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Hello,
Stellaris is an awesome game, one of the best of its genre. Unfortunately some aspects of game lack realism (even if we call "realism" concepts taken directly from popular SciFi books/movies/games). Some of them are fully understandable, since it's just game, and it need to replace some real-scifi-world mechanics by simpler solutions, but some aspects are not working as they should while they possibly could... causing some problems with game immersion, and making players evil empire not as evil as it should be.
bombardment - invasion - purge: balance, interaction and possible improvements
A. Lore:
Purge, Orbital Bombardment and planetary invasion aspects are illogically implemented into Stellaris.
If anyone know what "nuclear war" is, he can imagine how destructive would be orbital full scale nuclear bombardment of habitable planet. Developers know it, because we have post-nuclear, "tomb" worlds in the game. Logically, even small fleet armed with nuclear (or equivalent in power output) weapons should be able to annihilate life and infrastructure on planet in hours... What we have? 100k fleets of battlecruiser armed with weapons of unimaginable power (antimatter missiles?) need years bombardment to barely kill some pops or damage/destroy some buildings. It is completely counter-intuitive, against all logic and everything we know from real life and even sci-fi literature/movies. Orbital Bombardments should be easiest way of capturing and purging planets, at cost of massive infrastructure damage and risk of turning planet into inhabitable tomb world. Finally, there is no "peaceful bombardments". No matter how peaceful civilization is, their nukes are just as deadly as others... They may limit casualties, but not negate them.
Planetary invasion, on the other hand, naturally is the way of capturing world without damaging it's population/infrastructure too much, at cost of significant manpower loses. Simple relation - you want world intact, sacrifice your men; you want world desolated and scorched - use orbital bombardment. But not in stellaris. Here you can spend ages nuclear bombing world, but if You invade it, Your casualties will be very low. If You ever played EU series, sieges in this game are very, very costly. Storming high level fortress without heavily outnumbering enemy is suicide. In stellaris capturing planets, If You have slight advantage over enemy, is very easy. Lategame armies can defeat planet militia behind untouched fortifications without casualties... and Your reward is fully developed planet with full population. On top of that all armies are involved in battle at once. As I understand, all planets in game are one big flat areas without any choke points (Thermopiles anyone?). And capturing entire planet to groud army take only few days... and after this total blitzkieg infrastructure and population of planet is nearly untouched - and Your fully rested legions are jumping to another planet immediately after battle.. It is counter intuitive, illogical and against everything we know from both real world and sci-fi concepts. Since planetary invasion (unlike "fixed" planetary bombardment) gives You fully developed world, it should be far more time consuming. Finally, defeating enemy army doesn't mean securing planet...
Purge... Why all populations are exterminated at once? Shouldn't it be a process, like building queue? Why clearing one population require same time as clearing 25 pops? Finally - why is it free process? Killing such number of beings should cost money (death camps, execution teams, prisoners transport to execution sites - these things are not free), since these populations are not committing suicides, but are slowly eliminated in time-consuming process.
B. Idea implementation:
- After destroying planetary fortifications, every day (not month) of bombardment have a roll for killing pop, destroying building or turning empty tile into "nuclear fallout" hazard tile. % chance for bombardment casualties is be based on bombardment type and fleet size
- Every day, in addition to above effects, there is calculated chance for "Global desolation", turning world into tomb world, killing all armies (including deployed invaders), pops and buildings in process. Chance should be based on number of "nuclear fallout" tiles.
- "Nuclear fallout" tile is standard hazard tile, but removing it require no special research. Players should remove it ASAP after siege, because next siege will use its number to calculate "Global desolation" effect chance. Simple relation – the more often planet is sieged, the higher chance of turning it into tomb world is
- Owner of sieged planet have "surrender" button, transferring planet control to sieging fleet. Purpose of this "button" is emulating intention of saving own people/infrastructure, in order to, for example, "recover" intact planet by winning war in other areas, reconquering it in another war or for pure humanitarian reason (ruler who value his people life).
- Number of armies able to fight at once limited, to prolong ground battles, and to give defender chance to actually inflict some damage to superior (especially numerically) attacker in process. Defender can use more armies at once then attacker to emulate "defender advantage"
- Each day of ground invasion roll chance for killing pop, chance is based on empire ethics (highest for militarist, lowest for pacifist)
- Purges cost some Energy credits (not much, it's just for emulating expenses of extermination), and you now need to control planet only, owning it is not needed (of course empires may still purge worlds they own)
- Purges are now queued, and one population per planet is killed at once.
- Purges 2-3 times faster to compensate above effect. Purging huge population will take more time while killing one-two pops will be much faster.
C. Balance suggestions (with proposed numbers):
1. After planetary fortifications are removed, every day o of planetary bombardment there is chance of random tile being selected.
2. If planet is turned into Tomb World via Limited/Full Orbital Bombardment, all units, structures and populations on planet are killed. Planet is also removed from "wargoal" list (if present), and owner of desolated world get permanent (until end of war) warscore penalty. Planet can be recolonized/terraformed using same mechanics as colonizing other Tomb Worlds.
