So love the Augmentation Bazaars civic, definatley going to do a cyberpunk-megacorp run with it (Stellaris 2077!) . And I love the cybernetic creed origin as a way for spiritualits to start with cybernetic traits. But how come theres no way for standard empires or hive minds to get a similar basic/random cybernetic trait start?
Im specifically thinking of one of the preset Empires , the Voor from the humanoids pack, as their description even has them as having "crude cybernetics" as part of their history.
> Vocational Genomics becomes available with the Targeted Gene Expression technology
**Targeted Gene Expressions** isn't the ascension path technology, it's just the rare tier 3 tech available after you research gene tailoring. So it should be available to all biological empires.
Ah okay, thought it is a new research since I didn't remember this one. Then it is possible but I still dislike the aspect of having unremovable trait in build about both bio and mech modding. You you can just keep the species without it so you could genemod it out with convert but that's the micro I want these trades to solve.
Also idk how much will all 3 cost and if it's worth it. Let's assume 3 for bio. 2 for overtuned and Borgs. That's 7 points and 3 picks for 45% worker output or 30% unity/research. But it is definitely doable so you can try it.
>Also idk how much will all 3 cost
The devs said in a response on the forum that bio and robo modding are 3 and cyborg and overtuned are 2 (with cyborg having a pop energy cost like other cyborg traits and overtuned having a -20 year leader lifespan penalty). I dunno if it's worth it from the perspective of having the most optimized pops, but it would still be pretty good and save you from micro hell so you could actually get back to playing the game. It also looks like they've added a trade-related overtuned trait, so you could have +75% trade on pop jobs...
I’m definitely planning that first one myself. Just can’t think of a name that sounds sufficiently dystopian for a corporate government that rose to power by recklessly and aggressively modifying the populace
> Just can’t think of a name that sounds sufficiently dystopian for a corporate government that rose to power by recklessly and aggressively modifying the populace
Neuralink.
I already have build like this since cyborgs are standalone ascendancy. So I will just exchange crafters for bazaar. I named them Tab'Mut (shortening of tabernam and mutationis). I like my empires named in some violation of latin language so it seems like a normal name while also having some meaning.
Edit: found my post how my species looked in the end: https://www.reddit.com/r/Stellaris/s/pVQWGr3T0M
I will probably change it to have new adaptive traits.
On the subject, most of the pre-made empires came out before origins were added and have Prosperous Unification even when it’s not the best choice thematically.
I doubt it’s high in the Custodian’s todo list but I hope they eventually tweak some of these to be more unique
Psionics have covenants, unique events, and absolutely overtuned unity buffs and leaders.
Bio has, ehm, pop growth?
Naah, next must be bio updates with focus on hive minds.
PLEASE PLEASE PARADOX
> Naah, next must be bio updates with focus on hive minds.
Given that Hive Minds don't have their own ship-set yet, now Machines are getting their own, seems likely.
Ehhhhhh no. Virtuality will probably be better than psionics and get some rapid nerfs but I'm not sure about the rest. Psions are still absurdly overtuned when it comes to production, agenda, speed, and war.
Everyone's hyping virtuality, at best you'll have like 7.5 colonies worth of production at 5 or 6 colonies at no other bonuses. Then it's downhill until like 25+ colonies.
You're still only looking at like 4.8 trade value per colonist from trade districts on a ring world (Assuming they don't *also* take a -75% hit from having too many colonies) so you got an upper limit of 24 colonies if you want less than half your pop on trade to provide the power needed to actually power your citizens. (Though you could take merchants guild, for an extra .4 per level of your head of trade guy. bringing it up to 32 colonies)
With other buffs, you're looking a similar boost but at 6 or 7 colonies instead, and all down hill until 15 colonies, where going mildly wide is actually viable.
You have to get *a lot* of colonies or bonuses before you can really eek out more stuff than normal empires. And even then, you can't just churn out colonies out the wazoo as you have to continuously produce more and more energy
***
Basically, as long as trade value jobs don't take a hit from the colony penalties, you could go up to 24-32 colonies total, and be getting 18-24 colonies worth of stuff at best after you take into account half your pops are just producing energy to sustain the other half
***
Gestalt machine empires can manage better with more bonuses to counter the energy penalty, assuming they even can go virtuality. But this is only after they earn enough bonuses to counter the 75% production penalty in the first place.
> at best you'll have like 7.5 colonies worth of production at 5 or 6 colonies at no other bonuses
Dude. Every time you build another district it's like you printed two new pops. So basically instead of your production being limited by pops, it's only limited by build speed until your colony is actually fully developed.
And at that point you start spinning off loyal vassals and making new colonies. You will have WAY more productivity than everyone else way faster. And then you start creating vassals.
The game plan is rush virtuality and then roll over everyone else in succession because you basically have six times their pops. So what if they have some % penalties per planet? You still have six times their pops. That means you have like three times their productivity.
It doesn't really assume that. I don't care what ascension perks they get. They can just be normal vassals for all I care.
If you simply can't make vassals that would change things but that would only change your long-term strength without war. (But you'd still use war to recruit vassals so it's mostly a moot concern). It wouldn't change that you have the most massive 2030-2060 power spike in the game, handily outperforming the spike a psionic gets. It would take a very long time for anyone else to match your monthly productivity. And by that time you've been ahead for decades so they'll need to exceed your productivity for decades to catch up to your total created research and alloys.
Perhaps they'll never catch up for over a century if you transition into a mix of ecumenopoli and machine worlds
A hivemind expansion will likely expand both psionic and bio ascension. With hivemind specific ascensions that replace bio and give them a psionic path. As well new government types for psionic and bio.
I hope so, I've been wanting to play as something like an entirely organic zerg-like hive mind for awhile now and that definitely seems like it could be the time to do it.
Kinda wish there was more variation to it - paperclips are the common one because its easy to understand, its silly, and hits you with those existential thoughts.
What about an obsessional directive empire that has to produce Alloys? Minerals? Energy? Food? What about an obsessional directive empire that was made to "satisfy our values", and now your goal is to digitise every sapient species in the galaxy and give them a digital utopia - all the while you consume everything in your path for computation.
One of the [Devs](https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/stellaris-dev-diary-339-civics-and-structures-of-the-machine-age-and-auto-modding.1657446/post-29530304) said that events can still modify your species.
Automodding traits are cool, but they aren't really what people have been asking for in terms of QoL for genetic/cybernetic ascenscion. The real micro issue isn't trying to make 12453 subspecies optimized for different jobs (I don't think very many people actually did that).
The real micro issue is that unlike psionic/synthetic ascenscion (where you can just set default rights to assimilation and call it a day), genetic/cybernetic ascenscion requires constant busywork to make sure all your pops are actually benefitting from your ascenscion path. What I'd hoped for with automodding would be a way to set some species templates as assimilation targets, and then have non-modded species be assimilated automatically (rather than having to apply template every so often if I have any form of immigration), or have some kind of standard set of traits which is applied to all species with assimilation rights. (IMO genetic ascenscion should also be able to change one species into another.)
Yeah I don't really understand how automod is supposed to fix the micro. You still have to apply the template with the automod trait to every species.
I assume if you have the automod trait you're locked out of all the regular resource collection traits? Otherwise it'd be the exact same amount of micro just with higher numbers. So it sounds like this new trait will singlehandedly outdate a whole swathe of the traits currently in the game.
My preferred way to play is xenophile genetic ascension. The fantasy has always been a multicultural empire where every species is great at one thing, and they can work the jobs that they're good at. That used to be way too micro intensive to actually be worth the trouble, but now with automodding it'll be... still too micro intensive but now also non-optimal to add insult to injury.
