As far as low-hanging fruit goes in terms of easy fixes, I feel like this is definitely something up there. In terms of good and unique civics, Hiveminds literally only have Devouring Swarm. All the other Hivemind civics are either bread and butter or bread and butter and bad. Maybe this is just me, but I feel like there could be a whole bunch of different cool Civics, ones that I can practically yank off the top of my head out of sci-fi. They're mostly (all) kind of food-centric, but I feel like food, in general, is Hivemind's shtick.
- Why not have a Hivemind start with two or three different species, something along the lines of evolutionary symbiosis or mutualism (Symbiotic Mutualism)
- Maybe have a civic that starts a Hivemind with 3-4 Livestock, the ability to grow more livestock (as opposed to machines), increased food production from livestock by like 1 or 2, but less production from drones and a penalty to opinion with everybody else in the galaxy (honestly don't know why this isn't a thing) (Natural XenoPhages)
-A civic that increases food by 1 and gives an extra farmer job kind of like a Hivemind version of Rockbreakers (Botanical Husbandry)
-A civic that adds to or replaces some of military ship's production and upkeep costs with food and makes them regenerate armor and health and have less a chance of getting destroyed in combat (Biological Armaments)
-A civic that replaces some specialist upkeep costs with food (Food for Thought)
I dunno, maybe some of those are overpowered or would at least need to be carefully balanced, but I came up with all these in less than half an hour; I'm sure the big brains at Paradox can come up with better. It would just be nice to be able to have more than 1 truly civic supported playstyle on Hivemind. No two non-DS Hivemind civics are better than Byzantine Bureaucracy alone.
TL;DR, What I'm trying to say is that while some of my ideas might be bad, it would be nice if there were some good Hivemind civic options aside from devouring the entire galaxy.
- Why not have a Hivemind start with two or three different species, something along the lines of evolutionary symbiosis or mutualism (Symbiotic Mutualism)
- Maybe have a civic that starts a Hivemind with 3-4 Livestock, the ability to grow more livestock (as opposed to machines), increased food production from livestock by like 1 or 2, but less production from drones and a penalty to opinion with everybody else in the galaxy (honestly don't know why this isn't a thing) (Natural XenoPhages)
-A civic that increases food by 1 and gives an extra farmer job kind of like a Hivemind version of Rockbreakers (Botanical Husbandry)
-A civic that adds to or replaces some of military ship's production and upkeep costs with food and makes them regenerate armor and health and have less a chance of getting destroyed in combat (Biological Armaments)
-A civic that replaces some specialist upkeep costs with food (Food for Thought)
I dunno, maybe some of those are overpowered or would at least need to be carefully balanced, but I came up with all these in less than half an hour; I'm sure the big brains at Paradox can come up with better. It would just be nice to be able to have more than 1 truly civic supported playstyle on Hivemind. No two non-DS Hivemind civics are better than Byzantine Bureaucracy alone.
TL;DR, What I'm trying to say is that while some of my ideas might be bad, it would be nice if there were some good Hivemind civic options aside from devouring the entire galaxy.
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