Policy Cards Jumble

[Oberlus]

Maybe bonus for stealth for ships with empty slots ?

IMO, too similar to mounting stealth parts.

Currently, keeping empty slots in a ship design can have some purpose (saving some PP, keeping used slots unders 7 for Design Simplicity, reducing PP ship upkeep...), but I don't think that increasing stealth should be one of those purposes.

[LienRag]

A Policy to increase Science output : Open Science.
+0.05 RP per population everywhere (citizen science, everyone is a contributor)
+ 30 % RP everywhere
+ 2 Stability for planets focused on Research
- 0,5 Stability per warship in the system whose Species values are opposed to those of the Species on the planet ("no, no, we won't go !")
- 0,5 Stability per warship in the system for each Military Policy that is disliked by the Species on the planet
- 50 % Influence production (you can't bullshit an educated population)
- 0,5 influence cost per planet (an educated people is a self-governing one)
get 1% of the Research output of allied Empires
+ 1% Research for Empires at peace with the OpenScience Empire on research-focused planets
+ 10 % Research for allies on research-focused planets
10 % on the total Research put to one tech by the Empire is put to the same tech in all other Empires (they can benefit from the open science publications)¹
Big stability malus for each species while techs against their values are researched (everybody understands science so everybody is concerned when bad decisions are made), and these Tech RP cost is raised proportionally to the population of the Empire that dislikes them
Raised cost for all authoritarian and or plutocratic policies
Incompatible with Divine Authority, Feodalism, ...


¹It could be interesting to modify this number according to the Policies of the Empire receiving this bonus, like reduce it to 1 % on autocratic regimes, augment it to 15 % or 20 % for those with Liberty

[Geoff the Medio]

A Policy to increase Science output : Open Science.
+0.05 RP per population everywhere (citizen science, everyone is a contributor)
+ 30 % RP everywhere
+ 2 Stability for planets focused on Research

Similar to the effects of Technocracy.

- 50 % Influence production (you can't bullshit an educated population)

That explanation would increase influence cost, not reduce production, I think.

get 1% of the Research output of allied Empires
+ 1% Research for Empires at peace with the OpenScience Empire on research-focused planets
+ 10 % Research for allies on research-focused planets
10 % on the total Research put to one tech by the Empire is put to the same tech in all other Empires (they can benefit from the open science publications)

This is the interesting part that thematically fits and isn't redudant with other policies, I think. There is a general lack of policies relating to interactions between empires, other than just Allied Repair.

Something like this should also probably interact with a tech espionage type policy, making it much easier to siphon RP from other empires that have adopted it.

[Oberlus]

I like (and are in my sketch):

(- Academic Freedom (the other part of Liberty that I replaced with Democracy): flat bonus to research and malus to stability.)

- Open Science: Each of the empire's research-focused planets get extra RP from nearby foreign planets (unowned, or owned by an empire not at war and research-focused), and give back the same bonus.

- Free Trade: Each of the empire's planets get extra IP from nearby foreign planets (unowned or owned by an empire not at war), and give back the same bonus. If the two empires have the policy, total RP gain is doubled.

This bonuses better not a percentage, we already have two scaling priorities, one for the species trait and one for the policies effects. Something like +X*pop for each planet to spread over nearby (not counting unowned, I guess).

This two policies would be in the "Relations with foreign planets" subtype of policies that I haven't finished yet. And compatible with egalitarian/diplomatic empires.
Another policies in the same subtype would be to steal PP from supply lines (Piracy), steal PP from attacked planets (Raiding), get PP from planets not at war with you via taxes (Vassalization), maybe one to get influence from nearby foreign planets with an oppressive fluff, another to steal RP via telepathy-related tech from nearby planets (similar to Open Science but not giving back anything).

[LienRag]

another to steal RP via telepathy-related tech from nearby planets (similar to Open Science but not giving back anything).

Oh, nice idea !

[LienRag]

From 18th game :

Early game is way too punishing towards "wrong" paths. The difference between +2 liberty research/planet and not, is large. The difference between +5 centralisation research and not also considerable. We've got players struggling to crack 10 stability. I have over 10 on 3 planets that all have -5 from metropole. There's just a very limited number of winning paths and plenty of losing ones.

