Do you plan your affinity or just go with the resources on the map?

[roscoepfox]

I'm thinking about starting a new game and going Harmony as I've not done so yet. But last time I tried I found that I had zero xenomass anywhere near. Is Harmony the most difficult affinity to work with? It seems so for me as I always have plenty of resources for the other ones.

When you play do you go in planning on a certain affinity or do you just go with what you get by resources?

 

[docbud]

I'm new at BE, but I go in trying for Harmony.

 

[KingCraig]

I used to plan more ahead than I do now. I would pick an affinity before starting the game (maybe one I hadn't tried yet in my first few games) and plan everything around it. Now I look at what's on the map and how the resources will support me if I go one way or another.

However, it can be a problem to be too controlled by circumstances. In my last game, I changed my mind a few times based on what was around and my relationships with other factions that I wanted to stay friendly with. I ended up having a bit of everything and then too far behind to get to the affinity-specific victory in reasonable time (and domination would have been harder).

Pick something early and stick to it. That's my current plan.

 

[Roadcrew]

I've found myself defaulting to Harmony almost entirely because it's near-impossible for me to make out miasma on the map and it's easier to just become immune to it than to bother keeping track of it where it is.

 

[spider1]

Like policies and the tech tree, I try to cherry pick what I can get the earliest. By mid game though it's getting tougher to find free land and if you don't already have what you need, you have to just get it from someone. Since I attempt to play peaceably all the time (which, of course, doesn't always work out very well) I tend to go with the affinity my resources will best support.

 

[Roxlimn]

I pick something before I start the game and try very hard to make it work, even if the map tells me I should be pursuing another Affinity. Sometimes, you pick Rome and Iron simply never shows up. You trade for it or do without.

 

[player1 fanatic]

I pick something before I start the game and try very hard to make it work, even if the map tells me I should be pursuing another Affinity. Sometimes, you pick Rome and Iron simply never shows up. You trade for it or do without.

Exempt that in BtE, you can switch from Rome to Greeks during game itself, to make your gameplay optimal.

 

[Roxlimn]

Yeah, but then I wouldn't be playing as Rome, would I? Heck, if I wanted to play optimally, I wouldn't even choose Rome at all. It's firmly middle of the pack! Why would I choose to play a loser Civ? I choose to do these things for the same reason I don't pick Persia, Babylon, or Korea every single time I play Civ 5.

 

[a space oddity]

I'm with Roxlimn, before I play I choose the type of game I want to play. Since I have limited time I am now playing my fifth game and I have yet to reach an Purity win, so I'm playing Purity even though my starting location has little Floatstone. And I don't play Apollo every time either. My current game I try to play like every human on the new planet counts, so the AI can safely build and keep their cities. (Unless I manage to Coup, that way no human blood is spilled. )

 

[Ryoga]

Is Harmony the most difficult affinity to work with?

Not to my experience, definitely not. I feel like among the various affinity resources Xenomass is the one that is more evenly distributed.

Yeah, but then I wouldn't be playing as Rome, would I? Heck, if I wanted to play optimally, I wouldn't even choose Rome at all. It's firmly middle of the pack! Why would I choose to play a loser Civ? I choose to do these things for the same reason I don't pick Persia, Babylon, or Korea every single time I play Civ 5.

I don't quite get your comparison. You are talking about inherent strength in various kind of civs in Civ V but there is nothing inherently superior or inferior in affinities or at any rate this is not what we are talking about here.

I think a good comparison for playing an affinity without having the required resources would be to play as Genghis Khan in an archipelago map or as Theodora in a game starting from the industrial era or as Brazil in a game where the cultural victory is disabled.

To make another comparison, If I have a bow I want to use it for what it's meant to be used, as a bow, and not as a makeshift club. But that has nothing to do with the bow being an inherently superior weapon. I'm fine with using a club, but then I'll pick a club to begin with.

So if I play as Harmony I want to be able to build harmony specifics units and harmony specific buildings, else it wouldn't even feel like playing Harmony.

 

[a space oddity]

Not to my experience, definitely not. I feel like among the various affinity resources Xenomass is the one that is more evenly distributed.

Yes, that is my experience too. The first two games, in which I was just 'lookin around' so to speak, I automatically drifted to Harmony.

 

[roscoepfox]

Well, I think I got what I wished for. I started a new game as Pan-Asian and managed to find a few xenomass resources near my initial start. (plus a nest which I plan on destroying for the xenomass. I can't yet because the bugs are too powerful surrounding it.

