Make sure you get credit for your efforts.

Turn all mods off before you play. Achievements will not get credited with mods on.

After you think you've earned the achievement, proceed to the next turn. Many of the achievements are assessed by the turn update software, and you will not get credit until it does its thing.

Victory type achievements are mutually exclusive within a game. Once you win, you cannot get a different win type. See claim in comments that this is not true. I assume comment based on the player's experience and thus is correct.

It then follows that if you get a warning that a victory type you don't want is imminent, save your game and mitigate the win so that you can get your desired win instead. You can give away star systems to your opponents, if you have to. - Even with the disclaimer above, doing this is a good safety step, giving you a save point to avoid loosing current progress.

There are 93 achievements in HHG 2 ENDLESS™ Space - Definitive Edition.

In this section, I'll list many of the easier ones you may accomplish normally.
If comments warrant it, I'll add a section for any folks are having trouble with.

Spoiler Alert! - Several achievements are 'secret', the criteria for achieving them are hidden in the game. These are revealed here, and are labeled (secret). Mostly, these are 'do more of something for which you have received a lesser achievement'.


Turn count:

The easiest achievement is Ad Astra! - Play for 10 turns. Ten turns in this game is barely
getting started. Only 40.5% of the people that own this game have earned this achievement,
This means that nearly 60% of the people that bought this game on Steam have never played it.

There are similar achievements for more turns:

Heroic Patience - (secret) - Play for 1,000 turns

Endless Gamer - (secret) - Play for 10,000 turns

If you are trying for achievements, these should fall out naturally.


Win playing <race>:

Power and Profit! - Win with the United Empire

Science. It Works. - Win with the Sophons

Harmonized! - Win with the Amoeba

Faith and the Future - Win with the Pilgrims

One Galaxy at a Time - Win with the Horatio

Victory to the Strong - Win with the Hissho

Dangerous Shepherds - Win with the Automatons

What's for Dessert? - Win with the Cravers

Answered the Calling - Win with the Sowers

Cleaning Spree - Win with the Harmony

Giving the Orders - Win with the Sheredyn

Galactic Gambler - Win with a Random Faction - Any faction, but selected for you by the game.

I Did It My Way - Win with a Custom Faction - A faction you design with point buy. Slide the
gray slider bar in the faction selection screen to the right to reveal the feature. You get less
points than the normal factions, but can go nuts customizing.

Not all the races have a victory achievement, notice Vaulters is missing.
All of the races are strong enough to win a normal game victory, but all are different, and may lend themselves to different victory types.


Win a <type> Victory:

Bigger Is Better - Win an Expansion Victory - colonize 75% of the star systems. Generally
will involve some conflict, but it can be just a race.

Dice with the Universe - Win a Science Victory - research a key technology at the top
of the right side tree, aided greatly by the top tech of each other tree.

Bow Before Me! - Win a Supremacy Victory - take every other home star

Feel the Glory - Win a Wonder Victory - build several copies of the improvement from
the top of the lower tree.

Maybe It Does Buy Happiness - Win an Economic Victory - Income, not savings.

Numbers. They Don't Lie - Win a Score Victory - The hardest part of this is not winning
some other way first.

Diplomanic - Win a Diplomatic Victory - Never go to war, so you want pacifistic opponents,
keep your agreements, and trade with them.

These can be deselected in the setup interface if you want to focus on ones you haven't done.
There is also a default 'last empire standing' victory if all the others are deselected. It does not
have its own achievement as such.


Build Improvements:

Improvements are the upgrades you build in each star system. You will build some everywhere;
so the more systems you have colonized, the easier it is to get big numbers of improvements.,

Lean and Mean - Build 100 improvements in your entire Empire

Trial and Error - (secret) - Build 250 improvements in your entire Empire

Galactic Gourmet - (secret) - Build 500 improvements in your entire Empire

The Holy Terra - Build every Improvement in your home system - by Divine_Moments_of_Truth
This one is a little trickier. You have to have researched all of the improvements to build them,
and there are some in all four trees. There are a few things that you should skip; a couple of
things you can build that destroy your colonies.


Tech Trees:
Going for a science victory will get you most of the way there for these, but you can't leave
any holes.

