Stellaris Dev Diary #361 - The Vision

[Mech_infect]

I hope the opinion festival is not late and my post will be read on some analysis of opinions from the forum.

----What is Stellaris to you?

strategic game with role-playing for states.

----How does this match what you think Stellaris is, and where it should go? Would you change any of these vision statements?

So far the strategic challenge is simple, and the role-playing is not so deep and not so wide for each possible nation (yes, my gag is that there are too few slots for civics, so we get skimpy nations)

I think that Stellaris should deepen and expand the role-playing parts of the mechanics that exist, and !! interaction !! between them

(For example, it is not enough to become a galactic imperium, it would be cool to make different types of empires depending on civics, origins, government type. Different types of empires give different chains of events, different laws, different internal political chains of events and maybe even different types of internal political crises with different unique endings)

----What systems and content are “sacred” to you, which would make Stellaris not Stellaris anymore if we changed them?

Nation construction system (although it should give more opportunities to make nations more unique)

----How important to you are the current systems that use individual Pops and Jobs in the planetary simulation?

I have nothing against it. In the end, the interaction of genes and special jobs of your empire is an interesting moment for the player to think about.

The downside is that we need a more convenient system for assigning specific races to specific jobs.

----What aspects are most important in defining your civilization?

Civics and origins. I like to build interesting combinations and imagine the structure and culture of such nations. Another question is that I want to create a more unique and rich type. But with a small number of civics, they all seem to be a bit similar in their poverty of slots.

----How do you set goals for yourself during gameplay? When do you set them, and how often do they change as you play?

Based on the "culture" of the nation (which depends on civics and origins), I set a goal that such a culture could pursue.

I admit that there may be internal crises of the state that change the culture (and accordingly its goals) greatly, but so far there are no such events

Here I will immediately describe the problem that the depth of role-playing when achieving the goal is not deep. and its unique "taste" for the type of nation I play for, I do not feel. There is also no deep role-playing interaction between different mechanics that give goals.

----How important is the current Trade system, with routes collecting back to your Capital?

arrows do not necessarily have to go to the capital, there can be trade concentrations (for various reasons)

the piracy system should stop requiring fleets. Let there be a game system of police, for example, which feeds on unity and alloys, and credits

Some role-playing types of government should have their own interaction with trade value (hive minds, space communism)

I would like more slots for megacorporations on the planets of other states.

---Is colonization too easy? Should habitability and planet climate matter more?

JUST YES.

This would create more interesting interactions in the middle game and even the late game.

-----If you could remove one game system, what would it be? Which system would you make the central focus of an expansion? Is there a feature you want to enjoy, but feel the current implementation doesn’t quite work for you?

I want to enjoy shiponage (it is impossible to normally play a state with a weak army, but with an incredibly powerful spy network that would allow you to achieve INCREDIBLE and serious goals with spies, and not with the brute force of the fleet)

I would equally welcome a DLC with a developed system of state culture (and with a system of cultural influence and "subordination" of other states), a system of faith and of course a system of domestic politics)

-------------

If we go beyond these issues, then in general now the game needs to stop adding new mechanics. Now there is not enough depth to the mechanics that exist and their multi-factor interaction with all other mechanics to create a more developed role-playing experience (due to an increase in interactions and events, including between everything in general) and for a more flexible and diverse response to the challenges of the game + for a more flexible and diverse life of your state in the galaxy.

 

[fanaticAuthoritarian]

I hope comments are still open for this. I'll add my 2 cents as a player who evolved from a strategy only player to RP + strategy over the past few years, and greatly improving in the last year.

I enjoy Stellaris as a combination real time 4X game and roleplaying strategy game, with more emphasis on the 4X aspect. I've been a consistent player, though not commentor, since Megacorp.

• How important to you are the current systems that use individual Pops and Jobs in the planetary simulation?

It is intuitive and functional but it can be improved with further abstraction that allows for similar player control with better performance or roleplaying potential, it is good. I do not like the abstraction of an increasing pop growth limit which was originally put in place solely for performance reasons.

