Mission Sponsor Questions

[Lt Loco]

I know we only have a little bit of gameplay footage but I'm hoping to bring up a question the devs might be willing to answer before the game releases. How much of an effect will mission sponsors have on gameplay?

As listed here:
NASA (USA)
Weyland Corporation
CNSA (China)
ISRO (India)
ESA (Europe)
SpaceX
Roscosmos (Russia)
LDS Movement

I'm assuming some form of governmental distinction will be made between being a colony of the USA (presumably a republic), a colony of China (presumably a form of technocracy), a colony of corporations (presumably some form of business/megacorporation state), and a colony of a religion (presumably a theocracy)? The one I'll admit I'm most curious about is the LDS (Latter-Day Saints) Movement, commonly known as Mormons. Living close to Utah, I think I have more than the average person's daily exposure to this mission sponsor, and I really hope the gameplay is more unique than "you can build a temple".

Also, as Mission Sponsor seems to be one of the controlling factors for difficulty, will we get a custom sponsor for those of us that like to play games on the borderline of impossible difficulty?

 

[Bryartuck]

So far all we've seen is it affecting difficulty with what kind of equipment is available and how much money you have (unless I've missed something). It's probably a little early for the devs to be giving away much info, other than the official announcements or gameplay reveals (though a few extra tidbits would be nice).

Edit: Come to think of it, i have yet to see any actual devs post here. While there certainly have been posts by Paradox employees, neither are actual developers, and I've seen nothing from Haemimont.

 

[Lt Loco]

Weyland Corporation has:
"Difficulty: Easy" - presumably just a summary of the rest

"Funding: $10,000 M" - seemed like a fair bit of cash in the playthrough
"Research: 100/Sol" - looks like starting research would be done about 5 Sols/tech. Presumably others will take longer.
"Starting Rockets: 2" - which could mean some start with more (maybe larger nations) and maybe some start with less (so you have to buy/build a rocket for colonists?)
"Starting Applicants: 50" - presumably these are the starting colonists you can pull from when you ask for your first humans.

This next section seems to be where the different gameplay will come in. Hopefully it ends up more than just these sorts of building toggles, but we will see. You'd expect an "easy" sponsor to not be too complex.
"-Can buy rockets and applicants with funding" - This implies that some sponsors *can't* buy rockets. Perhaps they build them?
"-Probes can discover deep Rare Metals deposits" - Probably means other sponsors don't get the deep ones, so potentially less monies.
"-Rare Metals extractor can exploit deep deposits" - Follows the previous. You can't extract what you can't see anyways.


I am guessing that I'm too early. I'm very excited to finally be getting what looks to be a proper colonization of mars game - even if it includes aliens and random stuff like that. There's a lot of kinda meh ones out there (looking at you, Planetbase) that focus on just surviving with a few people and don't make the transition to having thousands of humans on the planet with multiple generations.

 

[Bryartuck]

There was another play through that Quill18 did with Suzie where he picked NASA. IIRC, he got 3 ships starting (2 cargo and 1 colonist) and may have had more research as well, though I don't recall exactly.

Edit: Here's the link if you haven't watched it yet:

 

[candyalien]

Just a quick note - The names of the sponsors are just placeholders for now But yes different sponsors will add to the challenge. some give you more benefits like extra vehicles and some don't. This is still being finessed in the game

 

[Basterbane]

I would not trust some company named Weyland. You start with hidden cost for some special project, but you don't have the permission to to ask what it might be about. For now you are building your thriving colony, it almost goes too well. It all goes to hell once you excavate some ancient space ship. Your colonists go missing, mainly those that clean ventilation canals and sewers. You start seeing shadows and walls moving and some people claim they saw hands with tails in their bathroom.

You are not doomed yet... To make everyone feel more secure you send for ship of elite Marines. Later as they die you discover that your base is overran by 3m tall black rodents with weird shaped head and acid for blood. More colonist go missing.

If you are lucky at some point you might find a crashed escape pod with something like Nos**omo written on its side. Inside is a female in cryo-sleep. Maybe she can be more useful than those elite marines?

One day you notice air moving and some of the black rodents dying. Someone is using very advanced stealth device or are those ghosts?
All of the *is*op series androids claim that everything is OK.

 

[RossMorris]

Has there been an update concerning the nuances of the sponsors other than starting material? Is there any in-game lore or objective differences depending who you pick for the sponsor?

