Stellaris Dev Diary #330 - Community Fixes in Eridanus

[Fulgrymm]

they should replace ground combat with Sci-Fi WarThunder

So Star Conflict, then? That would be pretty rad.

 

[Idle America]

Turns out it is relevant, because the devs (mostly) choose to not listen to people like you whose suggestions would make the game worse.

Ground invasions are perfectly fine and there are many more pressing matters to improve.

I disagree about ground invasions being fine, but I agree that there are other issues that should take priority. I would personally like to see ground combat that isn't just waiting for Pogs to change color, though.

 

[Idle America]

Sure, but wouldn't you rather have civilian ships flying around in your systems and along your trade routes first? That's what I mean by priorities.

Ooh, I'd love that! I want the galaxy to feel more alive!

 

[Sigilstone17]

they should replace ground combat with Sci-Fi WarThunder

 

[King Harkinian]

What suggestion? "Improve the worst aspect of the game"? Clearly they have been ignoring it and I didn't realize the most complained about feature is now fine just because you want to have a go at someone else.

It is in no way the most complained about feature, or the worst aspect of the game. There's a tiny minority of whiners who sometimes yell really loudly about it, and every single time it gets a massive response of "ground invasions are fine and the devs should focus on something more important and/or interesting" from the actual majority. I mean, you can just look at all your dislikes.

The devs are fully aware of player sentiment and have responded multiple times confirming that ground invasions are not a priority because indeed, most people think they are fine and do their job, and the devs would rather remove them altogether than spend time and money redesigning them. Which would be a terrible outcome leading to even more doomstack steamrolling, since planetary invasions and being able to snipe army ships are one of the few things holding the doomstacks back.

 

[rylasasin]

Indeed. There was a whole video a while back by... ep3o? Montu? One of those guys? One of the stellaristubers, that went over whole propositions to change ground combat and the pros and cons.
Eventually they concluded that there really is no good way to change them, and I myself have tried to wrap my head around this somewhat, but each time I come up short save for one aspect: the visuals, so that you actually see enemy soldiers shooting at each other in a line instead of just watching circles change color and disappear.

Like PTO2 (that's a very old game)

Or Distant Worlds 2

Or if they want to look a little closer to home, borrowing the style from HOI4 but minus any of the interactivity

Wouldn't change anything gameplaywise, but it would make it more immersive at least. Personally I'm more partial to the top one even though it's an old snes game, because it's the easiest for modders to adapt to. You'd just need a couple of sprites: One of the army standing there, and one of the army with muzzle flashes.

 

[Starfury]

Anyone wishing for better ground invasion visuals should take a look at Millenia to see that good intentions don't always lead to good results.

 

[MadCow94]

Since we're including community mod-patch-fixes, now is the perfect time to...

...wait for it...

remove the checksum requirement from achievements. Keep ironpants, because cheesing is bad, but I'd punch babies to be able to use my personal tweaks mod and still get cheevos.

 

[MadCow94]

Anyone wishing for better ground invasion visuals should take a look at Millenia to see that good intentions don't always lead to good results.

I happen to love the combat in Millenia.

 

[Calvax]

I don’t need a ground invasion rework but I would like to see more improvements to the AI recruiting, pathing, and using armies. It’s better than it was but it’s still common to see AI fleets stuck bombarding planets while armies idle elsewhere.

 

[sreckom92]

This is how this Dev Diary appeared in my forum feed.
I got intrigued and opened it.
It turns out it says ''Community'', and not some other particular thing I was thinking about.

 

[Scyobi_Empire]

Since we're including community mod-patch-fixes, now is the perfect time to...

...wait for it...

remove the checksum requirement from achievements. Keep ironpants, because cheesing is bad, but I'd punch babies to be able to use my personal tweaks mod and still get cheevos.

there’s a guide on steam on how to hex edit the game to allow mods and achievements

 

[grommile]

If the people complaining is such a "tiny minority" and the feature is fine then why was orbital surrender added?

Because people said "hey, shouldn't there be a possibility that planets will capitulate to orbital bombardment without significant boots on the ground?"

