United Empire Expert Guide - Endless Space 2 - Turns 1-30
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- Опубліковано 4 чер 2017
- First 30 turns of 4XAlchemist playing United Empire from Endless Space 2 on Endless Difficulty with Hard Pirates. Extensive commentary on multiple UE-specific and general strategies.
Highlights:
+ Turn 10 - 100 Industry on home system
+ Turn 13 - 2 Heroes and 140 science
+ Turn 15 - Level 2 Systems upgrade unlocked
+ Turn 28 - 3 Minor Civilizations Assimilated
Google drive link to save file for anyone wanting to pick up the game from this point: drive.google.com/open?id=0B5s...
Please let us know what you think about this video in the comments and like and subscribe if you're enjoying the content.
Thanks!
4XAlchemist - Ігри
"Monsoon with 5 titanium and a life form"... "extra population on turn 1"... "+50 influence, nice"... "found 2 systems one has 2 white dots"... "triple luxury resource, not too shabby"... "an atoll is my favorite early game planet type" oh there are 3 of them... "Did we get lucky? We DID."... It'd be nice to have a guide for turns 1-30 when you DON'T have such a great start-- home system with very long star lanes leading to small systems with no habitable planets with very few curiosities and no nearby minor civilizations. You know, like every game I play.
This is my life, i swear i thought he was cheating. Every turn it was like hey! you won the lotto!
Mmmm, I suspect this man can set it up or knows a good galaxy/player to pick ...
The key is to switch your strategy up towards more scouting and expansion if you don't have luck with your closest systems - barring any good expansions nearby you need to bum-rush your neighbor and invade.
amen
It's called UA-camr luck. It's a real thing.
4:59 "In exchange for a bit of happiness that we don't particularly need."
This has got to be the most realistic game I've ever seen.
man im watching these vids in 2020, thanks so much
same lol
Same, I wish he would finish the game!
I got it on sale love it civ was a bit wonky and I love space simulators
A lot of this info is out of date.
Yeah, upgrading scouts to reset probes doesn't seem to work. Just tried it. Maybe I'm missing something?
also the exploit he used in the beginning with the probes is no longer doable in the Current version
DAMNIT!
good
Yeah I was quite glad when I found out that this doesn't work anymore. Not very fun to do this every time you start a new game. More like a chore.
D'oh desu ka!?!
Yep, I noticed this. I start with a single probe and it just doesn't start as fast. I wonder how much this changed the game.
THANK YOU SO MUCH! My favorite race to play is the United Empire and this has helped me immensely on how the early game works, I found that I was really struggling trying to understand the complexities of the game and these guides, watching someone who knows what they're doing, really help.
Also helps to understand that the deeper you look in every aspects, the more rewarding it gets for consolidation of perks is a good long term reward that keeps giving.
Starting with this game because it was on sale. It's a great game plus a AWESOME guide. Thanks a lot!
Man, I've been LOVING this game the past week since I picked it up. Found you guys via reddit and totally enjoy what you're doing. You got my sub and like, keep up the good work!
Such a great analysis of the early game! I took some notes from this gameplay, and I think a quick tactical and strategical recap in the end of the video would further improve an already excellent material you guys did. Great work!
Thanks for pointing me to this one. it helped a lot. I think I overexpanded in the beginning though as I wasn't so lucky with my starter system. Somehow now after assimilating a minor faction fairly early, I find myself with very low diminishing population and also a lack of military ships has resulted in a few embarrassing defeats :) Still such a great game and your guides are great for a noob like myself.
I would love to see an entire playthrough of a campaign from you at some point. You have a great voice for commentary, very easy on the ears :)
I keep coming back to these guides because they're really useful as a resource. Thanks again guys!
Fantastic video. Thanks! I just played my second game with Empire and can see how much i need to improve my game. Woot.
Your explanations are great and really understandable, thanks for the great vid :)
Should've watched you first before starting and struggling on 2 games. Very cool.
Man absolutely fantastic guide, love this series. You guys are the best. Subbed!
I have to say, that is an extremely good start for the Empire. You couldn't have asked for it any better. I would have preferred a less favorable start just to see how you would have played it.
Yeah...it was insanely good. We are currently recording a PVP where I (David) am playing the UE, and it will hopefully be much more balanced. Additionally, we have learned so much since we made this first video, the new series will showcase some awesome new strats and tricks :D.
