Will purity be the best affinity in MP?

Choose Tectonic Scanner to spot the titaniums.

Research Bionics and build Institute to unlock Servomachinery, add Genetic Mapping and do a easy quest(e. g. clear 2 Alien nests) - You're level 4 in purity.

Now you can spam 40 strength unit, while other affinities can't level up affinity much with lack of such slingshot. (Strongest unit for them would be 18 strength Armor, if they somehow got level 3)

How do you think?

Edit: Armors have 18 strength now.

I think they should be very careful with their Free technologies bonuses. I'm not sure it's a very good idea to mix it with a tech web. Can create a lot of issues if you ask me.

Thank you for the hint. I am going to add that to the stash of ideas I can use against my friends in MP to steamroll them.

Purity's Battlesuits are a wild card in the game that I really like.

ggmoyang said:

Choose Tectonic Scanner to spot the titaniums.

Research Bionics and build Institute to unlock Servomachinery, add Genetic Mapping and do a easy quest(e. g. clear 2 Alien nests) - You're level 4 in purity.

Now you can spam 40 strength unit, while other affinities can't level up affinity much with lack of such slingshot. (Strongest unit for them would be 22 strength Armor, if they somehow got level 3)

How do you think?

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There is a lot to do with purity, it's not only about units but there are issues with purity bonus too.
This affinity is blatantly overpower. So many things need to be tweaked.

Well Purity is suppose to have strong individual units, Harmony relies on terrain and mobility, Supremacy use unit formations. Also, we have not seen how the other affinities work completely. Maddjinn playthrough is the only high difficult one we have seen and he picked purity because of the nearby floatstones. Not because it was the best.

aguliondew said:

Well Purity is suppose to have strong individual units, Harmony relies on terrain and mobility, Supremacy use unit formations. Also, we have not seen how the other affinities work completely. Maddjinn playthrough is the only high difficult one we have seen and he picked purity because of the nearby floatstones. Not because it was the best.

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You need level 6 for such bonus.

I'm not sure if any conclusions can be drawn at this point. Beelining towards Battlesuits takes a while, and you're leaving yourself naked in every other regard, so to speak. And by the way, Harmony 4 seems to enable Strength-34 Xeno Swarms, while Supremacy 4 unlocks Strength-38 CNDRs. I'm sure there's ways to reach those levels and the required techs around the same time a Purity player can get their Battlesuits.

So if I understand correctly, the Battlesuit can be obtained at level 4 Purity:

Battlesuit
Moves: 2; Strength: 40 (up to 66 with upgrades); Cost: 160 production; Requires Resource: 1 Titanium

To get to this unit requires:

Three ring one techs and one leaf: Engineering, Physics and Genetics (Genetic Mapping)
One ring two tech and one leaf: Bionics (Servo Machinery)
A Purity quest.

Compare this with the level 4 Harmony unit:

Xeno Swarm
Move: 2; Strength: 34 (up to 60 with upgrades); Cost: 120 production; Requires Resource: 1 Xenomass

To get to this unit requires:

One ring one tech and one leaf: Ecology (Alien Biology)
One ring two tech and one leaf: Alien Sciences (Alien Adaptation)
A Harmony quest.

Compared to the Purity Battlesuit, the Xeno Swarm has -6 Str, but costs 40 less production and requires two less ring one tech expenditures.

Opinion: This seems like a fair trade to me. For every 3 Purity Battlesuits (120 STR), a Harmony player can have 4 Xeno Swarms (136 STR).

As for the Supremacy level 4 unit:

CNDR
Move: 2; Strength: 38 (up to 72 with upgrades); Cost: 155 production; Requires Resource: 1 Firaxite

To get to this unit requires:

One ring one tech and one leaf: Engineering (Power systems)
One ring two tech and one leaf: Robotics (Tactical Robotics)
A Supremacy quest.

Compared to Purity Battlesuit, the CNDR has -2 Str initially, but becomes +6 Str better than the Battlesuit with upgrades. It costs 5 less production and requires two less ring one tech expenditures.

Opinion: This seems like another wash. Sure the CNDR sacrifices initial STR, but as the unit upgrades its STR outstrips the Battlesuit.

Final thoughts: I find it very interesting that Purity level 4 takes longer than the other two affinities. It requires six techs and a quest, whereas the other affinities can grab their level 4 units with four techs and a quest. perhaps Firaxis took into account that the Purity line leads to Bionics and more research whereas the others don't lead to more research. Anyway, as long as these numbers from Civ V Analyst are correct, then I think things are relatively balanced for MP with Supremacy being the weakest initial choice, but much better once it upgrades the CNDR.

