Feb 2 Stream Question/Discussion

[Drakonn]

So, I took notes while watching the stream today and came up with a bunch of questions and I figured it would be nice to have a thread to discuss it as well.

(As opposed to the thread announcing the stream date)

1.)Will we be able to pick starting citizenship rights?
-I noticed during the stream the Authoritarian player (apologies for name forgetting but I support your endeavors of uniting the galaxy under "proper" cuteness) started off with pops enslaved and wanted to be sure that this wouldn't be the case if you picked Authoritarian at start.

2.) Will faction leaders that are Leaders (Admirals, Governors, etc) have more influence (not influence gain)/consequences if their faction position is accepted/ignored?
-You don't want to make a faction leader that's a Governor upset because of consequences to your sector/planet he runs for example.

3.) Can we pick the type of Caste Slave?
-I think this was answered but I can't be sure.

4.) Will the monument that brings in Unity offset the negative modifier for additional planets completely?
-I wouldn't want that to be a default building that just renders the modifier inert because what's the point then. Which makes larger empires still gain just as much Unity or close because of all the monuments.

5.) Is Unrest from slaves only quelled by defensive armies?

6.) Have defensive armies been reworked to be better at defense.
-Right now it's better to have lots of assault armies as your defense.

7.) Pioneering Terminal?
-Not seen that before. New or already in game and what does it do?

8.) Ship/Station colors based off empire colors?
-Pretty sure that's what that was. Hoping it's easy for current color mods to be adjusted.

9.) What affects the Faction happiness/unhappiness modifier strength?
-Why would one effect give 15%red as opposed to 5%? Attraction? Faction Stength/pop number?

Anyways that's all the ones I have for now. Feel free to add more or answer as information becomes available!

10.) Refugee Welcome locked for Xenophobes?
-Seems to negate the whole trick them into coming and then enslaving/eating idea. I can see that from Xenophobes who think aliens aren't good for anything else.

 

[Redshift]

7.) Pioneering Terminal?
-Not seen that before. New or already in game and what does it do?

It is already in the game. It is a spaceport module giving the following modifiers:

modifier = {
        shipsize_colonizer_construction_speed_mult = 0.25
        shipsize_colonizer_build_cost_mult = -0.25
    }

 

[Garfazz Steamfang]

Can we use slavery out of authoritarian/xenophobe ethics? I'm pretty curious about that

 

[Drakonn]

It is already in the game. It is a spaceport module giving the following modifiers:

modifier = {
        shipsize_colonizer_construction_speed_mult = 0.25
        shipsize_colonizer_build_cost_mult = -0.25
    }

Ahh, it's restricted to Individualist/Fanatic Individualist. Something I never play ha. Which would explain why I thought it was new.

Can we use slavery out of authoritarian/xenophobe ethics? I'm pretty curious about that

I'm not sure. The Ethics Dev Diary (#54) stated that Authoritarian tolerate slaves and the Faction for Authoritarian gets a bonus happiness for having slaves. However, this thread was not clear on that distinction or not https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/question-slavery-in-1-5.996753/page-2 .

Brings me to another point about whether or not Caste Slaves are Slaves in the traditional sense or not as I just got confused reading that thread because I *think* they can be given certain citizenship rights/housing but I'm not entirely certain.

Personally, I think having bonuses but not restricted (see Question 10 in topic post) would be better than having it outright restricted.

 

[Drakonn]

Xenophobes can't give Aliens Full military service. I assume Battle Thralls are a separate thing and don't fall under this category? Also, will Xenophobes be able to determine the living standards of their alien pops? Can't remember if that was said. Would be interesting to be able to grant your Battle Thralls a decent living standard.

 

[henzington]

Xenophobes can't give Aliens Full military service. I assume Battle Thralls are a separate thing and don't fall under this category? Also, will Xenophobes be able to determine the living standards of their alien pops? Can't remember if that was said. Would be interesting to be able to grant your Battle Thralls a decent living standard.

The species screen will have the options. It is just limited because there is only one species per empire so far

 

[Nirmara]

1.)Will we be able to pick starting citizenship rights?

Wiz stated that, in the actual build, changing rights is free so you can always change it at the start of a game.

4.) Will the monument that brings in Unity offset the negative modifier for additional planets completely?

We saw a formula regarding tradition cost in the stream. (Youtube, part one, 40:42)

Basically, each colony increase the cost by 25% and each pop increase it by 2 so it won't negate the additional cost. It might be possible to upgrade the monument so that it give more unity.

10.) Refugee Welcome locked for Xenophobes?
-Seems to negate the whole trick them into coming and then enslaving/eating idea. I can see that from Xenophobes who think aliens aren't good for anything else.

True xenophobe conquer the weaker species, they do not need to trick them.

 

[Drakonn]

True xenophobe conquer the weaker species, they do not need to trick them.

