ENDLESS Space 2: Complete Guide

A strategy guide to Endless Space 2 for new and returning players: the FIDSI economy, expansion and approval, politics and the Senate, ship design and battle tactics, all twelve major factions, victory conditions, and what the 2025 Community Update changed.

Researched September 2026 — current as of the Community Update (patch 1.5.75, December 2025). Live games change; check the linked sources if something differs.

Quick Start

• FIDSI is the whole economy: Food, Industry, Dust, Science, Influence. Every system produces a mix, and each faction leans on different ones.
• Expand early, but watch approval. New systems raise your empire's expansion disapproval. Unhappy systems lose output, and very unhappy ones can revolt.
• Research the quadrant your faction wants. The tech tree has four quadrants: Science & Exploration, Economy & Trade, Empire Development, and Military. You don't need all of them.
• Politics are real. Your population votes for parties in the Senate, and the winning parties decide which laws you can pass. Grow the populations whose parties you want in power.
• Heroes matter. Recruit them from the Academy and assign them as fleet admirals or system governors. Level them up for strong skill trees.
• Ship design is rock-paper-scissors. Missiles, beams and kinetics each have a matching defense: flak counters missiles, shields counter beams, deflectors counter kinetics. Build to counter what the enemy uses, and match your weapons' best range to your battle tactic.
• Press Space for Amplified Reality. It overlays useful info on the map, trade routes and battle stats.
• Follow your faction quest. Each faction has a story quest line that gives strong rewards and ties into the Academy storyline.
• Pick a victory type early and steer toward it. Economic, Science, Conquest, Supremacy, Wonder, or Score.

Resources (FIDSI and more)

Resource | What it does | How to grow it

Food | Grows population on planets | Fertile planets, food improvements

Industry | Builds improvements and ships | Barren/rocky planets, industry buildings

Dust | Currency; buy out production, upkeep, market | Trade, luxuries, dust buildings

Science | Research | Science buildings, gas giants, anomalies

Influence | Diplomacy, laws, peacefully expanding reach | Influence buildings, parties, heroes

Other key resources:

• Manpower is used to crew fleets and fight ground battles. Losing lots of ships drains it.
• Strategic resources unlock stronger modules and hulls.
• Luxury resources give empire-wide boosts when you collect enough of them.
• Approval is effectively a sixth resource: it scales your output up or down.

Expansion and Approval

• Colonize systems by sending a colony ship or by building outposts, which then grow into full colonies.
• Every new system raises expansion disapproval. It becomes a problem sooner at harder difficulties.
• Counter it with approval improvements, luxuries, heroes as governors, and certain laws.
• Pick systems with good planet types for your faction; one great system is often worth more than three poor ones.
• Terraforming later in the tech tree lets you improve planet types.

Rules of thumb

• Stay at "Content" approval or better in most systems.
• If approval tanks, stop expanding briefly and invest in approval buildings.
• Choose population species that like the planets they'll live on.

Politics and the Senate

• Your population supports parties: Industrialists, Scientists, Ecologists, Militarists, Pacifists and Religious.
• Elections happen on a timer. The winning party determines which laws you can enact; each law costs Influence to keep active.
• Population types lean toward certain parties, and events such as wars or building choices sway votes.
• Pick the parties that fit your plan:
• Science victory: Scientists
• Wide economic empire: Industrialists
• Conquest: Militarists
• Some factions interact with politics differently, so read your faction's description.

Heroes and the Academy

• Heroes come from the Academy. Pay to recruit them and level them up through use.
• Admirals boost fleets in combat. Governors boost a system's output. Heroes can also sit in the Senate as senators to push your politics.
• Each hero has skill trees tied to their class. Pick skills that match the job you're giving them.
• The Academy quest line is a major part of the story; its outcome can change depending on your faction.
• Injured heroes are out for a while — keep a backup.

Ships, Fleets and Combat

Ship design

• Hulls come in small, medium and large classes, with roles such as explorers, colony ships, attackers, protectors, carriers and support ships.
• Each hull has module slots: weapons, defenses, and support.
• Late-game special hulls and huge ships unlock through tech and DLC; achievements reference the Obliterator, Juggernaut, Citadel and Behemoth.

Weapons and defenses

Weapon type | Best range | Countered by

Missiles | Long | Flak

Beams (energy) | Any — lower damage but unaffected by range, so very consistent | Shields

Kinetics | Short/medium — weak at long range, but can shoot down incoming missiles and fighters/bombers | Deflectors

• Scout before you design. If the enemy runs mostly kinetics, load deflectors.
• Match your weapon range to your battle tactic card so your ships spend the fight at their best range.

Battle tactics

• Before each battle you pick a tactic card that sets engagement range and applies bonuses.
• Your admiral's skills and techs unlock more cards.
• The Re-Awakening patch (March 2024) rebalanced space combat so more strategies are viable; older strategy guides that swear by a single "best" build may be outdated.

Ground invasions

• To take a system you siege it and invade it with manpower.
• Ground combat tactics and defensive improvements were rebalanced in the 2025 Community Update.
• Keep manpower topped up before big offensives.

