Stellaris II: I, For One, Welcome Our New Robot Fungus Hivemind Overlords

[Sian]

Doesn't even have to be balance, though. There's a lot of small things that are just good ideas. Like, in Stellaris, there are various status icons on pops. In the base game, they all have the same colour. There's a mod that gives them different colours, so you can tell at a glance how bad they are. It's a good idea, so I install it. What's the problem with that?

Sometimes, it's also just things where it shows the game designer had different priorities. Like, Skyrim is a good game. But it shows that the menus were done for consoles more than PC. So I install a mod that changes font size to about five times smaller, puts more on each screen and gives more inventory sorting options. That's just a good thing for me. What's the problem with that?

I'd argue that those a QoL changes, which as the name implies are nice to have, but in no way critically needed and outright mandatory

[Kaptin Keen]

Hm - without wanting to turn this entire thread into a mod debate:

I will freely admit to having been annoyed by the obvious console menus in Skyrim - but not to the extent that I'd have wanted to mod them. The cost is generally much higher than the benefits. The menus work, after all, and mods often don't.

So that kinda becomes how I see mods: They're like achievements, they don't really do anything, other than risk ruining the game.

But I imagine there are a few out there I'd have liked. Like, remember that quest in Witcher the first, in Vizima - where you chase your tail around and around from between three npc's, potentially forever? A mod that fixed that quest would have been welcome. Even now, because my girlfriend is stuck on that quest now.

But mostly, mods fall into two categories: Amateurs trying to do the work of proffessionals - or cosmetics that have a (slight, but relevant) chance of igniting your face. And then, every once in a while, there's Enderal.

[Grif]

Oh look, another balance patch. Hopefully they made diplomacy less dull. (Doesn't look like it from a glance of the patch notes.)

[Silverraptor]

Anyone tried the rogue Servitors yet? Do they know if they have a diplomacy penalty like the other 2 machine factions have? (Similar to Skynet and Borg personalities.)

[GloatingSwine]

I do see some point in mods that make it another game entirely. As an example, I'd be interested in a mod that changed Stellaris to more of a skirmish game - rather than the needlessly HUGE fleets of the endgame. Which, for one thing, my aging system can't handle. I also find it enormously dull. Consider, for instance, my last game: As usual, I was the biggest empire on the map - with the exception of that one AE that ate another FE early, and now had 450k fleet strength. By comparison, I could barely scrape together 140k. I would literally need to win the game by having 40% of the planets in order to have enough planets to rival that fleet strength.

Ehh, you can probably beat that fleet strength with only about 200k. Fallen Empires (and crises) are considerably overestimated by the fleetpower calculation.

That said I do agree that massively reducing fleet sizes like New Horizons does would improve the game. Individual ships would matter more, ship designs would matter more, combat could be easier to read and look prettier rather than "big blob of mess", and old potato PCs like mine wouldn't choke so hard. (New Horizons is the Star Trek mod/total conversion, and it's pretty fantastic, lots of interesting ideas that vanilla should steal).

I'm not a fan of mods that just shovel a load of complexity onto the system like Alphamod, or ones that just add "more stuff" like the ones that add more tiers of the same stuff. Stellaris is pretty degenerate, but I don't think you can change that by piling loads of stuff on to hide the degenerate options under.

New Horizons being more of a total conversion where basically everything is different though is worth the time.

[Olinser]

Ehh, you can probably beat that fleet strength with only about 200k. Fallen Empires (and crises) are considerably overestimated by the fleetpower calculation.

That said I do agree that massively reducing fleet sizes like New Horizons does would improve the game. Individual ships would matter more, ship designs would matter more, combat could be easier to read and look prettier rather than "big blob of mess", and old potato PCs like mine wouldn't choke so hard. (New Horizons is the Star Trek mod/total conversion, and it's pretty fantastic, lots of interesting ideas that vanilla should steal).

I'm not a fan of mods that just shovel a load of complexity onto the system like Alphamod, or ones that just add "more stuff" like the ones that add more tiers of the same stuff. Stellaris is pretty degenerate, but I don't think you can change that by piling loads of stuff on to hide the degenerate options under.

New Horizons being more of a total conversion where basically everything is different though is worth the time.

Yeah Fallen Empire fleet power is massively inflated because a LOT of that is in hull points and their Lances are effectively still calculated in power as though they were the old lances.

One time I completely destroyed a 300k Fallen Empire fleet with a 180k power fleet of my own and only lost about 15k in power in the battle.

