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Stellaris Dev Diary #238 - Ascensions, Betas, and More

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Hi all!

Last week we talked about the basics of the Unity Rework. This week we have multiple features and announcements to discuss.

Ready?

Planetary Ascension Tiers​


Tied to unlocking Ascension Perks, Planetary Ascension Tiers are a way of improving your core worlds by expending Unity. In normal empires they represent the active will of the people supporting your government and giving a little extra to do things the way they’ve always been done. In machine and hive empires, it’s more the well oiled machinery of the world gaining efficiency or drone instincts becoming better honed with endless practice.

In either case, an Ascended planet does whatever it focuses on better.

Once you’ve unlocked three Ascension Perks (you do not need to actually spend them for this feature), you can Ascend each of your planets to Ascension Tier 1. This increases all of the effects of the planet’s Designation by 25% - whether it be Technician Output from a Generator World or Trade Value on a Commercial Ring World.

1642604745912.png

Unity is strength.


Each additional Ascension Perk you unlock increases the maximum Ascension Tier by 1, with an extra 4 tiers unlocked once you unlock all of the Perk slots. This lets you Ascend planets up to ten times, for a maximum bonus of 250% of the base Planetary Designation effects.

1642604753849.png

A fully Ascended Tier 10 Fortress World. Vi Valam will break before its defenders.


Ascending a Planet costs Unity, and this cost is heavily affected by both Sprawl and the total number of Ascension Tiers you have across your entire Empire. Currently it costs the same amount of Unity to raise your first planet to Ascension Tier 2 as it would to raise two planets to Ascension Tier 1, so you’ll want to pick and choose which planets you want to improve, and decide whether you would rather raise all your planets to low Ascension Tiers or focus on reaching the heights of Ascension on your most productive core worlds.

We’ll be watching how you use Planetary Ascension Tiers and will be very interested in your feedback regarding the current costs and perceived benefits during the Open Beta.

Currently Planetary Ascension Tiers are only lost if a planet permanently changes owners (not merely from temporary occupation) or is abandoned.

Unity Rework, Continued​


We’ve continued refining some of the elements of the Unity Rework, and as mentioned last week, some civics and authorities have undergone some changes.

One change from last week is that we swapped out the Sprawl bonus from the Capital worlds for a production bonus. We’ve also found that starting with penalties isn’t very fun, so Sprawl under 50 is ignored.

Death Cults will now be able to build either regular Temples or Sacrificial Temples to suit their needs, and the Memorialist’s special building line now replaces the Autochthon Monument (and has gained the “extra Unity per Ascension Perk” of the Monument line). Hives will also have access to their own variant of the Autochthon Monument, the Sensorium.

1642604760915.png

Can you feel it?


The generic “Administrator” job is being renamed to “Politicians”, with “Administrator” being the category term for Bureaucrats, Priests, and other “unifying” jobs that guide your Empire. The Bureaucratic Colony Designation will also be renamed to “Administrative Center”, to better apply to any of these jobs.

1642604768855.png

Early feedback said that suspension of disbelief was being tested by Politicians being productive, but we embrace utopian ideas.


1642604776753.png

Less bureaucracy, more administration.


Civics like Technocracies and Merchant Guilds have been modified to no longer grant incidental Unity bonuses. Technocracy is actually changing quite a bit - it will now grant +1 Research Option, and the research expertise bonuses (such as Expertise: Voidcraft) of your scientists are doubled when selecting technologies to offer. This should give Technocratic empires the ability to better manipulate the technology deck when they’re hunting for specific types of technologies. They also once again require any level of Materialism rather than being restricted exclusively to Fanatic Materialists.

1642604787609.png

Technocracies excel at manipulating the research deck if you're looking for a specific tech.

We’ve also heard your feedback regarding the loss of Culture Workers. We’ll see if we can find a good place for them to return for those of you that prefer creative art to beautiful spreadsheets. In the Open Beta, the Ministry of Culture and Artisans will still be providing them, and we’ll be doing another pass on the buildings to see if there are any other good places to put them.

A Job to Die For...​


The Custodian team has the mandate to work on directives that come straight from the Game Director, Quality of Life changes they think would improve the game, and Community Requests that they wish to champion. They also have the right to pitch what we call “Passion Projects” for things they simply want to do.

One of these comes to life (sort of) in the 3.3 patch, as the Permanent Employment Megacorp civic.

