Getting Steam rolled as the Homolong

[Energist]

Hey, been away from the game a couple years. I'm getting raped.

Playing as the Homolong. I've noticed across two games now that I am getting war declared right upon meeting new empires, before I even meet them actually and they don't have any casus belli. They can take an infinite number of systems.

Now... I have some questions...

What's going on? I remember horde empires could gobble you up in one war, but that was it. Now is it everyone? Did they do away with the claim system ?

Second, how can an empire attack me before we have established contact? They seem to know me, but I don't know them, and having my embassadors try to establish contact for a whole hour yielded nothing.

Finally, how are the enemies so strong now? i had a great economy, strong navy, 6/6 starbases with 6/6 defense platforms and similar fleet strength (slightly less, but more counting station). I got chewed up.

[Terijian]

Its because the homolog is a driven assimilator, so everyone will hate you or be suspicious.
Im pretty sure thats also why they can "total war" attack you and instantly own anything they conquer. so its not them its you.

They dont know you either, contact is mutual. so they are attacking unknown aliens. you can do the same if you set first contact protocol to the hostile option
the envoys can take awhile with the first couple first contacts

[Sero]

First of all you are playing a genocidal empire, of course they will attack you on sight.
Secondly you should probablylower the difficultie from what you are used to since they have improved the AI a good deal. They even added an easier difficulty because of that.

[Zane87]

Originally posted by Energist:

Hey, been away from the game a couple years. I'm getting raped.

Playing as the Homolong. I've noticed across two games now that I am getting war declared right upon meeting new empires, before I even meet them actually and they don't have any casus belli. They can take an infinite number of systems.

Now... I have some questions...

What's going on? I remember horde empires could gobble you up in one war, but that was it. Now is it everyone? Did they do away with the claim system ?

Second, how can an empire attack me before we have established contact? They seem to know me, but I don't know them, and having my embassadors try to establish contact for a whole hour yielded nothing.

It's kinda like the school bully asking why no one likes him. You are a genocidal empire, you genocide empires.

Empires don't like being genocided.... They usually prefer to live.

Originally posted by Energist:

Finally, how are the enemies so strong now? i had a great economy, strong navy, 6/6 starbases with 6/6 defense platforms and similar fleet strength (slightly less, but more counting station). I got chewed up.

Well, defense stations are cheap but a better navy would probably be a better investment except if you can abuse the AI by luring then in and then kill their fleet with yours + Starbase - but you can do that without defense platforms as well.

Your fleet power may be the same, but they have more ships because of your genocidal empire bonuses, so it's not saying a lot. Also fleet composition >>> fleet power, you really need to spy/watch so you can see their fleet composition and then hard counter it yourself

[CrUsHeR]

Originally posted by Sero:

First of all you are playing a genocidal empire, of course they will attack you on sight.
Secondly you should probablylower the difficultie from what you are used to since they have improved the AI a good deal. They even added an easier difficulty because of that.

Actually the Driven Assimilator is the opposite of genocidal. They don't purge, they only turn pops into cyborgs and connect them to their gestalt consciousness. Taking planets back from a DA leaves all pops intact and ready for work.

In fact the DA can also befriend some regular empires, like fanatic xenophiles might even like vassalage or a federation with them. At the same time they also can find friends with Determined Exterminators.



Main problem i see is that the DA gets no real efficiency bonuses. While it is easy to conquer a huge amount of planets and pops, these all require upkeep and insanely bloat your empire size.

So for example you have 5x the pops and 10x systems to the second largest empire, but proportionally you can afford much less researchers and coordinators. So your technology and traditions costs 3x but you only produce 2x as much from each, then you're not keeping the edge.

Then eventually it takes one minute just to scroll through your planet list, and the micromanagement of having to re-build planets to your ongoing needs gets extremely tedious.

[Energist]

Everyone, thank you for your feedback. This makes sense. I kept getting war declared almost immediately, which is not something I'm used to. Didn't realize there was so much bias against the Driven Assimilators.

