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[vcuh666]

At Louis Armstrong Station I can 'volunteer' 10 crew to gain +3 relationship with Pirates. I could raid the pirates for loot, then volunteer crew to get back the relationship loss and the crew will cost less than the loot.

Shouldn't that relationship improvement be with MB? Also, it seems really high and is a very cheap way to get relationship. I'd suggest less relationship with MB in exchange for a much larger amount of crew.

Since I don't use Angry Periphery, I wanted to increase the size of the MB/KoC colonies in my own game. I edited the arcadia.json file and made both colonies size 6. I gave Nomios mining, commerce and light industry, which combines well with their volatile/organic deposit. It also complements the heavy industry and refining on Agreus, I like to imagine that both megacorps will trade together. Both got starfortresses to keep them safe.

Here is how i built up the worlds in my own test game-

Nomios-
https://postimg.cc/w78XQT5f

Agreus (I removed the KoC Shipbreaking since I'm using IndoEvo. Ignore the redundant Ground Defenses, that's a bug from the Second Wave mod)-
https://postimg.cc/0MKS7Lz1

[Great Wound]

Should there be any custom diplomacy settings between KoC and Mabye-Gogol to make them more/less peaceful to each other since they share a system? Are they rivals?

I also forgot about the Sindrians, should Mbaye-Gogol have friendly relations with them as is implied by the picture in the original post? Are they selling slaves volunteers to serve Philip? I think it'd be good fit for M-B since they don't currently have any friends other than TT.

The nex files are Ok as they are, but I made some very minor changes (gave them half the infantry morale effects of their parent faction, made Luddites hate KoC as much as Mbaye-Gogol, changed industry/bonusSeeds). Hopefully we can get it all finalised for the next official KoC release.

I'd also suggest some minor changes to the fleet names in the .faction files of the original mod as follows to develop the themes of each faction.

Between KoC and Gogol, I'm unsure. I say let the chips lie where they fall and to not give them any custom settings.

Sindrians, yes, get them to buddy up. I imagine MbG would sell 'debt' to the Diktat as means of slave trading. I also envisaged MbG acting as clandestine contractors for the the Diktat, and in case SHTF MbG they have got a cryo-pod with Andradas name on it in case he needs to go in to hiding long-term.

Names have been changed.

The written faction lore was very helpful for imagining their personalities, they are both a different type of evil. The KoC is staffed by a mix of war profiteers and ex-Hegemony military veterans but without any of the oversight from civilian Hegemony nobility to hold them back. I like that it's ambiguous about who/what exactly the Mbaye-Gogol elite are, and is the Rogue AI a loser in an internal power struggle? The indentured servant stuff is a really strong theme for the faction and makes them stand out and be unique since we don't hear that about the other factions.

They will give out commissions unless you don't use the custom .faction files. Mbaye-Gogol has phase ships so devious seemed very appropriate for them. Low Profile should keep them both alive for longer since they're both designed to get into protective alliances and the larger factions should be taking most of the hits.

I considered making them both pacifist but it might prevent them from using the irridentist trait to retake their homeworlds from invasion, if it comes to that.

Good shouts and calls, I'd actually imagined the KoC more like space Taiwan, wanting independence from the Hegemony but having no means while the Perseans supply them weapons for "self defense" in order to stir trouble. The Hegemony wants to reabsorb the KoC but publicly uses them as a outreach to independent colonies, who would otherwise refuse contact, as means of strengthen diplomatic ties with the ultimate goal of reabsorbing those colonies. Having them be war profiteers on the side works really well with that: "The Hegemony has asked me to visit you about restoring diplomatic relations, but if you don't fancy it I have all these fancy Persean-made weapons I can sell you...".

With that in mind I'd probably swap out the 'Dislikes AI' trait for 'Devious', rumors have it they make a profit scraping intelligence from dead pseudo-AI cores. The devious is more representative of their diplomats actions with things such as disrupting industries being the result of industrial action they had a hand in organizing.

would you consider similarly adding a unique hullmod to all KoC and M-B faction ships to make them more distinctive?

The KoC already get Blockade Runner and MbG get Phase Resonator.

I've also added commissioned crew bonuses for the next release.