4X Alchemist: Speaking of... When new pvp videos are coming out? It is very imoplite to deprive addicts of their drugs for a long time unless you want some riots...
haha. Some other people have asked the same thing. We've both been really busy, but are about halfway through the game :D
15 minues in and im like woah that guy knows his stuff. nice and calm manner, very educational, good work. if u did make a lets play on ES2 i will totally watch it.
Thanks! we have a PVP game on the channel where you can watch both sides of my brother and I playing a full game :D. We are working on another one now where I am playing UE.
Excellent presentation. I was thinking about giving up on this game after getting my butt kicked several times even on easy but my energy has definitely been revived and there is no better time than now to try again. Thank you so much.
Wow, this series has been very helpful, been playing inefficiently for years apparently. Thanks guys
Great video and imo the most informative. Happy to follow your channel.
Thanks man, very informative guide. You're awesome.
This is my first 4x since total war and its been fun piecing together the mechanics and sub mechanics of this game
Learned so much top notch stuff fellas!
What a great tutorial! Everything is well explained and he also says why he makes the choices he make. This is a thorough tutorial and a joy to watch. I learnt a lot of new stuff. Liked and subscribed.
This is probably by far the most useful and informative Endless Space 2 tutorial video. Keep up the good work and thanks A LOT!
Hey man love these videos, If I could give some feedback to you I'd love it if you could put a list in the description box saying what you researched first all the way through and what you did with the missions, I watched this video a LOT to get little tid bits of information x,D
Thanks for video guide here in 2020. I also didn't know that Topher Grace did gaming on youtube. Hell yea
Yes! Thank you so much :D I'm gonna watch It right now.
Very helpful--you explain things well.
Thanks a lot! Very good info guide and few tips was realy realy helpful for me.
thanks for the in depth guide.
Even though you are lucky with a good start... Still this guide is still good on 2020... There are no more probe exploits
Im watching ur video in 2021 , really helpful .
Wow! This was so helpful! :)
This is really helpful
Nice work done appreciated :)
Amazing guide man.
31:46 Since the whole theme behind Industrialists in this game is kinda space USSR and the first industrialist hero is Dmitry... to make the name Lena more comrade "feeling" it can be pronounced with E like in a word "Lemon", source Russian name Elena/Lena/Alena :)
and some fun facts:
Petra is Greek name but it's very popular in Germany and Slavic countries.
Hadri seams to be Arabic name
Interesting fact about surnames:
Hadri Lenko - Lenko is popular Ukrainian surname
Lena Zelevas - Zelevas is a surname of Emperor of the United Empire in the game :) According to wiki Lena is a Sister of Emperor. Most likely surname is Lithuanian, but seems to be completely fictional
Petra Mandžukić - Mandžukić is a Croatian surname
P.S. Great guide!
Nice onomastics
great video :)
Seriously learned so much. I've watched this twice and I appreciate how you go through your thought process and the pros/cons of each decision you make. (Even the seemingly trivial stuff that makes sense to you but not to people who don't know what you are doing) this is my first 4x game and informational videos seem hard to come by for ES2. Any chance you'll upload guides like this for all races? Or maybe loading videos where your first 30 turns are less then optimal (ie. Blocked in by other factions, not may useful systems, fewer bennifical resources etc.) so that we might see how you bounce back from a rough start/how you'd do things different?
Hey Pierre, glad the guides were useful to you! We have uploaded one for every race except the new DLC for Vaulters (coming soon). Check out our uploaded videos for the full list. We also have some longer PvP streams from both perspectives that could be useful as you're learning. Most were done on older patches so some things have changed but the core game is still the same. -James
So, I cannot figure out how editing ships refreshed the exploration probes. I'm in a system I control.
Ha I watched it twice because of the pure domination.
so relaxing, watching and learning. i just bought the game and wanted to get some ideas.
thx 4 that. good video.
Thanks man
Thank you for teaching me how to play this game lol
Great video! Is there a way you can time index things in the video where you explain the different ship designs? the battle tactics you choose? or just add the write up under the highlights?
Very helpful regarding the 'thinking' of this. I'm new player and wondering how to do anything regarding even moving an exploration ship. Yeah, that early in this game.
you are not alone brother :)
I'm still in the tutorial
Very well done video, helped me out a bunch!
Loving this game, loving your videos.
Can anyone tell me if there there is a "retire" option for when I'm sick of chasing my enemies down to the last man?
Is there an endgame replay where I can watch my color overtake all the other colors?
That was the best part about old timey Civ Games!
