it's really annoying that so many mandatory ascension perks are for things which i paid for. we should have more slots
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Some of them also probably shouldn't be perks at all.
Much like Federations should never have been a Tradition once more than 7 trees were added, as it was from the beginning supposed to be something everyone got - making it a tradition was fine only when you chose when to get it, not IF to get it.
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My "short list" of stuff that shouldn't be ascension perks at all.
This is also the list of perks I will NEVER pick up even at x25 GA (ALL) difficulty, because they're utterly boring and absolutely not needed.
Are ANY of these perks on anybodys "mandatory" list or can we all agree to just cut them completely?
Executive Vigor
Interstellar Dominion
Technological Ascendancy
Imperial Prerogative
One Vision
Eternal Vigilance
Lord of War
Grasp the Void
Galactic Force Projection
Master Builders
Defender of the Galaxy
Galactic Contender
This is also the list of perks I will NEVER pick up even at x25 GA (ALL) difficulty, because they're utterly boring and absolutely not needed.
Are ANY of these perks on anybodys "mandatory" list or can we all agree to just cut them completely?
Executive Vigor
Interstellar Dominion
Technological Ascendancy
Imperial Prerogative
One Vision
Eternal Vigilance
Lord of War
Grasp the Void
Galactic Force Projection
Master Builders
Defender of the Galaxy
Galactic Contender
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I don't disagree with this viewpoint. But I have another solution, just add more of them. A lot of them. Give us so many choices that it no longer matters and be clear that there are going to be ones that are useless and fun and everything in between the choice is yours. Having mandatory ones is always going to happen, someone is going to do the math and there is always going to be a bigger fish. How about adding ones that change the way you do things so drastically that the cool factor outweighs the numerical advantage. (Something like detox tried to be with its thematic relevancy to the Toxoids pack, but not laughable)
For examples, off the top of my head:
1) Synthesis - Robots now have biological pop growth and pops have assembly.
2) Age of the Servitor - The entirety of your worker and civilian jobs become automated and your people are given a very high consumer cost living standard that boosts complex resource production
3) Pursuit of Perfection (restricted to sovereign guardianship/inward perfectionists/natural design) - you gain access to a modular tradition tree that serves as a replacement for ascension allowing you to choose from a limited selection of traditions from all the ascension trees
4) Keeper of the Veil - Your people learn of the horrors beyond the shroud, and after completing your psionic tradition tree you sacrifice the bonuses to have the tree replaced entirely with a new tradition tree that gives you bonuses against psionic/become the crises/cosmogensis empires.
Don't worry about reworking them all from the ground up and giving up precious dev time to balancing them just drown us in a sea of awesome and cool and try to reign it in with balancing the numbers not the perks themselves and what they can accomplish. Clearly this is the time for stellaris to combine the lessons of the past with the new design visions of the future and nothing has ever so solely defined Stellaris gameplay more than Ascension pathways and perks.
For examples, off the top of my head:
1) Synthesis - Robots now have biological pop growth and pops have assembly.
2) Age of the Servitor - The entirety of your worker and civilian jobs become automated and your people are given a very high consumer cost living standard that boosts complex resource production
3) Pursuit of Perfection (restricted to sovereign guardianship/inward perfectionists/natural design) - you gain access to a modular tradition tree that serves as a replacement for ascension allowing you to choose from a limited selection of traditions from all the ascension trees
4) Keeper of the Veil - Your people learn of the horrors beyond the shroud, and after completing your psionic tradition tree you sacrifice the bonuses to have the tree replaced entirely with a new tradition tree that gives you bonuses against psionic/become the crises/cosmogensis empires.
Don't worry about reworking them all from the ground up and giving up precious dev time to balancing them just drown us in a sea of awesome and cool and try to reign it in with balancing the numbers not the perks themselves and what they can accomplish. Clearly this is the time for stellaris to combine the lessons of the past with the new design visions of the future and nothing has ever so solely defined Stellaris gameplay more than Ascension pathways and perks.
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Eternal Vigilance is being reworked to be a much better perk, and isn't terrible now.
Galactic Force Projection is actually decent in a leader build.
The rest, yeah, they're all trash, boring, or boring trash.