• If we made significant changes to fleets, how much could we alter before it no longer felt like the game you love?

As long as ships and fleets are buildable and movable like in traditional RTS games, it is good for me. This was the #1 thing that drew me into the game: how familiar it felt to traditional RTS in terms of strategic movement. I would not like, for example, combat to be abstracted out too much. I would like features to improve fleets in general - able to combine more ships into a fleet overall, fleet autocombiner, etc. But the core of the current system is intuitive.

• What aspects are most important in defining your civilization?

Origins, civics and ethics. I don't find it too important what exact species dominates my empire's demographics, but I try to set up an empire such that no matter what species it is, it will make it the strongest possible, within the confines of the roleplay that I set.

• How do you set goals for yourself during gameplay? When do you set them, and how often do they change as you play?

I play grand admiral and consistently increase difficulty of the crisis if I win while trying to avoid certain playstyles such as player crisis which do not fit the roleplay of the empire I use.

• How important is the current Trade system, with routes collecting back to your Capital?

Not very important. I can't see it yet is a cause of lag.

• Is colonization too easy? Should habitability and planet climate matter more?

It is just right for very hard settings where every second matters and waiting for terraforming could be the difference between life and death, but it is not very punishing in lighter settings where you can, in fact, wait for terraforming. Making low habitability a bit harder would be fine, but not too much harder.

• Are there any Origins that should be Civics, or Civics that should be Origins?

Eager explorer civics are so game changing at the start, they should be origins. Genesis guides is another early game civic that completely changes how you play, and I believe it can be swapped into an origin as well. Most origins are good where they are.

• If you could remove one game system, what would it be? Which system would you make the central focus of an expansion? Is there a feature you want to enjoy, but feel the current implementation doesn’t quite work for you?

Espionage could be improved with more impactful early game missions, such that internal security becomes a consideration along with economic and military development. The binary codebreaking/encryption system could be improved to have more depth.

In general, I would like some of the pain points around performance to be addressed, but the overall shape of the game is great, as long as limits on the AI are restricted to things that would break the AI, rather than due to performance reasons. The AI should be more difficult.

One thing to add: I believe some ethics are out of date for the current Stellaris. Materialist, for instance, has significantly declined in both power and popularity due to its narrow focus on robots, while no other ethic is so narrowly focused.

 

[prouddesert598]

• If you could remove one game system, what would it be? Which system would you make the central focus of an expansion? Is there a feature you want to enjoy, but feel the current implementation doesn’t quite work for you?
  
  Internal Politics rework, like actual ideology and poetical factions for pops and the way pops interact with each other economically/politically, and also religion especially. Your Empire should feel more alive and active, and rather like a society you are leading or nation you are governing then your chess pieces

 

[Star Heintinuse Dragon]

I forgot to include this in my past post. Please made communication events like this more frequently quarter or after half a year (I dont know what time is more suitable for the devs, just make sure we will have an event like this in the future at maximum every 1 year for recap and feedback), its been 8 years since we actually sit back and talk again its too long. Dont just add bloat useless new stuffs or nerf randomly or change how mechanics work without asking the player base in advance and after you are done with the act, I dont hate new stuff but some of them came half finish and conflict with past content, why would anyone wanted to buy and buggy as hell which also give you loads of technical debt. If you want another City Skylines 2 be my guess. Also old DLC prices should be lower or next Stellaris 2 should also include these DLC as features in game to make a more meaningful experiences, if you actually make full complete DLC (fleshed out mechanics, no bugs, add meaningful stuffs and revise old contents with matching update to match the new contents to make them not obsolete and doesnt conflict with each other. Yes I am spelling everything for you, (edit 22/11/2024) add a notification or indicator of something new just been added into the game I dont want to relearn everything I just want to learn that 1 new thing. In Stellaris 2 include event recap to see what have happened for better searching to see what anomalies, choices I have done, maybe add a glossary to explain terms). Maybe the customer will be more incentive to actually buy the costly DLC or expansion pass if you actually did the above? There's already competitor sprouting up to rival Stellaris please communicate more with your player base.

