Friendtopia Lost: How the Migration Mechanic Dooms the Blorg Commonality to Loneliness :(

[gharzad]

Scroll to the bottom for a 'too long, didn't read' version.

Let me preface by saying I am so excited about this game, I love it, I love all Paradox games I have played. That said, I would like to offer some constructive criticism here on a subject the developers have discussed in some detail. I can not withhold judgement until I play the game because I feel that things like this may factor into people's decision on whether to buy the game at all, so discussing them with the community is a positive thing in that light. That said, I'll start the discussion with some background.

Blorg Endgame, Goal of the Commonality: The Blorg's goal is clear, they seek friends. In line with their xenophilic ethos, the dream of every true Blorg is to one day live as a pop that is surrounded on all sides with strange new alien friends. Indeed, the ideal Blorg 'Friendtopia' would be an empire where every planet hosts a number of species, with different pops of all races living side by side. This is presumably the goal our streamers are working towards, and to accomplish this goal they have so far brought two alien species into the Commonality. We are now in the mid game, as has been stated, with empire borders up against each other and habitable planets largely colonized and full of their respective species. The Blorg will likely bring other species into the Commonality, perhaps even one day the entire galaxy. However, conquest is not the goal, friendship is. True Friendtopia will not be achieved until various alien friends have intermingled with each other on every world. As the Blorg work to control information and move alien ethos towards their own xenophilic ways, alien friends themselves would be as much in favor of moving to Blorg worlds as the Blorg would be in favor of moving to theirs. A golden age would commence as intermingling of xenophilic friends over time throughout the Commonality would be assured. But is it?

Futility of the Friendtopia: This golden age, it turns out, can not come to pass given the current mechanics of the game. In particular, pops being unable to migrate between full planets will prevent the Blorg dream from becoming a reality. Migration seems reasonable enough in the early game, as pops move from older worlds to the frontier as newer worlds are colonized. However, by the mid game, empire borders are up against each other, no new planets are being colonized, and those that are inhabited are quickly filled to the brim as we have seen in the stream. The mid game commences with empires expanding into other empires. The Blorg take the systems of other species, and those worlds are found to be already filled to the brim with their respective species, as we can see in the worlds of the former Tebedoran Bloc. Taking this to the logical conclusion, after a great Blorg military campaign of friendship, we would have a large Commonality with systems containing many planets that are each filled with a single species. At this point, the Blorg late game should take place, in which the Blorg work towards the final goal of an empire filled with multispecies worlds. The goal seems simple to accomplish at this point, however, this is not the case. The worlds are full, and thus the pops are unable to migrate to be with friends of other races. Even those xenophilic pops (and one day all will be xenophilic if achieve negative ethics divergence) that want to switch with each other to finally make the Friendtopia a reality will be unable to do so. Each species becomes locked in place is left alone on their respective worlds. Lizards live alone with lizards, owls alone with owls, Blorg alone with repulsive Blorg. The Commonality stagnates. The goal was unachievable from the start, the game was always rigged. The Blorg dream of Friendtopia is nothing but a cruel, futile myth.

Call to Bring Back the Dream: I would propose that if migration were allowed between two full worlds, Friendtopia could once again become an achievable goal. It has been stated by the only dev to speak on this issue that migration is not a major feature of the game, yet I must disagree. The goal of that same dev's own stream can not be accomplished with the migration mechanics the way they currently are. In addition to this, the dev diary on pops discussed how pops would migrate to be with like minded ethos, implying that this would be the cause of mid and late game civil wars. This too, can not be the case with the mechanics as they currently are. Changing the mechanic to allow the migration would make these things and more a possibility. It would make the galaxy a more dynamic place. It would make the galaxy a more diverse place. It would make the Blorg Commonality's goals achievable and it would Make Space Great Again!

Forced Resettlement: Some, including a dev, have made the point that resettlement is still an option between two full planets. This should not, however, be seen as a true solution because of the negative impact resettlement has on pop's happiness. Even if you were to take two pops who are xenophilic and living on planets populated exclusively with their own species, and make their dream come true by switching them between those planets via forced resettlement, a choice they would have made on their own had the migration mechanic allowed for it, they will hate you for resettling them. They will hate you for doing for them exactly what they wanted to do in the first place, but could not on their own. For this reason, resettlement can not be seen as a true solution to this problem.

Realism: Some have said in other threads that is it not realistic for two pops on two full words to switch with each other, as billions of people coming to some kind of swapping agreement doesn't make much sense in real life. To that I can only respond that the pop system itself is not realistic. It is a great system, however. I like how it allows you to visualize each pop, and it it allows for lots of other cool mechanics as well. Realism is clearly not the goal here, so I don't see this as a terribly valid argument.

Technical Issues: I know nothing of coding the game, I admit. If a dev were to tell us that allowing migration between full planets were not possible or unreasonably difficult, we would have to accept this. No dev has said this is the case as of yet, despite having the opportunity to do so in at least one other threat.

