Hi folks!

Today, we moved into our brand new offices so things have been a little hectic in Paradox land. The new building is great, but I will always miss the spectacular view of Stockholm from the 24th floor of "Skrapan"...

No rest for the wicked though, so let's talk a bit about the role that characters play in Stellaris. First off, this game is not character based like Crusader Kings, so do not expect a complex web of rivalries and friendships to develop between rulers and leaders with dynamic portraits and genetics. In Stellaris, the real stars of the show are the Pops, with characters acting more like the advisors, generals and admirals in Europa Universalis (though they do have certain personality traits that can affect what options they get in scripted events, for example.) With that out of the way, let's examine the different types of characters:

Scientists can be put in charge of one of the three research departments (Physics, Society or Engineering.) They can also be assigned to captain the Science Ships you use to explore the galaxy. These are all topics for upcoming dev diaries... Suffice it to say that their skill levels and personalities will have clear effects on their tasks. They are also valid ruler candidates in technocratic societies (government types).

Governors can either lord it over a single planet or an entire sector (more on sectors later). They are a very useful way of keeping the populace happy, or increasing the efficiency of a rich and powerful planet even more. Governors are valid ruler candidates under many government types.

Admirals, though they are not mandatory, can give a clear edge to your military fleets, which is pretty straightforward. They are valid ruler candidates in militaristic societies.

Generals lead your armies in defense of your planets against invasion, or when invading the planets of your enemies. Like Admirals, they are valid ruler candidates in militaristic societies.

Rulers give bonuses to entire empires, and, since other leader types can be elected ruler, they typically have a secondary skillset as well. Ruler type characters can also lead Factions; such characters are not recruited by you and cannot be ordered around. Factions and their leaders are, again, something we'll cover in detail later on.

Most leader types are recruited using Influence (a type of diplomatic "currency" in the game) and there is a cap on the total number of leaders you can employ, so you will need to weigh your need for Admirals against that for competent Governors, etc. Although all leaders tend to gain experience and become more accomplished over time, they do not live forever. The day will come when they perish and will need to be replaced…

Now, as you remember from last week’s diary, there are about a hundred different alien race portraits in the game. Thus, we initially felt that lesser leaders should not have actual portraits, because we could not possibly produce enough of them to provide the requisite variety. But then, the artists started to experiment with different backgrounds and clothes, which thankfully proved sufficient to allow all leaders to show a portrait.

The different types of leaders all use different sets of clothes. This helps increases variety, but also reinforces their role, with admirals having a militaristic uniform, governors being more casually dressed, and scientist being a bit more techy. Clothes are shared between some of the more similar species, because creating five unique apparels for each species is just an enormous amount of work. (Not all species wear clothes though; it would be odd if this was every alien race’s custom.)

I expect that humans will be by far the most popular race to play. Therefore, they are getting some special attention with different ethnicities, genders and hair styles. There is nothing stopping modders from doing the same for other races, of course! For example, the system could easily be used for other things, like an insect race where you have a multi tiered system, with one appearance for the ruler, a completely different morphology for your Pops, and a third for your leader characters...

Until next week, take care all!

 

[Kuschelflummi]

you blame Gavrilo Princip for Hitler ? If we take it add absurdum then You are essetially saying The one responsible for Holocaust isnt Hitler but some Serbian.
Im Joking but some insane people Would actually believe it. so carefull with that here.

Actually thats not so wrong. If the first WW never occoured, germany would never had this immend debts. So there would be no ground for Hitler. Furthermore... without WW 1, Austria would have shot a rising third reich down in flames.
If the sole reason for WW 1 was the murder of the prince, then yes, some serbian put it all in movment. With 2 bullets.

 

[aitaituo]

Actually thats not so wrong. If the first WW never occoured, germany would never had this immend debts. So there would be no ground for Hitler. Furthermore... without WW 1, Austria would have shot a rising third reich down in flames.
If the sole reason for WW 1 was the murder of the prince, then yes, some serbian put it all in movment. With 2 bullets.

