I regret getting Ideology

[StockSounds]

Let me tell you a story. I once only had Biotech, I had rightfully gotten it from the very start because I'd heard of how good it is. I'd played through a few different runs, getting a free rhino during the tutorial and discovering how dumb vanilla tech levels are when I thought the tribal start looked cool.
My first "successful" playthrough came from two things; me now using mods, and me not setting up a clear direction other than "try out mechtech and start with wasters". VFE Pirates cemented itself as my lasting favorite mod by it having the basic starting scenario but infinitely better and warcaskets being incredibly fun.

Now then, I'd trusted popular opinion with my DLC choices once, so surely Ideology really will be the second best like people say it is, right? People push tier lists as objective much too often, because if I knew that it was entirely a matter of opinion whether Ideology, Royalty, and Anomaly were fun, I would have definitely not gone with Ideology, because I don't even like it's themes or features, I just heard it was cool.

That successful colony I mentioned was about to come to a close. It was already getting a bit boring, but Ideology just dug a darn grave for it. First and foremost, I didn't get to pick my colony's ideoligion, the game just made one. I knew for a fact there was a creation menu, I just didn't get one and was confused and upset that this official DLC didn't have a single in-built way to so much as add an ideoligion to my colony when I just got the DLC. I had a bunch of depressed raiders in a colony that didn't raid. I now was required to build a room for a picky altar. I have a true resentment towards altars, and there needs to be more mods that just remove features from Ideology like altar requirements. Then I realized that trouble was brewing in my colony because the lesser half of my colonists followed different ideoligions, and quickly found out that the game did not have a real way to convert colonists, just an ability that takes an in-game week to refresh, and a ritual that I didn't understand.
I gave up, and it was Ideology's fault almost completely. Touchdown, slam dunk, hole in one, killed my best run to date just by adding its own features.
I initially chalked it up to just getting off on the wrong foot, and tried making a new colony. I only remember failure after failure, and a lot of anger with the ideoligion system.

Quite honestly, I do NOT know what other people see in this DLC.

Ideoligions are unbalanced. You're not required to make it equally good and bad like with Biotech, you can make your colonists love everything, good at almost everything, research faster, and so much more with mods that are simply following the formula that the devs set. That is not a good thing, total creative freedom is too easy, it's why using creative mode in a Minecraft speedrun is cheating, and there's a reason why Biotech did it with xenotypes the very next time a DLC came out. I have and always have had the ability to limit myself, but it feels so unnatural when I could just make it better.
Ideoligions are always tedious to set up, they'll constantly undo things you changed, with or without warning, and the hair selections just bring me less visual variety, more to have to manually change, and messes with some modded xenotypes.

One of the main reasons I got Ideology was because Slavery looked like a cool mechanic, but it was NOT! It's just recruitment but the pawns are somehow happier, it takes less time to do, they need a different hospital bed, they can revolt, and now I feel bad because my slave is actually a really nice guy who deserves better and it's really hard to recruit them.

The ancient decor is probably my favorite feature of the DLC, which is a very bad thing because the best part to me is landscape decoration. It's so odd to me that this is part of a paid DLC and not just something that's in the game and can be toggled on and off. The lore is also hideously shallow, it goes as deep as "there was an ancient civilization and a war or something".

Gauranlen trees are honestly shallow. I'd put them in second place on a list of Ideology features. They really are a commodity, and I think a lot of reason I for my mild dislike is expectations, I thought they'd be a little bit cooler. The other thing is that if you assign a pawn to a tree then they will COMPLETELY ignore it without your help. That little slider that tells your pawns how well they should prune means NOTHING. I played this on a colonist with plant-based priorities, mind you, so it's not like I had the priorities too low.
The trees can be a very big help if you can maintain them, especially in terms of providing resources, but the pawn I tried this on was a modded xenotype that has double pruning speed, and it was still annoyingly slow and taking up half their whole day. They're too stressful!

