Stellaris: a second Astral Planes has hit the game

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Stellaris: a second Astral Planes has hit the game

Conspiratiorist: Nov 12, 2015; 17th Separate Kryvyi Rih Tank Brigade named after Konstantin Pestushko
Look to my coming on the first light of the ~~fifth~~ ~~sixth~~ some day

OwlFancier posted:

Or if you are going to have granular combat it makes infinitely more sense to integrate it into the fleet combat or the economy, because those are the two developed areas of the game. Hence the wisdom of tying ground combat into fleet strategy decisions and economic development directly. You can not have a well functioning combat system that is wholly relegated to what happens after you conquer a planet, a thing that is entirely decided by fleet combat and does not integrate into the rest of the game.

What you have created in that instance is a minigame, and minigames are bad.

ED: some games built entirely out of minigames like Star Ruler 2 can be quite good, but it requires deliberate structuring towards that. It doesn't fit Stellaris' post-release sense of direction.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 21:59

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# ? May 20, 2024 16:45

Baronjutter: Dec 31, 2007; "Tiny Trains"

A lot of 4x games has "mini games" like tactical space and ground combat that worked great, but those were turn based games so it was never an issue to pause and focus on something else entirely. Stellaris being real time really limits this.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 22:10

ZypherIM: Nov 8, 2010; "I want to see what she's in love with."

Baronjutter posted:

In all my games the best troops I could build are droid armies, an early game tech that never gets better throughout the entire game. Everyone else seems to have xeno's and gene troops, specially fallen empires. They also love to land their 20 gene troop assault army on their planet making it nearly impossible to take. The last time I was fighting a fallen empire I had about 200k worth of ships bombard for years making almost no dent, and eventually had to send about 300+ droids to take the drat planet. Wave after wave of carefully timed droid armies.

The war was over, it was just agonizing busy work. The AI loves to land their assault armies and turn them into defenders.

So uh, you're doing it wrong? There is no world in which your early game robot tech is the best armies that you can get. If you're a machine intelligence, you can get a better version (1.5x dmg, 2x morale dmg, over 2x the hp) along with a giant robot thing later. If you're just having normal robot techs, you can get improved robots after you get synths (double dmgs, slight health increase) and still qualify for xenomorphs. The ascension perk armies are better than basic robots. Hell if your strategy is going to be "they've got to run out of bullets sometime" you might as well use clone armies: you can make 3 clone armies for every basic robot army (in the same time for the same cost/upkeep).

Unless you can't have organics around at all, you've always got the choice to research xenomorphs, and find some race of dudes to turn into very strong ground pounders for your empire. If you can't have organics at all (ie you're playing a machine intelligence) your upgraded ground army option is on-par with xenos (less dmg, more health) but you can also get giant robots. You can also consider having a military academy/war factory at where you're building your troops: they start with 100 experience, enough to get +10% dmg +10% morale.

The real tragedy is that the ascension perk ground troops are sort of trash compared to xenos. The 'downside' to xenos is their giant collateral damage stat, but that really isn't impactful compared to getting faster, cheaper, stronger units. They should have some sort of diplomacy hit (based on their descriptions, most races shouldn't be happy that you're sending poo poo like that at anyone), and some sort of additional upkeep (maybe food).

I haven't tried it, but if your enemies are making fortresses that feel uncrackable, how about getting the perk that lets you steal pops, and just steal all the people off the planet? If there aren't pops they should lose control of it, making armies they have on the planet a moot point.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 22:11

Trabisnikof: Dec 24, 2005

Bring back tiles but just for land invasions. Create different doctrines you can assign to the army to determine the pattern of landings and expansion. Like a mini-risk game that the AI plays out for you.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 22:15

isndl: May 2, 2012; I WON A CONTEST IN TG AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS CUSTOM TITLE

In my experience the big beefy armies like mega-warforms are best because they end up dying far less often thanks to their fat HP pool so I don't have to rebuild and micro the replacements back to the front lines, and an offensive doesn't stall out waiting for the reinforcement.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 22:16

Splicer: Oct 16, 2006; from hell's heart I cast at thee
🧙🐀🧹🌙🪄🐸

ZypherIM posted:

and some sort of additional upkeep (maybe food).

Given the resource changes in LeGuin I'd be real surprised if that wasn't the case.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 22:21

Baronjutter: Dec 31, 2007; "Tiny Trains"

ZypherIM posted:

So uh, you're doing it wrong? There is no world in which your early game robot tech is the best armies that you can get. If you're a machine intelligence, you can get a better version (1.5x dmg, 2x morale dmg, over 2x the hp) along with a giant robot thing later. If you're just having normal robot techs, you can get improved robots after you get synths (double dmgs, slight health increase) and still qualify for xenomorphs. The ascension perk armies are better than basic robots. Hell if your strategy is going to be "they've got to run out of bullets sometime" you might as well use clone armies: you can make 3 clone armies for every basic robot army (in the same time for the same cost/upkeep).

