Should origins be split into different categories that can be combined?

[Tannhäuser Cake]

Splitting off a separate thread for this topic.

I think it would be nice to get a separation of homeworld, species/biology, and society origins into three separate categories that could be combined relatively freely. Many or all of the permanent civics could then also be moved to the "society origin" or "society type" slot, such as Criminal Heritage, Fanatic Purifiers, Inward Perfection and Eager Explorers (in my opinion, Shadow Council belongs there as well).

Essentially, the current origins cover different aspects that often seem conceptually compatible with many other origins. Being able to combine different origin types could enrichen the gameplay experience and replayability (though we should be wary of combinations being overpowered, especially with multiplayer games in mind). At the same time, there is an increasing number of permanent civics that change starting conditions and seem more like origins than civics. This implies that the current origin system is getting overloaded and could benefit from greater structural flexibility. The design would also be cleaner if the distinction was clearer and more distinctive in regards to what a civic is, and what constitutes an origin.

Homeworld, species and society are not the only possible categories, but they seem like a good place to start a discussion. After making a first attempt at dividing origins based on these three categories, I also found that a fourth category could be needed to handle origins that modify the relationship between an empire and its surroundings. The table below shows how this division could work out.

Spoiler: Original version of the table

HOMEWORLD ORIGIN / TYPE​	SPECIES ORIGIN / TYPE​	CELESTIAL ORIGIN (for lack of a better name)​	SOCIETAL ORIGIN / TYPE​
"Default"	"Default"	"Default"	Prosperous Unification (default)
Remnants	Syncretic Evolution	Galactic Doorstep	Mechanist
Life-Seeded	Clone Army	Lost Colony	On the Shoulders of Giants
Post-Apocalyptic	Necrophage	Common Ground	Knights of the Toxic God
Doomsday	Overtuned	Hegemon	Fear of the Dark
Shattered Ring	Teachers of the Shroud	Hegemon Subordinate (should be available)	Under One Rule
Void Dwellers	Cybernetic Creed	Scion	Storm Chasers
Ocean Paradise	Synthetic Fertility	Here Be Dragons	Primal Calling
Subterranean	Calamitous Birth	Imperial Fiefdom	Treasure Hunters
Resource Consolidation	Tree of Life	Slingshot to the Stars	Fruitful Partnership
		Broken Shackles	Progenitor Hive
		Payback
		Riftworld	Barbaric Despoilers
		Arc Welders	Fanatic Purifiers
			Inward Perfection
			Idyllic Bloom
			Anglers
			Marine Machines
			Oppressive Autocracy
			Sovereign Guardianship
			Natural Design
			Storm Devotion
			Planetscapers
			Galactic Curators
			Beastmasters
			Eager Explorers
			+ Shadow Council
			Criminal Heritage
			Trawling Operations
			Maritime Robotics
			Corporate Protectorate
			Shadow Corporation
			Augmentation Bazaars
			Storm Influencers
			Geo-Engineering, Inc.
			Antiquarian Expertise
			Space Ranchers
			Privatized Exploration
			Devouring Swarm
			Terravore
			Mycorrhizal Ideal
			Stargazers
			Guardian Cluster
			Innate Design
			Cultivation Drones
			Caretaker Network
			Wild Swarm
			Determined Exterminator
			Driven Assimilator
			Rogue Servitor
			Guardian Matrix
			Obsessional Directive
			Tactical Algorithms
			Gardening Protocols
			Caretaker Network
			Biodrones
			Exploration Protocols

While some category allocations are more debatable than others, it seems like those four origin types (homeworld, species, celestial, society) would produce a relatively even distribution of origins between them.

However, when the permanent civics (and Shadow Council) are considered for inclusion in the society origin/type category, the number increases drastically. While it can be argued that some of the permanent civics should not be permanent, or that the empire designer would only show the small subset that matches the empire type (regular, corporate, hive, machine), or that the duplicated civics could be merged into singular origins that apply equally to all four categories, there are still so many of them that they could fill a fifth category of their own. One category having many more options is not necessarily a problem, however, and having separate categories for "societal origin" and "society type" is also not inconceivable - even if 5 categories would begin to stretch things a bit far.

