Stellaris Dev Diary #40 - Heinlein Patch (part 1)

[uzura]

Hello, Could prevent aliens are generated with the same look as your species? is a bit confusing to have in your empire a different kind with your same.
(sorry for my English)

 

[milamber81]

Hello, Could prevent aliens are generated with the same look as your species? is a bit confusing to have in your empire a different kind with your same.
(sorry for my English)

Problem with this is the fact, that there are only so many portraits. In a new galaxy, the game first decides/randomises what phenotypes are there (e.g. 10 mammals, 12 reptiles, 6 insectoids, 18 fungoids).
And here the game does not calculate existing empires, but also all the minors (bronce-age onwards, guys in tomb-world bunkers, subterran species) and presentients. And here's the problem:
If the number of species of a certain phenotype is bigger than the available portraits, the game creates a doubled species. If you than conquer them, integrate them or let them migrate, you get your two look-alike species in one empire. And till there are a lot more species packs with portraits per phenotype, I don't think that there could be done much against it.
The only possibility would be to force the game to randomise every doubled portrait again and again, until all portraits are used. Leading to a more flattened phenotype distribution. And if all portraits are used, you have the doubled species problem again. To be honest, I prefer the chance of having different phenotype-numbers over the the risk of doubled portraits.

 

[Secataur]

... but if you have something you feel should be addressed for Heinlein (and it isn't a major feature addition/overhaul), feel free to mention it here.

I'd like enlightened empires to inherit the type of FTL from their parent empire. I might be the only one, but, Nova!, having my pet enlightened empires somehow develop a different type of FTL just gibs my immersion.

 

[SolarGuy]

(When will you finally add the Blorg to prescripted empires, paradox? ;__; )

You know that the Blorg are available as a mod, right?

I'd like enlightened empires to inherit the type of FTL from their parent empire. I might be the only one, but, Nova!, having my pet enlightened empires somehow develop a different type of FTL just gibs my immersion.

"So, you are the Chiaukesh and want us bronze-age people to use warp drives? Too late, we already decided to use wormholes when we first crawled out of our caves lol"

 

[Zarathustra_the]

@Wiz is there an eta for the finishing of the custom ui element addition. At the moment it does not scope to anything but the empire taking the decision, rather than for instance the planet or fleet on which the element is being taken. Not having proper scoping for this feature means that the promise of this feature to provide the functionality of Targeted decisions is not yet there. If this feature is not going to be finished any time soon, could we get a basic decision system instead, something from which we can reliably drive events to specified scopes without having to fiddle around with edicts?

 

[SiNNiS]

@Wiz
Good to hear some details about 1.3 , and I hope a more extensive list gets announced in the future. But in all honesty with 320hours logged into the game now am finding it hard to justify playing MP games even though I really have admiration for this game. Not being one to offer criticism without feedback I believe the below issues need to be addressed (list is in no particular order but I have included the severity on a scale of LOW - MED - HIGH)

1- Corvettes rushes are too good, mainly because it is much easier to achieve and faster than just colonizing your own planets early game(350 mineral per colony ship causes significant time for ROI). I am sure the game was not meant to be played this way. A possible solution is giving home planets a defensive station with FTL inhibitor along with players starting with the technology (starports can be built after all so realistically defensive station tech should also be readily available)
Note: I have effectively been rushing all neighbors easily in every MP game I play with around 700-800 fleet power in 2205-2206 with Unyielding admiral, and it is just not entertaining when it has to be done to play the game competitively.
Severity: HIGH

