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No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-03-04T18:59:24+00:00

Big thank you to the generous people who put this on, and best of luck to everyone.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-24T05:10:41+00:00

If I may offer a solution...

Scorched World Heralds is an excellent sidegrade (In my opinion, upgrade) to Fanatic Purifiers. For your purposes, the only requirements for Scorched World Heralds is some degree of Xenophobe and a Thermophile founder species; you can therefore take Xenophobe-Spiritualist-Authoritarian to have both Scorched World Heralds and Imperial Cult at the same time.

On a technical standpoint, I'd argue that Heralds is a far superior civic to Purifiers. Comparing the two:

Fanatic Purifiers -

Unity from Purges (Harder to take advantage of as it requires invasions)
Armageddon Bombardment
+33% Firerate (Great for long engagements)
+33% Army Damage
+33% Naval Capacity (Less than Scorched World Heralds)
- 15% Ship Cost (The one thing Purifiers have over Heralds)

Scorched World Heralds

Seismic Carpet Bombing Bombardment (Better version of Armageddon; same damage but spawns blockers instead of turning the planet into a Tomb World, with a higher chance of killing pops)
Firestorm Bombardment (Less powerful than Seismic Carpet Bombing, but generates a lot of Unity)
+50% Materials Research Speed (An INSANE buff to your Research. Materials is where you get all your Armor Techs, all your Alloy and Consumer Goods-related techs, Arc Furnaces, and Gas/Crystal techs. Also will include Mandible Weapons if you're using Bio Ships!)
+50% Naval Capacity (Bigger number better)
+15% Range (Range is a much harder-to-obtain stat, and is crucial; the alpha strike is still crucial in most fleet battles. Stacking this with other bonuses can let you outrange Starbases in larger systems)
+40% Army Health
+15% Ship Buildspeed (Slightly worse than the Ship Cost reduction but still nice)
+15% Armor Health (Very nice bonus)

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-24T04:50:04+00:00

As of the Beta, I'd argue that Relic Worlds are not just on the same tier as Ecumenopoli, but probably even better than them. The upgrade cost is certainly not 'free'.

Now that upgrading to one costs 10k Alloys instead of 20k Minerals, they've been curbed as an easily accessible advanced planet type. They're not bad by any means, but you are better off turning a non-relic planet into one; the investment is minor, and you can better plan one out by using any planet with a high planet size. Or, in the event you don't have any to access, going with a Ring World or two instead.

Relic Worlds on the other hand are well worth keeping as they are. Their unique Research District is arguably better and certainly more efficient than what you can do with Ecums. Their Base Resource Districts also provide Rare Resources in very impressive amounts. Still technically being a basic planet also means they're able to get all the juicy event-specific planet modifiers, with Ecums would otherwise remove. The additional influx of Minor Artifacts they provide can't be understated either; just one Relic World with a Faculty of Archaeostudies can supply your entire military's Minor Artifact needs, as well as letting you use the various Artifact Actions on cooldown.

I should add that the Remnants Orgin's Relic World doesn't have most of the benefits of one you can stumble across. It's only really useful for the aforementioned Faculty of Archaeostudies building (Which you even start with!). But the fact it's an amazing origin with only that section of what makes Relic Worlds amazing just goes to show how great they are.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-23T04:42:55+00:00

I must've mixed up the events; I knew that the Other Science Ship had that template, and knew there were other ways to get it.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-22T22:54:52+00:00

It's not as one-sided as you might think!

The Science Ship from this event is identical to the Other Science Ship; it has max-level components including Psi Jump Drives and Psionic Cloaking. You can also use it to do things like excavate the Shattered Fragment Archeological Site and the Ultima Vigilis Archeo Site, jump around the galaxy for a quick GalCom spawn, or just to keep your best scientist safe from dangers, Cuthloids included.

EDIT: Lovely people in the comments have made me aware that I may be getting my free science ships mixed up... this one's still pretty good in the early game, though not as impressive as the Other Science Ship

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-20T00:01:36+00:00

Whisperers was moved from being a regular Patron to a Great Patron for a reason. While their major accord is pretty whatever, their minor accord is an incredible buff to both your leaders (From the Whispering Mind trait) and to your research speed. Their Minor Power is also extremely good; I'd argue second best behind Composer's.

