Which of the factions do you like most?

[McLaine]

Which faction do you like most... and why?
A question that comes up as generally speaking, in my style of play nor syster Myriam, nor Yang work well (I tried).

To answer my own question for myself:

In the AC classic, it is the Spartans - you can play scientific, green and democracy (so have quick advances, charm mind worms and avoid eco disasters, have exemplary efficiency) and still have serious striking power.

In Alien Crossfire, I am still making up my mind, but so far I love the Nautilus pirates - I always makr it a point to colonize the sea as fast as I can and this helps me quite a bit...

[CEO Aaron]

It's been a while, but sure, we could use one of these threads to pick up activity here.

Morgan. They're the premier economic powerhouse of Chiron, making it easy to obtain great technological advancement and huge wealth, which you can then easily reinvest into whatever yo want: Military Units, Industrial Output, Economic or Technological infrastructure.

They have two minor drawbacks and one major one: The minor drawbacks are extra support costs and the inability to run Planned economics, and the major one is the -3 habitation cap. The support penalty is easily compensated for with their extra economic income, and the lack of a planned economy means that they need to use a Golden Age to reach a population boom. However, your huge income makes the cost of psych less punishing, and your limited population cap makes booming a less important aspect of your overall strategy.

The one major limit, the pop cap itself, is really there to keep Morgan from running away with the game, and in any case is somewhat mitigated by Ascetic Virtues, and just by building many bases, though doing that without getting the Human Genome Project can kill your ability to reach a Golden Age.

[Petek]

From the original SMAC seven, I prefer the University. Main reason: Zak is the first one to get crawlers. This usually allows you to get most, if not all, of the early SPs. Also all the other advantages from crawlers. The extra drone (at transcend) can easily be controlled. I've never found the probe rating penalty to be significant.

From the SMAX seven, I'll take the Drones for several reasons: Extra drone control allows you to run Free Market more easily than most other factions. Planned also is a good choice. With Demo/Planned/Wealth you have +4 industry and normal efficiency. Add Creches and you have permanent pop boom. With Bioengineering, you get the Longevity Vaccine SP, giving two less drones at each base. Tree Farms and Hybrid Forests are built very quickly at +4 industry.

Petek

[Hydro]

My favorite faction is the Gaians.

Advantages:

• Exploration - Being able to get worms to explore Chiron early is great, as are all the Planet Pearls from worm kills. Getting worms and later Isles of the Deep are great for exploring Chiron. This exploration means you are likely to be the first to meet all the factions, which is excellent for tech trading, and being a tech broker. You can also control the call for Planetary Governor.

• Energy – although the Gaian can’t run Free Market, the worm kills give you plenty of cash. The extra energy is good for any number of things, including rush buying SPs.

• Research – again, the Gaians can’t run FM and have a low energy output, but you can compensate for this by cranking up energy to Research budget allocation since you have +2 efficiency and suffer less penalty. I routinely run a deficit but I don’t care since I’m getting lots of PlanetPearl energy (see above). Plus, if you find the factions early you can be a tech broker you can get ahead easily. Note that if you keep to Explore techs you’re likely to get Empath Guild, with free infiltration of all factions

• Bigger empire, easy pop boom – the +2 efficiency means you get more bases before bureaucracy drones start being a problem. With switches between Planned and Green you can pop boom your way to a huge production base. More and larger bases mean more resources, which is a good thing. Bigger bases can help compensate for no FM.

• Lots of artifacts – exploring Chiron means that you get to pop more pods, and get lots of goodies. Key among these goodies are Artifacts, which can be used to increase your tech rate by linking to Network Nodes or getting a huge bump (50 minerals, which is ¼ of an early SP) toward a Secret Project. In the early game an artifact can be key to get early SPs, and the Gaians are by far the best of the Original 7 at this. Play this right and between the artifacts and boatloads of PlanetPearls you’ll be many (most?) of the early SPs. The seas are a happy hunting grounds for a IoD and an empath foil pair. Worms scour unclamined land. And you get all the artifacts!!

• Worm army – if you get a big worm army early you can cow the AI factions pretty easily. Or you can just crush them like bugs with a worm rush. Later this is more difficult. Note that worms in fungus are support free! This really helps the early Gaians keep their industrial production up and keep an army-of-note doing things (exploring) or beating the snot out of your enemies. Worms are absolutely wonderful if they catch enemies in fungus.

Disadvantages:

• Weak military – worms are great for exploring, but don’t try this against a human player. Trance is huge for defenders, and against a dug in base worms die like stuck pigs (but are good at softening up a base). Your naturally low morale makes standard military units rather weak.

• No FM – although there are ways to work around it, not being able to run FM is a problem. The Free Marketeers get lots of research energy and can power their way through the tech tree. You’ll have to work hard to keep up.

