Are the Tinkers actually in the game yet? I've never seen them, but this may just be a symptom of playing the Phidi like the Phidi and letting myself get boxed in by my neighbors.

Yes, though their attributes are being rejiggered along with the other 9 new minor races being added to the game right now.

Other 9..? Good gods. I already really liked the presence and variety of minor races in this game, and this is like a golden treasure for my soul. Care to give me any teasers for the new minor races yet to be added to the game?

Sqwee!

nweismuller wrote:Other 9..? Good gods. I already really liked the presence and variety of minor races in this game, and this is like a golden treasure for my soul. Care to give me any teasers for the new minor races yet to be added to the game?

Sure!

The Lummox are giving me flashbacks to the Master of Orion 2 Natives... probably intended, actually.

This is the sort of stuff that adds great immersion.Do they have any specialty.

Ashbery76 wrote:This is the sort of stuff that adds great immersion.Do they have any specialty.

Yes, they each have varying yields and environmental preferences, as well as a variety of special characteristics, some of which we assigned to the existing population types.

Very nice indeed. This will go a long way to helping the galaxy feel alive rather than just a bunch of empty planets to colonize.

Arioch wrote:Yes, though their attributes are being rejiggered along with the other 9 new minor races being added to the game right now.

Really? I dug into special_decks.lua and don't see them as a natives special, and they don't have an 'epic system' like Tyl for the Gaiads in epic_systems.lua. If I'm reading this correctly, there's nothing that can cause them to be spawned into a game as things stand. Which would explain why I've never seen Tinkers in my games.

nweismuller wrote:

Arioch wrote:Yes, though their attributes are being rejiggered along with the other 9 new minor races being added to the game right now.

Really? I dug into special_decks.lua and don't see them as a natives special, and they don't have an 'epic system' like Tyl for the Gaiads in epic_systems.lua. If I'm reading this correctly, there's nothing that can cause them to be spawned into a game as things stand. Which would explain why I've never seen Tinkers in my games.

Oh... Opps. I now recall that I removed them temporarily because they were missing some encounter text. (There certainly have been beta builds in the past that included tinkers.) They should be re-introduced just as soon as I can plug in all the new content and do my own balance pass on the various numbers.

I've noticed AI (Ashdar) actively colonizing as Tinkers. Is this a bug or a feature?

bjg wrote:I've noticed AI (Ashdar) actively colonizing as Tinkers. Is this a bug or a feature?

Not a feature, exactly, but not a bug either. Colony ships use whichever eligible colonists on the planet are most numerous. The Tinkers aren't Primitive, so they can crew colony ships, so if an AI faction colonizes a Tinker world and doesn't move enough of their own population to the planet to outnumber the Tinkers, then when it builds colony ships on that planet, they will carry Tinker colonists.