Are proper civil wars still planned for the future?

[Hapchazzard]

While the new unrest system seems far, far better than the old one(now, even if your empire isn't threatened by a proper rebellion, large amounts of unrest will cause your economy to tank anyway and you to be vulnerable) and some small, localized rebellions can actually succeed sometimes(due to foreign intervention), it seems that huge, empirewide civil wars to overthrow the current regime still aren't possible.

I remember the devs stating several times that they would like something like this in the future(no promises, of course) and it being closely integrated with the sector system. I imagine this wouldn't even require the 1.5 unrest system to be reworked, but rather sectors would have to be significantly overhauled(which I'm almost sure is planned). Is this still considered a possibility for the future, or is the current unrest/rebellion system considered 95% done already?

 

[Emraldis]

It currently seems (from the patchnotes) that a rebellion is comprised of a bunch of armies spawning on your world, and attacking your garrison. If they manage to conquer the planet, they free themselves and become a separate empire, though they can also possibly join neighboring empires if they like their ethics. It no longer triggers a war. However, this isn't to say that you can't immediately declare war on them and take your planet back, that may still be possible.

 

[Magdaki]

I hope so. This is definitely something I would like to see in the game.

I would like to see it tied to thing that happen in the game so that it becomes an emergent property. For example, expand too far too fast and maybe you get a colonial uprising. As another example, commit too many atrocities and you get a "Rebel Alliance". This will create the feeling of eXperience when playing Stellaris that helps make different playthroughs memorable in some way.

 

[Almond_Brown]

It currently seems (from the patchnotes) that a rebellion is comprised of a bunch of armies spawning on your world, and attacking your garrison. If they manage to conquer the planet, they free themselves and become a separate empire, though they can also possibly join neighboring empires if they like their ethics. It no longer triggers a war. However, this isn't to say that you can't immediately declare war on them and take your planet back, that may still be possible.

Unless, if like most other "military" actions in Stellaris, there will be a 10 years hiatus enforced, thus allowing said Planet/New Empire, time to join/be gobbled up by a nearby Federation and once a member, provide them many Allies you will also have to fight to get said Planet back.

 

[PalmettoExplorer14]

Gosh I hope the rebellions and uprisings are working!

I was actually disappointed that I was never able to experience a space uprising or a rebellion since Day 1 of when I started playing Stellaris!

I never even had a pretender civil war!

 

[Griff Lancer]

It currently seems (from the patchnotes) that a rebellion is comprised of a bunch of armies spawning on your world, and attacking your garrison. If they manage to conquer the planet, they free themselves and become a separate empire, though they can also possibly join neighboring empires if they like their ethics. It no longer triggers a war. However, this isn't to say that you can't immediately declare war on them and take your planet back, that may still be possible.

That is an absolutely ingenious way to make armies relevant.
The army is to protect the people from invasions, and to keep the populace from pulling a worldwide coup.

 

[The Founder]

It currently seems (from the patchnotes) that a rebellion is comprised of a bunch of armies spawning on your world, and attacking your garrison. If they manage to conquer the planet, they free themselves and become a separate empire, though they can also possibly join neighboring empires if they like their ethics. It no longer triggers a war. However, this isn't to say that you can't immediately declare war on them and take your planet back, that may still be possible.

I think that change was primarily to avoid the "defense case".
Currently a rebellion is considered the "attacker" in the war. So defensive Pacts would trigger and help you recapture your Vassal. That makes rebellions even less of an issue then they are through the faction system.

It will be interesting to see how this works with Federations:
Currently they help you recapturing the planet, as the Rebels are the attackers.
But they might actually be a hinderance to reclaim rebel planets. As you need to declare war now, your allies might have issues with allowing you to do so. I fear that until a Fedeartion rework comes around, Federation members might be unable to recapture rebel planets. At all.

While the new unrest system seems far, far better than the old one(now, even if your empire isn't threatened by a proper rebellion, large amounts of unrest will cause your economy to tank anyway and you to be vulnerable) and some small, localized rebellions can actually succeed sometimes(due to foreign intervention), it seems that huge, empirewide civil wars to overthrow the current regime still aren't possible.

That would cause some logical issues. Like: "Where does that spacefleet come from all of a sudden?".
Without a instant fleet, there would be no way for them to chalenge you.
Overall the balance of a "Civil War" is very tricky. It must be strong enough to not be a pushover. Yet also not too strong, so that between the resource and fleet cap loss you economy crashes and they curbstomp you.
And then there is the issue with a outside force reacting to you suddenly being at war and having considerable loss of planet and income.

My best solution thus far:
Let the sectors keep a share of the Fleet Cap. Wich they use to build thier own localised defense fleet, that can deal with detail stuff like re-conquest of planets (after the enemy main fleet is defeated). It would also help solve doomstacks, by limiting how quickly your Fleet cap escalates as soon a sectors enter the game.

 

[Hapchazzard]

Let the sectors keep a share of the Fleet Cap. Wich they use to build thier own localised defense fleet, that can deal with detail stuff like re-conquest of planets (after the enemy main fleet is defeated). It would also help solve doomstacks, by limiting how quickly your Fleet cap escalates as soon a sectors enter the game.

I've actually imagined something like this, with sectors being similar to CK2 vassals and having a military force of their own.

There could actually be an interesting power hierarchy of central government -> local government -> local populace, where the central government appoints a local government, which then interacts with and affects the local populace. For example, if you set the sector government to consist of a democratically elected council of locals, they will be quite happy, but the sector government itself might not exactly be loyal to you(if your ideals clash) and may cause trouble down the line, with the added problem of the local populace being fiercely loyal to the sector gov, rather than you. On the other hand, you could appoint a corrupt puppet to rule the sector with an iron fist, but the locals will be highly displeased and you'll likely get general unrest(1.5 unrest) on the planets which might even escalate into armed conflict.

Now, with that, you could also begin simulating the local government becoming unruly in various ways - boycotting paying taxes, purposefully not taking a very active role in your wars, collaborating with foreign powers or, of course, outright rebelling. When a sector goes into rebellion, it shouldn't be an automatic sector vs everyone else civil war - rather, every sector in the country should get an option of either supporting the government, joining the rebellion, starting a rebel faction of their own(if the existing rebel faction isn't adequate for their ambitions) or staying out of the war but being able to pick a side down the line(this is inspired by the CK2 AGOT mod, where a very similar system works very nicely). This could make large, but politically fractured realms, actually unstable and add the possibility of them organically disintegrating into anarchy, providing much needed dynamism to the galaxy.