Worst Faction

[AMD4EVER]

No one seems to agree with me that Morgan is the worst faction. So which faction is the worst? Assuming all options for the map are normal or the middle option and that all rules are the ones most commonly used in games. For the most part each faction should be on their own small island or have some type of barrier between them and the faction next to them. Which faction does the worst in this most average of situations? Which does the best?

My opinion is that Morgan is the worst off of all the factions here. I'm not sure who the best off is but the Peacekeepers wouldn't do too bad.

[Flubber]

The question has been asked many many times and debated like crazy-- There is no absolute consensus among the original 7 factions. The factions I say are the weakest are the very same ones that other players ( including some strong players) see as strong.

Personally, I see the original 7 as being very balanced but if I had to choose a weak sister. I would choose the Spartans with the Believers very very close. With the spartans, I find that the industry penalty combined with the inability to go wealth is somewhat crippling. The believers, I just don't see enough to balance the research penalty. I will play ANY of the other 5 gladly in a PBEM-- I once thought of Morgan as weak as I HATED the hab limits and couldn't compensate. Now I still hate the hab limits but find Morgan to be quite strong


Of the Smax 7, I find the drones and aliens to be pretty powerful ( although each requires a different type approach) and the angels and cyborgs to be very playable. I have mixed feelings on the pirates since I am not sure I have mastered them at all.

That leaves the cult-- In your scenario of totally separate islands they would be very weak since ECON and IND penalties mean they are a poor builder. Many find the cult to be the weakest of the 14 , While I see their flaws, I see them as playable on any normal map where you don't get stuck on an island. The key is actually the free starting mindworm which can raise an army and subjegate a neighbor before they can get prepared-- The later game advantages of the cult are pretty small and in any game where there is not a close neighbor to conquer, I would prefer to be gaian.

[Chaos Theory]

I agree that the Cult is the weakest, plus in single player, they start a few years later than everyone, without the Aliens' advantages. And they're a cult.

They have the industrial problems of the Spartans, most of the economy problems of the Hive, and only get in return marginally better native life.

[CEO Aaron]

Well, in my opinion, a strong faction needs to have strengths that remain useful throughout the game, and weaknesses that aren't too crippling to negate those strengths. If your strengths don't remain relevant as the game progresses, it's vital that you make the best use of them before they cease to matter.

In light of this, I'll select the Cult as the weakest faction. Their weaknesses of poor economy and industry are quite crippling, especially the early turn-advantage you lose by being unable to expand at the rate of your more productive rivals. Their strengths seem to be a good planet rating and the positive police effect of Mindworms. A strong planet rating, while useful early on for generating a fast, free army, rapidly loses relevance as other factions can start to deploy trance troops and artillery to reduce natives to a near non-threat.

In short, you're under the gun to make something useful out of your early worms, and if you're unlucky and lose key battles or simply don't find anyone to bully, your advantages dissolve and you're still stuck with your penalties.

The runner up for my picks for Worst Faction is Sparta, since they too have a highly crippling industry penalty, and can't run wealth to counteract it. These are serious drawbacks that will hurt your development for the entire game. To overcome them, you're given extra morale. While the effect of that morale boost is there for the entire game, any other faction can easily mimic the effects of that boost with facilities. And again, if you're not in a position where you have neighbors that you can conveniently bully, your morale does you ZERO good.

[Petek]

Originally posted by Chaos Theory
I agree that the Cult is the weakest, plus in single player, they start a few years later than everyone, without the Aliens' advantages.

Just wanted to point out that the Cult's starting year in single player depends on whether you or the AI is actually playing that faction. Here's a post of mine from another thread where this was discussed:

"I started about a dozen games in which the Cult was one of the factions. Some games I was the Cult, other games I chose another faction. Went into the scenario editor as soon as the game started. Here's what I found: If you play as the Cult, then your first turn is MY 2106. However, all other factions also start in MY 2106. (In other words, no other faction had founded a base or moved a unit before the Cult's first turn.)

On the other hand, in those games where I played as a non-Cult faction, I started in MY 2101. Again looking in the scenario editor, the Cult was not to be found. They don't show up until MY 2105 or 2106.

Whenever I play as the Cult, I always assumed that I was starting 5 or so years later than everyone else. Now it seems that's not true."