2- Currently in early to mid game if a player loses his/her fleet they usually end up losing all their spaceports preventing any possible comeback. Offensive players should have to deal with heavy losses when deciding to take down Spaceport infrastructure as to make it possible for a comeback and make war costly and epic for both sides waging war. With the increase in range this made it even easier to melt starports before taking any substantial damage. Give starports weapon slots that we can customize, in conjunction with FTL inhibitors on Defensive stations could resolve the offensive range issue. Or perhaps even a new module only available to starports that increased weapon range to be used in conjuction with the weapon slots. Scalability can be added easily with Starport level. But at the time being we have starports with one weapon slot. Just imagine if it would cost you 10-20% of your fleet to take down a spaceport and another 10% to bombard a planet down to 0 because of anti-orbital artillery that could be built on the planet surface. In that case one would only go to war if they really had to because a war would put you behind other simmers and in the long run perhaps even make you irrelevant.
Severity: HIGH

3- Weapon balance introduced in 1.2 was very welcome , I am now using Kinetic early game however Tachyon and Particle lances still reign supreme lategame. Not that MP games reach that stage but if the earlier points regarding early-mid game get resolved then this would be a relevant point.
Severity: MED

4-Let us control target prioritization of our fleets in combat.
Severity: LOW

5-Give us the ability to check opposing fleets modules/components when in combat. We can't do this currently if the enemy fleet is engaged in combat.
Severity: LOW

6- Corvette evasion nerf in 1.2 was great however Corvette only fleets still reign supreme early-mid game and remain very effective until particle/tachyon lances on BS and that is the only time when Corvette fleets need to switch out, reward fleets with a combat bonus for balanced compositions to discourage corvette spam. Rather than getting into range and weapon damage modification which has implications on other factors, a simpler and more beneficial solution would be to give corvettes a -15% damage debuff (i.e Outclassed - when fighting ships of a greater hull type) for example.
Severity: MED

7- I think ethics divergence is a great system/mechanic however Ethics divergence requires tweaking as it is currently irrelevant. As the amount of populations that adopt current ethos/ethics remains negligible even with over -30% ethic divergence. Another point is that even with +50% Ethic divergence players play through the negative aspects which are not really a big deal. Allow ethic divergence to have a bigger impact on the game both negatively and positively by giving it multiplicative effect on happiness effect caused by ethic similarities or differences.
Severity: MED

8- Planetary unique buildings( i.e Paradise Dome , Monument to Purity) in most cases are not worth using because it is too cumbersome to macro planets in and out of sectors in order to have them built in addition to wasting influence points. Allow us to issue a direct demand for Planetary Unique buildings to be built even if planet is located within a sector.
Severity: LOW

9- Exploit/BUG: Currently it seems that when producing ships at a starport the ship cost is related to the initial design of the ship being built, however after queing up several ships and changing the template after in ship designer the latest design is produced at no extra cost.
Severity: HIGH

Edit:Added point 8,9

To close this on a positive note I think the changes in 1.2 were fantastic and if 1.3 could follow suit and cover the same ground we are definitely going to end up at the right destination.

 

[PirateJack]

If I might make a suggestion, I would change the on board computer systems so that instead of being stuck with one form of AI (such as Bombardment) until you can retrofit the fleet, they can be changed between battles. That way you can try to adapt how parts of your fleet act in preparation for fighting a certain enemy. Researching fleet doctrines would be a way to improve how these AI handle themselves and potentially make them use better tactics in battle.

 

[Duke of Nukem]

@Wiz

2- Currently in early to mid game if a player loses his/her fleet they usually end up losing all their spaceports preventing any possible comeback. Offensive players should have to deal with heavy losses when deciding to take down Spaceport infrastructure as to make it possible for a comeback and make war costly and epic for both sides waging war. With the increase in range this made it even easier to melt starports before taking any substantial damage. Give starports weapon slots that we can customize, in conjunction with FTL inhibitors on Defensive stations could resolve the offensive range issue. Or perhaps even a new module only available to starports that increased weapon range to be used in conjuction with the weapon slots.
Severity: HIGH

Space ports need to be fully customizable like ships and defense stations. I should be able to put in 7 missile modules if I want, or be able to equip shields or regenerating plating.
Also fix the code for stations so they don't get speed and dodge bonuses and instead get a larger damage boost bonus.