Unless you can't have organics around at all, you've always got the choice to research xenomorphs, and find some race of dudes to turn into very strong ground pounders for your empire. If you can't have organics at all (ie you're playing a machine intelligence) your upgraded ground army option is on-par with xenos (less dmg, more health) but you can also get giant robots. You can also consider having a military academy/war factory at where you're building your troops: they start with 100 experience, enough to get +10% dmg +10% morale.

The real tragedy is that the ascension perk ground troops are sort of trash compared to xenos. The 'downside' to xenos is their giant collateral damage stat, but that really isn't impactful compared to getting faster, cheaper, stronger units. They should have some sort of diplomacy hit (based on their descriptions, most races shouldn't be happy that you're sending poo poo like that at anyone), and some sort of additional upkeep (maybe food).

I haven't tried it, but if your enemies are making fortresses that feel uncrackable, how about getting the perk that lets you steal pops, and just steal all the people off the planet? If there aren't pops they should lose control of it, making armies they have on the planet a moot point.

I don't know, in all my last games I'd always top out on droid armies well into the end game. Don't you need a special perk for xeno and gene troops? I remember I used to be able to build xeno armies as cyborgs, but none of my games over the last couple months ever had the tech unlock for me. I'd be well into 100% repeatable tech and just be hoping for those odd +5% army health repeats.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 22:22

PittTheElder: Feb 13, 2012; Yes, it's like a lava lamp.

No, all you need is the Uplift tech as a prerequisite, and to not be a machine intelligence.

Aethernet posted:

Unless, of course, you're fighting robots, or anyone who's put a robot on a fortress.

It's also worth remembering that ground combat used to worse before the implementation of combat width meant that you actually suffer attrition and lose warscore from attempting to drown enemies in your armies, and there's a good reason to take advanced combat troops now.

Oh right, forgot about the robots.

PittTheElder fucked around with this message at 22:25 on Nov 28, 2018

# ? Nov 28, 2018 22:23

DatonKallandor: Aug 21, 2009; "I can no longer sit back and allow nationalist shitposting, nationalist indoctrination, nationalist subversion, and the German nationalist conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious game balance."

Trabisnikof posted:

Bring back tiles but just for land invasions. Create different doctrines you can assign to the army to determine the pattern of landings and expansion. Like a mini-risk game that the AI plays out for you.

This but unironically. HoI4 already has troops interacting with each other based on terrain, troop quality, leadership, learned tactics and RNG all controlled by AI out of the players control so it works. It's also something that is mechanically essentially an more refined form of MoO3 combat - it's from a 4x space game anyway!

Baronjutter posted:

I don't know, in all my last games I'd always top out on droid armies well into the end game. Don't you need a special perk for xeno and gene troops? I remember I used to be able to build xeno armies as cyborgs, but none of my games over the last couple months ever had the tech unlock for me. I'd be well into 100% repeatable tech and just be hoping for those odd +5% army health repeats.

Apparently you need whatever the primitives uplifting technology is called as a prerequisite (which implies the Fallen Empires have all been uplifiting in the past, because they're all Xeno users) for Xenomorph armies.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 22:24

binge crotching: Apr 2, 2010

isndl posted:

In my experience the big beefy armies like mega-warforms are best because they end up dying far less often thanks to their fat HP pool so I don't have to rebuild and micro the replacements back to the front lines, and an offensive doesn't stall out waiting for the reinforcement.

Warforms have the best stats of any buildable army. The downside is they take a year or so to build and cost about as much as a cruiser. Still worth it IMO, and at some point they are the only thing in my army once the others attrition off.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 22:52

Staltran: Jan 3, 2013; Fallen Rib

Zurai posted:

You can poo poo on it all you like, but it was an example of something which was supposed to not exist. I didn't say the mod did a good job of making ground combat more interesting (the mod had nothing to do with ground combat), it was just an example of the fact that it is possible with the current version of the game to make ground combat more complex than just "throw a stack of basic assault armies at it". Not much more, but still more.

And, again, you can say the exact same thing about navies in the current version. You can either overwhelm them with superior numbers of generically designed ships or you can look at your opponents' ship designs and create specialized ships designed to counter their strengths and exploit their weaknesses.

Complex!=better, what you described sounds significantly worse than vanilla. I think someone already addressed the fleet thing.

ChickenWing posted:

"interacting with the game" == "tedious micro" continues to be the worst take.

"Ugh another empire attacked me so I had to build a fleet (probably involving dozens of clicks), gather it, and move it to their fleet (even more clicks?!??) so they would shoot at each other. What tedious micro!!1!!!!11!!"

I get that ground combat is boring, but there are solutions to this beyond just reducing the amount you actually get to engage with the game. I'm personally in favour of giving troop transport capabilities to all navy ships (optionally configurable with troop transport modules), having fleets interact with invasions beyond the "nuke it all to the ground" phase, and moderately deepening the planetary siege game.

I am also in favor of that. I'm not in favor of "reducing the amount you actually get to engage with the game", I just don't think engaging with the game should be boring.

