How to keep the AI from popping the L-Gate way too early?

[Ferrus Animus]

Afaik, most, if not all, of the anomalies that would give L-gate insights are disabled for the AI.

I assume what's happening for most people who are experiencing this constantly, is that they're playing with a low tech cost modifier. The AI will absolutely rush through the clues on 0.25, especially now that they're more competent at producing a more reasonable amount of research early on.

Again, there are other random sources. And I play on 1.0 tech and have had the "AI ready to open the L-Gates" warning 40 years in multiple times since the DLC released.
Now I don't experience it constantly, but sometimes there's an AI that gets pretty fast to that point, and sometimes as a player you're unlucky too and can't outspeed them.

 

[Rezca]

We discussed this a bit last week and made some tweaks that should make this less likely to happen, while still maintaining the threat of the AI opening them before you so that you can't wait around if you want the goodies inside. If it looks good in internal testing, you might see some changes in this behavior in the next patch.

Can we have the option to just outright disable the L-Cluster and its mechanics entirely? Sometimes I like it and the risk/reward it presents in games, but there's also times when Ijust don't want the Cluster and its mechanics, and the only way to get rid of the Cluster is to just disable the DLC that adds it.

Just let us toggle the damned things' outcome like the end game crisis if people want to play with the tempest on, fine, let them, if they want to play and get the drakes let them, if they want to get gray, fine if they want to get nothing, let them, if they want it to be a roll of the dice, let them. Or let us be able to shut off the L-gates and keep the space monsters. I find the L-gates/L-cluster the most disposable component of distant stars because A: nanites are just meh as a resource and B: the Gray Tempest is a literal game/time waster. I get fed up playing a game for hours, finally having a decent run only to be f-ed over because the AI is a god damned idiot and the dice roll Gray Tempest which proceeds to burn the galaxy down because the AI has 10K and the Tempest base is 60K; it's not fun, it's not cute, it's not a 'get good moment' if I play as if the tempest is always going to be the outcome I'm going to body the AI, if I play to keep pace with the AI or with the community then the Tempest is going to burn the whole galaxy down. Five minutes ago I just walked away from a game that I'd been playing on and off for the last three days. It was going great was having fun....then the Tempest was released. You know what isn't fun...having a literal dice roll end a game...literally the DM getting mad and saying 'rocks fall everyone dies'. I only keep the damned DLC on for the space monsters....which are far more interesting.

117% agree with this. The L-Cluster mechanics were fun for the first few games, but more and more afterwards I just wish I could switch the whole thing off. We can turn off Mauraders (And the mid-game crisis that comes from them), the ever annoying Caraveeners, and Fallen Empires... Even disable Crisises entirely - why then, can we not disable the L-Cluster mechanics?

 

[Zander]

Gray Tempest (as is) is a bad mechanic. It should be removed from L-Gate options entirely and reworked as a possible endgame crisis. Just in terms of game systems "entire empires are randomly destroyed" is not something that should happen as a result of mid-game tech pursuits.

 

[DraLion]

This is about as annoying as seeing a bloodbags "here be dragons" dragon fighting in a pre-cruiser aged war.

 

[prismaticmarcus]

This is about as annoying as seeing a bloodbags "here be dragons" dragon fighting in a pre-cruiser aged war.

i haven't picked this origin yet. without spoiling, is it fun?

 

[DraLion]

i haven't picked this origin yet. without spoiling, is it fun?

Honestly... It is an interesting origin, but currently less so for machine empires.

 

[Archael90]

I agree with idea that Grey tempest should be pushed forward as endgame crisis (maruders also could be end-game crisis). L-gate should have more outcomes but neither should be empire wiping thing. Also, galactic community should have resolution banning L-gate activation, allowing special projects to destroy L-gates in your territory, forcing empires im gc to destroy L-gates and special casus belli for non-gc empires forcing them to destroy their L-gates.

 

[Dragatus]

Are the weightings working correctly btw? I know the grey tempest has the highest weight but the non tempest should still be more common in total. I haven't pinged to check every game I start but I feel like i'm getting really bad tempest RNG lately when in the past I almost never got the tempest ever.

Properly working RNG is notoriously random and it's likely that for any individual player some results will be more common than normal while others will be less common. What becomes cause for concern is if many different player are experiencing the same deviation from the intended norm.

