written by: MrFreake, jasonpepe, AlphaAsh, Jamesfire, corsairmarks, michaelmakesgames

Hello Stellaris Community!

You’ll be pleased to know that dev diaries are currently scheduled to return next week! In the meantime, we are going to take this opportunity once again to highlight some of the lesser known mods from the Steam workshop.

This week, we will be looking at mods that add internal political interactions within your empire, from new factions, to leveling your rulers, new mechanics for vanilla civics and even an industrial overhaul. This is an exciting lineup of mods, and – judging by the sheer number of people who are interested in an Internal Politics rework – one of these could be just the mod you were looking for. handwave

If you’re a Modder, and are interested in having your mod featured in a future Mod Highlights, please fill out this form. After this week Mod Highlights will be moving to a longer-form biweekly or monthly publication (depending on the number of interested modders we get), and either taking the place of Dev Diaries when there’s no news (eg. Summer and Winter holidays), or the second Monday of each month.

So if you are liking this format, keep an eye out for future Mod Highlights!

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Features

• Up to 15 new extremist factions can now form in a run.
  
• There's one extreme faction for Xenophobes, and two for all other ethics. Sorry gestalts - you get no extremist factions. Sad face.
  
• There are pros and cons to promoting or suppressing extremist factions.
  
• ...and also banning each of the factions. Yes, you can ban extremist factions.
  
• Some factions oppose each other. Think before you promote/suppress/ban one. Another faction may be very pleased... or very upset.

Summary

This mod includes 15 new extremist factions, one for Xenophobes, and two for all other ethics. There are pros and cons to promoting, suppressing and banning each of the factions.

Some of the factions are also opposed to each other, in such a way that promoting one faction will pee off any opposing faction, or suppressing or banning a faction will please any opposing faction. You aren't told which factions oppose which - experiment and find out.

You absolutely should not use this mod if you dislike red indicators in the factions screen. Or dislike not being able to get 100% approval from all factions all the time.

No, really. I get it, it's not for everyone. With this mod it is intended to be very difficult to keep all factions happy at the same time. It is intended for you to make tough decisions about which factions to promote, suppress or ban. It is intended that you will make compromises with policy, ascension and a few other areas of running your empire when managing factions. It is intended that your Unity from factions may fluctuate, sometimes seeming excessive, or lacking.

Inspiration
Factions are a feature that needed more bite. This mod does that.




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This next mod was hard to classify, since it has a mix of both diplomacy and internal politics. I put it in the internal politics highlight, because I write these things and that’s what I wanted to do. Stop judging me.

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Features
Adds new mechanics to the following civics for increased depth and RP:
- Exalted Priesthood
- Nationalistic Zeal
- Parliamentary System
- Shadow Council
- Technocracy
- more on the way!

Summary
Exalted Priesthood:
- Lead a Galactic Faith that other Spiritualist empires can join
- Use the Ideology casus belli to forcefully convert empires to your faith
- Compete with other Exalted Priesthoods to win followers
- Contend with the spread of unorthodox beliefs -- reform your faith or declare heresy!

Nationalistic Zeal:
- Balance your nation's Zeal
- If your zeal gets too low, you get Nationalistic Disgrace
- High zeal grants strong military bonuses, but too much causes Nationalistic Hubris
- If you lose a war or any territory while you have Hubris, you are immediately Disgraced

Parliamentary System:
- Planets elect factions to represent them in parliament
- Each faction has a unique effect on the planet
- The factions and political power of the planet's pops determines who wins (with a bit of randomness)
- If you don't like the election result, you can "find some more votes" for your preferred candidate, but you risk a scandal!

Shadow Council:
- Appoint your non-Councilor leaders to positions in your Shadow Council
- The more Shadow Councilors you have, the less experience your "legitimate" Councilors earn
- Six different Shadow Council positions, each with a unique effect that scales to the leader's skill
- Shadow Councilors can get exposed, and you'll face a tough choice

Technocracy:
- Your non-scientist leaders can start with the Technocrat trait, producing a little science
- At level 4, your Technocrats choose a specialization (Physicist, Social Scientist, or Engineer), with a unique effect depending on the leader's class

Each civic's new mechanics can be individually turned off if you don't want to play with them all.

