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

[Kaptin Keen]

Fallen/Awakened Empires are frankly what I consider best about Stellaris - they are fun, kinda hard to beat, and have a very distinct flavor. I can honestly say I wish the other AI empires were more like F/A-E's. That each was born with a distinct flavor of tech, something difficult to research or counter, but can steal if you get a win against them.

[GloatingSwine]

Fallen Empires are in a bit of a sorry state at the moment to be honest.

They tend to awaken too late when the galaxy is already full and the player can easily be rocking several times their fleet strength in meta battleships that annihilate them without issue. Still, at least 2.1.2 has given them their cassus belli, when 2.0 came out they were completely neutered because they couldn't declare war.

(I'm starting to think setting the mid/end game dates to 2275/2350 might be better).

[Kaptin Keen]

Fallen Empires are in a bit of a sorry state at the moment to be honest.

They tend to awaken too late when the galaxy is already full and the player can easily be rocking several times their fleet strength in meta battleships that annihilate them without issue. Still, at least 2.1.2 has given them their cassus belli, when 2.0 came out they were completely neutered because they couldn't declare war.

(I'm starting to think setting the mid/end game dates to 2275/2350 might be better).

I have no doubt this is true for you, but I'm uncertain you represent a majority of players - even if, a good long while since launch, the player base must be assumed to have built a certain level of proficiency. For my own part, I find Awakened Empires to be manageable, unless I've failed in other regards - but still fine for my purposes.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Is it just me or are habitations ridiculously powerful? I mean, it's basically a low-sized planet for free in any system you already have, which basically is huge amounts of population. Granted the 10k mineral cost is not precisely trivial (unless you had built up your minerals for making your flotilla and then hit your control cap with little else to do with your minerals... *cough cough*), but not precisely unobtainable, especially not in the mid-late game when you are likely to have unlocked their construction.

Currently, my home system has like four or five habitations, which means I've increased my total population by... almost a third? For nothing more than a mineral investment.

I mean, right now they seem like they're even better than a Ringworld, unless I'm totally missing something.

[Kaptin Keen]

I'm by no means an ace player of this game, but I can easily push up to +1000 minerals a month by the late game. I've never had the inclination to spam habitats, but ... yes, they are pretty damn OP.

Actually I fail rather spectacularly at having any real interest in the end game options. I've finished a ring world once, and I think I've built two habitats, before getting bored.

[factotum]

10k miineral cost, 5 years to build, 200 influence, *and* needing an ascension perk before you can even start is hardly "free", and what you get is a size 12 Gaia planet where you can mostly only build habitat-specific structures and where there are no natural bonuses on any tiles. Let's be honest, if you saw such a planet sitting in a system near you, you'd probably class it under "May bother colonising that when I've done all the good ones", even without the other costs involved and the restrictions on building. Also don't forget that, like any other planet, habitats increase your research and tradition costs, and Ringworlds (which are considered a single structure for this purpose, I believe, despite being split into four segments) are thus vastly superior in that regard--not to mention that Ringworlds *do* get tile bonuses like regular planets do, and you can build regular planet buildings on them.

[GloatingSwine]

I'm by no means an ace player of this game, but I can easily push up to +1000 minerals a month by the late game. I've never had the inclination to spam habitats, but ... yes, they are pretty damn OP.

Actually I fail rather spectacularly at having any real interest in the end game options. I've finished a ring world once, and I think I've built two habitats, before getting bored.

Habitats are generally considered a bit poo. If you're playing a super tall challenge build then slapping down a habitat full of resource replicators is an OK thing to do, but they're really not terribly cost effective compared to going out and getting some new planets.

Spoiler: An Endgame Empire

Show

I'm the blue bit, I set it to opinion mode because my heretic neighbours were also red.

This is my latest empire in the "got a bit bored of it" state, crisis defeated, ate one of the fallen empires 100 years before this date, etc. I'm not running Production Targets or Omnifarious Acquisition either.

(All you squeamish people who think miners need fancy things like rights and decent living standards should probably go Synthetic Ascension to get the output. Also, slap a silo on every starbase, they have no upkeep and there's nothing like crisis building fifty battleships to save you from unexpected contingency outbreaks)

[ShneekeyTheLost]

10k miineral cost, 5 years to build, 200 influence, *and* needing an ascension perk before you can even start is hardly "free", and what you get is a size 12 Gaia planet where you can mostly only build habitat-specific structures and where there are no natural bonuses on any tiles. Let's be honest, if you saw such a planet sitting in a system near you, you'd probably class it under "May bother colonising that when I've done all the good ones", even without the other costs involved and the restrictions on building. Also don't forget that, like any other planet, habitats increase your research and tradition costs, and Ringworlds (which are considered a single structure for this purpose, I believe, despite being split into four segments) are thus vastly superior in that regard--not to mention that Ringworlds *do* get tile bonuses like regular planets do, and you can build regular planet buildings on them.

