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how many games do people know of where their are 4 factions? There are probably very few.

Human, Orc, Undead, Night Elf.

'nuff said ;-)

shows why it took ages for blizzard to balance it ^_^

Anyways. 3 and 7. Primes.
yeah its all in the prime numbers. they bring variation and infinite mathematical joy. They're also irreductible.

so on this line, do consider 5 and 11.

btw.. warcraft had these non playable guys who would attack you. I like to call them the fifth faction. Just because the number 5 is cool like that.

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Original post by Taolung But take other extremes of humanity, and they just don't seem as scary. A race of incredibly lazy people? Extreme industriousness? Stupidity? Diplomacy? I can't really think of anything else that you can turn into a weapon as well as you can single-minded, reckless determination or cold and calculated logic. Anything else just seems like a moderate threat at best.

Deception for starters, possibly.
This may be a barely discernable(sp?) difference, but the star trek races seem to run the gamut of human extremes. Take for instance the Cardassians, the human extreme of deception and manipulation(Romulans belong more in the cold logic category naturally).
There are also the Shadows from Babylon 5, whose tactics are a combination of logic, mindless killing, and manipulation.
Independence Day featured essentially sentient locusts, as well as the Magog of Andromeda, the Replicators of Stargate, and in Battlestation, a book containing a collection of stories featuring a single campaign. One might put that in the category of extreme pursuit of wealth. A variant on this can be seen in the spider-like enemies in Stargate Atlantis, who only periodically plunder because they wish to eat.
There's the scientist or need to understand, like Brainiac from Superman or the Martians in Stranger In A Strange Land-although I never feel the need to destroy things I understand but I suppose that's the only way to make a villain out of someone with that trait.
The one I always thought ripened things up for a great sequel was the 'it's not personal, but my boss is gonna get pissed if I don't blow up your planet'. This can be seen in Robotech.
As alluded to, who needs an extreme, lots of sci-fi features aliens who simply want to conquer stuff the old-fashioned way.
Religion, I think that's covered by the Covenant.

When it comes to factions I personally prefer the 5-way style that was used to represent the color connections of Magic: the Gathering. I keep thinking that if DAOC had incorporated this it would have made the game ALOT more interesting.

The Basics
All 5 factions are layed out in a pentagon

1
2 3
4 5

Each Side is allied with each of its neighbors, but is opposed to each of its un-connected opponents.

I.E 1 is allied with 2 and 3, but is enemies with 4 and 5. Since your two allies are always enemies, and your enemies are always allied to one of your friends it could be very interesting.