Empire states

**Empire States** refer to the variety of states that Empires can be in, each having unique(and often quite drastic) effects upon said Empire's behavior. Empires can naturally change states every 1000 cycles (~1.5 minutes) and do so quite randomly.

(Descriptions taken from the official site)

## Expanding

When an empire is EXPANDING, it will obviously try to expand it's borders, by attacking other stars. They do some research too.

All empires start out like this, and it's usually pretty solid.

### Strategic point of view

Expanding empires are average land-grabbing empires. They are pretty much normal, but might fall behind in technology if they aren't fortifying.

## Fortifying

When an empire is FORTIFYING, it is trying to solidify it's border and focus on internal development. They will still defend lost stars quite fiercely, but rarely (though sometimes) conquer new stars. Research will be about 3x as efficient as an EXPANDING empire, and stars will develop faster.

FORTIFYING empires tend to beat out EXPANDING empires if they are lined up against each other. But if they are both starting out with a lot of room, then obviously the expanding empire will grow much faster and probably even out-research the fortifier and then quickly kill it. It's often an interesting fight.

### Strategic point of view

Fortifying empires are very defensive, and they seemingly won't do much, but they can advance in technology, develop their stars, and build up a fleet, preparing them for the next bout of expanding.

## Degenerating

This simply indicates that the empire has had enough for some reason. It has lost the collective will to do anything useful. Maybe they are simply lazy after dominating the galaxy for hundreds of millennia, or maybe they are busy filing paperwork in an explosive bureaucratic nightmare.

At any rate, DEGENERATING empires do not expand or defend lost territory. They do not research, and in fact, they may **lose** technology. They also blow up Artifacts left by ancient civilizations (or themselves).

An empire may bounce back from this to fortify or expand, but they typically find that the galaxy is now filled with lots of small upstart empires that have eaten up most of their territory while they were on vacation. Oh, and those upstarts still remember how to build plasma guns ... Have you seen the blueprints for them lately?

### Strategic point of view

Degenerating empires are in grave danger of losing territory to rebels or other empires, and even if they recover, they tend to lose most of their technology, so they'll be eaten up by the other empires anyways.

## Transcending

In this state every star of the empire leaves the galaxy and enters some kind of Utopian dimension. Normally, empires transcend when they reach tech level 9, but this can be set in the settings. Empires in the Transcending state can also fail to Transcend if a Seeper of Sloth comes.

### Strategic point of view

There's not much to this. They just get a +1000 opinion bonus towards everyone else until they zap out of the galaxy.

## Rioting

Well, something is clearly going wrong now... Perhaps some scandal in the court has outraged the plebeians to rise, or maybe it was the construction of that gigantic lunar monument with tax payer money that tipped people over the edge.

This state makes the faction spawn rate greatly increase, so spawning many new empires from rebelling stars. Those stars still loyal will bravely fight to get the empire back, but unless the prince apologizes for that faux-pas in the sauna to stabilize the regime, their outlook is grim.

### Strategic point of view

Rioting empires aren't in too much danger if the max empire count is sufficiently low, but if the max empires count is set to, oh, I dunno, maybe 9999, their whole empire will blow up, every province declaring independence.

They can recover from this, but by that time, pretty much 90% of their empire will be gone.

However, Rioting empires due to their dangerous position are very dangerous - their expansion is much more faster (so they will be able to reclaim lost lands), and they could "accidentally" attack and destroy other empires (especially if empires count is low)

## ALL\_WILL\_BE \_ASHES

This is a rarely seen thing, but it can be quite spectacular.

For some reason, they have now decided that they have to rid the galaxy of all life, including themselves. Maybe they got really bored, or maybe it's just a bit of the old *fhtagn!* kicking in.

They will launch a spectacular attack, boosted by their fanatic beliefs, in an attempt to conquer stars. But once a star in their empire has become developed, they blow it up... Including of course any stars they own when they collapse into this state of mind.

So the result is basically that they never have a core in their empire, they simply blow everything up and control only some stars in the front lines that they are continuously trying to expand. The vacuum left from their scorched space policy creates a great breeding ground for new empires. But of course, if the ALL\_WILL\_BE\_ASHES empire finds it's way back, it will simply get more fuel to continue on with the rampage.

This can go on for some time, like a wildfire constantly looking for new fresh worlds to conquer and blow up, and they can successfully do so with a greatly increased attack and defense. Or it can just fizzle out very quickly, but usually it's quite fun to watch.

There is no turning back from this state.

### Strategic point of view

All will be ashes empires usually fail because they blow up their provinces so they don't research so they lose in fights. In some cases, they might prevail, because they are immune to degenerating and rioting states because they can't turn back from this state.

## BLOOD\_PURGE

Well family is always the worst, right? Empires who enter this state have simply decided that there'll be no more awkward family dinners or drunk cousins at weddings. They all have to go.

Blood purgers will wage manic war against those who share a common ancestor with them, though be very reasonable with everyone else. They get a combat bonus, and are remarkably stable in that they simply want to end their bloodline once and for all.

Now, once they are done, and they no longer have any family around, there's not much more for them to do. Maybe they will simply Transcend to celebrate, or maybe they will turn inwards and realize that the blood of most hated enemy still lives ... Within themselves ...

### Strategic point of view

Blood purge empires tend to be very strong, not just in their combat bonuses, but also that they resist pretty much all uprisings (the rebels still share a common ancestor) and cannot fall into degeneration. Sometimes they might use this to their advantage and pick on other empires (without a common ancestor) and end up conquering all of the galaxy. The only way to survive a blood purge is when they start rioting after a while and let new empires take control of it.

They can even contest with empires a few tech levels ahead of them, simply due to their overwhelming strengths. But once all common ancestors are gone, they usually go away, so blood purge empires won't stay around to their newly-conquered galaxy.

## Crusading

The empire has gone all out on destroying the other empires with different religions. They go full militarism. They halt all research and put all focus on destroying empires with other religions. Once they are done they may turn into All Will Be Ashes or Degenerating. Very rare.

### Strategic point of view

Empires in this state will get combat bonuses, and also will ally with empires of the same religion in order to cleanse other religions in the galaxy. Research will cease to progress until the galaxy is cleansed of other religions.