Stellaris Dev Diary #272 - The Pact is Signed and Spoken

[-Marauder-]

Except it's not. You don't get to take numbers out of context and treat relative losses at net losses when they remain not only net gains, but are actively part of substitution effects.

Whisperers is only a -9% to all things if you ignore that, by virtue of the psionic rework, the precondition of Whisperers is being psionic, which- with telepaths- is a +20% gain to direct output. This would- if we want to be honest- be an 11% gain, compared to a 20% gain of no covenant at all, not a 9% loss. This could at least be getting basic numbers right if we considered all other things equal.

But they aren't, because whisperers is also bringing in other things. It's adding +3/6 science to your telepaths, which you'll be having about 2 per planet. This would be- if we wanted to be cheeky- an infinite % increase from a job you spam everywehre you can, and Whispers also comes that comes with a 5/10% research speed bonus- a much, much stronger boon to the research economy than a 9% researcher job output, given how research speed buffs work multiplicatively vis-a-vis job modifiers. And this isn't factoring in the psionic researcher angles, including the whisperer's own 10% relative advantage over other researchers for that chosen vis-a-vis its others, or psionic ruler pop advantages against others.

And this doesn't go into the influence economy implications. Influence is, by far, one of the most restricted chokepoint resources in the game, and no other ascension can support generation as well as psionic, and no covenant supports that as much as Whisperers. 15% empire influence has substantial implications at the points of the game when influence is your most limiting factor in economic expansion, be it claims, habitats, planetary rings for the next tier of pop job base value boosters, special worlds, galactic community, vassal resolution, etc. And unlike planetary production, influence isn't affected by planetary stability, since it's a per-empire modifier.


If you're going to ground your complaint credibly, at least identify that mechanics for what they are- a lateral shift in favor of your psionic economy towards science, influence, and espionage. It's one thing to argue one of those is bad, but it's poor showing to pretend the other two aren't explicit beneficiaries in this setup.

What the heck. The first part makes no sense whatsoever. Whisperer is a 9% loss below 85% stability no matter what. Psionic giving you a bonus that closes the gap to Synths doesn't change that. You still get slapped with a 9% decrease in all production. Both of these things are entirely unrelated.

As for Telepaths, you only have two per planet, that's almost nothing compared to having hundreds of researchers. It's a minor boon at best. Also, whisperer used to give 15% instead of 10%. You get 10% from a single AP, researcher traits and co, without any downsides whatsoever.

Your entire post feels like you're just mashing random things together to construct some kind of argument that simply doesn't hold any water.

 

[Dr Pippy]

Whisperers costs you 9%, perpetually, in all areas.

Whispers also comes that comes with a 5/10% research speed bonus- a much, much stronger boon to the research economy than a 9% researcher job output, given how research speed buffs work multiplicatively vis-a-vis job modifiers

If we're actually taking about Whisperers, the context is relative to nothing you get a 1% science boost and a 9% everything else including science inputs loss, which means you're actually trading all resources including science for the other Whisperers bonuses.

I don't generally play psionics, so I don't really have a dog in this fight. But it seems worth mentioning that the output modifiers from stability are additive, not multiplicative, with other job output modifiers. Since you can have ~100-200% modifiers by the late game, the 9% additive malus from Whisperers is about a 3-4% decrease in actual output. Likewise, the research speed bonus stacks additively with other research speed bonuses; these can be ~100% by late game, so a 10% reseach speed bonus means about a 5% reduction in time to acquire a tech.

So both the stability and research speed modifiers may have smaller effects that you'd initially think, at least in the end game. Although they're more prounounced in the mid-game, which might be difficult to reconcile with psi's niche as the ascension that shines early and then has to struggle to keep up.

 

[Thiend]

I don't generally play psionics, so I don't really have a dog in this fight. But it seems worth mentioning that the output modifiers from stability are additive, not multiplicative, with other job output modifiers. Since you can have ~100-200% modifiers by the late game, the 9% additive malus from Whisperers is about a 3-4% decrease in actual output. Likewise, the research speed bonus stacks additively with other research speed bonuses; these can be ~100% by late game, so a 10% reseach speed bonus means about a 5% reduction in time to acquire a tech.