A very old video but the gameplay info is insightful. Thank you. I do believe 4X Alchemist got an OP start with the types of planets, the minor civilizations, ect, which is very difficult to get. But the IDEAS presented are good ones. Just started playing this game in 2023, any chance of an updated video to cover hacking and the latest DLCs?
I am coming to this game and video late as well. I watch a lot of game tutorial videos and suspect that some content creators take several "takes" until they get a good start. Not saying this guy did, just saying I often find it impossible to replicate the luck and success I see in some videos, even when I replicate exactly what I have seen.
Great guide on the inclusive space humans! Really enjoy seeing your insight into all of these races and I pick up a ton of better habits for playing.
I had a question about the sphere of influence, and if it is a viable way to play UE - is it possible to play more passively and use influence to peacefully coax other systems into your control?
Top notch
This is a first Endless strategy i had to google a guide for. I don't know if that is a good or a bad thing.
High quality tutorial!
Just got the game and as is my habit I looked on line for basic info to play smarter and ur vids on 1st 30 turns were awesome. I am having problems doing the prob trick could someone tell me step by step how to do it?
I never get that many planets you can colonize. it's usually 5-6 systems out before I can get even 1
The double probe component and turn 1 upgrade is something I figured out myself and I'm glad to find that it's a smart move lol. It seems like you guys dont get a second scout ship out quickly, are you really too busy to do that?
You guys should check out the Eclipse and Twilight Imperium board games.
The trebuchet is by far the superior siege weapon. Good name choice!
The tempest proof ammo consisting of a fridge filled with concrete might just be one of the most efficient ones as it also strikes the ennemy with disbelief as well as with the hope that the fridge is actually filled with beer; a sort of trojan horse fridge peace offering filled with deceit and the tears or broken dreams. smh gullable ennemies, so gullable.
Really want to see turn 31-60, I learned a lot from this, Thank you. Also can you make a video on how to ensure Anarchy doesn't happen or how to deal with it when it does?
Anarchy happens when your citizens hate you (low approval) and then they rebel
So that the best way to avoid it is build lots of approval improving stuff and pass same laws
EASY
Your channel is awesome!!! What guides are you doing next? I hope Horation even though they seem to be mediocre and Riftborn would be great because I have no idea if I should build population or buildings...
Those two are definitely on our priority list. I love the gene splicing mechanic of the Horatio, but their ships are so weak and so expensive, that I've concluded that they are a low tier race. Additionally, they are pretty heavily bugged at the moment where if you get a certain number of Horatio population, all of your food is converted to industry when your population is full. I don't think this is intended because it is not stated anywhere.
As for Riftborn, we are currently putting together a video on them, but there are two very specific style that they can be played (long or wide) and we are thinking each deserves its own video. :D
Riftborn guide is now live! ua-cam.com/video/l2hcfiq8tW0/v-deo.html
Hi! I really enjoy your guides and they help me a lot of being bettter in Endless Space 2!
But i have one question where i didn´t found any answer for:
No matter what race I play, I run into problems with overpopulation on my planet.
Maybe you can help me solve this problem?
Thank you very much!
Maybe here I can get help.. I was playing Sophons, few times, always defeated by bankruptcy, details:
At some stage I have like 14 out of 10 systems, 85%approval across them, surplus 3-4k dust, played on easy and only 1 AI opponent (because of what follows), everytime same scheme: last time my +4k dust changed to -8k in just one turn (nothing happened like war or blockade or anything) and I couldn't fix it even by setting all systems for dust profiles and destroying expensive buildings here and there. Im lost.
Lol hero experience works like CEOs taking credit... love it.
Are you ever going to update these based on the goofy patches? For example he doesn't give 10% industry on system anymore. It's 5%. Is it still worth it to throw the hero on the system turn one? it doesn't lower my xeno industrial complex completion by even one turn.
Any chance to post game setup? How you setup game from begining? It's quick start or ...
I go through it briefly at the beginning. You can just pause the game there. It's pretty default settings. 10 competitors, huge galaxy, normal resources and constellations. Endless difficulty w/ hard pirates.
Wondering why the scouting around more systems is not done in the beginning.
Hey, hope you answer this, but is there any things you are 'supposed' to have around turn 30 when it comes to United Empire? Im mostly thinking of how many times you should expand. And when is a good time to start building ships? Thanks!
It seems the upgrade and get your probes back thing was patched out.
sehr hilfreich
You guys should make an updated version. Not sure if recent patches may have changed things. But I just recently picked up this game due to it being on game pass for PC. Loving these vids tho.