At Louis Armstrong Station I can 'volunteer' 10 crew to gain +3 relationship with Pirates. I could raid the pirates for loot, then volunteer crew to get back the relationship loss and the crew will cost less than the loot.

Shouldn't that relationship improvement be with MB? Also, it seems really high and is a very cheap way to get relationship. I'd suggest less relationship with MB in exchange for a much larger amount of crew.

I'll admit, I haven't spent much effort balancing that, the whole thing is basically a bit of fun and a morale choice, do you even know what happens to those dudes...... they definitely ain't going in storage and I guarantee it ain't pleasant.

The good thing is it has a cooldown so it isn't the easiest thing to abuse.


As for colonies, I'll have to get back to you on that...

[vcuh666]

Sindrians, yes, get them to buddy up. I imagine MbG would sell 'debt' to the Diktat as means of slave trading. I also envisaged MbG acting as clandestine contractors for the the Diktat, and in case SHTF MbG they have got a cryo-pod with Andradas name on it in case he needs to go in to hiding long-term.

Done. Kanta's Den is ruled by Warlord Kanta, who in lore is supposed to be 200+ years old. Her ingame profile pic makes her look very inhuman, almost alien. Kanta's Den also often has shortages of organs. Presumably Kanta is using harvested organs for life extension. It'd make sense if Andrada is preparing to do the same thing, and for MbG to have a special arrangement with Sindria.

Good shouts and calls, I'd actually imagined the KoC more like space Taiwan, wanting independence from the Hegemony but having no means while the Perseans supply them weapons for "self defense" in order to stir trouble. The Hegemony wants to reabsorb the KoC but publicly uses them as a outreach to independent colonies, who would otherwise refuse contact, as means of strengthen diplomatic ties with the ultimate goal of reabsorbing those colonies. Having them be war profiteers on the side works really well with that: "The Hegemony has asked me to visit you about restoring diplomatic relations, but if you don't fancy it I have all these fancy Persean-made weapons I can sell you...".

I feel like we have brainstormed some good ideas for faction lore. Maybe you could expand on the lore text that appears on the faction page ingame? The one that is in the screenshots in the original post.

I'll admit, I haven't spent much effort balancing that, the whole thing is basically a bit of fun and a morale choice, do you even know what happens to those dudes...... they definitely ain't going in storage and I guarantee it ain't pleasant.

The good thing is it has a cooldown so it isn't the easiest thing to abuse.

I didn't notice the cooldown, sorry. If it has a cooldown then it's probably fine then.

I'd still suggest switching the rep gain from pirates to MbG. Also I'd suggest making it cause a relationship decrease with the Church and Pathers.

As for colonies, I'll have to get back to you on that...

In Nexerelin games, they will need at least the second tier of defense station. Otherwise they will be too weak to resist the raids/invasions. In my test game I gave them the third tier. Like, a player usually prioritises defense for a starter colony so it makes sense that they also did that when they bought the planets.

Both factions have the monopolist trait, which makes them more likely to send raids against the player in response to large market shares of player industry. In order to make this feature more active, they need to have more export industries. Right now MbG only has organs as an export so they have very little reason to send raids against the player.

This is also good because it provides an opportunity for the player to encounter the faction-specific ships in battle. And it provides more reason for the player to visit those planets if they have more trade opportunities.

I'm not sure if they will send agents against the player to sabotage industries for market share reasons, but if they do then it would make use of the devious trait, which is another reason to expand their exports.

If you're willing to make Agreus larger, then maybe consider improving it's ore resources and giving them mining.

[Great Wound]

Done. Kanta's Den is ruled by Warlord Kanta, who in lore is supposed to be 200+ years old. Her ingame profile pic makes her look very inhuman, almost alien. Kanta's Den also often has shortages of organs. Presumably Kanta is using harvested organs for life extension. It'd make sense if Andrada is preparing to do the same thing, and for MbG to have a special arrangement with Sindria.

I feel like we have brainstormed some good ideas for faction lore. Maybe you could expand on the lore text that appears on the faction page ingame?

I like that touch with MbG supplying organs for Andrarda's...personal use...  You've certainly helped me expand the lore from an abstract concept with more specific examples.

