Friendly Codes

Friendly Codes are three character codes that you can set on each starship and planet. The Friendly Code you set can have a major impact on the game. Here are some basic Friendly Code properties:

• Friendly Codes consist of up to three letters (a-z, A-Z), digits (0-9), or symbols that can be entered from the keyboard ( !@#$%^*()_+-=[]{}\|;:'",./? and others). Friendly Codes may not contain the "&", "<" or ">" characters. There have been occasional problems reported with the "|" (pipe) and "=" characters. Also, there are occasional two-character sequences that cause problems.
• There are special Friendly Codes that perform certain actions. We will look at these further down.
• Special Friendly Codes are case insensitive for functionality, but case sensitive for matching to avoid combat. For instance, MSC, the Friendly Code that scoops mines, also works if you use mSc, msc, MSc, or any other case variation thereof. This is useful in preventing certain events that involve matching Friendly Codes (some examples follow). This documentation uses upper case Friendly Codes for clarity, but again, any mix of case will work.
• Starships that have the exact (case-sensitive) same Friendly Code will not fight each other under any circumstance. The three exceptions are the Friendly Codes MKT, NTP, and LFM (in upper-case, lower-case, or mixed-case), which do not prevent combat even if they match.
• Starships that have the exact (case-sensitive) same Friendly Code as a planet will not fight that planet. The two exceptions are the Friendly Codes ATT and NUK, which do not prevent combat even if they match.
• Minefields have a Friendly Code. A minefield's Friendly Code is the Friendly Code of the minefield owner's planet nearest to the center of the minefield (also see code MFx below). If a minefield remains after the owner's last planet is taken, it will have the Friendly Code of that planet. If a minefield is created with an owner that has no planets, it will have a Friendly Code of 000 . Starships that have the exact (case-sensitive) same Friendly Code as a minefield can pass through the minefield freely.
• Combat order of multiple ships can be determined by Friendly Code.
• Starbases have the same Friendly Code as the planet they orbit.

Special Friendly Codes

Planets

• ATT – (Attack) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the defense posts on the planet to initiate combat with any fueled, decloaked enemy starship that enters orbit. Races with the Planet Immunity advantage and Starships with the Planet Immunity ability will not be affected by this Friendly Code. At least one Planetary Defense Post is necessary for this Friendly Code to work.
• BUM – (Beam Up MegaCredits) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the planet to beam up any MegaCredits on the planet to all starships in orbit not owned by the planet's controller. The MegaCredits will be divided as evenly as possible.
• EDF – ( Energy Defense Field ) Use of this Friendly Code by the Rebels that have researched and enabled the Energy Defense Field will cause a planet with no starbase, but at least 20 defense posts, to generate an energy defense field which prevents orbital attacks by ships. Planets with an energy defense shield can only be captured by ground combat or Imperial Assault. Falcon Class Escorts which are located on planets with an energy defense field can land on the planet and can not be attacked or seen (they are cloaked by the defense shield). It takes 25 KT of fuel per turn to run an energy defense field.
• NTP – (No Torpedoes) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the planet to not use fighters in its defense against Bird Men starships. This only works when set by the Super Spy Deluxe mission of a Bird Men starship, and those Birdmen have researched and enabled the Super Spy Command advantage. This Friendly Code has no effect for attacking ships from other races.
• NUK – (Nuke) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the defense posts on the planet to initiate combat with any decloaked enemy starship that enters orbit, fueled or not. Races with the Planet Immunity advantage and Starships with the Planet Immunity ability will not be affected by this Friendly Code. At least one Planetary Defense Post is necessary for this Friendly Code to work.

  It should be noted that this is the only way in the game to initiate combat with a fuelless starship (without actually beaming fuel aboard). It is also the only way that a fuelless starship can fight. Because of this, it is possible for a fuelless warship to take over a planet by combat, without fighting the starships protecting the planet.

