Ruins/Map Generation Question

[Ashery]

Is it possible to remove certain types of ruins from map generation?

Finally picked up the game in the recent sale, and on my initial game I felt like the game's balance was completely thrown off by the late-game ships many factions had acquired through various events.

So, I dug around and found out that turning off story events would eliminate that particular issue and I started a fresh game. And it felt a lot more balanced...initially.

The first half-dozen or so ruins went great in terms of the balance I sought. ~6k credits, maps of nearby systems, abandoned mining stations, and little minor things like that. But it didn't last. Lost colonies that doubled my overall population (Well, the first one doubled it; the second only increased it by 50%, heh), both of which were spawned in existing territory and on non-native planet types (Ocean native, both spawned on ice). Massive end-game capital ships that were, once again, spawned in my territory via some trigger in the ruins.

I can force myself to salvage the ships for tech, but the vanilla AI doesn't do that and so I'd be putting myself at a disadvantage by doing so. Fortunately, Icemania's AI mod appears to address that particular sub-gripe, though.

But that still leaves the other subtypes that I want to remove outright, and so I went digging again. This time I went rooting around the editor, and I noticed that the events I wanted to remove were all on specifically defined ruin subtypes. But there's no text file for me to edit and change the corresponding frequency for the subtypes during map generation. There's no way to edit a save game without spoiling myself to the map layout (Completely ignoring the tedious nature of manually checking each ruin in the game editor).

Which leaves me at a loss of where to check next, though I'm already beginning to suspect that it's simply not possible.

[Bingeling]

Are you complaining about ruins or about independent colonies?

There are some good ruins out there. Diplomatic bonus, research bonuses (100%), happiness bonus. In addition there are the ultra-rares that give a great boost if you can control one (or more) of them. I don't find that those are that important.

Then there are the independents, and finding an independent of a fast reproducing race if slow reproducing yourself is rather "golden". In my Universe AAR I had the economy double or more after grabbing an Atuuk independent that was maximum population. You set the number of independents in the galaxy setting. Second screen, it should be. Keep in mind that to feed the pirates in a pre-warp game you need a good number of independents. Whether you want to feed them, is a different matter.

I dislike the original storyline because of the ship debris fields that appear with it. So I never run with that one.

In addition, various pirate events (base destruction) and possibly other things can spawn "lost ships". In the past these have been very powerful with late game tech, but they seem to have been reduced to more sane levels now.

[Spidey]

He's probably talking about those lost colony type ruin events where you get info on a "lost" colony, which is then spawned on an ice moon somewhere.

[Ashery]

ORIGINAL: Spidey

He's probably talking about those lost colony type ruin events where you get info on a "lost" colony, which is then spawned on an ice moon somewhere.

Correct. And unlike independent populations, they don't even require you to build a colony ship to send, you just need to move a ship to the planet. And that's also ignoring the other potential issues with acquiring independent colonies.

Lost colonies and the lost ships were the two big ones I had encountered in my second game that I want to outright remove, but I'd also look over some other ones that I saw in the editor that I've yet to encounter, namely the refugees. However, despite their tech level being fairly high, their combat ships tend to be on the small side from my one test, so I'd consider them a lower priority than the first two.

I'd also consider lightly nerfing the ruins that give empire wide bonuses when colonized, but I can't really be a good judge of that until I get a lot more experienced with the game.

[Spidey]

Those lost colonies aren't that big a bonus, in my opinion. Two billion populations don't offer that much GDP that taxation really has a serious impact and the colonies are almost always small ice balls with mediocre or worse planet quality. You still have to defend these colonies from pirates, though.

I'd much rather pay to put a colony ship on a great planet than get a free colony on some worthless chunk of ice. Size 29+ at quality 90% or above will make for very good colonies and I will happily go to war over a size 30 quality 95% planet, even if it has no resources. That combination adds up to a popuation ceiling of 20 billion. Put in a regional capital and a good governor and you've got a GDP generator that will eventually reach homeworld levels.

That said, the best bet is obviously taking actual homeworlds but invading independents is also a good investment. So what if you get a diabolical reputation? It will slowly tick back to normal over time and every colony you take is a colony that gives you more citizens, possibly new special abilities, and certainly a colony that isn't generating pirate income. And all it cost you was the very same invasion force you're going to need anyway, in case you want to solve your foreign policy issues the blunt way.

[Ashery]

But it's not just about the colony's potential GDP when fully developed. It's also about how the addition of a 2bil colony can nearly double your empire's population in the early game. This increases your research output, nearly doubles your colony ship output, decreases your required tax level to remain in the black which allows you to further increase your growth rate.

There are *tons* of these benefits from getting an additional 2bil people into your empire, even if the late-game effect (ie how useful the colony is when it's fully developed) isn't particularly great.

I just tested the research growth, and after editing my starting colony to 2.5 billion in an introductory game with the Shandar, my research jumped from 569k to 666k. And while this isn't a permanent ~18% bonus, it's still a major boost during the early game.

[ASHBERY76]

I thought someone stole my name for a second.

[Ashery]

Hah.

I was going to tease about me having the name first, but considering you join date is all the way back in '01, that's still a solid year before I first used this name anywhere, and a good four years before it became my go-to username.

[Spidey]

There are benefits to getting another 2 bil citizens, absolutely, but if you really want to push your game, your population is going to be a lot bigger than ~3 billion by the time lost colonies enter the picture, assuming you're starting pre-warp. If you start post-warp then it's a slightly different story and then yes, you might actually get a very decent early boost. To be honest, my experience with post-warp starts is limited and rather dated.

With a post-warp start, I suppose you could find a lost colony within the first year with a bit of luck, at which point you could indeed get a very cheap population increase at very little effort. But such bits of random luck are part of the game. You might also find an independent colony of Quameni, Gizureans, Boskara, Kiadians, etc. Those are very nice to stumble over as well, and all it takes to reap the benefits is a troop transport and a few troops.

[Ashery]

You're right on the point re:population being larger. I had forgotten about the importance of setting your tax rate to 0% initially as I misran an early test regarding happiness's influence on population growth: I failed to take into account that it takes a decent amount of running game time for the displayed growth rate to change after adjusting the tax rate. So I was falsely lead to the impression that the influence was minor at most.