His couch in the back is cool, not gonna lie
The probe trick you used at the beginning works half the times, and the other half it doesn't replenish them for whatever reason, 0/4. Any idea why?
Can I ask you where did you learn complete Tech tree? Just from sheer number of hours you play or something else?
for a start you can just look at what you wanna do next (e.g. need more of a certain resource/better military/colonise a certain type of planet) then use the search bar so all relevant techs light up
Old video, but I'm surprised you didnt put Lenko on a ship, modded with extra move + probes and no shields, then send him around to probe all the nearby systems and quickly level up with zero risk. Then bring him back home and park him on your main system.
Probes will not be replenished instantaneously anymore and Lenko does not give the start bonus
Yeah, the bonus is down to 5% and the drones does indeed not replenish
@@AMichagin I was saddened to find this out but am still in the tutorial...
I right clicked on the video to get out of menu :-D
What do you look for when deciding whether or not to colonize a system in the early game? Is it more about getting everything that you possibly can settle, or are you choosier about the planet's specialties and the system's max pop?
With the initial colony ship: if there's something that you can settle, just jump on it.
With later colony ships: move to settle everything you can, but in descending order of goodness for some of the things you mentioned, prioritizing: Planet types, total population capacity, luxury/strategic resources, proximity to your capital.
Think of colonies for empire as an investment of 3 turns of industry and ~12 turns of food in one of your colonies for the benefit of an additional producer of industry and science for the rest of the game. Viewed in that light, colonizing is very strong!
OK, it sounds like I could stand to be a little less picky then. I'll just select for the highest value as I can.
Thanks again!
I really enjoy this game but it's pretty slow paced for video content. That being said I know while niche it definitely has an audience.
Are you guys still playing? I'm surprised i haven't seen a Hissho guide yet.
imagine if the chozo from metroid would be in this game?
This start location is like 1 in 20. Very lucky.
The people who did dislike are noobs at every game and have desert brains to dislike such a good guide
P.s. I once had 1K dust production per turn with UE
I just got this game!
Me too, after letting this video macerate in my fizzy brain for a year and a half...
Great video! Have you had a look at the law TOYS FOR BOYS? It raises system and empire approval, can get you to happy/ecstastic, which provides a Dust bonus, and a science bonus (That compensates the loss from the law)
Not sure if it always applies, or if you know the strategy but tax is just better
I think we responded to this one in another comment but TfB still isn't working as advertised. You get the Food and Infl bonuses on systems from the happiness, but not the dust and science from empire-wide happiness.
This means in the early game I like the dust better for the most part.
How will you deal with pirates? they soon get bigger class, which makes it very difficult to deal with
Can you guys do endless legend guid??
At 45:45, I didn't understand the Dark Glitter and having more Manpower capacity makes your fleets fill up slower.
Can you do an update, or a new guide to the Empire. I was watching this, and I noticed that many, many of the tips you gave in this video are outdated, such as the probe trick, the upkeep for the law you passed, ship upgrade costs, the 10% industry bonus on Lenko etc.
to get the luxury ressource, do i need to colonihze the specific planet or just any plaent in the system ? thanks
You need to take the planet
I did the probe upgrade trick on turn one. It worked, I can tell because the scout ship now shows a probe capacity of 4 instead of 2, but I did not get the probes replenished. Did I miss a step, or is this an exploit that's been patched out?
Does not work anymore unfortunately!
Can anyone deny/confirm if hero exp still works this way? 26:20 IE they only get exp when a build completes, and you can jump a hero into a system right before the last tick to get full exp?
This guide has been out of date for a 2 years now since a lot of the exploits and techniques he abuses the developers fixed. It also appears when I pointed this out over a year ago, 4X Alchemist deleted my post. Cheeky, rather than update his videos since he doesn't care about ES2 anymore, he instead deletes my post because he still wants people watching an out of date guide. Two of the biggest changes since this video was put out was the release of Supremacy and Awakening, where the Behemoths are a cornerstone of modern strategies for the game as well as the introduction of Academy roles playing a major part in modern builds also. So think about it, he made this video when the only expansion out at the time was Vaulters and since then a total of 3 expansions have released along with them major free updates to the base game and total re-balancing multiple times. This is like watching a video guide for playing Cyclone Barbarian for Diablo 3 from 2013 in 2020 in Season 20 with you know, the expansion changes and all that. Or Watching a guide for Fiddlesticks from 2015 in league of legends and he has since been changed in 2020.
