The Harmony are an old race and they do know Dust and its implications from their past. In their culture Dust is a thing to be avoided and reflects in their inability to make any use of it. They cannot recruit heroes, cannot buy-out ships or buildings and are even penalized for accumulating dust.

The advantages for this restriction is their immunity to approval modifiers and an unlimited capacity in ship numbers. They dont pay upkeep which is the natural restictor for every other faction so they can have an unlimited amount of ships. Needless to say that the Harmony can never win an economic victory.

The resources FIDS known from other factions are reduced to FIS (Food, Industry, Science) as the Harmony cannot utilize dust in any way or form. While other factions center around dust mainly (income determines what you can do or forces your hand) in early game the Harmony focus mainly on food and growth.

Their "tax slider" (called Mind and Matter for the Harmony) therefore has a different function and doesnt affect income but regulates the empires focus between food and science. The Harmony can boost their natural food generation by setting a focus but the more they do the more they penalize their science output in equal strides. The same applies in reverse.

This makes it possible to adjust your empires output to your current needs. At some point your systems will reach their population cap and growth really isnt much of an issue then. This feature offers you a nice alternative in handling critical resource management other factions possess.

Due to their advantage to have an unlimited amount of ships the logical conclusion would be to start building ships from turn 1 and keep doing so until all competition is beaten to a bloody pulp.

The problem by doing so is that the Harmony get a -50% food penalty on every system they build ships on. This penalty is -100% whenever they build a design with a civilian module (aka colony ship). So even tho building ships non-stop is an option the result is that your system grows even slower then it does already which reduces your expansion rate (need population to build colony ships) and the real threat is that even tho you have massive armadas by the time of first contact you will be so far behind in technology and size that all your ships dont make a difference in a confrontation.

Another problem with ships is your inability to retrofit or repair them (both options require dust). So while you can have a high number of fleets you are risking to run into enemy mirror designs which wouild force you to rebuild all your ships again to stay competetive. A simple retrofit of your enemy would result in the same procedure.

As you dont have a quick reaction option same as other factions (which can simply throw money.....er dust at the problem) you need to come up with designs which have the potential to stay current for a longer time OR run the risk of massive micro-management. This means investing into "balanced" designs pays off in the long run but requires a basic understanding of how combat works. The Harmony hull bonuses are among the strongest in the game which helps them.

While other factions raise food and science side by side and can increase both at the same time the Harmony have to make a conscious decision as to which area they want to work on. Food is critical but a tech advantage is about the most powerfull option in the game. You can focus on science but it only gives you a flat %t bonus on the science you generate already. Without the population to generate said science even a +100% bonus to science doesnt add much.

On the other hand having a high growth rate results in a flat % PENALTY to science so even tho your base science is "okay" you will pay for it.

Turn it as you want, the end result is that the Harmony are slower at expansion then any other faction in the game. You will have access to technology later which in turn boost your resource gain or capabilities later then your competition and even if you focus on science in order to get em first or on time with other factions your population will be generally smaller due to the accompanying food penalty which other factions dont have to endure which means building said technical achievements takes longer (as more population = more FIS = faster rates in growth, building and research)

Food is generated and stored in-system only. But the Mind and Matter slider represents an empire wide bonus or penalty and acts like extra income same as tax for other factions with the difference that your extra income isnt dust but science or food.

Food generation difers with planet type but carries on to other planets in-system. The Harmony can put unused industry into science same as other factions but where other factions have the same option for dust the Harmony instead further boost their food income instead. Its not a light decision either way because the Ind-science conversion is one of the most powerfull science boosts in the game (depending on system size and development status) and you really want to have it running non-stop whenever possible.

Yet growth is equally important to the Harmony (something other factions get for free when running the ind-science conversion routine). So this is yet another hard decision for the Harmony to make.

In addition to all the bonuses flying around the Harmony also have to tackle and handle penalties.

Almost every planet type generates a specific amount of dust. There are highly specialized ones but lower tier (ocean, terran or jungle = tier1) also generate small amounts of dust. So even the starting system of the Harmony (settled tundra planet) is already considered "impure" and puts a small penalty on your whole empires food generation. System improvements which would boost dust income simply are not available to the Harmony so at least thats one thing out of your hair.

Building a colony ship (any design which has a civilian module mounted) has the same restriction as for all the other factions. It simply STOPS population growth for the time of the construction. In addition to this rule building a ship of any kind regardless of design will penalize that system with a further 50% food reduction for the time of the construction.

In order to grow your empire you need to build and send out colony ships. Losing colony ships to the dangers of the void (pirates, enemy AIs, events) is always an annoyance and a hassle but it can be downright CRUSHING for the Harmony as population is a prime resource for them and they already struggle to stay competetive to other factions.

As approval isnt a factor for the Harmony your heart might jump a beat at the prospect of simply mass settling everything in sight without care. The balancing factor in all this is that selecting the "right" systems is even more important to the Harmony then it is for other factions. Sure you dont have to worry about approval penalties coming from high-tier planets or red anomalies but the
other penalties to ind, food or science hurt even more.

