Stellaris - Tech Overflow Issue [Wells 2.7.2 (60bf)]

[nightraven1901]

Description
Tech Overflow Issue [Wells 2.7.2 (60bf)]

Game Version
Wells 2.7.2 (60bf)

What version do you use?
Steam

What expansions do you have installed?
Synthetic Dawn, Utopia, Leviathans Story Pack, Apocalypse, Megacorp, Distant Stars, Ancient Relics, Lithoids, Federations

Do you have mods enabled?
No

Please explain your issue is in as much detail as possible.
Researching tech while decreasing the penalties from Empire Sprawl can lead to the present value becoming higher than the target value, locking the research. Happens reliably every game; was under the impression efforts to fix the error had already been completed. Might have been because of the techs in question being awarded by anomalies, battle debris and/or the Caravaneers abandoned ship event (I know one of them was Crystal Infused plating, awarded by the Caravaneer abandoned ship), and all of these means of getting tech are a little buggy. It'll likely happen if you partially research a normal tech until near completion while under the penalties from empire sprawl too, but I don't habitually do that, so I couldn't tell you.

Solution: Make the tech system detect when the research points value has overflown and grant the tech by default if the value is equal to or *greater than* the desired target value. Also, anything that adds a tech should not do so by adding the tech as a locked choice then adding the tech's base cost in value, as it can't handle the empire sprawl mechanic. Just award the whole tech. Separately from the research system, instead of attempting to shove it through the extant system like we do now.

No save provided. I can reliably make this happen in half an hour or less; this isn't the first time I've made a report on the matter. This happens because I plan on killing so many mobs that I ignore researching anything I think I can complete the research for without spending the research department's time on it (figuring I can get it for free by getting 5-10 debris, which don't delay my tech-rushing by even a month) but this behaviour is not supported by current build.

Steps to reproduce the issue.
Simple. Get a locked research option (crystal plating, mining drone lasers and generic ship modules are easiest for this). Don't research it. Keep researching battle debris/getting events that add to the tech's present research value until the value is near to completion, and higher than the tech's base cost (due to empire sprawl). Now reduce empire sprawl or raise admin cap. You now have more research points in a tech than it needs to complete, and trying to research it will lock that research slot entirely, rendering you utterly incapable of ever completing that tech without raising your empire sprawl value (or putting all your bureaucrats on paid leave, my normal fix, which is a very odd order for an Emperor to give...).

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[Alfray Stryke]

Hi, thanks for the report. Can you please attach a save with this issue present?

 

[nightraven1901]

Sorry, auto-deletion of the Ironman saves got it (I started a new game before attempting to upload) Like I said, it's too easy to replicate to feel it necessary. Get a locked-option research option, preferably from battle debris, don't research it, get more debris. Natural fluctuations in empire sprawl will reliably produce this every game I play right up to now even without trying.

 

[CrazyJ]

i've never seen this bug, but i tend to keep sprawl under control from the beginning so that's not much of a surprise

 

[CrazyJ]

i've never seen this bug, but i tend to keep sprawl under control from the beginning so that's not much of a surprise

the fact that i am able to do that with ease despite the fact that i suck at the game says a lot about how truly terrible the current admin cap system is.

 

[nightraven1901]

i've never seen this bug, but i tend to keep sprawl under control from the beginning so that's not much of a surprise

I'm weird. I doubt this bug is getting most people, but for two reasons, it gets me every game.

Reason 1) I don't rush for the locked-option techs as soon as they're available, especially if many more debris sites could be made of that tech. It's more efficient to save the research teams the effort and get it for free.

Reason 2) It isn't possible to control empire sprawl rushing to expand as hard as I prefer. It will exceed cap and stay that way for at least twenty years. To be clear, all of my influence goes to expanding into new systems, except the amount needed to start Map the Stars, and if possible with new edict limits, activate Research Grants. All else is immaterial. Also, I should be shitting out influence, as I'm anomaly-rushing like a bad man (twenty researchers before 20 years, likely more if my panting economy can afford their exorbitant costs) and I will have the greatest possible discount for starbase influence costs. This is because I play on 1000-star maps exclusively. Lot of ground to cover.

Replicability is so simple I don't understand how it hasn't come up more often. It is vey easy to make happen; the average Youtuber isn't playing this way but I know a few of our fellow forum posters would be from the AARs. Nonetheless, I'd like to see a bug-squashing occur. It could very possibly ruin a playthrough by stalling a technology that is required for further advancement (instead of just trashing my immersion and economy deliberately lowering Admin Cap)

 

[CrazyJ]

I'm weird. I doubt this bug is getting most people, but for two reasons, it gets me every game.

Reason 1) I don't rush for the locked-option techs as soon as they're available, especially if many more debris sites could be made of that tech. It's more efficient to save the research teams the effort and get it for free.

Reason 2) It isn't possible to control empire sprawl rushing to expand as hard as I prefer. It will exceed cap and stay that way for at least twenty years. To be clear, all of my influence goes to expanding into new systems, except the amount needed to start Map the Stars, and if possible with new edict limits, activate Research Grants. All else is immaterial. Also, I should be shitting out influence, as I'm anomaly-rushing like a bad man (twenty researchers before 20 years, likely more if my panting economy can afford their exorbitant costs) and I will have the greatest possible discount for starbase influence costs. This is because I play on 1000-star maps exclusively. Lot of ground to cover.