I blame the Holocaust on God, for creating the Earth and humanity. That's assuming He didn't just get arbitrarily mad at the Jews again (you know some Jewish person somewhere had ate a cheeseburger or something equally unforgivable and for which their entire family/ethnic group/descendants/strangers within in an arbitrary distance could be held responsible for) and took an active hand in the process, possibly incarnating himself as some genocide obsessed Austro-German.

 

[Velorian]

you blame Gavrilo Princip for Hitler ? If we take it add absurdum then You are essetially saying The one responsible for Holocaust isnt Hitler but some Serbian.
Im Joking but some insane people Would actually believe it. so carefull with that here.

Well in a sense he's responsible but usually we don't blame people for things they'd had no way of even conceiving of happening in the distant future. With that kind of thinking you'd blame the guy who fired someone who then decided to do a murder-suicide routine on random people.

I blame the ones in charge of the Allies when the Versailles Treaty was made. It was needlessly punitive and directly responsible for German support for extremists like Nazis.

The shooter can only be blamed for the first war, though I'd say he only has partial blame as all the great powers acted stupidly aggressively and there'd probably have been a war eventually.

 

[Chief of Staff]

To be fair, Gavrilo Princip basically did set in motion a chain of events over a long term that spawned two world wars. But he is not solely responsible for this. You'd have to also hold German and Austrian leaders responsible as well in instigating the First World War (they could've chosen to not declare war on Serbia and this might've not happened at all). As for the Second World War itself, it's not only the Axis leaders that is responsible but also certain Allied leaders like Neville Chamberlain whose appeasement policy had helped Europe along down the path towards a Second World War.

Anyway, we are getting well off the topic here.

 

[rustic]

Hype level 9 reached and rising fast! Emergency shutdown process initiated! *faints*

If all dev diaries will be this enticing, my head will explode far before release date. Please Paradox, be considerate of the mentally frail (me).

 

[grandad1982]

Off topic people you are walking on eggshells here. Soon someone will say something that we'll all regret and things will explode.

 

[IsadorBG]

Well in a sense he's responsible but usually we don't blame people for things they'd had no way of even conceiving of happening in the distant future. With that kind of thinking you'd blame the guy who fired someone who then decided to do a murder-suicide routine on random people.

I blame the ones in charge of the Allies when the Versailles Treaty was made. It was needlessly punitive and directly responsible for German support for extremists like Nazis.

Not punitive enough was the problem. The Allies did correct their mistake in WWII by reducing Germany to ruins tough shame we had to wait dozens more million dead.

As Marshal Foch (Supreme Allied Leader) said "this is not a peace, it is an armistice for 20 years" noting how the treaty was too lenient. History proved him right.

 

[Super-Soviet]

Why not blame the Austro-Hungarians for "setting in motion a series of events" that lead to Gavrilo Princip shooting Franz Ferdinand.

 

[misterbean]

Not punitive enough was the problem. The Allies did correct their mistake in WWII by reducing Germany to ruins tough shame we had to wait dozens more million dead.

As Marshal Foch (Supreme Allied Leader) said "this is not a peace, it is an armistice for 20 years" noting how the treaty was too lenient. History proved him right.

I'm sorry, but I don't agree. Post WW I, Germans were not upset that they lost, but that the Treaty was too harsh. If the Allies had been a bit more lenient, Hitler wouldn't have had it to beat the German people over the head with. He might have remained a secondary figure at best. We might not have had WW II.

As for WWII, it is obvious that the Allies were a lot more lenient. Yes, they bombed the country into ruin DURING the war, but not afterwards. They guided them back into democracy. They gave the Krupps and others like them, a very mild slap on the wrist, so that their money could be put to use in restarting German economy.

 

[IsadorBG]

I'm sorry, but I don't agree. Post WW I, Germans were not upset that they lost, but that the Treaty was too harsh. If the Allies had been a bit more lenient, Hitler wouldn't have had it to beat the German people over the head with. He might have remained a secondary figure at best. We might not have had WW II.

