• We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.

Stellaris Dev Diary #187 - Post-mortem

Zaztl’s time had come. The Ritual of Elevation was soon to begin, and as she was inching ever closer to her own final destiny, she wondered “Is this perhaps the start of a new life?”. She couldn’t help but to latch on to hope in her moment of dread, but she also knew the futility of the question.

No Jeferian would ever know the answer to that question.

Shumon ins-Beth was born, the newest individual to join the Pasharti species.


---------------

1602149714895.png


The result of dark experimentation by the Jeferians - the former owners of the planet Taralon - the Pashartians are the ultimate parasites. Originally a semi-sapient creature dwelling in the depths of Taralon's mountains, the Jeferians uplifted and augmented them to act as a subservient slave race. However, their uplifting was rather too effective, and they unleashed a monster. Horrified at the capabilities of their creation - which included the ability to absorb other sentient species and turn them into Pashartians - the Jeferians tried to shut down the experiment. However, a small group of uplifted Pashartians escaped.

Over the years, they bided their time, managing not only to evade capture, but also gradually increase their numbers and develop a technological base to rival the Jeferians. Eventually, the Jeferians noticed that something was amiss, but by then they were powerless to resist.

Soon the Pashartians had seized control of the planet, unleashing violent pogroms on their erstwhile oppressors - all the while further increasing their numbers. Now poised to take to the stars, the Pashartians stand ready to pursue what they see as their solemn duty - the conversion of all lesser life forms to their likeness.


---------------

Hello everyone!

Two weeks ago we announced the Necroids Species Pack, and today we’ll be giving you more information about the gameplay aspects. But first, I’ll take the opportunity to link the trailer once again, in case you missed it.


For Necroids we wanted to add some new gameplay that would be available to many more different types of empires and species. Unlike Lithoids, these Civics and Origins will not require you to use a Necroid portrait. For Lithoids we felt like it made sense, but in this case we didn’t want to impose any limitations on your imagination and creativity.

Necroids gameplay includes:
  • Necrophage (Origin)
  • Memorialist (Civic)
  • Death Cult (Civic)
  • Reanimated Armies (Civic)

1602149745689.png

Necrophage is a new Origin that means that your primary species has a very hard time to procreate by themselves, but is instead dependent on transforming other Pops into themselves.

1602149789054.png

Necrophage Trait - live long and consume

1602149798241.png

Chamber of Elevation - when regular Uplifting isn’t enough

1602149808856.png

Necrophytes - Hey, what does the necro part of my job title stand for anyway?

---

In addition, there is also the Reanimated Armies civic that we showed in DD #185. This civic replaces the Military Academy with a Dread Encampment, and can recruit Undead Armies that are unaffected by morale.

1602149830251.png

Reanimated Armies - the ultimate in recycling.

1602149838710.png

Dread Encampment Building - wouldn’t want to get caught dead here

1602149846240.png

Undead Army - it’s not wight how they work them to the bone, but they don’t complain

1602149857376.png

Necromancer job - some say it’s a dead end job, but they’ve made a grave mistake
(Note: Above image includes the bonus from Ground Defense Planning)

This civic has a few restrictions - no pacifists, and it conflicts with Citizen Service since it replaces the Military Academy. Some subtle differences exist between Soldiers granted by Military Academies and the Necromancers from Dread Encampments - they’re Specialist tier and provide more defense armies, provide some research benefits, and will summon additional defense armies under Martial Law instead of increasing Stability.

---

That is all for this week! Next week we’ll take a look at the art process and all the effort that goes into creating the Necroid portraits!

We’ll be eagerly reading your responses, and remember that...
1602149867977.png

Jeff sees all
 
  • 154Like
  • 145
  • 16
  • 7
  • 4Love
  • 1Haha
Reactions:
Why no bio-gestalt version?
1602157007143.png

Where is the Gestalt love PDX?
It'd be on-point to have a necroid gestalt origin that was created by some ancient aliens as an experiment, and it now needs to consume other sentient lifeforms to expand its legions of drones.

Also, unlimited zombie armies?
No army rework in sight then? Just doubling down on army spam? OK....
 
Last edited:
  • 27
  • 2Like
Reactions:
Weekly reminder that a DLC -no matter how interesting in concept or well in execution- for a fundamentally broken base game is entirely pointless.

On the topic: Is there anything that stops the AI from uplifting slave species into extinction and therefore killing it's own pop growth for good?
 