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Yeah I feel like an additional tradition/AP slot or 2 would be great without eliminating the inherent trade-offs of the tradition and AP system
I take Imperial Prerogative all the time for the Empire Size reduction. For Wide Empires and any Empire looking to minimize Empire Sprawl, it's a must-have pick(extra Officials are gravy). One Vision is also one I often take for the extra Unity and Amenities reduction. Not everyone rolls Spiritualist that does both(10-20% extra Unity, Culture Workers reduce Amenity usage) or Genetic Ascension(-10%/-5% on Erudite Governors) so getting it via Ascension Perk is a nice bonus. Galactic Force Projection is also underrated for the +50 Command Limit. Since we have a softcap on Commanders, packing as many ships into a Fleet as possible maximizes the few Commanders under your command. Defender of the Galaxy and Galactic Contender are niche use cases with Defender being quite useful on x25 Crisis runs and Galactic can be useful if you intend to poke Fallen Empires relatively early.
Technological Ascendancy isn't that bad either10% Research Speed without increased upkeep costs on Researchers is nothing to scoff at). Master Builders speeds up Megastructure build speed(useful if you want to rush things, although I feel it needs something more... what that may be I don't know) and Grasp the Void may see more use with the new Citadel origin(more Starbases = more Turtling). Outside of that niche case though I agree it's kind of meh and Executive Vigor needs a major overhaul given what Galactic Paragons and Leader rework did to it. Lord of War is another niche AP. If you don't use Mercs, don't bother with it.
What I am surprised is why you don't have Xeno-Compatibility on your list. Like we really need half-breeds cluttering our Species list and no matter what they do, it slows/kills CPU's in the mid to late game. Archaeo-Engineers needs its Minor Artifact cost reduction bumped from 10% to 20% since it's not the damage they deal but the cost that holds people back from using Ancient weapons and the only way to get more cost reduction is via Scientists with Archaeostudies Trait.
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One Vision is a solid tempo pick for early conquest.
- Reduced Amenities demand is really helpful before the GArchive comes online.
- Extra Unity is very useful early.
- Governing Ethics Attraction is great for post-conquest integration, especially early when I don't have access to even simple tools like Deep Space Black Sites.
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Cheaper territory acquisition? This is routinely my first AP.
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Your short list includes several highly popular ascension perks.
The following perks from your list are very popular, either because they are decent generic boosts that you can't help benefit from, which is particularly useful for less experienced players, or because they are very strong for particular builds:
- Imperial Prerogative, which is the strongest tech perk by a large margin for a wide empire (5 empire size saved per unascended planet!) and arguably the strongest economic perk as well for wide by providing extra official slots
- Interstellar Dominion for rapid expansion
- One Vision is a popular general purpose perk for its unity/amenities bonus, and the governing ethics attraction comes in handy when civilizing conquered and integrated aliens
- Galactic Force Projection for the +2 influence/mth during the late early game and the midgame AND +50 fleet command; it is a strong perk both for the economy and for the military. You can only get it as the third perk or later, but that's reasonable given how powerful it is. The influence gain is best for unity rush builds since you can get it while sources of additional influence are few and far between and the demand for influence high, but few builds won't find it useful. The fleet command is of high value to everybody
- Grasp the Void for certain Unyielding starbase economy rush builds (rather niche, admittedly, but all extra income helps when you do economic rush builds)
- Master Builders for those who play on running a victory lap mass producing Megastructures after they've by any rational measure already "won" the game
- Technological Ascendancy for newbies, who need something that might not be the most powerful but is guaranteed to help them regardless of what they do, as well as for players doing Disruptor rush, and also (and I suspect this is the largest group), for players who either overestimate the importance of +10% research speed to their research rate long term, or understand very well that +10% from the perk isn't that much when modifiers start stacking up, but simply don't have anything they would rather choose for the first two perk picks (as you can probably guess I don't belong to any of these groups*, but that doesn't change the fact that many people choose it)
* My reasoning is fairly simple. You might well agree with me on the TA issue since you list it in the first place.
Even when I play as an overlord, I tend to play somewhat wide, and when I don't I tend to play extremely wide. Which means Imperial Prerogative is always a much, much, better tech ascendancy perk than Technological Ascendancy is.
I also consider Transcendent Learning to be a much better perk, both for general purposes and for tech long-term.
So if I'm looking for a tech perk before my ascension path, it is never going to be the inferior Technological Ascendancy perk, and after getting my ascension path I am usually looking for something with more oomph than a few percentage extra research speed.
But not all players think like me, and many players like Technological Ascendancy for perfectly valid reasons of their own, and that's just how it is.
