest of places".

The Kedeshi Grand Marshal Cox's assurances were quite... ambiguous. But as long as the Conglomerate could sell enough products to his subjects, the Conglomerate didn't care.

The developers made a great job making the AI empires' personality shine through their diplotext.

 

[stnylan]

I had forgotten already it was a small galaxy tbh

Still, some new opportunties for commercial expansion.

 

[LWE]

I had forgotten already it was a small galaxy tbh

Yeah, in most strategy games I increasingly prefer smaller sizes to extremely large playing fields where a lot of space ends up playing no decisive role at all.
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Hmm... maybe these Marauders are quite profitable to have nearby, after all, even if they pulicly stated that they will execute the next Conglomerate (tm) salesman who wanders in their space in a peculiarly painful way...

The Quelptilium looked like people who'd need a really massive advertising campaign to buy the Conglomerate goods. Far more intriguing was the presence of the Chinorr Combine, a similar galactic corporation.

Two pre-defined empires (The Voor and the Chinorr) in one game! What are the odds of that?

It's also rich of Queptilium to talk about "alien horrors"... although maybe we are as horrifying to them as they are to us?

Updated galaxy map.

- Grandma, why do you have so many eyes?
- To better notice all secrets of the universe, my child.
- But Grandma, why do you have such sharp teeth?
- To swallow and consume all knowledge of the universe, my child.

As the Conglomerate expanded its affiliates in Kedeshi Regime space, Xu'Lokako executives on Ficash noticed that the ape-like Kazam, once primitives conquered by Kedeshi armies, do quite fine for themselves, managing to, at least, avoid slavery.

Intriguingly, the Kazam are the only non-Humanoid Mammalian species of the galaxy.

Those on Jurandar who raised objections to cooperation with the slave-driving Kedeshi were simply old-fashioned, not understanding the advanced principles of corporate ethics.

The Board of Directors decided to allow Aski Klupp to head a subsidiary, which Klupp insisted on calling a "principality". Despite Klupp's eccentrics, he appeared to be a shrewd enough businessman.

 

[stnylan]

Now I have yet to encounter that event - that's neat.

 

[LWE]

Now I have yet to encounter that event - that's neat.

It’s from Dynamic Political Events mod... it’s indeed quite neat, since a lot of its events remind me of a Victoria and EU.

 

[LWE]

The Queptilium offended Lavvy Lav, the God of Tolerance. For the Conglomerate, Lavvy Lav and Cha Chingg, the God of Commerce, go together, for money and goods are what unites different nations and races.

After the death of Prappi Iza-Za, the CEO under whom the Conglomerate started its space expansion, he was proclaimed a saint by his successor.

The Conglomerate welcomes everyone whom it finds profitable, even the uncivilized Marauder admirals.

Finally, the Conglomerate knew what lay on the other side of the Mirovandia Marauders. It seemed that by serving as a buffer between the Xu'Lokako and the NEX, he Marauders inadvertently performed quite a big service to the Conglomerate.

With the Marauder admiral and the expanded fleet, it was time to pray to the god of War, Clashy Clush.

Conglomerate warships in battle

Voor fleet, although suffering only light damage, was forced to flee.

A major point in the war was the capture of the important Tyl starbase, thought by the Voor to be impregnable.

Still, the Voor made an attempt at attacking Lawam, a similar Conglomerate installation. Repelling this invasion required the combined efforts of all Conglomerate fleets.

Slowly, the Voor were losing their ships. But most of them managed to activate emergency FTL drives while still in the working condition, preventing any decisive victory on the Conglomerate's part.

 

[stnylan]

Quite a haul from that Debris there!

That Admiral is proving very useful I see.

 

[Vilhelm]

Dang. I don't think I've ever seen that much debris in the entire time I've been playing this game. Then again, I usually wait until my opponents are inferior to me in fleet power and tech to declare war...

Also, I really like the namelist you're using. Is it a vanilla one I haven't used or from a mod?

 

[LWE]

Dang. I don't think I've ever seen that much debris in the entire time I've been playing this game. Then again, I usually wait until my opponents are inferior to me in fleet power and tech to declare war...

Also, I really like the namelist you're using. Is it a vanilla one I haven't used or from a mod?

The Voor, as a Technocracy, were quite advanced, hence the techno loot from the debris. The list is vanilla, it's one of the Reptilian ones, it does seem to be made with the Geckos in mind.
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Encouraged by recent victories, the Conglomerate fleet attempted to reach deeper into Voor space, but the Voor demonstrated that their static defences are still powerful, resulting in the need to quickly retreat.

The Conglomerate, while never forgetting its commitment to rapidiously optimize empowered innovation, had to resort to buying alloys on the intergalactic market, restoring its fleet.

Now it was Voor turn to be overconfident.

The Curators must have looked at all this slaughter with pessimism. Of course, they had no idea that sometimes, military operations play an important role in competently maximizing out-of-the-box imperatives, as well as pleasing Clashy Clush, the God of War.

After a quick raid, after which the Conglomerate captured systems "north" of Tyl, the Voor agreed to a cease fire, with the Xu'Lokako retaining control of their conquests.

 

[LWE]

Despite recent successes, the Conglomerate remains last in power, according to its official Galactic Score (tm) metric.

