help understand life seeded origin + gaia seeders building

[geogus]

I’m not a min/max player — I focus on roleplaying, although I consider myself an experienced player (I've played lots of PDX games over the years).

So I tried the Life-Seeded origin for the first time and combined it with Idyllic Bloom (for hive minds) and the Ascetic civic.

My species is a plant-based hive mind with the Invasive Species trait and four negative traits: Slow Learners, Weak, Sedentary, and Repugnant.

The idea is a forest hive-mind species that grows on a planet until it “gaiaforms” the world, then tries to colonize other planets while stacking adaptability bonuses and rushing terraforming techs to speed up Gaia Seeder construction. My goal is to create as many Gaia Worlds as possible.

To my surprise, I didn’t get a Gaia Seeder on my capital (even though it clearly matches my species' preferred habitat). Even more surprising, I’m able to build Gaia Seeders on any colonized planet — even tomb worlds — despite not having researched any terraforming technology.

According to the wiki: “Empires whose primary species has a special habitability trait (such as Gaia World Preference) do not recognize any regular planet as matching their climate preference.”

So I wasn’t expecting to be able to build Gaia Seeders at all until I had researched Ecological Adaptation, unless I got to colonize another gaia world.

I’m not sure what I’m missing. The way the game is working actually benefits me, but I want to understand the rules. It is happening the opposite I hoped for

 

[Nwaij]

Gaia Seeders terraform non-gaia natural planets into Gaia Worlds. So why would you even try to build one on a Gaia World?

 

[geogus]

for the bonus pop growth of the building first stage, up until last stage, when i get the bloomed trait. However, for the RP perspective, i get I only have the option to build the builind last stage ( it is unavaiable in building options list)

 

[geogus]

Never mind, I got it ( I think)

I can build gaia seeders from the start because the first hive mind capital is considered tier II already ( it skips the tier I for regular organic empires)
Also, the habitability requeriments for the gaia seeders are only for for tier II and above versions, the first tier only needs a tier II capital (that as a hive I get for free)

 

[Dr. B]

Don't you have to wait until forever to get the tech required to upgrade those gaia-seeders on your colonies? At least I think you needed the same tech as for the World Shaper perk, because your preferred environment is Gaia?

Edit, at least you can start blooming your pops as soon as you can get hold of exotic gas.

Edit 2, oh you even mentioned Ecological Adaptation in your post, I just zoned past that. I thought you needed Climate Restoration. Ahem, sorry. I'd open with Adaptability agenda for guaranteed terraforming tech, and get the needed tech guaranteed when agenda is off cooldown (after ~30 years?).

 

[Nabil ad Dajjal]

Gaia Seeders terraform non-gaia natural planets into Gaia Worlds. So why would you even try to build one on a Gaia World?

They actually give their most interesting benefits on Gaia Worlds.

The final stage seeder blooms pops every five years, giving them special bonuses on Gaia World, and also boosts the Bloomed and Budding traits. You can go from the base +10% job output to +25% (+10% from Bloomed, +5% from Gaia Seeder) and +0.01 organic pop assembly.

Some of 4.X's changes mess with this a bit (e.g., you can no longer prioritize organic pop assembly or growth of Bloomed subspecies) but it's not bad.

 

[Dr. B]

They actually give their most interesting benefits on Gaia Worlds.

The final stage seeder blooms pops every five years, giving them special bonuses on Gaia World, and also boosts the Bloomed and Budding traits. You can go from the base +10% job output to +25% (+10% from Bloomed, +5% from Gaia Seeder) and +0.01 organic pop assembly.

Some of 4.X's changes mess with this a bit (e.g., you can no longer prioritize organic pop assembly or growth of Bloomed subspecies) but it's not bad.

You could get pretty decent pops with Bloomed and Mutagenic Habitability, should be able to get well above 100% habitability without doing too many weird things.

 

[DarkHelmet110985]

Life Seeded has you start on a Size 30 Gaia World with three Strategic Deposits. This makes your Homeworld an ideal Rural world to maximize those Strategic Deposits since 100 Technicians can(w/ a Mote Harvesting Trap Building) produce 0.50 Volatile Motes, 100 Miners can produce 0.20 Volatile Motes, 0.20 Exotic Gas and 0.70 Rare Crystals(w/ Crystal Mine Building) and 100 Farmers can produce 2 Energy and 0.60 Exotic Gas(w/ Advanced Bio Reactor and Gas Well Buildings) at the cost of 3 Food(can generate 0.50 Exotic Gas with just the Gas Well).

The other quirk of Life Seeded is that your Planet preference is changed to Gaia. This sets your Habitabilty to 100% on Gaia but 0% everywhere else. This makes early game Colonization a chore because you’ll have double the Pop upkeep, amenity usage and lower productivity until you terraform the Planet. Players sometimes pair the origin with Idyllic Bloom. Idyllic Bloom permits you to terraform planets in stages via Gaia Seeders. Phase 1 requires a Tier 2 Capital while additional phases is dependent on planet class. Terrestrial Sculpting permits it on same climate(Wet/Dry/Frozen), Ecological Adaptation permits it on the base 9 but not Tomb Worlds and Climate Restoration permits it anywhere. You do suffer increased upkeep on anything that is not your primary planet class(ex: Ocean). You can accelerate your Terraforming by taking Adaptability Tradition and get 25% progress on those Techs via its Agenda. Expansion Tradition also increases the odds of it rolling.

Mutagenic Habitability permits you to build Gaia Seeders anywhere so if you go down the Life Seeded route, I highly recommend you rush for Genetic Ascension and take Mutation for first flex pick. Also I highly recommend having Budding since Stage 4 Gaia Seeders improve Bloomed and Budding by 50%. Meaning you enjoy 15% Job Efficiency, 15% Pop Growth, -15% Amenity usage and -15% Housing usage on Gaia to go with 0.03 Organic assembly per 100 Pops. Not as strong as Polymelic but it’s at least something. The Bloomed trait stacks with Mutagenic Habitability so you can get 40% Job Efficiency, -40% Housing usage and -40% Amenity usage on Gaia Worlds. Tack on Genetic Ascension(30%) and Maximized Productivity(30%) and Gaia Worlds can achieve 100% Job Efficiency and doesn’t factor in Authority(like Mutation Democracy or Purity Oligarchy) or other Traits(like Robust).