Research designation on Habitats gives a 10% output bonus compared to the planet version's upkeep discount. They also make great fortress worlds as you can put them where you need and build many in a chokepoint.
- 4
Void dwellers need orbital rings equivalent
- Thread starter Cassia Tullius
- Start date
-
We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
Or do something else with them, like give +3 amenities to all colonies in the system per Entertainer on a Leisure Habitat, so I can actually specialize my habitats instead of spamming the same few buildings on every single one.
- 3
- 1
- 1
An option for amenities to be a system modifier rather than a planet modifier if you do dedicate a planet to it would be great.
- 1
These all don’t change the fact that habitats are just bad now: if a planet happens to be at a choke point it can defend well, oh now with orbital ring you can actually have another citadel worth of firepower on top of the starbase, what a surprise. Research habitats require deposits which is too rare in the wild to matter. Idk why people always like to argue about research habitats being good and you can spam habitats making it seem like you can spam research habitats while in reality you can’t.
You can get a lot of Research Habitats you just need to stop thinking that Void Dweller is a Tall play style, stop spamming habitats and conquer instead building research habitats over the deposits.
If you want to play a pacifist tall habitat build there is an origin that allows you it's called Knights of the Toxic god and its far superior to Void Dweller at tall playstyle, that single habitat will push out insane amounts of research.
- 1
- 1
- 1
Can you make a quick count on how many research habitats being possible across 100 systems? Many research deposits sits on the star which you cannot build a habitat on; others spawn on moon and is not accessible. Nobody even bother play “tall” as it’s just cringe.
- 1
Honestly it is kind of weird that Knight of the Toxic God is that much better as a Habitat-focused build than Void Dweller.
Last edited:
- 3
- 1
I think void dwellers trait should work on ring worlds as well, you should also be able to add the void dweller trait to modify other species if you are a voiddweller and research Glandular Acclimation , same with cave dweller. I also think they could use some buffs through a ascension perk that comes after voidborn and terraforming tech, called voidcentric. It would work like hydrocentric, making planets much worse to live on but in return you increase the output bonus given by void dweller, and unlocks terraforming decision that allows you hollow out planets into a space habitation structure destroying any resources they may have, I imagine such a project would be mega project level but void dweller need a more interesting late game.
- 2
If you're a Void Dweller and finish the Adaptability tradition, any Gas Giant, Toxic or Frozen world is a potential Research habitat.
- 1
- 1
- 1
We’re not talking about just VD here. Besides, VD is specifically taxed by that tradition to be any competitive. No other empire needs adaptability.
the easiest fix, and the one i would prefer, is to just add another tier of habitat tech to it to add a couple more districts. no need to complicate it with more rings, just add another advancement to habitat size and increase the max districts from 8 to 10, and add another building slot with the last tech.
- 5
Was curious, went ahead and did this:
Ignoring capital systems (which have guaranteed research deposits), I checked 100 systems and found 4 total research habitats. I'm fairly sure that 2 of them were from a preset system - I didn't find a single research deposit on a planet in the first 60 stars I checked.
The overwhelming majority of research deposits are stars, and most of the deposits that aren't on stars are on moons.
Anomalies weren't included and often add research deposits, but not enough to really provide a substantial amount to a wide empire.
With VD Adaptability, about 23% of all potential habitat sites will be research, which is plenty for playing tall, and adaptability is more useful for VD than most (housing reduction is very nice), but like you say, this is easily reframed as a tax. Rather than "VD can overcome it's problems with adaptability", it's more apt to describe it as "VD has to take a crap tradition tree to overcome problems that other empires don't have".
I agree with the sentiment that if you're playing VD and refusing to use migration treaties to colonise planets, you're playing wrong. VD has no capital planet or guaranteed habitables, but by the midgame it should have one or two planets that it uses for operations that don't belong on a habitat.
Habitats are supposed to beat planets for trade and research, but it's only a marginal advantage - orbital rings made planets clearly superior for everything else, so maybe habitats need a buff so they're clearly superior for their niche.
- 2
- 1
Not just that, you're better off focusing your empire on a small number of planets (+Ringworlds for science later in the game). If you blob out at all, even most of your natural planets become redundant for actually producing resources.
I think it's better to compare habitats to fringe planets, since in both cases they're something you add to your relatively low number of core colonies, and the strength of habitats is indeed that you can keep adding them if you run out of other opportunities to acquire colonies. The role of these fringe colonies is to produce pops, build some "one per planet" stuff like monuments, and maybe serve as a roadblock for invading fleets, and Habitats can do all of these. (The one thing fringe planets can do that habs can't is house a bunch of refineries.)
I think this is the rub of it. Outside of a trade build, the best argument for a habitat is the science district, but science-habitats are just too rare, and normal non-habitat builds have just too few building slots to make them worth packing science labs as opposed to refineries for sprawl purposes.
My own two cents on this is that either moons should be considered for a habitat's district selection- thus opening up far more habitats to districts in general- and/or that stars be valid habitat slots, even at the mutual-expense of starbases.
As-is, though, science habitat's aren't really a thing for most empires, just for the random distribution of science deposits.
It's hard to believe, but the game code actually claims that the inability to make habitats on moons or asteroids is "for balance reasons". Mind you, I think it's said that since before habitats got deposit-based districts... and possibly since before districts even existed.