[Silverraptor]

So, I already got the achievement to wipe all organics in the galaxy as Skynet. I learned a bunch while doing it. Turns out, if you set everyone to hyperlanes, its so much easier to conduct warfare and defense platforms and fortresses actually do stuff in this game! Also, if the game decides to drop you in the most isolated part of the galaxy with a bunch of heavy in resource worlds and you have the traits and civic that both improve robot build speed, you care less of what type of planet everything is and just build up and spread like a locust for 100 years without seeing a single organic and by the time the organics in the galaxy notice you, you already have the resources and fleet to zerg through all their territory in 3 waves. Each wave allows you to purge pops and acquire unity. AND its a special kind of purging. You matrix the population, having their bodies power your system and get you energy credits while their bodies slowly fail from the chemical process. Basically free energy credits and longer unity bonus. Skynet is great!

Now, I'm playing my race of robot embracing population. I have droids and have them all infused with cybernetics already and my next door neighbor has my exact ethics (Fanatic Materialist/Egalitarian) And we have become the best of friends and have signed a migration treaty as well. Everything is going great! And together we can keep the Inward Perfectionists and the fanatical purifier neighbors at bay enough they don't want to dare declare war with us!


Also, funny note, tried to make a spiritualist Robot species for fun. But during creation process, I got the <<ERROR. NOT MACHINE CONSCIOUSNESS GOVERNMENT>> message, so I couldn't do it. Just curious, but is there anyone else that also believes as me that there could be a race of robots that actually believe in a 'god' or a higher form of existence?

[Olinser]

So, I already got the achievement to wipe all organics in the galaxy as Skynet. I learned a bunch while doing it. Turns out, if you set everyone to hyperlanes, its so much easier to conduct warfare and defense platforms and fortresses actually do stuff in this game! Also, if the game decides to drop you in the most isolated part of the galaxy with a bunch of heavy in resource worlds and you have the traits and civic that both improve robot build speed, you care less of what type of planet everything is and just build up and spread like a locust for 100 years without seeing a single organic and by the time the organics in the galaxy notice you, you already have the resources and fleet to zerg through all their territory in 3 waves. Each wave allows you to purge pops and acquire unity. AND its a special kind of purging. You matrix the population, having their bodies power your system and get you energy credits while their bodies slowly fail from the chemical process. Basically free energy credits and longer unity bonus. Skynet is great!

Now, I'm playing my race of robot embracing population. I have droids and have them all infused with cybernetics already and my next door neighbor has my exact ethics (Fanatic Materialist/Egalitarian) And we have become the best of friends and have signed a migration treaty as well. Everything is going great! And together we can keep the Inward Perfectionists and the fanatical purifier neighbors at bay enough they don't want to dare declare war with us!


Also, funny note, tried to make a spiritualist Robot species for fun. But during creation process, I got the <<ERROR. NOT MACHINE CONSCIOUSNESS GOVERNMENT>> message, so I couldn't do it. Just curious, but is there anyone else that also believes as me that there could be a race of robots that actually believe in a 'god' or a higher form of existence?

I mean that's basically the Geth from Mass Effect.

In fact the actual trigger for the war between the Geth and the Quarians was one of the Geth asking its owner if it had a soul. The 'evil' Geth actually worshipped Sovereign as a god.

[Silverraptor]

I mean that's basically the Geth from Mass Effect.

In fact the actual trigger for the war between the Geth and the Quarians was one of the Geth asking its owner if it had a soul. The 'evil' Geth actually worshipped Sovereign as a god.

Actually, I was more thinking like Zenyatta from Overwatch, but that works too.

[GloatingSwine]

So, I already got the achievement to wipe all organics in the galaxy as Skynet. I learned a bunch while doing it. Turns out, if you set everyone to hyperlanes, its so much easier to conduct warfare and defense platforms and fortresses actually do stuff in this game!

Hyperlanes can make warfare a royal pain. Especially when intervening borders are closed to you but not the people you're at war with.

My current determined exterminators game has been a constant battle of finding ways to fight the people I want to. I had some advanced start Fanatic Purifiers near me, and they were super aggressive and had bigger fleets than me. Went to war with them when they had 9k and I had 6k (The AI is way better at gunning up now, I've let my military slip and had neigbours get superior fleets a couple of times this game), chopped their fleet in half then ran away to rebuild under the guns of my spaceports (because just having superior fleets isn't enough to let the AI win a war against me), and just as I did they got wardecced by a xenophile fallen empire and they liberated a big chunk of their worlds. So I had a neighbour who quickly turned back to Fanatic Miltiarist/Xenophobe and had a guarantee of independence from a Fallen Empire. So they were off the table. They ended up grabbing a few strategic colonies as well that meant it was hard for me to get at other empires but they could get at me.