  • 65
  • 8
  • 4Like
Reactions:
Uh. This isn't gonna work out very well with the current system. You can only 'grow' one pop at a time in the game right now. So how's that supposed to work with Necrophage? In the early game, you'll have the issue of maintaining alien pops vs Necrphage with a lot of micro. In the late game, you'll never realistically be able to convert even a fraction of all the pops you'll lord over. It might be slightly better if you could 'build' Necrophages and still have regular pops 'grow' on the side...

Seems very meh.
 
  • 35
  • 6Like
  • 3
  • 1
Reactions:
I look forward to conquering the galaxy in for the Goa'uld System Lords.

Also, seems like there is a typo in the Necrophage description if you haven't caught it yet. I'm assuming "Prepatent" is supposed to be "Presapient," right?

I stand corrected. Prepatent it is.
 
Last edited:
  • 3
  • 1Like
  • 1Love
  • 1
Reactions:
  • 36
  • 7Haha
  • 7
  • 4Like
  • 1
Reactions:
I look forward to conquering the galaxy in for the Goa'uld System Lords.

Also, seems like there is a typo in the Necrophage description if you haven't caught it yet. I'm assuming "Prepatent" is supposed to be "Presapient," right?

Courtesy of Google:
Prepatent refers to the period between infection with a parasite and the production of eggs by a female; equivalent to the incubation period of microbial infections, but biologically different because the parasite is going through developmental stages in the host. :)
 
  • 12
  • 2Like
  • 1
  • 1
Reactions:
I want to play a necrophage but they seem like they might be a terrible choice if you prefer pacisim. Thematically the idea of these darkly seductive dead(ish) guys that everyone knows need other species to subsume but they have a lot of immigration because they're just so damn sexy/mysterious attaracts me A LOT but that's only feasible if they don't have migration/large diplomatic penalties.
 
  • 3
Reactions:
This has to be deliberate at this point, no one can be so thick so as not to notice the future PR nightmare.
If we ignore it, don't acknowledge it, and not respond. It's just going to go away on it's own eventually!
 
  • 27Haha
  • 11
  • 2
  • 1Like
Reactions:
Really, people are in line to ask/demand/beg verification that you will look into the issues being reported over and over again and the official responses in the thread are about... prepatent/presapient?

Well.
 
  • 43
  • 3Like
  • 3
  • 2Haha
Reactions:
Meh.
Should have been a new purge type that kills off a pop and creates a new one, like parasytes in forgotten hivequeens mod
needing 1 building, and 3 pop per 10 year is weak. Conversion needs to be continous to avoid the mentioned turn it on every 10 year exploit
 
  • 16
  • 1Like
  • 1
Reactions:
If we ignore it, don't acknowledge it, and not respond. It's just going to go away on it's own eventually!

More like "Let's not make promises and then disappoint." :)
 
  • 46
  • 7Like
  • 4Haha
  • 3
Reactions:
... Aaaand here I was secretly hoping that the title would mean more of a talk about the state of the game. Oh well ...

On topic: this origin seems highly problematic from a gameplay perspective - necrophage pops can still grow and thus completely kill off the thrall species growth required to properly reproduce. That, and the conversion rate, when calculated as a growth rate equivalent, is pretty alright, but nothing stellar ... but is essentially assimilation. So it's basically biological driven assimilators with a "fixed" growth rate of the primary pop and a debuff to secondary pop growth... Do they suffer the appropriate diplomatic penalties and tradition swaps?

Too lazy to run the comparison numbers-wise to actual Driven Assimilators, but at a rough guess, actually worse (fixed max primary growth rate of 2.5 per month, same rate subtracted from thrall species growth).
 
  • 23
  • 1Like
  • 1
Reactions:
More like "Let's not make promises and then disappoint." :)
It's possible to talk and not make promises while still acknowledging the problem, though. This has been discussed in other threads, and the consensus seems to be very much to be that "we're trying to do x, we can absolutely not make any promises about the results, here's what it is: [...]" would still be better than having radio silence on the issue.
 
  • 40
  • 2Like
  • 2
Reactions:
Really, people are in line to ask/demand/beg verification that you will look into the issues being reported over and over again and the official responses in the thread are about... prepatent/presapient?

Well.

Or you know, he’s answering what he can/is allowed to answer.
 
  • 14Like
  • 5
  • 1
  • 1
Reactions: