It seems that everyone else (^) has already explained many of the points you've made so I'm gonna put this far more simplistic than I normally would 

Many of the points you made (especially since you're playing on Endless Difficulty) are ones that either aren't balance issues or things that you've clearly overlooked (such as certain hero classifications being less effective at leading fleets when compared to the Seeker or Guardian like that's there since Counselor and Overseer are meant to be governors, while Seeker classes aren't necessarily good as governors but are great as admirals, and Guardian is the best defensive hero in the game, and you can see the empire expansion dissaproval, it's in the faction tab on the top right corner; literally one of the easiest things to see in the game, or the colonization food "problem" LIKE, you can literally choose which system the colony draws food from. The food percentage that is going to the military is 1. realistic b/c a military requires lots of food to sustain it and 2. maybe look at the system improvements you've made as two of them, I won't tell you which ones, but they're near the technologies used to unlock ships *cough* take 30% off of your food production, and you're probably spending manpower too quickly hence your systems food production cannot keep up with your expenditures. AKA it's less of a balance issue and more of a-you-aren't-paying-attention-to-your-empire-issue)

Your issue with the economic victory isn't a balancing issue but you not playing correctly. Yes, the jingoist law gives you a public order bonus, no it does not mean declare war on literally everyone. Cuz what happens when you give the galaxy a common enemy, they generally ally against you since you're attacking all of them, like duh ? 

The economic victory is relatively balanced since it's aimed at getting players to ally themselves so that they can reach the victory conditions faster like you're not supposed to go for a single person victory on Endless difficulty, it's far easier and more effective of creating the strongest alliance in the game. 

Furthermore, Cravers have some of the strongest early game economic ability due to that 150% FIDS bonus, I've been in plenty of Endless Difficulty games where the Cravers are the first to get the Economic victory notice (they usually get wiped out because of that, since other empires gang up on them). 

There is little reason for Amplitude to "fix" the score and economic victories, and if you're struggling, play on Hard and learn the basics of the game before playing on Endless, you shouldn't be forced to disable Victory types simply because you're not playing up to par with the Endless Difficulty. 

Fleets aren't too slow, they've been balanced for years, and if you do it correctly, it's not hard to get really fast fleets, especially if you research the correct tech, impute the correct modules, and understand that you can't make every single one of your fleets super fast (that's what heroes are for). 

Guardian led fleets aren't made for speed, they're made for killing power, that's why the Seeker and Guardian Heroes are completely different classes, since it would be overpowered for Guardians to provide speed bonuses to fleets as well as defensive and offensive bonuses. You use Guardians to defend systems and attack enemy fleets/systems. 

Hero skills aren't useless, ever stuck a Counselor or Overseer in a turn 400 system, the bonuses are disgusting. On top of that, they aren't made to give ridiculous bonuses until the late game (as many of the later skills are percentage based). 

If you're complaining about the scarcity of points, I've had a number of games where my heroes have up to 21 excess points, so complaining about that is useless.

The AI has built proper fleets, my recent Endless Difficulty, 527 turn Vaulters game is having my max fleets contest with extremely diverse and powerful AI fleets. 

Trade companies are by far the most powerful economic tool you have late game, they bring in the most wealth of any singular empire or system improvement, and if you're trading with one or two other empires, that dust, science, and luxury resource produced is way more than any system. 

You need to understand that investing Dust into a trade company does not provide an immediate boost but a long-term benefit, after all it is an economic investment, not buying candy at the store. 

AI generally uses the strategic resources quite well, they generally spend them on fleets and wonders and sell them in the marketplace (if you pay attention to the rises and falls in market prices you can make a shitload of dust from selling). 

Fighters and bombers are some of the strongest modules in the game, what're you smoking ? Bombers can easily tear large ships apart, especially energy weapon heavy ships, and fighters are a great defensive unit against the bombers. 

The ships are meant to have a limited number of modules sections with a diverse choice of modules so the player can create a number of different and unique ships that allow them to diversify their fleets and create ships for specific events. Module section scarcity is meant to prevent certain ships from becoming too overpowered and especially prevent powerful jack-of-all-trade-ships that would ruin the rock-paper-scissors space battle style that the game currently employs. 

I would normally create a detailed, and well written explanation to help you with these problems, but b/c you decided to use the Games2Gether platform as a way to rant about a game that the Amplitude team has put their heart and soul into, that they have balanced since day 1, and complain about a number of things that aren't issues with the game, but issues with your own clear laziness or ignorance on game mechanics I'll leave this as a long rebuttal to your "rant". 