Inspiration
I like playing civics that have a big impact on gameplay! Sometimes I want to choose a civic that fits with the RP of my empire, but the effects are a bit boring... So I made Uncivic to add some new life to conceptually interesting but mechanically simple civics.





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Those of you who remember MODJAM2020, might remember this as a mod that started off as an Origin, but now contains almost a total overhaul of how vanilla industries work!

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Summary
Industry in Stellaris is simple, and abstracted to the point of not making much sense. Not only that, but critical methods of industry that should be utilized by space-faring empires are missing entirely.

Features
Rise of Cosmic Industry is composed of 7 modules that can be independently disabled at game start, and come with minimal overwrites:

• Orbital Infrastructure is an implementation of Orbital Districts on planets, opening up more options for planetary development.
  
• Realistic Development overhauls how things are built, using a Labour-like system called Industrial Production, so that 2 planets don't build twice as fast as 1 for some reason.
  
• Factory Automation implements Automated Factories, for making resources without pops.
  
• Space Exploitation is an expansion to Space Mining using Minor Colonies, allowing you to exploit celestial bodies more thoroughly.
  
• Fallen Empire Buildings provides a third tier of Buff Buildings, that increase the production of their appropriate job, as well as produce some resources on their own.
  
• Cargo Ships provides Cargo Ships that can be used to form trade routes with other empire's planets, granting both planets resources based on their existing production.
  
• Shipping Costs makes planet-level deficits cost some energy credits to represent shipping in materials to cover the deficit.

In Rise Of Cosmic Industry, I provide new mechanics and new content that better match how I feel this should work, and in some cases just add missing tech.




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Want to get your ruler to the next level? Jasonpepe has you covered with this next mod!

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Features
Unique Skill System for every empire Ruler(s).
1. Customize their focus
2. Spend their Execution points for campaigns when necessary
3. Leaders are self-learning and will level up over time

Summary
A mod that allows player to customize their Ruler's abilities, which includes:

1. Ruler Foci: A UI which allows players to customize their Ruler's Focus and Categories.

2. Every leader has Execution Points and Idea Points.

• Execution Points: Spend to level up categories and launch Ruler Campaigns.
  
• Idea Points: Used to unlock or skill up focuses.
  
• Rulers can only have up to 15 Execution and 15 Idea points.

3. Each Ruler has their Charisma, Affair, and Inspire skill levels.

• Charisma: Determines the speed of gaining Execution Points.
  
• Affair: Determines the progress speed Ruler Campaigns.
  
• Inspire: Determines the speed of gaining Idea Points.
  
• Ruler’s species traits will also effect the base-value of the 3 skills.

4. Ruler Campaigns: Short-Term, powerful Campaigns that appear from time to time. More Campaigns can appear with higher Affair skill levels.

5. Over time, Rulers will gain Skill Points (scaled by their Affair skill level). Skill Points can be used to improve Ruler's Charisma, Affair, and Inspire skills. Skill Points can also be converted to Execution & Idea Points.

Inspiration
In my gameplay of Stellaris, the Ruler is the main leader in my mind. Yet I always find a Ruler’s ability to rule a country being a lackster, as they should never appear to be a figurehead.

Putting the mind that I want my Ruler a 6-6-6 one, not 0-0-0 (EU4), a ruler mod is made.

This mod has a lot of history, the very first version was released in 1.5 (Utopia DLC). In pre 2.0 version, the mod still used the classic annoying popup events with randomized options. After 2.0 released, the first rework introduced the Ruler Campaign(s) edicts. Then in 2.6, the first version of Ruler Focus was introduced. The mod also got a complicated and massive rework in version 3.0, with a completely new custom-made UI, and an even more recent one in 3.8 with Ruler Directions getting an overhaul update.





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If an empire is subjugated and there’s no atmosphere to carry the sound, does it make a sound? No.. I don’t think that’s how the expression goes. Anyway, this mod will do the next best thing, and allow you to keep the leaders of integrated Subjects and pre-FTLs.

