Stellaris Dev Diary #143 - Changes to megastructures

[Nahadoth]

So it is very much possible that I end up in a game where I never see any of them due to bad RNG?
That's less than stellar...

I've never played a game where I didnt have every rare tech unlocked by 2400 at the latest.

 

[LystAP]

The infamous society research slant...

They did sorta of fixed it for machine empire, coordinator used to give only society but was split up, but unfortunately overall society is still bit too high for my taste.

Accordingly, I support this proposal for this reason if nothing else!

There's also the fact ecumonopolises give society too. Once you ran out of minerals, you just have trade value to produce consumer goods and build tons of research ecumonopolises with Leisure districts to fill out jobs.

 

[verybad]

Give us builder leaders that are extremely expensive, but required to have at the site where the megastructure is being built. Have the building leaders give a bonus to regular building on colonies and perhaps some megastructures requiring leaders with particular skills. ie They're useful at colonies, but necessary at super structures.

Now, make it so that some MegaCorp skills/techs can allow them to pick up and rent these building leaders for much cheaper rates (relatively) so they (the MegaCorp) can make some cash themselves. Give MegaCorp's the capability to be MegaCorps.

On this trend, how about MegaCorps being able to build better building ships or have more uses for them? Making MegaCorp investment in your empire in order to cut down the cost of that Ecumenopolis would IMO be kind of cool....

 

[Millbot]

Change sounds reasonable. Could you look into the following

-Habitats, these either need to be baseline since some setups work with them or they need a seriously rework to be in a spot where they are useful in most setups. There really should be a cap on how many an empire can build. This would help with performance in late game; especially, with the AI loving to spam them. Not to mention with the current meta being "more population!," not having a cap setups up a scenario where players can be easily annoyed by both AI controlled empires and other players because their ends up being 4+ colonies in every system hat need to be cleared/occupied. They also shouldn't require another perk to add more districts (I'm not a fan at all of trying to go for setups that force uniqueness of empires by locking it all behind megastructures because those don't exactly impact playstyle nor do most of them strike me as being something that an empire wouldn't build (strategic coordination center, mega art installation & intergalactic assembly are the only three I can think of where an empire might not think of building them).

-Ringworlds need to be more sexy; especially, if they are supposed to be a big ascension perk choice. Should start with giving them unique districts, making them not cost more admin capacity than a 25 sized planet. They should probably also get unique buildings, they span an entire system.

-Resource generation of Dyson Spheres and Matter Decompressor need to be revisited. A large, mineral rich planet shouldn't come close to close what the decompressor can do and with enough repeatable mining improvements, it's possible to get such a planet ahead of the decompressor (mind you it's a bit hard if your balancing all your tech). Same deal with Dyson Sphere vs large planets geared towards energy production. From the get go both megastructures should make large specialized worlds in what they do, look like a joke. Ringworlds get a bit trickier, they shouldn't every overtake the Dyson Sphere, but shouldn't be close, while also being able to get far ahead of normal generator planets. In short, the two megastructures should produce more than 1k resources baseline & they probably should start benefiting from the repeatable tech, so they always stay far ahead.

-Intergalactic Assembly shouldn't be an option for Devouring Swarm & Fanatical Purifier. The whole point is they don't do diplomacy because they are out to kill everyone else. Heck, the swarm gets zero benefit from the structure with normal empires because it has no immigration. We should also see some variations on the structure based on empire type because normal machine empires & normal hive mind don't benefit from immigration, but they can do diplomacy; however, they don't make consumer goods. Not sure how'd you fit the non-standard machine empires in, I'm still trying to figure out how they interplay with each other. I do think they should get something. Also inner perfectionist probably should get something different, they're less interest in galactic affairs short of keeping the xenos out of their backyard.

-Intergalactic Assembly & any variants should give the player access to long term project that costs influence, which when complete adds a permanent positive opinion modifier to an eligible targeted empire.

-Influence costs & gains probably should evaluated. Namely, there needs to be more sources of influence in the mid and late game, where we've already found all the empires that currently exist and have burned through all the anomalies that might aware influence.

