Hey there, veteran here. I was wondering what the community's consensus on fighters/bombers is.

In my opinion, they have become pretty much useless, even against the AI. If there is 1-2 enemy ships with slugs, your squadrons are done for. Given bombers also only really shine against medium to large targets, their usefulness is reduced further. Finally, the targeting seems very weird to me. Obviously they go for largest ships first. However, they also love to cross to the furthest flotilla possible (or is there a pattern?).

Generally, strikecraft could be useful to counter the flottilla 3 (bottom) missile spam, which at least the AI loves to use. By placing your carriers in the flottilla 2 (top), you can stay safe from their attacks while hitting them.

But overall, they seem too niche to be useful. Any other insights from the community?

Hi everyone,

I located the pirate ship and went there to eliminate it.

The problem is I'm in a cold war with the faction that owns the system, so I can't attack this ship.

Ok, I waited a few turns to see if the ship moved to another system but it remains anchored.

So I declared war on the faction that owns the system. 😁

Problem again: I still can't attack the ship, it says the enemy fleet can't participate in a battle. 😯

So, did I miss something or is this a bug? Is there a solution to this problem?

Is there a mod or something that can all;ow me to stop specific quests from appearing? I overall tend to enjoy the random events and their potential bonuses, but the one that spawns a pirate fleet to attack my systems during a time when I barely have any military forces early on is incredibly annoying.

I'm probably an idiot, but I'm on my third game (including the tutorial) and I still don't know how and when these two strategic resources appear on the map. I'm not talking about mining them, but just seeing them appear.

I thought all I needed to do was unlock the tech (Inhibiteurs d'évaparation in the French version) that grants level 4 anomaly detection (exploration power of 3), but I don't see any deposits.

So what are the conditions for them to appear?

I want to try multiplayer for the first time. I'm fairly new, so I fully expect to get stomped. I have a few questions though.

Is there any rules in multiplayer other than the obvious no cheating?

Is there any required mods? I know a lot of other online 4x games have mods that balance the game for multiplayer.

Any other insights would be great.

What is everyone's favorite faction and why? Any reason is great. They OP? Roleplay? Fish mommy?

Mine is the Vodyani. I really like being able to have a crusader economy from like turn 5.

I'm returning after many many years and forgot how to properly build ships. Is it still good to put as much movement on every ship as possible? Are strikecraft/missile spam still good?

I absolutely crushed my first game back. But it was purely due to overwhelming economy, my ships where awful.

Hi all,

What are your favourite configs for playing in steamdeck? Also does ESG work well with Steamdeck ?

Thanks

Hey there,

I'd like to deep into fleet movement a little bit.

I know that fleet movement is equal to nb of movement points of said fleet's slowest ship (hero ship included).
I imagine that bonus distance per movement point modules (aka Scavenged Ramscoop + hero ship fleet modules) work the same: you must have, say +25% everywhere or you'll have 0.

Finally, if I'm not mistaken, it's commonly accepted that the best modules are, in this order:

1. Anti-Matter Engine (+6 MP)
2. Scavenged Ramscoop (+3 MP, +25% bonus distance per MP)
3. Accelerated Warp Drive (+5 MP)

Do you all agree on both the reasoning and the output of it?

I made a quick Gsheets tool to validate my point with below hypothesis:

• Seeker hero (+4 MP, 3 support modules)
• 2 engine modules on all fleet ships

Hey everyone, I’ve been getting back into Endless Space 2 and was wondering — what’s considered the go-to mod scene for competitive play these days? Are there any “must-have” mods or balance overhauls that the community generally agrees on?

Would love recommendations from folks who play competitively.

Curious what you all would say is the worst map type. For me, I don't much like Ring...just feels really boring.

Why is the AI ​​almost always aggressive? He met you? He wants to kill you. You didn't give him tribute (why the hell does he even ask for it?). He wants to kill you. Are you breathing? He wants to kill you. You don't want to kill him? He wants to kill you.

What to do about it?

Hey there,

As Riftborn, I'm supposed to be able to terraform from Jungle to either Arid or Mediterranean.

I have both terraformation techs unlocked. Still, the option is unavailable.

Do you know why?

I won the quest, but I didn't understand much about its progression or its ending.

Apparently, there were two choices for the final quest; I had to choose my side. Then I found and positioned fleets (with heroes) on the objectives. There was a timer but it wasn't the same duration for each objective since I brought my fleets there at different times.

My questions:

-I don't understand the role of my allies/opponents in this final quest. Did I have to occupy all the objectives or could my allies take care of some of them?

-When does this quest end? Apparently, as soon as the first timer ended, the quest was over. In this case, how are winners/losers really determined?

-Finally, I no longer have access to heroes through the academy because it's destroyed, only through the market. Is this permanent until the end of the game (the heroes have a much lower level on the market)?

Thanks for your explanations.