 

[Sete]

Having to capture individual stations in a system is a good idea. Depends on how it's implemented though. It really needs to be automatic. The micro would very quickly grow out of control otherwise.

I agree.
Ship module with orbital assault troops would sort it.

 

[Obeliskkai]

Two things I kind of wish Stellaris had (other than what I summarised in my first reply)...

1.) A Tourism system. Why can't friendly aliens come and visit my planets? Perhaps there could be natural features on some planets that would attract Tourists, or the sites of great battles or events? Could generate Trade value.

2.) Irredentism. If a planet I control borders another Empire and if the planet contains a large proportion of pops who identify with the primary species in the other Empire, then a lot of them should want to join that other Empire, right?

 

[gardianz]

The most important improvement is late game performance: keeping the game as close to as snappy in the year 3000 as it is in 2200.

 

[Arphar]

I think that Stellaris becomes a greater and greater game the more we move away from tabletop mechanics, arbitrary limits and hard caps (I find that most games that take too much from tabletop suffer in the end because of it as opposed to specifically being a computer game).

For example, stuff like Leader cap, leader level cap, starbase size limitations, building amount limitations/building slots and districts amounts, and certain events as well, in my opinion cheapen the game a bit by railroading the flow of the game and thus limiting freedom in gameplay. Basing the game more on gameplay loop rather than limited happenstances would greatly help the replayability of stellaris (and perhaps it's pereniallity once it's finished).

I think Stellaris having more transient states as opposed to some hard limitations encasing it would allow the game to reach further for players.

 

[Gredd18]

• If we made significant changes to fleets, how much could we alter before it no longer felt like the game you love?

I think it'd be a challenge to make fleets worse. Any changes, I like to imagine, would be for the better. At current, I feel like fleet strategy matters most early on, and steadily falls off as you gain the ability to manuver fleets on a galactic level with less time concerns. In my experience, early on, you often ideally want multiple fleets to cover hostile borders in your empire, yet hyper-relays, and then gateways allow you to fewer fleets, often only one, covering a much larger area in the late game. The speed at which fleets move on a galactic level feels like it makes deathballing inevitable; there's no risk to having everything on offense, and nothing on defence, when you can easily pull back from an offensive, flush out the enemy invading your territory, and immediately return to that same offense.

I would think that a more robust espoinage system could help with this. Being able to set up operations to disable a nation's hyper-relay and gate networks for a year or two would make keeping significant, well-placed border defence far more important.

 

[Retoasty]

How important to you are the current systems that use individual Pops and Jobs in the planetary simulation?

Rather important, but open to change. I think individual pops and jobs creates highly interesting and strategic opportunity-cost decisions, especially in the early game where pops are quite limited. Any system that might replace this, I would hope adds strategic depth to economic planning throughout the course of the game. That said, population should always be a valuable resource itself, but perhaps not be the single most important factor for an empire's economic potential.

If we made significant changes to fleets, how much could we alter before it no longer felt like the game you love?

I’d like to see fleet mechanics massively overhauled, doomstacks are not tactically satisfying. I think some sort of logistic system would be a nice addition. Jump drives, quantum catapults, stealth ships, all have a lot of potential in creating really dynamic and tactical engagements. This is definitely an area of the game that I would love to see the development team innovate and perhaps not be afraid of making major changes.

What aspects are most important in defining your civilization?

I tend to think about what my civilization's culture and values might be as they relate to my government type, ethics, origin, and civics. This becomes more fleshed out as I pick up traditions and select an ascension perk. I find it is very easy to build a cohesive RP narrative, culture, and doctrine from these gameplay elements. I think this is a core strength of Stellaris and something it does incredibly well. I can design an empire and it is very easy to RP how that civilization might behave and act on the galactic stage.

How do you set goals for yourself during gameplay? When do you set them, and how often do they change as you play?

