Does noone use the Korath?

I use the Korath...and yes, they can keep up just fine. Try them, you might like them, you might not, but they are interesting enough to give it a try

I think Korath are one of the races that can easily pull off zero year wins in the hand of an expert.

Have look at the latest discussion in the MVL thread, there were examples about launching spore ships on turn 15 (or something like that) - quite unstoppable if you know what you're doing.

I have used them in a couple of games. Once you get spore bombs you're virtually unstopable, as long as you have a reasonable military.

I used them in my last game (which is nearly finished). Those spore ships are luvverly!

Don't have to worry about using up population to fight the invasions... all those people can go to getting invaded planets up and running quickly.

Nice!

Franbo


That said... I don't play in the metaverse...

I have not played any Metaverse games yet, but I enjoy an occasional foray into Korathdom at home. I also like to buy spore ships from the Korath when I am playing as other races.

What are your suggestion for the bonus points and initial research? Concentrate on military and push Research points to get a quick technological boost over other civs? I intuitively would give diplomacy a lesser priority. Which other bonuses would you suggest? Maybe you can give me a sample of point distribution appropriate to the Korath.

I always use a custom civ, because I like tweaking everything so it's just how I want it. You do get a few less points with a custom civ, but you can more than make up for it by getting exactly what you like. Plus, i just think it's just plain fun to create a civilization from scratch.

Sentient species taste better...

Depending on tech speed setting the Korath can have spore ships anywhere from turn 4 to turn 7.

The Korath are great. The biggest question is how big of a map are you playing on?

On medium and smaller size maps you don't need to do much else than kill everything. Your base bonus spread is high, so go for +tech and then either +morale/econ/pop growth or +speed. Start the game by going impulse/sensors if you have a lot of anomolies, or sporeships/impulse if you don't. Then just start kicking out spore ships and conquering everything.

On larger galaxies you are going to probably have one or two legitimate threats you can't just rush. In this case you need max +pop growth and at least +10% morale. You need this because AFTER you spore each world you are given a very few free colonists, and you need them to breed quickly to pay for the upkeep costs of those colonies you knock out.

As you spore more, you should eventually think about advanced toxic worlds to get the most out of your spore'd planet tiles. With the Korath you want to ignore soldiering completely, but in DA advanced govs aren't a bad investment because of the increased economy.

If the game happens to last long enough, xeno ethics is another super high priority with the Korath. Harmony crystals will help those struggling small populations, and the mind control center, psionic beams and artificial slave center will allow you to continue to roll with your spore fleets at frightening pace.

On balance, the Korath are I think the second strongest race in the game, just slightly behind the Krynn. I while back I ran a couple of tournaments, and both of those races did really well.

Hope that helps,
~ Wyndstar

See for instance:
Krynn v. Korath Tournament
and
Battle Royale Tournament

In a tournament with all races (the Battle Royale) the Korath came in 2nd overall.

~ Wyndstar

I dont know if its representative - if i understand the system correctly, then only the sum of scores of one race was compared. If more players used one race than another it would result in higher score for that race. That does not necessarily mean this race is better - it just means it is more popular. Maybe one should use averaged scores of races to get a representative picture?

I was just going to mention the same thing.

Admittedly, factoring difficulty levels into the equation could complicate things, but it would still probably be more representative.

Hi!

The reason on my side is Korath are too easy. Since AIs can't defend their planets properly, the victoy is just a matter of removing defenders from planets and "sporing" them. Repeat that enough times and you win.   

BR, Iztok

Hello there...

I've been playing Korath for the last few games, on medium size and crippling difficulty. I love the spore ships, but I get an econ crash every game. I start the spore rollout, take a few planets, and bang! My econ goes down the tube. I end up cutting production and creating loads of colony ships (I haven't researched inavasion so I don't have troops) and ferry pop from existing worlds to try to get balanced again.

I'm thinking I need to take troop ships with my spores to get the pop up to OK levels asap after landing the spore.

Or is there soem basic trick I'm missing?

Cheers

The last time I used spore in a large+ galaxy setting, I was playing a good-aligned custom race. (Aliens don't have to base their concepts of good and evil on the sensibilities of Terran western civilization, after all...)

