Hello everyone and welcome to another Stellaris development diary. Now that the 1.7.2 update is out, we can officially start talking about the next update, which has been named 1.8 'Čapek'. This update will include the reworked AI crisis and other changes to crises outlined in Dev Diary #72. More information will be forthcoming in future dev diaries on the exact nature and release date of 1.8, but for today we'll be going over some changes and improvements to Habitability and Terraforming coming in 1.8.

Habitability Changes
Ever since the changes to the habitable planet classes and habitability back in Heinlein we have continued to discuss habitability, and in particular, the frequency of habitable worlds in the galaxy. A general feeling among the designers has been that habitable planets are too common and do not feel special enough, but that reducing the base number of habitable worlds wasn't really feasible while most empires only had access to colonizing a third of them at the start. We also felt that the sheer abundance of habitable worlds that become available to you when you do achieve the ability to colonize/terraform other climate types also meant that there is little pressure to expand your borders - not when you can triple your planet count simply by utilizing the planets already inside your borders.

For this reason we've decided to make a number of fundamental changes to habitability. First of all, the habitability at which Pops can live on a planet was reduced from 40% to 20%, meaning that by default, most species will be able to colonize most habitable worlds in the galaxy from the very start. We have also changed the actual effects of habitability: Rather than acting as a cap on happiness, it now acts as a modifier on it (in addition to affecting growth, as before), with each 10 points of habitability below 100% reducing happiness by 2.5% (so at the base 20% habitability, a Pop would get -20% to their happiness). This means that while low-habitability planets are possible to colonize, it may not be a good idea to do so unless you have ways to compensate for the negative effects of low habitability.

With these changes, we have cut the base number of habitable worlds in the galaxy in half. For those that prefer to play with more (or even fewer!) habitable worlds, there is of course the habitable worlds slider in galaxy setup as before. Overall, the changes should result in habitable worlds and terraforming candidates feeling like more significant finds in the early game, and contribute to mid and late game friction as empires run out of worlds to colonize inside their borders.


Planetary Deposits
Along with the change to habitability, we have also changed the way resource deposits are generated on habitable worlds. Rather than all habitable worlds having the exact same chance to generate the different kind of resource deposits, we have now broken it up a bit by climate as follows:

Wet Climate planets (Continental, Ocean, Tropical) are more likely to generate food and society research deposits.
Frozen Climate planets (Arctic, Tundra, Alpine) are more likely to generate mineral and engineering research deposits.
Dry Climate planets (Desert, Arid, Savanna) are more likely to generate energy and physics research deposits.
Gaia planets are more likely to generate mixed deposits and strategic resources.

Of course, this does not mean that you will *only* find those types of desposits on such planets - it simply means they are more likely to be found there.

Terraforming Interface Improvements
Also coming in 1.8 are a couple changes to improve Terraforming and Terraforming Candidates. First of all, we've introduced a concept called 'significant planetary modifiers'. This is a flag (accessible to modders) that can be set on any planetary modifier, and will result in that planet appearing in the Expansion Planner even if it not of a habitable planet class. For now, the only significant modifier is Terraforming Candidates (such as Mars), so you should no longer find a Terraforming Candidate only to forget which system it is located in, but we expect to make more use of this functionality in the future.

We also spent some time cleaning up the Terraforming interface in general, hiding the button for planets where it is never applicable (such as non-Terraforming Candidate barren worlds) and improving the sorting and style of the actual terraforming window.

That's all for now! Next week we'll be talking about some significant changes coming in the area of genetic modification.

 

[Ghellis]

Have to say after playing Stellaris nearly clocking in 500 hours i still can't get enough of the game and i look forward to the changes that are coming with AI rebellions. With all the time playing i have never had a rebellion so its a shame missing out on one of the end game crisis so hopefully this feature will change that. I look forward to see what future content becomes available, i would love the idea after conquering the galaxy you can choose to become a fallen empire by changing Civics. You unlock new technologies such as the autonomous fabricators and dark matter power plants at the same time your borders begin to shrink, populations start to disappear over a long period of time.