To go back to the original question, the only non-mod solution I can think off for slowing down the opening of the gates is increasing tech costs, as that will slow down the rate at which the AI is researching the L-gate repeatable. What's your tech costs setting?

 

[StellarXe]

i haven't picked this origin yet. without spoiling, is it fun?

It's interesting in mechanism wise, however,
I was expecting more events/story plots but not as much as I have expected.

I don't know, it's my experience. Still fun if you roleplay your empire.

 

[DraLion]

I am not a fan of the current random events for the L-cluster.

I propose something different.

1. Remove the L-gates and allow Grey Tempest attacks at random locations against all the races (even Fallen Empires) that start weak and grow stronger when time goes on and eventually retreat back to the L-cluster.
Technology to enter the cluster is provided by:
a. A Fallen Empire who was attacked by the Grey Tempest and is demanding the younger races to assist in the defeat this nanite pest.
b. Combination of research of the defeated tempest ships... let's say 5 debris research sites (spawn only if all ships are destroyed) followed up by a newly created digsite that always spawns in the empire that is the first to defeat and research the five attacks.

2. Remove the L-gates and have a low chance event were instead of the Grey Tempest you have an exiled fallen empire inside the L-cluster which an existing Fallen Empire demands the whole galaxy to assist in their L-cluster enemy's purification.

In any case removing the L-gates solves the problem of people randomly opening them way to soon. ;-)

 

[Question]

Just make the l-gate special project only doable in the mid game or something like that.

IMHO the bigger issues are the fact that the goo ships are extremely unbalanced due to their weird stats. The titan beam is an RNG one shot, the nanite fighters are armored against flak (their supposed counter) and the energy spheres have high evasion. Its just annoying and requires you to use very specific setups to brute force your way through.

Also the defence fleets are too strong. That 30k gray tempest fleet that attacks in the mid game is not a big threat. The problem is that there are like 6 fleets sitting in terminal egress ready to pounce anyone trying to defeat the tempest. Its a mid game threat but it cant be defeated till the end game where you can brute force your way through with 200k+ fleet power. So for the entire mid game you just have to sit there and ignore the tempest as much as possible because the l-cluster is just too heavily defended.

To put it another way, the khan is a mid game crisis and can absolutely be defeated in the mid game. Imagine if the khan had 200k+fleet power and stuck around till the end game. He would be pretty annoying right?

 

[A2ch0n]

So for the entire mid game you just have to sit there and ignore the tempest as much as possible because the l-cluster is just too heavily defended.

For me is the tempest always a opportunity. It count as crisis and a long one too. I'm really happy if i see it because it allow me to get complete control over the GC. The AI always support custodian, limitless terms and galatic imperium in one row.

And now to some efficient tactics i use to fight the tempest.
First: Federation fleets. Even in midgame can a federation fleet easy overcome the power of the fleets in terminal egress. It's not really a problem if you really want it the tempest gone. In addition your (AI) fed members are even build your fleet if you allow that.
Second: Custodian fleet. This one is even stronger than a federation fleet and can be compared with it too. Become the custodian is really easy during each crisis and you can boost up any resolution you want.
Third imperial fleet: If you have managed to establish your empire even before the tempest arives, this one is more than enough (even durign midgame of course). But always remeber that all federation fleets are gone as soon an empire is proclaimed. So my favorit way is to use my fed fleet in combination with the custodian fleet to rough up the tempest, propose the galactic empire, let the tempest home system intact close to the end of the vote (or at least until i can finish it with custodian power), destroy the tempest, end the resolution and the midgame crisis is used as best as possible.

Yes the tempest is maybe to strong for a sigle empire but like the xenophile flavor text says: "This journey was never ment to travel alone"

 

[Harkinian's Dinner]

I've never seen the AI even get close to opening the L-Gates before the Tempest is no longer a threat.

I think these complaints suggest people are playing on weird settings, such as really low difficulty level (leading to weak, underprepared AIs) combined with early endgame dates(causing them to discover clues faster), combined with of course bad play from the player.

 

[Archael90]

I've never seen the AI even get close to opening the L-Gates before the Tempest is no longer a threat.