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Features

• Have the option to keep (and maybe assimilate) leaders in a variety of situations when gaining control of another empire:
  
• When integrating subjects
  
• When infiltrating or conquering pre-FTLs
  
• When firing the Nanobot Diffuser on a pre-FTL world
  
• Custom story text for different kinds of "Retain Leaders" situations, including integration between regular/hive/machine empires and interactions with homicidal civics
  
• Uses the new "Recruit Leader" functionality added in Stellaris 3.8 "Gemini," with additional background art taken from official Stellaris art
  
• Empires with assimilation available to them (or necrophages) can opt to transform leaders based on the available assimilation type(s)
  
• Updates the "Promising Officer" events (both the standard and the variant during fleet maneuvers) to use the "Recruit Leader" functionality - other built-in Stellaris events similarly enhanced, including expanded story text
  
• Adds special traits for former rulers - including those who lose an election or are otherwise forced out of rulership (includes variants for different empire types and leader classes)
  
• Designed to work with other mods published by corsairmarks, including additional gameplay interactions

Summary
Have you ever wondered what happened to the former leaders of your subject after you integrated them? Or perhaps where that pre-FTL leader went after you annexed their planet? Wonder no more! With this mod you will be prompted to choose what to do with the now-unemployed leaders whenever you integrate a subject, conquer a pre-FTL planet, "allow" pre-FTLs to join you via covert infiltration, or convert then via a colossus weapon.

Scientists and Admirals are automatically assigned back to their pre-integration roles, if they were commanding a science ship or fleet. Notably, if you play with "pause-on-event" the science vessels will then continue their assigned orders after the leader is reassigned for command.

Inspiration
I developed this mod over two years ago and it was first published to the Steam workshop in July 2021. Its functionality dovetails nicely with the enhanced focus on fewer, more memorable leaders as part of Stellaris 3.8 "Gemini" update (and Galactic Paragons expansion). Although it's less likely players will be integrating empires (since the Overlord expansion), the flavorful gameplay options still enhance interaction with pre-FTL empires.




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That’s it for this week! Next week Game Director Eladrin will be back with our first regularly scheduled Dev Diary after the summer!

written by: MrFreake, Mute, Risker34, corsairmarks, michaelmakesgames

Hello again Stellaris Community,

Welcome to our third mod highlight! It’s been quiet around the office this week, as most of the devs are off enjoying the 15 minutes of Swedish summer. So we’re back with another Mod Highlight on Thursday! We expect to see weekly Dev Diaries start up again in this spot on July 27th.

In the meantime, because we like talking about Stellaris, we’ve been doing these Mod Highlights – with the assistance of some of our Modders – to show off some Community-made mods that might not necessarily show on the frontpage of the Stellaris Workshop.

This week’s mod highlight is themed around diplomatic mods. These mods will allow you to perform new diplomatic actions against the empires around you, build new things, new ways to generate trade, and new ways to conquer enemy worlds (obviously the ultimate form of diplomacy).

Let's get into it!

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Features:

• New Traditions (Cooperative, Combative, Convictionative, Rebellious, Imperial, Subservient)
  
• New Federation Types (Closed Circle, Social Commonwealth, Intergalactic Soviet)
  
• New GalCom Resolution (Galactic Solidarity)
  
• New Ascension Perks (Machiavellian Machinations)
  
• New Espionage (Slander, Support Opposition, Backstab, Set Trap, Coup de Grace)

Summary:
Plays into the themes of DLCs such as Federations, Nemesis and Overlord. Offers some roleplay potential and interesting gameplay options for the Galactic Community, Federations, Overlords, Subjects and Espionage.

Cooperative, Combative and Convictionative Traditions are mutually exclusive and grant Players additional Bonus based on their Federation Type and more.

Imperial, Subservient and Rebellious Traditions explore what the relationship between Overlords and Subjects can look like. Subservient Empires have special interactions with their Overlords such as choosing to adopt their Traditions for free or joining them in Defensive Wars unrequested. (This is basically the loyalist fantasy of serving dutifully and fighting side by side with your leader/s until the very last breath).