Too Long, Did Not Read Version: Pops can not migrate between two full planets. This will prevent different species that are in an empire, such as that of the Blorg, from moving to intermingle with each other in the late game. The Blorg goal of living along side friends on every world is not achievable with the mechanics as they are. I humbly suggest the devs change this to, among other reasons, make the end goal of their own stream an achievable one. Please read the long version before you respond, I may have addressed the issue you wish to discuss in there at some point.

 

[waddles]

Totally agree. Without migration at max pop, planet populations become frozen, and less interesting.

Then endgame is a bit more static, as a potential driver for interesting instability is lost.

 

[Cynical Dreamer]

So sad

 

[Number 7]

assuming that migration rights with other nations are on, and that new planets are being colonised i can imagine slots opening up on planets when blorg/other pops move out of the empire / onto the newer worlds. That being said, moving off Blorg would be fairly unlikely due to its extremely high habitability and its happiness bonus for being the homeworld.

so the more unrestrictive policies you implement, the more migration i can imagine happening. although species are going to want to stick to worlds they can inhabit fairly effectively so if you have a desert race and a jungle race its going to be pretty hard to get them to intermingle because their preferences will just not line up, you'd need to add more pops who tolerate / love jungles

essentially taking full worlds and "opening up slots" before the end game when every planet is full (in theory? but i doubt this will ever occur) and thereby letting another pop move there. but lets see how it plays out in game first

 

[jcd000]

This sounds like a job for a DLC.

Victoria-style unlimited pop types per planet (and per tile) all able to come and go as they please (if the national laws allow it).
Only limit being the max population of the planet (or of the specific tile chosen).
Doing pops preferences at tile level sounds a bit expensive (in CPU) though, if all pops would be constantly considering if they want to migrate and specifically where to - Vicky does it on the other hand afaik.

 

[Cyridius]

I honestly don't see this being an issue. How often will you have all your planets be totally full? Very, very infrequently I would wager. I'm not saying this isn't a bit of an oversight if you see migration as a central component to the game, just that in the grand scheme of things the time and resources is probably better put into other things than a complex migration mechanic for edge cases.

 

[Okawoa]

So ... the population of a planet is 15 billion out of 15 billion. But you want the ABCD to migrate your planet. So you destroy one pop to make way for a budding pop of new migrants? Or what have a 16/15 situation? What if multiple groups want to migrate 23/15?

You see this makes perfect sense in Victoria where there isn't a pop-limit in provinces. But what your proposing is the equivalent of 100 million Englishmen, 100 million Nigerians and 100 million Japanese all coming to live in densely populated China. It's full up already.

 

[GameNerd]

The idea is good, some sort of migration between full planets should be allowed. In Star Wars the capital world of Corusacant was a full planet. Still did people both move there and move away.

 

[jimbox321]

So ... the population of a planet is 15 billion out of 15 billion. But you want the ABCD to migrate your planet. So you destroy one pop to make way for a budding pop of new migrants? Or what have a 16/15 situation? What if multiple groups want to migrate 23/15?

You see this makes perfect sense in Victoria where there isn't a pop-limit in provinces. But what your proposing is the equivalent of 100 million Englishmen, 100 million Nigerians and 100 million Japanese all coming to live in densely populated China. It's full up already.

No I believe what the op is asking is for pops on full planets to basically trade places with each other freely.

 

[RebelScum88]

I would generally say that pop growth seems pretty fast at the moment, which produces the effect described. Though that being said, the blorg seemed to seriously outnumber many of their neighbors. probably didnt help that jungle worlds probably have pretty high food levels compared to most planet types. But yeah, maybe pop growth will be tweaked down in the future.

 

[Okawoa]

No I believe what the op is asking is for pops on full planets to basically trade places with each other freely.

So you have 15/15 ABDC's on Planet A
You have 15/15 EFGH's on Planet B

and they are supposed to trade places. Making a temporary 16/15 on both Planet A and B? Otherwise what? pretending that one pop isn't there? Why do you think there isn't mass population exchange between Japan or China? Because both these countries are full. I promise you in the next 200 years there will not be a Japanese minority exceeding 1/15 of the population of China, or visa-versa.

 

[Oscot]

I honestly don't see this being an issue. How often will you have all your planets be totally full? Very, very infrequently I would wager. I'm not saying this isn't a bit of an oversight if you see migration as a central component to the game, just that in the grand scheme of things the time and resources is probably better put into other things than a complex migration mechanic for edge cases.

^ This.
Yeah, no-migration-at-full-capacity is slightly worse than you-can-have-migration-at-full-capacity, but the difference is beneath the threshold where I care - or, for that matter, can be bothered to read all the OP.

I'd much rather that Paradox code in another SPACE anomaly in this SPACE game then spend their time tinkering around trying to turn it into Realistic Migratory Population Mechanics Simulator.

