Stellaris Dev Diary #133 - The Caravaneers

[Sir Roderick]

Up to you, but you won’t get your sense of pride and accomplishment without them.

I'm not saying not to buy the reliquiaries, I'm saying that the MIGHTY POWER OF ROME is enough for the caravaneers to make an exception in the methods of payment.

 

[calen]

Readding this command after it was deleted for apparently not being "productive."
While I like the idea of the Caravaneers, I don't like this lootbox feature. It's tasteless, immersion breaking, and adds nothing to the game.

 

[Kleo]

Would it at all be possible for my Xenophobic Isolationist Space Empires to permanently close my borders to those space caravans? Or will I have to relish in their destruction everytime they invade my sovereign space that I happen to have filled with giant lasers? I'm fine with either one I just want to be sure what options I have available when I feel like playing as isolationists.

 

[henzington]

Would it at all be possible for my Xenophobic Isolationist Space Empires to permanently close my borders to those space caravans? Or will I have to relish in their destruction everytime they invade my sovereign space that I happen to have filled with giant lasers? I'm fine with either one I just want to be sure what options I have available when I feel like playing as isolationists.

They ignore borders.

 

[Kleo]

Thank you. I must have missed that. I know I'll look forward to this.

 

[simeon437]

@grekulf and @Wiz what would be of the trait inward perfection? Im interested to see if it would get any major overhauls. That and also the Agragian Idyll trait

 

[deoved]

They ignore borders.

Why so? Why anyone else cant ignore borders? Some techno-mumbojumbo?

 

[Calvax]

Why so? Why anyone else cant ignore borders? Some techno-mumbojumbo?

Most non-player entities ignore borders. If you want a headcanon justification it's because border policy coveres state level relations, not private citizens. If you really don't want them in then attack them.

 

[Pointyearedgit]

@grekulf and @Wiz what would be of the trait inward perfection? Im interested to see if it would get any major overhauls. That and also the Agragian Idyll trait

We know inward perfection is changing, just not how yet. There are 2 empires with it on the dev clash, I’m sure we will see the updated version when it is ready.

Agrarian idyll is completely different:

Agrarian Idyll changes:

https://twitter.com/Martin_Anward/status/1057933347874357248

 

[Lawst]

Can those Merchant ships also be a ship type players can use? They look great and if yes.

Take my money.

 

[henzington]

Why so? Why anyone else cant ignore borders? Some techno-mumbojumbo?

Same reason the marauders ignore borders

 

[Butlerian]

On the topic of people saying the lootbox Caravaneers "break immersion", I have to ask: do you people not actually read any sci-fi? Is your entire knowledge of the genre derived from 3rd hand Internet memes of what lo-brow reshares on pleddit think sci-fi is? Because the idea of capricious travelling space caravans spamming cornucopic abundance on somewhat confused traditional polities is a staple, and you'd know that if you'd read anything beyond Dune and Star Trek. Singularity Sky by Charles Stross particularly springs to mind.

"Muh immersion" might be a reasonable argument if you weren't outing yourself as too poorly-read to even know why you're wrong when you make it, but unfortunately, you are.

 

[TheAtreides84]

Uhm, so having a little fun at lootboxes, right? Well, understood, but I would have preferred real space traders.

 

[Calvax]

Uhm, so having a little fun at lootboxes, right? Well, understood, but I would have preferred real space traders.

The caraveneers are space traders. When they arrive in your space they offer you random deals. It’s the home base that is a casino you can call up to gamble.

 

[Ikael]

Man, reworked civics that actually changes how societies operate are some of my personally most wanted previewed features. They can do some crazy stuff with the Le Guin economic system. Looking at the new agrarian idyl and aristocratic elite, I can't wait to see what they have in store for warrior culture, inwards perfection or citizen service.

 

[TheAtreides84]

The caraveneers are space traders. When they arrive in your space they offer you random deals. It’s the home base that is a casino you can call up to gamble.

I don't really think someone offering random deals could be called a trader. The point of trading is exchanging a thing for another.

 

[Calvax]

I don't really think someone offering random deals could be called a trader. The point of trading is exchanging a thing for another.

If you travel around offering people one good/service for another good/service how are you not a trader...? Two out of the three images of communications screens we were shown in this dev diary had caravaneers offering clear trades along these lines.

 

[safe-keeper]

A space casino is a pretty cool addition, but gambling in any video game seriously needs to factor in the ability to save scum.

At a minimum, having reward outcomes trigger at least a month later takes out some of the worst of it. If you pull the lever, buy a raffle ticket, whatever, just delay the exposure of success or failure until the game has progressed enough that alt f4 won't redo your chance at the jackpot.

Personally I would love if many more MTTH events and/or RNG outcomes delayed their outcome a month+ so you cannot just crash out of them, but a casino is where I feel you NEED to do something.

Can't you work around save scumming by generating a seed at game start that is used by the game whenever it generates random numbers? Asking 'cause I don't know programming.

Also, not sure what I think about the idea of the leader of an empire gambling their empire's budget at a space casino. Seems a little bit too silly.

 

[Kayden_II]

If you travel around offering people one good/service for another good/service how are you not a trader...?

Because trade in the sense for goods means the actual transport and exchange of at least 2 different goods from location A to location B, but the goods (as well as their costs or prices or what-ever) from these caravaneers are generated / coded out of "nowhere" ...
(These caravaneers are as boring and not that embedded into the game as the enclaves, the only difference is, that they're using ships instead of space-stations) ...

Example:
production-costs for empire / location A for 100 consumer-goods = 100 EC(s) and for 100 alloys = 300 EC(s) ...
+
production-costs for empire / location B for 100 consumer-goods = 300 EC(s) and for 100 alloys = 100 EC(s) ...

It makes sense (for empire A as well as B) to trade / exchange 100 consumer-goods (from A) for 100 allyos (from B) as long as the transport-costs are smaller than 200 EC(s), so that and if you subtract the actual transport-costs from these 200 EC(s) then you get the (maximum) profit for such a trader / exchanger.

Edit:
Some improvements in regards to my example.

 

[Paladenite]

Time to destroy all organic lifeforms again, damn dirty meatbags. Oh and another thing, what do we get if we pre-order the dlc?