On the other hand, the Rebellious empires are the complete opposite, constantly displeasing their overlords and gaining a massive bonus whenever they are facing a stronger empire. (the opposite, disregarding authority, attempting to topple dictators throughout the galaxy)

Machiavellian Machinations unlocks Espionage Operations; these focus on manipulation and ruthlessness, allowing players to initiate wars in new ways, such as entering wars uninvited or performing a mercy kill against pathetic empires.

This also pairs well with the Closed Circle Federation, a highly exclusive secret organization where only members willing to adopt the leader's authority are welcome. Perks focus on Espionage, Diplomatic Weight, Sensors and Cloaking. (it's the Illuminati)

The Galactic Solidarity Resolution is a socialist utopia, increasing worker happiness, political power, helping with the recovery of recently attacked empires, banning being unfederated or being uncooperative and enabling the founding of a unique Federation with which redistributes a percentage of resources each month equally amongst all members.







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This next mod expands what you can do with branch offices, offering several upgrade paths to unlock bonuses and has the potential to amplify a planet’s specialization.

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Summary:
Here at Moar Branch Offices we want to provide you with a wider array of buildings to help you expand not only your economy, but the galactic economy as a whole! We do this by creating new buildings for you to build, including a new system that allows you to tailor your branch offices to the specialization of the planets that they're on.

Features:

• 20 New Branch Office Buildings for both Megacorps and CrimeCorps
  
• System to Specialize Branch Offices via the Buildings on them
  
• Ability to provide goods and services on planets with Branch Offices
  
• Ability to be a thorn in the side of planets with branch offices

Inspiration:
I was playing as a Megacorp with a friend and was having a hard time making enough strategic resources since Megacorps generally want to keep their planet count low and strategics scale off of planets. I got frustrated that I could gain just about every resource I needed from branch offices except the strategic resources I needed, so I decided to add strategic producing buildings. My friend came up with the idea of having lower level buildings unlock the ability to make bigger cooler versions, in lieu of actual upgrading, with it being balanced off the fact you have to dedicate an entire office to gain the highest level of each path.










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Specialist Subject types are something we’re excited to see more of. Dial your trade game up to 12, with this next mod.

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Summary:
This mod adds a brand-new specialist subject type - the Mercatorum! As an overlord, you can now charter one of your subjects as your very own megacorporation. Unlike other other specialist subject types, overlords are limited to a maximum of one Mercatorum, however that Mercatorum subject does not count for purposes of Divided Patronage (the loyalty penalty for having multiple subjects).

Features:

• Adds a new Specialist Subject type: the Mercatorum
  
• Charter your very own megacorporation - Mercatorums are converted into megacorporations and must remain so as long as they are specialized as a Mercatorum
  
• Includes all features of a Specialist Subject:
  
• Custom specialist perks
  
• A new overlord holding
  
• Special leader traits (specialist level 2)
  
• Special trade actions between Overlord and Subject
  
• Selection of agreement presets for the AI
  
• Updated agreement terms apply standard specialist restrictions (e.g. no integration)
  
• Specialist-specific diplomatic background
  
• All-new icons relating to the specialist subject type, themed on the Energy Credit symbol
  
• AI personalities for Mercatorum subjects - they prefer to avoid war, alternate flavor allows slavery
  
• Mercatorum subjects are heavily integrated into their overlord's economy
  
• Maximum of one Mercatorum subject, but does not count for Divided Loyalty
  
• Overlord can choose to bail out their subject in the event of a resource deficit (the AI knows how to use this)
  
• If a Mercatorum subject defaults on their debt, the overlord suffers penalties as well
  
• Overlord periodically receives special dividends (similar to Mercenary Enclave dividends) and the Subject keeps a percentage as commission
  
• New trade-related edicts available for regular empires, unlocked by existing technologies
  
• New branch office building exclusively for Mercatorum subjects: National Corporate Headquarters, which can be built once in their overlord and each of the overlord's other subjects
  
• Built-in compatibility with four flavors of Ethics & Civics (Bug Branch, Classic, Redux, FunEFork)
  
• Sub-mod to add compatibility with Vassals Expanded and Reworked (FunEFork)
  
• Works with all other mods by corsairmarks, including additional gameplay interactions

Inspiration:
I built this mod as a challenge myself to understand as much as I could about the new subjugation features introduced by Overlord. It also fills the economic niche that I feel the three built-in specializations did not cover. I hope that other modders can use this mod as a framework to help build their own specialist subjects.






