Worth removing corruption?

[TheMac]

I am trying a game as the Empire, against the Rebellion and the FOC. The FOC are just spamming corruption against my planets and it costs me $1500 each time to remove it. Is it worth doing that? Does it cost them more than $1500 to corrupt my planet in the first place? How many credits am I losing if I let it stay.

If anyone else plays the Empire against FOC, what is your strategy to deal with the planetary corruption if starting with limited income on tech 1? Thanks.

[joeball123]

Originally posted by TheMac:

Does it cost them more than $1500 to corrupt my planet in the first place?

Unless it's a Kidnapping-type corruption, it probably cost the Consortium more than 1500 credits to corrupt your planet - each Corruption mission consumes a Defiler (1000-credit minor hero), some amount of credits to perform the mission (how much depends on planet and corruption type), and often a couple of units.

The Kidnapping corruption type specifically gives the Consortium a large sum of credits (around 10,000, if I recall correctly), so they're probably net-positive to the tune of around 7,000 or 8,000 credits.

Having said this, I don't know how much the computer-controlled factions actually care about credits.

Originally posted by TheMac:

How many credits am I losing if I let it stay.

The problem with leaving a planet corrupted isn't direct loss of income so much as that leaving a planet Corrupted allows the Consortium to use Defilers to blow up your base structures, which quickly gets very annoying.

Secondarily, Corruption has a number of other negative effects.
- All types of Corruption grant the Consortium full vision of the planet for as long as the world remains corrupted.
- All types of Corruption allow smugglers to remain active indefinitely instead of going away after a certain amount of time.
- All types of Corruption allow Consortium forces to path through the planet as though your space station and any defensive fleets were not present, as long as the planet is being bypassed rather than attacked.
- Bribery disables your garrison spawns - TIEs from Acclamators and Star Destroyers; TIEs, corvettes, and Acclamators from the space station; infantry and vehicles from ground structures. This affects engagements against both the Consortium and the Rebellion.
- Intimidation disables planet bonuses (e.g. a production cost reduction).
- Piracy and Slavery grant the Consortium a number of additional units to play around with. These mostly aren't a problem due to being no better (or, in the case of many 'slave' units, worse in almost every respect other than cost) than what the Consortium already has, but you might want to prevent them from having TIE Defenders, Ewok Handlers, missile corvettes, and maybe Acclamators (sure, it's not a great ship, but it still comes with free fighters and the Consortium gets 25 space pop cap to play with to the Empire's 20).
- Black Markets are how the Consortium unlocks most of their unit abilities. To be fair, keeping them from doing that doesn't really do a lot to keep the Consortium weak, but any little bit can help against someone who can field things that really ought to have been Tech 3/4/5 stuff while you're still stuck with Tech 1/2 stuff.

Pretty much the only worlds that I tolerate Corruption on are Capital Ship Producers, because getting a 'free' cost and construction time reduction on Imperial Star Destroyers (or Mon Calamari Cruisers as the Rebellion) can be worth a bit of annoyance and Kuat, Fondor, Sullust, and Mon Calamari don't have enough base slots to be particularly important recruitment centers for my ground forces or income generators for my economy so I don't usually care too much if base facilities get blown up there.

Originally posted by TheMac:

If anyone else plays the Empire against FOC, what is your strategy to deal with the planetary corruption if starting with limited income on tech 1? Thanks.

My strategy to deal with planetary corruption is, basically, not to have limited income - pick some worlds and start filling them out with Mining Facilities (any world that's not on the front line and either has a high base income or lacks sufficient building slots to be useful as a recruitment center can be a good choice) - and to kill the Consortium before dealing with the Rebellion. Recruitment facilities and ground defenses are a waste of space anywhere that you're not recruiting from or having to fight ground battles on, and since unit production time decreases as a function of the number of appropriate recruitment structures on the planet it tends to be best to have a couple of worlds focused on unit production while the rest of the (safe) worlds just print money.

Another reason to kill the Consortium first is that IG-88 has an effectively-uncounterable special ability that lets the Consortium blow up the Death Star - and anything at the same location - for "free."

[Yoljot]

If you ask me, the corruption can and will be quite an annoyance. They will occasionally use a Defiler, to destroy your ground facilities on corrupted planets, as the other guy already mentioned. But sometimes I have a feeling they won't stop. Every time the Consortium uses a Defiler, to destroy a building on a planet, the next sabotage action is double the price. Considering we are already starting in the thousands for sabotage action 1, the next ones will be quite expensive, but they will do it nonetheless. And to get to something that is tied to this but not tied to the initial question, the money they possess is enormous. The Consortium gets money for basically everything they are doing. While it is true that corrupting planets is not an inexpensive proposition per se, the Consortium, with its Defilers, and Palaces, is just so wealthy and has such a high income that even 6000 Credits for something are merely peanuts for the Consortium. Playing against the Consortium is essentially playing in hard mode, no matter the initial game difficulty. (Easy, Normal, Hard)

[TheMac]

Originally posted by joeball123:

Originally posted by TheMac:

Does it cost them more than $1500 to corrupt my planet in the first place?

Unless it's a Kidnapping-type corruption, it probably cost the Consortium more than 1500 credits to corrupt your planet - each Corruption mission consumes a Defiler (1000-credit minor hero), some amount of credits to perform the mission (how much depends on planet and corruption type), and often a couple of units.

The Kidnapping corruption type specifically gives the Consortium a large sum of credits (around 10,000, if I recall correctly), so they're probably net-positive to the tune of around 7,000 or 8,000 credits.