Goals tend to be set in the empire creation screen and this circles back to the previous question a bit. For example one empire I enjoy playing is spiritualist/militarist civilization with the environmentalist civic. This civilization has great reverence for nature and the natural order and has adopted a militant approach to protecting it. As such, AI and robots being a violation of the natural order must be dealt with accordingly. Empires with relentless industrialist civic will also need to be shown the error of their ways. There are some nice galactic community resolutions that fit with this narrative as well, and these would be overarching goals throughout the course of the playthrough that tend to remain fixed.

However, events in stellaris provide a very dynamic strategic environment where ideological goals sometimes need to be pushed to the back burner. Some empires are malleable throughout the course of the game, others are resolute in pursuit of their goals. Again, this is an area where Stellaris is incredibly successful, every game tells a unique and different story even if I play the same civilization over and over again.

How important is the current Trade system, with routes collecting back to your Capital?

Trade needs to be overhauled!

Is colonization too easy? Should habitability and planet climate matter more?

Yes, Yes, and Yes!!

Are there any Origins that should be Civics, or Civics that should be Origins?

No comment.

If you could remove one game system, what would it be?

I am not sure… Sometimes subtraction is more beneficial than addition, but it's hard to pinpoint something specific that should be outright removed.

Which system would you make the central focus of an expansion?

Diplomacy, Espionage, Trade, and internal politics.

Is there a feature you want to enjoy, but feel the current implementation doesn’t quite work for you?

Diplomacy and Trade are big ones, more interesting interactions on the galactic stage. Economies are entirely based on Autarky (which makes sense for space faring civilizations, and should remain viable). However, more interesting trade dynamics could add a lot of diplomatic and economic depth.


On a less guided note, I would love to see more domestic institutions be possible. I always loved how Knights of the Toxic God felt like it was running parallel to your central government as its own non-governmental organization.

Shameless plug to a write up/thought experiment I did for institution content on stellaris subreddit.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Stellaris/comments/1egcebn/expansion_content_institutions

Huge thanks to the dev team, keep doing what you're doing, this game has progressed and developed into my favorite 4X/GSG of all time.

 

[Zogist]

I would like to see more on the behind the scenes numbers. For example, who and what is driving the insane use of food? Breaking it down so I can target the species causing it. You can do it planet by planet, but I would like more top down drilling.

More numbers and stats. I like stats and charts and everything.

Getting a chronological recodring of my leaders and notable fleet actions would be great. Something similar to CK2 lineage and chronicles for the leaders. Doesn't have to be a family tree, but for Imperial covs, that makes total sense.

More control over my starting position and composition. Do I want a fleet to start or not? Give a starting allotment and then have it saved as an option if the galaxy screen. Do you want to be in the center or in the core? Do you want to be in a nebula or not. More galaxy options.

More for the federation. Too often there are no ways for one or two of the empires because you have limited hyperlinks out. Guarantee that each empire has a path out into the larger galaxy to allow them a chance to expand. Also, the fleet mechanic needs tweaked. The command limits do not seem to apply to the fleets. It sound have an average of all members fleet caps (except hegemony which should mirror the peesidents). For all federation, make there espionage options that you can target thr indivdual members to break up alliances. The diplomatic incidents are too random. Let me sow discord!

Vessels are my favorite aspect of the game. More types of vessels and tributaries. Allow the overlord for authority and military to get a unity bump. Allow me to determine if and how much of a military they get. Allow them to secretly build a military out of sight of the overlord. Tell me how much the damn percentages mean to my economy. What can I expect to give or recieve whrn it is proposed. Give me different espionage options for my vessels that allow me to influence changes to ther society or increase their trust.

Allow a late game start or scenario where you are an awaken fallen empire. That way you can skip to the end.

Terraform gand colonization show be more of a mini game without crippling getting planets. Let's face it, the whole point is the spread across the galaxy and you need planets.

