Social Benefits and Difficulty

[Sigma]

In testing my custom factions I've found it interesting how difficulty changes the usefulness of certain social benefits. For instance at low difficulty, Growth and Research are king. Growth, because drones aren't nearly as troublesome meaing you can grow your faction horizontally with impunity, and Research because you can simply outrace your opponents to secret projects and dominate them in a builder game.

On the other hand, at higher difficulties where drones are a much bigger deal, Police is extremely powerful. Being able to keep your unruly citizens suppressed makes your life so much easier, and works in conjunction with a Growth to give your faction a major advantage. Same goes for Industry-- it's already powerful at low levels, but at high difficulty, where your enemies can easily outpace you in production, you need Industry to stay competitive.

What are some other examples of this phenomenon? Not just in social benefits but in the the game in general?