I finally got around to starting a Craver campaign. Despite what others upthread found, they seem super strong to me. The issues of depletion are easily solved by moving your Craver population (or most of it) on to ‘fresh’ planets, leaving behind captured non-Cravers and a token Craver to keep them enslaved for bonus resources.The early bonuses Cravers generate really snowball you - you get a huge boost to your initial infrastructure, and then you can start conquering enemy empires at a rapid pace. I actually think a lot of people online are seriously misunderstanding the Cravers and the depletion mechanic. I too misunderstood how it works.Cravers get a bonus on undepleted planets.

• Endless Space 2

This is quite significant: +50% FIDSI flat out great, and this bonus is included in the (numerous) buildings that add a bonus per population.They do not get this bonus on undepleted planets. But that’s it - there’s no penalty. This means that Cravers function like a plague, devouring planets, and then moving on.

Since other races have their own bonuses, I bring in slaves I’ve captured in my wars and ship them back to my depleted core planets, where a small group of Cravers enslave them for even more bonus FIDSI. Meanwhile the Craver population are moved on to freshly conquered planets, where they start the process again.I see a lot of people asking ‘how do I get rid of Cravers? They are devouring my planets!’ as if this is some sort of problem!

Kaizen Rejuvenation is a mod for Endless Space 2, created by aazzoggerr. Description: This mod provides an infinite improvement that reverses depletion effects of the cravers at a rate 10 points per turn (so the system is fully rejuvenated in 15 turns) and blocks construction queue. Dec 20, 2017 - Endless Space 2 - Guide to Cravers. Depletion: Cravers will deplete planets per Craver population on planets. The rate of depletion depends.

The issues of depletion are easily solved by moving your Craver population (or. ENDLESS SPACE 2 - AI MODDING CLOSED BETA. Kenshi how to switch weapons. Could someone point out to me the disconnect with Tom's relative exuberance for it vs.

FifthFret:Either way, there’s really no reason for a Craver pop to work on a depleted world.Doesn’t matter since all races get that penalty on a depleted planet. It’s the planet that is depleted. In fact I think other races have an even bigger penalty (I think it halves the planet’s output), though I haven’t played or looked at it in a while.It might work fine after they tweaked it, it used to be a planet would be depleted in like 7-8 turns. So you’d get a bonus on a planet that didn’t produce anything anyway and then once it was built up enough to be useful, it forever had a penalty.They made depletion take at least twice as long last time I looked.Edit: Looked it up quick to be sure, depletion takes a planet to 50% FIDS. I haven’t played this game yet, but I do know Tom really enjoyed it. Could someone point out to me the disconnect with Tom’s relative exuberance for it vs the general gaming populations seeming ambivalence?

Endless Space 2

The reddit community is only a fraction of even some fairly niche games like Hearts of Iron IV, for example, and it hasn’t been discussed here in weeks despite being relatively new-ish.Even when a game’s marketing fails it, when people really love a game they tend to discuss it to death, and I really haven’t seen that for this title.I only ask because I thought the first one was pretty decent and Endless Legends was even “good-ish” (having bought them both on large discount), so I thought I’d look into this. MisterMourning:Could someone point out to me the disconnect with Tom’s relative exuberance for it vs the general gaming populations seeming ambivalence?I can take a stab at it, but you’re probably better off if someone else weighs in.

But I’d attribute any commercial or critical failings to the following, roughly in order of importance.People are dumb.It doesn’t do a good job with the “new user experience”. That’s such a biz-term and I hate it, but it’s accurate. Endless Space is no Civ V or VI. Say what you will about those games – I certainly will! –but they’re very welcoming, very easy to sink into, very “come in, sit down, can I get you anything?” They know how to court new players. Endless Space 2 has a Euro snobbiness upfront.

The documentation is in the interface and you have to look for it. It will not meet you halfway.

There are scads of numbers and tooltips, and if you’re curious, the game is more than happy to reveal itself to you. If you’re not, well, it’s got stuff to do and it can’t be bothered babysitting a bunch of brats who haven’t played it already.The archetypes aren’t familiar. The playable factions are weird. Space humans, of course.

