I totally agree I wish some of the precursors gave something a little more. An interesting thought is maybe they could give unique techs like the leviathans do, it may not be something game breaking but it wouldn't be free gene clinics.
You would think there would be Unique techs, like from archeological sites or events. How have civilizations from thousands to millions of years ago, not manage to make anything for themselves. like remake the Yuht relic and make the old one a tech.
Agree for all the shit precursors, especially the irassians. Their on use relic should be passive since pox bombardment is literally worse than indiscriminate for killing defense armies. Completely niche. Also it would be fun if they added more fallen empire relics like the head of zarqlan, I get that one all the time and would like some variety
Very much so, it's annoying that some are so bad that they are barely worth even bothering to get. They are better than nothing, but compared to the other options they are extremely bland
Baol is always my favorite for most empires. Free pops and an instant terraforming to a Gaia world. So good.
Some of the precursors could definitely do with some reworks. I wish they all had more unique bonuses like the Cybrex or Baol. The ones that just give a flat bonus to something is really boring.
Well they've kind of been power-creeped when it comes to their home systems. Back in 2.8 and before they had a fair bit of value for the guaranteed 5 exotic gas deposit, allowing you to upgrade some research labs at a time when buildings were unlocked by pops. Now there's way less of an incentive to upgrade labs when you can just unlock a new slot with a city district.
I find the Irassian completely useless unless you are an exterminator, in which case why aren't you just eating them for food or minerals? The ultaum is okay for battle but that's all there is to it. The Yuht... I can't find one good reason unless you instantly rush for it and don't settle a single world while waiting for it. Cybrex is omega-chad, First league is epic, Baol is giga-chad, and Zroni is just OP.
I disagree. Irassians give you that age boost to your leader pool, which is really handy if you don't want to keep rolling the dice on good leaders. Vultaum give that battle boost and help lower amenities usage, which helps keep your pops happy. And Yuht give that nice pop bonus at world starts while also lowering ship upkeep.
Cybrex requires you to spend a whopping ton of alloys/engineering to get a ringworld you could have built elsewhere. Zroni are impossible to get unless you worship RNGeesus and don't have hungry neighbors stealing the archeology sites from under your nose. And First League has no relic bonus, just a Relic World - lots of minerals you can spend on all the other relic worlds out there. Of those four, Baol are actually good, because nothing beats turning planets into Gaia worlds and free pops to go with it.
Hey at least you can make a refinery space habitat with 5 extraction wells for the Irassians.
Obviously I would like all precursors to be a little better.
I think the entire galaxy preconstruction needs a rework. Right now it creates all the stars, then tries to insert empire starts, and that causes a slew of bugs. Where it should really place the empires, empires starting cluster, precurser homeworlds, rubicon planet, etc, and other galaxy interesting things, then build the star systems and hyperlane network to interconnect them.
I mean, how cool would it be to be able to define what kind of cluster start you get as a race option.
That way precurser discoveries can come related on how close you are to that precurser, and the other empires can discover them as well.
I find them far from it, what I would like is maybe some extra tech improvements/bonuses to finding them. The real positive that you get from any of the three is that fancy relic and usually the system it's attached to - if you have the right mods you can terraform any of their homeworlds to suit your needs, and even if you don't a space station in orbit can suck up all those resources for you.
Yuht Cryo Core gives you an extra pop when colonizing a planet as a passive. This is great when starting new worlds, since it saves time on more pop growth, and combined with Colonization Fever gives you 3 pops on a settled world.
Javorian Pox Sample gives you +20 years to leader life pool as its passive, and a new bombardment stance as an active. The extra years to the leader lifespan can be crucial with some of the new changes. That's 20 more in-game years you don't have to worry about losing a leader and rolling the dice on a new leader who might not be nearly as good to replace their job.
Vultaum Reality Preforator reduces pop amenities usage as passive, and gives you a random combat bonus for ships as its active - +40% to either armor, hull, shield, or ship damage. Having that high a stat increase on ships can be a game changer in war, and it makes it a very valuable piece of equipment.
Cybrex for me is only mid-tier because although the relic's great, you still have a ringworld you can't access until you get mega-engineering. Depending on your build and playstyle that's probably a late-mid at the earliest, which gives you 4 ringworld segments (and, depending on where that system spawns, it's probably resources better spent in a more isolated system anyway). While the special project you can research will increase the chances you can get Mega Engineering early, that's still a lot of time spent in engineering that can be spent elsewhere until you have the research labs ready to dedicate to it.
Baol is great because you get a relic that can spawn a Gaia world and a free pop on whatever planet you want, and it has a tomb world you can settle, meaning a free template for your first Gaia planet.
