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I've now played through a game using every profile (Obvi not every combo nor have I seen the final unlock in all of them, but reading them should be sufficient) so I think I can speak to their different strengths.
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Democracy: Best of the three. The QoL bonuses don't matter much, but the Political bonuses are godlike. Cabinet Retreat is insanely strong as it creates an upward spiral. The more you use it, the more of them you get, the more PP you have to spam 5+ of them a turn.

Meritocracy: Hard to get Merit points, and the reward is only Ok. My favorite part is actually the Recruit Talent card but you can grab that in the first tier. Grand Convention is a bit pricey for the job it does, I'd use the specific convention cards instead (Cabinet Retreat/Wargames/Governor Convention). If you can get it high enough, the "Call to Success" seems better than either of the other two "Call to X" cards. The faction card Worker Privileges is quite good as worker happiness tends to trail behind pop happiness from my exp.

Autocracy: Sucks. Easy enough to specialize in though. Recruit Special Ops and the Bunker busters are probably all that are useful here. And the Special Ops card really only needs to be played once if you are lucky. No passive bonuses like Merit/Democ to make up for it. The cards you unlock seem to all be terrible or actually hurt you. Even worse than the bonuses, picking Autocracy decisions means you will have a hard time with any diplomacy. Everyone will hate you.

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Government: Godlike. This boosts your Bureaucratic bonuses/Worker Happiness/Industrial bonuses. Almost every card is a huge winner. Governor Convention completes the set of Conventions if you picked Democracy. Bureaucratic push is super cheap and can be spammed (Plus the BP increases your PP next turn so while not free, it is discounted). Draft workers is VERY strong. Think of all those times you needed more workers. Basically every time you build anything. Or when you get a new city and need things built NOW. Attract Free Folk pulls them out of their little cities in droves and DOESN'T KILL THEM like some cards. Instant population. This is the strongest of any of the 9 profiles. It's not close. Easy to get the profile as well.

Commerce: Ok. This is all about happiness and boosting your private economy (And thus your entire economy). You need a good Interior Director to actually use most of the cards, but if you have that it should be hard for your population or leaders to ever have low happiness. Faction card Commercial Project is nice. Investor Backing is Ok.

Enforcement: Super meh. You are using this for the Logi/Tax bonuses and easy recruitment. But I've never had trouble with recruitment. The cards are all quite pricey in terms of PP and have high Difficulty checks to even use.

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Fist: Straightforward and Ok. You pick fist for the straight up combat bonuses, and for a few of the cards. Glorious War is a combat bonus with no downside, AND increases morale. I'd say it's actually the reason to pick Fist. Also Fist profile is easy to raise. It also has a billion ways to increase casualty tolerance. But I've never had an issue with this so I didn't care much. Boosts your militia a lot...but is that helpful? Also this suffers from the same problem as Autocracy, it's VERY hard to make friends when you are executing all their spies.

Mind: Decent and my preference. A bunch of research bonuses (And tech translates to military power) with decent cards. Fluid Defense is one of my favorites as it buffs the things you want and weakens things you don't care about. Infiltration is an early card that buffs Infantry attack waaaay before you normally could with any other method. Their Techno Mage is very nice to have so quickly as well. Faction card Zoo Project is nice.

Heart: Sucks. Gives your people/troops loyalty. Gives troops morale. Cards are pretty much all defensive.

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In conclusion I think Democracy/Government/Mind is the way to go. Or anything with Government and without Autocracy/Heart.
In my last game I was making near 100 PP a turn by midgame, and spending it on the convention cards until all my leaders were so good that I was seeing 1000%+ combat benefits from my OHQ commanders and 100+ suitability on all my leaders. If you are able to take a dip into Meritocracy for the first tier, Recruit Talent is a fantastic card to ensure you start with good leaders.

I tried an Autocracy/Enforcement/Fist run and while it went...fine...it was so much worse than anything else. I had no way to increase pop/worker happiness and every turn I had to put down worker rebellions, killing valuable pop.