Filling in the Blank Spaces - Unlock the whole Exploration & Expansion tech tree in a single game

One Big Happy Family - Unlock the whole Diplomacy & Trading tech tree in a single game

Indistinguishable from Magic - Unlock the whole Applied Sciences tech tree in a single game

Do You Feel Lucky Today? - Unlock the whole Galactic Warfare tech tree in a single game


Excelling at FIDS:

Massively Mass Production - Have 1 system which produces more than 1 000 industry

Labs and Fabs - Have 1 system which produces more than 1 000 science

Harvester - Have 1 system which produces more than 1 000 food

Cash Cow - Have 1 system which produces more than 1 000 dust

Not every race does well with each of these, You are likely to get these over time, as you
play each race and find their niche resources.


Hero Leveling:

When you start the game, one of the things you have available to you immediately are three
hero for hire. When you save up and hire them, and assign them a role, they will naturally
level up and gain skills.

Getting Schooled - Level up a Hero to level 10

Graduation Day - (secret) - Level up a Hero to level 20

Presumably, you've earned many achievements through normal game play, and are now stuck on the harder ones.

1. In the advanced game settings, turn pirates off. You do not need them interfering with your achievements.

2. When the achievement you are working on does not specify otherwise, choose the easiest setting.

3. You can create nerf opponents to play against. For the most part, you only need one, you can assign the same nerf opponent to several empires at a time. To do this, click your faction's portrait, this takes you to the faction selection screen. about midway down, there is a gray slider bar; slide it to the right and create a custom race as follows:

Select a racial profile. Choice here matters. The Amoebas and the Automatons are passive, the Hissho are aggressive. Special racial skills are tied to this choice.

Select a portrait. It does not affect game play.

Deselect all of the positive (green) traits.

Assign all of the negative (red) traits, except:

You can only choose one starting anomaly. I assign 'Poor Soil', it's a guaranteed hamstring.
If you prefer, 'Mineral Poor' is a good negative, or 'Unlucky Colonists' assigns a random one.

You can only choose one of 'Sheredyn Integrity' or 'Eternal War'. I use 'Sheredyn Integrity',
it gives me, their opponent, more flexibility. 'Eternal War' means you can't be at peace with them.

Save your nerf baby, and select who you want to play. When you want to play against the nerf opponent, select them as your opponent(s).

Bushidissimo

- As Hissho, build 1 000 ships on systems with Wargame Center while Bushido is active

One of the difficulties with this achievement is that the terms are not well defined in-game.

The Wargame Center is an improvement unique to the Hissho profile. To learn it, research
the beginning of the top research tree, the combat tree, to the left of the center, second tier,
'LMI Systems'. Learn this early and build these so they are ready to go when you need them.
It's not a first priority for play, but don't forget to build them. (It provides good benefit, ships
on this system constantly gain XP.)

Bushido is a status Hissho can have. It is hidden, there is no indicator flag that I've seen,
but it affects your morale greatly, so if your happiness spikes, you are in bushido mode.
You get Bushido status from winning battles; winning a space battle with ships give bushido
status for 15 turns, and successfully invading a planet gives bushido status for ten turns.
You have to have been in combat, so plan on playing aggressively for this achievement.

You will get a few count of the 1,000 you need just cranking out your normal ships.
To get this thing done expeditiously, set some of your systems to building cheap ships
for the count. I built stacks of scouts and then immediately scrapped them.You could
even design a practically empty ship just for this achievement.

There is no indication that you've achieved this, or rather, I didn't get any, but it might be
my archaic graphics. You can save your game and exit to Steam to check if you got it or
if you need to continue.

There's no Taste Like Home
- As Cravers, have your home planet not depleted at turn 80, without having lost your home system

There is a very easy trick to this, and it is not something you would do in normal play. Simply
do not use your home system.

Each time you use production of any sort including converting it to research or dust,
the planets in that star system are depleted a little. It builds up fast.

You can safely add a couple of features like a research installation and a dust installation
and send out a couple of initial colonies. Then stop. Let all your bug babies take over for
your hive world.

The Way of Harmony - As Amoeba, win a game without building any ships containing weapons

This is exactly what it says. This means you cannot build the standard scout. You should design
a no-weapons scout to explore with. (The one standard scout you get at the start does not break
this achievement. You didn't 'build' it.)

