Hello everyone and welcome to another Stellaris development diary. Today's dev diary will be focusing on the road ahead after Cherryh and Apocalypse, and our long-term priorities going forward.

Cherryh Post-Release Support
As mention in last week's dev diary, the immediate priority for the team is post-release support for Cherryh and Apocalypse, fixing bugs, addressing balance/feature feedback, and working on quality of life and performance improvements. We are maintaining a running 2.0.2 beta patch which we will continue to update every few days or so until we are happy with the state of the game.

The Post-Apocalypse
Apocalypse and Cherryh were an expansion/patch focused almost exclusively on war, and with it out, we are now going to be moving on to other, non-war related priorities for future updates, expansions and story packs. To give you an idea of what's coming, we're going to revisit the list of long-term goals for Stellaris I made and updated for Dev Diary #50 and Dev Diary #69. This time, we're going to organize the goals into the ones we feel have been delivered on, old goals that were added to the list before 2.0, and new goals that we have set for ourselves after 2.0 (there is no prioritization difference between goals based on when they were added or whether they are considered old or new for this particular list).

As before, the list is NOT in order of priority, and something being considered completed NOT mean we aren't going to continue to improve on it in future updates, just that we consider it to be at a satisfactory level.

As before, THIS IS NOT AN EXHAUSTIVE OR FINAL LIST, NOTHING NOT ALREADY COMPLETED IS CERTAIN TO HAPPEN AND THERE ARE NO ETAS

Completed Goals

• Ship appearance that differs for each empire, so no two empires' ships look exactly the same.
• More potential for empire customization, ability to build competitive 'tall' empires.
• Global food that can be shared between planets.
• Ability to construct space habitats and ringworlds.
• Factions that are proper interest groups with specific likes and dislikes and the potential to be a benefit to an empire instead of just being rebels.
• Ability to set rights and obligations for particular species in your empire.
• Buildable Dreadnoughts and Titans.
• Deeper mechanics and unique portraits for synthetics.
• Reworking the endgame crises to be more balanced against each other and the size/state of the galaxy.
• Reworks to war to address the 'doomstacks' issue and make the strategic and tactical layers of warfare more interesting and less micro-intensive.
• Superweapons and planet killers.

Old Goals

• A 'galactic community' with interstellar politics and a 'space UN'.
• Deeper Federations that start out as loose alliances and can eventually be turned into single states through diplomatic manuevering.
• More story events and reactive narratives that give a sense of an unfolding story as you play.
• More interesting mechanics for pre-FTL civilizations.
• 'Living systems', making empire systems feel more alive and lived in

New Goals

• Less micromanagement and more focus on interesting choices in regards to planets, the ability to grow planets beyond current fixed size.
• Empire trade mechanics and trade agreements.
• A galactic market where resources and strategic resources can be imported and exported.
• Espionage and sabotage mechanics.
• Improved galaxy/hyperlane generation with better placed systems and dangers.
• More anomalies and unique systems to explore.

That's all for today! Over the next few weeks, dev diaries will continue to focus on post-release support. Feature dev diaries will resume when we have new features to talk about. Finishing off this dev diary is a screenshot of how we're reworking difficulty modes in the next update to the rolling 2.0.2 beta:

 

[Zhuljin]

Really looking forward to Espionage \ Diplomacy \ Trade Improvements.
Keep up the great work!

 

[maccyb]

I have spent the last week bitching about the AI getting hidden bonuses. I am pretty happy that the developers are addressing that issue. It made me reinstall the game in fact. I can learn to live with or mod everything else so I am looking forward to whatever else Paradox can do with the new patches.

 

[Spartan322]

It's interesting that if Captain is the equivalent of Normal that the AI is still going to get some bonuses. Many competing Space 4X games do NOT give the AI buffs on Normal. It's traditionally the level known for the AI and player to be playing the same game. Specific recent examples are Gal Civ III, Endless Space 2 and Distant Worlds. None of them have the equivalent of half maintenance bonuses for the AI on Normal. The Distant Worlds AI even simulates vision and has to explore as does Gal Civ III these days (wasn't always the case).

Being previously unaware of those hidden bonuses, I had thought the AI was in relatively good shape compared to other games. Particularly when it comes to planet management it's highly likely the AI is actually not strong as compared to it's competition in the market, although of course that is hard to evaluate objectively. Either way, I would propose the buffs are removed from Normal entirely, and there is also consideration of improving AI planet management in particular.

Just to point out that there is almost no game with AI that has any type of challenge if its not given buffs against the player. From strategy to action games, AI in games is incredibly stupid and doesn't have the ability to evolve and adapt. Its using shortcuts to appear to simulate that. This is why humans can easily out-think AI, even if in a technical way the AI understands the game better. In truth I personally think we should stop referring to AI in games as AI because its misleading and attributes to an entity that can think and shares some type of conscious intention, it makes many people believe its an actual AI when its not, even for many players who understand that it doesn't its fairly common for them to be confused by the term. Let me say this once and for all: even if the computational reaction system that is employed (because its not an AI, its generally a weight and reaction task system that takes few resources to manage) were to be good enough to seemingly manage things right enough its going to be dumber then a human even if you model it after one. It can't think, reason, play logistics well, and most certainly can't change behavior on its own, so all it does is flatline. In any case Stellaris doesn't exactly feel like a 4X game, at the very least its a very huge distinction from that genre at all and that kinda exacerbates the issue.

