Vindicator Star Kingdoms guide v2 summary.
Full guide, calculator, spreadsheet and other useful things available at www.geocities.com/vindicator_sk

===Newbie Mode===
Some good guidelines to follow if you want to get a good start of the game.
•Construct 90 star mines and 25 probe factories on the 115 free land which you start with.
•Explore max land all the time while in newbie mode
•Pick both land and money rewards every day
•Train max soldiers
•Draft about 150 scientists, a bit at the time when you can afford it, and put them on money- population and military research.
•Train military when it's 24 hours or more left until you leave newbie mode. 400 troopers for offense, the rest laser troopers and tanks.
•When you leave newbie mode, try to find kingdoms with 250-275 land, less than 19k NW, and coordinates close to yours, and hit them with 1 WL + 100 to 110 troopers each.
•Repeat this to gain more land, use your probes to get stats of people, or to rob kingdoms with.

===Buildings ===
The most necessary buildings are barracks and powerplants. Chose status in the menu. If the barracks capacity is over 100%, build more barracks. If the power change is negative, build more powerplants.
Residences house civilians which make it possible for you to train military (10% of the civilians can be drafted into soldiers each day), and probes are good for robbing people and getting your stats with, so you should always make many residences and factories every time you hit someone. Spend the rest of the land in whatever way you want.

===Military===
Until you have a high population, always train as many soldiers as possible. You draft those into more advanced military, so you can always save them for later, for when you can afford doing so.
Troopers and Dragoons are offensive units only, Laser Troopers and Laser Dragoons are defensive units, Scientists research for your kingdom, and Tanks + Tactical Fighters can be used for both offense and defense. Some of the units need to be researched first, in order to be trained.
If you don't want to get attacked early on, you should train many Laser Troopers or Laser Dragoons. Ask sectormates or friends of about your own kingdom size how much defense they have, if you are uncertain about if your defense is enough.

===Income===
Your kingdom gains income at every hour change, both from Star Mines and from taxes paid by the civilians. This money can be used to construct buildings on your free land, or to train military.

===Probes===
Probes can be used to get stats of people, or to rob with. If you want to find banks in an easy way, you can use the spreadsheet located at www.redhousegames.com/vindicator/18_sheet.html . There is also a detailed help file for it at www.redhousegames.com/vindicator/20_sheetexplain.html , so that you will know how to use it. The most money probes can return with is 10 money/returning probe.

===Attacking===
To attack someone, you need to get his SoM (use probes, chose sector, chose spy on military, pick the correct kingdom in the sectorlist, and send out the probes).
Then go to www.redhousegames.com/vindicator/16_calculator.html , and enter your bonuses and values in the fields on the left part of the calculator. Make other probings (Spy on Research, Spy on Shields) of the person you will attack (or if you don't - just set his shields to 10% and military research to 30%). Then enter how much land he has, and if he is SL or not.
Copy the SoM to the text field, and press "get defender". Then copy your own SoM (can be seen in Status - military status) to the text field, and press "get attacker". After that, press calculate, and the calculator will tell you how much you need to send to be successful, or if the attack will fail no matter how much you send.
Don't forget things like amount of WL's which you will send, and your planet type. It's best to control everything twice if you want to be sure to be successful. Also don't attack exactly at an hour change, since people's armies will increase or war leaders which are out might return then.

===Doing good at SK===
If you want to do good at SK, here are some advice:
• Never leave your kingdom too open. You will only get attacked then, and it is no use gaining land if you will lose it all afterwards.
• Try to have a good probe ratio. Then you will be more successful when probing other people, and they will beless successful when trying to probe you.
• Rob much. It is the extra income from robbings which usually makes the difference between an average player and a good player.
• Be nice to people, and make friends. Get AOL instant messenger (most SK players use that), and be active in sector- and alliance forums if you want to get to know people fast.
• Be active, and remember to pick both the rewards in the menu every day.
• Try not to fail when attacking.

Written by Vindicator, 2004-01-20