I guess my intuition was true that they operate like the total war mechanic used to.

The AI indeed seems to have been improved, which is a good thing. I need to get my ass into gear now!

Going to switch to a more traditional empire type for the time being, but I am overall loving the new changes. The AI isn't messing around any more.

[Energist]

Originally posted by Terijian:

Its because the homolog is a driven assimilator, so everyone will hate you or be suspicious.
Im pretty sure thats also why they can "total war" attack you and instantly own anything they conquer. so its not them its you.

They dont know you either, contact is mutual. so they are attacking unknown aliens. you can do the same if you set first contact protocol to the hostile option
the envoys can take awhile with the first couple first contacts

So they are attacking me before they have any information on my empire? That seems a bit homicidal. It's frustrating being war declared by an empire I barely know exists, let alone have any idea as to how powerful they are.

[CrUsHeR]

If you want to play machines, i'd recommend this instead


Civics:

- Rapid Replicators
- Static Research Analysis / Introspective

Species:

- Mass-Produced (mandatory)

Origin:

- Resource Consolidation



Start with a Simulation Site in your capital and remove the blocker. Now your capital should assemble pops almost as fast as you can build new jobs.
Every colony gets two nexus districts, a machine assembly plant and a simulation site.
First colonies should be energy + minerals, afterwards more research and unity.

Once you get your third civic, add OTA Updates just to minimize the sprawl from pops.

Traditions and Ascension Perks should be:
1) Discovery > Technological Ascendancy
2) Expansion > Synthetic Age
3) ??? (e.g. Supremacy, Adaptability, Prosperity) > Machine Worlds

Once you can terraform your whole empire to machine worlds, perhaps also get the occasional Relic World for massive research, there's no stopping your tech and economy progression.

Played this twice in 3.7, this is a decently strong build.

[pete3great]

I main DA, and there's some good info here and some bad info. Yes, early game all your neighbors are gunning for you. That is true. What's not true is that having a crap ton of pops is bad. Pop is king in Stellaris. DAs have to go wide, so lean into it.

I think a lot the misunderstandings come from people who've only dabbled with DAs. DAs don't play like other empires, so advice that is true of other empires doesn't work for DAs. For example, pre-building districts is a must with DAs. When you take a planet, don't be afraid to consolidate its population somewhere else. You don't need influence to make claims, so why worry about the 200 point cost of moving the last pop?

Here's my DA build:

Civics:

Driven Assimilator
OTA Updates (make moving those pops even easier)
(later, when you get the third civic, take the one that gives you a Unity boost. Unity is the only resource DAs are really and truly starved of).

Origin:

Prosperous Unification (DO NOT TAKE RESOURCE CONSOLIDATION--You have pops that need food)

The Robots:

-Luxurious
-High Maintenance
+Logic Engines
+Mass-Produced
+Emotion Emulators (This is a key ability. You can mess with the others, but this is a must. A single Robot moved to a recently conquered planet can keep the pops undergoing assimilation there from revolting -- also, it means you need fewer drones on any given planet to create amenities, allowing you to spread them around more).

The Cyborg Species:

-Deviants (you don't have factions, so this doesn't hurt you)
-Wasteful (you don't have consumer goods, so this doesn't hurt you)
-Fleeting (not a big deal, you'll probably be using your robots as leaders anyway)
+Very Strong (these will be the bulk of your worker pops AND your invasion armies at first)
+Adaptive (With Cybernetic, +30 habitability)
--You might wonder why no rapid breeding to make up for being cyborgs. Quite simply, you grow your pops through assimilation. Rapid breeding is just spitting in the wind.

The two earliest Traditions to take are Expansion (you need that extra pop when colonizing as well as that reduction to population sprawl) and Supremacy (with your main ascension perks being cybernetics (obviously--which should be your third tradition tree as well) and Galactic Force Projection).


I also have a regular machine build that I haven't played in forever, but I always leave it on force spawn and the AI dominates with it, if you're curious.