1642604796161.png

Speaking of which, we're hiring!


A MegaCorp variant of Reanimators, this civic allows the construction of Posthumous Employment Centers, as well as the ability to reanimate Leviathans that the original Reanimators gained in the Lem update.

At the Posthumous Employment Center, carcasses bereft of consciousness can find new purpose and a new opportunity to pay off their debts. The Reassigner jobs from the P.E.C. provide organic pop assembly of mortally impaired… Well… Zombies.

1642604810235.png

Unfortunately for them, it's impossible to fulfill their contracts.

1642604818601.png

Thrifty Zombies. Give me the brain!


Zombies cannot produce leaders, have no happiness, are infertile, and can only work Worker strata jobs… But on the bright side, they don’t have any upkeep and won’t ask for any more raises.

There are a few more interesting interactions I’ll leave for you to find on your own during gameplay.

Announcement Number One…​


An upcoming event that we wanted to tell you about is…



1642604825608.png




DEV CLASH! DEV CLASH! DEV CLASH!

Announcement Number Two…​


Regarding the Open Beta we’ve been talking about… We’re planning on running the Unity Open Beta starting… checks watch… now.



Please note that the 3.3 Unity Open Beta is an optional beta patch. You have to manually opt in to access it.
Go to your Steam library, right click on Stellaris -> Properties -> betas tab -> select "stellaris_test" branch.



It’s up. Right now. Go play! The Unity Open Beta will run (assuming everything goes to plan) until the 3rd of February, and also has a sneak preview of the 3.3 Custodian release, “Libra”.

As we move into a more frequent release cadence than we used to have due to the Custodian initiative, with the 3.3 release we’re switching to Constellation names for patches to reduce the (sometimes significant) overhead related to negotiating with Author’s estates.

###################
# Features
###################
Major updates have been made to the Unity system in Stellaris. In general, Unity is generally more valuable and useful than before and is used for many internal matters, while Influence is used mostly externally.

A summary of major changes include:
  • All means of increasing Administrative Capacity have been removed. While there are ways to reduce the Empire Sprawl generated by various sources, empires will no longer be able to completely mitigate sprawl penalties. Penalties and sprawl generation values have been significantly modified.
  • The Edicts Cap system has been removed. Toggled Edicts will have monthly Unity Upkeep which is modified by Empire Sprawl. Each empire has an Edicts Fund which subsidizes Edict Upkeep, reducing the amount you have to pay each month to maintain them.
  • Unity Ambitions and Campaigns now function like Toggled Edicts and last until cancelled with upkeep rather than costs. Known Issue: Sacrifice Edicts do not show their up-front costs. Or charge them, other than the actual sacrifices, so these two cancel each other out.
  • Several other systems that used to cost Influence are now paid in Unity.
    • Reforming government now costs Unity. The cost is based on Empire Size.
    • Resettling pops that previously cost Influence now costs Unity. Abandoning colonies still costs Influence.
    • Suppressing or Promoting factions no longer costs Influence. Known Issue: Unity costs for Faction Manipulation are not yet functioning.
    • Most Megastructures now cost Unity rather than Influence, with the exception of any related to travel (such as Gateways) or that provide living space (such as Habitats and Ring Worlds).
  • Since Factions are no longer producing Influence, a small amount of Influence is now generated by your fleet, based on Power Projection - a comparison of your fleet size and Empire Sprawl.
  • Leaders now cost Unity to hire rather than Energy, and have Unity upkeep.
  • Planetary Ascension Tiers have been added to the game. After acquiring three Ascension Perks, Unity can be spent to improve the effects generated by a planet’s Designation by 25%. Costs increase with Empire Sprawl and the number of times you have performed this action. As you acquire more Ascension Perks, the maximum Ascension Tier increases, with an extra maximum bonus once all Ascension Perks have been unlocked.
  • More changes can be found in the Balance portion of the Patch Notes.

For additional details and background, see Stellaris Dev Diary #237.