Its still early in the game, just over 100 turns. I've got Hutama to my south and closer than I'd like and Kavi to the east. I'm a bit concerned because I've seen Kavi roaming around with a marine or two and I get the idea that she's scoping me out for weakness. I'm also sure that Hutama is going to go from friendly to hostile soon....I saw him moving a colonist to the spot of one of the masses. I asked him not to settle close to me and he agreed. Then I settled the spot. (in truth it was maybe one hex closer to me than to him, and I had the colonist *almost* there when I spotted his). This city effectively boxes him into a small area. He's not going to like that.

So I'm a little worried. I have yet to be attacked by the AI. But this game I'm not sure. Usually I can get enough of a lead to make them think twice, but right now I'm not completely sure.

 

[Xenotitan]

I'll avoid an affinity if I don't have any resources at all for it, but other than that it is mostly based on what early quests I get. For example, an early solid state citizen quest would have me crossing off harmony because the harmony branch spawns a station near you. And then the harmony branch wants you to murder them all which is kinda a jerk move.

 

[Roxlimn]

I don't quite get your comparison. You are talking about inherent strength in various kind of civs in Civ V but there is nothing inherently superior or inferior in affinities or at any rate this is not what we are talking about here.

I think a good comparison for playing an affinity without having the required resources would be to play as Genghis Khan in an archipelago map or as Theodora in a game starting from the industrial era or as Brazil in a game where the cultural victory is disabled.

To make another comparison, If I have a bow I want to use it for what it's meant to be used, as a bow, and not as a makeshift club. But that has nothing to do with the bow being an inherently superior weapon. I'm fine with using a club, but then I'll pick a club to begin with.

So if I play as Harmony I want to be able to build harmony specifics units and harmony specific buildings, else it wouldn't even feel like playing Harmony.

I don't consider the unique units or buildings to be the end-all and be-all of the Affinities, and rising in the Affinities grants you a base 4 of the resource in any case, so you're never really without.

Harmony has specific techs and tech paths it takes through the web. Having those and having the basic units feels sufficiently like Harmony to me that I don't really miss not having Xenoswarms. I mean, what's so special about that unit anyhow? The Miasma bonus? I don't really use that all that much, to be honest.

Aside from all that, searching for and acquiring Xenomass when it's not plentiful on my start zone can make a game a lot more interesting compared to just having everything served up and ready.

So I don't see not starting with any Firaxite or just 3 Firaxite as an absolute kill for a Supremacy game. To me, it's a lot more like Rome without Iron than Genghis Khan on Archipelago.

 

[roscoepfox]

I don't consider the unique units or buildings to be the end-all and be-all of the Affinities, and rising in the Affinities grants you a base 4 of the resource in any case, so you're never really without.

Harmony has specific techs and tech paths it takes through the web. Having those and having the basic units feels sufficiently like Harmony to me that I don't really miss not having Xenoswarms. I mean, what's so special about that unit anyhow? The Miasma bonus? I don't really use that all that much, to be honest.

Aside from all that, searching for and acquiring Xenomass when it's not plentiful on my start zone can make a game a lot more interesting compared to just having everything served up and ready.

So I don't see not starting with any Firaxite or just 3 Firaxite as an absolute kill for a Supremacy game. To me, it's a lot more like Rome without Iron than Genghis Khan on Archipelago.

I get what you are saying. I usually build one or two extra explorers to get a good look around my area. If I'm really wanting to play harmony and there is no Xenomass, well, I might as well start over.

...and that's probably because I really haven't played harmony (until today, actually). I wanted to see the units. Its only my opinion and YMMV but Harmony doesn't have as much resources in my games. Well, it does in a way....I find Xenomass that may yield 2 or 3, but to get a large yield you have to kill a nest. Meanwhile I can find only a few floatstones in my area but they yield anywhere from 3 to 7. Once I found one that was 9. Because Of that I think Harmony is a little harder affinity to play if you want to build the specific units for it.

I'm going to try this in the future, though....trade for what I want. The AI always seems to want titanium. I'm betting if I can find enough I can trade it for other resources.

 

[Roxlimn]

I actually did this "insane" thing where, despite having an abundance of Floatstone and Titanium in my start zone, I went Supremacy perforce. I even had something like 3 Xenomass tiles. But no. This game was Supremacy so I did Supremacy.

I had to trade with Brasilia for Firaxite (which they didn't need), and I gave them Xenomass in return (which I didn't need). Came in handy when I got into a tussle with Aff4 Battlesuits. It was tricky to maintain the relationship, though.

Eventually, I was able to use Affinity 6 Supremacy (just toggle the Orbital Layer) to scout out where all the Firaxite was, and used Phasal Transporters to beat Elodie out to a very rich site (15 Firaxite in two tiles) just in the nick of time. I could've just won that game straight out as Purity since I had the continent to myself after I forward-settled and soundly defeated General Vadim, but that would've been a much more boring game.

I like Purity now and again, but I think I've played it a little once too often.