Eventually they wardecced me again with some allies (we both had about 40k fleets by this point, me alone, theirs combined) and I grabbed enough worlds to break out.

Now I've pumped myself up to the point that fallen empire is going to get what's coming to it.

Update: Ill advised first confrontation got me pincered between FE spaceport and fleet, my fleet ignored theirs to drive to the spaceport so I took a kicking all the way, lost 2/3 of my fleet for about 40% casualties on theirs. Retreated, peaced out for the humiliate, then another empire declared on me so I've bitten a chunk out of them (was easy to remax in a defensive war, was building a battleship in 120 days). FE awakened whilst I was doing it but I'm going back stronger and harder because Network Integration lets you roll way over your fleetcap, even if fleetcap is smaller now (only 10 for a level 6 spaceport not 15).

[Silverraptor]

Hyperlanes can make warfare a royal pain. Especially when intervening borders are closed to you but not the people you're at war with.

My current determined exterminators game has been a constant battle of finding ways to fight the people I want to. I had some advanced start Fanatic Purifiers near me, and they were super aggressive and had bigger fleets than me. Went to war with them when they had 9k and I had 6k (The AI is way better at gunning up now, I've let my military slip and had neigbours get superior fleets a couple of times this game), chopped their fleet in half then ran away to rebuild under the guns of my spaceports (because just having superior fleets isn't enough to let the AI win a war against me), and just as I did they got wardecced by a xenophile fallen empire and they liberated a big chunk of their worlds. So I had a neighbour who quickly turned back to Fanatic Miltiarist/Xenophobe and had a guarantee of independence from a Fallen Empire. So they were off the table. They ended up grabbing a few strategic colonies as well that meant it was hard for me to get at other empires but they could get at me.

Eventually they wardecced me again with some allies (we both had about 40k fleets by this point, me alone, theirs combined) and I grabbed enough worlds to break out.

Now I've pumped myself up to the point that fallen empire is going to get what's coming to it.

Update: Ill advised first confrontation got me pincered between FE spaceport and fleet, my fleet ignored theirs to drive to the spaceport so I took a kicking all the way, lost 2/3 of my fleet for about 40% casualties on theirs. Retreated, peaced out for the humiliate, then another empire declared on me so I've bitten a chunk out of them (was easy to remax in a defensive war, was building a battleship in 120 days). FE awakened whilst I was doing it but I'm going back stronger and harder because Network Integration lets you roll way over your fleetcap, even if fleetcap is smaller now (only 10 for a level 6 spaceport not 15).

Good Luck! Skynet that Galaxy!

[GloatingSwine]

Good Luck! Skynet that Galaxy!

Yeah, had to give it up.

The FE were just too active too fast and I didn't engage them properly. Once they start building up escorts they can defend very effectively against missiles. Needed to sucker them into point blank fights and I didn't.

After three wars where I couldn't get ahead of them in fleet engagements it wasn't going to get any better.

[Silverraptor]

Yeah, had to give it up.

The FE were just too active too fast and I didn't engage them properly. Once they start building up escorts they can defend very effectively against missiles. Needed to sucker them into point blank fights and I didn't.

After three wars where I couldn't get ahead of them in fleet engagements it wasn't going to get any better.

Awww... Sorry to hear that.

[GungHo]

I've never been able to warp my head around feeling that mods feels mandatory to the degree that you'd feel that the game is unplayable without them

Most aren't, but there are some quality of life mods that really do markedly improve the experience, like things that allow for automated surveying or automated station building. The game isn't unplayable at all without those mods, but they do make the experience more enjoyable.

[Silverraptor]

Most aren't, but there are some quality of life mods that really do markedly improve the experience, like things that allow for automated surveying or automated station building. The game isn't unplayable at all without those mods, but they do make the experience more enjoyable.

Doesn't the automate survey and map the stars technology do this for you anyways?

[Olinser]

Doesn't the automate survey and map the stars technology do this for you anyways?

Yes.

And sectors auto-build stations.

Both those mods are terrible, they inefficiently do something that a human is much more efficient at and the engine already includes.

[GloatingSwine]

It turns out that my FE issue was not isolated, the Xenophile FE is apparently declaring war a lot more than it should in the current patch.

[Silverraptor]

It turns out that my FE issue was not isolated, the Xenophile FE is apparently declaring war a lot more than it should in the current patch.