Other factors:

• Deirdre is a babe with a sultry voice. But she isn’t a bubble-headed-bleach-blond but a scientist! Brains and beauty? ‘Nuf said.

[WotanAnubis]

Gaia's Stepdaughters.

Open-minded, environmentally friendly pacifists for, as they say, the win.

Also, the Data Angels for not taking things so deathly serious all the time.

As you can tell, gameplay considerations do not factor hugely into my liking or disliking of certain factions.

[fed1943]

University: the research advantage gives a lot of paths, allows to
adapt to the situation.

Followed by the Spartans, the true balanced faction.

Best regards,

[gwillybj]

SMAC - Spartans
SMAX - Cyborgs

[Xian]

We've had this thread so many times but here I go...

Which I like the most is a complex question with several different interpretations:

Which do I like to play as?
Which do I think is the best in the game?
Which do I agree with more (ie would prefer to live under)?
Which do I think is the coolest in terms of concept, leader etc.

In terms of the game itself, I almost always play as the Drones nowadays, the most powerful faction overall, I think. The single most important faction attribute (in terms of winning the game) is the INDUSTRY rating, and they have +2. In the majority of games in the majority of planetmap settings, the Drones are going to come out on top. Good diplomacy and alien artifact searching easily make up for any problems you run into with research.

In terms of ideological affiliation, I think I would be happy with the Drones, Angels OR the Gains. They all seem based on libertarian principles and a realistic perception of what a future societies ideals could be.

However, as I've always said, Yang's Hive is one of the coolest concepts in all of science fiction ever. They live underground for heaven's sake!

[Sergius]

The University. If you handle it well, you can easily outstrip the other factions technologically. Thus, every disadvantage you might have compared to the others can be easily compensated for. E.g.: University networks can easily be infiltrated by probe teams. However, when I play, I try to build the hunter-seeker algorithm as soon as possible. Before probe team become a serious threat, I'm out of harm's way.
If I combine technological superiority with careful policy (both foreign and domestic) I can slowly build up an unstoppable empire.

[Mart]

University when first was playing the game. Then
PK - the ambient music is cool.

Later i started to enjoy other factions, discover their hidden qualities. I have to say now, I like to play all of them, each has something in it that is fun. Progenitors too.
Maybe one thing: the biggest problem is with Data Angels and their Probe roll-over bug. I would enjoy playing it much more

[McLaine]

Originally posted by Mart
Maybe one thing: the biggest problem is with Data Angels and their Probe roll-over bug. I would enjoy playing it much more

What bug would that be (I never played the Data Angels)?

[WotanAnubis]

Originally posted by McLaine What bug would that be (I never played the Data Angels)?

If I recall correctly, the moment you hit Probe rating 4 (or possibly higher), the game 'resets' to a rating of 0.

This effectively makes the Angels pretty much useless once they invent Pre-Sentient Algorithms, unless you take steps to lower their Probe rating.

[Archaic]

University for me. With the significant turn advantage the faction generates through easy and early access to FM/Wealth and crawlers, and the lack of a real disadvantage (the drone problem being taken care of easily with the Virtual World), I honestly think there's no faction in the game that can really beat them for a fast transcendence. Assuming equally skilled players, there's pretty much no way to beat a properly established University by the mid game period. If you don't manage an early to early-mid military strike on them to divert resources away from their insane builder capacity, you'll be swept away. Even denying the Virtual World to the Uni will only delay them slightly.

[Heraclitus]

University

[Darrell01]

Keep in mind, I am strictly a PvEnvironment player.

I'll tell you I never liked playing the "Tech Race" ever since playing MOO2. The Psilons just owned too much for me. They usually always beat out everyone else. I tend to play Zharkov the least because he is the "Tech Race". The Cyborgs just own even more than Zharkov.

I like to play Miriam the most, since it can be really hard to play her. At least I don't have to deal with her as an annoying enemy in the beginning. In the end game, she gets a +25% attack bonus, meaning her units are the toughest attacking in the game. Red Rover, Red Rover, come on over...

Morgan is a tuff one to play for me as well. You really have to watch that energy and put it to the best use. Early expansion is such a pain. I usually base up in a 4x4 style with overlapping base tiles instead of a mildly staggered 5x5 that I do for everyone else.

I like to play Yang. I'm a builder and he's a rusher. Using that industry to build an economy for the literally poor guy is fun.

I like the Drones too. Most people will complain about the -Research races in many strategy games. I will have to say that he does own hard if left to his devices. Fully up-growthed core bases with a lot of other bases with this and that... Truly and industrial leading to an economic powerhouse.

Gaians are easy to play, as explained above. Cult of Planet is played much the same way as I play the Gaians, except for the use of wealth. Lal is pretty vanilla for me. Spartans are fun since I don't usually rush a lot. Data Angels are kinda vanilla too. Don't play the Aliens much... Pirates are ok. I've never had a problem with the idea. There are still pirates today.