I Hate Leader RNG and Want It Gone

[RingworldUtopia]

would it even break anything to have a skill tree and just choose what you want to upgrade instead of having it be random? or else have what someone does increase the weight for certain traits massively? like my governor on a mining only shattered ring segment gets foundry focus and mining focus because of how much minerals and alloys on that planet?

 

[GhostDanny]

Early on they found the Chronofuge anomaly, making them immortal

I would not use the Orb on an explorer class, that is FAR better on my self made starting leader.
Who will also research any and all anomalies that grants extra traits.

 

[Nakkivene]

Explorers are the most useless veteran class, and I've railed about it when they first announced it.

I don't know, maybe I've been playing wrong for 3 years, but I always set my 3 to 4 scientists to Auto-Survey, when what I should be doing is auto-explore and have my hotkeyed ship doing the surveying. But Exploration as a veteran class always felt bad because by the time you unlock it...YOU DON"T NEED IT! You've met your neighbors, established your borders, and until you unlock cloaking you can't get past hostiles or closed borders or marauders, so...

And then, eventually, you can get a destiny trait that gives all your scientists a bit of xp upon researching an anomaly or whatever it does.

It's kinda weird anyway how quickly a status is reached where there's nothing more to know about space.

 

[Sweeze]

Yeah leader RNG is stupid. I use mods that allows for more hireable leaders and gives like +5 trait options.

The traits are simply so imbalanced that not getting something you want and needing to scrap a leader and spend 20 years training up a new one is some of the most awful gameplay imaginable. No, I'm not going to suffer dealing with my ships taking 5 years to cross me empire because I didn't get Skirmisher traits on my admirals. That's bad game design.

IMO its only the commander traits that are a big problem though. The difference between stacking +90% sublight speed and not is just ridiculous. Well, there's also Wilderness who demands -building cost stacking. That's 100% essential and if you don't get it on your officials you might as well restart the game.

Maybe the council traits that affect your whole empire shouldn't stack with each other? That makes sense and would make the RNG a lot less awful since if you have multiple leaders its probable someone will roll what you want and then you're fine. Its kind of ridiculous that the... willpower(?) of multiple admirals in command makes your ships go faster than anything else in the universe and hardens your shields and armor to be impenetrable.

Why is Prospector, possibly the best trait in the game, competing on the same roll with Observer and Scout, both of which almost do the exact same thing, and both of which are useless anyway?

Uhh... what? I don't think its that relevant. Upgrading a +3 mineral deposit to +5 is not gonna change much unless its incredibly early in the game, which it isn't because that's like a level 4 trait at the earliest? How often do you get prospector before 90% of the galaxy is surveyed? All of my scientists gets traits that help science production when assigned as governors because past the first 3 levels there's nothing left to explore

I do wish that traits were beneficial both on and off the council. Each trait could have two effects: one that works on the council and one that works when governing a planet or leading a fleet or science ship.

For instance, Reformer (+5% monthly unity on council) could be combined with Unifier (+5% unity from jobs per level). If this was done to all traits then future council members could be trained through their first few levels by governing planets without being completely terrible and biasing their trait pulls to governor traits.

When the devs revisit their plan to move traits to every other level this could really help fix the odds of rolling the traits you want.

Or just make the traits like how sectors work, gives 50% of the benefit to everyone of everything if on the council. And again make it non-stacking (which it already is for sectors I think?)

 

[RingworldUtopia]

Uhh... what? I don't think its that relevant. Upgrading a +3 mineral deposit to +5 is not gonna change much unless its incredibly early in the game, which it isn't because that's like a level 4 trait at the earliest? How often do you get prospector before 90% of the galaxy is surveyed?

this ignores dyson swarms. having a prospector means you have lots of juicy dyson swarms later. possibly with rare resources.

 

[Sweeze]

this ignores dyson swarms. having a prospector means you have lots of juicy dyson swarms later. possibly with rare resources.

Cool but there's no way for me to GET a prospector before me and the rest of the AIs have already explored everything.

At least I play with the maximum number of AIs, and I assume most other people do as well.

 

[RingworldUtopia]

Cool but there's no way for me to GET a prospector before me and the rest of the AIs have already explored everything.

At least I play with the maximum number of AIs, and I assume most other people do as well.

someone in here was saying they cheese this by exploring borders and leaving swiss cheese holes to explore later, but yeah

 

[Red Death]

I've been playing 1.9 recently, and yes, it definitely has its problems. But I somehow find the old leader system less annoying.

Yes, the traits are even more random, you get no choice other than the initial hiring.

But: Admirals only get fleet commanding traits, Generals only get army commanding traits and Governors only get traits applying to governing planets! Leaders even have a separate set of traits that apply if they become rulers. The only exception are scientists that get a mix of surveying and research position traits, with a few traits applying to both positions.

I think both the leader category mergers and making all of them planet governors were mistakes. Or at least, in combination with traits that only apply to one of several positions a leader can hold.

So, traits need to apply to all leader positions, or leader categories need to be split up again.

