Ground combat soldiers question

[Misery]

Okay, so, I know that ground combat in general has been a bit of an issue recently, but my specific question is about the numbers of soldiers each race has.

What is it that creates this number, and is there anything that can be done to increase it?

In my current game, the Burlusts have pretty much lost the space war, but this seems to be because they trained EVERYONE to fight just on the ground.  The Skylaxians are next with some 7000 or so power level.

....and then everyone else has 10 or less.  A couple have zero, without having been attacked at any point.  And the Thoraxians just got obliterated pretty fast without any trouble.

So yeah, anything that can be done about this one?  I get the feeling I'm missing something, but it could also just be an imbalance or something.

[Draco18s]

In the "it's not observer mode, because I didn't check that box" game of non-interference, my Thoraxians have a cool 5.7 billion ground combat strength and no space ships.

They are being attacked almost constantly.

No one's dumb enough to send down ground troops.  As in, "attacking ground troop strength" is not shown and doesn't even come into play, not even for a single day.

I have no idea what's going on.

[Misery]

Yeah, thats pretty much been my experience.  I know the interface was updated a bit to show it a little more, but I"m still baffled by it.  THat's a good point about the attacking strength, that definitely needs to be shown instead of just the defenders.

...and I'm also baffled by the fact that the Thoraxians got utterly squashed as they did.  By the Skylaxians no less.  I'd love to know just HOW that came about, really.  They're supposed to be the unstoppable monsters, after all!

[Draco18s]

Yeah, thats pretty much been my experience.  I know the interface was updated a bit to show it a little more, but I"m still baffled by it.  THat's a good point about the attacking strength, that definitely needs to be shown instead of just the defenders.

Oh, it is.  If there are any actually on the ground.

...and I'm also baffled by the fact that the Thoraxians got utterly squashed as they did.  By the Skylaxians no less.  I'd love to know just HOW that came about, really.  They're supposed to be the unstoppable monsters, after all!

Superior tech and numbers, probably.  Skylaxians are one of the three research whores (along with the Evucks and Acutians).

[Misery]

Ahhh.... yeeeeaaahhhh.  Looking at them closely, good grief, the Skylaxians have mastered.... way too many things.  And they have so many buildings they could probably throw them at the enemy for extra damage.   Good grief. 

Note to self, dont be so spacey.  Hadnt noticed they were getting so out of control. 

Maybe they need a nerf?  I aint as knowledgeable about the strategy side of things so I cant say for sure.

[Draco18s]

Skylaxians in my game just threw their entire population at the Thoraxians (previously it was just the Andors and a handful of Boarines).  That's over 1.1m fleetpower and 27b groundtroop power.

Thoraxians are not long for this galaxy.

[SuperCactus]

I feel like Thoraxians have a real problem, I don't know if I'm the only one having this issue but they never become a threat to anyone, like NEVER. In all of my games their fleet is always weak, their ground power insufficient (compared to the burlusts they are like a bad joke), and obviously being always behind in tech they can't compete. Even when they are left alone doing their thing peacefully they can't get strong enough.
I don't know what to do about them, maybe give them easy-to-build ships, like floating hives with no space combat capabilities that would crash on enemy worlds so they can go for ground invasion?

[BobTheJanitor]

Yeah I had a Burlust riot point itself at the Thoraxians in a game last night, and I was curious if I could do anything to save them, so I kept reloading a save. No luck. I could continually fight off Burlust ships myself, but the moment I left, they were done. Trying a dispatch mission to beef up the Thoraxian fleet didn't help, they just couldn't build faster than their ships were shot down. In the end I had to admit defeat and just let them get crushed.

At the moment they're not matching up to their horrible hive mind alien stereotypes. More like pitiful helpless aliens.

[SuperCactus]

Exactly, victims of the solar system. As insects they should be more adaptive, get a bonus to compatibility, far higher birth rate, bonus to manufacturing and fleet production perhaps (hive mind coordinates efforts of the workforce more efficiently), they could be stronger and pose a real threat without having to rely on science, I think they should really be about swarming to kill their opponents.

Having played a lot to master of orion 2, I can't prevent me from making the parallel with the Klackon race, they are insects too. And I remember them being really strong in the early stage of the game, thanks to a bonus to food (here it is birth/death rates that look the closest to me) and  industrial productions (manufacturing and fleet production) even if they were unable to get as much techs as the other races, so they could get huge low tech fleets faster than others an be a real threat. The game being different I don't say it is the solution, but it may be a clue to solve this situation.

The balance is tricky here, if they were too strong in the early game, being able to directly attack opponents in this game they would simply destroy everyone, which is not better than having them feel a litlle useless right now.

[Azurian]

The Klackon  were also quite xenophobic and excellent at building things.
http://aliens.wikia.com/wiki/Klackon

[SuperCactus]

Yes, but the xenophobic aspect didn't strike me as a power related thing and is incompatible with the federation building goal in a certain extent, concerning building things, as I wrote, manufacturing and fleet productions are the equivalent here and thoraxians could benefit from such bonuses.