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Stellaris Dev Diary #47 - Guardians

Hello everyone and welcome to another Stellaris development diary. Today we'll continue talking about the Leviathans Story Pack, specifically its headline feature: the Guardians.

The Guardians (Paid Feature)
The Guardians, or Leviathans as they're also known, are space-dwelling beings of immense power. They vary a great deal in biology and composition: Some are enormous space creatures, some are technological remnants of ancient civilizations, and some are something far different altogether. How you find them also varies - some you may encounter in their home systems, jealously guarding their territory, others may be unleashed on the galaxy by exploring the wrong planet or star.

The chance of a particular Guardian being present in your game will depend on the size of your galaxy - a tiny galaxy might only have one or two, while a Huge galaxy might contain nearly all or even all of them if you explore far enough. Defeating them, or in some cases, helping them, will unlock rewards in the form of resources, empire-wide modifiers and unique technologies. Guardians vary in power, but are meant to be a serious challenge for a mid-game empire, so don't expect to be able to bring them down in the first decades of the game.

Below I am going to talk a little about a few of the Guardians. These are just a sample and not nearly all of them, but we want to avoid showing off everything there is for a player to find in the Leviathans Story Pack for those who wish to explore and find out for themselves.
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The Space Dragon
The Space Dragon is a capricious being, jealously guarding its hoard. With this particular Guardian, there is no reasoning or dialogue... it wants to be left alone, and will attack any and all trespassers in its territory. If you wish to get at its hoard, you will have to slay it, and you had best be sure to bring a large enough fleet - anger it enough, and it will not settle for simply driving you off. Should you bring it down, however, the vast mineral riches of its hoard will be yours to claim... and who knows what you might find among the treasures. Technology, artifacts... perhaps even a dragon egg?
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The Infinity Machine
The Infinity Machine, a strange metal sphere, sits at the edge of a massive black hole, unmoving. It does not attack as you approach, does not communicate, does not even react. It seems to be waiting for something. Perhaps if you find a way to speak with it, you can find out what it wants. Perhaps you can even help it? Or, if you choose, you could simply order your fleet to attack... after all, how much of a threat could a mere metal sphere be?
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Stellarite
What can live inside a star?

What sort of being can withstand, and even thrive in, such immense heat and pressure?

What could be its purpose?

... what does it eat?
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That's all for today! Next week we'll be talking about changes to the graphics and sound of Stellaris coming in the Heinlein update, as well as a teaser on the more than 20 minutes of new music by Andreas Waldetoft included in the Leviathans Story Pack.
 
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Excession?

"call me lightning rod call me conduit call me highway, scout, catalyst, observer, call me what you will i was there when i was required..."
 
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They look great, but still think its odd to have payed content this early when the game is still such a mess. The mid/end game is super dull, so now we have to pay to make it somewhat interesting. I know this has been said to death, but still think this should have been free or released once we have had some actually updates.
Any word on price ? Looking at the content I am guessing £5 max, anymore than that will be a bit of slap in the face.

There will always be free things and paid things, the paid things are what enables them to do the free things for free.

A "max of $5" is an undervalued estimate based just on what we've seen, not that we've probably seen it all yet. Can't really form an opinion on what the price would be since we haven't seen the whole package. Though I think $10 would be reasonable.
 
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Really hoping the tech we scavange off these guys will be SUPER worth it ya-ow!
 
I'm looking forward to dragging awakened empire and end game crisis fleets into a system with one of these that's hostile and then legging it.
 
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Maybe it can be possible to write some different storylines for each of that guardians, with random activation when you're trying to approach? For replayability and savoring "exploration-of-unknown"-spirit for the next ten times player meets it?
I mean, well, it's good mystery for a player who plays first time, but second or third (not to say more) will be kinda... not boring maybe, but automated. "Ah, that sphere, of course I know what to do, I'll activate it to... WHAT THE HELL THIS DAMNED THING SHOULD GIVE ME A TECH NOT EATING ALL MY FLEET!" can be quite better! :)
 
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