@DARCA Dang, that's a lot of planets under Yor control.

@Gaunathor Yeah, I think that AIP 8 suits the Yor better due to that need to set a fair tax rate and encourage early growth.

Morning.

I've seen the Yor do very, very well, it all depends on how they start the game. AIP11's love for biological tech can win them the day. But, considering how the Yor should be played I can see AIP8 doing better and now that we know how to tame AIP8 it shouldn't be that difficult. But I do feel at least one race should be AIP11 just to balance things out. Maybe the Iconians? I don't think it'll make a very big difference in how they perform and I had them on AIP11 on APT1.0 and 2.0.

As to the hulls being research to early.

I know this but it's nearly impossible to force the AI to get it right. Either they procrastinate much to long or they get their hulls very early. It's nigh impossible to time right, believe me I tried. 

When it comes to hulls we're left with two evils.

To early. Or to late.

It's the same with logistics. We could put the AIValue of basic logistics back to 30. This will make the tech valuable and AIP11 might pick it up eventually but this trick won't work with AIP8. So again we face the same evils.

To early. Or to late.

I'm in the to early camp. There's no way we can make the AI understand that logistics and hulls are quick ways to turn the tide of a war. Instead it will grind out weapons. The AI's need to be prepared as catching up is beyond their skill set.

Ohhhhkey... I can see how you guys prefer AIP8 controlling Yor worlds. Geez... Anyway I got them back in business on AIP8. They get all their +pop, eco, industry, research and they do their planets better.

Terrifying. I'll see if I can get the Krynn running on AIP11. Shouldn't take long.

It actually does work with AIP 8. Or rather, the AIValue of 32 works. I had set the Yor back to AIP 8, and used some of your tricks to get them to research better. However, I didn't use your trick for logistics, so they were still using the same values as AIP 11. They got Basic Logistics in 2227, and Enhanced Logistics by 2229.

I think we could leave the AIValues as they are, but remove the trick to force AIP 8 to research logistics. AIP 8 will still get those techs, just not as quickly as AIP 11. As long as they get some logistics for the first war, that should be okay.

I've seen some different results. e.g. Terrans, Drengin, and especially the Krynn not picking up any logistics throughout an entire game and it seals their fate before any wars have begun. Also, the Krynn won't work on AIP11 as my idea requires farms and I've made some headway with AIP8 that leaves the Iconians but they're fine as they are. Terrans and Drath have SA that apparently need AIP8.

The Thalans however... They start with the biggest pentalty to population increase and their current AI doesn't research advanced colonisation. 

So... I think the Thalans could do well on AIP11 with just a bit of tweakign. They don't have farms (which AIP11 muchs up).

Here are some screenshots from my last test game. I disabled the Logistics trick for all AIP 8 races.

Arceans:

They are on AIP 11, so it's not surprising that they have logistics.

Terrans:

They got  Basic Logistics in 2228, but I don't know, if they researched it, or bought it (I didn't pay much attention to what they did.   ).

The Yor researched Basic Logistics around the same time, so it's possible that the Terrans just bought it.

Speaking of the Yor, they most certainly researched beyond Enhanced Logistics.

I couldn't get pictures of the research screen from the other two players, the Iconians and Drath, because they were in a bit of trouble.

Though not for long. The Yor eventually took care of them.

All in all, it might be possible that the generic AIP 8 has less reservations regarding logistics, than the race-specific one. So we could set Basic and Enhanced Logistics to -10 for the Terrans, Drath, Krynn, and Thalan, while keeping them on the standard values for the Drengin, Iconians, and Yor.

I'm also going to increase the Aggression of the Drengin and Yor. Maybe that will help them get weapons sooner.

It could be worth a try. I had some problems with it, when I tried that with Autumn Twilight. Primarily getting the Thalan to research Industrial Adaptation and Technology Adaptation, and not screwing up their economy (though they do that on AIP 8 too sometimes). Maybe you have better luck.

Doesn't work on my end. The races seemed to treat the tech as usual. With AIP 11 going for it quite quickly, and AIP 8 pretty much ignoring it.

However, in one game, the Yor did research it pretty soon. They had the largest empire, and several of their planets were extreme worlds, they had conquered from the Iconians and Altarians. So, maybe it is working after all, and the races just didn't have the time and resources to go after Extreme Colonization in the previous tests.

I've run several tests with AIP8 races in one galaxy. And I've seen all of them go for it from time to time but some more than others.

AIP11 definately loves the tech but with this simple change AIP8 can be enticed to go for it as well. When they get into a war they lose interest though.