Replicability is so simple I don't understand how it hasn't come up more often. It is vey easy to make happen; the average Youtuber isn't playing this way but I know a few of our fellow forum posters would be from the AARs. Nonetheless, I'd like to see a bug-squashing occur. It could very possibly ruin a playthrough by stalling a technology that is required for further advancement (instead of just trashing my immersion and economy deliberately lowering Admin Cap)

i play completely differently, i like to wait until my empire is stable and has reached the limits of its peaceful expansion before i even consider war. i play with starnet enabled so i have to be very careful as the ai is brutal even on noob settings. not to mention i enjoy the peaceful expansion phase a great deal

 

[nightraven1901]

i play completely differently, i like to wait until my empire is stable and has reached the limits of its peaceful expansion before i even consider war. i play with starnet enabled so i have to be very careful as the ai is brutal even on noob settings. not to mention i enjoy the peaceful expansion phase a great deal

To each, their own,

As a matter of experimentation, try ignoring your empire sprawl utterly for the first twenty-five years. Your tech will suck at this stage anyway, so the sprawl penalty only really slows down your unity gain slightly. Then, once the wave of worlds you took gets their second slots (first one is for gene clinics, no exceptions except temporarily to get the resources to build them. MOAR growth!!!) fill out as many administrative buildings as you need, which will happen at roughly the same time you tech stops being so slow it's not worth considering. The result: You have no military for 25 years as all your alloys not needed to keep the AI from wardeccing you were spent on outposts (sounds like not too big a flaw if you don't wanna war early anyway) and then you take off like a ICBM economically as all those worlds/systems start spewing out resources. My last game? Thousand research by twenty-two years (And I thought I was being slow for a shattered ring start!). Just: try not to let the locked-options techs build up on you. Micromanaging that many pops off the admin jobs is not fun, and hideously inefficient.

I need to use Starnet or Glavius, but Ironman hates it. I hate the fact that Ironman hates it, and have bitched about it, but until I've either gotten them all or they fix that clearly-visible bug in balance, I can't use them, despite the fact I've heard naught but good things. Will continue bitching for now. It isn't helping, but it does make me feel better about it...

 

[CrazyJ]

ai that actually works> achievements, at least to me, and if i don't care about achievements i can go nuts with stuff like gigastructural engineering

 

[nightraven1901]

ai that actually works> achievements, at least top me, and if i don't care about achievements i can go nuts with stuff like gigastructural engineering

They're not really that important, so much as giving me something to use as an overarching goal for a playthrough. You make a good point about the AI mods, just, most mods make the game less stable, and I would be less effective at bug-reporting and such if I use them regularly.

 

[CrazyJ]

They're not really that important, so much as giving me something to use as an overarching goal for a playthrough. You make a good point about the AI mods, just, most mods make the game less stable, and I would be less effective at bug-reporting and such if I use them regularly.

starnet doesn't make the game less stable, although gigastructures has a few issues. and as to the overarching goal, the way i see it is that i use completing the mod as a final goal, by that i mean seeing everything the mod has to offer. I've spent so many hours in stellaris that i know the game back to front and the only way i get new content is modding.

 

[hart30]

For me the only way to get rid of annoying bugs, "intended designs" like habitat spamming or bad military ai is modding and mods . There is simply no way around if someone wants to keep playing the game for thousands of hours.

 

[nightraven1901]

For me the only way to get rid of annoying bugs, "intended designs" like habitat spamming or bad military ai is modding and mods . There is simply no way around if someone wants to keep playing the game for thousands of hours.

I appreciate your position, but I've spent a hundred bucks plus on this title. I think it's reasonable to expect it to have a working AI built-in, and I feel allowing any company or other game manufacturer and distribution outfit to get away without building one is giving them too much for too little. I gave out ~$150AU for my copy and DLC. The modmaker isn't a company employee, therefore his work is not what I paid for. I paid for Paradox Entertainment to give me a full and complete game, and I presently am not satisfied with my purchase, as my review of Stellaris goes to show. It's only just now approaching "not-an-obvious-beta" territory now, and I don't feel letting them off the hook for developing the AI in this title is going to help me (or any of you, by extension) get good games for fair prices. I feel allowing this travesty of a situation to continue is akin to an overly-submissive sexuality; undesirable and reserved for people other than me. I expect this situation to resolve itself and will not be purchasing other Paradox titles until it does what I expected it to when I bought it, and I feel using the mods and having some unpaid intern provide me the part they failed to create within their own product is just encouraging shitty behaviour going forward; it's a tacit admission I won't chase them around like a spurned lover for ripping me off in the first place, and an admission that we as gamers will allow this crap of selling knocked-down, incomplete games at full price to continue.