 

[Thiend]

I wouldn't quite go this far, but it does need refinement and there are specific areas where it can be thematically improved by improving the gameplay.

I would suggest autocratic governments should get less leader capacity but more trait picks on level up, culminating in the Imperial ruler and heir just picking among all traits, including starting trait and ruler class for heirs.

This is already present as a completely unnecessary reduction for authoritarian and increase for egalitarian, despite egalitarian having already been a largely stronger ethic mechanically.

It makes some thematic sense that autocratic governments have fewer total leaders, but they should also have more control over the development of those leaders both for the same thematic reasons and to not be arbitrarily at a disadvantage.



Separate from all of that, the 4.0 attempted rework ended up pretty good because it crunched at least some tier 1 traits into starting at the tier 2 version. I would suggest that a lot more could use that treatment, a lot of them even after that should be merged, and particularly council and non-council roles should be merged so that a dying councilor can be replaced by a senior leader instead of a fresh recruit. I would also like a "reprimand leader" agenda to remove negative traits.

So that surveying ceases to be something you should delay, we also need to be able to re-survey (or, per a past suggestion of mine, choose specialization of leaders immediately, which would make it possible to front-load survey specialists by having that specialization dramatically reduce xp required to level up).

There's a huge amount of QoL needed.

 

[CocoCincinnati]

I think a lot could be helped by just making traits apply to multiple jobs. We know it's possible because the ascension traits do it as well as things like the chosen one. Also, some traits like cautious apply to both fleet and army command. I will plead ignorant on the feasibility of such a change, but it sounds like it could be on the simpler side, at least compared to some of the other suggestions I've seen. I have said this before but why can't something like genius make governors or admirals better at their job?

Having traits apply to multiple jobs will also help the AI who I am convinced do not know how to properly assign leaders to planets and get suboptimal results.

One of my biggest issues with leaders is the uneven need for the specializations. If you are playing a diplomatic/xenophile empire you will need two delegates at the very least and would also like to have both an ambassador and advisor. That doesn't leave a lot of leader cap room for industrialists. On the flip side, if you are playing isolationists/xenophobe, you can turn every official into an industrialist.

When it comes to scientists, it's already been said but the need for scholars and explorers goes away fairly early in the game and then you want analysts to maximize science output on planets. For commanders, I usually roleplay at least one general, but you really don't need it. Hopefully some day in the future, generals will actually matter for ground combat.

 

[Red Death]

So that surveying ceases to be something you should delay, we also need to be able to re-survey (or, per a past suggestion of mine, choose specialization of leaders immediately, which would make it possible to front-load survey specialists by having that specialization dramatically reduce xp required to level up).

I'm a big supporter of re-surveying, but there is another, perhaps simpler way of fixing this incentive: remove the increased anomaly chance modifiers. Or relegate them to just things that are active day one, such as civics.

 

[BrokenSky]

1) Literally delete like half of the traits outright. Most are trash. Combine them in to fewer, more useful ones. NOBODY in the entire history of this entire game has ever said "hell yeah I got the trait that makes me clear blockers 10% faster!!! YES!" Ans yes, I love rolling this dumb terraforming trait when it's like 2208. Even if you wanted to keep both of those worthless traits why are they not combined?

Just as a point of reference, I do actually sometimes get use out of this trait - it's good for Remnants Origin and also for Planetscapers - I will sometimes pick up a leader if I see one with this trait in the pool for dedicated planet-cleaning duty.

That said, I never pick it on level up for a leader I actually care about though, which is obviously the spirit of your main point - just that I want to point out that I do like that this trait exists in some capacity under some circumstances, so I'd rather it be reworked than deleted.

 

[Thiend]

I'm a big supporter of re-surveying, but there is another, perhaps simpler way of fixing this incentive: remove the increased anomaly chance modifiers. Or relegate them to just things that are active day one, such as civics.

Even that wouldn't help, because the difference between surveying with and without Prospector 3 is enormous.

They'd need to remove ALL impact on surveys except for speed to remove the incentive entirely, or allow re-survey to make the incentive to survey later not require that you NOT survey early.

 

[Minervo]

I will go a little far than you. RNG is a bad influence in the mechanics that the player uses to build their empire (specially, in sterallis case, i'm thinking about the shroud and the leader traits mechanics). RNG in a strategy empire building game should only be used in the problems you face in a playthrough ( in a playtrough you face problem A, in another, problem B)

 

[Thiend]

I will go a little far than you. RNG is a bad influence in the mechanics that the player uses to build their empire (specially, in sterallis case, i'm thinking about the shroud and the leader traits mechanics). RNG in a strategy empire building game should only be used in the problems you face in a playthrough ( in a playtrough you face problem A, in another, problem B)

I would broadly agree. RNG deciding what problems you need to solve is very interesting and increases replayability, RNG in how you solve those problems... isn't. It takes it the extra step to make how you actually play the game less relevant.

