If I'm not mistaken, Spray & Pray + Deadly Weapons would work, especially due to evasiondisorientation. You have a couple of choices of how this is implemented.



High Accuracy

Given: 110% accuracy, 50% evasion, 15% penalty to accuracy, 36% bonus to damage.

(1-.5)*1*1 = 0.60 - Baseline damage

(1 - .5)*(1-.15)*1.36 = .6936 - Multiplicative

((1 - .5) -.15)*1.36 = .612 - Additive



Low Accuracy

Given: 80% accuracy, 50% evasion, 15% penalty to accuracy, 36% bonus to damage.

(.8-.5)*1*1 = 0.30 - Baseline damage

(.8 - .5)*(1-.15)*1.36 = .3468 - Multiplicative

((.8 - .5) -.15)*1.36 = .204 - Additive



However evasiondisorientation worst case scenario is you miss with 3 extra shots than normal, and deal 136% damage. On ships with 12 or more weapons Spray & Pray + Dead Weapons should always be better if the accuracy penalty is additive REGARDLESS of base accuracy (12 weapons - 3 weapons to remove the 15% evasion penalty using evasiondisorientation *136% damage = 12.24). A lower base accuracy or a multiplicative implementation would reduce that number. I don't know which is correct, but I believe that the formula is multiplicative, which would always make the combo better.

"Added a new planetary infrastructure for Harmony which increases the local deposit of a strategic resource by 1"



maybe I am just to dumb but i cant find that thing in the Tech Tree o.O

Sovereign wrote:
"Added a new planetary infrastructure for Harmony which increases the local deposit of a strategic resource by 1"



maybe I am just to dumb but i cant find that thing in the Tech Tree o.O

It's there from the start. It's an exploitation like food, industry or science. It replaces the dust exploitation for the harmony and is only available on planets with a strategic resource in the first place.

Nosferatiel wrote:
It's there from the start. It's an exploitation like food, industry or science. It replaces the dust exploitation for the harmony and is only available on planets with a strategic resource in the first place.

that explains pretty much...^^



mhh what is your tipp? when should i take this explotation? directly Asap on any planet with a strategic ressource on it or later?

Directly. You get the stacked bonus of another deposit, which is always good, and +1% FIS on empire! Can it get any better with any improvement?

Nosferatiel wrote:
Well, I play my "supercritical liquid crystal"-harmony, now:



Efficient Stock (+25) - Too good not to take, now. The ability to increase the strat resources on a planet by 1 allows for +1% FIS on empire per upgrade of this type

Eternal War (-10) - No sense in making the harmony trade or do diplomacy. We are here to sow disharmony, aren't we?

Cloning 1/3 (+5) - Some extra food can come in quite handy, especially on the higher tier planets, because otherwise a high food -> sci conversion becomes impossible without starving some colonies

Powerless Warriors 2/2 (-5) - A simple point source.

Militarists 3/3 (+24) - Building ships hurts the harmony only in the sense that it looses growth. So we should, especially in the beginning, ascertain 1 turn colony ships on fast. Later on, ships don't hurt the harmony at all. We can have limitless ships. So we should FLOOD the galaxy with crystal dreadnaughts and laugh in the face of everyone with one of our nice shiny ships in orbit. We are just trying to make the universe look friendlier.

Fast Travelers 2/2 (+10) - Having many ships is nice, having many ships moving around fast is nicer.

Deep roots 2/2 (-2) - A simple point source.

Tolerant 2/2 (+30) - The harmony doesn't suffer from colonizing planets, but has some problems to channel science vs food, at first. So having this trait allows you to spread, regardless of surroundings, making your crystals the irremovable pest they should be.

Unhappy Colonists (-10) - Unhappy harmony? Who heard of such a thing, ever? You also have a chance of getting negative anomalies actually HELPING you, removing dust or just plain approval for giving you interesting stuff. A very good way to get points.

Xenobotanics (+4) - We start on tundrae, tundrae are powerful for the harmony and goddamn, those 4 points couldn't be allocated better, since you'd otherwise loose 25% FIS on the first few rounds...

Fragile Hulls 2/2 (-6) - We produce endless ships. What do we care if those endless ships burst? Also, with metal memory, we can have the most effective defenses in space. And crystals are supposed to be brittle.

If you take Black Thumbs 3 (-30) you can increase Cloning to 3 (25) which gives a net effect of 7 food per pop and gives you 5 more points to spend elsewhere.



Why not take Scientists 3 instead of Tolerant 2 for the same cost? Yes, you'll have to wait to colonize some worlds, but you'd blast thru the techs a lot faster.



I don't know about your version of the game, but in my version, which is English, It's Feeble Warriors not Powerless Warriors and the anomaly is called Unlucky Colonists not Unhappy Colonists. I am only bringing this up because folks who aren't familiar with creating a custom race might get confused when trying to find those two.