So both the stability and research speed modifiers may have smaller effects that you'd initially think, at least in the end game. Although they're more prounounced in the mid-game, which might be difficult to reconcile with psi's niche as the ascension that shines early and then has to struggle to keep up.

That's actually a separate issue with psionics in my opinion. If the various bonuses it provided were multiplicative, barring some mildly crazy covenant downsides ATM, psionics would be fine. 20% higher pop output actually would be enough that combined with other bonuses psionics could compete without pop assembly... But that's the problem, having 30% more pops is 30% more job output and telepaths + Instruments is actually not 30% more job output. I've never added it up to be sure of exact numbers per job but it's... Not actually that much, because it's additive.

That's why earlier (so much earlier I think it was in the previous beta post) I suggested psionics could get something like 1% more job output per psionic pop on the planet as the psionic trait (replacing all current trait job modifiers) - even that would take much longer than you'd think to compete with pop assembly, because as an example if psionics is at 50 pops and biological is at 70 you'd think psionics would effectively outpace biological with 50% more output, equivalent to 75 pops... But it's not going to be 50% more output per pop, and 70 pops is going to be 40% more than 50 pops. What size planet would outpace pop assembly is tech-dependent, but it's really large and becoming better when at extremely high population density isn't exactly overcompensating for taking so long to even reach parity.

And all of that is disregarding that you can't build advanced buildings/orbital rings until you've upgraded the planet capital, which is dependent on population size. Which reduces output multiplicatively.

 

[Ikael]

I still think that giving psionic pop assembly is not the best solution for their conundrum. However, devs must understand that a measly "+10% to X resource" with added drawbacks doesn't cut it at all. You need pops producing twice their regular output outright, or receiving flat modifiers, planetary-ring style ("+X resources") in order to compensate for their low numbers, and I am all for it. Let us have godly pops instead of mundane, abundant pops.

If that presents balance problems, you can easily offset them by moving insane pop output bonuses to the very end of the covenants, so they appear roughly at the same time that the rest of the ascensions get their pop assembly.

 

[-Marauder-]

I don't generally play psionics, so I don't really have a dog in this fight. But it seems worth mentioning that the output modifiers from stability are additive, not multiplicative, with other job output modifiers. Since you can have ~100-200% modifiers by the late game, the 9% additive malus from Whisperers is about a 3-4% decrease in actual output. Likewise, the research speed bonus stacks additively with other research speed bonuses; these can be ~100% by late game, so a 10% reseach speed bonus means about a 5% reduction in time to acquire a tech.

So both the stability and research speed modifiers may have smaller effects that you'd initially think, at least in the end game. Although they're more prounounced in the mid-game, which might be difficult to reconcile with psi's niche as the ascension that shines early and then has to struggle to keep up.

I'm aware. The issue is less "worker" output such as Minerals and Energy which have plenty of modifiers. It's Specialist type things. Such as Alloys that really suffer from this. Trade also gets hit hard, so if you're a megacorp, this really sucks.

And yes, this stuff is worse early on. Which is exactly when it should benefit you the most. As it stands right now, the covenants are simply too punishing for what they offer. A lot of people look at the -15 stability, 200% fleet upkeep and go "well, that's bad, but maybe sufferable". And then forget that there are still the random events on top of that. Whisperer comes with.

Substance abuser is the best outcome here. Losing a high level leader, especially one with rare traits is incredibly irriating. Losing pops in these numbers/additional stability shenaningans especially in the early and midgame is just over the top. So Whisperer is the most punishing early and mid game. But it's bonuses are the worst late game where the effects aren't as pronounced anymore.

Eater of Worlds has even worse random events. Instrument of Desire also slaps you hard if you get unlucky. Giving hundreds, of even thousands of pops 0.75 alloy/unity upkeep can just absolutely nuke your Empire if you get it at a bad time.

• can still give the substance abuser trait to a leader
• can still kill a leader
• can now kill 1 pop and cause -10 stability, +100% ethic shift chance and -200% gov. ethics attraction on a planet for 3600 days
• can now kill up to 8 pops and cause -20% unity production, +100% ethic shift chance and -200% gov. ethics attraction on a planet for 3600 days​

 

[AlchemistaGPH]

This patch changes in general and in particular, the ones for Spiritualist empires are amazing. Thanks for the great work!