Spoiler: Second version of the table

Edit: after writing post #9, here is a second version of the table.

HOMEWORLD (homeworld)​	EVOLUTION (traits, ascension paths)​	PRE-FTL SOCIETY (starting development)​	POST-FTL RELATIONS (diplomacy, infrastructure)​	SOCIETY TYPE (former civics, abnormal gameplay)​
"Default"	"Default"	Prosperous Unification (default)	"Default"	"Default"
Remnants	Syncretic Evolution	Lost Colony	Galactic Doorstep	Barbaric Despoilers
Life-Seeded	Clone Army	Mechanist	Common Ground	Fanatic Purifiers
Post-Apocalyptic	Necrophage	On the Shoulders of Giants	Hegemon	Inward Perfection
Doomsday	Overtuned	Knights of the Toxic God	Hegemon Subordinate (should be added)	Shadow Council
Shattered Ring	Teachers of the Shroud	Fear of the Dark	Scion	Criminal Heritage
Void Dwellers	Cybernetic Creed	Under One Rule	Here Be Dragons	Devouring Swarm
Ocean Paradise	Synthetic Fertility	Riftworld	Imperial Fiefdom	Terravore
Subterranean	Natural Design / Innate Design	Storm Chasers	Slingshot to the Stars	Determined Exterminator
Resource Consolidation	Calamitous Birth	Primal Calling	Broken Shackles	Driven Assimilator
	Tree of Life	Treasure Hunters	Payback	Rogue Servitor
	Progenitor Hive	Arc Welders	Fruitful Partnership	Obsessional Directive
		Eager Explorers / Privatized Exploration / Stargazers / Exploration Protocols	Galactic Curators / Antiquarian Expertise / Caretaker Network / Caretaker Network	Sovereign Guardianship / Corporate Protectorate / Guardian Cluster / Guardian Matrix
		Beastmasters / Space Ranchers / Wild Swarm / Biodrones		Idyllic Bloom / Mycorrhizal Ideal
		Augmentation Bazaars
		Tactical Algorithms

While some category allocations are more debatable than others, it seems like these four origin types (homeworld, evolution, pre-ftl history, post-ftl relations), plus a more or less permanent society type, would produce a relatively even distribution of origins and (formerly) permanent civics between them. This division into categories could enable such combinations as Remnants + On the Shoulders of Giants, or Doomsday + Tree of Life + Fruitful Partnership.

"Shadow Council" was included in the Society Type list for reasons elaborated in post #9. Some currently permanent civics were not included in the list because they seem more like regular civics that should be switchable (but please object if you disagree):

• Shadow Corporation
• Oppressive Autocracy
• Storm Devotion / Storm Influencers
• Anglers / Marine Machines / Trawling Operations / Maritime Robotics
• Planetscapers / Geo-Engineering, Inc. / Cultivation Drones / Gardening Protocols

Edit: a third version of the table can be found in post #53.


What are your thoughts on this topic?

• Should origins be divided into different categories, where origins of different types can be combined?
• What should the categories be? Which origins should go where?
• Should the current permanent civics be converted into societal origins / society types?
• Should there be any balancing mechanism for combining origins?

Elaboration for "balancing mechanism":
For instance, should 2 beneficial origin picks require that an empire also makes 1 "maleficial" pick?
If so, what would such "bad" or "challenging" origins look like?

• Homeworld: small and low-gravity homeworld, resource-poor home system?
• Evolution: "lowly evolved" (species gets -2 trait points)?
• Post-FTL: no guaranteed homeworlds, home system is a "predestined" arrival point of a crisis invasion?

Or should the new default origin picks per category be things we currently get for free, thereby indirectly adding an "alternative cost" price tag for the other origin picks, similar to the bonuses of Prosperous Unification (+4 starting pops, +2 starting districts, and 20 years with +15% Happiness, +25% Amenities & +10% Resources from jobs) which other origins do not get?

