Multiple expeditions is completely pointless ?

[Stringer1313]

Is it just me or are all the multiple expedition buffs --- level 1 supremacy, and that tier 2 prosperity virtue, plus whatever building quest --- are completely pointless because by the time you get them, all the ruins have been excavated?

Weren't de-orbiting satellites supposed to leave behind ruins? (Not that that would leave behind enough wreckage to be useful)

 

[Minor Annoyance]

Depends on the planet size, number of colonies, amount of aliens, if there are islands, and obviously the number of expedition sites. I've never found just one expedition per explorer to be enough unless they are getting killed very fast.

 

[FaceUnderMask]

I think this is a wrong forum.

I have the same experience as Minor Annoyance - one expedition per explorer is not enough for me. Especially since expeditions are so OP.

 

[Browd]

Moderator Action: Moved to General Discussions.

 

[Mutineer]

+ 1 expedition from affinity can come early, if you lucky and be very useful, but additional expeditions from culture is really too late too expensive.

 

[FaceUnderMask]

+ 1 expedition from affinity can come early, if you lucky and be very useful, but additional expeditions from culture is really too late too expensive.

In my recent game I rolled three affinity-related expeditions. Massive Protean map though.

Also out of all of the stuff that influences how fast my colony develops in first 50 turns those lucky 80 production expeditions are on the top, by far. I usually switch production to colonist 1 turn before just in case.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

I tend to play on massive terran maps and sometimes find expeditions even in the late game. There's usually a couple of small or medium sized land masses without any colonies on them. I like to open with Foresight -> Field Research to accelerate my early research and the additional expeditions from Supremacy and the laboratory building quest are a big help, but Pathfinders is one of those virtues I consistently ignory. The risk of it ending up mostly useless is too high, there are too many better virtues, and it requires Workforce Initiative which isn't that good either.

 

[Halbbruder]

Is it just me or are all the multiple expedition buffs --- level 1 supremacy, and that tier 2 prosperity virtue, plus whatever building quest --- are completely pointless because by the time you get them, all the ruins have been excavated?

Pointless in the long term, mostly yes, but definitely not in the short term, which is basically what the additional expeditions are about. Also depends on map size and if you got a massive map size, there will be a lot of expeditions to acquire.

Weren't de-orbiting satellites supposed to leave behind ruins? (Not that that would leave behind enough wreckage to be useful)

The devs did say that, but they obviously changed it because it would be ridiculously OP. In this case: Just spam satellites, de-orbit them by deleting them and harvest the production from the crashed satellites. If they really did want to implement this idea, they could make the satellite crash randomly on the planet with the risk of it falling into the sea or lake (% chance calculated according to how many sea tiles there are as a % of all tiles on the map). They could also ensure that crashed satellites only occur when the satellite completes its duration in full. Another idea would be to add the ability to reveal underwater expeditions which would take longer and you run the risk of being attacked by alien wildlife, as sea creatures are generally more aggressive.

I tend to play on massive terran maps and sometimes find expeditions even in the late game. There's usually a couple of small or medium sized land masses without any colonies on them. I like to open with Foresight -> Field Research to accelerate my early research and the additional expeditions from Supremacy and the laboratory building quest are a big help, but Pathfinders is one of those virtues I consistently ignory. The risk of it ending up mostly useless is too high, there are too many better virtues, and it requires Workforce Initiative which isn't that good either.

Field research shares the risk of becoming useless with pathfinders and it also doesn't scale into mid-game, where 30 science boost is nothing. Since you prefer massive maps, pathfinders will ensure that you don't have to send your explorer all the way back home to recharge their number of expeditions. And workforce initiative gives a free worker, how is it not that good? Why expect so much from a t1 virtue?

 

[Mutineer]

Since you prefer massive maps, pathfinders will ensure that you don't have to send your explorer all the way back home to recharge their number of expeditions.

How can you recharge there Number of expeditions? 0 expedition explorer in my cultural space is still 0 expedition explorer.

 

[Halbbruder]

How can you recharge there Number of expeditions? 0 expedition explorer in my cultural space is still 0 expedition explorer.

Send explorer into one of your cities (outposts don't count).

 

[FaceUnderMask]

the additional expeditions from Supremacy and the laboratory building quest are a big help, but Pathfinders is one of those virtues I consistently ignory. The risk of it ending up mostly useless is too high, there are too many better virtues, and it requires Workforce Initiative which isn't that good either.