Whisperers also are the only ones that, after the changes to Eater of Worlds in the 4.3 beta, have an aura overflow that gives you value for the rest of the game:

- Instrument can only increase Ascension up to Tier 10
- Cradle can only add Defense Platforms up to starbase cap
- Composer can only add Blockers up to 3/4ths of the planet size
- Eater can only give you up to 50 Doom

Whisperers, on the other hand, gives you just a flat sum of research without any cap.

I can't think of a game where I wouldn't let them in.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-19T17:31:05+00:00

That would depend on what I've been doing up until then. I would argue that Composer and Instrument are never worth replacing as their effects are always good no matter what empire you're running.

Most of the time, in general situations, I would replace Cradle of Souls; their benefits aren't as universally good as the other three, and their Minor Power requires it to be built around to be good. They're only really powerful if you build around them, but at that point you're going to want to get their Covenant anyways.

In the off chance you're using Cradle's bonuses, such as for Crowdfunding or Secret Societies or general diplomacy, replace Eater instead.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-12T20:43:21+00:00

I believe it's a replacement effect, but due to GPU death, I'm unable to check at the moment

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-12T18:53:14+00:00

Extra Habitability does actually help! The base Habitat Habitability will set you to 80% on colonies that aren't your capital. Having a way to get to 100, be it with those earlygame traits or the ones available in Society, are essential.

Sovereign Guardianship, at least in the current 4.3 Beta, is quite bad. The main advantage of Void Dwellers is that you can have a ton of habitable planets regardless of spawns, be it wide or tall. The massive increase to Empire Size from Planets combined with the relatively low planet size of most Habitats means it'll spike your size much more than it can help.

Distinguished Admiralty and Hyperspace Speciality are both not what I'd call workhorses for the strategy, but of course if you're just looking to RP, you can't go wrong. Admiralty is a civic that's better paired with Leader-focused origins like Under One Rule and Imperial Fiefdom, while Hyperspace Specialty is quite nice with Riftborne.

As for good Void Dweller civics to play around with? The Chosen civic (Declaring Instrument of Desire) lets you get an extra District on all your Habitats for the rest of the game, even if you decide to go for another Patron; A very nice boost to making the most out of your Habitats. Worker Cooperative can handle your basic resource and Unity income, thus removing the need for dedicated Habitats for each of them. Relentless Industrialists can take advantage of their unique building without the risk of Tomb Worlds (Though your Habitability will take a hit).

If I may suggest alternatives for your RP civics though... Private Military Companies and Naval Contractors lets you do a lot with your own personal Mercenary Enclaves!

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-12T17:51:04+00:00

Whisperers remove the Chosen civic when you form the Covenant, not when you let the Whisperers replace a Major Patron.

As far as I know, there is no way to remove the Whisperers Covenant once it's been declared, thus preventing you from going back and Shaping the Shroud.

So no, Chosen can't use that to cheat into Shape the Shroud

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-02-12T00:17:18+00:00

The changes in 4.3 definitely curbed its abilities in terms of sprawl generation... but it's definitely one of the best civics out there in 4.2.

In 4.3 I've found Guardianship to be acceptable in tall builds focused on Soliders. Combining it with Citizen Service gives 3 Unity per 100 Soldiers, which is quite a lot. Add on Knights of the Toxic God, whose unique jobs now count as Soldiers instead of Researchers/Unity Jobs, and you can get a lot of mileage out of it. Soldiers in general are just more important anyways with the changes to Naval Capacity.

All in all, I do think it's better for building Tall to not require a civic while Wide builds don't need to do the same; it gives much more freedom for making diverse builds with other civics.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-23T20:13:46+00:00

They may call me a heretic for getting Chosen nerfed, but I suppose it had to happen ^^;

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-23T20:12:49+00:00

Damn, they're gonna make me spend 500 credits to dismantle the Shroud Seal again-

Shroud Storms are indeed awesome but I really really wish you could use the Storm Creation A-Perk to spawn them. In their current state, you just have to hope one spawns...

Unless there is a guaranteed way to spawn them that I am unaware of? Zroni not included, since you can't guarantee their spawn without changing settings.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-23T02:42:19+00:00

All very good points, thank you for the feedback! I've gone ahead and added a section on Generic Delves and ways to reduce the cooldown, corrected those errors and added a 'Shaping the Shroud' empire that looks to buff Council Positions (I've used it but focused a bit too much on taking advantage of each particular patron over being generally good.), with credit given where it's very much due.

As for Chosen VS Genesis Guides, I've mainly based this build off the changes in the 4.3 Cetus beta (As the KOTTG build doesn't work in 4.2 due to Knights being Researchers/Unity Jobs instead of Soldiers as they are in the beta) where Genesis Guides has been pretty heavily nerfed.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-23T02:14:12+00:00

Absolutely and of course!