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This next mod adds new mechanics to conquering planets. I assure you our blockade is completely legal.

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Features:

• When a starbase is occupied, all planets in that system are considered Under Siege
  
• Besieged planets must produce their own resources
  
• Planets that don't produce their own resources face worsening shortages
  
• Stockpile resources on a planet to delay shortages when besieged

Summary:
Shortages are tracked separately for Energy, Minerals, Food, and Consumer Goods. The effects of the shortage are fully dynamic based on the species on the planet and the empire's civics. Out of minerals? Your lithoid pops will be unhappy and stop growing. Catalytic forge world out of food? It won't be producing many alloys.

Critically, both Energy and Mineral shortages affect orbital bombardment damage. A self-sustaining fortress world will last much longer!

As an alternative to self-sustainability, you can transfer resources from your empire's stockpile to a planet's local stockpile. During a siege, planets will use resources from their stockpile before they face any shortages. And if that sounds like micro-management, fear not! You can set a monthly budget to stockpile resources on your highest-priority planets, based on the population, local production, and how long the current stockpiles would last. The AI understands all of this, and will stockpile resources appropriately too!

Anecdote:
Sometimes, the simple things are the hardest. At about 2000 lines of script, the tooltip is the most complicated part of this mod.




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Yes, Mod Enjoyer. I see you. No conflicts detected this week! All of these mods should be fine to use with one another.

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That’s it for this week’s Mod Highlights. Next week we’ll be talking to the people who ought to know, and they’ll tell us how it ought to be!

by MrFreake_PDX

Hello Stellaris Community!

During this year’s summer vacation in Stockholm, we’re doing something a little different: each week we will be highlighting a selection of the fantastic mods made by our modding community. As some of you may know, unless you own one of the most popular mods, or submit something brand new to the workshop, getting discovered on the workshop is.. difficult. We hope to help out some of our modding community, and highlight some of those mods that might not otherwise be seen.

In this week’s Mod Highlights, we have a selection of mods that will add more unique species and give you more abilities for existing species in your galaxies.

Apparently we’re not the only ones who have seen calls for gaseous/energy based species, as our first mod clearly shows:

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By Exakan



The mod adds everything a new species pack can offer - origins, civics, traits, perks, and more. It adds a new playable species of energy beings called "Electroids". They live in the orbit of stars or black holes and many features are built around energy.

Features:
- New colony type: "Aurora" habitats are the homes of Electroids - pure energy spheres!
=> Each star class where the Aurora is being built adds different bonuses and districts to the colony.
- 5 Origins: You live in the orbit of stars, black holes or a distant star cluster.
- 10 Civics: From playing the Unbidden, to eating stars and more!
- 11 Traits: Add unique bonuses & pop production.
- 2 Perks: A new colossus with an own mechanic & a trait ascension.
- 3 Shipsets: All 3 Unbidden shipsets are usable (blue, orange, green).
- 1 Fallen Empire (Electroids): They are neutral but can be very strong if attacked.
=> FE is called the "Realm of Nova".

Inspiration
I always wanted an energy species in Stellaris, so I used ~2.5 weeks of my available time to design & create my own pack instead of just dreaming about it. I remember it was so much fun to create this one, I plan another species pack very soon!








Get the Unofficial Electroids Species!​

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This next mod is for those of you who really believe that unit just doesn’t have a soul.

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By Corsairmarks



Are you looking to end the pernicious threat of artificial intelligence? Maybe play the inverse of Determined Exterminators, or the slightly friendlier cousins of Fanatic Purifiers? Look no further, this is the mod for you! Play as the Organic Zealots who seek to outlaw and curtain development of cybernetics, robotics, and artificial intelligence. Should they encounter an abominable Machine Intelligence, or should the worst come to pass and an organic empire synthetically "ascend..." - that's what the Anti-Thinking Machine war goal is for. Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of an organic mind.

