Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Maybe this is common knowledge, but I came across this unexpectedly in a single player game and realized that it could be used as an exploit. I usually take strong measures to keep my empire happy. The benefits of being Jubilant and the pain of Riots makes it worth it. So I normally don't have any happiness problems. In SP games, I like to increase the event frequency to add spice to the game. In a recent SP game, I had a small planet deep in my empire rebel due to a random event. This was in the late game and I had conquered a couple of other empires, but still had no hydrogen breathing populations. The rebelled planet was on a hydrogen planet previously populated by my native population and thus domed. When I checked, the newly rebelled race were hydrogen breathers (!) with no dome. Needless to say, this 1-small-planet empire in the middle of my empire was easy pickings for capture or surrender. Then it occurred to me that a player could have planned this by intentionally letting a protected planet with a different atmosphere riot and then rebel. Once rebelled, the population converts atmosphere breathing and its population is available to the first conqueror. If done in the early game, it could seriously change the balance of the game.

In another game a long time ago, this happened to an enemy and I made the 1-planet empire surrender to me. I didn't realize the atmosphere changing at this time because the planet was of the same atmosphere as the parent empire. I really cashed in on the techs when they surrendered because these rebelled empires have all the technology of the previous empire. Now there is a risk to doing this intentionally - if this new empire surrenders to one of your enemies, they get lots of your techs. I would conisder this, if done intentionally, a "cheesy" exploit. But I thought you all might be interested in this - or maybe I was the only one who didn't know about it.

Slick.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

How exactly do you cause a planet to rebel? There is is a random event, and an intel op that will cause this. But simply allowing them to riot doesn't cause them to rebel at some point later as far as I know.

There is a patch item in the latest beta that addresses this spontaneous creation of new population I think. I'll have to double check that.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

The switch to breathable must have been put in a recent patch. In the old days, the planet stayed domed. Maybe we could return to that method -- it's not like these planets really stand a chance in any case.

[EDIT]

Geo, you beat me by one minute. Rats.

[ December 15, 2003, 16:03: Message edited by: Arkcon ]

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Just lower your happiness in your empire setup, research troops early to keep your selected planets happy. Set up a protected system with all the other planet types, colonize and let them riot and rebel. Then make them surrender. Then eat your cheese.

[edit: I thought a rioting planet would rebel after some time. If this is not the case then this whole discussion is wrong.]

[edit2: from happiness.txt:

Population Happiness Effects:
- Riot prevents any point generation from that planet.
- If a planet riots for sufficient time, it may rebel.
- Rebellion changes the planet to a new owner.
- Happiness level modifies output of the planet.

]

Slick.

[ December 15, 2003, 16:12: Message edited by: Slick ]

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Make them research colonies. Don't conquer them too fast. Let them do some research on their own. Then get some extra technology.

Burger with melted cheese and cheese sauce, anyone?

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Very strange. I had many rebelions and population never changed. Not a single time http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif Idid see suddedn jump in population (extra 2B people) but no change in atmosphere breath.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

"- If a planet riots for sufficient time, it may rebel."

I believe "may" is the crucial point that prohibits a systematic exploit. It may take a very long time and you will not be sure that you get a desired atmosphere. And if I am not wrong, you will not have rebellions at all if there are already 20 empires in the game.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">If you set it up early and pick the atmosphere types by colonizing selected planets, you should be able to harvest the breathers of your choice by mid-game. Good point about the 20 empire limit, though.

Slick.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Rebellions can create in excess of 20 empires.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Has anyone actually seen a planet rebel after rioting? I've had test games with planets rioting for decades that never rebelled. I have never seen a planet rebel other than intel, except for the very occasional rebellion that seemed to be the random event because in the couple cases where it happened the planet wasn't even unhappy.

I know this used to happen quite often in SE3, and I know it's in the files for SE4, but I believe it has never worked.

Geoschmo

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I don't think this is correct. It seems I rememeber trying this and once I got to 20 empires the PPP projects would always either fail entirely or the planet switched sides. Prior to 20 you would get the occasional planet that would rebel but not join your empire.

Geoschmo

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yes. It has happened to me in the past when I neglected Intell production. The best example would be your Awakening scenario. I could just about hold the AI back, but I would start losing colonies eventually. I must try to deliberately do what Slick suggests when I get home.

