I smell death on you

Agreed neutral are indeed game breaking.

Astroid at your HW produce .46 and neutral produce .61. So some quick math 61/46= 1.326 and some so round that up to 1.33 means that by default neutrals produce 33% more resorces then the HW. normal culture gives you 10% more. Super advent culture give you 30% more so even the advent can't push that number up high enought to equal.

Now they are 2 ways to fix this:

1) (the one I favor) Lower the income gained from neutral to 70% that of a homeworld so .61/100x70=.427 so round that up to .43 wich makes neutral still important and give your an extra edge but no longer are I win buttons.

2) (the one i least favor) Take away vasary scouts takeove abilaty and place it on their migrator like every other faction. But this take in my opinion some of the flavor form the game away.

Also later ill do the math for trade ports to show that it doesn't add up at all.

That wouldn't work because neutral mines are also outside of the expansion.

hm, actually, compared to what you get from planets and other sources, it does seem a bit high. maybe there could also be some variation of values that equal out the imbalances sometimes created by other random variations.

also, neutral mine capture could be a researchable ability. that could also make it a tad weaker and make it more difficult to claim them all early on.

I hope your being sarcastic Annatar, because i would have hoped someone like you would have crunched the numbers corectly.

per extractor? barely! on the whole, you do make more resources with planets than with neurals - at least hopefully, early on, it need not be so - but what has defense have to do with it. besides, we both know that starbases can somewhat defend them, it's actually one of the things they can do reasonably well in the current version of entrenchment.

I wouldn't mind if starbases also had the default ability to claim those neutrals, in some way or another, so we don't have to have the respective ship nearby in case the enemy does snag them.

in fact, this very instant I got an idea: you think that taking over might work as a sort of channeling ability? like, the ship needs to stay close to the extractor for say 15 seconds or so, else the process is interrupted and you need to start over again. that way, if you place a starbase next to them, it does become quite difficult to wrench them, whereas now, you probably could sneak one in, capture it and be out of range again before being destroyed. I'd imagine antimatter usage needs to go down if there is a sort of channeling effect for taking neutral extractors, but it would make sense and add just a little element of 'I need to protect those guys for them to do their job'.

well, then we could just as well give them a rate of 1000 if all that matters is that ai gets interested and they are contested, so neither can profit from them too much or for too long. I still don't see what defendabiliy has to do with it or that the ai needs to tackle them more. it's not a huge issue for me personally, just a matter of taste that some rocks somewhere in nowhere produce resources more efficiently than the rich ground next to your planet that should be easily exploitable. and I'm sure they'll still be strongly contested even if their value is nerfed a bit, but they just should not be more valuable than planets with so much less effort involved.

TAKE NOTE THAT THESE CALCULATION DO NOT FACTOR INT HE TIME TO GET A VOLCANIC OR TRADE PORTS. AND THAT WHEN YOU FACTOR IN TIME IT EVEN EVEN MORE GLARINGLY APPARENT THAT IT'S VERY UNBALANCED. aND THAT TEH RESORCES YOU ARE INVESTING IN MATCHING HIS GAIN FROM NEUTRALS HE IS INVESTING IN OTHER THINGS TO FURTHER GET A GLARING ADVANTAGE, THING LIKE A FLEET LARGER THEN YOURS. aND IF YOU DON'T MATCH HIM HE'LL STILL BE STRONGER THEN YOU.

Annatar in thsi tread here i don'T think no one cares about the AI i for one don'T if the AI learns to use them fine but i don't give a squat.

That being said i fail to see why you justy something that can cost you only a small early investment early game to be so strong that you instanly produce more income then your ennmy. Because if you do the math the guy that takes over 3 neutral extractors gets a superior income bost from those then someone who colonises a 3 extractor volcanic of ice world. Wich he to get needed to get 2 civil labs, research colonisation, clear the world, buy 2 lvls of civil infrastructure and then speed 750 more credits to build the 3 extractors. With 4 extractors you bearly produce more.

Math:

1 scout cost 225/20/0 conver sesorces to credits by standard x5 multiplier the scount cost is 325 credits. This scoutn quickly captures 3 neutral extractor producing each .61 resorces x3 x5 makes it to me 9.15 credits

Now taking over a Volcanic:

750/60/80 x2 for 2 civil labs end up costing 2900 credits

600/50/100 for volcanic research cost 1350

Now to upgrade yoru world so it doesnt drain credits:

lvl1 450/150/75

lvl2 550/175/125

Total cost for planet: 3625

3 mines 750 producing at .41

Grand total: 8625 credits for 8.2

So 3 neutral cost 325 credits and produce 9.15 credit per second. 3 mine Volcanic cost 8625 and produces only 8.2 credits per second when population reaches 70/70. If you ahve 4 mine the cost is 8875 for 10 credits per second once population at 70/70. Conclusion 8625/325=26.5384 thus those 3 neutral were 27 times cheaper to get thent he volcanic and produce more.

Now trade ports can they match 3 neutral mine? Hell no they cant.

Math:

750/60/80 x2 for 2 civil labs  cost: 2900

600/50/100 for trade port research cost :1350

750/100/125 per trade port you build cost: 1875

So lets concider your lucky and the guy with the 3 neutral lets you get 4 wordls ina  line and build trade ports there

4x1875=7500

7500+2900+1350=11750

How much incoem will your 4 trade ports make you? Intotal the trade ports will make you only 5.6 credits per second as TEC. And already this venture has costed us roughtly 20% more then taking a volcanic planet.

In fact with trade ports you need to have 7 ports in a 4 world chain to out make what hes making. And you only make 9.8 credits per second. so the new cost for this sinc eyou also now need to purchase 1 logistical upgrade at best this will cost you the huge ammount of 18480 credit versu the 325 for the scount. That make the neutral 18480/325=56.8615 so a stuningly 57 times cheaper.

Now if we set neutral back to .43 which si equal to the ammoutn mined from worlds 3 jumps away from you HW w/o culture 3 neutral extractors will gain you 6.45 credits per second. That'S still a huge amount, it's still more then 4 trade ports you need 5 to surpase this. And the volcanic is still only producing you roughtly 25% more income for a much pricier price tag. So the reduction proprosed is far from making neutrals useless it just tries to balance them more then what they currently are.

no ideas about the channeling of capturing neutral mines? vasari scouts could have a disadvantage here that makes them a bit less effective.