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While Master Builders permits you to build multiple Megastructures at the same time(up to three at a time with Ambition and no other bonuses like Arc Welders or Research Cooperative President Perk) and at a much greater speed, I've often felt it could use something more to make it a much more rewarding pick. A couple ideas include having it buff Planetary build speed like Architectural Rennaissance Ambition and perhaps permitting you to build one more Megastructure of that type(like the Contingency Relic). Normally you're capped to one Megastructure but with Master Builders, you could build up to two Dyson Spheres, Matter Decompressors, Science Nexuses, SCC's, etc. The +1 Megastructure cap alone would make Master Builders one of the strongest Perks you can take since that can translate into additional Naval Capacity, Sublight Speed, Starbase Capacity and Defense Platform cap from just the extra SCC and this doesn't count any Ruined SCC's you restore or ones you happen to conquer. Then if you happen to roll Contingency and grab its relic... well now you can have up to three but at that point you'll likely have won the game if you survive.
Alternatively, you could have Master Builders buff the effects of Megastructures by 50%. Having 6k Energy Credit Dyson Sphere would be worth the Ascension Perk and honestly if it did this, I'd take it every time. Just the thought of a Sentry Array giving me +60 Intel is more than worth it. Ditto the Diplomatic Weight on Interstellar Assembly and the higher Sublight Speed on SCC too since the +50% applies to anything you happen to find or capture. Whether it should also affect Habitats, I'm on the fence. Ditto Orbital Rings + Ring Worlds. The thought of having 12-15 Districts on Ring Worlds... *drools*.
Alternatively, you could have Master Builders buff the effects of Megastructures by 50%. Having 6k Energy Credit Dyson Sphere would be worth the Ascension Perk and honestly if it did this, I'd take it every time. Just the thought of a Sentry Array giving me +60 Intel is more than worth it. Ditto the Diplomatic Weight on Interstellar Assembly and the higher Sublight Speed on SCC too since the +50% applies to anything you happen to find or capture. Whether it should also affect Habitats, I'm on the fence. Ditto Orbital Rings + Ring Worlds. The thought of having 12-15 Districts on Ring Worlds... *drools*.
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As for my personal list of APs I would like to see revised at some point:
Eternal Vigilance
---> I love, love what they are doing with it. I hope other APs would get the same treatment
Executive Vigor
---> Useless outside extremely niche edict fund early game builds. Also, pick it first, or pick it never
Imperial Prerogative, Technological Ascendancy & Interestellar Dominion
---> Don't get me wrong, those are all absolutely fine, but they are vanilla to the bone
Detox & Hydrocentric
---> Firm candidates to merge with World Shapers
World Shapers
---> We need better Gaia worlds, or at the very least, a suitable niche for them
Grasp the Void
---> Boring, and easily surpassed by some unyielding traditions
Enigmatic engineering
---> Not too much use since I don't have the cloaking DLC. Espionage being mostly harmless does not help it, either.
Galactic Wonders & Master builders
---> A "win more" AP if I ever saw one. I still pick at least Galactic Wonders in the end game because I love megastructures anyways, but I would like it if you could angle for those instead. Perhaps changing Galactic wonders so it grants mega-engineering and megastructure tech options in addition to unlock them would do the trick (or might turn them into disproportionate "must picks", perhaps)
Defender of the Galaxy
---> I guess it is a must-have for those who plan to fight the crises. I personally restart the game long before that happens. It would be cool if, at some poin,t it were reworked as an "anti-crisis path", complete with its own unique defense-focused toys and options for unifying the galaxy against the common threat
Galactic Contender
---> Fallen Empires rarely require that level of specialization
All the "you need this AP in order to make this trait or origin work"
---> Please don't do that
Eternal Vigilance
---> I love, love what they are doing with it. I hope other APs would get the same treatment
Executive Vigor
---> Useless outside extremely niche edict fund early game builds. Also, pick it first, or pick it never
Imperial Prerogative, Technological Ascendancy & Interestellar Dominion
---> Don't get me wrong, those are all absolutely fine, but they are vanilla to the bone
Detox & Hydrocentric
---> Firm candidates to merge with World Shapers
World Shapers
---> We need better Gaia worlds, or at the very least, a suitable niche for them
Grasp the Void
---> Boring, and easily surpassed by some unyielding traditions
Enigmatic engineering
---> Not too much use since I don't have the cloaking DLC. Espionage being mostly harmless does not help it, either.