Globally a very good remark, but I'd quibble that the problem with Centralization is not that the bonus is important (it is, but not in an unbalanced manner imho), and actually the problem is not with Centralization (whose bonus is paid by a supply and influence malus that are highly punishing).
The underlying problem is that the game is broken on one of its major mechanisms, settling planets. With the very low growth, the limited player's agency over Stability in the early game, and the mismatch between the Stability requirements for boni and the benefits of these boni, it's basically never a good economic/research strategy to go settling planets, so the Policies that favor the Capital (to the detriment of settled planets) get completely unbalanced since sacrificing the minor planets has basically no setbacks.

Also Metropoles have a very bad consequence, it's that one just needs to settle any planet to reach the right number of planets that will allow the biggest ones to get the Metropole bonus. Which is the exact opposite of what was the objective of the new Influence mechanism, to have the player think strategically about what he's gonna settle or not.
So not any planet should be allowed to count for helping a Metropole, maybe a Stability of 10 should be required, and/or a Population of 5, and/or a maximal distance from the Metropole (won't work for dispersed empires/Species, but not everybody need to have use of Metropoles), and/or being settled for 20 turns ?


To offer alternative to Centralization, I think of four new Policies, available either at start or unlocked by a cheap Tech or building :
- Frontier Spirit : the planets of the settled system that is the furthest away from your Capital get no penalty (neither Influence nor stability) from deconnexion, get a flat + 5 Stability bonus, a flat + 1 Influence, and a flat +2 bonus on whatever their Focus is.
- Slow and Steady : as long as one has no more than 3 + turn_number/30 planets¹, each planet except the Capital gets +5 Stability and +1 to whatever their Focus is, as long as they are connected to the Capital (so, opportunities of disruption for enemy ships !).
- Panspermia : each Planet that is newly settled with a range of between N and 3N jumps from the Capitol gets a +10 bonus to Stability decaying over time (-0.1 point per turn), and a +0,1 per pop bonus to whatever its focus is, as long as its Stability is over 10. N starts at 1 and doubles each time a planet is settled (don't know how to make a permanent variable in FOCS, though). If many planets are settled the same turn, none gets the bonus.
- Solarpunk : each Planet around an Yellow star gets a +2 Stability bonus and +1 Production +0,5 Influence +0,5 Research

In the "Frontier Spirit" policy, since colonizing/invading a planet in a farther system would move the bonus to the new system, it makes the colonization pattern way more strategic (or at least needing a lot of careful thinking).

Maybe the "Exploration" policy could also add +30 Stealth to the furthest planet not supply-connected to the Capitol ? Or allow it to use the "Stealth" Focus² that brings 1 Stealth per turn, up to +30 (make it easier to understand that the Stealth is reversible if a planet even further is acquired or if the planet is supply-connected to the Capitol³) ? Obviously also give this furthest planet a +10 Stability bonus to compensate for not being connected (but we can keep the Influence malus, it's a cost to maintain an exploration outpost).

For unlocks, what I can think of :
- Frontier Spirit : unlocked by the first Outpost Base built
- Slow and Steady : unlocked by Algorithmic Elegance
- Panspermia : unlocked by Planetary Ecology
- Solarpunk : unlocked by Asymptotic Materials ? Not sure about the fluff justifying it... But Solar Orbital Generation is too far away in the Tech Tree.


I'd like to have a Policy unlocked by first discovery of an alien Species (native or player/AI) but don't have a good idea about one right now.

¹ Or systems, but I didn't want to make it too similar to the "Frontier Spirit" one
² That already exists in FOCS macros, but with a flat bonus IIRC
³ Imho it would be more interesting to have the planet lose 1 Stealth per turn then, rather than lose everything at once

[wobbly]

The underlying problem is that the game is broken on one of its major mechanisms, settling planets. With the very low growth, the limited player's agency over Stability in the early game, and the mismatch between the Stability requirements for boni and the benefits of these boni, it's basically never a good economic/research strategy to go settling planets, so the Policies that favor the Capital (to the detriment of settled planets) get completely unbalanced since sacrificing the minor planets has basically no setbacks.

A quibble with "never a good strategy to go settling planets". I went for early colonisation in game 17th and it work out just fine. I do however think that planet growth was slowed down too much. I'd prefer a half way pt between the old growth numbers and the new ones.