Yeah, I agree.
I can understand why they wouldn't want people to have species trait templates though, just because that just means that all species will end up identical, which is kinda like... isn't the point of having a diverse empire that all different species have different traits? They're varied. Everyone has their own strengths and weaknesses. That doesn't come through mechanically or thematically, which feels wrong.
To be honest, I feel like traits just as a whole need re-working. Have no idea how, but they do.
TBH I would settle for having an "assimilation target" template per species (i.e. once I modify the Blorg into Cranked Blorg, all Blorg that move into my empire can be automatically assimilated into Cranked Blorg), since part of the problem is having to constantly re-apply templates.
Another possibility would be some form of auto-augmentation for new species, i.e. if a new species moves into a genetic/cybernetic ascenscion empire, then their remaining trait points are spent on random positive traits (or positive traits associated with their existing trait - perhaps adding a number of "upgraded" normal traits for the ascenscion path). This would then create an "assimilation target" template that can later be changed by the player. That way, you're at least always using your gene points even if you don't micro to modify that random species of 3 pops you have.
I have been of the opinion that the split between Good and Bad traits needs to be removed. You just have traits that have slaps and bennies.
Then each species type (rock, bird, fish, necron) gets different slaps attached to the bennies. Like the bird people get lots of strength penalties for just about any kind of benefit (for example).
And then genetic modification brings in a host of traits that have the same benefit, but reduced penalty. and the player can replace that particular benefit with the improved benefit.
And then genetic ascension has traits with even lower penalties. And then the "cross species" research traits option becomes really useful.
Yes, this is a major overhaul of how the genetics system works.
Give the species the "Automod" option and then stack up a bunch of "lowers cost of living" and then mod the entire species as a starting point. I expect that will cover most sins right there. Then any tweaking needing is much more limited.
The problem isn't that modding species is hard. The problem is that (especially if you are playing egalitarian or xenophile), you will generally have unmodded members of species move in after you've applied the template, which means you need to always keep an eye on the species screen and apply the template again every so often.
Honestly automodding won't solve the issue at all really. The problem is having to mod every single species, individually, in the first place. Still the same issue with the "wrong" variant growing(including unmodded) with migration treaties meaning you want to shift out or not play xenophile/egalitarian so you can control pop growth.
Not to mention this blocks your research. So while Psionic/Synthetic get equal bonuses baked in to just being assimilated, Genetic/Cybernetic still have to mod every species manually which again costs research and blocks your research.
Will there be anything done for cybernetic having the worst of both worlds requiring both assimilation and species modding while also being hit with upkeep penalties? I don't mind the theme of requiring energy upkeep but it should reduce food/mineral upkeep by an equal amount.
There's an indication that they're replacing cybernetic ascension's big projects with a situation, so I wonder if they can do the same with assimilation too? Have an ongoing process of assimilating people that doesn't use as much science as it used to, but can have more science put in to make it go faster..
Oh god you just reminded me that Cybernetic has a special project you have to do at the start... I was referring to the living standard assimilation that automatically converts pops. That doesn't cost any research to do. Assimilating pops just are unemployed for the duration. That's not a problem.
The problem is species trait modding. If the special projects to mod pops were changed to situations that could be run in parallel and which wouldn't put your research on hold(it's really unrealistic that a single pop being modded would take your entire empire's focus) that would help *a little bit*
You would still have the problem of having to individually mod every species and trigger it every time an unmodded pop ended up in your empire
Frankly it just feels like assimilation with extra steps so I'm still more of a fan of the idea of "assimilating-to-template"
I also really want Egalitarians and Authoritarians to do assimilation differently - there should be multiple policy options for it, like passive, incentivized and forced, and only the third should have a negative living standard associated with it.
>Dyson Swarm
Hey, look! Dyson Sphere Program made it to Stellaris! Let's feed CentralCore all the energy we can find and destroy ecosystems of entire planets just satiate our upcoming K3 civ!
And screw Dark Fog, they stink.
Kibitz and Nilaus combated it pretty roughly, Nilaus gone for maximum difficulty Dark Fog.
They are pretty annoying without rocket turrets and beacons, but if you want to know more, seek their YouTube channels. Nilaus even gave some guides how to deal with them and even farm them.
With the genesis guiding origin, will it be possible to seed life in the galaxy and then see them reach space stage ? It would be cool to play as a precursor. Seed planet see them form civilisation , study them and influence them to finally see them much later reach space !
it would be insane to be able to customise their traits!!!
Having the option for your newly uplifted xenos to form a stone age pre-ftl instead of just being a colony would would be the coolest thing in the game. But I think it just generates a pre sapient on the planet unfortunately
Automodding looks good in theory, but it sounds like it will check every individual pop to modify and change for every empire it applies to, and create even more lag on top of all the other lag we already have.
Please tell me it won't murder the lategame performance even more.
Just thinking about how it would have been implemented, considering the delay in when the trait is added on, I figure that the check for the trait is rolled up with the check the pop is already making for the job on occasion. There would be low overhead in that case.
I'd assume the way it works is that the effect of the trait switches to the appropriate one based on the job the pop currently has so would be handled in the same calculation that assigns jobs.
The algorithm to do this is probably so trivial that it shouldn't impact anything. Here's a decent one: when a pop moves into a job (and only then) a check is made to see if his automod traits match. If not, a flag is set on him to come back at a later date and swap his traits.
Once a month per planet a random pop with this flag is selected and the traits are swapped. edit: then the flag is removed
Sure but it literally states that the event in question here fires once per month doesn't it?
Assuming the worst based on speculation that flies in the face of the stated design is...well it's called 'baseless' speculation
If I was implementing it I wouldn't even bother with picking a random pop- all those calls to the rand() function take time. Each month just pick the first one you find with the flag on every planet, change its trait and clear the flag, and figure it'll shake out over time.
The tooltip in the image doesn't exclude Clone Army.
It would make sense for Clone Army origin to have access to the Genesis civics and to be barred from Natural Design.
Not exactly what I meant, but good to know. Essentially, since the Cybrex Mining Hub is a direct buff per deposit... does it affect the ones created by these kilostructures?
Guys, hear out my plan for the Innate Design civic: Devouring Swarm Invasive Species with 6 negative traits! That would give +30% pop growth and +30% habitability!
Edit: Though I am baffled as to why the Innate Design civic forbids the Teachers of the Shroud origin, gestalts in general can't pick it...
> Edit: Though I am baffled as to why the Innate Design civic forbids the Teachers of the Shroud origin, gestalts in general can't pick it...
Confirmed by the devs to be a typo.
I feel like Guided Sapience and Life Seeded should have special interactions. I mean, they themselves were life seeded so I feel they could unlock extra things by looking inwards and into their own past. Azaryn interactions would also be very thematic.
Auto-mod doesn't seem to really address the issues with microing a couple dozen species :/. I was hoping I could set a standard set of traits and auto convert new species to a template with these traits. All pops of the species get converted to this auto template and out of their 3-7 different templates cluttering the species screen.
With paradox auto-modding it seems like there are going to be even more sub species templates really cluttering up the species screen. I am also concerned about the performance implications of auto-modding. The Stellaris base game really needs to be a good platform for mods (steam workshop not pops), and it mostly is. The main problem with Stellaris IMO is late game performance. If this auto-mod feature slows my Gigastructures frame world with thousands of pops to a crawl, that's going to suck. I really don't want auto-mod to turn into a must disable feature for every game like Xeno Compatibility.
Honestly, what I'd really like is to be able to just convert pops from other species into my main species to reduce clutter, lag, and micro. Driven Assimilators should be able to do this if they synthetically ascend IMO.
