Stellaris Dev Diary #201: Galactic Imperium

[Arithmetician]

Cincinnatus would be the classic example of the Roman dictator system working correctly, and actually relinquishing his power at the end of the emergency. But it only needs to fail once, and absolute power all too often tends to corrupt absolutely. And we digress.

 

[Jordan_Lienhard1999]

Again, the "nicer" way of uniting against the crisis would be as the Custodian. They have resolutions to help with this and they can form the Galactic Defense Force. They don't have to proclaim the Imperium.

Well can there be something like "Proclaim the Galactic Federation" or "Start the Process of Forming a Galactic Republic" where the members can voluntarily join in, but the nation trying to form it can use their political (and military) save to enlighten at least the minimum amount of nations to form a more centralized Republic....which can still turn into an Imperium?

 

[Nocx]

I'm a bit worried that this will be very game-able in that everyone will just leave the community before the resolution can be forced. AIs won't be programmed to do that though, so it only really applies to games with a lot of human players.

One way to fix this is that resolutions before the proclamation of the imperium will apply de-buffs to nations that leave after they are passed.
e.g. you have military coordinators from the community that you have become dependent on, and upon leaving they would be recalled, causing your millitary to become disorganized. Or maybe some of the people of your nation object to leaving, causing a happiness drop.

I do think that nations should get an option to leave whenever the imperium is first formed (and they would still get the de-buffs), the Imperial Core probably has a casus belli to force nations to join anyways if they can't resist.

 

[Tetragrade]

The concept is great! But what a bizzare implementation... Having to lose your federation is an obnoxious trade-off, but forcing you to change name and government is just insane. I want to crush the galaxy under the iron fist of my empire, not a single generic Star Wars knock-off. Removing the mandatory country changes, and adding the ability to customize the galactic empire - renaming it, maybe having the UI/background inherit your country colour - would go a long way.

Edit: Regarding the federation comment, I'm talking about the fact that forming the empire seems to dissolve your own federation as well, your centuries old hegemony for example. It makes sense I suppose, it's just kind of anti-fun.

 

[King Harkinian]

The concept is great! But what a bizzare implementation... Having to lose your federation is an obnoxious trade-off, and forcing you to change name and government is just insane. I want to crush the galaxy under the iron fist of my empire, not a single generic Star Wars knock-off. Removing the mandatory country changes, and adding the ability to customize the galactic empire - renaming it, maybe having the UI/events/background inherit your country colour - would go a long way.

Nothing is preventing you from simply conquering/vassalizing the galaxy under your own empire separate from the galactic community.

 

[Scyobi_Empire]

Please say you have an option to leave it before it comes into action, I would rather not be forced into Authoritarian in a MP or SP game with competent AI's (funny joke, I know). Like when your policies breaches Galactic Law you get a chance to change it, you should be able to have an option the moment the Imperium forms. This could jumpstart the Rebellion and let preexisting federations not be dismantled.

 

[Maethendias]

the real question is:

when

 

[LordRegent303]

Well, probably not the answer that satisfies people asking the question, but the Egalitarian way to go about this would seem to just be the Custodian, and make your term permanent, without actually declaring yourself Galactic Emperor. You still nominally respect the democratic process and sovereignty of other nations, though you likely have enough diplomatic weight to outvote most/all of them by that point, and that, paired with the Custodian's emergency powers, effectively makes you the ruler of the galaxy already.

But unless you get other nations to willingly vote for you as Emperor, you effectively trample their sovereignty and silence their self-determination in the very act of establishing the Galactic Imperium, itself an usurpation of absolute power that betrays of whatever egalitarian ideals that the society may have previously professed to believe in.

I for one don't mind the Ethos shift. In-game, it's often quite difficult to change from Egalitarianism to Authoritarianism, because of how powerful Egalitarianism' ethos attraction is. The built-in shift toward authoritarianism helps my RP when I want to go from republic to empire immensely. Beforehand, I would pretty much rely on the Divine Sovereign event as the easiest way to shift to authoritarian ethics in a reasonable amount of time, making it much harder to accomplish if I didn't start with Spiritualist as one of my ethics. Granted, I often would start with spiritualist to RP the Jedi in the Galactic Republic, but that's besides the point.

It just... doesn't feel nearly as satisfying, you know? Sure, I can pass the Universal Prosperity Mandate and the Custodian Permanent Term with my overwhelming diplo power, but that feels no different from any other, less impactful resolution. Also, there's no guarantee anyone is going to actually follow those rules. Making an egalitarian Imperium/something similar with a grand event and several new mechanics in a new interface is much more impactful, but we ain't getting that. Only the authoritarians do.
My empire might believe in the freedom and equality of individual citizens but not galactic empires. There would be a lot more room for RP if it weren't for the restrictions.

 

[GuildenSpur]

Looking forward to this! If my games usually last a week, how many games can I still play before Nemesis is released

 

[Tetragrade]

Nothing is preventing you from simply conquering/vassalizing the galaxy under your own empire separate from the galactic community.

