i have some many douts

[MOITA]

-gene clinics worth it for the 10% grow speed bonus? Is it equivalent to robot assembly but for organic pops?
-Should I use robot assembly or gene clinics or both simultaneously?
- If I want to develop my species with the gene tree, should I avoid building robots?

- Is there any onus on me having robots in my empire, since I intend to acquire the genetic ascencion perk?
-Is there any onus on me not to purge other species from my empire?
-When I conquer a new empire should I purge all aliens or keep them even if they don't have the same bonuses as my species?

- Should i always build "urban worlds" and tons of commerce ?

[Jarlaf]

Gene Clinics are debatable. the 10% is nice but not worth it by itself. My general rule of thumb is that if the amenities provided from the gene clinic are enough for your build so that you don't have to build a holo-theater on that world then use it instead of a holo-theater and enjoy the pop growth bonus.

Pop assembly on a world can be either organic or robotic, but not both at the same time. you could build robots early then scrap the robot factory for cloning vats later. (also 'budding' and 'crystallization?' counts as organic pop assembly)

Generally speaking, purging make other civs mad at you to varying degrees

MURDER ALL XENOS!!! opps... no... Depends on your civ or roleplay, but generally more pops are better for you, so put them to work...even if they are... prisoners with job

I almost never use urban world, commerce isn't as efficient as tech jobs, unless your doing a mega-corp.

[Leoscar]

I never bother with them. They require consummer goods, meaning I could put a science lab and will most likely get more value out of it. The extra amenities are hardly worth it when you can just slap one holotheatre on every planet and not think about it. I don't think I even know a single player that uses them.

Gene clinic, and someone correct me if I'm wrong, boosts pop growth, where the robot assembly creates pop assembly. So if I'm not mistaken their effects are "compatible".

You should always have robots, period. Or at least some form of pop assembly. The real question is : why wouldn't you want robots in your Empire ? More pops = more ressources.

Genocide isn't really great. Killed pops don't produce anything. Especially with the way pop growth works now. They'll be much more useful as slaves with barely any consummer good upkeep.
It's just so much better to keep them. Remember a dead pop doesn't get you anything. Except maybe a cleaner "species" tab.

No, trade is good don't get me wrong, but it's better to use habitats and ring worlds to generate trade value. The point is : you want merchants to generate trade, not clercs. Clercs just suck and you want to have the least amount of them.

[yuzhonglu]

I hate purging food. Are you the type of person who goes around shooting cows?

[Bandit_6]

Clinics get a bad rap and idk why. The base version gives you everything you need to get a planet started without having to build a theater so it saves you a building slot and gives you pop growth. Get the upgraded version and it's 2x the bonuses, so 20% pop growth.

Definitely build robots, unless you're RPing. If you do go the gene tailoring route then just switch to clone vats and sell the robots or keep them around, depends on you.

Now that last question is a tricky one. I've got 5k hours in this game and I'll tell you straight up I've rarely ever had urban worlds. Typically you want to specialize a planet according to the number of each slot it has and what you need atm. I see a size 22 planet with 24 industrial slots then it's an industrial world, a size 16 with a planet modifier for energy generation and a decent number of generator slots is gonna be a generator world. Smaller worlds, something like 10-14 districts total, will be made into research/unification/thrall worlds.

[xycotta]

Anyone else was hoping they had too many donuts and wanted to share? And all I am left with is doubts...

[HappySack]

-No, it gives a multiplicative value instead of a flat value so it scales very poorly
-You only get geneclinics for all the benefits together, otherwise you're wasting a building slot, a robot assembly basically doubles your total pop growth since it uses the assembly slot
-If you can't afford the food costs from clone vats you can substitute with robot assemblies, the plus side is that since they're easy to move around unless you give them citizen rights

-More pops means more resources which means more ships allowing you conquer more pops, to purge pops is pretty wasteful unless its for short-term gains or if you're roleplaying
-Trade comes naturally or with high living standards, focusing on it entirely if you're not a trade-based empire is very wasteful

[Peter34]

Gene Clinics give multiple bonuses in addition to the bonus to natural Pop Growth. such as Amenities which are always useful, and a Habibability increase which is useful until at some point in the mid game.

Your starting species might have +10% Adaptable (or rarely the +20% version), so early on you'll be colonizing baseline 80% planets and maybe some of the 60% ones too, but you'll eventually research 4 Techs that each give +5%, and you'll also very likely eventually Terraform (before or after colonizing) so that every planet at least fits your 80% baseline preference, unless you Terraform to Gaia World or Hive World, in which case it's a natural 100%. Or you might genemod in Adaptable or Robust or something, or go Cyborg or Synth.

