One big issue i have with the current stellaris.

[Swarm lover]

So im not here to talk about the issues everyone is talking about like lacking of internal stuff etc, but rather one that has become quite glaring with the new content of the nemesis dlc. That issue is the huge difference in "scope" and "craziness" of certain areas of the game.

For example you got the crisis path which is basically goes full crazy with star destroying ships, a galaxy ending god hood device and a galactic war. It really goes all out with a long journey with a big pay off. (I think there was a mention that initially the team planned to have three different crisis paths depending on your ascension so there could have been even more)

Then on the opposite end we have things like ascensions, which are meant to be big empire affecting changes but barely bring anything at all. Like as a "master of genetics" why can't i create my own space monsters? You mean to tell me any regular empire can figure out how to create a god hood machine but creating space monsters is too hard? I mean there are naturally occuring ones so i really dont see whats stopping our scientists from doing so, if the answer is they ask themselves "if they should rather than if they can" then im gonna start throwing them out the airlock until i get myself a mad scientist.

Currently there are a lot of areas that compared to others stay too "grounded" while others go full crazy which does add a feeling of weirdness for me what the things empires can do. Building gigantic complex space instatlations like a dyson sphere or matter decompressor? No problem. Making space faring creatures made for war like the prethoryn when i have gone with the genetic ascension? Sorry no can do, even if there are literal living examples that you could simply take DNA of and start cloning or make your own modified version.

I dont know if other people feel the same way and i doubt the custodian team will be able to do anything about it for a very long time (yes the small changes they make might add up to make a big one but who knows how long thats gonna take), but i never saw anyone talking about it.

Do you guys feel the same way or is it just me.

 

[MordridBlack]

the 3 ascension paths do feel a bit...lacking

granted this is often why people turn to mods which either improve them or add onto them, but not everyone wants to (or can) play with mods active)


they do need to look into it, but that is a job left to the custodian team, and they have a lot of stuff on their plate to try and fix

 

[Azhcristokos]

The issue is very simple: ascension paths are old content. When they were released with Utopia, ascension perks and megastructures were both new and ambitious relative to what had existed before 1.5/Banks. The idea of turning your whole empire into robots or having psychic powers was very novel and gameshaking. Hell, awakened empires, leviathans, and enclaves (now mainstays of the game) were still pretty fresh, having been implemented with 1.3/Heinlein not that long before.

Now we have a Galactic Imperium, the player-turned-crisis, multiple midgame crises (including one that regularly ends the galaxy), necrophages, clone armies, city worlds, etc. As Stellaris ages, the devs become more ambitious in order to top their previous content, with mixed rates of success. Ascension paths definitely need a facelift, but that might not be something we get until Stellaris 2.

Added to this are the evergrowing mods like Gigastructural Engineering that add in content utterly dwarfing what is available in vanilla in terms of sheer sci-fi badassery.

 

[bunkerman]

I for one dont see the grounded scale of stuff as a problem what i see as a problem is the thigs like nemesis that completely take over the whole game and make it a mess, if anything id say they should scale nemesis down not ascensions up, if anything maybe they can buff psionics to be on par with the others but upping the scale of robotic ascension any higher would be game breaking in my opinion

 

[Ryika]

I agree that there's a huge gap between some of the mechanics, but personally I gravitate more towards the other end of the scale - I think the "Becoming the Crisis" stuff is just silly.

I'd find it much more interesting if the game scaled things back a bit, focused more on the politics between empires, on how things like Synth Ascension change your society, and your relations with other empires, etc. Those old mechanics could certainly need some more interesting stuff, but "creating space monsters" as a mechanic isn't really what I'd want to see.

 

[Dragatus]

This does sound like something for the Custodian Team once they're done with the admin cap/unity rework. Ascension paths have had a decent run, but need an update to become exciting again.