While becoming fallen you get to interact with smaller empires like requesting leaders if you are materialist or populations and putting them in a sanctuary's if you are an Xenophile etc. I reckon you should be able to check what other empires are researching as well and if they go down the dangerous AI path or jump drive you can send threats to these empires to stop and if they refuse you wage war on them. I believe this would be great for role playing and replayability.

I reckon you should be able to seed planets with new life on planets you previously owned and guide their evolution without their knowledge. This would be included in technology you can research and would fill the galaxy if there are not many empires left to interact with or conquer.

Just a couple of ideas for the end game keep up the good work Paradox!

 

[Ikael]

It is really great to see the developers willing to shake the very foundations of the game, it shows a level of self-reflection and willingness to improve very rare to see in commercial gaming

That being said, even with this patch there's still a long way to make planets feel unique. The suggestions here regarding a "vertical resource distribution". would be great in order to add both flavour and flexibility, and far more potent planet-specific modifiers should be in order too, so just one single planet can make an empire-wide difference.

Wiz's comments about making habitability determine a planet's producion seems also very on point, for we would need habitability to effect synths and hiveminds somehow, and happiness and growth penalties are not that much of an malus, me thinks. Still, really loving the direction where all of this is going.

 

[Manqs]

I love that you guys keep reinventing and improving the game and not being afraid to try new stuff even with the game core systems. And I hope you will keep doing this for a long time, just like the other grand strategy paradox titles.

That said, we could really use a patch or two focusing on just bugfixes. The fact that the game has been the most buggy since the Utopia launch combined with the problems alot are having with the 1.7.2 new multiplayer tech is kinda disappointing and you kinda need to fix that before moving on to the next new features.

 

[PirateJack]

@Wiz Given there's going to be some combat rework, may I ask if there's been any luck getting missiles up to snuff?

 

[Sorbo]

I'll lower the cost to 6.

Wow, thank you! Long live the roach overlords!

 

[Mann42]

I believe this is overreaction. Home planet has 13 tiles with pre-defined resources, so there are only 3 ~ 7 tiles left for random. In such small sample size RNG will have more influnce than deposit weight, in my opinion.

Overall I think deposit weight change will be less impactive than people imagine. For a size 20 (non-homeword) planet, I bet the difference of average amount of a resource kind between favored and unfavored will most probably less than 10, and quite possibly less than 6.

A difference of 5 minerals is around a 50% increase in mineral output at the start of the game, which is perfectly plausible with 3 to 7 tiles. That means you're going to be outputting your first ships, stations, and buildings almost 50% faster than those who don't have a mineral planet start.

Combine this with slaves/robots on start, and you're looking at an even greater exponential boost at the start of the game. Remember, snowballing is exponential. Even small boosts in the early game can translate into a massive advantage by the mid-game. Even a 20% increase in minerals compared to neighbors can easily translate into a mid-game advantage to those that don't - just look at how powerful slavery and robots are.

We won't know without seeing the exact numbers and how they play out, but considering how much Paradox seems to underestimate the value of minerals and mineral efficiency, I don't think it's unreasonable to point out this as a potential issue.

 

[PirateJack]

@Mann42 Home planets have set resources. The only variable is the planet size.

 

[Mann42]

@Mann42 Home planets have set resources. The only variable is the planet size.

Ah, so starting planets are exempt to the new planet balancing changes? Was that reaffirmed by Wiz or the DD? I didn't see that written anywhere, and I didn't assume it would go unchanged, since they're actively talking about how planets will be different.

 

[PirateJack]

Ah, so starting planets are exempt to the new planet balancing changes? Was that reaffirmed by Wiz or the DD? I didn't see that written anywhere, and I didn't assume it would go unchanged, since they're actively talking about how planets will be different.

I don't see why it would change because it was introduced as a multiplayer conceit. Nothing has changed in that regard, so I don't see a reason to do so here.

 

[Mann42]

I don't see why it would change because it was introduced as a multiplayer conceit. Nothing has changed in that regard, so I don't see a reason to do so here.

While I'd prefer dev reassurance (which is why I posted my concerns originally), what you say makes sense. Hopefully you're right.

