Multispecies empire: unity cost

[drawar]

A simple enough idea without the need for the creation of any real internal management (even that would be fine) to add a constraint to very species-diverse empires.

The objective would be to add a unity penalty based on species diversity.
Acquiring foreign pops through war or immigration and other means can be very useful to increase its population especially with the change in population growth.

Currently, the only real disadvantage of having many species is having the very contagious «disease of xenophilia»...


Each species with Citizenship "Full Citizenship", "Residence" or "Slave" will generate a cost in unity.
The species “robots without rights and pops with the traits: Serviles, Docile Livestock, Zombie and Nerve Stapled” are not counted.

The formula might look like this

U = C(Fc + 0.5R + 0.25S)*Spop/Epop

U: Unity cost of a species
C: a coefficient, possibly configurable in the game creation options
Fc: number of "Full Citizenship" species, excluding the species of the empire ruler
R: number of "Residence" species
S : number of "slave specie
Spop: number of pops of the species
Epop: number of pops of the empire (excluding robots without rights and pops with the traits: Serviles, Docile Livestock, Zombie and Nerve Stapled)

Basically, the more numerous a species is, the more it generates a significant penalty.
The higher a species' rights, the greater the penalty it generates. The explanation is that a foreign free pop is more likely to maintain its traditions, ways of life and etc., so it is less inclined to adopt or conform (against its will) to the main/ruling culture.
Also, the other species could also badly support these foreign manners.

Also the more different species the empire has, the higher the unit cost.
100 pops of 10 different species will generate a higher cost than 100 pops of the same different species.

The Living standards could modify the unity cost of a species, high living conditions would increase the fixed cost (“FC,R and S” of the equation) in unity, but would decrease the unity cost per pop of the species; low conditions would do the opposite.
The Indentured Servitude would also increase the fixed unity cost, but decrease the cost per pop; the Livestock would do the opposite.
Species won't appreciate giving too much importance to other "alien" species, but those "alien" species will feel less solidarity with the empire if they are marginalized.

Also note that the species of the ruler of the empire does not count and does not generate a unity cost.
In multi-species elective empires, changing the ruler's species can suddenly increase or decrease the unity cost.

A useful small change would be powers to allow or prohibit the immigration of a species into its empire to avoid receiving any species by signing migration treaties with other empires.
Also possibly a small change that could be appreciated would be to allow or prohibit the immigration of a species to a planet or sector of its empire.



The xenophile ethic will lose its trade value bonus and will gain a bonus reducing the unity cost generated by the “alien” species.
The xenophobic ethic would lose the ban on giving "Full Citizenship" to a species.
However, xenophobic ethics will increase the unity cost of "alien" species.

Note that this concept could be extended to other prohibitions generated by ethics, such as sentient robots for spiritualist ethics.
Instead of having prohibitions that completely block an empire, when politics often have to be pragmatic and such, going against the ethics of the empire could generate a unity cost. The cost would be weighted according to the type and extent of the breach of empire ethics.

For example, pacifist empires allowing Unrestricted Wars will have a unity cost based on the number of pacifist pops in the empire.

Spiritualist empires will have a unity cost based on the number of sentient robots.

If we want to add a stronger penalty, this could be accompanied by a loss of stability, but this can already be the case by dissatisfying the factions, therefore decreasing the happiness of pops.

 

[Der4ndere]

Maybe slightly change it, so that your main / most numerous / most influnetuel species (should in most cases be the same) generates unity with each pop and that value gets reduecd according to your formula?

 

[drawar]

This is already the case indirectly in two ways.
The species of the ruler of the empire has no unity cost. Admittedly, it is not necessarily the most numerous species, but this is something to take into account when managing its demographics and its choice of ruler.

The second way is that there is a "Spop/Epop" ratio factor between the population of the species and the population of the empire.
So the more the ruler's species, the lower this ratio is between 1 and 0.
For example, in an empire of 1000 pop, if you 100 pop of species B, that's 100/1000=0.1 or 10%, if you prefer, if species B would have 250 pop (still in an empire of 1000 pop), that's 250/1000=0.25 or 25%.

For example, if in this same empire at 1000 pop, you have three alien species at 250 pop each.
This would therefore have three times this unity cost via a ratio of 25% for each alien species.
So this empire will spend a lot more unity for the same amount of pop.

Besides, an empire with 75% of alien pop of the same species would have a lower unity cost than an empire with 3 species each representing 25% of the population of the empire because of the part of the formula “FC+0.5R+0.25S”


So having a lot pop of ruler specie helps reduce the unity cost. A single-species empire or “robots without rights and pops with the traits: Serviles, Docile Livestock, Zombie and Nerve Stapled” aliens would have no unity cost.

Finally, there is no need to add unity production for the empire ruler's species, there are already many ways to produce unity.

 

[Cry_Havok]

Diverse empires already have a unity penalty, faction unity. You don't need to buff Xenophobe which is already OP

 

[drawar]

There are ways to change the ethics of pops.
It is possible to have several happy factions.
Also, this is based on pops and not species.
For example, in my idea, 25 aliens of 4 different species will generate a cost in unity higher than 100 aliens of the same species (in equivalent condition).

 

[GOLANX]

I think unhappy factions should cost Unity not (relatively) happy Xenos. Now imo Xeno pops should I think have an ethics pull from their home empire, just because they live far from home doesn't neccesarily mean they don't miss it and didn't bring their ethics with them. Imo Xenos should have reduced habitability as well. Turning a door handle is probably easier for hands than tentacles. Being a 8 foot tall Xeno in a society of 5 foot tall people you'll be bending over a lot, and need special Accomodations that I think can be somewhat represented with a 10% habitability malus.

 

[MordridBlack]

As one of the few crazy people who runs xeno-compatibility

NO

 

[drawar]

I think unhappy factions should cost Unity not (relatively) happy Xenos. Now imo Xeno pops should I think have an ethics pull from their home empire, just because they live far from home doesn't neccesarily mean they don't miss it and didn't bring their ethics with them. Imo Xenos should have reduced habitability as well. Turning a door handle is probably easier for hands than tentacles. Being a 8 foot tall Xeno in a society of 5 foot tall people you'll be bending over a lot, and need special Accomodations that I think can be somewhat represented with a 10% habitability malus.

It could also be a nice addition that factions with less than 50% Approval cost unity.
So maybe we should also put a unity cost to Support or Suppress a faction.

However, it should not be limited to the ethics of pops.

The tentacles with suction cups, it's very practical. I've seen octopuses open jars before.
And Elephants are very agile with their trunks.


For a malus of habitability, it is complicated to manage. There are too many species similar to Stellaris.
But one could imagine special and civic traits associated with it. For example "dwarf" and "dwarf architecture", species without the "dwarf" trait would have a penalty on planets using dwarf architecture and vice versa.
Dwarf architecture could be a planetary decision, if one acquires an alien planet.
Eventually, a bit like the aquatic trait.

As one of the few crazy people who runs xeno-compatibility

NO

Precisely, this ascension perk can also have a bonus to help manage this cost.