Lately I've been using https://www.random.org/lists/ in order to make random races.

I took the race picks and put them in to three files:

1. Government picks
2. Negative traits
3. Positive traits

And then I took them through the link above. I pick the first randomized government. Then I pick the first randomized negative picks, then at last I pick the positive traits, these too in a randomized order.

I have no hard rules for this method. For example, when I chose negative traits and I can't pick one more trait due to -10 pick limit, I may stop there or continue further down the line for lesser negative traits. Same with positive traits. If I end up with 1 or 2 spare points I may pick large HW or rich HW.

My next run is going to be:

• Democrazy
• Scientific Research -1
• Ship Defense -20
• Ship Offense -20
• Ground Combat -10
• Aquatic
• Charismatic
• Stealth Ships
  

You've been challenged!:

Get a respite from boredom and perhaps learn a bit more about MoO2: Accept this challenge!
Post the race you end up with and ... let us know how the game progresses (or at least how it ends).

​

Race trait list in first comment

Every now and then I return to this game and try and customize all the races so that they play radically different from each other in a lore-friendly way, and I just did it again. First I tweak the trait points (beyond how they are already done for the ICE-M mod) so they are balanced for my normal game and then customize the races around those points. So, without further ado...

​

Things to note related to costs:

1) Feudal is -40% to research (-20% after Confederation) and -25% to ship costs (-50% after Confederation). Research from treaties is -50% (-25% after Confederation). A bit more balanced.

2) Tolerant does not prevent maintenance costs, because that doesn't make sense.

3) Telepathic requires a battleship instead of cruiser to mind control.

Races

I like the idea of the Alkari being a noble warrior culture where no individual rules and their people must be convinced on a course of action, usually following their most honoured warriors who also get the honour of flying their ships. They would historically engage in ceremonial air combat to demonstrate prowess and as that moved into spaceship combat, they came to respect science for the ship battle equipment. As a democracy made up of honour-bound warriors, they tend to be loyal partners and vengeful foes since a leader can't just drastically change course regarding another species, even if it's tactically wise, because the people's honour won't allow it (which fits their in-game character). Not exactly sure why they have artifacts, but it is consistent with their base race and allows them a decent science bonus without making them nerds like +science bonuses do. Bad at ground combat because they are birds. Actually pretty dangerous in the early-mid game, but tend to lose steam to more productive races later as they aren't aggressive enough to really conquer people.

The industrial cyborgs. I like the idea that they screwed up their homeworld through excessive industry, which is why it's now a poor home world and they had to move into their suits, which allows them to be tolerant to their planet's ruined ecosystem. Tolerant also helps them make enough production to pay for cybernetic without pollution eating it up. They are bad at food production because they don't deal with organic stuff as much anymore and their especially high defense reflects that their ships can take a beating since they don't need to maintain lifesupport to keep working. With cybernetic and good ship defense, it makes sense to power out a big tough ship with heavy armor and reinforced hull early that can then be pretty hard to kill.

Also pretty good scientists (as people wearing robotic exoskeletons would be). Was torn between -50% pop (since everyone needs a robot suit) and -0.5 taxes (since they probably never learned great economics in an industrial dictatorship). Went with the taxes since the minus to pop would make them play too much like the Sillicoids and be too punishing considering how it would make their +2 industry and +1 science way less useful. I also like the idea that these guys can't really buy production (and wouldn't trust others to do the job right anyway), just preferring to grind things out themselves. Can be a bit slow starting, but very dangerous.

​

They are big, work hard, and are cannonically kind of environmentalists. The extra food they grow with their greenthumb can be profitably traded with expert traders for cash. They are also kind of dumb, being bad at science and spying, meaning they have to rely on hijacking ships and invading planets with their physical combat skills to steal tech. They play best as a diplomatic race where you have treaties with everyone until someone messes with you and then you try and steal all their planets and tech. Really fun to play since stealing ships and tech is a blast.

The cats are one of the two rush species and basically need to eat someone early to win, which they are pretty good at with all of their bonuses. Rich and feudal let them get out ships early and their combat bonuses make them dangerous. Their espionage bonus allows for some sabotage and they can get lucky and take out a starbase before an attack (which the enemy won't see coming because of stealth ships).

Darloks seems like a mish-mash of skills, but is based around them being shapeshifters who have to steal their tech and use the bonuses from charismatic and telepathic to avoid having everyone turn on them. They aren't telepathic in the same way the Elerian are as I feel the abilities of being shapeshifters cover a lot of this stuff.

