Stellaris Dev Diary #174 - Federations is out, now what?

[Capt.Picard]

2.6.3 countains multiple OOS fixes.

I am really glad for this, let's hope it actually makes a huge difference, because OOS is a game and fun killer.

 

[hfel]

Or some Authoritarian vs the egalitarian Greater Good.

I don't think the greater good concept should be limited to egalitarians. In point of fact I think it works better the other way around: Authoritarians want individual sacrifice for the good of the social organism, while egalitarians -- by insisting on everyone's equal rights -- are more individualistic and prize the freedom of the individual from any social convention or bond that solidifies the larger social organism.

 

[ThatRabidPotato]

Unsure if it's already been said, but PLEASE add some more to the current Origins, as well as maybe more Origins.

I mentioned it before the DLC released, and as it turned out it wasn't in: Why don't Fallen Empires notice or care if you have the Remnants Origin? A civilization that was once their peer is now on the come back? Maybe give other empires Archaeological Digs relating to you, ending with a Relic, and give you a CB to take the Relic back? (A cool idea I saw on Reddit, can't take credit for it.)

Galactic Doorstep needs more than literally just a Gateway.

Origins just need more love. Such a cool concept.

 

[James Fire]

If it's as easy as changing a single line, then why is it still broken after the change they have made?

I answered this in the comment you responded to. Go read it.

I find it funny that you're quick to criticise modders for not having a robust enough mod, especially when they are voluntarily fixing an issue the devs haven't bothered to fix themselves for the past two years.

I'm a modder myself, that is attempting to fix empire sprawl. So yeah, I criticize doing extra things you don't need to.

According to the discussion in the mods steam page, the single line of code that paradox used to "fix" the issue cannot even be found anywhere in the game files.

Then they aren't looking hard enough. I've seen it, I've considered changing it. I'd post what it is, but I'm not at my computer.

How did it partially fix it? Pops seem to pick ethics almost randomly, as even after 100 years I still have factions at ~20% support when the game tells me they should be moving towards < 5%.

Materialist faction was at 25% support. Promote faction, 30 years later they're at 40%. (Numbers not exact, but it did happen)

I find this to be a fault of the calculations in the UI, not ethics shift itself being broken.

 

[Methone]

I mentioned it before the DLC released, and as it turned out it wasn't in: Why don't Fallen Empires notice or care if you have the Remnants Origin? A civilization that was once their peer is now on the come back?

This was asked, and answered, on the twitter.

"Do fallen empires recognize you if you have Remnants?"

"They recognize you as a primitive."

They didn't think much of you then, and they don't think much of you now.

Galactic Doorstep needs more than literally just a Gateway.

Yeah, why did we get Gateway Origin instead of 'Wrong Climate' origin? The latter could actually fit 2 of the preset empires.

 

[GeorgieBest]

I answered this in the comment you responded to. Go read it.

I'm a modder myself, that is attempting to fix empire sprawl. So yeah, I criticize doing extra things you don't need to.

Then they aren't looking hard enough. I've seen it, I've considered changing it. I'd post what it is, but I'm not at my computer.


Materialist faction was at 25% support. Promote faction, 30 years later they're at 40%. (Numbers not exact, but it did happen)

I find this to be a fault of the calculations in the UI, not ethics shift itself being broken.

If you don't believe me and all the other people who agree that POPs do not change ethics and that ethics attraction is not working correctly, then go do your own tests and come back.


Strange hill to die on.

 

[James Fire]

If you don't believe me and all the other people who agree that POPs do not change ethics and that ethics attraction is not working correctly,

I don't believe you because it was working better, which is what I asserted in the first place.

then go do your own tests and come back.

I presume you have these rigorous tests that are more than just looking at your factions every once in a while in a normal game? Cause that's all you've said you've done, and same for me.

Strange hill to die on.

I could say the same for you.

Also, looking at the mod you linked, it still works.

 

[GeorgieBest]

I don't believe you because it was working better, which is what I asserted in the first place.

I presume you have these rigorous tests that are more than just looking at your factions every once in a while in a normal game? Cause that's all you've said you've done, and same for me.


I could say the same for you.

Also, looking at the mod you linked, it still works.

So you say it's working better but that the only testing you've done is looking at the factions screen every now and then? I think we're done here.

 

[Unendingfear]

Can we please also get some changes to Robots, Droids, and Synthetics? Synthetic ascension ist way to strong. The game is forcing players to use robots cause of the big pop growth(
at least equivalent to +66% bio pop growth on 100% habitability). There should be a trade-off when someone is using robots in general. You balanced Maschine Empires well. Now we need similar changes to normal Robots and Synthetic Ascension. Using Robots should be an ideological choice, not an economic necessary choice. Which means there is no choice at all in the current state of the game.

I couldn’t disagree more with your bolded statement. Automation has time and time again been the fastest way to improve economic output historically. It is an ideological decision; yes, one that values capital and resource production over labour rights and tradition. Not using robots is an ideological choice that runs directly contrary to economic growth. It would be nice for Stellaris to have such a robust internal politics system that such choices become valid gameplay paths, but to relegate robotics to a purely ideological realm would be absurd.

 

[James Fire]

So you say it's working better but that the only testing you've done is looking at the factions screen every now and then? I think we're done here.

You say it's completely broken and that all you've done is look at the factions screen every now and then, so how is that any different?

