Hello everyone and welcome to another Stellaris development diary. Today's dev diary will be about some more changes coming in the 1.8 'Čapek' update, with a particular focus on Hive Minds and Traditions.

Hive Minds
Hive Minds was a feature in Utopia that we were not unhappy with, but felt we could have done more on. While it works fine from a gameplay perspective, offering a different mode of play for those who do not wish to concern themselves with internal politicking and just want to get on with building their glorious empire among the stars (and eating those that stand in their way), Hive Minds ended up somewhat lacking in the flavor department, and suffered narratively from gameplay text that does not fit a Hive-Minded society, such as early exploration events.

For 1.8, we've decided to make a major push to improve Hive Minds, both narratively and gameplay-wise. Many events have been changed, disabled or rewritten to fit Hive Minds and their unique societies. We've also tried to address a number of non-event related narrative breaks, such as replacing the 'Sprawling Slums' starting planet tile blocker with a unique tile blocker only found on Hive Mind homeworlds. A new system for relocalising technologies based on government authority types was also created, and a number of technologies will now have different, more suitable names for Hive Minds (such as renaming Administrative AI to Synaptic Enhancers). Some new, unique interactions were also added to the game to emphasise the inherent psionic nature of Hive Minds.

We've also changed the way Hive Minds interact with non-Hive Mind pops. While we still do not want non-Hive Minded Pops to be regular citizens of Hive Minds (for numerous reasons, the main one being keeping Hive Minds distinct from regular empires in how they are played), we have added the option to keep them around as Livestock instead of simply being processed or displaced. AI-controlled Hive Mind empires now also vary in how they treat Pops of other species, with some preferring displacement and others making use of livestock or processing. Livestock/Processing have been buffed from 3/6 food per Pop to 6/8 respectively, and a number of fixes have been made to ensure that Pops that are kept as livestock do not incur building maintenance or similar issues.

Devouring Swarms
In addition to the changes to regular Hive Minds, we've also devoted some more attention to the Devouring Swarm civic that was added in 1.6. Devouring Swarms have had their bonuses increased to be more on par with their Fanatical Purifier non-Hive Mind variant, and a new government type and AI personality was created for Devouring Swarms that you encounter while exploring the galaxy. They also have a few new flavor texts and unique interactions.

Assimilation
Finally, we've improved the process of assimilating non-Hive Minded Pops into the Hive. Instead of having to genetically modify the project (and complete said project before the Pops are eaten or forced out), Hive Minds now have access to a new type of citizenship species right, that is unlocked once they unlock the Evolutionary Mastery ascension perk. This citizenship type, called 'Assimilation', will convert non-Hive-Minded Pops into a Hive-Minded variant of that species, allowing them to be integrated seamlessly into your Hive Mind empire. The process is gradual, with a certain number of Pops converted at regular intervals rather than all being modified at the same time. Non-Hive Minded Pops will of course be quite upset by this, selfishly holding on to their individuality rather than simply surrendering to the glory of the collective. This new method of assimilation was also made available to Synthetic empires, and can be used to convert Pops to cyborgs (if partway through Synthetic Ascension) or upload them into robot bodies (if fully Synthetically Ascended). It can also be used to by non-Hive Mind empires that have unlocked Evolutionary Mastery to de-assimilate Hive-Minded Pops.

Tradition Swapping
Another issue both gameplay and narrative-wise that affects Hive Minds, but is not unique to them, is that certain traditions simply do not fit certain kinds of empires. When creating the tradition trees, we tried to keep them as broad as possible, but ultimately you're never going to be able to design seven full trees that fit perfectly into every possible society and playstyle. It's for this reason that we have created a new system that we call 'Tradition Swapping'. Tradition Swapping allows any Tradition Category (such as Diplomacy) or individual Tradition (such as Trans-Stellar Corporations) to be set up with a number of potential 'swaps'. These swaps have conditions and weights for each individual empire, and can be anything from a simple name and description swap to a full replacement of name, description, icon and effects. A number of such tradition swaps have been created for empires with specific playstyle, such as Hive Minds and Fanatical Purifiers. For example, Hive Minds have replaced 'Trans-Stellar Corporations' (Private Colony Ships make very little sense in a Hive Mind...) with Warrior Forms, a tradition that reduces army upkeep. They also have the entire Diplomacy tree replaced with Adaptability, a new tree focused on growth, habitability and genetics.