[CrUsHeR]

Emotion Emulators

That is definitely outdated.

1) Since the Simulation Site gives plenty of amenities, it is viable to run planets with as close to 0 maintenance drones as possible (also why nobody would use maintenance protocols)

2) As of 3.7, having any drones with amenities bonus causes the job assignment to favor maintenance drones over actual jobs (so you end up with 0/20 mining drones and 20/20 maintenance drones on a mining planet)

Basically the same how Thrifty pops favor being clerks, except that maintenance drones contribute close to nothing to your economy

[pete3great]

Originally posted by CrUsHeR:

Emotion Emulators

That is definitely outdated.

1) Since the Simulation Site gives plenty of amenities, it is viable to run planets with as close to 0 maintenance drones as possible (also why nobody would use maintenance protocols)

2) As of 3.7, having any drones with amenities bonus causes the job assignment to favor maintenance drones over actual jobs (so you end up with 0/20 mining drones and 20/20 maintenance drones on a mining planet)

Basically the same how Thrifty pops favor being clerks, except that maintenance drones contribute close to nothing to your economy

Simulation sites give a whopping +6 amenities, and upgraded versions aren't much better. Relying on them to provide the bulk of your amenities is a fool's game. Also, fun fact, you can lower the number of jobs on a planet so that your pops take different jobs. You might complain about micromanagement, but micromanagement happens to be my favorite part of this sort of strategy game. Don't tell me how to have fun.


Edit = But also, if you hate maintenance droids so much, and I'm not saying you're wrong to, wouldn't you want fewer of them taking up space doing nothing? Thus the point of emotion emulators.

[Energist]

Originally posted by CrUsHeR:

If you want to play machines, i'd recommend this instead


Civics:

- Rapid Replicators
- Static Research Analysis / Introspective

Species:

- Mass-Produced (mandatory)

Origin:

- Resource Consolidation



Start with a Simulation Site in your capital and remove the blocker. Now your capital should assemble pops almost as fast as you can build new jobs.
Every colony gets two nexus districts, a machine assembly plant and a simulation site.
First colonies should be energy + minerals, afterwards more research and unity.

Once you get your third civic, add OTA Updates just to minimize the sprawl from pops.

Traditions and Ascension Perks should be:
1) Discovery > Technological Ascendancy
2) Expansion > Synthetic Age
3) ??? (e.g. Supremacy, Adaptability, Prosperity) > Machine Worlds

Once you can terraform your whole empire to machine worlds, perhaps also get the occasional Relic World for massive research, there's no stopping your tech and economy progression.

Played this twice in 3.7, this is a decently strong build.

This is awesome! thank you. Going to try it. I like the machine empires.

[Energist]

Originally posted by pete3great:

I main DA, and there's some good info here and some bad info. Yes, early game all your neighbors are gunning for you. That is true. What's not true is that having a crap ton of pops is bad. Pop is king in Stellaris. DAs have to go wide, so lean into it.

I think a lot the misunderstandings come from people who've only dabbled with DAs. DAs don't play like other empires, so advice that is true of other empires doesn't work for DAs. For example, pre-building districts is a must with DAs. When you take a planet, don't be afraid to consolidate its population somewhere else. You don't need influence to make claims, so why worry about the 200 point cost of moving the last pop?

Here's my DA build:

Civics:

Driven Assimilator
OTA Updates (make moving those pops even easier)
(later, when you get the third civic, take the one that gives you a Unity boost. Unity is the only resource DAs are really and truly starved of).

Origin:

Prosperous Unification (DO NOT TAKE RESOURCE CONSOLIDATION--You have pops that need food)

The Robots:

-Luxurious
-High Maintenance
+Logic Engines
+Mass-Produced
+Emotion Emulators (This is a key ability. You can mess with the others, but this is a must. A single Robot moved to a recently conquered planet can keep the pops undergoing assimilation there from revolting -- also, it means you need fewer drones on any given planet to create amenities, allowing you to spread them around more).