I got this via an expansion victory, which is what I recommend. The Amoebas can colonize any
world from the start of the game, with a production penalty until they learn it. Amoebas can see the whole map, You can use this to spot good choke points and plan your expansion.

There Can Be Only One
- Be the only remaining empire in a game with 8 starting empires - by Monthar

Checkmate
- Win a Supremacy Victory by capturing 4 home worlds within the same turn

Checkmate 'merely' requires a Supremacy Victory, with only four opponents. You
must invade with troops to ensure that your invasions occur within the same turn.
Save before you invade, then if the invasions fail, you can add lander fleets.

If you do Checkmate on its own, a small galaxy should be sufficient.

If you combine these two achievements, you will need to save four home stars for last.
It would be best to do all seven opponents at the same time, to make sure you do not
get an expansion victory.

There Can Be Only One requires taking every star system on the map, eliminating
every other empire entirely. You will almost certainly have already won by the time
you accomplish this. If not, doing so will result in the default elimination victory. If
you win, just keep playing until you accomplish the elimination.

Remember to move on the the next turn when you accomplish the elimination.

Meeting of the Minds - As Sophon, receive 30 technologies from others and give at least 30 technologies to others in a single game

This was the hardest achievement I've done so far. The issue is that getting 30 technologies
from your opponents is difficult. They have to be good enough at research to learn things
you don't know, and you have to stay far enough ahead of them to have techs to trade;
they are very demanding when they trade, generally wanting a couple of levels ahead.
And, to enable a trade, they have to know prerequisites.

I had to beef up the level of science of my nerf opponents, and I picked a few aggressive
profiles that would research the military tree. Even so, I had to give away some prerequisite
techs to keep them viable.

You want multiple opponents for this, four seemed ideal.

These achievements require you to try all options of a part of the space combat interface:














For each step, after selecting, run the combat to get credit.


Trick Shooter - Use every fleet targeting option

Try all three fleet targeting options using the first drop down selector, 'A'.














Using the Tools - Use every fleet formation

Try all six fleet formations using the second drop down selector, 'B'.




















Big Bag of Tricks - Use every Battle Action of a Hero at least once

Battle actions are what you choose in the three lower slots for long range, mid range, and
melee in the lower selection spots marked 'C'. You know some of these battle actions from
the start of your game, you learn some from the right side science and industry tree, and
your heroes can learn some as they level, at higher combat levels. Use them all.

The hero battle actions you need have a dust cost and are labelled 'Battle Action'. There
are six, and only combat type heroes can some learn the ones you want. No one hero
type can learn them all. So you will have to level fleet heroes to get these.

It is said elsewhere that you need to do these all within a single game. I do not believe this
is true. I missed one for Big Bag of Tricks and as soon as I figured out which one I missed
and used it, I got the achievement, even though during that game I had not used many.

Checking out the Neighborhood - Explore 25% of a huge galaxy in less than 25 turns

The Truth is Way Out There - Explore 75% of a huge galaxy in less than 40 turns

To Boldly Go - Explore 100% of a huge galaxy in less than 50 turns

There are a very few guides about how to do this. They are for the most part spot on.
Here is what I found to be the best advice.

When you are choosing a huge galaxy, also choose:

Shape: disk - no arms requiring backtracking

Empires: 2 - minimize opponents (one), they are a stumbling block to achieving the 100%

Also go into advanced settings and choose:

Number of constellations: unique - no wormhole traveling needed, so you can start exploring
the whole galaxy immediately (Some of the guides explained getting wormhole travel quickly,
researching 'Casimir Effect', this avoids that delay entirely)

Galaxy density: low - less stars to explore, so, easier achievements

Star connectivity: high - more routes between stars, less backtracking and isolated stars.

The first two, 25% and 50%, will be easy. Your single opponent will get in your way for the
To Boldly Go 100% achievement. Use a nerf opponent for the least interference.

Make a custom racer faction. (see profile discussion below) They should have:
- Fleet: Fast Travelers (2 levels) - speed of exploring
- Building: Builders (3 levels) - cheaper improvements, build upgrades faster
- Building: Militarists (3 levels) - cheaper ships, build scouts faster
- Anomaly: Mineral Rich - for industry for creating scout ships
- Technology: Compact Fusion Reactors - grants +2 speed
- Technology: PeV-scale Accelerators - grants +3 speed engines; scouts have an add-on engine

If you don't want to exclude wormholes (Constellations is not set to Unique):
- Technology: Compact Fusion Reactors - required to research 'Casimir Effect'
- Technology: Xenobotany - required to research 'Casimir Effect'
- Science: Scientists (3 levels) - faster research
(the per population benefit from Kitchen Chemists is too low in the early game to affect this)

Much ado is made about getting a hero quickly of a certain type. I didn't do any of that.
A random set of hero selections will be good enough; the specialty distinctions tend to
stand out later in the game.