On an unrelated note, I think something that would help a lot is giving buildings, modules, upgrades, etc. the ability to be queued before the requirements are finished, but only if they are to be finished sequentially (or even make it so if you try to upgrade a building that needs another building it queues the prerequisites first) and maybe even add an ability to queue buildings like upgrading ships where it waits to actually do so until you have the resources. The games I've had this in always felt a lot smoother and less agitating bits of micro because I already pre-designated everything and didn't need to come back as much.

 

[kgptzac]

I'm highly skeptical of the need to have 6 tiers of AI because, let's face it, scripting AI well is hard, and I'm not convinced that the devs can magically come up 6 gradually, balanced, and meaningfully distinctive tiers of the AI. I can only wish that at least one of them are relatively bugless by the time of their inception.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

I'm highly skeptical of the need to have 6 tiers of AI because, let's face it, scripting AI well is hard, and I'm not convinced that the devs can magically come up 6 gradually, balanced, and meaningfully distinctive tiers of the AI. I can only wish that at least one of them are relatively bugless by the time of their inception.

Its not really tiers of AI- it's tiers of AI crutches/bonuses.

The AI will be the same for each of them, it'll just get more discounts and bonus research etc. the higher the difficulty.

 

[Wolfgang I]

Will vassal status still remove the difficulty related AI bonuses?
I would like to see an independence war at some point but vassalization cripples insane AIs and usually causes a deficit from which they do not recover.

Maybe the income or fleet cap you gain from tributaries/vassals should be reduced on higher difficulties instead?

 

[whowhatwhyhow]

I really hope that governments/leaders get some attention in the diplomacy update. There's really nothing interesting, mechanics-wise, separating the government types other than how frequently your ruler gets replaced and some differences in available civics. Leaders themselves aren't remotely memorable or interesting; they're just +10% research-speed guy #2 or whatever.

Agree completely; would be cool to have some more flavors to leaders; as well as a historical record of your rulers and their accomplishments / failures, etc.

 

[Bearjuden]

It's a 4X. Symmetrical game mechanics give the player a huge advantage.

Everyone's gotta' start somewhere...this game is better than your typical Paradox game, but it's still a lot to be introduced to. Even if you never use it, it makes the game a little bit more accessible to other people. CIv, for example, has 'em, despite being a 4X game.

I agree with @BrokenSky, personally. It would take minimal effort to put in and does literally no harm to anyone else if it is included. What's the worst thing that happens? You never use it?

 

[Bearjuden]

Also @Wiz, I notice that factions are under "Completed Goals". While they are obviously far improved from where they started, this doesn't preclude further work on them, right? Because there is generally a point in game where you can just...stop worrying about them at all, and it is paradoxically at the time when they should matter more than ever! Once you stop colonizing so much you stop needing so much influence. On top of that, this is further into the game, so you've already probably unlocked a tradition and done some things to make a few chosen factions happy. Yet once the empire is stable and everyone is jostling for position in your developed empire rather than being a backwater, intimidated by the gunships of the central government...this is when factions should be at their most rowdy, and thus this is when it shows how underdeveloped they still are as compared to what they maybe could be.

This is not of course to knock you or your work. Thank you for your time and dedication to this game, it's great

 

[Spartan322]

Also @Wiz, I notice that factions are under "Completed Goals". While they are obviously far improved from where they started, this doesn't preclude further work on them, right? Because there is generally a point in game where you can just...stop worrying about them at all, and it is paradoxically at the time when they should matter more than ever! Once you stop colonizing so much you stop needing so much influence. On top of that, this is further into the game, so you've already probably unlocked a tradition and done some things to make a few chosen factions happy. Yet once the empire is stable and everyone is jostling for position in your developed empire rather than being a backwater, intimidated by the gunships of the central government...this is when factions should be at their most rowdy, and thus this is when it shows how underdeveloped they still are as compared to what they maybe could be.

This is not of course to knock you or your work. Thank you for your time and dedication to this game, it's great

Didn't he already say that anything in the completed pile isn't voided from getting improvements? (I mean its just above the list and he merely states they're satisfactory enough, which I'm assuming means they're not a top priority and will be improved more slowly then the more primary unfulfilled goals)

 

[Bearjuden]

Didn't he already say that anything in the completed pile isn't voided from getting improvements? (I mean its just above the list and he merely states they're satisfactory enough, which I'm assuming means they're not a top priority and will be improved more slowly then the more primary unfulfilled goals)

Oh. So he did. Never mind then! I'm clearly not thinking straight.

