Has ethics attraction been fixed yet?

[Turean]

Have not played in a while and just got the itch after seeing that a new update is out. So I just wanted to ask if ethics attraction has been fixed at this point.

What do I mean by "fixed" in case it's not apparent? Well, in the past it would go something like this. I start a new campaign. Everything is going well. Then all of a sudden, a bunch of random factions spawn that have no explicable reason for existing at all. Like for example, I'm not playing a materialist empire, have no robots or research agreements with materialists, nothing that would increase Materialist attraction. And still it creates a Materialist faction. Suppressing it just wasted influence. Nothing I could do to stop it. At all. Happiness would tank and I would lose interest and quit.

So is it still like this? [Apologies if this came across as a rant. This was meant as an honest question.]

 

[Quinzal]

There are quite a few factors that govern attraction, not just your governing ethics and techs. For the Material/Spiritual axis, these are:

Materialist Attraction	Requirements​	Spiritualist Attraction
2.00	Pop is a robot	0.25
1.50	Member of a Research Cooperative	1
1.50	Pop is Cybernetic	1
1.33	Research Agreement with a Fanatic Materialist or Materialist	1
1.25	Citizen Rights Artificial Intelligence policy	0.75
1.25	Origin is Mechanist	1
1.25	Pop is not a robot but Robot pops live on the planet	1
1.25	Pop has trait Natural Engineers	1
1.25	Pop has trait Natural Sociologists	1
1.25	Pop has trait Natural Physicists	1
1	Has Psionic Theory technology	1.25
1	Has Mind Over Matter ascension perk	1.50
1	Has Transcendence ascension perk	1.50
1	Has defense pact, commercial pact or Federation with a Fanatic Spiritualist or Spiritualist	1.50
1	Is Subject of a Spiritualist or Fanatic Spiritualist empire	2.00
1	Non-Subject Fanatic Spiritualist or Spiritualist empire has migration access	2.00
0.00	Pop has Priest or High Priest job	1

So, outside of what you talked about, your pops could also be randomly turning materialist because of your Federation, or their traits. There is also the possibility that you have a Migration Pact with a species that is dragging foreign ethics in, or have some modifier that is altering your Governing Ethics Attraction; just because you don't have a source of Materialism doesn't mean that they can't drift toward it, that's what Gov Ethics Attraction is for.

After enough time with enough drift, enough pops will be Materialist for a faction to form. You can negate this by playing tall so it's easier to manage the space you have, having the Conformist trait, picking One Vision AP, or going psionic (which, in addition to increasing Spiritualist attraction, also increases Gov Ethics Attraction in the form of a psychic ruler).

I agree that the system is flawed; Pacifist is almost impossible to keep high without being a pure diplomat or pure isolationist. But there are more factors than just your ethics.

 

[MathyM]

Suppressing it just wasted influence. Nothing I could do to stop it. At all. Happiness would tank and I would lose interest and quit.

I think ethics and faction shift are still broken, happening at 1% of the rate they are supposed to, because someone working on the script assuming the chance was in the 0.0-1.0 range, rather than 0-100 (percent) range.

 

[Zander]

The big issue I find is that attraction seems to have no connection to what the size or growth of your factions is. It is perfectly ordinary to have a faction with e.g. 12% of your population, 0% attraction, and growing steadily while other under-represented factions shrink. I've never seen the slightest hint that attraction affects growth at all, which makes boosting or suppressing factions seem worthless. I wouldn't even be surprised if someone told me the numbers actually work in reverse of what you would expect, and higher attraction produces lower results.

 

[Turean]

Thanks guys. It sounds like this is still not working right after all this time. I realize this is maybe not the most important issue right now but when you see how there are buildings, techs, etc. that are supposed to effect ethics attraction it's clear this was supposed to be a somewhat prominent mechanic in the game and not just an afterthought. So seeing it not work correctly at all can be discouraging.

 

[Mcgan]

The thing that annoys me the most about the current system, is that government ethics do not decrease attraction toward opposed ethics.

It's especially ridiculous when you have the "Mechanists" Origin and your pops are attracted to spiritualism...

Also, if you have a faction representing an ethic your government does not have, then it'll give that ethic a +100% attraction.
You get the same bonus attraction for your government's non-fanatic ethics. (Fanatic ethics get +200% instead).

 

[SirBlackAxe]

Oddly enough, my current 3.2 game is the first time I /haven't/ seen all factions spawn - I'm 109 years into a corporate fanatic xenophile pacifist game and I still only have 3 factions; the non-governing one is egalitarian, likely from the democratic crusaders I got an early defensive pact with.

Either there's been some change since 3.0, xenophile ethics are just that overpowering, or avoiding migration pacts because I'm aquatic and rolled terraforming early matters more than I thought.

 

[Mcgan]

There is one thing that is good about the current system however, and that is the effect of happiness:
positive happiness can grant up to 50% government ethics attraction.

So pacifists or egalitarians can have an easier time with factions.
Or even better, Authoritarian Pacifists. Give them the "decadent" and "weak" traits for even more authoritarian and pacifist attraction.