Every DLC adds new technologies and Ideology is the worst with it. Even Royalty, the very first DLC of the game, had a new method to research. It wasn't perfect, but at least it wasn't the stanley standard research that honestly sucks.
And what do I get for this research? I get a giant sleep pod that boringly works at half capacity without a meme and puts your pawn to sleep for a long time to do a procedure that honestly should not be a part of the game at all with how immortality-pilled it is.
Or perhaps we can use the Neural Supercharger, a technology with a long cooldown and hefty cost that you're expected to build many of way too early on if you want your transhumanists to act civil.
Also, there's the sleep accelerator which was outdid completely in an official piece of content with the sleep suppressor.
There's also just a couple things that are confusingly locked to a meme for basically no reason, and usually a niche one at that. The autobongs would be a pretty solid if I could use it without having a colony of stoners.
The gibbet cage just makes me mad, because you're telling me that these people WANT a rotting body on display? And then it litters every faction base like lines to a football field. The skullspike just makes me mad that it's clearly facing one direction and cannot be rotated.

The modding scene, credit where its due, is pretty good. There's one or two memes that I think genuinely improve the gameplay, but I think it's only just barely better than the Anomaly modding scene. Don't get me wrong, there are good Ideology-requiring mods, but largely ones that require Ideology for terrible reasons.
Let's take Vanilla Expanded for example; Tribals is a pretty stand-up mod, but it only qualifies as an Ideology mod because it requires Ideology seemingly just for the heck of it. Tribals requires Ideology because of the ritual system that it uses as a crappy low-tech and annoyingly slow version of research. Mind you, Anomaly has the exact same ritual system now, so it might not even be an Ideology thing.
VFE Ancients is similarly guilty, except this time I blame the devs rather than the modders. It's a mod themed around all that funny ancient junk mentioned above, which of course makes it appealing. That does however mean that I still think it's stupid that it requires Ideology. That and the little hacking system that I wouldn't blame you if you didn't even notice was in Ideology at all.

My message to the Ideology DLC, Your skills are nothing! You serve no purpose in your colony. You should eat without a table, NOW.

Anybody who disagrees, tell me all about how much you love Ideology, because I want to know why so that I can see the joy you see in the $20 I spent.

[Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia]

Rarely is it a good idea to add new mods or DLC to an existing save, and you should use dev mode to fix any issues that arise from doing so.

Many parts of ideology have negatives to counteract their positives. Transhumanists get mood buffs from artificial limbs, don't mind nutrient paste and have access to neural superchargers which boost learning speed and are one of very few things that can push consciousness above 100%, they complain a little if they don't get the superchargers but not enough to offset how easy they are to keep fed and otherwise happy.

[XelNigma]

Rimworld is very much "Play it your way" and ideology is just that.
If you want an easy ideology, go for it.
Want one thats near impossible, Sure knock your self out.

But mainly it for changing how you play in vanilla. getting a theme or setting and having actual rules ingame follow that theme.

[StockSounds]

Originally posted by Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia:

Rarely is it a good idea to add new mods or DLC to an existing save, and you should use dev mode to fix any issues that arise from doing so.

I wouldn'tve known that, I hadn't touched dev mode and I expect a higher standard of addability from official content.

[Narn]

TLDR version: OP is mad because DLC wont work well on old saves and he is not good at the game.

[MadArtillery]

Well ideology is a bad dlc. So not too surprising. I'd recommend if you add it to a save like that booting up dev mode and manually editing the ideology.

The complete lack of balancing is 100% true, really makes ideology a lot less interesting. Many options exist purely for challenge runs. While I do like challenge runs, everything being -mood is a pretty boring challenge run compared to biotech challenge runs that have that mechanical grit to torture you with. Mediocre for challenges imo. If you just want an easy win ideology has you covered in spades though.