Clicking on a planet, clicking an army ten times to queue ten builds, then repeating with five other planets is tedious. So is moving those 5 stacks together to assault the planet. With better armies building 10/planet also takes ten years, so if you want to be done quicker than that you get to find more planets to click the army button on. This is completely different than navies, where you actually need to think about what you're doing unless you completely outclass the enemy. Though the fleet manager still doesn't have shift or ctrl clicks as far as I know, which is certainly an issue. Unless you also think clicking the "increase amount of corvettes in template" a hundred times isn't tedious, I suppose.

I've personally had my wrist get tired when playing Stellaris from clicking the same goddamn button repeatedly dozens of times, then repeating that soon after, so I really can't agree with your characterization of that as "interacting with the game". I learnt how to make an autohotkey script to left click ten times in a row so I'd stress my wrist less while playing Stellaris. I think it's concerning that I found that worthwhile, and I think that the game would benefit from ground combat involving less mindless clicking, just as removing tiles is a massive improvement.

# ? Nov 28, 2018 23:47

S w a y z e: Mar 19, 2007; f l a p

The best ground combat in any 4x game was MOOII and I will fight any of you to the death to defend it.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 00:07

Fintilgin: Sep 29, 2004; Fintilgin sweeps!

Pacho posted:

Planetary invasion could be incredibly fun if every planet is a fully rendered Clausewitz map with 3000+ provinces, each with their own leaders, buildings and economy

and you have to build buildings indvidually in each and pops and provincinal decisions and and aand
:supaburn:

# ? Nov 29, 2018 00:09

Bloodly: Nov 3, 2008; Not as strong as you'd expect.

quote:

The best ground combat in any 4x game was MOOII and I will fight any of you to the death to defend it.

Of course, that was also a game where if you chose, you could bypass the ground game outright(Telepathy). And the problems there have also come here. Transport ships that needed building, traits to improve warfare, and the fiddyness of them.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 00:10

DatonKallandor: Aug 21, 2009; "I can no longer sit back and allow nationalist shitposting, nationalist indoctrination, nationalist subversion, and the German nationalist conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious game balance."

dylguy90 posted:

The best ground combat in any 4x game was MOOII and I will fight any of you to the death to defend it.

MoO3s ground combat and MoO1s ground combat were both better.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 00:15

S w a y z e: Mar 19, 2007; f l a p

DatonKallandor posted:

MoO3

How dare you.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 00:32

Jazerus: May 24, 2011

Ham Sandwiches posted:

I don't get what the relationship between ground combat and space combat is supposed to be anyway. Space fleets are important it's how you control space, engage enemy fleets, destroy transports, deal with menaces and pirates, all that jazz.

Ground troops help you retain control of your planets. By having separate ground forces and space forces you can come up with a scenario where a fleet gets rolled but the ground troops are strong enough to hold out until more space forces come and bring more ground forces or whatever.

I don't know that any of that really works in Stellaris. I just don't see individual planets holding out being an interesting thing. I don't see bastion planets that are a big struggle to take in an offensive campaign where you already have space superiority are a very interesting thing. So if armies are going to continue and maybe even have resources put into them down the road, then I'd look at how can they serve a purpose that provides compelling gameplay. Because I don't see it right now.

a bastion planet in the right place can be a huge pain in the rear end, particularly early on when you're not rich enough to just endlessly produce armies until you win. it can reduce losses in war if located at a chokepoint - even if the enemy has space superiority, if the planet helps you wait out the peace timer, you'll lose fewer systems. it also gives you a chance to produce more ships and regroup to maybe reclaim space superiority. ground combat would be a much bigger part of the game if the AI wasn't so bad at it even in its current implementation, mechanically it is quite important between two equal opponents but the AI's incompetence makes it seem less important than it is

# ? Nov 29, 2018 00:32

Nessus: Dec 22, 2003; After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!

I don't know if this was proposed, but why not have a component chunk for ships that lets you install a troop transport or something? Have it be available for all ship classes, although making a corvette-scale troop carrier means it will be unarmed (but your 4 troop corvettes can be screened by the 12 laser corvettes). Upgrades would work something like fighter/bombers do now, with some of the super-powered armies needing larger ships to carry them; I could see that you might need a destroyer to carry Godzilla to an alien planet. Or three corvettes working in tandem...

Anyway if you don't need to invade anyone you can just refit the ships to have guns instead. Or if this is also reworking carrier aviation, your hangar-and-nothing-else corvettes have the "Escort Carrier" hull for their single interior module.

e: For extra bonus, a troop carrier ship can storm and board alien ships, with a tiny possibility of seizing the odd ship intact and a much larger chance of causing interior damage and perhaps increasing the value/odds of debris appearing, representing ships that your space marines hosed up and left adrift and intact-ish rather than having been blasted into vapor

There might also be a tech for raider troops, allowing you to scrape off some alloys etc. from enemy ships while doing damage.

Nessus fucked around with this message at 01:33 on Nov 29, 2018

# ? Nov 29, 2018 01:25

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Is this new dlc going to be removing tiles, or is that for a future release?

# ? Nov 29, 2018 01:33

PittTheElder: Feb 13, 2012; Yes, it's like a lava lamp.