But otherwise Space Ents, some slavers who might be lizards, extradimensional space beings, some space religious people. Some of them aren’t even familiar gameplay archetypes. Growing roots around solar systems? Orbiting instead of colonizing? What do you mean my planets degrade after I’ve used them.It even avoids expected gameplay archetypes. The politics stuff, for instance. What kind of game that isn’t a Paradox spreadsheet does that???

There’s a reason Firaxis can just glom new tech trees onto their games and call it design. People understand tech trees. But Endless Space 2 has a tech platter, political leveling up, colonies that aren’t just like cities where you stick buildings on a planet, etc. “What the heck is going on here?” someone might ask if he was just wanting some comfort food 4X. “This isn’t like the other games I’ve played!”.The production values are arty. Lots of big splashy but static drawings.

“Hey, what’s with all these paintings in my videogame? Where are the cutscenes?” I adore the space porn in this, but it’s largely in the combat, which is its own non-archetype.The combat isn’t easy to figure out and there’s no familiar paradigm for it. It’s very hands-on for the set-up, which can relate to the ship building, which relates to the tech tree, but in ways that aren’t very well documented. If you don’t know what you’re doing – the game won’t help you too much – it’s going to feel like you might as well roll a big fat space die.I’m sure there are other reasons people might not like Endless Space 2, but those are a few guesses off the top of my head.-Tom. Tomchick:some slavers who might be lizardsCyborg insects, I think.I think the big two of Tom’s list are certainly the “new user experience” and the unfamiliar archetypes.The documentation is mostly there in the form of tooltips, and having played Endless Legend I didn’t have trouble with most of it. But some of it is just missing. (On the plus, 99% of the bugs appear to be resolved now, which massively helps figure out the rules.)Amplitude loves weird and wonderful.

Endless Legend had an enslaving cult of sentient robots and “elves” undergoing a magic fueled industrial revolution. Endless Space 2 is maybe a bit less out there, but one of the most normal factions is a weird looking race of semi-aquatic creatures organised like the mafia.I love the arty production values, but I can see why they aren’t to everyone’s tastes.

As with many of these futuristic 4X-style games, there's a staggering number of elements to juggle and a whole lot of gameplay options you might not even realize you can use on the first playthrough.While the in-depth nature of the game makes it a must-try for the 4X fans, it can also turn off more casual gamers not familiar with the style, as there's a steep learning curve here.Probes are one of those elements that are easy to miss or just simply misunderstand if you did manage to notice them sitting there. Below, we cover everything you need to know about gaining access to probes, using them to explore and find anomalies, and replenishing your depleted probe stock. Using Probes in Endless Space 2Some players totally miss probes in the early stages of the game because only exploration ships ( marked with the magnifying glass) and hero ships are capable of launching probes.What's the point of probes instead of just sending a fleet off to find locations? Probes can head into unexplored areas that haven't been revealed yet, bypassing normal movement paths and unveiling anomalies or even new systems.To launch probes, you first have to add them as a module to an explorer ship.Like most technologies in the game, probe modules can be upgraded later on for better results and longer vision range. For instance, researching Machine Bacteria on the Science and Exploration technology tree gives access to Titanium and Hyperium probes.Checking the probe module on a shipTo see probes off to find new systems, access the fleet menu and click the explorer or hero ship, then select the Launch Probe button (the icon pretty clearly looks like a probe or a satellite moving towards the right). The Launch Probe button also shows your current stock of probes along with the maximum number that the ship is capable of housing.Probes replenish automatically over time for any ship equipped with the module (see the replenishment rate by hovering over the icon and checking the Cooldown entry).Besides just checking to see if an area of space has any systems worth exploring, probes are also used for investigating anomalies.

When you find a system, check the list of planet names underneath it. If any planet names are pulsing, they have anomalies to explore by sending a probe.Zoom into the planet and click the curiosity question mark icon to launch a probe. You can also get to the same options by choosing Start Expedition instead.Investigating anomalies on a planetAnomalies and curiosities vary wildly in their results but can be well worth discovering, sometimes offering up resource caches, speeding up research, and so on. Featured ContributorTy splits his time between writing horror fiction and writing about video games. After 25 years of gaming, Ty can firmly say that gaming peaked with Planescape Torment, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have a soft spot for games like Baldur's Gate, Fallout: New Vegas, Bioshock Infinite, and Horizon: Zero Dawn. He has previously written for GamerU and MetalUnderground. He also writes for PortalMonkey covering gaming laptops and peripherals&period.