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Stellaris Dev Diary #56 - Ascension Perks

Hello everyone and welcome to another Stellaris development diary. Today we'll be talking about a feature that was hinted at in last dev diary, Ascension Perks. Ascension Perks are related to the Traditions and Unity system, but is a paid feature in the (unannounced) expansion accompanying the 1.5 'Banks' update, rather than a part of the update itself. Those without the expansion will get full access to the Traditions and Unity features, but not to the Ascension Perks themselves.

Ascension Perks
The idea behind the Ascension Perks is to provide more unique unlockable features for Empires, and to provide the player with the ability to determine an 'endgame' for their species: What their empire is striving towards. Perhaps your goal is to go all-in on AI, replacing the frail biological bodies of your pops with immortal machines, or to harness the psionic potential of your species and reach a higher form of existence, allowing your empire to tap into other planes of being? All these and more are covered by the Ascension Perk system.
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Each time you complete a Tradition tree, you will unlock one Ascension Perk slot, of which there are 8 in total. There may also be other ways to unlock slots, such as from certain rare technologies or as a reward for a particular event chain. This slot can then be filled with any of the Ascension Perks available to you. The final number of perks is not yet set down, but there are currently more than 20 and there will likely be more added. Ascension Perks have pre-requisites, which can for example be a particular technology or tradition, a certain number of Ascension Perk slots to be unlocked, or a specific ethos or government type. Some Ascension Perks are one-offs that simply provide a bonus to a particular area of your empire: For example, a bonus to border range, or cheaper terraforming. Others unlock new features, such as the ability to construct new types of space structures (more on in later dev diaries).

Finally there are the three 'Species Endgame' paths: The biological path, the spiritual path and the synthetic path. These three paths each consist of two perks, the first of which unlocks access to the second once a number of other pre-requisites have been met. The paths are mutually exclusive, and once you start heading down one of them, the other two are locked off.
  • The Biological Path focuses on mastery over biological evolution. The first level of it gives access to more gene points and significantly cuts the cost of genemodding projects, while the second level expands the options available during genemodding in addition to further providing more points and less cost.
  • The Psionic Path focuses on developing the psionic potential of your population. The first level unlocks new psionic technologies and benefits, while the second level allows your empire to reach a higher level of existance and communicate with the beings present there.
  • The Synthetic Path focuses on the replacement of biology with machinery. The first level allows you to turn your population partly synthetic through the use of cybernetics, while the second level replaces your biological pops with robots, turning your empire entirely synthetic.
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That's all for today! Next week we'll be talking about the concept of species rights and obligations.

Also about eating pops.
 
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Best dev diary so far, without any bit of hyperbole. Seems banks is when Stellaris finally reaches its full form, hah


Would be nice if each different Precursor chain quest gave access to a unique, "hidden" Ascension Perk.
 
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Morell said:
Having an end goal of a transformation to synthetics sounds like a nightmare in having to mod around those goals, or modding vanilla files which was never my desire in the first place.
With Synthetic transformation as an end goal, it would suggest that there is no desire from the devs in implementing native support for a vanilla robotic species from the beginning of the game.
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Why? To me it looks like this update opens an interesting mod possibility: you start the game as race of sad synthetic beings which ultimate goal is trascendence into a warm meat body.
 
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How does this affect Species Portraits?

Really hoping it does, if my neighbour goes down 'Flesh is Weak' I want to realise that by seeing that they look different in the diplomacy screen. E.g. Cybernetic optics, grafted circuitry etc.
 
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The only thing I'm a little disappointed by is the fact that the endgame perks are mutually exclusive. I'd really like to create a species that uses both advanced gene-modding and cybernetics (even if it means they would be unable to master either as well as a species that had focused on one branch exclusively). I guess there's always the potential for hybrid paths to be added in a future patch though.

I don't want to sound too negative though - I've honestly not been this hyped for a game update in a long time. It's sounding like 'Banks' is going to be a very substantial update and should help give species a bit more personality and depth, which is always a good thing imo. Really looking foward to hearing what else is in store!
 
