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Stellaris Dev Diary #83: Čapek Feature Roundup (part 1)

Hello everyone and welcome to another Stellaris development diary. Today's dev diary is a round-up of some minor changes and reworks coming in the 1.8 'Čapek' update. Though most of what's in these round-ups will already have been discussed on stream or twitter, we still want to make sure that people whose primary source of Stellaris information is dev diaries are aware of what's changing. Everything mentioned in this dev diary is part of the free update.

Democratic Election Changes
We've taken some time to make a variety of changes and fixes to democratic elections in 1.8. Rather than being a confusing mess of candidates from the entire leader pool, elections in 1.8 will be centered around factions and faction leaders. Instead of a candidate's vote share being based on their mandate, candidates from faction now get election support directly based on the strength of their faction, so a candidate from a powerful faction has a much better chance of securing an electoratal victory than one from a fringe party. Election candidates will be generated from all faction leaders, with independent candidates added into the mix if there are less than 4 factions that are able to provide candidates. We've also made some changes to the way faction support is calculated when there are species that lack Full Citizenship (and thus the ability to vote and be leaders): Though free Pops without Full Citizenship can still join factions, their support count for only 1/5th the amount that a Full Citizenship pop does when calculating the overall political strength (and thus also vote share) of a faction. We had hoped to also spend some time adding more Mandates for 1.8, but unfortunately didn't end up being able to fit it into our scheudle. However, it's something we're going to revisit as soon as we can spare the time for it.
2017_08_24_1.png


Leader Max Level
Another change to leaders in general in 1.8 is the rework of the Leader Skills modifier. Where previously Leader Skills modifiers (such as the Talented trait) would increase the base skills of leaders, this has now been reworked into a Leader Max Level modifier that increases the potential skill level cap of your leader. The default skill level cap is still 5, but this can now be increased all the way up to 10 with the right combination of traits, civics, traditions and policies. This will allow empires that focus on raising leader level cap to have extremely powerful leaders, and since all leaders now start at level 1, will also make the Leader Experience Gain modifier far more valuable, especially in synergy with level cap increases.

Core Sector Governors
We've made some changes to governors in 1.8. First of all, the core sector has been changed so that only a single Governor is needed to govern it, rather than one Governor per planet. Also, the effect of Governor skill level has been changed to provide a direct bonus to all resource production in their sector, meaning that highly skilled Governors are now a valuable asset that will significantly strengthen the economy of their sector.
2017_08_24_2.png


Vassal Creation
Lastly for today, we've reworked the Create Vassal button. Where previously it was hidden away in the Demographics screen and would only let you release entire species whose homeworld you had conquered, the Create Vassal button is now prominently displayed in the planet interface and will allow you to release any (non-capital) planet you own as a vassal, under the governance of any species of your choice that is present on that planet at the time of release. Released vassals will get your empire ethics and authority, but will pick their own civics. In combination with other changes and additions in 1.8 (such as reworking the Domination tree to be all about having subjects rather than annexing them, and the new Feudal Realm civic that lets you control far more vassals without having them rebel), this should make a subject-oriented playstyle far more viable.
2017_08_24_3.png


That's all for today! Next week we'll continue the feature roundup by talking about new and changed policies in 1.8.
 
Odd, I do not see the "Create Vassal" option when I play the game. I colonized a world, even deleted my core worlds leader, and I do not see it anywhere (Didn't see it anywhere in another version with more planets in it) The option is missing entirely. Is this perhaps due to issues with others DLC's?? Can anyone help??
Are you looking at the 'planet summary' tab of an inhabited planet? The button even shows up on your capital (although grayed out).
 
Are you looking at the 'planet summary' tab of an inhabited planet? The button even shows up on your capital (although grayed out).
Yup. It is always completely missing, no matter what I do or where I look (It isn't even grayed out) Does it disappear at some point? Do Cheatcodes or high tech levels make it disappear?
 
Yup. It is always completely missing, no matter what I do or where I look (It isn't even grayed out) Does it disappear at some point? Do Cheatcodes or high tech levels make it disappear?
You probably have a civic that prevents it:
Code:
can_release_vassal = {
   NOT = { has_valid_civic = civic_fanatic_purifiers }
   NOT = { has_valid_civic = civic_machine_terminator }
   NOT = { has_valid_civic = civic_machine_assimilator }
   NOT = { has_valid_civic = civic_hive_devouring_swarm }
}
Also if the only pops on the planet are not free-willed you can't release it:
Code:
can_release_vassal_from_species = {
   root = {
       is_sapient = yes
       NOR = {
           has_trait = trait_machine_unit
           has_trait = trait_hive_mind
           has_trait = trait_mechanical
           has_trait = trait_nerve_stapled
       }
   }
}
 
You probably have a civic that prevents it:
Code:
can_release_vassal = {
   NOT = { has_valid_civic = civic_fanatic_purifiers }
   NOT = { has_valid_civic = civic_machine_terminator }
   NOT = { has_valid_civic = civic_machine_assimilator }
   NOT = { has_valid_civic = civic_hive_devouring_swarm }
}
Also if the only pops on the planet are not free-willed you can't release it:
Code:
can_release_vassal_from_species = {
   root = {
       is_sapient = yes
       NOR = {
           has_trait = trait_machine_unit
           has_trait = trait_hive_mind
           has_trait = trait_mechanical
           has_trait = trait_nerve_stapled
       }
   }
}
Nope that's not it, because I'm playing a machine terminator and I have the greyed-out button.
 
It's actually a bit of a UI bug. On lower resolutions the button doesn't appear, as seen in Rholden's pic. I used to play on a lower resolution borderless window, and I had that problem, but playing on fullscreen (max resolution) fixed it. It's not an ideal fix though because the game is pretty slow now.

Dunno what to report in a bug report.
 
It's actually a bit of a UI bug. On lower resolutions the button doesn't appear, as seen in Rholden's pic. I used to play on a lower resolution borderless window, and I had that problem, but playing on fullscreen (max resolution) fixed it. It's not an ideal fix though because the game is pretty slow now.

Dunno what to report in a bug report.
I'd report exactly that with screenshots showing what it looks like at the different resolutions.