Terra Invicta: Early Game Walkthrough

Win the Space Race with this one weird Trick!

Note: This post has been edited and up to date as of 09/12/23.

I haven’t written any posts for a long while because of real life stuff, and also because I’ve been playing Terra Invicta. It’s not XCOM, but I feel it is worth writing about in this blog because it was developed by Johnny Lump, the chief developer of both Long War 1 & 2, and it has a lot of that same XCOM feel, though without the brutal tactical game play. I am not going to write up a full review of Terra Invicta, but suffice in saying that it’s really great, has remarkably unique and innovative gameplay and very few bugs, but also has opaque mechanics, and is a little rough around the edges.

This guide is not going to explain the basics. If you are just getting started with Terra Invicta, I recommend first reading the Terra Invicta Wiki Beginner’s Guide (part of the Terra Invicta Wiki), play around with your first campaign, then read this extremely well made walkthrough: How to Beat an Alien Invasion in 10 Easy Steps. I am not going to try to outdo that guide because it’s really good and you should just read it. That will get you up to speed on all of the concepts and mechanics. (My own strategy diverges in one major way, I don’t attempt to delay angering the aliens - choosing to build a fleet and start fighting them as early as 2029).

And so the purpose of this guide is to go into more detail on exactly what to do, and why. There are a few strategic decisions that were not perfectly clear to me after reading the guides above - this guide will explain those issues more precisely, which also means that this guide is a bit more of a strategic spoiler. I would suggest playing through one or two campaigns before reading this guide, if you want to figure most things out for yourself.

Preamble Completed. Now here is a brief walkthrough of what I hope to do in the first 5 months…

Plan for the First Few Months

At the start of a Terra Invicta campaign, nothing matters as much as persuasion. You want to have at least 2 councilors with high PER. A good start requires bringing smaller nations over to your side as quickly as possible, and eventually winning over larger nations.

On the first turn I spend several minutes examining my starting councilors as well as all of the potential recruits. I am not terribly worried if my councilors are crap, so long as there are some good ones available in the pool. You have to be careful when considering each councilor. There are a lot of tricky traits that help sway some countries but not others. And your top persuader needs to have both the Control Nation and Public Campaign missions, or you will need to find another persuader who can fill that gap effectively.

When picking councilors in the first few months, I don’t worry too much about the long game. I will replace most of my early game staff with better long term options as they become available. The first set of councilors is all about persuasion, and hopefully with one guy who has enough command to fight off the Xenoflora.

On day one I will immediately grab a 3rd advisor - with my 4th advisor also planned out in advance. Then I adjust Research to 100% We Are Not Alone, and select Management Research as my project, but give it 0% effort. I want my faction to be the lead researcher for We Are Not Alone, so that I can start Clandestine Cells before everyone else. This project grants a 5th councilor - and should also be set to 100% focus when it becomes available.

I always target Kazakhstan on day 1, and hit it it with Public Campaign + Control Nation until I’ve acquired both of its control points. The goal is to get the executive CP as soon as possible, then have Kazakhstan abandon the Eurasian federation 180 days later, and thus hoard all of the Cosmodrome’s boost. (Alternatively, if you run a successful coup operation, it will allow Kazakhstan to leave the federation immediately).

There is one big risk to the Kazakhstan boost strategy. If the Servants take over Russia, they will invade Kazakhstan, and take it back. Even if this happens, you will still get a lot of value by pursuing this strategy - but you will need to find another source of boost. The US or India are both solid boost options.

I put Kazakhstan on 100% Unity till my faction’s popularity is over 80%. Then adjust it to 25% unity; 75% boost. It is also a good idea to Defend Interests in Kazakhstan. This costs 20 influence but is often worth it. Other factions will often try to steal it from you. Eventually, I will also want to run Stabilize Nation missions in Kazakhstan until Unrest is under 2. High unrest greatly reduces Investment Points and the rate at which Kazakhstan will gain additional boost. Reducing unrest is a low priority and it can wait until after I’ve grabbed a large country.

As a decent alternative to Kazakhstan, you can pump boost in Singapore. In fact any smallish country with a high IP/CP ratio should work... but not as well. Considering Singapore in detail, it will require you to invest 50 IP to get their space programs going, which will take 6 months if you invest 100% of Singapore's IP (exactly the same amount of time to withdraw Kazakhstan from Eurasia). Then Singapore would need to invest another 150 IP¹ to match Kazakhstan’s initial boost output, that will take at least a year and a half. So grabbing Kazakhstan has the largest potential boost in the early game.

[EDIT: I used to go after India first, but find that I prefer just jumping to the US via Canada, and Mexico]

Next I target the US.

A lot of players say that France is the best starting country, and maybe that’s true, but other factions also target France. I’ve found that it’s simpler and easier to just let them have Europe, and instead start in Asia or America.

The first step to taking the US is to acquire most of its neighbors (Canada and Mexico). Acquiring these neighboring control points will make it easier to influence the US.

I put most of countries on Unity and Spoils. I am not developing these countries and will abandon them eventually. Pumping Unity will build my faction’s popularity in those nations, which means I collect more influence each month, and impede other factions. Spoils are a great option in the early game - this priority allows you to quickly amass funds that can be used to buy orgs.²

Taking the US may still require a bit of luck, but with a decent persuader (12+) it should be possible. Once I get a single control point, pumping Unity will make it easier to take the rest. Getting your foot in the door is the hard part.

I will abandon the neighboring countries as needed. If my CP total exceeds the cap, influence points are lost, and my control points are easier to Crack/Purge.