Example figure on current population growth. My 1st colony (small terran) is at 6.84 out of 10 on turn 62. Additional figures: Eaxaw 47, Eaxaw non-capital 19, Biege Goo 32. Notice the way that 1 native planet completely dwarves my colonization efforts?

[Ophiuchus]

I do however think that planet growth was slowed down too much. I'd prefer a half way pt between the old growth numbers and the new ones.

Example figure on current population growth. My 1st colony (small terran) is at 6.84 out of 10 on turn 62. Additional figures: Eaxaw 47, Eaxaw non-capital 19, Biege Goo 32. Notice the way that 1 native planet completely dwarves my colonization efforts?

happy christmas? PR-3621

Before introducing growth policy in 5c9b502, base growth factor was 0.01
Then it was 0.005, but one could improve it by 50% using the policy.
Now the base growth factor is 0.008

With adopted population policy growth is 0.012 (so 20% higher than originally). This may be too high, but it is better than what we have now and we can nerf it to 0.07 after the next test game if growth is too high. 0.006 was be not much difference and 0.007 being odd results in stranger numbers when adding 50% (0.007 *1.5 == 0.0105 vs 0.012).

[LienRag]

Actually, I'm not against keeping the base growth low, if there is some player agency about it (and not the Growth Policy being the only option to do so, especially since Social slots are scarce).

Have a better growth on high Stability levels (but not under Terror Suppression nor Indoctrination nor Conformance, so as to differentiate stability-by-adhesion from stability-from-repression) ? Like multiplying the growth by 0.1 Stability (reducing it while Stability is under 10, augmenting it when Stability raises over 10)...

Maybe have Slow and Steady not have a hard limit on number of planets (the bonus would be limited to the 3+t/30 planets, but would exist even with more planets settled), but have a growth bonus only when no more than 3+t/30 are settled ?
So if you want to have a full bonus, you don't settle more than 3+t/30, but if the Stability/focus is what you're after, you can settle more planets (who won't get this bonus) anyway ?

Also have Panspermia make the Growth bonus on the Capital work as an Evacuation System (but never lowering pop before 5, so no accidental reduction to outpost) ? This would mean a direct hit since the Capital production bonus would go down (as would go per-population boni that the high Stability on the Capital allows) but be a long-term investment since it would allow to populate settled planets quicker (and with the slow growth rate that we have now, it certainly wouldn't be a no-brainer, since even the Capital population would take time to replenish).

If the base growth is so low, then Growth policy should be higher. Maybe keep the base at 0,05 and put the Growth Policy growth at 0,15 (so choosing Growth over Liberty is a hard choice) ?
Other Policies could give a growth bonus of 0,01 each, making them not nil but not overpowered either (if you want real growth, go for Growth ! Other policies' bonus to Growth are just perks).
These other Policies could give growth bonus just to a subset of planets (specifically Good ones, or Adequate ones, or Oceans, or Capitol-species ones, or ImperialRegionalAdminstration Species, or Species who do not dislike any Policy in the Empire, or planets with a distance requirement, or with a Stability requirement, or with a Special on them, or with a specific Focus), in order to add diversity.
Growth-quickening Specials would be an important thing, too.

[Ophiuchus]

i think the growth policy policy +50% is actually good.
applying the policy is also a tradeoff.

besides paling to natives, another main problem here are metropoles. you need 20 population and that is something a native planet or an enemy homeworld might provide muuuuuuuch earlier. At turn 68 in slow-game 18 I may be able to put together a second metropole timing evacuation on most of my planets (so the population actually goes to the right places). It is very managy and also a huge hit on resources (the meters start climbing up from zero again, especially on my homeworld that is costly (i would get ~8pop from there).
Maybe the metropole policy should decrease growth on low populated/low stability planet and boost it on (free-possible metropoles) high populated 12 stability planets.


for boosting growth in i think the policy is a bit late/hard to research (very similar to exobot). i am not sure because i did not prioritize for that. it is 125RP in the current game so with that scaling one should be able to get it in 10 turns, plus you need to unlock a free social policy slot before. I would guess that propaganda broadcasts is still more important even if you go for metropoles(?).