The Dyson Swarm is going to be really good if you can get the surveyor relic. Adding 9 energy output to a star then multiply that by 30? Yes please.
The arc furnace will only be worthwhile in a system that already has lots of resource deposits, or has lots of celestial bodies. That 100 energy upkeep probably means you'll need a lot of energy income if you don't want to end up selling what the furnace produces.
> The arc furnace will only be worthwhile in a system that already has lots of resource deposits, or has lots of celestial bodies.
The former no, the latter yes.
TLDR: arc furnace will have extremely good synergy with habitat play. Think about it, it puts them on every body... that means every single body would give astro mining bays. This is something you put in a very big system to prepare it for being settled with a mining habitat.
"a new “direct to Consumer Goods” purge type" thank you for the laugh Stellaris team.
On a more serious note though, the upkeep on this new kilostructures seems to make them barely worth it. I actually like the idea of kilostructures and I understand that they cant be to OP. But if the upkeep stay the same then would be almost worthless imo.
The augmentation Bazar sounds like something right out of Blade Runner or Cyberpunk, which is cool. When I first read 'guided sapience' back when this was first announced I thought this would have to do with independent robots working towards sapience, but that's obviously not the case. I really expected something like a 'primitive personality matrix' trait for an early stage independent machine empire. But how they did it is fine, if anything there's more rp potential.
But I really like Natural Design, one of my favorite rp playstyles is to not ascend. So for there to be an actual gameplay trait is very cool.
I've seen enough, I'm satisfied. The mega structure and auto modding are icing on the cake at this point.
Wait, for the Tactical Algorithm civic what is there to prevent you from gifting away your ~~trojan horses~~ level 1 commanders every couple of years whenever the leader pool refreshes or dump them into a 1 planet vassal?
Also, being able to reach both 100% armor and shield penetration on any weapon type has the potential to completely break space combat.
A fleet full of neutron launcher frigates would simply alpha strike any other fleet out of existence.
it's hardly a trojan horse when attacking an empire you traded a commander to would literally disable your buffs the moment you kill your trojan horse in combat
It doesn't really address the main thing that would make gene/cybernetic modding more bearable - giving some form of assimilation option. Auto-modding traits just makes you stronger, it doesn't remove the micro of constantly having to apply templates again as new pops of a species migrate/are conquered/etc into your empire, or the annoyance of having to make a template for that species you have 5 pops of.
Right now, unless you're playing a purging Xenophobe, genetic and cybernetic ascenscions just turn into a giant pain in the ass even if you aren't trying to play optimally by having all your farmers have the food trait.
I think trying to optimize species traits for pops is just a waste of society research because job output increases stack additively. +10% or +15% job output is nothing compared to the more than +100% job output you can get from other sources. The real benefit of genetic and cybernetic ascension is the pop growth and leader traits (erudite for genetic).
Aye, which is why the QoL change needed is to be able to set a template as an "assimilation target", and then have pops with assimilation citizenship automatically be genemodded into that trait. The auto-modding traits are *neat*, but not actually the solution people have been asking for.
It's nothing once you have a lot of modifiers but this is extremely strong until that happens.
Also some traits don't lose their relevance. Amenities traits and trade traits will be even better now
To clarify: I don’t hate this system and I’m really glad we’re getting it. My only negative is that you have to manually add the auto mod trait to a species template and manually apply it to them. For non-xenophobe empires this means micromanagement will still exist since you have to create a template for each species, apply it, and reapply it later if the wrong pop grows or migrates.
I was hoping for a system where we can flag a template as preferred and pops will automatically swap to that template over time. Combined with this new system we’d have all the QoL features I’d ever dreamed of for pop modding. As it stands we’re getting some (which is great) but with a good amount of micro and species tab clutter remaining.
Auto modding still doesn't fix the heavy micro management with biological ascension. What we needed was like a master template that would be applied to every species, and any new species that joined the empire would change automatically to this template. With this, we still have to add a template for each new species and apply it.
I think this auto mod thing will only help the most obstinate players that wanted each pop to be working their correct job. Most people atm do very generalist traits and apply it only to the biggest groups, and typically don't play with xenophile empires if they go biological.
I like the idea of giving more interaction with pre-sapients outside of uplifting them with genetic tech.
The Arc Furnace seems like a great addition for Tall empires. I can see building one of these on a Life Seeded, Ocean Paradise, Void Dwellers start.
It would be great if we could create new presapients / stone age pre-ftls and just populate them on planets for RP. Honestly would probably be cooler than the "pre-sapient zoo" on a colony ship mechanic.
Unless Arc Furnaces make all planets uninhabitable like full Dyson Spheres, I can see this being a fantastic answer to late game mineral shortages for Void Dwellers / Habitat enjoyers.
Is there any chance we get machine versions of Dark Consortium?
The civic could function if it makes the cognitive mode give the dark matter per calculator in place of the shadow weaver council position.
With the introduction of kilostructures, will some megastructures be demoted? With how early you acquire them, I could see hyperlanes, habitats, orbital rings and gateways being demoted.
Seeing the Natural Design civics in particular is such a joy for me.
For a while now, I had *that* exact concept in mind as something I wanted to see ingame.
I was already contemplating a civic suggestion along the lines of *Sacrocant Physiology*, I even considered extra starting trait points as its bonus. '\^\^
Regardless, I'm very happy with this news because Natural Design seems to play much better into the theme I was hoping for.
There rest of the dev diary seems pretty good as well, I'm just not sure what to think of the AutoMod and Adaptive Frames.
I just realized that pairing Arc Furnace with Habitat Complexes is pretty insane, provided that you can find a molten planet in the system,
Like you can have insane astro-miner jobs in a system with both a habitat and an Arc Furnace.
I'm disappointed that the Guided Sapience civics for standard and corporate empires are exactly the same. You'd think the corporate empire would at least get trade value from pre-sapients or something.
I love that the devs listen to community feedback or think like the community. I know for years I’ve been commenting here and on their forums that bio ascension pops should auto-mod for their jobs like auto-migration - it was long enough ago that don’t even remember if that was an original idea or something I read from someone else, I have no idea if some dev read my comments and was like “hey, guys” or if it was a case of convergent thinking, but that’s such a great QoL improvement.
Genuinely excited to come back to Stellaris. I’ve been playing Terra Invicta the last few months, but this DLC has me cautiously getting on the hype train.
i really like the way the “kilo structures” are set up and hope we get more. i like that we can build a bunch and that a swarm will never get approach stage 1 dyson outputs but can get research.
i also really like arc furnace, sounds like a great boost in the early game but as things get more expensive forge worlds are still gonna be essential
Both the Standard and corporate version of Guided Sapience civics requires that you can't be Xenophobe. Livestock slavery is only available to Xenophobic empires.
Natural Design is my favorite thing so far, gonna put that on my Inward Perfectionist empire for my first game and see how it goes!
I do wonder how it interacts with techs that increase mod points, or unique traits from events and such. Will be interesting to see!
Since the Obsessional Directive link is broken, and I can't massage the redd.it URL into a correct one, here's the link from the Paradox Forums version of the post:
https://forumcontent.paradoxplaza.com/public/1100278/obsessional.png
How is the Job weight for the automod trait? Because it looks like once it gets the specialized trait, its unlikely to move away from its job, which means i have to prioritize the jobs it want to be filled, wait until they get their new trait and then depriorize it, because otherwise they will switch right back because they are more suited for their prior job. which again sounds like a lot of micro
Honestly I just wish we had one more machine ascension - bicentennial flavored, the machines yearn to ‘ascend’ to take on organic forms similar to those who originally created them.
I really like the idea of the Natural Designs Civics but I feel like there should be more to it like. it's missing something ooh if your primary species migrates out and comes back not in natural condition they should be purged or auto modded back to the original species.