Though Tradition swaps may appear to be completely different from what they are replacing, they still occupy the same 'slot'. This means that the system is able to easily handle any change in the empire that would affect the tradition trees - if a Fanatic Purifier has the Purity tree (replacing the Domination tree) filled out and stop being Fanatical Purifiers, they will not lose their unlocked traditions and ascension perks, instead they are simply swapped for whatever variant of the same slots are valid for the empire - in this case reverting the Purity tree back to being Domination. While this may seem slightly strange, we felt it is nonetheless the preferrable way of handing such switches, as all sorts of issues would arise from simply yanking a number of unlocked traditions from empires that could no longer fulfill the conditions for them. By keeping the system as robust and dynamic as possible, it allows us to make far more adjustments to individual traditions for different playstyles than would be otherwise possible. The Tradition Swapping system is, of course, fully accessible to modders.

That's all for today! Next week we'll be talking about voices. Or hearing voices? At any rate, voices will be involved for sure, so stay tuned!

 

[Butterwings]

I love how the description text for the assimilation is a quote from the Borg. xD

 

[Hertzila]

Focus on diplomacy, federations and so on really does not fit too well with the playstyle and general theme of Hive Minds. Diplomacy is still possible unless you're a Devouring Swarm, but they're not too good at it - their mindset is simply too alien to individualistic societies. You're going to have to try harder than most to make friends.

I'm considering adding a special civic for 'peaceful' Hive Minds that try to understand and co-exist with non-Hive Mind civilizations though.

Please do. One of my favourite things to do in games that allow it is to play against the common trope and see what happens and how well I can pull it off. Stuff like friendly hive minds or in fantasy good-aligned (or at least not-evil) necromancers are fun and interesting in my opinion.

While not critical, losing the ability to form and benefit from Federations would be a nasty loss for a diplomatic Hive Mind. A civic that allows Federations again and helps with diplomacy in general would be nice.

 

[Malecord]

A hive mind is not a unique person but a sum of unique people with a collective spirit. Spirit that can be either open to its environment or centered on itself. So be a greater diplomat, or less than a single person.

It's a sentient entity and ofc can learn to be a diplomat or not. But in the scope of this game is an entity that has lived alone for thousands if not million of years. We can agree that when it will finally meet other sentient beings it will have 0 experience and thus be clumsy if not totally inept with these interactions.

 

[CrowScape]

Well, since I was big on complaining about making aliens tasty so that livestock was something other than a joke option, I've got to say: good job. It looks like devouring swarm can use the livestock option to get 9 food per tile fairly early on now, which is yuuge, and 12 with processing. Doesn't match late game slave food production, but early game performance cannot be dismissed.

Would like to still see more development on this in the future, but it now has a function in the game.

 

[Ur-Quan Lord 13]

A hive mind is not a unique person but a sum of unique people with a collective spirit. Spirit that can be either open to its environment or centered on itself. So be a greater diplomat, or less than a single person.

This... Kinda sounded like a response to the diplomacy thing, not what you quoted. Assuming so...

Humans have capacities called empathy and theory of mind, which are used for understanding the feelings of other individuals, and providing the knowledge that their feelings, situation and motivation may differ from our own.

These capacities were produced through evolution, because they were useful to forming communities. It's a reasonable guess that most spacefaring civilizations would have some vaguely analogous capacities, and these would be used by both entities to attempt to understand each other, despite being alien.

A hive mind may or may not be composed of unique individuals... That's up to roleplay, I'd say. It at least has autonomous drones, which could maybe have their own feelings if you think they do, or could just be analogous to a liver or heart that can be given commands; they are meant to do this task, and can continue to do so without conscious effort from the hive mind to maintain it.