What about the Pacifist Xenophobes? (Isolationists) Then again, from the Wiki description they don't even want anything to do with aliens. Decadent Hierarchy isn't Xenophobe either so hmmm. Granted these are bound to change with 1.5.

Still, I feel like this would be better if restricted to Fanatic Xenophobe perhaps. Maybe I'm just still attached to my Fanatic Militarists Xenophobes and ideas of them accepting aliens who prove themselves (Battle Thralls) or the Purifiers who trick them with promises of Utopia and they get enslaved/livestock before engaging on a galactic crusade. Though the triple build from the Authoritarian in the stream seems very interesting. Ugh, so many ideas. So much time to wait.

Wiz stated that, in the actual build, changing rights is free so you can always change it at the start of a game.

Seems like a missed opportunity to truly craft your empire the way you want ahead of the game. Plus, he mentioned they may add a cost depending on how it goes because they're still modifying species. (If they go that route then these things really need to be picked in Empire creation)

The species screen will have the options. It is just limited because there is only one species per empire so far

Guess we'll have to wait and see. "Full" military service could mean military Leader generation for them so there's that.

Thanks all!

 

[Tim_Ward]

Here's the thing that has me a little (only a little, it's still a cool feature) bothered about traditions.

The current traditions are these:

- Expansion
- Domination
- Prosperity
- Harmony
- Supremacy
- Purity
- Exploration

Let's break these down. Nice traditions: harmony, prosperity. Dick traditions: purity, supremacy, domination. Neutral traditions: expansion, exploration.

Now, say I'm playing a nice empire. So I don't want to take any of the dick traditions, for role playing reasons and also because I don't want hostile ethics drift.

So, I take Harmony and prosperity, and fill them out and then take expansion and exploration and fill them out too.

Now what am I going to spend my unity on? Is it going to sit there and accumulate - does that aspect of the game simply stop once you reach that point? Is the game balanced so as you'd never actually have enough unity to completely fill out that many trees, because if it isn't I feel like there should be something else you can use unity for.

 

[Drakonn]

Here's the thing that has me a little (only a little, it's still a cool feature) bothered about traditions.

The current traditions are these:

- Expansion
- Domination
- Prosperity
- Harmony
- Supremacy
- Purity
- Exploration

Let's break these down. Nice traditions: harmony, prosperity. Dick traditions: purity, supremacy, domination. Neutral traditions: expansion, exploration.

Now, say I'm playing a nice empire. So I don't want to take any of the dick traditions, for role playing reasons and also because I don't want hostile ethics drift.

So, I take Harmony and prosperity, and fill them out and then take expansion and exploration and fill them out too.

Now what am I going to spend my unity on? Is it going to sit there and accumulate - does that aspect of the game simply stop once you reach that point? Is the game balanced so as you'd never actually have enough unity to completely fill out that many trees, because if it isn't I feel like there should be something else you can use unity for.

Purity was replaced by Diplomacy. Where the ability to be in a Federation and some other benefits are. I'm hoping it's leaning towards the increasing costs making it to where an empire can't get every tree. Three or four trees might be good. That way each empire isn't set up in a default manner or a specific Tradition build each time. Incentives for multiple trees (similar to Civ V) might be good too.

Edit: What Purity is going to do will appear in a future dev diary when they announce whatever that feature is since they removed it from Traditions but not from the game.

Aside: Domination Finisher is a shared 30% research bonus on techs either party doesn't have. Wouldn't this make your vassals stronger and thus more likely to break away?

 

[Tim_Ward]

Trouble with 'can't get every tree' is... the game goes on forever, in theory. Unlike EU4* and Civ (which both have similar concepts), eventually you're going to get to a point where you have all the traditions you want and unity is just stockpiling with nothing to spend it on. It's not as big a deal if the game is balanced so that this won't happen until 2700 or something, but it's still an issue.

When it's part of the design that taking a tradition tree in the wrong circumstances can actually have negative effects (ethics drifting towards ethoses you don't want and pissing off certain factions), then in principle there should be something else to use unity on. Especially, if the games gonna be like 'you have enough unity to buy a tradition now!' and the only traditions remaining are ones you don't want. Nothing worse** than notifications telling you to do things that you actually shouldn't do.

* plus, in EU4 ideas cost monarch points and there's never any shortage of things to spend those on
** this is figurative; there actually are worse things.

 

[Foefaller]

Thanks to some frame-by-frame, I was able to spot most of the traditions for Domination and all the Traditions for Diplomacy.

