Have you considered that maybe, there is no "borderline forum hive mind", it's just filled with many individuals with differing opinions and preferences?
Not really. Every time things like this come up, the instant knee-jerk response is "Ugh too tedious, too much micro, I don't wanna have to do things". Almost every single time topics like this crop up. This topic in particular. Every topic I come across talking about in depth improvement is like 50% of people whining about too many clicks, basically. The Crusader Kings section is even worse. Try to ask for Crusader Kings to actually add more strategy elements? you get downvoted to oblivion because everyone just wants to play the Sims and jerk off because their banging every woman in the game and ERPing.
Half the time in these Stellaris sections, it seems like anything that goes beyond "right click, attack system" is "too tedious, too much micro" that no one wants to bother with, and it's absolutely ridiculous. You all realize these are strategy games right? the entire genre could be renamed "micromanagement" and it would not be inaccurate. Homeworld makes my damn wrist hurt I have to click so much, and I wouldn't have it any other way. Granted I limit my play time to avoid permanent damage, but still. The fact that a dev actually came in here and said "remove one of the most important aspects of Sci Fi writing is the correct decision" with a straight face is incredibly alarming frankly, and makes me wonder what his priority actually is as a developer, because it's clearly not making an in depth strategy experience.
ANd before anyone tries to counter with "it's not really a strategy game, it's a story game" or w'/e your about to say. The lore and fluff is utterly gone halfway through the mid game aside from the Crisis stuff, so I don't wanna hear that crap. From the Mid game onwards it is a pure strategy experience (cough offensive deathball simulator cough) with basically no story pop ups. Your head canons are not game mechanics, and do not matter when it comes to improving the game. Clearly the devs want mechanical improvement as well (well in some areas anyway) because their DLCs these days are focused on new mechanics, half baked (The Empire being worse than hegemon in most ways) and sometimes worthless mechanics (hello Espionage) but still.
Granted they've made it clear that the very concept of Defense is vile and evil, and not a proper method of warfare, because they've gone above and beyond to remove any possible method of defense, in even the smallest of ways. I suspect their next patch will remove weapons from Star Bases entirely and replace it with a picket sign that says "Free Real Estate" since they love their memes so much. After all, we can't afford to have the AI/Crisis hindered in any possible way while it beelines for you in the most brain dead manner possible because the devs need their terrible gimmick Nemesis mechanic that makes the Crisis worse than it was before, which I didn't think was possible. So I honestly don't understand the devs priorities at all at this point. Their making the game as smooth brained as possible in terms of actual strategic options, while constantly adding mechanics that add more theoretical options that don't actually do anything. Probably because of all the folks on here whining about "too many clicks" and just wanna live in their own little head canon world of make-believe where they play Palpatine/Prequel memes in their head on repeat and not actually challenge themselves with strategy mechanics. In truth that's probably what the devs do as well, it would explain their complete and utter lack of logic in their strategic design.
I welcome any Devs who reads this to respond and explain and discuss anything I've said and why I might be wrong. But I know it won't happen, because this post, and me by extension will be labelled as "too toxic" and ignored, because critical feedback hurts feelings and we can't have that. Just ask Youtube about their removal of the Dislike meter, or the devs from Jason Schreier's Battlefield article, where project leads told his sources to not give critical or negative feedback on design decisions because it would hurt their co-workers feelings (this is not a joke). Devs don't want to actually debate their decisions, or even conceive of the concept that they might be wrong in their decision making. I've seen it too many times in my life to be convinced otherwise. Devs are convinced their always right, and always know better than the player. I again welcome any dev here to disprove that assertion with a calm back and forth, but I know it won't happen, because I know how this works. I've just said all the quiet parts loud, and that's a big no no, and I will be shunned and downvoted into oblivion as a result. I don't care. At least Paradox hasn't hidden their downvotes yet, so I'll give em credit for that.
Make sure you show the attacking fleet travelling to the system's asteroid belt to simulate the collection of rocks to drop on the planet...
The current army mechanics are annoying and boring because... they're annoying and boring, not because they're army mechanics. They could be done better, absolutely, but planetary invasions are one of the major tenets of science-fiction writing, so they shouldn't simply be thrown out.
There are a few issues with armies and planetary invasions that I would look at first:
There are plenty more issues to cover, but I'll leave by saying: keep armies and invasions, treat them as the important things that they are, have them make sense and be natural (but not overly simplistic) to work with.
- Invasions are portrayed as an "oh, yeah, that too" function of warfare, both on attack and planetary defense. There needs to be emphasis ADDED to planetary invasions, not removed. Certain megastructures notwithstanding, planets are the end-all, be-all of interstellar warfare. Taking a planet should be meaningful, and the process of doing so should be, as well.
- Planets right now are defenseless against fleets without fleets of their own in vanilla. There are no surface-to-orbit weapons, no massive launches of SC, and certainly not in the numbers that an entire PLANET should be able to bring to bear. Part of this has to do with the false balancing of resource value between space projects (including fleets) and planetary projects. Individual warships are most likely infinitesimal compared to even the smallest planets, and the only advantage they have over the defenses of a planet is all of their weapons can bear on one target on a planet, while any given direct-fire weapons on a planet are limited by their firing arcs (SC and GW have far fewer restrictions).
- Defensive armies, as a factor of planetary populations, would be colossal, and assault armies would have to be comparable. Not only for the personnel involved, but all of their weapons, equipment, vehicles, planet-side fortifications, supplies, ammunition, etc. It should require a big clunky fleet to bring them across planetary systems, and it should require escorting and baby-sitting to make sure they get to their target relatively unscathed and prepared for invasion. If the escorting/baby-sitting is too much for the normal ship-to-ship main battle fleet, add escorts to the transport fleet and/or configure them to be able to defend themselves.
- Armies/transports need to be as easy to configure, build, upgrade, and replace as regular pure-warship fleets (assuming you can get the Fleet Manager to cooperate). You need to be able to determine species, training, equipment, and transport systems quickly and easily.
- Planets would not just sit there peaceably after being invaded - troops and blockading ships would need to be left behind to ensure compliance. Lightly- or unarmed transports would be sitting ducks for counter-raiding by the owning empire's warship fleets, even in small numbers. Rules would have to be in place for what happens to armies when their transports that are chased away or destroyed (e.g., does a transport have to wait for its army to "die" before it can be "re-armied"?).
Happy holidays to everyone!
In conclusion, and to bring this all back around. This guy is 100% correct and spot on. I have nothing more to add from what he said.
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