Starships

• BDM – (Beam Down MegaCredits) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the starship to beam down all MegaCredits to the planet it orbits, no matter who owns it.
• BD# – (Beam Down MegaCredits) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the starship to beam down the specified number or portion of MegaCredits to the planet it orbits, no matter who owns it. The # can be any digit, or the characters "H" (Half) or "Q" (Quarter). As an example, the Friendly Code of BD3 will beam down 30 MegaCredits. This will only function when the BDx FCs feature was enabled at game creation time. If that feature wasn't enabled, this will function like any random non-special Friendly Code.
• BTF – (Beam Transfer Fighters) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the starship to transfer its fighters to all foreign carriers in the same spot.
• BTM – (Beam Transfer MegaCredits) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the starship to transfer its MegaCredits to all foreign starships in the same spot.
• BTT – (Beam Transfer Torpedoes) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the starship to transfer its torpedoes to all foreign starships in the same spot with the same tech torpedoes.
• CLN – (Clone) Use of this Friendly Code will signal a starbase, if present, to attempt to clone this starship.
• GSx – (Give Ship x ) Use of this Friendly Code will give the starship to the player specified by x (for example, GS5 will give the starship to player 5) if that player has a starship in the same spot with at least one clan on board.

  If the Must Match GSx feature was enabled when the game was created, the receiving ship (the one with the clan on it) must have the same, case sensitive, Friendly Code.

• HYP – (Hyperjump) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the starship to perform a hyperspace jump if it is a hyperspace capable ship, has enough fuel, and a warp speed is set above 0.
• LFM – (Load Fighter Minerals) Races that can build fighters in space (Robots, Rebels, and Colonies) can use this Friendly Code to load the appropriate mineral and supply ratios and use them to build free fighters. This will only function for beaming minerals and supplies from planets that are owned by the player, or planets owned by any player with a full alliance.
• MKT – (Make Torpedoes) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the starship to convert any minerals and MegaCredits on board the ship into torpedoes.
• NBR – (No Board) This Friendly Code is used by Privateer and Crystal ships to disable boarding parties when towing, which prevents capture of an enemy fuelless ship.
• NTP – (No Torpedoes) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the starship to not launch torpedoes or fighters in combat. This Friendly Code is useful for capturing instead of destroying enemy starships. If the starship has torpedo tubes, neither the tube nor torpedo information will be displayed in the VCR.
• POP – (Pop) Friendly Code is used by Fury glory device ships to cause the glory device to detonate on the following turn.
• TRG – (Trigger) Friendly Code is used by Fury glory device ships to cause the glory device to detonate if a cloaked ship is in the same location as the glory device ship.
• Xnn – When used in a Birdman starship with the Super Spy mission set, use of any Friendly Code with an X as the first letter will disable the function of changing the planet's Friendly Code for that starship.

See also: Out of Fuel.

Alchemy Starships

• ALD – (All Duranium) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the Merlin to create only duranium.
• ALM – (All Molybdenum) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the Merlin to create only molybdenum.
• ALT – (All Tritanium) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the Merlin to create only tritanium.
• NAD – (No Duranium) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the Merlin to create molybdenum and tritanium, but no duranium. This will only function when the Extended Alchemy FCs feature was enabled at game creation time. If that feature wasn't enabled, this will function like any random non-special Friendly Code.
• NAM – (No Molybdenum) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the Merlin to create duranium and tritanium, but no molybdenum. This will only function when the Extended Alchemy FCs feature was enabled at game creation time. If that feature wasn't enabled, this will function like any random non-special Friendly Code.
• NAT – (No Tritanium) Use of this Friendly Code will cause the Merlin to create duranium and molybdenum, but no tritanium. This will only function when the Extended Alchemy FCs feature was enabled at game creation time. If that feature wasn't enabled, this will function like any random non-special Friendly Code.
• NAL – (No Alchemy) Use of this Friendly Code will disable alchemy on any alchemy ship.