(Which I have conceptual doubts about, but I have no problem with as a gameplay experience.)

there’s a guide on steam on how to hex edit the game to allow mods and achievements

Is there now?

I'm sure Paradox would be very interested to know about that. Posting such a guide on an official platform seems foolish.

 

[prismaticmarcus]

Since this is a Dev Diary and really shouldn't be locked, I'll just ask people to behave like adults.

 

[MadCow94]

there’s a guide on steam on how to hex edit the game to allow mods and achievements

...which is more reason to just do away with the requirement, so I don't have to hex edit anything.

 

[Starfury]

I happen to love the combat in Millenia.

The animations?
Good for you then, but you seem to be clearly outnumbered there.

For me, they look far cheaper than the icons in Stellaris, even though they obviously required far more work.

 

[TranscendentalDragon]

The animations?
Good for you then, but you seem to be clearly outnumbered there.

For me, they look far cheaper than the icons in Stellaris, even though they obviously required far more work.

and run worse

 

[Troyen]

Yeah, the Millenia battle-sequences are turn-based like AoW, except it's auto-play and you watch the AI make dumb decisions sometimes. Much prefer all of that just being abstracted into a single attack and retaliate animation like Civ does so I don't have to cancel out of a 30-second combat display every time.

Auto-resolving turn-based combat is really weird to watch. It's fine if you're participating, but looks dumb when it's AI vs AI.

I don't really see them giving us any control over Stellaris ground invasions (boy, that would drag the lategame out), so I don't really see the need to make it more complicated visually than a bunch of circular progress bars.

 

[mrt1212]

Some good addressments in this one, the multiple robot uprising for ftls thing was so annoying.

Hmm, I see. Can't say I quite agree though.

I know Rogue Servitors are supposed to be based on Wall-E, but personally I've always found them to be closer to The Culture. I'm sure I'm not the only one who made that connection either (I saw a rogue serivtor playthough back in the day that did.) Maybe that's just me though...
Or... maybe it's an opportunity for a Rogue Servitor revamp that lets you choose whether you play them much closer to the former or the latter, with the bonuses and consequences of both playstyles.


Well that explains why the Slavers like the RS (even if it is kind of a stretch), but it doesn't explain the other way around. Slavers should be everything the Rogue Servitors are trying to prevent.

Actually come to think of it, Egalitarians and Xenophiles should hate slavers a lot more than they currently do. As in, almost making it impossible for them to get along in any capacity. In fact, I think the only people who should even tolerate slavers... are other slavers.

Finally, I think that Hegemonic Imperialists should also hate each other rather than like each other, for the simple reason that 'you're competition'.


Right now, the only thing if anything I'd improve with ground invasions... is the visuals. Instead of just icons going from green to red, actually have some little sprites representing soldiers/tanks/mechs/planes, etc shooting at each other. Wouldn't change anything gameplaywise but does increase immersion.

My bread n butter spec is a technical xenophile slaver megacorp, a press gang as it were, by virtue of Nihilistic Acquisition. Its a minor facet of my notion of being a Pirate Haven but...

Every time I think about how my empire should be dispositionally towards slavers, RS, I hate them competitionally at most and only sometimes? The exterminators/genociders/assimilators/machine empires are the real bad news, not ones that keep pops in the game and available. The occassional refugee is the only silver lining to those punks.

And this is a rare confluence of ethics-meet-strategy for me in game, cause of business being business and slave market purchases being a lesser liberation of sorts, which a slaver empire populates with their own basis.

Idk, just my 2 cents on dispositions cause I do take Xenophile cause I genuinely think my empire realizes any body that fits the role is pretty groovy, so welcome aboard maties.

 

[Keith_C]

Finally, I think that Hegemonic Imperialists should also hate each other rather than like each other, for the simple reason that 'you're competition'.

I'm fine with Imperialists liking each other when there's no points of friction; they have a cultural similarity that would bring them together, and would see each other as natural allies against the forces trying to stop the natural order of expansion and conquest.

Until, of course, the next target for conquest is each other.