Stellaris Dev Diary #270 - Traditional Results (of Summer Experiments)

[Alfray Stryke]

I absolutely love the changes to this! But I do have one question on the Synthetic path:



Does this mean that Fanatic Purifiers can't become robotic through this ascension path? If so, I'm curious why that was chosen.

Oh they can, they just can't assimilate others into the civilization.

 

[Alfray Stryke]

Right then, back from lunch and answering questions.

Some were duplicated so I quoted the first instance I found.

The tradition artworks are amazing btw, especially psionic. In case of psionic i really wish we could choose our covenant with the final tradition. Maybe a chance?

1) The covenant is apparently random, if we don't get the one we want can we decline and do it again? The psionic RNG isn't super fun, particularly as it's the only one that relies on it

It currently uses the same weighting for the covenant that exists in 3.5. However you can reject the pact offered and hope to get another offer when you enter the shroud later. We've got some ideas for looking at covenants in more detail, but I'm not sure when we'd be looking at those.

2) Are there any changes to pop-template management planned?

Nothing yet, however it's a common topic of discussion in the design team and we recognise that it could be improved.

3) The replicator job for capital buildings is cool, could something like that be added to the mechanist origin?

It could be, I'll be looking at feedback given during the open beta and seeing what changes should be made.

Did you guys Experiment with making all Ascension paths work like the "becoming the crisis" with levels and "Experience" collecting? So reaching Ascension is like becoming the crisis an ongoing progress with different feats to fulfill to reach the end goal of a Ascension?

This was considered, but we wanted players to both be able to have an ascension path and take the become the crisis path without them interfering with each other.

Hum. Does the devs' consider having one more tradition slot on the vanilla game ? OR a special slot (or 0 slot cost) for the ascension tradition ?

The opportunity cost of taking an ascension path and thus having one less tradition tree was considered a positive aspect of this rework.

If Overtuned empires can go Cybernetic

They can.

Is there no way to keep the Latent Psionic trait on your primary species and finish the psionic tradition ?

Nope, in order to fully explore the Shroud you must fully embrace psionics.

Why hive cannot go psionic?

Because the vast majority of this rework was done as an experimental project of mine, done during self-development time and over summer, working with limited art, code and narrative design support, we determined that giving hive-minds access to psionics and doing it justice would take more resources than we had available.


Otherwise, for the various comments that have mentioned balance concerns - the primary reason we're including this in an open beta is so that we can gather feedback on the massive changes made and then take that feedback into account before the patch is finalised.

 

[Eladrin]

I love the new ascension perks update, how long before the beta is available?

Soooooon.

There's a reason this was a really long dev diary.

 

[Eladrin]

I like this,, in general, but I'm seeing a missed opportunity. it would have been lovely to hear that genemoding would not take a science department for several months/years. it would also be cool if the process unfolded/could unfold as a generational shift - bioengernring the next generation rather then reshaping this one.

Redoing how gene and robo modding work was out of the scope of things @Alfray Stryke could do as part of Summer Experimentation, but it's on the "todo" list. (Though without a firm target as to "when".)

It could be a lot better.

One of the nice things about the release cadence given to us by the Custodian Initiative is that we always have the opportunity to make things better, it just needs to be prioritized appropriately.

 

[Alfray Stryke]

Back from lunch today, time to answer some more questions!

Will we get more trait *points* to utilize the new cybernetic traits? Are we meant to get extra points through the provided negatives?

The current intention is that the negative cybernetic traits should provide points to get the positive traits, but as always not final numbers are not final and things can change due to feedback during the open beta.

Will bonuses to robot build speed effect the building of cyborgs? (What is this meant to be in flavor, anyways?)

No, this shifts roboticists to providing organic pop assembly. Flavour-wise, this is diverting the production lines from building robots to manufacturing cybernetic implants for your population.

Any plans for allowing Overlords to export their ascension to their subjects? I could see this being done on a light scale through holdings. Say, a building that converts a couple of pops a year in exchange for energy or the like. (This would also make for a fun branch office building. Exporting transcendence and such.)

No current plans, but this sounds like a great suggestion for a future Custodian update.