[ December 15, 2003, 17:46: Message edited by: Arkcon ]

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I don't think this is correct. It seems I rememeber trying this and once I got to 20 empires the PPP projects would always either fail entirely or the planet switched sides. Prior to 20 you would get the occasional planet that would rebel but not join your empire.

Geoschmo </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That's right. The game keeps track of every race created in the game, and there is a maximum of twenty races. A planet rebelling effectively creates a "new" race (even though the only thing different is the name). Once 20 is reached, there can be no more (even if some were destrroyed/reabsorbed).

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yes. It has happened to me in the past when I neglected Intell production. The best example would be your Awakening scenario. I could just about hold the AI back, but I would start losing colonies eventually. I must try to deliberately do what Slick suggests when I get home. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You misunderstood my question. I was asking if anyone has ever seen a rioting planet rebell, that was NOT caused by intel.

[ December 15, 2003, 18:15: Message edited by: geoschmo ]

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">But how you can make your population riot unless you take heavy combat losses? Remember the natural decrease.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">But how you can make your population riot unless you take heavy combat losses? Remember the natural decrease. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Just lower your happiness in your empire setup, research troops early. Obviously you have to be planning to do this during empire setup.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yes. It has happened to me in the past when I neglected Intell production. The best example would be your Awakening scenario. I could just about hold the AI back, but I would start losing colonies eventually. I must try to deliberately do what Slick suggests when I get home. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You misunderstood my question. I was asking if anyone has ever seen a rioting planet rebell, that was NOT caused by intel. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I have to admit, I haven't seen planets rebel from rioting, but I usually don't let them riot for long and the only time I see it is when I get a race to surrender. I take immediate action to drop troops and move a fleet in to build a UPC.

Slick.

[ December 15, 2003, 18:35: Message edited by: Slick ]

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I don't think this is correct. It seems I rememeber trying this and once I got to 20 empires the PPP projects would always either fail entirely or the planet switched sides. Prior to 20 you would get the occasional planet that would rebel but not join your empire.

Geoschmo </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I am absolutely certain that you can have more than 20 empires from rebellions. I have seen it happen dozens of times.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

had something like that happen. when i conquered them, they went back to oxygen breathin.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I don't think this is correct. It seems I rememeber trying this and once I got to 20 empires the PPP projects would always either fail entirely or the planet switched sides. Prior to 20 you would get the occasional planet that would rebel but not join your empire.

Geoschmo </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I am absolutely certain that you can have more than 20 empires from rebellions. I have seen it happen dozens of times. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Are you refering to rebelions of the random event nature, or the intel kind, or either? Not to be a doubting Thomas but I specifically rememebr trying this and it seems odd that it would have just stopped working spontaneously in my game, but still work otherwise. Guess I will have to do some more testing.

Geoschmo

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Lowering your happiness won't make your people angry, they just became happy slower. I know it, I play always with 51% happiness and I've never encountered problems (bigger than usual http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif ).

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Hmm... it might have been an earlier Version, or just from a random event... I can not seem to get a 21st empire to form from PPP right now. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif Or maybe it has something to do with allowing more neutrals to form if there are less than 20 normal empires, but up to 20 total including neutrals.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

I'm pretty sure that I've had a game where there were more than 20 empires after rebellions. But it was quite a while ago and one of the patches may have taken care of that particular instance.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Lowering your happiness won't make your people angry, they just became happy slower. I know it, I play always with 51% happiness and I've never encountered problems (bigger than usual http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif ). </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Verrry interesting. Good to know for max/min. I did not know that. Maybe there is no way to make your people unhappy (as if that was a good thing). Maybe there is no real exploit here. Maybe picking "Neutral"...

Slick.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

This is all very interesting, but why I never saw "atmosphere conVersion" ? And I witnessed dozens of rebellions in my games http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon8.gif Every time I see a rebellion (due to PPP or random event) the population retains the atm. type. What the hell you are all talking about ? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

OK. I tested it. Now, I used the Puppet political parties project to cause an enemy planet to rebel. Their description said that their home atmosphere type had changed from carbon dioxide to none. During ground combat, the planet was domed, and after combat they were CO2 breathers again.

Now, I don't know what would have happened if rebels had colonized other planets. And we still don't know if there is a method for causing your own planets to rebel.

