Stellaris Dev Diary #174 - Federations is out, now what?

[G S Palmer]

I'm not sure that competing Megacorps is a part of opposite ethics bias. Megacorps don't necessarily have competing ethics.

Yes, but it still falls in the same game design vein of trying to set the player up to have early conflicts.

 

[LWE]

Is there a bias towards competing megacorps at all? Did the devs confirm this, as opposed to opposite ethics?

 

[Spaceception]

Edit, wanted to quote this actually

I'm not sure that competing Megacorps is a part of opposite ethics bias. Megacorps don't necessarily have competing ethics.

It's not that, it's the fact you're competing for branch offices. Each planet can only get one per Megacorp, and Megacorps can't have branch offices on their worlds from other Megacorps. So as long as those two things persist in the game, having nearby Megacorps can sometimes be an annoyance rather than a challenge.

 

[Pyzayt]

Edit, wanted to quote this actually

It's not that, it's the fact you're competing for branch offices. Each planet can only get one per Megacorp, and Megacorps can't have branch offices on their worlds from other Megacorps. So as long as those two things persist in the game, having nearby Megacorps can sometimes be an annoyance rather than a challenge.

If I recall correctly, the planet's Branch Office limit is per Megacorp rather than total, right? Megacorps can't establish branch offices on each other's planets, but they can both have branch offices on the same planet of a third ally? What is known is that Branch Offices cannot be established on the worlds of an empire with the Corporate, Hive Mind or Machine Intelligence authorities - So I think the game weights those a little higher for Megacorps to create conflict?

 

[G S Palmer]

If I recall correctly, the planet's Branch Office limit is per Megacorp rather than total, right? Megacorps can't establish branch offices on each other's planets, but they can both have branch offices on the same planet of a third ally? What is known is that Branch Offices cannot be established on the worlds of an empire with the Corporate, Hive Mind or Machine Intelligence authorities - So I think the game weights those a little higher for Megacorps to create conflict?

No, only one Megacorp can have a branch office per planet. That's why the Expropriation and Hostile Takeover casus belli exist.

Though honestly, I kind of wish multiple Megacorps could establish branch offices on a planet, and then they just had to compete to see who could get the largest share of the profits.

 

[Pyzayt]

It'd be nice if Megacorps in the same Federation could share Branch Offices.

 

[Tyro]

Buff migration, nerf resettlement. Fix the democracy cap issue, maybe go back to giving influence or giving some influence and some unity. Egalitarians need some love.

Make the AI more aggressive, and maybe make envoy influence on AI attitude weaker - it's laughably easy to make any non-genocidal non-fallen empire love me regardless of differences in ethics & policies.

 

[NilsFabian]

So does everyone who doesn't use robots. That isn't something that makes them OP, especially since you can hamper your own growth this way as long as robots are as good as they are. And since there's mostly randomness to the Crisis anyway, such as when you're careful not to give one too much trigger weight.

Sorry but here you are mistaken. Even if I don't have synthetics in my empire the Contingency can send agents in my empire to wreak havoc. I have to suffer lot of terrorism before I can do the defense project. As a psioniker I can reveal them instantly.

How?

Robots need engergy, the unbidden are pure energy... maybe some sort of energy absorption aibility.

 

[Dan1109]

We found another bug, and the fix will be released in the next patch.

Thank the Maker!!....my first game on PC, and I have been disgusted about how slow, if at all, ethics switched. I was able to switch from Fan Egal Xeno, to Egal Xeno Spirit, but only because I luckily had a psionic researcher and researched telepathy which boosted Spiritual. If this was the intended behavior, I would have been horrifically disappointed in PC Stellaris - except for Fleet Management issues, its been 100x better than console. Great Work!!!

 

[Panzerslothen]

Hello everyone!

Federations was released a little bit over a week ago, and we hope it's still giving you much joy.

There’s much to celebrate as the community has broken a bunch of records! We had 64-thousand people playing Stellaris on Saturday, which is the highest amount of concurrent players since its release 4 years ago. We want to thank you for the massive amount of support we’ve received with this expansion! We hope everyone has found this expansion as fun and enjoyable as us.

While you are busy enjoying the game we’ve been planning updates and working on patches. We are currently working on a 2.6.3 that we’re planning on releasing as a beta sometime soon. 2.6.3 should hopefully be the last of the smaller patches, as we will be switching focus to a somewhat larger free update in May.

The May update (TBA) will contain more bug fixes, but also a bunch of new things for you to play with. We are very interested in hearing your feedback and ideas regarding Federations, and if there was anything you would have wished for us to add. We are especially interested in feedback related to Resolutions and Federation Laws. Although I will not promise they will be added, I still wanted to leave some room open in case there were ideas that the community really wanted.

View attachment 559188
Will you protect the Tiyanki or hunt them for profit?
​

We will give you some more information about the May update at a later stage, so stay tuned! Until then, keep enjoying the game

I for one would really like you, The Devs, to focus on addressing bug fixes for a while - far above any urge for new content*[Note 1]. You've got the game to a good point with 2.6.* - now let's see a bit of polish be added to that.

There are still major bugs - the /r/Stellaris subreddit has a pinned post detailing the major ones, I don't think you look at it much if at all - but also lots of little things, like Apocalyptic Bombardment not turning worlds into Tombs, AI Empires still not building buildings on their planets, things like that.