Surprised you still never figured out the trees being cutting job from our previous discussions. It's a job like any other, they ignore it if you tell them too. You also have to tell them what level to prune to if you didn't notice that either. A pruner is generally best to be fully dedicated to pruning indeed though. You can get a lot of trees done with 1 pawn if you specialize them. The combat swarms can get impressively large per pawn. Great fun for optimizers like me making permeantly neurosis pulsed tree huggers. Much of their enjoyment the puzzle of optimizing the hell out of them. Could the system be more interesting though? Absolutely, it's no mechanitor.

As for what people see in the dlc? They look mostly at the surface and don't even realize how many memes are fake do nothings. Ideology is the only dlc that is an empty box without mods. Mods don't make the dlc good, they carry the dlc on their shoulders and make it exist.

[StockSounds]

Originally posted by Narn:

TLDR version: OP is mad because DLC wont work well on old saves and he is not good at the game.

If you're familiar with just about any other beloved game with DLC, chances are you would know better than to call somebody out for being upset with their save file being ruined when they add a content DLC. I had expected that if they weren't gonna let me choose my memes then they'd at least have the system off by default.
And then you added "skill issue" but reworded it to make it abundantly clear that you're serious.

[StockSounds]

Originally posted by MadArtillery:

Well ideology is a bad dlc. So not too surprising. I'd recommend if you add it to a save like that booting up dev mode and manually editing the ideology.

In hindsight, you couldn't be more right. But I hadn't touched dev mode at all yet, because why would I? I was just getting the experience in the moment.

Originally posted by MadArtillery:

The complete lack of balancing is 100% true, really makes ideology a lot less interesting. Many options exist purely for challenge runs. While I do like challenge runs, everything being -mood is a pretty boring challenge run compared to biotech challenge runs that have that mechanical grit to torture you with. Mediocre for challenges imo. If you just want an easy win ideology has you covered in spades though.

Exactly, yes, that. Biotech is just better Ideology in every way.

Originally posted by MadArtillery:

Surprised you still never figured out the trees being cutting job from our previous discussions. It's a job like any other, they ignore it if you tell them too. You also have to tell them what level to prune to if you didn't notice that either. A pruner is generally best to be fully dedicated to pruning indeed though. You can get a lot of trees done with 1 pawn if you specialize them. The combat swarms can get impressively large per pawn. Great fun for optimizers like me making permeantly neurosis pulsed tree huggers. Much of their enjoyment the puzzle of optimizing the hell out of them. Could the system be more interesting though? Absolutely, it's no mechanitor.

Yes, I listened abundantly, it's just that I'm at least 70% sure that I was doing what you said I should be doing, but that didn't make my problems I had disappear when you said that you didn't have them.
Also, funny you mention the mechanitor, because once again, Biotech is just better Ideology, Mechtech is just better Gauranlen. I'd forgotten to mention that.

Originally posted by MadArtillery:

As for what people see in the dlc? They look mostly at the surface and don't even realize how many memes are fake do nothings. Ideology is the only dlc that is an empty box without mods. Mods don't make the dlc good, they carry the dlc on their shoulders and make it exist.

If I can't enjoy Ideology at least I can love to hate it. I just wish I'd formed my own opinions based on asking questions about features rather than just being like "yall like it, I'll like it". I might have Royalty, which would at least give me Vanilla Psycasts Expanded even if it lacked in main content as well.

Also I'd like to thank you for the advice you gave me about how to use my time. I've gotten a massive boost in confidence already just by allocating 2 hours to working. It really helped a lot.

[MadArtillery]

Hmm so about the trees, what percentage do you have them set to be pruned to? Would really like to figure out whatever the issue is your having and that seems the most likely issue if you have them set to plant cutting, other then perhaps a mod issue.

Overall we agree pretty hard on ideology. Personally I'd really like for them to go back and polish up the older dlcs a bit. Ideology needs it the most out of all of them but they seem allergic to changing old content.