....
ok, i just now tried with humans single-player with default scaling, pushing for population and it took me until turn ~65 to be able to apply metropoles, .
Id say that was mostly an average game. I applied a growth special to bring up the max pop (though i think at ~100 i got the tech not to need it) and evacuated from three planets to move pop over, so number of planets >7 and pop was > 20 in turn ~90-95. I had ignored influence and stability though and that made a major problem, especially with the -5 from metropoles (i did not understand when somebody told me before). I had to do some tricks (kick out growth, take liberty, kick out industrialisation and take balance because humans like that, brought me up to stability 9 on my future metropole) and remove and readd metropoles for three turns. actually i had to roll back some turns because the first try to get up stability was not working, left me with too few influence and had my empire in shreds (because of the missing +2 supply from metropoles). So I got my second metropole working in turn 105. That was a single-player game without AI, default monsters and specials and no natives. So without the specials, having the second metropole at turn 110 is certainly feasable and probably you could make it turn 90 if you make less mistakes than i did.

[LienRag]

As I wrote earlier, the main problem with Stability (and the high requirements of it to have any bonus) is that the player's agency over it is extremely limited at the beginning of the game; later, there are Policies and Policy Slots unlocked that can be used to manage the Stability levels, but at start either the player entirely goes with its starting Species likes and dislikes (driving his strategy, which is not good) or he is lucky enough to have a Stability booster right on the planets he can colonize, or he has to make do without the boni.
Also, since having a Native planet early is a matter of luck and a huge bonus to a starting Empire, it's nearly impossible to pass over a chance to get the first Natives available, which also makes Stability a problem if those Natives are not compatible dislikes-wise the player's Species - but not in a fun nor strategic way since the player's agency is still limited at start (yes, nobody is forced to invade, but if getting the wrong Native nearby wrecks the Empire's ability to have a good start, it makes the luck factor even worse).
The likes/dislikes mechanism is designed to make Native acquisition a strategic feat and not a no-brainer, but at start (except maybe on high Natives settings) that's not what it produces.

So, here's an Economic Policy that can help solve this problem (yes, I know that Stability is usually addressed by Social Policies, but Social slots come later in the game, and if we make getting an early Social slot mandatory that's not helping a diversity of strategies) :

[*] Trust-based economy :
Unlocked at start.
Gives a flat +10 Stability bonus to all planets, and to the same Planets a Stability malus of [SquareRoot(TotalNumberOfPlanetsSettled+TotalNumberOfOutposts+TotalNumberOfBuildings+TotalNumberOfPolicies+TotalNumberOtTechs+TotalNumberOfSpecies)+NumberOfBuildingsOnThePlanet].

So basically, the Empire starts happy, and as it grows the Emperor has to find ways to manage Stability as the trust system that works well in a simple society starts to not be sufficient...
You'll note that it will take long for this Policy to not bring any bonus (basically, up to 100 total of planets, buildings, techs, Species and Policies); but its bonus will start relatively early to be less prominent (25 of total means the bonus dives to +5 only), and the Policy takes an Economic Slot (so, basically, it's that or Centralization, or Industrialism), which are not as scarce as Social ones, but still limited.
Also, each Player's action and success (settling, researching, building, invading) will have an effect on the Stability bonus, but an effect small enough to not forbid these actions, just to make the player think about them rather than doing everything at once (you won't research a tech you don't need, for example, even for those who have a small RP cost; nor invade a Native that doesn't bring you anything).

I wouldn't give this Policy any exclusive save Terror Suppression, so that it can be used in a variety of different strategies.

i think the growth policy policy +50% is actually good.
applying the policy is also a tradeoff.

What I was mostly saying is that if you want to nerf the growth nerf (revert to a better growth, like the 0,08 you proposed) it is better to keep the base growth low and raise it through Policies, that allows for more gameplay diversity.

[Ophiuchus]

player's agency over <Stability> is extremely limited at the beginning of the game

agreed, not much wiggling room and mostly dependent on empire species. i think that likes/dislikes shapes the empire is actually a good thing, but it is probably very easily unbalanced.

but if getting the wrong Native nearby wrecks the Empire's ability to have a good start, it makes the luck factor even worse).

I'd phrase it the other way round - having the right natives close is huge boost.

