When do factions spawn?

[smjjames]

When should I expect to see factions appear? It's been 23 years into the game and there aren't any factions yet. I looked at other AI players and most of them have factions already, some have two as well.

At this point, the only ones without factions are the hivemind empire, my empire, and another empire which has an imperial authority government (enlightened monarchy, to be specific). The hivemind aside, it looks like imperial authority ones have a delay, but only problem with that is that theres another imperial authority government empire (a despotic hegenomy) which has a faction.

So, I'm wondering what are the triggers for factions to start spawning in an empire?

 

[SevenSerpents]

Needs 5 individual pops of a given ethic.

 

[smjjames]

Needs 5 individual pops of a given ethic.

There are five spiritualist non-slave pops on my homeworld, so, how come I don't see a faction appearing?

 

[SevenSerpents]

There are five spiritualist non-slave pops on my homeworld, so, how come I don't see a faction appearing?

Even after it happens, an event has to proc for it. If it never happens, your game might be bugged.

 

[smjjames]

proc? In any case, about four ingame years later, an admiral in my empire has formed a faction.

 

[heliostellar]

Do they have to be fanatics of that ethic?

 

[The Founder]

Do they have to be fanatics of that ethic?

Pops can not be Fanatic anymore with 1.5. They have one non-Fanatic Ethos, that does not affect happiness (that is what Factions are there for now).
There should be multiple Factions for every Ethos, but I do not know how and when they trigger. It could be the game is "stuck" between two or more possible Spiritualsit Factions and needs something to decide wich one to pick.

Do not worry about loosing Influence: The base from happines is multiplied by [Faction Size]%. So the minimum size Faction (5 pops) with 2 base gain (a high 70% happiness) would grant a whopping 0.1 Influence per month.
And starting Faction Happiness for Factions will be pretty low. You have to work kind of hard to actually get a realy happy Faction.