[Thoramyr]

Originally posted by StockSounds:

Originally posted by Narn:

TLDR version: OP is mad because DLC wont work well on old saves and he is not good at the game.

If you're familiar with just about any other beloved game with DLC, chances are you would know better than to call somebody out for being upset with their save file being ruined when they add a content DLC. I had expected that if they weren't gonna let me choose my memes then they'd at least have the system off by default.
And then you added "skill issue" but reworded it to make it abundantly clear that you're serious.

Literally every other game out there works the same, whether it's DLC, mods, or updates. You always run the risk of not being able to play old saves when you change a game's files. Some DLC, because of their nature, are less of a problem but Ideology changes much of the game. It is what it is.

[CloudSeeker]

Ideology is a Roleplay DLC. If you want to get overpowered, you can. If you want pawns to love everything. You can. However that is your choice because the point is about setting your own rules and roleplay according to those rules. If you just want to min/max you are most likely going to consider it a bad DLC because you are not actually engaging with it.

One of the main reasons I got Ideology was because Slavery looked like a cool mechanic, but it was NOT! It's just recruitment but the pawns are somehow happier, it takes less time to do, they need a different hospital bed, they can revolt, and now I feel bad because my slave is actually a really nice guy who deserves better and it's really hard to recruit them.

Have you ever heard that slavery has never been profitable. Strange isn't it? But it is actually true. It turns out that paying people and making people work out of their own free will is much more effective. This is why slavery is always abolished in nations that become or are rich. The reason slavery makes everyone poorer, including the slave owner is:

1. The slaves do not work efficently. Why should they work hard when they get nothing for it.
2. You have to employ people that only keep the slaves in line, which means those people are not doing anything productive.
3. Slavery slows down inovation and scientific advanacements. Why should a slave owner want to spend time to inovate to develop something like a tractor? He already have something that plows the fields. Creating tractors and make a lot of the farm automated only reduse the need for the slaves, which means he wasted his investment into them. So the slave owner will advocate against research and development only to protect his own assets.
And all of his competition will also not be able to inovate and research new and better things. If he has a free workforce, you will not be able to compete to pay for the research and development as you need a slave workforce yourself.

Yes. Slavery is not optimal in Rimworld, just like it isn't in real life. However. Ideology is a roleplaying DLC. You have slaves because you want to roleplay a coloney that has them. Not because they are the most efficent way to do things.

[StockSounds]

Originally posted by CloudSeeker:

Yes. Slavery is not optimal in Rimworld, just like it isn't in real life. However. Ideology is a roleplaying DLC. You have slaves because you want to roleplay a coloney that has them. Not because they are the most efficent way to do things.

"Roleplay DLC" feels like a sorry way to justify its shortcomings. I can agree in one sense; it makes it easier to do some of the more wacky and outlandish ideas with a colony, but that doesn't make it [i[fun[/i].
I came into the slavery feature expecting it to not be much more than just evil recruitment anyway, and I was still disappointed with how there was genuinely not one thing else to it.

Ideology does definitely add that variety like having mole people and cannibals, but it doesn't go any further in any interesting, leaving the feature feeling superficial. It only exists for swapping around the desire to stay alive with the desire to raid, the swapping the desire to bask in sunlight with the desire to hide in the dark, swapping the desire to have a normal diet with happy cannibalism.
It doesn't feel like giving them a culture, it feels like just changing the system and being forced to build a church, and more importantly, it doesn't feel fun.

It IS a roleplay DLC, but it's not a good one.

[MadArtillery]

I feel like Ideologies "Roleplay niche" which really is just an excuse for them not bothering balancing anything and throwing a bunch of boring moodlets around and is a bit outdated if anything. The more and more biotech the modding scene keeps developing the less value ideology actually offers, Can really easily mod in much of what ideology does as biotech genes these days. Cannibal? Mod gene. Undergrounder? Mod gene. Racist? Mod Gene. Hate light? Why look a vanilla gene! Nudism? What a variety of mod and non mod genes to look at! Gene system is thankfully flexible enough for modders to just, make whatever roleplay they could want as genes skipping ideology entirely.

