Puzzled Newb Doesn't Get It

[SteveG700]

I played the Introductory game, and it was all too easy. Plenty of planets to colonize, plenty of resources--or at least not for me. The galaxy was my oyster.

Next I started up a default Classic Era game with a random race. ALmost immediately, I'm bumping heads with essentially a mirror version of my own race, who hates me and imposes trade sanctions immediately. And even when they lift the sanctions, the game is suggesting I impose them. Worse still, there are virtually no planets of my type to colonize, and the few that do appear I'm in contention with counterpart for.

Okay, bad luck of the draw I figure. Try again. New random race, same results. Stuck facing my own race sitting on top of me. Play for a while, still starved for planets.

Re-roll a third time. Same thing.

So, I guess this is the intended design. You play the game to get a race with special, asymmetrical abilities, but you wind up crushed up against who has all the same features that yours does. And there's no place to go. So the game is basically hitting me over the head to get into an early war just due to their proximity and lack of colonization options.

I've watched Youtube videos and read FAQ's, but I don't see anybody talking about this. Is it normal for a default-setting to keep you limited to one planet for decades? Is it normal to always have a mirror race in your way? And I guess most importantly, is there some way to get a game where all of this doesn't keep happening?

Sorry, I know how whiny all of that sounds, but I really have high expectations for this game, and this is petty frustrating to keep experiencing.

Thanks.

[Cauldyth]

First, welcome to the game and the community!

As for what you're running into, it does sound strange. Having said that, I don't play the default game setup, so I'm not entirely sure what settings that uses. In the worst case, you can set up a custom game, which lets you choose (among a million other things)

* The physical size of the galaxy
* The number of stars in the galaxy
* The number of races in the galaxy
* The prevalence of colonizable planets in the galaxy

Playing with those four settings should allow you to create the setup you want. You can also dive into much more detail, controlling which races are present and where in the galaxy, but that's not necessary, you can just leave that all on random. Again, sorry, I don't know much about the default game setup.

One thing you can try, and which I've done when experimenting with what settings I like, is

* Start the game with particular settings
* Once the game starts, switch to Game Editor mode - it's one of the buttons at the top

This will immediately show you who all the other races are, and where they're located in the galaxy. It's useful for getting a feeling for what sort of game those settings will produce. You can then go back and tweak them, try again, etc. Unfortunately I don't think there's any way to see where all of the colonizable planets are.

Maybe someone who's more familiar with the default game setup can provide more insight into what's happening there.

[Bingeling]

There is certainly a luck factor in where you end up. Sometimes the game throws a fit and places you in the same system as someone else, which is usually best countered with a restart.

More stars, fewer empires, more sectors will of course make it much more likely to be reasonably "alone" at the start.

It is not rare to start quite close to someone else, but there should usually be a "free direction" to go. When it comes to "free direction" it is a reason why some automatically restart if they end up at the galaxy edge.

If you are doing pre warp (which you say you did not), you may experience a twin empire nearby. What happens is that there is usually an "original home" with an independent population that may start an empire if left alone too long. This can of course also happen in a classic game, but you ought to find a nearby independent before that happens unless you cruise around your system for quite a few years first. This would not be an evil twin though, it would be a quite friendly twin at first.

Also, mirror versions? I can't think of mirror versions hating each other in the unmodded game? If you do the editor trick above, you should also have the powers to remove any offending faction nearby (best done at the very start before the spread out), but it will of course also spoil you about the general galaxy layout (who are present, and where).

[feygan]

Now the DW is pretty much complete from a dev view, it does have what can seem like an overwhelming amount of stuff in it (assuming you are playing DW universe). For a new player I think you really only have one of two ways to get to grips with playing. Trying to just play a tutorial then move into the game proper will result in the frustrations you are already having. I think that you can either :

1. Spend hours pouring over these forums to glean all you can and commit it to memory before applying it in the game. Not an easy task and likely suitable to a small number of people.