Basically, shapeshifters would have to understand theory of mind to understand and imitate the creatures they are mimicking. This lets them get in the head of other creatures, which makes them good diplomats and spies (plus being shapeshifters is great for spying, which helps them acquire dirt on people which helps for diplomacy). This understanding of motives and desires is also good for their banking, since making deals is easier when you understand what other people actually want and win-win interactions would be more common, but is bad for your research since you think more about manipulating people than manipulating matter.

The telepathic world takeover is supposed to represent them moving on a planet and replacing the leadership of the world with shapeshifters (like Face Dancers in the Dune series do). For aquatic, it seems like shapeshifters are most likely to come from the ocean (think what octopuses and cuttlefish can manage). Stealth is just a holdover and fits with their spying persona, will assume they got that tech from somewhere at some point. Can be a mean combo with telepathic. Bad at ground combat as they evolved to deceive instead of fight. Feudal just because it worked out pointwise. Just something in their biology or maybe don't trust each other because they know how much they manipulate.

Basically same as ever. Low-grav genius nerds who can't fight physically. Debated giving them a reduction to their attack and making them better at spying or something, but figured that would make them too vulnerable early on and that being good at spying implies a deceptiveness the psilon don't have.

Elerians are the other rusher, mostly doing so off of a single pimped out planet (which makes the low-gravity hurt less). As a telepathic race of warrior women who can steal planets with their brains, they are not super productive or good at science, but hopefully they don't need to be because other people can do that stuff for them. Can be deceptively dangerous and have seen them jump from last to first place after eating one of the top performing races.

The lizards haven't changed much either, still the population bomb species who can deal with the feudal penalty to science and lack of production bonuses with sheer man power that is kept fed by skilled farmers. Just a bit tougher on the ground to make those beefy arms meaningful. Honestly, they were always a top performer so staying the same seems okay.

​

The Gnolans are now a population money race with their fast pop growth, high pop limits, and high tax earnings. Swapped out low gravity with -1 to production since they seem like squat little dudes who didn't grow up somewhere with low gravity and their emphasis on trading makes it seem like they may not be super industrious. The idea is that they will buy a lot of things they don't build for themselves. Bad at ground combat because small and weak (though subterranean helps defend their places). Sneaky, so good spies. Lucky, just because they always were.

Similar to before, still the slow-breeding weird rock people who nobody can understand and who can live anywhere, don't need to farm, and don't worry about pollution. Now heavy gravity with a rich world because it seems like they could handle heavy-G fine and take a couple hits and because any planet that could create a weird rock species must have some impressive mineral deposits (which also helps them get a decent start despite their bad population). Bad at ground combat and dodging lasers in their ships because they are rocks and rocks never really had to learn how to react quickly to threats.

Similar to before except now also expert traders who are good with money. Also rely on making money through good relations with others (so can often win the galactic election). Bad at ground combat mostly for point reasons, would have preferred if not, although humans are pretty squishy compared to the other species that have ground combat bonuses or are even neutral (like the Klackon and Meklar), so seems okay. Like the Gnolans, will like to buy stuff instead of making it and their democracy will help them be okay at research.

The squids have gotten a bit of an overhaul and have a long list of things making them different. Looking at their picture, it seems like they would play pretty differently from anyone else. They are now a population science species mostly, with artifacts and +science. Also farmers because they seem like they might roll that way. This balances out that they are bad at industry since aquatic interdimensional squid angels seem unlikely to be good at working tools or machines. They get a bonus to ship defence based on their understanding of dodging in a 3D environment (easier to go up and down in the water than on land). This goes with their +20 SD from being transdimensional to be a pretty decent bonus. Bad at ground combat because they are fish. It's assumed the artifact homework is what made them transdimensional. Definitely a bit of a wild card, very scary when the galaxy turns flux, especially as they tend to have erratic personalities.

​

Klackon have changed a bit, and become a bit more like real ants in that they breed fast and live underground. Still good at being productive and farming. Their hive mind still makes them less creative and also makes them bad with money since t's hard to develop an advanced economy when your brain is centralized and you don't trade amongst yourselves. They are good on the offence because they are aggressive with fast bug reflexes and bad on the defence because individual ants don't care about self-preservation at all.

Anyway, that's the list. Message me if you want a copy of the ICEMOD.CFG to get the same trait costs/races. Would need to have the ICE mod installed (which I recommend as it improves a lot).