That said:
- Hero: Legendary Heroes (2 levels)
will give your heroes a couple of levels of helpful up front; this is a race, so it's worth while
- Economy: Dust Archaeology (2 levels) gives starting dust (money) for and instant hero hire
and extra toward the second one.

A hint was made, to design stripped down scouts with one engine and no weapons.
The idea was you could build these cheaper. I found this to not work. The stock scouts
the game provides were cheaper to build than my stripped down scouts with less stuff,
which makes no sense, but whatever, it was good enough. A further suggestion, take:
- Building: Master of Illusion 2/2 (40% cheaper scouts after you remove weapons)
makes some sense, but I did not try it. I took:
- Building: Militarists (3 levels) - cheaper ships, build scouts faster
which is all-around cheaper ships, and you can't take both.

In any case, in spite of the note of urgency to crank our explorer ships, I found that I didn't
need that many.

You will have to take some negative traits to offset the positive ones you've chosen. Pick
from some of the more battle oriented ones that won't matter for this set of achievements.

For profile selection, there were suggestions to use the Amoeba profile, since they can see
the whole galaxy immediately. If that works for you, great, it also helps with one opponent
gotcha. I found it too useful to have the stars I had not explored yet not be labeled, just to
keep track of which I needed to hit that this would have been a burden.

Another suggestion was for the Sophon, for research. This is honestly not that research
intensive, unless you need that 'Casimir Effect' early.

I used the Vaulters. Sheredyn or United Empire would work well.

Another suggestion was to set your two starting ships to auto-explore. I did not do two
of these things. I used manually targeted destinations throughout this, and I only initially
explored with my colony ship until I found a suitable site for a second home base.

Suggestions were made for 15 to 20 scouts. I used less than 10.

The single biggest gotcha to getting the 100% is that miserable, feeble opponent. The rule
start you in a 'Cold War' status once you discover them. That means you can not knowingly
enter their systems once you have explored them. You can proceed beyond them, but cannot
re-enter them.

The mitigation is to research the diplomacy skills on the upper side of the left hand tree early,
for three levels (counting the dust one as the first), then ask for Peace, then Open Borders, as
quickly as you can. There is a short delay for each. The AI opponent will almost certainly take
the offer.

If you fail that, and time is running out, and you have only a handful of their stars left to
explore, take your scouts to one star system, near them, stack, but do not merge them,
then declare war. You will be able to travel to their stars. They will try to kill your scouts, but
they can only kill one fleet at a time, and each scout not merged is a fleet. Take the survivors and finish exploring.

Don't forget to click to end the turn when you think you've finished.

Are We There Yet? - (secret) - Travel 100 000 parsecs in all your games

That Took How Many Parsecs? - (secret) - Travel 1 000 000 parsecs in all your games

Obviously, these take time, but you can speed them up.

What is a parsec? It is a unit of interstellar distance somewhat over three light years,
and is based on how much a star appears to shift in the sky as the earth orbits the
sun. It's the parallax of one second of arc, which is a very small angle. For the game,
just know it is a measure of interstellar distance.

Stars in the game are multiple parsecs apart, but not a whole lot. You have to do a
lot of traveling to get these achievements.

First, note that warps, though long, only count as one single parsec each.

The travel is measured independently for each of your fleets, even if they cover the
same space, even if they do it concurrently. It does not apply to individual ships, unless
each ship is a fleet. The size of the fleet does not matter. So, if you want to speed this
up, when you have a secure area, make a stack of scouts and send them back and
forth between two stars. Unfortunately, the game does not offer a way to automate
this. Do not merge them, they should each be their own fleet.

The set of 'Win with X level of difficulty', 'Be the faction with the highest score ...', and
'Create a custom faction with specified horrible total build' can be played against your
ultimate nerf opponent in a tiny galaxy.