The worst planets you can settle early game are terran, arid and desert. These have a focus on dust generation so while other factions might make a happy dance when stumbling across a 5 planet system consisting of arid and desert mostly (aka treasure grove) you "should" hang your head in disappointment and move along. You "can" settle this system and eventually you will but early game it ll just further slow down your already slow pace.

Anomalies suddenly become a main topic. Many green anomalies are hurting the Harmony and cannot be considered "good". Take Dust Lode for example which is an extra +3 dust
per population. Its simply neck breaking for the Harmony. On the other hand there are orange and red anomalies which reduce dust income which in turn is welcome to the
Harmony.

A world standing on its head :)

Luxury resources are generally a great addition to ones FIDS. Many of them increase the planets approval in addition to other very nice bonuses. For the Harmony the decision to unlock luxury resources via research should be something they think about twice.

For one, the approval modifiers, their biggest strength is all but wasted on the Harmony and many of them would increase dust generation as well which is a bad thing so depending on how your map seed looks it might be better to pass on certain technologies which would represent a serious FIDS gain for any other faction. Just imagine playing in a lux resource heavy map unlocking the use of Redsang (Xenology) and within a single turn ending up with 4 of these claiming the abundance bonus and suddenly your empire has to swallow 20% more dust which penalizes it.

So it looks like the deck is stacked against the Harmony from turn 1.

And indeed, when the Harmony was implemented in their first iteration they were complete underdogs and competeing with them on higher difficulties was all but impossible. All because their early game was so slow that whoever wanted to do so could have a peck at them at any
time without them being able to raise a fight.

It wasnt much better for the AI. AI controlled Harmony's usually didnt survive into midgame and only by lottery-equal chances did they get into endgame at all. Due to community feedback there soon was a patch changing the Harmony's affinity to counter this problem.

Meet your most important tool and beloved friend.....

In order to overcome early game problems the Harmony were granted an additional affinity bonus called "resonant vessel". The description states the following

+2 FIS per ship orbiting colonized systems. Limited to x2 empire CP

It might sound confusing but its a real simple concept. Notice the starting scout and colony ship you are given for free every match you start regardless of faction? Those 2 ships while orbiting your home system provide it with an additional +4 to food, industry and science while they stay in orbit through an end turn (+2 per ship). The more ships you build and place in orbit the higher the bonus gets. In effect this can DOUBLE the effectiveness of any given planet you own in that system and presents a great jumpstart mechanism for new outposts.

In order to prevent you from abusing this mechanic there is a high limit in place represented by your empire CP. If you dont select certain traits the default CP is 5 which means that building and
parking more then 5 ships in any single orbit is a waste and the maximum FIS bonus you can aqure by resonant vessels is +10 until you raise your CP cap.

Early game this represents a SERIOUS bonus but its not as important and even becomes outright negligible on better developed systems later in the match. Its comparable to certain hero bonuses which the Harmony cannot use.

So building ships in order to stock up on the resonant vessel buff ties in nicely with the unlimited number of ship capacity of the Harmony. And it doesnt matter what kind of ship it is. It could be an empty hull, the bonus doesnt care.

But as you can see. Especially in the beginning where every single point of FIS counts you are faced with hard decisions. While other factions simply send their 2 starter vessels out it might be a good idea to leave yours in orbit for a few turns in order to help jumpstart the "engine". The risk is that you fall behind on the expansion rate even more compared to other AIs in the match.

Naturally the Harmony's empire is FILLED with fleets at a certain point because you always try to get that resonent vessel bonus in adition to scouts or colony ships or even defensive ships you might maintain. This is a two-edged sword but depends on your mentality.

The advantage is that your military score is much higher then if you would play a different faction. As the military score often is the primary factor for an AI to attack you or not this can result in an easy match where you are left alone for the most part even tho most of your ships are "fluffies" which couldnt defend themselves or your empire for their life.

The disadvantage is micro-management. You have to build every ship, you have to keep track on which system has how many. In case of casulaties you have to pinpoint the locations then build and send specific numbers there. Every ship without a task will up your notifier to the left of your end turn button (a HUGE annoyance for me).

Even with these additional bonuses the Harmony is without doubt the slowest faction in the game when it comes to early game but they do have a competing chance now. So chances are that your piece of the cake will be the smallest by the time all "real estate" is split up.

The Harmony tend to do either very well or very bad on smaller maps depending on the maps make-up. If you end up right next to an AI you basically have caught it with its "pants down" and can simply swarm and crush it before it can raise to power because you dont have to worry about maintaining and balancing an economy based on dust to pay for the ships you use in battle. Things change if you have to unlock wormhole travel (or any other technology requirement) before you can make your move. As you will almost garantueed hit certain technological benchmarks the last (splitting focus between science and food remember?) the risk is that you are running into a well prepared enemy by the time you can move ahead. The smaller the map the more important an optimized early game is.