Did the developers address it or something?

[GloatingSwine]

Did the developers address it or something?

Yeah, Wiz has said on the forums that FEs are declaring wars they're not supposed to, outside of their normal triggers.

Given that the Xenophile is quite easy to annoy anyway (if you're mad purging murderbots) that's a wee problem if they spawn near you.

[Silverraptor]

Yeah, Wiz has said on the forums that FEs are declaring wars they're not supposed to, outside of their normal triggers.

Given that the Xenophile is quite easy to annoy anyway (if you're mad purging murderbots) that's a wee problem if they spawn near you.

Yeah. Sounds like. Guess you got to hold off playing those murderbots with FEs in the game until the fix-it patch.

[Grytorm]

I decided to get this while on sale (plus some of the expanded content). I should maybe have avoided that. But I will play it someday. Just like I will play someone other than Dublin in Ireland some day.

[Silverraptor]

I decided to get this while on sale (plus some of the expanded content). I should maybe have avoided that. But I will play it someday. Just like I will play someone other than Dublin in Ireland some day.

Which expansions did you get?

[Grytorm]

The two story packs before Synthetic Dawn and the Utopia expansion.

[tonberrian]

Hmm. I'm feeling like robots are slightly too expensive. Either that or i need to expand slower.

On the other hand I prefer to draw out the exploratory phase of the game as long as possible, having maximum galaxy size with minimum empires spawned, so it's okay usually.

[Olinser]

Yeah, Wiz has said on the forums that FEs are declaring wars they're not supposed to, outside of their normal triggers.

Given that the Xenophile is quite easy to annoy anyway (if you're mad purging murderbots) that's a wee problem if they spawn near you.

Weird, this game I'm playing I actually finally got the ridiculous rando achievement for getting a gift from a Fallen Empire from a Xenophile empire.

[Silverraptor]

Weird, this game I'm playing I actually finally got the ridiculous rando achievement for getting a gift from a Fallen Empire from a Xenophile empire.

How did you accomplish such a herculean task?! I had one that liked me +140 and I got no such gifts.

[boomwolf]

Some achivements in this game are just dumb luck.
Some can be cheesed by altering luck in your favor.



In any case, I grew tierd of waiting and decided its easier to mod-purge than to wait for them all to update.
Unfortunately, that also means purging (or working hard to fix) all my races.
And giving up many things that made the game more interesting (losing "reworked planetary diversity" is a major hit)

[Olinser]

How did you accomplish such a herculean task?! I had one that liked me +140 and I got no such gifts.

Its just pure RNG but there seem to be 2 requirements.

1) Opinion and Trust have to be fairly high
2) You must fulfill at least one request from the Empire that generally has a big negative backlash (in my case it was giving up one of my pops for effectively their zoo that cost me I think it was -15 happiness across the empire for 10 years)

Basically you have to fulfill any request they give you, do NOT declare war on anybody else for the duration (that will cost you trust and opinion) and get lucky on RNG that they decide to gift you something while Opinion and Trust are still high but decaying from the bonus after your request. Not sure if its required but I gave them several gifts of a few thousand energy and minerals (I was maxed out on both anyway so why not it was getting binned anyway).

It was about.... 20 years or so after I gave up one of my pops at their request that they just gave me a couple ships and the achievement.

[Silverraptor]

Its just pure RNG but there seem to be 2 requirements.

1) Opinion and Trust have to be fairly high
2) You must fulfill at least one request from the Empire that generally has a big negative backlash (in my case it was giving up one of my pops for effectively their zoo that cost me I think it was -15 happiness across the empire for 10 years)

Basically you have to fulfill any request they give you, do NOT declare war on anybody else for the duration (that will cost you trust and opinion) and get lucky on RNG that they decide to gift you something while Opinion and Trust are still high but decaying from the bonus after your request. Not sure if its required but I gave them several gifts of a few thousand energy and minerals (I was maxed out on both anyway so why not it was getting binned anyway).

It was about.... 20 years or so after I gave up one of my pops at their request that they just gave me a couple ships and the achievement.

I see. Good to know.

[Olinser]

I see. Good to know.

Yeah some achievements are just stupid RNG though. I'm trying to provoke the War in Heaven right now but the un-awakened Fallen Empire is still just sitting on their duffs and refusing to awaken 50 years later :(

I also still can't kill a freaking Wraith. I've found several of them I just can't catch them before they blunder into an AI and get killed.

Fun fact. If you order your fleet to attack a wraith, and a vassal fleet fires on it first, you don't get the achievement if you kill it.