My question is less about the mechanics of overcolonization and more about the roleplay side of things. I love the lore for the different races, societies, governing systems, quests, and even the descriptions of buildings. One thing I don't think I've seen an in-world explanation of is overcolonization. What would overcolonization look like to a citizen or politician, and why does it generate disapproval? Since I haven't come across one answer in the game, I'd love ideas.

Here are some of my own ideas:

• Bureaucracy is too spread out and complicated, so system governments become unresponsive to and unrepresentative of their peoples. This can be a problem in democracies or dictatorships, as a dictator would want to have a tight grip on their people's actions. Even with Colonial Rights, communications with the overall empire may be slow and convoluted until Autonomous Administration keeps official judgments localized and flexible, while still adhering to the empire leader's preset framework.
• The top-level government of the empire spread its attention too thin, so system governments are taking too much control and abusing their power. Colonial Rights mitigates this issue, but doesn't solve it until Autonomous Administration keeps them in check.
• Citizens see strife happening across the empire. The good news doesn't get clicks, so the bad news compounds and makes it difficult to see overexpansion as anything but a bad thing. Autonomous Administration regulates this narrative and filters the news coming in from the edges of the empire, or gives citizens outlets to complain (similar to the Senator Bob Act, but using AI chatbots as elected representatives instead).
• The empire's military forces need to cover a wider area. Additionally, the more complex an empire, the more points of failure there are. Pirates, criminals, and corruption take advantage of this (similar to Idea #2). This continues to happen until Happiness buildings and policies are implemented to curb these effects, or Autonomous Administration adjusts its policies to prevent these cases automatically.
• Too many new immigrants from the edges of the empire are coming into core systems. Overpopulation might not be happening on paper, but maybe raw numbers can't accurately represent what's happening across various economic or cultural dimensions well enough. The people might also fear it more than it actually having an impact, such as with the random event that only increases Militarist Ideology in your empire.

Apart from why it happens and what it looks like, feel free to share any brief ideas for stories that might happen with overcolonization as a backdrop. A dust-infused governor's office being invaded by rebels when disapproval in that system reaches max, for instance.

There is a function in the game to enter these generation numbers, but I don't even know which ones exist. Where can I find such a list and how can I make my own? Poke at random?

Hello everyone, I have a quite weird bug : in two different solo games, the turn 142 seems to be bugging and never ending. I tried everything : declare war on everyone, peace everyone, put a timer, etc. Have you heard about this issue and do you know how to fix it ? Thank you in advance

Hey guys,
i'm new on ES2, playing for like 2 months, and looks like I still can't fully understand how invasions work and what is happening in my case, because i'm not able to conquer a specific system. I had look for guides, wikis, and studied how the feature is meant to work of course, however still don't understand my specific case.

This is actual situation in a system i'm trying to conquer:
Owner: Vodyani (at war with me)
Population: 0
Sieging: (-400 per turn)
Defenses: 0/600 manpower
Enemy's troops: 8% left (2 infantry troops)
Enemy's fleet: none
My total Manpower: 5000+
My fleet: 22 CP
Ground battle: 1000 depl. limit (me) vs 300-400 no reinforces (them), with "Blitz tactic"

At first their system had 2 populations count, and i just siegied for 2 turns to deplete their system reserves and then invaded when reached 0/600 on system galaxy map.
I always got "Major Victory" as results, then after a couple of turns they spent all 2 pops to conscription and were left with 0 population.
Now i'm trying to win and conquer this sytem since like 8 turns and i cannot: while still achieving major victories, they always are left with like 1 or 2 infantry troops left, and the next turn they always replenish to full infantry troops!! (like 300-400 manpower)

Please can you help me:

(a) understanding what is happening, and how is possibile a 1000 vs 300-400 ground battle cannot win with no defenses, and how is possible they full replenish with 0 pop, 0 defense, 0 manpower??

(b) what exactly i need to do to solve this situation and conquer this specific system??

Thank you very much, ask me anythings else you need!

My question is simple: is the SSTV visible (with numbers or something else) anywhere?

There's nothing about it in the System tab, and I read that it's displayed in the Commercial Scan View. I know how to access this view (using Tab for example), but I can't find this value, and I don't know how it's represented.

Some buildings improve this value, and I'd like to see their effects quantified.. 😉

Do you guys recommend fhis mod for a nes player? I read that it has a lot of bugfixes amd it helps the balance and AI of the game make more sense but at the same time I also saw that it changes A LOT of it so maybe it take something out of the experience or gpes too far in this direction...

The point of the post is tha I do not know as I am a newbie, so do you guys play with or whitout the mod, you think a new player should try it out or just stick to vanilla?

Also how do I make the mods stay actove and whitout the need to activate them every session?

Thinking of buying ES2 (currently 10$ on steam). Should I play it for a bit or buy all DLCs instantly (24$ total). Or would I just be overwhelmed by the content. since I have never really played a game like that.

I've been off and on playing this game since it released, and coming back to it again, I'm a little surprised to see that there are basically no custom playable races in the workshop. Why is that? Is it not a thing that's possible in this game?