-I don't want to see a ton of these get locked behind perks because I think that would do zero to address several issues that people have. Namely, a ton of empires feeling samey. I would like to see something in place to give players more control and be less at the mercy of RNG. I'm also not wild about these structures being put behind mega engineering (could we lock them behind citadel tech instead, they're just giant specialized space stations) because we already need that to fix ruined megastructures IIRC). I'd like to see them come into play earlier than they currently do, while also not coming online at the same time that we can get ruined megastructures online.

-Could we also split the engineering tech tree in two because it's already rather bloated IMO.

 

[G S Palmer]

Here are a few things I feel are necessary to improve megastructures:

• Remove the limit on Dyson Spheres and Matter Decompressors. They just produce basic resources: we should be able to build as many as we want. I understand the only-one limit on Strategic Coordination Center, Science Nexus, Sentry Array, Mega-Art Installation, and the Interstellar Assembly, but why these?
• Allow us to build 2 at a time if we take Master Builders.
• Buff Dyson Spheres, Ringworlds, and Habitats. The reasons for doing so have been pointed out by many people above. Especially ringworlds: they should feel amazing to build just like your first ecumenopolis is.
• Lastly, please change the art for ringworlds and connect the sections. They're a massive ringworld: why is it only 4 tiny sections? You can leave them the same size district-wise, but please, if I build an entire ringworld, I want it to look like one.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

Will they be looking at civics? Like Philosopher King, which is nearly useless with all the boosts in-game.

They said they plan to rework as many civics as possible to be more in line with ones like the reworked "Warrior Culture" in the last(?) dev diary.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

• Lastly, please change the art for ringworlds and connect the sections. They're a massive ringworld: why is it only 4 tiny sections? You can leave them the same size district-wise, but please, if I build an entire ringworld, I want it to look like one.

I think the "disconnected habitats with infrastructure segments between them" look is quite unique and memorable, actually. I'd hate to see it replaced with a more generic look.

 

[G S Palmer]

I think the "disconnected habitats with infrastructure segments between them" look is quite unique and memorable, actually. I'd hate to see it replaced with a more generic look.

Why? Part of the joy of a ringworld is knowing that it is an absolutely massive structure that surrounds an entire star. Imagine being able to look up at a sun and think "you know, I could walk all the way around that (if I could live long enough)." That's part of what's so amazing about them. As they are, they're just a few boring plates suspended from a big wire hoop.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

Why? Part of the joy of a ringworld is knowing that it is an absolutely massive structure that surrounds an entire star. Imagine being able to look up at a sun and think "you know, I could walk all the way around that (if I could live long enough)." That's part of what's so amazing about them. As they are, they're just a few boring plates suspended from a big wire hoop.

I value a unique and memorable visual in this case moreso than I value conformity with other media.

Stellaris ringworlds look different than most ringworlds and that's precisely why I like them. Their appearance has no intrinsic impact on the way they mechanically work, and four out of twelve segments being incomprehensibly giant landmasses isn't really any less impressive to me.

 

[Delthor]

These changes are cool, but I'd like to echo the sentiment that ringworlds are very underwhelming. Now comparing ringworlds to ecumenopolises, ringworlds require a later ascension perk, way more resources invested, and you also have to spend time researching a tech now. Yet ecumenopolises totally outclass ringworlds with their absurdly overpowered districts and growth bonus. Energy and food just aren't valuable enough to be worth the massive investment, since they're not a limiting factor in most empires so late in the game.

 

[tobias.mb]

since you want the visuals to also reflect that.

I already hated that argument deeply when it was the reason we couldn't modify our spaceport weapons however we like.

Please understand that there are players who couldn't care less about visuals when they stand in the way of improving a mechanic.
I'm not saying I am content looking only at tables - Stellaris is still a game after all (and I appreciate how nice the game looks; don't get me wrong). But the same model for different levels of habitat is absolutely fine for me!

 

[wthree]

yay, this is what we need.

Making megastructures even more useless than they already are.

They are already far enough into the game that they don't really become a thing until you've essentially already won.

