So when are we getting space nomads?

[Foefaller]

In stellaris your faction mechanics are determined by your ethos, never being able to colonize a planet and live on huge arc ships would somehow have to be shoehorned into that. And before someone says something about the nomadic trait, no that does not determine your playstyle or tech pool. Traits are often picked to complement one's faction, but are not strictly tied to the playstyle or factions mechanics. After all, having very strong citizens does require you to invade enemy planets, nor does having intelligent population give you access to exclusive techs on the research deck, etc... Having the nomadic trait alter the way a faction plays would be breaking continuity with the other vanilla traits. So being nomadic would have to be shoehorned in on the ethos branch. So do we have a 5 way ethos branch now? And this post is getting too long winded for me to dive into the ramifications about that.

This suggestion shows one of Stellaris's downsides. The faction system is extremely flexible and customizable, but it's wide and modular reach means it cannot go very deep. While In the endless franchise there is no such restriction and each faction's gameplay is custom tailored to their lore and meant to be totally unique from the get go. And in the case of the roving clans (Endless legend nomads) and the Vodyani, their games respective mechanics were designed from the ground up with them in mind since they were debuting factions. Like the sheriff said, a Stellaris nomad would have no such support.

So could they shoehorn in nomadic gameplay? Sure. Will they be able to pull it off effectively in the constraints of Stellaris game mechanics? I would not have high hopes for it.

IMO Ethics wouldn't determine if you are Nomads, it would determine what you do as Nomads.

Militarist nomads would probably get what they need hiring themselves as mercenaries, or raiding lightly protected worlds before the empire that owns them can respond. Pacifists could be traders, acquiring resources from one empire and trading them away to another. A xenophobic Empire might avoid direct contact with empires diplomatically, gaining what they can by raiding and/or illicit smuggling, while Xenophilic Nomads would regularly interact with earthbound empires, allowing those that wanted to join them to do so. Spiritualists are on the fleet as a pilgrimage. Materialist for the chance to boldly go where no blorg has gone before (and make some energy credits from it), and Authoritarian/Egalitarian is based on whether everyone in the fleet is expected to dedicate themselves entirely to the fleet, or everyone is here because living a life traveling the stars is seen as the ultimate expression of freedom. And if you're Hive Mind, Petheryon Swarm says hi.

If you make it a choice, it's probably either a starting civic (like Syncretic Evolution) or a new overarching option related to homeworld or goverment type, with some new civics of it's own.

Some of the things here would require new mechanics, that is true, but there is nothing with the current ethics wheel that makes it impossible to be one.

 

[Foefaller]

But I can't really wrap my mind around how you'd play nomads that remained nomads the entire game. Too much of this game is based around territory expansion and territory exploitation.

You absolutely wouldn't have the same goals as a normal empire, that's true.

Wiz during the AMA talked about how he wants more personal victory conditions, rather that what exists now. Current victory conditions are really just there because if you had to put Stellaris in a specific gameplay genre, it's a 4X, and 4X's have victory conditions (I believe one the pre-launch comments from the devs stated that this is literally why victory conditions exist at all in Stellaris, because they don't in any of Paradox's Grand Strategy games)

If that means something like Sunless Sea, where you pick how you want to win from the beginning (with the ability to change it down the road depending on the circumstances) I would expect Nomads would have their own set of victory conditions to choose, ideally setting up why your empire is nomadic in the first place.

 

[I am Sovereign]

I am fan of the Endless series from Amplitude Studios since the beta of Endless Space One and I very like their games for MP purposes (though ES One had too many issues with desyncs) and Endless Legend was an art work but for a nomad factions I realy liked the way they were handeled in the Total War series (Atilla / Warhammer) especially playing Chaos in Total War:Warhammer was alot of fun. ( Though Endless Legend mechanics would fit more for peacful nomads).

For Stellaris I want the option to play peaceful aswell as warmongering nomads ; D.

 

[Rip Off Productions]

I see Namads being something that should come with(or at least after) a major Trade overhaul Patch/DLC, as Galactic Trade would likely be the biggest source of income for them(either as merchants or as pirates).

they'd start the game fairly strong(having better starship tech for obvious reasons; strong enough that a chance encounter with a 'Guardian' won't wipe you out in the first few years, but not enough to take one down by yourself) but then drop off as the planet-bound Empires grow(unless you do something crazy, or as militant fleet go full Mongols and "conquer" them through vassalization and somehow keep them that way).

building new(or capturing from enemy fleets) lifeships/arks/whatever the POP carriers will be called, or expanding existing ones with upgrades, will be the core of expanding personal power(though alliances with other fleets and planet-based Empires will help you out a lot too).

and maybe a "Galaxy Jumper" could be an end goal megastructure for Nomads, requiring a massive investment in technology and resources to transport the entire fleet the insane distances to another Galaxy... and if extra galactic exploration ever becomes a thing in Stellaris then the Nomads will likely be the first to get there.

