The pop mechanism is quite terrible in 3.0

[sillyrobot]

Key point here is what's the end game? Realistically you could play the stupid thing until year 3000. A guy in one of the other threads was saying that year 2600-2700 is "mid game" for him.

End-game for me is 2500-2550. I'm done after that. There's nothing else to explore Maybe Imperium pushes that out another 50 years but are we really basing major design changes on people who want to play the game into year 2800 and beyond?

First 100 years you never have a problem with pop anyways. It's the 2350-2400+ timeline when things get ugly, and if they could delay that by a hundred years then I'm 100% on board. I don't need an equation to make the game playable way past when it was ever really designed to be played for the same reason I'm okay ending my EUIV playthrough in the 1800's and my CKII playthrough ~1400. There aren't any features for timelines beyond that.

I started to have a problem with pops ~2275. My 40 colonies were generating 7 biological and 1 robot pop a year. In other words, my growth had stalled to the point there was nothing to do but either watch time tick by or go to war.

 

[gamerk2]

My thoughts:

Pop growth should really care about just a few factors:

• Amenities
• Available Housing
• Available Jobs
• Planetary Capacity
• Habitability

If there is an excess of these on a planet then pop growth will occur at a faster rate. If not, then it slows down until eventually hitting 0 (stable population). When available, pops will also take into account other planets they are able to migrate to, though this will always be at a growth penalty relative to local growth factors.

This would have the interesting side-effect where you could pre-buy districts/buildings on a planet to temporary prop up it's pop growth; lots of jobs/housing would lead to a faster growth rate, allowing planets colonized later to catch up in population over a shorter timespan.

This "works" in the fact that, disregarding Habitats (which are their own issue) that overall pop capacity will only be slightly larger (10-20% is probably a good target) the total planetary capacity of the galaxy and serves as a hard cap on pop growth.

Habitats also need to be significantly scaled back; the AI spams them, and they lead to unchecked pop growth that simply breaks things. The easy fix is to limit Habitats to either Void Dweller origin or the VoidBorne ascension perk. Even then, I'd jack up their upkeep (especially for empires who go the ascension route) and add some other downsides (maybe pops born on Habitats having a negative modifier to Habitability, making it harder to move them around?)

 

[Janx14]

I think the problem is design wise, we've sort of returned to the idea of how things worked pre-2.2 in terms of pops. The thing is the old system displayed this is in a much cleaner and elegant form, than some bizzare mathematical curve you can cheat. Its moved from a gamey but clear and concise system, to something more simulationist thats now shackled by gameyness.

The game in the last 2.5 years has also moved away from all the things that made 2.1 pops work. The game has, haphazardly, moved in the direction of infinite pops. Entire systems have been redone and 'balanced' (i use this lightly as stellaris has been horrendously balanced in 2.2+) for this. Suddenly trying to put the genie back in the bottle is, unsurprisingly, getting unenjoyable results.

 

[Andakingu]

I just want planets to grow naturally so you won't have very slow grow initially, and actually need some work to be done so POPs grow at decent speed afterwards. And, ofc, squeezing in last few POP should be challenging.

I too would like to see natural growth. But I'm not sure that toying with growth rates too much is an answer, beyond perhaps adjusting for per planet growth based on how close to it's carrying capacity it is. More pops and less room, slower growth. As we might see in any other game, as you say.

If we scale down POPs, buildings and districts having some spare housing and amenities to grow isn't too big or too small of a requirement. And having a breeder worlds that somewhat stimulate grow on other planets isn't that bad also. IMO. You will have some planets you can't properly utilize due to to bad features anyway.


Well, i think it's too late for that. We need to somehow work within current game rules. PDX surely won't make another major overhaul. Don't forget - their motto is: minimum effort, maximum DLC spam.

This I think, is exactly why we didn't get a different solution to pop numbers and global pop count.
Once you introduce a pop cap per planet (based on any criteria other than jobs, housing and amenities, the current decider of the ceiling.) You suddenly have to address amenities production, you have to address housing numbers, you have to start accounting for fewer jobs in the economy. Once you start having to account for fewer jobs, you need to consider boosting the resources given by certain jobs and pop productivity, which means revising the way buildings work, which involves changes to the UI and on and on.

