Stellaris Dev Diary #158 - Federation rework

[MateuszS]

Why do some ethics get special federations they can only start and other ethics get nothing? How come spiritualist, xenophobes, egalitarians, pacifists, and xenophiles get nothing?

I suppose that being in federation already suggests that you like high-level degree of cooperation with others, so xenophiles would fit most of them. Same goes for non-IP pacifists .
On the other hand, xenophobes wouldn't like equal coopoeration (Working with xenos? Argh!), yet they should being able to form hegemony.

 

[Eled the Worm Tamer]

Can't say that I am impressed by the materialist's research federation, the upper reaches of the tech tree are full of rather blah incremental % improvements and its too easy to get a tech advantage as is.

 

[pekkegnito]

Now we need an equivalent system to deal with Subjects...

Like, we could demand subjects to provide X amount of fleet capacity, Y percentage of minerals and energy, ban them from researching some particular tech branches (no AI for you, heathen!) and require them to provide armies...

From what I see, this expansion would be a perfect framework for a better subject management system.

 

[Tyrannical Prince]

@grekulf

Fleet contribution you mean?

Centralization and Level are different things. The level determines the max option you can select. Centralization is a sub restriction. You may actually not want more centralization but you'll always want a higher fed level.

 

[The Exile]

Um... yeah i think you are right. Silly me, i think i read other thing distracted with the images problem

No worries. To be fair, it was a little awkwardly stated -- and as a game designer I'm sympathetic to Grekulf, since I also have those moments where because I understand the mechanics, it can be challenging to explain the results to those who aren't aware of how everything works yet. I think that's all that was going on here.

 

[GnoSIS]

Now we need an equivalent system to deal with Subjects...

Like, we could demand subjects to provide X amount of fleet capacity, Y percentage of minerals and energy, ban them from researching some particular tech branches (no AI for you, heathen!) and require them to provide armies...

From what I see, this expansion would be a perfect framework for a better subject management system.

I believe there will be mods to turn the federation system into an imperium system, where members are vassals and they are forced into membership.

 

[Major Malfunction]

The system will be in the free patch and should be fully moddable, yes.

Can we expect a unique federation interactions for machine con. and hiveminds?

 

[StellarisFan1]

I liked the idea of the Arena, but I would like to see that the player could somehow interact with the character during the battle.

 

[zorkon08]

I suppose that being in federation already suggests that you don't mind to have some free xenos roaming around your borders, so xenophiles would fit most of them. Same goes for non-IP pacifists .
On the other hand, xenophobes wouldn't like equal coopoeration (Working with xenos? Argh!), yet they should being able to form hegemony.

The point is this might make picking some ethics even stronger then others and unbalance them more so. And tell me how come other non pacifist ethics cant form military alliances? Same goes for trade and research ones.

 

[The Exile]

Now we need an equivalent system to deal with Subjects...

Like, we could demand subjects to provide X amount of fleet capacity, Y percentage of minerals and energy, ban them from researching some particular tech branches (no AI for you, heathen!) and require them to provide armies...

From what I see, this expansion would be a perfect framework for a better subject management system.

Yes! Something like the Vassals Expanded mod, perhaps?

I recently went back to dabble in 1.9 again and really appreciated the Domination traditions that gave you naval cap from your vassals. I mean, hugely OP in its implementation (once you got 1 vassal and 1 tributary it was only a matter of time before you conquered the whole galaxy), but the concept of some strong tangible benefits from vassals again would be very appealing.

 

[thisisbossi]

@grekulf
So incredibly excited by this! A Federations rework has been my #1 desire for years now (well... that and AI improvement to go with it). A few scattered thoughts...

- Resolutions - Eager to hear more about the Resolutions. For all the flaws of MOO3, I really loved its Senate gameplay. In addition to affecting member states' Policies I'd love to see stuff like establishing production goals, or austerity plans if members run negative generation rates, etc.

- Succession - Among Succession, consider adding a martial strength option and a population option.

- Vote Weight - Would like to see more options such as martial power, economic power, population. It'd be neat if there could be a Referenda option where member state's factions vote in their own interests.

- Veto Power - Consider Laws relating to Veto power, and whether no one has it, the President has it, or Members have it.

- Economic Status - Provide a status screen of member states that shows their stockpiles and generation rates for each metric (food, minerals, energy, alloys, etc) so that it's easy to see who's short on what.

- Faction Status - Provide a status screen of member states' factions & associated metrics.

- Faction Status - Some means of inviting federation members to assist with suppressing factions, or suppressing unrest. It's weird suddenly seeing planets spin out of my federation because I'd had no idea there was a civil war.

- Banking - Consider federal banks / stockpiles / reserves of materials. By resolution member states may be required to submit a one-time contribution, a fixed monthly rate, or a percentage of monthly surplus to the shared supply (taxes). By resolution materials can be sent from the supply to member states. AI should weight their votes by their surplus versus the recipient's need.

- Fleets - Consider fleet commands. Presumably the President will have full command authority over all fleets. Consider allowing the President to designate members as co-commanders of specific fleets (particularly helpful in multiplayer federations).

- Fleets - Another fleet command option I'd love is for a player who doesn't control a fleet to be able to "issue" orders to the target uncontrolled fleet. This would send a suggested order to the controlling AI or player.

- Starbase Access - Settings which allow/disallow member states to repair at each others' starbases, to upgrade at each others' starbases, and/or to construct new ships at each others' starbases.

------------------
Now onto my #2 desires which hover somewhere between a tie of AI improvements, expanded diplomacy / embassies, and espionage!

 

[StellarisFan1]

why didn't they add a pacifist federation ??

