How do you do it ?

[Total Nugen]

So, I've never played Endless games before and my first 4x was Civ V and VI. so i jumped into Endless space 2, after i think 6 entire play through i only managed to win ONCE. on the easiest difficulty through military means. playing as the United Empire. i came close with the Lumeris. but in each play through i lost differently each time. Rebellion ( not 100 % sure how to deal with that ). lack of money/ lack of influence/ been beaten to the victory post so on so on I've lost in so many unique ways. I eventually WON A GAME. is that just me ? or is each game as hard as that. the only thing that kepted me going was selling Resources that i had as a bonus from planets. Tips etc?

[ElPrezCBF]

First thing you got to know is this isn't a Civ game and shouldn't be played as such. Apart from generic things common to all 4x games, ES2 is very different from Civ. Unlike Civ, all factions in ES2 are assymetrical and have unique traits. By this, I don't mean simple bonus differences like what you see in Civ but actual differences in fundamental mechanics between factions. UE and Sophons are good factions to start off with as a new ES2 player because their gameplay is more "balanced" compared with certain factions like Cravers or Vodyani that require more extreme strategies.

Another huge difference from Civ is the tech tree here is non-linear where you have to research a minimum number of techs to unlock more advanced tech tiers. But you can also choose to delay unlocking advanced techs and grab more basic techs to gain advantages in more lower tier areas first. Both research strategies are equally viable depending on the situation. You can also choose to focus more on any one of the 4 different tech catgories: military, economy, population and exploration.

Your faction needs the basic resources of food (population growth), industry (construction), dust (economy), science (research) and influence (diplomatic currency) to expand. There are also luxury resources that you can gain bonuses from through city upgrades in your economy screen and strategic resources that you can use to create more advanced buildings and weapons (most of which also have tech requirements).

There are too many mechanics to explain in one post and what works for one faction may not work for another due to their assymetric nature. The good thing is by mousing over the UI, you can view messages that inform you what your faction needs to unlock certain things, so use it. You can also get some tips from the guide here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Xf6h4rZ88g

[Total Nugen]

twel70 Thank you for the reply, I haven't compared the game to Civ i just mentioned that they are my previous experiences. I will check out the video, so much to learn. a quick question twel70 what is the best way to keep population steady i have moved them around as such for balance, near end game I struggle to keep control due to over pop, and rebellion. any tips on this ? Thank you again :)

[Varivox]

This game is, imo, more "challenging" than a Civ game.

Civ games don't really "punish" (for lack of a better word) you for making too many buildings. For instance, the upkeep costs of many buildings in Civ are pretty low, but in ES2 even low tier buildings can cost a lot of money so investing in every building in every system can drain your dust income, especially early on. To counter this, you can of course research/build dust producing buildings. However, especially early on, it helps to praise minor civs that eventually give you dust for being good friends. Trade routes aren't physical "things" to be built in ES, unlike Civ, but you still have to invest in them and they produce more and more money (that's an easy one to miss).

That's just one example, they may both be 4x, but they both have very different systems.

I'd suggest Twel70's video he linked there, 4x alchemist has some good guides for each race (and just generally good content). Another good YT channel with good guides is "Waervyn's World" who has a lot of basic guides for each individual feature in the game.

[Varivox]

Originally posted by =RAV= Sparky:

twel70 Thank you for the reply, I haven't compared the game to Civ i just mentioned that they are my previous experiences. I will check out the video, so much to learn. a quick question twel70 what is the best way to keep population steady i have moved them around as such for balance, near end game I struggle to keep control due to over pop, and rebellion. any tips on this ? Thank you again :)

different government types help, democracy gives a +1 happiness/pop while federation(?) allows for more system colonizations before unhappiness penalty. Certain tech of course.

One useful thing is, in the militarist or pacifist governments, there are good happiness laws that provide +happiness for each war and each peace respectively. There are also other laws that you can pass that boost empire/population happiness as well.

edit: I also sometimes will go back and find any useless systems (consisting of only a gas giant or 1 or 2 planets with no resources generally) and evacuate them. Fewer systems for the overcolonization penalty that way.