  • Added Plantoid, Lithoid, Necroid, and Aquatic pre-sapient pops to discover if you own the respective Species Packs.
  • Added an event chain about a mysterious labyrinth.
  • Finishing tradition trees now unlocks the ability to select previously locked Federation types.
    • Mercantile unlocks Trade League
    • Discovery unlocks Research Cooperative
    • Unyielding unlocks Martial Alliance
    • Domination unlocks Hegemony
  • New Megacorp Civic: Permanent Employment added.
  • The Hydrocentric AP now allows aquatic empires to flood habitats, making them suitable for Aquatic species.
  • New Events! Some are *quite* refreshing

###################
# Performance
###################
  • Refactored bonus resources that civics grant to jobs.
  • Refactored unemployment benefits from living standards. A side-effect of this was better tooltips.
  • Refactored Living Standards to use pop modifiers on the living standards script, instead of being checked for each pop category. A side-effect of this is better tooltips.
  • Greatly improved the performance of telling a fleet of ships to upgrade. This mainly affects the tooltip of the UI (which was very expensive when hovered over), but also saves some time each time the AI attempts to upgrade its fleets.
  • Reduced framerate impact of species view when there are many species in the galaxy.
  • Reduced framerate impact of colonisation selection UI when there are many species available to colonise with.
  • Reduced frame rate impact of opening planet view.
  • Updated ship shader to support empire color in emissive, decreasing the amount of draw calls for Aquatic ships.

###################
# Balance
###################
  • Fixed unmodifiable traits so that you can now correctly remove special habitability traits, along with various other traits that you were not meant to be able to add but it was fine to remove. Also allowed you to apply existing species templates containing such traits to the rest of the species. (This mainly covers flavour-based traits - there are still some such as Mechanical or Psionic or Necrophage which you will not be able to add or remove via species modification).
  • Capital designations now provide production bonuses.
  • Many updates to authorities, civics, techs, traditions, and ascension perks related to the Unity rework.

Civics:
  • Imperial Authority now gains increased Influence from Power Projection.
  • Imperial Cult Civic now grants 100 Edict Fund instead of 2 Edict Capacity.
  • Inwards Perfection now grants 50 Edict Fund instead of 1 Edict Capacity.
  • Citizen Service no longer provides +2 unity to soldier jobs. Instead it grants -25% war exhaustion and +2 starting level to your Admirals and Generals.
  • Cutthroat Politics now also reduces Edict Upkeep by 20%.
  • Merchant Guilds no longer produce bonus unity.
  • Brand Loyalty civic now grants 25 Edict Fund instead of 1 Encryption.
  • Subsumed Will and OTA Updates now also grant 25 Edict Fund.
  • Feudal Society now also reduces Leader hiring costs by 50%, waives Unity upkeep costs for employed Leaders, causes employed Governors to instead generate Unity equal to their skill level, but removes the ability to dismiss Leaders.
  • Technocracy no longer generates unity. Instead the civic now doubles the chance that your scientists will discover a technology from within their expertise and grants you +1 research slots. The civic only requires you to be partially materialist.
  • Pearl Divers now produce one more trade value (3 by default) and will not steal Angler jobs when food is short anymore.

Traditions and Ascension Perks:
  • Executive Vigor Ascension Perk now grants 100 Edict Fund instead of 2 Edict Capacity.
  • Grand Council and Harmonious Directives Traditions now grant 50 Edict Fund instead of 1 Edict Capacity.
  • Integrated Preservation Tradition no longer increases admin cap, instead it gives your empire a flat 30% increase to Automatic Resettlement Chance.
  • The Void Dweller finisher from the Expansion tradition tree now also discounts upgrading habitats.

Technologies and Buildings:
  • Planetary Unification now grants +5% Unity production and a one time Unity award instead of +2 Unity.
  • All other technologies that increased unity production now instead increase Edict Fund by 20.
  • Autochthon Monument, Corporate Monument, and Simulation Site building lines now generate a small amount of Unity and increase Unity generation from jobs on their planet.
  • Hive empires can now build a variant of the Autochthon Monument line called Sensoriums.
  • Memorialists and Death Cults can now choose whether to build their specialized Unity buildings or regular ones. Memorialist buildings now replace the Autochthon Monument line.
  • Spiritualist empires can now acquire the technologies associated with the Autochthon Memorial and similar buildings, as well as their faith based line.
  • Renamed Administrator jobs to Politicians. Assigned Bureaucrats, Priests and other related jobs to the new Administrator economic category.

Origins:
  • The Here Be Dragons endgame trigger now lets Machine Intelligences with the Synthetic Age ascension perk reach it after 4 ascension perks rather than 6.
  • The Living Metal technology can now be discovered as long as you have some within your borders.