Habitats don't take up another planet cap, because it's already in-system with an already established planet, which makes it FAR more attractive if you are trying to limit sectors due to lousy governor AI.

However, I didn't know that about Ringworlds, making them more viable than I initially thought.

The ascension perk is needed as a prerequisite for ringworld and other megastructure building anyway, so it's really a wash if you are already intending on building megastructures.

Also, by the time you get access to them, it's not like you really need your construction ships doing much else, as the rest of the galaxy has already been at least outposted, and your means of expansion will be diplomatic or militarily rather than simple expansion. So the build times and taking up construction ships isn't much of a downside either.

[Kaptin Keen]

Habitats are generally considered a bit poo.

I'm sure they are. But like I said, you're not most players, there's a reason you're the guy with the answers to all the questions the rest of us ask.

They are OP in terms of: It costs 10k minerals to build a place that will yield 10k minerals (or whatever else you want) in a few months. That's OP because it scales to infinity.

It also happens to be at the point in the game where you have no reason to scale to infinity - and may well already have scaled to infinity by other means.

So I maintain: It's wildly OP that you can simply create whatever ressources you might need, but by the time you can, you already have more ressources than you have any use for.

Edit: Oh, also - I'm sure there's meant to be a picture, only there isn't =)

[GloatingSwine]

I'm sure they are. But like I said, you're not most players, there's a reason you're the guy with the answers to all the questions the rest of us ask.

They are OP in terms of: It costs 10k minerals to build a place that will yield 10k minerals (or whatever else you want) in a few months. That's OP because it scales to infinity.

If you have Master Builders and have a +100% tile bonus (not impossible but harder on a hab because no processing plant) it takes 89 months for a habitat to pay off its own cost if you use it for mining.

Mining is the worst thing to do with habitats, because the mining building you can get on them is crap (4 minerals vs 5 for a tier 4 mine and no adjacency or tile bonus).

The best way to use them is for energy (6 energy vs 5 for a tier 4 power plant albeit with no tile bonus or adjacency) which lets you replace planet energy tiles on your planets with mining tiles. If you've embraced the worm you can also put a spiral power hub on habitats (not ordinary power hubs).

However, a Dyson Sphere is worth six habitats even if you have +100% energy tile bonus (harder to get than minerals, energy is harder to boost), doesn't need you to wait for population to grow, doesn't add to your tech or unity costs, and still benefits from the empire wide edicts.

A Science Nexus is worth 5 science habitats as well, but with no tile bonuses science habitats are worse than planet science (Especially if you are sensible and ignore biolabs, that pic where I have 1450 social science? Haven't even researched Biolab 1, clinics/cyto-revitalisations are enough).

It's far better to go Galactic Wonders than Voidborne, even with Master Builders.

Better to spend your resources on warships to go and get some planets with. Ringworlds are OK, they're bigger and have tile bonuses, so if you're fanatic pacifist and can't add planets the traditional way it's better to go for them. (Remember you can build on sector planets now, which means you can correct the sector AI's worst excesses, but in that empire pic I posted all but my 7 core worlds were pure AI built, I've done barely any optimising and all it was was going and paving over some excess farms with mines).

[factotum]

Habitats don't take up another planet cap, because it's already in-system with an already established planet, which makes it FAR more attractive if you are trying to limit sectors due to lousy governor AI.

AFAIK, research costs for technology go up according to the number of systems you own *and* the number of planets you have--this is not related to your overall planet/system cap. So, if you had a system with 20 habitats in it you would get 20 planet's worth of research cost increase, even though it's only a single system as far as the planet cap mechanism is concerned.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

AFAIK, research costs for technology go up according to the number of systems you own *and* the number of planets you have--this is not related to your overall planet/system cap. So, if you had a system with 20 habitats in it you would get 20 planet's worth of research cost increase, even though it's only a single system as far as the planet cap mechanism is concerned.

Oh... now THAT I did NOT know. Drat. That does cause a complication if you are still trying to tech up.

Granted, Master Builder gives a +3 to size, but it's still not great if it starts jacking up the price of research. Well, drat.

[Silverraptor]

I've only found mass habitats good for 1 playstyle, and that's when I'm playing Rogue Servitors. Since whenever I play machines, i get machine worlds anyways (Because why not) and the problem that there is little air on machine worlds to breathe, so the bio trophies don't tend to live well (Even though they CLEARLY live in a dome!) So I make habitats and ship them all to there. Then I set the reproduction rights to allowed and seed these habitats with one pop each after i got them all off world and I'm farming unity and servitor morale in these habitats while also having machine worlds for production.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Got my first Ringworld up and running, Section A is now populated, and Section B is in the process of being cleared.