[ElPrezCBF]

I know, it's just that if Civ was your only other 4x experience, it might be natural for you to play ES2 like a Civ game, which it isn't. :))

Overpopulation (pops occupying planetary slots under the orange curve) results in an approval penalty that affects your system's resource output. You can transfer pop to other systems you own, but you'll need a space port to do that. You'll need to unlock the third tier of your economy tech quadrant to unlock the first tier urban upgrade that comes with this port. But you'll also need to select a luxury resource for the urban upgrade. So you'll need adequate amounts (25 to be exact) of a certain luxury resource to build the upgrade.

If you're lucky to start close to systems with the grapes resource, you can colonize and exploit those systems early, then select grapes for your tier 1 urban upgrade to get a +25 approval bonus, which is massive.

In your empire management screen (laurels icon on top left), you can see that there is a cap on the number of systems you can own without incurring an empirewide approval penalty. The more you exceed this cap, the greater would be the penalty. This cap may be increased by researching the right techs but not by much, so you can't depend on that alone. Approval can be increased by transferring pops to other systems to reduce/eliminate overcolonization, building approval improvements and getting a grapes urban upgrade as mentioned. You can also abandon less useful systems to reduce the number of systems over the cap limit.

You can also select hero traits that give approval bonuses during promotion or assimilate Kalgeros/Horatio pops that have approval bonus traits.

Last but not least, you can set a law that forces all systems to "content" but only if you manage to get a religious government into power.

[BossGalaga]

I like the whole 4x space genre but this game looks a little heavy on the micro-management aspect and that's not really my kick. Moo2 or Star Control is more my speed.

Is my impression of this about right?

[Varivox]

Originally posted by BossGalaga:

I like the whole 4x space genre but this game looks a little heavy on the micro-management aspect and that's not really my kick. Moo2 or Star Control is more my speed.

Is my impression of this about right?

Never really felt micro-intensive to me tbh. If you want to min/max your empire, yea, it can be. However, I wouldn't say that I juggle around populations or anything like that all that much, which would probably be the most micro intensive aspect of ES2. There are certainly things to do, but even planets have a fairly competent "focus on X" auto management option for you.

TBH, it's been so long since I played MOO2 and never played Star Control, so I can't really compare it all that well to those two, but I never though of this game as being micro intensive. Honestly, I think the only time I would call the game micro intensive is if you are min/maxing everything, and the game is forgiving enough that you probably don't need to do that.

[BossGalaga]

Originally posted by Varivox:

Originally posted by BossGalaga:

I like the whole 4x space genre but this game looks a little heavy on the micro-management aspect and that's not really my kick. Moo2 or Star Control is more my speed.

Is my impression of this about right?

Never really felt micro-intensive to me tbh. If you want to min/max your empire, yea, it can be. However, I wouldn't say that I juggle around populations or anything like that all that much, which would probably be the most micro intensive aspect of ES2. There are certainly things to do, but even planets have a fairly competent "focus on X" auto management option for you.

TBH, it's been so long since I played MOO2 and never played Star Control, so I can't really compare it all that well to those two, but I never though of this game as being micro intensive. Honestly, I think the only time I would call the game micro intensive is if you are min/maxing everything, and the game is forgiving enough that you probably don't need to do that.

Okay, thanks for the feedback. I'll check out some gameplay videos on youtube and see if I like what I see.

[ElPrezCBF]

Originally posted by BossGalaga:

I like the whole 4x space genre but this game looks a little heavy on the micro-management aspect and that's not really my kick. Moo2 or Star Control is more my speed.

Is my impression of this about right?

To be exact, micromanagement here mainly relates to population management. This starts off fine but as you expand to more systems, it becomes a hassle. And because pop transport between systems is not immediate, the destination system would probably be full by the time the immigrants arrive. In other words, it doen't make much difference in practice. This is one of the game's weaknesses apart from non-military victories that are too easy to achieve. But overall, it's still a fun game.

[Total Nugen]

Thanks for your guidance all, really helpful and i learned alot I never have used the transfer system, only moved people around from 1 planet to another in the same system, but not other systems, I need to re check some laws as i don't think i realised that there are some happyness laws out there, ive been a greedy one with dust and cheaper units etc. Also, i didnt know max pop penatlys affect output ! so much here. going to re try some games and see how i do. excellant thank you all. Also i don't feel the game is micromanagment at all it is very forgiving, i enjoy the exploration of the game, and development and its not hard to do at all. thats why i like this game, it only gets complicated near end game with pop but other then that, its straight forward, for micromanagment. Ive come from some good old RTS games, that require high end micromanagment and 4x games are a breather I have all the time in the world to make decisions and end turn.