Miscellaneous:
  • Increased political power of ruler and specialist strata under Decadent Lifestyle.
  • Increased the consumer goods upkeep of Decadent Lifestyle.
  • Increased the likelihood of getting endgame crises that are not the Unbidden.
  • It now costs 25/50 influence to upgrade a habitat in addition to the alloy cost.
  • Regenerative Hull Tissue, Nanite Repair System and Nanobot Cloud have had their values sliced in half however they now heal on a percentage basis rather than a static one leading to a net buff in most situations.
  • Scientists currently researching a technology can now gain new traits as they level up.
  • The "Sell to Private Collector" minor artifact decision now grants a flat 500 energy and has a 6 month cooldown.

###################
# AI
###################
  • AI rogue servitor empires will now build a organic sanctuary on each planet that has upgraded their capital building, and build additional ones on planets with high science or industrial output.
  • AI can now balance how many pops it needs that produce amenities better (mostly relevant for Hiveminds, so they don’t put ALL their pops on amenity creating jobs).
  • AI tech picking overhaul (f.e. willingness to choose rare tech has been reduced from 400% to 50% and a total overhaul for scripted AI tech selection. The important techs are now: extra research speed, extra resource production, resource producing buildings, ship types and starbase types).
  • AI when calculating the economic plan, ai will now take into account what is currently under construction.
  • AI empires that require food will no longer build bio reactors.
  • AI empires who are not using food will now delete agricultural districts if they happen to have one, for example when they conquer planets.
  • AI ethics such as militarist, spiritualist and materialist will now have an effect on the AI overall economical strategy where they will have additional focus on alloys, unity or science respectively.
  • AI fleets who are following a player fleet with "take point" will now merge with each other when they reach the player fleet.
  • AI fleets will now follow the player more closely with a follow command when they are in the same system.
  • AI is now much more likely to prioritize surveying a system if they know there is a colonizable planet there resulting in faster expansion.
  • AI will now look at the individual unemployed pop when considering what job to create for it, solving various issues where jobs were created for pops who could not work them.
  • AI will now demolish superfluous districts, commonly obtained during conquest and purging the previous owners (no more useless planets with tons of empty districts that just cost energy upkeep).
  • AI will now favour researching techs unlocking the weapon type they favour (according to their personality).
  • AI will now make sure planets contain at least one free building slot if it has unemployed pops and it is unable to find any possible construction which contributes to the AI's economic plan.
  • AI will now only build defense platforms if they have maxed out their fleet cap.
  • AI will now only upgrade fleets if there would be a substantial benefit (+30% fleet power - this reduces wasting a lot of alloys unnecessarily).
  • AI will now remember if they have fought against a crisis together with the player and continue following their fleets as long as the threat of the crisis remains.
  • AI will now spend more of its alloys on upgrading starbases when they have reached their fleet cap
  • Added support for "is_essential" property on buildings which when added to the AI build queue will remove all non essential build tasks (used to enforce ai to build ancient cloning vats).
  • AI budget for alloys will now heavily favour building colony ships if we have claimed planets we want to colonize.
  • AI now understands how to evaluate energy grids and other buildings that apply modifiers to the planet (so now it can create specialized planets better).
  • Fixed AI construction deadlock in certain cases due to being in deficit of consumer goods and food at the same time.
  • Fixed AI often aborting jump drive orders during windup.
  • Fixed an issue where AI would continuously upgrade buildings and create an excessive amount of jobs.
  • Fixed an issue where AI would incorrectly multiply the trade value generated by a building by the number of jobs provided by the building twice.
  • Fixed an issue where hive minds were unable to build the spawning pool.
  • Fixed an issue where the AI did not colonize low habitability planets when there are no other options causing doomsday origin empires in particular to often experience a very swift end to their species.
  • Fixed an issue where the AI would not construct buildings to solve unemployment for their slaves.
  • Fixed bug that made the AI desire repeatable techs way more than they were expected to (compared to regular ones).
  • Fixed several issues where AI would get stuck and not build any modules or upgrade any starbases when there were open module slots which were unable to be filled according to the AI's starbase template.
  • Reactivated "Take Point" Follow behavior for fleets. If you select “take point” in a fleet, your allies and subjects are following this fleet during a war or a crisis.
  • Increased allowed budget for alloys on planet construction which prevented AI from building energy grids or other buildings costing alloys.
  • Lithoid empires are now more liberal in spending minerals on their colony ships.
  • Removed weighted random from AI construction as it now more correctly prioritizes which buildings to build.
  • The AI will now use minor artifact decisions with extra focus put on Arcane Deciphering.
  • Fixed an issue where AI necroid empires didn't build chamber of elevation on their planets.
  • Fixed an issue where clone army origin species would not always build ancient clone vats on their new colonies when possible.
  • Fixed an issue where the AI were not allowed to build Gaia Seeders
  • Fixed an issue where the AI would incorrectly evaluate the potential resources gained by constructing a building.
  • Fixed an issue where the AI would sometimes revert to obsolete fallback behaviour when deciding what to build.

