Ah. That definitely changes things.



However, bear in mind that starting with some technology unlocked can make a big difference to your initial start. Personally, I never bother as catching up is relatively straight forward and the benefit doesn't last throughout the game.



I'm not sure how to balance this except to remove the free techs from the faction traits and tie them in with the affinities. Have affinities specialise further, basically. Perhaps even unlock some unique starting techs for each affinity, unrelated to the default tech tree.

??? I'm confused. You would pay more than 10 points for a level 1 tech? Or are we talking about something else? In my post I was referring to the traits under "TECHNOLOGY" not "SCIENCE"

I have to agree with Igncom1 - though in my opinion the Science bonus traits are fine as they are. I rarely take all 30 points.

I still love their traits enough for them to be my 3rd favored faction.



And If I do go heroes, then I go big style.

I see my comment about the strength of the horatio faction ability caused a bit an argument. Let me throw out my two cents.



Yes, it is a bit based on luck whether or not you hit the admin hero, but there are two mitigating factors. The first is that you can then pick up a corporate and gimp your best sci based systems for a nice mid game science boost. Remember that if you go negotiator +10 sci + 10 dust negotiator 2 + 20% sci negotiator 3. You have something thats pimping +40% sci in addition to his base wit.



Now as for how frequently you don't get an admin? I'm not going to do the exact math, and it'll probably be wrong since I don't know if the hero classes are equiprobable but you are looking at 6 chances to have a 1/5 chance happening roughly. I think that that is roughly gonna be 73%. (just mental estimate).



There's also when you get lucky and pick up that admin corp hero that is 9 labor 8 wit or something similar.



Also, again, I'm talking from a multiplayer standpoint as is usual.



As for the comment about sowers, I haven't seen anything amazing done with them. Intuitively I would imagine everything manages to grow slower with them. In fact their affinity is more like a penalty rather than a buff. Base food is often higher than base cogs once you get improvements up, not to mention that faction traits like cloning are not utilizable with them.

That sounds great! More ways to debate preference.

We will open a new subject on faction traits next week, with probably for you the ability to edit some Google Doc.

Late game? The Horatio affinity can do just as well with pilot, commander and adventurer heroes in the mid game.



People assume that the administrator heroes are the only way to go, but a good admiral can pretty much make a fleet invulnerable to assault, and quick to invade, and the adventurer heroes can pull a number of nasty ticks out of his hat.



The Horatio affinity affects all uses of heroes, through the game, no matter the type and with the unique techs that came with it about improving the use of heroes you can or should expect enemy heroes at every confrontation and to full in every little crack in the empire while the population speeds to capacity.



The Sophon ability is undeniably better, because you can be downright lazy with it, you set it, and get tech just like that.

Its power does not come from strategy, or form any kind of actual forethought, and is really the best affinity for a player who doesn't even want to try.



I can't play as the Sophons anymore, as it is far too easy, and not fun in any way.



So I will stick with my inferior affinity's based on that alone, bloody Sophon hippys and their no taxes.

Igncom1 wrote:
Of course, but the Sophon affinity is so blunt and direct, Affinity's like the Horatios takes guile and cunning to pull off, but the payment for succeeding can be massive.

Even in the best hands there's too much going against the horatio affinity to make it compete with something like the sophon affinity. If were assuming that people are playing to just win, i don't see them picking the horatio affinity(or a couple of others) ever. The ability to have a few systems boosted heavily in the late mid game, vs having an entire empire wide boost just can't be compared with ES's fondness for expansion. And again, it can fall pretty flat. If you cannot design a race around having an admin hero early or a quick corporate, simply because you might not get them. Sure you can get a newer and larger batch sooner than other races, but I'd aruge that's just not enough when you're dealing with empire wide bonuses to FIDS.

Of course, but the Sophon affinity is so blunt and direct, Affinity's like the Horatios takes guile and cunning to pull off, but the payment for succeeding can be massive.

