Hello everyone!

As promised on the stream last week, I’d write a shorter dev diary to let you know what we’re up to now. As you probably have heard, I have now taken over as the game director for Stellaris, so that Martin can go work on [REDACTED]. Check out Martin’s goodbye message on twitter if you haven’t already!

So what are we doing now then? We have updated the beta branch last week, and will update it again soon before we disappear for a brief while over the holidays. Whenever it's ready, Jamie will be making a post about it. The beta branch should include some performance improvements related to slowdowns caused by gateways and wormholes in later stages of the game.

In the beginning of the next year we will be taking more time for post-launch support by focusing on bugs, improving performance and more quality-of-life stuff. One small spoiler that I can mention is that we’re looking into improving the planet interface, and I’ll probably post some more sneak peeks about it in the beginning of next year

We don’t really have that much more to say right now, but I will try to be back with the next dev on the 10th or 17th of January.

Until then, have a great holiday with family, friends, and of course, the Blorg! Happy holidays!

Blorg celebrating the holidays. Date unknown. Photographer unknown, but most likely the blorg itself.​

 

[Duuk]

This guy Dread is running all over the forums acting like he works at paradox its a joke the game was released in a totally unacceptable state. Period. I didn’t see early access or beta in the store when i bought the expansion it’s been a total mess and I 100% agree performance is the sole issue right now that has to be addressed.

You're welcome to ask Steam for a refund if you feel that strongly about it. No reason to get that angry. Namaste, my friend.

Relax, allow the peace of the Blorg to relax you.

In the future, if you feel that Paradox releases buggy unplayable messes, my advice to you would be to add the expansions for Stellaris to your wishlist. Do NOT order them on day one. Let those of us who enjoy the ride get them on day one, test them, influence how they get patched, deal with the LITERALLY UNPLAYABLE TEXT BUG FOR DEMOCRATIC ELECTIONS DAMMIT.

Then, a few months in, when the DLC goes on sale, you can buy it at a discount and it will be fully patched.

You will then have peace and victory in your life.

 

[Wolfgang I]

Since one of the main times rulers and specialists end up unemployed is during assimilation, and since assimilation events only happen once a year, that won't help at all.

Does the gene-modding workaround still work?
Assimilate at least one pop of a species>genemod all other pops with that template.
Even before 2.2 I would not have played a conquest heavy assimilation game without that option.
But I also stapled and unstapled pops all the time to delete unwanted factions.

 

[mergele]

@grekulf Do you still stand by the promise of space unicorns?

Improvements to the planet interface are quite surprising news. It would take me more than 10 seconds to come up with a possible improvement or complaint, so that would put it into paradox top 20 interfaces.

 

[Jamor]

I really hope they push the lastest fixes to the main branch. There are a lot of people who don't know about the betas and in my opinion 2.2.1 there are already worlds between 2.2.1 and stellaris_test in terms of performance, AI and general fun playing.

You don't say?

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...m-2-2-2-patch-now-live-checksum-5b48.1140495/

Look for an updated stellaris_test version with even more fixes plus some experimental performance improvements Soon(tm) as well.

 

[Duuk]

We are planning on giving recently promoted pops a grace period (~360) during which they can instantly change back to their previous strata.

What might be a better solution, in my humble, zen opinion (I'm very Zen today), might be:

If a higher-strata job is not available for an unemployed pop but a lower strata job IS, have the timer only be 30 days BUT:

Add a modifier -20 happiness (took lower strata job) for 360 days
In the Harmony traditions change the tradition from "reduces the time it takes for a pop to demote" to "reduces the duration of unhappiness for having to take a lower strata job by 50%"

 

[Duuk]

Also, @Jamor and @grekulf could either of you please for the love of everything holy fix the "a campaign to elect a new <default ruler title>" instead of "custom ruler title>" bug in the Jnuary patch? I would convert to whatever Scandinavian gods you require and sacrifice several goats.