I am favoring Four arm spiral galaxies, getting the Casimir Effect first, and expanding
like crazy for an expansion win. I have done a quick kill Supremacy Victory with some
of these.

The AI is aggressive on the harder settings, so diplomacy is not an option.


The 'Create a custom faction with specified horrible total build' achievements work similarly,
but you'll want to do most of them on the easiest setting, since you are nerfing yourself.

These games are slow; playing with a -196 against your -230ish opponent crawls. Set the
game speed setting to 'Fast' to minimize the grind.

One minor bug to be aware of, Win with a faction with -195 points did not grant the
achievement, a faction with -196 did get the achievement. Seems like 'with -195'
should have said 'less than -195'.

The last of these, Don't Even Think About It, combines the difficulty requirement and
the extreme negative build. My first attempt at this did not go well. Even with the
opponent nerfed worse than I was, on Endless difficulty, he was ahead in research.


There are three achievements that you should get while you pursue the difficulty ones.
Two of these are hidden achievements.

Leading by a Nose
- Be the faction with the highest score at turn 25 playing on hard or higher difficulty

Primus Inter Pares - (secret)
- Be the faction with the highest score at turn 50 playing on hard or higher difficulty

Primus Inter Imperatores - (secret)
- Be the faction with the highest score at turn 100 playing on impossible or higher difficulty

You should not have to do anything special to get these, they should occur as you pursue
the difficulty wins. Just be sure you play enough turns to get them, and don't forget to click
the next turn button.

There are several of these. From easier to more difficult:

Women and Children First - Kill 50 populations via Bombardment

Not sure why this has a low percentage, it is very easy. Research AP bombing and/or
bombers in the upper (military) tree. Build some ships with some of either or both. Use
these ships when you siege a star system. You will accumulate population kills. There
is no dependency on the AI doing anything special, and no particular faction is required.
It is easy because every star system has population to kill. Targets are not a problem to
find.

Note that lowering a star system's population before you take it makes it easier to take,
but also lowers its value to you.


Hammer of Fate - Destroy 5 fleets within a turn
Galactic Grindstone - (secret) - Destroy 10 fleets within a turn
Scourge of the Galaxy - (secret) - Destroy 15 fleets within a turn

These are relatively easy, but require some planning.
You have to have enough enemies to have enough fleets.
You have to have enough fleets yourself to take them out.
You should be at peace with your opponents until the turn you want to take the fleets out,
otherwise, you will have constant attrition of target fleets or your own fleets.
Open Borders helps, just keep a fleet close to each of theirs.
Then declare war on all of them, kill the fleets, earn achievements.


Heartless - Destroy 10 colony ships using Battle Stasis

Battle Stasis is a Sheredyn trait that prevents an opponent from retreating. This means
your scout ships should be able to take out any opponent colony ships they run across.
You have to play Sheredyn or a Sheredyn profile custom race for this. In spite of being
one of the rarest Endless Space - Definitive Edition achievements, this should be easy.
Everyone makes colony ships, and normally sends them out undefended. You should
run across a couple each game as you explore. This achievement is another one that
is cumulative, so you don't have to stress about getting it done in one game.

Note added after I finally got this, it took around thirty games to catch ten colony
ships. It seems like you should be able to improve on this, but I did not see a plethora
of enemy colonies. I played both full strength and nerfed enemies.


Slapping the Mosquitos - Destroy 50 Fighters and Bombers
Stomp the Ants - (secret) - Destroy 200 Fighters and Bombers
Pigeon Shoot - (secret) - Destroy 500 Fighters and Bombers

The basic ship combat is rock, paper, scissors with bullets, beams, and missiles.
A few steps up the combat tree is the technology to incorporate fighters and
bombers. Now, like Spock and lizard, you have more options.

Fighters and bombers occupy the third tab in your ship build, the one with few slots.
The most basic ship has one slot, the largest has four. An assignment of fighters to
a slot represents a flight of five, each with stats much like your ships, but for the
most part hidden. Bombers are similar. For this achievement, you want fighters;
fighters can destroy fighters and bombers. Point defenses also work. Ship weapons
cannot, nor do bombers fill that role. You also want your opponents to have and use
this technology so that you have targets that count for the achievement. The Hissho
were suggested as favoring fighters. I have not yet had much luck with that.