###################
# UI
###################
  • Tooltips should no longer show any percentage values with decimals.

###################
# Stability
###################
  • Fixed a bug where the closest_system effect could cause an OOS.
  • Fixed a crash if script tried to change the species rights of a country (e.g. pirates) without species rights.
  • Fixed an OOS if you ever use every_system_in_cluster in a tooltip (luckily, we never did that).
  • Fixed crash when using pass_targeted_resolution in events.

###################
# Bugfix
###################
  • Fixed an issue where pops would mass switch from one job to another (for example maintenance drones).
  • Trade value from jobs now get a penalty from low planet habitability.
  • Added Planetary Automation behaviour for districts that grant Bio-Trophy jobs.
  • Added missing custom icon for ship component "Nanite Repair System".
  • Added missing description for deposit "Project Cornucopia".
  • Added missing tooltip when hovering the shipyard tab of a mega shipyard owned by another empire.
  • Blocked building ships in occupied shipyard.
  • Colonizing Consecrated planets no longer enables breaking the Consecrated Worlds limit.
  • Democratic manadates now check for uncapped rural districts, allowing democratic candidates on shattered rings to usher in a new age of digging too deep and too greedily!
  • Ensured that the Arcology Project checks for agricultural districts on Wet Aquatic worlds.
  • Fixed "The Library" dig site occasionally granting unaccessible deposits
  • Fixed Angler job name not displaying in FR.
  • Fixed Megacorp Death Cults not starting with a Sacrificial Temple.
  • Fixed Megastructure view description sometimes not reflecting the selected Megastructure.
  • Fixed Megastructure view not always using the default image when no structure specific image exists.
  • Fixed a bunch of empire names being missing (and therefore displaying in English) in Chinese. Mainly Machine Empires and the Galactic Imperium.
  • Fixed a dev comment being present in an event text when you encounter an empire with Here Be Dragons during First Contact.
  • Fixed an issue where Medical Workers' habitability bonuses would not affect habitability impacts on pop growth correctly.
  • Fixed an issue where only the fleets of the main attacker would go MIA in enemy territory when a new war starts.
  • Fixed an issue where the tooltip breakdown for the habitability of an uninhabited planet was missing country modifiers.
  • Fixed automatic ship design name generation often generating a design of an invalid name (i.e. one your empire was already using somewhere) on certain name lists.
  • Fixed broken localization reference in Doomsday Origin.
  • Fixed cases of unlocalised text when the Galactic Community or Empire tried to build too many Titans for its Defense Force.
  • Fixed fleet upgrade button telling you your ships were already upgrading telling you your ships were already upgrading twice.
  • Fixed gender selection tooltip in empire creation stating that clicking a non selected gender will revert to default gender settings.
  • Fixed grammar of adding a single clue to an arc site or insight to a first contact.
  • Fixed it being possible to build ships in occupied mega shipyards.
  • Fixed missing loc string for Nemma Mining Operation deposit.
  • Fixed potential issue where Sentinels (crisis-fighters) used the same global event target as Sentinels (stone soldiers from an arc site).
  • Fixed several places where tooltips in the contacts or diplomacy views would mistake guaranteeing and being guaranteed, and supporting independence or having one's independence supported.
  • Fixed some inconsistencies with whether Aquatic habitability modifiers were applied and displayed.
  • Fixed some megastructures not animating properly.
  • Fixed some misgenderings of rulers in German espionage and Galactic Imperium events
  • Fixed starbase modifiers not always being properly updated when removing buildings or components.
  • Fixed that an empty broken Federation details tooltip would show up if you tried to look at the federation of a country with no federation in the contacts view.
  • Fixed the Manifesti faction demanding you outfit your ships with the Gestalt equivalent of sapient combat computers.
  • Fixed the species gender selector not having the correct impact on certain Vanilla species' leader portraits.
  • Fixed transport ship jump drive cooldown resetting when landing on a planet.
  • Increased reward of the "Shattered World" anomaly event from 3 to 5.
  • Loading... New Rogue Servitor Planetary Automation Algorithms installed. Bio-Trophy district management for habitats and city worlds updated... Have a nice day.
  • Machine Intelligence empires with the Rogue Servitor civic won't be forced to burn organics during the Primordial Soup event.
  • Pop job weight for enforcers is now adjusted based on if there is crime or not
  • Science ships no longer get a free survey completion when their target system gets taken over by someone else.
  • Shorten string SLAVE_MARKET in French.
  • Streamlined "Unknown Contact" event chain by turning the "Study the Living Sea" planetary decision into a special project.
  • The Nemma World colony event will now actually fire.
  • The Rubricator is no longer lost to the player if a non-default empire kills Shard
  • The orbital station on New Baldarak (which is rendered useless by the events that create New Baldarak) is now correctly removed.
  • The portrait selection view for empire creation now gets a scrollbar if the number of portraits exceed the two visible rows.
  • Transport Fleets should handle Landing armies better, notably when in Aggressive stance.
  • Venus realized that they were larger than Earth and has decided to shrink to a more appropriate size.
  • You can now build a Fleet Academy if you have queued a Shipyard (you don't need to wait for it to complete).