 

[sillyrobot]

Does the gene-modding workaround still work?
Assimilate at least one pop of a species>genemod all other pops with that template.
Even before 2.2 I would not have played a conquest heavy assimilation game without that option.
But I also stapled and unstapled pops all the time to delete unwanted factions.

I don't have the gene tech yet, but it might still work although it's a very heavy hit to social research. Normally, I just set the race to assimilate in December and resettle some pops between worlds to speed the process, moving them around again in January.

 

[domein]

Let's hope for 64bit engine version that can use some more memory to save some cpu

 

[Wolfgang I]

I don't have the gene tech yet, but it might still work although it's a very heavy hit to social research. Normally, I just set the race to assimilate in December and resettle some pops between worlds to speed the process, moving them around again in January.

It was a research hit but getting fully functional planets asap always seemed worthwhile to me. Might be different now that the AI does not build OKish planets anymore.

 

[J-S]

Would love it if you could fix how sectors are created (or just let us make our own sectors again), having mostly 1 or 2 Planet sectors is really pointless and immersion breaking.

 

[Peter34]

Look for an updated stellaris_test version with even more fixes plus some experimental performance improvements Soon(tm) as well.

Soon as in before you guys close down before Christmas? Or soon as in after Christmas but before New Year? Or soon as in early 2019?

 

[Little Green Mensch]

Any chance that ruler traits and starting rulers disappearing after losing elections will be in the pre-holiday beta bug-fixes?

 

[Bearjuden]

[REDACTED]

Victoria III confirmed?

In all seriousness, I hope all goes well. I was alarmed when I read that Martin was leaving, since from what I've seen he seems to be a singularly talented game designer, but you've been there alongside him for three years, so surely some of him has rubbed off! 2.2 may still need some polishing, but I'm loving where you're taking the game. You're making all the moves I wish some of the other games at the studio would make, and it's been making me a very happy boy.

And of course have a happy holidays!

 

[veryalien]

Soon as in before you guys close down before Christmas? Or soon as in after Christmas but before New Year? Or soon as in early 2019?

They did a live push now with additional fixes and have an update to beta which won't be released today. I'm assuming their office is open tomorrow so if the beta tests out good tomorrow we should see it as well in the beta branch.

 

[Peter34]

They did a live push now with additional fixes and have an update to beta which won't be released today. I'm assuming their office is open tomorrow so if the beta tests out good tomorrow we should see it as well in the beta branch.

Yeah, I’m asking about the new beta, if it’ll come out before weekend or not.

I’m super happy with the Ruler Trait fix, and the Trade fix, but there are still a few bugs, such as Gaiaforming being destructive, and while I’ll finally be able to play for real now, with 2.2.2, either way, it’d be sweet to get one last beta before Christmas.

 

[Bearjuden]

That is just fixing the symptoms. Pls just reverse the job priority. Let pops always first take jobs in the worker strata then in the specialist strata.

That would make no sense whatsoever...people aren't going to take shitty low wage jobs when they were working in a factory for decent pay or, even, the cushy administrator/noble/whatever of an entire planet. No, having them prioritize higher strata jobs is definitely more appropriate than vice versa.

 

[sillyrobot]

That would make no sense whatsoever...people aren't going to take shitty low wage jobs when they were working in a factory for decent pay or, even, the cushy administrator/noble/whatever of an entire planet. No, having them prioritize higher strata jobs is definitely more appropriate than vice versa.

Keep the job priority; reverse the stratum change penalty. Populations trying to go up a stratum take time to do their roles effectively. Populations going down a stratum become instantly effective.

 

[Belshock]

Game performance will be better - they said. Before MC i played Stellaris all day long. Since MC came out i cant play the game, i have the day1 stutter issue. Even if i revert my game to an older version, the lag is still present. Seriously i can run Endless Space on medium settings without lag. I hope you fix this soon, and future expansions wont be rushed like MC was...

 

[r3xm0rt1s]

Run slaver guilds to alternate filling worker and specialist vacancies. It also fixes the greater problem of not running slaver guilds.

 

[ryry117]

So over the holidays we will be stuck with a broken game, thanks for nothing Paradox.

*shrug* My game is not broken.