As for getting that lore in game. I don't think the faction page is the ideal place as I don't want it to turn in to an essay. I've got a rules template for hooking it into Callisto. Getting the information from in-game characters would be a more organic and natural way for the player to find out the darker sides of the factions. Just need to figure out how to create custom persons and get them in game so it's not all coming from one person:

Story Hook

[close]

In Nexerelin games, they will need at least the second tier of defense station. Otherwise they will be too weak to resist the raids/invasions. In my test game I gave them the third tier. Like, a player usually prioritises defense for a starter colony so it makes sense that they also did that when they bought the planets.

Both factions have the monopolist trait, which makes them more likely to send raids against the player in response to large market shares of player industry. In order to make this feature more active, they need to have more export industries. Right now MbG only has organs as an export so they have very little reason to send raids against the player.

This is my concern with Nex, there's so many "they must" it takes away from them being unique, I want the KoC to fit in Vanilla first and foremost. Here's the current setup for Arcadia:

Arcadia.json

Code

{
	"starSystem":"arcadia",
	"markets":[
		{
			"entities":["nomios"],
			"faction":"MaybeGoogle",
			"size":5,
			"startingConditions":[
				"population_5",
				"thin_atmosphere",
				"cold",
				"volatiles_abundant",
				"organics_common",
				"rogue_ai_core",
		                "stealth_minefields",
		                "trade_center",
			],
			"industries":[
				["population", "orbital_fusion_lamp"],
				"spaceport",
				"cryosanctum",
				"heavybatteries",
				"militarybase",
				["commerce", "dealmaker_holosuite"],
				"cryorevival",
				"orbitalstation_high",
                		"mining",
			],
		},
		{
			"entities":["arcadia_station"],
			"faction":"hegemony",
			"size":5,
			"startingConditions":[
				"volatiles_abundant",
		                "outpost",
				"population_5",
			],
			"industries":[
				"population",
				"spaceport",
				"militarybase",
				"starfortress",
				"mining",
		                "commerce",
		                "grounddefenses",
		                "waystation",
			],
		},
		{
			"entities":["agreus"],
			"faction":"KoC",
			"size":6,
			"startingConditions":[
				"shipbreaking_center",
				"ruins_extensive",
				"population_5",
				"ore_sparse",
				"volatiles_trace",
				"cold",
				"no_atmosphere",
			],
			"industries":[
				"population",
				"megaport",
				["refining", "catalytic_core"],
				"militarybase",
				"heavyindustry",
				["heavybatteries", "drone_replicator"],
 		               "techmining",
		                "KoC_Breaking",
#				"orbitalstation",
			],
		},
	],


}

[close]

Nomios is built around commerce and the cryosanctum/revival, I've added mining as per your suggestion but gave them an Orbital fusion lamp instead of +1 size and light industry (Nomious is a rather cold place to live), the irony being that what they're mining is exactly what they need; Organics for Cryorevial and Volatiles for the Lamp. They'll never produce enough but they have a large commerce sector to drive imports.

Argeus is shipbreaking and construction. Not much change here, you'll notice they don't have an orbital station, why...

Because Arcadia has been upgraded to a starfortress! Arcadia is a logistics station, it's also serves as a 'reminder' to the KoC to not step out of line, it's there to both intimidate them and protect them should anybody encroach on the Hegemonies territory, which Argeus is considered a part of...

[vcuh666]

In my test games I found that KoC and MbG formed alliances with their parent factions very quickly, too quickly. I feel like it'd be better to cut their diplomacy bonuses by half, maybe three-quarters. That should give the RNG more chance to form alternate arrangements, in particular for KoC to have a chance at forming an alliance with the Perseans. KoC and MbG already have a lot of diplo bonuses from shared alignment traits and common enemies, so the diplo bonuses are mostly redundant and possibly counter-productive if too high.

I'll drop it by 2/3 and see what happens on a new game.

As for getting that lore in game. I don't think the faction page is the ideal place as I don't want it to turn in to an essay. I've got a rules template for hooking it into Callisto. Getting the information from in-game characters would be a more organic and natural way for the player to find out the darker sides of the factions. Just need to figure out how to create custom persons and get them in game so it's not all coming from one person:

So wave me Mbaye lol embrace the memes!