Even small changes start to require substantial re-writes of code and game elements. Granted, how much is too much is somewhat relative and only PDX know for sure how much exactly would need to go into such changes, but I see little meaningful difference between one type of re-write and another, they are both megastructure scale projects, for lack of a better term.

If PDX are to genuinely address the issue at hand, I suspect the workload is going to be huge. One way or another, the only solutions are re-works and if PDX were honest, they know that already and have been trying to avoid it! Perhaps, understandably so.

That goes without saying.

If only that were true though, because apparantly it doesn't. There are plenty of voices who have come out in support of the new system. I personally don't understand how people are okay with it, but it seems they are and I guess, atleast someone is enjoying the game in it's current form. I could never begrudge that. But it does need to be said, I feel and ofcourse, it has been. By plenty of people, which gives me hope that PDX will atleast take the matter seriously enough to have a look.

 

[UltimateTobi]

No-one has been complaining about less pops. People are complaining about zero growth. People I suspect would be happy, if that growth was capped at a planetary level. Max population per world. We don't need planets with 200 pops on them. It becomes meaningless.

Aye, as I said.
And I agree with the latter part. And I believe that'd already be achieved, without the empire-wide Pop Growth penalty.
The S-curve and the penalty to Pop Growth once Housing reaches zero would already accomplish that. Unless I am missing something.

 

[Andakingu]

My thoughts:

Pop growth should really care about just a few factors:

• Amenities
• Available Housing
• Available Jobs
• Planetary Capacity
• Habitability

If there is an excess of these on a planet then pop growth will occur at a faster rate. If not, then it slows down until eventually hitting 0 (stable population). When available, pops will also take into account other planets they are able to migrate to, though this will always be at a growth penalty relative to local growth factors.

I would much rather the first three be removed from the equation entirely and have them contribute only to Planetary Cap, with that effect itself being capped, so once you reach a certain level of saturation in housing and amenities (drop job availability entirely from this equation and let it apply soley in migration calcs) thats it, no more rise in capacity. Have THAT saturation figure be defined by the planet size (abstracting available utilisable land, etc)

Anything more than that and the complexity no longer affords the system flexibility it requires to remain dynamic.

This would have the interesting side-effect where you could pre-buy districts/buildings on a planet to temporary prop up it's pop growth; lots of jobs/housing would lead to a faster growth rate, allowing planets colonized later to catch up in population over a shorter timespan.

I can't say I'm a fan of gameyfied means of boosting pop growth, beyond improving habitability and specific tech buildings ike gene clinics. etc. But reasonable minds can differ.

This "works" in the fact that, disregarding Habitats (which are their own issue) that overall pop capacity will only be slightly larger (10-20% is probably a good target) the total planetary capacity of the galaxy and serves as a hard cap on pop growth.

Hard cap is what we need though, for sure.

Habitats also need to be significantly scaled back; the AI spams them, and they lead to unchecked pop growth that simply breaks things. The easy fix is to limit Habitats to either Void Dweller origin or the VoidBorne ascension perk. Even then, I'd jack up their upkeep (especially for empires who go the ascension route) and add some other downsides (maybe pops born on Habitats having a negative modifier to Habitability, making it harder to move them around?)

Origin and Ascension perk locked for Habitats. For those that choose these things (which precludes other benefits) I dont think pop maluses are needed, but cap the number per star system, with their reduced pop numbers compared to planets, this could readily address an empire that relied on them exclusively (the origin) or used them to play tall when boxed in. (dunno how an AI would make that call, but maybe it's doable?)

I think the problem is design wise, we've sort of returned to the idea of how things worked pre-2.2 in terms of pops. The thing is the old system displayed this is in a much cleaner and elegant form, than some bizzare mathematical curve you can cheat. Its moved from a gamey but clear and concise system, to something more simulationist thats now shackled by gameyness.

True.

