Stellaris Dev Diary #193: Signal Discovered

[The_Draco]

Well, in my Opinion, Envoys should be Leaders, with this coming Update, they are used as Dipolmats, Communication-Officers and why at least not also as Spys... so why shouldn't they are Leaders with traits like Scientists are, wich are used for Research, Survey and Archeology atm, also 3 "jobs" for Scientists as for Envoys...
I would make Envoys work like normal Leaders, also make them possible to become Ruler in a somehow diplomatic based Empire, for example the Blorgs Ruler could be an Envoy, would make Sense for them xD

Also it should not be the Envoys-cap that gets changed with civics, traits and techs and such, but their efficiency, so that you have to use more Envoys for the same work if you are a "not-diplomatic" empire...and if Envoys are also used as Spys, theyr efficiency there could be modified same way, with other civics, traits and so on, that a non-diplomatic Empire would have to use more Envoys for Improving Relations, than a corvee-Empire but less for Espionage stuff, cause of another civic they have but the corvee one don't.

Hovever, i also would like to be able to attack Empires i don't have Comms with and even invade their Planets, for some Empires like Devouring Swarms/Terravores, FPs, Babaric Despoilers, Exterminators, Driven Assimilators and also some "normal" xenophobe or millitary Empires it would be "normal" (even for Necrophages it would make somehow Sense as for "Slavehunters")

 

[The_Draco]

Pretty sure the only reason they're pseudo-leaders now is that without a tweak to how leader assignment works it would be a pain to remember where an Envoy was when you replaced them. Currently if you lose any other kind of leader you can find out what job just became empty pretty quickly, either by glancing at your notifications or the outliner. This is because your slots for other leaders are pretty much intended to always be filled (every fleet has an admiral, every science ship a scientist, every sector a governer etc). So not only is the list of slots small and easy to find a recently vacated slot is obvious because it's likely the only one.

With envoys you could potentially send them to any other empire, or a federation, or the GC. For Envoys to not be a pain you'd need at least notifications for exactly where an envoy was just lost, if not a planner of some sort that shows recently vacated positions.

Well, i think so too, ther is a need of something showing where the Envoys are, maybe a "rework" of the Leader-Panel could be helpful, if it would show more Details of where the Leader exactly is, what he currently does and how long it may take till it can be reassingned...

I also tink an Envoy used for Comms, Empire-Relations and such (maybe also for Espionage) should get a Ship, like Scientists have, in case to make it more easy to control where the Envoy is, only difference between science- and that envoy-ships should be that Envoys can cross closed Borders...

Envoys used for Federations or GC are like Scientists in the Research Panel, they stay at the Federations- or GC-Offices at soud Capital and don't need a Ship so xD

 

[Staal]

1. Should envoys not be rolled into "governors", a general sort of administrative/political role?
2. I really like this expansion of exploration.
3. I don't follow the forums all the closely but what is eta on expansion of fleet logistics or otherwise overhauling the military aspect of the game? I would like fleet operations to be a bit more nuanced and varied.

 

[Red Earth]

It's easy to see how envoys could be fun, but its also easy to see how it would be really annoying to have to manually adjust which envoys are working on what. Especially with a re-assignment cooldown. I think a better option would be to be able to specialize your foreign office somehow. No promises!

My thought is to give envoys individual levels, traits etc. but have their effect be collective, contributing to the effectiveness of your whole diplomatic corp to avoid micromanaging but still have them gain or lose traits and have it matter what species have citizenship/leadership rights.

 

[_MikeS_]

So are we also going to get a special first contact event chain for Dessanu Consonance (L-Cluster) ?

 

[Scottsman]

Love it. Are the references to intel points maybe a hint we'll be getting a espionage system too?!

 

[HugsAndSnuggles]

Interesting. Hopefully [redacted] is not a game-breaking DLC-exclusive, like it is for HOI4.

Exploration has always been one of the best parts of Stellaris

Which is what you should expand the first opportunity you get: if it survives through mid-game, Stellaris will feel less shallow, and science ships will have use for majority of the game, moving them them closer to be integral part of it rather than afterthought.

(Envoys do still currently not have traits or levels, but it is something we are actively discussing.)

I don't get it: what's there to discuss?

 

[FleetingRain]

The difficulty of the first contact investigation will be affected by things like how friendly the target is, or how difficult it is to translate their signals.

Goodness yes, it always irked me how we had some universal translator out of nowhere. We should have to put a first effort into translating those weird aliens' messages!

