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[Teneb]

buy from SpaceCo

SpaceCo only accepts purchases made in S-Bucks. Unless you are buying S-Bucks, of course.

[IcyTea31]

SpaceCo is also hiring! Easy work for excellent pay! (Salary paid in S-Bucks) A loyal working community! (Non-compete clause prohibits work in all fields for 10 years) Great upwards mobility! (Promotions handed to those who work 100 hours a week) Send an application to your nearest branch office today! (Postage 10 S-Bucks)

[Majestic7]

I can't wait to play Scientology (criminal enterprise + megachurch) and enslave all the Thetans.

[Telgin]

Looks like another mechanic was added to try to cut down on patchwork empires:



I think I like the idea as a replacement or complement to the old pirate system.  It makes some logical sense, and it still lets you snake and leave holes up to a point.  I'm guessing there will be techs, traditions or ascension perks that also let you tolerate less cohesion without penalties.  The mechanic could also easily serve more purposes in the future with rebellions or revolts.

I also just find it funny that the game has so many mechanics centered around discouraging people from taking too many systems and penalizing them if they leave holes in their empire.

[Majestic7]

I hope gateways and wormholes have an effect on the cohesion. If you link your separated wings with gateways, they are practically next door regarding travel times. I hope traderoutes can pass through gates and wormholes as well.

[Criptfeind]

I really don't like the mechanic. It doesn't seem to make sense, at least pirates had some justification as for why they existed in pockets and fringes of the empire... And it's just another step in the war between two punishments for playing the game. Play one way, get tech penalties. Play the other way, get tech penalties. Pick the third way and don't play at all, still probably get less tech. Instead of endlessly punishing empires that play the only part of the game that actually exists and growing bigger in random ways, maybe they could add some gameplay to some part of the game other then expansion and some rewards for not growing bigger?

[forsaken1111]

Makes sense to me, build a snake empire and you'll have trouble with logistics and defense. Leave unconnected systems and you have even more trouble.

I really like the reworked pirates, they steal trade value and only spawn a fleet if they get enough money/power that they feel they can be a threat or cause some havoc.

[Criptfeind]

I think the pirate rework is good as well. I don't like the trade system, but the pirates are certainly an upside to the whole thing. But how does the snake empire punishment make sense? System A, which is otherwise identical to system B, is twice as hard to control because it has more sections of empty space that you can go too from it. How does that cause administrative problems? What's the in game justification for it? Like, at least pirates had some justification, if there was distance based penalties maybe you could justify it as communication issues. The only justification I can think of for this empire cohesion system is "the devs can't figure out how to make small empires interesting or rewarding to play. So instead they'll punish big empires so people might play something else."

[KingofstarrySkies]

new from spaceco: pirate-b-gone, takes 9mm spacebullets

[Flying Dice]

Yeah, the whole "strung-out/disconnected empires have more trouble with coordinated efforts and opportunistic predation by third parties" bit is perfectly reasonable. If you have colonies who are two years out from your nearest coreward colony of  course they're not going to be contributing much to ongoing research back home and are going to be more vulnerable to opportunistic raiding.

[Blood_Librarian]

I just assume its like a heist and the empty spaces and external pockets means a pirate can get in, do the job and then make a quick getaway.

Less possible if they are in the middle of empire space, more possible with patchwork empires.

[Rolan7]

It's interesting that "owned systems" *increases* cohesion, so it's not really a check on large empires.  Just large empires with an unnatural number of unsecured lanes to secure (IE from holes).

[Criptfeind]

Yeah, the whole "strung-out/disconnected empires have more trouble with coordinated efforts and opportunistic predation by third parties" bit is perfectly reasonable. If you have colonies who are two years out from your nearest coreward colony of  course they're not going to be ... more vulnerable to opportunistic raiding.

I just assume its like a heist and the empty spaces and external pockets means a pirate can get in, do the job and then make a quick getaway.

Less possible if they are in the middle of empire space, more possible with patchwork empires.

These statements would make sense if the system was still based around something like piracy. But how does decreasing efficiency and increasing government costs have any justification because there's more jump lanes out of one system then another? How does that have anything to do with piracy (a mechanic that now effects trade and has nothing to do with this) or opportunistic predation? Like, yeah, strung out empires are going to be more open to attack and getting split into halves by enemies. That's modeled in the game already by strung out empires being more open to attack and getting split into halves by enemies. The last game I played I beat a superior enemy because his nation was strung out, I hit him in the middle and split him in half, and he couldn't pull his fleets together into one mass to fight me, that's a perfectly reasonable and logical downside to a "snaking" empire, but this system doesn't do anything like that, its a completely unrelated negative that doesn't make sense.

If you have colonies who are two years out from your nearest coreward colony of  course they're not going to be contributing much to ongoing research back home

If they wanted to model communication lag leading to worse efficiency, they could make it a punishment based on distance from capital that decreases research efficiency overall or just in those systems. Instead in this system you can have totally unoccupied systems that don't continue research at all dragging down your research from your core planets that are all cozied up next to each other because they have too many star lanes jumping away from them. How does that make sense? You can have super far flung systems contributing research without any issues so long as they don't trigger the arbitrary "your empire doesn't fit my aesthetics" alarm that's in the game now.

[Rolan7]

Because supply chains can operate more efficiently when they're more secure.  Hyperlanes leading into rogue space are a threat to the invisible cargo ships, they have to take different routes or be armed or something.

[Criptfeind]

What invisible cargo ship exists in the 2 mineral system on the edge of your empire that's so threatened by 2 hyperlanes instead of 1 that it reduces the research efficiency of your entire empire?

All these justifications make a lot of sense for a system that's not in the game, although the game might better off if it was.