I had almost no econ problems because a) I started building transports to ferry population fairly early in the war and b) I only spored key planets (PQ 10+) and left the fully-populated smaller worlds in between to culture flip to me later.

This won't work with evil civs, unfortunately, because once you build the Mind Control Center (MCC), it becomes almost impossible to culture flip other worlds.

Your economy crashes because when you spore planets, the infrastructure remains intact. So maintenance costs get higher and higher every planet you take. There are no colonists so you have no tax revenue. Theres a few solutions:

With your starting points, try spending them on either pop growth + morale, or econ + morale. This will help with your economy no matter what approach you take. With political party, try either federalist or universalist.

Slow down your "massive" spore attacks until your own infrastructure can handle the load. Depending on the size galaxy, I would even consider making your capital the production planet and all the other ones simply economy planets. Don't forget your government techs, they help with econ and production.

Research fertility clinics and build them on your spored planets. They are cheap and your populaton will grow faster. Demolish stupid AI buildings you dont need that are just causing you to have higher maintenance costs.

If you want to be REALLY evil or roleplay, spore a planet them demolish the colony. That will show those bastards who's boss!

I'm a Korath fan. More and more I am using them of late. I always favor bad guys in games but what do I know?

I've recently come to think the same thing. I noticed on a poll recently that almost no one used them, so I gave them a try. Whooped the crap out of everyone in no time flat. More people should give them a try.

I typically judge how effective a race design is by seeing how the AI fares wtih it. I can say that I don't play anything below crippling level anymore. I typically judge the empires which can survive the longest as good designs. That said the Korath are a race I have learned to eliminate quickly if possible or to appease if I cannot. When you combine their attack bonus with the spore tech, they are a major pain to deal with.

Hidar

I had to stop using them because I got addicted to spore ships. Any time I made a custom race after that I made sure they had access to spore ships. I had to go cold turkey and force myself to play something else for a while. Reading this thread is bringing the feeling back. Aaaah...

that's the same reason i use them!

I find the korath great fun - one of the most tedious things for me in a game is having the computers military completely destroyed, with my might unchallenged, but having to wait forever for my population on my planets to grow back up far enough to send out a transport ship to take over their planets 1 by 1. I just don't have the patience usually - it's clear I've won, so let me do it a bit faster!

With the korath though it's easy. Just build a few spore ships to go along with your military ships and you can wipe out an opponent in a single turn with a sneak attack (although you quickly build up a hefty budget deficit)

I agree.

The fact that I will gladly restart any game with the Korath shows my opinion of them. Easy almost to the point of cheese.

The best way to avoid the "econ" crash is to ONLY spore homeworlds.

My strategy is to research Planetary Improvements, and then Spore Weapons. At the beginning of the game, I set Research spending to 100% and buy several labs. Fly your Colony Ship right next to the closest neighbor's homeworld. As soon as you develop Spore Weapons, UPGRADE the Colony Ship to a Spore ship and take the homeworld...they'll never see it coming.

You use the Colony Ship because it's "harmless" and doesn't tip off the AI. You can't "spore conquer" a world with an unarmed Spore Ship if there's another kind of ship docked there, even if it's a Space Miner or Colony Ship, so sometimes the AI will leave one of those ships in port just to keep you from spore rushing if it sees a Spore Ship moving into it's territory. So you use your Colony Ship, which doesn't tip off the AI, then Upgrade it to a Spore Ship, and then take the planet.

Then you wait. Don't take ANY of that race's other planets. With no homeworld, as soon as you research a few Influence techs, all their other planets will defect to you, and you can avoid the massive "cash crunch" that comes with Spore-rushing.

IMO, this is THE most powerful strategy in the game, especially if you use a Custom race with "Super Anhilator" instead of the Korath. You can knock out 2-3 other races almost immediately on a Medium-sized galaxy...once you have 3 homeworlds and all the other planets start defecting, you're basically unstoppable unless you do something really stupid.

Korath? Ph-shaw.

Welcome to the world of ARC(advanced race customization). Try Super Annihilator with the Yor or Thalan.

I like Altarian/Super-Annihilator, homestar Iconis for ZYWs.

Sentient species taste better...