Note that as the achievements state, fighters and bombers can each be destroyed,
yours as well as theirs. You can replenish yours by repairing your ship, over time
or with dust.

The ship component, Point Defenses, occupies the same slots as fighters and
bombers. It defends against fighters and bombers, and as such contributes to
this achievement. Point Defenses are not subject to attrition from what I've seen,
they are just ship weapons that defend against fighters and bombers.

Air defenses, researched in the upper tree, also contribute to this achievement,
if your opponent uses fighters and/or bombers in a siege. These have icons that
look like antiaircraft guns.

These are cumulative. You don't have to get these within a single game.

The easiest way to get this is to get a friend with the game to help you. You can
fight each other with fighter carriers and give each other the achievements.


Three Little Pigs - Kill 10 troops with collateral damage
Offensive Defense - (secret) - Kill 50 troops with collateral damage
Valley of Death - (secret) - Kill 200 troops with collateral damage

If you know what 'collateral damage' is, the use of the term in this context may rankle;
in-game, you have to kill invaders invading your system(s), combatants, hence this is
not actually 'collateral damage'. Whatever. You do this by having strong system invasion
resistance, which you can acquire through traits during setup, population size, techs
that address invasion resistance, which are mostly on the upper tree, but scattered
elsewhere, and building those improvements (Some techs apply directly to your stars
with no building involved), and assigning a hero that buffs system resistance. Your
fleets in orbit do not enhance this resistance (other than the presence of an appropriate
hero). They can prevent an invasion, but this is about allowing an invasion to occur and
resisting it. Note that even if you fail to resist, you get credit for the kills.

Being Sieged does not count for this, only being invaded with troops. The difficulty is
that the AI rarely does this. A comment said that the Horatio use troop invasions; its
worth a shot.

One saving grace is that these are also cumulative. You don't have to get these within
a single game.

You might wonder if there is any way other than so called collateral damage to kill
invader troops. Yes, there is. You can kill the carriers, which also kills the troops.
You do not get credit for these towards these achievements.

The easiest way to get this is to get a friend with the game to help you. You can
invade each other repeatedly and give each other the achievements.

Additional note on the last two sets of these; your AI enemy using fighters, bombers,
or invading with troops is painfully slow. You want a cooperative situation where you
can have these fed to you. Well, ENDLESS™ Space - Definitive Edition goes on sale
for less than $3.00 (US), it just did a couple of weeks ago. That's less than is usually
charged for a single DLC. It is feasible to buy a copy to gift to an opponent.

If you have a second machine available, or can run a virtual machine for a second
instance of Steam, you could get a second Steam account, get a second copy of
the game while it's cheap, and be your own opponent.

There are five achievements involving specific heroes:

Immortal Bard
- Hire the two romantically involved heroes, the spy and the general, in the same game.
Hire Tephys (Sheredyn spy) and Karta Vauclas (United Empire general) in the same game.
Your faction does not matter.

Cake²
- Clone Galdos AI - by Adder
In order to clone a hero, you need to be playing using the Horatio profile. Cloning is an
option in the Heroes window, next to 'hiring', more expensive, but not prohibitively more.
Hire the Galdos AI and make a clone.

A Fistful of Dust
- Hire the Endless Hero
This 'Endless Hero' is Skuoi Kyryi, as with 'Praise to the Endless'. Skuoi Kyryi was
originally the only Endless hero when these achievements were created.
Your faction does not matter, but you may want to combine this with Praise to the
Endless as follows:

Praise to the Endless
- Win with an Expansion Victory with the Sowers when you have the Endless Hero
Play Sowers and hire Skuoi Kyryi, then play toward an expansion victory.

Endless Day
- …the galaxy as the Archivist, Emlek Tarosh, fulfills its duty.
Between January 21st and January 25th (midnight CET), start a game. This unlocks
the hero, Emlek Tarosh. He appears immediately as the first of your three initial choices.
This step can be completed in the context of trying for the Endless Day achievement as
follows, but does not require it.

Between January 21st and January 25th (midnight CET), start a game. Start a game
in Endless difficulty. Hire Emlek Tarosh. Win the game. Your faction does not
matter.

The game can be completed at any time. You might want to start and save a couple
of games if you are going to wait, in case you fail in any.