To answer your question since 4XAlchemist definitely won't answer it, how EXP is gained has changed, the amount from governor assignment has been nerfed into the floor since release, they only get 1XP per building along with per turn now. Technically if you build using dust and influence since you can easily do that as UE, you can theoretically give them more XP from governing a system than from being assigned to a fleet. If you are facing off against an aggressive AI or on the war path it's better to assign them to fleets if you plan to fight a lot. But if you want a passive game of building and tech, may as well assign them to a system. Heroes gain the same XP in about 10 turns passively from turn cycle and building as they would from winning one battle. So that's a big deal. However, XP does scale based on exploited resources and the amount rewarded from battles varies based on the number of opponents. The bonus from engineering the UE starting hero gives is about 75% that of the amount they gave when this video released, so a one turn difference in construction time. UE used to be really broken in the past, didn't take much effort to win the game and claim every wonder then.
As for the tech tree pathing and building queue, the guide is still relevant and useful if you are playing without any of the expansion DLC active for both Supremacy and Awakening, it's fine with all the other ones. As like I wrote before, Supremacy and Awakening are a big deal as they don't just add factions to the game, additional quests or flavour stuff, like the other expansions; instead they directly impact the tech trees of all the factions as well as changing up how the diplomacy interactions and how heroes work in the game.
dude come back and the game has got as many users as humankind, you can't leave us with unupdated guide :)
How do i import your save game?
I would really like to see you play turn 150+.
Is drone network basically not worth building?
I don't think it is unless you have NOTHING better to do.
The reason for this is that neither 5 extra food or industry makes nearly the impact early game as the 10 sci or dust. Because the Colony Base building is already giving +40F and +25I, the extra +5 to each is really a drop in the bucket. And you have to pay 5 turns or so of production for it (Drone Networks cost 160).
Compare that to XII [Xeno-Industrial Infrastructure], which costs 280 and give +30 industry immediately (1.75x the purchase price, 6x more efficient for industry, which matters more), and gets more efficient for each new planet you colonize in the system.
I actually think that XII is so good that races which don't get full use out of it, like the Horatio who start on a Mediterranean, are at a major disadvantage unless they have a Fertile/Temperate level 0 planet in their home system.
Yeah that's how I felt. +5 feels trivial even at the very start
Can't wait for you to do vodyani
So, you could not have grouped the governor dude with the scout ships at the start for the home star system discoveries because there is a .. 7 or something cool down before he could go on a planet, correct? Also is it really not better to have him quickly grind some levels with the scout ship like the one on the other race because his skillpoints are not that sick , or just because his ship is a little bit slower? Ps, dont have pc here so cant play for another 2 weeks, whitch is why I cant check myself:p
It's a close call. You're absolutely right that the opportunity cost is that you can't reassign the hero until turn 9. With Lumeris I always use my hero in the fleet, with Empire I think it's right in about 25% of games.
This is for a few reasons:
1) Dmitri's ship is slow, only 4 MS, so he actually slows down whatever fleet he's with, although this is actually not true if you do the 4 probe upgrade as I showed in this vid
2) Empire only starts with 2 probes (max of 6 on turn 1) vs. the 11 of Vodyani (max 16 actually but I don't recommend that)
3) Leveling Dmitri isn't that good. His first tier of abilities is really just ok and even then only in the later game.
All of this said, do I think it's bad to have your hero flying around for the first 9 turns: no. It's probably better in a fair number of cases and I think after writing my reasons here it's probably right >50% of the time. However, compared to the Lumeris it feels so much slower with so much less to gain that I don't love doing all the micromanagement for such a small gain when I can always shave 1 turn off the sweet, sweet XII that I start building on Turn 1.
Great comment though! Thanks for making me think deeper about the decision.
Why do you write off Superspuds as a level 1 improvement so quickly. Wouldn't that be a pretty good starting strat if you have a lot of dust and want to expand very quickly and buyout enough improvements on each new system to get them decent?
Or if you have a lot of dust but not great production, and want to be able to buy out fleets quickly.
The 10% buyout is significantly worse than any of the other per person FIDS resources which take effect every turn instead of just when you want to buy something. Also, I'm not sure if the 10% reduction applies to the UE influence buyouts.
Did they change the probe exploit mechanic, or does it still work?
