Why is everyone suddenly talking about "Can't fill my place anymore"?

[monkeypunch87]

I wonder about this issue being talked in all POP growth-threads. I never knew that this was an important thing before 3.01. I probably never had a full Ring World or Ecumenopolis in 1000 hours of Stellaris playtime and it didn't kill my enjoyment with the game. You know, your opponents, AI or other player, have the same problem, so there is no disadvantage for you. And it is, even with the new mechanic, not an impossible feat to fill one, you just need to think about it as "Not an Addon for my people to stay on, it is an Instead-place". Now, you have to really play tall to fill them. It is great.

 

[sillyrobot]

If I gave a crap about the AI opponents, I'd play a game where those opponents stood a chance. It's not only that I can't fill the special habitats like ringworld and ecumenopoli, they no longer serve a purpose in the game because they can never be filled. So why upgrade? Why build them? I like building them, but if I'm going to waste the time, I want more than the satisfaction of seeig them built. Most games pre-3.0 I end up with 5-7 ecu filled and productive. Now I can't have one.

 

[Cronos988]

It's a game about building an interstellar empire with your own handmade civilization. Are you wondering why people care about more than pure mechanical equivalence?

 

[monkeypunch87]

It's a game about building an interstellar empire with your own handmade civilization. Are you wondering why people care about more than pure mechanical equivalence?

That is exactly what I'm talking about. For me, they made it more "realistic" (whatever it means in Stellaris) that not every places fills to the brink with people in 200-300 years. If you want to use your new shiny thing, the Ring World or Ecu, to its full effect, you need to play your empire around this goal, which is great. Pre 3.01 turned mindlessly all my planets to Ecus after a while to cope with the growth.

 

[Amorenkaire]

Because before hand, as building slots were unlocked with population and I could build more factories or foundries, those factories or foundries could be FILLED to get the resource production I needed. And even if not, I could be reasonably certain the planet would grow in a short while and meet the demand I needed.

Part of that is the change to district/building slot change, but a lot of it is by mid game your empire population growth slows to a crawl. and people are noticing the vast difference in productivity they had compared to the last patch.

 

[monkeypunch87]

Because before hand, as building slots were unlocked with population and I could build more factories or foundries, those factories or foundries could be FILLED to get the resource production I needed. And even if not, I could be reasonably certain the planet would grow in a short while and meet the demand I needed.

Part of that is the change to district/building slot change, but a lot of it is by mid game your empire population growth slows to a crawl. and people are noticing the vast difference in productivity they had compared to the last patch.

Yeah, as I said, all of your opponents suffer the same, so there is no disadvantage for you, that your empire is less productive. Crisis gets harder, ok.

 

[Stein14]

It's not about filling up, it's about getting at least 10 pops in a ring world until playing. In a whole mind you.

 

[monkeypunch87]

It's not about filling up, it's about getting at least 10 pops in a ring world until playing. In a whole mind you.

And I made a reasonable suggestion to it: Abandon your other places and start to play a tall Ring World playthrough after construction. Or be happy with not so many people on your new construction.

 

[arosenberger14]

Because in previous versions every planet would fill itself up at a similar rate in roughly a century from per planet pop growth. We all became habituated to expect that to happen, and it felt good to sit back and watch your colonies grow. Now that that's changed, we all still expect it to happen, but it doesn't (without player intervention).

 

[Secret Master]

It's not only that I can't fill the special habitats like ringworld and ecumenopoli, they no longer serve a purpose in the game because they can never be filled.

I was going to ask if there was some kind of micro way to get them filled up. (Well, maybe not full, but at least to 75% capacity.)

Like, could I create breeder worlds that, instead of trying to open all jobs and districts, cap out the jobs at a lower number (i.e. I don't open all districts or slots). Say, at the number that would be at the top of the population growth curve. Then use manual resettlement to my ecu or ringworld to fill them up that way. Or maybe even use automatic resettlement in this way?

Because my first game where I had an ecumenopolis (fixed a relic world, not taking the perk), it was the least productive planet ever. Especially because I got it fixed right around the time I blew past 600 or 700 POPs. And I was constructing POPs with Clone Vats, which isn't too shabby anymore.

 

[Amorenkaire]

Yeah, as I said, all of your opponents suffer the same, so there is no disadvantage for you, that your empire is less productive. Crisis gets harder, ok.

Because it means the reward for investing in a planet DOESN'T HAPPEN. You get to enjoy ~50 years of solid growth, then sit around wondering when you can upgrade your colonial worlds to the t3 capital. And then sit around and wait as your halved alloy production accrues enough to upgrade your megastructure despite the fact you've not built a single ship since then.

 

[Amorenkaire]

I was going to ask if there was some kind of micro way to get them filled up. (Well, maybe not full, but at least to 75% capacity.)