Treat them essentially like a fortress with lower upkeep because it's "in orbit".

While we are at it let's allow admirals to man them (or another leader type?) for customizable bonuses. My primary production spaceport should look nothing like my hostile frontier spaceport.

Speaking of the extra power bonuses why can't we "reroute" power where we want? Why am I boosting my dodge on my battleship and my dps on my corvettes? I really like the idea of incentivizing extra reactors for more flexible builds, it just needs to be a bit more useful.

 

[fetusthebard]

Why are all of the intelligent posts completely glossing over the fact that Fanatic Pacifist is unplayable right now?

 

[Zenicetus]

I'd like enlightened empires to inherit the type of FTL from their parent empire. I might be the only one, but, Nova!, having my pet enlightened empires somehow develop a different type of FTL just gibs my immersion.

Yeah, it's a minor thing but it does break immersion and should be easy to fix. I have to role-play it and assume that some nefarious other empire sneaked in there undercover, and gave them the technology

 

[Duke of Nukem]

Corvette evasion nerf in 1.2 was great however Corvette only fleets still reign supreme early-mid game and remain very effective until particle/tachyon lances on BS and that is the only time when Corvette fleets need to switch out, reward fleets with a combat bonus for balanced compositions to discourage corvette spam.

All large weapons need a substantial range boost. That will nerf corvette swarm unless you get trapped by Admiral Ackbar in which case corvette swarm should reign. Possibly even give small weapons a -% to damaging cruisers and BS.

Personally I would like to see 2x range on all large weapons with a bell curve accuracy falloff on the second portion. That will lend itself to research in firing range also as the bell curve could be extended to the third or fourth increment. If the largest ship uses the longest range weapon it should be able to fire with poor accuracy from the center of a solar system nearly to its edge after a research or three into firing range improvements.

 

[Derp]

A liberation war in which the aggressor is a Federation should have the resulting state(s) automatically added to the Federation. It's annoying to try to set up some benevolent Federation of Planets-style thing only to have the AI use it as a roundabout way to feed themselves vassals.

 

[SiNNiS]

All large weapons need a substantial range boost. That will nerf corvette swarm unless you get trapped by Admiral Ackbar in which case corvette swarm should reign. Possibly even give small weapons a -% to damaging cruisers and BS.

Personally I would like to see 2x range on all large weapons with a bell curve accuracy falloff on the second portion. That will lend itself to research in firing range as well as the bell curve could be extended to the third or fourth increment.

The main problem with this is L weapon slots come too late in the game, let me elaborate. Corvette swarm will still overcome a fleet early-mid game because Starports have to get upgraded and you will have a limited number of starports. So even if you are using Destroyers it does not provide enough feasible firepower for the cost to get them out. The only time L slots play a factor is with Tachyon and Particle lances because they are so great. Corvette swarms with 150+ still wreck everything because another player with BS and Cruisers will still require substantial fusion power tech , lance tech, starport levels , minerals and build time to even begin countering.

So Destroyers are for the most part useless early to mid game even if they were equipped with an L slot, with some limited use in late game. Rather than getting into range and weapon damage modification which has implications on other factors, simpler and more beneficial solution would be to give corvettes a -15% damage debuff (i.e Outclassed - when fighting ships of a greater hull type) for example. This would also force players to put focus on having starports upgraded throughout the game.

 

[Deranged Goblin]

Sorry if this was already mentioned, but there is one thing that I think should be fixed. I've run into situations where I'd take a system, but instead of connecting to my empire or open space, the system I'd take would be surrounded by the enemy empire's territory, making it impossible to access the system, or worse, trapping my fleet in that system if it's already present. This sometimes happens even if the system is near the edge of their empire.

Maybe fix the border expansion system so any system you take won't be surrounded by enemy territory, even if it means restricting the systems you can take in war to planets on the edge of their space. Either that of something akin to the black flag system from EU4 where you can get your fleet back to the main part of your empire.

