Hello everyone!

Today we aim to shed some light on the upcoming changes for the 1.2 “Asimov” update.

Border Rework
Something we did not like with how Stellaris played out towards the mid-game previous to 1.2, was how that the player tended to get locked in and blocked from exploring or gaining access to the rest of the galaxy.

In the upcoming update we aim to correct that issue by reworking how border access works. By default, everyone will have open border access to other empires’ borders. An empire may close its border through a diplomatic action, and access is denied to your rivals by default.

We hope that this will make the game feel less constrained towards the mid-game.

Another valuable addition is that when you give your ships or fleet a Return order, but they cannot find a valid path home, you may set them as “Missing in Action”. While ships are missing in action, they will be invisible to you and reappear within your borders within a certain amount of time.

Expansion Cost
To reduce exploits of the open borders, we have chosen to introduce an Influence cost to colonizing planets or building Frontier Outposts. This cost will be based on the range to your closest owned system.

Embassies & Trust
A significant change in 1.2 is the removal of embassies and the passive opinion increase they provided. In the “Asimov” update, players will have to gain trust by cooperating with the AI. Trust is gained over time by having some sort of treaty with the AI.

Diplomatic Changes
A number of diplomatic statuses that were previously available through trade have now been changed into being Diplomatic Actions available through the diplomacy screen. We felt that some of these actions did not really feel in place, and that they were too hidden, in the trade interface.

We have changed how cooperating with the AI happens. It is no longer as easy to enter into an Alliance with the AI, and you have to start off by gaining their Trust through research agreements, guarantee independence, non-aggression pacts and defensive pacts.

Defensive Pacts are a new diplomatic action that allows two empires to be called into wars if any of them should get attacked.

Joint War Declarations
Another new diplomatic feature is the possibility to invite other empires to your wars. The AI will not join your wars if their Attitude towards you is not at least neutral and they have something they also want from the target.

All things combined we hope that these changes will make the mid-game feel less static and will open up more possibilities for interesting situations to occur.

Join us again next week for more details about the upcoming 1.2 "Asimov" update!

 

[karl2025]

Suggestion: Fallen Empires should still have default closed borders. They've fallen out of the whole dealing with the galaxy thing, you should have to work to open them up (if possible)

 

[melkor88]

Thanks!

 

[Kensai7]

I like that Embassies have been reworked, but I really want to see again Embassies reimplemented in another way. Please think about it for a future patch/DLC.

 

[Battlenelf]

If you colonize 20 planets along the path to the target system, it will cost less influence than saving up for that one far distant system alone. This is actually a good thing and creates a game out of colonization.

And each planet gave you 11% penalty to research. Now I just saw that devs want us to colonize every shitty planet, instead of choosing big and good ones.

 

[Duuk]

In the Stream, Wiz showcased that there is a NEW policy called "War philosophy". It'll have three positions:

a) Unrestricted warfare
Same as usual. No restrictions apply.

b) Liberation warfare
You may never declare wars to cede planets. You can declare wars to liberate planets as usual

c) Outlawed warfare
You may never declare wars. For ANY reason.

This policy, however, does not affect defensive wars. Even if your War philosophy is not "unrestricted", you can set "cede planet" wargoals if you're being attacked. Also, you can always declare wars and choose "cede planet" if the target planet was yours in the past. All ethics can choose any philosophies, save for Fanatic Pacifists being locked at "Outlawed warfare" and maybe Militarists being locked at "Unrestricted warfare" (I say maybe because Wiz haven't said that, but it makes sense.).

So...

Basically this week's DD was *less* informative than the already released info from the stream that only people with 2 hours of their life available already had.

I've got serious concerns that Stellaris doesn't have a direction and doesn't have an idea of what is actually wrong with the game right now, and it seems like the sharing of information is disjointed at best.

 

[StJimmyRocks92]

Do you have to individually turn off border access for every empire you encounter? I prefer the default closed borders.

As far as opened borders go I'm all for it, they would add more depth and complexity to the game, but I would like this to be a three tier system:

• First tier would allow all types of ships to cross borders (the default setting),
• the second one would allow me the option of closing the borders for military fleets so that other empires would still need to ask me for permission,
• third closed for all types of ships.

The second tier, just like the closed borders for all types of ships would come at a cost (worst relations with other empires). The second tier would add more complexity, because if it is allowed that other empires have their fleets in your systems then they could declare war and achieve war goals much more easily. This would be very infuriating in MP where a declaration of war can happen easily.

