STELLARIS: New Paradox Game in SPAAAACE

[celedhring]

How do the new fleet stacking limits + FTL nerfs affect warfare?

On paper they seem a good step in making war a bit more tactical than just chasing doomstacks, but I'm curious how they work in practice.

[Josquius]

FTL seems to for sure; you have to be outside the rim on the correct side of the system to warp to another one.

Haven't seen combat in the new setup though. Would be nice if they do fighting retreats- you press retreat and your fleet tries to make its way to the rim, under fire as it goes. Rather than just a countdown then flash out.

[crazy canuck]

Played about 4 hours yesterday. My custom race experienced some slave unrest that I pretty much ignored because I was concentrating on expanding the borders of the empire a bit too much. Eventually I started to run out of food because I was growing too much and expanding too fast. Then a huge slave revolt overthrew my government on my homeworld and declared independence. A moral democracy of all things 

I quickly declared war and began sieging my homeworld but the rebel slaves had a huge army garrison so I had to wait and build up a large enough army to assault the planet while my fleet bombarded the planet back to the stone age. While this is happening a couple pirate groups spawn in unclaimed space around my empire because I expanded way too quickly. The pirates raid up and down my systems destroying research stations and mines. All the while I'm desperately trying to increase the food and energy supplies so I don't continue starving or go bankrupt. I declare martial law on the rest of my planets to help quell the slave unrest and population unhappiness due to the food shortage.

As soon as I feel confident enough of victory I assault my slave-owned homeworld and after a brutal battle I am victorious. I quickly annex the planet and, not long after, switch my race profile to 'Full Citizenship' to not replicate what happened on my homeworld again. The slaves won their freedom after all. Soon after, I deal with the pirates and things are now back to normal.

I just went through an unscripted time of troubles and it all narratively makes sense. That is pretty damn cool.

Well done, Space Admiral Sulla.

 

[crazy canuck]

I like the new geography of the game.  Also the interface is a lot better.  I can easily tell when something needs to be upgraded and so I don't have to cycle through the planets anymore (although this may be more of a function of other changes since I have not really played this game in a while).  I also really like the new mechanic for expansion.  You really need to think about how you want to expand rather than watching your borders grow through colonization.

[Tonitrus]

FTL seems to for sure; you have to be outside the rim on the correct side of the system to warp to another one.

One thing I noticed with that is that fleet/ship movement through your empire has slowed waaaaay down.

This can really feel annoying, especially for:

- reacting/chasing newly spawned pirates on the wrong side of your empire
- That asteroid event
- Got that timed anomaly that requires a construction ship?  Ouch.

Though it has forced me to build more construction ships, where before I probably had two at most.  And I have to think more about moving a science vessel exploring one outskirt of my empire before moving it to another side.

[garbon]

You really need to think about how you want to expand rather than watching your borders grow through colonization.

Not all that much though. It becomes easier to gather influence as the game progresses in the base game.

Having tried it a bit (and then the ST mod) this weekend, I'd say that overall the changes freshen the game up a bit but are really only great for those who had been excited with the game. My take is in line with the OP of this thread:

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/stellaris-still-feels-like-i-just-sit-there-and-get-techs-until-the-end.1072358/

[Razgovory]

What kind of settings do you guy's use?  Like maps size, AIs, fallen empires etc?

[HVC]

Still getting used to the new war rules. It appears that if you don't get to the war goal you want the enemy still auto white peaces at 100 percent war fatigue.

[Richard Hakluyt]

I've been experimenting with expanding on a broad front so that no systems have been left behind without an outpost. No pirates for 50 years, may be a coincidence of course.

[Josquius]

Still getting used to the new war rules. It appears that if you don't get to the war goal you want the enemy still auto white peaces at 100 percent war fatigue.

Surely that must be a bug? As that just sounds wrong. Get yourself at perpetually high war fatigue and you are immune from anyone,

[HVC]

White peace works by each faction keeping what systems they've taken control of.

And I don't have apocalypse, but I do have the other DLCs

[Tamas]

I've been experimenting with expanding on a broad front so that no systems have been left behind without an outpost. No pirates for 50 years, may be a coincidence of course.

AFAIK pirates are supposed to appear on the outside of  borders next to well-developed star systems, and that's definitely how it has been for me. So yes, I try to have protective "frontier" systems outposted next to the built-up ones, seems to work well. Which I must admit, is the best implementation of pirates in a sci-fi 4x that I have seen - they almost irritated me greatly.

Otherwise, one must be careful with outposts as it adds 1 (or 2?) percent to tech costs per system and that can stack up quickly. Which means though that there now seems to be a tall alternative to wide, to a certain extent.

[garbon]

I don't know, I feel like every time p'dox has added something that supposedly makes a tall alternative to wide, it never really works that way. Particularly as, with the exception of CK2, the main thing that you do in their games is either be at war or preparing for war.

[Tamas]

I don't know, I feel like every time p'dox has added something that supposedly makes a tall alternative to wide, it never really works that way. Particularly as, with the exception of CK2, the main thing that you do in their games is either be at war or preparing for war.

Well, yeah. In my current game I feel like I am probably going to restart simply because I am at the point where I can only further expand via war, and I can't be bothered. But that's not a 2.0 case, that's always been a case for me with such games.

[garbon]

Sadly, I don't think the update has made war all that more fun. Planetary invasions still suck though yes, at least you don't have to play the fun of creating defensive armies that you often never need to have.