 

[SenatusPopulusqueTerrenus]

If the population size of a planet is limited by food supply, one alternative might be to allow more pops than tiles on a planet - with the caveat that the number of productive pops would be limited to the available tiles. If a pop does not have a tile, it will not produce anything (or perhaps only energy/curreny), but will still require food.

Since the need for food production might become so great that other endeavours have to give room (i.e. less production, less science), there would be gameplay room for family size-related edicts that make pops slowly fade away, allowing the empire to reclaim farmed land for industrial and other endeavours.

 

[bel3338]

The only way I could see it working would be akin to wanting to buy a house in the real world; you've got to wait for the owner to sell. Similarly, any pop that wanted to migrate would be flagged as such and would have to wait for a pop on their target planet to move, or swap places if target pop wanted to move where the initial pop was.

Without knowing all the reasons pops might want to migrate, beyond planet habitability - and the only one I'm aware of is moving to less crowded planets which isn't applicable here - the point may be moot anyway as they might simply not have the desire to move

 

[Exemplar Voss]

If the population size of a planet is limited by food supply,

It isn't. It is limited by tiles.


The biggest obstacle to the Blorg dream wasn't a lack of full planet migration. It was that their neighbors were also inherently jerks, xenophobes and/or had different habitability preferences at a time when they had no ability to colonize non-tropical worlds. But now some of the owls have embraced true friendship, and if they turned migration on, some of the owls would leave, but equally tropical lizards would intermix with blorg pops, venom sacs and all.

The dream is perfectly viable (and achieved, actually). Wiz just wanted to trap owls on the homeworld in a time when they lacked any other friends. Because they were insanely xenophobic non-friend making types, AND filthy continent dwellers.

 

[SenatusPopulusqueTerrenus]

It isn't. It is limited by tiles.

I meant "in addition to tiles".

 

[Wulfram]

If there's an issue, it would be that slots fill up too easily, I'd say. And perhaps that new slots don't show up enough late in the game?

There is an edict that encourages Xeno migration. So I guess you could use that to hope to lure the aliens out to new worlds and then move your guys in?

 

[Hanekem]

What about this? Hybrid pops, not in the Sense of Star Trek, but as in pops with a mixed composition and drawing ethos and stats based on the percentage of their component sub pops.
That way we can simulate a living multi planetary society, with civilian liners and other ships, like cargo vessels, moving in between planets which would be rather cool and interesting not to mention simulating an economy.

Anyone here ever played Distant Worlds?

 

[gharzad]

This sounds like a job for a DLC.

I shudder to think of a world where this was the go to solution for every problem a developer encountered.

I honestly don't see this being an issue. How often will you have all your planets be totally full? Very, very infrequently I would wager.

I'm really just basing my assumptions on the Blorg steam. They are playing the game far less optimally than even the average player would play (purposefully so) and yet they are already almost full up on every one of their worlds, with few colonization options remaining available to them. So I don't believe full planets would be an infrequent scenario/edge case at all.

So you have 15/15 ABDC's on Planet A
You have 15/15 EFGH's on Planet B

and they are supposed to trade places. Making a temporary 16/15 on both Planet A and B? Otherwise what? pretending that one pop isn't there?

I think I see what your talking about, correct me if I'm wrong. I don't remember if this is the case or not in the stream but are you saying that when a pop is migrating they actually inhabit both the planet they are from and the one they are going to for a period of time? If so, this is indeed a technical issue that would have to be resolved for a new mechanic to work. Could probably be done so by making it so that they are only on the start world until the migration is complete. That is, if this is even how it works at all, I don't remember.

Without knowing all the reasons pops might want to migrate, beyond planet habitability - and the only one I'm aware of is moving to less crowded planets which isn't applicable here - the point may be moot anyway as they might simply not have the desire to move

I'll refer you to the original post,where I use the Blorg Commonality as just one example of where pops would want to swap on full planets on a large scale. Once negative ethics divergence is achieved, lizard people and owl people will become xenophilic, and want to move in with pops of other races, just as the Blorg want to. There will suddenly be plenty of pops that want to switch places on worlds that are already full with a single race each, to achieve a multiracial friendtopia. They need to be able to migrate between full worlds, though, for this to happen. Otherwise, the galaxy remains a lonely place.

The biggest obstacle to the Blorg dream wasn't a lack of full planet migration. It was that their neighbors were also inherently jerks, xenophobes and/or had different habitability preferences at a time when they had no ability to colonize non-tropical worlds. But now some of the owls have embraced true friendship, and if they turned migration on, some of the owls would leave, but equally tropical lizards would intermix with blorg pops, venom sacs and all.

The dream is perfectly viable (and achieved, actually). Wiz just wanted to trap owls on the homeworld in a time when they lacked any other friends. Because they were insanely xenophobic non-friend making types, AND filthy continent dwellers.

The problem is, by the time we convert the owls to xenophilic, the owl world and all the Blorg worlds will probably be full (they already nearly are). The pops will want to move to be near each other to fulfill their ethos and make friends, but they will be unable to.