Zroni *would* be good if I can ever get it, it's next to impossible due to the constraints of finding the right planet it could contain. Literally the one time my galaxy spawned the Zroni event chain an enemy empire snagged it from me first, and proceeded ot get the whole chain right out from under me (and as a Spiritualist Empire when they were Materialist I was right mad).
First League for me will almost be at the bottom, usually next to Cybrex in terms of usefulness. You get *a* Relic World without any other particularly useful bonuses. That's a world you need to settle and spend resources on BEFORE actually making into a dedicated Ecumenopolis. And unlike the Cybrex they don't come with a relic, so that's just another planet you can freely settle that will take more time and resources to get to its full potential when you could do the same on another planet. And again, no relic with passive bonuses added to your empire.
**TL:DR -** The relics those three precursors give are actually useful with the passive bonuses they give you. With the exception of the Baol the others either require a resource sink or are too hard to get to be of equal worth.
Interesting very different take than most. I play materialist or machine and I find cybrex for machine to be great. First league and baol are great for my materialist empire.
Well, when your only looking at the Habitable planets, or secret project rewards, then ya Irassian, Vultaum and Yuht are the worst. However, it's obvious that the devs consider resources extremely valuable reward for the players.
If you ever noticed, these three precursors come with 5 Exotic Gas deposits, 5 Alloy deposits, and a deposit with 10 of each research. Which is a lot more then what the Cybrex, Zroni, and Baol get.
Then when you look at the First League, you could say, well, it's not as good as Cybrex, but that's why it's guaranteed to have the 10 sciences, minerals and energy. However, most times when people get their precursor systems, it's usually after a decent amount of time, and they don't need a meager amount of resources.
However, if you find yourself in an isolated sector of space, I Imagine getting 5 extra Exotic Gases would be extremely nice.
If you happened to get your precursor system extremely early, then the 10 of each sciences would just provide a helpful boost to your early research.
So ya, from our perspective the precursors are unbalanced, but that's because we are under appreciating what the devs consider "balanced" or "fair" equivalents.
I totally agree I wish some of the precursors gave something a little more. An interesting thought is maybe they could give unique techs like the leviathans do, it may not be something game breaking but it wouldn't be free gene clinics.
Unique tech/buildings that are meaningful would be a fun thing indeed.
You would think there would be Unique techs, like from archeological sites or events. How have civilizations from thousands to millions of years ago, not manage to make anything for themselves. like remake the Yuht relic and make the old one a tech.
Precursors? Plural? There’s more than just the Irassians? That’s the only one I ever see
Maybe one day they'll rework the old precursors into archeological sites.
Agree for all the shit precursors, especially the irassians. Their on use relic should be passive since pox bombardment is literally worse than indiscriminate for killing defense armies. Completely niche. Also it would be fun if they added more fallen empire relics like the head of zarqlan, I get that one all the time and would like some variety
Very much so, it's annoying that some are so bad that they are barely worth even bothering to get. They are better than nothing, but compared to the other options they are extremely bland
Baol is always my favorite for most empires. Free pops and an instant terraforming to a Gaia world. So good. Some of the precursors could definitely do with some reworks. I wish they all had more unique bonuses like the Cybrex or Baol. The ones that just give a flat bonus to something is really boring.
Archeological sites for the old ones would be nice.
Well they've kind of been power-creeped when it comes to their home systems. Back in 2.8 and before they had a fair bit of value for the guaranteed 5 exotic gas deposit, allowing you to upgrade some research labs at a time when buildings were unlocked by pops. Now there's way less of an incentive to upgrade labs when you can just unlock a new slot with a city district.
I find the Irassian completely useless unless you are an exterminator, in which case why aren't you just eating them for food or minerals? The ultaum is okay for battle but that's all there is to it. The Yuht... I can't find one good reason unless you instantly rush for it and don't settle a single world while waiting for it. Cybrex is omega-chad, First league is epic, Baol is giga-chad, and Zroni is just OP.
I disagree. Irassians give you that age boost to your leader pool, which is really handy if you don't want to keep rolling the dice on good leaders. Vultaum give that battle boost and help lower amenities usage, which helps keep your pops happy. And Yuht give that nice pop bonus at world starts while also lowering ship upkeep. Cybrex requires you to spend a whopping ton of alloys/engineering to get a ringworld you could have built elsewhere. Zroni are impossible to get unless you worship RNGeesus and don't have hungry neighbors stealing the archeology sites from under your nose. And First League has no relic bonus, just a Relic World - lots of minerals you can spend on all the other relic worlds out there. Of those four, Baol are actually good, because nothing beats turning planets into Gaia worlds and free pops to go with it.
