How much "later" does my homeworld need yellow?

[Paul Morganthall]

I'm trying to figure out something about Andy's "Standard Opening Move", as reported on the I Love Homeworlds page.

He usually starts "with a Large Green ship and a Blue/Red star system", and mentions "Yellow isn't needed until later..."

Since you need yellow to move out of your homeworld, isn't yellow needed in the next turn or two? There's only so much building and trading you can do at homeworld. Or is that the strategic point I'm missing? I should build/trade up to 3 of each color before I start Discovering?

If mega-stockpiling is not the strategy, then it feels like I've wasted a turn, since I'll need to trade into yellow sooner than "later". Can you tell I'm relatively new at Homeworlds?

Thanks for any ideas you have.

[Russ Williams]

"Later" does not imply "many turns later". It can also mean just a few turns (e.g. 3) later. It's not uncommon to build & change colors for the first few turns before moving.

About "wasting a turn" - I think it's simply a matter of tradeoffs. You'll probably want ships of all colors sooner or later, so if you start with a yellow ship instead of some other color, then you could similarly consider yourself to be "wasting a turn" to get that other color later. And evidently Andy thinks a blue/red star is good for other reasons, so you couldn't start with a yellow ship, given a blue/red star, or you couldn't build anyway.