So, in your role play world, the cells of the hive mind could have unique feelings and such. But, they know each other's spirit. So, no need for empathy, theory of mind. They feel each other. Any capacity to communicate or understand outside of the hive mind would most likely atrophy.

And the hive mind itself would have no reason to have empathy, theory of mind, anything of the sort. It doesn't interact with other hive minds. It is the one. It could, of course, imagine other hive minds on other worlds, but it has never talked to one. It would be engaging in diplomacy, with zero experience ever interacting with another being.

And, if it's constituents were sentient before becoming linked in a hive mind, it may even remember that, and imagine other sentient beings which never became linked like it did. (Or, it could be like the bugs in ender's game, and not conceive of such a thing until after a bloody war.) But once again, it would have zero experience in interacting with any entity other than itself.

 

[runrun]

This... Kinda sounded like a response to the diplomacy thing, not what you quoted. Assuming so...

Humans have capacities called empathy and theory of mind, which are used for understanding the feelings of other individuals, and providing the knowledge that their feelings, situation and motivation may differ from our own.

These capacities were produced through evolution, because they were useful to forming communities. It's a reasonable guess that most spacefaring civilizations would have some vaguely analogous capacities, and these would be used by both entities to attempt to understand each other, despite being alien.

A hive mind may or may not be composed of unique individuals... That's up to roleplay, I'd say. It at least has autonomous drones, which could maybe have their own feelings if you think they do, or could just be analogous to a liver or heart that can be given commands; they are meant to do this task, and can continue to do so without conscious effort from the hive mind to maintain it.

So, in your role play world, the cells of the hive mind could have unique feelings and such. But, they know each other's spirit. So, no need for empathy, theory of mind. They feel each other. Any capacity to communicate or understand outside of the hive mind would most likely atrophy.

And the hive mind itself would have no reason to have empathy, theory of mind, anything of the sort. It doesn't interact with other hive minds. It is the one. It could, of course, imagine other hive minds on other worlds, but it has never talked to one. It would be engaging in diplomacy, with zero experience ever interacting with another being.

And, if it's constituents were sentient before becoming linked in a hive mind, it may even remember that, and imagine other sentient beings which never became linked like it did. (Or, it could be like the bugs in ender's game, and not conceive of such a thing until after a bloody war.) But once again, it would have zero experience in interacting with any entity other than itself.

We are able to have empathy for our own spacies as well as for other species around us (like for a dog).
Being a hive mind does not mean that it can t live in symbiosis with the other species of its planet and to know what is "the other". Which would make it a xenophilic species.

Even if they had remained thousands of years isolated on their planet, they are not a machines but living beings distinct. What could be nearest is an ant colony which as a living being is able to care for its own survival even though sometimes can very well sacrifice for the group.
These units are not physically connecting as an arm or a leg but by the mind. Which makes a clear difference in the evolution of the species.

I simply pointed out that it was possible to envisage several possibilities.
Which is also in the sense of the game since it allows, at the creation of the species, to adjust it according to our desire. I showed then that he should not see the hive mind than one way. Spirit of hive! ... then it is not nice and it does not know how to communicated with the other.

 

[Sandermatt]

I really hope the new traditions fit the playstyle and are meaningful.
The replacement of the colony ship with warrior form worries me, since it is not a very useful bonus and it has not really a connection to the playstyle of a hivemind.

For example for fanatic purifiers/devouring swarms: They would benefit from ship building cost reduction/ship building speed to replenish their losses from the frequent fighting.
Inwards perfection: They would benefit more from a ship maintainance reduction, since they will only have to maintain the fleet, rarely replace losses. Furthermore they might want to add bonuses to things that help with the internal development (e.g. powerful but expensive buildings that a more expanding playstyle wouldn't build).

 

[Ur-Quan Lord 13]

We are able to have empathy for our own spacies as well as for other species around us (like for a dog).
Being a hive mind does not mean that it can t live in symbiosis with the other species of its planet and to know what is "the other". Which would make it a xenophilic species.