The range of time is from 00:00 January 21 to 23:59 January 25, five full days. CET
is Central European Time (the game is made in France), one hour ahead of UTC.
For North America this is 6 hours before EST, 7 hours before CST, 8 hours before
MST, and 9 hours before PST covering. If you miss the window, you can do this
achievement by resetting your system clock to within those days.

Getting the specific hero(s) you need:

There are 82 heroes in the full Definitive Edition game, a few less if you do not have
all the bells an whistles, and one less if you do not have Emlek Tarosh unlocked.

You get three random heroes you can hire at the start of each game. Lets say 'more
or less random'; it seems like your starting race may bias the chances, not greatly.
So you have roughly a three in eighty chance to get the hero you want in any game.
(It does not work exactly like that, but it's close enough.)

The zeroth option, just keep playing, and let it happen naturally. I admire your patience.

First option, the vanilla technique, restart until you get the hero(es) you want.

You can quit and start a new game until you get the hero(es) you want. Tedious, but
not prohibitive; in the long run, reliable.

Second option, use a Galaxy Generation Seed know to give the results you want.

Applying a random seed known to grant the hero(es) you want can get you there quickly.
Look below Game speed and click the 'advanced' button. Scrolling to the bottom,
uncheck 'Random Galaxy Generation Seed', then type your number into the Galaxy
Generation Seed box. This affects the initial heroes selection as well as other features
of your galaxy, so your results may be affected by other galaxy settings you choose.

Seed 42 is said to produce the Endless Hero, Skuoi Kyryi. I tried it and it worked for me.
I was able to complete Praise to the Endless (Already had A Fistful of Dust from random
play).Unfortunately, though this method works, you may not find the seed numbers you
want; I was unable to.

So, why is it called a 'seed'? The term is from pseudo-random number generation.
Pseudo-random number generation uses a deterministic algorithm to produce a stream
of numbers that have what appears to be a random distribution. (Some are better than
others.) In use, the number from each pseudo-random number generation is fed in to
be the source for the next cycle; one of the properties being that the numbers don't
clump, they spread widely over the range of the algorithm. However, there needs to
be a number used at the start, and that is called the 'seed'. You don't want to keep using
the same seed, or you will get the same string of numbers each time, in our case, you
would generate the same universe each time.

Computers are capable of producing truly random numbers. All you need is a physical
phenomenon the computer can measure that is independent of its own operation. For
typical purposes, you are the source of this value. The date and time of day you start
the game can be used. It does not mater if you 'always start playing as soon as I get
home from work or school' because in this case, milliseconds are significant. This is
the kind of thing normally used for 'Random Seed', which is what you want, unless you
want to play the same universe over and over.

So, don't forget to check the box, 'Random Galaxy Generation Seed' when you are done.

Third option, edit the Hero.XML file that governs what heroes are available.

If you are comfortable editing configuration files, this is a third option open to you.
It works reliably, but you need to be careful when you attempt this.

I'll cover it how to do so in the next section. There's quite a bit to cover.

This section pertains to pursuing the third option mentioned in the previous section for getting
the hero(es) you need to complete the hero achievements.


What is XML?

XML is a text representation of a database used to transfer sections of data between
disparate database systems. Or, as has been done in our case, it is being used as an
ad hoc database for the purpose of a piece of software. It is not a good database format
per se, but it is an open standard and is vendor agnostic. It is easy to monkey with, which
is not a good thing for databases, but suits our purposes.

Each valid XML file has a schema, a dictionary that defines what is in it. Because of this,
an XML file is more robust than an comma delimited file or a space or tab delimited file.


Where is it?

Good question, and there are three answers. These are the Windows locations, you will
need to translate if you use a different OS.

If you purchased just the base game, your Hero.XML file should be in:

Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Endless Space\Public\Simulation

If you purchased the full Definitive Edition all at once, I expect you'd have yours in:

Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Endless Space\Public_xp1\Simulation

If you are like me, and bought yours over time, you might have both. I did. In that case,
you can edit both, but you are probably using the _xp1 for the expansion. You could try
editing that, then going back and editing the other if that doesn't work.


So, what do I do?

Another great question. You're on a roll. First, back up Hero.XML, so that you can later
restore it. Make a copy and call it something like BackupHero.XML. (You might want to
keep this permanently.)