I like that First Contact uses Archeology mechanics but the UI really should be different. It's very WIP right now however so I'm not complaining.

 

[Mavkiel]

I don't get it: what's there to discuss?

Probably balance and display issues. Where do you put the envoy screen? Where do you hire/fire them? Do you allow them to have negative traits? Do positive/negative traits have events with them? If so, how far down that rabbit hole do they want to go? (I can see a whole dlc linked with envoy events).

Heck I can see envoys having many events associated with them. An envoy set to improve relations with an empire for 20+ years might be a celebrated entity in that empire. They could even have a day of mourning when he/she/it dies. (Or a day of celebration for those harming rep)... I can see less ethical envoys peddling drugs in the empire, or running various illegal enterprises. (Those envoys could generate cash or other resources from the capital world they are stationed on.)

 

[FleetingRain]

Huh just now I realized, Psionic empires are totally getting a huge buff to Espionage, right?

 

[HugsAndSnuggles]

Where do you put the envoy screen? Where do you hire/fire them?

IMO, it's not so much about envoys as about overdue UI rework.

 

[Lilac Crusader]

This looks great, and adding more roleplaying flavour to the game is always appreciated. If that sort of thing is becoming the focus, does this mean that in the future we might get some internal politics along with the intel / espionage system, even if it is just a heap of events which deal with factions, sectors, crime, government types, stability, etc.?

 

[Millbot]

Probably balance and display issues. Where do you put the envoy screen? Where do you hire/fire them? Do you allow them to have negative traits? Do positive/negative traits have events with them? If so, how far down that rabbit hole do they want to go? (I can see a whole dlc linked with envoy events).

Heck I can see envoys having many events associated with them. An envoy set to improve relations with an empire for 20+ years might be a celebrated entity in that empire. They could even have a day of mourning when he/she/it dies. (Or a day of celebration for those harming rep)... I can see less ethical envoys peddling drugs in the empire, or running various illegal enterprises. (Those envoys could generate cash or other resources from the capital world they are stationed on.)

Yeah, they could do some interesting things here, but there is the whole issue with retooling the UI. That said before they give us more leaders that require micro, I'd prefer to see the current system for leaders and current leader types get a facelift. IMO I'd like to see negative traits go away and be replaced with neutral traits that have pros and cons and maybe each leader only gets one neutral trait, but is the first trait they roll with. So there are interesting choices to be made. The current negative traits really don't impact decision making that much. If you get arrested development, it's pretty much fire the leader once you can afford to take the hit to dismissing them, which is usually quick. Sometimes you keep them if they rolled a really rare and useful trait. Granted sometimes you might keep them if they have solid traits for everything else are are like level 8 higher. After that substance abuser and maimed traits are the only other two that might get any consideration and that's if you're spending influence on an election and only if those traits could mean they die before the term ends. For the most part, leaders just aren't that interesting, they are merely stat sticks that get moved around to game the system.

As for first contact stuff. On further thought, I'm hoping megacorps get some megacorp exclusive stuff because that's potentially a new market for them. On the front of megacorps, seems like espionage could allow a means to retool criminal heritage because currently it isn't great. Yes, it has great RP flavor, but seems like few enjoy playing them or really playing against them. Maybe espionage could be a means to get them to a spot where people like playing them and don't find them annoying to play against.

 

[Libertine Angel]

I've been pretty burnt out on the game for a while, not even kept up with the other DDs, but this has entirely brought me back into the hype train, sounds amazing. Between this and the upcoming Imperator update it's like you're trying to make CK3 the only Paradox game I play

I'm also in the "make envoys full leaders" camp, it'll let us develop stories of brave & skilled ambassadors (something like a Linguist trait that benefits first contact), smooth-talking deal brokers (Persuasive, giving benfits to trade deals or Galactic Community voting), and less scrupulous opportunists (Well-Connected, giving additional Intel but with higher upkeep, and maybe being a source of Crime that could cause a diplomatic incident if discovered).
I think giving science ships at least a bit of military capability is sensible too, after all each USS Enterprise was designed for exploration and first contact but they could certainly hold their own because it's a very dangerous job.

 

[Tamwin5]

There are a few reasons to not have envoys be full leaders, but I think they can all be addressed/dealt with.

First is Envoys dying and losing their position. Change the UI for the leader death notification so it shows what position they were in. This would be very useful for scientists and admirals as well, although for them you can often figure out what position is missing a leader.

