SIRNEF
| Topic | Start-Level | Species | Habitation | Economic Attributes | ||
| Beams | 2 | Sirnef | 100% | 14% Population growth. | ||
| Missiles | 2 | Toags | 73% | ALL research topics cheaper. | ||
| Fighters | 1 | Drall | 70% | No escalation in research cost with increasing colonies. | ||
| Hull | 1 | Gorgoth | 70% | |||
| Shields | 1 | Kreel | 70% | |||
| Engines | 1 | Oomari | 70% | Habitability | ||
| Sensors | 2 | Shydow | 70% | Temp 50% | ||
| Stealth | 2 | Turians | 70% | Atmosphere 50% | ||
| Research | 4 | Zeeb | 70% | Water 50% | ||
| Economy | 1 | Ji | 66% | |||
| Production | 2 | Military Attributes | ||||
| Mining | 2 | 5% Discount on sensor costs | ||||
| Nanotech | 1 |
Sirnef Scythe:
Starting Out
Ideal Alliance Partners
Danger
Military
Requirements: Nanotech level 10, Sensors level 14, Research level 13
- Affects up to 20 ships in the same fleet.
- Affected ships which incur hull damage converts the 'salvage' to research points on a 1 to 1 basis based on the ore-cost of the damaged ship, i.e., 20% hull damage earns 20% of the ore-cost of the targeted ship in the form of research points.
- Affected ships will gain no other salvage.
- Sirnef start by researching the research topic.
- Sirnef economic strength is average at game start.
- You will find the best habs by far from greys if you are playing sirnef. The majority of greys will be over 70 hab, and a large number of those will be over 80 hab.
- Build an all-mega at your 3rd or 4th colony, and every THIRD colony therafter until you have 20 colonies (six all-megas). After this, guage whether you have an oversupply of population or an oversupply of resources. You should then be able to do an All-Mega every fifth or sixth planet until you have about twelve all-megas total. These all-megas will continue providing population at a rapid rate until you have well over 100 planets if your expansion extnds that far.
- Concentrate early research into economics. With your all-megas, you will be rolling in credits.
- It is not essential to have a strong ore/prod economy, as your colonies will be cheap. Usually, you will have an excess of resources and be waiting for additional population.
- Raise all economic techs to 7, including research. Then raise all ship-techs to 5. By now, despite expansion, you will have sufficient resources to build a batch of light destroyers.
- You can start attacking inactive players close to you, or use the light destroyers to kill inactive homeworlds you may encounter. Five light destroyers with level 5 techs is sufficient to take on a starting space-station.
- Continue researching as high as you can go.
- Toag: market discount. The market discount is invaluable, considering you will be doing a lot of all-megas, and your early economic strength depends on a solid credit income.
- Oomari and Kreel: military bonuses. These species have notoriously bad habs from greys, so they can dump all on you. In return, be unselfish with your good habs and make sure they have reasonable hab to colonise with. The various military bonuses they impart are impressive as well. Lastly, let them do what they do they do best (speed and stealth), and concentrate on weapon techs, especially missile HBS (high tech missiles, for shield penetration).
- Ji: the only species that can be considered to have opposite hab, if 67 for sirnef is bad.
- Sirnef offer no inherent alliance bonuses like Kreel, Oomari or Toag.
- Many predatory alliances will see even decently ranked sirnef as a source of good hab planets.
- If you border such an alliance, build shield generators and minefields on bordering planets. Early fleets have a very dificult time getting past such hindrances, and will give you time to build up an adequate defense, or it will simply demoralise your enemies.
- Go for the scythe and aim to get full fleet coverage with it. Research is your strength, and the lack of ore salvage is irrelevant, you will save sufficient resources with your relatively cheap colonisation costs.
- Be aware of what your allies are building, and work to complement their fleets.
- Sirnef have no inherent military advantage, except technology, and technology alone is not enough to overcome the various bonuses other species enjoy unless you know exactly how to exploit their weaknesses, or counter their strengths.
- The technology gives the ability to adapt to any situation, a sirnef player can build the amongst the most powerful battleships in the game, or amongst the most evasive escorts, or one of the most numerous swarm fleets.
- Lastly, because every planet you conquer is going to be good hab, you can dedicate a lot more resources into your starships than many other players who will battle to colonise the many bad hab planets they might conquer.