What Become the Crisis does that ascension paths don't is it unlocks a new area of gameplay. You get massive bonuses, provoke the galaxy into teaming up against you, and you get to build a megastructure that destroys everything and makes you win the game. I do partially agree with the opinion @bunkerman presented that it does too much, but I think the issue isn't in what it does. The issue is that it only takes 1 AP to do it (partially because Menace requires almost no effort to accumulate). Unless the number of traditions and so APs we can take gets scaled down (which I don't think will happen, people love their APs) I think it should take multiple APs to get there. Taking Become the Crisis as the 4th or 5th out of 5 APs would be acceptable, but if we keep 8 APs it should take at least 2 APs to get to get to the final stage, but even that feels a bit low to me.

 

[MordridBlack]

I for one dont see the grounded scale of stuff as a problem what i see as a problem is the thigs like nemesis that completely take over the whole game and make it a mess, if anything id say they should scale nemesis down not ascensions up, if anything maybe they can buff psionics to be on par with the others but upping the scale of robotic ascension any higher would be game breaking in my opinion

yeah but how would they scale down "becoming the crisis and giving the ability to blow up a sun"

Nemesis is honestly fine; as it gives those who go down dark path of Determined Exterminator/Fanatical Purifier/Devouring Swarm something kind of new to chase


it would probably be easier to just go back to the older content and upscale it or improve it for the current game; rather than try to down play the new stuff to fit better with the old stuff

 

[Ryika]

yeah but how would they scale down "becoming the crisis and giving the ability to blow up a sun"

Nemesis is honestly fine; as it gives those who go down dark path of Determined Exterminator/Fanatical Purifier/Devouring Swarm something kind of new to chase


it would probably be easier to just go back to the older content and upscale it or improve it for the current game; rather than try to down play the new stuff to fit better with the old stuff

Maybe the best course of action would be to add a toggle in the map settings screen. That way, people who want these more crazy runs can have them, but it's not just the default state that the game devolves into. It'd also justify the mismatch between the scopes.

 

[Swarm lover]

This does sound like something for the Custodian Team once they're done with the admin cap/unity rework. Ascension paths have had a decent run, but need an update to become exciting again.

What Become the Crisis does that ascension paths don't is it unlocks a new area of gameplay. You get massive bonuses, provoke the galaxy into teaming up against you, and you get to build a megastructure that destroys everything and makes you win the game. I do partially agree with the opinion @bunkerman presented that it does too much, but I think the issue isn't in what it does. The issue is that it only takes 1 AP to do it (partially because Menace requires almost no effort to accumulate). Unless the number of traditions and so APs we can take gets scaled down (which I don't think will happen, people love their APs) I think it should take multiple APs to get there. Taking Become the Crisis as the 4th or 5th out of 5 APs would be acceptable, but if we keep 8 APs it should take at least 2 APs to get to get to the final stage, but even that feels a bit low to me.

I do some what agree with you, as cool as the crisis path is it feels kind of sudden and out of place for how suddenly your empire gets this weird desire to conquer everything and discovers tech to make star eating ships.

Personnally i would make it something like this. The crisis path is seperated into 2 parts, each having their own progression tree and you cant get the second one before completing the first one.You cannot take the perk until you have fully commited to one of the three ascensions (each ascension has its own crisis path and perks).

The first crisis perk has you embracing your ascension completely, so much that it can be unerving to some unless they are of the same ascension as you. It would basically put you on the same " threat and power level" as an awakened empire, you would basically be out to prove your ascension is superior and try to enforce it everywhere on the galaxy (galactic community and imperium included, like you try to pass resolutions to put people of your ascension on pedestals and in power while putting down everyone else) but you can still be "moral" and arent out to end everything else so you can achieve "greater heights". Once you finish the first "tree" you are not obligated to go for the second one, but there would be a log that sort of hints there is so much more that could be achieved if you didnt have things like morals or the opinion of others holding you back etc. (Basically hints your empire knows there more but currently still holds on to its morals.

The second part is going full crisis (of course its still a gradual thing )where you put the entire galaxy at risk to achieve your own version of god hood.

 

[Swarm lover]

Maybe the best course of action would be to add a toggle in the map settings screen. That way, people who want these more crazy runs can have them, but it's not just the default state that the game devolves into. It'd also justify the mismatch between the scopes.

Would be kind of hard to determine what could be viewed as "crazy", some might view mega structures in general as crazy, some might not etc. Maybe some want certain crazy features while blocking others out.

