Stellaris Dev Diary #175 - Space Fauna

[Weklong]

There are some great ideas on here! I wouldn't say no to some (probably reasonably rarely encountered) smaller fauna on planets too. Just to make the galaxy feel a little more alive.

Some sort of scenario like:

"Oh no! We've found a race of giant nonsentient insects which completely dominate this otherwise very habitable world. Shall we send some armies in to exterminate them? Or try to tame them somehow?"

Maybe not that exact thing. But I'm all in favour of more life that isn't necessarily an event or organised into a galactic-level civilisation.

 

[Capt.Picard]

Any news on bug fixes and QoL updates?

Those feel a much higher priority than activities involving space whales to me.

I agree with this completely, I don't care about space whales if I can't even play the game because of the desyncs, i would prefer you guys publishing a dev diary on this serious game breaking issue ( mainly multiplayer which is what I and thousands of others play) and update us on what desyncs you are fixing what has been fixed and what you are having difficulty with, because when i saw OOS fixes in 2.6 to 2.6.2 patchnotes release but the OOS hasn't really been fixed then i start questioning the credibility here, its a great singleplayer game, but a totally broken multiplayer one, until it is fixed i go play Mount and Blade II Bannerlord.

 

[Capt.Picard]

The point of this free patch is to give the content designers something to work on while the programmers are fixing bugs. It's a win/win for us. We shouldn't complain.

Priority here should be the bugfixing and the desyncs for multiplayer, maybe a dev diary on the bug fixing would be much more appropriate than some frills about space amoeba that doesn't change my strategy at all, can't even enjoy the damn things if the game desyncs anyways LoL

 

[Capt.Picard]

How can it feel empty when it is full of bugs? *ducks*

That's a knee slapper right there, hahaha

 

[G S Palmer]

One thing I'd really love to see (though it's probably outside the scope of this patch) would a revamping of the project to build a zoo for your empire with the eight alien animal species. Instead of it just being a set of projects that spawn on the appropriate planets, have there actually be, behind the scenes, dozens or hundreds of cool aliens species that spawn on specific worlds around the galaxy (maybe they could be represented as planetary features, and maybe some of them could produce resources like gasses or motes, provide happiness, that sort of thing). After you've found one, you could get the option to found a zoo, then the option to add new species to it as you discover them (maybe it costs something to expend the effort to collect them, but you get unity for it in return). If you're authoritarian or xenophobic maybe you keep pre-sapients (or full sapients ) in there, or maybe one of your zoo species starts developing sapience—how do you handle that? There'd be all kinds of little events you could tie into it, and it would make the galaxy's habitable planets feel more alive and unique (instead of "Savannah planet #137", you'd have "Savannah planet with the cool lithoid worms which produce crystals").

You should check out my Alien Lifeforms suggestion.

 

[Radene]

Cool. I approve I wanted to have more persistent wildlife since the beginning.

What of void clouds and crystalline entities?

 

[yerro]

I'm sorry if it's off-topic, but I was just wondering if you're going to fix ethics in the May update?

Right now I can end up getting only a Spiritualist faction on my first alien discovery because of a Spiritualist-leaning starting leader (no chance to change prior to that), as a Fan. Materialist. Apart from that, the general "pool" of factions I get early on is quite often too broad and doesn't make sense.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

Fascinating!

@grekulf would you consider updating the Mining Drones as well? Perhaps adding a pacification project to spoof their IFF codes and make their existing home system spawn additional drone fleets that would seek out new systems to establish mining operations in, or patrol between existing operations and their home base?

 

[G S Palmer]

Ideas for new Space Fauna:

Asteroid Hermit Crabs: essentially just an asteroid with legs and eye stalks. Moves from system to system, where it latches onto asteroids and feeds on them, reducing the resource output of any mining stations.

Stellar Ambush Predator: looks like a cuttlefish, acts like an antlion. Lives inside a hollowed-out asteroid, whenever anything gets close enough it becomes hostile and makes a lunge attack which does a massive amount of damage. However, it then needs to return to its nest before it can make that attack again, and can only make small lashing attacks. Quite vulnerable while outside its nest, very well protected while within it. If attacked with enough power, it will hunker up inside its nest and only make lashing attacks. If killed or pacified, its asteroid nest can be mined for a large amount of alloys due to the surrounding debris field from ships it has destroyed.

Space Lampreys: more of an environmental hazard since they're not actually hostile and can't be attacked. Live in large swarms in some systems and will slowly leech hull and armor points from ships in the system until you complete a special project to make your hulls inedible to them.

Sun Dancers: plasma-based critters that migrate from star to star and feed off the energy they give off, reducing resources from mining stations.

 

[Spaceception]

Asteroid Hermit Crabs: essentially just an asteroid with legs and eye stalks. Moves from system to system, where it latches onto asteroids and feeds on them, reducing the resource output of any mining stations.

Sun Dancers: plasma-based critters that migrate from star to star and feed off the energy they give off, reducing resources from mining stations.

Should these give society and/or engineering, and physics respectively as an additional resource? Maybe these could stay in orbit for many years before migrating.

