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Stellaris Dev Diary #315 - The Velvet Glove

Hi everyone!

3.9.2 has been released with a handful of bugfixes.

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#################### VERSION 3.9.2 ######################​

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Balance
  • Catalytic empires can now build bio-reactors.
  • Pre-FTL empires now have reduced technological development before the mid-game year.

Bugfix
  • Anomalies that reward Scientist Expertise traits now apply those traits to the Cognitive Node for gestalt empires.
  • Blocked empires without the Scientific Method technology from constructing research districts.
  • Federations End should no longer spawn empty habitats if the pre-FTL slider is set to 0
  • Fix a CTD when loading a save containing an invalid species archetype
  • Fix for wrong value for evasion in ship design.
  • Fixed being able to build multiple gaia seeders on a single planet.
  • Fixed Fallen Empires not triggering their monthly random events
  • Fixed pre-ftl civilizations that naturally progressed to the Early Space Age being unable to become space faring.
  • Fixed Secrets of the ... no longer granting Expertise traits.
  • Fixed stage 4 gaia seeders being buildable, but immediately destroyed by non-Idyllic Bloom empires.
  • Fixed the Colonial Remains deposits not spawning for the Remnants origin in some cases.
  • Fixed the Patron achievement not firing.
  • Fixed the Prethoryn getting stuck because their starting system contains an FTL inhibitor that prevents them from expanding
  • Fixed the Surveyor not spawning resources in some cases.
  • Gardening Drones will no longer have an unlocalized string.
  • Habitat Central Complexes constructed around stars should now be placed further away, so they no longer clip into the star.
  • Industrial designation is now only available on habitats for gestalt empires, if they use consumer goods.
  • Merc enclaves now inherit their shipset from their creator.
  • Paradisiacal Habitat modifiers in Ithome's Gate no longer use placeholder icons.
  • Restored -25% penalty if the government doesn't have a head of research.
  • Set a manual planet size for the Toxic God star asset, as it otherwise counts the large visual effects as part of the planet.
  • The Crystal Splitter will now hopefully stop blowing up Fruitful Partnership colonies
  • The spiritualist fallen empire will now wake up if you eat their holy worlds.
  • The knights will no longer try to quest if you pacify their habitat.

Performance
  • Removed MTTH from anomaly.6710, bane of ship events, horror of designers
  • Removed MTTH from assorted fallen_empire_tasks events
  • Removed MTTH from communications_spread.1 and communications_spread.3
  • Removed MTTH from crime.1, crime.40 and crime.41, plus added pre-triggers to all crime-events
  • Removed MTTH from fallen_empires.1, fallen_empires.3, fallen_empires.10, fallen_empires.11
  • Removed MTTH from leviathans.660 and leviathans.662
  • Removed MTTH from pop.1-13, madness that should have never existed
  • Removed MTTH from random caravaneer events (cara.4000-4050)
  • Removed MTTH from refugees.5, scourge of the game, destroyer of performance
  • Removed MTTH from the Migrating Forests event chain (colony.1 to colony.12)
  • Removed MTTH from the Orbital Debris event chain (colony.171 and colony.171)

UI
  • Added new main menu gradient

Modding
  • Added researchers_add.txt and archaeoengineers_add.txt inline scripts for buildings.
  • Added chemist_add.txt, factory_add.txt, foundry_add.txt, refiner_add.txt and translucer_add.txt inline script for buildings.

3.9.3 is currently planned for a few weeks from now, and will include some more bugfixes as well as some diplomacy changes that we’ve pulled in. The recommended DLC screen updates I mentioned a few weeks ago have shifted to 3.10 at the earliest.

Let’s talk about Diplomacy now.

Diplomacy and Trust​

A common complaint since the release of Overlord and the 3.3 ‘Cepheus’ update is that the galaxy frequently degenerated into a handful of powerful vassal blocs, and things like Federations only formed rarely. A significant cause of this was due to the willingness of AI empires to quickly diplomatically submit to more powerful empires, even if the difference in power really wasn’t all that high. This then led to a snowball effect, as newly encountered empires would generally be less powerful than this already established bloc.

We’ve made a few minor adjustments to AI Acceptance in past releases, but decided that we need a more impactful change to delay this sort of behavior. We do want it possible for these political formations to form, but it shouldn’t be a fast and virtually guaranteed phenomenon.

Trust is an existing concept that grows over time between empires that have diplomatic ties. It grows up to a Trust Cap based primarily on the magnitude of those diplomatic ties, but is also affected by traditions and other sources of modifiers. Since the release of Federations and the 2.6 ‘Verne’ update, Envoys could be assigned to Improve Relations to waive most of the requirements for diplomatic pacts - this has now been largely shifted over to Trust and having an Embassy with the target or the Diplomatic Networking tradition.