2. Start a new game with the options set for easy, no pirates, tiny galaxies etc etc, also turn off the story parts. Then when the game starts turn on all the AI options, from there pick one thing to turn off, this will allow you to master that feature and fully understand how it works. Then repeat and turn off something extra, carry on like that until you understand all the elements of the game. From there you can add things like pirates and the story etc.

DW is simply too big to jump right in, it has many underlying mechanics that you will never understand if you are trying to do it all at once. The problem then being that it is a combination of all of these complex elements that make the game great, and without understanding each one fully you will always find yourself fighting against the game rather than bug eyed insects to be burned.

[Cauldyth]

Also, mirror versions? I can't think of mirror versions hating each other in the unmodded game?

I've seen this a fair bit, even in custom setups. The setup will place two empires of the same race either in the same system, or in adjacent systems. Often they'll have conflicting government styles, and combined with the "Your colonies encroach on our territory" and "We covet your colonies" penalties, it often leads to never-ending rage between them.

[Bingeling]

ORIGINAL: Cauldyth

I've seen this a fair bit, even in custom setups. The setup will place two empires of the same race either in the same system, or in adjacent systems.

Huh? What are those custom setups? Player generated galaxies modded into oblivion? Like the Ancient Galaxy Scenario?

The DW I have played does not start with more than one empire of each race, although more can happen if independents are allowed to start new empires. And the base game have no evil twin empires, but the extended mod have the XHumans. And if the galaxy is hand crafted it could be possible to make weird thing happen, I guess.

From the opening post I got "default Classic Era game with a random race", and that does not sound very custom or modded to me. But 11 races in 700 stars 10x10 can be a bit crowded if there is bad luck. For instance when starting my shadows launch AAR my capital's influence circle was in conflict with the Gizurean capital's influence circle.

[Unforeseen]

I've never encountered a problem like this nor any difficulty in learning the game initially. My first real game was played during ROTS as the Humans, I won several wars with various races with most of the settings on normal and a full size galaxy. I only ran into trouble when the Shakturi finally showed up on the opposite side of the galaxy from me and sent a fleet and a world destroyer all the way across to wipe me out. By the time I stopped playing that game I was so crippled that I would have had to dismantle my entire fleet and rebuild for centuries. But that was to be expected, what your experiencing is absurd. Even if you are new to real time 4x games, you should be having little trouble on normal surviving the early stages of the game.

Colonizable worlds should be few and far inbetween initially until your race learns to colonize other types of planets. You can set the slider to abundant in the game creation phase which alleviates this. But it does not make sense for you to consistently be encountering your OWN race that is hostile to you. Even if there was a situation where this would be occurring they most certainly should be friendly to you without modding your race prior to the game. It's possible, but unlikely that if your playing as the Humans that you are encountering the X-Humans, but even they are unlikely to be so hostile so quickly and the probability of you encountering them that early in the game so many times is low(but possible, in 90% of my randomly generated games the Teekans have started within 3 sectors of my homeworld, once they even began in the same exact star system as me)

Did you purchase the game via steam or did you get it from here? Is your game patched with the correct version pertaining to the expansion your using?

[Bingeling]

It is probably some poor communication and/or general new player confusion. With a string of bad luck one will run into another empire quite soon, maybe too soon for the inexperienced.

[Unforeseen]

It "probably" is player error but I just wanted to make sure he didn't obtain the game from some place other than the norm, or use the wrong patch on the wrong expansion. The only thing about it being his ability in game is the suggestion that he encountered his own race. That should have only happened late in the game when an independent colony upgrades itself to an empire.

I'd be interested in seeing a few screen shots.

[Cauldyth]

Huh? What are those custom setups? Player generated galaxies modded into oblivion? Like the Ancient Galaxy Scenario?

Well, I'm using the Extended Universe Mod, but I don't think that should change things. Other than that, I'm just doing a custom game in the age of shadows. I often see pairs of the same race starting in close proximity.

