How are Hive Minds right now ?

[Krabbz]

So 2.6.1 just droped a few days ago.

1) I've read that Hive Minds were considered a bit trash compared to normal empires and Machine empires. How are they now ?

2) Is the Tree of Life origin good and does it work with Hive Worlds ?

3) Their civics are still a bit meh and we still don't have a Bio ship skin availlable for them. Do you think Paradox are going to rework them in the next DLC ?

Thx for the replies :)

[Half Phased]

An economy focused hive mind can easily take over the galactic community in MP now.

Why? Well, their economy and pop scores are easy to grow, so they benefit from the resolutions that boost those a lot. And with their large economies, they can support a large fleet to get a good score there.

Paradoxically, hive minds can also get a ridiculously high research score as well, since large numbers of synapse drones allow them to go wide without any tech repurcussions. You get 2 drones per planet base, and then hive capital upgrades and synaptic nodes allow you to push your admin cap through the roof and out tech everyone else, just by sheer volume of researchers.

So yeah, the changes to admin cap have really helped hives.

On the tree of life point, I’d argue that prosperous unification is actually worthwhile, the early game boost you get is more than enough to see you to an early rush which you can then snowball into a strong mid game. Tree of life may offer stronger bonuses later in the game, but that early game boost cannot be understated.

[Krabbz]

Thanks for the reply.

I've quickly tried a Hive Mind game but something just kills it for me... the flavor.

They still haven't updated the events flavor nor the techs nor anything else for Hive Minds. And I can't play a Hive Mind game without Bio ships and skins for their fleets/stations/megastructures...

They REALLY need to make a big update to Hive Minds in the next DLC...

[Jynn]

I've been enjoying my hive mind lithoids so far. i've refused to join the galactic senate however

i went with meteorite colony ship for my lithoids, fast and cheap colony ships :D

[lumberjack]

if you like to play grand admiral with 25x crisis strength and at least 100 years early on game then that extra pop growth speed from the tree of life will really help to speed your economy.

[Locklave]

Hive and AI both have huge Amenities issues because the devs removed the Amenities buildings.

[Dakota]

Originally posted by Locklave:

Hive and AI both have huge Amenities issues because the devs removed the Amenities buildings.

Still get a good bit from the city districts, just means they're a bit more focused on high pop worlds with more buildings now.

[Cryten]

Having the highest early game pop growth, bonus society science, not having to worry about consumer goods, factions or trade and piracy as well as easy access to unity and admin cap. All this turns them into the best early game tech empires.

Their main disadvantage is being harder to maintain relationships with 1 less envoy and a -20 relationship penalty. And no machine pops.

[pete3great]

Originally posted by Cryten:

Having the highest early game pop growth, bonus society science, not having to worry about consumer goods, factions or trade and piracy as well as easy access to unity and admin cap. All this turns them into the best early game tech empires.

Their main disadvantage is being harder to maintain relationships with 1 less envoy and a -20 relationship penalty. And no machine pops.

I've been playing hive minds lately, and despite the pop growth, can fall behind other empires early game. That said, they're an amazing catch-up build. Once your economy is solid, you'll easily outpace your neighbors even if the first few decades were rocky.

[Cryten]

You can only really compare what the empire can do for you since the difficulty bonuses to AI and the cleverness of humans means your almost always behind to begin with.