Hive Mind needs their own traits...

[xsubtownerx]

So I've been having blast playing the new bank patch and Utopia DLC. One thing I've noticed is that Hive Minds can be quite OP if built right.

The build I have that is totally kicking ass uses: Extremely Adaptive, Rapid Breeders, Sedentary, Repugnant, Solitary (Rapid breeder could be replaced with enduring which I also like a lot).

Notice that the negative traits don't have ANY impact on Hive Mind. None. Hive minds are not affected by happiness (good or bad).

And of course seeing as how you need at least 40% habitability to colonise, Extremely Adaptive allows you to colonise any planet type (as long as the planet itself doesn't have a habitability debuff) and your pops will operate without any penalties. Meaning you can expand quickly and with the best available planets of all types. SUPER POWERFUL!

If they were intended to be played like this, that's cool. If they weren't then I suggest they get their own unique traits to pick from (just like their civics) to balance the game a bit.

Cheers.

 

[Alblaka]

The build I have that is totally kicking ass uses: Extremely Adaptive, Rapid Breeders, Sedentary, Repugnant, Solitary (Rapid breeder could be replaced with enduring which I also like a lot).

That's weird, I couldn't select Solitary and SedentaryDeviant for Hiveminds, because those traits were specifically excluded from species creation with Hivemind ethic selected. (Or more precisely, required you to have any of the 8 base ethics selected, which implies you cannot be hivemind at th same time.)

Sounds like you either found a bug, or are maybe using mods that circumvent the fix of this rather obvious exploit.

 

[Sirbab]

Perhaps it was changed in the beta patch?

 

[Antediluvian Monster]

Yeah, I couldn't pick obvious free negative traits like solitary or decadent either. The trait tab was highlighted red and tooltip explained they were incompatible. Though I didn't attempt to save or start with the empire.

 

[Alblaka]

Perhaps it was changed in the beta patch?

I created my Hivemind on the evening of release date.
And whilst I did not check whether the exploit is still fixed in 1.5.1, it seems weird to assume they unfixed it in a hotfix.

I strongly suspect mods here, especially because of the way the condition is defined (=must have one of the 8 ethics), which could be accidentally circumvented by having a mod that, say, reduces hivemind ethic cost to 2 (which is a common thing, because it allows playing hivemind with some flavour in form of an ethic choice).

 

[xsubtownerx]

That's weird, I couldn't select Solitary and Sedentary for Hiveminds, because those traits were specifically excluded from species creation with Hivemind ethic selected. (Or more precisely, required you to have any of the 8 base ethics selected, which implies you cannot be hivemind at th same time.)

Sounds like you either found a bug, or are maybe using mods that circumvent the fix of this rather obvious exploit.

Solitary doesn't work anymore but Sedentary still does.

 

[Alblaka]

Solitary doesn't work anymore but Sedentary still does.

My bad, I confused Sedentary and Deviant (because that's another trait that would be trivially broken for Hiveminds to pick).
Of course Sedentary is still fair, since Hiveminds do employ Resettlement (or at least have the option theoretically).

Still leaves me puzzled how you ever managed to craft that species in first place though...

 

[xsubtownerx]

So I replaced solitary with wasteful. Not sure if it's worth it yet but I do like rapid breeders... (or Enduring).

Still with that said, just give Hive Mind their own set of Traits!

 

[Alblaka]

Still with that said, just give Hive Mind their own set of Traits!

I would personally prefer allowing Hiveminds to have some form of ethics to designate different types of Hivemind, with either more civics or conditional access to the normal empire civics.
Trait-wise, Hivemind species don't differ enough from normal species (both in gameplay and realism) to justify adding a new set of traits. Just conditional'ing out unfitting traits (as this thread has shown) is sufficient, in my oppinion.

 

[Antediluvian Monster]

I don't think they need their own traits. Resilient in particular sound a stereotyped hive mind pick. Some alteration to traditions and better flavor for events and such would be more important.

 

[xsubtownerx]

I would personally prefer allowing Hiveminds to have some form of ethics to designate different types of Hivemind, with either more civics or conditional access to the normal empire civics.
Trait-wise, Hivemind species don't differ enough from normal species (both in gameplay and realism) to justify adding a new set of traits. Just conditional'ing out unfitting traits (as this thread has shown) is sufficient, in my oppinion.

Yeah OR allow us to modify our immortal leader. Seems strange that they are all the same and do nothing.

 

[Myrkabah]

At current, there's a bug where you can still select the normally-disallowed traits in genetic modification.

Screenshot: https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd....251/8F15EE7E89D0DD838969004C41B65562BF218C4D/