Quick question, though. So, if we chose to explore the Shroud on our own, what happens? We would explore the Shroud in the same way as before the patch? No new content for empires who refused to pact with the entities?

 

[Dr Pippy]

I'm aware. The issue is less "worker" output such as Minerals and Energy which have plenty of modifiers. It's Specialist type things. Such as Alloys that really suffer from this. Trade also gets hit hard, so if you're a megacorp, this really sucks.

From what I can tell, Trade and Alloys have the fewest modifiers available, but for both of them, you still have quite a few other modifiers:

• Trade: F Xen. (20%) + Free Traders (10%) + Mercantile stance (10%) + Traditions (2x10%) + Thrifty (25%) + Planet designation (20%) = 105%, with other modifiers possible as well depending on Galactic Community and Federation. Not sure if bonuses to Resources from Jobs also impacts TV; if so, that's another 30% from the planetary capitol and ~10% from the governor.
• Alloys: Tech (10%+10%+5%) + Capitol building (30%) + Governor (~10%) + Militarized Economy (20%) = ~85%, depending on governor level.

So the difference between, say 85 stability (+21% output) and 70 stability (+12%) would be +106% alloy production vs +97%; the -15 stability has cost you about 4.3% of your alloy output. (If you don't run militarized economy, it's more like 4.8%.) This is not nothing, but it doesn't seem crippling, either. I don't disagree with your point that the penalties are too high; I just think it's valuable to be as precise as possible about what they actually are.

And yes, this stuff is worse early on. Which is exactly when it should benefit you the most. As it stands right now, the covenants are simply too punishing for what they offer. A lot of people look at the -15 stability, 200% fleet upkeep and go "well, that's bad, but maybe sufferable". And then forget that there are still the random events on top of that.

Agreed on all counts. In particular, having both the empire-wide maluses and the random events seems gratuitous, unless the bonuses are going to be larger.

I would also say, though, that the devs approach to psionic ascension now seems conceptually a lot stronger than it has been, and hopefully the open beta offers them the chance to do the necessary tweaking of the numbers.

 

[Oculument]

So the difference between, say 85 stability (+21% output) and 70 stability (+12%) would be +106% alloy production vs +97%; the -15 stability has cost you about 4.3% of your alloy output. (If you don't run militarized economy, it's more like 4.8%.) This is not nothing, but it doesn't seem crippling, either. I don't disagree with your point that the penalties are too high; I just think it's valuable to be as precise as possible about what they actually are.

But -15% stability cuts consumer goods production as well. If alloy workers have to shift to cg production to correct a deficit then its more than 4.3% It is efficient to try to run both cg and food close to zero surplus, but those would become deficits upon gaining -15 stability.

 

[Mímisbrunnr]

Given the number of requests for a "reject all covenants feature" perhaps that could be the means by which the Chosen one is manifested? Instead of linking the psychic power of a species to a mysterious entity, they funnel their power into one of their own. It could be mechanically interesting while fitting the 40k theme.

Oh, I like this.

 

[MagicMaxWell]

I personally think (and yes, you have every right to disagree with me) that Shrouded Communications is a very bad psionic tradition and should be replaced by another tradition. In all other paths of ascensions, as traditions are unlocked, you have to choose between one strong tradition and another strong tradition. Very often these traditions open up new unique possibilities. But in the psionic trdition tree, after opening the Great Awakening tradition, you have a choice between breaching the Shroud and also get +5% production from telepaths, or just getting +2 Codebreaking and +2 Encryption. Well, this is just ridiculous. Are any of you going to take Shrouded Communications before Breach the Shroud? No? I believe this is because the presence or absence of any real impact from Shrouded Communications is difficult to feel in practice, but the impact from the breaching the Shroud is felt very strongly. Shrouded Communications does not even feel like a tradition with new features, but just something that needs to be closed in order to quickly get bonus from closing the tradition tree. On top of that, it's also not good for people who don't have Nemesis DLC.

I honestly think that +2 Codebreaking and +2 Encryption is really good for psionic empires, but this bonus has no place in the psionic tradition tree. Shrouded Communications is more of a technology than a socio-cultural evolution of a society. Shrouded Communications can be made into a 4-5 tier psionic technology, which will only be available for research after unlocking a specific psionic tradition. It won't be hard to make it as a technology (the hardest part here is icon design and localization. Paradox designers and translators - thank you for your work!).

