Dev Journal #112: The Exterminators

[p]In Galactic Civilizations, the infamous Korath Clan are every bit as deadly as their horrifying and well deserved reputation suggests. This radical offshoot of the Drengin were changed, both mentally and physically, by a brush with the deadly energies of the Dreadlords themselves, and make regular Drengin, a race of cunning, brutal slavers look rather tame by comparison. As the self-proclaimed apex of Drengin evolution the Korath Clan take it on themselves to purge the galaxy of all inferior civilizations and as well see, in Galactic Civilizations IV, they certainly have the tools for the job![/p][p]The Korath Clan are likely the most aggressive Core Civilization in GalCiv4, and this is reflected in two appropriately deadly, unique Civilization Abilities they start the game with.[/p][p][/p][p]Exterminators represents the Korath Clan’s unwavering commitment to their mighty crusade to wipe every other Civilization off the game-map, by granting access to Spore Ships. These horrifying vessels contain enough deadly self-replicating and corrosive bacteria to destroy any known life-form, regardless of its physical makeup, and any Civilization that detects an inbound Spore Ship must do all it can to destroy it or suffer catastrophic consequences! These Spore Ships not only wipe out all alien Citizens on the world, but they carry enough new Citizens to begin repopulating it with a more acceptable species to the Korath Clan.[/p][p]The threat that this terrifying Ability represents is also modelled in-game: the Korath Clan have a +15 Intimidation bonus, allowing them to muscle their way through Diplomatic Trade sessions, while reducing their Influence Growth too: it turns out that genocidal mania is a rather unpopular culture with more reasonable species.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]Speaking of which, the Korath Clan’s second Civilization Ability is Genocidal.[/p][p]This is the meat of the Korath Clan Civilization’s identity. Along with another meaty Influence penalty, the Korath Clan’s natural aversion to Diplomacy means you’re more likely to be at war with other Civilizations. These two penalties are actually quite interesting: one problem with rapid Influence generation is that it will eventually cause border frictions with neighbours earlier rather than later.[/p][p]While the Korath aren’t skilled Diplomats, relying on Intimidation to extort what they want from their rivals, they tend to expand through conquest rather than Culture, and this Influence growth penalty can be helpful to allow you to pick and choose your targets, before your borders do the talking for you. Genocidal also boosts Deception, a useful skill for many of the Events that will pop up as you play.[/p][p][/p][p]Speaking of which, the Korath Clan’s second Civilization Ability is Genocidal.[/p][p]This is the meat of the Korath Clan Civilization’s identity. Along with another meaty Influence penalty, the Korath Clan’s natural aversion to Diplomacy means you’re more likely to be at war with other Civilizations. These two penalties are actually quite interesting: one problem with rapid Influence generation is that it will eventually cause border frictions with neighbours earlier rather than later.[/p][p]While the Korath aren’t skilled Diplomats, relying on Intimidation to extort what they want from their rivals, they tend to expand through conquest rather than Culture, and this Influence growth penalty can be helpful to allow you to pick and choose your targets, before your borders do the talking for you. Genocidal also boosts Deception, a useful skill for many of the Events that will pop up as you play.[/p][p][/p][p]They work hard and they fight even harder, but they’re not going to be winning any scientific prizes any time soon. They’re not quite as unpleasant to be around as the Irradiated Citizens of the Cosmic Contaminant, but they’re not much better, and they don’t much like being around any other Citizens of other species.[/p][p]The Korath used to be really weak in Research but these days they’re just kind of average at it, which means the AI tends to play them a lot better than they did before. They’re never going to outpace a Researched focused Civilization but their exceptional combat prowess means they can often even the odds against superior tech.[/p][p]They’ve got some new tools to help them boost their Research output a bit too. Let’s take a look at some of these Improvements.[/p][p][/p][p]The Interrogation Machine here helps the Korath with Research and increases the max Population you can house on the planet. You only get one of these but if you place it well, it’ll grant a substantial Research bonus on the planet.