However, I agree that the Cult is weak if not starting close to other factions, no matter when it "lands".

[johndmuller]

I'm not exactly in love with the Cult, but I don't think that they are all that bad either, although the luck factor is somewhat more prominent than with the other factions.

Basically, the extent to which you are able to marshal a large number of (mostly cr@ppy) Worms, IoD's and Spore Launchers has a great deal to do with your situation. The more you have, the larger the area you can cover and the more additional contacts with native life you can expect to get. In addition to the police effect (quite helpful in the early game), I find that there is a pretty substantial income to be expected from a decent contingent of MW's and IoD's cruising the fungus, looking for trouble and popping pods, not to mention free builds, more native life and other goodies. That is where all the luck comes in - how many MW's you can get quickly and the capture/fight ratio.

If you go Green, and moreso if you have the right SP's, your native life has a pretty substantial attack bonus and can do surprising damage to impressive looking opponents. Of course, they have the usual NL disadvantages, but all those junky SporeLaunchers you get for ftee can counter the traditional artie approach to NL, so you can hang in there militarily, although some regular troops (particular the classic chop and drop units) are nice to have too.

[Curiosity]

I'd have no problems with taking Morgan in MP, unless another human had control of the University. The HGP is a really big thing for Morgan, due to the need to GA pop-boom, and a university player in most likely to have the opportunity and motive to snag it first.

However, even if this happens then all is hardly lost, as you can fall back on a reasonably effective ICS game.

Of the original seven, I would definitely say Miriam is the weakest. Her early game tech is abysmal, and there's a real disadvantage in not having formers for that long. Then, by the time she actually has the tech to go out conquering she's going to be facing very stiff opposition. It's not so bad starting near to someone, but on an island... there's not much hope for her.

Having said that, for about 3 years my fastest tanscend was with Miriam.

I'm pretty comfortable with the Spartans, though they're generally badly regarded. The ease with which they can submit factions early in the game is a huge bonus. Those who remember the fast transcend records know what I mean. The ability to get Elite infantry at a critically early point is also amazing - ever seen the elite scout rush?

They're not a fantastic builder faction without submissives, but they can nip along in early-game tech, at about the same rate as Lal or Deirdre. Later, they can often do a good job of fielding an army in Free Market, either with the Ascetic Values or police state. The police bonus also helps out when ICSing.

I've played the x-pack factions a lot less, but it seems to me that the Pirates, Consciousness, Angels and Cult are all horrible. At least the Cult can claim small maps with abundant fungus as their own territory, so I'd maybe call the Pirates the weakest.

[UnityScoutChopper]

With pods on, the Pirates can be a very good "luck-based" faction. The trick is to set one or both of the first two bases to building a transport foil and then use the unity gun foil to pop pods until you get the "auto-completion" pod reward -- which comes surprisingly often during such scumming. This becomes the beginning of your building up of "available transport-turns", which you start investing into pod-popping. If you're lucky, you get tremendous benefits quickly. Otherwise... you'd better hope the seas are full of specials, and that the landmasses you blindly begin colonization on (there's no point in starting your colonization at sea) are not already someone else's property.

Has anyone else noticed a greater propensity of the Pirates to land near the equator and specifically to land next to the Monsoon Jungle?

---

Miriam is NOT a weak builder. Just pop out formers like nobody's business, and/or take advantage of "painless democracy's" ability to increase growth, the base limit (if not running Planned), and cash flows.

USC

USC

[Gufnork]

Pirates are good if you're lucky. I generally get 75% IoD's in the pods which means I spend eternities healing my foils. You get a lot of cash, though. They're not a bad faction, but rely on luck and is damn hard to play. And yes, they usually start next to the Monsoon Jungle.

CyCon's early rover rushes would be amazing. If their techsteal ability would work, which it never has for me for some reason. Going all out military and still get the builder techs as fast as anyone is quite an advantage. Not to mention that it doesn't take long before they get those techs. Or, just go builder. Deidre's efficiency and Zakharovs research? They're good.

Cult are terrible. They don't have any useful advantages that Gaia doesn't have, with terrible negatives and no +2 efficiency.

Angels are hard for me to judge. I'm a poor prober.

Cult, Spartans and Believers are the worst in my book.

