Paradox Studio Thread

[Lonjil]

Anybody try Nomads for Stellaris yet?

I've been playing it some today and while I get the underlying idea and like that idea, the implementation is just strange honestly and does not really fit within the current mold of the game. I really believe they should just move onto the sequel and build this type of nomadic system into the base game and build around it.

My current game I am playing as a Nomadic trade league, but honestly it just feels like playing a landless leader in ck3, where I just am doing contracts and harvesting places building up my economy. Upon unpause every single non-purifer empire I come across instantly will accept becoming my vassal. I started with the civilian type of arkship but I am 5-10x stronger than ai starting forces and my economy is insane as well.

Idk, I like the idea like I said but this just feels like it really should have been part of a new game.

Edit: Now I posted that and re read it, I really think comparing it to landless rulers in ck3 is really apt comparison. Its a totally different system but unless you REALLY enjoy it, its completely boring compared to normal gameplay. Also the ark ship designs are incredibly mid at best and, idk if this is true, the new advisor va sounds completely ai. Hopeless someone mods in better ark ships lol

 

[Kane Lives]

I've been playing it some today and while I get the underlying idea and like that idea, the implementation is just strange honestly and does not really fit within the current mold of the game. I really believe they should just move onto the sequel and build this type of nomadic system into the base game and build around it.

My current game I am playing as a Nomadic trade league, but honestly it just feels like playing a landless leader in ck3, where I just am doing contracts and harvesting places building up my economy. Upon unpause every single non-purifer empire I come across instantly will accept becoming my vassal. I started with the civilian type of arkship but I am 5-10x stronger than ai starting forces and my economy is insane as well.

Idk, I like the idea like I said but this just feels like it really should have been part of a new game.

Edit: Now I posted that and re read it, I really think comparing it to landless rulers in ck3 is really apt comparison. Its a totally different system but unless you REALLY enjoy it, its completely boring compared to normal gameplay. Also the ark ship designs are incredibly mid at best and, idk if this is true, the new advisor va sounds completely ai. Hopeless someone mods in better ark ships lol

It's just a continuing problem with Stellaris where they (the Stellaris team) keep nigger-rigging the engine to do things it wasn't meant to do, instead of doing the right thing and dropping that shit for an entirely new engine that can accomodate whatever they wanted to do.

 

[Lonjil]

It's just a continuing problem with Stellaris where they (the Stellaris team) keep nigger-rigging the engine to do things it wasn't meant to do, instead of doing the right thing and dropping that shit for an entirely new engine that can accomodate whatever they wanted to do.

100% agreed. They really need to move to another engine since, like most DLCS, this one relies on interactions with the ai for its flavor. The ai is still braindead and afk most the time, so its just nothing happening

 

[Scale Smerch]

100% agreed. They really need to move to another engine since, like most DLCS, this one relies on interactions with the ai for its flavor. The ai is still braindead and afk most the time, so its just nothing happening

The AI issue is separate from the engine, that's just down to Paradox growing lazy. Current/prior mods like Starnet, Stellar AI, and ACE (for the crises) show the scripting tools exist to make it decently competent, just no devs actually engage with them beyond the bare minimum. It's one of the areas Paradox as whole seems determined to offload onto mods until the complaints grow too much (like with Vicky 3 now).

Engine is the more annoying one. The Clausewitz Engine was clearly never intended on tracking thousands of individual units (each ship is technically a unit) or dynamic effects altering them over time (bioships) given the begrudging acknowledgement of pathfinding calculations being the main culprit for much of the mid-late game lag. Stellaris demands a different design philosophy (how fleets are conceived) or architectural approach (game engine), but I wouldn't trust modern Paradox to do either correctly.

 

[GoodWinSon]

PDX finally added exponents and trigonometric functions to hoi4.

 

[geckogoy]

PDX finally added exponents and trigonometric functions to hoi4.

Shocking announcements like these do a lot to remind me that many pdx games only have like 2 programmers working on them at any given time

 

[Scale Smerch]

The one thing which Paradox does deserve some credit for IMO is how heavily scripted their games have become. Being able to abstract away so much to simplistic scripts easily handled by glorified low-code product managers is not an easy feat and goes to show the talent which they have (or had; engine work isn't a glamorous position) working for them. Whether or not they are coasting on the ability for mods to make up for their incompetency, those devs they have managing the Clausewitz Engine deserve the commendations and references from it.

Seriously, so many games are tedious at best to mod total overhauls for but Paradox gives you everything you need to make crap like Kaiserreich or Anbennar with minimal coding experience. That is something worth sticking on the resume.

