Ideal active universe in 8.0?

[LameFox]

If players can cause conflict now, I guess that changes some of the calculations behind what storylines to choose to make an interesting universe.

In the core game, forming TEM sounds more viable (although they are a silly faction with zero economy, so only if you want to supply them yourself). Or else just leaving that plot alone. Can it *be* left alone, or is the HOP/PAR rep with each other locked until you do it?

In SV siding with the Curbs should get you an extra viable faction to work with, one which *does* have its own logistics.

The others seem largely unaffected. KE has no options, TL and ToA are not really relevant to this, and CoH might as well still start a war. Not sure what difference it makes to the Yaki. Does diplomacy work on them?

[Old Drullo321]

The best choice for the PAR plot is actually NOT doing the Par plot.

If you unite PAR to TRI, you loose access to two war guilds, which are a viable source of credits, L miners (therefore ships, nividium, experienced crew/marines, ship mods) and plenty of other stuff.
If you create TEM you loose acces to easy and plentiful hunting BUC ships for a variety of purple ship mods (most BUC drop like 99% nanoweave, plus there are a couple of Prometheus which drop multiple purple mods at once). (Technically you can still hunt them but it creates issues if you want to keep them alive and stay at high rep)

And doing either plot i don't know if the special PAR ships guarding the Apotheosis stop spawning, which are another source of multiple purple ship mods.
And not doing the TEM solution locks you out from ever getting access to Prometheus blueprint (you can still capture them obviously)

I hope Egosoft addresses this issues in the future as doing variant of this plot is disadvantageous for the player.

[vvvvvvvv]

If players can cause conflict now, I guess that changes some of the calculations behind what storylines to choose to make an interesting universe.

In the core game, forming TEM sounds more viable (although they are a silly faction with zero economy, so only if you want to supply them yourself). Or else just leaving that plot alone. Can it *be* left alone, or is the HOP/PAR rep with each other locked until you do it?

In SV siding with the Curbs should get you an extra viable faction to work with, one which *does* have its own logistics.

The others seem largely unaffected. KE has no options, TL and ToA are not really relevant to this, and CoH might as well still start a war. Not sure what difference it makes to the Yaki. Does diplomacy work on them?

I was under impression that you can't invite HOP to diplomacy but apparently I'm wrong about it. The list here suggests you can invite them both:

viewtopic.php?p=5290425

The issue with TEM is loss of BUC. BUC are #1 source of purple upgrade materials, especially with engines. This really hurts. War guilds are another problem. SCA has similar issues. Hostile SCA is a source of ships to steal on Moo Kyo, so making them peaceful leads to reduced amount of fun.

In general it feels like there should be always hostile faction which you can't destroy, because otherwise player can run out of things to do, especially if befriending everyone.

And not doing the TEM solution locks you out from ever getting access to Prometheus blueprint (you can still capture them obviously)

The best thing to do with prometheus is to start a custom game start with the tech unlocked. This solves the hassle. Sadly, for some reason you can't do that with Yaki ships or Timelines ships.

[LameFox]

I recently was testing a custom start with TEM already created, and it seemed like the modded Promethei were actually still being spawned in. I don't currently have a game where TEM were formed after starting to compare with, however, so I'm not sure whether they always persist or it's just a quirk of starting with the quests completed.

[GCU Grey Area]

Generally find I can get enough ship mods by doing guild missions, so BUC have never been a particularly important source for me. Instead my choice over what to do with the Paranids tends to boil down to whether I want strong Paranid factions or to exacerbate the factional in-fighting & keep them all weak.

In the former case I go for Unification but generally don't complete the entire plot (I delay indefinitely the final delivery of stuff to the player-built station). That way I get to keep the war guilds in play, but PAR & HOP stop shooting at each other & start trading instead, which strengthens both factions.

If instead I want weak Paranid factions I bring in the Duke to add extra mayhem to the situation & make sure the shipyard I built for him is well supplied. Eventually they do build their own economy but they usually need a bit of help to get the ball rolling because they have very few other friends.