 

[Methone]

yay, this is what we need.

Making megastructures even more useless than they already are.

They are already far enough into the game that they don't really become a thing until you've essentially already won.

Not everything has to have a brutal minmax purpose. Kick out Resort, Prison, and Thrall worlds while you're at it. Oh, and also every ship type that isn't an Alpha Strike Battleship. Colossus too. Oh, and half the ascension perks...

 

[glee8e]

I don't quite understand the crowd fasinating about "making choice" here. There are people who'd build every single megastructures avaliable here. We just want a powerful empire that can master everything. Yes, yes, specialisation is good. But if we can master everything why don't we do that? You guys are just forcing the others to accept your gaming philosophy like certain Awakened Empires.

 

[Kuronan]

These changes are cool, but I'd like to echo the sentiment that ringworlds are very underwhelming. Now comparing ringworlds to ecumenopolises

Let's be real: EVERYTHING is crap compared to Ecumonpoli. Ecumonpoli break the game balance just because the districts just offer way too much without any special resource maintenance. If you have the raw minerals to feed them and the food to feed the workers (or energy for robots) you can basically win the game with just one Foundry World. Those things just offer way too many jobs without any special resource requirement. At least with Consumer Goods you can neglect them with a trade policy, but Alloys? Most expensive thing in the game to keep in production.

Getting back to topic... Ring Worlds: The Segments are too large. hat was once 100 population slots is now 200, and with the new Administration Cap system, you'd need the equivalent of 1/10th of the largest galaxy size possible to make full use of them, ignoring the massive amount of population each Ring World will demand of you. Furthermore, Ring Worlds should absolutely have a third district. Since Ecumonpoli handle Consumer Goods, Alloys, Trade and Unity, I'd argue the Ring World's fourth district should be Science to make it competitive.

Cut district number in half to reduce bloat, add a Science District, now Ring Worlds are worth a damn.

 

[Attelwyn]

I had an idea, but I didn't bother reading through all the pages here to see if anyone has had the same idea, so if you did, I apologize.

What if, instead of Rare Technologies, the wonders were tied to the Tradition finishers.
So that by finishing Exploration, you unlock Habitats for example.
Even if you unlock some early that way, you still wouldn't be able to produce them for quite some time because of the cost.
Going through all the Traditions, I figured something like this:

Exploration - Habitats
Domination - Sentry Array
Prosperity - ??? (Dyson Sphere?)
Harmony - Mega Art Installation
Supremacy - Strategic Coordination Center
Diplomacy - Interstellar Assembly
Discovery - Science Nexus

Which leaves Ring World and Matter Compressor, and possible Dyson Sphere at the perk.
The main problem I see with this is way of doing it, is racial types that have other Traditions.
But on the other hand, this can also be a reason to come up with some new Galactic Wonders you can only get by having those exclusive Traditions. And maybe one for Prosperity too.

 

[Millbot]

Also would love to see planetary ringworlds added; especially, if they scaled with planet size. Like how gigastructures goes about it.

 

[pryr]

Can't say that i happy with this change. Now it will be harder to focus on mega-structures for tall empires. Unity was always ahead of science for tall empires, and now half of mega-structure choices will be delayed for a long time.
And wide empires got half of mega structures for free.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

I don't quite understand the crowd fasinating about "making choice" here. There are people who'd build every single megastructures avaliable here. We just want a powerful empire that can master everything. Yes, yes, specialisation is good. But if we can master everything why don't we do that? You guys are just forcing the others to accept your gaming philosophy like certain Awakened Empires.

Meaningful choices make for deeper, more engaging gameplay.

Nothing stops you from using mods if you want to make an ultra-mega-super empire that can do everything equally well- that's what stuff like "take all three Ascension Paths at once" mods are for.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

What if, instead of Rare Technologies, the wonders were tied to the Tradition finishers.

Ew, no. Then you'd always unlock the same megastructures every game that ran long enough to unlock all trees- which is most games.

Tying them to other Perks (like the science nexus being tied to Technological Ascendancy) would mean that different empires would wind up with radically different options depending on the Perks they took.