Several points for discussion based on some of our recent MP games:

• Stellar Guardians is potentially undercosted for its benefits. The changes to system happiness based on in-bubble/out-of-bubble can make Stellar Guardians better than Optimistic for much fewer points (then again, it's a complete gamble based on galaxy topography, so perhaps it's undercosted because it's occasionally useless). As a side note, does being in-bubble/out-of-bubble affect Disharmony penalties, as I couldn't see any effect today even though I was sure it was supposed to?
• Should the Cravers be allowed to take Anarchists? It appears to be a free 15 points as their faction techs give them the 2 CPs back by mid-game.
• Harmony are severely limited in negative traits they can take (and small point cost bonuses to fill up points). Every other custom faction can get away with Dust Impaired and Sloppy Sawbones without any pain whatsoever (suggesting those traits need a bigger penalty), Micromanagers is reasonably safe for another 15 points, if Sheredyn Integrity's fixed (which I'm presuming it is), that's another 7 they can't take, and obviously they can't take the "start with zero dust" or "start with a bit more dust" to fill out their 65 points exactly.
• I'd probably argue the "I can see all strategic resources" trait is far too expensive, but then I'm not sure there's any cost at which it's worth spending points on. Unless you're on a low-resources map, you're pretty much guaranteed a deposit of each resource.
• The +1% FIS per strategic is nice (really, brokenly, nice for the UE considering they automatically get +1 deposit size at mid-game) but 25 points is a lot for anyone who isn't the UE...
  
  

I guess I should come clean and point out that it was my complaining about Stellar Guardians that prompted RobM to add it to his list of observations. That said, there are a few reasons why I think it's over-powered (or under-costed) given the recent changes to the way influence works.



1) A lucky galaxy generation can leave you in a massively beneficial position. In one previous game, one of our player's capitals was the entrance to his wormhole, i.e. very close to the centre. His influence bubble therefore covered half the centre, preventing any of the rest of us from being able to colonise the systems in the centre. In this case, you're completely at the mercy of the galaxy generator, which seems kinda silly.

2) Since the expansion, the effects of influence are now two-fold: on the one hand, your own expansion disapproval is massively reduced; on the other, your opponents expansion disapproval is massively increased if they are unlucky enough to be under your influence bubbles.

3) Given its apparent power, 10 points seems extremely cheap considering that you pay 20 points for Optimistic 2 that doesn't have the two-fold benefit.



Regarding Cravers and anarchists, I'm in two minds. On the one hand, they seem to be powerful enough currently that they certainly don't need an extra 15 points but on the other, it's not a game-breaker as far as I can see.



Harmony are still too weak as far as I can tell: anything that gives them a buff would be a good thing and they have very few choices for negatives and certainly none of the 'no brainer' negatives that the other races can take.



Seeing all the strategic resources would be nice for 5 points but for 15 it's just not worth it.



Given that I've been playing UE a lot recently, I've been enjoying the FIS bonus per strategic so perhaps I'm not the best person to comment on this. That said, even without the UE deposit increase tech I'm usually getting ~10% extra FIS by the time I've hit Hexaferrum, so I think it's just about worth the points regardless of race. Maybe a slight reduction to 20 points might make sense but no more than that.

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