Balancing aquatic factions

[ete]

For the next game I'm CMNing, I need to balance some aquatic factions. Looking over the ones with wiki pages (note: this does not include all factions, I've not made pages for recent factions which are likely to be updated unless the creator offers to keep the page updated with newest version of the factions), we've got:

http://alphacentauri2.info/wiki/Bree

http://alphacentauri2.info/wiki/Planet_Freight

http://alphacentauri2.info/wiki/Procyon_Consortium

http://alphacentauri2.info/wiki/The_Atlanteans

I've played a couple of large all-aquatic games to the end during the time my internet was down, so I'm a bit more able to comment on balance for water factions than previously. The core difference is the plentiful nutrients due to the early and easy 5 nutrient squares (nut bonus+kelp), and once resource caps are removed extremely plentiful nutrients and energy. There are also significant combat, exploration, tech path, native life, eco damage, etc.. differences to take into account.

I'm not going to target the Bree since they will likely be the AI opponent for the game.

http://alphacentauri2.info/wiki/Planet_Freight is an interesting faction. -1 Econ is not a very big deal, and +3 Commerce is actually amazing, but -1 Support and a penalty to demo makes choosing Politics very painful for them. PS/FM/Wealth is kinda cool though. I'm not ver sure if I'd change anything much about this faction, other than removing amphibious pods since it does not work correctly, and maybe giving them some other minor bonus.

http://alphacentauri2.info/wiki/Procyon_Consortium Sigma's alien aquatic faction. If alien aquatics are allowed, this could be quite cool. +2 Growth is a very big deal (much faster pop booming than others, just demo+creche (pop boom under FM, and you need creches for effic) or demo+planned). I would remove several of their secondary bonuses to compensate, no free subsea trunklines until they get the tech for it or deep pressure hulls. They do have a very vulnerable time near the start due to low morale and Planet, but I'd be inclined to give them some later relevant penalty, perhaps a small hurry penalty or -1 Indust? Or instead give them a smallish combat modifier, like 90% Offense.

http://alphacentauri2.info/wiki/The_Atlanteans I honestly don't know. There are too many things going on here, I'm not sure whether the very nice bonuses (+2 Police, +1 Planet, +2 Probe, Terraform bonus) compensate for the very major disadvantages of 125% research and hurry cost and -2 Growth. My instinct is that currently they're significantly underpowered, and I'd like to remove a lot of unnecessary bonuses/penalties. Not sure exactly what that looks like.


Thoughts?

[Geo]

http://alphacentauri2.info/wiki/The_Atlanteans I honestly don't know. There are too many things going on here, I'm not sure whether the very nice bonuses (+2 Police, +1 Planet, +2 Probe, Terraform bonus) compensate for the very major disadvantages of 125% research and hurry cost and -2 Growth. My instinct is that currently they're significantly underpowered, and I'd like to remove a lot of unnecessary bonuses/penalties. Not sure exactly what that looks like.


Thoughts?

Code: [Select]

^+2 POLICE and +1 PROBE: {Loyal citizens of a distinct culture}
^-2 GROWTH: {Accidents for the unattentive in a hostile environment and birth control}
^{May not use Free Market economic choice.}
^Free Deep Pressure Hull ability with discovery of necessary technology.
^Terraform Bonus: {Drowning your opponents is an option}
^Bases need Hab Complex to exceed size 4: {Small bases difficult to discover}
^Enhancements may be built in ocean and trench squares with the discovery of Advanced Ecological Engineering: {Trained for life at sea}
^Bonus mineral from ocean shelf squares: {Culture and technology adapted for the ocean}

ATM I'm thinking of giving a free seaformer to start with.
How about this?
It's my old aquatic MP faction.

[ete]

That's a modded version of Atlants? It looks, to me.. probably fairly well balanced, maybe a little underpowered, and somewhat bloated still. There's still a lot going on, but.. hm. I guess small bases and low growth work well together so it'd be not too weak, and police for good control+terraform is important. Yea, I *think* I'd be comfortable allowing that in with a set of normal factions, but will have to think a bit more.

[Geo]

Well, there's 3 others that need to be convinced as well.