I think the aparent issue is 2 fold
1. Battlesuits are right under Bionics...which gives you a free tech Quest
2. Battlesuits don't need an affinity resource

#2 isn't really an issue because both Supremacy and Harmony's early affinity unit is right under their affinity resource

#1 is harder... But Bionics is an Expensive ring2 Tech
Robotics and Alien Science (and their leaf techs) are Cheap ring2 techs
Chances are good you could get their leaf tech about the same time as you researched Bionics, and built the institute, and actually got the quest.

I think it looks pretty well balanced for the level 4 Affinity Units. Purity might be able to get there a bit faster, but not much.

Also consider that going straight to Battlesuits doesn't do anything for you getting Floatstone for later units, while going straight to Harmony and Supremacy gives you the Affinity-specific resource techs on the way. Purity will have to go back to Terraforming (+2 techs) before being able to build any better Affinity uniques. The other two can better focus on getting the Affinity uniques and Affinity points.

also consider that the Purity level 7 unit is hiding under a ring 3 supremacy tech.

Harmony level 7 is on a ring 2-3 tech (more expensive but not too far) and also under a Harmony tech.

Supremacy level 7 is also close to Supremacy techs -- and more orbital units.

I think it gives Purity a nice mid-game advantage, but if you can hold out against them, it probably won't last. We need to see late gameplay footage to see how things shake out then.

Eagle Pursuit said:

I think it gives Purity a nice mid-game advantage, but if you can hold out against them, it probably won't last. We need to see late gameplay footage to see how things shake out then.

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overall it's about style.

XenoTitan makes everything look squishy.

Arioch said in another thread that mid/lategame unit stats seem to still shift a lot between builds. We still have 3 weeks before release, and the builds we've seen are even a bit older.
In short, our info is from builds that missed most of the balancing and polish.

Don't get me wrong, I'm pretty sure the dev's find our theorycrafting helpful as hints towards balance oversights, but we shouldn't forget that the versions we see are still very very beta. They are just pretty impressive for this early stage so we are inclined to take them for final.

Well try to rush for Battle suits With this build.
Slavic federation. Research physics- Luck out on solar collector. pick bionics.
pick battlesuits with the free Tech. go straight for might and +20% affinity bonus and a free affinity. You should be able to get them really fast as the slavic federation.
choose techtonic skanner and watch the fun reveal itself.

of course building alot of them might not be viable since you will only get some of them. but they are really fast to rush. But as the slavic federation going might it will be really Nice.
but that is because you do not need to Research the tier 2 leaf Tech or the tier 2 Tech. so you might Luck out and have them when the others have not even gotten tier 2 armor.

of course this is Limited to one sponsor. but it is quite brutal. The problem occurs because you stack 2 free Techs. and bionics Tech is really good on it's own as well

I agree that other affinities look better if the game lasts longer. (Have to research Terraforming which is on other side from purity military techs, etc) Maybe it was not a very good title for my concern.
The real question was if you can survive from the purity neighbor.

Polaris stream showed that in latest version basic units got nerfed.
Marines 16 -> 14, Gunners 18 -> 14, Armors 22 -> 18.
But strength of CNDR was unchanged, so I assume Battlesuits will have same 40.

So it will be harder to defend without affinity units. At least Harmony have +450 science building quest, but what about supremacy? Will they able to defend 40 strength units with 14 ranged and 18 melee?

I think the xenoswarm looks alot more dangerous. It's available earlier and moves faster, so I could have them in my opponent's face before he can build his first battlesuit.

Magma_Dragoon said:

I think the xenoswarm looks alot more dangerous. It's available earlier and moves faster, so I could have them in my opponent's face before he can build his first battlesuit.

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The Xenoswarm isn't any faster.

You are thinking of the Xenocavalry

But both Xenoswarm and CNDR are available almost as soon as Battlesuits

Xenoswarm:
Ecology, Alien Biology, Alien Sciences, Alien Ecology (and a quest)

CNDR:
Engineering, Power Systems, Robotics, Tactical Robotics (and a quest)


Battlesuit (assuming tectonic scanner)
Genetics, Genetic mapping, Physics*,Bionics**, [free tech servo machinery](and a quest)

*less expensive than Robotics and Alien sciences
**Just as expensive as tactical robotics/Alien Ecology