I am not sure why the developers hate sectors, but more control over sectors. Make them more lawless on the fringes for pirates or raiders, but I like having the map complete and covered. Allow name lists for the sectors so they are not tied specifically to the planet. I will admit I do notnise the automation, but that is mainly that I hate how the AI does their planets.

Unity needs tweaked. Tech races are at a disadvantage in the beginning, but you can overcome it with planets (which then cause everything else to be more expenive due to the empire cap). Tech races still have a strong identity, it is not just spiritual. I get trying to balance it so more people use spiritual, but I get 2 or more paths with spiritual and can keep up with research. I kind of like the change to have leaders use unity, but it feels out of balance. I get balance again, but I like early exploring and discovery, the late game is too much of a slog for me. The whole empire size and unity and tech all seem to fight one another. I like massive galaxies with all possible races and lots of interactions. The caps should be based on the size of the galaxy for vessels and such.

More aspects and traditions, they are the most fun. Hekp understand how and why to play tall. Too often you have to spread out to keep up with unity and tech. Allow me to make a small insular empire that is got going to get crushed.

Lastly, fix corporations. Allow the corps to lay on top of friendly empires and spread out to fight other corporations with proxy battles. It is a chore to figure out where I can expand and having a fleet and planets in a defined are has never made sense. Corporations and crime families (so push more of this!) do not have centralized power, they spread out. Allow them to control planets within other empires, either covertly or directly. Having a traditional empire that happens to be a corp is fine, but being able to spread across the galaxy without conquering would be more fun. Allow me to boot out other corps or allow more then one corp/crime family per planet. Allow me to convince empires to let me colonize planets without controlling the system or build habitats would make more sense. Less a traditional conquering and more of influencing and supporting my customers. Make crime families more criminal! Let me set up raiders that I get the income from, allow me to syphon off credits and reseach, allow me to corrupt the youth, allow me to assassinate leaders that are not toeing th line, and all the evil goodness that are the Hutts.

 

[kidwiz0101]

More economic asymmetry
Most empires have a 3 planet setup where you need alloys, research/unity, and basic/upkeep resources. The arc welders origin was a fantastic addition because it changed this core structure, generating basic and alloys from space remains my favorite way to play the game. The new space fauna ships also changed the core loop since you can forego alloys and just make food, empowering slave and worker bonuses that often get passed over for specialist output. More things like this please!

Deepened Storms
The new storm mechanics are a fun concept, I like there being a way to punish people that play too greedy, but the storms themselves aren't tied to a lot of other game systems, I'd like to see some of the suggestions from one of the Vela dev diary replies be implemented by the custodians to breathe some more life into the them.

Reduced Shroud RNG
Psionic ascension is very fun, but the rng means sometimes your power level can vary drastically, making it unreliable and frustrating. I propose the shroud becoming more like a curator, where the options to unlock things (psi combat computer, cloaking, etc.) are available at all times, but the chance to unlock them changes with each visit still indicated by text color. This provides more versatility as you can play it safe to eventually unlock everything or you could also take a risk if you need something sooner. Tipping or bribing the shroud with zro for better odds over time would be great. More so if you don't tip/bribe you can get negative events and if the cost of the zero scales over time then choices matter.

Cosmo and Virtual, Nerf/Rework PLEASE
I know it has been stated that the power level of the machine age will not be reduced. If you must make any change, please reduce the effectiveness of riddle escorts in Cosmogenesis, it is actually impossible to beat them even with higher fleet power, they always survive via disengagement. For virtual, please look at adopting mechanics from the Nodal Network from Dune Spice Wars' House Vernius of Ix. The bonuses a virtual empire would receive by strengthening their network is a good thematic fit and would help with balancing. At the most basic level it could be achieved via starbase building and a stronger industrial output nerf (-90% or -15% per virtual tradition picks from industrial jobs).

Christmas Wishlist
Trade league trade policy to federation level 3
Buff nanite ascension my beloved
Sovereign guardianship mutually exclusive with empire size reductions for planets and space.
I only use ocean planets, other planets aren't as involved.
Hive gets the machine age glow up.

