This tutorial will guide you through how to play Space Domination up to the level of being an intermediate player. If you do not understand everything, do not worry - these concepts are much easier in-game. Please make use of the images for each section, as they greatly aid in understanding

1. Requirements to play Space Domination
2. The different servers
3. Logging into the game
4. Choosing your race
5. Moving in game
6. Battling enemy forces
7. Setting up a planet
8. The Ship Types
9. The Different Planet Types
10. Phenomena
11. Facilities
12. Star Darts
13. Declarations

1. Requirements to play Space Domination

• Pentium 333mhz or higher processor
• Information is not shared with 3rd parties. Please read the Privacy Policy if you want to know more.
• 28.8k modem or higher
• Java compatible browser
• Java version 1.1.8 or higher - note the latest version of java can be downloaded from here
• Space Domination is 100% free to play

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2. The different servers

There are currently 4 Space Domination servers

1. Newbie - This is the shortest of the arenas, and is specifically designed for new players. If this is your first time playing Space Domination, it is a good idea to first enter this arena. Games last about 1 day.
2. Blackeye - The fastest of the advanced servers. It is slower and larger than Newbie, but faster and smaller than Milkyway. Games last about 2 days.
3. Milkyway - This is the middle of the advanced servers, being larger and slower than Blackeye, but faster and smaller than Andromeda. Games last about 1 week.
4. Andromeda - the longest and slowest arena. Games on this server can last for weeks, as opposed to the Newbie server's games which can be completed in hours.

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3. Logging into the game

Click on one of the server links on the games page. A window will be opened. If no window appears, you will need to suspend your popup blocker. Space Domination will now load. If it doesn't load please visit our faq, or post a message on the forums if the faq doesn't help you.

Now that Space Domination is loaded, please enter in a username and password of your choice, and hit enter. You will now be brought to a race selection screen, which will be explained in the next section of this tutorial.

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4. Choosing your race

There are 8 different races to choose from in Space Domination. This section is a lengthy, though informative. If you wish to skip this part of the tutorial and read it later, then just pick humans. Do not fret if some of the things such as sector you don't understand yet.

The following is an in depth explanation of the different races

Humans

Home World: New Earth

Sector: 0
Planet Build Bonus: -10%
Speed and Maximum Speed Bonus: -10%
World Bonus: Builds frigates 50% faster on desert worlds.
Unique Ability: When a destroyed star dart lands on a phenomenon you control, you have a 50% chance of scoring an additional star dart.

Makluvians

Home World: Makluvia

Sector: 1
Planet Build Bonus: +10%
Speed and Maximum Speed Bonus: -20%
World Bonus: Builds rangers 50% faster on mountain worlds.
Unique Ability: +50% command build.

Kaletians

Home World: Kaletia

Sector: 2
Planet Build Bonus: None
Speed and Maximum Speed Bonus: +20%
World Bonus: Builds corsairs 50% faster on tundra worlds.
Unique Ability: Can pass through nebulae without losing speed.

Zorestians

Home World: Zorestia

Sector: 3
Planet Build Bonus: None
Speed and Maximum Speed Bonus: +5%
World Bonus: Builds sloops 50% faster on aquatic worlds.
Unique Ability: All ships decay 25% less than other races.

Avarians

Home World: Avaria

Sector: 4
Planet Build Bonus: None
Speed and Maximum Speed Bonus: +10%
World Bonus: Builds stations 50% faster on jungle worlds.
Unique Ability: Stations on worlds can be dragged to and from your fleet.

Najunians

Home World: Najunia

Sector: 5
Planet Build Bonus: +10%
Speed and Maximum Speed Bonus: -5%
World Bonus: Builds industry 50% faster on metallic worlds.
Unique Ability: Ships deal 20% more damage in battle.

Cestanians

Home World: Cestania

Sector: 6
Planet Build Bonus: +10%
Speed and Maximum Speed Bonus: +5%
World Bonus: Builds everything 25% faster on large worlds.
Unique Ability: All facilities build 200% speed on average worlds.

Quarethians

Home World: Quarethia

Sector: 7
Planet Build Bonus: -10%
Speed and Maximum Speed Bonus: -5%
World Bonus: Builds everything 25% faster on small worlds.
Unique Ability: Ships fire, move, and retreat in battle an average of 15% faster than normal.

Once you have chosen the race that you think is best, hit the submit button. You may have to wait up to 10 seconds to the server to receive all information and to put you into the game.

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5. Moving in game

To move, you click on a planet. You will see that your fleet will begin moving towards that planet. To stop your fleet, press the escape button on your keyboard. To travel around the galaxy, you click from planet to planet.

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6. Battling enemy forces

To battle a planet, click on it, and don't re-direct your fleet. Your fleet will collide with the planet, and you will enter the battle screen.

Your ships are the ships at the center of the screen. The enemy ships are on the right side of the screen. To fire on the enemy, click on one of your ships, holding down the left mouse button, drag to an enemy ship, and let go.