Galactic Wonders & Master builders
---> A "win more" AP if I ever saw one. I still pick at least Galactic Wonders in the end game because I love megastructures anyways, but I would like it if you could angle for those instead. Perhaps changing Galactic wonders so it grants mega-engineering and megastructure tech options in addition to unlock them would do the trick (or might turn them into disproportionate "must picks", perhaps)
Defender of the Galaxy
---> I guess it is a must-have for those who plan to fight the crises. I personally restart the game long before that happens. It would be cool if, at some poin,t it were reworked as an "anti-crisis path", complete with its own unique defense-focused toys and options for unifying the galaxy against the common threat
Galactic Contender
---> Fallen Empires rarely require that level of specialization
All the "you need this AP in order to make this trait or origin work"
---> Please don't do that
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Figure I'd add one more potential "buff" for Imperial Prerogative and that is that in addition to reducing Empire Size from Colonies by 50%, it should reduce Empire Size from Systems by 25% as well. The reason for this is that there's only two sources of Empire Size reduction for Systems: Expansion Tradition and Private Prospector's Civic for MegaCorps. Since IP is meant for Wide Empires, I don't really see the harm in doing this and the Ascension Perk would effectively mirror Private Prospector's for non-MegaCorps and double up on Private Prospector's for those looking to shift to it after taking IP. Net result after taking Expansion + IP is -50% Systems(75% with Private Prospectors) and -75% Colonies.
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Absolute agreement.
Side use: Be a fanatic xenophobe, purge your enemies, have the rest of the galaxy still love you. Trust Uncle MadCow.
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Master Builders is a trap, I took it not knowing what "megastructure cap" meant and thought I would get an extra Dyson Swarm. Once you max out your megastructures the perk becomes worthless.
I definitely prefer an RP playthrough and there's not enough RP-flavored perks, and there's too many "mandatory" ones. I'd like Megastructures to have its own entire tree though.
Also for those asking, yes, it's entirely possible to skip ascension perks. I regularly do because I just don't like them very much because of their "all or nothing" implementation.
I definitely prefer an RP playthrough and there's not enough RP-flavored perks, and there's too many "mandatory" ones. I'd like Megastructures to have its own entire tree though.
Also for those asking, yes, it's entirely possible to skip ascension perks. I regularly do because I just don't like them very much because of their "all or nothing" implementation.
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Your short list includes several highly popular ascension perks.
Snip...
Well I DID say that my take would be unpopular.
While i do agree that some of these perks can give you things when you pick them that are hard to get that early, or that they can snowball you, I don't think that is interesting design space for ascension perks at all.
Ascension perks should.. well.. Ascend your empire in some way.
One vision is my go to example of doing it wrong but getting a strong mechanical effect.
While it is undeniably a strong pick it does NOTHING that cannot be achieved by an empire by other means which makes it not about ascension, but merely an efficiency thing, which I personally think should come from a combination of techs, traditions and policies.
Your point about TA hits the nail square on the head from my perspective.
If a perk is being picked "because there's nothing better to pick" it shouldn't exist. Neither should the other "nothing" perks.
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Now that you mention it, Master Builders allowing you to build a second megastructure of each type in addition to its other effects would be quite awesome (and bananas). I mean, by the time you can pick it up, it is not as if such a thing would throw off the game's balance.
then unless you're playing with super crises (high multiplier, multiple crises), you're just doing victory laps
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Ah, in the variety vs enhancer ascendancy perk debate you are firmly in the variety camp. All is clear.
I'm afraid you are out of luck except for mods that share your design vision, as the developers seem pretty clearly to be on team "both variety AND enhancers" to please a player base that is also divided on the issue. From an economic perspective, it is hard to fault them.
But, as you might expect, not from mine.
Not everybody picks perks for the same reasons you do, and eliminating perks that don't fit your vision of being worthy picks is a disservice to the players who, for perfectly valid reasons of their own, pick those perks. Even if their method of picking is "least bad" or "most mechanically powerful of the available".
What is better is highly subjective. A player picking a perk solely because they think there is nothing better to pick says nothing about the value of the perk, its alternatives, or whether the player thought it an interesting choice. It tells us only this: That that player, in those circumstances, based on his own priorities, thought it was the best of the lot.
Other players in the same circumstances might well make a different choice because they evaluate things differently.
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