3. Population, structures and tiles can no longer be damaged by bombardment until planetary fortifications are destroyed.
4. New button added to interface under armies tab, "Surrender planet". Button is active only if planet is sieged. Pressing it make planet occupied (like after successful siege) by sieging force, killing all owned garrison forces (if there are any), in order to save infrastructure and population from bombardment. AI, maybe except fanatic pacifist, should not use this function.
5. Now only portion of armies is fighting in ground battle. Depending of planet size, defender may use up to 7-10 units at once, attacker can use 5-8 units at once - other deployed/garrisoned units are hold in "reserve". If any of fighting armies is killed, it is automatically replaced by unit from reserve. Only fighting units can take and inflict damage. It will make large ground battles much, much longer, and larger army will no longer take win huge battle without casualties.
6. Planetary garrison size is now 7-10 units, depending on planet size. Garrison is deployed (and therefore killed) before any regular army.
7. Every day of ground fight there is chance for random planetary pop to be killed in process. Chance for random pop kill is:
8. Purges are 2x-3x faster, but only one population per planet is purged at time. Marking population for purge now cost some EC (50? value may be related to ethics of specific population). Purges are queued (like buildings), population marked for purification do not create new populations (just like now)
9. To start a purge you only need to control planet (via invasion), making it Your own as result of winning war is no longer required. If planet changes owner during purification, all purges are stopped.
What do You think?
Stellaris is an awesome game, one of the best of its genre. Unfortunately some aspects of game lack realism (even if we call "realism" concepts taken directly from popular SciFi books/movies/games). Some of them are fully understandable, since it's just game, and it need to replace some real-scifi-world mechanics by simpler solutions, but some aspects are not working as they should while they possibly could... causing some problems with game immersion, and making players evil empire not as evil as it should be.
bombardment - invasion - purge: balance, interaction and possible improvements
A. Lore:
Purge, Orbital Bombardment and planetary invasion aspects are illogically implemented into Stellaris.
If anyone know what "nuclear war" is, he can imagine how destructive would be orbital full scale nuclear bombardment of habitable planet. Developers know it, because we have post-nuclear, "tomb" worlds in the game. Logically, even small fleet armed with nuclear (or equivalent in power output) weapons should be able to annihilate life and infrastructure on planet in hours... What we have? 100k fleets of battlecruiser armed with weapons of unimaginable power (antimatter missiles?) need years bombardment to barely kill some pops or damage/destroy some buildings. It is completely counter-intuitive, against all logic and everything we know from real life and even sci-fi literature/movies. Orbital Bombardments should be easiest way of capturing and purging planets, at cost of massive infrastructure damage and risk of turning planet into inhabitable tomb world. Finally, there is no "peaceful bombardments". No matter how peaceful civilization is, their nukes are just as deadly as others... They may limit casualties, but not negate them.
Planetary invasion, on the other hand, naturally is the way of capturing world without damaging it's population/infrastructure too much, at cost of significant manpower loses. Simple relation - you want world intact, sacrifice your men; you want world desolated and scorched - use orbital bombardment. But not in stellaris. Here you can spend ages nuclear bombing world, but if You invade it, Your casualties will be very low. If You ever played EU series, sieges in this game are very, very costly. Storming high level fortress without heavily outnumbering enemy is suicide. In stellaris capturing planets, If You have slight advantage over enemy, is very easy. Lategame armies can defeat planet militia behind untouched fortifications without casualties... and Your reward is fully developed planet with full population. On top of that all armies are involved in battle at once. As I understand, all planets in game are one big flat areas without any choke points (Thermopiles anyone?). And capturing entire planet to groud army take only few days... and after this total blitzkieg infrastructure and population of planet is nearly untouched - and Your fully rested legions are jumping to another planet immediately after battle.. It is counter intuitive, illogical and against everything we know from both real world and sci-fi concepts. Since planetary invasion (unlike "fixed" planetary bombardment) gives You fully developed world, it should be far more time consuming. Finally, defeating enemy army doesn't mean securing planet...
Purge... Why all populations are exterminated at once? Shouldn't it be a process, like building queue? Why clearing one population require same time as clearing 25 pops? Finally - why is it free process? Killing such number of beings should cost money (death camps, execution teams, prisoners transport to execution sites - these things are not free), since these populations are not committing suicides, but are slowly eliminated in time-consuming process.
B. Idea implementation:
- After destroying planetary fortifications, every day (not month) of bombardment have a roll for killing pop, destroying building or turning empty tile into "nuclear fallout" hazard tile. % chance for bombardment casualties is be based on bombardment type and fleet size
- Every day, in addition to above effects, there is calculated chance for "Global desolation", turning world into tomb world, killing all armies (including deployed invaders), pops and buildings in process. Chance should be based on number of "nuclear fallout" tiles.
- "Nuclear fallout" tile is standard hazard tile, but removing it require no special research. Players should remove it ASAP after siege, because next siege will use its number to calculate "Global desolation" effect chance. Simple relation – the more often planet is sieged, the higher chance of turning it into tomb world is
- Owner of sieged planet have "surrender" button, transferring planet control to sieging fleet. Purpose of this "button" is emulating intention of saving own people/infrastructure, in order to, for example, "recover" intact planet by winning war in other areas, reconquering it in another war or for pure humanitarian reason (ruler who value his people life).