Even if they had remained thousands of years isolated on their planet, they are not a machines but living beings distinct. What could be nearest is an ant colony which as a living being is able to care for its own survival even though sometimes can very well sacrifice for the group.
These units are not physically connecting as an arm or a leg but by the mind. Which makes a clear difference in the evolution of the species.

I simply pointed out that it was possible to envisage several possibilities.
Which is also in the sense of the game since it allows, at the creation of the species, to adjust it according to our desire. I showed then that he should not see the hive mind than one way. Spirit of hive! ... then it is not nice and it does not know how to communicated with the other.

Our ability to have empathy for dogs is most likely an extension of our ability to have empathy for each other. Just like the ability of dogs to have empathy for us is most certainly an extension of their empathy for each other.

A hive mind has no initial need to have empathy for anything. Why would it have developed a sense of empathy at all, when there is no other entity it needs to deal with or care for?

It cares for its own cells, sure, but that's more self preservation than empathy. Like if your liver could tell you it's drinking too much.

And, like I said, it might imagine that some other civilization might have cells which all act independently, like the dumb non-hive-mind animals on its home world, but still be smart like its cells are. And it might care about the dumb animals on its home world, and might extend that same level of caring to the weird sentient but not connected cells it meets out in space.

But it would have no evolutionary reason to have ever developed a capacity to understand, empathize, communicate with anything, at all, and definitely no experience doing so.

Even a human, with all our innate capacity for getting along with other humans, would suck at it if they were isolated for the first 50 years of their life.

A hive mind would definitely have no such innate capacity, because it would have never needed it, and life that develops capabilities it doesn't need doesn't survive.

 

[joecov]

Gradual assimilation, can we also get gradual purging.

 

[Devanor]

As there's been no mention

Gradual assimilation, can we also get gradual purging.

Yes! It just feels weird that purge-opted pops remain until X date, and then all are annihilated in one fell swoop. Rather, it should be 60 months divided by number of pops (say, 10), that means 1 pop is purged every 6th month. The process will still take 5 years, but at least you'll see some progress on the way.

 

[runrun]

Our ability to have empathy for dogs is most likely an extension of our ability to have empathy for each other. Just like the ability of dogs to have empathy for us is most certainly an extension of their empathy for each other.

A hive mind has no initial need to have empathy for anything. Why would it have developed a sense of empathy at all, when there is no other entity it needs to deal with or care for?

It cares for its own cells, sure, but that's more self preservation than empathy. Like if your liver could tell you it's drinking too much.

And, like I said, it might imagine that some other civilization might have cells which all act independently, like the dumb non-hive-mind animals on its home world, but still be smart like its cells are. And it might care about the dumb animals on its home world, and might extend that same level of caring to the weird sentient but not connected cells it meets out in space.

But it would have no evolutionary reason to have ever developed a capacity to understand, empathize, communicate with anything, at all, and definitely no experience doing so.

Even a human, with all our innate capacity for getting along with other humans, would suck at it if they were isolated for the first 50 years of their life.

A hive mind would definitely have no such innate capacity, because it would have never needed it, and life that develops capabilities it doesn't need doesn't survive.

I could explain that evolution does not necessarily keep what is indispensable and rejects what is useless. Many examples to demonstrate it.

I simply pointed out that your point of view is not the only valid one. Nature has more imagination than we have together

 

[Ur-Quan Lord 13]

I could explain that evolution does not necessarily keep what is indispensable and rejects what is useless. Many examples to demonstrate it.

I simply pointed out that your point of view is not the only valid one. Nature has more imagination than we have together

Keep what is indispensable: not sure that's what you meant. It definitely does. If a life form loses something truly "indispensable", it cannot reproduce, and dies. Evolution may fail to develop something that is now indispensable due to changing environments (leading to extinction), and very very often develops things in suboptimal but "good enough" ways (like the vertebrate eye, sorta crappy compared to other eyes) but something that (currently) has a positive opportunity cost to reproduction will never be lost.

Rejects what is useless: true. It doesn't reject what is useless, unless it's detrimental. But, it usually eventually fades. Look up the Wikipedia article on human vestigiality. It's actually quite an interesting read. But one take away is, almost every vestigial trait they mention either retains some minor benefit, or actually has deteriorated. Did you know that large populations of humans don't grow wisdom teeth? Or are missing muscles used for climbing by ancestral primates?