Thank you for hearing our feedback and for making this game I have 2000 hours in!

 

[JacketReturns]

I have played over 3000 hours on Stellaris, and I tend to be rather focused on what I can't simply fix myself as a modder.
That nearly year long period of the dominant species check being broken was massively punishing while working on my species pack, and so I often just wish bug fixes for species were significantly faster.


This is a bug I'd like fixed pronto!

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/stellaris-stellaris-3-13-2-d465-species_names-and-name_lists-priority-got-reversed-from-3-11-into-3-12-causing-distinct-issues-in-the-menu-and.1711689/

Anything that I can't simply mod away is the number 1 concern for me, Stellaris is and always has been a game of infinite opportunity even with modding, and expanding and fixing such concerns that cannot be fixed by mods is PARAMOUNT!


So please, consider helping the Species modder out, just a wee bit.

 

[Aoreyzus]

I think maybe the trade system can be similar to civ 6 style trade routes, where you can build and send out trade convoys ships to a certain destination, but it hits all the colonies on the path to the destination, and maybe they build hyper relays in the process after 5 years of the hyper relay technology being researched?

For example a trade convoy ship is built on Earth in the UNE, the destination is set to Unity of the CoM because the UNE and the CoM had a commercial pact. From Earth on its way to Unity, the trade ship mak stops at Alpha Centauri before going to Unity.

Each trade route will generate a certain amount of energy credit and resources from the colonies they hit , for example, the Earth to Unity route generates 50 Energy Credit, but since Alpha Centauri is a tech world and is hit on the way, the trade route grants an additional +4 society, physics, and engineering research.

This convoy ship will be treated as a civilian class ship similar to construction and science ships. But if a hostile force(pirates, mauraders, at war nations, space faunas) attacks the convoy ship, then the trade route is disrupted, and you loose the resources generated by the trade routes

Mauraders should also be able to launch more raids to capture trade convoy ships, forcing you to spend more alloys on rebuilding trade convoy ships or sending escort fleets to defend trade convoys from attack. Basically, make the marauders the barbarians of civ 6 type of thing

That is just some of the ideas I have for trade

 

[Aoreyzus]

I do think that the current pop system is a major hampering point of late-game performance. On a similar note, the species tab needs a rework, with all the 1 pop sub species my eyes hurt lol. Maybe the pop system change can be tied in with the species tab rework somehow? Idk

 

[Zogist]

I would realy love to see a rework of war negociation, with a way to ask for systems, ressources or even relics in exchange of peace. With real stakes and warscore, like conquering the capital or loosing a flag ship should heavily impact the war score. And if possible it would be great if other beligerents could have something to say in the peace negociation, and the ability to leave or join war in their own term.

Agree totally with joining and leaving pointless wars, adding in CK3 options to join would be good. I also would like the AI to actually trade a damn planet or system! Even vessels that love me will never part or trade a system.

As a side note, allow religious civs to declare a crusade and have your religion spread like you could do in Civilization.

 

[Aoreyzus]

Personally, to me
Stellaris is a roleplaying game, the only parts of it that I find lacking are the interactions between Empires. The current trade system is one I would love to see re-vamped, able to interact with more when reaching out to other empires. Obviously, this would be touching up with Megacorporations to, but I think a revamped new Trade System would be nothing but good!


To me, the most important part of defining our Empire is the way it interacts with the Galaxy at large. I would love to see a better implementation of interactions, see smaller scale interactions and choices that impact our empires at large. Federations don't feel impactful, the Galactic Community itself is fantastic, but it all feels like you aren't interacting with people. There are no REAL issues with the laws being proposed, there is no conflict or embargos or even interacting with empires on a vote apart from Favors. A better system of Favors would be neat.

A system I feel like I want to enjoy but really can't is Espionage and the Intel system, it feels far too static. I think that trying to add more options to it itself would be fun, options to lower the Intel Cap in general for other empires, the ability to construct blacksites within enemy space with cloaked Engineering ships that can be detected and result in opinion loss, the ability to decide what the Spy Network is doing when you aren't doing operations, maybe even the ability to increase crime or lower stability in general on worlds, something to add indepth interactions and true espionage.

