I sent this to Cat-o-Ninetales, thought I´d post it in a forum as well, see what people say!

Hi, I have had both games for a quite some time and love the universe, lore and the game, but I have some questions after playing and watching some established youtubers:

4xAlchemist addresses a radical imbalance with Vodyani, where they have actually banned playing that faction at all. Is this at all being looked at to fix?

- It would be cooler to play the game, especially multiplayer, knowing the factions have at least a remotely equal chance to win...

It also seems quite obvious there are too few relics for Nakalim to have a chance... and so on, so forth. Now, there are mods to counter this. Just curious why some factions take such an obvious front and back seat...

Since the videos are a bit old, I have no clue as to if I am late to the party and you have actually looked at these things and fixed some of them.

But for example they bring up the fact that Vodyani will either be super bad or super good, and I don´t understand why Devs won´t lock down the starts for each faction harder to make sure the start of the game is more balanced; a bit of luck or bad luck can will of course always be part of a game like this.

I´m also wondering about the hacking feature: I am struggling to understand how, when I hack a system several nodes away, with a Compression Singularity in the starting system - which should increase hacking speed 100% - and Encryption on my home system and Accelerator and Overload on the enemy system - how the heck (hack) can they manage to not only trace me but then they manage to hack me where I did not in the above described scenario?! And I don´t only mean that they trace my hack. They manage to hack me in a separate scenario where I failed. And in shorter time than I have spent (I doubt they traced an extra long route taking 14 turns).

Added now (not sent to Cat-o-Ninetales)

This thing about the hacking makes me wonder about how the AI work in general, are they cheating? Or just getting more resources apart from providing a stronger opposition?

Also, something I thought about when playing ES1 and 2:

I don´t understand why some features exist. I research a bunch of improvements, but they get down-prioritized because I have better things to build... for so long that I am wondering why these improvements exist at all. The cost and pay off of building them are often not even close to worth it. Anyone agree?

Also, my experience with the game is that its very stressful. It contains so much exploration possibilities and things you can do, that you never get the chance to do since you need to defend yourself and try to win the game... Like cruising around exploring moons and such things... its this cool thing but I feel like by the time I could do those things, I am busy trying to win the game rather than doing these cute and thrilling explorations...

Same thing with all these nebulae and black holes and such... except for maybe Unfallen, to me it seems that by the time your influence is great enough to give you their boosts... you don´t even need it anymore cause its so small compared to what you already have.

Maybe I am just too inexperienced with the game, I´d love some responses!

_John_Blackthorne wrote:

...if I am late to the party...

Yeah, kinda. Game is 4.5 years old and receives almost no updates now. But yes, a lot of things have changed since 4XAlchemist made their videos.

_John_Blackthorne wrote:
with a Compression Singularity in the starting system - which should increase hacking speed 100%

Singularity effect is applied to the system it is on. Since you can't hack your own system, you aren't helping yourself to hack some other system, you are helping to enemy to hack your own.

_John_Blackthorne wrote:
This thing about the hacking makes me wonder about how the AI work in general, are they cheating? Or just getting more resources apart from providing a stronger opposition?

They do not cheat. On higher difficulties their receive increased FIDSI output to their systems. Because AI have more resources that way, they are free to play more aggressively. But logic is the same behind every difficulty from normal and higher.

_John_Blackthorne wrote:
The cost and pay off of building them are often not even close to worth it. Anyone agree?

Perhaps you research it too late?

_John_Blackthorne wrote:
Also, my experience with the game is that its very stressful. It contains so much exploration possibilities and things you can do, that you never get the chance to do since you need to defend yourself and try to win the game... Like cruising around exploring moons and such things... its this cool thing but I feel like by the time I could do those things, I am busy trying to win the game rather than doing these cute and thrilling explorations...

Decrease the difficulty and enjoy your exploration.

_John_Blackthorne wrote:
Same thing with all these nebulae and black holes and such... except for maybe Unfallen, to me it seems that by the time your influence is great enough to give you their boosts... you don´t even need it anymore cause its so small compared to what you already have.

You are wrong. That flat resource gain that neutral nodes provide is applied before system multipliers and bonuses, so it scales well.

Thanks a bunch for the replies and explanations.

So the Vodyani is not completely OP now? What about their start being either SUPER BAD or SUPER GOOD?
I saw there is a patch to make their insane hero feature more acceptable. The FIDSI per level per population.

About researching it too late. What I mean are mostly these early things that provide more science.

It takes a lot of turns to build it - and if you do - you don´t get out colonization ships and other things that are more important at this state of the game out.

I think the early one is called PEV-scale accelerators or something like that. It gets research in a turn or two in the beginning, but by the time I feel like I can afford to put my industry into building it, I have 1-2 other improvements that are way better already researched.

"Decrease the difficulty and enjoy your exploration."

- I make a Colossal or Exceptional Galaxy and play on hard to adapt it... so yeah, thanks.

But I am just questioning the reason why there is so much exploration to do... if you can´t do it on higher difficulties anyway...

I mean, if you want to beat the higher difficulties or other human players, it becomes "not prioritized".

Ultimately, I think a game should make the super cool stuff necessary to win, not a super cool thing you could have/do only if you are completely superior to your opponents.

"You are wrong. That flat resource gain that neutral nodes provide is applied before system multipliers and bonuses, so it scales well."

Any way to increase your influence-radius except researching on the left side? I think its called Empire Improvement.

The main reason some factions either soar or crash is due to their reliance on things that are RNG dependent; minor factions are a big one for factions like Vodyani or, say, Horatio.  Some factions are fairly indifferent to their starting conditions, like Sophons, Lumeris or United Empire; others need more specific things to get rolling.  It makes it something of a gamble to pick those factions, especially in a multiplayer environment, but that's just part of the game I suppose.