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smjjames said:
Oh come on, why, WHY must it be a paid expansion rather than part of the Banks update itself? What's wrong with including it IN the Banks update?
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Because Devs can't tip strippers with dank memes.
 
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Greyhound_Gen. said:
The only thing I'm a little disappointed by is the fact that the endgame perks are mutually exclusive.
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Maybe they could limit the perks to 2. In this way you would not have psi synths (no biological mind to use psi), but you would have psi cyborgs. You would not have gen modded trascended beings (spirits are body less) but you could have psi mutants. And so on.
 
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Malecord said:
you start the game as race of sad synthetic beings which ultimate goal is trascendence into a warm meat body.
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"What a day to be alive!"
*Comet of Doom sighted*
Greyhound_Gen. said:
I'd really like to create a species that uses both advanced gene-modding and cybernetics (even if it means they would be unable to master either as well as a species that had focused on one branch exclusively).
Click to expand...
This one actually doesn't sound far-fetched.
 
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smjjames said:
Oh come on, why, WHY must it be a paid expansion rather than part of the Banks update itself? What's wrong with including it IN the Banks update?
Click to expand...

Because it seems to be a huge feature with new mechanics, art (ships,portraits,cities...), events etc... so it would implie a lot of work. WIz has said that banks is absolutly not ready yet ("while away") so they have really hard work forward. I assume these ascension perks, if they are cool, would requiere really HUGE work for doing it. That's pretty much why they are going to be in a DLC i presume.

I admit i would have prefered a trade DLC first but this is really good too, giving you the opportunity to play as robot, energy being or even swarm species that will not have worked well with a standard starting.


Greyhound_Gen. said:
The only thing I'm a little disappointed by is the fact that the endgame perks are mutually exclusive. I'd really like to create a species that uses both advanced gene-modding and cybernetics (even if it means they would be unable to master either as well as a species that had focused on one branch exclusively). I guess there's always the potential for hybrid paths to be added in a future patch though.

I don't want to sound too negative though - I've honestly not been this hyped for a game update in a long time. It's sounding like 'Banks' is going to be a very substantial update and should help give species a bit more personality and depth, which is always a good thing imo. Really looking foward to hearing what else is in store!
Click to expand...

Well i think it's normal after all (for the second level i think) it would be pretty weird to be both synthetic and energy beings as they both require different mechanics, art and so on...
But where i can go with you is on the first level of the perks (cybernetics implants, psi..) coz, if you look at Mass effect or Star wars for exemple, you can have both synthetics implants, prothesis and able to use psionism. I think those two are don't totally imcompatible coz they don't seems to require special mechanics.
But maybe if you can use both level 1 of cybernetic for implants,prothesis and the first level of psionism you can't choose a level 2 of ascension that seems fair.
 
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Wiz said:
Ascension Perks are related to the Traditions and Unity system, but is a paid feature in the (unannounced) expansion accompanying the 1.5 'Banks' update, rather than a part of the update itself.
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Wiz said:
but is a paid feature
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I have mixed feelings. I realy like this but i have to pay for it wich makes it a bit meh
somewhere i expected (and respect) that but that doesn't mean i can't dislike that right?
 
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Morell said:
As the mod author of Synthetic Empire I'm not sure I am a fan of these ascension goals. Especially given the interest from the community in playing as a purely synthetic species from the beginning. This popularity have been observed from the various synthetic/robot mods that have popped up since the release of the game. Mods such as Playable Robots, Playable Robots (Fixed), Networked AI and Robots+ among others.

Having an end goal of a transformation to synthetics sounds like a nightmare in having to mod around those goals, or modding vanilla files which was never my desire in the first place.
With Synthetic transformation as an end goal, it would suggest that there is no desire from the devs in implementing native support for a vanilla robotic species from the beginning of the game.
Click to expand...
Nothing will prevent you or other modders from continuing to support mods that allow an all-synth species from the start. The synthetics perk is more analogous to players that, over the course of play, replace all their biological POPs with Synths. Different scenario entirely.
 
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