Independent Colony Races

[Lord_Asmodeus]

I was curious, are all of the Independent Colonies based solely on the Empires that are in existence? Like, if I played a game with no other empires, would the only independent colonies be the same race as my empire?

Even in games with a ton of other empires I only ever seem to run into Independent Colonies the same race as I am, at least before the point where they might start rebelling.

[MadMcAl]

AFAIK... yup.

It can happen that you stumble over an drifting colony ship.
That can maybe bring a race not already empire building here, but I am not a 100% sure.

[Nedrear]

You can find alien colony ships, but you should find alien races as well. All can be independent.

[feelotraveller]

Yes only the empires which start the game. Yes.

[MadMcAl]

ORIGINAL: Nedrear

You can find alien colony ships, but you should find alien races as well. All can be independent.

Only races that are used for the starting empires may be found as independent colonies.

Nothing more, nothing less.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: Lord_Asmodeus
Like, if I played a game with no other empires, would the only independent colonies be the same race as my empire?

There's no limitation that they would only be the faction you are playing, but they would be from one of the playable factions.

Regards,

- Erik

[feelotraveller]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

ORIGINAL: Lord_Asmodeus
Like, if I played a game with no other empires, would the only independent colonies be the same race as my empire?

There's no limitation that they would only be the faction you are playing, but they would be from one of the playable factions.

Regards,

- Erik

Erik - in every game I have played I have only ever found independents from those races who have an empire at the start. Can you confirm that it is indeed possible to find independent races from factions which do not start the game as empires (leaving aside the two special non-playable cases). I'm surprised but I would like to get it clear one way or the other.

Or is a single starting empire a special case?

[Nedrear]

I definetly found a Teekan colony ship without them starting as an empire. I am not 100% sure about the colonies though. I guess I saw one.

[Data]

I too have noticed that independents are always the same race as the empires on the map, and I looked and tested explicitly for this. But given that I can use the edior to setup a game in a myriad ways I forgot about it.

[Lord_Asmodeus]

That makes sense, kinda wish it was an option for others (I wanted to play a game with no other starting empires but my own with plenty of colonies which could become empires)

Another question I had was, when you get the colony ships with the other races, unlike other races they never seem to migrate off of that planet. Is there a reason for that?

[Nedrear]

The planet needs a minimum population.