The likes/dislikes mechanism is designed to make Native acquisition a strategic feat and not a no-brainer, but at start (except maybe on high Natives settings) that's not what it produces.

invading natives now is a lot less a no-brainer than before for me. before there was almost no downside to invading natives.
i dont know if you guys had use for natives. until end of game, oberlus and i did not get any. wobbly did get some benefit out of it. i was pondering if i should invade raaagh, which i usually ignore; but they had 20 pop, so they would have been a metropole option (i could have put a lot of suppressors there to boost stability if not sufficient).


So, here's an Economic Policy that can help solve this problem (yes, I know that Stability is usually addressed by Social Policies, but Social slots come later in the game, and if we make getting an early Social slot mandatory that's not helping a diversity of strategies) :

[*] Trust-based economy : ...

LGTM

which are not as scarce as Social ones, but still limited.

i think the economic slots are scarce (in the sense that i would like to adopt more policies than i have slots).
first social slot is just quite later. second economic slot is easy and a must-have. second and third social slots are both ok to get. the third social one is much easier to get than the third economic one.

if you dont hate military command, getting two military slots is ok.

i think the growth policy policy +50% is actually good.
applying the policy is also a tradeoff.

What I was mostly saying is that if you want to nerf the growth nerf (revert to a better growth, like the 0,08 you proposed) it is better to keep the base growth low and raise it through Policies, that allows for more gameplay diversity.

i am working on getting an early boost (tied to bootstrapping) and a late boost (tied to metropoles) which can also be applied on top of population policy.
but the math is a bit daunting (if not going for if-then-else).

[Grummel7]

Regarding speeding up colony growth I remember that in the MOO, you could sent settlers from one planet to another. In fact you almost wonder why this should not be possible. Of course evacuation kind of does it, but since evacuation basically shuts down the sending planet, you won't ever do that on your home planet.

Doing it the same way as in MOO would cause too much micromanagent. But there was some discussion to change Evacuation so that is is really only meant to send out population and not to just empty a planet even if there is no place to send the people to.

If we replace Evacuation by something that does not stop production nor population growth on the sending planet, it could be used temporarily even on the home planet, or maybe on another, fast growing but not so useful colony, to kick-start new colonies. Especially if it is implemented in a way that the settler will go to the planet that is emptiest, i.e. that has the smallest ratio of current/max population.

[Ophiuchus]

Regarding speeding up colony growth I remember that in the MOO, you could sent settlers from one planet to another. In fact you almost wonder why this should not be possible.
...
Doing it the same way as in MOO would cause too much micromanagent.
...
If we replace Evacuation by something that does not stop production nor population growth on the sending planet, it could be used temporarily even on the home planet, or maybe on another, fast growing but not so useful colony, to kick-start new colonies. Especially if it is implemented in a way that the settler will go to the planet that is emptiest, i.e. that has the smallest ratio of current/max population.

using evacuation for the same purpose is more trouble.

JFYI I quite often did evac on my home planet (and been that since a long time); its quite a resource hit, but done at the right moment it is quite jump starting the population in an empire (so a long term investment). the trouble with it is that i misuse it in order to bring up population of certain planets - that is quite suckish and micro management (you can prevent pop going somewhere by setting evacuation on that place). but i usually do that maximum once per game, so it is not too bad.

i think the high resource hit is there in order to stop people from micromanagement.

so one way to do it is migration policy like oberlus suggested: slowing growth on populated planets, increasing growth on empty planets.
(one could of course also do that with "real" migration, where population is decreased in some places and increased in others)

there might be (another kind of) growth focus in order to specify where population should especially grow fast.

we certainly should not have mechanism where you can choose both the target and source planets and have it low cost.

[LienRag]

The likes/dislikes mechanism is designed to make Native acquisition a strategic feat and not a no-brainer, but at start (except maybe on high Natives settings) that's not what it produces.

invading natives now is a lot less a no-brainer than before for me. before there was almost no downside to invading natives.
i dont know if you guys had use for natives. until end of game, oberlus and i did not get any. wobbly did get some benefit out of it. i was pondering if i should invade raaagh, which i usually ignore; but they had 20 pop, so they would have been a metropole option (i could have put a lot of suppressors there to boost stability if not sufficient).

Well, yes, and it's good; but I mean that as you experienced for the Raagh, at the beginning of the game it does have drawbacks if the Species stability and likes/dislikes are not the ones the player wants, but they're still too good to pass.

It just adds to the luck factor, doesn't add much strategy (again, I'm speaking about the beginning of the game).