 

[Riekopo]

Put the old Nomads back in. We need some BSG style and Quarian style fleets escaping death.

 

[G S Palmer]

Should these give society and/or engineering, and physics respectively as an additional resource? Maybe these could stay in orbit for many years before migrating.

That's a pretty good idea. Would definitely help give you an incentive not to just murder them.

 

[G S Palmer]

Stellar Ambush Predator: looks like a cuttlefish, acts like an antlion. Lives inside a hollowed-out asteroid, whenever anything gets close enough it becomes hostile and makes a lunge attack which does a massive amount of damage. However, it then needs to return to its nest before it can make that attack again, and can only make small lashing attacks. Quite vulnerable while outside its nest, very well protected while within it. If attacked with enough power, it will hunker up inside its nest and only make lashing attacks. If killed or pacified, its asteroid nest can be mined for a large amount of alloys due to the surrounding debris field from ships it has destroyed.

Also, you'd probably want to program this critter to not become hostile until something enters its attack radius, to keep things from just automatically avoiding it. Maybe you could also program it to only attack when "hungry" (which you could control by giving the ship a "sated" timed modifier every time it "eats"), and thus could temporarily pacify it by feeding it science/construction vessels occasionally.

Another critter idea: Space Sharks. Not actually hostile like the name might suggest, they roam from system to system preying on Tiyanki. Whenever they get hungry and find a Tiyanki herd, they attempt to chase them down to kill and devour one of the hatchlings/calves. Of course, having something passively depleting Tiyanki herds would also probably make it necessary to be able to replenish those herds, so you could introduce a mechanic where every time a reduced herd (that still contains a bull and cow) enters orbit of a gas giant, they have a chance of spawning new hatchlings.

Tying in with that and my previous idea of Tiyanki dying, shouldn't it be possible to make them age? Every time you create a new "ship" (aka Tiyanki), trigger a ship event with a MTTH of X number of years (however long you want that stage of their lifecycle to last). When the event is triggered on a Hatchling, it would replace it with a Calf, on a Calf it would replace it with a Bull or Cow, and on a Bull or Cow it would replace it with the new Elder class. Once a Tiyanki became an Elder, it would leave its current herd and start travelling alone, and would eventually find a peaceful place to die. (This could be a Tiyanki Graveyard like in the PD mod.)

 

[Pyzayt]

Put the old Nomads back in. We need some BSG style and Quarian style fleets escaping death.

The Nomads are still, technically, in the game, just like the old Pirate system... But they're disabled by DLC! Seeing them brought back, irrespective of DLC, would be nice. The Nomads could be turned into something like a mobile version of the Curator order or something; able to be communicated with, and traded with while in your space (as if trading with an empire, rather than the Caravaneers. They might even set up their own Void Dweller habitats in conjunction with their fleet (as I'm not sure "mobile habitats" for ships would be possible).

 

[G S Palmer]

And if Tiyanki are going to reproduce (via spawning new hatchlings), then probably Space Amoebas should too. Of course, their mechanic would probably want to be different, so how about something like this: any adult amoeba has a random chance every X number of years of budding off a new amoeba juvenile. When a juvenile grows into an adult, they leave the (flock? herd? what are amoeba groups called again?) and start their own fleet, where they too will start occasionally budding off juveniles.

 

[Lorenerd11]

Any news on bug fixes and QoL updates?

Those feel a much higher priority than activities involving space whales to me.

Oh my god, please. Pop management is a pain, it could be made to require so much less micromanagement. And I'm so tired of save-editing to fix ringworld positioning.

 

[Nigro Angelicus]

All the best, I know that everyone around the world is having a tough time and despite that you guys are working on building things to entertain, distract and provide enjoyment. Thank you. Take care of yourself (devs and players).

Thank you.

Let me double it: take care of yourself (devs and players).

 

[James Fire]

I agree with this completely, I don't care about space whales if I can't even play the game because of the desyncs, i would prefer you guys publishing a dev diary on this serious game breaking issue ( mainly multiplayer which is what I and thousands of others play) and update us on what desyncs you are fixing what has been fixed and what you are having difficulty with, because when i saw OOS fixes in 2.6 to 2.6.2 patchnotes release but the OOS hasn't really been fixed then i start questioning the credibility here, its a great singleplayer game, but a totally broken multiplayer one, until it is fixed i go play Mount and Blade II Bannerlord.

Priority here should be the bugfixing and the desyncs for multiplayer, maybe a dev diary on the bug fixing would be much more appropriate than some frills about space amoeba that doesn't change my strategy at all, can't even enjoy the damn things if the game desyncs anyways LoL

I can give you the relevant content of that diary right now.

"We're working on it. Some fixes will make it into 2.6.3, some will have to wait for the free May update."

Such a diary would give us so little that wouldn't already be in the patch notes, that there is literally no reason to do it. Have some patience.

 

[nukularpower]

Just a random thought, but this sounds like a great chance for some sort of "wild galaxy" origin, where the galaxy is overrun with amoebas or etc with multiple homeworlds

 

[Kayden_II]

Space-Amoebas and Space-Whales: It's still enlightening how stuff is prioritized.