Stellaris Dev Diary #321 - Origins and Civics

[ZomgK3tchup]

Prescripted empires are underrated.

It doesn’t seem like much, but I really enjoy being able to jump straight into new content without fiddling with empire creation.

The new portrait is also a very welcome surprise.

 

[Atmaz]

The Dark Consortium is a type of Civic that cannot be added or removed* after the game starts, as it adds some significant changes to your society. Not only do you begin with a Dark Matter deposit in your home system, you already have the capability to harvest it.

I've made a small clarification in the original post.

Technically, the Dark Consortium is a bit unique here. If you start with the Dark Consortium Civic, it can never removed. However, you can add it once you research Dark Matter Drawing, but once you use its Council Agenda to obtain Dark Matter technologies, it can then never be removed. Sorry about any confusion there.

 

[Rafss]

If only you knew how many things in this build are changed in 3.10

Alfray, Eladrin and team:

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

If only you knew how many things in this build are changed in 3.10

I would have even more fun, because I would be already be putting together an even better build based on available incomplete information, with the goal of making your new game mechanics cry for mercy.

I've been running roughshod over PDS game mechanics since 2001, and the one thing that Stellaris has done better than any other of the company's games so far is to keep introducing new game mechanics and features for me to get interested in either optimizing for maximum amusement or incorporating into roleplaying builds. It is why I make sure I get all its DLC as presents from my nephews and nieces for my birthday (May) and Christmas, ensuring I play it a few months each year during summer and winter, catching up and making new builds.

So keep up the good work!

Ps: If your leader rebalancing doesn't in some way address the "stacking council scientists" issue, which I have highlighted countless times since this summer, you DESERVE for research to maintain its current troubled state, where it gets completely out of hand during the first 3-4 decades if the player knows what he is doing, and gets even worse after that.

The major problem is not the scientist super ethics-destiny traits (though I certainly expect those to be hammered) - it is the ease of stacking veteran techspeed increasing traits on the council - and having to balance both for builds that do that, and builds that do not (or don't have Paragons in the first place). Of course there are other issues than that, but being able to comparatively easily double or triple the effect of the raw science output during the first century, even quadruple it or more if truly dedicated, well... its an incredible accelerator, is all I'm saying.

So if when 3.10 rolls around it suddenly becomes impossible, or at least a lot harder, to gain 300-400% increased techspeed in all three disciplines by 2300, I am going to be happy, because you'll have made the game more interesting.

 

[Atmaz]

So is the Rift from the Origin a special, pre-scripted Rift? It'd be pretty hilarious if the Certera finally managed to explore their own afterlife, only to randomly draw a Plane of Infinite Suffering or somesuch.

Indeed, they get a special one. It's designed where each choice you make along the way influences the 'reward' you get at the end.

 

[Rafss]

Riftworld is the rich cousin of Galactic Doorstep

 

[Calvax]

Indeed, they get a special one. It's designed where each choice you make along the way influences the 'reward' you get at the end.

Maybe I’ve misunderstood but I thought all rifts were designed with branching stories that lead to different outcomes. This seems to imply that normal rifts have set outcomes?

 

[Ajacoba]

Maybe I’ve misunderstood but I thought all rifts were designed with branching stories that lead to different outcomes. This seems to imply that normal rifts have set outcomes?

sounds more like the origin rift has a fail safe - for the obvious reason that it would suck not to get to a proper end
just like you can't really fail the toxic god quest unless you willingly end it or lose the game

 

[Atmaz]

Are all the sovereign guardianship civics non-swappable? Only the standard one has it specified.

This has been fixed. They are all non-swappable.

 

[Peepijeep]

Council Legitimacy sounds like a small version of internal politics! Cant wait for that!

 

[zZander56]

At first I kinda wanted to complain about the price, but the amount of content added is great!

Also question - I remember that in previous DLCs and Patches you tried to make a way that civics will be different depending on a government (so normal empires have bonus X and Corporate ones have similar bonus Y, but with some stuff changed). Have you decided to step away from this practice or have you simply not give it much of a thought here?

I absolutely like the Edicts for Dark Matter, finally makes it useful outside of emergency funds.

EDIT: It might be worth it to add what Hyperlane Breach Points technology did, cause I don't remember every technology on top of my head ;P

It is a shame that civic variants are essentially copy-pasted across the empire types.

 

[Atmaz]

Maybe I’ve misunderstood but I thought all rifts were designed with branching stories that lead to different outcomes. This seems to imply that normal rifts have set outcomes?

This is true. I worded it poorly.

To be more specific for this one, there is an Empire Modifier you will receive that changes based on your choices - so that each playthrough you can lean into slightly different playstyles.

 

[Bitzo]

I'm unsure about what makes the Sovereign Guardianship Civic require Militarism, especially given that Inward Perfection exists and these two would be a perfect match. You get a Civic that severely limits your ability to engage with other empires and - due to requiring Pacifism - isn't really geared towards conquest (and thus expansion beyond what little you claim early on) and gives you a Council Position that buffs your Defense Platforms, i.e.: gives you defensive bonuses. Then you have a Civic that gives you a Councillor with combat bonuses to your Starbases and to anything within your own territory, as well as an additional defensive Starbase Building, but penalises you for expanding outward too much. On top of that the latter Civic gets an Edict to convert Influence, which is somewhat less useful for an empire that barely - if ever - expands, into Unity. Oh, and half the bonus of a whole other Civic - Citizen Service - right on top for good measure. Does Inward Perfection get anything to make up for the opportunity cost of not picking this instead?