[Unforeseen]

Can you put a couple of screen shots so we know what we're looking at? This could be an actual bug.

[Bingeling]

ORIGINAL: Cauldyth

Huh? What are those custom setups? Player generated galaxies modded into oblivion? Like the Ancient Galaxy Scenario?

Well, I'm using the Extended Universe Mod, but I don't think that should change things. Other than that, I'm just doing a custom game in the age of shadows. I often see pairs of the same race starting in close proximity.

The extended universe got more races, and one could say that Humans and XHumans are a pair. But there is nothing causing them to start close to each other more than any two random races starting close to each other.

But if you play age of shadows with pretty default setups, you see new empires being spawned before you can find them. This is typically the problem with the fast breeders. If you have a slow tech, pre-warp galaxy and the gizurean or securan are present, you are very likely to get multiple empires of those unless you turn off "new empires allowed to spawn" (or something similar) in the galaxy setup.

The requirement for a new empire to form should be a colony with 3000 population.

I find this new empire spawning a bit annoying, as I like slow tech. It hurts the AI Gizurean and Securan, as the empires compete with each other starting usually rather close. At the same time I like the idea of old empires starting again (after being wiped out), if the colonies rebel and go independent.

[Unforeseen]

Ah i hadn't thought of that. Good catch Bingeling. It's a shame they didn't correct the generator so that races generated inside their old empires more often. It would have created alot of interesting games with all the various colonies pushing for control and/or getting in each others way. Unfortunately it appears this part of the game will remain broken for all time. Races will continue to start next to another races empire, assimilate them and become out numbered by their new counter parts. (This has happened so many times, i keep encountering insectoid races whose majority population is Humans, you have no idea how annoying this is to me)

[Cauldyth]

I think I know why it's happening for me. I'm playing the Extended Universe mod, but I've edited it slightly to disallow certain races from being selected by the game setup. I think I'm now requesting more races than there are available, so it has to double up. For whatever reason, when it doubles up, it likes to place the redundant races in close proximity. I've attached a screenshot below where 3 Atuuk races are placed next to each other in a pre-warp start, including 2 sharing the same homesystem.

I'm not complaining, I actually like it, as it makes for an interesting game. I had a pre-warp start where I shared my home system with another race. There was another start where two Mortalen empires shared the same system, but were unable to knock out each other's homeworld. It was fun choosing sides.

I find this new empire spawning a bit annoying, as I like slow tech.

You can disable it in the game setup: "Allow independent alien colonies to form new empires during the game" or something like that.

[Bingeling]

ORIGINAL: Cauldyth

I find this new empire spawning a bit annoying, as I like slow tech.

You can disable it in the game setup: "Allow independent alien colonies to form new empires during the game" or something like that.

I know I can disable it, but I would prefer it to work better.

Rules like:

12000M population required (instead of 3000M).
Not in the first 20 years.
Not if there is another empire of the same race.

As for the dual empires, I never bothered mod much, but something got to happen when you have more empires than races (like the game crashing or something

It could be that it starts a bit "independent style", the independents of the same race tend to stay reasonably close to each other.

[Aeson]

As for the dual empires, I never bothered mod much, but something got to happen when you have more empires than races (like the game crashing or something

It isn't a mod thing. I've never installed any mods for Distant Worlds, and I've occasionally had starts where there were one or more empires of the same species as my own empire, sometimes within my home system, when the game randomly generated the starting empires. I've also seen multiple empires of the same species within a game while being reasonably certain that those empires were not ascended independent colonies. In my experience, it's rare, but not impossible.

[SteveG700]

Hey, I'm the OP. Sorry for a delay in response. I thought I was supposed to get notified by email when someone replied, but that only happened with the very first reply.

Just to reiterate, I wasn't playing with anything but a default classic era, and every single time I have indeed found a mirror empire popping up. With the zone of influence showing, I can se that I have a big circular area that is suddenly broken in half by same-race empire. And while our racial similarities provide some relationship bonuses, they don't initially overcome the negative modifiers. They do eventually, at least with the less aggressive races.

