United Empire vs Vaulters, Pros and cons and which is better for a beginner?

[Ouch Crab]

Hey there, exactly as it says on the tin.

I've played UE/Vaulters/Vodyani and will attempt to focus on those three to grow my understanding of the game, while personally i feel like UE are the stronger of the 3 i think that might be only because of my lack of knowledge about the game.

However i'd like to focus on UE or Vaulters first up, Which faction is considered the stronger option and what pluses or minuses can both factions offer to a newbie?

Thanks.

[kahlrasierter Affenarsch]

with UE you have a solid race with all the standard functions. it only adds the buyout via influence for systems and technologies. vaulters have a different style of sttling new systems and voidyani are working toltaly different in many ways. so i would recommand UE. maybe you start playing with them two or three games and then create a new race based on the UE and yust change some minor traits.

I think when you know the basics of the game you will learn faster if you build your own races. but this depends on the person playing, maybe :D

[Arcrom21]

United Empire, since their gameplay is more straightforward compared to the others you mentioned and you don't need to micro UE population allowing you to focus on learning other things.

[CMDR_Cryonics]

Play them all. Pick one you think is interesting and play it. Then play another and another.

[Ouch Crab]

Originally posted by CMDR_Cryonics:

Play them all. Pick one you think is interesting and play it. Then play another and another.

I have played each one already, Vodyani i've played twice.

I just want to know about some of the strengths of the factions and how to play them.

[patrick]

UE is pretty strong on industry. You can build the xeno industrial building first and if you have more temperate fertile planets your start is absolutely golden. Jadonyx can help aswell and you can get sci fi design schools from the quest aswell. Industry gives you influence which makes taking minor factions easy and you can use it to jumpstart new colonies by buying the xeno industrial complex out (later on better use dust so you can use influence on science). Since you are so good with industry it‘s also easy to construct buildings for all other fidsi so you shouldn‘t lag behind much in anything.

Vaulters are very reliant on strategic ressources and have to pay alot of dust if they want to make new colonies somewhat quickly early on. Which is something you definitively should do. But their strategic ressource system developments are powerful and take away the reliance on getting access to good luxury ressources. Using titanium or jadonyx is pretty good as a first development, but not the only choice. The new colonization method means you don‘t have to build colony ships, so you can focus on other system developments or ships. You get colonies instantly aswell. The teleport network makes defending your territory alot easier, you can easily merge fleets and you can also use it offensively via pirates. Vaulters have a penalty to food i think so it‘s inportant to put some investment into getting food system developments. Their scout class is really good, it can fit 4 support modules. Since i like to get the titianium system development i usually go for 2 hyperium engines and 2 hyperium probes, which gives them huge vision range.

Empire heroes are pretty good for industry and also give some influence early on, which improves your lead on minor civ diplomacy even further. I‘m not that amazed by vaulter heroes, but they have a +30% science skill which helps.

I only played vodyani very little so i don‘t think i can help you with that. But the population boost is strong so have a look at the population screen in the empire development menu. Similarily to cravers you might to keep empires you dominate barely alive so you can benefit from them (leeching instead of happiness). I put in the essence module into every slot in my arks, although i usually switch between that and all engines so i can set up a colony quickly and then upgrade the ship to collect essence. System developments and increasing your population is very important, so do that even if you get trash luxuries like dark glitter.