• Homeworld: resource-abundant home system with one terraforming candidate? (in Sol, the candidate could be Mars, Venus or Luna?)
• Evolution: "normally evolved" (species gets +2 trait points, while default is otherwise 0 trait points)?
• Post-FTL: 2 guaranteed habitable worlds nearby (replacing the guaranteed habitables setting, and perhaps also scaling the number with the frequency of habitable worlds)?

 

[HFY]

Breaking origins down into categories does NOT mean every origin fits into exactly one category.

For example, some origins have impact on the home system and neighboring systems (Ocean Paradise, Void Dwellers). Some only impact the neighbors (Slingshot to the Stars); some only impact the home system (Fear of the Dark, Payback, Here Be Dragons).

For another example, some origins swap your founder pops for pops of other kind (Syncritc, Necrophage, Mechanist, Broken Shackles). These must be in conflict with each other, but they can each have other benefits as well.

 

[Thiend]

I would assign a point value to each origin and convert a lot of civics into origins. Civics are an overloaded system, but so are origins at this point - want to play with fauna? If you want them to be actually good, you're going to have to take a specific origin and probably a civic too. That's just too much.

There's a lot more like that, too.

So I'd say give them a point value, and current origins that make the game harder such as Doomsday can have a negative point cost. Prosperous Unification can have a variable cost, so that you can use remaining points on it if desired to avoid leaving any unspent or needing to pick something you aren't thematically interested in just to be optimal. People who want to play with a challenge origin can just take their challenge origin with its negative point cost and not spend the points.

Some will still be compatible, but it opens a huge amount of customization. Clone Army Remnants is just obvious low-hanging thematic fruit, for starters, but then for instance any two origins setting your homeworld to something specific wouldn't make sense together.

 

[Ryika]

I think from a design perspective, Origins are fine the way they are.

On the scale from "We have no options to design interesting empires, and everything is bland." to "Every empire is so special, the galaxy is a clown show.", I think Stellaris currently sits in a good position right in the middle. We have interesting empires that have a few defining things that make them interesting, but they're not all special in every regard.

What I would like is a balance pass to make some of the currently less impactful origins more viable and flavorful.

 

[Metallichydra]

For the first 3 categories, I think those would be easy.
I mean, most of the homeworld origins would obviously be mutually exclusive, although I guess a doomed ringworld would be cool.
For the most part, though, homeworld, species and celestial origins wouldn't take away anything from players since they're all former origins.
It's when we come to the last one, societal, that we run into major problems.
If there's a limit of 1 societal origin, then Rogue Servitors can no longer be guardianship matrixes.
No longer can you have a Determined Exterminator determined to grind every single organic being into consumer goods.
Fanatic Purifiers just can't fish anymore.

And if we make it possible to take multiple then we just reinvented civics.

 

[Lazy Name]

For the first 3 categories, I think those would be easy.
I mean, most of the homeworld origins would obviously be mutually exclusive, although I guess a doomed ringworld would be cool.
For the most part, though, homeworld, species and celestial origins wouldn't take away anything from players since they're all former origins.
It's when we come to the last one, societal, that we run into major problems.
If there's a limit of 1 societal origin, then Rogue Servitors can no longer be guardianship matrixes.
No longer can you have a Determined Exterminator determined to grind every single organic being into consumer goods.
Fanatic Purifiers just can't fish anymore.

And if we make it possible to take multiple then we just reinvented civics.

This is my perspective, too. Personally, though I know it's not the most popular idea, I think it ultimately would've been best to just have kept origins as civics and given an extra civic slot instead. As is, I can't see any system that doesn't lock players out of so many interesting combinations.

 

[Dayknight]

I think adding non-permanant, lesser version of permanant civic is enough. Making origin that complicated feels excessive to me.

 

[Foxosaur]

Splitting off a separate thread for this topic.