This one.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 01:35

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Yessss, I have been holding off playing until that roles out.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 01:43

Nemo2342: Nov 26, 2007; Have A Day; Nap Ghost

The worst part is having to wait for someone to mod it so that I can make a driven assimilator megacorp. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our salesforce.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 06:26

Ciaphas: Nov 20, 2005; > BEWARE, COWARD

Nemo2342 posted:

The worst part is having to wait for someone to mod it so that I can make a driven assimilator megacorp. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our salesforce.

wait who are their customers if they're turning everyone into salesdrones

# ? Nov 29, 2018 06:40

Pylons: Mar 16, 2009

Ciaphas posted:

wait who are their customers if they're turning everyone into salesdrones

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truck_wages

# ? Nov 29, 2018 06:48

Demiurge4: Aug 10, 2011

Distant Worlds has a kind of tile based system with multiple unit types. You have infantry, armour, special forces and planetary defence. Planetary defences have a chance to shoot down troops landing on the planet but have expensive upkeep�s, special forces counter this by rolling to disable them ahead of an invasion. I forget the exact maths on infantry and armour.

Invasion troops move forward on a map screen and it�s all automated but various modifiers affect go, damage and morale.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 06:55

Nessus: Dec 22, 2003; After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!

OK I preordered. All in. I make the best deals, with my best pedipalps.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 08:13

Runa: Feb 13, 2011

I wonder what would happen if there were ground defense stations folded into the Fortress or Planetary Shield improvements that let a planet shoot back against orbital bombardments.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 08:55

Bloodly: Nov 3, 2008; Not as strong as you'd expect.

Demiurge4 posted:

Distant Worlds has a kind of tile based system with multiple unit types. You have infantry, armour, special forces and planetary defence. Planetary defences have a chance to shoot down troops landing on the planet but have expensive upkeep�s, special forces counter this by rolling to disable them ahead of an invasion. I forget the exact maths on infantry and armour.

Invasion troops move forward on a map screen and it�s all automated but various modifiers affect go, damage and morale.

And all races had their own base strength for troopers. It never tells you this in game; you'd have to go file-diving to get the full numbers. It's important because of course by default standard assault infantry are gonna be the mainstay, mostly because things like Armour and Special Forces take more space on transports and take more time and trouble.

There are three ways to vary on that basic system as tech permits.

Elite Troops(+50% to the base strength. The troops produced are Infantry).
Cloning(The most experienced infantry across your empire is cloned. Fairly quick to create).
Robo-troops(Another type of Infantry. Cheap in terms of maintenance, fast to make, but weak. Still there are races that are only as strong as these or weaker.)

Each planet can only have one of these troop buildings at once.
Troops are expensive to keep, also.

Bloodly fucked around with this message at 09:09 on Nov 29, 2018

# ? Nov 29, 2018 08:57

Bedurndurn: Dec 4, 2008

Demon_Corsair posted:

Is this new dlc going to be removing tiles, or is that for a future release?

The patch that comes out the same time as the new DLC is removing the tiles. So you'll be able to check it out and see what you think without having to buy anything.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 09:32

AAAAA! Real Muenster: Jul 12, 2008; My QB is also named Bort

Nessus posted:

I don't know if this was proposed, but why not have a component chunk for ships that lets you install a troop transport or something? Have it be available for all ship classes, although making a corvette-scale troop carrier means it will be unarmed (but your 4 troop corvettes can be screened by the 12 laser corvettes). Upgrades would work something like fighter/bombers do now, with some of the super-powered armies needing larger ships to carry them; I could see that you might need a destroyer to carry Godzilla to an alien planet. Or three corvettes working in tandem...

This isnt me calling you out specifically but this is an example of why the Ground Forces discussion has gone on for the past ~10 pages it feels like. This has been proposed and discussed at length like three times already.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 14:41

Darkrenown: Jul 18, 2012; please give me anything to talk about besides the fact that democrats are allowing millions of americans to be evicted from their homes

In other news:
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/stellaris-dev-diary-136-2-2-le-guin-patch-notes.1132161/

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:00

Dreylad: Jun 19, 2001

The most important new feature is 16 minutes of music. Okay and the worker voice pack.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:06

AAAAA! Real Muenster: Jul 12, 2008; My QB is also named Bort

Darkrenown posted:

In other news:
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/stellaris-dev-diary-136-2-2-le-guin-patch-notes.1132161/

Saving us from ourselves!

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:08

AG3: Feb 4, 2004; Ask me about spending hundreds of dollars on Mass Effect 2 emoticons and Avatars.; Oven Wrangler

Huh, simplified Chinese localization is in. Maybe they'll stop review bombing the game now.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:14

prefect: Sep 11, 2001; No one, Woodhouse.
No one.; Dead Man’s Band

Darkrenown posted:

In other news:
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/stellaris-dev-diary-136-2-2-le-guin-patch-notes.1132161/

Added Shared Burden civic for all your luxury space communism needs, with a new prescripted empire using it, the Kilik Cooperative

:nice:

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:19

Cynic Jester: Apr 11, 2009; Let's put a simile on that face
A dazzling simile
Twinkling like the night sky

Darkrenown posted:

In other news:
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/stellaris-dev-diary-136-2-2-le-guin-patch-notes.1132161/

quote:

#################################################################
######################### VERSION 2.2.0 ###########################
#################################################################

###################
# DESIGNERS' NOTE #
###################

Greetings!