I like the three tiered borders, and I think it would be smart to add a policy for Default Borders. So you could set how you want your borders to be upon meeting a new empire, and then have the option of changing it based on the individual empires you meet.

 

[S5731]

i would like an energy fee when you drive trough colonized aereas (aereas where they have scanrange of)

Agreed - or an influence penalty while in another empire's territory.

 

[Serenity84]

Saving someone in their hour of need ought to earn gratitude and loyalty for decades, if not centuries.

I had such a situation with two empires that were already vassals. The Big Bad attacked them, carved out huge chunks and basically cut them in half. The enemy was "superior" to me and had battleship fleets while I barely got to cruisers. But they had missiles, and given how overpowered PD is, I hardly lost any ships. But it was still a struggle to build my fleets and keep the enemy fleets at bay.

Eventually I returned the planets my vassals lost, liberated two others and took one for myself. But my vassals showed no improved relationship Not even for ceding them planets (regardless of whether they used to own them or not)

 

[schedim]

Well, there is no "magic wall". If I tell you "I see any of your ships in my space, and it is war", actual war is what you need to enter my space (and you can always declare war, unless truce is in effect).

Soo the truce DO actually conjures a magical wall

I think you understand what I mean...

 

[romothecus]

Difficulty penalty to alliances is gone, instead it'll be heavily dependant on your war philsophy policy setting (which determines if you're the conquering type or not).

my what? I've still never figured out what war philosophy policy settings are

 

[kazper]

my what? I've still never figured out what war philosophy policy settings are

War policy in this case is a new policy setting. It's not the weird diplomatic malus.

 

[Arizal]

This seems kinda pointless given all the other major problems with Stellaris. How about fixing the severe lack of content and play first and then worry about fine tuning and redoing elements later? Right now Stellaris is one of the most boring games I own and with these changes I have even less reason not to play like a genocidal warmonger.

This IS adding content. Namely, they are adding a (good, I think) diplomacy system. With those changes, the game promises to be indfinitely more reactive and engaging than it is right now. I love Paradox games (especially EUIV) because of their diplomacy, and to me they made the right choice by improving diplomacy before (almost) everything else in a game which is about interacting with other space empires.

You can still be a genocidal warmonger. The reaction others will have about that will be as realistic as right now : they will hate you, but it will hopefully be improved, since they will be able to act on those feelings. If they do something to prevent you (or a player, AI or human, who wants to do that. It's not against you) to mass murder the galaxy, I will rejoice. This game will need some diplomatic "skills", whereas right now you only have to colonize rush.

 

[Subbak]

I hope Trust will not be an entirely separate metric from opinion, otherwise you've gone one step down the slippery slope of having diplomatic action be a complex web of parameters where opinions don't mean much, like EU4. I liked that Stellaris had made the choice that opinion actually represented opinion.

 

[victorexach]

For a game that "broke sales record" at release, I'd hoped for a different amount of love and attention. Just a thought.

 

[RMG]

If embassies are getting removed, what will pacifists get instead? That extra embassy was really useful when embassies were strong.

 

[Amor_Fati]

If embassies are getting removed, what will pacifists get instead? That extra embassy was really useful when embassies were strong.

Happiness.

 

[kanukki]

Suggestion: Fallen Empires should still have default closed borders. They've fallen out of the whole dealing with the galaxy thing, you should have to work to open them up (if possible)

Isn't this already a thing? Or did I just imagine that is a thing because it's so darn logical.

If rivals are automatically closed borders, so should Fallen Empires. Yup. And since I'm frequently rivaling my neighbours and using FEs as buffers, I'll probably be just as fenced in on Asimov as I am now on Clarke. But all good.

 

[Wouter445]

are those diplomatic chances count for AI also?.

 

[gmckean]

According to the twitch stream, pacifists will get a happiness bonus (which spiritualists are losing in exchange for decreased ethics divergence) and decreased influence cost for diplomatic actions. Pacifistic forms of government will also get an increased number of core sectors.

 

[VoodooEconomist]

For a game that "broke sales record" at release, I'd hoped for a different amount of love and attention. Just a thought.

With the cause of delay and briefness of the dd being given by the developers as basically "we're too busy actually working on it" I'd say the game is getting a proper amount of attention - it's the game that needs attention, not the community. I'm fine with less communication if resources are pulled to work on the patch, that seems like reasonable prioritisation.