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Stellaris Dev Diary #15 - Fallen Empires

Hello and happy new year! I’ll be your substitute Doomdark for today and in this week’s dev diary we’ll take a closer look at Fallen Empires.

The galaxy is vast, old and unknown. New species constantly flare into existence and some are even able to take their first cautious steps towards other stars. Of those that do some are arrogant enough to assume that they are the first and only chosen. They fail to realize that others may have taken those same steps before them, others who have found amazing wonders and unraveled their secrets, others who reached the furthest edges of knowledge only to crumble away. Those others are called Fallen Empires.

These are once-glorious empires that for unknown reasons have stagnated and often fallen to infighting or crippling apathy. That which once covered hundreds of systems have shrunk to a fraction, barely held on to by superior technology and what little remains of a once glorious fleet. Fallen Empires are isolationist and will look at newer species with disinterest or outright contempt. Diplomatic attempts are futile and they will most likely attack any unknown ships entering one of their remaining systems.

stellaris_dev_diary_14_01_20160104_diplomatic_contact.jpg

The response of Fallen Empires vary greatly when approached. It is rarely friendly though.

Design Reasoning

We’ve added Fallen Empires to the game for a couple of reasons. They have the potential to enable some really cool stories and there is a bunch of different directions we can take to ensure players get a different experience from game to game. Players should never feel confident in how a Fallen Empire may react to different events in the galaxy. If left alone they might resurge as a reaction to a galaxy-wide threat or become outraged when their most holy planets are colonized by lesser races.

Gameplay-wise the Fallen Empires can act as a potential source of advanced technology for players willing to invest the military forces required to defeat one of their fleets in battle. In Stellaris, all ships destroyed in combat will leave debris behind and through reverse engineering a player may discover the technologies required to build the weapons and components equipped by those ships. Players can also invade planets belonging to Fallen Empires, allowing them to utilize whatever advanced buildings placed there. This of course means dealing with a new species within the Empire.
While the rewards may be tempting, players may want to consider the risks before attacking a Fallen Empire. Who knows what horrors they have unearthed during the ages, what forbidden secrets their planets hold within, what captives might be unleashed should their wardens be struck down.

stellaris_dev_diary_14_02_20160104_fallen_empire.jpg

Fallen Empires will use a separate series of models for their ships and stations.

Next week the good Goosecreature will be back with a dev diary on the events and mishaps that may befall colonies and their inhabitants. Until then!
 
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Well I see many have noticed and commented on the fasces, but in the same screenshot there are also (perhaps less obvious but IMO still clear) Wheel-of-Dharma and Lotus symbols. I guess this is something like an "ethos" mapmode?

I doubt it. For one thing, the Wheel and the Lotus seem like they would be very similar, and the fusion of ethos don't seem like they can be categorized so easily as ideologies. Plus, just like say the religion map mode or the culture map mode, wouldn't it make more sense put down the name of the ideology/ethos combo over each empire, not their actual name?

Also, how do you guys think one is marked as a Fallen Empire, my idea was that I was thinking it'd be that you trigger an end-game event (which the Devs said may not necessarily happen late-game), and barely survive it, lose over half of your systems, maybe even two-thirds, either to rebellion, other nations, or death from the end-game event. Maybe this triggers an event that flags you as a 'Fallen Empire'? Maybe that even causes an ethos shift towards xenophobic as "your people" are now wary of the galaxy?
 
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What would be hard to fathom would be if aliens imbued such symbols with the same or similar meaning as human cultures.
How do you know that they don't have different meanings?

The sun cross could be a symbol for the Solarianism faith, with the four hands of the Cross repersenting different things in the universe that are all part of the cosmos and with the sun in the center to repersent the divine spark within us all.
 
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Can someone explain these borders to me? It appears that the precursor race controls the bright orange area (pretty impressive for a fallen empire) but what is the more pale/transparent orange area? Is that their area of influence, the area they claim or used to occupy (de jure?), or something else?

I think that just means the player has explored the area or that it's not covered in FoW.
 
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Can someone explain these borders to me? It appears that the precursor race controls the bright orange area (pretty impressive for a fallen empire) but what is the more pale/transparent orange area? Is that their area of influence, the area they claim or used to occupy (de jure?), or something else?

It's just where the FoW has been lifted by the player
 
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Can someone explain these borders to me? It appears that the precursor race controls the bright orange area (pretty impressive for a fallen empire) but what is the more pale/transparent orange area? Is that their area of influence, the area they claim or used to occupy (de jure?), or something else?
I think it's the color of the galaxy, the galaxy seems to be gray until you discover areas and explore it.
 
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Well I see many have noticed and commented on the fasces, but in the same screenshot there are also (perhaps less obvious but IMO still clear) Wheel-of-Dharma and Lotus symbols. I guess this is something like an "ethos" mapmode?

it's the standard political mapmode, in Stellaris (from what we can tell from screenshots and videos anyway) you map color is the background color of your "flag", when zoomed out your "flag logo/symbol" and your nation's name appear over your territory. I quite like it, it make it pretty easy to get a hang of the galactic "who's who"
 
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What would be hard to fathom would be if aliens imbued such symbols with the same or similar meaning as human cultures.

But how do you know that this fallen empire does use it as a fascist symbol?
 
Thanks! Looks like they just beelined it towards the precursor race instead of exploring their immediate area, which confused me.
Presumably they just wanted a shot for the dev diary.

Also note that they apparently passed through the Dharma-Wheel people to get there (since the player is the Jehetma Dominion, and the only explored path passes through that system). Which brings up questions about military access agreements...
 
Actually I have a few questions that occur to me:

1. If Fallen Empires resurge can/will they join Federations?

2. If fallen Empires resurge will they pursue new scientific advancements?

3. Will any of the Fallen Empires be elves?
1. An interesting possibility. I do not see why not.

2. I'd imagine they might have a separate tech tree to research from?

3. Oh for the love of.... If the answer is "Yes", then, I do not care how dangerous their tech is, I will do everything in my power to eradicate them.
 
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Will we find empires that no longer exist? It would be cool to be able to do some light archaeology on their planets and learn about these ancient races. Studying them could unlock new technology, or show the location of something hidden in the galaxy.
 
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Fallen Empires where one of the things i was looking forward to finding out about the most, so this was awesome.

"Who knows what horrors they have unearthed during the ages, what forbidden secrets their planets hold within, what captives might be unleashed should their wardens be struck down."

Hmm, you would think that would drive me away and stop me from attacking them, but the priiiiiize.
It's like "cotton candy" in DF!
Huh, when you said fallen empires, I assumed you meant a one or two planet domain. That empire looks massive!
Well, the Imperium of Man isn't exactly tiny either...
 
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I am somewhat worried that these fallen empires could block species / races that use warp lanes from expanding through their territory, but not the other 2 types of space travel. How will this balance issue be dealt with?

why would the other means of travel also not be blocked by a fallen empire?
 
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