But it's not as easy as Slick thought when he first worked it out.

[ December 16, 2003, 02:25: Message edited by: Arkcon ]

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Geo, I have had this happen to me-- a planet riot then rebel-- in single player games.

You can get a total of more than 20 different empires by the end of the game, but not all at the same time. Once there are 20, one must be eliminated before another can appear. When you look at the Score screen when victory is declared, you can see more than 20 empires.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Agreed that it's not as easy as I first thought. I initially thought that setting happiness to < 100% during empire setup would eventually be less than the "natural" happiness increase [decrease?] and so you could create an empire that got unhappier over time. But this is not the case. There are other happiness-lowering events in happiness.txt that could possibly be used, though. I think this needs a little more testing. Hopefully I am wrong that this could be a realistic exploit.

I think a rebelled population should not change atmosphere breathing.

Slick.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Maybe you can ask one of your allies to PPP your planet to make this happen?

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

"Hi, can you please steal one of my planets?" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">1.2.4 Happiness: Every five percentage points you increase your happiness makes 0,1% people happier every turn. For example if you increase happiness 10% it's the same effect if you have one troop on your every planet.(Asmala)

If you drop your happiness to 50%, it makes 1% of your population angry each turn. Natural decrease is 2% (neutral 5%). The result is 1% happy people each turn.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Thats interesting. I still am going to have to see it to believe it, no offense. This is something I was so sure didn't happen that I have been asking Aaron to change it in a patch. If it's already possible, I am looking a little sheepish. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif I know it did not work in any tests I did. Do you happen to have a save game, or can you recreate the circumstances involved?

Geoschmo

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yes. It has happened to me in the past when I neglected Intell production. The best example would be your Awakening scenario. I could just about hold the AI back, but I would start losing colonies eventually. I must try to deliberately do what Slick suggests when I get home. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You misunderstood my question. I was asking if anyone has ever seen a rioting planet rebell, that was NOT caused by intel. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I have. Last PBW game I played, one planet of mine was rioting several turns and one turn it was a brand new empire of its own. Though, their athmosphere preference didin't change. I was carbon dioxide breather, and rebelled planet was oxygen. People in there were still carbon breathers when I conquered it back.

Oh yes, and intel was not allowed in that game.

[ December 16, 2003, 13:29: Message edited by: Karibu ]

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Thats interesting. I still am going to have to see it to believe it, no offense. This is something I was so sure didn't happen that I have been asking Aaron to change it in a patch. If it's already possible, I am looking a little sheepish. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif I know it did not work in any tests I did. Do you happen to have a save game, or can you recreate the circumstances involved?

Geoschmo </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I am in the same situation as you Geoschmo. I used PPP a lot in my games (always with 20 empires) and didn't see a new empire for months. That of course does not prove it is not possible.
Could it be that more than 20 empires are only allowed, if one old empire has completely been deleted: no more ships/unit/population of that empire present in the game?? I almost always conquer foreign races therefore they are still in the game when the empire itself is gone. But this is just a guess.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Perhaps the discreapancy is that PPP cannot cause the game to excede the 20 current+historical empires, but the riot/rebellion event can. That would be an intersting discrepancy. I can't say it's not true, because as I said I've never even seen the riot/rebellion thing happen in SE4.

Geoschmo

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

Maybe you need to be more careless with your Happiness.

Leave whole worlds of foreign populations without Troops or UPF while you are at war with their people. Scrap large numbers of ships in that system, 'dumb hulls' even.

I'm not sure what else you can do...

Lose your number one Homeworld.

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

No one's confirmed / disproved this yet? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

For what it's worth, I personally have never seen more than 20 active empires at any 1 time. Yes, there has been more than 20 on the Scores screens, etc. but some were not active and had surrendered / been destroyed.

</$.02>

Re: Exploit: create other breathing population
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well, I don' tthink anyone was claiming to have seen more then 20 active empires. The question was whether it was possible that you could have more then 20 in the entire history of the game. A couple of us have tested it and cannot get it to happen (Including Fyron who started out thinking it was possible) and we have three people now saying it is possible and they have seen it happen.

I wonder if anyone who claims to have seen it happen can produce a savegame showing it, or can recreate it so we can see what's happening?

Geoschmo