The Twelve Major Factions

All twelve are confirmed by the game's achievements. The first eight come with the base game; the Vaulters, Hissho, Umbral Choir and Nakalim come from DLC.

Faction | Playstyle summary

United Empire | Industry and Influence powerhouse; strong at conventional expansion and military

Sophons | Science specialists; the easiest faction for a Science victory

Unfallen | Peaceful tree people that spread influence via vines between systems

Lumeris | Dust-focused traders that can buy outposts rather than just colonizing

Horatio | Clone-obsessed; gene-splice other species to improve themselves

Riftborn | Odd, sterile-planet-loving faction that uses a singularity mechanic

Vodyani | Nomadic arks that leech essence from other populations instead of settling normally

Cravers | Aggressive planet-strippers; depletes worlds and pushes toward war

Vaulters | Refugee faction with portal-based movement (Vaulters DLC)

Hissho | Honor-driven warriors fueled by battle (Supremacy DLC)

Umbral Choir | Shadowy infiltrators built around hacking (Penumbra DLC)

Nakalim | Ancient faction tied to Endless ruins; reworked in 2024's Re-Awakening patch and rebalanced again in 2025, including Slumbering Ruins (Awakening DLC)

You can also create a custom faction mixing traits.

Best beginner factions

• United Empire or Sophons — straightforward economies, no weird rules.
• Save Vodyani, Riftborn and Cravers for later; their rules change core systems.

Victory Conditions

Victory | How it works (summary)

Economic | Accumulate a large amount of Dust

Science | Complete the late-game science projects

Conquest | Take over the galaxy militarily

Supremacy | Eliminate or dominate rival empires

Wonder | Build the wonder improvements

Score | Have the highest score when the turn limit is reached

Check the victory screen in-game for the exact thresholds on your galaxy settings.

DLC Overview

DLC | Release | Adds

Vaulters | March 2018 | Vaulters faction (paid DLC)

Supremacy | — | Hissho faction

Untold Tales | — | Extra quests

Celestial Worlds | November 2018 | 14-chapter quest line, 2 unique planets, 6 weapon modules, 8 empire improvements

Penumbra | January 2019 | Umbral Choir, hacking and stealth

Awakening | September 2019 | Nakalim, Academy Empire, interaction with Isyander

Dark Matter | May 2021 | 12 new quests

Harmonic Memories / Lost Symphony | Music | Soundtracks

Several free updates (Renegade Fleets, Target Locked, Little Grin Man, Galactic Statecraft, Stellar Prisoner, Guardians & the Galaxy) are included for everyone.

Recent Patch Notes (what changed)

• Re-Awakening (March 2024): reworked Awakening/Nakalim content and rebalanced space combat so more strategies are viable.
• Community Update 1.5.75 (December 2025): made by community VIPs with Amplitude's support. Many AI fixes (fleet attacks, colonizing, invasions, heroes, pending-turn hangs), rebalanced ground combat tactics and defensive improvements, rebalanced Nakalim (especially Slumbering Ruins), and fixed an Academy quest issue that could cause pending turns.

Takeaway: the AI plays noticeably better than it did at launch, so harder difficulties feel more fair.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Expanding past your approval. A big empire in revolt is worse than a small happy one.
• One weapon type forever. The AI adapts defenses too. Refit your designs.
• Ignoring politics. Letting the wrong party win locks you out of the laws you need.
• Neglecting Influence. It fuels laws, diplomacy and peaceful expansion.
• Leaving heroes idle. Every turn they're not governing or admiraling is wasted.
• Skipping quests. Faction and minor quests give strong early rewards.
• Attacking without manpower. Invasions stall without it.

Advanced Tips

• Specialize systems. Industry systems build ships; science systems research; don't try to make every system do everything.
• Minor factions. Befriend or assimilate them for population types and bonuses. The 2025 patch made the AI actually use ships gained from assimilation, so watch your rivals too.
• Trade companies give Dust and bonuses across your empire; build their HQs early if you're going economic.
• Luxury thresholds. Collecting a luxury resource in quantity triggers empire-wide bonuses. Check the Marketplace.
• Use Amplified Reality (Space) in battle reports and fleet screens to see why you lost.
• Hero synergy. An admiral with range-matching skills plus the right tactic card beats a larger fleet.

FAQ

Which faction should I start with? United Empire or Sophons.

What does FIDSI mean? Food, Industry, Dust, Science, Influence — the five main outputs.

How do I counter the AI's fleets? Check their weapons in battle reports, then equip the matching defense: flak for missiles, shields for beams, deflectors for kinetics.

Is Endless Space 2 still being updated? The last major update was the community-made patch 1.5.75 released in December 2025. Amplitude's newer project is Endless Legend 2.

Is multiplayer still supported? Yes, up to eight players.

What's the Harmonic Memories DLC? A music pack of remastered songs (Steam lists it alongside the soundtracks); it adds no gameplay.

Sources

• ENDLESS Space 2 on Steam
• ENDLESS Space 2 DLC list on Steam
• ENDLESS Space 2 Steam news (Community Update, Re-Awakening)
• ENDLESS Space 2 global achievements
• Endless Space 2 on Wikipedia