###################
# Modding
###################
  • Added "random" toggle to scripted loc. If you set "random = no", it will pick the loc key with the highest weight, or the first valid one if no weights are specified, rather than acting as a weighted random
  • Added ai_ignore_was_human console command for toggling ai passiveness after taking over a human controller empire on/off
  • Added complex_trigger_modifier to mtth functions
  • Added complex_trigger_modifier to mtth functions: now you can use complex_trigger_modifier = { trigger = num_favors parameters = { who = from } trigger_scope = owner mode = add potential = { <triggers> } } in places where you could use modifier = { factor = 1 <triggers> }
  • Added downgrade_all_buildings and downgrade_buildings_of_type effects
  • Added is_starbase_type trigger
  • Added script_values, which are like ai_weight versions of scripted triggers. You can refer to them by key to get a number via value:my_value
  • Added skip_federation_cooldowns console command
  • Easier mod overwriting of objects that dynamically add modifiers
  • Enabled further mathematical operations in many modifier = { factor = x } fields. The full list is now: set, mult/factor, add, subtract, divide, modulo, round_to, round = yes, floor = yes, ceiling, max, min, abs = yes (all taking a number on the right, except where otherwise specified)
  • Enabled scripted localization for base scopes, meaning that "Root." is no longer needed in some localization strings
  • Exposed the default megastructure portrait key as a define
  • Extensive defines to modify the math around the planetary ascension
  • Fixed a number of potential crashes on startup due to interactions between the load order and a number of effects and triggers
  • Fixed a variety of issues with the use of variables as multipliers in triggered resource tables
  • Fixed ambient objects' scale_to_size making ambient objects appear a different size the first time you looked at a solar system than subsequent times.
  • Fixed crash when closing TweakerGUI
  • Fixed issues where mods overwriting objects (e.g. jobs) that dynamically add modifiers would cause issues where the added modifiers would not work
  • In value-based triggers where you would say e.g. num_pops > 32, you can now no longer say num_pops > from, but you can instead say num_pops > from.trigger:num_pops. This change was doing for technical reasons, to save on memory usage by not saving two event targets in each trigger
  • Often-reused scripted effects and triggers will now no longer show misleading file locations in error logs
  • Replaced the modification boolean flag for traits with the additional triggers species_possible_add, species_possible_merge_add and species_possible_merge_remove
  • Stopped some weight/chance fields inexplicably returning 1 even when script said the base should be 0
  • Variables that accepted "trigger:<trigger>" now also accept "modifier:<modifier>"
  • You can no longer use "count" in any_x triggers. You should use count_x instead (which uses much better code)
  • You can now use count_x script lists in export_trigger_value_to_variable

Since this is still a very much in active development branch, we have a few known issues in the Open Beta to keep things spicy. Localization for new strings are currently only available in English, and some things may still only be partially implemented or give placeholder rewards. Due to the many changes, 3.3 Unity Open Beta is not save game compatible with existing saves, and may or may not be compatible with the eventual 3.3 "Libra" release.

