When I initially picked up GalCiv2 and DA, I always played with a custom-made race. I would focus on social, econ, research and diplomatic strengths. I would have tech trading and tech brokering turned on, and I'd become this peaceful, all-tech-controling superpower (tough difficulty level, AI algorithms set to max).
When TA first came out, I did the same thing. I chose Terran as my custom race's tech tree, since I was familiar with it. But through trade I quickly gained everything that everyone else had anyway. At that point, I figured that I was thus missing out on the whole racial uniqueness feature that TA had brought to GalCiv. So I then determined to play with the set races, turn tech trading and tech brokering off, and feel the experience as a unique race who cannot fully comprehend the technology approaches of other unique races.
So here's where things got funny. I chose a race (any of the non-Terran, more peaceful races so that I could explore the unique tech trees). After choosing my race, I started the game (Immense map, max civs, Tough level). I got killed. Some evil race declared war on me and I had done way too little military research to compete. Played again, pretty much the same thing, again, same thing.
Okay, so I figured, there's a lesson to be learned here. If I'm not able to trade for some advanced military tech, I'm really gonna have to research it myself or I'm gonna get killed. D'uh.
I figured I'd also browse a few strategy guides--stuff on this website and on the wiki for any guidance. There was reference to how people would customize their starting race. I was like, huh? Doesn't that sorta negate the whole point of playing with one of the set races to begin with? But just to see what they were talking about, this game I decided to play as Terrans, but I clicked the tabs to look at their point allocation. Lo and behold I had 10 points to divy in any way I saw fit. But I also had various racial advantages. So as a custom race I get 15 points to distribute. As the Terran stock race I get a bunch o' racial advantages, and still 10 more points that I can distribute on top of that. So I played a Terran race that gets better planet quality, extra econ advantages, and better morale. Oh and lucky, courageous, and creative to boot! Well, I did also modify my military tech strategy, so that probably helped too, but overall, this game is going like a breeze compared to that series of defeats.
So in reflection on that, it seems like those 10 points to distribute, well, they really make a pretty huge difference that I was overlooking previously. And with the inherent racial advantages, it seems like my end result is a more powerful race than would even be possible using the custom creation tools. I think the manual actually mentions that set races are or may be more powerful, ultimately, than the custom races. But given that the customization of a set race ends up being pretty vast, and the end product seems hands-down better than what could ever be created from scratch, is it a clear thing that the stock races will always be more powerful than custom races?
Do people looking for difficulty ever waive investing points into their starting race?
