New moral desisions would be nice

new ones would be good but in your example i think the evil choice needs to be better balanced.

How should it be balanced?

The evil choice is pretty much how it went down in the US.

In the good choice, the motherfrakkin officers need to go to prison along with the pregnant hillbilly.

I agree, 15% morale is a lot, and I've never used espionage (yet, still finishing up a normal difficulty game...). Maybe 10% for that planet alone or 5% civilization-wide, or a random range, with espionage effected at two or three times the rate of the negative morale penalty?

Balancing the already-available ethical alignment events would also be nice -- almost none of the "good" aligned choices offer any advantage, even when it seems the circumstance could easily include benefits.

Example; "Undersea Domes:" Good choice: Establish relations with the undersea population to further our research and culture. (Maintainence: 5 to 10 [random] bc per turn, 5% - 10% cultural bonus, 10% - 15% research bonus [randomized in balance with cost].)

Also it's very difficult to see what events have effected your culture, and to my knowledge it's impossible to change any of it. I would suggest that the events take up one or more squares of the world's map, and when selected, display the current effects, and provide reconsideration options (when applicable -- some choices necessitate the destruction of the event, but lingering effects should still be displayed).

I haven't developed all of the ethical specialty buildings or tech trees, but it seems that neutral provides the best civilization bonuses, and evil is vastly preferable for planetary bonuses from events. Evil does make it more difficult to trade, but in a normal difficulty game, I can still fund a massive empire, bristling with death, by selling technologies. We've all barely begun constructing weapons, and I'm the only civilization with more than 300 bc! (40,000! And growing, even at -250 bc/wk!) This needs balanced, and random event choices are a good place to start...

Anyone else have some ideas for desisions?

i agreed, more moral decision not just when colonizinf a world. and i would like to see some moral decision that have more important result, such as new technologie or ship that are not avalaible otherwise. because i'm tired of the % of a thing or money.

Last time I checked, moral decisions happen randomly in game. You can also create your own.

They've been toned down a lot, but I'm sure they're there. Not entirely sure about specific parameters for them like being in a war, and I'm also not sure how kindly the AI would take to that.

I really think the moral decisions are not big enought.. +2% moral or -200bc hardly makes any difference. Now put a moral +5% or -2000bc and I would give it much more thought atleast in early game

The evil choice is pretty much how it went down in the US. In the good choice, the motherfrakkin officers need to go to prison along with the pregnant hillbilly.

A. The US tried to do BOTH good & evil versions - Good for public consumption and evil somewhere else covertly.

B. You need to replace "*** officers" with "CIA Consultants" who circumvented the chain of command and left everyone else holding the bag.....

As far as the benefits/penalties of the various moral choice scenarios, the numbers of the penalties/benefits need to be larger - or variable in relation to your economy or other current ability. Outside of the PQ colonization items, I agree with sam0t - the numbers don't have much of an impact.

One related idea: How about benefits and drawbacks, instead of being fixed, are random
within a known range...

Oh, did i imply that moral decissions only pop up whne colonising planets? sorry, i know they come randomly, i'm just saying ones trigerd by certain events (like war)
would add more spice to your games. Oh, and does it annoy anyone else that the same desisons keep appearing?

I've had games where there have almost been more events at random than during colonisation. In my last game I has perhaps five random events. In fact, I had three right after each other, part of the reason I began researching Xeno Ethics a bit ahead of schedule. Also, in my last few games I have seen many events that I knew existed but have not seen in a long time. The game may repeat them, but it can also show a wide variety.

Personally, I wouldn't mind a bit of variation in the effects. For instance, instead of Good choices being either no reward or a penalty, perhaps there could be something like a bonus to diplomacy or influence, for giving up financial benefits. Or perhaps refusing to let your population drop could give a temporary morale benefit.

One other change I would make is to have less results that give credits and more that give permanent benefits. A couple of hundred extra credits isn't very tempting, even to an extent in the early game; +20% research, on the other hand, is something I would consider even if I wanted to be Good for that game.

I like the idea of improving the ethics events, but the one in the OP doesn't fit story-wise b/c there are no prisoners in GCII. Invading kills *all* residents.

I agree that

it's very difficult to see what events have effected your culture

, and I'm only assuming that you can find them on one of the planet detail windows b/c I've never noticed a clear sign of Event X Happened Here.

I also second both the idea of adding more context-sensitive stuff like wartime events, or even peaceful-player-in-warring galaxy events and making some of the choice results variable instead of fixed % or BC.

I know t kills all residents, that was just an example.

Technically, it kills all taxpayers, right? So you could still have a vast non-tax paying populace of the dregs and elites of society. You really just kill all the hard-working middle class people with an invasion in GalCiv 2.

You really just kill all the hard-working middle class people with an invasion in GalCiv 2.

Nothing like trying to win the hearts and minds of the people.

Destroying the entire population while only one tech and no pillage rights is a little too abstract.

Technically, it kills all taxpayers, right?

This is a very good question, and the answer might well be yes. Or sort of. If the "population" is defined as only active taxpayers, then some survivors might have headed for the hills.

But Wheel also reminds me of something I thought of when I got back to the game after my last round of posts--what's up with the population after a culture flip? Has anyone checked to see if they retain the old species ability bonuses or does a culture flip entail some sort of mass genetic reprogramming?

If we want to get technical, you can have survivors if you choose information warfare.

I believe you can trace back most permanent events on planets when you check the 'details' tab on your colony view. Bonuses for research and production are stored there. Keep in mind that economic buildings and capitals also put their bonuses there so don't be fooled by those.

I can see why people feel the 'Good' guys are getting a raw deal, most, if not all the choices they make affect their empire adversely. On the other hand, the defensive techs you can research when you're Good also bestow permanent effects on your ships. The best aspect of being Good, however, is knowing you are Good. It's supposed to give that warm and fuzzy feeling of contentment.

Being Good is all about sacrificing a potential benefit for yourself to benefit others. If that didn't apply, Good would lose a lot of its meaning in my humble opinion. So in short, the choices for Good should hurt you to some degree but the end result of choosing your alignment might then perhaps yield some added (long-term) benefits.

My only real quarrel with alignment is that the game views choices from a third person perspective. Suppose you see yourself as a superior being and, incidentally, all others as various forms of semi-intelligent creatures. Moral choices such as stealing underwater cities wouldn't be much of a problem: you want it, they have it, you take it. You're evil.
But what if you discover those research pods? You don't want to harm your own populace so you leave them. And lo and behold, you're good.

I've used this approach a few times and I've been Good, Neutral and Evil over different games. I feel the choices you are given are more attuned to whether or not you are considerate of the costs others bear for your benefits, regardless of who those others are.

I encountered a new one... insects on a planet. Evil didn't offer any benefit. Neutral and good were both morale penalties.