While running these tests I checked on logistics research and... well... it was depressing. -10 for basic and enhanced seems to work well though with Basic Logistics on AI 30 and AI 26 on Enhanced. This prevents AIP11 from grabbing BL immediately.

Also, I got the Thalan running pretty well on AIP11. The extra planets they grab with extreme planets really seem to help them in the early game. The AI also seems to handle their morale quite well and has little difficulty getting their planets to max pop.

These were the same criteria as I had in mind (didn't mind to much if a GA was attached but it's a fair point. I'm nearly done with the Thalan conversion to AIP11 which is looking very good imo. Their high research causes them to plow through the advanced colonisation tech and they grab a lot of planets as a result.

Once I'm done I'll post the changes and work on a list of techs which could be stealable within limits. 

Forgot to reply to this. This can be solved by setting Advanced Hulls to 30 as it stops AIP11 from instantly grabbing it but it will cause them to procrastinate their hull progression.

List of tech that could be stealable:

• Interstellar Expansion. aka Enhanced Adaptation. Torians, Iconians have it too). This tech has no baring on story and it's description was written for multiple races.
• Robust Hulls*
• Dark Influence. There's nothing there that states what the Korath do exactly so it could be stolen.
• XenoIntimidation. Iffy... but possible. I don't see Altarians doing this then again they are rather self righteous.
• UnconventionalWarfare. Maybe?
• OrganicMaterials. You could possibly steal this technology from another. Even the Iconians are just immitating the Precursors.
• OrganicHulls. Ditto
• SelfHealingHulls. And ditto
• ExpertEngineering. More Ditto.

Thalan techs are really specific to the Thalans but if we exclude them there will be nothing anyone can steal from them. Considering the Thalans moved to out dimension and are using currently available fusionreactors to do everything it is reasonable to assume other space faring being could understand these techs.

• Basic Gravitonics. I see no reason why another species could understand this technology.
• Expert Gravity Channeling. Same.
• Hyperion Hull Point. Same.
• 4d Phasing
• Dimensional Exploitation
• Dimensional Weaponry
• Near Omnipotence

It's also highly dependable on the biology of the race. Overall, I'm just not seeing it working for all races. For example, the Drengin are not known to adapt to other planets. They make other planets adapt to them instead.

How can you use something, if you don't know how it works? The Korath most certainly won't tell you how to do it.

It's intrinsic to the Drengin/Korath society. So I'd say, no.

I consider those major features of the Iconians. They are the ones with the Precursor-techs. If everyone can get them, then what makes the Iconians unique?

I don't think so. The parts may all be contemporary, but the items themselves are based on scientific knowledge that is way ahead of ours.

No, to both of these. Both are major features of the Korx. Plus, the Super Trade SB module requires the Protection Racket module, which gets unlocked by Fortified Freighters.

I don't think the Korx would trade such huge advantages away. They may love making money, but they are not stupid.

I would also add the following techs to the mix of possible candidates to steal:

Robust Hull Construction
Hull Strengthening
Creative Good
Paradise Worlds
Righteous Might
Righteous Justice
Fleet Warp Bubbles (I forgot to set these to un-tradeable/stealable earlier.)
Fleet Warp Bubbles II
Fleet Warp Bubbles III

Anyhow, I've run a few tests with the remaining races:

The Torians are doing okay overall. However, they often lack the space to build Healing Pools on Toria and other planets, because it is used up for Schools. This is pretty bad for approval, especially if the Torians built a Harvester on Toria (which often isn't the case, due to the same problem).

The Arceans and Korx haven't researched Xeno Engineering and/or Planetary Improvements several times. Also, in one game, the homeworld of the Korx looked like this in the middle of 2229:

In case you're wondering, no, the planet hadn't been conquered or culture-flipped. The Korx were far off in a corner, where no-one could reach them.

The Drath aren't researching Temples, and often don't research beyond Xeno Mysticism. In the last couple games, they haven't even researched Xeno Mysticism itself. Even when they had a good start. They do, however, have no problem going for War Profiteering (and abusing the hell out of it).

I'm not quite certain about the Thalan yet. They do seem okay, but I have the suspicion that they did better on AIP 8. That may, however, just be my imagination. I'll keep an eye on them though.

The Korath don't research Spore Weapons. At least, they didn't in any of the test-games today. It's strange though, because I had them reliably research Spore before, even when their start sucked. Maybe it is due to the bigger map, or one of the other settings. Weird.

The Krynn do okay, but they sometimes neglect Planetary Improvements in favour of their influence techs.

I think that's all of the races now.