Awful hot take. What the heck is the point in them spending time developing all these new mechanics, just to flub the theming when it'd be so easy to improve.

 

[methegrate]

This reminds me of a conversation someone brought up in another thread, about how authoritarian/egalitarian are kind of outliers on the ethics tree.

The other ethics define how your empire fundamentally sees the world and its place in it. What do they value, and what goals does your empire pursue? Otoh, authoritarian/egalitarian defines your empire's politics. How do they pursue those goals? What system do they use? It's more of a government choice than a fundamental ethic.

The imperium seems like a great example of that. It feels like you could have a different type of imperium for each other type of ethics. Spiritual imperiums could impose a divine theocracy, while militarist imperiums could constantly seek new worlds to conquer. Xenophile imperiums could essentially eliminate all borders in the galaxy, while xenophobic ones could enforce rigid separation and containment. The imperium vs. custodianship seems like a means to an end. It's more about how your empire pursues its goals rather than a goal in and of itself.

Feels like there's lots of room for different types of authoritarian imperiums based on what goals that empire has and what they want to achieve, and that could be a very cool way to build on this concept.



Although overall, and just speaking personally, Nemesis really isn't shaping up to be my jam. It seems like a late game story expansion. And don't get me wrong, I'm all for Stellaris leaning into story expansions. I feel like the right road forward for Stellaris is probably something like D&D, where the base game is seen as sort of a world or game system in which people then create and release story packs. This looks like a cool story, and I'm sure it will go over great for some players.

But right now, I don't need more late game material. I still find the middle game impossible to get through. I feel like the late game is overstuffed with toys that I never actually see because I get bored halfway through the game and stop playing. Looking forward to seeing what espionage brings to the game but, mostly, I'm kind of waiting for the update that gives us a Grand Unified Theory of Stellaris mechanics, something that connects the game's many isolated elements into a galaxy that feels more responsive, interconnected and alive during the long middle section between when exploration ends and all of these big end-game wars begin.

 

[TofuFox]

Outsiders have a war goal to dissolve the Imperium and restore the Community, which puts them at war with the entire Imperium. In most cases this would be fairly suicidal, but if your rebel federation has managed to white peace their way out of the Imperium, they can still build up their forces and declare war again at a later date to get the Community back.

Can war declarations include both a Federation and non-Federation members now? Would fit here - Rebels aligning with others in a war without all joining the Rebel Federation.

Assuming you're not a MegaCorp as the Emperor, you can bestow an Imperial Charter upon a MegaCorp member of the Imperium. This gives them access to the Imperial Concession Port branch office building. For every such building your loyal Imperial MegaCorp builds, you get a small energy credit bonus... and those buildings significantly increase the value of the entire branch office for the MegaCorp.

If you're a MegaCorp as the Emperor, you can build Concession Ports yourself so there's no need for Imperial Charters.

Does becoming Emperor as a Megacorp seize the Branch Offices of other members of the Imperium? Or could that be available as a resolution - That is, after all, the perogative of the Emperor.

That is more or less the Custodian, where you can act as a benevolent defender of the Community. But declaring yourself the ruler of the galaxy is a fairly authoritarian thing to do.

But the Custodian doesn't actually have anything interesting to do as a benevolent defender of the Community; they just get another fleet and some bland resolutions. They can't end conflicts amongst members to reduce vulnerability to crises or other threats. They can't setup resource or military transfers to community members from the community as a whole, to aid the protection / recovery of weak members. They can't prevent community members from victimizing weaker members of the community (blocking offensive wars, protecting primitives). They can't set community policy interactions (commercial / research pacts, migration treaties amongst members). They can't encourage political freedom (limits to faction crackdowns). They can't construct gateways to ensure rapid response to threats and more effective trade (would also be helpful with allies in general). They aren't actually expected or required to intervene against the crisis or anything else because it doesn't look like it will affect how anyone votes on anything. All of this would be a custodian acting as, well, a custodian of the galaxy.

It's great that we can do the galactic imperium thing in a more substantive way. And that Spritiualist Megacorps will be included in the "Bow before your god emperor" options, which fit Gospel of the Masses really well (establishing official state churches in every planet, via Branch Offices!), though I've wondered why there's no "Family Company" imperial succession for Megacorps in general. But the most interesting part of having diplomatic influence is actually exerting that influence in a substantive way on others - and paying a price in diplomatic accountability for it - and that's still limited to more or less the later stage Galactic Community resolutions. Custodian doesn't have it.

Like has been already mentioned, the action of taking such power is intrinsically incredibly authoritarian.

It can be somewhat consistent with both Democratic Crusaders (war for democracy!) and the Pacifist Federation Liberation Chain War (We want to be at peace, so we'll spend 200 years declaring war on every single nation that disagrees with us until they join us). But both of those exerting influence could fit the Custodian, if the Custodian had the features to support it.