Then, using a non-formatting text editor, you will edit Hero.XML. Notepad is perfect
for this. Do not use Wordpad, nor MS Word, nor any editor that lets you change fonts or
add bold, italics, underlining, nor anything else. Notepad is in the Windows Accessories
folder in the launch menu in Windows 10.

The structure of the Hero.XML file is:

A short header, a couple of lines, the same in either file location. Leave that as it is.

A long section of hero data entries. This is the part you will edit.

This section is is longer in the _xp1 expansion, mine had three additional entries.
The hero data they have in common appears to be the same, the number match.
The extra _xp1 data I saw was Hero79, Hero80, and Hero81, all three Vaulter
heroes, the only Vaulter heroes in the game.

Entries look like this:

<Hero Name="Hero01" LastName="%Hero01LastName" FirstName="%Hero01FirstName1;%Hero01FirstName2">
<Gui>
<Title/><Description>%Hero01Description</Description>
<Icon Small="Gui/DynamicBitmaps/HeroPortraits/sophonHero04Small" Large="Gui/DynamicBitmaps/HeroPortraits/sophonHero04Large" Wide="Gui/DynamicBitmaps/HeroPortraits/sophonHero04Wide"/>
</Gui>
<Level>1</Level>
<Descriptors>Administrator;Corporate</Descriptors>
<Attributes>Labor=6;Wit=6;Melee=3;Offense=0;Defense=0</Attributes>
</Hero>

Not exactly readable, but if you know the hero numbers you want you basically
delete all the others. Treat each entry as a unit and delete or retain the whole unit,
from <Hero Name= to </Hero>, and be sure to leave blank lines between them
for your own sanity as you edit.

Then a trailing section that has data about the heroes, five HeroClasses and a number
of HeroLevels. The base game has twenty, the expansion has twenty five. In terms of
loading specific heroes, these are not relevant, leave them as they are.


So, which Hero Numbers do I want?

Again with the great questions! The hero numbers are the same in both versions.

v1.0 Galdos AI, the Amoeba you clone is Hero48

Tephys, the Sheridan spy. the one lover, is Hero66

Karta Vauclas, the United Empire (Terran) general, the other lover, is Hero26

Skuoi Kyryi, the one called out as The Endless Hero, is Hero61

I was unable to find Tarosh Emlek, needed for Endless Day. I never unlocked him, so
I think he's blocked. But I think he's Hero82, because that hero would not display. My
guess is that when you unlock him, during the Endless Celebration, which is Amplitude's
anniversary, he is probably automatically one of your choices; otherwise, the odds of
getting him so you could do the achievement in the four day window would be quite slim,
and it is a celebration, after all; the devs want to give you a warm fuzzy. - I can confirm,
Tarosh Emlek unlocks when you start a game during the Endless Day celebration, and
he is the first of your three initial choices for Heros in the game you unlock him.

With further investigation, I found that of 82 heroes in the game, and as mentioned,
the 3 vaulter heroes are missing from the the non-expansion directory, 4 others are
also missing from both, heroes 74 through 77, all from the Disharmony expansion.
But there are 5 heroes added in Disharmony, so one of them is present. I thought it
might be a glitch in my setup, so I uninstalled and reinstalled, but got the same result.
So apparently it is by design, and these are not linked through the Hero.XML file.


OK, so I know what Hero Numbers I want, now what?

Well, as I said, your editing consists of deleting the heroes not relevant to your goal.
If you leave three in place, those are the three that will load. You could make your
Hero.XML with the four specified, then you'd only have to reload if you were trying
to get Immortal Bard and missed one of the lovers; odds are you'd get them both
pretty quick,

I found out, through selecting a Hero Number that would not load, that the game
will recycle its choices if you give it less than it needs. (It was oddly specific, it picked
the same extra one each of three times.) Note that if you produce a duplicate Galdos
this way, that does not satisfy the 'cloning' requirement. Cloning is a specific action,
and the clones are marked with a version number. (Side note, cloning also clone the
current skills of the Hero being cloned. They then progress separately)

Remember to restore your full Hero.XML when you finish. If you totally botch this, you can
uninstall and reinstall the game.

I plan to expand this guide as I earn more of the achievements. I've been pretty good about
adding sections as I think of them. If you want something that's not covered, ask in the
comments.

I have seven achievements to go. More than half are the swat the bugs kind that require
the AI to create and use certain combat features.