The game in the last 2.5 years has also moved away from all the things that made 2.1 pops work. The game has, haphazardly, moved in the direction of infinite pops. Entire systems have been redone and 'balanced' (i use this lightly as stellaris has been horrendously balanced in 2.2+) for this. Suddenly trying to put the genie back in the bottle is, unsurprisingly, getting unenjoyable results.

I can't see how else this can be dealt with. I can't see this system working going forward. Going back, to some degree (with simplification of the current system, so it atleast looks like the old one) seems the only viable choice.

 

[Andakingu]

And I believe that'd already be achieved, without the empire-wide Pop Growth penalty.
The S-curve and the penalty to Pop Growth once Housing reaches zero would already accomplish that. Unless I am missing something.

I feel that housing is the primary determinant in pop levels and I think thats wrong. As I say in an above post. Obviously, amenities and jobs play a role too. But I think that's all backwards. There should be a predefined hardcap based on planet size and habitability. Availability of the other three things (although I'd say forget jobs) should influence cap only, with pop growth being based on hab and planet size, plus techs or buildings.

Having it represent more complex trends, I think becomes an exercise in pointlessness. While we all want a simulation with some depth, some types of depth doesn't really bring anything meaningful to the game experience.

Fiddling around with housing numbers to boost pop growth, sounds like a remarkable amount of irritating, fun-barren, busy work.

 

[permeakra]

There is absolutely no need for the obscene amounts of housing and amenities for pops and I feel these are a simplified version of vicky's pop needs.

Vicky uses a 'continuos' model of pops, where there exist a separate 'pop' for every possible combination of 'pop traits'. Stellaris uses enough 'pop traits' (stratum, job, pop racial traits, faction, happiness, etc) that using 'vicky model' becomes questionable and pretty damaging a the end-game. At this point discretization of pops actually allows to cut down their amount since the minuscule ones simply do not appear. *Of course* you still want as much discrete pops as possible to make the model feel 'smoother', but still you can use less of them.

 

[Andakingu]

Vicky uses a 'continuos' model of pops, where there exist a separate 'pop' for every possible combination of 'pop traits'.

And I think was a contributor to that game slowing later too

Stellaris uses enough 'pop traits' (stratum, job, pop racial traits, faction, happiness, etc) that using 'vicky model' becomes questionable and pretty damaging a the end-game.

Agreed, unless the parts taken from the vicky model, are different ones. Abstract numerical pop count. Make traits and faction allegiance apply to the whole planet, rather than individual pops and then apply jobs and stratum as per usual. Is just one suggestion. There are doubtless others. You can have a staggered/tiered check system to reduce calculations over all. Improving performance, allowing planets and their pops to form internal factions with some actual utility (if three of your world goes fanatic pacifist in your fanatic militarist dictatorship, it actually means something, because it's three of your world) Such changes I suspect are beyond the purview of this game and are likely ideas for a sequel, admittedly. But it is worth looking at alternatives incase it inspires something that could work here.

At this point discretization of pops actually allows to cut down their amount since the minuscule ones simply do not appear. *Of course* you still want as much discrete pops as possible to make the model feel 'smoother', but still you can use less of them.

I can kinda see your point. But at the same time, I'm not 100% convinced. I don't think having ever more granular pops to keep track of (can calculate for) is a good idea, neither in terms of calculation nor actually for game play.

 

[maxirage]

There should be a predefined hardcap based on planet size and habitability.

Imagine if you each planet had a simple planetary pop cap (let's call it planet size) and it maxed out at a low number (let's say 25). That would solve all these problems without being obtuse or overcomplicated. Man, the devs really should implement something like that.

 

[Andakingu]

Imagine if you each planet had a simple planetary pop cap (let's call it planet size) and it maxed out at a low number (let's say 25). That would solve all these problems without being obtuse or overcomplicated. Man, the devs really should implement something like that.

There is nothing I can say to that. Touché perhaps?

Not to mock the devs ofcourse, but I wouldn't be surprised, if perhaps, that has rated low on the solutions list, as it might be regarded as a step back or reversal of previous choices.

It would, on the surface, appear to be the simplest solution. But surface appearances can be decieving. It probably isn't that simple.

 

[Druktar]

I for a change like the changes and the Update in general.