 

[GoodWinSon]

PDX finally added exponents and trigonometric functions to hoi4.

The one thing which Paradox does deserve some credit for IMO is how heavily scripted their games have become. Being able to abstract away so much to simplistic scripts easily handled by glorified low-code product managers is not an easy feat and goes to show the talent which they have (or had; engine work isn't a glamorous position) working for them. Whether or not they are coasting on the ability for mods to make up for their incompetency, those devs they have managing the Clausewitz Engine deserve the commendations and references from it.

Seriously, so many games are tedious at best to mod total overhauls for but Paradox gives you everything you need to make crap like Kaiserreich or Anbennar with minimal coding experience. That is something worth sticking on the resume.

I just realized I can now be super autistic with this and model economic cycles like growing seasons and higher fuel consumption during winter.

That's a bit too far though lol.

 

[Lonjil]

One thing that I just noticed is the ai diplomacy for joining or leaving a war is entirely broken, not sure if anyone has noticed it so far. I just declared war on an empire and 4 others joined on their side, I gave each 100 total energy credits and they peaced out. The default opinion value for the trade deal seems to either be broken or overlooked, its -1 for them leaving the war, so lmfao.

This also works with getting people to join the war on my side. Anyone I try to ask its just a starting opinion of -1, 100 total energy credits each and now half the galaxy is in my war. Definitely wish they tried to test things before releasing them.

Edit: Yeah, there is no way this is tested. AI empires keep joining the other side in the war. I keep paying them 100 credits flat to leave, they rejoin 2 years later lol

Second edit: New bug found. If a federation joins the war after it starts, you cannot peace them out separately. So now the war just spirals and spirals negating the mechanic entirely. Lmao

 

[I Know 孤独のせい]

instead of doing the right thing and dropping that shit for an entirely new engine that can accomodate whatever they wanted to do.

Sell the same DLC again under a new name ?

 

[local asuka]

I personally would have gone with 1356[...]

It is funny you say this, because 1356 is exactly the start date MEIOU & Taxes choose for EU4, and was an EU3 start date iirc. It's quite amazing how with two precedents they choose to pass over it for 1337.

This also works with getting people to join the war on my side. Anyone I try to ask its just a starting opinion of -1, 100 total energy credits each and now half the galaxy is in my war. Definitely wish they tried to test things before releasing them.

Edit: Yeah, there is no way this is tested. AI empires keep joining the other side in the war. I keep paying them 100 credits flat to leave, they rejoin 2 years later lol

I NOOOTICED in my recent Stellaris run that every AI-AI sprawled into half the galaxy nominally fighting. They do at least offer an appropriate bribe when they want out but that's the extent of it working. One of my subjects had independent Diplomacy and would drag me into random defensive wars (which I could still pay nothing to bail out of, lol).

 

[Lonjil]

Alright new bug discovered for this patch LMAO, this is either a really cancerous decision or a really big oversight, honestly it could be either or both knowing modern paradox. So as I stated previously ai can join or leave wars via diplomacy screen. I have a subject where I will join defensive wars if they are attacked. They joined the defending side of a war across the galaxy -> It dragged me and ALL my subjects into the war since I had similar agreements with them.



So this is the result. The entire galaxy is now at war with the Commonwealth of Man on the defending side. And since I joined the war due to my "Join defensive wars of subject" selection, I cannot peace out of this war. I have a -10000 due to being in a "defensive alliance", even though I am not allied to Yalon (I didnt even have knowledge of them either).

Great DLC so far Paradox. This is just really cancerous I am now dragged into random total wars since neither side is willing OR ABLE to peace out.

 

[85CentSoda]

-snip- new bug

Yeah, from what I've seen this latest patch has been a total mess with the number of bugs and the badly broken balance. It's clear that shoving the nomad stuff in there really really broke a lot of stuff in unexpected ways. I'm expecting a big series of patches sometime either this month or next. There's already an open beta with a load of changes/fixes.

 

[Kane Lives]

Alright new bug discovered for this patch LMAO, this is either a really cancerous decision or a really big oversight, honestly it could be either or both knowing modern paradox. So as I stated previously ai can join or leave wars via diplomacy screen. I have a subject where I will join defensive wars if they are attacked. They joined the defending side of a war across the galaxy -> It dragged me and ALL my subjects into the war since I had similar agreements with them.