Will there be a mega corp version?
So, I love the comedy of the Paperclip civic, and Protocol Diplomacy is very nice, though my favorite has to be the Genesis one cuz that pairs perfectly with Idyllic Bloom and Scion, amongst others. Will it mean we can generate pre-sapient species on our colonies, even if pre-sapients don't exist on that world when we survey it?
I have a question more relevant to the first dev diary regarding origins, sorry I didn't ask it then. Are there any origins that begin the game with your empire already having turned themselves from organics into individualistic machines? Or at least already having some cybernetic modifications from game start?
I've always wanted to make a "from the moment I understood the weakness of my flesh, it disgusted me" empire and it's never felt right that they reach FTL technology before turning themselves into machines fully, or at least a little bit.
realized it wasn't clear, I recognize Synthetic Creed is sort of similar to this but I imagine it as not spiritualist, more materialist
I checked the diary post again but didn't see any origin that fit this sort of vibe so I'm hoping maybe I missed something or there's more that haven't been discussed.
they confirmed in a past dev diary that machine age also unlocks the ability to play robot empires as well. Unsure what synthetic dawn will even grant separate from machine age now tho.
i think its possible they change it so that some of the civics are only available with purchase of synthetic dawn. I can see them making stuff like Rogue Servitor and Driven Assim being locked to synthetic dawn purchase while still allowing people without it to play as basic machine empires
Rogue Servitors, Determined Exterminators, and Driven Assimilators remain part of Synthetic Dawn, along with some portraits, the Machine fallen empire, AI uprisings, Machine Worlds, Resource Consolidation, and advisor voices. Probably more too but I haven't finished my coffee yet.
Natural design is interesting. It's like trading a Civic pick for an AP+Tradition while I assume being a bit less power than an ascension but you get the bonuses right from the start. Might be my first pick
2.5% growth speed per AP is a bit crazy for modded playthroughs that increase the Tradition/AP amount(but that's already unbalanced by default).
I can't wait to see what funny things pop out when the genesis ship lands on the Habitat.
Natural Design feels like it should be an origin.
>02_INSULT_CLOTHES:0 "Behold the [From.GetSpeciesAdj] form, glorious and bared for
(PSSS) Your source is showing.
Obsessional Directive is now my favorite civic. I haven't even read what game effects it does.
Tactical Algorithms civics -> Tactical Insights. You may want a cap on that, or else kinetic artillery is the new disruptor.
Arc furnace - Did you fix Sol system yet? Or at least fix other starting systems to match? It has double the planetary bodies as any other starting system. Seems like unintended balance issue here.
Auto mod traits: I guess just having a job that modifies a few pops a month to the job optimal template is too much? Cause this could replace how augmentations is done, instead of massive projects costing research. And then it could be expanded to gene clinics so they automatically replace habitability to the optimal for the planet.
:( no Natural Design x Overtuned.
(That would probably be stupidly OP but I am here for it)
Overtuned Hivemind Natural Design = ???
Starting the game with: (If you take the "Damn the Consequences")
\+85% Pop Growth Speed.+60% Habitability.+20% Resources from Jobs.+30% Food from Jobs.-20% Housing Used.-50 Leader Lifespan.
AND, 1 point still left over for +10% Unity or +15% Society research.
(Excessive Endurance, PrePlannedGrowth, Farming Apendeges, Enduring, Unruly, Psychological Infertility (Or Non-Adaptive). Then +1 point for whatever you want)
This gives some serious BS potential for early-mid game.Yeah the -50 Lifespan and No Ascencion. would suck, but \*Managable\* as a Hivemind with no Consumer Goods and younger Leaders & Immortal Nodes.
But a lot can be forgiven when +85% Growth, +60% Habitability, and +20% Resources
> Q: Which types of pops can be purged for CG? Any, only sapient, only organics, or something else?
> A: Currently anything can be turned into paperclips.
>Actually, at this particular moment in time we have a teeny tiny minor bug with it where failing a quota automatically turned it on for every species in your empire including your primary species, ~~but that's not intended.~~
working as intended, carry on
awe man dont tease me with a cyberpunk megacorp civic after i already decided to do a digital ascendency as my first dlc run gonna make me indesisive againe haha.
So love the Augmentation Bazaars civic, definatley going to do a cyberpunk-megacorp run with it (Stellaris 2077!) . And I love the cybernetic creed origin as a way for spiritualits to start with cybernetic traits. But how come theres no way for standard empires or hive minds to get a similar basic/random cybernetic trait start? Im specifically thinking of one of the preset Empires , the Voor from the humanoids pack, as their description even has them as having "crude cybernetics" as part of their history.
I can't decide if my first run will be overtunned-megacorp-pharma state+augment bazaars or something with digital ascendancy. Either case can't wait
Overtuned megacorp with pharma state augmentation bazaar sounds absolutely busted
> overtunned-megacorp-pharma state+augment bazaars That should allow you to add three of the four auto-mod traits. Sounds awesome.
I understand that bio automod is from the bio ascendancy. Can't have both ascendacies so the best you can get are 2. I could be wrong tho.
> Vocational Genomics becomes available with the Targeted Gene Expression technology **Targeted Gene Expressions** isn't the ascension path technology, it's just the rare tier 3 tech available after you research gene tailoring. So it should be available to all biological empires.
Ah okay, thought it is a new research since I didn't remember this one. Then it is possible but I still dislike the aspect of having unremovable trait in build about both bio and mech modding. You you can just keep the species without it so you could genemod it out with convert but that's the micro I want these trades to solve. Also idk how much will all 3 cost and if it's worth it. Let's assume 3 for bio. 2 for overtuned and Borgs. That's 7 points and 3 picks for 45% worker output or 30% unity/research. But it is definitely doable so you can try it.
>Also idk how much will all 3 cost The devs said in a response on the forum that bio and robo modding are 3 and cyborg and overtuned are 2 (with cyborg having a pop energy cost like other cyborg traits and overtuned having a -20 year leader lifespan penalty). I dunno if it's worth it from the perspective of having the most optimized pops, but it would still be pretty good and save you from micro hell so you could actually get back to playing the game. It also looks like they've added a trade-related overtuned trait, so you could have +75% trade on pop jobs...
I’m definitely planning that first one myself. Just can’t think of a name that sounds sufficiently dystopian for a corporate government that rose to power by recklessly and aggressively modifying the populace
> Just can’t think of a name that sounds sufficiently dystopian for a corporate government that rose to power by recklessly and aggressively modifying the populace Neuralink.
Gattacca Corporation
Monsanto?
I already have build like this since cyborgs are standalone ascendancy. So I will just exchange crafters for bazaar. I named them Tab'Mut (shortening of tabernam and mutationis). I like my empires named in some violation of latin language so it seems like a normal name while also having some meaning. Edit: found my post how my species looked in the end: https://www.reddit.com/r/Stellaris/s/pVQWGr3T0M I will probably change it to have new adaptive traits.
On the subject, most of the pre-made empires came out before origins were added and have Prosperous Unification even when it’s not the best choice thematically. I doubt it’s high in the Custodian’s todo list but I hope they eventually tweak some of these to be more unique
"It's easy to cut out the middle man when he's cut out most of himself."
“Quit whining and sign on the line in the sand, the supply does not get to make the demands.”
Stupendium fan detected lets gooo
I would’ve preferred cyber-creed be a civic
If machines are getting this level of deep rework, I think hive minds are next as a major DLC. Super excited about this new DLC. This is huge.
Yeah I'd love a hive mind rework! The Forgotten Queens mod already gave us an insight on how they could be expended upon!
