A recent thread on the Steam forums brought me back to a topic I've considered a few times before - I believe the Tinkers have the potential to be much more compelling.
On the topic of Harmonized population units, Arioch stated "They are essentially a better version of slaves; they need to be carefully managed to keep them in line." Maybe I'm watching the 'wrong' SciFi relative to Arioch, but... huh? When I think about Cyborg aliens and Cybernetic enhancement, it's a very different image and interaction than thinking about slave planets with chained-up miners being worked to death.
Should the defining trait of the cyborg race really be that it has "better slaves"?
I don't think it should be. I think Tinkers would be more compelling and more evocative of their own SciFi tropes if:
[*] Harmonized population (even disconnected Harmonized population) always had 0 Morale
[*] An interconnected race of Cyborgs were not worked to death or experimented on to death (A. They have inhuman stamina. B. It makes no sense to do that to a member of the collective consciousness.)
[*] They had their own mechanic to replace the work-slaves-to-death / experiment-slaves-to-death one they've borrowed from the Gremak.
I think there are a few things that could be fun, and I don't mean any of these as "buffs" or "nerfs," just as ideas. All could be tuned as needed by adjusting pros and cons to make it fit.
Idea one is to push in on the interconnected theme by adjusting the production of Tinkers based on the number of Harmonized population units on the planet. The base value would be their disconnected value and would gain +1 with 5 or more Harmonized population units and +2 with 15 or more Harmonized population units (or something along those lines that is properly balanced).
Idea two is to push in on the cybernetic enhancement element and allow the populations of different planets to specialize. This, too, would require some adjustments to their base stats but would also allow fun interactions. The slavery buttons would change to (something along the lines of) "Construction Augments," "Excavation Enhancements," and "Neural Network," which would grant bonuses to production, mining, or research respectively. Again, not intended to be fully-baked and fully-balanced, just a starting point.
But either of these concepts, to me, would evoke a cybernetic race instead of a race with "better slaves."
Thoughts?