After initial hurdles are overcome tho all gloves are off and the midgame plays on par with every other faction. The same old limitations and penalties count but overall the Harmony has much more freedom to act once it breaks a specific empire size which allows it to counter the dust-based penalties and restrictions. During this time the Harmony is a formidable opponent and its greatest weakness is the inability to retrofit its ships and fleets on the fly. Lenghty wars showcase this problem very clearly when equal opponents run into each other and your enemy suddenly switching all his ships to overcome your defenses or counter your strengths forcing you to build completely new fleets. Also the lack of heroes becomes an obvious weakness as your opponents will use these (by now) high-level heroes to either boost certain systems to ridiculous FIDS levels or improve any of its "average" fleets to incredible performance.

Your best chance to overcome this problem is by building and using balanced designs but of course a balanced design will never perform as well as a specialized one. This isnt as much a factor versus the AI as it is against other players as human opponents will mercilessly exploit and know about your weakness and most MP matches I witnessed were directed versus the Harmony early on before they could grow into a threat. The AI doesnt have this knowledge tho so playing the Harmony versus AI is a much more enjoyable experience.

By the time other factions push into endgame (usually indicated by empire size and technological level) the Harmony run at risk to be "left in the dust". Thats the point within a match where dust (at first a critical factor) becomes a non-factor for every faction regarding survivability. Its generated in the thousands and used to buy-out fleets and improvements generally skyrocketing an empires capabilities.

The Harmony cannot tap into this resource and are at a severe disadvantage at this point in the match. For this reason the Harmony's tech tree is specifically tailored and designed to overcome these problems at specific times. Identifying these technologies and unlocking them as early as possible will mostly decide about your matches course (hard, easy, crushing, entertaining, frustrating etc). I dont want to spoil the fun of exploring the Harmony and learning its capabilities but I ll give you the technology which signals the Harmonys entry into endgame.

Personal Shielding --> Contamination Barriers

Trying to go for this technology directly from turn 1 results in a 624 turn duration of research. Needless to say this would be a futile attempt to dominate the match. The research path and development cycle you decide for your Harmony turn by turn depending on the map you play in will mostly affect your chances to unlock that specific tech as early as possible. So basically "play smart" and "think about what you are doing" wins the day.

Application of the Contamination Barrier doesnt automatically win the match either. But it allows the Harmony to tap into an additional resource which is available en mass at this point of the match. Coupled with the fact that most systems now will probably sit at population cap and theres really not much need for expansion anymore (as enemy systems you invade will come at full population as well if you dont bomb it to the ground) your OTHER special rules will layer bonus upon bonus on you while certain penalties drop away completely. Your FIS will increase dramatically and with this your capabilities open up.

The default Harmony faction is competetive and designed to teach you how the Harmony plays but its far from optimal (same as any other default faction really). Tho the Harmony forces you into specific gameplay loops (due to factional restrictions) you "can" play it any way you want. It might be a good idea to customize your Harmony in a waythat benefits your preferred playstyle the most tho.

The Harmony come a little late to the party but even tho they are highly agressive and their ultimate motive could be considered "genocide on a galactic scale" they ARE capable of being at peace and entering trade relationships.

Usually trade represents a small extra benefit when at peace with warring factions. Especially early game this is a welcome opportunity for every faction which is struggling to level out its economy and become independant. For this reason competeing AIs you encounter early in the match usually welcome a peace treaty for its benefits.

Each active trade lane usually results in a small increase of dust and science. The Harmony only get one of these even tho their trading partners benefit from the dust which the Harmony dont have access to. You could argue that trading with the Harmony aint worth it because you only get half of the deal but really its more then just the small bonus.

For one a diplomatic status change is enforced for a specific number of turns (depends on game speed selected) so going into peace with a neighbouring faction GARANTUEES you non-agression for x turns which you can use to push further ahead or close of your borders and prepare for war.

As the slowest faction on the board this is a nice extra to get from a peace treaty so should be considered.

Also while missing out on dust the Harmony can through research enhance their trade routes to get small amounts of extra food from them instead.

The Harmony arrived at a time for me when pretty much all other factions started to blend together and play out similar. It is alien and different enough to refresh the whole game and it also transforms Endless Space into a different beast.

Picking the Harmony as your beginners faction is feasable of course but not recommended because many critical aspects of the game are completely different (dust, approval, economy) and whatever you learn with the Harmony you cannot translate to other factions. Their early game
handicap most probably will result in an even more frustrating newcomer experience but everybody is different of course.

To this day the Harmony are one of my favorite factions to play with. I can still come up with new customized set-ups to play into a different strentgh or counter another weaknes and its fun to explore this factions capabilities and find new things even after all the time I already spend with it. The faction really is more then "just another space race" and was a complete surprise when Disharmony hit the shelves.

Please feel free to make suggestions or uncover confusions within this guide.