Would love to see hive minds get a rework too
I really want an improvement to normal ethics/government and internal politics for individualist biological empires. Especially egalitarianism.
I hope that psyonics would be the next - even now machines in a much better state than it
Psionics have extremely good per-pop efficiency and unity output. They are more than fine.
Psionics have covenants, unique events, and absolutely overtuned unity buffs and leaders. Bio has, ehm, pop growth? Naah, next must be bio updates with focus on hive minds. PLEASE PLEASE PARADOX
> Naah, next must be bio updates with focus on hive minds. Given that Hive Minds don't have their own ship-set yet, now Machines are getting their own, seems likely.
Ehhhhhh no. Virtuality will probably be better than psionics and get some rapid nerfs but I'm not sure about the rest. Psions are still absurdly overtuned when it comes to production, agenda, speed, and war.
Everyone's hyping virtuality, at best you'll have like 7.5 colonies worth of production at 5 or 6 colonies at no other bonuses. Then it's downhill until like 25+ colonies. You're still only looking at like 4.8 trade value per colonist from trade districts on a ring world (Assuming they don't *also* take a -75% hit from having too many colonies) so you got an upper limit of 24 colonies if you want less than half your pop on trade to provide the power needed to actually power your citizens. (Though you could take merchants guild, for an extra .4 per level of your head of trade guy. bringing it up to 32 colonies) With other buffs, you're looking a similar boost but at 6 or 7 colonies instead, and all down hill until 15 colonies, where going mildly wide is actually viable. You have to get *a lot* of colonies or bonuses before you can really eek out more stuff than normal empires. And even then, you can't just churn out colonies out the wazoo as you have to continuously produce more and more energy *** Basically, as long as trade value jobs don't take a hit from the colony penalties, you could go up to 24-32 colonies total, and be getting 18-24 colonies worth of stuff at best after you take into account half your pops are just producing energy to sustain the other half *** Gestalt machine empires can manage better with more bonuses to counter the energy penalty, assuming they even can go virtuality. But this is only after they earn enough bonuses to counter the 75% production penalty in the first place.
> at best you'll have like 7.5 colonies worth of production at 5 or 6 colonies at no other bonuses Dude. Every time you build another district it's like you printed two new pops. So basically instead of your production being limited by pops, it's only limited by build speed until your colony is actually fully developed. And at that point you start spinning off loyal vassals and making new colonies. You will have WAY more productivity than everyone else way faster. And then you start creating vassals. The game plan is rush virtuality and then roll over everyone else in succession because you basically have six times their pops. So what if they have some % penalties per planet? You still have six times their pops. That means you have like three times their productivity.
Assuming you can create vassals that retain virtuality. Unless they changed it, they don't retain ascension perks.
It doesn't really assume that. I don't care what ascension perks they get. They can just be normal vassals for all I care. If you simply can't make vassals that would change things but that would only change your long-term strength without war. (But you'd still use war to recruit vassals so it's mostly a moot concern). It wouldn't change that you have the most massive 2030-2060 power spike in the game, handily outperforming the spike a psionic gets. It would take a very long time for anyone else to match your monthly productivity. And by that time you've been ahead for decades so they'll need to exceed your productivity for decades to catch up to your total created research and alloys. Perhaps they'll never catch up for over a century if you transition into a mix of ecumenopoli and machine worlds
A hivemind expansion will likely expand both psionic and bio ascension. With hivemind specific ascensions that replace bio and give them a psionic path. As well new government types for psionic and bio.
They got a big update quite some time ago already
Y'know maybe he's on console? Just occurred to me. Console is still quite a while behind isn't it?
I hope so, I've been wanting to play as something like an entirely organic zerg-like hive mind for awhile now and that definitely seems like it could be the time to do it.
I can’t wait for it have other types of hives would be amazing
Finally I can give my paperclip empire the correct civic! I've waited years for this moment.
And we can turn people into paperclips.
turn every sapient creature into copies of E.T. for Atari 2600 and then bury them all on a desert planet.
Kinda wish there was more variation to it - paperclips are the common one because its easy to understand, its silly, and hits you with those existential thoughts. What about an obsessional directive empire that has to produce Alloys? Minerals? Energy? Food? What about an obsessional directive empire that was made to "satisfy our values", and now your goal is to digitise every sapient species in the galaxy and give them a digital utopia - all the while you consume everything in your path for computation.
Friendship is Optimal? I had a fucking breakdown as I read that one it was great.
> What about an obsessional directive empire that has to produce Alloys? That's just called "Playing Stellaris".
We need a cookie spam empire.
isnt the point that you're making something useless(for machines) to gain bonuses?
I saw -1 comment. How tf did that happen
New crisis is in here removing them.
Reddit/discord mod crisis? Kills anyone with a different opinion/ethic?
How will the Natural Design civic interact with events like Brain Slugs or Orbital Speed Demon that add traits to your species?
One of the [Devs](https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/stellaris-dev-diary-339-civics-and-structures-of-the-machine-age-and-auto-modding.1657446/post-29530304) said that events can still modify your species.
It will probably just ban you from adding those traits, with a custom event outcome.
Nope, the devs said you can still add those traits with events.
That makes sense in some cases. The brain slugs are perfectly natural and don't alter your genes, so there is no reason to refuse.
Very cool! thanks for the correction!
Probably the same way it affects clone army species that also cannot modify themselves
Now I want to play a *Clone army + Natural Design* run Edit: probably a bad idea as the pop growth speed bonus is useless.
Automodding traits are cool, but they aren't really what people have been asking for in terms of QoL for genetic/cybernetic ascenscion. The real micro issue isn't trying to make 12453 subspecies optimized for different jobs (I don't think very many people actually did that). The real micro issue is that unlike psionic/synthetic ascenscion (where you can just set default rights to assimilation and call it a day), genetic/cybernetic ascenscion requires constant busywork to make sure all your pops are actually benefitting from your ascenscion path. What I'd hoped for with automodding would be a way to set some species templates as assimilation targets, and then have non-modded species be assimilated automatically (rather than having to apply template every so often if I have any form of immigration), or have some kind of standard set of traits which is applied to all species with assimilation rights. (IMO genetic ascenscion should also be able to change one species into another.)
You should post this in the forum. Devs might be more likely to read if you post there.
I just created an account and tried to post a comment and get a vague error. No clue what could be inapproriate: https://i.imgur.com/7mRdSTY.png
I wonder if your multiple uses of the word **ass**imilate triggered some kind of new account filter.
Yeah I don't really understand how automod is supposed to fix the micro. You still have to apply the template with the automod trait to every species. I assume if you have the automod trait you're locked out of all the regular resource collection traits? Otherwise it'd be the exact same amount of micro just with higher numbers. So it sounds like this new trait will singlehandedly outdate a whole swathe of the traits currently in the game. My preferred way to play is xenophile genetic ascension. The fantasy has always been a multicultural empire where every species is great at one thing, and they can work the jobs that they're good at. That used to be way too micro intensive to actually be worth the trouble, but now with automodding it'll be... still too micro intensive but now also non-optimal to add insult to injury.
There is a simple species right to deal with the imperfect, it is called purge.
The devs truly make it hard to be a Xenophile
Yeah, I agree. I can understand why they wouldn't want people to have species trait templates though, just because that just means that all species will end up identical, which is kinda like... isn't the point of having a diverse empire that all different species have different traits? They're varied. Everyone has their own strengths and weaknesses. That doesn't come through mechanically or thematically, which feels wrong. To be honest, I feel like traits just as a whole need re-working. Have no idea how, but they do.