In my Meritocracy/Commerce/Mind run I found out exactly how hard Merit is to raise. Don't expect it to get much more than half through the Feat tree. I've never hit the top of any tree, but I got closest with Autocracy. Too bad it's useless.

Final note, near the end of my games turns seem to have far fewer decisions. Meaning very few ways to change profiles. I'm not sure if this is intentional but at that point I'm rarely able to unlock any new Profile Features.

I pretty much agree with you. These days, I find myself more RPing in the game, rather than going specifically for victory, and I'm learning to appreciate the other profiles a lot more. Just did a playthrough with Meritocracy/Government/Heart and that was pretty fun. I actually had a glut of Cap V leaders by the halfway point in the game. It was awesome!

I do love me a Cap V leader. Generally I start by firing anyone that doesn't match my profiles, but Cap V's get a pass (And a Happy Family card if needed)

The Call to Power CovOps card is very expensive in PP terms and generally considered not worth it.

Assassinate Leader is pretty strong in specific cases. Suppress Unrest is really useful when conquering new zones, often they have 80+ unrest, good for early game aggressive play. Hero of the Nation is situationally useful. But yeah, Autocracy is pretty weak overall, Vic is clearly playing political favorites here : V

Meritocracy's 3rd Feat gives +25 OHQ rolls. Pair that with "+25% combat power" from Fist's 3rd Feat and that gets pretty deadly, and it spirals too (just like Cabinet Retreat) because your commander is stronger and wins more fights with less casualties means they get EXP faster and their troops also gain EXP at accelerated rates.

Logistics +50% is a lifesaver with Easy Logistics: Off. Logistics is one of the hardest things in the game and Enforcement gives you a gigantic bonus to that. Efficiency Drive is also extremely powerful as your admin level increases.

Cool to hear other's thoughts on this. Honestly I haven't seen any other posts really discussing profile choices in depth. I see what you are saying with the first few points. For logistics (I always play with easy:off) I find that just spamming Truck Stop upgrades in every city the second you can gets me where I want to be. Sealed Roads are a must and Rails seem to only be needed mid-end game. Buuuuuut it's true that it's always better to have more Logi points. And being able to use those to Strategic Move is quite strong.

ORIGINAL: Krytor

Cool to hear other's thoughts on this. Honestly I haven't seen any other posts really discussing profile choices in depth. I see what you are saying with the first few points. For logistics (I always play with easy:off) I find that just spamming Truck Stop upgrades in every city the second you can gets me where I want to be. Sealed Roads are a must and Rails seem to only be needed mid-end game. Buuuuuut it's true that it's always better to have more Logi points. And being able to use those to Strategic Move is quite strong.

I found sealed roads overpriced and underpowered. Very rarely make sense. Railroads on the other hand are amazing. If you can build one "axis" of long railroad, with dirt roads branching off it to the sides, it's a winning combo.

supply bases are a must of course (and note you can upgrade them!)

Railroads are generally pretty expensive so usually you try to make sealed roads and supply bases work for as long as you can.

Not to get too off the topic of profiles, but sealed roads can be placed for a discount over normal roads, so it's not a waste to grab em. Plus some of my playthroughs have created a circular route between my cities which means any extension of Logi points could make those points usable many cities over. Of course if you are not using the extra distance (It's double a normal road right?) then I guess you don't need them.

Very well-detailed breakdown, these are pretty much my exact thoughts on profiles.

I don't think Heart is that bad, if nothing else because it's easy to maintain, pairs off very well with the Anima Circle cult (as it is Democracy + Heart) and its faction demands are easy to fulfill. The "Popular Rally" faction card feat you get at 60 is fairly decent as well, but Mind's "Breakthrough Now!" and "Zoo Project" are just plain better. The extra people loyalty you get also makes getting conquered cities to a serviceable status faster than normal. Overall though, Mind is better.

