Stellaris Dev Diary #109 - 2.0 Post-Release Support (part 2)

[macd21]

Erm. Why? It's just as easy to get as minerals. Harder, actually, as it doesn't come from space resources.

The prices shouldn't be set based on how much you personally value the resource, but based on how easy it is to produce. Food buildings are on par with energy and mineral buildings, so having the same exchange rate as them makes sense. A 4:1 ratio would be laughable - the mechanic might as well not exist then.

No, because price isn’t just about supply, it’s also about demand. Food isn’t as important as minerals. I’d happily trade a bit of pop growth for the resources to build a new fleet, upgrade a station or build more labs. A 4:1 ratio would be generous.

 

[macd21]

hm, that is a valid thing. would preparing them and being automatically transfered passively be okay? so you dont have to bring them, just build them?
however sometimes i dont understand why we should make it easy to capture planets, its already pretty dumbed down.
even if i agree that right clicking is also quite annoying. i like the solution in blizzard games where you can rightclick the action button to get an autocast, and autocasting attack could lead an orbiting army to invade at 50% garrison strength vs own power or sth. (although the attack button is really handy)

what about transforming some of the invading forces to occupying forces automatically, so at least the attacker has to bring enough armies (starting with the weakest)?
for me it simply does not make sense that taking planets is done with one blob of armies, that almost suffers no casualties, and the only minigame about them is to kill the transport ships, or wait for bombardment to equal some numbers out.

waht do you mean with manpower

Frankly, the system the devs are proposing seems fine. Everything you’re suggesting just adds annoying, pointless micro. You can just assume the troops are drafted or something, or are auxiliary reserves that are ‘built’ at the same time as your assault armies and are included in the cost.

 

[g4borg]

Everything you’re suggesting just adds annoying, pointless micro.

how does automatically transforming troops add pointless micro?
all you have to do is click create armies a few times more
it adds costs per planet, and requires you to prepare better, instead of just "ah well, lets just take another planet"

also my suggestion about auto-invade is for sure not about more micro.

and are included in the cost.

but they are not, there are no included costs at all, since you will even with the current system not lose any army value per planet, except if you have time pressure and invade early. if you play it safe, its bomb, take, bomb, take.
of course such an easy task gets tedious if it needs micro.
but thats the problem, pointless micro is pointless because its pointless.

i dont want to add pointless micro, which is why i ask how it could be done more challenging, without adding chores. magicly appearing defense troops just helps the offensive force yet again and adds a pointless detail, now you dont even have to care about that planet you just won.

that being said, its like in risk, you capture, leave the weakest army behind, it gets transformed into 1-3 defense armies after a while. would be perfectly non-micro intensive, but way more fair.

 

[Etrutian]

Ok...I get the AI having food problems. AI in such games hasn't notably improved in terms of overall capability, they can just handle more (still broken) mechanics as poorly as they handled everything else over the years of 4x games. All of the AIs in such games always suck...that's just apparently some stupid rule that exists for no good reason. It's fine, I guess.

But PLAYERS are having the food issue? HOW? How can a player possibly run low on food? The worst a player could do, is just not have a very good overall resource income, and maybe expand too far too fast. But that's not a game problem, that's a player problem. How can anyone ever run low on anything? The game practically throws so much stuff at you that it's stupid and entirely strategically laughable. You can't run into an unrecoverable deficit unless you're radically overexpanding AND starting wars you couldn't win to begin with.

Sure, sometimes you get a bad start between a Ravenous Swarm, Fanatic Purifiers, a Determined Exterminator, and a Xenophobe FE...but otherwise, in and of itself, you shouldn't run out of things unless you're doing it wrong to begin with. Newer players, sure, that makes sense...everyone's gotta learn their own way at their own pace, but that's still a player issue, not a game issue.

Rant over...

I like the addition of trading food for things and vice-versa. It makes it somewhat worthwhile to keep using food tiles for food, using the trade deal to turn that food into whatever you might need or want more of, and just ending it if you start to run short of food.