[Kirov]

Several thoughts here:

I don't think that pop-booming is that important on sea (you mentioned it in the other thread). I played some with the Pirates recently, who can't popboom, and with just a bunch of kelp farms they grew much faster than I expected, quickly reaching 5-7pop. With pop-boom I wouldn't even catch up with drone facs.

All the stuff which gives you some bonus with a certain tech, if said tech is not up to tier 4, is neglectable. Seriously; just don't bother. If you see the Pirates researching Advanced EcoEng, you see a cat playing with mouse.

Geo, your faction: the problem I see here is that one thing cancels out the other. Pop4 bases with -2 Growth call for ICS ASAP, the faster you can get on land, the better. But the Police bonus is of no use then. Sure, one police quells 2 drones, but that's it - I wouldn't switch to PS with such a faction (what for with pop4?), so I don't know, this Police is kinda wasted. +1 Probe doesn't help here, Pressure Hulls and AEE - see above, you're not gonna see them in standard games. I would say this faction is greatly underpowered. And what's that terraform bonus? Is it like the tech or industry percentage?

[ete]

Hm, perhaps my estimation of the power of pop booms was due to playing as a faction which had +2 bonus population, but I did find my power graph went massively exponential far before usual, and it felt like extremely quick growth was the result. The base pop limits do come into play much sooner, but being able to go from a size 1 base to a size 7 in six turns (rush a police unit, rush a rec commons (after first few mins), rush a NN or holo if you missed VW and that's 5 out of 7 citizens under control, the last can be handled by either psych or more police if you have it. Running a specialist heavy strat early is also cool and means less rushing facilities.) is important. I probably did overstate the importance of pop booming, but it does let you get lots of bases big very quickly compared to normal growth, and unlike on land setting up the terraforming for enough nuts to support a size 7 base is trivial.

[Geo]

Geo, your faction: the problem I see here is that one thing cancels out the other. Pop4 bases with -2 Growth call for ICS ASAP, the faster you can get on land, the better. But the Police bonus is of no use then. Sure, one police quells 2 drones, but that's it - I wouldn't switch to PS with such a faction (what for with pop4?), so I don't know, this Police is kinda wasted. +1 Probe doesn't help here, Pressure Hulls and AEE - see above, you're not gonna see them in standard games. I would say this faction is greatly underpowered. And what's that terraform bonus? Is it like the tech or industry percentage?

The faction is most definitely geared for going beyond industrial automation, that's true.
The terraform bonus (IIRC) halves the cost of adjusting the altitude of a tile.

[ete]

I missed a bit, terraform bonus doubles terraform rate (I think).

[Yitzi]

I missed a bit, terraform bonus doubles terraform rate (I think).

I think it halves the energy cost of raising/lowering land...

[Geo]

* Geo nods

[Yitzi]

With pop-boom I wouldn't even catch up with drone facs.

Yeah, but if you grab Centauri Empathy or build any psych-boosting facility, a doctor/empath is worth enough to quell drones and then some.

All the stuff which gives you some bonus with a certain tech, if said tech is not up to tier 4, is neglectable. Seriously; just don't bother. If you see the Pirates researching Advanced EcoEng, you see a cat playing with mouse.

Well, unless you change the game settings to promote much longer games...

[Kirov]

Yeah, but if you grab Centauri Empathy or build any psych-boosting facility, a doctor/empath is worth enough to quell drones and then some.

Even at -1 Growth, the Pirates have much more food than minerals. Psych facs are expensive after RecCommons (for that matter, I never build Holo Theatres due to their maintenance of 3). And normally you go for CEmpathy quite late, air power and EnvEcon are much more important. Of course, in the game ete is preparing where EG is not banned, it's no secret that I'm going to try my luck with it. But I tend to ban EG in my games, which severely impairs the importance of CEmpathy.

[Yitzi]

Even at -1 Growth, the Pirates have much more food than minerals. Psych facs are expensive after RecCommons (for that matter, I never build Holo Theatres due to their maintenance of 3). And normally you go for CEmpathy quite late, air power and EnvEcon are much more important. Of course, in the game ete is preparing where EG is not banned, it's no secret that I'm going to try my luck with it. But I tend to ban EG in my games, which severely impairs the importance of CEmpathy.

Yeah, that makes sense...