This mod adds a lot of gameplay content, but unfortunately needs to get heavily involved in altering built-in gameplay from Stellaris in order to add restrictions. It has a reasonable chance of conflicting with other mods focused on the same areas, but is supported by The Merger of Rules and has built-in support for Vassals Expanded and Reworked (FunEFork) (one agreement term value that is affected by both mods) and Forgotten History (playable with the Banished Threat origin).

Features:
* New homicidal civic Organic Zealots - friendly to organic empires, but hostile to robotic empires (the inverse of Determined Exterminators) with two council seat options
* Fully implements all features of being homicidal:
* Has a special Total War (Anti-Thinking Machine) against robotic empires
* No need to claim the territories of the foul machines
* Opinion modifiers impacted by empire ethics and ascension choices
* Diplomatic actions are restricted appropriately against robotic empires
* Purge robotic Pops to create Unity and Alloys
* Policy option restrictions similar to other homicidal empire types
* New Casus Belli/Wargoal (Force Policy/Outlaw AI) to force organic empires to outlaw robotics - the casus belli could be reused by others who want to add custom wargoals to force other kinds of policies
* New building Clone Birth-Labs (and corresponding job) available for regular (non-gestalt) empires to gain a small amount of organic Pop assembly
* New assimilation type Expurgatory Transfiguration to remove cybernetics
* Restricts Organic Zealots from researching AI-related technologies or selecting AI-related ascension perks/traditions
* Replacement technologies for Organic Zealots, including accessing a special leader trait instead of being able to research Positronic AI
* Special option for Organic Zealots to Sunder the Disconnected Contingency Core in order to create a powerful monument on their capital planet, or keep at a unity penalty in order to build more megastructure
* Works with all other mods by corsairmarks, including additional gameplay interactions

Inspiration
I was inspired to create this mod by player suggestions on the Stellaris Modding Den Discord. The idea of not-fully-homicidal empires intrigued me, and there was a good example to follow because Determined Exterminators get along with (most) other machine empires.

It was a lot of fun to write, so this mod includes overrides of almost all built-in Stellaris events that deal with artificial intelligence or cybernetics, in order to add additional story text or options for Organic Zealots. I carefully verify these events for changes with every official patch to Stellaris so that players can continue to purge robots without worrying about missing features from the base game. Clone Birth-Labs are an homage to novels written by C.J. Cherryh, and are to compensate for Spiritualists and Organic Zealots generally wanting to avoid robotics.





Get Organic Zealots!​

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For those of you on the other side of the robot debate, we have our next mod which adds a ton of new content for our mechanical “friends”.

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By XVCV



A few years ago, I made my first big mod for Machine Intelligence and Synthetic Ascended Empires. This mod is a rework of that. Thank you for your interest in my mod and this Mod Highlight! Have a nice day. :)

Features:
- 2 Custom GUIs for adding & removing Traits for the Ruler & Leaders
- 1 Ascension Perk for Unique Planet Classes for Popless Resources Production
- 1 Ascension Perk for Abyss (a Modified Version of the 'Shroud' in Vanilla) Access for Machine & Synth Empires
- 1 Ascension Perk for gaining & becoming a Biological & Mechanical Hybrid Species (which can have some of Biological and Mechanical Species Traits together, and has Food Pop Upkeep that is adjustable using a Policy)
- 2 Ascension Perks for adding & removing Gestalt Consciousness Ethics (i.e., Machine Intelligence <-> Synthetic Ascended Empire)
- 1 Ascension Perk for Determined Exterminators for triggering Machine Uprising against Another Empire via an Espionage Operation
- 1 Ascension Perk for Rogue Servitors for providing more various Pop Jobs for Bio-trophies
- 1 Ascension Perk for becoming a Determined Exterminator or Driven Assimilator or Rogue Servitor (or a Standard Machine)
- 2 Origins for starting as a Synthetic (Ascended) Empire (One for Normal Synth Start, Another with a Unique Homeworld)
- 1 Civic for starting with a Situation that slowly gains Progresses by Player Actions (i.e., Player adopts a Tradition, declares a War, surveys Stars, etc...) and gains Buffs for Resources Production
- 1 Civic for Machine Empires to form a Trade Route and send Trade Ships for earning Resources (with a Policy to determine the Type of the Resources) based on the Opponent's Trade Value or Monthly Energy Credit Production (for Gestalts)
- 1 Civic for Machine Empires to utilize Consumer Goods for better Unity Creation
and more!