Second is that envoys have a cool down to assignment, meaning that it's hard to shuffle them around in the same way that other leaders are. Now obviously this could be removed, but the cool down exists for a reason. Having an envoy in the galactic senate only matters at the instant where a proposal is called or the vote is chosen, and diplomatic agreements can use envoys to ignore relationship requirements. The solution to this is simple add a "wind up" period for envoys equal to the current cool down for assignment: It takes a year for an envoys in the galactic community to build up connections and exert their full diplomatic power (probably start at half or 40% though, so you can try to last minute squeeze some extra diplo power if you need it), and in order to ignore relationship requirements for actions you need to have had your envoy there improving or harming relations for a year. Now reassigning envoys back and forth instantly doesn't give an advantage, so there is no need for the cool down.

Third is that envoys have a cap, while all other leaders don't. This isn't a big problem, and can just be ignored (the envoy limit exists for game balance), but I could also see adding a limit to the other leader types, likely tied into an institution system. We shouldn't go back to the days where a single leader pool applied to all leaders though.

 

[UltimateTobi]

I think giving science ships at least a bit of military capability is sensible too, after all each USS Enterprise was designed for exploration and first contact but they could certainly hold their own because it's a very dangerous job.

I'd like that, too.

Star Trek: New Horizons mod has Science ships that can fight (like the Enterprise).

 

[Methone]

Goodness yes, it always irked me how we had some universal translator out of nowhere. We should have to put a first effort into translating those weird aliens' messages!

What do you mean 'out of nowhere'? What do you think that Society special project was?!

 

[methegrate]

I’d also hope for an “Isolationist” first contact stance. I’m thinking the Dominion from DS9. They don’t know you, they don’t want to know you. They actively don’t want contact with outsiders (maybe right up until it’s time to crush you).

Maybe it could make other first contact missions much harder. It could even give you active events to interfere with first contact missions of other empires. (Again to borrow from the DS9 inspiration, how the Founders deliberately made everyone think that the vorta were the leaders of their empire.)

I mean, there would be questions of what benefits would attach to this. But I think that’s a general question of how to add better ongoing interactions between empires beyond just war and peace.

 

[Drachasor]

If we're thinking about Envoys being leaders, then perhaps some of the Leaders should get envoy-like limits for some actions.

Suppose each leader type had a certain number of slots for big projects. You can have more leaders than these project slots, of course, so you can still have them run planets, man ships, etc.

Projects types:
Scientist: Major research projects, dig sites, some megastructures
Government: Some event projects, some megastructures
Not as sure about military stuff, but I am sure there are possibilities.

Megastructure build limits would be based on these assignment slots. Each Megastructure requires one person to be assigned to it, and they provide a speed boost based on their level (and potentially skills). You can assign more people to further increase the speed or spread them out among several projects at once. Things that give you bonus Megastructure projects now would instead give you that many free assignments for Megastructures that don't count against your limit.

It's a thought, anyhow.

 

[methegrate]

Well, in my Opinion, Envoys should be Leaders, with this coming Update, they are used as Dipolmats, Communication-Officers and why at least not also as Spys... so why shouldn't they are Leaders with traits like Scientists are, wich are used for Research, Survey and Archeology atm, also 3 "jobs" for Scientists as for Envoys...
I would make Envoys work like normal Leaders, also make them possible to become Ruler in a somehow diplomatic based Empire, for example the Blorgs Ruler could be an Envoy, would make Sense for them xD

Also it should not be the Envoys-cap that gets changed with civics, traits and techs and such, but their efficiency, so that you have to use more Envoys for the same work if you are a "not-diplomatic" empire...and if Envoys are also used as Spys, theyr efficiency there could be modified same way, with other civics, traits and so on, that a non-diplomatic Empire would have to use more Envoys for Improving Relations, than a corvee-Empire but less for Espionage stuff, cause of another civic they have but the corvee one don't.

Hovever, i also would like to be able to attack Empires i don't have Comms with and even invade their Planets, for some Empires like Devouring Swarms/Terravores, FPs, Babaric Despoilers, Exterminators, Driven Assimilators and also some "normal" xenophobe or millitary Empires it would be "normal" (even for Necrophages it would make somehow Sense as for "Slavehunters")

Maybe you could helm science ships with envoys for first contact missions. When there’s a scientist in charge, the ship can survey. When there’s an envoy in charge, it can explore and advance your contact.