No offense to either of you, but you are both a direct enemy to me in this field. You are running through these forums telling me to let them do this shit unchallenged. "It's okay, they'll charge us for some more fixes soon! The next DLC will be amazing!" Yeah, look, I don't disrespect your enjoyment of the game, but I will also not be sold a half-complete title and then told to wait (how many?) years to give them time to build the rest of what I already paid for, let alone accept being charged for each module of fixes where they should be released free. If you need three more years to complete my copy, can I please have my money back until then? Oh, wait, I can't? Well, that's... Unfair. What about these modmakers? Are you paying them to keep the game workable until you're done wanking on a big pile of our money? Also, no? Well... That's unfair. I paid a total of about 35 bucks to Stardock Entertainment for Galactic Civilizations II (for two copies, no less) and it shipped with a fully realized AI, fifteen plus years ago. If Paradox can't do the same or substantially better, what did they advertise at me for, hmm? I didn't ask them to take my money...

"Oh, you're a hater, go home. Be less salty." No. For one, I quite like the game's potential, or I wouldn't f***ing be here. People who allow this to go on year after year are the problem. They pay for nothing. They give them 200 bucks and only expect the framework of a game in exchange, a framework that you and others will need to fill in before it can be used for entertainment. I think paying for that's stupid. Pokemon Uranium released for free as a fan game. I can get a lovingly-crafted title with heart and years of work sunk into it for free.

No, gents. I thank-you for your efforts to assuage my worries, but this is not a situation I see as fixable by mods. I see this as a systemic issue. It's the reason CK III isn't in my library. It's the reason Steam is currently waiting to see whether I actually delete my account with them to avoid their excessively-shitty behaviours of advertising at my within my own steam library. We must not let these people use us like this. We're human beings and we deserve better. We're paying customers and we deserve better. We're their paymasters, if we wish to act like it, and we deserve better than to give up a wallet-full of cash and be given a wad of I-O-Us saying "we owe you one working AI" and "we owe you one working admin system" and "we owe you one functional game element X" written on them in return.

Respectfully, I wish to not hear that excuse for laziness and poor behaviour repeated to me ever the f*** again.

But I am genuinely glad you're having more fun than I am. The last game I tried to play I got exactly twenty-two years in and got dogpiled by three-plus severe bugs, bugs I reported f***ing years ago that still haven't been fixed. I don't care if the rest of the world agrees anymore: I expect better for my money. You guys disagree? Great. Keep paying for DLCs. You will come to join my side on this matter- but it won't be until your larger appetites for being f***ed around are also full, and your wallets emptier, and it almost certainly won't be relating to Stellaris because it will be long dead by then. Ask me then how much we should care about Stellaris's AI being non-functional; when none of us can play it because the modders all got jobs and the fanboys took their mother's money elsewhere, and the DLCs are all released and no longer supported, when even the Paradox team won't help you get the game running and only Steam remains to tell you they don't support this title and they're desperately sorry that they can't give you your money back... Ask me after you've become as fed up as I am. And there won't be a Stellaris left to bitch about, or a me left listening, because I too would have left for greener pastures. By then, Starnet will be dead too, because the talent behind it is working for Stardock or some such, and one of the final hand-wringingly grasping DLCs will break it and he won't be around to fix it for the dozen thousand people left playing it.

We must prevent these people destroying something we love. By bitching at them (something I'm good at, huzzah)!. So, to this end: please consider the above my reasoned argument and continued agitation for a working AI in Stellaris.

 

[hart30]

Wow - thats a really long statement. I feel very similar, it is incredibly sad that mods are needed to get the intended vanilla experience, because ai behaviour and overly huge micromanagement lack behind so much. Games like civilization and sins if a solar empire HAVE a way better ai. But sadly those games are not developed further. So i decided to stick to stellaris, mod out what doesnt work right (sadly not everything can be modded out) and play most of my games in a competitive stellaris multiplayer group. At least there i dont have to worry about the ai and only the host needs to own all the dlc. From time to time i can even win a dlc for free.

PS: dont rage about a smiley - i am a very sarcastic person.

 

[nightraven1901]

Wow - thats a really long statement. I feel very similar, it is incredibly sad that mods are needed to get the intended vanilla experience, because ai behaviour and overly huge micromanagement lack behind so much. Games like civilization and sins if a solar empire HAVE a way better ai. But sadly those games are not developed further. So i decided to stick to stellaris, mod out what doesnt work right (sadly not everything can be modded out) and play most of my games in a competitive stellaris multiplayer group. At least there i dont have to worry about the ai and only the host needs to own all the dlc. From time to time i can even win a dlc for free.

PS: dont rage about a smiley - i am a very sarcastic person.

Fair enough, mate. Also, I wasn't raging; I prefer to think of the emotions that caused that as being closer to "righteous indignation" than "rage" (Though it's not up to me if I was being a dick; that's 100% trial by peers, and there's certainly some frustration present). I haven't played any multiplayer Stellaris- most of my friends' tastes overlap with mine for tabletop gaming but not videogames.

Might I ask how DLCs are won? I am unfamiliar with this process, but broke and could certainly benefit from it.

 

[nightraven1901]

Hi, thanks for the report. Can you please attach a save with this issue present?

Got it again; made a special run and everything. Have screenshot confirming:

And I included the save. Hope this aids in your bug-squashing.