 

[Echo Candor One]

You can already turn off content that you own piecemeal.

 

[Swarm lover]

The issue is very simple: ascension paths are old content. When they were released with Utopia, ascension perks and megastructures were both new and ambitious relative to what had existed before 1.5/Banks. The idea of turning your whole empire into robots or having psychic powers was very novel and gameshaking. Hell, awakened empires, leviathans, and enclaves (now mainstays of the game) were still pretty fresh, having been implemented with 1.3/Heinlein not that long before.

Now we have a Galactic Imperium, the player-turned-crisis, multiple midgame crises (including one that regularly ends the galaxy), necrophages, clone armies, city worlds, etc. As Stellaris ages, the devs become more ambitious in order to top their previous content, with mixed rates of success. Ascension paths definitely need a facelift, but that might not be something we get until Stellaris 2.

Added to this are the evergrowing mods like Gigastructural Engineering that add in content utterly dwarfing what is available in vanilla in terms of sheer sci-fi badassery.

I completely agree with you on that part, although i doubt we are going to get a stellaris 2 any time soon. (Wonder what the "story" of sorts would be, how would it differ from the current stellaris. Still remember when you could spam dyson spheres.

 

[Nebbie Zebbie]

Becoming the Crisis has more UI because it's later content, so there was more existing work to go off of. That said, it's ridiculous as just 1 perk that completely obliterates any semblance of game balance. It really should require some other perk (maybe one of Interstellar Dominion or Galactic Force Projection) as a pre-requisite to push it into more of an actual path.

The main ascensions need just a few more mechanics, like the ability to resurrect leaders for Psionic/Synth and the ability to bio-assimilate for BIo.

 

[klopkr]

Four different paths for four different fleets?

Genetic path: Space monsters and bio fleets.
Psionic: Space ghost fleets, super heros, void spawn.
Machine: Giant sentient machine fleets, 'gundams', nano swarm clouds.
Generic: Planet/moon sized ships with pops?

 

[Swarm lover]

Becoming the Crisis has more UI because it's later content, so there was more existing work to go off of. That said, it's ridiculous as just 1 perk that completely obliterates any semblance of game balance. It really should require some other perk (maybe one of Interstellar Dominion or Galactic Force Projection) as a pre-requisite to push it into more of an actual path.

The main ascensions need just a few more mechanics, like the ability to resurrect leaders for Psionic/Synth and the ability to bio-assimilate for BIo.

Also feel like you can get it too early and there is little explanation as to the sudden change and discovery of tech. Like for megastructures the initial ones alll empires can build are "tame" hey are all pretty much a giant space station with a specific purpose, then once you have finished one of those you can go for the wonders perk and build some of the more "extreme" ones. There is some lead up to those, your empire made some simple ones and can choose to invest into more complex ones.

 

[currylambchop]

I’d gate ‘become the crisis’ behind psionic ascension and make everyone be able to take psionic ascension except for machines

 

[Swarm lover]

I’d gate ‘become the crisis’ behind psionic ascension and make everyone be able to take psionic ascension except for machines

Dont fully agree with you on that one, i do agree machines going into the shroud or even a hive mind is weird but blocking off machine empires from a big content like that is not a good idea. Better option in my opinion would be different crisis paths based on your empire and stuff, but i do agree with you that the crisis perk should be gated behind something.

 

[currylambchop]

Dont fully agree with you on that one, i do agree machines going into the shroud or even a hive mind is weird but blocking off machine empires from a big content like that is not a good idea. Better option in my opinion would be different crisis paths based on your empire and stuff, but i do agree with you that the crisis perk should be gated behind something.

It makes no sense for machine empires to be able to access the shroud though.

 

[Swarm lover]

It makes no sense for machine empires to be able to access the shroud though.

Thats what i said and why i suggested different crisis paths based on ascension. (In a machine empires case i would consider it like a machine ascension.

 

[currylambchop]

Thats what i said and why i suggested different crisis paths based on ascension. (In a machine empires case i would consider it like a machine ascension.

Perhaps a ‘ultimate assimilators’ for bio ascension and a ‘gray goo’ for machines?