It all depends on degree, of course, but a great deal of stuff with Psionic, leaders, and to an extent stuff like ruined megastructures is now well past the degree where that starts being detrimental. Some is good, but the difference between "I delved the shroud and got the components in 5 total attempts" and "I never got them in 100 years before the game ended" is just too large, to say nothing of for instance Ascension Theory showing up at all.

 

[Trigaea]

I agree with like half of what you said.

Specifically:

1. You shouldn't be able to roll traits for mechanics you haven't unlocked, specifically terraforming.
2. There are too many filler traits that don't do anything outside of extremely niche meme builds.
3. There's no intuitive and/or non-micro way to train leaders, which is lame.
4. It's jarring that space democracies of hundreds of billions have the same 5 people running for office.

That being said:

I literally have an empire of billions upon billions of people and you think I'm gonna buy that when it comes to finding politicians, out of BILLIONS OF PEOPLE, that it should feel like trying to organize a society out of the survivors of a plane crash?

We have billions of people and many of our leaders are clearly not the best and brightest among us.

It makes sense that even space empires haven't figured out how to weed out the nepotism babies, bad faith actors, people who've continually failed upward, and others who are not the best fit for the positions they hold.

Maybe there should be a mechanic for creating a leader of your exact specifications, but that should be the exception rather than the rule. After all, if every leader is perfect and tailored precisely to the positions they hold, what's the point of having leaders at all? You might as well have sliders that buff whatever specific mechanic you invest money into.

 

[Kava]

Personally, I was not a fan of the leader consolidation update. It moved all the slave and basic resource output from Officials to Commanders, but I want Commanders to lead my fleets, not govern my sectors. It also deleted Generals and moved their traits to Commanders.
I have never wanted to use a Commander or Scientist to govern. Officials have nothing to do but govern, while Commanders have fleets to command and Scientists have surveys, anomalies, digs, rifts, and more to keep them busy.

 

[Adaman5280]

Personally, I was not a fan of the leader consolidation update. It moved all the slave and basic resource output from Officials to Commanders, but I want Commanders to lead my fleets, not govern my sectors. It also deleted Generals and moved their traits to Commanders.
I have never wanted to use a Commander or Scientist to govern. Officials have nothing to do but govern, while Commanders have fleets to command and Scientists have surveys, anomalies, digs, rifts, and more to keep them busy.

Commanders i get since i would never use one as a governor either. Scientist governors on the other hand, I've seen them catching a lot of hate in here and i cant understand why, I always use scientist governors. After all what are they even gonna be doing when all the anomalies, rifts, etc are exhausted? and even when they're not you really only need like 2-3 scientists to focus those things and the rest can be governors. I see the Analyst branch as a W. Personally for me the Explorer branch is the most useless only because it takes a while to level and the only trait you're really going for is prospector, which you probably wont get thanks to rng lol. Archeologist is okay and like i said i run like 2-3 of those and that's usually more than enough.

I think commanders really ought to just go back to being military only and they should transfer/merge their governor traits back into the official role.

 

[DarkHelmet110985]

Leader Trait RNG is like Tech RNG. If you don't like it, expand the number of options via Leader Trait options. Meritocracy Civic + Aptitude Tradition(which people crap on for good reason) are ways to generate additional Trait options. Rushing Genetic Ascension would do a lot for you as well since Erudite comes with +1 Leader Trait picks(and +1 Research Alternatives). If you go hard into Purity, then you can generate additional starting Traits(which stacks with Aptitude).

With respect to Aptitude, I have three upgrades for it that would instantly catapult it to among the Traditions I would always use. The finisher for Aptitude would increase the Level Cap for Leaders from 10 to 11(or ideally 12). The bonus level cap results in more Veteran Trait picks, additional perks from their respective class(Fire Rate for Fleet Admirals) and coincidentally stronger Councilor perks. Second change would lower XP required by 10-20%, enabling Leaders to level up much faster. Final upgrade is with regard to Negative Traits. Aptitude and Harmony are the only Traditions with Maximum Negative Leader Trait perks but even with that and Erudite(which also yields a -1), you're still subject to getting Negative Traits at random without additional Negative Trait perks via Talented, Elevated Synapses or having two Flexible Traditions from Purity Tree(which grants another -1). To safeguard your Leaders from being ruined by RNG, Aptitude's agenda would yield 5% XP gain(ramp up) and 20% XP at launch while removing all Negative Traits at the cost of 500 XP each. You do those changes and Aptitude would be S-Tier.

 

[Sweeze]

Leader Trait RNG is like Tech RNG. If you don't like it, expand the number of options via Leader Trait options. Meritocracy Civic + Aptitude Tradition(which people crap on for good reason) are ways to generate additional Trait options. Rushing Genetic Ascension would do a lot for you as well since Erudite comes with +1 Leader Trait picks(and +1 Research Alternatives). If you go hard into Purity, then you can generate additional starting Traits(which stacks with Aptitude).

That's a bad way to excuse an awful system.

If you miss a tech, you'll still get it eventually. In fact most builds will hit a point where they research super quickly and clean up dozens of techs per year. With leader traits you never get back a bad level unless you suck it up and scrap someone who has spend 30 years leveling.