In other news, I now have Giants In The Playground active, one of the Fanatic Religious FE's awoke. Fortunately, they're on the other side of the galaxy, and the wormholes don't really help them a bunch. They still have quite a bit to conquer before they can get one that will lead to my territory, and that particular wormhole is already quite well defended. They're only registering as Superior rather than Overwhelming, even with only around 120k worth of force total, and plenty of fleet capacity to build up to.

I may also have a War In The Heavens scenario, as they've just declared war on another FE, which I think might cause them to Awaken. The problem is that this other FE is in MY neck of the woods, and is the science dudes who kinda like me for being 'sophisticated machines'. They apparently either did not hear about or did not care about my genocidal beginnings.

Currently I have two fleets at roughly 60k-ish fleet power, mostly in battleships with X/L/L configuration, but having a few L/PD destroyers backing them up and a handful of M/M/S Cruisers which were originally intended to swat anything fast enough that the L/X weapons would have trouble locking it up. While the fleets themselves have hit cap per individual fleet, I've got enough total capacity for a third fleet of roughly the same size.

Not even going to bother with the Science Nexus this time 'round, as I've already hit infinitely repeating research on Social (still hitting up the fleet cap bonuses), and don't foresee many decent techs coming out of the other two either.

Still haven't seen the Crisis Event yet, unless that's going to be War In The Heavens, but I'm not sure if that even counts.

[Kaptin Keen]

If you have Master Builders and have a +100% tile bonus (not impossible but harder on a hab because no processing plant) it takes 89 months for a habitat to pay off its own cost if you use it for mining.

Mining is the worst thing to do with habitats, because the mining building you can get on them is crap (4 minerals vs 5 for a tier 4 mine and no adjacency or tile bonus).

The best way to use them is for energy (6 energy vs 5 for a tier 4 power plant albeit with no tile bonus or adjacency) which lets you replace planet energy tiles on your planets with mining tiles. If you've embraced the worm you can also put a spiral power hub on habitats (not ordinary power hubs).

However, a Dyson Sphere is worth six habitats even if you have +100% energy tile bonus (harder to get than minerals, energy is harder to boost), doesn't need you to wait for population to grow, doesn't add to your tech or unity costs, and still benefits from the empire wide edicts.

A Science Nexus is worth 5 science habitats as well, but with no tile bonuses science habitats are worse than planet science (Especially if you are sensible and ignore biolabs, that pic where I have 1450 social science? Haven't even researched Biolab 1, clinics/cyto-revitalisations are enough).

It's far better to go Galactic Wonders than Voidborne, even with Master Builders.

Better to spend your resources on warships to go and get some planets with. Ringworlds are OK, they're bigger and have tile bonuses, so if you're fanatic pacifist and can't add planets the traditional way it's better to go for them. (Remember you can build on sector planets now, which means you can correct the sector AI's worst excesses, but in that empire pic I posted all but my 7 core worlds were pure AI built, I've done barely any optimising and all it was was going and paving over some excess farms with mines).

All you needed to take away from my post was 'scales to infinity'. I never said 'use your habitats for mining'. I never said 'there are no better options either.'

Given time and effort, you can produce an infinite amount of whatever you so please. Though of course creating an infinite amount of research in this way would be silly, as I assume the research cost scales up to infinity faster.

[factotum]

Still haven't seen the Crisis Event yet, unless that's going to be War In The Heavens, but I'm not sure if that even counts.

War in Heaven and endgame crisis are unrelated, so there's another shoe yet to drop. In fact, Awoken FEs will generally help out with the Crisis--I had a game where one joined my federation when the Prethoryn showed up, and then left the federation as soon as they were defeated.

[boomwolf]

You had FE actually HELP?

I've never seen any AI lift a finger against any crisis until it hits their borders. not that they could possibly help, they are usually FAR too weak to even be a speedbump.

[GloatingSwine]

All you needed to take away from my post was 'scales to infinity'. I never said 'use your habitats for mining'. I never said 'there are no better options either.'

Yeah, but the only way it scales to infinity is using the habitats for direct mining.

And planets will always be better for mining.

There's a simple question to ask yourself before building a habitat with the intention of increasing your mineral yield: Is there a planet in the galaxy I don't own yet?

If there is, go and get that instead it will be better.

Until the 2.2 rework completely changes everything to do with planets and pops, habitats are the worst of all possible options.

[Silverraptor]

I may also have a War In The Heavens scenario, as they've just declared war on another FE, which I think might cause them to Awaken. The problem is that this other FE is in MY neck of the woods, and is the science dudes who kinda like me for being 'sophisticated machines'. They apparently either did not hear about or did not care about my genocidal beginnings.

Fallen Empires don't care what you do if it doen't effect them what-so-ever.

[Kaptin Keen]

Yeah, but the only way it scales to infinity is using the habitats for direct mining.

