To ascend or not ascend, that is the question. Is it better to ascend or spend slots on....

[Secret Master]

I am wondering if the three ascension paths are "required" from a power gaming perspective.

If I understand ascension perks correctly, as you complete tradition trees, you unlock ascension slots. Some of them apply to things like Voidborn (megastructures), but they also apply to the ascension paths. After the recent DD, it is clear that ascending your species has massive benefits. There also seem to be disadvantages. The Shroud seems to be a crap shoot, and having all your POPs run off energy instead of food has its own issues.

But I'm wondering if it will be a viable approach to just say, "Meh, ascension is some Vorlon-Elder Races bull****. We don't need no ascension." And just invest your slots in all the other categories. Or should we plan all empires around one of the ascension paths, with the other slots as secondary goals?

 

[SuperGeek89]

I don't know about what the "optimal" play will be in Banks but at least for my first couple of playthroughs in shunning ascension completely. After all Humanity made it to the stars without fundamentally changing what we are so why start now?

I am however torn between my choice of first pick of ascension perk. Not sure if i should go with Unity of Vision, Imperial Pejorative, or the research one that's name escapes me.

 

[Stadhouder]

Will it be optimal? No idea, but I'am sure playing without ascending will be viable. In the DD Wiz mentioned they had already over 20 and expected to have more at release, so I'm certain some interesting build can be made, including only ascending partially.

 

[Sheriff Godwin Law]

Short answer, "Don't even know if ascension is going to be the most optimal play."

Medium answer, "I've seen someone dominate a third of the galaxy on the hardest difficulty using a single planet. So if you don't want to ascend, but still want to succeed, I'm certain there is a way."

 

[Untrustedlife]

Short answer, "Don't even know if ascension is going to be the most optimal play."

Medium answer, "I've seen someone dominate a third of the galaxy on the hardest difficulty using a single planet. So if you don't want to ascend, but still want to succeed, I'm certain there is a way."

A single planet?
I understand 4-9 planets but 1 planet dominating a third of the galaxy , did they use a federation or something?

 

[Aphil]

The obvious answer is that no one really knows.

But I suspect that ascending won't be something that's strictly necessary. Yes, the Ascensions give pretty powerful bonuses, and rightly so but you could always use those two Ascension perks for other things. Maybe you want to focus on engineering great wonders so you focus on Habitats, Ringworlds, Megastructures and that perk that reduces the cost and time to build of each. Then you can also get the Technological Ascendancy perk while you're at it too. The one that increases fleet capacity might be a useful one too especially if you're building tall with limited space, letting you go toe-to-toe with larger empires.

Yes, you can mix and match any of the above with ascension perks but it will take more time, Unity and perhaps you won't have enough slots.

 

[Sheriff Godwin Law]

A single planet?
I understand 4-9 planets but 1 planet dominating a third of the galaxy , did they use a federation or something?

As near as I can figure they...

went heavy into research, because their research wasn't hit by multiple colonies early on that produced no research they got an edge. Because they didn't need to worry about ethics divergence, they chose the open thought policy that dramatically increases research speed at the trade off of greater ethics divergence. These things allowed them to pull ahead of their neighbors. They aggressively planted frontier outposts to limit their rivals growth and capture as much territory as possible. I'm pretty sure he hired and fired alot of scientists until he found one that increased the spawn chance of anomalies. Of course they laid down as many research and mining stations as possible to milk as much as they can out of uncolonized space. They focused heavily on border expansion technology, and energy weapons technology. A few wars allowed them to force abandonment of planets that were encroaching on their increasing border size, which allowed more resources. Interestingly, they won the wars with a corvette spam strategy at first, but then expanded that building star bases/star fortresses to reinforce their single large space port. On the offensive the AI's doomstack will go after your largest space port first.

The most important thing they did was stay active and aggressive, even though they were not expanding they were able to keep their neighbors from building up large enough that their growing tech advantage was overcome.

But here, don't just trust my likely flawed analysis after the fact, take a look yourself.