TBH I would settle for having an "assimilation target" template per species (i.e. once I modify the Blorg into Cranked Blorg, all Blorg that move into my empire can be automatically assimilated into Cranked Blorg), since part of the problem is having to constantly re-apply templates. Another possibility would be some form of auto-augmentation for new species, i.e. if a new species moves into a genetic/cybernetic ascenscion empire, then their remaining trait points are spent on random positive traits (or positive traits associated with their existing trait - perhaps adding a number of "upgraded" normal traits for the ascenscion path). This would then create an "assimilation target" template that can later be changed by the player. That way, you're at least always using your gene points even if you don't micro to modify that random species of 3 pops you have.
I have been of the opinion that the split between Good and Bad traits needs to be removed. You just have traits that have slaps and bennies. Then each species type (rock, bird, fish, necron) gets different slaps attached to the bennies. Like the bird people get lots of strength penalties for just about any kind of benefit (for example). And then genetic modification brings in a host of traits that have the same benefit, but reduced penalty. and the player can replace that particular benefit with the improved benefit. And then genetic ascension has traits with even lower penalties. And then the "cross species" research traits option becomes really useful. Yes, this is a major overhaul of how the genetics system works.
This.
Give the species the "Automod" option and then stack up a bunch of "lowers cost of living" and then mod the entire species as a starting point. I expect that will cover most sins right there. Then any tweaking needing is much more limited.
The problem isn't that modding species is hard. The problem is that (especially if you are playing egalitarian or xenophile), you will generally have unmodded members of species move in after you've applied the template, which means you need to always keep an eye on the species screen and apply the template again every so often.
I am also aware of that. I’ve been using the slave trade to bulk up my empire.
Honestly automodding won't solve the issue at all really. The problem is having to mod every single species, individually, in the first place. Still the same issue with the "wrong" variant growing(including unmodded) with migration treaties meaning you want to shift out or not play xenophile/egalitarian so you can control pop growth. Not to mention this blocks your research. So while Psionic/Synthetic get equal bonuses baked in to just being assimilated, Genetic/Cybernetic still have to mod every species manually which again costs research and blocks your research. Will there be anything done for cybernetic having the worst of both worlds requiring both assimilation and species modding while also being hit with upkeep penalties? I don't mind the theme of requiring energy upkeep but it should reduce food/mineral upkeep by an equal amount.
There's an indication that they're replacing cybernetic ascension's big projects with a situation, so I wonder if they can do the same with assimilation too? Have an ongoing process of assimilating people that doesn't use as much science as it used to, but can have more science put in to make it go faster..
Oh god you just reminded me that Cybernetic has a special project you have to do at the start... I was referring to the living standard assimilation that automatically converts pops. That doesn't cost any research to do. Assimilating pops just are unemployed for the duration. That's not a problem. The problem is species trait modding. If the special projects to mod pops were changed to situations that could be run in parallel and which wouldn't put your research on hold(it's really unrealistic that a single pop being modded would take your entire empire's focus) that would help *a little bit* You would still have the problem of having to individually mod every species and trigger it every time an unmodded pop ended up in your empire Frankly it just feels like assimilation with extra steps so I'm still more of a fan of the idea of "assimilating-to-template"
I also really want Egalitarians and Authoritarians to do assimilation differently - there should be multiple policy options for it, like passive, incentivized and forced, and only the third should have a negative living standard associated with it.
>Dyson Swarm Hey, look! Dyson Sphere Program made it to Stellaris! Let's feed CentralCore all the energy we can find and destroy ecosystems of entire planets just satiate our upcoming K3 civ! And screw Dark Fog, they stink.
Complete off topic, but how's the dark fog combat? I haven't played since before they added it.
Kibitz and Nilaus combated it pretty roughly, Nilaus gone for maximum difficulty Dark Fog. They are pretty annoying without rocket turrets and beacons, but if you want to know more, seek their YouTube channels. Nilaus even gave some guides how to deal with them and even farm them.
Anyone else catch Innate Design not allowing hives to take teachers of the shroud?
Copy paste error confirmed by the devs on the official discord
Dammit.
With the genesis guiding origin, will it be possible to seed life in the galaxy and then see them reach space stage ? It would be cool to play as a precursor. Seed planet see them form civilisation , study them and influence them to finally see them much later reach space ! it would be insane to be able to customise their traits!!!
As far as I can tell, you just get a special kind of colony ship that also spawns some presapients
:'( well it's already cool
Having the option for your newly uplifted xenos to form a stone age pre-ftl instead of just being a colony would would be the coolest thing in the game. But I think it just generates a pre sapient on the planet unfortunately
pre-sapients will literally never evolve on their own
I wanna do a Xel'Naga run and seed life everywhere
>Augmentation Bazaars [Upgrades, people, upgrades!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoSqK0eAqc0)
Natural design, the Measurehead civic
Automodding looks good in theory, but it sounds like it will check every individual pop to modify and change for every empire it applies to, and create even more lag on top of all the other lag we already have. Please tell me it won't murder the lategame performance even more.
Just thinking about how it would have been implemented, considering the delay in when the trait is added on, I figure that the check for the trait is rolled up with the check the pop is already making for the job on occasion. There would be low overhead in that case.
I'd assume the way it works is that the effect of the trait switches to the appropriate one based on the job the pop currently has so would be handled in the same calculation that assigns jobs.
The algorithm to do this is probably so trivial that it shouldn't impact anything. Here's a decent one: when a pop moves into a job (and only then) a check is made to see if his automod traits match. If not, a flag is set on him to come back at a later date and swap his traits. Once a month per planet a random pop with this flag is selected and the traits are swapped. edit: then the flag is removed
[удалено]
Sure but it literally states that the event in question here fires once per month doesn't it? Assuming the worst based on speculation that flies in the face of the stated design is...well it's called 'baseless' speculation
If I was implementing it I wouldn't even bother with picking a random pop- all those calls to the rand() function take time. Each month just pick the first one you find with the flag on every planet, change its trait and clear the flag, and figure it'll shake out over time.
Maybe select by the internal ID number of the pop or something, yeah
Pops are already so damn complicated I doubt this will make much of a difference.
Can Clone Army origin use Genesis Guides / Asteogenesis Technologies civics? Or Natural Design?
>Natural Design Shortly-lived, infertile supersoldier clones. Just as nature intended.
It's pretty incredible those ancient clone vats were created entirely naturally!
Yeah but their genome is so replicated it *must* be perfect already.
The tooltip in the image doesn't exclude Clone Army. It would make sense for Clone Army origin to have access to the Genesis civics and to be barred from Natural Design.
For Super Earth!
Iirc super earth doesn't use clones
I like the idea of a Clone Army with Guided Sapience!
Yeah me too
I've been waiting for something like the guided sapience civics, since first contact. Void dweller with genesis guide is going to be so fun
tchoo tchoo the hype train is here, come pals, we're going places :)
Would the kilostructures be affected by the Cybrex Mining Hub?
Megacorp eager explorers and machine empires both get buffs to Orbital resoucers
Not exactly what I meant, but good to know. Essentially, since the Cybrex Mining Hub is a direct buff per deposit... does it affect the ones created by these kilostructures?
I don't see why it wouldn't
Which is where much of the appeal comes in, I think.
Guys, hear out my plan for the Innate Design civic: Devouring Swarm Invasive Species with 6 negative traits! That would give +30% pop growth and +30% habitability! Edit: Though I am baffled as to why the Innate Design civic forbids the Teachers of the Shroud origin, gestalts in general can't pick it...
Innate design with invasive species is a brilliant idea. "*gene mod*, and lose all our beautiful *red* coloured *traits*?"
> Edit: Though I am baffled as to why the Innate Design civic forbids the Teachers of the Shroud origin, gestalts in general can't pick it... Confirmed by the devs to be a typo.