Having said this, I don't know how much the computer-controlled factions actually care about credits.

Originally posted by TheMac:

How many credits am I losing if I let it stay.

The problem with leaving a planet corrupted isn't direct loss of income so much as that leaving a planet Corrupted allows the Consortium to use Defilers to blow up your base structures, which quickly gets very annoying.

Secondarily, Corruption has a number of other negative effects.
- All types of Corruption grant the Consortium full vision of the planet for as long as the world remains corrupted.
- All types of Corruption allow smugglers to remain active indefinitely instead of going away after a certain amount of time.
- All types of Corruption allow Consortium forces to path through the planet as though your space station and any defensive fleets were not present, as long as the planet is being bypassed rather than attacked.
- Bribery disables your garrison spawns - TIEs from Acclamators and Star Destroyers; TIEs, corvettes, and Acclamators from the space station; infantry and vehicles from ground structures. This affects engagements against both the Consortium and the Rebellion.
- Intimidation disables planet bonuses (e.g. a production cost reduction).
- Piracy and Slavery grant the Consortium a number of additional units to play around with. These mostly aren't a problem due to being no better (or, in the case of many 'slave' units, worse in almost every respect other than cost) than what the Consortium already has, but you might want to prevent them from having TIE Defenders, Ewok Handlers, missile corvettes, and maybe Acclamators (sure, it's not a great ship, but it still comes with free fighters and the Consortium gets 25 space pop cap to play with to the Empire's 20).
- Black Markets are how the Consortium unlocks most of their unit abilities. To be fair, keeping them from doing that doesn't really do a lot to keep the Consortium weak, but any little bit can help against someone who can field things that really ought to have been Tech 3/4/5 stuff while you're still stuck with Tech 1/2 stuff.

Pretty much the only worlds that I tolerate Corruption on are Capital Ship Producers, because getting a 'free' cost and construction time reduction on Imperial Star Destroyers (or Mon Calamari Cruisers as the Rebellion) can be worth a bit of annoyance and Kuat, Fondor, Sullust, and Mon Calamari don't have enough base slots to be particularly important recruitment centers for my ground forces or income generators for my economy so I don't usually care too much if base facilities get blown up there.

Originally posted by TheMac:

If anyone else plays the Empire against FOC, what is your strategy to deal with the planetary corruption if starting with limited income on tech 1? Thanks.

My strategy to deal with planetary corruption is, basically, not to have limited income - pick some worlds and start filling them out with Mining Facilities (any world that's not on the front line and either has a high base income or lacks sufficient building slots to be useful as a recruitment center can be a good choice) - and to kill the Consortium before dealing with the Rebellion. Recruitment facilities and ground defenses are a waste of space anywhere that you're not recruiting from or having to fight ground battles on, and since unit production time decreases as a function of the number of appropriate recruitment structures on the planet it tends to be best to have a couple of worlds focused on unit production while the rest of the (safe) worlds just print money.

Another reason to kill the Consortium first is that IG-88 has an effectively-uncounterable special ability that lets the Consortium blow up the Death Star - and anything at the same location - for "free."

Excellent read. Wow, blow up the death star? Wasn't aware that was a thing. :) Thanks again for the time and expertise.

[TheMac]

Originally posted by Yoljot:

If you ask me, the corruption can and will be quite an annoyance. They will occasionally use a Defiler, to destroy your ground facilities on corrupted planets, as the other guy already mentioned. But sometimes I have a feeling they won't stop. Every time the Consortium uses a Defiler, to destroy a building on a planet, the next sabotage action is double the price. Considering we are already starting in the thousands for sabotage action 1, the next ones will be quite expensive, but they will do it nonetheless. And to get to something that is tied to this but not tied to the initial question, the money they possess is enormous. The Consortium gets money for basically everything they are doing. While it is true that corrupting planets is not an inexpensive proposition per se, the Consortium, with its Defilers, and Palaces, is just so wealthy and has such a high income that even 6000 Credits for something are merely peanuts for the Consortium. Playing against the Consortium is essentially playing in hard mode, no matter the initial game difficulty. (Easy, Normal, Hard)

Thanks for your advice and insight. This is also quite helpful. I'll have to go back and rethink my strategy quite a bit. :)

[^9[DSS]Dahaka]

It needs to be tuned WAY down. If you capture all planets in galactic conquest, and leave just one for the consortium, even though they are at their unit cap and cant build anything more, they still auto corrupt 2-3 planets simultaneously every 3 or so minutes. If you speed up the game and leave it like that for like, 10 minutes, almost all of your planets will be corrupted.
The bot might be able to corrupt your planets without even a defiler. Im not sure about that though.

Most definitely worth removing, to avoid the constant sabotage, and the lack of garison units made by your structures with certain types of corruption.

[TheMac]

Originally posted by ^9DSSDahaka:

It needs to be tuned WAY down. If you capture all planets in galactic conquest, and leave just one for the consortium, even though they are at their unit cap and cant build anything more, they still auto corrupt 2-3 planets simultaneously every 3 or so minutes. If you speed up the game and leave it like that for like, 10 minutes, almost all of your planets will be corrupted.
The bot might be able to corrupt your planets without even a defiler. Im not sure about that though.

Most definitely worth removing, to avoid the constant sabotage, and the lack of garison units made by your structures with certain types of corruption.

Thanks for the additional info.

[mosser1989]

Ditch vanilla, use mods