Hivemind question - starvation

[Blue Giraffe]

Am I just not seeing something but aside from being unable to grow more pops the hivemind receives no penalty from running on empty food?

1.stock up on max non-secotr planets you can get
2. fill them up with pops
3. replace these worhtless farms with whatever you need (to benefit from small empire some science/unity buildings).
4. ?
5. Profit

 

[Secret Master]

Am I just not seeing something but aside from being unable to grow more pops the hivemind receives no penalty from running on empty food?

1.stock up on max non-secotr planets you can get
2. fill them up with pops
3. replace these worhtless farms with whatever you need (to benefit from small empire some science/unity buildings).
4. ?
5. Profit

How will you colonize new worlds or fill up conquered worlds without food? The Hive cannot expand without food.

You can conquer other POPs for food and expand that way, but that means being constantly at war so that you are always bringing in new biomass upon which to feed.

Remember: POPs you send to habitats need food, too. Once you unlock them, even a small empire can build a ton of habitats. You'll need positive food to fill them up. Then there's ring worlds....

 

[Blue Giraffe]

How will you colonize new worlds or fill up conquered worlds without food? The Hive cannot expand without food.

You can conquer other POPs for food and expand that way, but that means being constantly at war so that you are always bringing in new biomass upon which to feed.

Remember: POPs you send to habitats need food, too. Once you unlock them, even a small empire can build a ton of habitats. You'll need positive food to fill them up. Then there's ring worlds....

As I said, I think it's a bug that the hive-mind gets zero penalties from running on negative food.

However, from your post I deduce you are not very good at the game as you preach that building habitats is something good and fail to realise penalties that growing wide brings in current version of the game.

So about habitats: Spend 5 years, 5k minerals, 100 influence, and extra food to receive SEVERE penalty to research and unity, brilliant idea!
The penalty you get for extra planets for research unity is overwhelming (10%)! That's the bonus you get for rare and expensive tech or from your precious ethos/trait. Hence, the above is a gamebreaking bug - I've been running on 0 food ever since I spotted this in my hive-mind campaign and my species are doing awesome!

 

[Secret Master]

However, from your post I deduce you are not very good at the game as you preach that building habitats is something good and fail to realise penalties that growing wide brings in current version of the game.

Was it really necessary to insult my game playing ability?

To be honest, I thought using habitats were for those playing tall. They aren't worthwhile for those going wide, unless all habitable worlds in the galaxy are already owned. It's cheaper just to conquer people or colonize.

The penalty you get for extra planets for research unity is overwhelming (10%)!

If you think a 10% penalty is overwhelming, you haven't really tried playing the game in some other ways.

So about habitats: Spend 5 years, 5k minerals, 100 influence, and extra food to receive SEVERE penalty to research and unity, brilliant idea!

Or 3700 minerals and 75 influence, if you bother to make them cheaper. And if you are a hive mind, who needs excessive unity past a certain point? There are plenty of traditions that are worthless for a Hive Mind. And you can win the game long before you need to bother unlocking more than a handful of ascension perks.

I've been running on 0 food ever since I spotted this in my hive-mind campaign and my species are doing awesome!

Sure. Meanwhile, I've smothered the galaxy with my hive, with so many teeming POPs that I don't even bother to research debris. Who needs tech when you already own the galaxy? The Unbidden didn't even rouse my interest for more than few minutes. My drones are tired of winning at this point.

 

[TomatoJuice]

So about habitats: Spend 5 years, 5k minerals, 100 influence, and extra food to receive SEVERE penalty to research and unity, brilliant idea!
The penalty you get for extra planets for research unity is overwhelming (10%)! That's the bonus you get for rare and expensive tech or from your precious ethos/trait. Hence, the above is a gamebreaking bug - I've been running on 0 food ever since I spotted this in my hive-mind campaign and my species are doing awesome!

Minerals + Energy still beat (almost) everything.

Oh one of your ships can beats three of mine?
How cute let's see you win with 6 to 1 odds.
Oh you beat my fleet? I have a new one before you even replenish half of your losses?.

In my current Pacifist hivemind (role-play as an extreme isolationist) game I had some really unlucky tech choices.

I've got just Lvl 2 Projectiles, lvl 2 armor and lvl 3 shield, Warp 2, Engine 2 and Computers 2 and jus Cruser Tech.

And got attacked by Evil Purifying Birds.
They had freaking Lvl 5 Projectile, Lvl 4 Armor, Lvl 5 Shield, Wormhole, Lvl 3 Engine Lvl 3 Computers with Battleships.

Just Zerged those ugly Birds. Yeah I lost way more ships than they fielded. But my superior mineral production allowed me to never stop building ships and my energy allowed me to go to about 240% fleet cap before the war ended (also got enough wreckage that many of those techs where free or at least almost free for me).

