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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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It's looks like awesome ! "Flesh is weak" <3

After that i think that the best would be a game mod where we play one of the Fallen Empire and be one of the warden of the galaxy and punish the factions who search IA, colonize Gaia/Dead world, make massive slavery... (depending on the type we choose)
 
Awesome I can not wait :D, Will there be any ship designs for the 3 species endgame paths like some kind of biological ships for people that go engineered evolution or some kind of visual sign on the ships of what path someone is going down?
 
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Well, it's official. I can now realize my dreams of ruling the Ethereal Empire.

I mean, uh... Ethereal... States... of Not Slavers? Yeah. That.
 
Anonymous@98 said:
Are some of these mutually exclusive? It would seem that you can't go "mind over matter" and the "flesh is weak" at the same time
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The answer is already in the Dev Diary, just above the picture.
 
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Aequinoctis said:
I agree that cybernetic and robot versions of every species would be far too intensive, but it would be nice to see a robot/droid/synth portrait for each species group (mammalian, avian, etc.) A plantoid droid would be interesting...
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Nah, it would not fit all species in the group. It's be better if the these ascended sets depended on the physical characteristic of the species (one set for slim bipedals, one set for enormous species, one for very thin species, etc.)
 
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Hapchazzard said:
Here's a question, though - will some of these perks change the way you can interact with some of the end-game crises? For example, the AI rebellion will not be automatically hostile towards you if your population is entirely synth, or you can actually engage in limited diplomacy with the Unbidden if you have transcended, etc.
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I hope so too, and you can add the obvious correlation of linking the controlled evolution Empire with the Prethoryn.
 
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Will the ascension paths cause weaknesses that you exploit during the process of ascension? When fighting am empire of that nature it makes sense from a game design perspective to make a species greatest hour come just after their most vunerable? Also i'd hate for ascension to be an instant win scenario.
 
Are we there yet?

Sorry.
 
Radically Right Wing said:
The first point I totally agree with. Having Ori like abilities will be pretty cool, I am sure that their will be POP bonuses but I don't know what they are just yet.

I don't think that they are going to add religion to the game because they have said that they want to keep that intentionally vague.
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The Ori don't actually offer "religion" but more espouse "enlightenment" which they then use, through a subjects worship in the hope of "enlightenment" and self ascension, to convert to some form of "energy" they can use.

The correlations are indeed remarkable but also vague for likely the same reason the game is so vague in that regard.

And remember, the ancients do not get involved in the lower planes, thus once you "ascend" using them as a template, there is not going back thus it will have to be an end game condition. ;)
 
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