Stellaris has (once again) undergone bold changes! In 2.2 the focus of the changes has been to rework how you develop planets and to deepen the game's economy. The purpose is to make the management of planets more fun and engaging.

Tiles are gone, and have been replaced with Districts, Buildings, and Jobs. You will now instead construct City Districts, Farming Districts, Mining Districts, and Generator Districts, as well as various Buildings with more specialized roles. Districts and buildings provide Jobs, and a job worked by a Pop will produce resources.

As a planet gains more Pops it will unlock more Building Slots. Buildings work similar to how they did before, but now most of them provide Jobs instead of producing resources directly.

2.2 also introduces a new Trade Route system. What you essentially want to do is to collect Trade Value (found in space and produced on planets) by upgrading a nearby starbase. You should then set up a Trade Route leading back to your home system. Trade Value is converted into usable resources when it reaches your Trade Capital.

We recommend you to take a look at the updated tutorial!

###################
# Megacorp Expansion Features
###################

# Megacorps

* Added the Megacorporation empire type, which features unique civics as well as the ability to become an economic powerhouse by spreading branch offices on the planets of other empires

# Ecumenopolis

* Added new ascension perk: Arcology Project, enabling the Decision to convert a planet to an City-World completely covered in urban sprawl

# Xeno-Compatibility

* Added new ascension perk: Xeno-Compatibility, which allows cross-breeding between species

# Universal Transactions

* Added new ascension perk: Universal Transactions, which makes it easier for Megacorporation empires to establish branch offices and commercial pacts

# Caravaneers

* Added the Caravaneers, nomadic space traders who will give unique offers in exchange for a variety of resources, and also offer games of chance in their home system

# New Megastructures

* Added new Megastructures: the Matter Decompressor, Mega-Art Installation, Interstellar Assembly, and Strategic Coordination Center, including ruined versions you can discover

# Slave Market

* Added a galactic Slave Market so you can buy or sell slave Pops (once the Galactic Market is established)

# New Voices and Music

* Added 3 new advisor voice sets as well as 16 minutes of new music (added to the soundtrack DLC as well)

# New Canon Empires

* Added new pre-scripted Empires using Megacorp mechanics, and changed the existing Chinorr to a Megacorp

# Achievements

* Added 10 new achievements

###################
# New Utopia Expansion Features
###################

# Hive Worlds

* Added new ascension perk: Hive Worlds, similar to Machine Worlds but for Hive Minds, which allows them to terraform planets into living planets on which only hive drones can live. Hive Worlds gain a bonus to resource output and are not limited by deposits in how many resource districts they can support

######################
# 2.2 �Le Guin� Free Features
######################

* Added Simplified Chinese localization

* Removed planet/habitat tile system, replaced with districts, jobs

* Pops and Pop Jobs now belong to a social class (Pop Category) that determines their luxury needs. Social classes are ranked, and Pops that belong to a higher social class will refuse to take jobs belonging to a lower class until they demote over time

* Added unemployment for pops without suitable jobs, which lowers planetary stability if their living standards are low

* Added planetary housing, usage of which depends on pop's social strata (rulers and specialists = a lot, slaves and menial labourers = a little)

* More dynamic pop growth system: populations can grow and decline based on their rights, living standards, immigration/emigration

* Added crime. Crime is generated by overcrowding and poor living conditions, and negatively affects planet stability. It can also generate events

* Added new and reworked planetary decisions and empire edicts

* Added new resource types (alloys, consumer goods, etc) which tie in to the economic simulation in many ways, diversifying the domestic activity of empires considerably

* Added the Internal Market, where resources can be converted into other resources at a cost

* Added the Galactic Market, in which all game resources can be bought and sold in open exchange between empires, with prices fluctuating based on supply and demand. This is formed when enough Empires are in contact with each other, replacing the Internal Market. Genocidal empires do not get access to the Galactic Market

* Added trade routes, where you can collect trade value from upgraded starbases and send it back to your trade capital to convert to wealth for your empire. Reworked piracy system to link in to this, and added a patrol order so your fleets can actively suppress piracy

* Added commercial pact diplomatic agreement, where the signatories gain trade value equal to 10% of the other party

* Added empire development based on owned systems, districts, and colonies. It is a soft cap that, when exceeded, applies scaling penalties to leader cost, edict cost, research speed, etc. This replaces the old system of static penalties based only on systems owned, and more accurately reflects the size and complexity of your empire. Development cap can be increased with techs and ascension perks

* Introduced a new concept called Empire Cohesion. Empire Cohesion is increased by each owned system, and decreased by each external hyperlane connection and cut-off (non-owned) system inside your borders. If cohesion loss goes above cohesion gain, you will suffer penalties in the form of increased empire size and the corresponding costs it brings

* Added 9 new basic Mandates relating to your empire's internal economy

* Tweaked army display and ground combat screens, with improved army icons

* Reworked planetary bombardment to produce devastation, which damages housing, amenities, trade value, and pop growth. High devastation will ruin buildings and kill pops