I've never seen it used that effectively, it is certainly more common to see the Sophon affinity winning a game, even without Science Victory.

All hero types are useful in some manner, so I still believe that the Horatio have a very effective bonus, administrator or not.



A bunch or corporate heroes can give more dust then a dozen systems, and can super boost your research.

I'd have to disagree again.



While playing ES you're already subject to dozens of randomised rolls that can determine the course of a game, any faction that is further subject to more random rolls to be effective is going to suffer. Is it a good bonus? Yeah. Does it really stack up with the ability to stack 50k Industry, explode ahead in tech, or alternatively gain a 25% boost to FIDS? No.

Waylander1982 wrote:
The Horatio affinity is based on far too much luck and subject to the random rolls of the game, which are already numerous, to be effective.

I must disagree.



Their affinity gives them a higher hero cap than anybody else in the endgame, a cap of 5 heroes much earlier than anybody else in the mid-game, more frequent newcomers to your academy in the mid-game, and it allows them to copy any type of hero that you have which is useful to you, if you'd like to have an extra copy (or a half dozen).



Whether it is cloning your highest administrator, corporate hero, or dummy that was dragged into administrating your planet lacking one of the two, given money you will at all times have the very best available at the highest level you have achieved in as many copies as you want up to the academy cap. Likewise with fleets - have you got a good fleet hero of one type or another and suddenly need to fight on two fronts because your pesky enemies use multiple avenues of attack? No problem, fire the one of your current heroes you need the least, duplicate your fleet hero, and assign him on the second front.



When other players hire new heroes later in the game after unlocking them, they start at level one and take what feels like ages to reach high levels unless you've got some weak enemy around to train them in combat on. Horatio? If you've already got a hero doing a job like the one you want your hero to perform, your duplication will ensure you have one available at the experienced hero's level immediately.



Regardless of which heroes the game serves you will, you will use heroes, and they will significantly affect your empire's overall growth, industry, science, and economy as well as your warfare - Horatio is the faction that says, "I'll make the best of it".



While it magnifies the effect of getting a good hero start to an incredible degree, the Horatio affinity is powerful regardless of luck so long as you are willing to abuse it and get into the mindset of sacking people when you need to change focus or when somebody falls behind.



That said, it is a highly active ability coupled with affinity-techs that synergize well with it, which makes it require considerably more effort from a human player to maximize than one of the strong passive affinities, like the Sophons' affinity.

Igncom1 wrote:
I still love their traits enough for them to be my 3rd favored faction.



And If I do go heroes, then I go big style.

Yeah, but the bigger point is that if you took all their faction traits, and thew it on another affinity(Sophons for example) it'd likely be better. The horatio one strikes me very much as a "win more" if i get lucky, and doesn't do much if I don't sort of thing.

Expensive? If anything its too cheap.

The Horatio affinity is based on far too much luck and subject to the random rolls of the game, which are already numerous, to be effective.

Almost I ironic that I never use more then 2 heroes, if at all when playing as them.....

Eji1700 wrote:
Im surprised to see horatio make the list, and no sowers. Care to elaborate?

Because they get an admin hero and clone him, so they have 4 admin heroes (remember they get their hero academy increase much earlier than other races) and then get a fleet commander. 4 admins heroes is silly powerful. I use this affinity in one of my custom mplayer races, it is pretty silly.

Earthstrike wrote:
Just something I want to throw out there: Affinity balance necessarily precedes faction trait balance. When people make custom factions, if one affinity is much stronger than the others, then that is what will always be picked. Sophons, Cravers, and horatio currently have the strongest affinities from an MP point of view.



It is also the case that if you want to balance the faction traits in terms of point values AND also have balanced premade factions, that affinities also must be balanced.

Im surprised to see horatio make the list, and no sowers. Care to elaborate?



And I think one thing that may need to be looked into is vastly changing the price of certain affinities. Cravers are always going to be strong because flat FIDS bonuses are amazing, and it's really hard to just stop them, so maybe it should cost a significant amount more.