While I really like 2.2, I'm reaching the late game in a 1000 star galaxy, and now, managing 70+ planets is really wearing on me.
While managing up to like 20 planets is fun in the midgame, especially when you're at peace and have nothing else to do, trying to fight a war or a crisis or anything else like that, and keep your planets continuing to grow well, and not have housing shortages, unemployment, etc, is quite tough. At least with 2.1's tiles you could plan all your buildings, and just come back to everything to click the upgrade button a thousand times, but you where still getting a good build out just with one pass on a single planet screen. That way you can transition from your emperor's hat to your admiral's hat, and your empire would be in decent shape when you got back to it. In in 2.1.3's 2400, you barely needed to look at your planets, and could focus on the naval game.
Now, because buildings are staggered by population, now you cannot plan ahead more than a few years per planet, and thus they constantly need attention. Before with Stellaris, the early game, and the late game were the funnest parts. Exploration was cool, and fighting for your life against near overwhelming odds was fun too. Its just the middle that lacked substance. So you can imagine the excitement curve of 2.1 to be two humps, one peak that is early, one peak that is late. Now in 2.2, the curve has a steady increase, but then it falls off a cliff when a player's individual complexity meter gets filled as the planet micro becomes more chore than game. At this point, I'd like to be in the wide view, empire level problems, and not have to constantly go into the weeds to solve a homelessness problem or whatever. 2.2 adds depth, but that depth doesn't have a nice progression of scope. Planets demand so much love, you really cannot ever really ignore a planet, even if you have bigger fish to fry.
So at least in the late part of the game, I'd really like something where I could say "Build this pattern of planet, Industrial, Forge, Research, whatever" and have a blueprint for it to follow. So It can build on a logic, Build distrinct until 5 pops, Robot Factory, keep building districts, at 10: Gene Clinic, at 15: Cloning Vats, at 20: Autochthon Monument, Upgrade the Monument, etc, etc, then each path would branch into its specialization. Also have a nice checkbox, "Replace districts to add Housing" or "Don't replace districts to add housing" so you can keep raw materials flowing.
It could even be behind a technology, like automatic exploration, so people don't miss the game, but have a tool for later when their concerns a more geopolitical than central planning.
While managing up to like 20 planets is fun in the midgame, especially when you're at peace and have nothing else to do, trying to fight a war or a crisis or anything else like that, and keep your planets continuing to grow well, and not have housing shortages, unemployment, etc, is quite tough. At least with 2.1's tiles you could plan all your buildings, and just come back to everything to click the upgrade button a thousand times, but you where still getting a good build out just with one pass on a single planet screen. That way you can transition from your emperor's hat to your admiral's hat, and your empire would be in decent shape when you got back to it. In in 2.1.3's 2400, you barely needed to look at your planets, and could focus on the naval game.
Now, because buildings are staggered by population, now you cannot plan ahead more than a few years per planet, and thus they constantly need attention. Before with Stellaris, the early game, and the late game were the funnest parts. Exploration was cool, and fighting for your life against near overwhelming odds was fun too. Its just the middle that lacked substance. So you can imagine the excitement curve of 2.1 to be two humps, one peak that is early, one peak that is late. Now in 2.2, the curve has a steady increase, but then it falls off a cliff when a player's individual complexity meter gets filled as the planet micro becomes more chore than game. At this point, I'd like to be in the wide view, empire level problems, and not have to constantly go into the weeds to solve a homelessness problem or whatever. 2.2 adds depth, but that depth doesn't have a nice progression of scope. Planets demand so much love, you really cannot ever really ignore a planet, even if you have bigger fish to fry.
So at least in the late part of the game, I'd really like something where I could say "Build this pattern of planet, Industrial, Forge, Research, whatever" and have a blueprint for it to follow. So It can build on a logic, Build distrinct until 5 pops, Robot Factory, keep building districts, at 10: Gene Clinic, at 15: Cloning Vats, at 20: Autochthon Monument, Upgrade the Monument, etc, etc, then each path would branch into its specialization. Also have a nice checkbox, "Replace districts to add Housing" or "Don't replace districts to add housing" so you can keep raw materials flowing.
It could even be behind a technology, like automatic exploration, so people don't miss the game, but have a tool for later when their concerns a more geopolitical than central planning.