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/the-one-planet-empire-the-op-opm.953291/

 

[The Founder]

I am wondering if the three ascension paths are "required" from a power gaming perspective.

If I understand ascension perks correctly, as you complete tradition trees, you unlock ascension slots. Some of them apply to things like Voidborn (megastructures), but they also apply to the ascension paths. After the recent DD, it is clear that ascending your species has massive benefits. There also seem to be disadvantages. The Shroud seems to be a crap shoot, and having all your POPs run off energy instead of food has its own issues.

But I'm wondering if it will be a viable approach to just say, "Meh, ascension is some Vorlon-Elder Races bull****. We don't need no ascension." And just invest your slots in all the other categories. Or should we plan all empires around one of the ascension paths, with the other slots as secondary goals?

To clarify: Certain Ascension Perks like Voidborn, Galactic Wonders, Ring fo Life and the Ascension Path Perks required the 2nd and 4th Slot to be unlocked before you can take them. With a total amount of 8 Slots to be gainable.
It is not a question if you will take perks off the ascension path. But if the Ascension Paths will be worth your 2nd and 4th Slot, respectively.

Personally I find the Biological Path to be most interesting, as it is the one with the widest options and the least Ethos Restriction/Inherent Ethos atraction potential (I can see both Psionic and Technological to atract along that axis). Genetic Engineering can either buff a leader focussed build, a pop focussed build and even slavery builds (with the Advanced Options in particular).

A single planet?
I understand 4-9 planets but 1 planet dominating a third of the galaxy , did they use a federation or something?

Vassals and abusing the hell out of the AI shortcommings. Obviously not viable in MP.

 

[Felfox]

As others have pointed out, we have no idea just yet. If I were to guess, I'd say the ascension perks are designed to synergisee greatly and offer a new playstyle (or improve on existing ones)

I imagine they would be a strong addition to your empire's growth but whether they'really the better option compared to all the megastuctures and other edicts nobody knows.

 

[Promethian]

From what I have seen the Ascensions offer more raw power but are less immediate. Take the research ascend. It gives a straight up research boost immediately. Easy to understand and easy to use. Compare that to Bio Ascend. Modding all your researchers with the new Erudite trait gets you effectively the same thing but requires time to set up. Bio ascend also lets you specialize mod all your pops on other resources as well. Bio ascend also gets you access to very powerful armies. All these things require some build up but together once they are rolling are much more powerful than the individual ascend.

 

[Sheriff Godwin Law]

Now that I've seen the mechanics for the first and second stage species ascension paths, what might be neat is having the first stage of one only lock out the second stage of the other two. Then having the second stage lock out the first stage of the other two. This would let you grab multiple species ascensions at the first level without fully investing in the significant gameplay changes that tier-2 introduces.

You see, Mind Over Matter, The Flesh is Weak, and Engineered Evolution have some nice bonuses all by themselves but they don't completely shift the way you play the game or compromise the identity of the race you've generated. Meanwhile, Transcendence places you into a shroud themed side game to gain greater bonuses, Synthetic Evolution erases the identity of your race and completely changes your growth and food mechanics, and Evolutionary Mastery thrusts you into the role of caste system planner. All fine things if it's what you're after, but if you just want to play a mixed of race of humans living in a dystopian space opera where cyborgs co-mingle with gene-jocks and there's the flaky chick in the back who claims she's psychic and nobody is quite sure if they believe her. Well, that's a fun time too.

 

[The Founder]

You see, Mind Over Matter, The Flesh is Weak, and Engineered Evolution have some nice bonuses all by themselves but they don't completely shift the way you play the game or compromise the identity of the race you've generated.

That might actually be the reason the lockout exists in the first place.
The combination of Traits could become way too strong. Having Latent Psionics, Cybernetics and the extra Gene Points+Cost reduction could be quite the OP combination.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

Vassals and abusing the hell out of the AI shortcommings. Obviously not viable in MP.

I've never considered Stellaris to be a competitive multiplayer game in the first place.

It's heavy enough on text events and roleplaying aspects (and the combat balance is screwy enough) that I just don't see the fun in competing against other players in a serious manner.