- Number of armies able to fight at once limited, to prolong ground battles, and to give defender chance to actually inflict some damage to superior (especially numerically) attacker in process. Defender can use more armies at once then attacker to emulate "defender advantage"
- Each day of ground invasion roll chance for killing pop, chance is based on empire ethics (highest for militarist, lowest for pacifist)
- Purges cost some Energy credits (not much, it's just for emulating expenses of extermination), and you now need to control planet only, owning it is not needed (of course empires may still purge worlds they own)
- Purges are now queued, and one population per planet is killed at once.
- Purges 2-3 times faster to compensate above effect. Purging huge population will take more time while killing one-two pops will be much faster.
C. Balance suggestions (with proposed numbers):
1. After planetary fortifications are removed, every day o of planetary bombardment there is chance of random tile being selected.
Chance is:
For Light bombardment: [2% + 0,002% x fleet size] (1000 size fleet: 4%)
For Limited bombardment: [5% + 0,005% x fleet size] (1000 size fleet: 10%)
For Full bombardment: [10% +0,010% x fleet size] (1000 size fleet: 20%)
Is successful, random planet tile is selected, and following algorithm triggers:
- If randomly selected tile have structure, structure is destroyed.
- If there is no structure, but there is pop, pop is killed.
- If tile is empty or has "hazard", except "nuclear fallout", tile is changed to "nuclear fallout" hazard tile
- If tile has "nuclear fallout", and player is using either Limited or Full bombardment, there is chance equal to [1% x number of "nuclear fallout" tiles] for turning planet into Tomb World (Global nuclear desolation effect). If player is using Light bombardment, this point is skipped.
For Light bombardment: [2% + 0,002% x fleet size] (1000 size fleet: 4%)
For Limited bombardment: [5% + 0,005% x fleet size] (1000 size fleet: 10%)
For Full bombardment: [10% +0,010% x fleet size] (1000 size fleet: 20%)
Is successful, random planet tile is selected, and following algorithm triggers:
- If randomly selected tile have structure, structure is destroyed.
- If there is no structure, but there is pop, pop is killed.
- If tile is empty or has "hazard", except "nuclear fallout", tile is changed to "nuclear fallout" hazard tile
- If tile has "nuclear fallout", and player is using either Limited or Full bombardment, there is chance equal to [1% x number of "nuclear fallout" tiles] for turning planet into Tomb World (Global nuclear desolation effect). If player is using Light bombardment, this point is skipped.
2. If planet is turned into Tomb World via Limited/Full Orbital Bombardment, all units, structures and populations on planet are killed. Planet is also removed from "wargoal" list (if present), and owner of desolated world get permanent (until end of war) warscore penalty. Planet can be recolonized/terraformed using same mechanics as colonizing other Tomb Worlds.
3. Population, structures and tiles can no longer be damaged by bombardment until planetary fortifications are destroyed.
4. New button added to interface under armies tab, "Surrender planet". Button is active only if planet is sieged. Pressing it make planet occupied (like after successful siege) by sieging force, killing all owned garrison forces (if there are any), in order to save infrastructure and population from bombardment. AI, maybe except fanatic pacifist, should not use this function.
5. Now only portion of armies is fighting in ground battle. Depending of planet size, defender may use up to 7-10 units at once, attacker can use 5-8 units at once - other deployed/garrisoned units are hold in "reserve". If any of fighting armies is killed, it is automatically replaced by unit from reserve. Only fighting units can take and inflict damage. It will make large ground battles much, much longer, and larger army will no longer take win huge battle without casualties.
6. Planetary garrison size is now 7-10 units, depending on planet size. Garrison is deployed (and therefore killed) before any regular army.
7. Every day of ground fight there is chance for random planetary pop to be killed in process. Chance for random pop kill is:
3% base chance
+1% if any of fighting empires is Militarist or Fanatic Militarist (civilian war casualties are ok)
+1% if any of fighting empires is Collectivist or Fanatic Collectivist (sacrificing unit in name many is ok)
-1% if any of fighting empires is Pacifist or Fanatic Pacifist (war doesnt mean losing humanity... ehm fungunity? lizardity?)
So chance is 2%-5% a day, depending on ethos
+1% if any of fighting empires is Militarist or Fanatic Militarist (civilian war casualties are ok)
+1% if any of fighting empires is Collectivist or Fanatic Collectivist (sacrificing unit in name many is ok)
-1% if any of fighting empires is Pacifist or Fanatic Pacifist (war doesnt mean losing humanity... ehm fungunity? lizardity?)
So chance is 2%-5% a day, depending on ethos
8. Purges are 2x-3x faster, but only one population per planet is purged at time. Marking population for purge now cost some EC (50? value may be related to ethics of specific population). Purges are queued (like buildings), population marked for purification do not create new populations (just like now)
9. To start a purge you only need to control planet (via invasion), making it Your own as result of winning war is no longer required. If planet changes owner during purification, all purges are stopped.
What do You think?
- 6
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