Stellaris Dev Diary #148 - Relics & Relic Worlds

[DreadLindwyrm]

Exactly. We've been looking at the sun for thousands of years, and we are still finding new things about it. We've been sailing the oceans for thousands of years, and we're still finding new things in it. We've been dealing with gravity for thousands of years, and we are still finding new things about how it works. Things change, for sure, but usually we just miss something that was there all along because we didn't know what we were looking at, or how to see it at all. Science and exploration are both iterative processes, and it would be nice to see that reflected more in game. Especially given how much depth and story value are derived from the exploration side of the game. Be honest, the first time you got Horizon signal, were you compelled to find out more? Did it make you play way longer than you had planned to for that session? Sure, the 5th time you get it you aren't as interested, but not knowing how it would turn out is a large part of what makes it interesting. Almost every planet in Stellaris is a one and done - you have no reason to ever return. And that's a shame, because the game is fundamentally about controlling planets as a means of telling the story of a space faring society. At a certain point, the game turns into "I know everything there is to know, what's left to do? I guess I can paint the map." Adding more depth to planets and exploration won't stop this, but it could move that point from 2400 to 2600 and beyond. And that would give players a lot more time to enjoy the new mid and end game features.

That won't be stopped by re-surveying, it'll just take a few years to have the galaxy resurveyed once a new tier of survey becomes available - or at least the portion of the galaxy that is accessible.
Assuming of course that you can't just sit and survey something infinitely to get more results of course, but that would just be ridiculous.

And no, that event didn't really cause me to extend my session. It was fairly interesting, but not that attention grabbing due to the necessary research steps.

 

[Shadowstrike]

I mean this is what colony events are supposed to be, right? They are effectively extra anomalies that are discovered after a planet is settled. The real issue is that there are so few of them at the moment. You can imagine some of the current events might be adaptable for this: the Exile event, the alien mural, and so forth. But we do need a whole lot more events that happen *after* the initial survey. The archeology system somewhat extends the exploration part of the game, but a bigger issue is that there need to be a lot more events period.

 

[OwlOfSpace]

I mean this is what colony events are supposed to be, right? They are effectively extra anomalies that are discovered after a planet is settled. The real issue is that there are so few of them at the moment. You can imagine some of the current events might be adaptable for this: the Exile event, the alien mural, and so forth. But we do need a whole lot more events that happen *after* the initial survey. The archeology system somewhat extends the exploration part of the game, but a bigger issue is that there need to be a lot more events period.

But please for love of Worm do NOT make it RNG based ‘Get a good thing or get screwed without being able to do anything about it.'


Give players at least couple choices, safe/slow way and quick/high-risk-high-return.

And don’t make the outcomes ‘Obviously good and stupidly bad’, make all of them have ups and downs. (Ex with Derelict ship one could pour more energy to make sure it can be dug out safely, Old Terraforming tool could give a good planet with little resources or barren world but with tons of resources on it etc)

 

[SarahGabriella]

A game that leans heavily on exploration, shouldn't have a setup where RNG completely hoses your ability to do so because all your neighbors are real jerks. Also kind of dumb, that one ship survey by me or someone dropping an outpost means that there is nothing new to find in a system. New stuff should show up because either it was missed on the first pass because no one had the tech to see it or new unexpected things happen.

Hell, you're going to be disappointed when they do redo the system because this stuff is going to be in the diplomacy menu or a new espionage menu, that you have to go to. Also the major issue with the current system is that it's way too simple and way too binary. Diplomacy isn't an interesting concept because it's simple black & white. It's interesting because it is all those various graduations that you don't want to deal with. One being that my border choices shouldn't be a binary open or close.

Only the early part of the game is about exploration. The rest is diplomacy and wars.

 

[SarahGabriella]

I mean this is what colony events are supposed to be, right? They are effectively extra anomalies that are discovered after a planet is settled. The real issue is that there are so few of them at the moment. You can imagine some of the current events might be adaptable for this: the Exile event, the alien mural, and so forth. But we do need a whole lot more events that happen *after* the initial survey. The archeology system somewhat extends the exploration part of the game, but a bigger issue is that there need to be a lot more events period.

I think it would be great to find secrets on planets we settled. Like the event about giant species taking over. That was weird but fun.

 

[Millbot]

Lock the second pass behind a tech, that doesn't become available until mid-game because that's were the game sorely needs content. I wouldn't be surprised if even in the next patch, player have burned through a decent chunk of the archaeology stuff by that point. You can only do the second pass once. Might be interesting to maybe even tie the tech to the sentry array (everyone will be able to build one in one of the up coming patches), if you have that up, you get a research option to see if there was any missed anomalies. The chance of anomaly being there would be super rare.

 

[CrazyZombie]

Not right now, but that may become possible in the future! I like the idea.

Yes, please, it would be even better post-apocalyptic civic than post-nuclear start. And if you also add some story events to this start type, similar to such for Commonwealth of Man...

I just like to have start-civics that create more distinct stories than usual.

 

[shadowclasper]

I hope that you guys will add more relics to the rest of the leviathans creatures, also there'd be some cool relic possibilities for the worm as well.

I love the ether drake, it's the iconic leviathan, but they all deserve some love!

 

[SarahGabriella]

Lock the second pass behind a tech, that doesn't become available until mid-game because that's were the game sorely needs content. I wouldn't be surprised if even in the next patch, player have burned through a decent chunk of the archaeology stuff by that point. You can only do the second pass once. Might be interesting to maybe even tie the tech to the sentry array (everyone will be able to build one in one of the up coming patches), if you have that up, you get a research option to see if there was any missed anomalies. The chance of anomaly being there would be super rare.

I think what the mid and late game needs is more story events that are fun to do even with other empires around and war going on.

 

[GulGnu]

I think what the mid and late game needs is more story events that are fun to do even with other empires around and war going on.

In particular, it needs more events that forces interaction with surrounding empires. I reckon that´s part of what the Diplomacy Expansion (TM) needs to do.

 

[CrazyZombie]

In particular, it needs more events that forces interaction with surrounding empires. I reckon that´s part of what the Diplomacy Expansion (TM) needs to do.

Well, diplomacy and espionage. I want some gameplay of peacetime even if I play as horrible genocidal regime - to sow distrust and chaos around me, ensuring that coalition against me will crumble under own weight.

I also want some more dinamic of ethic drift, allowing me to take unique ethics, I can't obtain at the start.

 

[Millbot]

I think what the mid and late game needs is more story events that are fun to do even with other empires around and war going on.

Yeah, I'm hoping the diplomacy/espionage patch gives us that. No offense to people that like the combat in this game, but I find it rather tedious, since it comes down to, can you build a bigger deathball than the people you want to steam roll. Determined exterminator and fanatical purifiers probably get a ton of love form the community because they get a bombardment stance that lets you cut out the tedious aspect of conquering planets and habitats. You can just kill everyone on them without a colossus by parking your fleet over them for a long enough period. Also has the bonus that it comes with system performance improvements.

Well, diplomacy and espionage. I want some gameplay of peacetime even if I play as horrible genocidal regime - to sow distrust and chaos around me, ensuring that coalition against me will crumble under own weight.

I also want some more dinamic of ethic drift, allowing me to take unique ethics, I can't obtain at the start.

Yeah, I'd like to see something in the game that make ethic drift more interesting, while also giving the player some tools for pushing ethic drift if they want to go a certain direction.