Since this is your first planet, it is wise to make it a weak planet. Weak planets are 10-20 population planets. The population of a planet is displayed in the lower left-hand side of the applet when you mouse over the planet.

If you see a Star Dart (it will usually be in the back row, and looks significantly stronger than the other ships) press the retreat button. You are not strong enough to kill a Star Dart yet.

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7. Setting up a planet

Once you have conquered a planet, you will be brought to a screen of blue. This is where all the magic happens, and is called the industry screen. This will teach you everything from building ships and industry, to building facilities.

Building more ships

The planet will be already be building at least one ship. We want to make our planet build several different kinds of ships. Avarians are the only race that can move Stations to their fleet, so if we aren't Avarian, we better make sure that planet is building more than just Stations. Follow the below steps to build another ship on your planet.

1. Click on an empty box

2. Select a ship. The ship types are Sloop, Ranger, Corsair, Station, and Frigate. You will notice that some ships are different colors, and some may not be selectable.

• Unselectable means that the planet doesn't have any of the mineral required to build that ship
• Red means that the planet will build the ship at 50% speed, due to a lack of minerals
• Normal (not shown in this picture - the text is simply black) means that the planet builds the ship at normal speed
• Green means that planet has an abundance of that mineral, and will build the ship at 150% of the normal speed.

The amount of minerals for each ship is also displayed on the right hand sice of the applet, but the above graphic tells you everything you need to know, in a quick and easy way.

3. Tell the planet how many of this ship to build. You do this by sliding the industry bar.

As you can see in the above graphic, the bar is has been moved. You can also see that there are two numbers; 18/20. The 20 is the number of sloops that you told the planet to build. The 18 is how many of the sloops the planet has already built.

4. Tell the planet whether you want it to biuld this over and over again. This is done with the repeat button. In the above graphic, you can see that there is the word 'true' under the numbers. This means that once the planet has built 20 sloops, it will put that box at the end of its queue, and build those sloops again. It is normal for a player to have a planet building several ship types, all with repeat set to true. This cycles the ships that the planet builds, and gives the planet a good defense.

Note: The number 100 that is partially covered by the send button indicated how many build points building 1 sloop takes. If you are on a weak planet, it is wise to only build ships that don't use up many build points.

5. Hit the send button.

Building Industry

Industry is a very important factor in how fast a world produces ships and local facilities. Building industry is easier than building ships. There is a Max Ind button on the industry screen.

Clicking on the Max Ind button will fill a box at the end of your planet queue that is set to build the max amount of industry that the planet can handle. The button automatically sends the command to the planet for you. Please note that all industry you build using the normal industry button should be left on false, since a planet buiding industry over and over again simply wastes build points, and does nothing for the planet.

Building Facilities

If you know how to build ships, then you can build facilities without much trouble. Facilities are explained in depth in the Facilities section of this tutorial, but will also be explained in part here.

There are two different types of facilties; global and local.

To build a local facility:

Highlight a box, and then click on either the Doomsday, Factory, or Stellurae buttons.

the number 8000 is the build points required to build the Stellurae. 8000 is a LOT of build points. Your planet will not be able to handle this local facility by itself. Your planet recieves a bonus when you are docked on it, and you will need that bonus to successfully build the facility. On longer, slower servers, you will have to wait until your empire is larger before you can build one. Planets are limited to 1 local facility each.

Note: It is asked, "I get build points every turn, so why won't it reach 8000?" The reason is because decay becomes a factor. Decay takes out a certain, small percentage of your ships and/or build points each turn. When the decay becomes more than the amount of build points your planet supplies every turn, the planet gets stuck. For this reason, it is wise to only build things you know your planet can handle.

Building Global Facilities:

Global facilities are time based. This means that a population 10 planet will build them at the same speed as a population 90 planet. For this reason, the strongest global facilities can be built on your first planet - though they will take some time to build.

The global facilities are Merchant, Blaster, Beacon, and Stardock

Global facilites are built the same as ships; you need to select the number of them to build with the industry bar, and can have a 'true' or 'false' value. On stronger planets, you can build many of the different types of global facilities.

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8. Ship Types

There are several different ship types, each with their own strengths and weaknesses.

Sloop:
Cost: 100
Guns: 2
ECM: None
Strong Against: Frigates
Weak Against:Corsair and Rangers

Station:
Cost: 200
Guns: 4
ECM: 0.02
Strong Against: Nothing
Weak Against: Star Darts

Ranger:
Cost: 500
Guns: 10
ECM: 0.06
Strong Against: Sloop
Weak Against: Frigates

Corsair:
Cost: 500
Guns: 10
ECM: None
Strong Against: Sloops
Weak Against: Frigates

Frigate:
Cost: 2000
Guns: 20
ECM: None
Strong Against: Corsair and Rangers
Weak Against: Sloop

Star Darts are explained later in this tutorial

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9. Planet Types

Space Domination boasts several different planet types, with each planet having its own special attributes.

