Can materialist eventually do psionic ascension (2024)

They can, rarely, but psionic ascension adds significant spiritualist attraction which will make for a faction likely to be unhappy at all the materialism going on.

So it's not necessarily a good plan.

FullMetalFox said:

I think there are some events/anomalies that can gain your scientist a psionic trait

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Or you can get lucky and just roll psi specialist, the chance is infinitesimal though.

The Kombinator said:

They can, and they aren't gona like it.

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Materialists DGAF about psi ascension/technologies. Spiritualists - whose faction will most probably spawn after psionic theory research - will be unhappy, though.

I usually start as a non-materialist and switch to materialism once I have researched psionic theory.

In my last game, I didn't get a spiritualist faction even with PSI-Ascension, and in my opinion materialist + synths + psi would be worth it anyway.

You can, and it works fine. The +Spiritualism attraction from the Psionic research will be more than offset by the +Materialism you get for having robots.

I find that level-up is the fastest way to farm the scientist needed to unlock it; I have a couple of science ships dedicated to training, and fire the scientists if they get to level 3 without a new skill, or if they get a skill that isn't Psionic Theory. I mostly tend to have the necessary scientist by the time I'm in position to spend the Ascension Perk points.

GloatingSwine said:

They can, rarely, but psionic ascension adds significant spiritualist attraction which will make for a faction likely to be unhappy at all the materialism going on.

So it's not necessarily a good plan.

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Had plenty materialist psionic play throughs with not even a wiff of a spiritualist faction. Psionics gives pops a +1.25 weighting towards spiritualism, a single robot on the same planet or having AI rights will cancel that out. If you take the ascension path you gain an additional +1 towards spiritualism but its still pretty easy to cancel that out.

-Myth- said:

A Maniacal scientist can roll the rare tech too. I've done it.

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Not with Materialist ethics; without Materialist, Maniacal does get a major bonus to their chances.
Materialist has its own "chance = 0 unless scientist is tech_psionic" thing.

Bouchart said:

If you are Materialist, you can't research Psionic Theory unless you have a scientist with Psionics expertise. Scientists can get Psionics expertise on rare occasion when leveling up.

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Defiler99 said:

Materialist has its own "chance = 0 unless scientist is tech_psionic" thing.

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I remember reading in patch notes that it's no longer the case. Now you have little chances to get psionics tech without a having a Psionics expertise scientist.

Ezumiyr said:

I remember reading in patch notes that it's no longer the case. Now you have little chances to get psionics tech without a having a Psionics expertise scientist.

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That would be cool, so I went to check. Rule still seems to be in the game files, circa v2.0.5 beta:

 modifier = { factor = 0 AND = { OR = { has_ethic = "ethic_materialist" has_ethic = "ethic_fanatic_materialist" } NOT = { research_leader = { area = society has_trait = "leader_trait_expertise_psionics" } } } }

Aed said:

Had plenty materialist psionic play throughs with not even a wiff of a spiritualist faction. Psionics gives pops a +1.25 weighting towards spiritualism, a single robot on the same planet or having AI rights will cancel that out. If you take the ascension path you gain an additional +1 towards spiritualism but its still pretty easy to cancel that out.

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I'll second this - I have gone with psionic materialist (usually with fanatic pacifist) several times and none of my pops ever get attracted to spiritualism

Bouchart said:

If you are Materialist, you can't research Psionic Theory unless you have a scientist with Psionics expertise. Scientists can get Psionics expertise on rare occasion when leveling up.

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Except I am pretty sure that you can't get Psionic expertise on level up until you have researched Psionic Theory.

To quote the wiki.

Expertise: Psionics

• +15% Research speed (Psionics)

This leader is, following years of study, considered an expert within the field of Psionics.

• Requires Psionic Theory

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Which means as a materialist empire, to get psionics, you need one of your scientists to get the trait from an event(anomaly) as you wont get it from level ups until you do the research.