The following are some of the known issues in the 3.3 Unity Open Beta. This list is not exhaustive and some issues have already been resolved internally but did not make the open beta build. If you encounter any issues however not reported here please report them via the bug forums :)
  • Sacrifice edicts are not showing their up front Unity costs. Conveniently, they're also not charging them at the moment. Heads still roll though.
  • Unity costs for faction manipulation are not implemented yet.
  • The Byzantine Bureaucracy and Parliamentary System civics need tooltip updating.
  • Depreciated triggers, modifiers, buildings and jobs have yet to be totally removed.
  • Influence from Power Projection tooltip is unclear and needs refactoring.
  • Planetary Ascension does not have any form of confirmation.
  • Fleet reinforcements sometimes create a new fleet instead of joining the fleet it is supposed to.
  • Species traits look a bit wonky in the colonisation window.
  • Aquatic pop portraits not randomizing properly or applying gender options reliably.
  • Void Dwellers with Permanent Employment start with a ruined posthumous employment centre.
  • The tooltip informing the player of the cost to reform their government does not explain how the cost is calculated.
  • AI implementation for new features is still using hot code.
  • AI issue where they are building a lot of buildings that are not using jobs such as luxury housing
  • After submitting to the Khan you will quickly just be attacked again, so don't give up!

Please keep all Open Beta feedback in this thread and report bugs in the bug reports forum so we can keep track of everything. Thanks!

Enjoy, and see you next week, when we’ll have @Caligula Caesar explaining all of the new modding tricks we’re adding in 3.3.

Edit:
Due to an AI uprising, the modding diary will be #240, not #239. Sorry!
 
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Reactions:
Kabian said:
will you be able to ascend habitats as VD? maybe even increasing size?
Planetary Ascension does work on habitats, but the only way to increase their size is still their upgrade.

apples951 said:
Can hive minds get their own variant of Reanimators? I've been wanting to play as the Flood for so long.
Maybe, if we cram enough cinnamon buns into Iggy.

I'd want it to have some unique flavor though, so it wouldn't play exactly the same as the others.

MarkDey said:
Does this enhancement require the Federations DLC?
Yes. The different federation types are still part of Federations, this change provides more ways of gaining access to them.

Dr. B said:
Will monospecies/monoculture empires get more unity than multi-species empires?
We don't have any mechanics based on that currently, but it would be an interesting thing to explore, perhaps with xenophobic edicts.

Tannhäuser Cake said:
What about Culture Workers from Alien Zoo buildings?
Zoos give Entertainer/Duelist jobs.

tribnia said:
Having zoos give Duelist sounds strange...
Gladiators!

Edorath said:
Will the extra designation bonuses from the Greater Good resolutions also be buffed with planetary ascensions?
They should.

Bdwetzler said:
How does this work in a total war, where planets can "permanently" change hands many times before the war ends?
They will count as permanent owner change. Total Wars are nasty.

xking said:
I wonder what this means for the pleasure seekers civic. Considering what it does to entertainers.
Time to find the brain bleach.

Inny said:
"Easier mod overwriting of objects that dynamically add modifiers."
This is huge. Can you expand on this please? Will this remove the need to do a full file overwrite of jobs, buildings, districts, etc?
What about the objects that will duplicate instead of overwrite if we don't do a full file overwrite, like technologies or planet classes?
Next week's dev diary will be all about the new powers in the modding section.

MathyM said:
Can I unlock achievements while running the Open Beta?
I believe so.
MathyM said:
Also, can a Spiritualist empire with Discovery now start a Research Cooperative?
Yes, if they've also taken the Diplomacy tradition to found a Federation. Otherwise if they have completed Discovery, they can propose their current Federation changes to a Research Coop.

MathyM said:
Why does Habitat Upgrade still cost Influence? Doesn’t it make more sense (as well as being more consistent) for it to cost Unity?
Things related to transport and living space remain Influence.

OnyxAbussos said:
Zombie Mind Control Parasite Neurotoxin Shenanigans
Iggy keeps sending me a link to the Ophiocordyceps unilateralis wiki page.

BrokenSky said:
I feel like ascension tiers representing "the active will of the people supporting your government and giving a little extra to do things the way they’ve always been done" doesn't really mesh thematically with the fact that you can change planetary designations at will...
In the first design draft we did have them lock the designation in, but it felt very punishing and unfun.