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

Yeah, why did we get Gateway Origin instead of 'Wrong Climate' origin? The latter could actually fit 2 of the preset empires.

Galactic Doorstep IS more than just a gateway AFAIK. It has an event chain and a digsite associated with it. Not sure if there are multiple outcomes or not, though.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

I couldn’t disagree more with your holder statement. Automation has time and time again been the fastest way to improve economic output historically. It is an ideological decision; yes, one that values capital and resource production over labour rights and tradition. Not using robots is an ideological choice that runs directly contrary to economic growth. It would be nice for Stellaris to have such a robust internal politics system that such choices become valid gameplay paths, but to relegate robotics to a purely ideological realm would be absurd.

Once upon a time (pre-2.2), robots had a number of trade-offs and weren't a one-size-fits-all blanket solution that EVERY empire was better off using.

It absolutely shouldn't be a purely ideological decision.

 

[GeorgieBest]

You say it's completely broken and that all you've done is look at the factions screen every now and then, so how is that any different?

Where did I say that the only testing I have done is occasionally looking at the faction page?

 

[Methone]

Once upon a time (pre-2.2), robots had a number of trade-offs and weren't a one-size-fits-all blanket solution that EVERY empire was better off using.

... they weren't? I don't remember it that way.

 

[Unendingfear]

Once upon a time (pre-2.2), robots had a number of trade-offs and weren't a one-size-fits-all blanket solution that EVERY empire was better off using.

It absolutely shouldn't be a purely ideological decision.

I’ve been playing robots since 1.0. I know what kind of changes they’ve been through. I used to get my empire to 100% robots by not colonizing until I had droids and keeping my primary species locked to my home world, losing it after I had Synths, and bombing the pops down to 0 so I was 100% synthetic. I firmly believe though that given two empires of roughly equal size and resources; if one chooses to forgo using robots as an ideological decision it should have a weaker economy than the empire that embraces robotics.

 

[Brael]

FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THINGS SPACE. FIX. THE. DESYNCS! (multiplayer is impossible to play past 2320.)

Yep. I tend to play coop, and prior to this patch on a large sized map the game would desync with just 2 players nearly every day by 2450. Played a large map as soon as the expansion released and we couldn't even get to 2350.

I know the desync issue was supposed to be a major focus of this expansion, and I have to say it's been disappointing. On the other hand, there have only been a minimal number of desyncs on a smaller map so far, but smaller maps are just so much less interesting.

 

[TofuFox]

Galactic Doorstep IS more than just a gateway AFAIK. It has an event chain and a digsite associated with it. Not sure if there are multiple outcomes or not, though.

There's at least one event that differs between playthroughs, but it's not that varied.

 

[Androidmead]

Right now it feels like there's not a lot of choice in how many envoys should be in your federation and federations level painfully slowly with no way to increase it. I'd like to see envoys increase the max XP a federation can gain. For example each envoy could add +1 max federation XP gain. So a federation with 4 envoys would have a maximum XP gain of 14. That potentially allows for more interesting decisions and for speedier federation levelling for players who want it IMO.

 

[Bones13]

Overall I am very happy with the new content and will be playing many more games of this with my friends. I will try to leave a little constructive feedback.

1) Federation Fleets still do not Auto Upgrade correctly and I am constantly going back in to adjust and update my fleet. This has been an issue for quite some time and is very troublesome in larger games with many player trying to adapt to the competition of live players. Your ships get left out of date and overrun because you fall behind the tech curve without a lot of extra micro management. This has been one of our biggest pet peeves for some time. Many players would avoid Federations just so they didn't have to deal with this. Now, we want to really enjoy this content and we hope this does not push us away again.

2) We have also noticed that going into the ship designer, especially with Federation Fleets causes a lot or De-Sync problems for us. On a good note, we do notice less De-Sync overall and hope that a few more fixes will make it very consistent. This makes us very happy and we are enjoying much longer sessions of play.

3) The AI seems to just constantly flood the Galactic Community with laws repeatedly even if it gets voted down over and over again. We have even noticed that some AI will sponsor a law, get it pushed to the top to get to the floor and then vote against their own proposal. Our Suggestion Might be to have a slight increase to the Influence cost of the proposals and to have the AI better align with laws that actually benefit them. We have noticed specifically that Spiritualist and Slavers will often push for laws that impose sanctions against them.

4) There needs to be either a window with more organized details of what each active laws is contributing and an easier way to find out which laws are imposing sanctions against players. In multiplayer games we try to keep the game running but often find that as we reach mid to late game we are pausing often so the players can each figure out how they are in breach of Galactic Law, search through policies to see if they can change them, or what law they need to try to repeal or use a Veto power to stop. We do understand that there is a learning curve and we do like the overall principle. We would just like a little better layout of information to keep our game moving when we are The Swarm is invading and the Fallen Empires are starting a War in Heaven. We love how it all stacks up and have to deal with the complex problems we make for ourselves. We just want to Know how we got there and why !

Thank you so much for all that you do. Most of the people I game with have been playing this game since release and we can never seem to get enough of it.

Cheers !

 

[Wyti]

Small thing, but I would love for some UI QoL when choosing which resolution to vote.
Currently we can only preview the modifiers for the resolution being voted when they are proposed to be passed.
During a proposition to repel them, we only see their name (and its hard to remember all of them).