Sounds good, the more interactivity the better. Are you also considering adding custom missions and bounties for the IBB? Smuggling missions for organs to Sindria (often very hard because it has such high security)? Helping KoC trade with the Perseans without letting the Hegemony find out (and doging the Hegemony when they try to intercept you)? Minor piracy 'acquiring' specific Hegemony/Persean hulls for the KoC to renovate, repaint and sell on for profit?

Since the KoC has blockade running and MbG has phase ships, it seems like they're built for smuggling missions.

This is my concern with Nex, there's so many "they must" it takes away from them being unique, I want the KoC to fit in Vanilla first and foremost. Here's the current setup for Arcadia:

That's a fair point. Balancing it for Nexerelin is significantly divergent from vanilla balance.

I've learned to modify the .json files for my own games so I have nothing to complain about since I can modify it for personal use. My own game is a wartorn hell with 10-15 Pirate/LP bases and Cabal fleets everywhere, balancing for it is defnitely not like vanilla lol.

Nomios is built around commerce and the cryosanctum/revival, I've added mining as per your suggestion but gave them an Orbital fusion lamp instead of +1 size and light industry (Nomious is a rather cold place to live), the irony being that what they're mining is exactly what they need; Organics for Cryorevial and Volatiles for the Lamp. They'll never produce enough but they have a large commerce sector to drive imports.

Argeus is shipbreaking and construction. Not much change here, you'll notice they don't have an orbital station, why...

Because Arcadia has been upgraded to a starfortress! Arcadia is a logistics station, it's also serves as a 'reminder' to the KoC to not step out of line, it's there to both intimidate them and protect them should anybody encroach on the Hegemonies territory, which Argeus is considered a part of...

I like the touch with the orbital lamp, and it seemed a shame to waste those resources when their industries needed them.

[vcuh666]

Yeah, 1/3 of the diplo values is good. It's enough to setup positive relations but they're still at the mercy of the RNG gods. MbG actually has negative relations with Sindria in the early game right now due to a random event. KoC has almost equal relations between heg/perseans and could swing either way with future alliances depending on RNG.

There is still a slight bias to the RNG so they should still tend in the right direction over a long enough time. They shouldn't be so 'locked-in' to their diplomatic relations now.

[vcuh666]

I ahven't tried the KoC/MbG ships yet. I noticed that the factions have only their own custom ships and no vanilla ones. Are the faction ships enough to make a functional battle fleet? I'm not sure how it would play out on a battle that isn't auto-calc.

[Nyctophonik]

I smell nex settings/econ conversation...

... but really, considering I made a giant database about it I like to think I'd be able to advise economic/diplomatic changes, if you want me to of course. I also made a (currently unreleased) mod focused entirely on the economy + politics over the guns or hulls.

and while I'm here, how does the Periphery Planet Pack work? You say that it makes the Ko/M-G stronger, but I don't notice anything suggesting that...
I'll probably just run the game for myself to find out, though.

[vcuh666]

I smell nex settings/econ conversation...

... but really, considering I made a giant database about it I like to think I'd be able to advise economic/diplomatic changes, if you want me to of course. I also made a (currently unreleased) mod focused entirely on the economy + politics over the guns or hulls.

and while I'm here, how does the Periphery Planet Pack work? You say that it makes the Ko/M-G stronger, but I don't notice anything suggesting that...
I'll probably just run the game for myself to find out, though.

I'll leave it to great Wound to explain, in his own words, his intentions for KoC, the PPP and Angry Periphery submods since they're his own work. Right now we've agreed that balancing it for vanilla takes precedence over Nexerelin stuff.

Does your econ rebalance have any publically available content, here or in Discord?

My dream mod for this game is one that seperates all the Pirate and Independent markets into unique factions. KoC is a significant step in that direction, so I'm eager to get the Nex content working. If you would download the attachments in my previous posts, look over the nex faction configs and give feedback then that'd be a good contribution.

[Nyctophonik]

The mod I made is a faction mod (or three). It adds some anti-Hegemony factions whose combined strength was, in testing, enough to deter the Hegemony + Iron Shells' often brokenly powerful alliance.
... most of the time.