 

[Harris0n]

It is possible that all members of Imperium got same ship skins from a main empire (same set and same engine colour). Because it is Emperium and we must have all same - because it standard.
Would be cool.
Different ship skins only for weak loosers - federations!

 

[SilentReflection]

Are you sure? It specifically said "Your Ethics will shift towards Fanatic Authoritarian".

If the ethics shift "towards" fanatic authoritarian, that does not necessarily mean it will be fanatic authoritarian.
If the ethics shift "to" fanatic authoritarian, then you will be fanatic authoritarian.

 

[Arithmetician]

Well, it doesn't work during ironman mode, and I admit it would be cool to be able to standardize the Imperium's shipset in the main game, at least as an option/ resolution, likely with some gameplay effect to make it meaningful beyond just RP, but you can achieve this fairly easily with console commands, by briefly taking over each other nation and then typing something like the following:

"gfx_culture mammalian_01"

"mammalian" would of course be replaced with the desired species archetype for the shipset.

I was actually planning to make use of this if I did an RP run where I turn a republic to an empire. Have a certain shipset while I'm still the Republic, and then use gfx_culture to switch over to Imperial ships once I become the Galactic Imperium. It only affects new ships though, so you'd still have a number of pre-Imperial warships lying around.

 

[DrNukeLear]

The concept is great! But what a bizzare implementation... Having to lose your federation is an obnoxious trade-off, but forcing you to change name and government is just insane. I want to crush the galaxy under the iron fist of my empire, not a single generic Star Wars knock-off. Removing the mandatory country changes, and adding the ability to customize the galactic empire - renaming it, maybe having the UI/events/background inherit your country colour - would go a long way.

I agree with the dissolution of Federations, but the sudden loss of something built up over time without any chance of reaction is quite frankly bad design. Once the proposal gets to the floor it’s too late, it’ll never be proposed unless it’s going to be passed due to obscene DW and the AI is probably not coded to leave the GC with you.

Some of mandatory country changes are just unnecessary. Leave the authority alone, give me the cool new civic and yes, shift me authoritarian - but why has my democracy changed to a monarchy after a resolution passes in a supranational entity?

If I want to change my nation’s authority, I’ll spend 250 influence. I shouldn’t need to spend 250 influence to keep it.

 

[Lorenerd11]

Supporting a people trying to liberate themselves from autocratic rule is championing democracy. Invading a stable country to "liberate" them from their ruler means YOU are being autocratic towards that people. The notion that every culture everywhere wants democracy (or a specific religion or even religious freedom) is bonkers and diminishes a people's rich history and sense of identity to values YOU care about.

This reminds me, Ideology/Liberation wars should really be reworked. It makes no sense for them to result in a carbon copy of the attacking government.

 

[Scyobi_Empire]

This reminds me, Ideology/Liberation wars should really be reworked. It makes no sense for them to result in a carbon copy of the attacking government.

*Sweats in doing it to 20 AI's in 1 game*

 

[SilentReflection]

I agree with the dissolution of Federations, but the sudden loss of something built up over time without any chance of reaction is quite frankly bad design. Once the proposal gets to the floor it’s too late, it’ll never be proposed unless it’s going to be passed due to obscene DW and the AI is probably not coded to leave the GC with you.

Some of mandatory country changes are just unnecessary. Leave the authority alone, give me the cool new civic and yes, shift me authoritarian - but why has my democracy changed to a monarchy after a resolution passes in a supranational entity?

If I want to change my nation’s authority, I’ll spend 250 influence. I shouldn’t need to spend 250 influence to keep it.

I understand the concern, but it would be very hard to be caught off guard with something like this. Either a player or AI empire would need to become the custodian, make their position permanent, and then declare a new order. Even with the ability to shorten vote time, you would be more than able to kill the would-be Imperium in its infancy.
As for authority, I agree with that to a degree. If you're a democracy then a change would be obvious with the shift to authoritarian, but if your a dictatorship (or maybe even an oligarchy) you should be able to keep that.

 

[Acacias]

The main problem here is that it makes authoritarian empires better at getting feature in comparison to eglaitarians . Sure egalitarian nations can form the empire, but likely a lot of their pops will still be egalitarian and a smart player will have built his empire around the things only egalitarians can do (like utopian abundance). This means that starting authoritarians and then forming the empire is objectively better than starting eglaitarians and doing the same.

Plus egalitarians(and especially democracies) are underpowered to authoritarians, so making them better at forming a superempire just compounds the problem.

I think it would be better if the imperium could be formed in different ways according to the ehtics, as it would add varierty and be better for balancing authoritarians and egalitarians.

I also disagree in that taking power form the galactic community to form the empire is inherently authoritarian. if the EU federalizes right now, but still retians democracry, would it be "authoritarian"

Also pls buff democracies, mandates are a joke in both their bonus and in what they take to complete.