Diplomatic Networking tradition, now also allows Advanced Diplomacy without an Embassy

The Centralized Yibrak Systems would like to join your network.​

These requirements will change the initial flow of the game quite a bit - it’ll be harder to meet someone and have a Commercial Pact, Research Agreement, and the like a few days after finishing first contact, but similarly as a MegaCorp it’ll be rarer to encounter an AI Empire that already has their fill of Commercial Pacts and refuses to enter any more. It takes a bit of getting to know one another before they’re willing to entwine their economies or swear eternal allegiance to one another.

Form Defensive Pact requires Positive Relations or 20 Trust, and either an Embassy or the Diplomatic Networking tradition.

Let’s not be too hasty, maybe get to know one another first.​

Balance
  • Rebalanced requirements for diplomatic treaties to require trust.
  • Having less than 50 Trust with an empire imposes a -100 Acceptance to them becoming your subject or overlord.
  • Removed the ability to trade favors.
  • Insulting someone decreases their Trust of your empire.
  • The Intimidation menace perk now allows you to ignore diplomatic requirements for proposing subjugation.

AI
  • The AI will no longer request to become the subject or overlord of another empire unless they have 50 Trust with the other party.
  • Certain AI personalities (Federation Builders, Spiritual Seekers, Migrating Flocks, and Peaceful Traders) are now 25x more likely to select Diplomacy traditions.
  • The AI will no longer request to be subjugated by empires that are equivalent or weaker than them.
  • Trust between nations is now visible in the main diplomatic screen.

As another general diplomatic change, we’ve removed the ability to trivially trade favors between Empires. The traditions related to them and the Extort Favors operation will be the most consistent source of favors going forward, though in time we plan on adding more to various events that feel like they really should include a favor exchange. (This pass will not be complete in 3.9.3.)

A spreadsheet of diplomatic requirements

All values are subject to change, but we’re generally pretty happy with them so far.​

Internal testing has shown these changes to be pretty effective at reducing the vassalization blobs while still allowing them to form either over the long term or through judicious application of violence. (Subjugation wargoals do not require trust.) This also gives a potentially interesting hook for the Smear Campaign operation when we revisit Espionage sometime in the coming updates.

Next Week​

Next week we’ll be examining a potential 3.10 feature - the Leader Consolidation and trait balancing.

A scientist is governing a planet, and the Private Mines trait provides Miner Jobs instead of minerals from nothingness

Hey wait, who put you in charge of that planet?​

See you then!
 
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Awesome, it's cool to see trust being reworked to become more important. Also glad to see leader resource traits get a rebalance.
 
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Are you planning this to affect the possible interactions between player empires too? On the one hand many diplomodifiers like trust seem worthless in MP and therefore the Sources that grant it. On the other hand it also feels annoying when both sides agree to a deal and then are limited by some game restriction.
 
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While those trust changes and even the removal of favour trade are a good thing, it feels like peaceful or diplomatic gameplay is unnecessary difficult now. Even if the diplo tradition is used early on. My biggest concern is that harm relations and now insults are way to powerful. You can't compete without an embassy or a huge amount of envoys.

So a question:

Will we get another Ascension Perk that enhances diplomatic gameplay, trust build up and diplomatic acceptance? Actually is everything in favour of open warfare and conflict and that isn't appealing to everyone of us.
 
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Federations formed rarely???

In most of my games there is barely any independents. Almost every joins a federation. It’s one of my pet peeves with this game.
 
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On paper it sounds excellent! Can't wait to try it in game.

Another idea to enhance diplomatic gameplay could be having Commercial and Research pacts benefits grow overtime, for example (let's take Commercial): it start at 10% shared Trade Value but for each year the pact stays on it increases its value by 2% up to 30%, maybe more if you have diplomacy traditions (for example, that tradition perk which currently only increases trust, which is totally useless between human empires in multiplayer). Same would be for research pacts.

Edit: really hoping for consistent upgrades for existing espionage operations and new operations to interact with internal politics of other empires
 
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I like what I'm seeing. Galactic dynamics have been an issue for quite some time now (before vassal spam it was big federations), it makes playthroughs very repetitive unless you actively try to dismantle the natural order.
It will be really nice for the game to have different scenarios.
 
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- Removed the ability to trade favors.

WOW. Forget everything else @Eladrin said. THIS is the big one, that trivializes the early diplomatic game.

Whether trading favours for favours, favours for resources, or giving them away for free to get +100 good relations boost, favour trading is the most abusable mechanic in Stellaris currently.

EDIT: Also, my early 2208-2212 federations with xenophile empires appear to be a thing of the past with the new trust requirement, requiring rather more work. Exciting times are ahead!
 
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Very cool, the vassal blobs (and Federation blobs before that) caused the mid- and lategame to be pretty poor and unfun experience. Hopefully 3.9.3 is released quickly without problems.

I already made a small mod for myself which increase the trust and relationship requirements for diplomatic vassalization in the same way it was show in the earlier dev diary. Though I am not sure if I want to start a new game even with the mod...

HMS Enterprize said:
Federations formed rarely???