With that said, someone with mineral planet habitability who lucks out and starts near multiple mineral planets (allowing for high mineral output without happiness loss earlier) is going to still snowball harder than food planet habitability races that can only colonize mineral planets at a 20% happiness malus. So I still see some balance concerns with this.

I look forward to the inevitable MP balance posts after the patch goes live.

 

[Wizzington]

Ah, so starting planets are exempt to the new planet balancing changes? Was that reaffirmed by Wiz or the DD? I didn't see that written anywhere, and I didn't assume it would go unchanged, since they're actively talking about how planets will be different.

Not exempt, but starting planet resources are mostly prescripted so it's unlikely to have any significant effect.

 

[Mann42]

Not exempt, but starting planet resources are mostly prescripted so it's unlikely to have any significant effect.

Thanks for the reply! As long as you guys are aware of it and trying to keep balanced starts, I'm reassured.

 

[PirateJack]

While I'd prefer dev reassurance (which is why I posted my concerns originally), what you say makes sense. Hopefully you're right.

With that said, someone with mineral planet habitability who lucks out and starts near multiple mineral planets (allowing for high mineral output without happiness loss earlier) is going to still snowball harder than food planet habitability races that can only colonize mineral planets at a 20% happiness malus. So I still see some balance concerns with this.

I look forward to the inevitable MP balance posts after the patch goes live.

You do need to consider pop growth speed in there as well. Early game, the increased growth speed from that food (especially given you're only going to have 3-5 pops growing) may in fact give you a better starting economy as you can have more mines providing resources earlier.

Not that I've ran the numbers on that so it may not be entirely accurate.

 

[Coyote027]

I hope they add in the ability to turn a race into food animals for non-hive species. I'd actually have a use for all those pesky aliens crowding my worlds. That or in some way weaponize the alien pops.

I can think of two possibly helpful ways to go with this for pre-sentients.

One, domestication. Enabled by the Xeno Zoo tech, let's say. Domesticated pre-sentients would have their own "domesticated" rights setting, not be counted for research/unity costs, always be resettleable and unable to migrate regardless of your policies, and would count for food consumption. They'd be able to produce food, and perhaps minerals with a -50% penalty to efficiency, and of course you can eventually genemod them to be Delicious or Industrious as you see fit. Domesticated pre-sentients would still be upliftable later on, but it'd be more costly if you've let them multiply to large numbers over many worlds than if you'd uplifted them in the beginning instead.

Two, tie the Xenomorph Army tech to requiring non-uplifted pre-sentients in your empire, and you get a special project to convert pre-sentients into Xenomorphs. I'm not sure what should happen to the pops in that case, but it seems fair that (a) you could only recruit xenomorph armies from those pops and (b) the armies would take on the characteristics that their parent pops have (Strong, Weak, Resilient, etc). This would need some more brainstorming to mold into a workable idea.

 

[melaw]

You might want to increase the terraforming cost by at least a factor of 2, or even better, let the terraforming process use a monthly number of energy while it's at work.
Additionally, terraforming should either use 1 terraforming gas or liquid ressource ressouce while it's at work, dependant on if you make the planet wetter or drier.
(either it needs those ressources, or it uses them while using the speedup effect of them - just to avoid mass terraforming)

Currently, terraforming is just "oh I'm at energy cap, let's terraform 5 planets"... while actually it's a HUGE project even in space age.

 

[Seelensturm]

This is especially true for Gaia Transformation, which I find entirely pointless, besides the cool factor: there's pretty much no reason to turn a planet Gaia when you can just turn it into whatever planet your species prefers, at a fraction of the cost and (more importantly) time.

The only use for terraforming a Gaia planet is to make the Traditionalist faction happy if you have no natural Gaia planet yet.

 

[Mrakvampire]

Gaia planets should give an additional buff.

 

[Wizzington]

Gaia planets should give an additional buff.

There's more (and better) mixed deposits that can spawn there now, but I don't disagree regardless. Any ideas for what that buff might be?

 

[Red192]

Any ideas for what that buff might be?

Extra Population grow, migration

 

[melaw]

The only use for terraforming a Gaia planet is to make the Traditionalist faction happy if you have no natural Gaia planet yet.

Oh, if you play multi-species empires, you want to have large Gaia planets because all species can settle there.