It feels as if saying "You know that Civic we added in Utopia? We made a better version that is explicitly incompatible with the original."

 

[Calvax]

This is true. I worded it poorly.

To be more specific for this one, there is an Empire Modifier you will receive that changes based on your choices - so that each playthrough you can lean into slightly different playstyles.

Thanks for clarifying

 

[kidwiz0101]

Please make guardianship compatible with inward perfection

 

[Beauty Nova]

Very sad that sovereign guardianship conflicts with inward perfection, the two are natural fits for each other thematically and mechanically. That said they don't need to exclude each other by name because they're already exclusive thanks to ethics, inward perfection requires pacifist while guardianship requires militarist (though I'd argue pacifist and xenophobic would also fit for it as alternate options).

All in all some interesting options here though, none that speak to me quite yet but I'm sure that'll change sooner or later. Sort of sad that the mechanics of dimensional worship is tied to spiritualist too but I suppose us materialists can't get all the goodies.

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

I'm unsure about what makes the Sovereign Guardianship Civic require Militarism, especially given that Inward Perfection exists and these two would be a perfect match. You get a Civic that severely limits your ability to engage with other empires and - due to requiring Pacifism - isn't really geared towards conquest (and thus expansion beyond what little you claim early on) and gives you a Council Position that buffs your Defense Platforms, i.e.: gives you defensive bonuses. Then you have a Civic that gives you a Councillor with combat bonuses to your Starbases and to anything within your own territory, as well as an additional defensive Starbase Building, but penalises you for expanding outward too much. On top of that the latter Civic gets an Edict to convert Influence, which is somewhat less useful for an empire that barely - if ever - expands, into Unity. Oh, and half the bonus of a whole other Civic - Citizen Service - right on top for good measure. Does Inward Perfection get anything to make up for the opportunity cost of not picking this instead?

It feels as if saying "You know that Civic we added in Utopia? We made a better version that is explicitly incompatible with the original."

Those civics do not seem to me to be at all complementary.

Inward Perfection is for people who most of all want to ignore everybody else and be left alone, somebody looking inwards rather than outwards to their neighbours - but it is not inherently intended for tall empires, making as much sense for wide, even very wide, empires that expand through colonization of planets and habitat and ringworld building rather than conquest. In some galaxies there are very limited opportunities for peaceful colonization of planets, in others there are huge opportunities. And the better the player is at leveraging rapid early expansion through first contact influence, extensive scouting, and diplomatically neutralizing AIs, the more often "huge opportunities" is the case.

Sovereign Guardianship is for people who look outwards, sees threats, and want to entrench their possessions heavily while being careful about not overextending themselves territorially. (Now whether it actually will achieve that tall preference over wide is something that I and others have already disputed, but it is clearly the intention.)

Having the inwards looking be pacifist and the outwards looking be militarist does seem to make sense. Certainly allowing a country to combine the two would seem really strange conceptually.


EDIT: That being said, it would be really neat if the Influence > Unity edict was added to Inward Perfection. I quite agree that that particular functionality would seem a natural fit.

 

[Incompetent]

The main reason why tall does not work in Stellaris is because the base pop growth of planets. For the Sovereign Guardianship civic to work it needs a way to generate pops in other ways than owning more planets. You need to be able to increase the pop growth of your planets significantly by developing them.

That's easy - you steal them from other empires, either by raiding bombardment, or by annexing, stripping planets of pops, and releasing what's left. You're pushed into doing this anyway in the later stages of the game, because of how existing population limits pop growth and because if you keep conquering, you end up with more planets than the galaxy has enough pops to fill.

It makes sense for a raiding-oriented civic to be militaristic. Having the military bonuses be "defensive" is a little weird, but you can probably work with it by baiting enemies into your territory.

Where empire size doesn't work as a balancing tool is with giant vassal blobs: you hoover up tons of resources, potentially including AI bonus, without your own costs going up. If the devs are serious about encouraging genuinely "tall" empires (as opposed to making a Crusader Kings Holy Roman Empire in space, with a small "demense" but a vast effective realm), then at a minimum, subjects would have to pass some % of their sprawl to the overlord (depending on how extractive the contract is).

 

[Navar]

Riftworld is the rich cousin of Galactic Doorstep

Man, I hope they touch on GD to be interesting. It has so much potential and just stubs its toe on the the doorstep with three events and a digsite. The end reward is nice, but I feel like there should be a bit more to it!

 

[Minuro]

As a person who often designs games, I can tell when a team is short of ideas. I don't want to be a hater, I'm going to try to be constructive here, but I am concerned about the lack of originality in the design of the special actions you unlock in expeditions. I'm referring to those that cost "blue mana".
Maybe I've only seen the "meh" skills, because there are a lot more I don't know about, but this introduction has me worried. Abilities like instantly building hyper-relays or blocking a portal can be handy or even decisive at certain times, but they are still a VERY circumstantial benefit. In my games it's rare that I need to hastily build a hyper-relay, or plug a portal (if I have one at all).
I think it would be more interesting to offer a technology from a special pool, or a new type of building that offers advantages for the planet's specialization (or the opposite, balanced worlds also deserve to be viable).