 

[Destruction935]

is it possible to tag FE borders for time limited special projects like this one to not spawn there. this FE made my second favorite special project fail.

 

[Jin_Cardassian]

IF you absolutely must, connect it to how much information you have to govern/war/conduct diplomacy with. Make it so we don't instantly know the species characteristics of never-before-seen aliens, their government policies etc, what tech they use, what systems they own, where their starbases are, etc. Also, if I'm running a non-democratic government, make me not know who is and isn't in the opposition factions, unless I have proper intelligence/security services. Let me send support to like-minded factions in other empires. Make openness of society have some benefits and weaknesses that make it play different from closed ones (have different accesses and needs of access to information).

We have no intention of adding espionage just to add espionage. If that's what we were going to do we'd have done so already.

@Wiz Hey Wiz, I had a question regarding an earlier statement you made when announcing the 2.0 changes to surveying. This was in regard to how establishing communications with another empire automatically gives you knowledge of their systems. At the time some people objected to the idea of xenophobes and the like automatically giving this information out to any alien they meet. You mentioned that the ability to conceal/reveal systems info might be made optional in the future, but this would depend on more developed diplomacy/espionage systems.

Can you confirm if this is on the table to be included in those systems now?

Great job with the 2.0 changes so far. Really looking forward to the changes still to come.

 

[James Fire]

We need a button or something that we can hold while giving move orders to tell the fleet to not use any wormholes or Gateways. I want you to travel through the enemy systems so you will capture them dammit!

 

[Bearjuden]

We need a button or something that we can hold while giving move orders to tell the fleet to not use any wormholes or Gateways. I want you to travel through the enemy systems so you will capture them dammit!

Shift+click at intermediate stages? So if you want to go to a system 10 systems away, shift click on every other system or so on the way there. That way each jump is probably short enough that it will think "slowboating is faster than using a gateway" even though the net trip would be faster with a gateway.

 

[lyndonguitar]

i hope you solve the annoying mechanic in 'total war' casus belli if you have allies or vassals, cause whoever has the most claim in a system instantly gets that system, regardless of who declared war or who took that system. you can't claim systems either to outbid their claims, so you have no control which territory will end up yours or not.

great updates and goals though! im excited for future diplomacy options

 

[Etrutian]

For building robot pops there was a QOL change made so we could build a lot of pops quickly; When will we see the same feature for buildings?

What are the odds we could see more planet modifiers (such as Lush or Hallucinogenic)?


Keep killing it Wiz, thanks for the stellar work!

 

[Person012345]

On victory conditions: I really have no love for victory conditions and don't see any need or point for them. However, I do understand that they are sort of important to quite a number of people and I think if they are to be in the game, they should be done right and more fleshed out. So my preferred way of doing them, would be tying them to ethics or government type or something. Maybe even making them selectable into limited slots like civics in race creation, so that if someone wants to pursue a victory condition they can choose one or two that fits the intended playstyle of the race. There should be plenty that do suit different styles of play and the sort of things that different ethics types might consider "victory" over the galaxy. As they are I don't really think they're all that fulfilling to anyone and give the wrong impression that there is only one real "correct" playstyle (that of domination). Which leads to problems on the forums between people who think that the victory conditions are the sole criteria that should be "balanced" around and those who don't care about them.

 

[Popenhauzen]

regarding micro ans qol improvements:

hotkeys! give me a hotkey about surveying,so that i dont have to first click on thr survey button. give me a hotkey about mining/tech station and outpost. give me a macro about building buildings like l for labs,m for mines, e for power plants(though of course build multiple is ideal like you can do with robots.)

also the ability to have a menu show up when you hover on a system in galaxy map, so you pick which resource stations to build.

overall really liking the update, and opening planets through galaxy shields was sweeeeet.

 

[tigershark13]

Diplomacy changes, for someone who loves his pacifists/xenophiles are most welcome!

One thing I would also like to see is more interesting transfers of power internally, factions have more impact in elections and influence build-up being more important for dictatorships/monarchies.

Way I see it, if the player can't spend the influence to "ensure the line of succession" then a power struggle (either behind the scenes or actual military conflicts, depending upon ethics, unrest etc.) should ensue, this could take the form of assassinations, soviet style "purges" of the leadership castes, faction conflicts (E.G. two large factions may engage in cut throat politics in an attempt to get their chosen candidate into place, the player can try influence things but it may break out into civil war if mismanaged) Authoritarian empires would find managing this internal pressure easier and have a lesser influence cost (representing a more well defined line of succession)

Democracies could also have a similar setup, whereby single factions or leaders consistently remaining in power could undermine democratic tradition and lead to coups, (military or otherwise) in non-egalitarian empires, that sort of thing. It would really help to shake-up the midgame and we'd potential see more opportunities for major political shifts in the galaxy (and thus alliance shifts), it could help the universe to feel less static.