And honestly, when it comes to Origins I have an interesting idea

Instead of one big lump sum origin (Shattered Ring, Primal Calling, etc)

We divide it into Cultural and Planetary Origin
Shattered Ring is now a Planetary Origin, but your cultural origin on that world is Primal Calling

Void Dwellers is a Planetary Origin, and you could pair it with Cybernetic Creed as a Cultural Origin

This would be pretty powerful, obviously, but it would impact more what our Empire is and WHERE it Came From

This is brilliant!

 

[Confused_Us]

Broadly, my biggest "problem" with Stellaris is that it doesn't scale. The scope of your actions never changes over time. You perform the same tasks 200 years into the game that you do on day 1. You go to a planet. You build a thing. You pick a science ship. You tell it to do a thing. An event occurs. A tech completes. You pick a new one. As the game goes on, you make the same decisions, over and over. The frequency you must make those decisions increases, but the mechanical outcome of each decision decreases over time.

Much of this can be automated, sure, but ultimately those actions are what the game is, mechanically. However, the outcome of each individual choice is less and less meaningful as time goes by. Because there's no change of scope, the player's choices individually become less and less meaningful as time goes by. Players have emotional reactions to that type of change. For some it becomes tedious. For others, overwhelming. Some may not even recognize they're having that reaction, and simply move on to another game.

Let's visualize the number of clicks vs the mechanical effect of each click, over time:

View attachment 1219032

With some analytics, I'm sure you could actually figure out where the lines cross, but cross they do.

That is the inflection point where the scope and scale of the game should change. Ideally, the blue line never crosses the red, or not for long. Shift the game's scale or scope to keep actions meaningful. You can reduce clicks, increase outcomes of clicks, or both. Lots of story-based ways to do that. Move to sector-based administration, rather than planet-based. Build squadrons of ships instead of individual ones. Dedicate a scientist to a particular branch of the tech tree while another continues work on breakthroughs.

The actual solutions are up to you!

Stellaris is one of my favorite games of all time. I really hope you can solve this!

Having read through the replies to this thread, I'd like to add an addendum to my post.

Throughout the replies, look at the answers to this question:

What aspects are most important in defining your civilization?

The answers are overwhelmingly in favor of the big differentiators. Origins at the top, then Ethics and Civics. These are the large, meaningful decisions that determine the overall trajectory of your empire.

Then look at the other answers to the other questions. It might be bias, but I sense a trend there, too. The things that people like the most are the big effects. The ones that make the player's action(s) meaningful.

I think this dovetails with my original post above. The desire is for meaningful choices that drive interesting narratives.

I urge the dev team to look at systems and determine what actions are meaningful. Is there a way to consolidate multiple minor actions into one meaningful one? A great example is in the tech tree. There are so very many techs that increase production or output of a specific thing by a few percentage points. Why do we have to decide between 5% more output from miners and 5% more output from space mining? Is that a meaningful decision? In my eyes, it is not. Worse, imagine you see a +5% mining output tech vs the next size up in starbases or ships. Who would ever choose the mining in that situation? It's a non-choice.

I would much rather see these things grow passively as part of progression or combined into big bonuses that actually compete with other choices. Now I have to decide between 25% more minerals and citadels? That might actually be a choice worth considering.

 

[PLSKICKME]

• How important to you are the current systems that use individual Pops and Jobs in the planetary simulation?

Not at all, I mostly aim for purity anyway, and my computer would like it a lot.

• If we made significant changes to fleets, how much could we alter before it no longer felt like the game you love?

As long as there is no hard rock-paper-scissors

• How do you set goals for yourself during gameplay? When do you set them, and how often do they change as you play?

Depends on the empire, but dont really care, i feel more competittive when playing machines.

• How important is the current Trade system, with routes collecting back to your Capital?