I actually mentioned that pairing in my original post, but then wasn't sure it was worth mentioning so I deleted it. Heart's pairing with democracy is better than I give it credit for. Besides it having natural cult/faction synergies, it means your leaders will likely also subscribe to that faction. So basically everything you do makes your leaders happy.

In fact, my current game that I'm doing Democracy/Government/Mind is having some leadership issues since there doesn't seem to be a faction that wants this trio. If this power dynamic was intentional (The best combo doesn't pair well with cults/factions) then that's pretty impressive on Vic's part.

I was enthusiastic about Grand Convention the first time I got it, but yeah in actual practice it feels pretty underwhelming. Cabinet retreat I've liked, seems if anything it's even better than I suspected. Especially since some of my cabinet have unhelpful profiles and easily get sulky.

I found that meritocracy is a very good choice when you have a lot of farmer minors surrounding you. Getting peace, protectorates and then unifications is quite easy. Switching to democracy later for PP bonus and worker strike control is quite easy, and with good leaders you can keep democracy 80+ while meritocracy still is at 55-70, keeping your feats.

In my book, commerce rules the government profile . My current game forced me to city spam for radiation survival of my infantry. My high commerce is netting me 4.4k IP from 38 zones light industry and two(!) industries II I built myself. The faction cards are both very good, OP is underestimating the Private investment card like a lot. It is 17 PP cheaper than the regular investment card and does the same.

Edit: https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=4824130#

In the end, it comes to you, player, what you like. I won with auto - fist - enforcement because I had to on a small lifeless moon with a major territory neighoring my capital, like directly adjacent. But I prefer meri - commerce - mind.

THAT is a lot of zones. I never took having that many zones into consideration. I can see how the industry buffs would help from commerce. Private investment has been less useful for me because eventually a city gets all the private buildings and doesn't seem to make use of the extra cash. But if I had 38 zones then I can see how that would stay strong.

I aim to have as few zones as possible so I can have bigger cities since the higher tier buildings are more efficient, but if the map has so many existing cities then there's no way to build tall. Or if the resources would cause too much admin strain due to location.

I don't doubt that any combo of profiles can lead to success, but some really seem to be much more powerful than others.

Yes, the UI can only show 26 in the quick zone tab on the left, that needs to be adressed. I have constant worker strikes that I pay off easily, and my advisors are specialized in oratory etc. to help out with the occasional meritocracy gamble.

My turn now takes an hour or so, and AI is at 30 minutes. I wanted an epic game, and it is worth waiting.

Going into Enforcement or Commerce from the beginning of the game should allow for a faster early economic ramp-up, since a regime investing in the Government profile doesn't get much benefit from it in terms of industrial points until they've sunk thousands of metal into Industry assets. As an Enforcement-focused regime, the initial goal should be to rapidly expand the population base to maximize the IP, BP and credit income from the service tax, which they get bonuses to, and Commerce regimes get extra production from metal-free Light Industry and are better equipped to get more of it built faster. I'm not disputing that Government has lots going for it, but the other economic profiles might have an easier time arriving at midgame in an advantageous position.

I've been experimenting with Commerce lately, and I haven't actually tried out the other profiles in depth yet. I want to mention some of the side benefits from Commerce, though:
* The corporation will use political influencing operations to make your factions more friendly to Commerce, making your factions and leaders easier to manage over time if you invest heavily in the profile.
* The profile is easy to boost since it comes with several corporation-related decisions that have a choice to boost it (including asking to put your leaders on the corporate board via the 'Meet the CEO' stratagem - up to half the board can be your leaders, and the size of the other half slowly expands over time).
* Having a corporation, which investing in Commerce early on guarantees, plays nice with certain other profiles, as it grants extra opportunities to boost Meritocracy, Mind or Fist.
* The 'Co-optation' faction strategem from the Commerce-80 regime feat gives a leader of your choice +15 Intelligence, War and Charisma, which is a pretty nice bonus. Putting leaders on the corporate board also comes with stat bonuses (+10 Charisma and potentially more Charisma and Intelligence if the corporation decides to give them extra perks), though it's not as good on already highly loyal leaders since board memberships drag the leader's relation down if it's above corporate relations, and it's hard to maintain corporate relations near 100 without spending a lot of PP on chit-chats with the CEO.