Most Germans were convinced that they didn't lose the war and had to pay nothing for it. It may surprise people but Jews got killed for a reason however aberrant it might seems.

As for WWII, it is obvious that the Allies were a lot more lenient. Yes, they bombed the country into ruin DURING the war, but not afterwards. They guided them back into democracy. They gave the Krupps and others like them, a very mild slap on the wrist, so that their money could be put to use in restarting German economy.

Are you kidding ? Germany lost far more territory than they ever did in WWI and we all know how Germans were upset about those territory lost afterall the Weimar Republic never recognised it's eastern border (short to we will go to war over it sooner than later).

And how Germans raged about the the French occupation of the Ruhr ?

The country got split in 5 and was to remain that way indefinetly broken forever. Industries were dismantled in all the country and less not talk about how Germans were treated citizens of Germany or not.

It is very lucky that the Cold war changed the situation for a split in two and only under military "protection" of the US and Soviet Army but to say that it was more lenient than WWI is just a joke I am sorry.

 

[misterbean]

Here is the complete text of the Treaty: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/subject_menus/versailles_menu.asp

Read it and then tell me that the Allies were less lenient. Let's face it, after WWII, they had a lot more reasons to be strict. They weren't. Germany's economy was for Germany, not for the victors. The occupations in the Western half were never meant to be permanent. By the 50s, Germany had rebuild itself as a major economic powerhouse with Allied help. A case can be made for East Germany being a Soviet puppet for 50 years, but the Allies were not in a position to do anything about that. That was all Stalin's doing.

edit: and, please, the Jews? Please, don't go there.

 

[IsadorBG]

Here is the complete text of the Treaty: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/subject_menus/versailles_menu.asp

Read it and then tell me that the Allies were less lenient. Let's face it, after WWII, they had a lot more reasons to be strict. They weren't. Germany's economy was for Germany, not for the victors. The occupations in the Western half were never meant to be permanent. By the 50s, Germany had rebuild itself as a major economic powerhouse with Allied help. A case can be made for East Germany being a Soviet puppet for 50 years, but the Allies were not in a position to do anything about that. That was all Stalin's doing.

edit: and, please, the Jews? Please, don't go there.

Why not ? Why should we put blame on Versaille but forget who Germans blame for it ? it works both way if Versaille was too lharsh then Jew are responsible that's the interwar Revanchist rethoric in Germany. The two were not dissociable because remember ? Germany didn't lose the war.

I see no where that Germany border should be on the Oder, that the Germans state should be forfeited, that Germany should be permantly occupied by Allied forces or that Germans have forfeited their right to live outside Germany.

Germay may had rebuilt itself in the 50's but so did germany in the 20's in fact Germany didn't have to rebuilt itself in the latter case as it was pretty much intact !

the US (and the SU until 91) has military bases to "protect" Germany to this day. that's because Germany has been removed the right to defend itself after WWII let alone build an army like a real sovereign state.

 

[Velorian]

Not punitive enough was the problem. The Allies did correct their mistake in WWII by reducing Germany to ruins tough shame we had to wait dozens more million dead.

As Marshal Foch (Supreme Allied Leader) said "this is not a peace, it is an armistice for 20 years" noting how the treaty was too lenient. History proved him right.

Actually it should either have been more lenient or ruthlessly oppressive which would probably have led to problems eventually.

I understood his quote to mean the terms were too weak to prevent them from recovering but too harsh to prevent them from seeking revenge.

 

[IsadorBG]

Actually it should either have been more lenient or ruthlessly oppressive which would probably have led to problems eventually.

I understood his quote to mean the terms were too weak to prevent them from recovering but too harsh to prevent them from seeking revenge.

British thought that Versaille was too harsh and let Hitler do what he wish and we got WWII.
SU and US did ruthless oppression and we have now a peaceful Germany.

Would a lenient Versaille :No territorial concession in the east, no war tribute, no army limitation, no military occupation to give what Germans where the most angry about would have led to lasting peace ?

