Shadow Empire | Steam Release - 02 - Cut Off

[@eduardopupucon]

it's called an isthmus, when it's a peninsula that is connected on the other side

[@BlueTemplar15]

8:07 - No, as you can see, the extra water is getting lost, which means that traders don't want it. 8:30 - Well, you *could* try to give your private economy a boost... (Light Industry !) 9:02 - That uncommented +1 Pop Happiness is probably due to higher loyalty dragging it up ? 9:06 - I'm not aware of any relationship between city tier and luxuries or directly happiness. AFAIK city tier only lowers max QoL scores. 17:04 - Why would you prefer solar power on a planet with plenty of water/food ?

[@boomboomf2268]

Ooof I wish you luck with the 2 majors and the slavers. That is abit of a rough start. Slavers are especially tough cause they have lots of vehicles like tanks and buggies. Possibly (and this is a debated move on the discord) it might be worth it to get a model design council early to rush tanks, as even one independent light tank unit can punch really hard. Also buggies are super useful early game for scouting and on the attack

[@Ben111000111]

One possibly reason the relationships with the Majors seems backwards, with the 38 being “hostile” and the 33 “friends” is your borders. You have fully enclosed the 38, restricting them to only a couple more tiles than they started with, whilst you’ve only just pushed your borders into contact with the 33

[@BlueTemplar15]

13:08 - Yeah, also some regime types are inherently more hostile than others ?

[@f4uxp4s]

Thanks for this playthrough!

[@thesci-ficafe3050]

As far as budget goes, I thing it's pretty faithful to reality that a council responds by getting upset, even if you split the resources 50/50. They're still losing assets, reducing their negotiation chances and their prestige. Why wouldn't they be upset? The game sort of insists on the idea of fierce interpersonal competition. Mostly, an individual or corporative interest would trample a collective interest in a society ruined by war (that part isn't entirely true, but still the game does give characters their own convictions and levels of loyalty and egoism). I still think it is quite solid in this aspect. It just surprised me precisely because of it: I expected more of a pure wargame with extra strategic venues (administration, diplomacy, and so on). It feels a lot like a role-playing experience, though, and the copious amounts of dice-rolls contribute to give it a board game aspect, at least to me. Not complaining, mind you (I like rpgs and board games). Just surprised.

[@attackanddestroy]

The combat reminds me of Emperor of the Fading Suns.

[@igncom1]

I think the city events are harsh to make sure the player manages their citys well, or face endless rebellions.

[@BlueTemplar15]

16:46 - Yeah, with the very large number of the rolls made in this game, you *do* get the law of large numbers ! And I don't understand what you're talking about : what kind of "single roll determining the whole course of the game" happened to you related to population happiness ? EDIT : 34:07 - Yeah, I'm still not convinced. First, that even is not completely random, it tends to happen when your happiness is already low. Second, it mostly seems to be a tradeoff for picking Meritocracy in the first place. And yeah, you can't count on success for that choice until you have a great governor... but note how Meritocracy also gives you a stratagem for generating better leaders ? Third, the Autocracy and Democracy options aren't completely free either. Finally, Unrest, even high levels of it, is not *that* hard to deal with, though I can see how if your regime is being strained from every direction you could end up in a death spiral.

[@trekaddict]

Somehow, the lack of a mini-map bugs me. FoW is one thing, but has the concept of even paper maps for senior officers died in the future?

[@boomboomf2268]

There is a minimap of sorts under one of the tabs that looks like a globe. The dev is a one man studio so some of his design is out of date, esp in the UI, but again I feel that as a 1 man studio a degree of slack should be cut.

[@benlex5672]

But... but there is a mini map... you just have to open it

[@trekaddict]

@@benlex5672 True, could be that my gateway drug to RTS games was C&C Red Alert...

[@benlex5672]

It’s not exactly RTS but turn-based, eliminating the functional need of minimap on UI at all times. On the other hand in games like total war that are RTS you’ll always see minimap because there is a functional need

[@rpscorp9457]

@@boomboomf2268 for this level of graphics...nah, i cant cut him any slack. Wizards and Warlords, 1 dev. Stellar Tactics, 1 dev. Astrox Imperium, 1 dev. This guy needs to either step up or step off. Maybe go and find something else to do that suits better.

[@kalianvan9222]

1 a day is simply not enough for me! :D really enjoying this series just like your Arrakis/not like Arrakis planet you did oh oh still have the planet that Das found that actually has the giant sand worms? :D

[@locked3313]

new series r always something to look forward to thanks mate :)

[@happydemon3038]

Regarding the RNG bit: I call it volatile RNG, basically it's when a single dice roll can have huge effects. If you roll high you gain a lot and if you roll low you lose a lot. This can be reduced by having more rolls, as you're less likely to hit 3 consecutive high rolls than 1 consecutive high roll. It's part of the complaint between the X-COM games. In the older games, the RNG was tough, but you had more troops to play with, so losing a single trooper isn't a game-ender, while in the older games all but requires you to have a veteran squad by the endgame, which is hard when by endgame you only have 6 troops you can send at a mission at a time, unlike the 26 of the Avenger of the older game, though you also had more tactical flexibility, as the game didn't arbitrarily decide this trooper can only ever use snipers and this one is the only one with a rocket launcher. You decided that on your own.