One thing though, that I don't know of an example of, is a new trait becoming adopted and widespread, that was useless from the start. I mean sure, there are genetic diseases, that persist because they're recessive, or allow reproduction before they kill you. But can you give an example of a trait, in humans or another species, that became widespread despite never being useful ever? Not being sarcastic or rhetorical, I'm genuinely curious.

Anyway, the individuals making up the hive mind might still have some vestigial communication capabilities or emotions, though they no longer need them, depending on how long ago they became a hive mind (they may never have been independently sapient, or maybe they were). The hive mind itself would not. But, maybe it could even tell its cells "hey... Use that old communication stuff we still haven't completely lost, to understand this... Thing I'm talking to."

But, it would be weird and unnatural to the hive mind, and it would be the first time it's ever done it. So... That's why there's a penalty. Diplomacy is allowed... The hive mind can figure it out. But it's brand new to the experience.

 

[Vitruvian Guar]

Special traditions for special playstyles is definetely a step in a right direction. But I'm not sure that all this swapping thing makes sense. I mean they a called traditions after all. It is something that has been pcracticed in the society for a long time. How can the traditions change immediatelly after goverment change? Picture this: "For all the history of our civilization we were isolationist, we developed our unique culture and made our best not to be corrupted by alien influence. But yesterday we have settled a new colony so we removed our inner perfection civic in favour of effective burocracy... and now we are immediatelly aware how to create a federation and benefit from it. "
I think it would be better if traditions couldn't swap during the game so that they showed the history of the society. Also it would be more fair for players who pick special civics ( like fanatical purifiers ) from the start.

When creating the tradition trees, we tried to keep them as broad as possible.

And this is where the problem really is. You shouldn't have done it that way. Traditions should be specialized they should represent the differences in culture they should be a way for different playstyles. There should be at least two tradition trees for every category. Take industry. It can be extencive or intencive. So the first tree reduces build cost and speed of buildings and stations and the other increase their productivity. Like +1 mineral from every tier of mining network. Extencive industry gives you small empire wide bonus for every copy of a rare resource, intencive let you create a special building that refines the resource and gives bigger bonus for a planet. And so on.
How do you mange your pops? You want to intimidate them to work or rather prefere make them happy to be more productive? There can be special tradition trees for both playstyles. How do you govern your empire? Delegating power to sectors? Or via high centralisation? How do you treat other species? As equals so you want to engage diplomacy or you either think that they are only good to be your vasals? What is your approach to war? Defensive? Or offensive? Every time there is a choice there can be a tradition tree rewarding you for a particular way of playing.

 

[Ari54x]

I don't believe hive minds are OP, at least not from a single-player perspective. What I've noticed happen in most of my SP games is that AI diplomacy pretty much decides that any hive minds or fanatic purifiers need to go, and early on they work towards taking them out (sometimes repugnant species, as well).

I rarely play as hive minds or purifiers, but I like to have them in my game. They just never seem to be able to survive on their own.

I play hives relatively frequently and have a fair amount of hives in my premade list, both Swarms and friendly hives.

If by Hive Mind you mean Devouring Swarms, then yes, the AI tends to try and kick them down ASAP just like Purifiers, because either one tend to snowball really quickly so they're viewed a bit like a mini-crisis by the AI. (And if Purifiers or Swarms last to the mid-game at all, they tend to require either a giant blod or an effective federation to take them down) I haven't noticed a tendancy to specifically eat Hives, but that malus combined with any purging from wars if they get locked in could easily make them very unpopular with the neighbours and put them on the Must Conquer list. If your hive has enough room to expand peacefully fast at the beginning of the game, they'll generally be threatening enough that once they're border-locked, they won't be as likely to die after their first war when suddenly everyone hates them for purging. It might get even easier for them in 1.8 if assimilating doesn't incur the same diplo malus as other types of purging.