In place of Shrouded Communications, it will be possible to put some kind of strong tradition, which, for example, will help psionic empires with their huge weakness - a weaker economy compared to the economy of other ascensions due to the inability to get a large number of pops. It is absolutely not necessary to increase pop growth or add organic pop assembly to psionic empires, just give them some kind of bonus like +0.00000123% to production per psionic pop on planet or add a similar bonus to the strength of edicts, idk (of course after some balancing). This would fit in with the general psionic idea of "a really small number of really very good pops". The whole point is to help psionic empires to better scale. Personally, I just believe that psionics shouldn't be only good at early game, ascensions should be viable at any stage of the game (ideally). I know that the imagination of the devs works better than mine, so they will figure something out, I'm sure!

 

[-Marauder-]

From what I can tell, Trade and Alloys have the fewest modifiers available, but for both of them, you still have quite a few other modifiers:

• Trade: F Xen. (20%) + Free Traders (10%) + Mercantile stance (10%) + Traditions (2x10%) + Thrifty (25%) + Planet designation (20%) = 105%, with other modifiers possible as well depending on Galactic Community and Federation. Not sure if bonuses to Resources from Jobs also impacts TV; if so, that's another 30% from the planetary capitol and ~10% from the governor.
• Alloys: Tech (10%+10%+5%) + Capitol building (30%) + Governor (~10%) + Militarized Economy (20%) = ~85%, depending on governor level.

So the difference between, say 85 stability (+21% output) and 70 stability (+12%) would be +106% alloy production vs +97%; the -15 stability has cost you about 4.3% of your alloy output. (If you don't run militarized economy, it's more like 4.8%.) This is not nothing, but it doesn't seem crippling, either. I don't disagree with your point that the penalties are too high; I just think it's valuable to be as precise as possible about what they actually are.


Agreed on all counts. In particular, having both the empire-wide maluses and the random events seems gratuitous, unless the bonuses are going to be larger.

I would also say, though, that the devs approach to psionic ascension now seems conceptually a lot stronger than it has been, and hopefully the open beta offers them the chance to do the necessary tweaking of the numbers.

Oh I don't disagree at all. Especially about the approach and moving away from the heavy RNG. I'd actually like for them to change the Shields/Jump Drives/Precog Interface as well. You can go entire games without them.

I honestly think that either the running cost, or the random events have to go. Or both have to be tweaked a lot. People underestimate how huge the impact of Eater of Worlds is. In my current game around 2380 I pay roughly 15k energy, and 5k alloys for my fleet. Eater of Worlds would tripple that to 45k and 15k alloys. Meaning I would either need to be perpetually at war, which isn't possible, or massively downscale my fleet.

And 10% weapons range, 15% Fire Rate, and some naval cap simply don't justify such a humongous cost. Especially with the eater putting (permanent?) blockers on your worlds which reduce their size by 2, decrease stability by another 5, and potentially kill a bunch of pops. Honestly ignoring the 50% army damage here, because I've never seen army damage really matter.

Whisperer and Composer are in a similar boat. +20% Pop growth speed, isn't all that much. neither is +20 years leader lifespan.

My problem is not with any mechanical changes or such, it's with the actual numbers involved here. As of right now, you'd likely be better off without a covenant than picking up several of these. I don't think that's intentional by any means. A lot of them offer things which really don't matter, such as Orbital Bombardement Damage, Intel, Army Damage, or even Infiltration Speed/Encryption/Decryption. Hell Encryption/Decryption have basically no impact on anything whatsoever beyond making your espionage go "slightly" faster, and the enemies slightly slower. The outcomes are exactly the same regardless.

 

[Aaron_S]

Looks good generally, but if you leave the psionics rework at this it really feels like it wants to force them into a morally evil role. Psi Warriors having the lowest collateral damage, Psi Pops being happier and the Spiritual Fallen Empire not being morally evil puts this in a weird position.
Please add a No Covenant path where you can tell the 40k chaos gods(and actual Satan) to stay on their side of the Shroud. A small Shroud Story DLC similiar to distant stars would probably give a great opportunity for letting your Chosen One ascend to a similiar power level after some significant hardship and reward you with a somewhat customizeable Shroud Entity, leaving their blessing and maybe a new chosen one by <prev chosen one> to lead the Empire they left behind.
Alternatively maybe a morally gray and/or good Shroud Entity needs to exist.