There are a lot of other things going on in the first few months. Here are some of the other choices and tasks, and how I deal with them:

Other Stuff in the First Few Months

At the midway point of each month I will check for new orgs. Even small bonuses to persuasion or research can be incredibly helpful early on. At the same time that I look for new orgs, I will also check for new councilors. I think new recruits arrive on the 8th of each month, but I’m not entirely sure. They may trickle in. It is easy to just check for both new orgs and new councilors on the 15th of each month.

I always try to chase down all the Alien Activity. One of your starting councilors will have that mission, and usually low PER as well. The biggest impediment will probably be ops income.

I usually kill all the Alien lifeforms that accompany crashing UFOs - but sometimes not. If I don’t have a councilor with high Command (8+) I will put this off until I find one available to recruit. It’s important to remember where the UFOs have crashed so that I can go back and scan those areas when I am able to take them on.

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Step 2 - Mars

It’s important to withdraw Kazakhstan from the Eurasian federation as soon as possible. It’s also easy to forget. Don’t forget. To see how much time remains before a nation can leave a federation, as well as many other diplomatic possibilities and limitations, you will need to open the “Relations” tab, and hover the mouse over the country flags. Oddly, you will need to have Russia selected (or any country in the Eurasian Federation other than Kazakhstan), and then hover over Kazakhstan’s flag as shown below.

Checklist for winning the Space Race:

1. Take Kazakhstan and leave the Eurasian Federation.

2. Adv. Chemical Rocketry → High Thrust Probes.

3. Put a base on the Moon and put a Mining Complex on this base. The mine should be up and running before the Mars probe arrives.

4. You win the race to Mars! The prize is all the choice sites. (I take about 8).

There are several technologies needed to mine in space, and in order to insure that they are completed in time I will need to do some steering of global research, and that means I have to be the top contributor for some technologies.

The other big goal during this time is to take over another super power. In early 2023, there is no way to obtain a high enough CP cap to control both the US and China. But it doesn’t have to take a long time. The first step is to research those technologies that increase the cap. You won’t find much on the Tech Tree:

1. We Are Not Alone → Clandestine Cells. +10 CP, 5th councilor (~15 CP).

2. Management Research. +5 CP. (should be done a couple times)

You can go after Global Command Structure (+25), but it will take a very long time to reach. Instead you need to follow a Tech path that does not appear on the Tech Tree (note: this is for the Resistance faction - other factions may differ).

3. Alien Signatures → Alien Methods → Alien Operations → Defend the Earth

You will obtain +25 CP from this research path (which happens to be the primary quest/research path for the campaign, by the way). You do not need to research Alien Flora. Along with the CP bonus, the Resistance faction gains an extremely powerful org which adds another +13 CP.

These technologies, will only take you to about ~235 depending on councilor attributes, and that should be enough for all of the US and most of China. To get the rest of the way there, it’s necessary to load up on administration boosting orgs. The problem is that those orgs are rare - appearing infrequently at the marketplace. I am a little impatient, and instead of waiting to buy them, I choose to steal as many as I can from rival factions. To make this work, I need a councilor with high ADM and Hostile Takeover, and one with high INV and the Detain mission.

It’s also good to start Inspiring your councilors early.

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More about Mars

Here is an a list of the Mars site from an old playthrough:

There are much better mining sites out there, but Mars has everything you need to build a solid fleet. I feel that 8 bases on Mars is about as many as I can manage while also going after both Vesta and Ceres later on.

Right away I will plant my flag at about 5 sites - one site also gets a Mining Complex + Fission Pile.³ Because of my moon mine, the price to send a Mining Complex to Mars is usually about 20-30 boost - without that mine on the moon, it would cost ~126 boost. Even with the reduced cost, my Boost will be completely exhausted, and I will need to wait to put down the 6-8th colonies.

I switch from Boost to Mission Control around this time. I usually have boost set to 25-30; and 0 Mission Control. I flip that to 0 Boost; 25-30 Mission Control. Now that I am about to start producing resources in space, Boost becomes far less significant. With 0 Boost priority, I will still generate Boost at the current rate, ~12 Boost/month, which is fine. Also I will take over more countries and they will have boost.

Let’s talk about sending vs. building modules on Mars, as there are a lot quirky rules. First off and most important - you cannot build new colonies (Outpost Core modules) without a Construction Module nearby. So you will need to claim every new colony by sending an Outpost Core from Earth, and waiting 11 months for it to arrive on Mars.

Other modules can either be delivered from Earth or built locally. It takes about 11 months for a Mining Complexes to reach Mars when delivered from Earth, but they can be built in only 2 months - but in order to build them on Mars you must be producing ALL the materials required locally on Mars. If you aren’t producing one of the required resources, you will have to wait for the missing resources to be shipped from Earth (or the moon), taking ~11 months. And so you will want to deliver the first Mining Complex + Fission Pile from Earth, and ideally it should be placed on a site that produces all 5 resources.

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Other Terra Invicta posts:

Terra Invicta: 2025-2030

Terra Invicta: Early Game Fleets

1. 150 IP is required if Singapore delivers 0.4 boost / year per tick, which I read somewhere on the internets.

2. Unity and Spoils are the only priorities that immediately help your faction. Every other priority will build up that nation so that it will become stronger, and thus more profitable to control, in the future. Additionally it should be noted that Spoils do not deliver any money to your faction if you abandon the nation, whereas Unity continues to improve your faction’s popularity, even in abandoned nations.

3. You will need to build Fission Piles to generate power on Mars. Solar Collectors generate only 3 power on the red planet. Be sure to research Nuclear Fission in Space → Fission Pile, before your probe arrives.