Still works
Can i somehow play old versions of this game? Cuz game balance change SO much. I watch a lot of old videos - and game is fun (and broken?) and when i play it myself - it sucs
Is this guide recorded with any dlcs active?
Sidequestions: Which dlcs are worth it?
This guide has no DLC. In my opinion, the Vaulter DLC is the best.
I'm playing it 1:1 right now, but the trick with the probes is not working. (As I am writing I'm in my first round)
and my first quest came to me in round 10
Is Xeno-Industries really better than building the two tier zero buildings? They're so cheap and give a little of everything.
Great tips and content would like to see an update. Also what do you do if you near systems are not that great or have many planets?
I was trying the game out and I was trying to see if I could get the military choice from the initial quest pop up within a reasonable time frame. I was following a similar research path and still trying to explore and get established, too. I was trying to see if getting the tech that enabled conscription might help me get past the unlock faster.
Anyhow, still not sure if it's a viable strategy or whether the loss in early population is worth the +10% attack strength for the rest of the game but.,,
Wanting to go for the same hero in the quest chain as you I noticed her research unlock cost varied between different attempts
Two attempts testing out the initial science option followed by selecting the Seeker hero, her science-per-turn unlock was 55 one game and 67 another. Trying to go military manpower choice first and then still trying to get her, her unlock cost was 181 per turn...
Is it based on how soon in the game you get to select her and start the second part of the quest chain?
I agree, the military quest would be great if it didn't take soooooo long, and yes, Petra's quest is dependent on either the turn or your current science output. I'm not sure.
Thanks! I had just tried to confirm it myself maybe a half hour ago in another attempt before checking back here. :)
Anyhow, thanks again for the video! It answered some questions I had. :)
Now I only wish I could find out in advance what the sub-faction choices (Sheredyn, stay with the industrialists, etc.) will result in. :)
OK, I figured out how to take the military option first and still get Petra around the same time. To do it you have to be willing to sacrifice two points of population at the beginning of the game through conscription and research N-Way Fusion first. This is a pretty steep price at the beginning and you'll likely lose your single population point of Hisho doing so.
Otherwise, you can get N-Way Fusion and conscription second (after Xenobiology) and try to only use up one population point with conscription, but have to wait probably until at least turn 19 or later.
The problem for me was realizing a little better what was going on with the manpower situation. My mistake was focusing on increasing manpower gain. That's seemingly intuitive but it takes much longer. If you instead focus on Manpower Limit and are willing to use conscription, it becomes possible to do much sooner. Actually, I'm still not sure exactly how the Manpower limit is calculated but here's what I observed with 'Slow' game speed settings.
You start with a Manpower limit of 375. This seems to stay the same even if you get a bonus population point from a Curiosity. When you create your first outpost, it jumps to 500. If nothing else happens to change the manpower limit before completing research on N-Way Fusion, when completing that tech the Manpower limit goes to 750. The Tier Two unlock bonus says +200 Manpower at the moment, so I'm not sure where the extra 50 is coming from.
At that point you can use conscription immediately if you wish and if you suddenly switch into the Large Hosts act, but if you are going the earlier 'sacrifice two population points route' I think waiting two more turns until your first Xeno-Industrial plant is done is wise. Since you'll be taking a significant early game population hit to do this this early and that building doesn't depend on population...
The Large Hosts act can be used at the 'last minute' to increase your global reserve Manpower limit if need be-just long enough to get things done and then switch back out of it after you've completed the quest. The increase to Manpower gain from this act is still insignificant at this point in the game but what's important at this time is the 20% increase to the Manpower cap to get the limit to 800 or above. Without that, your total Manpower is well... capped :) at its current limit.
If you are able to create your first outpost-regardless of other conditions for your start-it's very easy to consistently complete the military option for the first quest this way.
For me, with the 'sacrificing two population points' route, that was consistently no later than turn 14 (earlier if you don't wait for the Xeno-Industrial plant to finish building). One time it was turn 13, when a bonus point of population found in my home system on turn two sped everything else up slightly. Petra comes pretty quickly after that.
That being said, waiting until you only need to sacrifice one point of population seems a little less extreme of an early game price.
Hey Douglas, thanks for your research into this. I'm pretty skeptical about both diverting to the North Tech Tree that early and eating a population for the military level 1 quest, but your work here gives me a much better idea of how to weigh those decisions.
I think it's not the way I'll go unless I'm surrounded by a land of no curiosities, but it's awesome to have a creative backup plan like the one you've put together! I've never thought of eating my own pops to get that quest finished!