Help me understand, why bother with transcendence?

[RabbaDooDabba]

Being immune to contingency infiltrators is also a neat boon.

 

[Ek1]

Freely means "nothing is stopping them from accessing the feature just like anyone else can".

Sorry, still not understanding your point. Psi needs specific tech and ethics to be able to get the ascension path or otherwise you have a 16,25 weight chance to get it. Every other ascension path starts by far easier tech to be obtained.

I got super lucky, I rushed psi ascension and first shroud use got me psi jump drive very early.

I got psi shields but around 200 years after getting it still no Zro as everything is already scouted when the resource was gained.

 

[The Boz]

Sorry, still not understanding your point. Psi needs specific tech and ethics to be able to get the ascension path or otherwise you have a 16,25 weight chance to get it. Every other ascension path starts by far easier tech to be obtained.

That is... not contested.

I got psi shields but around 200 years after getting it still no Zro as everything is already scouted when the resource was gained.

Psi is best even without psi shields. I should know, I'm playing a few right now, one of them in multiplayer.

 

[Cry_Havok]

You sure we playing the same game? Sure does look not-free to me.
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Yes I can because that means you have spend decade or two to researching single tech while others can steamroll updated tech all that time. Is it a good plan to fast lane to best tech? It is if you can survive that long as you save the research points from the lesser techs for something else. Also you are taking huge risk war-vise as everyone see your tech level as pathetic as you are not gaining new tech.
Well yeah but not really. Divine Enforcer does work lot like it but instead it makes pops spiritual, not loyal.

Psionics can be assimilated, you don't have to do a special project

 

[Ek1]

Psionics can be assimilated, you don't have to do a special project

Oh that's what he was after. Why he didn't say so?
I don't see how loosing whole nations production (psi and synth) is some how superior compared of loosing research points (bio).

 

[Avil]

Psionics can be assimilated, you don't have to do a special project

Pops under assimilation don't work, and have a double negative on mood due to both assimilation and unemployment, also they lose their working places and stay unemployed until they get demoted to lower strata. YAAAAAAAAAY
Plus authoritarian faction hates you, if you have one, because "awakening" isn't stratified economy

 

[Kravoka]

"Better ship ship parts" means nothing if they're locked behind the worst system of any ascension. With the other two I can just ask for something and get an ETA without any extra disappointment, psionic is about occasionally reaching into a bag of prizes that includes poisonous candy. It's the reliquary with no sense of irony.

 

[Jazzbanana]

I stand with OP. The RNG nature of the shroud's boons and rewards feels underwhelming in my personal understanding of the game. Albeit the Zro-scarcity sounds like an oversight (perhaps you could also synthesize it once trascended?) my main beef with it is having to pay credits every arbitrary interval of time for the chance to spin the psi-roulette, hoping no leader dies this time. I understand that the RNGness can be a matter of personal taste and that you couldn't possibly reward all psi-techs on ascension for obvious reasons. I also admit it's fun to get random events like probing fallen empire minds. My point is that while the two other ascensions correctly portraits your species as masters of the specific tree, the trascendance feels like you depend on random deals and gifts you may or may not get in the shroud. I'm not saying it's not fun, just that I deem it underwhelming in comparison. it's my opinion that it would benefit from some more reliability/player agency.