Tips for Syncretic Evolution?

[Devanor]

So I've begun a game where I'm playing as a Syncretic Evolution empire, and while I can control which specie will grow, as my empire expands it just gets more and more tedious to micromanage it.

Should I just let the game decide which pop will grow and hope everything will work out in the end? Or will that end with lots of unemployment, crime and my eventual downfall?

 

[Ariphaos]

Generally, once a world is 'finished' I end up locking reproduction to my main species. After which I come by once in awhile and resettle ~3-5 pops off of said world to do whatever. Start new colonies, etc.

Having a few unemployed/unhoused pops is not going to break you. Microing at each turn is ridiculous, do it in waves.

 

[Belhedler]

Rather than tips, why not the meta itself? OK it's a bit long but it's worth the read. Examples are in the following posts.
How to Authoritarian in 2.2

To answer your question.

Should I just let the game decide which pop will grow and hope everything will work out in the end? Or will that end with lots of unemployment, crime and my eventual downfall?

Colonies with mixed districts and resources producers will be fine letting the AI handle the allocation for the most part until they are full. Then you have to do something with your pops and the best option would be to relocate them to a now fast growing colony (since you are relocating all the growing pops in the already grown systems). Specialist colonies: just select the main species once and for all. Same issue once its fully grown. That's not the optimum but that's efficient enough to not deal with too much micro.

 

[Astelon]

Never really had trouble with syncretic evolution. I just let the pops grow however they wish, never had issues with unemployment. Unlike the meta posted above, I play as xenophile egalitarian. One nice thing I noticed is that, once you take the tradition from the expansion tree that gives two pops to new colonies, it always seems to be the serviles that accompany the primary species as initial pops. Not sure if this was just luck or an actual mechanic.

 

[Belhedler]

Unlike the meta posted above, I play as xenophile egalitarian.

The drawback being that you are not allowed to move pop around, that they will move to other colonies on their own and in the empires you have migration agreement with and that you're missing the sheer amount of resources a slaved serviles produces. Getting the serviles go to other empires means that some will start to enslave your serviles and get the production income for their own. It's somewhat risky because migration pacts are transversal and the pops you expected to eventually see only in your or allied empires will appear in opposing empires.

You will also get other empires pops coming in from various sources, which is great for potentialy colonizing other planet classes. But that will in turn diminish the interest of having taken Syncretic Evolution in the first place. Syncretic Evolution is a permanent civics. That's the downside of going that direction. But yeah it's playable and even enjoyable. I'm not saying the contrary.

One nice thing I noticed is that, once you take the tradition from the expansion tree that gives two pops to new colonies, it always seems to be the serviles that accompany the primary species as initial pops. Not sure if this was just luck or an actual mechanic.

I think it's indeed true. But even then serviles are now coming shortly to any colony (even ones with poor habitability). At least that's what I have in 2.2.3. There's no need to relocate a servile to have it growing on the colony anymore (that was the hardship in previous versions)

 

[Devanor]

Having a few unemployed/unhoused pops is not going to break you. Microing at each turn is ridiculous, do it in waves.

Feels like microing each turn will break me...

Guess I'll have to fix any problems with resettlement if need be.

I play as xenophile egalitarian.

Egalitarian rabble! I play as Authoritarian Xenophobe (so I can enslave the syncretic species)

One nice thing I noticed is that, once you take the tradition from the expansion tree that gives two pops to new colonies, it always seems to be the serviles that accompany the primary species as initial pops. Not sure if this was just luck or an actual mechanic.

I'm sure it's a mechanic, since I've settled many worlds and one of the pops have always been syncretic (to my chargrin, since one pop will be a "settler" and one will be unemployed why is the settler job specialist?!)

Update: it's not a mechanic, I just settled a world and got 2 of my primary species on it.

 

[Less2]

The pop growth sort of naturally goes towards a 50/50 split, which is reasonably close to what you want a developed planet to look like in terms of lower class/upper class. Involving other races is asking for trouble though, so you'll probably want to disable growth and/or migration for whatever else you acquire (they aren't properly min-maxed serviles anyway).

I'm sure it's a mechanic, since I've settled many worlds and one of the pops have always been syncretic (to my chargrin, since one pop will be a "settler" and one will be unemployed why is the settler job specialist?!)

Settler job is crap though, you want to make a district immediately and get to using that.