Essentially, the current origins cover different aspects that often seem conceptually compatible with many other origins. Being able to combine different origin types could enrichen the gameplay experience and replayability (though we should be wary of combinations being overpowered, especially with multiplayer games in mind). At the same time, there is an increasing number of civics - usually permanent ones - that seem more like origins than civics. The design would be cleaner if the distinction was clearer in regards to what a civic is like, and what constitutes an origin.

Homeworld, species and society are not the only possible categories, but they seem like a good place to start a discussion. After making a first attempt at dividing origins based on these three categories, I also found that a fourth category could be needed to handle origins that modify the relationship between an empire and its surroundings. The table below shows how this division could work out.

HOMEWORLD ORIGIN / TYPE​	SPECIES ORIGIN / TYPE​	CELESTIAL ORIGIN (for lack of a better name)​	SOCIETAL ORIGIN / TYPE​
"Default"	"Default"	"Default"	Prosperous Unification (default)
Remnants	Syncretic Evolution	Galactic Doorstep	Mechanist
Life-Seeded	Clone Army	Lost Colony	On the Shoulders of Giants
Post-Apocalyptic	Necrophage	Common Ground	Knights of the Toxic God
Doomsday	Overtuned	Hegemon	Fear of the Dark
Shattered Ring	Teachers of the Shroud	Hegemon Subordinate (should be available)	Under One Rule
Void Dwellers	Cybernetic Creed	Scion	Storm Chasers
Ocean Paradise	Synthetic Fertility	Here Be Dragons	Primal Calling
Subterranean	Calamitous Birth	Imperial Fiefdom	Treasure Hunters
Resource Consolidation	Tree of Life	Slingshot to the Stars	Fruitful Partnership
		Broken Shackles	Progenitor Hive
		Payback
		Riftworld	Barbaric Despoilers
		Arc Welders	Fanatic Purifiers
			Inward Perfection
			Idyllic Bloom
			Anglers
			Marine Machines
			Oppressive Autocracy
			Sovereign Guardianship
			Natural Design
			Storm Devotion
			Planetscapers
			Galactic Curators
			Beastmasters
			Eager Explorers
			+ Shadow Council
			Criminal Heritage
			Trawling Operations
			Maritime Robotics
			Corporate Protectorate
			Shadow Corporation
			Augmentation Bazaars
			Storm Influencers
			Geo-Engineering, Inc.
			Antiquarian Expertise
			Space Ranchers
			Privatized Exploration
			Devouring Swarm
			Terravore
			Mycorrhizal Ideal
			Stargazers
			Guardian Cluster
			Innate Design
			Cultivation Drones
			Caretaker Network
			Wild Swarm
			Determined Exterminator
			Driven Assimilator
			Rogue Servitor
			Guardian Matrix
			Obsessional Directive
			Tactical Algorithms
			Gardening Protocols
			Caretaker Network
			Biodrones
			Exploration Protocols

While some category allocations are more debatable than others, it seems like those four origin types (homeworld, species, celestial, society) would produce a relatively even distribution of origins between them.

However, when the permanent civics (and Shadow Council) are considered for inclusion in the society origin/type category, the number increases drastically. While it can be argued that some of the permanent civics should not be permanent, or that the empire designer would only show the small subset that matches the empire type (regular, corporate, hive, machine), or that the duplicated civics could be merged into singular origins that apply equally to all four categories, there are still so many of them that they could fill a fifth category of their own. One category having many more options is not necessarily a problem, however, and having separate categories for "societal origin" and "society type" is also not inconceivable - even if 5 categories would begin to stretch things a bit far.

What are your thoughts on this topic?

• Should origins be divided into different categories, where origins of different types can be combined?
• What should the categories be? Which origins should go where?
• Should the current permanent civics be converted into societal origins / society types?
• Should there be any balancing mechanism for combining origins?

Elaboration for "balancing mechanism":
For instance, should 2 beneficial origin picks require that an empire also makes 1 "maleficial" pick?
If so, what would such "bad" or "challenging" origins look like?