In most of my games there is barely any independents. Almost every joins a federation. It’s one of my pet peeves with this game.
Click to expand...

Before Overlord Federation blobs were very common, but after Overlord turning others to vassals was much easier so federations turned to vassal swarms.
 
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Next Week​

Next week we’ll be examining a potential 3.10 feature - the Leader Consolidation and trait balancing.
Click to expand...


Leader consolidation? Are we getting a feature like character loyalty in Imperator: Rome?


Very Excited
 
Getty said:
Leader consolidation? Are we getting a feature like character loyalty in Imperator: Rome?
Click to expand...
He's talking about merging classes. When it was first mentioned in #307, they were talking about reducing the five leader classes, admirals, generals, governors, scientists, and envoys to three, commanders, diplomats, and scientists, but that might have changed since those early experiments.
 
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Pale Blue said:
Are you planning this to affect the possible interactions between player empires too? On the one hand many diplomodifiers like trust seem worthless in MP and therefore the Sources that grant it. On the other hand it also feels annoying when both sides agree to a deal and then are limited by some game restriction.
Click to expand...

Yes, Trust will be required between player empires as well, just like how Opinion is required in the current system.

A2ch0n said:
While those trust changes and even the removal of favour trade are a good thing, it feels like peaceful or diplomatic gameplay is unnecessary difficult now. Even if the diplo tradition is used early on. My biggest concern is that harm relations and now insults are way to powerful. You can't compete without an embassy or a huge amount of envoys.

So a question:

Will we get another Ascension Perk that enhances diplomatic gameplay, trust build up and diplomatic acceptance? Actually is everything in favour of open warfare and conflict and that isn't appealing to everyone of us.
Click to expand...

I'm more likely to buff the Diplomacy traditions or alter Shared Destiny if needed than create a new diplomacy focused Ascension Perk.

HMS Enterprize said:
Federations formed rarely???

In most of my games there is barely any independents. Almost every joins a federation. It’s one of my pet peeves with this game.
Click to expand...

They currently tend to form vassal blobs rather than Federations, since the latter requires the Diplomacy traditions.

Laaaaan said:
Is that a scientist governing a planet? Horrific. I hope i get to do that too.
Click to expand...

Indeed.
 
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I still say the bigger issue with Federations getting outcompeted by vassals is....Federations require at least ONE member to take the Diplomatic ascension, which largely is only useful for Federation making/building. I suspect most AI (unless they were specifically federation builders) don't take the diplo ascension path, and thus none of the AI had the ability to do a federation. And since most players probably didn't take it (Since so many of the other ascension perk paths are more lucrative to them) no one can do a federation because it's locked behind a ascension mechanic no one is really super incentivized to take unless they were making a federation.

TLDR Federation making shouldn't be locked behind an Ascension path, it greatly hampers federation building especially when similar vassal arrangements can be had (And are more beneficial to the overlord) without taking a middling ascension tree. It should be like the third tier of the 'embassy tech' line. And the Diplomacy tree should give modifiers to federation experience or a special 'diplomatic corp' building that gives even more diplomats than the embassy building.
 
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A2ch0n said:
While those trust changes and even the removal of favour trade are a good thing, it feels like peaceful or diplomatic gameplay is unnecessary difficult now. Even if the diplo tradition is used early on. My biggest concern is that harm relations and now insults are way to powerful. You can't compete without an embassy or a huge amount of envoys.

So a question:

Will we get another Ascension Perk that enhances diplomatic gameplay, trust build up and diplomatic acceptance? Actually is everything in favour of open warfare and conflict and that isn't appealing to everyone of us.
Click to expand...

I think I'd need to play with it more to be sure, but I don't know if I feel that diplomatic gameplay will be too difficult, but rather perhaps it will just stop being so easy. In the current version of the game, particularly if you're a xenophile, it's trivial to make someone you just met your friend unless you have very opposing ethics.

I think it's a bit more reasonable that an empire you came into contact with last year might not want to enter into a defensive pact this year, they barely know who you are. You'd need to maybe start with a non-aggression pact first and then in a few years' time take the next step forward once there's more trust.

I don't see an empire that wants to play diplomatically feeling like they need diplomatic traditions to accomplish their goals more quickly as a bad thing.
 
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Hum, deleting governor leader type seems like a good idea to reduce the number of leaders
 
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I'm really looking forward to the changes/improvements to the Smear Campaign operation. I like to roleplay the Indoctrination angle of the Reapers from Mass Effect, and I really like the idea of sabotaging the relations between species to undermine their efforts to unite and fight me
 
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RhysTheT00n said:
I'm really looking forward to the changes/improvements to the Smear Campaign operation. I like to roleplay the Indoctrination angle of the Reapers from Mass Effect, and I really like the idea of sabotaging the relations between species to undermine their efforts to unite and fight me
Click to expand...
I love the idea that I can get the Systems Alliance and the Turians to be less willing to work together by letting one of them think the other doesn't trust them or wants to sever ties or something
 
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