Still, I think it's high-time a system were implemented where the opinion of the enclave affects the quality of the deals offered. Curators should charge an outrageous monthly sum for their research bonus...reduced by higher opinion over time. Same with their other offerings, and with the other enclaves. You can pay through the nose early game, or wait a while and get on their good side for a better deal. And maybe Curators and Artisans can offer "levels" of deals like the Traders where the more you pay, the bigger your bonuses gained. Like the Curators allowing you access to their YA fiction section for the lowest price, and their "Library of Congress" for the highest price.

Also, while I like the inclusion of the monthly income deals, I'm still finding that I end up with stockpiles of resources I don't really need, and I'd kind of like to sell it out. Maybe I have too much energy, but I need minerals for my ringworlds...or perhaps I've got minerals for eons but not enough power to terraform my multitude of otherwise not particularly hospitable worlds. But, I've got nowhere to dump it all in trade, because everyone else in the galaxy either dislikes me (I seem to get a LOT of militant xenophobes and spiritualists), can't afford to give up what I need, or has no use for what I'm offering.

Perhaps there could be a soft cooldown on reintroduced instant trades with the enclave where if you trade too much too soon, the trade value gets worse because you're depleting their stock and giving them too much product they don't really need otherwise, and now they have to get that sold. Perhaps such "overtrading" causes an opinion loss.

Neither type of deal should ever be quite as good as what you could potentially get from another empire with maxed opinion of you, but they should get reasonably close, I think. It should probably mean that the traders start with a much worse set of deals to begin with. 3, or even 4, to 1...steadily improving little by little as their opinion rises, or again getting worse if you take too much of their stuff too often.

"Still, I think it's high-time a system were implemented where the opinion of the enclave affects the quality of the deals offered. Curators should charge an outrageous monthly sum for their research bonus...reduced by higher opinion over time."

This sounds great in theory, but the cost progressively increases as it is. Dropping the cost over time due to relationship would create late game imbalance; if anything, it should be more expensive than several thousand energy for the bonuses late-game.

 

[urogard]

This sounds great in theory, but the cost progressively increases as it is. Dropping the cost over time due to relationship would create late game imbalance; if anything, it should be more expensive than several thousand energy for the bonuses late-game.

Those "jumps" in price are also silly. "You're 2 pops over the limit so now you pay an extra 1,000 energy..."

It should be some flat value per pop in your empire (10-20 Energy) and scale into infinity (although possibly decrease progressively so a 2k pop empire doesn't pay 40k energy)

 

[Triech]

Making food not reliant on unrest and happiness feels like yet another hit on hive mind, not like they had that much uniqueness.

It would have been better if unrest and low happiness still affected food production but we had ways to lessen the effect, like authoritarian can enact martial law for a time to secure food processes ( just one example ) or when in starvation mode unrest/happiness would affect food production much less, since pops will produce food to avoid starvation,

but how does unrest or happinnes not affect food production at all make sense? In history entire populations died because of this reason, since unrest/happiness was a consequence of other things, like a poor economy ( e.g people not prioritizing farms, ring a bell.. ), infrastructure management or war, which would cause a shortage in food, a lot of countries had to rely on ally help for these types of things.

This feels like a bandaid fix, you could have the same food shortages prior 2.0.2 and it was always the cause of people min-maxing planets for energy/minerals instead of going wide, not trading for food; just going for food tech early on ( really just going for hyper arm II early and you're set for a long long time )

Not only that but this change also makes other traits that increase food output even less important, people should prioritize food just as they prioritize minerals and energy, the fact that you made this change just to appease them.. I wish you would revert it..