Yes the popsystem feels strange at first but on the other Hand it feels really rewarding to set up a bunch of grow Planets for Pops to fill up your ringworld later on. Going for the same Layout on every Planet works but isnt the best idea.

Going driven exterminator isnt a no brainer like it used to be. I know that i can snowball Early on but popgrowth will be bad down the line. For me thats a choice i make in the new system not a problem.

But i dont care about stellaris mp and i still agree the changes arent the best for competitive games.

 

[permeakra]

I can kinda see your point. But at the same time, I'm not 100% convinced.

Most design decisions are a compromise, and very few are perfect. This one cuts down both on performance penalty and UI noise coming from insignificant minor factions, so I'd argue that given aims of Stellaris it is a good one. It is other parts of the game we have a problem with.

 

[Druktar]

My thoughts:

Pop growth should really care about just a few factors:

• Amenities
• Available Housing
• Available Jobs
• Planetary Capacity
• Habitability

If there is an excess of these on a planet then pop growth will occur at a faster rate. If not, then it slows down until eventually hitting 0 (stable population). When available, pops will also take into account other planets they are able to migrate to, though this will always be at a growth penalty relative to local growth factors.

This would have the interesting side-effect where you could pre-buy districts/buildings on a planet to temporary prop up it's pop growth; lots of jobs/housing would lead to a faster growth rate, allowing planets colonized later to catch up in population over a shorter timespan.

This "works" in the fact that, disregarding Habitats (which are their own issue) that overall pop capacity will only be slightly larger (10-20% is probably a good target) the total planetary capacity of the galaxy and serves as a hard cap on pop growth.

Habitats also need to be significantly scaled back; the AI spams them, and they lead to unchecked pop growth that simply breaks things. The easy fix is to limit Habitats to either Void Dweller origin or the VoidBorne ascension perk. Even then, I'd jack up their upkeep (especially for empires who go the ascension route) and add some other downsides (maybe pops born on Habitats having a negative modifier to Habitability, making it harder to move them around?)

Actually thats already in the game.

Pop growth for organics is based on the planet AND Pop total. Sweet Spot for growth is around 80 capacity aka the Number hidden in the planet Overview so nobody will see it straight away....

Just hover over planet Size in colony Overview and you will find what you just asked for.

 

[Andakingu]

It is other parts of the game we have a problem with.

I have to disagree there. This and AI are, in my opinion, the biggest problems, in regards to performance and challenge/over all stability of the game world.

Actually thats already in the game.

Pop growth for organics is based on the planet AND Pop total. Sweet Spot for growth is around 80 capacity aka the Number hidden in the planet Overview so nobody will see it straight away....

Just hover over planet Size in colony Overview and you will find what you just asked for.

But it's not a hard cap. It's a soft one that is quite possible to surpass and not just by abit. But by alot. That has been cut down now, ofcourse, but at the expense of too much else.

I'd like to see a hard cap and smaller pop counts than 80 per planet. I'd be happy for it go back to 20-30 range, at most.

 

[permeakra]

This and AI are, in my opinion, the biggest problems, in regards to performance and challenge/over all stability of the game world.

AI certainly is a problem and yes, high pop count in the current architecture results in bad performance. But I don't see a better alternative except dropping social factors alltogether. Than even a toaster would be able to manage things in this regard, like it did at Master of Orion days.

 

[Druktar]

I have to disagree there. This and AI are, in my opinion, the biggest problems, in regards to performance and challenge/over all stability of the game world.

But it's not a hard cap. It's a soft one that is quite possible to surpass and not just by abit. But by alot. That has been cut down now, ofcourse, but at the expense of too much else.

I'd like to see a hard cap and smaller pop counts than 80 per planet. I'd be happy for it go back to 20-30 range, at most.

Im fine with a hard cap or lower numbers.

It is just strange how often people dont realize that full planets mean less growth because the Info you need is hidden like something you are not supposed to see.

The guy i quoted even asked for stuff that just got implemented because of that.

Synth still feel op. 800 plus research within 20 years anyone? And so on....

 

[SaintD]

Remove pops. Brainstorm a system that does essentially the exact same thing but isn't a giant spaghetti mess of garbage.