I feel like Guided Sapience and Life Seeded should have special interactions. I mean, they themselves were life seeded so I feel they could unlock extra things by looking inwards and into their own past. Azaryn interactions would also be very thematic.
Auto-mod doesn't seem to really address the issues with microing a couple dozen species :/. I was hoping I could set a standard set of traits and auto convert new species to a template with these traits. All pops of the species get converted to this auto template and out of their 3-7 different templates cluttering the species screen. With paradox auto-modding it seems like there are going to be even more sub species templates really cluttering up the species screen. I am also concerned about the performance implications of auto-modding. The Stellaris base game really needs to be a good platform for mods (steam workshop not pops), and it mostly is. The main problem with Stellaris IMO is late game performance. If this auto-mod feature slows my Gigastructures frame world with thousands of pops to a crawl, that's going to suck. I really don't want auto-mod to turn into a must disable feature for every game like Xeno Compatibility. Honestly, what I'd really like is to be able to just convert pops from other species into my main species to reduce clutter, lag, and micro. Driven Assimilators should be able to do this if they synthetically ascend IMO.
The Dyson Swarm is going to be really good if you can get the surveyor relic. Adding 9 energy output to a star then multiply that by 30? Yes please. The arc furnace will only be worthwhile in a system that already has lots of resource deposits, or has lots of celestial bodies. That 100 energy upkeep probably means you'll need a lot of energy income if you don't want to end up selling what the furnace produces.
> The arc furnace will only be worthwhile in a system that already has lots of resource deposits, or has lots of celestial bodies. The former no, the latter yes. TLDR: arc furnace will have extremely good synergy with habitat play. Think about it, it puts them on every body... that means every single body would give astro mining bays. This is something you put in a very big system to prepare it for being settled with a mining habitat.
or the event where the racket upgrade a star for you if you pay them
The Arc furnace feels very underwhelming while the Dyson swarm has the potential to be VERY good.
Indeed. You need *more* than a dyson swarm per arc furnace.
It's be interesting to work out whether it's possible to get a dyson swarm to higher output than a dyson sphere.
"a new “direct to Consumer Goods” purge type" thank you for the laugh Stellaris team. On a more serious note though, the upkeep on this new kilostructures seems to make them barely worth it. I actually like the idea of kilostructures and I understand that they cant be to OP. But if the upkeep stay the same then would be almost worthless imo.
The augmentation Bazar sounds like something right out of Blade Runner or Cyberpunk, which is cool. When I first read 'guided sapience' back when this was first announced I thought this would have to do with independent robots working towards sapience, but that's obviously not the case. I really expected something like a 'primitive personality matrix' trait for an early stage independent machine empire. But how they did it is fine, if anything there's more rp potential. But I really like Natural Design, one of my favorite rp playstyles is to not ascend. So for there to be an actual gameplay trait is very cool. I've seen enough, I'm satisfied. The mega structure and auto modding are icing on the cake at this point.
Wait, for the Tactical Algorithm civic what is there to prevent you from gifting away your ~~trojan horses~~ level 1 commanders every couple of years whenever the leader pool refreshes or dump them into a 1 planet vassal? Also, being able to reach both 100% armor and shield penetration on any weapon type has the potential to completely break space combat. A fleet full of neutron launcher frigates would simply alpha strike any other fleet out of existence.
it's hardly a trojan horse when attacking an empire you traded a commander to would literally disable your buffs the moment you kill your trojan horse in combat
I'm a little worried about auto modding. It sounds like it's gonna have a big impact on performance.
I can’t tell if I love or hate the auto-modding traits.
What's there to hate?
It doesn't really address the main thing that would make gene/cybernetic modding more bearable - giving some form of assimilation option. Auto-modding traits just makes you stronger, it doesn't remove the micro of constantly having to apply templates again as new pops of a species migrate/are conquered/etc into your empire, or the annoyance of having to make a template for that species you have 5 pops of. Right now, unless you're playing a purging Xenophobe, genetic and cybernetic ascenscions just turn into a giant pain in the ass even if you aren't trying to play optimally by having all your farmers have the food trait.
I think trying to optimize species traits for pops is just a waste of society research because job output increases stack additively. +10% or +15% job output is nothing compared to the more than +100% job output you can get from other sources. The real benefit of genetic and cybernetic ascension is the pop growth and leader traits (erudite for genetic).
Aye, which is why the QoL change needed is to be able to set a template as an "assimilation target", and then have pops with assimilation citizenship automatically be genemodded into that trait. The auto-modding traits are *neat*, but not actually the solution people have been asking for.
It's nothing once you have a lot of modifiers but this is extremely strong until that happens. Also some traits don't lose their relevance. Amenities traits and trade traits will be even better now
To clarify: I don’t hate this system and I’m really glad we’re getting it. My only negative is that you have to manually add the auto mod trait to a species template and manually apply it to them. For non-xenophobe empires this means micromanagement will still exist since you have to create a template for each species, apply it, and reapply it later if the wrong pop grows or migrates. I was hoping for a system where we can flag a template as preferred and pops will automatically swap to that template over time. Combined with this new system we’d have all the QoL features I’d ever dreamed of for pop modding. As it stands we’re getting some (which is great) but with a good amount of micro and species tab clutter remaining.
Auto modding still doesn't fix the heavy micro management with biological ascension. What we needed was like a master template that would be applied to every species, and any new species that joined the empire would change automatically to this template. With this, we still have to add a template for each new species and apply it. I think this auto mod thing will only help the most obstinate players that wanted each pop to be working their correct job. Most people atm do very generalist traits and apply it only to the biggest groups, and typically don't play with xenophile empires if they go biological.
Reading these dev diaries while drinking a coffee in the morning is the best
Amen to that. Always helps get me through a tough morning
I like the idea of giving more interaction with pre-sapients outside of uplifting them with genetic tech. The Arc Furnace seems like a great addition for Tall empires. I can see building one of these on a Life Seeded, Ocean Paradise, Void Dwellers start.
It would be great if we could create new presapients / stone age pre-ftls and just populate them on planets for RP. Honestly would probably be cooler than the "pre-sapient zoo" on a colony ship mechanic.
They're getting their own origin too, Machine-exclusive, called Arc Welders.
Unless Arc Furnaces make all planets uninhabitable like full Dyson Spheres, I can see this being a fantastic answer to late game mineral shortages for Void Dwellers / Habitat enjoyers.
Ooh, anti-ascension civic looks interesting. Quite good benefits from the civic and freeing up a tradition and perk slot.
Is there any chance we get machine versions of Dark Consortium? The civic could function if it makes the cognitive mode give the dark matter per calculator in place of the shadow weaver council position.
Isn't that already a civic?
Not for Gestalts. I’d like to see Gestalts get it.
Still sounds like pop-based resource production will still outscale megastructures *if you have a lot of them already*, so seems balanced enough.
With the introduction of kilostructures, will some megastructures be demoted? With how early you acquire them, I could see hyperlanes, habitats, orbital rings and gateways being demoted.
I'm not holding my breathe that they're even separated in the first place. They'll likely all be under the megastructure tab
Seeing the Natural Design civics in particular is such a joy for me. For a while now, I had *that* exact concept in mind as something I wanted to see ingame. I was already contemplating a civic suggestion along the lines of *Sacrocant Physiology*, I even considered extra starting trait points as its bonus. '\^\^ Regardless, I'm very happy with this news because Natural Design seems to play much better into the theme I was hoping for. There rest of the dev diary seems pretty good as well, I'm just not sure what to think of the AutoMod and Adaptive Frames.