Bullxdog33 said:
Has the team thought about reworking on the Psionic Ascension; more specifically The Shroud and what you can get from it? Any possible events that maybe be added once you have gained access to it aswell?
I'd love to revisit the Shroud, but that requires time and resources and the blessing of those higher up the food chain than I.

Bezborg said:
In the patch notes:

  • Added ai_ignore_was_human console command for toggling ai passiveness after taking over a human controller empire on/off


    Can someone please explain what this means? Is it if I use the console to change to another empire and edit it a bit, I can unpause for a while without fear that my original empire will be ruined by the AI at the help, until I return? If so, then I have to input this code before I switch to another empire and back?
So there's a bunch of stuff the AI is banned from doing if the empire it is controlling was recently (within 10 years or so) a human player - this is made in the case that players drop out in an MP game. However for AI testing it isn't great, since it limits what the AI can do, ergo there's now this console command.

j0hnk18 said:
Hi I am hoping someone can clarify/help me out. I opted in and downloaded the beta. But when I run the game it displays all the 3.2 info and what not, despite saying beta 3.3 at the bottom for the build. So it says I'm in 3.3 but it hasn't changed anything and is still running 3.2. Anyone know of a fix for this?
The welcome screen for 3.3 wasn't ready for the beta release.

Seyfried said:
Is the Beta only available for the Steam version? Can I get it through the Paradox Launcher?
Yes, the beta is only available via Steam.
 

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Any sufficiently advanced Human Resources department is indistinguishable from dark magic.
(To any sceptics: Frankenstein was the beginning of the science fiction genre. This is essentially just Frankenstein on a sci-fi space opera scale.)

Some questions regarding the Permanent Employment civic for Megacorp(se) empires:
  • Can zombies be sold as slaves?
  • Can zombies be sacrificed by (Corporate) Death Cults?
  • Can zombies generate trade, that varies depending on their living standard?
  • Can zombies work as soldiers, and spawn armies? If so, are the armies undead?
  • Can zombies be purged with less restrictions and consequences than other types of pop purging? ("it's not mass murder if they are already dead")
  • Why no reanimated armies for this civic?
  • Any tentative plans to let zombies ever rise up against their masters, similar to robots?
  • Any tentative plans for a new colossus type, for instant incorpseoration of pops into your empire?
Some questions regarding the vanilla Reanimators civic:
  • Any tentative plans for regular Reanimators to gain the ability to create zombies?
  • Any chance of Necromancers getting engineering research output, to be more in line with sci-fi ideas of using cybernetics as part of a reanimation process?
 
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Planetary Ascension Tiers​


The Planetary Ascension sounds bit like what a old world should be if it is allowed to develop peacefully.

Are the extra bonuses to the planet designation instant? I have always found it bit silly that the designations can be changed at will to get the instant benefits from them and the this feature makes it even more noticeable.

And now I am going to spend next hour reading the patch notes...
 
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With all of those ways to spend unity on I feel like tech rushing will become compeletly irrelevant because of empire sprawl and bonuses to economy. But we can always rebalance it later though
 
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Oh boy. Let's go to 3.3 !
 
I love the idea of Planetary Ascension but I feel like Pacifists should a reduce unity cost as their whole thing is peaceful development

I also love the idea behind Permanent Employment so can hive minds get their own variant of Reanimators? I've been wanting to play as the Flood for so long.
 
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###################
# Features
###################

  • Finishing tradition trees now unlocks the ability to select previously locked Federation types.
    • Mercantile unlocks Trade League
    • Discovery unlocks Research Cooperative
    • Unyielding unlocks Martial Alliance
    • Domination unlocks Hegemony

Does this enhancement require the Federations DLC?
 
Miscellaneous:
  • Regenerative Hull Tissue, Nanite Repair System and Nanobot Cloud have had their values sliced in half however they now heal on a percentage basis rather than a static one leading to a net buff in most situations.
  • Scientists currently researching a technology can now gain new traits as they level up.

Nice! Those both look good to me, with Regenerative Hull Tissue being something I actually might pick now.
 
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How about removing the e-spionage techs and replacing them by e-spionage ascension tiers, similar to the planetary ascension tiers. This would allow a proper e-spionage focus with unity, so having the best tech does not mean anymore that u also have the best e-spionage and noone can use higher spy level operations against u (for example steal ur tech).
 
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