 

[Untrustedlife]

As I said, I think it's a bug that the hive-mind gets zero penalties from running on negative food.

However, from your post I deduce you are not very good at the game as you preach that building habitats is something good and fail to realise penalties that growing wide brings in current version of the game.

So about habitats: Spend 5 years, 5k minerals, 100 influence, and extra food to receive SEVERE penalty to research and unity, brilliant idea!
The penalty you get for extra planets for research unity is overwhelming (10%)! That's the bonus you get for rare and expensive tech or from your precious ethos/trait. Hence, the above is a gamebreaking bug - I've been running on 0 food ever since I spotted this in my hive-mind campaign and my species are doing awesome!

What?

habitats can EASILY pay for themselves in research, in fact habitats specialize in energy and science.

Also yes they are for tall players.

 

[Blue Giraffe]

What?

habitats can EASILY pay for themselves in research, in fact habitats specialize in energy and science.

Also yes they are for tall players.

Correct me if my math is wrong. From building a full pops habitat u get 22% research penalty 10% from planet 12% from 12 pops. Meaning, unless you make up with more than 22% of research u are already collecting this will result in net loss for your research (not mentioning unity!). If I am collecting 140/140/140, building a habitat will demand that I collect with it additional 31/31/31 to off-set the penalty.

 

[tangled axile]

Correct me if my math is wrong. From building a full pops habitat u get 22% research penalty 10% from planet 12% from 12 pops. Meaning, unless you make up with more than 22% of research u are already collecting this will result in net loss for your research (not mentioning unity!). If I am collecting 140/140/140, building a habitat will demand that I collect with it additional 31/31/31 to off-set the penalty.

Yeah, you're mixing up how it works.

The penalty is additive, NOT multiplicative. In brief: You're assuming that every time that the penalty increases by 22%, the new cost is 1.22* the previous cost. What actually happens is that you add 22% of the BASE cost of the technology. So cost growth is linear, not exponential - and, in theory, the amount of new research points is also linear.

TLDR: There definitely ARE setbacks while planets are empty or undeveloped, but in the long run new planets' extra resources will roughly balance out the associated penalty.

(Usually, a new planet also means more territory and this more mining/research stations, hence more resources than you get specifically from the planet tiles, but i admit that habitats generally won't add much to your borders).

 

[Blue Giraffe]

Yeah, you're mixing up how it works.

The penalty is additive, NOT multiplicative. In brief: You're assuming that every time that the penalty increases by 22%, the new cost is 1.22* the previous cost. What actually happens is that you add 22% of the BASE cost of the technology. So cost growth is linear, not exponential - and, in theory, the amount of new research points is also linear.

TLDR: There definitely ARE setbacks while planets are empty or undeveloped, but in the long run new planets' extra resources will roughly balance out the associated penalty.

(Usually, a new planet also means more territory and this more mining/research stations, hence more resources than you get specifically from the planet tiles, but i admit that habitats generally won't add much to your borders).

How so? If I have research with base cost of 600 and I get 10 planets with 0 pop each it goes to 1200?

 

[Felius]

How so? If I have research with base cost of 600 and I get 10 planets with 0 pop each it goes to 1200?

Well, technically no, but only because a planet with no pop is immediately lost. But yeah, if you could have a planet with zero pop, this would be the result.

 

[Angelic_Daemon]

How so? If I have research with base cost of 600 and I get 10 planets with 0 pop each it goes to 1200?

The game tells you the associated cost of planet and pops. Just hover over the cost of a tech, at least it use to, I have check in this version.

Will administrative costs bonus reduce the tech penalty?

 

[TempusxX]

as others have said habitats are for tall players so that they can compete with wide players and if you have habitats they specialize in science and energy

 

[Galithor]

Tangled Axile's point is that you dont need 22% more monthly tech to research a tech thats 22% more expensive in the same amount of time.

All the research bonuses cut into that significantly.

 

[Alblaka]

Correct me if my math is wrong.

Plain example:

You currently make 200 research points a month.
Now you build a habitat and fill it with pops. Your tech costs raise by 22%.

As to what I've understood from your point of view, you think this means the habitat now needs to produce 44 points of science to compensate (because 1.22*200=244)
Which however, is only true if you previously had exactly 1 planet with 10 pops (aka, 100% tech cost).

Assuming a more realistic number for 200 research a month, you likely have something like 10 planets with 200 pops (raw guess) and techcosts of upwards 300%.
Simply taking latter value, adding 22% means you now rise from 300 to 322% tech costs. Which means, to compensate, you have to earn ~215 research points now (not 244!).
(Math: 200/3.00*3.22=214.6)

Which, even withoud any % modifiers, is VERY doable for a Habitat.