Really? Usually I choose the other option on lab quest, and delay level 1 supremacy a little, because it's first tech (power systems) is so useless, therefore I quite welcome pathfinders. Also it's more about opportunity cost - let's say I want to get to the bottom of Prosperity for health bonuses - I can either go Pathfinder route or Helping hands route. One worker is better than +15% worker speed unless you already have 5+ workers, and Pioneer Spirit's worth is hard to calculate, I'd estimate it being fairly low. So that's why I end up with Pathfinders.

 

[Ryika]

I think they should rework the expedition-system so that it stays useful throughout the game. Leave the early ones the way they are right now, but add additional types of expeditions that need to be made visible through techs, give them nice bonuses that are strong enough to make it worthwhile to spend attention and well, here we go - BEs version of Archeology.

 

[Qbix]

I think they should rework the expedition-system so that it stays useful throughout the game. Leave the early ones the way they are right now, but add additional types of expeditions that need to be made visible through techs, give them nice bonuses that are strong enough to make it worthwhile to spend attention and well, here we go - BEs version of Archeology.

Dude, you can't mention to add something to BE that stems from Civ V without upsetting everyone around here. This is a different game, stop making it better!

 

[FaceUnderMask]

Dude, you can't mention to add something to BE that stems from Civ V without upsetting everyone around here. This is a different game, stop making it better!

Yeah, I was reading his idea and thought it was pretty good, actually. But then he just had to mention Civ5 and Archaelogy, and his idea became disgusting immediately.

Hello - explorers are already hybrids of scout and archaelogist.

 

[Ryika]

Dammit! I knew mentioning Civ5 was a risk. Just pretend I never did that and tell me how great my idea is!

 

[Gort]

I wouldn't say "completely pointless" - I've seen lots of situations where I'd get expeditions done faster if I hadn't had to return to a city in order to get new equipment.

It's certainly not worth a policy though. The Supremacy 1 bonus of an extra expedition is probably similarly useful to the Purity 1 and Harmony 1 bonuses, though - it falls under the heading of "nice to have" in my book, just like Explorer double defense against aliens and miasma immunity. I certainly wouldn't bother getting Supremacy 1 just for the bonus.

 

[Bandersnatching]

Pathfinders has never seemed worth it to me, but then again I play with aggressive aliens and small planets - neither option is very good for explorer longevity. +3 expedition modules for a virtue just seems wonky when you could spend an entire game scouting the map and never use all the expedition modules an explorer was given with the virtue. That said, I have sometimes taken Supremacy 1 just because I've got a few explorers sitting uselessly atop derelict settlements and would rather use them than let the AI get the bonus, but that is an uncommon thing. I think that spending a little time developing a different affinity costs less than spending a virtue on such a bonus, because you usually get more than one useful thing with an Affinity tech.
The building quest seems underpowered - gaining an additional expedition module for explorers is in my mind always worse than a science bonus, even if it is a small one, and I never go for it even when I have explorers sitting on ruins and waiting to be relieved.

There are certainly problems with explorer usefulness into the late game, and their virtues need reworking if they are to be competitive with the other options available to players.

 

[JokerJace]

+ 1 expedition from affinity can come early, if you lucky and be very useful, but additional expeditions from culture is really too late too expensive.

I agree. This is part of why the Prosperity tree sucks until you reach tier 3. Yet it is mandatory because of the settler / worker. Terrible balance yet again.

 

[Lord Tirian]

Dammit! I knew mentioning Civ5 was a risk. Just pretend I never did that and tell me how great my idea is!

It would certainly fix the Contact victory if you tied it to the tech tiers (i.e. you unlock better expedition upon entering a new tech ring).

Then, you could have underground ruins/skeletons as first "upgrade" and deep ruins and underwater versions as last tier (which could then yield pieces of the signal).

This would fix contact victories, make naval play more interesting and keep the explorer system relevant. On top of that, it wouldn't even be a Civ5-clone as it now iterates on the concept!

 

[Xenotitan]

I agree. This is part of why the Prosperity tree sucks until you reach tier 3. Yet it is mandatory because of the settler / worker. Terrible balance yet again.

The settler is really good but not mandatory. The worker certainly isn't mandatory.