There's no in-game explanation for this restriction, and indeed hollowed-out asteroid habitats are both a staple of sci-fi and plentiful in Stellaris lore.
It would be a different matter if habitats were actually meaningfully more efficient, which used to be their old niche - small but high-quality - but they really aren't anymore. Even the VD trait bonus just doesn't compete with the benefits planets can get, and the more-efficient districts (for sprawl and upkeep benefits) are strictly overshadowed by the vastly higher per-colony sprawl and the alloy upkeep of each habitat.
They still have a small place in trade-focused builds - less so now that planets have a trade-boosting designation, and merchants are worse but much easier to get, though - but for the most part they really are only good as choke-point-holder + naval cap fortress stations, or as pop factories (because, as we all know, in Stellaris your pops come from colonies, not from other pops). The latter effect is significant, especially if you are locked out of ecus by your empire type, playing peaceful, or running a low habitable worlds multiplier, but it feels really bad gameplay-wise. Just because I can slap down a robot factory / spawning pool / cloning vat and like 2-3 other buildings really doesn't feel as impactful as being a space-dwelling empire really should!
There's no in-game explanation for this restriction, and indeed hollowed-out asteroid habitats are both a staple of sci-fi and plentiful in Stellaris lore.
It would be a different matter if habitats were actually meaningfully more efficient, which used to be their old niche - small but high-quality - but they really aren't anymore. Even the VD trait bonus just doesn't compete with the benefits planets can get, and the more-efficient districts (for sprawl and upkeep benefits) are strictly overshadowed by the vastly higher per-colony sprawl and the alloy upkeep of each habitat.
They still have a small place in trade-focused builds - less so now that planets have a trade-boosting designation, and merchants are worse but much easier to get, though - but for the most part they really are only good as choke-point-holder + naval cap fortress stations, or as pop factories (because, as we all know, in Stellaris your pops come from colonies, not from other pops). The latter effect is significant, especially if you are locked out of ecus by your empire type, playing peaceful, or running a low habitable worlds multiplier, but it feels really bad gameplay-wise. Just because I can slap down a robot factory / spawning pool / cloning vat and like 2-3 other buildings really doesn't feel as impactful as being a space-dwelling empire really should!
Let's not forget habitat has many designations worse than planet: Basic resource designation only provides 10% while planet equivalent are providing 25%; Farming habitat designation doesn't even add productivity, it's a joke to even consider using; Even trade station has a secret nerf of missing the -10% building upkeep which incidentally includes the strategic resource. Now let's add a planetary ring which boosts base output on top of all the discrepancies. Why even bother use habitats for anything other than abusing the base 3.0 growth and/or pop assembly that doesn't remotely care about planetary capacity?
- 1
How are you only getting 4 research habitats in 100 systems? I opened up my most recent save, and I have 6 potential research habitats just in the first 35 systems that are 4 jumps away from my capital. And that's if I skip Yuhtan, ignore Baldarak/New Baldarak despite counting the system, and ignore all the deposits in the capital system.
To clarify, I am:
- Only counting research and zro deposits (no dark matter or nanite deposits, though those would also be research habitats, as I don't have any on planets)
- Only counting proper planets that actually give the option to construct a habitat (or on which I already have a habitat built)
And the rest of the empire doesn't look any less rich, at a glance, though it may be that all the research deposits elsewhere are located on moons.
- 1
In my current game I'm up to year 2325 and still haven't even bothered researching habitats. The game is absolutely positive I want them and is giving the research option a drop weight of 252,000 (runner-up coilguns is 1,235 and everything else is under 500; only 4 non-habitat techs even break 0.0%) but I'd rather use my alloys and influence for megastructures and orbital rings. I've already got 21 planets from peaceful expansion and 4 more available terraforming candidates if I want them.
I've got 9 potential research habs in 52 non-starting systems, but 4 of those are guaranteed deposits in Tiyana Vek, so that's roughly 1 research habitat from random deposits and anomalies per 10 randomized systems. Odds might be impacted by how much you push for +% anomaly discovery chance.
It consistently annoys me that habitats built on strategic resource deposits don't have access to a designation that boosts them, since the mining designation requires a minerals deposit instead, there's no rural district variant that boosts worker jobs, and the refinery designation only boosts specialist SR manufacturers.
Are trade districts even all that competitive with city district + commercial zones when you take the habitat construction time and cost into account?
I've got 9 potential research habs in 52 non-starting systems, but 4 of those are guaranteed deposits in Tiyana Vek, so that's roughly 1 research habitat from random deposits and anomalies per 10 randomized systems. Odds might be impacted by how much you push for +% anomaly discovery chance.
It consistently annoys me that habitats built on strategic resource deposits don't have access to a designation that boosts them, since the mining designation requires a minerals deposit instead, there's no rural district variant that boosts worker jobs, and the refinery designation only boosts specialist SR manufacturers.
Are trade districts even all that competitive with city district + commercial zones when you take the habitat construction time and cost into account?
In the Gulli's Planètes Modifiers mod, there is a lot of decisions to enact for habitats, depending on the resources deposit they exploit. Those decisions cost alloys and unity to enact and give a bunch of Modifiers and special jobs for the habitat : specialists miners/technicians, archeologists... +X building slots, various Modifiers to trade value or consumers goods upkeep.
I think this is a nice Idea to give habitats some love without giving them the same bonuses as planets