Like, could I create breeder worlds that, instead of trying to open all jobs and districts, cap out the jobs at a lower number (i.e. I don't open all districts or slots). Say, at the number that would be at the top of the population growth curve. Then use manual resettlement to my ecu or ringworld to fill them up that way. Or maybe even use automatic resettlement in this way?

Because my first game where I had an ecumenopolis (fixed a relic world, not taking the perk), it was the least productive planet ever. Especially because I got it fixed right around the time I blew past 600 or 700 POPs. And I was constructing POPs with Clone Vats, which isn't too shabby anymore.

You can. Its also basically the only use for habitats now it seems. Because they're certainly not going to grow enough to continue your income needs (not that you'd likely need more energy or minerals or food now, since you have so little of the resources using it except maybe food for clone vats). Just keep spamming habitats and micro'ing them to the sweet spot of 6 pop growth speed and have the auto-resettlement move them elsewhere. And keep building more, because those penalties are just going to get worse the more you do this.

 

[monkeypunch87]

Because it means the reward for investing in a planet DOESN'T HAPPEN. You get to enjoy ~50 years of solid growth, then sit around wondering when you can upgrade your colonial worlds to the t3 capital. And then sit around and wait as your halved alloy production accrues enough to upgrade your megastructure despite the fact you've not built a single ship since then.

Sounds like great choices to be made. Do want to invest in growing your planets (which is possible, just start building more city districts at the start to unlock all your building slots)? Do you want a fleet? Do you want a full effect megastructure?

You can't and shouldn't have everything.

 

[FinbarFlin]

BUT, BUT, wouldnt a ringworld section totally dedicated to produce free housing space speed up the pop growth?

 

[Yourss]

And I made a reasonable suggestion to it: Abandon your other places and start to play a tall Ring World playthrough after construction. Or be happy with not so many people on your new construction.

Stellaris is a game of tightly interconnected systems. Taking one of those systems (pop growth) and making drastic changes to it without any adjustment to other systems causes the play experience to completely change.

It seems the general issue is that you get to the point where the opportunity cost of growth in your empire is so high that it makes all sorts of cheesy plays optimal to get your populations to grow.

 

[Yourss]

Sounds like great choices to be made. Do want to invest in growing your planets (which is possible, just start building more city districts at the start to unlock all your building slots)? Do you want a fleet? Do you want a full effect megastructure?

You can't and shouldn't have everything.

If my empire has conquered half the galaxy, achieved technologies that are more or less miraculous. I can and should have everything. Instead, I have a population growing slower and slower, and robots that cost as many allows as a battleship.

 

[monkeypunch87]

Like, could I create breeder worlds that, instead of trying to open all jobs and districts, cap out the jobs at a lower number (i.e. I don't open all districts or slots). Say, at the number that would be at the top of the population growth curve. Then use manual resettlement to my ecu or ringworld to fill them up that way. Or maybe even use automatic resettlement in this way?

This is exactly a way. Breeder worlds, where you have only jobs at half your capacity. If you like breeder worlds.

 

[Dainty Owl]

Yeah, as I said, all of your opponents suffer the same, so there is no disadvantage for you, that your empire is less productive. Crisis gets harder, ok.

Another commenter already said this but you're making the same point so I'll restate what he said: It's not about balance. It's about enjoyment.

Building your empire is enjoyable. Having new pops grow is enjoyable. Having a planet be fully developed is satisfying. Having a planet be underdeveloped for a long time or never fully develop within the span of the game is unnerving and irksome. Having a less productive empire is LESS enjoyable.

I don't spam habitats or ringworlds. At most I'll build one ring sometimes. But I wanna see them grow and fill up.

Also in regards to your suggestions, reseteling pops and abandoning colonies is not enjoyable.

I just wana have the game I've always had:
-Colonize peacefully
-Get about 10planets
-Build an ecu
-Maybe build a ring
-Watch them grow and fill up all the way and enjoy the site of my fully developed empire. Then fight the crisis.

Speaking of which if you want the crisis to be more difficult just bump up the setting in the galaxy creation screen. Also the crisis is more dangerous now because it doesn't use construction ships and as such doesn't stop expanding after a little bit.

 

[monkeypunch87]

Stellaris is a game of tightly interconnected systems. Taking one of those systems (pop growth) and making drastic changes to it without any adjustment to other systems causes the play experience to completely change.

I'm not saying that it didn't change drastically, but so far I prefer this drastic change to pre 3.01, where I could only cope with the growth by building larger and larger megastructures.

 

[grommile]

robots that cost as many allows as a battleship.

this is the thing that really pushes me over the "so how much actual long-playthrough testing did this subsystem get before release? perhaps you should at least triple that." threshold.