Hey Guys, Environmentalism was buffed massively!

[Silesian Burd]

Ranger Lodges are now BUILDINGS too, in addition to being Holdings! The buildings incentivize leaving naturally-occurring Blockers in place, while the Holding appears unchanged. Rangers now produce Society Research and Amenities, a bit similarly to old Culture Workers (but with Amenities instead of Unity)!

On the other hand, you can't have both Environmentalism AND Relentless Industrialists. I know some might be disappointed by that.

 

[Hansatron]

It's a shame they don't give unity, because Detox terraformed worlds are loaded with blockers; you could just set up some 3-4 pop outposts and absolutely reap a windfall.

 

[Silesian Burd]

It's a shame they don't give unity, because Detox terraformed worlds are loaded with blockers; you could just set up some 3-4 pop outposts and absolutely reap a windfall.

Ranger Lodges are supposed to give Unity, though.

I imagine it's a similar quantity to the Monuments.

 

[moyang]

Did console test, natural blockers does not grant unity bonus.
Ranger lodge adds a blocker to the planet, and only that blocker gives meager 2 unity bonus to the building. It's just unbelievably bad.

I was wrong, it works well.

 

[Bearmarshal]

Ranger Lodges are supposed to give Unity, though.
View attachment 881573
I imagine it's a similar quantity to the Monuments.

Hansatron means the unique blockers on detoxed worlds don't give unity. Normal blockers give 3 unity each, I think? Also, the Ranger Lodge itself creates a single 1 sector blocker which counts as natural for the purpose of producing unity.

Unfortunately, the Ranger Lodge doesn't remove the pop growth penalty from blockers, so your larger planets will suffer quite a bit unless you're willing to forgoe your environmentalist ideals.

Did console test, natural blockers does not grant unity bonus.
Ranger lodge adds a blocker to the planet, and only that blocker gives meager 2 unity bonus to the building. It's just unbelievably bad.

In my game they worked as intended. Which blockers were present naturally for you?

 

[legionof1]

Yeah i imagine they tried to restrict what counts as "natural" so that event blockers that dont block districts, or the aforementioned detox stuff wont count, and made it too restrictive.

Even coded properly unity as a trade for the job potential a blocker represents is bad. The only time i would see it being good, is playing knights of the toxic god as a unity rush, since the home world is stuck on 4-5 blocks anyway

Maybe if it compensated you a few jobs scaled by blockers it would be good.

 

[Hansatron]

Yeah, I was thinking that 2 unity for actually counts is thin. If the ranger jobs also granted unity per blocker or something, then maybe you'd have something going. Most worlds are only gonna have 2-4 blockers and the fact that the building itself forces you to give up a district is not a fantastic trade.

That and the rangers give 2 society and 3 amenities; they are not very good, even as workers without job upkeep.

 

[moyang]

In my game they worked as intended. Which blockers were present naturally for you?

Ok I tested again, and this time it worked correctly. Not sure what happened in my last test...

Then it could be a nice source of unity early game. while it's not as useful in later stage of game.

 

[Silesian Burd]

The following Blockers do not add Unity, in my experience:
-> Slums
-> Industrial Wastelands

I imagine the Toxic stuff doesn't give Unity because looking at it kills you.

 

[Pancakelord]

Feels like going with unity per # blockers isnt really worth it - unless we get some rework of planetary blockers/features, so they can regenerate somehow. Like it feels a bit pointless if you take someone's world and they have already cleared the blockers there.

Failing that, the building probably ought to just provide "some max value" of unity, maybe equal to the planet's size, scaled by the % of un-built districts (so a 25 world with 10 free districts gives 10 rather than 25 unity) - biologically diverse worlds (gaian) could give more than dead (tomb) ones, too. Resort worlds would be a prime candidate for such a building, then. Maybe the output could even scale if there are Conservationist trait pops on the colony.

 

[Silesian Burd]

Feels like going with unity per # blockers isnt really worth it - unless we get some rework of planetary blockers/features, so they can regenerate somehow. Like it feels a bit pointless if you take someone's world and they have already cleared the blockers there.

Failing that, the building probably ought to just provide "some max value" of unity, maybe equal to the planet's size, scaled by the % of un-built districts (so a 25 world with 10 free districts gives 10 rather than 25 unity) - biologically diverse worlds (gaian) could give more than dead (tomb) ones, too. Resort worlds would be a prime candidate for such a building, then.

Hmm... did Terraforming ever reroll features and blockers?

 

[Pancakelord]

Hmm... did Terraforming ever reroll features and blockers?