NO ONE, ever said that this game is perfect, that is clear by the number of extensive updates that this game receives. However, for you to act like a pretentious asshole and attempt to trash the game simply b/c they released a DLC, and that it isn't perfect to your specifications is disgusting. 

This stupid rant has no place on this platform, and if you want actual help with mechanics in the game instead of treating this platform as a way to voice your misplaced frustration, you can message me or any number of seasoned Endless Space veterans and I'm sure we would be happy to help you understand the game.  

And if you're gonna complain about balancing issues, point out actual problems, not mechanics that are well rounded. 

And mind the fact you didn't play during Early Access, that actually had serious bugs and balancing issues that they more-or-less fixed. 

LASTLY. 

Don't trash this company of all companies, I've played games and observed and payed attention to a number of game companies for over a decade, and Amplitude has done an amazing job listening to the community, balancing the game, creating beautifully crafted content, and continuing to care about the game and the players. 

Ansa wrote:

Brace for impact.

1) Empire management numbers are empirical and impossible to guess. 

- Will settling this colony put my food into negative? No? I have no idea.

- Why food is taken from my homeworld to colonize, when I have colony right next to it, overflowing with food? No idea.

- How many colonies I can settle before expansion disapproval hits? I have no idea.

- Why Food % to Manpower buildings bring my systems into starving and pops running away? If there is not enough food to feed the pops, stop slamming it into manpower then?

2) Economic victory is still broken

- As a Craver, naturally, I declare war on anything that moves, to keep the happiness bonus from Jingoist Paradise law.

- Just a dozen turns later I find entire galaxy united in an alliance against me. They seem to have no issues with each other whatsoever, but as soon as they see me - they immediately ally.

- A few more dosen turns later, by turn 80 normal speed Endless difficulty, while busy trashing their puny fleets with my stacks of Queen carriers, I get the message "Hey man, nice game and all, but this alliance is close to economic victory, cya!". Complete disbalance. Especally lame that an alliance can work together towards a victory - there is no way a single empire can outpace that or rush enemy down. Especially in 80 turns. Not with the current fleet speeds (more below).

- Have to disable both score and economic victories now until they fixed (when?)

3) Fleets are too slow. And non-seeker Admirals are useless.

- Best engine tech you get access to in reasonable time  is +4 speed engine. Considering you mount it on a 2-speed Carrier, that's 6 speed on fleet, which is a joke, of course. It will take roughly 10 turns to move this fleet anywhere. So, naturally, the most logical option is to fit 2 engiens to it, to bring it up to 10 speed at least.

- Now comes the sad part - the actual fighter heroes, the Guardians, flying FLAG ships, that have onl2 2 (TWO) support slots. So if they fit 2 engines, they cannot fit probes, which are constantly required here and there. 

- On top of that, Guardian heroes do not give any speed bonuses to fleets, ever. So, they are eaither stuck with 2 engines and no probes, or 1 engine and probes, which is slower than 2 engines you fit on ships.

- End result - never use Guardian hero for the fleet, have to scrounge Academy and Marketplace for Seeker heroes, who use ship with 3 support slots and can fit 2 engines + 1 probe. Also they have 2 fleet speed increases in their skill line.

As of right now, Admirals are considered to be utterly useless - you always get more bang for your buck, by putting a Governor into the planet.

Why? In Endless Space 1, a Pilot/Adventurer hero put as Admiral had access to skills that bring you Dust+Science per destroyed CP, get your fleets repaired outside of friendly territory, got access to unique tactics (Dust Barrier OP), and so on and on. Your fleets bloomed with an Admiral.

Here, in this game (I guess we still call it ES2, even though it has very little to do with ES1), Admirals have nothing besides dubious skills like increase some fleet damage/health here and there, sometimes add move points. All of that is taken care by fitting mods already.

On top of that, since you have moved the powerful Dust+Science per destroyed CP from faction traits and hero skills into laws and ship fittings, they never see the light of day simply because by the time you unlock Militarist law for that the game is almost over, and fitting that on ships simply never happens because there are ways too much modules already and not enough slots for them.

The whole reason of the Dust+Science per destroyed CP was to help aggressive empires, who forfeit heavy science and dust production, to keep moving forward, was it not? Besides, the bonus is very small now (50 dust+science per CP), and was supposed to help in early game, since the gains are negligible in late-game, when you pushing thousands scince per turn. Now,  considering that you stuffed it into VERY late game, it is utterly useless, specially since AI barely builds any fleets, as mentioned below. This mechanic was very powerful and working very good in ES1 (up to a point where it was banned in multiplayer), but here is entirely broken and useless, out of its place. 