 

[Groot]

Something that has annoyed me is that pirate spawn way too often and they only spawn for the player as well. Could you change this in the future. It is very tedious. Also hive minds are almost useless in the way i see it. You still need food, there is still(even though it is small) a negative modifier, and it is hard to make friends. I would like to see some new civics in the hive mind type along side with some new features that could be useful or make it fun to play them. Also you cant assimilate pops that you take over unless you are able to genetically modify them. In this case you basically just kill planets if you claim them. I feel as if the hive mind is not fun to play as and it has voids to fill. As of right now, the hive mind empire type is useless and undesired. Please take this into thought to try to add something. Another thing is that i never see the scourge anymore and i havent gotten the acheivement for the queen because of that.

 

[Triech]

It should be possible to trade multiples resources for another e.g 100 energy for 50 minerals AND 100 food for 50 minerals.

 

[Cat_Fuzz]

RE: Food - it could be good to convert excess food into a production bonus but only when you currently have no pops growing and are at maximum food cap.

To go further, you could gain a bigger bonus at the higher caps (say 5% at 200, 10% at 500 and 20% at 5000) to create an incentive to stockpile, and create a choice between growth over bonus production.

EDIT: Above example not final numbers and such

 

[Thrandirin]

Making food not reliant on unrest and happiness feels like yet another hit on hive mind, not like they had that much uniqueness.

It would have been better if unrest and low happiness still affected food production but we had ways to lessen the effect, like authoritarian can enact martial law for a time to secure food processes ( just one example ) or when in starvation mode unrest/happiness would affect food production much less, since pops will produce food to avoid starvation,

but how does unrest or happinnes not affect food production at all make sense? In history entire populations died because of this reason, since unrest/happiness was a consequence of other things, like a poor economy ( e.g people not prioritizing farms, ring a bell.. ), infrastructure management or war, which would cause a shortage in food, a lot of countries had to rely on ally help for these types of things.

This feels like a bandaid fix, you could have the same food shortages prior 2.0.2 and it was always the cause of people min-maxing planets for energy/minerals instead of going wide, not trading for food; just going for food tech early on ( really just going for hyper arm II early and you're set for a long long time )

Not only that but this change also makes other traits that increase food output even less important, people should prioritize food just as they prioritize minerals and energy, the fact that you made this change just to appease them.. I wish you would revert it..

The problem was mainly that it was a death spiral for AI: they mismanage food so they get unrest and unhappieness so they produce less food and less minerals so they need to build more farms with less minerals around. And their pops still grow so they need even more food. They just weren't able to get out of it.
I'm fine with punishing players for mismanagement but this "bandaid fix" should end problems for AI not really breaking much for human players. Unrest and unhappiness still affects power and mineral productions afterall, so it's not worth it to just ignore food.

Also it makes some sense as uh, people who are unhappy because of starvation (lack of food) produce less food? Of course if they were starved to death so that they don't have any strength left it would make sense, but if it's just food shortages I doubt it. Keeping it the way it was made no sense too in this scenario, and additionally caused severe problems for AI to balance its economy effectively making some enemies entirely useless (no challenge for player at all).

For me foreign empires who were so advanced that they researched faster-than-light travel and colonized other worlds not being capable of balancing its food economy makes even less sense so I'm fine with this update. AI having empty tiles and starvation because people refuse to work on farms to prevent starvation is too much for my suspension of disbelief. It's not like it really changes anything for player, I doubt anybody will really notice this, but it should help AI massively without adding more mechanics - which might be better as it is "more realistic" as you say, but add complexity to the game which AI is not really good at handling and it doesn't really add any gameplay value for player. The simplest fixes are the best for AI afterall, and I can't think of simpler fix than actually preventing starvation spiral.

I agree with the point that food traits aren't really useful though (I wish that trait giving +15% food produced would cost 1 not 2 points...), but I doubt it's of utmost priority right now. Especially that there are many mods adding or balancing traits while fixing AI effectively is actually massive modding task.

 

[Mavkiel]

I just want the patch . I'd hate to start a game and miss out on the various fixes and changes listed.