[/p][p][/p][p]The Death Camp provides some free Ruined Torian Citizens for you to work to death, while increasing Manufacturing too. This is a good Improvement, just be aware that your Korath will be upset that you’ve got filthy alien scum on your planet and you’ll suffer an Approval Penalty.[/p][p][/p][p]So let’s talk strategy.[/p][p]Of course, the Korath Clan are built for war and you’ll be doing a lot of that later in the game. However, with the way GalCiv’s tech tree works, while you will start the game with a Siege Ship and some bombers, which is sufficient enough to get some early game colony theft in, you will need to develop your infrastructure for a while before you can commit to a war with an established neighbour.[/p][p]The Korath are still Drengin deep down, and so they are as cunning as they are brutal, but they’re not great scientists. However, with their excellent martial skills, wartime you’ll get much more out of the tech levels you do have.[/p][p]That said, you’ll usually be behind your rivals technologically and it can be important to put that cunning to use and extort as many Techs as possible out of weaker neighbours to ensure your military is up to the job. The Korath’s high Intimidate score ensures you can get more for each Threaten action that you make.[/p][p][/p][p]Threaten also reduces relations, and this can be really useful for goading a rival into attacking you, ensuring that is is they that suffer the Diplomacy penalties for starting a war, and not you. Because you’re already at a disadvantage in Diplomacy with most Civilizations, this can be helpful to avoid having multiple Civilizations declare war on you all at once.[/p][p]As with all Civilizations in GalCiv4, the Korath can be played quite differently and you’ll have to adapt your strategy depending on who you start close to. If you’ve got more peaceful neighbours who’ve been neglecting their defences, make use of your early military advantage and go grab some new Colonies. Racing up the Logistics tree for Battle Cruisers and the Planetary Mobilization line of Techs before them will ensure you’ll win an early war and grab a big chunk of territory before other Civs are getting off the ground.[/p][p]Alternatively you can build your economy up and rely on your natural strengths to take the enemy on at a later date, knowing they’ll be better prepared for you by then. Whether you rush to an early war or not will very much depend on how many of your neighbours will be likely to declare war on you as a result.[/p][p]If you are surrounded with powerful Civilizations and you do need to buy some time to build a stronger military, it can be wise to jump into the Emissaries line of the Governance tree to grab some Diplomacy boosting Techs: the classic Drengin play of “I’m your friend, honest!” can work for a while in keeping your rivals off your back long enough to build your defences up. Then, you can pick a target at your leisure and take a whole bunch of worlds.[/p][p]Military Bases will help here, as they are a dramatic force multiplier when fighting on home turf. If you are attacked back, you need to be prepared.[/p][p][/p][p]One big dilemma for the Korath is whether or not to use the Spore Ships to exterminate the Citizens from a world and repopulate them with your own. Doing so will avoid the rather nasty Approval penalty you get for recently conquered worlds compounding on the Korath Citizen’s hatred of sharing a world with aliens, but then you’re getting a drastic reduction in that Core World’s various Planetary Outputs until you’ve managed to repopulate it. Generally speaking you want Korath-only planets, but if you’ve built your Civilization to handle the Approval penalty, it can be worthwhile to keep Citizens with high Intelligence or Social Skills around for a while.[/p][p]The Korath have the ability to rapidly take enemy territory, but they’ll often not get a whole lot of of those conquered Core Worlds for a long time. This must be factored into your war plans![/p][p]I hope this has inspired you to go give the Korath Clan another play! They’re not quite as one-dimensional as war-focused factions in other 4X games can sometimes be, and much like the Yor and Drengin, can be played as sneaky conquerors instead of just running at your enemy with a huge number of Fleets. This can be a great challenge Civilization, and if you ramp the difficulty up and throw yourself into a galaxy of hostile aliens, you can have great fun burning the lot to the ground![/p]