The balancing of it in ES1 was also perfect - you field a huge fleet, your dust income plummets into negatives, and you are looking for anything to kill to gain more dust to keep your fleets going - exactly how the mechanic should work and feel.

4) Useless skills for all heroes

- It is obvious, that throughout the course of the game, most heroes will either spend their time as Governor or as Admiral. By the time you can make hero thatis good in both, the game is probably over.

- So,in all skill trees there are constantly bad choices that force you to take fleet-related skills on Governors - since Admirals usually can roll around this problem by picking skills in their personal tree, still useless ones, but not as bad as Governors.

- On top of it, the personal hero skills in last picks are "Reduce hero upkeep by 25%". It costs 46 dust to upkeep. Why would I ever waste a skill point on that guano? On top of it, the latest skill in personal line is always "Remove upkeep cost for the hero", which is, again, crap because Nobody cares about 46 dust upkeep, and second - I have just put a skill point to reduce his upkeep by 25%, and now you offer me a skill that removes upkeep? Where is the logic in that.

In Endless Space 1, heroes had so much nice skills, it was always a tough choice "Hmmm what do I pick, aww come on everything looks so juicy". Here, in this game, the skills picks are reduced to nothing literally, you hit rank 3 on your hero and choose out of 3 skills - 1 admiral skill, 1 governor skill, 1 crap personal skill. Literally no choice whatsoever, and all heroes have same exact skills, because 80% of skills just suck. Clone army.

Please, make all hero skills mean something so there is actually any incentive to pick them. And please, add more skills so there is actually something to choose from and not "obvious planet stuff/obvious fleet stuff/obvious weird stuff" every level up.

5) Endless AI still doesn't build any proper fleets.

- I can declare war on AI and sit for 20 turns and nothing happens. Then I come over with Carriers to find out they barely have few mid-size ships. With fleet caps at 15-20 in turns 40-60, I have never ever seen an AI to build up to fleet cap once. No idea what they spend dust on - probably useless trade companies, but not fleets.

6) Trade companies are weak and useless

- So I invested 10k dust into a trade company, and it brings me 10 science and some dust? Really? First of all, investing this amount of dust to get more dust over 3000+ turns is pointless, the game pace is too fast even on normal.

Second, I generate over 4,000 science at this point myself. And I can build a planet specialization +1 dust per pop and it will give me hundreds more. No idea what is the point behind the trade companies, but they suck as it is.

The whole thing with ES1 trading was that it was passive income, without huge upfront investment. You spend research on it, and you spend production on it to get it going, and then it pays off in reasonable time.

In this game - considering you also have to slam obnoxious amount of dust into it, along with science and production - it is completely not worth it at all. The base economy of it needs heavy work, all the way back to the drawing board.

7) AI has no idea how to hoard and use strategic resources

Basically, what I do is hoard titanium, build slag&sludge, build all mining unions and max my titanium income. Then I produce a bunch of titanium-filled ships, even t1 hulls,  and voila - I can reap apart whole galaxy easily.

By turn 80 normal speed I am yet to see a single AI using Titanium or Hyperium weapons. And by this time, I am already uprading my fleets to Adamanitum and researching Orichalcx/etc.

AI needs to learn the basics of science, and which areas to approahc and when. Like, you beeline basic colonization first, then food, then you beeline basic science + production + dust, then you beeline to basic ship fittings, back to colonization and so on. Then you beeling titanium/hyperium weapons depending on what resource you got the most, along with goo hulls. As of right now, these waves of research for AI seem broken and inneffective.

8) Abysmal ship fitting options. This requires a topic of its own, but nonetheless.

God, there are SO MANY pointless, useless and bloated modules in the game now.

1st - fighters/bombers taking up a WEAPON slot on ships - why would you ever, ever fit a crappy fighter/bomber there when fitting Adamantium slugs in there guarantees you rip your enemy apart? If they could fit into expansion slots, or special fighter/bomber slots, that would be understandable. As of right now, they are terrible and useless.

2nd - there are so many support modules bloating my screen, but in reality what is the use for them? 

You fit a ship to carry:

- weapons

- 2xengines minimum or it will be too slow to get anywhere on the map

- 1 shield 1 plate

- if you have any slots left, a repair module or siege module

Done. There is no space for all those useless mods like "10% ship less chance to get attacked", lol, really? "Additional manpower on ships" who cares when I cannot field more than 900 troopson planet anyway? I could list useless modules here half a day and still wouldn't get half of those. Too much. Too pointless with miniscule bonuses not worth a slot.

Please, make the ship mods mean something so there is actually any incentive to use them.