Maybe but it is painfully forgetting that France as the main contributor in the war would have never let Germay go with that and that letting Germany scot free is actually no asssurance at all.

 

[aitaituo]

Not punitive enough was the problem. The Allies did correct their mistake in WWII by reducing Germany to ruins tough shame we had to wait dozens more million dead.

As Marshal Foch (Supreme Allied Leader) said "this is not a peace, it is an armistice for 20 years" noting how the treaty was too lenient. History proved him right.

That's an interesting way of looking at it, though definitely not the consensus of historians, albeit partially because historians have moved away from moralizing history. I'd love to read an alt-history where Germany was annexed by France or partitioned between the Entente powers after WWI. Politically, the post-WWII demands were much stricter, effectively preventing Germany from becoming a global power without cooperating with the nascent EU, but economically they were the total reverse of Versailles, which pretty much served to sabotage the German economy as much as possible.

In any case, the only fruits of national blame are hatred and war. When you treat the state as if it is a person, it becomes as irrational as a monarchy.

 

[IsadorBG]

That's an interesting way of looking at it, though definitely not the consensus of historians, albeit partially because historians have moved away from moralizing history. I'd love to read an alt-history where Germany was annexed by France or partitioned between the Entente powers after WWI. Politically, the post-WWII demands were much stricter, effectively preventing Germany from becoming a global power without cooperating with the nascent EU, but economically they were the total reverse of Versailles, which pretty much served to sabotage the German economy as much as possible.

In any case, the only fruits of national blame are hatred and war. When you treat the state as if it is a person, it becomes as irrational as a monarchy.

What I don't understand is how people like to point out how Versailles "war tribute" is the root of the next war and conviently forget that Germans put Danzing and Jew above it and WWII didn't happen when Hitler denounced to "tribute" or remalitarised the Rhein but when he invaded Poland to get the rightfull clay back and now is universally hated for having dealt with the "traitors".
Ok I am a bit too harsh most of the democratic party in the Weimar just wanted the clay and the army back no blaming jew most of the time.

Versailles saboting the Germans economy is a myth. Germany was not the only country in Europe having economical difficulties post WWI. At best Versaille aggravated the problem. That and the instability of the Weimar Republic.

So either Versailles was too harsh and Hitler was right invading Poland because "right of auto-determination" and all that (written in the aforementionned treaty) or it was too lenient by letting a possibily for the Germans war machine recovering unlike post WWII.

 

[Velorian]

British thought that Versaille was too harsh and let Hitler do what he wish and we got WWII.
SU and US did ruthless oppression and we have now a peaceful Germany.

Would a lenient Versaille :No territorial concession in the east, no war tribute, no army limitation, no military occupation to give what Germans where the most angry about would have led to lasting peace ?

Maybe but it is painfully forgetting that France as the main contributor in the war would have never let Germay go with that and that letting Germany scot free is actually no asssurance at all.

Right but the war was a mutual tragedy the allies weren't complete innocents who had tried in vain to prevent war, they were fairly belligerent and France wanted back their lost territory (which were as German as French population-wise).

I don't view territorial concessions as overly harsh compared to deliberately crushing the economy and keeping it down and forbidding a military (which challenges their right to even be a sovereign power). The terms of the Versailles peace made it clear that the Germans were to be held completely responsible for the war, which wasn't really justice and a great source of discontent.

After WW2 the harshest territorial concessions were handled by the Soviets not the Allies anyhow, the Allies tried be as lenient as possible to prevent a new war.

The reason the Germans after WW2 became much more passive/peaceful compared to after WW1 is not so much harsh peace terms but more of a sense of collective shame.

Edit:

Versaille saboting the Germans economy is a myth. Germany was not the only country in Europe having economical difficulties post WWI. At best Versaille aggravated the problem. That and the instability of the Weimar Republic.

It aggravated it at a bad time and it gave the perfect excuse to blame everything on the treaty. The treaty also was extremely oppressive but the effect was lessened by German refusal and resistance to actually paying up fully.