• Homeworld: small and low-gravity homeworld, resource-poor home system?
• Species: "lowly evolved" (species gets -2 trait points)?
• Celestial: no guaranteed homeworlds, home system is a "predestined" arrival point of a crisis invasion?

Or should the default origin picks be things we currently get for free, thereby indirectly adding an "alternative cost" price tag for the other origin picks, similar to the bonuses of Prosperous Unification?

• Homeworld: resource-abundant home system with one terraforming candidate? (in Sol, the candidate could be Mars, Venus or Luna?)
• Species: "normally evolved" (species gets +2 trait points, while default is otherwise 0 trait points)?
• Celestial: 2 guaranteed habitable worlds nearby (replacing the guaranteed habitables setting, and perhaps also scaling the number with the frequency of habitable worlds)?

I think from a roleplay perspective and being given more tools to personalise your empires start to fit into whatever narrative(and however deep that narrative is), this would be awesome. You could be essentially doubling or tripling the uniqueness of empire starts for which Stellaris is plentiful of already. So not strictly needed but I think a welcome addition.

Nice thread Tannhauser.

 

[Tannhäuser Cake]

For the first 3 categories, I think those would be easy.
I mean, most of the homeworld origins would obviously be mutually exclusive, although I guess a doomed ringworld would be cool.
For the most part, though, homeworld, species and celestial origins wouldn't take away anything from players since they're all former origins.
It's when we come to the last one, societal, that we run into major problems.
If there's a limit of 1 societal origin, then Rogue Servitors can no longer be guardianship matrixes.
No longer can you have a Determined Exterminator determined to grind every single organic being into consumer goods.
Fanatic Purifiers just can't fish anymore.

And if we make it possible to take multiple then we just reinvented civics.

Though a case could be made for keeping "Societal Origin" and "Societal Type" separate.

Civics like Inward Perfection, Barbaric Despoilers, Shadow Council*, Rogue Servitor, Devouring Swarm, Sovereign Guardianship all describe fundamentally differently functioning societies, more or less different types of civilizations, but do not describe how they got to that point, and would fit well as "Society Type" options. Society Type would generally represent substantial gameplay/playstyle differences, and could perhaps also be possible to change via forced ideological conversion (or revolutions, if they ever get added). IIRC, one of the developers (I think it was Eladrin) once also expressed interest in perhaps going in a society type direction in the future with certain civics.

Meanwhile, Eager Explorers dramatically alters the starting conditions and feels much more like an origin than an actual civic, and is also mutually exclusive mostly with other origins, and origin-like permanent civics. Natural Design could probably also work better as an origin (species origin?) than a civic; the list of mutual exclusions is even almost only species origins, and it would seem appropriate that it would remain combinable with (for instance) Fanatic Purifiers.

It is less clear why civics like Anglers, Oppressive Autocracy and Storm Devotion should be permanent in the first place, and they could fit better as regular, non-permanent civics than either a Societal Origin or a Societal Type (since they do not fundamentally alter starting conditions, or change how their empires interact with the rest of the galaxy).


* Shadow Council was included in that list because I am of the opinion that it should be more fleshed out, with potential diplomatic/espionage interactions that would make little sense under the other "Society Types". The current gameplay makes no sense in that alien empires easily find out about the Shadow Council, yet cannot use that extremely sensitive piece of information for anything; protecting the secret should be an important part of the gameplay, and other empires should be able to do something with the information if they manage to uncover the truth, and "Shadow Council" is also a very poor match for the meaning of the word "civic" since it is all about something being hidden from civil society. It is not something that the society publicly upholds and takes pride in. It is not a civic, but a secret.

 

[HFY]

Fanatic Purifier, Devouring Swarm, Rogue Servitor, Driven Assimilator, Determined Exterminator: these are basically Ethics rather than Civics or Origins.