* Reworked sectors to be automatically generated, removing the "mini-economies" and having them directly contribute to your empire stockpiles

* Reworked factions to always give an amount of influence based on their faction approval, rather than having a hard cutoff below which they would contribute nothing

* Reworked the Tradition Trees to synchronize with all the new systems

* Added Shared Burden civic for all your luxury space communism needs, with a new prescripted empire using it, the Kilik Cooperative

* Replaced authoritarian Caste System with Stratified Economy living standards: does not use slavery but has a similar effect (happy rulers, downtrodden masses). Authoritarians can still use species-wide slavery. Slaver guilds civic is now required to enslave own species

* Added alert messages for completing a Megastructure's intermediate upgrade steps

* Added a conclusion to the Strong Magnetic Field events

* Unity Ambitions are now a free feature, and no longer restricted to owners of Apocalypse

* Added new single star custom system options

* Created and implemented new SFX for Natural Wormholes which have been silent until now. No more.

* Since the Chinorr have become a Megacorporation, replaced them in non-Megacorp games with a new prescripted empire, the Glebsig Foundation

* Added technology Resort Worlds that unlocks the ability to designate a colony as a Resort World. This colony will be unable to have districts and most buildings built on it, but will increase amenities and immigration pull across the empire.

* Added tech for Penal Colony worlds which have high crime rates but decrease crime on other planets

* Added a tech for slaver empires to designate a world as a Thrall-World. Thrall-Worlds cannot support city districts or manufacturing/research buildings, but get vastly increased growth rate and access to special buildings and jobs for slaves

* Updated tutorial to explain the new systems

* Added the multiplayer observer mode from the 2.1.4 beta to the default game version

* Added new civic: Byzantine Bureaucracy, that reduces housing/amenities usage and allows for the construction of Bureaucratic Complex building that adds administrator jobs

* Deploy Hunter-Killer Drones decision can now be toggled on and off

* Added a game setup setting for how many habitable worlds are guaranteed to spawn near your starting system

* Research Agreements are now diplomatic actions, rather than being part of trade deals

* End game victory conditions reworked into a score system, tallying up your total empire accomplishment based on size, population, military, tech, federations, and many other measures

* Added some new Colony events.

* Civilian ships are now constructed at starbase rather than planets

* Added pop selection view to colony ship construction in starbases

* Colony ships can now be built populated with any species which you have a migration treaty with

* Colony ships built via the expansion planner will be automatically constructed at the starbase nearest the target planet

* Planets have a decision to stop pop growth, although this comes with a penalty to stability for regular empires.

* Blockers now generally reduce the usable districts on a planet, while clearing them often unlocks additional district types.

* Clearing Blockers can now also give one time bonuses, i.e. clearing a slum grants a pop.

* The homeworld of the First League is now an Ecumenopolis

* Notifications dealing with the player�s own empire are now marked with a golden yellow rim to distinguish them from those affecting only other empires

* Added 6 new corporate-themed empire flags

###################
# Balance
###################

* Improved distribution of space creatures and unique systems

* Leader Capacity has been removed from the game and replaced with energy credits upkeep for each leader

* Subterranean civilization famine event now uses food rather than energy

* Increased the delay between the Prethoryn Vanguard and the main swarm arriving

* You no longer get influence when another empire finishes first contact project before you do

* Teachings of Warriors event now only gives energy as reward for selling to a private collector

* Removed neighbor restrictions on rivals and most CBs

* No longer possible to pick Imperial Prerogative as first ascension perk

* Federation members now automatically have a commercial agreement with each other, but have to pay 15% of their energy credit income in federation taxes

* Federations are now always led by the most powerful member empire rather than having a rotating presidency (25% more power than leader is required to replace an existing president)

* Added a decision to curtail planetary growth through voluntary measures, available to empires that don't allow other forms of growth control. It reduces growth by 75% at the expense of increased pop upkeep

* Reworked relative empire power to be based on fleet power, economic power and tech power (in order of descending importance). Economic power is calculated as the amount of resources produced by the empire each month, multiplied by the base value of said resources, while tech power is calculated by the total cost of researched techs

* Added two new technologies for machine empires that improve pop assembly speed

* Nivlac pops now generally spawn in groups of 15

* Nivlac species trait effect on habitability and pop growth has been significantly reduced

* Added Cadet difficulty setting as an 'easy' level below Ensign, granting the player economic buffs

* Admirals no longer gain the Fleet Logistician trait from a random (MTTH) event

* Changed Forlorn Ruins modifier to be -5% happiness instead of -20%

* Drastically reduced the research cost for Entropic Recursion and Doctrine: Strange Loop, and removed their associated buildings

* Drastically reduced the Machine Uprising's starting fleets so they shouldn't immediately economically collapse

* Habitats now have a monthly alloy upkeep on their capital building

* Strong/Weak traits now have a small effect on worker output

* Culture shock is now a planet modifier rather than a pop modifier

* Assimilation now faster, and planetary culture shock will be removed if there is only hive/cyborg/machine pops on the planet, because free will is a painful illusion