 

[Kipperian]

Occupation Armies
Since the army rework in 2.0, it's become significantly easier to snipe back planets that were recently taken by the enemy, as these planets lack a garrison to defend them. For this reason, we've implemented a new type of army type called Occupation Armies. When a planet is occupied, the occupier now spawns a garrison force of these Occupation Armies (the exact type varying depending on species just as with defense armies). Unless destroyed by battle or bombardment, the garrison force remains until the planet is either annexed or reverts to the owner's control.

Wouldn't it be better if occupation armies wouldn't "spawn" but rather you would need to build them in your planets prior to war and subsequent invasion of other worlds? This would add depth as it is not realistic to fully occupy let's say 10 planets in a single war without having the armies needed to control the hostile population. At least you would need 1 occupation army for each pop living on the planet (without modifiers of some kind, which would reduce this number).

 

[Mavkiel]

Occupation Armies
...
Wouldn't it be better if occupation armies wouldn't "spawn" but rather you would need to build them in your planets prior to war and subsequent invasion of other worlds? This would add depth as it is not realistic to fully occupy let's say 10 planets in a single war without having the armies needed to control the hostile population. At least you would need 1 occupation army for each pop living on the planet (without modifiers of some kind, which would reduce this number).

Honestly I viewed it as using local forces. It would make a great deal of sense for an invading force to seize control, then hand it over to local sympathizers. It'd likely clamp down greatly on unrest. (Being oppressed by a foreigner, who doesn't understand your ways is more offensive then a local)

 

[g4borg]

Wouldn't it be better if occupation armies wouldn't "spawn" but rather you would need to build them in your planets prior to war and subsequent invasion of other worlds?

i think as players have pointed out on that, this would include more micro, more manual labour for little reward.

i have had a discussion with friends of different views. we came to the conclusion, best would be if the weakest army of your invasion force gets transformed into these occupation forces, with a growing mechanic. it would give slave armies, or mixed armies with cheaper units attached some meaning. it would not add micro, as it would work automatically.

it is also kinda like the boardgame risk works. you have to leave one behind. so you better pack enough for all.

Spoiler

it could also serve in the future for expansion of the mechanic, so you can have your special gestapo like / specialized occupation forces you have to prebuild, which get picked preferably from your armies as occupation armies and reduce unrest, accelerate purging or sth.

 

[RadioactiveHellion]

There have been a lot of good developments during the 2.0.2 beta. Hopefully you get around to how the AI handles claims on allied/overlord territory because atm that's one of the bigger turn offs for some playstyles, where they accumulate enormous claims penalties against you. In my last game I even had a suddenly disloyal protectorate during a Total War because I retook some of their lost systems (which, officially turning over to me immediately due to how Total Wars are handled, caused claims penalties)

 

[Bearjuden]

How has it been two weeks since the patch and post-Colossus empires still don't have a general purpose CB?

 

[unhide]

I'm so glad for the subspecies rights! Couple weeks ago during an Inward Perfection game (no xenos!) I had genemodded a couple planets with Nerve Stapled and some other traits to maximise their mineral production, and I was disappointed I couldn't also make them slaves.

 

[ashbery76]

Occupation Armies
Wouldn't it be better if occupation armies wouldn't "spawn" but rather you would need to build them in your planets prior to war and subsequent invasion of other worlds? This would add depth as it is not realistic to fully occupy let's say 10 planets in a single war without having the armies needed to control the hostile population. At least you would need 1 occupation army for each pop living on the planet (without modifiers of some kind, which would reduce this number).

No because lots of added micro for little gain.

 

[RadioactiveHellion]

Maybe as a compromise for army occupation: Let every military unit support up to X occupation armies, which automatically spawn up to whatever capacity they're planned to atm but after a point you'll need more armies to support more extensive occupation.

 

[Matt516]

I just want the patch . I'd hate to start a game and miss out on the various fixes and changes listed.

Yeah, I'm hoping to play a bit this weekend but not on the current version. Workday is now over in Sweden though, isn't it?