Peoples start preference

[wodin]

OK what are your preferred start preferences?


Tech Level?

Councils?

Amount of starting zones?

Troop strength?

To those who have tried different starts what settings have been the most enjoyable?

Thanks

[Twotribes]

Ok, I roll a planet with large rain and high level life on it Siwa. My preferences are highest tech 3 zones 2 armies each. I choose Meritocracy Enforcement and mind. My planets right now are largest. I start with all councils.

[Larac]

I have been doing Medium and Large planets, minimal start, 1 Zone and low tech.

Finding a life filled planet for me has been hard.

[cspringer1234]

I do low tech, medium planets, unknown planet, slowest speed for epic games, one zone, militia, no councils.

Basically anything to drag the whole game out and slow it down so there are lots of slug it out battles and all tech developments have time to be fully appreciated. I'm only playing on regular difficulty at the moment.

[LordAldrich]

I've tried a whole lot of different conditions. I've found that I do NOT like regular difficulty games on the lowest tech/zone/army settings. It's too volatile, you're basically a minor regime and your success or failure is dependent on too much randomness: what neighbors you have, and especially how much access you have to metal. For "apocalypse tribe growing into a civilization" games I really like the beginner difficulty setting: the guaranteed metal deposit and slightly reduced minor regime aggression are just about right. (regular difficulty with 1 starting army is close, but you still run the risk of never finding any metal and losing around turn 40-50 when you get steamrolled by a major regime that had more luck than you).

Almost any increase to tech/zone/army settings will reduce the relevance of minor regimes (they don't get the same bonuses) and push you into conflict with major regimes much faster.

From a governmental perspective I've found that Meritocracy/Government/Mind is a very powerful combination, excellent leaders (who get good results on many common events) and excellent passive bonuses where they matter most can snowball pretty quickly.

All the different planet conditions are fun. I usually use a small world simply for performance reasons. I often like having a breathable atmosphere simply because it makes a variety of unit equipment (e.g. filters, thermo-gear) relevant. Environment suits are too good, they should be nerfed - but that's a different topic.

[cspringer1234]

ORIGINAL: LordAldrich

I often like having a breathable atmosphere simply because it makes a variety of unit equipment (e.g. filters, thermo-gear) relevant. Environment suits are too good, they should be nerfed - but that's a different topic.

Start the topic, or find the one that may already be here somewhere. I would really like for the environment to have more of an affect on your troops / city. Make those super freezing / super heated temperatures / toxic air / and especially radiation really suck. Station troops / cities in radiation heavy areas for too long, without anti-radiation buildings in your cities, have some of them die off / spawn mutants. [:D] Might be hard to make an AI that would appreciate the danger though, I could easily see putting cities / troops into locations where in order for the enemy to attack you, they have to sit in a fiery/freezing and irradiated hex of death.

[Grotius]

How much of the planet do you all reveal at start? "Partial"? None? I've been going with the least-revealing option ("none" or something like that).

[cspringer1234]

I reveal none of it. And I wish it was harder to maintain recon / control on it. I want it to revert to fog of war faster if no troops, roads or cities are within a certain distance of the hex.

[LordAldrich]

ORIGINAL: Grotius

How much of the planet do you all reveal at start? "Partial"? None? I've been going with the least-revealing option ("none" or something like that).

I go with "None" and then use spies and recon battalions to scout the map (you can use spies on wilderness areas).

More information than that tends to just make my restart-itis worse.

[Lorgath]

I mostly play large sized Siwa planets that had a high pre-collapse population. I have started trying more hostile environments now I know what I am doing better. I play the default city state start with militia, no councils and low tech.

I'd say that there have been three most interesting starts, other than my first couple of games where I had no idea what to expect. My current game is a blisteringly hot Cerberus planet in the early stages of evolving life, giving me utterly toxic, hostile conditions. The planet was a mining hub and spawned at least one megacity that's some 30+ hexes of ruins around a sea of lava. I started in spitting distance of 3 different major factions with raiders everywhere else, but I was lucky in that my capital was on top of what must have been one of the planet's mining colonies, as I got 3 ruin sites with metal and artifact deposits early on. I'm protected on three sides by mountain ranges that are just big enough for the AI to want to ignore, while not being too much of a nightmare to bypass and route logistics networks around. The changes with diplomacy in the beta have let me pacify and vassalise most of the raiders before they became a problem or the Majors started rolling into their territory. The planet also suffered multiple nuclear exchanges, so is an irradiated husk.