Features yes. fairly sure no for blockers. It used to be faster to clear a very big planet of its blockers by terraforming it sometimes, back in tiles, so I think it's always wiped out natural blockers.

An alternative is to let players create them e.g. a new ranger planet decision "increase/reduce ranger funding" could block/freeup a district and spawn/remove another nature preserve, letting you stack them, too. Bit micro-ey though.

 

[Silesian Burd]

Features yes. fairly sure no for blockers. It used to be faster to clear a very big planet of its blockers by terraforming it sometimes, back in tiles, so I think it's always wiped out natural blockers.

An alternative is to let players create them e.g. a new ranger planet decision "increase/reduce ranger funding" could block/freeup a district and spawn/remove another nature preserve, letting you stack them, too. Bit micro-ey though.

Yeah. I see the Lodge as being neat for if you expand quickly, but it could maybe use a bit more Unity per Blocker, or maybe an option to build more than one on a planet. Or heck, Culture Worker stuff, since Rangers count as Culture Workers.

 

[Morchaste]

Even coded properly unity as a trade for the job potential a blocker represents is bad. The only time i would see it being good, is playing knights of the toxic god as a unity rush, since the home world is stuck on 4-5 blocks anyway

The saddest thing is that they're planetary features, not blockers. They do not count.

Yeah. I see the Lodge as being neat for if you expand quickly, but it could maybe use a bit more Unity per Blocker, or maybe an option to build more than one on a planet. Or heck, Culture Worker stuff, since Rangers count as Culture Workers.

It would be nice if the Ranger Lodge replaced the Monument, like for Memorialist. It would free a building slot, and you would get the cheapest Culture Workers in the game.

 

[Sinister2202]

Finally space elves now viable. I wish with warrior culture, ranger lodge would give you soldier jobs. Right now the ranger lodge seem underwhelming. What a waste of a civic point. What a shame.

 

[DeanTheDull]

Feels like going with unity per # blockers isnt really worth it - unless we get some rework of planetary blockers/features, so they can regenerate somehow. Like it feels a bit pointless if you take someone's world and they have already cleared the blockers there.

If the opponent is clearing their blockers by the time you're conquering them, that's a good thing- it means the opponent is either being very inefficient with their early-game teching (blocker techs instead of useful ones) and econ, or is so desperate that they had to commit to blocker clearing despite the inefficiency, both of which are probably why you're the one conquering them and not the other way around. This is a bit of the inverse of the criminal syndicate dynamic: you're not beating the syndicate if you spam early-game enforcers, because while you're doing that it's still growing.


Environmentalism as a civic is for early-game wide expanders and pop bloomers, especially xenophobes, to have an aggressive tradition growth without having to commit the pops towards culture workers instead of scientists. It's closer to a xenophobe war economy set-up for a year 25 war, where you spend your first tradition as an econ base (prosperity after dipping into exploration's tech draw chance) leading to Supremacy as a second tradition.

Mechanically, it's a civic that rewards/incentivizes you to invest more heavily in your mining/mineral capacity early on by letting you turn those miners into unity (the pop-free unity that comes after the 1000 mineral commitment), before transitioning that mineral over-capacity into industrial districts and CG and then alloys. Even if most planets 'only' provide an average of 6-8 unity via the imposed and natural blockers, this is basically an extra politician per world at a point in the game where politicians are the core of one's unity economy, only without needing the pop to be the unity job. Early traditions are functional techs, and expanding unity production before science production is quite viable- and this civic allows you to expand the unity production without actually taking the pops from being science.

This isn't as much a unity infusion as, say, Parliamentary System, but it is one of the only civics that actually adds pop-free unity into the early game economy, where it's most useful.

 

[Silesian Burd]

Environmentalism as a civic is for early-game wide expanders and pop bloomers, especially xenophobes

I suppose you can't hate the trees if they've been there before you-- Oh wait, Americans can't really use that logic, whoops.

 

[Critical Ethics]

Small public service announcement: you can prevent the planet automation from removing blockers via the planet automation menu.

 

[Ikael]

It seems like a very minor bonus, mainly done for flavor. Ranger Lodge's main benefit is the reduction in consumer goods consumption. Perhaps making it dependant on natural blockers rather than a fixed amount would be a bigger incentive for leaving planets unspoiled (say, -5% planet consumer good consumption per intact "natural" blocker).

 

[Mcgan]

Ranger Lodge's main benefit is the reduction in consumer goods consumption.

It doesn't do that though?
The civic reduces pop consumer goods consumption, and the Rangers from the Ranger Lodge Holding do too, but that's it. The normal building doesn't reduce consumer goods consumption in any way.