Monthar wrote:
If you take Black Thumbs 3 (-30) you can increase Cloning to 3 (25) which gives a net effect of 7 food per pop and gives you 5 more points to spend elsewhere.

This isn't how those traits work: Black Thumbs 3 costs 30% of your food production, which is multiple food per person even in the early game on most good planets, whereas Cloning is a static +1 food per person.

Monthar wrote:
Why not take Scientists 3 instead of Tolerant 2 for the same cost? Yes, you'll have to wait to colonize some worlds, but you'd blast thru the techs a lot faster.

I've personally gone both ways on this one, but Tolerant's a valid choice. The Harmony not only get to avoid the approval penalty as Nosferatiel mentions, but also benefit hugely from having planets with only one rather than two base dust: the penalty for dust is ridiculous on the higher difficulty settings. Tolerant is a boost to early-game productivity for a faction that has a lot of trouble in the early game and thus a strong choice. Harmony players looking for research boosts should consider Knowledge Gathering as it works very well with the tax system. You can slant taxes toward food while still getting a great deal of research from blowing stuff up.



I'm currently in the middle of an Endless game that's taking advantage of Knowledge Gathering on the Harmony affinity (as well as a few other things, like the Spray and Pray with Deadly Weapons trick), and it's very likely a win. The Harmony are still pretty weak, though: I got by with no early wardecs and by the virtue of out-designing AI ships. Any other faction (barring the Sowers) would have had a ridiculously easy win with that start even without custom traits.

HundredBears wrote:




(as well as a few other things, like the Spray and Pray with Deadly Weapons trick)

Spray and Pray with Deadly Weapons trick whats that?



i only remember how strong snipers was in the vanilla and how cruel the spray and pray malus was.



but how is it in Disharmony? whats that trick?



PS: How do i make rally points?

Sovereign wrote:
Spray and Pray with Deadly Weapons trick whats that?



i only remember how strong snipers was in the vanilla and how cruel the spray and pray malus was.



but how is it in Disharmony? whats that trick?



PS: How do i make rally points?

Spray and Pay deadly weapons is something that most think is a good thing but really isnt all that great... It is where you take lvl 3 spray n pay and lvl 3 deadly weapons. It gives you 36% extra damage for -15% accuracy, so in theory you get +21% damage for no net less of race points. However, deadly weapons only takes effect After penetration of defenses. So Spray N Pay decreases your probobality of damaging the opponent. And if you can't damage the opponent... Your deadly weapons don't take effect. That's why I find Snipers and Humane weapons work better. (ofc, you lose points with this combo)



So yeah. Thats it in a nutshell. Deadly weapons + spray and pay trick does work allot better with Optimal Structure though (OP trait )



you make rally points by holding down ctrl, then clicking the forge system, and then clicking the destination system.

T41 wrote:
That is weird, I would think you would have to save the Dust to get the victory.

I think I wouldn't even consider going for that victory if that was the case. ^^



I got the idea to try and go for it when I noticed that there's a Horatio-specific tech that gives you +30 Approval on every Arid and that this way it's pretty easy to run 100% taxes.

But I knew that I don't have to save it.

My reasoning is essentially the same as thuvian's with regard to EvasionDisorientation. I actually thought that EvasionDisorientation was 15% rather than 5% (wasn't it that way in one of the previous patches), but the trait combination's still going to be good in most circumstances. Assuming that missles' To Hit calculation happens in the last round of the phase, it's particularly strong for suicide missile destroyers: a very small tonnage of melee kinetics is enough to cancel out the accuracy penalty, leaving all the long range missles capped at 90% hit chance and enjoying the Deadly Weapons damage boost.

EvasionDisorientation was 15% back in the earlier 1.1.X's, it was reduced after we complained about it.

I have not found anyone reporting evidence on the order in which weapons impact (e.g., kinetics first versus missile first).

Unless you have a desire to do missile damage, kinetics will probably still be better. They certainly still have higher damage efficiency. They also are less affected by equal amounts of defenses (the passive anti-missile defense works at the fleet level, whereas kinetics is ship local). Lastly, they fire 4 times per phase, in contrast to missiles, so you have four potential targets to kill rather than just one.

Oh, EvasionDisorientation resets per round, rather than per phase. My mistake, and so much for that idea.



I agree with you for on kinetics v. missiles most of the time but not for suicide ships. At tier 2, missiles have a higher theoretical damage efficiency at long range (~84/ton compared to ~74/ton), and firing once rather than four times is an advantage: a fleet of glass cannons will lose ships every round, which cuts into the damage that kinetics deal while missiles are unaffected. The effect of defenses also depends on the target fleet. It's possible to overwhlem the interception ability of all but the most dedicated anti-missile fleets since each ton of flak, ignoring overkill, only intercepts 1.75 tons of missiles (once again assuming T2 weapons and defenses). If a significant number of missiles get through, they may do better than kinetics due to the higher defense/tonnage ratio of deflectors, although I haven't run the numbers to see where the threshold is.