But early on, the Habitability bonus from Gene Clinics has some value, and I miss it when plaing as a Hive Mind or as Rogue Servitors.

You really want to have a source of Pop Assembly, to function in parallel to Pop Growth, and using Robots via the Robot Assembly Building is one way of getting that, although if you instead use biological Pop Assembly, via Budding or Crystalization, then that will get a bonus from the Gene Clinic, one which doesn't apply to Robot Assembly.

When playing as a normal polity or Corp, i.e. not a Hive Mind or Machine empire, I always use Robots unless I'm playing as Spiritualist, or if I'm playing with the Void-Dwellers Origin. If I am then I might take a Trait that starts me with biological Pop Assembly.

If you take the Biological Ascension Path, then you'll eventually become able to construct Clone Vats which make biological Pop Assembly (at the cost of huge amounts of Food), but you should still have Robot Assemblies until you reach that point, then just do a replace with Clone Vats one planet at a time, so that you don't suddenly get overwhelmed by a huge Food deficit.

Usually the first stuff I build on a new colony is 1 City District, 1 Robot Assembly, 1 Gene Clinic, then I queue up as many as 4-7 more City Disticts, so that when I come back I'll have a bunch of free Building slots. The "colony sequence" varies a lot based on what kind of empire I'm playing, though, but it's something I decide on for each game and then mostly stick to.

As for Purging, that's really a roleplay question.

There will be diplomatic consequences if you Purge, and Pops are really, really useful because. They. Fill. Job. Slots. You want to be able to fill as many Job Slots as possible to produce the 3 main resources in the game, ARU, Alloys, Research and Unity, as well as have the support resources and infrastructure to allow those Jobs to function (Energy Credits, Food, Consumer Goods, Amenities, and tier-1 Strategic Resources) and allow you to build and expand (Energy Credits again, and also Minerals and Influence).

ARU.

That's the mnemonic. You want as much of those as possible, and that's where you want as many Pops as possible. A bad Pop is still better than no Pop, because it's one more Job that gets actually done, instead of the Job Slot sitting empty.

To me, Purging makes more sense if you get something out of it. I think Fanatic Purifiers get Unity from Purging, Devouring Swarm Hive Minds get Food, and Death Cults get... something, and likewise Necrophages transform into a "higher tier" of Pops. Or you might be in a situation where Purging is automatic, like Inward Perfection (but then you can switch to Displace instead of, you know, adolphing them) or, I presume, non-IP Xenophobes too, which I have very little experience with.

If you don't get anything out of it and you aren't forced to Displace, then put those Pops to work, at least as slaves, instead of Purging.

"Tons of commerce" makes sense for me when I play as a Corp. I once tried playing as a non-Corp with Merchant Guilds and it sucked utterly. Would not recommend. Most of the time I don't play as a Corp, and so I'll grab what Trade Value is easily grabbable, and I might build some Shrines of Numa or Galactic Stock Exchanges on some of my planets (towards the late game, the Orbital Galactic Stock Exchange is my go-to Orbital Ring Building if I have a Building slot I don't know what to do with), but I never focus on or obsess about Trade when not a Corp. Instead I go for ARU.

Or I try to.

Sometimes I get distrated by shiny crap. Don't tell anyone, but one recent game, a few weeks ago, I ended up obsessively stockpiling tier-1 Strategic Resources. I had an income of like 100 Gas, 80 Crystals and 50 or so Motes. Which is all kinds of excessive. Having a positive income is prudent. Having a low double-digits income of Gas in anticipation of an upcoming increase in need, like upgrading a lot of Labs to higher tier, is good. But what I did was just... a distracted kind of obsession. I wasted so many Pops on those Jobs, and huge amounts of Minerals.

Think in terms of ARU.

[Exothermically Eclectic]

Originally posted by Peter34:

ARU.

That's the mnemonic. You want as much of those as possible, and that's where you want as many Pops as possible. A bad Pop is still better than no Pop, because it's one more Job that gets actually done, instead of the Job Slot sitting empty.

Possible exceptions apply, thanks to the "When choosing a species to grow, planets will generally prioritize species that are under-represented on the planet and have citizenship equal to that of the already existing species" thing. If you... acquire... a small number of really bad pops and suddenly half your planets are growing Serviles or Slow Breeder/Cave Dweller pops, and your people don't like having some less free than others, well, sometimes you just have to take the short-term pain to avoid worse long term pain.

[Duder]

Gene Clinics are worth it now imo for the habitability increase and the extra amenities
Later on, new colonies get a gene clinic and industrial district. But that's me.

[Peter34]

Are we sure that the game choosing which species to grow still works that way?