I like 2.6 and it's got me majorly into Stellaris again. I have supported all your DLC drops. But please, really make the game as taut and bug-free as you can.


*[Note 1] - the exception to this, of course, is Espionage and stealth content. I really really do want some skull-duggery and spying content to be added in. That could fit so well on top of the frame Federations has laid for it!

 

[Spaceception]

As a psioniker I can reveal them instantly.

That's just a neat side effect of being able to read minds and tell when someone actually isn't their race. And not OP, the events are bad, but inconvenient. Not crippling. For some, Psionics get worse maluses from rolling a Nat 1 in the Shroud.
Hive minds get the feature too for a similar reason.

Robots need engergy, the unbidden are pure energy... maybe some sort of energy absorption aibility.

If anything the robots should have a bonus against the contingency, because, well, they can recognize the inner workings of their logic, and expect it. Or some other technobabble.
And the psionics can have a bonus on the Unbidden, because it has been mentioned the Unbidden know of the Shroud, so maybe you can use your psionic energy against them, as it's an exotic form of power unlike just guns.

 

[Dr. Crabnipples]

Will there but a look on origin balance? for example Scion and Shattered ring specifically? and maybe a few others that are underwhelming like life seeded?

 

[Capt.Picard]

Yep. I tend to play coop, and prior to this patch on a large sized map the game would desync with just 2 players nearly every day by 2450. Played a large map as soon as the expansion released and we couldn't even get to 2350.

I know the desync issue was supposed to be a major focus of this expansion, and I have to say it's been disappointing. On the other hand, there have only been a minimal number of desyncs on a smaller map so far, but smaller maps are just so much less interesting.

I couldn't agree more, like today we wanted to play stellaris and then we realize the OOS is so bad it is not worth playing the game. Please give us an update on these desync fixes, we don't want more content ( and i refuse to buy anymore DLC) until the desyncs are appropriately fixed and not an issue, it makes no sense for us to buy DLC's and new features for a game that we can't even play ( multiplayer ). @Devs

 

[Untrustedlife]

I would really appreciate having the ability to create a flag/symbol for my federation. Instead of only having one symbol per federation type.

 

[Capt.Picard]

I for one would really like you, The Devs, to focus on addressing bug fixes for a while - far above any urge for new content*[Note 1]. You've got the game to a good point with 2.6.* - now let's see a bit of polish be added to that.

There are still major bugs - the /r/Stellaris subreddit has a pinned post detailing the major ones, I don't think you look at it much if at all - but also lots of little things, like Apocalyptic Bombardment not turning worlds into Tombs, AI Empires still not building buildings on their planets, things like that.

I like 2.6 and it's got me majorly into Stellaris again. I have supported all your DLC drops. But please, really make the game as taut and bug-free as you can.


*[Note 1] - the exception to this, of course, is Espionage and stealth content. I really really do want some skull-duggery and spying content to be added in. That could fit so well on top of the frame Federations has laid for it!

Biggest bug of them all for multiplayer is the out of syncs, everyone is having issue with it and we aren't even playing the game until this OOS is fixed, i hope to god they come out with 2.6.3 next week with serious fixes to the desyncs. Maybe they need to implement a system like civilization 5 or 6 on how they fixed their desync issues.

 

[Akamia]

If anything the robots should have a bonus against the contingency, because, well, they can recognize the inner workings of their logic, and expect it. Or some other technobabble.

They kind of already do have a bonus. Well, more accurately, Ascended Synths do. Their pops completely no-sell the Ghost Signal. Sapient combat computers, regular synths, and machines on the other hand, are still negatively impacted by the Signal. At least machines’ autonomous ship intellects are untouched, so while their production will take a hit, they can still fight.

That may or may not be the kind of bonus you’re thinking of, but it’s something.

 

[Zentay]

Fanatic Purifiers should be able to engage in some limited diplomacy.

 

[Von Thoma]

MULTIPLAYER :
Please have a look also of that save game file transfer IT IS TERRIBLE SLOW ,
make first somehow a torrent connection between the host and clients and transfer the save game direct ...

in the last 2 weeks (I know, that many gamers are at home) it was terrible, most of the time the file transfer needed 5min and longer , and we have
50/10 Mbit connections ...

And the connection lost to the host has been every 30-60 minutes , so once again waiting > 5 minutes !

that needs a fix

THANKS

 

[Tyro]

Improve the search function so you can search for specific resources, world types, structures, etc - not just proper names. Think Civ VI.

Add a wormhole view to the galaxy map.

 

[Spaceception]

Fanatic Purifiers should be able to engage in some limited diplomacy.

My neighbors, my fellow space-farers, the time is now to realize that our species is the only true path. The one that deserves to rule over the galaxy. So with that in mind, please let us eat/kill... I mean establish a trade deal!

Rogue servitors and Driven Assimilators don't kill everyone they conquer. Though admittedly, I don't see why DA have such free reign in diplomacy. Since they do want to take your free will, something Spiritualists would want to destroy you for, and everyone else feel very uneasy about.
It might be good if there were resolutions that restricted diplomacy with machines for certain reasons, maybe there could be a policy for your cyborgs.
Like what kind of Assimilators do you want to be? Where they're connected to you, have vastly lowered CG req. but still have happiness as well as the ability to become leaders, to help ease this.