Will POPs be a quantified population, or abstracted points?

[Ninking]

I don't think I've read any about how POPs will be quantified in the game. We know that they have an ethos and a race, but what I'm wondering about is whether they will be quantified like in Victoria 2 and be subject to population changes? The alternative would be POP markers, where a planet might be able to hold the arbitrary amount of, say, 12 POPs and each occupying a certain box somewhere on the planet.

I really hope to see that it's not like that, and that POPs will be represented with realistic numbers and be subject to population growths and declines!

 

[aitaituo]

I, too, am very interested in the specific POP mechanics. I assume it will be somewhat simplified from Vicky 2's system. I'm fine with abstract POP numbers like in the Civ series rather than V2's "3 accepted culture/religion bureacrats increasing at 0.004% per month", but I hope there's at least a veneer of realism so it says something like 1 million POP rather than just 1 POP. It's just immersion breaking when you have one drone causing a riot in a bustling metropolis of a dozen people.

 

[valergain]

This is a good question one that like to know the answer. Personally I think its going to the abstract pops.

 

[EntropyAvatar]

I think pops with specified populations are a lot more flexible and have fewer tricky edge cases, especially with regard to population growth. It also let's you start a colony off with a very small pop instead of bringing a hundred million people in one ship or something. So I am hoping for actual population numbers.

 

[((1+SQRT(5)))/2]

I hope the population head count for a system is like many congressional districts, of evenly distributed population points. Given certain government choices, it would make sense. And then, the systems could be like states, electoral college and elect you, the leader of your empire!

 

[aitaituo]

I hope the population head count for a system is like many congressional districts, of evenly distributed population points. Given certain government choices, it would make sense. And then, the systems could be like states, electoral college and elect you, the leader of your empire!

Only if we also get rotten boroughs, too!

 

[aruon]

most likely pops counts will read something like "pop = 1.0m"

 

[Demonsul]

I don't see why pops won't be represented as real numbers. There's no issues related to searching censuses for historical accuracy, and really a computer can crunch pretty much any number as good as the next, since if it's anything like Victoria the pops won't all be simulated as individuals but instead will be large blocks of like-minded people.

 

[EU3NOOB]

I don't see why pops won't be represented as real numbers. There's no issues related to searching censuses for historical accuracy, and really a computer can crunch pretty much any number as good as the next, since if it's anything like Victoria the pops won't all be simulated as individuals but instead will be large blocks of like-minded people.

There's a difference between Vic3 and Stellaris, though. For Vic3, pops were predetermined by game code and was the same at the start of every game, whether it be 1836 or 1861.

For Stellaris this won't be the case. Stellaris will generate pops dynamically and will be different at the start of every game(presumably at 2200AD). Not saying it's impossible, in fact I hope it's the case, but it will be quite a lot to process, though of course once processed you're good to go!

It'll be interesting to see what PDS does.

 

[Velorian]

There's a difference between Vic3 and Stellaris, though. For Vic3, pops were predetermined by game code and was the same at the start of every game, whether it be 1836 or 1861.

For Stellaris this won't be the case. Stellaris will generate pops dynamically and will be different at the start of every game(presumably at 2200AD). Not saying it's impossible, in fact I hope it's the case, but it will be quite a lot to process, though of course once processed you're good to go!

It'll be interesting to see what PDS does.

I don't think that will be much to process at all. It's no worse than generating the galaxy itself.

 

[Fourthspartan56]

I don't see why pops won't be represented as real numbers. There's no issues related to searching censuses for historical accuracy, and really a computer can crunch pretty much any number as good as the next, since if it's anything like Victoria the pops won't all be simulated as individuals but instead will be large blocks of like-minded people.

Are you sure? I mean doesn't Victoria 2 lag pretty badly at the end of the game due to the massive numbers of pops, and because of this wouldn't it be significantly worse for Stellaris?

 

[Knightfall52]

Remember there is an adjacency system for buildings that will likely play a huge role on how pops act, we will likely end with really specialized planets with specialized pops.

If its pop is just a silly incremental 'pop unit' that works a single tile like in civ it would be a big let down especially since they will likely not be complex enough to allow for a gameplay interaction that will give them meaningful character since they are supposedly the protagonists of the game i am pretty sure this wont be the case though.

 

[Fourthspartan56]

Remember there is an adjacency system for buildings that will likely play a huge role on how pops act, we will likely end with really specialized planets with specialized pops.

If its pop is just a silly incremental 'pop unit' that works a single tile like in civ it would be a big let down especially since they will likely not be complex enough to allow for a gameplay interaction that will give them meaningful character since they are supposedly the protagonists of the game i am pretty sure this wont be the case though.

I agree that a Civ style single worker unit to represent a million people would be silly and unacceptable. But I would rather that they have slightly abstracted pops that doesn't cause the game to lag a massive amount (and when I say slightly abstracted I mean something like 1 pop=1,000 people or something).

 

[Daltesh]

In the hookedgamers interview it was said that "The planet’s surface is represented by a number of tiles, which you can manage individually by assigning workers to them-" which gives me the impression that pops on a planet will be represented as markers like in a city in Civilization.

 

[Thure]

Are you sure? I mean doesn't Victoria 2 lag pretty badly at the end of the game due to the massive numbers of pops, and because of this wouldn't it be significantly worse for Stellaris?

Remember that Victory 2 is highly outdated. It was still the old engine which was used for HoI2 and EU3. So we actually don't know how laggy it would be today.

 

[Velorian]

Are you sure? I mean doesn't Victoria 2 lag pretty badly at the end of the game due to the massive numbers of pops, and because of this wouldn't it be significantly worse for Stellaris?

Does it? I played a Vic2 game a few months back on a modern PC and it did fine. Regardless it's not so much the pops as it is the economy because all their purchases are simulated. Stellaris probably won't simulate individual purchases. A pop which does almost nothing will have a negligible performance effect.

If they are mostly used for simulating politics and determining production then that's almost nothing performance-wise, by itself.

I agree that a Civ style single worker unit to represent a million people would be silly and unacceptable. But I would rather that they have slightly abstracted pops that doesn't cause the game to lag a massive amount (and when I say slightly abstracted I mean something like 1 pop=1,000 people or something).

It's silly to limit it to pops of 1000, what's wrong with the Vic2 number system?

To a computer a number is a number, if there is a 1000 pop which represent 1,000,000 people it will take the same amount of resources to handle that as if there had been a pop with 1,241,742 people in it.

What matters is how many different pop units they are divided into, not how many people each pop has in it.

 

[drakeheath]

Pops might have different modifiers (if pops have modifiers that is) that might represent the population size.

Like you have a pop with very small as a tag which would mean there are about 10,000 people to that pop, while if you have a pop that has the tag large it represents maybe a billion or so people. So you could have pops improve as the tiles improve by being larger and thus increasing the bonuses and power that pop has. You don't need to crunch numbers, just have certain prerequisites for the pop to increase or decrease in size.

 

[Kadanz]

In the hookedgamers interview it was said that "The planet’s surface is represented by a number of tiles, which you can manage individually by assigning workers to them-" which gives me the impression that pops on a planet will be represented as markers like in a city in Civilization.

I hope this isn't true.

 

[Velorian]

I hope this isn't true.

You probably assign priorities to the tiles and then pops get automatically distributed. I'm sure they didn't choose a system as simplistic as the one from Civilization.

 

[Kadanz]

You probably assign priorities to the tiles and then pops get automatically distributed. I'm sure they didn't choose a system as simplistic as the one from Civilization.

I'm hoping for a more in depth pop system were planets have actual population numbers. More leaning towards vic 2.