Making them Ethics-swaps would give Gestalts something else to play with -- instead of being a generic Hive or Machine Intelligence, you'd get to pick some kind of direction other than the genocidals.

For Fanatic Purifier, you're already locked into Phobe 2 + (Spi or Mil) so it's kinda already consuming your Ethics points.

 

[Falrinn]

While I like the idea in principle, I do think creating too many categories is real risk since it could result in empire creation getting excesively complicated. In general if we are breaking apart a potential category mostly to support one or two outliers, then maybe that's a sign that we should try a different route to the same end.

I'd probably limit origins to just Homeworld, Species, and Society. Permanent civics would become regular civics or society origins. In some narrow cases I think some civics can become semi-pernament, in that they cannot be removed or added purely by government reform, but can under the right circumstances.

 

[Tannhäuser Cake]

Added a new version of the category table to the original post.

HOMEWORLD (homeworld)​	EVOLUTION (traits, ascension paths)​	PRE-FTL SOCIETY (starting development)​	POST-FTL RELATIONS (diplomacy, infrastructure)​	SOCIETY TYPE (former civics, abnormal gameplay)​
"Default"	"Default"	Prosperous Unification (default)	"Default"	"Default"
Remnants	Syncretic Evolution	Lost Colony	Galactic Doorstep	Barbaric Despoilers
Life-Seeded	Clone Army	Mechanist	Common Ground	Fanatic Purifiers
Post-Apocalyptic	Necrophage	On the Shoulders of Giants	Hegemon	Inward Perfection
Doomsday	Overtuned	Knights of the Toxic God	Hegemon Subordinate (should be added)	Shadow Council
Shattered Ring	Teachers of the Shroud	Fear of the Dark	Scion	Criminal Heritage
Void Dwellers	Cybernetic Creed	Under One Rule	Here Be Dragons	Devouring Swarm
Ocean Paradise	Synthetic Fertility	Riftworld	Imperial Fiefdom	Terravore
Subterranean	Natural Design / Innate Design	Storm Chasers	Slingshot to the Stars	Determined Exterminator
Resource Consolidation	Calamitous Birth	Primal Calling	Broken Shackles	Driven Assimilator
	Tree of Life	Treasure Hunters	Payback	Rogue Servitor
	Progenitor Hive	Arc Welders	Fruitful Partnership	Obsessional Directive
		Eager Explorers / Privatized Exploration / Stargazers / Exploration Protocols	Galactic Curators / Antiquarian Expertise / Caretaker Network / Caretaker Network	Sovereign Guardianship / Corporate Protectorate / Guardian Cluster / Guardian Matrix
		Beastmasters / Space Ranchers / Wild Swarm / Biodrones		Idyllic Bloom / Mycorrhizal Ideal
		Augmentation Bazaars
		Tactical Algorithms

While some category allocations are more debatable than others, it seems like these four origin types (homeworld, evolution, pre-ftl history, post-ftl relations), plus a more or less permanent society type, would produce a relatively even distribution of origins and (formerly) permanent civics between them. This division into categories could enable such combinations as Remnants + On the Shoulders of Giants, or Doomsday + Tree of Life + Fruitful Partnership.

"Shadow Council" was included in the Society Type list for reasons elaborated in post #9. Some currently permanent civics were not included in the list because they seem more like regular civics that should be switchable (but please object if you disagree):

• Shadow Corporation
• Oppressive Autocracy
• Storm Devotion / Storm Influencers
• Anglers / Marine Machines / Trawling Operations / Maritime Robotics
• Planetscapers / Geo-Engineering, Inc. / Cultivation Drones / Gardening Protocols

 

[Falrinn]

I think when we start talking about 5 categories, we've gone beyond what can reasonably be retrofitted from current origins/permanent civics and into a completely new origin system where it's understood that you aren't combining origins but assembling an origin from building blocks that aren't complete origins on their own.

This would likely entail reworking many of the existing origins so they fully fit into their assigned category. Some of them might even have to be broken up.