All-in-all, they seem close enough to each other that it really will depend on whether you want to do missile or kinetic damage most of the time.

man i feel like the old man in The Shawshank Redemption who isent able to manage to life in a world wich changed so much and is full of new stuff.



I hope the old code of Weapon Damage bonus is great for lasers and Missles but meh for Kinetics where accuracy counts more is still valid.





PS: Nosferatiel what turn you ended your game (the one you posted that diagramm)? which were your settings?

Sovereign wrote:
PS: Nosferatiel what turn you ended your game (the one you posted that diagramm)? which were your settings?

Asking me that 4 days after is somehow a bit later. I don't remember the turn, but I didn't go for a fast victory in any case, since I really researched every single tech there is in the tech tree.



Otherwise I believe to have had a galactic disk, few connections between systems, normal number of wormholes and constellations, impossible difficulty, no pirates, random events and wonders on, plentiful resources, many planets of random size in an old galaxy. That's partially guesswork but I guess that's about right.

sry i thought u got a save game or something like that.

HundredBears wrote:
This isn't how those traits work: Black Thumbs 3 costs 30% of your food production, which is multiple food per person even in the early game on most good planets, whereas Cloning is a static +1 food per person.

Yes, I keep forgetting about the other sources of food. However, in the case of the build I was replying to you could drop both levels of fast travel to raise cloning to 2. Then with black thumbs 1 you'd have the points to raise cloning to 3. That would give you 5 food per pop on the class 1 worlds minus the 10% from black thumbs for a net of 4.5 food per pop. Of course, since cloning 1 adds the 1 food per pop to all the planet types that don't start with any food for only 5 points and it takes 10 points each for level 2 and 3 to just add 1 more food to those planets that at least some food, it's really not worth going past cloning 1.



Thanks for the spray & pray for deadly weapons tip. It worked beautifully in my last game.

I Haven't played with the Harmony expansion yet. Actually, the last time I played was in late August.



What has changed and how have your tactics been modified?



Thanks.

You can turn off the victories you don't like. By the time you get to huge ships, huge fleets, tier 3 weapons, and 88% decreased expansion disapproval, you are already very close to science or wonder victory. I turn everything off except expansion and supremacy victory. That way, you actually get to use your uber fleets, and heavy troops.

Ail wrote:
The Eco-Victory is pretty illogical anyways. I mean how does the mere accumulation of dust win the game? It's not like I saved it. I spent all of it on buyouts.

That is weird, I would think you would have to save the Dust to get the victory. Maybe the more Dust you have accumulated, the more overall stuff you have or have had in the past (ships, improvements, colonies). That would seem like the idea behind it.

The Eco-Victory is pretty illogical anyways. I mean how does the mere accumulation of dust win the game? It's not like I saved it. I spent all of it on buyouts.

Ail wrote:
The AI-Harmony beat me... not by 1 turn but in the exact same turn where I would also have had victory. But for some reason the game had computed their vicotry-condition first .

No ties? The AI must have watched Highlander

Nice. I am gearing up to fire up my first game in the next few days. I do wish that they would balance out the weapons already.

Haha.Good for the A.I.

The AI-Harmony beat me... not by 1 turn but in the exact same turn where I would also have had victory. But for some reason the game had computed their vicotry-condition first.









(the turn before I was at 98% Eco-Victory)



I had a war with them and was winning but accepted cease-fire when they got Tier-3 Weapons/Defenses before me.

Tredecim wrote:
Impressive - or should we say: imbalanced?

I was last in the game on start, I was behind in the midgame, I was first in the endgame, far ahead. The harmony is slow and it can be stopped, but if you don't stop them... You see what they did there?

Impressive - or should we say: imbalanced?

Well, just played a session against impossible AIs. I won wars against a sower, two pilgrim and UE. In the end, noone could stop my 143% efficient stock FIS bonus, 50% harmony FIS bonus, everything a waterworld crystal tyranny.



So I got a "tiny" industrial advantage, in the end:

Nosferatiel wrote:
Np, but if I'm not infamous for walls of text in this forum, yet, I've severely underperformed, recently. XD

I'm not scared of wall-of-text's - continue



People appreciate every bit of information!

Sovereign wrote:
Yeah teach me too! Yes I AM BACK after moving to another town , anyone remembers me? Sovereign...the Reaper Guy? No!?



Nice Guide Nos i am looking forward to read even more!

Tredecim wrote:
The internet is full, go away Sov



Nah, welcome back lol





Thanks for this very usefull wall-of-text Nos !

