What dose 'independant life' slider actually increase/decrease?

[Larsenex]

Just wondering. I see that "Planet quality' relates to how many habitable planets there are. I will scale this waaaaaay back. and we get to 'fight' it out for new colonies. What does the independant life mean and how is it used in DW?

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: Larsenex

Just wondering. I see that "Planet quality' relates to how many habitable planets there are. I will scale this waaaaaay back. and we get to 'fight' it out for new colonies. What does the independant life mean and how is it used in DW?

Independent life slider controls the number of independent colonies and how well developed they are. At rare, they are far between and low population ~100m each. At Plentiful, the independent colonies are all over the place, and can go full empire easily.

[Data]

yap, i can confirm this, i usually set this to teeming....i like to have a vibrantly alive galaxy, nice feature

[gargoil]

ORIGINAL: Data

yap, i can confirm this, i usually set this to teeming....i like to have a vibrantly alive galaxy, nice feature

Ah ha! You, my friend, are a genius!

I have been playing DW for a long time now, and loving it. But I have ranted on these forums that colonies are so unimportant as compared to the homeworld of all the empires. Your post hit me like a ton of bricks. Of course, jack the independent slider way up, and you create a "Star Trek" like galaxy, teaming with civilizations to have join or fight your empire. There will be a huge assortment of worlds at differing levels of development and population.

BRILLIANT!

[Data]

mind you, they do not behave like non-independent empires in terms of expansion and many other aspects but they are still more than simple colonies
all the credit goes to Elliot but nice to see I've put more fuel on your DW fire [:D]

[gargoil]

ORIGINAL: Data

mind you, they do not behave like non-independent empires in terms of expansion and many other aspects but they are still more than simple colonies
all the credit goes to Elliot but nice to see I've put more fuel on your DW fire [:D]

Some will become full fledged empires. And some will join other empires by allowing themselves to be colonized. Still others will be hostile and need to be invaded. That added to all the other empires created at the start of the game.

I have to try this yet, what has been your experience? Does your game have many more worlds with significant population in your and AI empires? Have you had trouble finding enough other worlds to colonize?

[Data]

[/quote]
Does your game have many more worlds with significant population in your and AI empires? Have you had trouble finding enough other worlds to colonize?
[/quote]

Yes to the first one and no to the second one....but i use very aggresive exploring right of the bat, all my money goes initially into cheap explorers and colony ships....i even delay constructors and researching for this

[Data]

and Gargoil, you are correct about this part also "some will join other empires by allowing themselves to be colonized"
not sure if my observations are correct but many of the independent worlds seem to belong to races that are on that map so they join easily...not sure how good they are as opponents, i don't think they were designed for war
they certainly do not seem to care about advancing their own technology
 
but again, this is my experience...i haven't paid close attention to them, just used them exactly as you've said; as a great federation of races

[feygan]

Do they at least build troops and general warships for defence? So far I haven't tried the slider that far up for fear it would just offer up a bunch of easily conquered/colonized high pop planets that would do nothing other than give both player and AI freebies planets.

[Shark7]

Depending on the race...

A race I added to the game and placed as an independent with 5 billion population not only built troops, it defeated my invasion using a fleet with 19 troops in it. So yes, they will defend.

[Abraxis]

ORIGINAL: feygan
So far I haven't tried the slider that far up for fear it would just offer up a bunch of easily conquered/colonized high pop planets that would do nothing other than give both player and AI freebies planets.

This was my fear as well, it also seemed like it would turn the galaxy into one giant melting pot very quickly as races wouldn't have to adhere to their specific planet types early game, and they would quickly accumulate other races' bonuses.

Glad I read the topic, if they aren't just bonus freebie planets this should make for an amazingly dynamic and living game.

I'll probably start a new one just to try this out!

I wonder how this interacts with the Colony Prevalence slider though. If Colony Prevalence is set to scarce while Independent Life is set to teeming, does that mean pretty much every colonizable planet will have independent life on it? Or are they completely separate, meaning there will be few colonizable empty planets, but a ton of independent life planets?

[Data]

they are separate and you do indeed get few colonizable empty planets, but a ton of independent life planets

[gmot]

Very interesting - I'll have to try out this myself in my next game. Unfortunately, won't be for a couple weeks until after some travel done.