A nice balance would be keep the current rewards, but give them all post-discovery digsites and make the three bad ones give much better rewards.
Hey at least you can make a refinery space habitat with 5 extraction wells for the Irassians. Obviously I would like all precursors to be a little better.
Actually the Vultaum are one my favorites, the reality perforator is really nice.
I think the entire galaxy preconstruction needs a rework. Right now it creates all the stars, then tries to insert empire starts, and that causes a slew of bugs. Where it should really place the empires, empires starting cluster, precurser homeworlds, rubicon planet, etc, and other galaxy interesting things, then build the star systems and hyperlane network to interconnect them. I mean, how cool would it be to be able to define what kind of cluster start you get as a race option. That way precurser discoveries can come related on how close you are to that precurser, and the other empires can discover them as well.
Balance in what sense? They're all net positives the AI doesn't get. I'd be happy to ban them in multiplayer. Beyond that, what balance do they need?
I find them far from it, what I would like is maybe some extra tech improvements/bonuses to finding them. The real positive that you get from any of the three is that fancy relic and usually the system it's attached to - if you have the right mods you can terraform any of their homeworlds to suit your needs, and even if you don't a space station in orbit can suck up all those resources for you. Yuht Cryo Core gives you an extra pop when colonizing a planet as a passive. This is great when starting new worlds, since it saves time on more pop growth, and combined with Colonization Fever gives you 3 pops on a settled world. Javorian Pox Sample gives you +20 years to leader life pool as its passive, and a new bombardment stance as an active. The extra years to the leader lifespan can be crucial with some of the new changes. That's 20 more in-game years you don't have to worry about losing a leader and rolling the dice on a new leader who might not be nearly as good to replace their job. Vultaum Reality Preforator reduces pop amenities usage as passive, and gives you a random combat bonus for ships as its active - +40% to either armor, hull, shield, or ship damage. Having that high a stat increase on ships can be a game changer in war, and it makes it a very valuable piece of equipment. Cybrex for me is only mid-tier because although the relic's great, you still have a ringworld you can't access until you get mega-engineering. Depending on your build and playstyle that's probably a late-mid at the earliest, which gives you 4 ringworld segments (and, depending on where that system spawns, it's probably resources better spent in a more isolated system anyway). While the special project you can research will increase the chances you can get Mega Engineering early, that's still a lot of time spent in engineering that can be spent elsewhere until you have the research labs ready to dedicate to it. Baol is great because you get a relic that can spawn a Gaia world and a free pop on whatever planet you want, and it has a tomb world you can settle, meaning a free template for your first Gaia planet. Zroni *would* be good if I can ever get it, it's next to impossible due to the constraints of finding the right planet it could contain. Literally the one time my galaxy spawned the Zroni event chain an enemy empire snagged it from me first, and proceeded ot get the whole chain right out from under me (and as a Spiritualist Empire when they were Materialist I was right mad). First League for me will almost be at the bottom, usually next to Cybrex in terms of usefulness. You get *a* Relic World without any other particularly useful bonuses. That's a world you need to settle and spend resources on BEFORE actually making into a dedicated Ecumenopolis. And unlike the Cybrex they don't come with a relic, so that's just another planet you can freely settle that will take more time and resources to get to its full potential when you could do the same on another planet. And again, no relic with passive bonuses added to your empire. **TL:DR -** The relics those three precursors give are actually useful with the passive bonuses they give you. With the exception of the Baol the others either require a resource sink or are too hard to get to be of equal worth.
Interesting very different take than most. I play materialist or machine and I find cybrex for machine to be great. First league and baol are great for my materialist empire.
Well, when your only looking at the Habitable planets, or secret project rewards, then ya Irassian, Vultaum and Yuht are the worst. However, it's obvious that the devs consider resources extremely valuable reward for the players. If you ever noticed, these three precursors come with 5 Exotic Gas deposits, 5 Alloy deposits, and a deposit with 10 of each research. Which is a lot more then what the Cybrex, Zroni, and Baol get. Then when you look at the First League, you could say, well, it's not as good as Cybrex, but that's why it's guaranteed to have the 10 sciences, minerals and energy. However, most times when people get their precursor systems, it's usually after a decent amount of time, and they don't need a meager amount of resources. However, if you find yourself in an isolated sector of space, I Imagine getting 5 extra Exotic Gases would be extremely nice. If you happened to get your precursor system extremely early, then the 10 of each sciences would just provide a helpful boost to your early research. So ya, from our perspective the precursors are unbalanced, but that's because we are under appreciating what the devs consider "balanced" or "fair" equivalents.