the more i play, the more certain i am. the scores in 1.0 and prior should not be compared with 1.1 ... the changes are way to significant grand statues cost more. they have a tortured artist trait now for creative inspiration (wondrous room). mechs have longer range than sniper rifles (anything on merciless) and (though i think it's a bug) nimble guys will not hit a trap... ever. the value of components, even when damaged doesn't change. some weapons are biocoded so you can't sell them or use them. in short you can't play the game the way you used to.

some of the peaceful runs might be similar to the old . but i think it would be a mistake to try and split hairs and make some runs carry over and others not.

I was waiting till I had a chance to play around with the game some. the game is different. ... with or without royalty. the additional units in the game change everything in anything other than peaceful. the new traits on units and various bug fixes change the game fundamentally.

In short i think 1.1 and 1.0 really are close but they are different.

Royalty is fundamentally different with the psychic components of the game they added. Royalty is treated like a mod, you can uncheck it in mods. Turning it off seems necessary.

Was messing around with a new challenge/speed run idea. base value. now i was playing around with it on merciless and dieing cause well merciless. but i think even in peaceful its an interesting thing to speed run. the real question is how high in total value would be best. i was going for 1,000,000 ... as a million is just ludicrous and i like a challenge. also can you imagine the raids on 1 million value on merciless (lol) ? It that might be too high as even on peaceful you are going to have to raid something like 20-40 hexes to get that kind of value. 100,000 is trivial so maybe 500,000 is a better number. I'll no more after i play around with it some.

the ai ship is probably the best hex to setup a base since that is just free instant value. but on the same note mining gold and making works of art might trump that ... it might just be better to send someone down to deconstruct it. anyway. i'm going to keep messing. anyway what do you all think?

to be clear i've been clickin on history to see how high my value is. I look at the highest peak. there may be a better way

edit i picked really high values to make a game out of it. i think the solution though after trying it some is to stick to 100k but to not allow the ai ship. thoughts? I think peaceful this is a good game. i think in merciless it'll be a struggle to not die hehe.

lol okay. so pirate all the pirates. i've tried it a couple times and it unfortunately is a category that needs a better seed. best seed i've found so far is "ooo" and it gives you 12. it becomes a real boring project after the first 3 or 4 bases to destroy the other 8. i still like it as a category, perhaps someone can find a seed with say 6-8 which would make it far more enjoyable and less of grind. that being said... okay i think pirate a pirate is out. pirate all pirates needs something to make it more doable... BUT.

how about just a "single hex - escape". that is you can't leave the map and you need to build a ship and leave. it's like everything you want in the game base building. making the spaceship. works in all environments. everything has a purpose (ex: pods are the best way to send goods to wood-be-allies) the only 2 rules are never send a unit off the original map/hex and escape. I'm gonna try it tonight. don't get me wrong it will be a LONG game (at first at least). very susceptible to RNG and picking the right hex and units... but it'll be interesting and fun to learn to min/max.

what do you all think?

edit i tried it and clearly forgot 1 thing. there is no way to get an AI core unless you leave the map. i actually rather enjoyed the run. 8:45 on peaceful begining to end (on a random hex) built a ship but couldnt launch it cause there was no way to get a core. So, the real question is, is that even a viable game? don't leave the hex till the ship is almost done. or don't leave the hex except for trips to get the ai core. (you can't deliberately stop anywhere else or settle anywhere)

so I played some more pirate a pirate. I'm not sure it's worth creating a category for it. i was able to beat a base in under a minute on peaceful and under 2 on merciless (same seed and starting spot). there just wasnt much to it. if we do have it. it shouldnt be when you see them running. you need to see the blue message "Base Destroyed" . if you dont have the message the base will remain on the map. (both of my "wins" i just quit at running. so i'll need to redo them if we want to do this)

For pirate all pirates, i do think we should should add a category. it's an effort (and a lot of fun). even on peaceful it takes time. i'm gonna try it again today. i'll submit it when I get a win :). i wont be using blood1 for that seed as it turns out 1 pirate base is on the other side of impassible mountains :(

final thoughts (for now), much like wondrous room. its WAY harder on merciless. that wont stop me... but it makes me think pirate a pirate (just 1 base) should be a game as well. (kinda like grand gold statue vs wondrous room)

in fact in that case it is a much better game on merciless or peaceful. well better in that its not 10 hours long. also you can have sea ice and extreme (for pirate a pirate). 1 of the rules though (to be keep people from just orbital bombarding it. is there should be no originaly-hostiles on screen (all dead, captured or off screen), not just running away. I don't remember if there is a message like when you do an enemy outpost or not. i'll update a little later when i can check (i dont think there is, just 1 about them running)

further messing with the environment settings got the pirate bases down to 11. I mean, its still going to be an effort to clear them quickly. I'm sure people will find seeds with an even smaller number of pirate bases. but as long as there is at least 1 ... we have a game. Also once you get a new record posted, everyone will know the seed. So, that keeps it a pretty level playing field.

i certainly wouldnt recommend doing a 100% run. i had to hunt through a few seeds to find sub 18 hostible bases. (i think the one i found is 13 ... blood1 if you want to check it out) temp would definitely effect this run. (base position/number) but its another thing to min max. it seems unlikely an extreme desert of sea ice run would be possible since you would have bases outside of the temp zone. though pirate a pirate (not all but 1) might be possible with the right seed... hard to do, especially for sea ice, but possible.

So, I was saying in discord. I've started messing around with Pirate all Pirates. I quite enjoy it so far and it strikes me as some that even with the best seeds will take hours and hours (like wondrous room did/does).

I think it has all the elements a good game speed run (of this sort of game) tends to have min/maxing a good seed. doing everything you can to "get in", "fight","grab" and "move on" as fast as possible. I've been trying it on brutal/merciless (cause i like that sort of game) but the crux of clearing out the pirates keeps even a chillax peaceful game worth running.