[Mongoose]

Techsteal didn't work out of the box...needs the V2.0 patch to function.

[Lazerus]

Worst to best in my opinion :

Cult
Spartans
Pirate
Angels
Believer
Caretaker
Usurper
Peacekeeper
Gaian
Morgan
University
Drones
Conc. - if techsteal for all is on then put below drones
Hive (Yeah i don't care if this is biased, def the most fun faction )

note, thinking of this as MP, so aliens have been rated rather lowly - easy to gas, no chance of govt and u've got a pain in the arse AI or another player bugging u all game.

[Hydro]

In my opinion the Pirates are not a good sea pod-popping faction. One has to open any pod, and particularly a sea pod, with great care since it is fairly likely that an IoD will erupt. When that happens you have to attack (if you can), and it is generally an even-up battle – you don’t get the 50% attack bonus like on land psi combat. This means that you will have a lot of dead foils and transports (which are toast if they are unarmored, or don’t have trance). Foils have a 50-50 chance, so this means an eternity to repair even if they survive and attack/defense. If you are in sea fungus you are generally stewed with the 50% psi penalty (IoDs shine her, btw, since they have no penalty for defense psi in sea fungus). Actually, it is better to have a trance foil and let the IoD do its worst, although armored fission trance transport foils are very expensive early on (60 or so minerals). I generally don’t pop any sea pods until I have a transport (1-1-3 will do) or IoD with a foil or trance foil to try to take out the hostile IoDs.

Obviously, a good Planet rating will help a lot. Even having +1 planet gives you an edge, and gets you a few IoD recruits. Late Green economies can do this, but I’d argue that the Gaians are the best for early game sea exploration. If they stay with Explore for research then Doct: Flex comes early, and a 1-1-4 or 1-2-4 foil is very cheap. I take this foil, plunge into sea fungus until I get an IoD, pray it is friendly, then rinse and repeat. I like to have a foil (later with Empath) scout for the IoD if I can, and have it attack hostile IoDs out there (they have a better chance of capture since they aren’t native).

As a result, I’d say the Pirates are not a good sea faction. They are always mineral challenged, and their sea colony pods are very expensive (even if they do get free RCs). Later they can rake in the energy, but life is hard before then. For early sea domination give me the Gaians (or if necessary the Cult – but they have their issues [see above threads]).

Hydro

[joncnunn]

Well, regardless of your faction choice, you have to make the right social choices for your faction to minimize your weakness and further increase your strength.

Morgon's Handicap : -3 pop limits, increased support costs.

Offset by: Tighter city spacing, special effort to build the AV, capture of aliens in areas closer to enemy bases than your own resulting in no support costs.

Morgon's Strength : +1 Economy. Enhance by choosing Wealth for the +1 energy a square, along with Democracy and Green for +4 Efficency.

Originally posted by AMD4EVER
No one seems to agree with me that Morgan is the worst faction. So which faction is the worst? Assuming all options for the map are normal or the middle option and that all rules are the ones most commonly used in games. For the most part each faction should be on their own small island or have some type of barrier between them and the faction next to them. Which faction does the worst in this most average of situations? Which does the best?

My opinion is that Morgan is the worst off of all the factions here. I'm not sure who the best off is but the Peacekeepers wouldn't do too bad.

[joncnunn]

I mostly agree, except that Knowelge is a fine choice for Sparta given the free prototypes.

A Spartan choosing Power without having the Cloning Vacts though would be very crippling.

Originally posted by Flubber

Personally, I see the original 7 as being very balanced but if I had to choose a weak sister. I would choose the Spartans with the Believers very very close. With the spartans, I find that the industry penalty combined with the inability to go wealth is somewhat crippling.

[Jac de Molay]

Morgon's Strength : +1 Economy. Enhance by choosing Wealth for the +1 energy a square, along with Democracy and Green for +4 Efficency.

Why not free market? If you build the PTS and start pooping out colony pods, you're making big time energy on the base square alone for new bases. Just wondering because I'm playing morgan extensively for the first time.

Anyway, I dont like believers because yang can pick up the same support benefits with se choices, plus free P. Def and starting with command nexus makes mirian much weaker by comparison, IMO.

[joncnunn]

Belivers main weakness:
#1 No reseach points prior to 2110.
#2 -2 Knowledge
#3 -1 Planet

Offset #1 by for the first ten turns of the game set Economy to whichever value gives you the most energy. (Due to efficency, depends upon your bases.)