9) Some quests are pointless/impossible to complete

Got the quest to Save the Core at my homeworld as Cravers. The planets are depleted, and there is simply no way for me to ever make this system produce 600 production and 500 science per turn and not in total. So, this quest is stuck forever. Need to change quests like that to produce something over time and not instantly in a system - otherwise very often you get stuck because the system cannot ever do it.

Sorry for so much rant, but I see you guys are already releasing eye-candy DLC, which means you consider the game balance being fine and not needing work.

It is nowhere near even Endless Space 1 as a 4x strategy - as explained above, many things need work, the overall game pace needs work as well.

Right now the only things enjoyable in this game are UI, visuals and music, so props to UI design, FX and audio teams. 

The rest, the actual gameplay and strategy component, is just terrible.

I could rant for hours, but my coffee is running low and temper cold.

As of right now, the game is still in the worse state that Endless Space 1, and it is really sad to see it.

Peace.

 

1.

Food Export: It takes from the most productive Colony. Would not really help you if you got a new colony not growing? It is largely a limitation on how many colonies you can grow at the same time. A lot of 4x games have that, nowadays.

Expansion Penalty: Empire Screen. That bar under your Traits.
Just scrap unneeded Buildings that Sap Food to Manpower. Colony Center gives 10%, that is all you will normally need.

The only thing I agree here is the uncertainty about food consumption.

2.

Alliance is limited to Competitors/2. So not one alliance. If they ally quickly that is because you are a danger. Makes sense, does it not?

Cravers can be content, if they go Religious.

The message "close to Victory" can appear at about 50% completion. I had games where someone else was "close to getting Conquest Victory" every other turn. It triggers at like "40% to victory".

Alliances increase the Victory Tresholds drastically. Also you can just turn Economic Victoy off at game setup.

3. Fleet Speeds:
How about using Support Ships to Carry Support Modules? You know, like the FLEET SPEED BONUS one? 1 Engine on every ship (including Hero). 1 Fleet Speed bonus on the Support ship(s). Works like a charm, saves a ton of  Support modules, you can sue for buffs.

Certain Species give Speed bonuses. Why do you only pick Heroes by 1/2 of their Skilltrees?

If you do not think something like +20% Damage, +40% Health, +60% Shield and Amor Penetraion on Fleet is good - I have no idea what your definition of "Good" even is.

4. General Skills:
Please explain how these Level 12 and Level 19 Admirals are weak:

Damage: +20%. Another Fleet CP times 2.5% (at 30, that is +75% for a total of +95%)

Considering that Fleet sizes are strongly Regulated by CP limits, every single percentile bonus counts.

5. AI Challenge

A lot of issues appeared with teh AI, after the Pirate rework. In 1.0.5 Pirates were simply way to strong for the AI to handle, utterly ruining the early game. Try again in 1.2.1.

6. Trade Companies:
I barely (if ever) Invest money into them. If I do, it is always to get more Luxuries from them. One TC is a easy boost on any System making important Luxuries.

8. Slots:
Have you tried the Strategic Resource needing Squardons? Even the 1.2.1 ones? Especially on a actuall Carrier?
Why waste slots on Siege Modules? The average Fleet can overrun the average System with Sheer Manpower. Why not use the +20% Weapon Damage modules on Hunters?

9. 600 Production and 500 Science? My figures are usually in the 175 on normal speed. Sounds like one of your many mods screws that up.
Also with Cravers: Go for flat bonuses. Per Pop yields are highly penalised on Depleted Planets.

Ansa wrote:

Brace for impact.

1) Empire management numbers are empirical and impossible to guess. 

- Will settling this colony put my food into negative? No? I have no idea.

- Why food is taken from my homeworld to colonize, when I have colony right next to it, overflowing with food? No idea.

- How many colonies I can settle before expansion disapproval hits? I have no idea.

I agree with some points, but these 3 can be (mostly) answered:

-new colonies take a fixed percentage of your food (20%?)

-You can change which world food is taken from by selecting the (new) colony

-System limit is shown in the empire screen. As of this new patch, you also get a pop-up when (over)colonizing that warns you.

2) The game is very far from over when "close to victory" announcement is made, even on Endless difficulty. Victory condition caps are raised for alliances, so it isn't easier to reach victory condition in Allience, then without it. Usually it is harder. If you can't win as Craver before economic victory is triggered, then you are simply slow Craver.

3) This was a problem for me, before I realised how powerful fleet boosters are. 3 small upgraded support ships (defenders) stacked with fleet boosters - you have 15-20 speed fleet. 6 defenders - 25-50 speed for any fleet. Depends on the total amount of modules per fleet and their quality. Heroes make the even better. You can literally warp-jump to anywhere across the galaxy in one turn, usually even visit few nods per turn.