Diplomacy (Replaced Purity, some Purity effects/traditions might show up in other things)

Adoption effect; reduce influence cost for diplomatic deals by 25%
Completion effect: increases Trust Cap by 50

First tree
Tradition #1 (forgot to write down names, no reqs): Federation Tech
Tradition #2 (requires Tradition #1): Fleet cap you contribute to your Federations counts for double (i.e. you contribute 20 of your fleet cap for the fed fleet, fed fleet gets 40)
Tradition #3 (requires Tradition #1): 5% bonus to Unity for every empire in your Federation.
Second tree
Tradition #4 (no reqs): Improve Habitability by 10%
Tradition #5 (requires Trad. #4) unlocks Visitor Center building.

Domination (now about vassals, instead of slaves)

Adoption effect: Warscore cost for Subjugating Empires reduced by 25%
Completion effect: Permanent research agreement between you and your vassals; 30% reduction to the cost of techs you or one of your vassals know.

Tradition #1(no req) reduces the cooldown before integrating vassals by 50% and improved opinion form your vassals
Tradtion #2(no req) increases leader cap by 2, gives governors 2 extra skill (points?) on recruitment
Tradition #3(requires 1 and 2) increase income gained from Tributaries by an extra 10% of their income.
Tradition #4(requires 1&2) Increases your Fleet Cap by 20% of the fleet cap of your vassals.
Tradtion #5(requires 1&2) was not shown.

Think most of Exploration was shown as well (it was what Wiz was working on for his empire) but I got tired of scanning the stream and had to sleep, might be able to post most or all of it later.

Seems like both are pretty great for those who don't plan on being the only Empire left at the end, whether it's with Equals or as the overlord. The governor bonus seems a tad out of place for Domination, but I guess it's there for those interested in going wide by integrating vassals that were subjugated or enlightened instead of direct conquest.

 

[Foefaller]

Aside: Domination Finisher is a shared 30% research bonus on techs either party doesn't have. Wouldn't this make your vassals stronger and thus more likely to break away?

Two of the traditions for Domination improve your vassals opinion of you and adds 20% of their fleet cap to yours. As the chance of your vassal rebelling is directly tied to opinion and one of the biggest malus is not have a fleet that is significantly larger than theirs, that should help with having loyal vassals as the completion bonus helps with making more useful ones.

Besides, it goes both ways, and it's not unheard of for other empires to have techs that you don't, especially if the vassal in question was once part of a FE

Trouble with 'can't get every tree' is... the game goes on forever, in theory. Unlike EU4* and Civ (which both have similar concepts), eventually you're going to get to a point where you have all the traditions you want and unity is just stockpiling with nothing to spend it on. It's not as big a deal if the game is balanced so that this won't happen until 2700 or something, but it's still an issue.

When it's part of the design that taking a tradition tree in the wrong circumstances can actually have negative effects (ethics drifting towards ethoses you don't want and pissing off certain factions), then in principle there should be something else to use unity on. Especially, if the games gonna be like 'you have enough unity to buy a tradition now!' and the only traditions remaining are ones you don't want. Nothing worse** than notifications telling you to do things that you actually shouldn't do.

* plus, in EU4 ideas cost monarch points and there's never any shortage of things to spend those on
** this is figurative; there actually are worse things.

That's part of the reason why Purity was replaced with Diplomacy, for more ethos-neutral options that you can benefit from regardless of your playstyle.

...and if you're wonder why someone playing Xenophobic Empire might want anything to do with Diplomacy, much less federations, obviously you've never played Hard with aggressive AI

Plus I don't think the factions care about what traditions you pick, they are more concerned about your actions. I don't think unlocking Federations as your Fanatic Xenophobes begin purging the last vestiges of xeno life in the galaxy is going to suddenly cause empire-wide rebellion.

 

[Drakonn]

It's not as big a deal if the game is balanced so that this won't happen until 2700 or something, but it's still an issue.

This is what I'm hoping for. The choices should matter and it matters less if you can shrug your shoulders at it because you'll eventually have them all.

that should help with having loyal vassals as the completion bonus helps with making more useful ones

Very good point. Didn't think about that. Ha, I can myself becoming very attached to having several Vassal States now. Ohhh man, I haven't been lucky enough to survive/play a full game long enough to get as far as Vassalizing a FE empire yet.

...and if you're wonder why someone playing Xenophobic Empire might want anything to do with Diplomacy, much less federations, obviously you've never played Hard with aggressive AI

Plus I don't think the factions care about what traditions you pick, they are more concerned about your actions

Another reason to be able to set your Refugee policy in Xenophobes to allowed.

I may have to watch the stream again but didn't picking certain traditions influence certain ethos attraction? This would in turn influence factions. I'm all for factions reacting to Traditions. Unless that will let you screw yourself over far to easily.

Seems like both are pretty great for those who don't plan on being the only Empire left at the end, whether it's with Equals or as the overlord

Seems Tributaries (though yes the 10% is good) could use some love. By love, I mean the ability to extort slaves (or livestock) out of them or dictate policy. Then again, that's specific to Slavers but oh the ideas.