Offset #2 by beeling to Foil Probe Teams. Build lots and Go out and steal tech!

#3 Results in nothing produced from fungus until late in the game unless you go green. So after you can build Foil Probe Teams set your reserach to beeline to Centauri Empathy to allow the Green economy to cancel out the planet penalty . As a side effect, you'll get native mind worms that are just as good attacking high tech units as low ones. And the same tech allows Biolabs which is both a cheap way to increase science output, especally for a small base, and enhances your life forms.

Main strength: +1 Probe. Complement by the building of foil probe teams.

As for best social choices for Belivers when not pop booming and assuming you don't have cloning vacts: Democracy (Fundie would give you a -4 Knowelge rating at which point you might as well turn reserach off unless you have a lot more cities than anyone else) + Green + Wealth (You don't want to add a crippled construction of units that power would give you to your knowlege handicap).

Originally posted by Curiosity

Of the original seven, I would definitely say Miriam is the weakest. Her early game tech is abysmal, and there's a real disadvantage in not having formers for that long. Then, by the time she actually has the tech to go out conquering she's going to be facing very stiff opposition. It's not so bad starting near to someone, but on an island... there's not much hope for her.

[joncnunn]

What???, there's no way the Hive is the best, they have a very serious economic problem early in the game. In non-head quarter bases without a river they get no income from size 1 bases prior to recyling tanks being built. (Offset by beeling to Recyling Tanks followed by a beeline to Wealth.)

Also, Gaia is really the easyist with the ability to capture mindworms form year 2101 and being able to terraform right away.

Originally posted by Lazerus
Worst to best in my opinion :

Cult
Spartans
Pirate
Angels
Believer
Caretaker
Usurper
Peacekeeper
Gaian
Morgan
University
Drones
Conc. - if techsteal for all is on then put below drones
Hive (Yeah i don't care if this is biased, def the most fun faction )

note, thinking of this as MP, so aliens have been rated rather lowly - easy to gas, no chance of govt and u've got a pain in the arse AI or another player bugging u all game.

[Lazerus]

if you noticed that little sentence afterwards saying "yeah i dont care if this is biased" ... i find them the most fun to play, i don't really care much that they slow down abit later in the game with others pop booming etc.

Also i never bother to build rec tanks until later in the game, play ICS and get alot of bases thats where you get the energy from (also early on go 80% labs for a tech rate of 8-10turns,once you've reached wealth switch to that and it keeps it going). Theres no way i'd go for the tanks before IA aswell, wealth is def more important, the increase in economy to give just -1 energy at the HQ base which is neglible. Also once your in wealth your at the stage that every other faction bar morgan is in at the start of the game.
Trust me anyways the economic problem isn't that bad, the +3 industry from faction+planned+wealth offsets never having much money to rush and as for research you're just a standard researcher, but stick in a few specialists and your as quick as any of the others or play momentum and go beat those researchers up.

[Hydro]

The fact that there are defenders for (almost) any given factions says a lot for the balance of SMAC and SMAX. BR - well done!!

Hydro

[The Vagabond]

The weakest faction is definitely Miriam.

As for the Cult, I find it pretty amusing. I get pretty decent amounts of cash from hunting the native life. It's actually a win-win situation: you either capture a worm, or kill it and get the cash. You need to have a really bad luck in order to lose your unit. In the early game, all this cash offsets the economic and industrial penalties: I rush-buy SPs with the Cult all the time. The only real drawback of all this is that I find it boring to move too many units each turn.

The situation is pretty much the same with the Spartans! I always try to hunt the native life by deliberately wandering in fungus. With Spartan high morale, it's rather a realistic and profitable undertaking. Unlike the Cult, you can't capture native life (unless you are Green, which we assume you aren't), but on the other hand you encounter more native life as the Planet rating is lower. Besides, your units get a morale upgrade after killing a worm.

[joncnunn]

I've found that an additional two points of efficency yeilds more energy than the additinal +1 a base when your empire has a large enough population.

Commerce income is very low in early game when you don't have many contacts.

Free Market also has very unhealthy effects on PSI Attacks & Defense and significantly increased fungus booms. If you add Wealth to Free Market without Command Nexus, your units are dead meat.