 

[aitaituo]

What I don't understand is how people like to point out how Versaille "war tribute" is the root of the next war and conviently forget that Germans put Danzing and Jew above it...
Ok I am a bit too harsh most of the democratic party in the Weimar just wanted the clay and the army back no blaming jew most of the time.

Frankly, I don't see what Jewish people have to do with it. I don't think their role in the Weimar economy and interwar politics would be anything more than a footnote if Hitler hadn't scapegoated them. They certainly had absolutely no relevance to the terms of the Versailes or post-WWII treaties (except the stuff regarding the Mandate of Palestine, but that was politically incidental to what happened in Germany [even though the Holocaust was the proximate cause of Jewish migration] and was mostly the result of British policies).

 

[IsadorBG]

Right but the war was a mutual tragedy the allies weren't complete innocents who had tried in vain to prevent war, they were fairly belligerent and France wanted back their lost territory (which were as German as French population-wise).

I don't view territorial concessions as overly harsh compared to deliberately crushing the economy and keeping it down and forbidding a military (which challenges their right to even be a sovereign power). The terms of the Versailles peace made it clear that the Germans were to be held completely responsible for the war, which wasn't really justice and a great source of discontent.

Indeed.

You may not view it but Germans were furious about it that was their number one grievance again: the Weimar Republic did pay some of what it has to the allies (tough Germany never paid all of it) and did tone down the army but never recognised the eastern border.

War wasn't provoked when Germans stopped paying or when they rebuild they army but when they wanted back their rightfull territory unjustly taken in the Diktat.

After WW2 the harshest territorial concessions were handled by the Soviets not the Allies anyhow, the Allies tried be as lenient as possible to prevent a new war.

Territorial concession that were agreed by all the Allies sorry to disappoint and it was also agreed that Germany as a state was over.

The reason the Germans after WW2 became much more passive/peaceful compared to after WW1 is not so much harsh peace terms but more of a sense of collective shame.

The fact that they didn't have an army anymore and Soviet and American soldiers in their soil probably helped but hey just my view.

It aggravated it at a bad time and it gave the perfect excuse to blame everything on the treaty. The treaty also was extremely oppressive but the effect was lessened by German refusal and resistance to actually paying up fully.

Oh I am sure it was the perfect excuse just like the other perfect scapegoat that are the sons of Israel.

Frankly, I don't see what Jewish people have to do with it. I don't think their role in the Weimar economy and interwar politics would be anything more than a footnote if Hitler hadn't scapegoated them. They certainly had absolutely no relevance to the terms of the Versailes or post-WWII treaties (except the stuff regarding the Mandate of Palestine, but that was politically incidental to what happened in Germany [even though the Holocaust was the proximate cause of Jewish migration] and was mostly the result of British policies).

It is simple thing scapegoat: Think Tribute=Jew,=money stealer and you have the political program of the German far-right in the 20's.
After problem scapegoat is dealt with we can proceed to the real program: Clay and Military for the return of Germany as the dominant world power

 

[Velorian]

Territorial concession that were agreed by all the Allies sorry to disappoint and it was agreed that Germany as a state was dead.

Well there was a little pressure from the fact that the Soviets had occupied to whole area...

The fact that they didn't have an army anymore and Soviet and American soldiers in their soil probably helped but hey just my view.

If that had been done after WW1 there'd have been vicious resistance and guerilla fights. After WW2 Germans accepted blame and felt shame, after WW1 they did not.

Oh I am sure it was the perfect excuse just like the other perfect scapegoat that are the sons of Israel.

Why do you have to keep bringing up the Jews? It was a tragedy but had nothing to do with the cause of the war and nothing to do with WW1. They were used as scapegoats by everyone all over the world.

Almost nothing about what Germany did in WW2 was right or justified, but as for the cause of the first world war blame was shared but assigned exclusively to one party. That perceived injustice was directly responsible for Germans voting for Hitler. Hitler then proceeded to do all sorts of bad things as I'm sure we can all agree.