Sins of a Solar Empire
Register
No edit summary
Line 96: Line 96:
   
   
But you are advent and have upgraded your culture to 1.3 spread rate. I am lowly Tech and haven't upgrade my culture at all. So your culture is STILL pushing towards me at a rate of .3, thus my allegiance continues to drop.
+
But you are advent and have upgraded your culture to 1.3 spread rate. I am a lowly TEC and haven't upgraded my culture at all. So your culture is STILL pushing towards me at a rate of .3, thus my allegiance continues to drop.
   
 
And eventually the situation will become
 
And eventually the situation will become
Line 106: Line 106:
   
   
Now whenever culture crosses a grav well its spread rate gets cut in half.
+
Now whenever culture crosses a gravity well its spread rate gets cut in half.
 
So lets say A is your planet with a single unupgraded culture center. B is mine or neutral whatever, just doesn't have any other culture items.
 
So lets say A is your planet with a single unupgraded culture center. B is mine or neutral whatever, just doesn't have any other culture items.
   

Revision as of 02:08, 11 October 2013

Culture is generated from the Culture Center logistical structure. These are Temples of Communion, Broadcast Centers, and Media Hubs. Culture is represented in game by phase lanes turning the color of the player whose culture is being spread down that phase lane.

Allegiance

Main article: Allegiance

Each planet has an allegiance value, represented as a percentage. When the planet is selected, this value is displayed on the main HUD in a panel to the left of the planet portrait. You can hover over the value to get details on the allegiance of the planet. Allegiance is a percentage modifier of all the income rates of that planet (credits, metal, crystal). So a planet with 50% allegiance is only returning 50% of its harvest to you. The allegiance of planets drops off very quickly based on how many jumps the planet is from your homeworld.

No. of

Jumps

Base

Value

With

Culture

Culture

+ Allure

0 100% 110% 120%
1 90% 100% 110%
2 80% 90% 100%
3 70% 80% 90%
4 55% 65% 75%
5 40% 50% 60%
6+ 25% 35% 45%

Source

(Allure is a late game Advent research that raises the max allegiance of planets)

Allegiance is also affected by culture.

Allegiance Shift

When a planet is affected by friendly culture, the allegiance slowly begins to rise. Allegiance can rise to 10 points above its default value (determined by the number of jumps from Homeworld). When a planet is affected by enemy culture, the allegiance will slowly begin to fall. When the allegiance hits zero the planet will become neutral. Advent can research the "Allure" ability which allows a planets allegiance to rise 20 points above its default value when in friendly culture.

Culture Spread Rate

This is the rate at which cultures move down the phase lanes, and the primary way in which opposing cultures compete. People will sometimes say "Culture Strength." They mean the same thing, don't be confused.

More info than you needed

When allegiance is affected by culture, the rate of allegiance change slowly climbs to .7% per second. It maxes out at .7% per second. The speed at which it climbs to .7% is due to a variety of unknown factors, but may have something to do with the strength of the culture affecting the planet. Either way, this is such minutiae it doesn't really matter.


Culture Explained

First we review the basics.

Planet A is yours, planet B is mine.

A-----B

You build a culture production center and start shipping culture down the phase lane at a rate of 1.

+ is your culture.

A++----B


Allegiance at planet B immediately starts shifting in your favor. (the rate of change gradually increases to .7/tick)


I build a culture center at Planet B. * = my culture

A+++----***B

Eventually our cultures collide.

A+++++*****B


But you are advent and have upgraded your culture to 1.3 spread rate. I am a lowly TEC and haven't upgraded my culture at all. So your culture is STILL pushing towards me at a rate of .3, thus my allegiance continues to drop.

And eventually the situation will become

A+++++B++++->


That's the basic culture situation.


Now whenever culture crosses a gravity well its spread rate gets cut in half. So lets say A is your planet with a single unupgraded culture center. B is mine or neutral whatever, just doesn't have any other culture items.


A++++++B++++C+++D

Spread rate 1 between A and B. Spread rate .5 between B and C. Spread Rate .25 between C and D, etc.

Remember, allegiance begins shifting as soon as culture begins spreading towards the planet, so you can still get the full effect of your culture way out on the fringe of your empire, it will just take a looong time to get there.

Now spread rates stack, so you can speed things up by building another culture center at A. Then you can have a spread rate of 1 on the other side of B. .5 from C to D, etc


Neutral Planets

A neutral planet is uncolonizable if enemy culture is moving through that grav well and down the next phase lane so...

Planet A is yours. Planet B is neutral and Planet C is mine.

A-------B----------C


Your culture looks like this (signified by +).

A++++++B-------C

I CAN colonize the planet.


As soon as it looks like this:

A++++++B++++++++C

or even this:

A++++++B+++++---C

or even this:

A+++++B+------C


I cannot colonize B.

so in order to colonize B I need to begin repelling your culture from C and fight you back to:

A+++++B-----C

Then I can take B.

This is simple enough if I feel like building culture centers.

If I don't I can use capital ships.

Capital Ships and Culture Repulsion

Capital ships repel culture at a rate of .3 at lvl 1 .05 for each level so .75 at level 10

This has NO effect on the allegiance of any planet EVER.

This repulsion only applies to phase lanes immediately touching the gravwell the capship is in. That is, capship culture repulsion does not cross gravwells.


Now the Kicker: Capital ship Culture Repulsion rates get HALVED at neutral planets and are reduced to Zero at hostile planets.

Let me say that again, because it's important and easily forgotten: Capital ship Culture Repulsion rates get HALVED at neutral planets and are reduced to ZERO at hostile planets!

I wrote this guide, and I still just played a game and wondered why the hell my capital ships at a neutral planet weren't pushing back his culture. Do not forget this detail.


So in the case of

A+++++B++-----C

a good solution is to put capships at C. (not B, see above)

But remember, even if you build just a single unupgraded culture center at A, the spread rate from B-C is .5. So I'll need at least a Lvl 7 capship, or equivalent to begin pushing it back... very very slowly. And once I do that, and colonize B, the allegiance there will begin dropping immediately.


So we can see that a protracted culture war can begin to get very costly very quickly. The player who invests hard and strong in his culture (at the expense of other things) will be able to make life significantly difficult for the player who neglected his own culture or wasn't expecting major culture warfare.