 

[KlinkerFyren]

I don't think you need to become something extreme like the psionic or cybernetic ascension path. I seem to remember there is a perk called "Galactic Contender" that gives 33% more damage against Fallen Empires for instance. Also we should assume that the number of non-extreme ascension perks outnumber the fancy ones. There is also one that seems to geared towards xenophiles, another one that helps to colonize stuff and a technology one. So there should be good stuff for sane empires to enjoy too!

 

[Alblaka]

and having all your POPs run off energy instead of food has its own issues.

Off-Topic, but it bothers me how many people can't do basic math and cannot see that eating 1 energy is far superior to eating 1 food. Energy is produced

• +1 compared to any other ressource building of the same tier
• gets a % bonus from Energy Hub, opposed to food not having such a bonus building at all
• can be mined from orbitals
• (is global, an advantage energy loses over food, but a for pre-1.5, is still significant)

The only 'downside' of Synth is their growth being a tad more expensive initially, but in return being much faster for larger planets, and more controllable.

But I'm wondering if it will be a viable approach to just say, "Meh, ascension is some Vorlon-Elder Races bull****. We don't need no ascension." And just invest your slots in all the other categories. Or should we plan all empires around one of the ascension paths, with the other slots as secondary goals?

Back to topic, I would argue that any 'non-Unity' empire, aka, broad mass-conquerers, might want to go without Ascension, simply because it requires 4 Ascension Slots, and fills 2. Instead you could go for boosts to other areas (the border range thing is real) and maybe there will be more Ascension Perk's that are actually worth pursuing.

That said, the way Unity is currently implemented, I kinda doubt any empire, regardless of blobbing, will not be able to amass enough Unity to start Ascending 'somewhen'.

 

[laptor]

I guess not focusing in one ascension path will have benefits as well - at least I hope so...

 

[Shatterfury]

That might actually be the reason the lockout exists in the first place.
The combination of Traits could become way too strong. Having Latent Psionics, Cybernetics and the extra Gene Points+Cost reduction could be quite the OP combination.

To get all 3 you need to do spend 3 ascension points, that is a high price to pay and to get access to them you are forbidden to make use of the spiritualist - materialist axis.

 

[NHunter_rus]

It is not a question if you will take perks off the ascension path. But if the Ascension Paths will be worth your 2nd and 4th Slot, respectively.

I'm not quite sure, but I think Ascension paths can use any slots; you just need to have 2+ unlocked for the first step and 4+ for the second/final step.

Back on topic... we can only guess about this until April 6th, but I think that with the right perks you should be able to do quite well without ascending. At very least, science, core system and border perks will probably take priority over ascension ones even for those who will ascend.

 

[Promethian]

I'm not quite sure, but I think Ascension paths can use any slots; you just need to have 2+ unlocked for the first step and 4+ for the second/final step.

Back on topic... we can only guess about this until April 6th, but I think that with the right perks you should be able to do quite well without ascending. At very least, science, core system and border perks will probably take priority over ascension ones even for those who will ascend.

If you are going bio the first perk reduces gene mod time by half and gives you a bunch of points. That is something you can take advantage of immediately to good effect. Even if its just to add thrifty, intelligent or industrious that is a big bump to overall output.

 

[The Founder]

I'm not quite sure, but I think Ascension paths can use any slots; you just need to have 2+ unlocked for the first step and 4+ for the second/final step.

Indeed it can use any slot. But it is the kind of bonus you want to have as early as possible.

Technological:
It helps with the Colonisation game thanks to habitability boost. Even mere Cybernetics has +20% Habitability or so.
Not to mention you got Droids at that time too (requirement), so you can colonise everywhere using 2 kinds of pops (and I still asume robots add Materialist Atraction).

Psionic:
More chance to get the Psionic Leaders wich are more powerfull at thier job without any downside (can get only 1 trait from leveling anyway).

Biological:
The ability to adapt habitability a lot cheaper. The less population, the easier it is to genemod them all. the rest of them can grow.
And especially Hiveminds need the 2nd Ability to integrate conquered species.