Initial brainstorm: Pops are gone. Just gone. Don't need them. Immediate benefit: don't have to track thousands of pops and your RP potential is increased because the population number can be whatever you imagine it to be. If you picked the dragon portrait and like to imagine your planetary population is actually a couple of hundred individual dragons in charge of their own mini-gestalt of drones or thralls, fine, whatever.

Replace the pops with a 'planetary development' number that builds up exactly the same as pop growth did, but now we can actually have it affected by more things than just your sheer biological fertility - a system that has tons of trade through it develops faster, a system that's a colossal doom fortress develops slower, being the site of the galactic market is a massive boon worth actually fighting over in the GC, all kinds of stuff. When planetary development reaches certain levels, you can build a new district/building that provides resources exactly like districts and buildings do now.

We don't need pops. At all. Re-contextualize how you think about pops - all they are is a growth token that you stick into a slot to generate resources. That's it. There is literally no difference between waiting for pops to grow so you can build something to put them in and generate resources.....and just having the building generate resources. Pops are a middle man we don't need in this transaction.

Stellaris:
Wait for growth numbers to reach a certain level (create a new pop), then create a building/district, then the pop goes in the building to generate resources.

No pops Stellaris:
Wait for growth numbers to reach a certain level (create a new building slot), then create a building/district to generate resources.


Why do we need pops for this?
Do you want housing as a limiting factor? Fine. Keep it. Insufficient housing stunts the development of a planet until it reaches a point that it ceases developing. Some of your buildings will need to be for housing instead of resources if you want the planet to continue developing. Whoopdy doo. We just don't need pops to achieve EXACTLY THE SAME RESULT as the pop system we have now. They are an absurd middle man to the equation. Growth leads to buildings leads to resources. Some of the buildings have to be 'wasted' on certain kinds of maintenance. Why. Do. We. Need. Pops. For this. Whywhywhywhywhywhywhywhywhywhy.

Put a big picture of a male and female member of my species on the planet screen so I can ogle the SE humanoid blue space babe sl00ts, and we've lost NOTHING.

And you know what's even better? No more manually moving population to suddenly explode a backwater planet into some sort of pseudo-Ecumenopolis. Because pops don't exist. It makes no sense we can do this. Just picking up and shovelling people onto a planet shouldn't turn it into an instant powerhouse. It needs to actually develop. It takes time.

 

[grommile]

We don't need pops.

What do genocidals (kill all xenos, take over their infrastructure) and pamperbots (shuffle all meatpeople and rockpeople into pampering facilities, staff their factories with robots) look like without pops? (remember, gestalts are paid DLC, so unless you're writing a suggestion for Stellaris 2, you need to address this )

What does xenophobe egalitarian gameplay (enslave all aliens, give your own species Utopian Abundance) look like?

Heck, what does xenophile egalitarian militarist gameplay (be a crusading bastion of diversity and acceptance that crushes tyrants and welcomes immigrants, where a foxperson refugee, a conquered/"liberated" butterflyperson, an economic-migrant lizardperson, and a native-born parrotperson all have the same rights) look like?

 

[Andakingu]

Im fine with a hard cap or lower numbers.

So are alot of people. As I have said previously, I don't think people are concerned with how big the numbers get (or how restrained they remain) What people object to, is enforced, arbitrary growth stagnation, that leaves players with less to do and potentially impacts the AI in alot of negative ways. The details of which I won't rehash, as they can be found across the previous 38 pages.

It is just strange how often people dont realize that full planets mean less growth because the Info you need is hidden like something you are not supposed to see.

The guy i quoted even asked for stuff that just got implemented because of that.

Can you be specific as to what I have asked for, that has already been introduced?

Synth still feel op. 800 plus research within 20 years anyone? And so on....

There is alot of imbalance in the current system, undoubtedly. I don't think a system with so many moving parts, some totally at odds with eachother, is ever going to be properly balanced. But, I've never been one to scream that balance must be achieved. Some of the best fun I've had have been in games that had some inherent imbalance.

What I am a stickler for, is stability, reliability and ultimately, fun.