Influence and faction management

[Fuinril]

Hello,

In my current playthrough I struggle to manage my empire's factions and so I lack influence to use diplomatic options and expand.... and am at a loss understanding why.

Basically it exists 7 factions in my empire, the most populate one being obviously the one with the less approval (0) . I suppressed this faction for years, at the same time I encouraged another one and use the edict which add governemtal ethics attraction.... And still this faction grow faster than the others.

There's 5 species in my empire, 2 of them being deviant. But that only makes 48 pops for 232 pops and the deviant malus is only 15% whereas the edict gives +50%

Any idea ?

[Tree Diagram]

You have to tailor your government and policies around your factions not the other way around. The largest faction is usually based on species traits or cultural values like materialist or religious. If you have a big faction that is dominant you don't get to just suppress it and swap it out. You would be better served looking at the factions' demands and trying to accomodate their desires into your play style.

[Xankrieg]

Theres always the choice of gestalt conciousness. No need to worry about factions anymore.

[Fuinril]

Well, sorry. I should have specify what they want neither match the dominant specie traits nor the cultural values of my empire (they are at 0 approbation for a reason).

I let you judge.

I play as criminal syndicate. Civics are : criminal heritage (obviously) and indentured assets (40% enslaved pops).
Ethics are : authoritarian, militarist and materialist

Now, what the faction ask for is :
- no native interference
- no specie wide slavery (which I have no more but failed to be acknowledged for some reason)
- no purge
- all refugees welcome
- multicultural society
- enclaves incorporated
- federated
- new contact

Basically I would understand this if I played as a standard megacorp or with xenophile or egalitarian ethic, but that's not the case.

[Fuinril]

Originally posted by Xankrieg:

Theres always the choice of gestalt conciousness. No need to worry about factions anymore.

Indeed, or hive mind. But that's some serious restrictions to overall gameplay possibilities for one part and I can not do all playthroughs as exterminator ;)

[Zsrai]

Sounds like you have an Egalitarian faction because you have so many slaves... also because you freed some and those ex-slaves are very likely to all join the Egalitarian faction, making it stronger.

Originally posted by Fuinril:

Originally posted by Xankrieg:

Theres always the choice of gestalt conciousness. No need to worry about factions anymore.

Indeed, or hive mind. But that's some serious restrictions to overall gameplay possibilities for one part and I can not do all playthroughs as exterminator ;)

Hive Minds are Gestalt, and they all don't have to be Devouring Swarms. You can play as a "regular" Hive mind or Machine Empire and have a good game too.

[Fuinril]

Originally posted by Zsrai:

Sounds like you have an Egalitarian faction because you have so many slaves... also because you freed some and those ex-slaves are very likely to all join the Egalitarian faction, making it stronger.

Hmm if the egalitarian faction is so strong because of the indentured asset trait it basically makes it unplayable appart from choosing fanatic authoritarian or xenophobe maybe... Would be very lame.

For the ex-slave part that's a possibility but I only enslaved it to control it's reproduction cause I had no colonizable planet adapted to their habitability nor the possibility to change it. As soon as I had, I freed them but they were like 3 pop at this time.

[Kash]

My problem with playing slavery societies is the unhappiness that results, I haven't figured out a way to compensate for that unhappiness and concluded that such a play style is broken. My game was doomed, the perfect trifecta of I never recovered from.

1. Unhappiness
2. 3-5 wars at all times
3. Not enough influence gain

Rather than abandon that game I cheated using the console commands.

Then came 2.2, forcing me to start over.

Good riddance to that game.

[Fuinril]

Originally posted by Kash:

My problem with playing slavery societies is the unhappiness that results, I haven't figured out a way to compensate for that unhappiness and concluded that such a play style is broken. My game was doomed, the perfect trifecta of I never recovered from.

1. Unhappiness
2. 3-5 wars at all times
3. Not enough influence gain

Rather than abandon that game I cheated using the console commands.

Than game 2.2, forcing me to start over.

Good riddance to that game.

Well I already did several playthroughs as a slaver and did not had any issue (granted the choosen traits were a bit more slave friendly than the ones I use now)

[Fuinril]

So, if anyone has the same problem, I fixed my issue with one simple little thing.

The faction had a leader. I did not pay much attention to that fact. I simply dismiss him and now the faction influence decrease at a very high rate. Problem solved !