Couldn't find any attachments on restructing the economics of KoC/M-G, but:
 - Do note that traits like Trade Center and Outpost have no effect right now. If you want them for the sake of having them, though, that's fine.
 - I'm pretty sure you want to be swapping the "mult" and "count" on the cryosanctum, to prevent a billion cryosanctums semi-breaking the economy.
 - I don't know if the Cryorevival center does anything considering that there isn't a ship to accompany it
 - The attachment for Arcadia has 5 industries on Agreus: Refining, Military Base, Tech-Mining, Heavy Industry, and Shipbreaking.

As for their diplomatic relations...
 - Irredentist feels somewhat unnecessary, at least on KoC markets. The bonuses to revanchism have a tendency to spiral out of control
 - Swapping off Dislikes AI on the KoC makes sense.
 - Generally, this is a lot of traits for factions to hold. Most all factions have no more than 4, because past that you start confusing players and the traits begin to lose their meaning. If M-G is generally isolationist, maybe drop Devious/Paranoid/Monopolist. If KoC is a Hegemony puppet and under their protection cutting Low Profile could be reasonable. Even if those factions might suggest those traits, they don't have to actually exist - and refining their identity down to a couple core traits would help.
 - This is probably the first time I'm okay with a faction having Helps Allies, @ modders stop putting Helps Allies on ALL YOUR FACTIONS
 - KoC being Hierarchial/Militarist to me seems like it should get a review. Also, consider making them both anti-Ideological. Especially the M-G.

Once I figure out how to do those little drop-down windows I could try my hand at reorganizing the economy.

[Great Wound]

I'll leave it to great Wound to explain, in his own words, his intentions for KoC, the PPP and Angry Periphery submods since they're his own work.

In a nutshell Angry Periphery creates four new new systems two of which have planets for KoC and Mbaye. The intent was to give them a power boost; and try my hand at making custom systems.

It also enabled Commissions/Hostillities since it was disabled in Everybody Loves, but given the work Vcuh is doing on the Nex side I've decided to make enabled the default going forth.

Couldn't find any attachments on restructing the economics of KoC/M-G, but:
 - Do note that traits like Trade Center and Outpost have no effect right now. If you want them for the sake of having them, though, that's fine.
 - I don't know if the Cryorevival center does anything considering that there isn't a ship to accompany it
 - The attachment for Arcadia has 5 industries on Agreus: Refining, Military Base, Tech-Mining, Heavy Industry, and Shipbreaking.

Trade Centre and Outpost grant +2 Stability, I'm using them to help offset the -3 from Commerce. Similarly the +1 from Stealth Minefields offsets -1 from Rogue AI, although this was more of a happy coincidence since I was using them for flavor.

Keep up the good work Vcuh and thanks for the advice Ncyt.

[vcuh666]

Similarly the +1 from Stealth Minefields offsets -1 from Rogue AI, although this was more of a happy coincidence since I was using them for flavor.

Plus, it helps to stop the debtslaves and organ farms from escaping. It's more about keeping people in than keeping them out...

I'm glad to get a second/third opinion on this, because it means that I'm less to blame for bad balancing decisions lol.

I mixed up the "mult" and "count" in the config files, my bad, fixed it now. Irredentist was intended for use with the Angery Periphery submod, since their vanilla and modded defences are weak enough that they are likely to lose their homeworlds from Nex invasions. The intention was to ensure they would use the extra planets from Angry Periphery to recapture the homeworlds rather than attacking the planets of other factions. Is it redendant or excessive in this context? I don't actually use invasions in my game so I've never seen what a faction does when it loses a planet.

Reducing traits seems reasonable, I'm not entirely sure which ones though. Great Wound, your opinion?

Heirarchy/militarism was from the KoC being partly staffed by ex-hegemony military veterans, it also helps them join the Iron Shell 'Greater Hegemony' alliance which is an alliance based on militarism so they need it to be a positive value, without it they get locked out. It also gives diplo bonuses with Hegemony from shared alignments, they are intended to lean overall to the hegemony (with an RNG chance of flipping to the Perseans). The values are both +0.5 and less than the Heg's +1 because they still put profit first and are run by civilian war profiteering executives. Halving the hegemony values seemed reasonable to me, I didn't imagine they would be negative. Their nature as a corporation also implies a positive value for heirarchy, TT also has heirarchy set to 0.5.