* Xenophobes now get +10%/+20% pop growth instead of claim cost reduction (to balance for not having as much growth from migration, etc)

* Ascension perk Defender of the Galaxy now grants bonus damage against the Tempest too

* Ascension perk Galactic Contender also grants bonus damage vs the gate builders

* Yurt, Vultaum, and Irassian Home systems now have some additional resources

* Having an L-gate in your space increases the odds of rolling gateway tech if you don�t have a regular gateway

* Spiritualist faction will no longer be unhappy about Tomb Worlds if you get Wormed

* Having Psionic pops in your empire allows for the possibility of rolling the Psionic theory tech if not otherwise possible

* Several existing civics have been adjusted to affect the new jobs system: Merchant Guilds, Police State, Agrarian Idyll, Aristocratic Elite, Citizen Service, Exalted Priesthood and Technocracy

*Species trait Thrifty now increases Trade Value production, new trait Ingenious increases Energy Production

* Reduced cost of robo-modding a species

* Reduced the cost of bio-modding a species

* Databanks Uplinks tradition now increases research station output instead of unlocking assist research

* Assist Research is now available from the start of the game

* Ending a resource deal with a merchant enclave early now gives -5 opinion

* Distinguished Admiralty civic effect on admiral level cap reduced from 2 to 1. In addition, the effect on naval capacity has been replaced with ship fire rate

###################
# UI
###################

* Split the policies and edicts view into their own views

* You can now start the game with the "-console" argument and it will dump all console commands to the info.log file

* Added various info about target planets in the Resettlement dropdown list

* Colonization screens only show the list of species and will generate a ship from the closest shipyard

* Species are sorted in habitability order on the colonize "select species" window

* Expansion planner now shows scripted district in a moddable way instead of being hardcoded into energy, minerals, food

* The expansion planner now shows Rare Deposits

* Added navigation sidebar and moved all topbar menu items to it

* Reworked planet battle view to show frontline, reserved and disengaged armies separately

* Standardized colors for displaying cost and time

###################
# AI
###################

* AI now considers the potential resource gain against its system upkeep cost when deciding whether to build an outpost

* Adapted AI to new economy system

* Improved early game economy AI

* AI will now revoke claims it has on empires it wants to maintain a long-term alliance with

###################
# Modding
###################

* Added scriptable leader classes, old classes are now attributes for the new ones

* Added on_crossing_border on-action

* You can now set an arrival_effect on auto_move_to_target, this will fire that scripted effect on arrival

* Added "on_fleet_combat_joined_attacker" and "on_fleet_combat_joined_defender" on_action. Both are fired when fleet enter combat, scopes etc in the file "00_on_actions.txt"

* Added country_trade_fee modifier

* Replaced free_pop_slots trigger with free_housing trigger

* Updated the "if" trigger to work in the same way as the "if" effect: if { limit = {...} } else_if { limit = {...} } else { ... }

* Added define for default trade change

* Added MARKET_FLUCTUATION_EPSILON define to avoid useless calculations

* Added last_building_changed / last_district changed triggers

* Added on_system_lost and on_system_gained on-actions

* Create Species can now accept an event_target for the species class create_species = { class = event_target:caravaneer_fleet2_country.species }

* Most modifiers in the game now take custom_tooltip to print a custom desc

* Added perc_communications_with_playable trigger

* Added "country_immigration_pull_add," "country_immigration_pull_mult," "country_emigration_push_add" and "country_emigration_pull_mult" modifiers. They work like the planet modifiers of the same name, but at country level

* Added triggers "has_rival = <Target>" and "has_overlord=<Target>"

* Added is_half_species trigger

* Added create_half_species effect

* Added country-scoped variants of event pulses. Which countries get these is controlled in country type settings

* Added GetRulerName to localization script in Leader scope

* The "has_colonization_control" trigger now works like other species rights trigger: has_colonization_control = { value = no country =root }

* Added a "can_colonize_with_species" game rule

* It is now possible to directly script a civic as changing the empire's homeworld class, and this will be reflected properly in empire designer

* The number of district types shown in the expansion planner is now fully moddable through a Define ( EXPANSION_VIEW_NUM_DISTRICTS ) However, the gui files must also be changed to have that number of district buttons/icons

* Added set_market_leader effect

* Anomalies with a null_spawn_chance set that are set to only happen once for the country/game will now be blocked from being rolled again if they fail to pass the null spawn chance check, meaning that some anomalies can be made properly rare and not occur in every game

* Added the "diplomacy_economy" database where you can defines upkeep and production of resources for various types of diplomatic relations.

