Synaptic Lathe Worth It?

[Doctor Proteus]

I'm trying to use the Synaptic Lathe but as soon as I put more than one Pop in it, other Pops just start dying. It has at least one class upgrade, x3 Neural Gate, x3 Ampliative Speculator, x2 Neural Stabalizers, x2 Synaptic Sustainer, and x1 Expanded Reactor. I don't get the how this thing is useful, the amount of resources it is sucking up is ridiculous and it just sin't giving me anything back. Is it worth it? What is the general consensus on this Megastructure so far?

[Xaphnir]

From what I know (haven't used it myself) the way it's supposed to work is that the more pops you put in it, the more efficient each pop is at producing research. And since having more than one pop in it causes pops to decline, you really want to conquer planets and pile all the pops from them into the Synaptic Lathe. If you can get large numbers of pops in it, it will produce truly ridiculous amounts of research.

From what I've seen of those who have used it, I wouldn't be surprised to see a nerf coming for it in the near future. It seems to produce research well beyond the limit of what devs seem to be comfortable allowing unmodded.

[HappySack]

It's a giant blender where you get more benefits based on how many pops you put into it, as such you end up needing to do a bit of conquering and/or abductions to "persuade" pops to go into it.

[Gingermonkey]

It requires a lot of micromanaging, and personally, didnt feel that worth while. But i was also playing tall with Inward Perfection, so my options for gathering pops was limited.

[Doctor Proteus]

Didn't know it was a Death Machine. Sounds like total ass. Do they even explain why it requires living beings at all to function? Sounds a pretty lame and incompetent piece of technology to me.

[❤ Sly Succubus ❤]

Originally posted by Doctor Proteus:

Didn't know it was a Death Machine. Sounds like total ass. Do they even explain why it requires living beings at all to function? Sounds a pretty lame and incompetent piece of technology to me.

Its based off of the Matrioskha Brain as far as I know which is a theoretical machine that places the entire population of a civilization inside a massive device that is internally powered by a dyson sphere and acts as the universes largest sentient computer, within theory the idea of taking trillions of minds and linking them inside of a computer like its the Matrix on roids is not that far fetched; that said most mega's in the game save the Dyson sphere and swarm are just renamed theoretical machines

[▲ iGregory]

When I built this megastructure I found that there were no available districts to build. Should I research something to do this? Or maybe it’s just a bag?

[Blackhand]

It really depends on your playstyle really. You'll need to put pops in it to make it truly shine. the more, the better.
I tried it out once and went complete berserk with it. I went into war with another empire and as soon as their massive populated worlds were captured, they went straight into the Lathe. It gave me an 8k research bonus which declined pretty fast. Normally, I play pretty low key

Now as the real reason why you want that thing. Fallen Empire ships and buildings. They are borderline overpowered.

[Doctor Proteus]

Originally posted by ❤ Sly Succubus ❤:

Originally posted by Doctor Proteus:

Didn't know it was a Death Machine. Sounds like total ass. Do they even explain why it requires living beings at all to function? Sounds a pretty lame and incompetent piece of technology to me.

Its based off of the Matrioskha Brain as far as I know which is a theoretical machine that places the entire population of a civilization inside a massive device that is internally powered by a dyson sphere and acts as the universes largest sentient computer, within theory the idea of taking trillions of minds and linking them inside of a computer like its the Matrix on roids is not that far fetched; that said most mega's in the game save the Dyson sphere and swarm are just renamed theoretical machines

I don't think that is specifically what a Matrioskha Brain is. That is to say, it doesn't have to specifically have people plugged into it.

[❤ Sly Succubus ❤]

Originally posted by Doctor Proteus:

Originally posted by ❤ Sly Succubus ❤:

Its based off of the Matrioskha Brain as far as I know which is a theoretical machine that places the entire population of a civilization inside a massive device that is internally powered by a dyson sphere and acts as the universes largest sentient computer, within theory the idea of taking trillions of minds and linking them inside of a computer like its the Matrix on roids is not that far fetched; that said most mega's in the game save the Dyson sphere and swarm are just renamed theoretical machines

I don't think that is specifically what a Matrioskha Brain is. That is to say, it doesn't have to specifically have people plugged into it.

Your correct, that also said the brain in of itself is already a computer as well so the brains just make it more powerful anyways, same situation here, the device is already a computer, just add more brains to make it...er..think? better

[mss73055]

If you want a crisis victory then you need this lathe.
If you're fine with enigma battlesheep then common research and a bunch of scholarium underlings will get you there.

You don't want to level up with rule bender research. That's going to take the better part of a century, while you nuke the entire galaxy including yourself.

[aslanarwen14]

you will see its value when you have undesirables that you have to purge thru automatic resettlement into the lattice. you will suddenly get from 6k to 18k research for 200 population

[Carog the Fat]

I used it playing virtual ascension playing tall i would just conquer who ever annoyed me pile them in and them shut down the server on their captured pop centres. I was getting 45-60k research from it.

[Mad Poppins]

Originally posted by aslanarwen14:

you will see its value when you have undesirables that you have to purge thru automatic resettlement into the lattice. you will suddenly get from 6k to 18k research for 200 population

Lathe is a much better way of purging conquered pops you don't want in your empire.

[Oakshadow]

How good it is is going to depend on how consistently you can feed it pops.
The lathe eats pops pretty quickly. If you ever end up in a rut with no pops to feed it, you could end up with the equivalent of a super expensive research building.

Also Cosmogenesis has a clock on it. Eventually a fallen empire will awaken and come after you for having tech too advanced. If you stall out at any point during the game due to an ethics mismatch or a bad empire decision, you could end up getting ROFL-stomped by the end of mid-game.

In other words while any empire can take Cosmogenesis, most empire types are likely to crash and burn trying it. Way I see it... there's only three empire types that can make it work.

A bio-ascended empire with insane pop growth and corvee system civic. An authoritarian empire utilizing thrall worlds with a slave race of rapid breeders.... or an aggressive genocidal empire that invades their neighbors to steal their pops for the lathe.

Anything outside those three builds is probably going to struggle

[Antearz]

It depends on how You Play it and When.
It can be absolutely Worth it if You get it Early. Build it up. And then Declare Conquest Wars on Enemies where You Steal their Planets and then Really have 200-300 Pops at once to throw them into the Fully Build Synaptic Lathe.
Because that means You are basicly getting 2-5k Monthly Research of each Type for a few Years.

The Importand thing is not to Waste Pops by Sending them there in Small Numbers.
Because then You get very little Benefit of it.


Putting it Simple.
You can use it to Purge Conquered Species for Absurd amounts of Quick Research.

Each Time You Conquer 300-400 Enemy Pops. You basicly Convert them into something around 200k Research of each Type in a fairly Short Time.