 

[MateuszS]

The point is this might make picking some ethics even stronger then others and unbalance them more so. And tell me how come other non pacifist ethics cant form military alliances? Same goes for trade and research ones.

It's simple: if you are not specialised in X (where X means militarism/trade [trade guilds and megaporcs]/research) you can't form related federation. Specialisations are for geeks.

 

[Ikael]

Oooooh sweet, sweet in-depth Developer Diary, how I missed thee! I really hope that this is the beggining of meatier DDs and a constant drip of information!

Alas, let's ponder on these news:

- At last, long last, cool things to do while being a pacifist and / or xenophile. I expect lots of federation oriented bonuses for these two types of empires
- A federation presidency decided via trial by combat sound AWESOME and it would give a much needed flavour to some of the most vainilla species traits ("strong", "quarrelsome", etc) and to leaders in general. Looking foward winning ritualistic combats and bringing honor to my house
- A psiconic duel option yet no spiritual federation? That sounds quite suspicious, if you ask me
- Also: Reworked feudal kingdoms, anyone?
- Mad props for giving love to non-vainilla types of empires in this expansion instead of forgetting of every single prior expansion (*cough hiveminds cough*). Megacorp-exclusive trade leage sounds incredibly powerful and flavourful!
- Starting as the leader of an Hegemony sounds like a blast
- All of this makes me wonder if we are going to see some kind of internal politics / factions / leader / diplomacy rework along with this expansion. The whole envoy system seems to signal that major diplomatic changes are coming, at least.
- Federations getting stronger or weaker depending on their internal politics sounds like a really good dynamic system rather than making it a default "late game federations are always more poweful than early game federations". Perhaps some kind similar system could be applied for intra-empire instability in order to prevent snowballing. Hmmm...
- A spyionage system focused into making other empires more "cooperative" about our shiny future under a shared banner would be great
- I really did not get what the point of centralization was all about, must re-read

Overall, an amazing Developer Diary. Keep them coming!

 

[Minuro]

Take my money!

 

[Cold Evil]

This is a tremundus boost to the now boring federation gameplay!

Feedback on the new consent of the wip law screen: unsure if I like this new look of the CK2 style law slider and I actually prefer the minimalistic one from the current empire policy.

But if this new concept gets implemented; will the empire laws and policy's also get a simular update graphically to match this system? To avoid potentional confucion and keep laws and what not consistent.

 

[zorkon08]

It's simple: if you are not specialised in X (where X means militarism/trade [trade guilds and megaporcs]/research) you can't form related federation. Specialisations are for geeks.

I know all this. It was a rhetorical question.
Then other ethics need there own specialisations with federations.

 

[Raven4030]

My main questions are:

1) Can you force empires within the federation to adopt certain policies? I'm thinking of things like federation-wide bans on slaving and purging. Perhaps even make certain policies a founding principle and any species that carries out these sorts of things generates a cassus belli for the federation. Could even get silly with it and legislate certain pop lifestyles or ban others (Shared Burden living standard outlawed! No commies allowed!). These policy changes could allow for an Empire to change their internal policy while ignoring the cool down, or just ignore the ban setting the stage for a potential showdown or other schisms within the federation.

2) In the vein of the above, what about forcing government types on members? Like mandating all federation members must become democratic? While this is something where you can just refuse to join a federation that lets the 'wrong' governments in and liberate others to expand, I could see somebody joining a federation initially for protection, becoming president, then wanting to do this. Might even have it for civics too. Could even have it so if the federation mandates a certain government type one can reform their government once for free so long as they are switching to the appropriate government type, or an option to formally protest and denounce the move which revokes the free reform but grants you influence for standing up for your sovereignty.

3) Big question on federation fleets - as it stands, on larger galaxies (i'm almost always running on huge galaxies) you can typically reach your federation fleet cap pretty easily with the 20% contribution. It seems like if that cap remains then late game federations would have lower fleet contributions, not higher ones, since once you hit 500 anything beyond is pointless, unless the plan is to make the federation fleet(s) subject to the same rules as player fleets. Meaning the fed fleets have a command limit equal to the highest command limit available to federation members and the fleet cap can stretch on into infinity in theory. Just wondering how that'll work because it would be kind of pointless to require a high fleet contribution if it makes no difference compared to low. It would also be game breaking and bring us back to doom stacks if we just had a 1000 size federation fleet running around or something.

4) I know this question has been asked a lot but can you force people into your federation through warfare? Just trying to determine if an authoritarian with dreams of galactic domination would benefit from forming a hegemonic federation at all or is better off just collecting vassals.

 

[kgptzac]

I think many wanted an option for a federation type that eventually solidify into a single state. Hegemony fed type is most thematically likely to have that option, but no consolidation is mentioned?

 

[The Exile]

This is interesting! One question so far: Are Hegemonies going to be the replacement for Feudal society if you have Federations (Like how Megacorps replaced Corporate Dominion), or is it a new thing? Either way, will Feudal society be fixed, and improved?

Given how very similar the icon for Hegemony is to the current Feudal Society icon, I suspect it is indeed going to be a replacement (for those with the DLC, just as you say). If so, I'm assuming nothing will change with the vanilla civic (why would it?) since the new and improved version is in the DLC.

My inclination to this view is bolstered by the reminder that there will also be an Origin that lets you start as the head of a Hegemony. What could possibly be the point of a Feudal Society civic when that was an option? Therefore, it is probably best thought of like some other civics (Mechanist, Life-Seeded, etc) that are being turned into origins. While FS is unlike these others in that you could add it later in the game, that option is preserved in that you can establish a Hegemony later on even if you don't start with one via Origin.