Reducing the ideological alignment for MbG seems reasonable, it won't much hurt their relationship with TT and Sindria. MbG is -0.5 anti-militarist because they rely on agents and phase ships. They are more heirarchical then TT because they own debtslaves and organ farms rather than mere wageslaves.

Nyct, did you think the diplo stuff was OK?

EDIT: I have a post editing addiction, I'll stop myself now lol.

[Great Wound]

Plus, it helps to stop the debtslaves and organ farms from escaping. It's more about keeping people in than keeping them out...

+1 for lore! 

I'm glad to get a second/third opinion on this, because it means that I'm less to blame for bad balancing decisions lol.

Reducing traits seems reasonable, I'm not entirely sure which ones though. Great Wound, your opinion?

I've already told you, make it your way, I'm leaving the Nex side of things in your hands. If balance goes askew listen to the feedback and integrate it but only if you feel it's appropriate. As for traits, here's my take:

KoC:

Code

    "diplomacyTraits":["lowprofile", "devious", "monopolist", "submissive", "helps_allies"],

Mbaye:

Code

    "diplomacyTraits":["lowprofile", "devious", "monopolist", "neutralist"],

Feel free to disagree.

[vcuh666]

To help consider how to narrow down the faction traits, here is how I would categorize them with lore justification.

Of the MbG, these are their core faction personality 'flavour' traits- "neutralist", "temperamental", "paranoid", "devious"
Lore reasons: Isolationist (neutralist), they have infighting among faction elites and rogue AI activity, never certain exactly who is in charge (temperamental). Worried about debtslave insurgency, don't want foreigners liberating their slaves (paranoid). Phase ships, covert activity and organ/slave smuggling with Sindria (devious)

For the KoC, these are the core faction personality 'flavour' traits- "devious", "submissive", "helps_allies"
Lore reasons: they are war profiteers who want more war for profits (devious), will seek alliances for protection (submissive), and then goad the bigger allies into fighting so they can sell industrial exports (helps_allies).

And these are the traits that both factiosn have but are for gameplay reasons only, not lore or 'flavour'- "monopolist", "lowprofile", "irredentist"

Monopolist to make them attack players, lowprofile to keep them alive when they have only 1 planet and the Angry periphery is not used, irredentist to help them recapture homeworlds when Angry Periphery is used.

[Nyctophonik]

I'm glad to get a second/third opinion on this, because it means that I'm less to blame for bad balancing decisions lol.

No problem. I can make even worse balancing decisions for you

Irredentist was intended for use with the Angery Periphery submod, since their vanilla and modded defences are weak enough that they are likely to lose their homeworlds from Nex invasions. The intention was to ensure they would use the extra planets from Angry Periphery to recapture the homeworlds rather than attacking the planets of other factions. Is it redendant or excessive in this context? I don't actually use invasions in my game so I've never seen what a faction does when it loses a planet.

Generally, Irredentist makes the faction doggedly pursue retaking their territory. Revanchism, is, at minimum, -8 - and only increases with planet size. A 50% bonus basically shuts the door on diplomacy and usually makes war constant and inevitable, in my experience anyways. The Persean League having the trait, along with lots of easily-invaded planets, is why Nex games descend into war so fast.

Heirarchy/militarism was from the KoC being partly staffed by ex-hegemony military veterans, it also helps them join the Iron Shell 'Greater Hegemony' alliance which is an alliance based on militarism so they need it to be a positive value, without it they get locked out.

It doesn't need to be positive. It just needs to be not negative. You could set their alignments to 0 if you wanted. That being said, I see a much clearer case for Hierarchial over Militarist.

Nyct, did you think the diplo stuff was OK?

Other than the stuff I did bring up, basically yes.

In a nutshell Angry Periphery creates four new new systems two of which have planets for KoC and Mbaye. The intent was to give them a power boost; and try my hand at making custom systems.

It also enabled Commissions/Hostillities since it was disabled in Everybody Loves, but given the work Vcuh is doing on the Nex side I've decided to make enabled the default going forth.

Trade Centre and Outpost grant +2 Stability, I'm using them to help offset the -3 from Commerce. Similarly the +1 from Stealth Minefields offsets -1 from Rogue AI, although this was more of a happy coincidence since I was using them for flavor.

Keep up the good work Vcuh and thanks for the advice Ncyt.

I didn't know that. Neat.