Can biologically ascended empires apply cybernetic templates to pops?

No.

Will other traditions will be buffed then?

To quote the 3.6 patch notes

• Rebalanced Harmony, Prosperity, Mercantile, Versatility and Adaptability traditions.

Can hiveminds now get Roboticists when they take cybernetics?

Nope!

Is taking a covenant the intended playstyle for Psionic?

Yes, we are looking at rebalancing the bonuses and penalties for the various covenants but I can't say anything more at this time.

Wait, some of the effects here are different, are some of these being changed for robotic species too?

Nope, the cybernetic traits were inspired by robot/machine traits, but have been changed.

Also, I feel that the pop assembly nerf for synthetic is a bit too much. Should be fine with 3 assembly job, especially with the boost for organic assembly.

Spoiler

Seems like the time-gap between latent psionics and fully psionic is quite short now, perhaps those could be spaced out a bit?

Yeah, that's something we're discussing.

It seems the Synthetic path can now be completed without even researching Synthetics

A requirement of the Synthetic Age tradition is to have researched the Synthetics technology.

Will we still be able to get Synthetics without taking the ascension path?

Currently, you can research the Synthetics tech, but robotic leaders is locked behind the tradition. I'll pay attention to feedback if this should be changed or not.

Are cybernetic ascension and synthetic ascension going to be mutually exclusive like all other ascensions?

All four ascension paths are mutually exclusive.

The finisher for Psionics allows us to form a Covenant with a random Shroud Entity. Is that simply opening the roll for the Shroud or does it immediately start an event with one? Also, if we decline, do we get the ability to roll for a different one (I think at some point that wasn't possible, but I can't remember).

Currently, it is a random roll for which shroud entity contacts you weighted by your ethics and other choices (as it currently is in 3.5). You'll have the option to decline of course and that means you can randomly stumble across potential covenants when exploring the Shroud (as in 3.5).

The Synthetic opening on the tradition tree flowchart says: "Can require robotic leaders", but in the actual dev diary it says:

A typo no-one noticed even through I had many proof-readers. It should "Can acquire robotic leaders".

I'm surprised there isn't a cyborg trait equivalent for Domestic Protocols or Propoganda Machines. Is there any particular reason those ones weren't added? Or were those too machine-y of traits for cyborgs?

They felt too robotic for cyborgs.

On transgenesis, it says we can add Lithoid and Plantoid traits to their respective non-archetypes. I assume that certain overlapping traits such as budding/crystallization and delicious/felsic count as the "same" trait and you can't have both, is that correct? Also, Polymelic doesn't mention being mutually exclusive with budding so both of those can be combined, I'm assuming? Also, as a slight aside, I'm not sure if this is intentional game design but Budding is compatible with the Fertile advanced trait despite not being compatible with Rapid Breeders, but I assume Polymelic will be also be compatible with those 2 as well?

Budding and Delicious can't be applied to lithoids, as they are not made of meat. Likewise, Felsic and Crystallization can only be applied to lithoids due to the aforementioned lack of meat.

Polymelic should be mutually exclusive with both Budding and Crystallization.

What's the requirement for the DNA-harvesting project for leviathans? Do you need to already have transgenics, or be on the genetic AP, or is this something normal empires can harvest "just in case"?

In order to harvest DNA from a Leviathan, you need to have researched Gene Tailoring and not have begun undertaking one of the other ascension paths.

For clarity, can this stack with Thrifty, for +50% TV from jobs?

Yes.

Looking at my recent cybernetics only save, I see that the Cyborg trait doesn't even do anything for rulers, and yet still takes up one of the three potential trait slots that leaders get. Cybernetic leaders have less room for diversification without a real upside when compared to synths.

Spoiler: Leader Trait Rebalance

New modifiers that depend upon @Eladrin's DD next week have been redacted.

 

[Alfray Stryke]

Thanks for your answers Could you perhaps explain the thinking behind keeping it RNG, as opposed to having it be a choice?

The Shroud is supposed to mysterious and even those that have attained Psionic ascension and learnt from the Shroudwalkers do not fully understand it.