 

[Promethian]

You guys don't seem to understand how rockets work. You can send them back for multiple runs. (as demonstrated repeatedly in the streams) Its not "oh i have 2 rockets, one for supplies and one for colonists." More rockets means you can ferry anything, people or products, faster.

 

[Latheloi]

More starting rockets means more opportunities to have stuff delivered without having to develop the infrastructure to send the rockets back (was mentioned in the stream)

 

[Darkstar616]

How do mission sponsors affect colonists, if at all?

And if I pick Roscosmos does that mean my colonists will have Russian names?

 

[Boyan_Haemimont]

Sponsors have a very big impact on the difficulty of a given playthrough. The biggest impact is definitely the funding and starting rockets that each sponsor provides but there are also unique effects that showcase the strengths of different sponsors and they do have different play styles. For example Europe is very focused on research and provides additional funding for each technology you research which makes you prioritize that aspect a bit more than others. This combines well with the Nerd colonist trait which gives bonus morale when researching a new tech. So in a playthrough with Europe you will probably have more research buildings and more scientists nerds.

The more difficult sponsors even have some drawbacks that will affect your gameplay - for example rockets taking more time to reach Mars.

As to how sponsors affect colonists - colonists will indeed be named differently based on the mission sponsor. The sponsor also defines how many applicants you have that want to go to Mars in the first place. Sponsors may even define certain traits of the colonists - for examples when playing with the Church of the New Ark all colonists will have the Religious trait.

 

[Orlunu]

Also, as Mission Sponsor seems to be one of the controlling factors for difficulty, will we get a custom sponsor for those of us that like to play games on the borderline of impossible difficulty?

 

[Submaster]

I do hope they keep the generic religious sponsor, I will definitely be choosing it. But I also think making them shun science is silly; all the sciences benefitted from religion at least in starting. I think a good drawback to a religious sponsor would be that periodically one or more colonists will be under 'house arrest' (no work production) for a time as punishment for some sin against the religion.

 

[Lt Loco]

I do hope they keep the generic religious sponsor, I will definitely be choosing it. But I also think making them shun science is silly; all the sciences benefitted from religion at least in starting. I think a good drawback to a religious sponsor would be that periodically one or more colonists will be under 'house arrest' (no work production) for a time as punishment for some sin against the religion.

I haven't seen anything about the religious trait or religious sponsor causing reduced science... do you have a timestamp/quote?

As for your "house arrest" suggestion, I feel like reduced or sporadic (as if you were getting donations, which will not be constant) sponsor money, few starting rockets, and a (presumably) required trait will be enough drawbacks - a random and (to the player) arbitrary house arrest system would be frustrating.

 

[Promethian]

I haven't seen anything about the religious trait or religious sponsor causing reduced science... do you have a timestamp/quote?

As for your "house arrest" suggestion, I feel like reduced or sporadic (as if you were getting donations, which will not be constant) sponsor money, few starting rockets, and a (presumably) required trait will be enough drawbacks - a random and (to the player) arbitrary house arrest system would be frustrating.

The tooltips for the sponsors have all been shown in multiple places. I'd suggest the Quill18 video as he shows them all right at the beginning. Every sponsor has some built in tech rate. Highest is 400/Sol. Religious sponsor is the lowest at zero. They also only have 1 starting rocket and 4000 starting sponsor money (the lowest). They also have a penalty to the starting food producing building. Their advantages are fast breeding rate and every applicant has the religious trait which is improved morale and they never suicide from insanity (pure positive). I get the feeling I underestimate the strength of the religious trait because the difficulty listed is lower than for the Russia sponsor (190% vs 200%) who is better in every way except for a longer rocket travel time.

 

[Lt Loco]

The tooltips for the sponsors have all been shown in multiple places. I'd suggest the Quill18 video as he shows them all right at the beginning. Every sponsor has some built in tech rate. Highest is 400/Sol. Religious sponsor is the lowest at zero. They also only have 1 starting rocket and 4000 starting sponsor money (the lowest). They also have a penalty to the starting food producing building. Their advantages are fast breeding rate and every applicant has the religious trait which is improved morale and they never suicide from insanity (pure positive). I get the feeling I underestimate the strength of the religious trait because the difficulty listed is lower than for the Russia sponsor (190% vs 200%) who is better in every way except for a longer rocket travel time.

Ah okay. Well, I feel like that's fair. A religious organization may have universities (see: seminary) but they aren't likely to be doing research relevant to Mars colonization. I kinda like that - it means you've got to earn money to outsource and generate science on site. I'm really looking forward to this start now.