Originally posted by Jac de Molay

Why not free market? If you build the PTS and start pooping out colony pods, you're making big time energy on the base square alone for new bases. Just wondering because I'm playing morgan extensively for the first time.

Anyway, I dont like believers because yang can pick up the same support benefits with se choices, plus free P. Def and starting with command nexus makes mirian much weaker by comparison, IMO.

[Lazerus]

I've found that an additional two points of efficency yeilds more energy than the additinal +1 a base when your empire has a large enough population.

true with any faction in my experience, I'd definately recommend FM for morgan atleast until mid-way in the game just after his first pop boom though when you can have a quick switch around to see which will yield greater results.

Free Market also has very unhealthy effects on PSI Attacks & Defense and significantly increased fungus booms. If you add Wealth to Free Market without Command Nexus, your units are dead meat.

1-1-1-trance units, dirt cheap and if i remember right planet rating has no effect on defense?
You'll have enough cash to just probe the enemies units.
As for fungus blooms just keep an eye on your clean mineral limit and push it up with a few early pops and tree farms then you'll have no problem with them as im sure i remember reading planet rating only affects the severity of eco-damage caused by the minerals that are over the clean limit.

If i wasn't so reliant on my cheap 1-1-1-police units for Yang then I'd definately be running FM most of the time.

[Mongoose]

Free Market (and Planet Rating generally) has NO effect on Psi DEFENSE...only on attack.

[Hydro]

Mongoose is right - FM has no effect on psi defense. You're just hosed when you try to attack the MW parked next to your base. Advice - invest in empath rovers and trance scouts (or armored probe teams for that matter - expensive before fusion, but no support)!

FM/wealth has its place. It is wonderful for Morgan, since he can make tons of energy with dinkly little bases (ICS anyone?). As mentioned, it is less attractive with larger bases, larger empires, and enhanced terraforming/crawlers. FM/wealth can tide him or other factions over until he gets a chance to get on his feet and get hab units built - then boom away, and switch to Dem/Gn/Kn/GA.

[VoidEvils]

I don't find Morgan's pop prohibiting. I just usually side-step it with supply crawlers.

[Hercules]

I am never quite sure what is meant by 'worst faction'.

In SP games, does it mean:-
the most difficult faction to win with. And thereby maybe the most challenging faction to play.
the most boring faction to play (the example of moving all those units, or the 'too easy' faction, like the Uni or Pks)
The worst faction for attaining a high score or fastest transcend.

In MP games a different set of factors kick in. Pacts, Treaties and Diplomacy, geography, can partly help 'weaker/worst factions' ride out their bad times.

Atm I enjoy playing the 'worst' factions, for one, they're comparatively less well documented in terms of strategy (I am not saying I going to discover anything new, but I might).

[Adalbertus]

Originally posted by joncnunn
What???, there's no way the Hive is the best, they have a very serious economic problem early in the game.

For the first 20 turns, yes (unless you are lucky with a special or river). Your first tech should be Centauri Ecology, giving formers (especially with Yang). Plant forests and farms. Exploit that you can run PS/Planned without penalty. Gives you bigger bases than everyone else, or two formers per base instead of one.

I'd guess the only even more easy faction are the Drones. Compensate your research penalty by initially building 18 bases instead of 9 (huge map assumed). Build like crazy.

Btw. playing the Drones I discovered that "no research during first ten turns" is an inherent property of -2 Research, and not specific to Miriam ...

[VoidEvils]

Hercules has a good point. I'd say that "boring" would be the deciding factor. But hey, that's just me.

[Jac de Molay]

Originally posted by Hercules
I am never quite sure what is meant by 'worst faction'.

This is a good point, and I define the worst faction as meaning least flexible, and why I stick with miriam. The research and planet penalties are like an albatross, and I always get the feeling Im just sitting there shuffling units around, especially if there's no nearby neighbors to hassle.

[AMD4EVER]

Originally posted by Jac de Molay


This is a good point, and I define the worst faction as meaning least flexible, and why I stick with miriam. The research and planet penalties are like an albatross, and I always get the feeling Im just sitting there shuffling units around, especially if there's no nearby neighbors to hassle.

The worst one is the one that wins the least often under the standard settings IMO.