It feels like energy gatherers with extra steps, i dont find managing pirates fun.

• Is colonization too easy? Should habitability and planet climate matter more?

Colonisation is easy, but rushing corvettes, taking and CONVERTING planets is so broken. Even in Eu4, you need some years to convert a nation next door, imagine how hard it is to tell a feathered guy to not eat their sluggish and yummi overlord. Especially in the early game.

• Are there any Origins that should be Civics, or Civics that should be Origins?

I feel like Necrophage should be an "Only available at empire creation" civic.

• If you could remove one game system, what would it be? Which system would you make the central focus of an expansion? Is there a feature you want to enjoy, but feel the current implementation doesn’t quite work for you?

Remove: Galactic paragorn free content
Tbh i still dont like what Galactic paragorn did to the base game. The free patch made the new system way worse for those who dont own the dlc. You used to get some random perks, some of which are positive and some were negative, now you still get negative perks, but you also get governor and councilor perks thats rarely gets used, leaders this way feel less unique or important than before,since there were some "legendary leaders" with all positive traits and some really bad ones. Now every leader feels generic, with some useful, some harmful and some useless trait ...
I mostly play machines for this reason since they are the closest to the old system




Expansion wise, im happy that the DD363 announced the idea of a psionic expansion. id love to see empires with different expertise in weaponry(Normal, psionic, relic), i was kinda bummed that even though relic tier components exists, they are just worse than the regular weapons even with the AP. In Astral Planes, you can have as much DLC specific Strategic resource as you want,and in normal games too, while relics are random and you either control relic generating sites or you dont.
I miss this part of old stellaris where Strategic resources were really Strategic and you had to fight for them. I guess i have to install Guilli mods to feel different solarsystems important.


Espionage is a cool system, but feels weak, you get all the info relatively easily and there is no way to counter it. Id rather have a system thats more complex, but rewarding at the same time. Like having absolute dominion relative to the other party could make you cause a problem like resource deficit campaign(gets triggered at max-1 charge and ticking down is slower compared to normal resource deficit)



And please please please: Make scientist working on anomalies still have a "lock on their current system" . Imagine its 0.25 hyperlanes. 2 Science ships both going to different ways. One starts doing an anomaly, the other one travels several system, only to reach the system the first one was in. Now the first one after doing the small sees that someone else is doing the system, and see that the next system to explore is the one the other science ship was doing.... and this goes on ever since the auto solve archeology/anomaly/project was added.
Well, auto exploration could have user defined algorithms, or selectable, i get it that in high hyperlane setups it can be better, but in small HL setups its just very very ineffective.

 

[Halcy]

More ways of exploiting space like the arc furnace would be great I think. I was honestly blown away by the implementation of the kilo structures, finding good spots for them is so much fun!

Changing fleet combat is fine as long as big battles feel epic. I kinda missa combat speed beacuse it made the culminating battles of your playthrough more of a spectacle. Anything that can make those moments shine would be good in my book. Also I do like to observe what's happening between the AI empires so a way of being notified when big battles you aren't part of yourself happen (but have vision of) would be nice.

Trade routes and piracy could be ripped out of the game and be replaced with nothing and I wouldn't miss it. It's not a fun system to engage with.

Any change that makes planets feel more "lived in" would be good. I like to care for my populace and just switching on utopian abundance doesn't really scratch that itch. No real ideas of what should be implemented here just something more than just plopping down districts and buildings. Something that would make me feel like I can pour resources into making my Gaia world/Ecumenopolis/Ring world the best and coolest place in the galaxy!

The RNG with techs can be a bit frustrating sometimes. I once wanted to RP an empire with a focus on industry (mining and alloys) to the detriment of everything else, vowing to take any opportunity to select techs that fit the theme no matter what else was offered, only to be offered almost no such techs at all in the first 30 years. I don't really mind the RNG but more the fact that there are few transparent ways of influencing what kind of techs you will be offered can be annoying. More ways of nudging the tech draw please!