The other two most interesting starts for me were a Limos planet that was a little too warm and a needed filters right up until the colonization phase, when much to my pleasure the game informed me that the planet had been seeded with terran plants, raising the amount of oxygen enough to turn it into a garden world. It then had a relatively peaceful collapse and my biggest problem was the total lack of fuel sources. The other fun one was an Unclassified ball of ice that had blue forests clinging to the mountains, but I got overrun by slavers early on.

Environment suits are too good, they should be nerfed - but that's a different topic.

I agree with this, at the moment I cant see any reason at all not to use an environment suit at the start, regardless of the conditions.

[WeaverofBrokenThreads]

Unclassified planet, minimal mountains, 500+ rain, water optional (it can happen to have 0% water, but to have rain), no syndicate, low tech, supreme council only, extreme difficulty.

I generally don't really scout the map. I will follow roads to see how my neighbors are, but I will generally return and turtle, scouting only with spies. I don't go for assets, even if they are close. I build my plan of expansion based on reports I get from scouts.

[cspringer1234]

ORIGINAL: Lorgath

Environment suits are too good, they should be nerfed - but that's a different topic.

I agree with this, at the moment I cant see any reason at all not to use an environment suit at the start, regardless of the conditions.

Make them like masks in real life, have them lower troop morale and performance. Higher the rating of the armor / filtration, the more morale and performance it saps?

People don't even want to wear flimsy paper / cotton masks in real life, let alone full environmental suits.

[76mm]

ORIGINAL: Larac
I have been doing Medium and Large planets, minimal start, 1 Zone and low tech.

Finding a life filled planet for me has been hard.

hmmm, this is what I do, but only large Siwas. Life forms out the wazoo, they are overwhelming, can't kill them with the initial tech.

[diamondspider]

I like:
+normal planet size
+normal difficulty (about to kick it up a notch next game)
+low tech/normal pacing
+zero councils
+less than 10% mountains and oceans
+no life
+high planet tilt for interesting seasons
+no extreme temp... round 20-30 average but with high tilt get a good range
+a good number of ruins, both because they are interesting terrain and they give some early metal... not too many though because it makes the game too easy
+epochs (don't love them, but they add an interesting element).
+meritocracy, commerce, mind.
+See map but full fog of war.

I dislike:
-too much forest, so usually go for either shrubs maximum life or, even better, reroll until I get not much forest.
-cloud forests are zero tolerance
-too much population, so I usually play heavily nuked worlds with lots of radiation
-for now I keep cults, corps, and criminals options off, but will experiment in future.
-to reiterate, I dislike any animal life being on the planet, both because fighting wildlife strikes me as boring and because I believe life will turn out to be extremely rare in reality.

Don't care:
-about oxygen levels and other hazards as they don't have much impact... hopefully this will change in future so they have more impact.

[EuchreJack]

ORIGINAL: Grotius

How much of the planet do you all reveal at start? "Partial"? None? I've been going with the least-revealing option ("none" or something like that).

I've been using complete map, so I can see the world but not the people without spies/recon. I mean, just think of how many maps of our planet and globes exist in a small community. The school alone probably has one per classroom, and many private homes and businesses have at least a map or a globe. So, why wouldn't my regime be able to scrape up at least ONE map of the world they inhabit. It just doesn't make sense to me, so I go with a map of the world. I can at least see the ruins and expand meaningfully. I can however totally understand the wonder of having a whole world to explore, and might go with "none" again in the future, but complete map just makes sense to me currently.

[diamondspider]

I've been using complete map

Same. Planning if what I enjoy in these games, and whatever can help me plan I turn on. Of course I have no idea about the enemies and special structures there, so there is still plenty of surprise.

[ramnblam]

Random planet gen, full fog of war, lowest tech start, one city, epic game speed.

[lloydster4]

ORIGINAL: 76mm
hmmm, this is what I do, but only large Siwas. Life forms out the wazoo, they are overwhelming, can't kill them with the initial tech.

What?! You hate fighting creatures with low-tech, but you ONLY roll Siwas with low-tech?

Are you masochistic or just stubborn?

[LordAldrich]

I've split out a thread in the suggestions sub-forum about how environment suits should be nerfed, feel free to continue that discussion there if you're so inclined!

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=4840108

[Kamelpov]

I play with wildlife raiders slavers and lot of population all fog of war and epic dev speed tech 3 all cult and no council and things like that to have a minor city start.