 

[Hertzila]

I think it would be better if traditions couldn't swap during the game so that they showed the history of the society. Also it would be more fair for players who pick special civics ( like fanatical purifiers ) from the start.

Gameplay trumps lore in this case. As illogical as it might be, immediately gaining access to the swapped traditions means that it's actually sensible to change civics, rather than risk costing a massive amount of Unity in addition to all the other costs involved in changing civics, or ethics or whatever else can cause tradition swapping. The other option is to basically massively punish a player for daring to change their playstyle mid-game.

Besides, especially in civics' case, you already spend a good amount of influence to change the government, so why not change the traditions as well? They have to start somewhere!

 

[bloodyglasspuppet]

Besides, especially in civics' case, you already spend a good amount of influence to change the government, so why not change the traditions as well? They have to start somewhere!

I agree in general, but the fact that changing civics and even government-types is that easy bothered me since the beginning. I would think there would be more consequences for radical changes in a society. Why not take inspiration from Civ? At least there is a phase of anarchy after changing government-types, economic systems etc...

 

[Jorlem]

Probably because we all know that in this case we'll just cherrypick the best stuff, which means you'd have to add arbitrary restrictions that are harder to communicate inside the UI (without a full redesign) OR you are forced to have parity between all potential options (which isn't exactly easy and would eleminate a lot of the more "fluffy" flavorful ones).

Honestly, I wish that traditions worked more like EU4's Ideas. Currently by endgame, pretty much everyone has exactly the same set of bonuses, as they have most if not all of the tradition trees filled out, with a few differences coming from ascension perks. It could also be used to give a much more dynamic feeling of empires changing and evolving than just adding an extra civic midgame does. (As an aside, I wish there was a way to see what your government would become before finalizing the changes and paying the 250 Influence to embrace a faction or change civics or government forms. There's no way of knowing if a set of changes will satisfy the Spiritualist faction demand for a specific government name, for example.) Traditions could be something that gives empires wildly differing personalities, if they were allowed to represent traditions within the empires, but they currently result in everyone following the same traditions in the end. The swapping mechanic helps with this, but it seems like most empires will still be functionally the same.

 

[GAGA Extrem]

Honestly, I wish that traditions worked more like EU4's Ideas. Currently by endgame, pretty much everyone has exactly the same set of bonuses, as they have most if not all of the tradition trees filled out, with a few differences coming from ascension perks.[...]

If anything, I'd rather want EU3 like NI slots instead.
But as Wiz mentioned, there are things in the pipe regarding the use of excess Unity - and from what I have seen, that might also shake up the actual Tradition choices.
...obviously still subject to changes, so no details.

 

[Vitruvian Guar]

Gameplay trumps lore in this case. As illogical as it might be, immediately gaining access to the swapped traditions means that it's actually sensible to change civics, rather than risk costing a massive amount of Unity in addition to all the other costs involved in changing civics, or ethics or whatever else can cause tradition swapping. The other option is to basically massively punish a player for daring to change their playstyle mid-game.

Besides, especially in civics' case, you already spend a good amount of influence to change the government, so why not change the traditions as well? They have to start somewhere!

But why should it be even more sensible to change civics? Let's forget about common sense and speak only about gameplay. One can choice to be a fanatic purifier from the start of the game being hated by everyone or to take that civic in the end when all the traditions are already filled. One of the easiest way is to begin with being celestial empire get tons of unity very fast and end up cleansing the galaxy from all the xenos. If there is no difference why would anyone want to play FP from the beginning? At least when naked corvettes are fixed...

Also would it be such a punishment if some of your traditions were not fit your new playstyle exactly and immediatelly? If there were a way to remove old traditions and then swap the trees it would be perfectly fine. Also - a way to spend unity late game.

 

[Kayden_II]

I don't really understand this half-backed "tradition-swapping"-thing ...

Traditions aren't traditions in the case, that you can get all of them ...
It's still a better idea, that you have to choose mutually-exclusive traditions, which are really strategical decisions ...

Like in CK-II-Conclave - Is this some sort of a "fear", that the customer couldn't like any form of "restrictions" ? ...
If so, it's bull****.