ORIGINAL: Soar_Slitherine

Going into Enforcement or Commerce from the beginning of the game should allow for a faster early economic ramp-up, since a regime investing in the Government profile doesn't get much benefit from it in terms of industrial points until they've sunk thousands of metal into Industry assets. As an Enforcement-focused regime, the initial goal should be to rapidly expand the population base to maximize the IP, BP and credit income from the service tax, which they get bonuses to, and Commerce regimes get extra production from metal-free Light Industry and are better equipped to get more of it built faster. I'm not disputing that Government has lots going for it, but the other economic profiles might have an easier time arriving at midgame in an advantageous position.

I've been experimenting with Commerce lately, and I haven't actually tried out the other profiles in depth yet. I want to mention some of the side benefits from Commerce, though:
* The corporation will use political influencing operations to make your factions more friendly to Commerce, making your factions and leaders easier to manage over time if you invest heavily in the profile.
* The profile is easy to boost since it comes with several corporation-related decisions that have a choice to boost it (including asking to put your leaders on the corporate board via the 'Meet the CEO' stratagem - up to half the board can be your leaders, and the size of the other half slowly expands over time).
* Having a corporation, which investing in Commerce early on guarantees, plays nice with certain other profiles, as it grants extra opportunities to boost Meritocracy, Mind or Fist.
* The 'Co-optation' faction strategem from the Commerce-80 regime feat gives a leader of your choice +15 Intelligence, War and Charisma, which is a pretty nice bonus. Putting leaders on the corporate board also comes with stat bonuses (+10 Charisma and potentially more Charisma and Intelligence if the corporation decides to give them extra perks), though it's not as good on already highly loyal leaders since board memberships drag the leader's relation down if it's above corporate relations, and it's hard to maintain corporate relations near 100 without spending a lot of PP on chit-chats with the CEO.

The Corporation is a optional rule. And one I rarely use, due to it being so detrimental to pop happiness.
I am also not a fan of Private Economy overall: The increase in QOL will drag civilsiation score up when I do nto want it(I very rarely want that one up) and the amount of used private workers will drag the expected Worker salaries up, also potentially starving my entire public sector of workers.

I was going to make a new topic about this, but I think I'll simply put it here: Autocracy is abominably bad and has little to no benefit to the player. It's just terrible all on it's own but looks especially awful when compared to its neighboring profiles.

Other regimes will despise you for reasons already mentioned.

No regime-level bonuses (the only profile without them).

Call to power I-III is *far* too expensive for the effect it has; on top of that, the skill roll to succeed is ridiculously difficult.

Suppress unrest/pillage/raze/razzia require passing a difficult skill roll, but even when you pass, your soldiers will still clash with rioters and you will need massive amounts of them to win in any decent sized city (while sustaining heavy losses).

It's an altogether atrocious choice and desperately needs a rethink/rework to actually make it useful to an intelligent player.

On top of that, suppressing the rioters can lead to total destruction of your assets. And there is no warning about that anywhere.

Thread: https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=4930229

Useful thread! I've only started to keep attention and even role play a bit these profiles in my last games. The game is very playable even without them though. Just do what keeps most of your leaders happy etc what suits you best and you most of the time succeed. If you do not have any money, build barracks and keep some crappy troops in cities to kill rioters. The only problem with autocracy I have had yet is only that worker happiness stays pretty low.

I'm currently playing with Commerce starts. It's actually very strong, because with such a huge boost to the private sector you don't need to bother building any of the QoL buildings and your cities will grow very quickly as a result.

I'm interested to know what kind of planets you've based these results from, because my own experiences suggest that the Profiles you need are highly dependent upon the planet, your starting conditions and the neighbours you have around you.