Habitable Space Stations

[EvilTom]

I've always liked the idea of a race (or races) of people who solely live in space with no planets.

This could range from something like a Babylon 5 style space station which could become independent to a fleet of ships with no permanent home (similar to Battlestar Galactica).

Is there any scope for this in the game? Do space stations/star ports have populations? I've never seen a space game do this well yet. Having an entirely mobile population could be strategically interesting...

 

[corny.1234]

I'm not sure but i think you can upgrade space ports to contain some pops.

 

[TheDellingr]

i like that... but i think that is not how this game was designed

 

[Dr_Creeptor]

I would urge Paradox Interactive to make this a reality, to be able to have Spaceports containing a population.
This would be great for some instances such as when you find a planet covered with Miasma. Alright, set up a spaceport near it, have some people live there, expand, grow, monitor, until we get a solution to live on such a planet.

Please allow us to do this PDX.

 

[Dessic]

I don't think Stellaris's population system is designed to handle that. One POP unit is supposed to be roughly analogous to upwards of 1 billion individuals. That would take a massive fleet or enormous space stations just to hold and provide enough food, water, and atmosphere for one POP unit. Mining stations, research stations, and frontier outposts seem to be this game's equivalent of space stations that would hold a few thousand people.

 

[Dr_Creeptor]

I don't think Stellaris's population system is designed to handle that. One POP unit is supposed to be roughly analogous to upwards of 1 billion individuals. That would take a massive fleet or enormous space stations just to hold and provide enough food, water, and atmosphere for one POP unit. Mining stations, research stations, and frontier outposts seem to be this game's equivalent of space stations that would hold a few thousand people.

In a game where you can actually go faster than light, something impossible (correct me if I'm wrong), I think PDX can at least allow you to have Space Stations with a few billion people on it. And if that doesn't work, balance it by allowing you like 4 space stations and making them expensive as hell.

 

[TheBeautifulVoid2]

I think they have chosen the path of not allowing buildable space habitats or populated non-planet entities, and so using that as a way to limit the amount of dwelling space in the galaxy and so provide a population cap of sorts.

I could be wrong.

 

[EvilTom]

I think they have chosen the path of not allowing buildable space habitats or populated non-planet entities, and so using that as a way to limit the amount of dwelling space in the galaxy and so provide a population cap of sorts.

I could be wrong.

I'm ok with that as a gameplay device. I know balancing a game and setting somewhat "artificial" limits are required to keep to the games scope, budget and time restrictions.

It'd still be nice as like I've said... I'm yet to see a decent game that does this well. it could be an interesting solution to a race that has far too much population growth and not enough habitable space.

 

[ahhheygao]

I believe this falls squarely under the purview of DLC.

 

[desiriel]

I think they have chosen the path of not allowing buildable space habitats or populated non-planet entities, and so using that as a way to limit the amount of dwelling space in the galaxy and so provide a population cap of sorts.

I could be wrong.

Orbital habitats are a staple of sci-fi (and even planned in actual space programs in our old Earth ) so I can't think that Stellaris' devs forgot them. I think you're right that their implementation would open a new level of balance options so I'm pretty sure that they were neglected for release but are in some position of their "to-do-after-release" list.

 

[TheNitram]

Well maybe we could expand on this by imagining a moving planet. A one tile planet that can change solar systems.

 

[SgtSmuckers]

Perhaps make habitable space stations a thing only a federation can build, as it will not doubt cost a lot of credits/minerals/influence. I always imagine the citadel from mass effect when I think of this

 

[Botox]

Its for the same reason that terraforming every planet was not implemented in this game.
You can always RP that your space stations have some population or crew, which would be explainable and logic, but it would not be anywhere near a total POP (i.e. about 1 billion people). Imagine that we have about 7 billion people living on earth right now and even given that we'll later have more refined tech, I still find it hardly beleavable that one can build a space station that can support even one seventh of it.

I sometimes think people forget the sheer number of people one POP equivalents to, even if I can understand it (and the need for ring worlds/dyson spheres and so on).

 

[Posca]

Its for the same reason that terraforming every planet was not implemented in this game.
You can always RP that your space stations have some population or crew, which would be explainable and logic, but it would not be anywhere near a total POP (i.e. about 1 billion people). Imagine that we have about 7 billion people living on earth right now and even given that we'll later have more refined tech, I still find it hardly beleavable that one can build a space station that can support even one seventh of it.

I sometimes think people forget the sheer number of people one POP equivalents to, even if I can understand it (and the need for ring worlds/dyson spheres and so on).

Just remember the above when someone decides they want to purge "just one" POP. They have just become 100 Hitlers, and humanity's greatest monster (or funganity's greatest monster)

 

[TheBeautifulVoid2]

Just remember the above when someone decides they want to purge "just one" POP. They have just become 100 Hitlers, and humanity's greatest monster (or funganity's greatest monster)

Besides, you can never stop at just one.

 

[Oscot]

Besides, you can never stop at just one.

"I couldn't help it, they were just so more-ish. My bad."
- Mao Zedong

 

[Nyrael]

I think they have chosen the path of not allowing buildable space habitats or populated non-planet entities, and so using that as a way to limit the amount of dwelling space in the galaxy and so provide a population cap of sorts.

I could be wrong.

There are Ringworlds already so we already have one space habitat if I understood it correctly.

 

[Alexander Seil]

I'd also rather see them put some effort towards making ring worlds (which, presumably, you discover and conquer rather than build) be something more than a glorified perfect planet. For instance, one could imagine a quest chain to activate certain sections, or to change the climate to suit your species better. Or, at least, mineral maintenance to keep the whole damn thing operational.

 

[Admiral Howe]

One POP unit is supposed to be roughly analogous to upwards of 1 billion individuals.

^^ This.

You'd need to get into orbital megastructures - rings around earth for example, to get enough area to plausibly house the many hundreds of million, if not billion, people representing a single pop point.

 

[Nuril]

The Pops do grow into place with food-consumption determining how quickly they become an active Pop, though, IIRC? It would be interesting in a DLC if smaller space habitats or nomadic Life Ships could each contain individual fractional Pops that limit the growth and have lower output. So locked at +0.1 or what-have-you per expansion-upgrade. Perhaps even multiple fractional Pops at once capped off, for political dynamics.

The flipside to the benefits of constructing them would be that A) Expensive start-up cost (less for stationary of equivalent size, as you bulk up Life Ships more for extra capabilities), B) SIGNIFICANTLY more vulnerable during wars. Stay vigilant, control space-superiority. Think the destroyed habitat Heliopolis of the Orb Union or the Junius Seven tragedy during the early episodes of Gundam SEED or the later attacks on their home PLANTs threatening their entire homeworld-equivalent.

Would also help advanced-but-small tall regions, unable to expand, not simply be out-massed by larger nations? Some large-scale habitats and powerful military stations in a defensible position.

You'd need to get into orbital megastructures - rings around earth for example, to get enough area to plausibly house the many hundreds of million, if not billion, people representing a single pop point.

You are heavily underestimating just how massive the potential population able to be housed by such a colossal installation is. Like, that is a continuous human-constructed urban habitat stretching across multiple continents. Food production aside, it's... quite something. Remember the magnitudes that they had to scale down the available space in the Ring World to not have it be "Basically if you control this your opponent would have to colonize the rest of the galaxy to compete".

There's a reason a civilization on the level of the Culture abandoned terraforming in favour of more optimizable Orbitals.