But doesn't really matter, because friendly or not we're still in contention for the same scant few types of planets, which leaves me playing long stretches of the game with one colony.

So, it does seem we are talking independents turning into full-blown empires before I've even had a chance to find them, much less colonize them. Some of you guys are saying that can be disabled, but again that's only for custom games, which I established I hadn't been playing. I tried one last time I played. Looked like I didn't start with any ships or mining facilities. I guess that's normal in a custom game.

Thanks for the help. I guess I'll give up on default games, and when/if I revisit Distant Worlds, I'll stick to custom games. It's a shame in my opinion that the default game makes so many missteps.

[SteveG700]

Okay, started up a default game, but tweaked the size and number of stars slightly. Still going in with random race and government.

I still received a clone empire (the Sluken Hive, as opposed to my Sluken Conformity). Since they have a unique government, that negated any chance of getting a random conflict there. The main difference is that the Hive was a reasonable distance away (about the same as other empires. Oddly, I was still sufficiently crowded in that there's no real chance of expanding without going to war. Fortunately, the Sluken are well-suited to this, and I've already send troop transports to lock down some independent rodents. I suspect I will find that some of these other nearby empires are themselves clones of further-away empires.

While I have some attention, I'd like to ask some questions. I hope you'll indulge.

1) I'm playing with most things set for the game to "suggest" things to me, but it never suggests anything relating to tourism. Is it something I should try to do even if it's not related to any of my racial victory conditions?

2) Is there a point to all these trade sanctions the AI keeps telling me to impose on unfriendly races? Trade helps them, but it helps me too. If I'm mad at them, I'll do something that clearly benefits me more than it does them.

3) Why would I rather enslave a race than assimilate it? My understanding is that enslavement provides an economic boost, but prevents it from growing, generates unhappiness, hurts your reputation, and sparks rebellions. Doesn't seem that good of an option.

4) This is a little thing, but why do some systems get a little planet icon next to it even when I have no colony there? Some systems where I'm mining get a blue planet icon, and others don't.

[Bingeling]

If you want to disable those "twins", you can either remove independents in one of the followup screens to the first one, and also disable the spawning of new empires in the same general area.

The Gizzies breed fast, and get new empires fast due to reaching the population limit. Your maps seem more cramped than mine, it may be a difference in how we see things

A default game is just 10x10 700 stars, mostly (all?) normal.

Your 4 questions:

1: Tourism is visiting resort bases. Apart from building them (at scenic sites) there is nothing you can do about it since the passenger ships are private and automatic. The resorts are built by construction ships, and there is auto or manual only for ships (no suggest).

2: A point? Sanctions is an aggressive act, and the AIs are simple beings. If you look in diplomacy, you see a numeric score for relationship. Initially hurt by "strange ways" that disappear over time. Depending on AI stast (friendliness?) there is a numeric limit to when i wants to do stuff like free trade, trade sanction, etc. The AI is not very good at grand strategy and long lasting plans

3: You want to enslave if you roleplay enslavement races...

4: A circle that is blue and white? It is the default "you can refuel here" symbol. You have a gas mine there, I guess? You can also see them at independent colonies and at fuel sources of empires where you got military refueling rights. It will only be there i there is actually caslon/hydrogen available for refueling.

[fierceking]

This is happening because in your game there are not enough star systems relative to the number of races.

In my mod with 70 races I see this happen all the time. I usually run games in auto to test out bugs.

At the start 40-50% of the time you will land in a system with other race, I've had 3 races in one system. I haven't seen 4 yet. The races are at war constantly with each other. Also If 2 races are the same (like 2 human races, 2 quemeno or whatever), there is a higher likely chance of both empires to be placed on one system to make room for the other races.

Solution is to increase the number of stars or less AI races