In order to improve its galactic standing, the Conglomerate decided to further authoritatively re-engineer integrated methods of empowerment through the use of Universal Transanctions.

The new approach could be tested in spreading Conglomerate affiliates to Kan Jukla, which opened its borders to the Xu'Lokako after seeing their success in the war against Voor.

Now, the avians of Kan Jukla could immerse themselves in the latest Conglomerate enterntainment complexes!

The Voor technocracy apparently experienced some social stress, since it started to expel its own citizens.

In the Conglomerate, the Voor refugees, after abandoning their technocratic ways, found their place as priests of Xu'Lokako gods.

The Heejam Braves were also deemed unsuitable as clients. Apparently, they had the temerity to consider Conglomerate products as "soft and effete".

The Trabbur "monarchic" subsidiary continued on.

More insults from ingrates who don't appreciate the way the Conglomerate collaboratively redefined professional galactic services.

The Voor has attacked us, our gods, our prophets, and our profits.
- From the Chief Executive Officer's speech.

 

[stnylan]

I kind of imagine the Voor as having expelled religious and political dissidents, and now excuse their latest war as your support for terrorist/criminal elements in additional to good old reconquest

 

[LWE]

I kind of imagine the Voor as having expelled religious and political dissidents, and now excuse their latest war as your support for terrorist/criminal elements in additional to good old reconquest

Yep, the flavor of Stellaris allows for some interesting organic storytelling.
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Annoyingly, the war declaration was right in the middle of fleet retrofitting

Still, the Xu'Lokako fleet was ready.

Tyl, the old space static defense station constructed by the Voor, now served the Conglomerate.

Xu'Lokako scientists were eager to find out the enemy's secrets in space debris.

The task of investigating debris was soon replaced by the quest of exploring the finally-found lost Yuht homeworld. In any case, the sudden presence of Sakyt fleets, allied to the Voor, made further debris study too risky.

The Sakyt were brought into the war as a result of the Conglomerate defensive pact with the Kedeshi, which triggered the Voor pact with the Sakyt (the democratic Sakyt and the Kedeshi junta were enemies for long). It appeared to the Board of Directors that defensive pact commitments are more trouble than they are worth...

The combined Sakyt-Voor intrusion into Conglomerate space was quite dangerous.

The Yuht seemed to be quite paranoid, declaring an extermination war on a race just because of what they might do. At least, research into their home planet would be profitable for the Conglomerate. All praise Cha Chingg, the God of Prosperity.

As the Sakyt advanced further, they made a mistake by lagging their transport ships behind, allowing Xu'Lokako to intercept them.

The Voor transports were better protected. One of their armies took Trabbur, causing panic in the Conglomerate.

The Conglomerate fleet in Alphecca is following the aggressors, retaking the stations they previously managed to conquer.

Thankfully, on Sakyt-Kedeshi front, it seemed that the slavedriving Kedeshi regime finally got its act together, pushing back against the insectoid democratic aggressors.

The fleets invading the Conglomerate entered the orbit of Jurandar, the capital planet, and started bombarding it. This, however, allowed the Conglomerate to recover all other lost stations, resulting in no system being completely controlled by the invaders. Thus, Status Quo resulted in no space changing hands.

 

[stnylan]

Fought them to a standstill, but something of wake-up call I think.

 

[LWE]

The war, in which the Conglomerate managed to barely hold its own, led to the Conglomerate emphasising the military industry more.

The Xu'lokako priests and scientists have made a striking discovery of awesome psionics potential among their people. It was clear that Materialist mockery of the gods and the spiritual realm had been a sign of woeful ignorance.

Gradually, the Kan Jukla hegemony became the main client of Conglomerate (tm) products.

Private research partnerships brought great profit to the Conglomerate.

After Kan Jukla declared war on the Voor, it was clear to the Board of Directors: it is time to strike the arrogant Voor once again...

Picking the moment when the Voor fleet was distracted, the Board of Directors ordered Rhizome of Lavender (what strange names did the Marauders have) to attack the Voor defences...

But the Voor quickly patched the hole in their mobile defence fleets.

While the war was raging, the brilliant Dr. Xib from the Curator station led two ambitious genetic modification projects - one of the Kazam, to make them more useful leaders to the Conglomerate, the other one of the Xu'Lokakoi themselves, removing the cause for other galactic races calling them "fleeting", while making them require less consumer goods to lead a content life. The Conglomerate at first chaffed at the later idea, but finally, it decided that other space empires make for far better clients than its own population.

The Voor, tired of the waiting game, finally went for an all-out assault of Kan Jukla space. This allowed Rhizome of Lavender to finally take control of Eriga bastion.

Seeing that Voor fleets were further distracted....

Rhizome of Lavender mounted an attack on Zarim, a system which actually had a planet inhabited by the Voor.

At first, when Rhizome noticed a Heejam Braves marauder fleet on the horizon, he was alarmed. However, it turned out that the Marauders have no quarrel with the Xu'Lokako, and are here to raid the unfortunate Voor. With hostile fleets on all sides, the Voor fleet was massacred.

This allowed the safe passage of Xu'Lokako armies to the planet of Vallaj Mog. Its defences, while strong, eventually fell.

Since the Conglomerate fleet was quite battered, and the remaining Voor defences still powerful, the Conglomerate agreed for a cease fire which acknowledged the Xu'Lokako control over the planet and some other systems.