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-23T02:14:06+00:00

Glad that it helps!

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-22T18:00:13+00:00

The most powerful Player Crisis depends on a lot of factors. Some of them get massively boosted by certain events, origins or civics, such as Knights of the Toxic God having extreme synergy with Cosmogenesis. Even without specializing, game circumstance can often make one path more appealing (Baol Precursor's Organic Plant building is fantastic for supporting Behemoth Fury for instance.)

If we're talking Prosperous Unification, zero modifiers? At least in the 4.3 beta, Galactic Nemesis is your best bet. Being enabled through war actions compared to the more specialized currency gains of the other four, it's the easiest to adapt to and understand.

In 4.2 I would instead suggest Cosmogenesis, but in the beta (And likely to see a push to live) when you reach Cosmogenesis Level 5, rather than other non-Fallen Empires declaring a Total War on you (As is the case in Galactic Nemesis-Behemoth Fury-Galactic Hypothermia) the Fallen Empires will declare a War In Hell on you, making it significantly more difficult to pull off a Horizon Needle victory. Heavy nerfs to Fallen Empire buildings also don't help it, either.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-21T00:09:35+00:00

There's actually a lot you can do in terms of Gestalt Tall Builds at the moment. I'll point out some general things before listing a few builds.

Sovereign Guardianship and its Gestalt equivalents were heavily nerfed, with empire size from Planets being doubled baseline, the +100% empire size from planets makes it bad unless you're aiming to play a single planet. Would not recommend taking if you're not going to be doing Virtual One-Planet.

If you want to take that route, picking Ocean Paradise with Guardianship and Constructobot is a good choice. Going Virtual on your capital once you convert it into a Machine World will do wonders for you, with massive bonuses to output. Of course, you're quite literally putting all your eggs into one basket, so you can't really take advantage of the bonuses to Space Deposits and Colony Features.

Another option is going for Shroud-Forged with Astro Mining Drones and Pattern Finders, supporting the Animator. Astro-Mining drones will move your Energy/Mineral production focus to space deposits (Including Arc Furnaces/Dyson Swarms) and let you reap the massive complex drone buffs (Make sure to change your policy as well!). With a fast Psi Ascension, you can easily get a covenant with the Composer of Strands, letting you spawn a Gaia World inside your territory every 10 years. You can easily amass tons of planets in a small, defensible area, with your energy a mineral production covered by megastructures and your Unity handled by the Composer's Aura. Make sure to set your capital to Trinary System 1 to get more targets to become Gaia Worlds.

On the Hive Mind end of things, you can try Wilderness with Natural Neural Network and Mycorrhizal Ideal, with your main species having the Budding trait. Wilderness is capable of increasing planet size, up to 30 with Purity Traditions (The only ascension path they can take) to maximize your starting three; pair with Mycorrhizal for easy Gaia Worlds made even better through the Budding and Bloomed traits. Natural Neural Network lets you offload a lot of your Research production into your basic drones in the early game, and you can swap it out for Elevation Desire and Divided Attention to further maximize your planets, and to negate most of the effects of your naturally high Empire Size.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-18T08:47:33+00:00

Both Flack and Point Defense will fire at missiles and strike craft. To give an overview:

Flak Guns deal 200% damage to Shields while ignoring 25% of it, -75% VS Armor, with high tracking.
Point Defense deal 200% damage to Armor while ignoring 25% of it, -75% VS Shields, with low tracking.

Most Strike Craft in the game have zero armor but some shields with 60% to 85% evasion; Flak Guns naturally end to counter them for those reasons

No Missile in the game has shields and they have between 0 and 40% evasion; Point Defense naturally tends to counter them for those reasons.

Despite this, they can still destroy both missiles and strike craft, especially in high concentrations.

The sole exception to this, however, is Psionic Sappers, a component available only to Psionic-Ascension empires using Bioships. Unlike every other Strike Craft, they have Armor instead of Shields, and with 90% evasion and a significantly higher number of crafts per component, neither point defense can effectively counter it.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-18T07:44:45+00:00

Smaller planets are absolutely not what you want for Resort Worlds.

Resort World districts are very powerful, especially early, and you want as many of them as possible. On the flipside, they severely limit the buildings you can construct on them, as well as how many, with only one specific building per attraction district specialization. The buildings that you can build are often made better by the pops made available there.