The Cyborg Species:

-Deviants (you don't have factions, so this doesn't hurt you)
-Wasteful (you don't have consumer goods, so this doesn't hurt you)
-Fleeting (not a big deal, you'll probably be using your robots as leaders anyway)
+Very Strong (these will be the bulk of your worker pops AND your invasion armies at first)
+Adaptive (With Cybernetic, +30 habitability)
--You might wonder why no rapid breeding to make up for being cyborgs. Quite simply, you grow your pops through assimilation. Rapid breeding is just spitting in the wind.

The two earliest Traditions to take are Expansion (you need that extra pop when colonizing as well as that reduction to population sprawl) and Supremacy (with your main ascension perks being cybernetics (obviously--which should be your third tradition tree as well) and Galactic Force Projection).


I also have a regular machine build that I haven't played in forever, but I always leave it on force spawn and the AI dominates with it, if you're curious.

Love it! I'm excited to keep playing DA now.

[Energist]

Originally posted by CrUsHeR:

If you want to play machines, i'd recommend this instead


Civics:

- Rapid Replicators
- Static Research Analysis / Introspective

Species:

- Mass-Produced (mandatory)

Origin:

- Resource Consolidation



Start with a Simulation Site in your capital and remove the blocker. Now your capital should assemble pops almost as fast as you can build new jobs.
Every colony gets two nexus districts, a machine assembly plant and a simulation site.
First colonies should be energy + minerals, afterwards more research and unity.

Once you get your third civic, add OTA Updates just to minimize the sprawl from pops.

Traditions and Ascension Perks should be:
1) Discovery > Technological Ascendancy
2) Expansion > Synthetic Age
3) ??? (e.g. Supremacy, Adaptability, Prosperity) > Machine Worlds

Once you can terraform your whole empire to machine worlds, perhaps also get the occasional Relic World for massive research, there's no stopping your tech and economy progression.

Played this twice in 3.7, this is a decently strong build.

I'm not seeing those civics. I have all DLC fyi

edit. Nevermind. I have to choose the gestalt ethic first

[Energist]

Originally posted by CrUsHeR:

If you want to play machines, i'd recommend this instead


Civics:

- Rapid Replicators
- Static Research Analysis / Introspective

Species:

- Mass-Produced (mandatory)

Origin:

- Resource Consolidation



Start with a Simulation Site in your capital and remove the blocker. Now your capital should assemble pops almost as fast as you can build new jobs.
Every colony gets two nexus districts, a machine assembly plant and a simulation site.
First colonies should be energy + minerals, afterwards more research and unity.

Once you get your third civic, add OTA Updates just to minimize the sprawl from pops.

Traditions and Ascension Perks should be:
1) Discovery > Technological Ascendancy
2) Expansion > Synthetic Age
3) ??? (e.g. Supremacy, Adaptability, Prosperity) > Machine Worlds

Once you can terraform your whole empire to machine worlds, perhaps also get the occasional Relic World for massive research, there's no stopping your tech and economy progression.

Played this twice in 3.7, this is a decently strong build.

How do I specify a start with a simulation site?

[Dave]

Originally posted by Energist:

Hey, been away from the game a couple years. I'm getting raped.

Playing as the Homolong. I've noticed across two games now that I am getting war declared right upon meeting new empires, before I even meet them actually and they don't have any casus belli. They can take an infinite number of systems.

Now... I have some questions...

What's going on? I remember horde empires could gobble you up in one war, but that was it. Now is it everyone? Did they do away with the claim system ?

Second, how can an empire attack me before we have established contact? They seem to know me, but I don't know them, and having my embassadors try to establish contact for a whole hour yielded nothing.

Finally, how are the enemies so strong now? i had a great economy, strong navy, 6/6 starbases with 6/6 defense platforms and similar fleet strength (slightly less, but more counting station). I got chewed up.

Homolog. Spell it right.