[@Seve82]

23:33 Funny how the experience is opposite for me as I always seem to be out of political points. One part might be that I run with all the event stuff turned on draining a lot of pp. 24:56 In my current game I actually had capable supervisors trigger for me before accomplished envoys around turn 20 even with latter having 20% chance for 10 turns. The dice gods seem to not favor me. Perhaps I need to sacrifice another goat to please the allmighty RNGesus...

[@TortugaPower]

Political points become a problem later in the game when you have more councils that starve the Supreme Council of points for PP gen. So it's an issue, although I haven't found it gating me from important decisions like money can. [edit: although money seems to lose importance pretty quickly after early game]

[@benlex5672]

You need more zones and governor. Mid game my PP income is about 70-ish per round.

[@BlueTemplar15]

I think maybe that he hates "wasting" FPs on PPs ? 22:17 - You could get fate points by playing that red fate stratagem : Paranoia ! Anyway, I would assume that the lack or abundance of PPs (or any other resource, really) is going to depend a *lot* on the game conditions and playstyle ! ---- Huh, I didn't even think that getting a higher level Regime Feat before a lower one in the same line was possible ! 25:06 - I assume that's +1 Food / 1k Population in Private Jobs ? Yeah, that's probably not going to be super good on this planet but think about planets where you can't do open (xeno)farming and where water is scarce ! 25:42 - You don't think that the Recruit Talent stratagem is already pretty good ? Also, the 2nd Meritocracy Feat gives you the Faction "Worker Privileges" stratagem, which is IMHO *really good* at keeping workers happy ! 26:26 - +200cr/round/100k populace, with no strings attached IMHO *is* quite a big deal !

[@BlueTemplar15]

@@benlex5672 Not directly. Though more zones might mean more BPs from Bureaucrat Offices (meaning more BPs available to be converted into PPs). AFAIK Governors don't have *any* effect on BP production ?

[@BlueTemplar15]

9:51 - Yeah, with only 2 arty out of 10 military subunits, you're better off not wasting your unit APs only engaging with the arty... 11:09 - Are the "goody huts" really only hidden on the free folk settlements, and do you really have to walk a unit on it or claiming that territory is enough ? 19:21 - You went from 3.5:1 to 6:1, so *better* odds ? (Yeah, the order of units also matters, I still don't understand what it's about...) Also, IMHO good enough to risk an attack, especially since these units are likely to be *immediately* required elsewhere ! 29:20 - I would have moved on those Dorian Mountains, because if the AI does, you can probably say good-bye to your cut-off troops... EDIT : 35:37 - Yep, who's willing to bet that that unit was *just* moved there ? 35:55 - They still have ammo and fuel... for now. 36:10 - That's weird, they still have 100 infantry for 10 trucks (and the bikers ride on their own), so why the infantry icon ??

[@Bill_Garthright]

Didn't you choose that starting option where your planet is much more fractured than normal? That's why you're so crowded in by other major regimes, isn't it? I don't like that when I play the game. I'm not a wargamer, and I'm not interested in leaping immediately into war, so I prefer a game where I have time to spread out a bit and get my nation established. But it's good that we can kind of design the game we want, huh?

[@midnightfox6378]

What if Salzburg attack and take your city?? You need to defend the capital

[@davidburton9690]

Salzburg is Theocratic. Sister Miriam and all that.

[@BlueTemplar15]

4:00 - But this Advisor is specialized in Covert Ops, not fighting, shouldn't the Supreme Command Director be a better target ? 5:31 - Yeah, you *really* should put that Eugene Oldhall Cap IV as your SHQ Commander ! 6:53 - Why putting BPs into research when you have nothing to research yet ? And you're putting BPs into Prospecting while you haven't even checked whether there were any spots to prospect... 7:03 - I hear that as long as there's at least 1% (or is that 1 BP ?) for a task, the directors will get trained (as much?) for this task ?

[@dracopticon7788]

Thing is, if you want this video and the first to be instructive, for instance you can't click through what cards you get and such with blinding speed and keep talking about things you know but others do not. It just become "note to self" instead of explaining how it works. Otherwise good video.

[@VuldEdone]

Slight note, I had given up on Arrakis due to the slow speed and decided to follow this series due to the sped up turns. That meritocracy speech in the middle, and the other talk near the end, were already bogging down the video.

[@TheMasterChief101234]

That's one of the reasons I almost never finish Tortugas series' :( he's an awesome content creator but a little too meticulous for my taste tbh.

[@cedo3333]

Hey i have found a new council and so your budget is halved or -40% do you really think people will be happy about that??? come on!

[@BlueTemplar15]

4:27 - Yeah, that's why you fire a Director before lowering his budget, and then re-hire him again the next turn ! 4:47 - The directors are upset because they only care about seeing their budget *changed* (in % of the global budget, and actually *NOT* counting new councils being added !)