 

[Hail Blorg]

I think that implementing "wild space" along with nomads would greatly help them. Wild space could be a section(s) of space that has many hostile space-borne creatures that are hostile to non-nomads (lets just say that the nomads have spent years in space and know how to pacify space creatures.) Within the wild space, nomads could hide from empires and/or mine stuff. Refugees would try to colonize wild space and make "city states," nomads could trade with them or raid them. If a normal empire tried to "tame" wild space nomads/refugees would get pissed.

 

[Sinister2202]

I wish the space nomads that are already in the game would interact more with the players. Maybe "land" or orbit on one of your colonies, open comms...etc, trade energy for minerals or vice versa... instead of just sitting on a star all the time.

 

[Rip Off Productions]

I think that implementing "wild space" along with nomads would greatly help them. Wild space could be a section(s) of space that has many hostile space-borne creatures that are hostile to non-nomads (lets just say that the nomads have spent years in space and know how to pacify space creatures.) Within the wild space, nomads could hide from empires and/or mine stuff. Refugees would try to colonize wild space and make "city states," nomads could trade with them or raid them. If a normal empire tried to "tame" wild space nomads/refugees would get pissed.

this sound like a separate concept to Nomads; Nomads do not need some kind of uncolonizable space to hide from the planet-settlers, Nomads likely would have special rules for movement when it comes to border transversal(if not a reworking of borders for everyone in the DLC/Patch that introduces Nomads).

even if Nomads have to fallow the same rules that Empires currently do, they'd likely have allies/trade partners/federation membership or association with at least one Empire were they'd find refuge by the time no unclaimed space remains.

 

[Lemont Elwood]

I don't see how playing nomads could be implemented in a way, that playing as one, would be fun. At least with the current gameplay mechanics. Pdox would have to revamp nearly the whole game to make that work.
For starters: we would need a way to get new ships, that would have to be on par with at least a middle sized empire.
And what would be the goal? To conquer a planet for your people? To colonise a world for your people? To survive as long as possible?
The first two things would just be the same as we have now, only with a different origin story and a potentially heavily handicaped start. The last would make no sense whatsoever in a 4X game.
I really don't think Stellaris is the right game to have playable nomads, cause that would mean that Pdox would kinda have to develope a completly new game inside of the existing game.

Use some creativity!

Instead of colonizing planets, you build very expensive colony ships that can be directed around to different planets. You also have at least six buildings on your ships, one for each resource, and those buildings take the natural resources of the planet and multiply it by a certain amount (the multiplier increases with time). Your ships have built-in spaceports (including defenses) and can be heavily damaged (requiring repairs to be made functional), but not destroyed (so that all the population isn't lost). Only nomads can conquer other nomads' ships.

Oh, and when you choose to harvest a world, you're bound to it for a certain amount of time. Harvesting slowly reduces the amount of natural resources, though. Maybe some limited ability to sack other empires' buildings, too.

It should be balanced so that the nomads are best off in the early game, where they have plentiful virgin worlds to ravage and can potentially produce more resources than everybody else. In the long-run, though, they're screwed with low Unity production and get eclipsed by the sedentary powers (both due to resource depletion and increasing production in facilities). They either conquer the world quickly, go legit through a unique Ascension path that just gives them the ability to build Orbitals (and, further down the line, rule planets, making them a hybrid society), or die.

 

[Riftwalker]

I just think nomad is a good starting idea, but expands onward to all space based societies.

there are a number of things you can do as a space based society and I believe they would liven up much of that missing part of the game.

Pirates, Traders, Nomads moving to new resources, Diplomats, explorers and pathfinders. As the Planet based societies expand they'll have to specalize as there's less "free" space.

just imagine it, becoming a pirate empire that even built pirate docks and have carved out a section of space as their own and raid into more civilized lands.

An empire of slavers going around making their means by capturing pops and selling them and using them to get an edge.

A wide network of trading families that compete with each other to get the best deals on inter-planet based trade.

A collective of explorers who went out to space on their own forsaking their planet so that they could tap the secrets of everything beyond.

A traveling musical band, who sell illegal substances on the side.



along with my earlier post, i see mechanics of being able to build structures on already colonized planets that give you a bonus and affect the nation you put it on. they'd be like mansions from CK2, taking up a single spot but being individually customized. You might make a trade port that generates money for you and increases credit gain for the owner. If you don't have high opinion from the hosting government, you might instead make a smuggler's ring as well as add some stuff to hide pirate goods there increasing your force limit, this slightly increases unrest and lowers credit gain but you gain more. (of course the amount of armies affect how likely they'll find you so this probably only works out well on backwater planets). Maybe they're a military oriented group, but aren't powerful enough to conquer larger nations and have instead decided to offer their services and will set up outposts to help ship construction or army morale, etc, for a cost. there's so much they can do.

Then if you advance enough and get enough resources you can start making stations of your own, not requiring a benefactor.

I think they'd likely have an additional mechanic beyond what's currently here to log their progress, such as the number of ships they have limiting what you can make, or when you can make things, or the number of outposts you can get.

but yeah, they should have an influence on where they go, and nations should carefully consider who they let prance around in their territory and who they should try to get rid of, as even making them enemies could add a thorn in their sides.