See also: Out of Fuel.

Minelaying

• MD# – (Mine Drop Number) If either the Lay Mines or Lay Web Mines mission is selected, use of this Friendly Code will cause your starship to convert ten times the number specified, up to the number of torpedoes in the starship's hold, of its torpedoes into mines or webmines, as appropriate (i.e., the Friendly Code MD3 will convert 30 torpedoes to mines, assuming the starship has 30 or more torpedoes on board). The special case of MD0 will drop 100 torpedoes as mines.
• MDA – (Mine Drop All) If either the Lay Mines or Lay Web Mines mission is selected, use of this Friendly Code will cause your starship to lay all of its torpedoes as mines if the Lay Mines mission is selected. This is the same action that would be performed if no special Friendly Code were set to restrict minelaying.
• MDH – (Mine Drop Half) If either the Lay Mines or Lay Web Mines mission is selected, use of this Friendly Code will cause your starship to lay half of its torpedoes as mines if the Lay Mines mission is selected.
• MDQ – (Mine Drop Quarter) If either the Lay Mines or Lay Web Mines mission is selected, use of this Friendly Code will cause your starship to lay one quarter of its torpedoes as mines if the Lay Mines mission is selected.
• MIx – (Mine Identity x ) If either the Lay Mines or Lay Web Mines mission is selected, use of this Friendly Code will cause your ship to lay mines or webmines in another race's identity, specified by the x (i.e., to lay mines as the Rebels, you'd use MIA in a normal 11 player game). It should be noted that the use of the MIx Friendly Code causes all torpedoes on the starship to be converted to mines.
• MSC – (Mine Scoop) If the Mine Sweep mission is selected, use of this Friendly Code will cause your ship to collect any of your mines or webmines from the minefield you're in and convert them back into torpedoes.

See also: Out of Fuel.

Minefields

• MFx – (Mine Field X) This Friendly Code is used to set a global minefield Friendly Code. Setting any planet Friendly Code to this (you may vary the x to be anything) will give all of your minefields an additional Friendly Code setting of MFx. You may use this to give an unallied race a universal Friendly Code to pass through your minefields. If more than one planet has a MFx Friendly Code set, the planet with the highest ID takes precedence.

  On Planets.nu, the MFx Friendly Code is not normally used by the planet owner to give safe passage through minefields. Instead, the planet owner uses the "Safe Passage" setting in the Diplomacy screen.

  The primary use of this feature is by the Birds. They can use their Super Spy Deluxe mission to set a planetary Friendly Code to this code, enabling them to bypass minefields.

Starbases

Starbases have the same Friendly Code as the planet they're orbiting.

• DMP – (Dump) This Friendly Code will cause the starbase to deconstruct any spare starship components it has in stock and convert them back to minerals. The recycle rate is 100% for minerals (you get back all minerals you put in), but no MegaCredits are returned. Hulls will not be recycled, nor will current builds.
• PB# – (Priority Build) This Friendly Code will set the starbase to be a priority build base, spending PBPs or PPs in order to build a ship. The # determines the priority of the starbases (i.e., PB1 , PB2 , PB3 , ..., PB9 ). As long as there are enough PBPs or PPs, starbases will build in that order. It is possible to have multiple starbases set to the same PB# Friendly Code, in which case all starbases with a given priority will build before any starbases with the next lower priority. The build order within a specific priority differs between the two build systems. Refer to the pages on the Build Queues for more information.
• RB# – (Regular Build) In a game with the PPQ build queue , this Friendly Code allows the player to set the order in which regular builds occur. The # determines the order of the starbases (i.e., RB1 , RB2 , RB3 , ..., RB9 ). As long as there are enough builds allocated, starbases will build in that order. It is possible to have multiple starbases set to the same RB# Friendly Code, in which case all starbases with a given priority will build before any starbases with the next lower priority. The build order within a specific priority are random.

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