Aquatic World:
Aquatic worlds always build sloops at 150%.

Average World:
Average worlds do everything average, hence the name average.

Beacon World:
Beacon worlds can build more beacons than other worlds, and builds them at 200%

Blaster World:
Blaster worlds can build more blasters than other worlds, and builds them at 200%

Core World:
There are 12 core worlds in each game, all of which directly surround Old Earth. Core worlds all have 100 population, and give out small declares.

Dead World:
Dead worlds are dead. They are removed from the maximum score, because they become worthless.

Desert World:
Desert worlds build Frigates at 150%.

Jungle World:
Jungle worlds build Stations at 150%.

Large World:
Large worlds have 6 industry points for every population point. The added bonus of industry allows large worlds to build ships and local facilities faster.

Merchant World:
Can build more Merchants than other worlds, and builds them at 200%.

Metallic World:
Metallic worlds build industry at 200%

Mountain World:
Mountain worlds build Rangers at 150%.

Poor World:
Poor worlds build ships and local facilities at 50%.

Rich World:
Rich worlds build ships and local facilities at 150%.

Small World:
Small worlds have only 2 industry points for every population point. This decreases the potential of the planet drastically.

Stardock World:
Stardock worlds can build more Stardocks than other worlds, and builds them at 200%.

Tundra World:
Tundra worlds build Corsair at 150%.

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10. Phenomena

There are 6 different types of phenomena in Space Domination

1. Nuetron Stars: These are denoted by a large yellow circle. When in one of these, your fleet moves 2 times faster than normal.
2. Nebulas: These are denoted by a large grey circle. When in one of these, your fleet moves and 1/2 speed.
3. Gateways: These have a stargate-like look. Entering into one of these will transport you to another gateway in a different planet in the galaxy. The order of transportation between galaxies is static.
   
4. Wormholes: Wormholes are small, purples cirles. Their function is similar to gateways, except they transport you to a random wormhole, instead of a set wormhole.
5. Red Giant: Red giants are denoted by a large, red circle. When in a red giant, your speed is reduced, and decay is increased (you lose ships faster).
6. Blue Dwarf: Blue dwarves are denoted by a blue circle. When in a blue dwarf, your speed is increased, and decay is decreased (you lose less ships).

You can find Star Darts in all of these phenomenas

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11. Facilities

There are two different categories of facilities. Within each category, is a set of facilities.

Category 1 - Local facilities

The local facilities are Doomsday, Factory, and Stellurae . You may only build one local facility per planet, and they only affect the planet that they are built on. Local facilities are build point based.

Doomsday: When an enemy captures your planet, it destroys part of the enemy fleet, and becomes a dead world. The dead world becomes worthless, and is subtracted from the highest obtainable score.

Factory: A factory increases the amount of build points your planet gets per turn.

Stellurae: A stellurae has a chance of attracting a Star Dart that is killed. If a stellurae successfully attracts are Star Dart, it will be added to the guard of that planet.

Category 2 - Global facilities

The global facilities are merchants, beacons, stardocks, and blasters. Global facilities affect all of your worlds, and on stronger worlds you can build many of them on one planet. Global facilites are different from local facilities in a large way; Global facilities are time based. This means that instead of using build points, global facilities have a timer. No matter how strong your planet is, it still will only build global facilities as fast as the timer.

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12. Star Darts

Star Darts are the most powerful ships in Space Domination. It takes several thousand guns to challenge one stardart. For the inexperienced, killing a Star Dart can take around 10,000 guns! When found in a group Star Darts are even harder to kill, and do incredible amounts of damage.

How to obtain a Star Dart:

First a Star Dart must be killed. This involves going to a planet, and destroying the Star Dart. The Star Dart will now be considered 'up'. This means that the Star Dart is now available to be found by any player.

To find the 'up' Star Darts, you must go into the center of a phenomenon. When you hit the center, and it says that you have found a Star Dart, you have indeed found a Star Dart. If it does not say that you found a Star Dart, then you must try other phenomena. (It is wise to not search for Star Darts until you know there are Star Darts up)

13. Declarations

Declarations happen when you take control of one of the strongest planets in the galaxy. The home world for your race will declare, home worlds will declare, and Old Earth will declare.

A declaration; when you capture one of the above planets, other planets and phenomena automatically decide to join your side. A graphic of this is shown below:

As you can see above, I captured Old Earth. 40 other worlds decided to join my side, as well as 11 phenomena. Phenomena are useful on your side, because they allow you to 'score' darts. Scoring darts is talked about in the next section.

This is the end of the tutorial! You now have enough knowledge to play the game of Space Domination well. Congratulations for those of you who read the whole thing. For those of you who read bits and pieces, I wish you good luck in game (you may need it, hehe).