 

[Duke of Nukem]

The main problem with this is L weapon slots come too late in the game, let me elaborate. Corvette swarm will still overcome a fleet early-mid game because Starports have to get upgraded and you will have a limited number of starports.

I do agree it's a lot costlier to start producing destroyers but its not that hard to get your home system producing them fairly early. If they had 2x the current range then a missile/torpedo barrage from destroyers would wreck vettes. If that range boost were to be combined with AI that actually kites when it has a range advantage then vettes would be mowed down in droves and do little to no damage to the destroyers.

 

[gozaus]

Why not Fleet designer yet??????

 

[Defiler99]

Right now the "Fleet" abstraction is basically "list of ship ids that are part of the fleet", and a bunch of other layers need to be built before we can have a Fleet Designer that does something.
Similarly there is a really simple geometric algorithm right now for how ships position themselves relative to each other, and something new needs to be added under the hood to expand on that etc etc. Something of the scope of a fleet-designer is for sure not coming as just a bonus in some other patch.

 

[Defiler99]

I do agree it's a lot costlier to start producing destroyers but its not that hard to get your home system producing them fairly early. If they had 2x the current range then a missile/torpedo barrage from destroyers would wreck vettes. If that range boost were to be combined with AI that actually kites when it has a range advantage then vettes would be mowed down in droves and do little to no damage to the destroyers.

From my understanding of the multiplayer "meta-game" right now, the winners and losers are pretty much sorted out by 2215 or so. Destroyers are too little too late on that scale, and corvettes remain useful well past that date.

 

[Robrecht]

1- Corvettes rushes are too good, mainly because it is much easier to achieve and faster than just colonizing your own planets early game(350 mineral per colony ship causes significant time for ROI). I am sure the game was not meant to be played this way. A possible solution is giving home planets a defensive station with FTL inhibitor along with players starting with the technology (starports can be built after all so realistically defensive station tech should also be readily available)
Note: I have effectively been rushing all neighbors easily in every MP game I play with around 700-800 fleet power in 2205-2206 with Unyielding admiral, and it is just not entertaining when it has to be done to play the game competitively.
Severity: HIGH

I gotta be blunt here... This sounds less like a balance issue than it sounds like a 'You're playing a grand strategy game with an RTS mindset' issue. Stellaris isn't Sins of a Solar Empire or Starcraft. If you and the people you're playing with only care about 'winning' ASAP, rather than having a nice game of empire building, political intrigue and essentially telling a story together, you may not be playing the ideal game for your preferred play style.

I'm not saying you're 'playing the game wrong', but if you're doing things like rushing and trying to knock other players out of the game as quickly as possible, you're pretty much ignoring half the things that sets Grand Strategy (and 4X) games apart from regular RTS games.

2- Currently in early to mid game if a player loses his/her fleet they usually end up losing all their spaceports preventing any possible comeback. Offensive players should have to deal with heavy losses when deciding to take down Spaceport infrastructure as to make it possible for a comeback and make war costly and epic for both sides waging war. With the increase in range this made it even easier to melt starports before taking any substantial damage. Give starports weapon slots that we can customize, in conjunction with FTL inhibitors on Defensive stations could resolve the offensive range issue. Or perhaps even a new module only available to starports that increased weapon range to be used in conjuction with the weapon slots. Scalability can be added easily with Starport level. But at the time being we have starports with one weapon slot.
Severity: HIGH

3- Weapon balance introduced in 1.2 was very welcome , I am now using Kinetic early game however Tachyon and Particle lances still reign supreme lategame. Not that MP games reach that stage but if the earlier points regarding early-mid game get resolved then this would be a relevant point.
Severity: MED

From reading Point 3, I think I've figured out why you're having range-related trouble with your Starports in Point 2.

 

[Duke of Nukem]

Rushing ruins multiplayer. 4x, RTS, you name it.