_John_Blackthorne wrote:

Thanks a bunch for the replies and explanations.

So the Vodyani is not completely OP now? What about their start being either SUPER BAD or SUPER GOOD?
I saw there is a patch to make their insane hero feature more acceptable. The FIDSI per level per population.

About researching it too late. What I mean are mostly these early things that provide more science.

It takes a lot of turns to build it - and if you do - you don´t get out colonization ships and other things that are more important at this state of the game out.

I think the early one is called PEV-scale accelerators or something like that. It gets research in a turn or two in the beginning, but by the time I feel like I can afford to put my industry into building it, I have 1-2 other improvements that are way better already researched.

"Decrease the difficulty and enjoy your exploration."

- I make a Colossal or Exceptional Galaxy and play on hard to adapt it... so yeah, thanks.

But I am just questioning the reason why there is so much exploration to do... if you can´t do it on higher difficulties anyway...

I mean, if you want to beat the higher difficulties or other human players, it becomes "not prioritized".

Ultimately, I think a game should make the super cool stuff necessary to win, not a super cool thing you could have/do only if you are completely superior to your opponents.

"You are wrong. That flat resource gain that neutral nodes provide is applied before system multipliers and bonuses, so it scales well."

Any way to increase your influence-radius except researching on the left side? I think its called Empire Improvement.

Vodyani are effectively Space Vampires. If there are no Minor factions or an unwilling Major faction nearby for them to leech Essence, then their start can be really rough. Ideally you want Minor Factions since you can use them for a source of Dust/Science as well. Horatio fall into the same boat but for Gene Splicing. As for building system improvements, everything is worth building but some are more cost effective than others. Knowing where and when to build stuff only comes with experience. As for Influence generation, there are several ways to do so but the easiest and cheapest way to do so is Planet specialization. After that it’s System Upgrades(example: Level 2 upgrade applies +30 Influence), System Governors(specifically Counselors and/or specific factions like United Empire or Unfallen) and System Improvements(Ex: National Museum). Giga Lattice and Meta-Entactogen deposits also apply a +2/+3 Influence per population on the planet their deposits reside on(making Tier 2 and 3 Influence Luxuries particularly potent).

Cool, thanks for all the tips.

So I take it these drawbacks of Vodyani and their over-poweredness has not been changed at all since 4xAlchemists verdict on them (making them ban them for their own online games)... making them potensially unstoppable in a human multiplayer game?

As was said, virtually any faction is "potensially unstoppable in a human multiplayer game" and 4xAlchemists videos are seriously outdated, things have changed.

_John_Blackthorne wrote:

Cool, thanks for all the tips.

So I take it these drawbacks of Vodyani and their over-poweredness has not been changed at all since 4xAlchemists verdict on them (making them ban them for their own online games)... making them potensially unstoppable in a human multiplayer game?

Vodyani’s population produces +4 FIDS but their growth rate is far slower than other factions. That’s why the need for Essence is so vital for them early on since it’s their only means of expanding and early source of population generation(if you opt to do so that is). Get by the early game wall as Vodyani and they become a force thanks to their Hero perks and Religious ideology(allowing them to siege/invade in Cold War). Any faction, in the hands of a skilled player, is basically a threat in either single player or multiplayer. Game Difficulty doesn’t really change how the AI acts but merely determines how much of an advantage they get compared to you(which is really noticeable in the early game when they’re able to claim multiple systems very quickly on Endless Difficulty). Might feel hard with a Vanilla faction but with a custom faction, Endless Difficulty isn’t that much of a challenge with respect to Single Player. Can’t say that for Multiplayer but I don’t play it to begin with. As for the tutorial videos 4XAlchemist made, those are incredibly old and outdated. Becomes rather obvious when you notice him doing the refit trick for Exploration probes(which was possible back then but not today since it’s technically an exploit). If you got any questions, don’t be afraid to ask and if you want some custom faction ideas, check out the Custom Faction thread here in General.

Vodyani can be strong both early and mid game but they got nothing on e.g Horatio late game.. And u usally start with two ''colonised'' planets which is decent where one planet is super bad and three planets are super good.. Their playstyle makes this my favorite faction but i wouldnt call them overpowered. Also, their heros gave an extremly positive boost on systems which made the 4xAlchemist ban their race and any vodyani heros. But thats been fixed where u now get +1 fidsi on all pop and plus another 0.5 fidsi on all pop if a govern.

Vodyani can really lack behind in the late game especially if they havent got to expand as fast and soon early on. If u play against them u want to be war with them or peace becouse of their ability to attack and invade in friendly zones while cold war. 

AceRevo wrote:
If u play against them u want to be war with them or peace becouse of their ability to attack and invade in friendly zones while cold war. 

It's not Vodyani ability to do so. It's basic religious law, as long as the religious party is in the lead.

Groo wrote:

AceRevo wrote:
If u play against them u want to be war with them or peace becouse of their ability to attack and invade in friendly zones while cold war. 

It's not Vodyani ability to do so. It's basic religious law, as long as the religious party is in the lead.

yes i know this xD

Just saying if u play with against a player vodyani or even ai..

The current state of ES2 as of June 2021 is that it's been harmed rather than helped by the last two DLCs and it's full of bugs that the developers don't seem interested in fixing. This "lore pass" on the tech tree that the devs were talking about also doesn't seem to have materialised, and the lack of communication suggests that ES2 is no longer a priority with Humankind competing for limited development resources.

PAnZuRiEL wrote:
This "lore pass" on the tech tree that the devs were talking about also doesn't seem to have materialised

It did, 2 monthes ago.