I think these complaints suggest people are playing on weird settings, such as really low difficulty level (leading to weak, underprepared AIs) combined with early endgame dates(causing them to discover clues faster), combined with of course bad play from the player.

You not seeing a thing is not an argument in any way. I have never seen a virus, nor Grand Canyon, does this means neither exists?

 

[John MacWhat]

I'd really just love an L-gate toggle with "Always" "Off" and "Random" as options. I want the other content from Distant Stars which is why disabling the DLC is not a solution, but I'm not sure I want the L-Gate to appear in every single galaxy I play

 

[MathyM]

I'd really just love an L-gate toggle with "Always" "Off" and "Random" as options. I want the other content from Distant Stars which is why disabling the DLC is not a solution, but I'm not sure I want the L-Gate to appear in every single galaxy I play

I thought we already had this option. I think it would be nice to have a slider that allows us to limit the number that spawn or completely disable L-Gates. They are especially annoying during wars, since they act as Gateways that any enemy empire can access. You have to park fleets there so you don’t get small swarms leaking into your territory.

 

[hart30]

For now I will disable the whole distant stars dlc. As much as I love the events the dlc provides, the l-cluster started to become a huge pain in the ass. If I have a l-cluster in my space or close by I basically can restart the whole game, as if the grey storm pops out I will be busy fighting it until the end game, becoming unable to do anything else, maybe even die. If the l-cluster gate is not close, the grey tempest often destroys or at least weakens some of the strongest enemy ai empires in the game, causing weaker and incredibly friendly/boring empires to conquer them turning the whole action packed galaxy into a one/two federation peace festival. I end up having nothing to do until the end game crisis, as nothing to challenge is left (I absolutely love one genocidal empire eating a federation or other boring peach empires, so I get a bigger threat, which I can fight).
Even if the l-cluster turns out empty it later tends to become a huge pain, as the end game crisis likes nothing more, than using it as super highway spreading its territory like swiss cheese all over the galaxy. Sure, u can say this increases the challenge, as u are nowhere safe for preparation, but this also means that ur crisis fighting fleets have to be at a dozen places at once. Especially with the unbidden this is horrible, as the anchors cannot be marked on the map (u have to click manually through hundreds of systems on huge maps and good luck doing that through a galactic storm, which prevents ur sentry array from looking in said systems). Also the unbidden tend to instabuild new anchors by simply taking one system, so if a single fleet is on the other side of the galaxy u have bad luck and cannot destroy the portal. U end up in a infinite anchor chase until either most of the ai empires, which build new outposts for instatakeover anchor building either are dead, or u die. The only strat there currently exists against the unbidden is to crush them as soon the pop up, not allowing them to reach one l-gate.

It already ruined too many games for me. I rather sacrifice the spawning of the corrupted avatar, tianky matriarch, voidspawn, scavenger bot, rattlings and prikikki ti and other special systems.

 

[Harmsway]

A mid game crisis strength slider would also greatly help for this case.

I don’t think it would. You would have to know before even starting the run that the AI will open the L-Gates sooner than expected.

You don't *need* to know anything like that. Even if the hypothetical slider did nothing but control the strength of the Tempest, that would address the bulk of the "not fun at all when endgame fleets pop out during midgame and steamroll entire empires" problems.

 

[Harkinian's Dinner]

You not seeing a thing is not an argument in any way. I have never seen a virus, nor Grand Canyon, does this means neither exists?

Yes it is. It is a completely valid statistical argument, unlike your bogus comparisons. A virus cannot be seen, and the Grand Canyon cannot be seen if you don't go there.

An actual legitimate comparison would be if you flew across Nevada between two random points on the state border 50 times at low altitude. It's exceedingly unlikely you wouldn't see the Grand Canyon at least once in those 50 flights. That is what we are dealing with here. I have played a whole lot of Stellaris games, and the posited problem has never arisen. That means that the problem is exceedingly unlikely to exist. Instead, it must be explained by the users manufacturing it themselves, likely by choosing galaxy settings or mods that cause it. Solution: Use different settings.

 

[MathyM]

You don't *need* to know anything like that. Even if the hypothetical slider did nothing but control the strength of the Tempest, that would address the bulk of the "not fun at all when endgame fleets pop out during midgame and steamroll entire empires" problems.

Then you risk making the Gray Tempest, Great Khan, and other midgame crises all too easy.