This isn't necessarily a bad concept and has a lot of potential, I just think it's going to turn out to be a much bigger concept in practice then perhaps intended.

 

[HFY]

Proposed categories for piecewise Origins:
- Homeworld (e.g. Life-Seeded)
- Home System (e.g. Dark Consortium)
- Neighbors (e.g. Slingshot)
- Species (e.g. Overtuned, Syncritic, Natural Design)
- Tech (e.g. Eager Explorers)
- Society (e.g. Under One Rule)
- Politics (e.g. Scion)

Some piecewise Origins will overlap multiple categories:
+ Hegemon (Neighbors, Politics)
+ Necrophage (Species, Neighbors)
+ Remnants (Homeworld, Neighbors)
+ Shattered Ring (Homeworld, Home System, Neighbors)
+ Ocean Paradise (Homeworld, Home System, Neighbors, Species)
+ etc.

 

[Lazy Name]

Proposed categories for piecewise Origins:
- Homeworld (e.g. Life-Seeded)
- Home System (e.g. Dark Consortium)
- Neighbors (e.g. Slingshot)
- Species (e.g. Overtuned, Syncritic, Natural Design)
- Tech (e.g. Eager Explorers)
- Society (e.g. Under One Rule)
- Politics (e.g. Scion)

Some piecewise Origins will overlap multiple categories:
+ Hegemon (Neighbors, Politics)
+ Necrophage (Species, Neighbors)
+ Remnants (Homeworld, Neighbors)
+ Shattered Ring (Homeworld, Home System, Neighbors)
+ Ocean Paradise (Homeworld, Home System, Neighbors, Species)
+ etc.

To be honest, I really don't see the appeal of something like this over even just giving two origin picks. You'd be able to take way too many origins at once (a doomsday clone army eager one rule hegemon is a bit much), while simultaneously being locked out of some origins that could make sense together but are in the same category (most examples of society origins).

 

[HFY]

To be honest, I really don't see the appeal of something like this over even just giving two origin picks. You'd be able to take way too many origins at once (a doomsday clone army eager one rule hegemon is a bit much), while simultaneously being locked out of some origins that could make sense together but are in the same category (most examples of society origins).

Doomsday also impacts neighbors, so would be prohibited from Hegemon, and it modifies the homeworld -- rather destructively -- so it might not be compatible with Eager either.

Doomsday Clone Army One Rule might be fine, or there might need to be a Narrative category for set-piece story origins like UOR which might conflict with other origin narratives.

 

[Lazy Name]

Doomsday also impacts neighbors, so would be prohibited from Hegemon, and it modifies the homeworld -- rather destructively -- so it might not be compatible with Eager either.

Doomsday Clone Army One Rule might be fine, or there might need to be a Narrative category for set-piece story origins like UOR which might conflict with other origin narratives.

But, doomsday is already compatible with eager...? It's very thematic, if unoptimal. I'd rather not have any new system take away customization options.

 

[HFY]

But, doomsday is already compatible with eager...? It's very thematic, if unoptimal. I'd rather not have any new system take away customization options.

Okay, then I guess it's not a problem if those are compatible?

 

[Ryika]

Doomsday Clone Army One Rule might be fine

This is one of those threads where I ask myself, am I really that out of touch? But nonono, it's just the kids these days. They know no bounds.
Perhaps I should just go back to 1.9 and pretend that everything that came after was just a bad dream that I was having.

 

[Thiend]

To be honest, I really don't see the appeal of something like this over even just giving two origin picks. You'd be able to take way too many origins at once (a doomsday clone army eager one rule hegemon is a bit much), while simultaneously being locked out of some origins that could make sense together but are in the same category (most examples of society origins).

Personally, I would enjoy two picks and just block off any that outright don't work together.

There's plenty we can contemplate with categories, or point limits, but its all a lot more complicated than just "two that aren't directly incompatible," leaves open options that would be blocked in either a category or point setup, which is also the easiest to implement.

It's a LOT of added customization. Two is realistically plenty.