Harmony's nice, but the unique units feel bland. I think I need to make a stronger effort to spam Miasma around my battle sites to really feel Harmony in the units. As it is, the Xenoswarm just feels like a cheaper, weaker Battlesuit. At least the CNDR has defensive and adjacency bonuses.

 

[Ryoga]

Harmony's nice, but the unique units feel bland. I think I need to make a stronger effort to spam Miasma around my battle sites to really feel Harmony in the units. As it is, the Xenoswarm just feels like a cheaper, weaker Battlesuit. At least the CNDR has defensive and adjacency bonuses.

I agree that the miasma bonus is pretty lame, but isn't it what most of the regular units as well get as an option? Which means you end up taking the basic bonus which is the same for any affinity.

So basically I don't really see the optional miasma bonus perk as something that is inherently tied with Unique Units, and I see very little reason not to want to get Xenoswarm since they are still stronger than anything else you can get at the same affinity level. Besides nothing says "harmony" better than a unit composed of a mix of aliens and humans.
Later then you get cavalry which are very nice because of their faster movement and then Xenotitan which is arguably the strongest unit in the game.

But the bigger reason to want Xenomass near your cities when you play Harmony is because the best harmony buildings require a workable Xenomass resource and when they do not need that, they need Xenomass. Moreover Xenomass in itself with all the harmony techs gives the best possible tile yield.

Harmony has specific techs and tech paths it takes through the web.

Let's just say that you just like to endeavor to look for resources you need even when they are far from your starting location, because most of those techs do not even have a point in being researched (apart from the affinity points) without Xenomass.

 

[Roxlimn]

Tissue Engineering (Harmony): Units heal +10 HP per turn
Swarm Robotics (Harmony): unlocks Drone Sphere
Metamaterials (Harmony): unlocks Tectonic Anvil
Alien Biology (Harmony): Allows Workers to clear Miasma. Workers immune to Miasma
Alien Adaptation (Harmony): unlocks Xenoswarm unit (requires Xenomass, can be traded or from Affinity benefits)
Alien Hybridization (Harmony): Units immune to Miasma; Units heal in Miasma
Designer Lifeforms (Harmony): unlocks Rocktopus (requires Xenomass, can be traded or from Affinity benefits)
Photosystems (Harmony): Unlocks Solar Satellites, improves Plantation output
Swarm Intelligence (Harmony): Unlocks Bytegeist
Nanorobotics (Harmony): +1 Science to Manufactories
Exotic Matter (Harmony): Unlocks Ansible

These constitute most of the techs that award Affinity points. Many do not require having a Xenomass tile to be beneficial. Alien Adaptation is a leaf tech of Alien Sciences, which does require a Xenomass tile to make sense in itself. That's about it. Both Xenonursery and Xenofuel Plant are from Alien Sciences - the quest that boosts Xenomass tile output is from Xenofuel Plant.

I don't actively avoid taking Xenomass tiles when I'm playing Harmony. In fact, I seek them out! That's because the techs I have make them very, very good for me. However, that does not mean that my faction plays exactly like a Purity one just because I don't start with a Xenomass tile. I hope I've demonstrated that.

So basically I don't really see the optional miasma bonus perk as something that is inherently tied with Unique Units, and I see very little reason not to want to get Xenoswarm since they are still stronger than anything else you can get at the same affinity level. Besides nothing says "harmony" better than a unit composed of a mix of aliens and humans.

Likewise, I don't actively avoid building Xenoswarms when I have the tech and the excess Xenomass. It's just that, for the most part, they kind of behave almost exactly like a tweaked Battlesuit. A Battlesuit is at least distinguished by being the most powerful Strength Aff4 unit, capable of withstanding a great deal of abuse, and dishing out lots in revenge. A Xenoswarm is kind of just a disappointing version of that, graphics aside. I mean, you can easily overlay that graphic on anything.

It doesn't feel very "Harmony." The XenoCavalry does because when upgraded, it ignores terrain penalties. It can hie off into thick jungle and move very fast. I'd have liked something of similar distinguishing nature on the Xenoswarm. As it is, it's just a Miasma-loving Soldier with fancy graphics. It doesn't even inherently heal in Miasma.

 

[ixias]

Well, I think I got what I wished for. I started a new game as Pan-Asian and managed to find a few xenomass resources near my initial start. (plus a nest which I plan on destroying for the xenomass. I can't yet because the bugs are too powerful surrounding it.

Actually, you can keep the nest in your territory and it counts as improved, plus makes the aliens more friendly to you! Win win there in my opinion.

 

[Kalmarunionist]

I like harmony most, but other two are nice also. If I have 10x resource in a tile next to me or multiple smaller ones, that's the affinity I take. Having plenty of xenomass really helps both the economy and military. Of course it doesn't really matter when there is no I in AI, but I like to pretend that I got enemies