I started several new games with my custom Civ and 1 with the Terrans just as a double check.  Each game has every citizen (not just criminals) contributing 1.5% to crime, 3% for my Civ, plus an additional 3% for Criminal trait.  Not sure where that Criminal trait is coming from - nothing I picked it setting up my custom Civ says anything about crime and it's linked to the Terrans also.  That's a starting point of 11-14% crime.   I hate having to give up one or more of my hexes to crime maintenance and really hate using one of my "way too valuable" orbitals for a prison.  On top of that you nerfed:

• “Colonial Law" and “Policy Crime” reduction on planets reduced from -0.1 to -0.03 

• “Minister of Justice” crime reduction reduced slightly 

If this is all a big coding error please fix asap.  If it's your new vision for the updated game, please - please, rethink it.  At least back off on the population impact of every citizen contributing. 

(plus, an additional 3% for Criminal trait) Check your pops you will find that for each "Criminal trait" one of your pops will be a Criminal.

As far as I know each and every one of these changes is WAD as the "Powers That Be" and others thought crime penalties were a joke as they stood because crime could be almost totally removed just by the Justice Minister.  

gypsy2299 - I figured as much.  I've voiced my opinion about the crime mechanic in this game several times before.  I don't buy Space 4X games to play whack-a-mole with criminals.  The Gigamass DLC was a big win for me, but they need to take this down a couple of notches because IMHO it takes the FUN out of the game.

We are in complete agreement here. 

Why I turn off the hostiles.

Monsters ect

I do the same.  Maybe Draver can come up with a Mod to turn off the Criminal Trait.  And every citizen shouldn't be boosting crime by 1.5%!  I run my home planet & Ringworlds with 20 Pop.  What's the point of large pops if everyone is a criminal? 

Only 48 turns into game and look at the mess crime is making.  I don't mind different mechanics to make the game interesting, but this is not my idea of fun guys.  I shouldn't have to worry about crime more than the real focus of the game - 4X!!!

I believe Draver has done one

I'd noticed that when I unlock the fighter and bomber, for some reason I have kinetic fighter and missile bomber, but no energy fighter. Not sure why all the base designs aren't unlocking

Hey, thanks for your feedback on crime. Afaik, crime was previously reported to barely exist, due to some policies and techs countering it. So this is a balance change based on that feedback. I see how this may be a not welcomed surprise for such a veteran player like you. If you do not want to search for new strategies to combat crime, I think it should be possible to mod in crime reduction pretty easily.

Mostly it's because I don't think it belongs in the game!  There are so many more interesting things you could be enhancing, like all the wonderful new bells & whistles you added with Megastructures.

BTW - I try to play without Mods so that I know any strange occurrences I report come from the basic game itself.

Very much appreciated! Your feedback is always extra helpful!

The criminal trait has been in a game since GC4 Epic I believe. For sure since supernova. You've always gotten 3% crime per colony. However, it's been fully negated through many techs like the Colonial law and policy that reduced crime from colonies by 10. Which was overkill since colonies only only generated about 3 to 6 crime + extra from some of the factions or other abilites.

New in patch 2.94

- Citizens now generate 1.5 crime per citizens. So a ring world with 20 pops will have 30% crime. 

- Colonial wealth and policy used changed from reducing crime by 3% to 
- Minister of Justice was giving 1% crime reduction per diligence to .01%. But it means if you can get 30 digilience minister and colonial law and policy you'll get negate most of the effects of crime. Even a 10 diligience minister would reduce it by quite a bit. 

Mechanics that have been in the game prior to 2.94 that still apply

- Crime reduces wealth by up to 100%.

- It's additive so even with a 500 wealth% from improvements you will still get 400% wealth. 

-Criminals do not suffer from approval penalties from crime so you can transport all the criminals to manufacturing world if you don't want to build prisons.

- the higher the crime on the planet the higher chance for more criminals. 
- you can always imprision them after turn 24 and they will convert to ex-convicts. I generally dont worry about this but its possible if you want to keep crime low. I generally just ship them off world. 
- crime is part of Xeloxis game mechanics and even they could get to a point they could ignore it. They can push crime on others. All their citizens are also criminals. You can still make tons of credits per turn playing them as I mentioned its additive.
- different races have

- There is traits that also reduce crime from criminals. Such as Traditionalism Social Ties. Although will have to confirm its working. 

- There are many other methods of handling it that have been in the game to so for most players it will eventually be a non issue. 
- Crime creates a minor approval penalty however the approval district was greatly buffed. 

Oh one thing to mention too. There are a few crime reductions that worked prior to 2.94 that are not working now. These include some events, leader traits, etc...

The thing that I really don't like about it, and which is made worse by the "high crime produces more criminals" snowball effect, is that it forces - or at least pushes you very heavily - to have to micro your citizens and check every new one for whether they're a criminal and then deal with them (in whatever fashion). No other trait does that.

Between the management hassle it adds and the fact that it's kind of redundant with the new crime rate per citizen mechanic, I'd really like to see that trait axed entirely.

The criminal trait has been in the game since Xeloxi were added. Its worked basically the same way since day 1. There is an urge to make all good numbers go up and make bad numbers go 0. You really dont need to micro your citizens just leave them as criminals. The largest source of crime is still colonies. There is a minor increase from poplation and is lowered through many methods. 

Crime has two effects
- Approval reduction for non criminals. If your at 96% approval this doesn't matter. The approval district was also increased in potency. This only matters for research and production worlds

- reduces wealth which only matters for wealth worlds. Put your prisons on these worlds. You can also build financial districts to offset it 

FWIW, I agree with others here that the change went a bit too far on crime.  Granted in the past it wasn't an issue (at all) once you got your minister of justice in place, so it might have been too mild before.  But now it's too much.  Even with a minister and the planetary orbital improvement on your core that lowers crime 20, I'm getting > 40 crime with few ways to mitigate it.  You can build the prison complex improvement, yes, but even then it wouldn't be enough -  is it something you just have to live with?  Big core planets are always inefficient from corruption?  I'm not one of those people but I'd think it stops you from "playing tall" or having cores with a lot of satellites (the way I prefer to play).

Otherwise, if it isn't backed down some, I think there needs to be a few more ways to deal with it.  Even just a couple new anti-crime buildings that would give adjacency bonuses might be enough - I can live with losing 3 tiles better than just living with crime-riddled core planets (especially if, like housing, they give a +1 to all adjacency bonus - consider it a "cheap prison workforce").  This might have been the thinking with the random event (that pops for meat least 3-5 times per game) that gives you a choice of lowering crime 5% or taking a handful precursor nanites, but I need them nanites fer my core taps :)  Also, I know you can put them in jail, but 24 turns of non-productive citizen?  How about a tech called "cyber-lobotomy" that lowers crime and removes the attribute but at that point they can only work as either workers or entertainers (hah!)

Best regards.

I think the module changes weren't for the better. Paying a little giga mass is better than a constant energy upkeep per dreadnaught. 

I humbly disagree with your opinion.  There are several ways to create more energy but Gigamass is a limited resource, once it's gone you can't get it back.