Np, but if I'm not infamous for walls of text in this forum, yet, I've severely underperformed, recently. XD

The internet is full, go away Sov



Nah, welcome back lol





Thanks for this very usefull wall-of-text Nos !

Yeah teach me too! Yes I AM BACK after moving to another town , anyone remembers me? Sovereign...the Reaper Guy? No!?



Nice Guide Nos i am looking forward to read even more!

Well, I play my "supercritical liquid crystal"-harmony, now:



Efficient Stock (+25) - Too good not to take, now. The ability to increase the strat resources on a planet by 1 allows for +1% FIS on empire per upgrade of this type

Eternal War (-10) - No sense in making the harmony trade or do diplomacy. We are here to sow disharmony, aren't we?

Cloning 1/3 (+5) - Some extra food can come in quite handy, especially on the higher tier planets, because otherwise a high food -> sci conversion becomes impossible without starving some colonies

Powerless Warriors 2/2 (-5) - A simple point source.

Militarists 3/3 (+24) - Building ships hurts the harmony only in the sense that it looses growth. So we should, especially in the beginning, ascertain 1 turn colony ships on fast. Later on, ships don't hurt the harmony at all. We can have limitless ships. So we should FLOOD the galaxy with crystal dreadnaughts and laugh in the face of everyone with one of our nice shiny ships in orbit. We are just trying to make the universe look friendlier.

Fast Travelers 2/2 (+10) - Having many ships is nice, having many ships moving around fast is nicer.

Deep roots 2/2 (-2) - A simple point source.

Tolerant 2/2 (+30) - The harmony doesn't suffer from colonizing planets, but has some problems to channel science vs food, at first. So having this trait allows you to spread, regardless of surroundings, making your crystals the irremovable pest they should be.

Unhappy Colonists (-10) - Unhappy harmony? Who heard of such a thing, ever? You also have a chance of getting negative anomalies actually HELPING you, removing dust or just plain approval for giving you interesting stuff. A very good way to get points.

Xenobotanics (+4) - We start on tundrae, tundrae are powerful for the harmony and goddamn, those 4 points couldn't be allocated better, since you'd otherwise loose 25% FIS on the first few rounds...

Fragile Hulls 2/2 (-6) - We produce endless ships. What do we care if those endless ships burst? Also, with metal memory, we can have the most effective defenses in space. And crystals are supposed to be brittle.



Typical strategy:

First go about building an industry exploitation. Grab the nearest useful planet to you, which is basically anything with much ind, food or sci and the least dust possible. Then adjust the tax lever each turn to have one world grow in the least turns possible, ideally 1. Getting tech is based on exploration events and the phases, when you build a colony ship (don't forget to add an engine to the default design), where your planets stop growing. So instead of wasting that food, convert as much as you can without letting your people starve to science. Also, speed up growth by converting ind->food, when you do not build anything else, unless it helps no more. Then convert ind->science.

For the harmony, getting n-fold fusion, then xenobiology, isolation shields and building these three is a good start. Then you can choose depending on the distance to the next systems, whether you want to go for core mining or compact fusion reactors, next. Afterwards go for high energy magnetics, botanic scans and harmonised planets, if everything is peaceful. Otherwise get at least to L2 kinetics and then metal memory, as fast as possible!



In any case, once you got harmonised planets, the micromanagement begins. Always try to have at least two planets per system and one of these full to the last pop (preferrably the more useful one, but if the other one is far smaller and not totally useless, try filling that up). This will give you a 50% bonus with the improvement on that planet's production. That is one of the most important things to do as Harmony.

Now, at the latest, go out with Casimir and try settling everything everywhere, until you hit the other players. If you already had everything settled, at any point before, insert Casimir there, when there's only one system or so left. Converting most food->sci for getting such a key tech is also a sound strategy.



If you plan on really getting on everyone's nerves and conquering someone, now, fill up as many planets as possible in your systems, to get the bonus, fix the tax lever at ~50%, for now, then start building cheap ships en masse. You do not have to necessarily bother with things like defenses, but it is a good idea, since they also get huge bonuses. The grand strategy is to outproduce other players by having as many strategical resources as crystally possible. You can then go for military or science victory, that is up to you. In the first case, swamp them with cheap ships that manage to still kill something (1 cp ships + rally point settings are paramount for being able to pull that off) and blockade ALL their systems. That is the key, general blockade of everything. You do not pay maintenance, so make USE of it and take cheap fleets of invasion ships without troops (too costly to replace for harmony, as pop is scarce and this kills your bonuses) to besiege all their systems at once.

In the latter case of sci victory, get more living space on the bottom, more science and strat resource types on the right, more food on the left, in turn. Terraforming everything to ocean, in the end, gives you another awesome boost, but remember to drag your new oversized planets full of population, so you get the harmony special building bonus!



Well, this has been tested on the VIP build and has proven to be competitive enough against even DMT, so give it a try, if you want.