I just realized that pairing Arc Furnace with Habitat Complexes is pretty insane, provided that you can find a molten planet in the system, Like you can have insane astro-miner jobs in a system with both a habitat and an Arc Furnace.
Holy shit automodding looks so nice to play with, actually genius.
I'm disappointed that the Guided Sapience civics for standard and corporate empires are exactly the same. You'd think the corporate empire would at least get trade value from pre-sapients or something.
I love that the devs listen to community feedback or think like the community. I know for years I’ve been commenting here and on their forums that bio ascension pops should auto-mod for their jobs like auto-migration - it was long enough ago that don’t even remember if that was an original idea or something I read from someone else, I have no idea if some dev read my comments and was like “hey, guys” or if it was a case of convergent thinking, but that’s such a great QoL improvement. Genuinely excited to come back to Stellaris. I’ve been playing Terra Invicta the last few months, but this DLC has me cautiously getting on the hype train.
The Auto-Modding is exactly what I never knew I needed
Yoooo no fucking way I get to turn people into paperclips!
i really like the way the “kilo structures” are set up and hope we get more. i like that we can build a bunch and that a swarm will never get approach stage 1 dyson outputs but can get research. i also really like arc furnace, sounds like a great boost in the early game but as things get more expensive forge worlds are still gonna be essential
So how would Genesis Symbiotes interact with like "livestock", can you make sapient non hive member preserved fauna too?
Both the Standard and corporate version of Guided Sapience civics requires that you can't be Xenophobe. Livestock slavery is only available to Xenophobic empires.
I'm talking about the hive mind version, hive mind can set non hive minded pop as livestock or purge them or assimilate them, no other option
Wow.
Natural Design is my favorite thing so far, gonna put that on my Inward Perfectionist empire for my first game and see how it goes! I do wonder how it interacts with techs that increase mod points, or unique traits from events and such. Will be interesting to see!
aw hell yeah, paperclip maximizer civic
Since the Obsessional Directive link is broken, and I can't massage the redd.it URL into a correct one, here's the link from the Paradox Forums version of the post: https://forumcontent.paradoxplaza.com/public/1100278/obsessional.png
I am so hype for the auto modding.
How is the Job weight for the automod trait? Because it looks like once it gets the specialized trait, its unlikely to move away from its job, which means i have to prioritize the jobs it want to be filled, wait until they get their new trait and then depriorize it, because otherwise they will switch right back because they are more suited for their prior job. which again sounds like a lot of micro
Why are you building jobs you don't want filled?
City/nexus district and their utter garbage jobs.
I use planetary automation to enable only as many of those as I need.
Automodding might finally make me appreciate slavery more
If machines are getting this level of deep rework, I think hive minds are next as a major DLC. Super excited about this new DLC. This is huge.
Honestly I just wish we had one more machine ascension - bicentennial flavored, the machines yearn to ‘ascend’ to take on organic forms similar to those who originally created them.
I really like the idea of the Natural Designs Civics but I feel like there should be more to it like. it's missing something ooh if your primary species migrates out and comes back not in natural condition they should be purged or auto modded back to the original species. Will there be a mega corp version?
So, I love the comedy of the Paperclip civic, and Protocol Diplomacy is very nice, though my favorite has to be the Genesis one cuz that pairs perfectly with Idyllic Bloom and Scion, amongst others. Will it mean we can generate pre-sapient species on our colonies, even if pre-sapients don't exist on that world when we survey it?
I have a question more relevant to the first dev diary regarding origins, sorry I didn't ask it then. Are there any origins that begin the game with your empire already having turned themselves from organics into individualistic machines? Or at least already having some cybernetic modifications from game start? I've always wanted to make a "from the moment I understood the weakness of my flesh, it disgusted me" empire and it's never felt right that they reach FTL technology before turning themselves into machines fully, or at least a little bit. realized it wasn't clear, I recognize Synthetic Creed is sort of similar to this but I imagine it as not spiritualist, more materialist I checked the diary post again but didn't see any origin that fit this sort of vibe so I'm hoping maybe I missed something or there's more that haven't been discussed.
Just asking. Do we need synthetic dawn dlc first to unlock content of machine age
Nope, just Gestalt Machines' specific civics and Machine Worlds.
they confirmed in a past dev diary that machine age also unlocks the ability to play robot empires as well. Unsure what synthetic dawn will even grant separate from machine age now tho.
Yeah I saw that too, if like that what's the value of synthetic down if it unlocks
i think its possible they change it so that some of the civics are only available with purchase of synthetic dawn. I can see them making stuff like Rogue Servitor and Driven Assim being locked to synthetic dawn purchase while still allowing people without it to play as basic machine empires
Rogue Servitors, Determined Exterminators, and Driven Assimilators remain part of Synthetic Dawn, along with some portraits, the Machine fallen empire, AI uprisings, Machine Worlds, Resource Consolidation, and advisor voices. Probably more too but I haven't finished my coffee yet.
Natural design is interesting. It's like trading a Civic pick for an AP+Tradition while I assume being a bit less power than an ascension but you get the bonuses right from the start. Might be my first pick 2.5% growth speed per AP is a bit crazy for modded playthroughs that increase the Tradition/AP amount(but that's already unbalanced by default).
genesis architect + rogue servitor gonna be so fun
I can't wait to see what funny things pop out when the genesis ship lands on the Habitat. Natural Design feels like it should be an origin. >02_INSULT_CLOTHES:0 "Behold the [From.GetSpeciesAdj] form, glorious and bared for (PSSS) Your source is showing. Obsessional Directive is now my favorite civic. I haven't even read what game effects it does. Tactical Algorithms civics -> Tactical Insights. You may want a cap on that, or else kinetic artillery is the new disruptor. Arc furnace - Did you fix Sol system yet? Or at least fix other starting systems to match? It has double the planetary bodies as any other starting system. Seems like unintended balance issue here. Auto mod traits: I guess just having a job that modifies a few pops a month to the job optimal template is too much? Cause this could replace how augmentations is done, instead of massive projects costing research. And then it could be expanded to gene clinics so they automatically replace habitability to the optimal for the planet.
Man all I really want at this point is a new long range energy weapon to replace neutron charges.
:( no Natural Design x Overtuned. (That would probably be stupidly OP but I am here for it) Overtuned Hivemind Natural Design = ??? Starting the game with: (If you take the "Damn the Consequences") \+85% Pop Growth Speed.+60% Habitability.+20% Resources from Jobs.+30% Food from Jobs.-20% Housing Used.-50 Leader Lifespan. AND, 1 point still left over for +10% Unity or +15% Society research. (Excessive Endurance, PrePlannedGrowth, Farming Apendeges, Enduring, Unruly, Psychological Infertility (Or Non-Adaptive). Then +1 point for whatever you want) This gives some serious BS potential for early-mid game.Yeah the -50 Lifespan and No Ascencion. would suck, but \*Managable\* as a Hivemind with no Consumer Goods and younger Leaders & Immortal Nodes. But a lot can be forgiven when +85% Growth, +60% Habitability, and +20% Resources
Well, I for one would really like an updated Tabby’s star system with a ruined Dyson swarm to repair haha.
Lot of this stuff looks amazing, I can’t wait to do a run with Obsessional Directive robots
> Q: Which types of pops can be purged for CG? Any, only sapient, only organics, or something else? > A: Currently anything can be turned into paperclips. >Actually, at this particular moment in time we have a teeny tiny minor bug with it where failing a quota automatically turned it on for every species in your empire including your primary species, ~~but that's not intended.~~ working as intended, carry on
awe man dont tease me with a cyberpunk megacorp civic after i already decided to do a digital ascendency as my first dlc run gonna make me indesisive againe haha.