There's also roleplayers in your game, not just MP players and as one of them I wouldn't enjoy seeing Psi Empires lean so heavily on the evil side all of a sudden now.

 

[Ferrus Animus]

Given the number of requests for a "reject all covenants feature" perhaps that could be the means by which the Chosen one is manifested? Instead of linking the psychic power of a species to a mysterious entity, they funnel their power into one of their own. It could be mechanically interesting while fitting the 40k theme.

Maybe change the Divine Sovereign event when you have a normal Chosen to have an option for a bigger effect if you have no covenant and removes the covenant shroud encounter from future rolls.

I honestly think that either the running cost, or the random events have to go. Or both have to be tweaked a lot. People underestimate how huge the impact of Eater of Worlds is. In my current game around 2380 I pay roughly 15k energy, and 5k alloys for my fleet. Eater of Worlds would tripple that to 45k and 15k alloys. Meaning I would either need to be perpetually at war, which isn't possible, or massively downscale my fleet.

Given you probably got a couple ship upkeep reductions from different sources (like the -5% from the Refit Standards tech or -10 from Supremacy's Fleet Logistic Corps); the final number will be even higher.

 

[dulahan]

Or perhaps Chosen is a step that can lead to helping make a Covenent better... or eventually become something else. Either way, it's a fun thing!

 

[-Marauder-]

Given you probably got a couple ship upkeep reductions from different sources (like the -5% from the Refit Standards tech or -10 from Supremacy's Fleet Logistic Corps); the final number will be even higher.

Yeah, it just feels like the benefits are way, way, way too small to justify the massive downsides we're seeing here. Most of them are barely in the 2-3 repeatable range. Yet you'd get saddled with humongous costs, permanent reductions, and other issues.

Hell, is there anyone who'd ever want either Encryption or Decryption? They do absolutely nothing beyond making operations go slightly faster/slower.

 

[Serifina]

I'd also like to note that no other ascension path has to saddle themselves with some kind of major negative to get all the positives out of it. And some of these downsides are just... massive.

Also, espionage stuff just... isn't worthwhile enough to really focus on it. Espionage benefits in a tradition (and doubly so for the ascension path) just feels like a waste of the Unity.

 

[4xForEver]

text to speech is awesome feature, I have such a pain reading events and this will be very useful.

 

[Nevars]

As long as the dev still insist that Psionic is the only one that must be hammered on hard with actual penalty, terrible pop growth and rng, I think the best way to still make them competitive even with all of that is to make their bonus more than compensate it, not just on par or slightly better than other ascensions, it's need to be over the top better, overshadowed them all to make psionic actually worth it.

Like if you actually do the math you will realized that all of psionic bonus is amount to just barely better than other ascensions or just being on par but they got bogged down with a lot of downsides that other ascensions never have to endure.

 

[Thiend]

I'd also like to note that no other ascension path has to saddle themselves with some kind of major negative to get all the positives out of it. And some of these downsides are just... massive.

Also, espionage stuff just... isn't worthwhile enough to really focus on it. Espionage benefits in a tradition (and doubly so for the ascension path) just feels like a waste of the Unity.

Personally, I'd like to see espionage actually be good rather than be removed from psionics... But until it is good, in addition to all the other problems with psionics right now, encryption and decryption are worthless - they're difficult to quantify, but they don't do much of value.

Some things that could improve espionage; rework/dramatically increase almost all rewards from success, also add a real chance of failure. Things don't always have to be hostile, either; espionage could boost trade, or increase trust cap/build rate and envoy effects. It could do things like abduct pops, or have steal technology be directed toward certain fields. There are options to make it awesome, and feel strong to get bonuses for it.

 

[Ferrus Animus]

Hell, is there anyone who'd ever want either Encryption or Decryption? They do absolutely nothing beyond making operations go slightly faster/slower.

I do like keeping mine good, because it impacts infiltration speed and elvel for me, meaning I have an easier time getting that intelt reshold for military/ branch offices, and it slows down the AI doing their sabotages, as toothless as they usually arre they can still be annoying.

However relative advantage is capped at +4 anyway, so more and more soon literally do nothing.