And planets will always be better for mining.

There's a simple question to ask yourself before building a habitat with the intention of increasing your mineral yield: Is there a planet in the galaxy I don't own yet?

If there is, go and get that instead it will be better.

Not if you want infinite production. Which is all I've said. There is a finite number of planets - but an infinite number of possible habitats.

The fact that they don't do anything you particularly need is irrelevant, because by the end game, needing anything is very much a thing of the past.

[factotum]

The fact that they don't do anything you particularly need is irrelevant, because by the end game, needing anything is very much a thing of the past.

Which begs the question: if you already have more minerals than you know what to do with, as you're implying, why use them to build habitats just to produce more minerals?

[Kaptin Keen]

Which begs the question: if you already have more minerals than you know what to do with, as you're implying, why use them to build habitats just to produce more minerals?

Why do anything by the time the end game rolls out? For fun, to see how much you can do. Whatever.

Let's be honest: Even just a year or two into the endgame, you know if you've won. From that point, it's really a question of how you want to roll over the galaxy - and whether you can be bothered to actually do it or not.

[GloatingSwine]

Not if you want infinite production. Which is all I've said. There is a finite number of planets - but an infinite number of possible habitats.

The fact that they don't do anything you particularly need is irrelevant, because by the end game, needing anything is very much a thing of the past.

Infinite production is a red herring though. If there are planets that are not yours, the best way to increase production is to take those planets.

If there are no planets that are not yours, the game is finished.

"Infinite production via habitats" is a non-thing, there's no situation where it solves any problem you might be having.

[The_Snark]

Why do anything by the time the end game rolls out? For fun, to see how much you can do. Whatever.

Sure, but you were saying they were OP; if they're only useful in the late-game, post-scarcity, I've-effectively-won-already-now-I'm-messing-around stage of a playthrough, I don't think I'd call them that. At that point in the game, overpowered and underpowered are not meaningful terms, you can do whatever you like and it doesn't matter.

[Kaptin Keen]

Sure, but you were saying they were OP; if they're only useful in the late-game, post-scarcity, I've-effectively-won-already-now-I'm-messing-around stage of a playthrough, I don't think I'd call them that. At that point in the game, overpowered and underpowered are not meaningful terms, you can do whatever you like and it doesn't matter.

But with the same argument, you could say nothing is OP in the endgame.

[The_Snark]

Well. Yes, I'm saying exactly that. OP is a meaningless term in that stage of the endgame. (The post-game? After you've beaten/secured a decisive advantage over the endgame crisis, fallen empires, all your regular rivals, etc) The game is a sandbox at that point, calling something overpowered feels like a category error.

I'm sort of struggling to come up with an analogy, but... imagine you were playing in a literal sandbox, and someone came up and told you that the type of sand castle you're building is OP; would that make any sense to you?

[Kaptin Keen]

Well. Yes, I'm saying exactly that. OP is a meaningless term in that stage of the endgame. (The post-game? After you've beaten/secured a decisive advantage over the endgame crisis, fallen empires, all your regular rivals, etc) The game is a sandbox at that point, calling something overpowered feels like a category error.

I'm sort of struggling to come up with an analogy, but... imagine you were playing in a literal sandbox, and someone came up and told you that the type of sand castle you're building is OP; would that make any sense to you?

Sure - ok ... I'll concede your point. But then, gimme another fitting term for scaling to infinity =)

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Sure - ok ... I'll concede your point. But then, gimme another fitting term for scaling to infinity =)

I think the argument isn't necessarily scaling to infinity, but that in a post-scarcity scenario there's no reason to scale to infinity in the first place because you already have more resources than you need to complete any given task that is possible to complete.

I'd also argue that it isn't scaling to infinity because you have a finite time frame before you inevitably hit some sort of win condition and the game ends.

At any rate, I'm trying to move all my people off of my habitats and onto my ringworld in an attempt to reduce certain costs. Is there a way to deconstruct a habitat?

[The_Snark]

Sure - ok ... I'll concede your point. But then, gimme another fitting term for scaling to infinity =)

Nothing springs to mind, sorry! Habitats do scale arbitrarily, it's true.

I'd also argue that it isn't scaling to infinity because you have a finite time frame before you inevitably hit some sort of win condition and the game ends.

I think you can play on after you've won the game, if you really want to? Some of the default win conditions feel a little arbitrary. I think most people err on the side of stopping before they've officially won, rather than after, but technically nothing's stopping you from conquering the entire galaxy and building so many habitats the game crashes.

[GloatingSwine]

At any rate, I'm trying to move all my people off of my habitats and onto my ringworld in an attempt to reduce certain costs. Is there a way to deconstruct a habitat?

You can blow them up with a colossus. Might only be for enemy ones though. (You can blow up uninhabited but habitable planets).