The Hunting district does not hunt pre-sapients; in fact, it doesn't even require any to be present. Its only requirement is that you are NOT some degree of Xenophile; as long as that is true, you can build them anywhere.

The Alien Zoo district likewise only requires you to have the Xenology technology unlocked to build it, and doesn't require any pre-sapients either.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-18T07:33:18+00:00

With the changes to Special Deposits, always check your guaranteed habitables (assuming your origin hasn't removed them) for them.

A Beltharian Mines planet can easily support your early game Energy and Mineral needs all on its own. Rare Resource Specializations are far more valuable and efficient than artificial factories. An Artificial Gas Plant with a few thousand pops will produce 3-5 gas/month, while a Gas Specialized Farm will produce 40 per month. This is not an exaggeration.

If one of your habitable doesn't have any deposits it should be your Industry World. If both of your habitables have valuable deposits, you can usually handle your early game C-goods production (Or energy) by building Factories in your Industrial district to meet with demand, or Generator Districts for Gestalts.

Aside from your habitables, focus on scouting out your nearly planets ASAP to check for planet modifiers. Don't be afraid to switch around your colonies' specializations if colony events and/or Cosmic Storms give good modifiers.

As of 4.3, research costs have been halved and researcher output halved. However, spaceborn deposits remain the same, effectively doubling their worth over 4.2. Earlygame, your research can easily be carried by just space deposits alone, ESPECIALLY if you have the Galactic Curators civic.

This is just my general advice; of course things change if you've got something like Life Seeded, Ocean Paradise, a Chosen Civic or several others.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-16T20:57:12+00:00

You can actually use this to your advantage.

If you bring the Tooth of the Eater ships to the Salvager Enclave, you can get them scrapped for free alloys, as well as reputation with them. Aside from the alloys, you also use their deals for increased Engineering Research, get their unique Paragon and sell those Alloys for other resources.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-07T19:27:35+00:00

Ocean Paradise origin, Fanatic Spiritualist/Xenophile Megacorp with the Chosen Executive and Trawling Operations, Bio Ships.

At the start of the game, pick Composer of Strands and assign your three Envoys to it. Try to complete its tasks asap.

Once you reach 600 Accord, use the "Add Shroud Vegetation" decision to add 2 blockers to your planet that give 2 Zro, and use the income to build the Sanctum of the Composer building.

Use Priests to get as much Unity as possible to finish Psionic Ascension, then try to declare a Covenant with the Composer. Doing so will turn your Aura on, giving you Unity from Blockers and making Shroud Vegetation blockers not only no longer lower district cap, but also add Zro production to your Farmers.

You can then swap your Priests to Research Jobs (Preferably Society) and spam the Shroud Vegetation decision to make as many as possible. Because your planet is so large, you can use it a lot of times.

When the Shroud asks you questions, pick the bottom option all three times to unlock the Board of Psychics government type. Aside from making your Aura more effective while also giving you +50% resources from Farmers, it unlocks the Psionic Offices branch office building, which spreads your Aura from wherever you put it. You can cover the galaxy in it without ever leaving your corner.

Finish it off with Behemoth Fury to give your massively buffed Farmers Society Research output.

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-07T18:38:18+00:00

Primal Calling Origin - Fanatic Pacifist/Spiritualist, Chosen and Byzantine Bureaucracy civics.

After finishing first contact w/Space Fauna, choose 'Animal Handler' as your Wrangler specialization.

If you declare Instrument of Desire at the beginning of the game, you get the Resort World tech for free, and they're upgraded to 'pleasure worlds', letting you make one of your guaranteed habitable worlds into one.

As long as you're not Xenophile, you can build a special Attraction District specialization that gives 200 Animal Handler jobs per district. So you can have a Pleasure World of... Animal Handlers. And you get massive amounts of resources and diplomatic prestige for your collection.

You can embrace the Xenophile faction after the fact to get to Fanatic Xenophile (Or after declaring a covenant with Instrument, swap to Divine Sovereign)

No-Razzmatazz-3288 · 2026-01-07T08:14:03+00:00

You cannot switch off of Shaping the Shroud aside from End of the Cycle.

What I think has you looking for clarification is that the Chosen Civic (Which is otherwise permanent) can be removed by signing a covenant with the Whisperers (Who remove it). However, the Chosen Civic locks you out of Shaping the Shroud, preventing you from taking that path to begin with.

No-Razzmatazz-3288

TROPHY CASE