* Added remove_deposit effect

* Added is_deposit_type trigger

* Add define for resource base, min and max price on the market

* Add defines for constants in price change equation

* Buildings can now have a custom tooltip effect

###################
# Bugfixes
###################

* Fixed incorrect starbase Missile Battery description

* Restoring changes to Impossible Organism event to allow Nivlacs to be spawned on any planet, not just the capital

* Fixed Contact Report: Primitives event sometimes fetching the wrong text key

* Fixed incorrect pluralization for Gene Warrior armies

* Fixed a handful of Crystalline Entities not being affected by the Crystal Pacification project

* Fixed the Lokken Mechanists pre-scripted empire using the wrong ruler title

* Fixed a bunch of old sound files that had bad loops or other cruddiness

* Fixed literally unplayable localization bugs

* Removed references to a nonexistent special project in an event chain

* Fixed an edge case where paying off Marauders would cost you nothing

* Fixed "The Xvan Labs" special project spawning in too-distant systems

* Preventing Ketling planets subject to ongoing invasion, orbital bombardment and/or starbase construction from progressing to spacefaring Ketlings

* Fix crash at start when the outliner settings contain double entries

* Fixed Leviathans first contact report not firing in some cases

* Scavenger Bot and Tiyanki Matriarch systems are now flagged as hostile (and guardian) systems

* Fixed bug where upon re-election a ruler would not get a proper new mandate

* Fixed Crisis ambient audio continuing to loop after Crisis has been defeated

* Fixed an issue where Primitives would accumulate too many Ethics over time

* Removed arrow from peace messages since they were misleading

* Added localization that had been missing from Observation events that had been missing since 2015, good golly Miss Molly

* Pacifists are now blocked from Aggressive First Contact protocols, as charming as it was that they had a loophole in their ethical structure that permitted unlimited violence until polite first greetings had been exchanged

* Leviathan Death Notification message should now function

* Fixed the bug when in the MP Lobby create new empire tab was shown beneath custom empires

* Fixed the multiplayer "show players" mapmode being saved and reloaded in single player mode, resulting in all-grey maps

* Fixed tutorial making observer mode outline visible in single player

* Master Builders Ascension Perk no longer applies twice to Habitats

* Marauder fleets now actually show up in the Marauder Vengeance event, rather than merely threatening to do so

* Fixed a crash when deleting an empire led to having a corrupted empire design selected

* Create vassal button now checks properly if a vassal can actually be created

* Fixed multiple contact from same empire

* Fixed empires created by rebellion, being released as a vassal always showing up with grey map colour

* Fixed the "blue solution" sometimes not granting a trait

* The red/green/blue event now adds a custom free trait so as not to mess with trait points.

* There will now always be a minimum of one L-Gate system when playing with the Distant Stars Story Pack, regardless of galaxy size

* Fixed peace deal localization

* Fixed some loc references in post-war messages from Fallen Empires

* Fixed the Horizon Signal event chain sometimes resulting in Pops getting incompatible traits

* Fixed the Grateful Refugee pop modifier potentially stacking (modifier is now instead refreshed if the pop becomes a refugee again)

* Contact Report: Leviathans (story.8) should now fire for all leviathans (will now display a special desc for mechanical leviathans)

* Fixed an issue with terraforming in the Atomic Clock event

* Numerous other bugfixes and performance improvements

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:20

Aethernet: Jan 28, 2009; This is the Captain...

Our glorious political masters have, in their wisdom, decided to form an alliance with a rag-tag bunch of freedom fighters right when the Federation has us at a tactical disadvantage. Unsurprisingly, this has resulted in the Feds firing on our vessels...

Damn you Huxley!; Grimey Drawer

quote:

Added a tech for slaver empires to designate a world as a Thrall-World. Thrall-Worlds cannot support city districts or manufacturing/research buildings, but get vastly increased growth rate and access to special buildings and jobs for slaves

This is an amazing boon to Space Hitlers everywhere.

Not sure how the new sectors will work - will literally only your starting cluster be under your direct control?

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:28

OwlFancier: Aug 22, 2013

Aethernet posted:

This is an amazing boon to Space Hitlers everywhere.

Not sure how the new sectors will work - will literally only your starting cluster be under your direct control?

I believe the idea is that your core sector is whichever one your capital is located in.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:31

Splicer: Oct 16, 2006; from hell's heart I cast at thee
🧙🐀🧹🌙🪄🐸

Darkrenown posted:

In other news:
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/stellaris-dev-diary-136-2-2-le-guin-patch-notes.1132161/

* Added alert messages for completing a Megastructure's intermediate upgrade steps

* Notifications dealing with the player�s own empire are now marked with a golden yellow rim to distinguish them from those affecting only other empires

* You no longer get influence when another empire finishes first contact project before you do

* Added a decision to curtail planetary growth through voluntary measures, available to empires that don't allow other forms of growth control. It reduces growth by 75% at the expense of increased pop upkeep

I am running dangerously low on things to complain about.

Splicer fucked around with this message at 15:38 on Nov 29, 2018

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:33

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? May 20, 2024 16:45

Splicer: Oct 16, 2006; from hell's heart I cast at thee
🧙🐀🧹🌙🪄🐸

Aethernet posted:

This is an amazing boon to Space Hitlers everywhere.

Not sure how the new sectors will work - will literally only your starting cluster be under your direct control?

Sectors are generates based on terrain. If I recall correctly all planets remain entirely under your control, or you can assign a governor to semi-automate a sector for you.

# ? Nov 29, 2018 15:36

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Stellaris: a second Astral Planes has hit the game

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