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Stellaris Dev Diary #128 - Decisions and Planetary Bombardment

Hello everyone! We’re back yet again for another Stellaris development diary. Today we're going to continue talking about the 2.2 'Le Guin' update, and as promised last week, the topic will be Decisions and Planetary Bombardment.

And before we get right into it I of course have to reiterate that we're not yet ready to reveal anything about when 2.2 ‘Le Guin’ is coming out, and that screenshots may contain placeholder art, interfaces and non-final numbers.

Decisions
Planetary edicts are gone - long live Decisions! Decisions is a new feature that will replace the old Planetary Edicts. We’ve always wanted to do more with planetary edicts, and Decisions now allow us to do a lot more cool stuff. Some Decisions can be enacted on any planet (colonizable or not) in your empire’s borders. Decisions can cost any resource, and can also require a certain amount of time to pass before the effect will take place. For example, the Mastery of Nature Ascension Perk now allows you access to Land Clearance – the Decision (see image below). Some Decisions will have toggle options – like for example Martial Law. Enacting the Martial Law Decision allows you to later on Revoke Martial Law should you wish to do so.

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The system will be fully moddable and we’re looking forwards to seeing what cool stuff the community can come up with.

Planetary Bombardment & Devastation
To better fit with the new systems, bombardment has been slightly reworked.

When a planet gets bombarded it will suffer Devastation. Devastation ticks up from 0 up to 100, and is a direct penalty to your planet’s housing, amenities, trade value and pop growth. Clearing Devastation will take time and cost resources, as one would expect.

Fleets, as you know, have different Bombardment Stances – each with its own effect on how fast Devastation ticks up and how large chance there is for a Pop to be killed during bombardment. The higher the Devastation is on a planet, the higher the chance is for a Pop to be killed. When a building slot becomes invalid due to no longer having the amount of Pops required for it to operate, the building occupying it will become Ruined. A Ruined building may be repaired once the requirements of the building slot are once again met.

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For those concerned that Devastation is too punishing, rest assured that we will be looking into that. Recovering from Devastation should never feel like an impossible task.

Next week our we will continue covering the features of the 2.2 ‘Le Guin’ update with the topic of Tradition rework. Because this week’s dev diary is a bit shorter, I’ll leave a teaser for next week. Enjoy!

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Ahh, those decisions are going to make a lot of the mods I use a lot more interesting.
 
I have been thinking that minerals are too much important in the game, and you can not "role" designs of planets and exotic societies, because is not worth.
In fact, the priority of each game will always be to obtain a lot of mineral, and if you build power plants or farms, it is for pay the maintenance of the mineral factories.

In EuropaUniversalis, money is very important, but it acts more as a brake on your development that you need manage, because the pace of expansion of your empire is different, more slow and limited.
In Stellaris the mineral is like the resources of Starcraft. Almost all decisions are based on expanding fast, getting a lot of mineral, and everything else is less important.
Does anyone think like me?
Should Stellaris adjust the rate of obtaining minerals?

In the mod "Stellaris: Realism", the uninhabitable planets do not normally give energy or mineral, but produce concrete raw materials like ice, silicon, etc. This detail, combined with certain adjustments in construction costs, can make interstellar expansion more strategic and less mechanical, and change the pace of the game to be less 4X and more "grand strategy".
 
Devastation sounds like an interesting mechanic. How will that effect landing armies? Or is that a topic for another dev diary? Super stoked about the tradition rework, that has been overdue for a bit I feel. Great stuff as always!
 
Devastation sounds like an interesting mechanic. How will that effect landing armies? Or is that a topic for another dev diary? Super stoked about the tradition rework, that has been overdue for a bit I feel. Great stuff as always!

Bombarding fleets will also damage armies, as before.
 
Is it possible for a toggle-able decision like Martial Law, to have a monthly cost associated with it?
 
When a planet gets bombarded it will suffer Devastation. Devastation ticks up from 0 up to 100, and is a direct penalty to your planet’s housing, amenities, trade value and pop growth. Clearing Devastation will take time and cost resources, as one would expect.

Is clearing devastation an active or passive process? Like will it naturally tick down over time (assuming the bombardment has stopped) or will it be fixed with something like tile blocker clearance and decisions?
 
Would be cool, if you add a visual clue if a decision can be done once (land clearance), mulitple times (encourage planet growth) or works more like toggle for a permanent effect (declare martial law)
 
Fleets, as you know, have different Bombardment Stances – each with its own effect on how fast Devastation ticks up and how large chance there is for a Pop to be killed during bombardment. The higher the Devastation is on a planet, the higher the chance is for a Pop to be killed. When a building slot becomes invalid due to no longer having the amount of Pops required for it to operate, the building occupying it will become Ruined. A Ruined building may be repaired once the requirements of the building slot are once again met.

will devastation stop ticking up at a certain point if the fleet stance isn't at the highest level? I typically only conquer planets I want so I use a more lax bombardment stance, so it'd be nice if it didn't reduce all the planets infrastructure to rubble.
 
Well I hope that the Tradition Rework brings more than just a few replacements.
I have been thinking that minerals are too much important in the game
That's precisely an issue 2.2 is going to address. Maybe you should read the other dev diaries.
Of course minerals will remain important, but all ressources will be more interdependant and interequivalent.
 
Is it possible to make decisions like encourage pop growth to have both toggled (where you pay over time) and one off version?

Sometimes I would like to boost the planet/empire one off, but most often then not I want to keep the bonus running until I make a decision of not wanting it anymore. Coming back to all of the planetary decisions/empire edicts every 10 years to click them again is a bit annoying.
 
" When a building slot becomes invalid due to no longer having the amount of Pops required for it to operate, the building occupying it will become Ruined." - Sounds very weird. Dont you think that the building ruined/not ruined shall be dependent on planetary bombardment and not people who live/hide/not hide in it?
 
" When a building slot becomes invalid due to no longer having the amount of Pops required for it to operate, the building occupying it will become Ruined." - Sounds very weird. Dont you think that the building ruined/not ruined shall be dependent on planetary bombardment and not people who live/hide/not hide in it?
If there's nobody to live in it, nobody is maintaining it.