I adore roleplay colonies, most of my colonies are role plays with a ton of restrictions and the like, I was here before biotech and the depth you can get in a roleplay was pretty shallow with ideology due to it's lackluster systems but biotech can let me do so much more with roleplay it's unreal. I wish people would stop using roleplay as an excuse for a mediocre dlc. It could have been a lot better and nothing is really stopping the developers from doing things like updating it for the better. Why should like half the memes do nothing? Even in high impact there are memes that do nothing! Nothing isn't a boon to roleplay nothing is nothing!!!!!!!!!

[Astasia]

I still rate Ideology as the best DLC. It perfectly encapsulates what I feel RimWorld is all about and what makes it so amazing and replayable. Biotech has some great content, but it's largely just content and after a few runs engaging with said content it loses the novelty, things like children and preset xenotypes can add something to every run, but you probably don't feel like playing with mechinators, sanguophages, or genemodding every single run after a point. Ideology is just always there, always allowing you to shape a run and give you tangible reasons to do things in ways other than the optimal way. The combinations are basically endless, there's always something new to try, either mechanically or thematically.

If you are just getting started with RimWorld Ideology may not make a lot of sense and just feel like arbitrary rules/restrictions/bonuses, but after a few hundred hours of success in the game I think it should eventually click for most people and they will appreciate how much life the expansion breathes into the game. A lot of us were already sort of doing what Ideology does by the time it came around, setting self-imposed restrictions and themes on our colonies to keep things fresh, but Ideology took that concept and made it "real" and dialed it up to 11.

It's not going to be for everyone though, if you treat RimWorld as a "game to win" and/or just always try to play very optimally, then Ideology is not at all about that. There is balance there, most of the memes are balanced to some degree or simply do not add power, and some of the precepts that allow you to toggle certain minor mechanics come at the cost of having to deal with the ideology mechanics to begin with (altars, expectations, conversion). That's not the point of the expansion though, you don't pick Tree Connection to get a balanced experience, you pick it to play a run in an entirely different way than usual, it has trade-offs and benefits, but it's likely going to be harder than usual overall and that's fine because the challenges and gameplay are unique to that meme. Many of the memes do that, and then combining them creates something new again. Tree Connection + Cannibals, Tree Connection + Darkness, Tree Connection + Nudism, these are all very different runs.

I don't know if any expansion going forward can ever really match Ideology. How do you create another expansion with infinite potential?

[Narn]

I am going to go against the grain and say that I like Ideology. Mostly because its more like real life in that lots of annoying ideologies exist and people are always trying to convert each other to their dumb ideas. If you min max to make the perfect ideology of course you are going to be board. The idea is to make something fun and different that is not min maxed. You can make an ideology that is insane to see if you can survive with that or not. The idea is to increase or change the difficulty to how you want to play. Do you want to be crazy meat eating raiders? Or would you want to be some weirdo conversion fanatics? Or maybe furry freaks? Its to try new things and see if you can survive. Its also fun to make an ideology that is super powerful to fight against. There is also a lot of fun to be had to make a ideology of people you dont like and try to wipe them out or convert them. If you are going to think in linear terms of items / research content added and min maxing than you are going to hate the Ideology DLC.

[StockSounds]

Originally posted by Narn:

If you min max to make the perfect ideology of course you are going to be board. The idea is to make something fun and different that is not min maxed. You can make an ideology that is insane to see if you can survive with that or not.

My issue isn't that it's too easy, I am willing to challenge myself with the system even if it's completely unbalanced, the thing is that the vast majority of negative effects is just that pawns will be sad and whine more unless you fill their every need. It makes pawns somehow even more needy than they were before.