Wyświetl załącznik 9181032

So this is the result. The entire galaxy is now at war with the Commonwealth of Man on the defending side. And since I joined the war due to my "Join defensive wars of subject" selection, I cannot peace out of this war. I have a -10000 due to being in a "defensive alliance", even though I am not allied to Yalon (I didnt even have knowledge of them either).

Great DLC so far Paradox. This is just really cancerous I am now dragged into random total wars since neither side is willing OR ABLE to peace out.

For all the shit EU5 gets, Stellaris is infinitely worse at simply not working at all.

 

[Ughubughughughughughghlug]

Stellaris was the one Paradox mapgame I never got into well. I mostly played a ton of CK2, some Victoria 2 and EU4, a bit of HOI4, own Imperator Rome but never actually played it (honestly hard to see why a person would, I think they really did not have a sense of what they were doing with it, if you want battles you can do Rome 2 Total War and if you want character drama my impression is Rome sucked at that).

But Stellaris, I actually poured some time in it trying to like it and in the end I realized it was severely misguided because I was trying to force myself to like it because it was a Paradox game and I just assumed I had to collect 'em all and play them all even though I never cared for the premise to begin with.

 

[Lonjil]

For all the shit EU5 gets, Stellaris is infinitely worse at simply not working at all.

The problem for stellaris is in order for you to meaningfully engage with 85% of the systems they have put into the game and continue to put in, you need to interact with the ai. Stellaris is far, far too messy for paradox ai systems to handle so everything just falls apart. I never feel like I am one empire of dozens vying for power and meaningful stories, I am just the only meaningful state after 20 years.

Only real fix is modding the game to an extent its basically a new project.

 

[Ayynon69]

Only real fix is modding the game to an extent its basically a new project.

Average paradox experience at this point.

Normgroids zonked out after a 12hr shift in the powerpoint factory:
vanilla

Average historical gaming enthusiast:
fantasy total conversion + expert AI + yoda death sound + ui fix + civil tax modifiers expanded

 

[Computer God Autism]

A lot has been rightfully talked about Stellaris' early design schizophrenia and how it's been reworked into a game it was never envisioned as being, but I think a bigger culprit for the state of Stellaris is its procedural elements, not that it went from a mostly-driven exploration sci-fi game into a kitchen sink grand strategy. Sure, the execution of a lot of recent additions is unbelievably poor, but Stellaris only got more popular once it started becoming a proper grand strategy. If anything, I didn't think it went far enough. How much of Stellaris' dev time and energy has been wasted on creating different flavor variants for the same underlying system of totally interchangable space races with no real lore on totally interchangeable maps? Because of how the map is procedurally generated, empires also have to behave fundamentally the same; there's always a land-grab, even for tall empires, and the borders always end up as being amorphous blobs that have no history or culture or easily-identifiable intrinsic value that have to have grand strategy elements retroactively layered onto them. Stellaris could have actually been a competent Victoria 2 in space if it was designed as one from the get-go instead of being reworked into one - you could even still have some procedural map elements in a scramble for Africa analogue like a race for the Unknown Regions or something, as well as varying locations for extragalactic locations like the L-Cluster. It would also allow for more starting asymmetry and for the factions and races to play more differently since they all don't have to be interchangeable suggestions.

In other news I'm considering buying Distant Worlds 2.

 

[Tito Melema]

Is there a way to play CK3 that is fun and immersive yet? I haven’t checked in on it in years, gave up in disgust when everything was flavorless memey custom religions. But I’ve sunk so many hundreds of hours into CK2+HIP, would love to experience that again.

 

[Scale Smerch]

Stellaris could have actually been a competent Victoria 2 in space if it was designed as one from the get-go instead of being reworked into one - you could even still have some procedural map elements in a scramble for Africa analogue like a race for the Unknown Regions or something, as well as varying locations for extragalactic locations like the L-Cluster. It would also allow for more starting asymmetry and for the factions and races to play more differently since they all don't have to be interchangeable suggestions.

In other news I'm considering buying Distant Worlds 2.

The procedural elements combined with the Vicky-lite approach are what hurt it the most IMO. Without any established lore or asymmetric starts it causes the various mechanics and resources to bleed into themselves and turn every flavour of empire into the same thing over time. Amplitude with the Endless series shows you can make the strategy work for 4x, but you have to get very imaginative with mechanics for a given empire and treat each case significantly different from the rest.

You can tell the Stellaris devs know this is a problem too with how bioships turned out, what was attempted with the Wilderness origin, and the two upcoming "scenarios" DLC with established galaxies and more constrained conditions. The emphasis on randomization and procedurally generated empires is arguably the biggest flaw the game has.