Inspiration
I enjoy playing as machines or synths in Stellaris, but I feel that machines, in particular, lack content. For example, gestalts 'usually' cannot access 'Trade Value', 'Shroud', 'Factions', 'Consumer Goods' (as well as 'Foods' for standard machines), etc.

I believe this is due to an attempt to give them different play styles compared to non-gestalts. However, I think this should be achieved by providing more unique content for them, not by reducing it. Therefore, I decided to add this content myself.

That's how I started modding this game of my life. And now that was four years ago, considering that the original mod (Unofficial Machine & Synthetic Empire DLC) was released on June 6, 2019. Wow, time DOES fly so fast!






Get Machine & Robot Expansion!​

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Our final mod asks the question, why not play with your food?

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By corsairmarks



Lithoids can pick the Agrarian Idyll civic, but the benefits are still applied to farming districts. This mod creates a swapped Agrarian Idyll just for lithoids - now your miners will generate amenities instead of farmers! This mod also features English localisation for these effects.

Features
* Lithoids have a special civic swap for Agrarian Idyll, named Lithorian Idyll
* Miners (and miner-related) jobs to generate amenities instead of farmers
* Mining Districts grant bonus housing instead of Farming Districts
* Interacts with Origin: Subterranean for more stacking bonuses
* Swapped councilor seat that boosts mining instead of farming
* A new technology that mirrors Agrarian Utopias, instead further improving housing from Mining Districts
* Both versions of Agrarian Idyll gain partial bonus building slots from rural (Mining, Farming, and Generator) districts
* Both versions of Agrarian Idyll begin the game with more of their "preferred" rural district instead of City Districts
* Built-in support for Planetary Diversity
* Fully compatible with all other mods by corsairmarks

Inspiration
I wanted Lithoids to benefit more directly from Agrarian Idyll, which is already a very flavorful civic. Stellaris has evolved since the mod was originally published, making the mod more and more compatibility-friendly with other mods over time.



Get "Agrarian" Idyll for Lithoids!​

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Some of these mods are not compatible with one another. We’ve put together a (sort of) tested compatibility patch that will (hopefully) let these mods be run together. This patch will not be maintained past the current version, and if anyone wants to maintain it moving forward, please let me know in the mod comments.

Get the Compatibility Patch!

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That’s it for this week, be sure to check out Mod Highlights again next week, where we'll learn to love our neighbors!

by MrFreake_PDX

Hello Stellaris Community!

One of the things I’ve always wanted to do as a part of the Community team is to try and come up with a format to better highlight Community mods. The Steam workshop is a wonderful, almost magical place, but from a Mod Creator’s perspective unless you’re in the top 20 most popular mods (a hard place to reach after mods that have been there 7 years), or post a brand new mod (that gives you 7 days on the front of the Workshop, if you’re lucky), your mod will never be seen by someone who doesn’t actively search for it.

Since it’s summer, and it’s the time for experiments, we’ve started a small-scale experiment to see if we can highlight some of the lesser well known mods in the workshop. This is currently limited to a small group of modders, but should it turn out to be popular, we would like to eventually expand this to the broader modding community.

Each of these modder highlights will be geared towards specific aspects of the game, new species, politics, etc. Today we’re here to show off four warfare related mods.

Let's get into it!

This first mod is something a lot of you’ve been asking for. While this isn’t a likely direction that the base-game will go, maybe this is the Ground Combat Rework you were looking for. handwave

By Risker34


Major Features:

• Re-imagined Ground Armies
  
• Origin/Civic/Authority unique Army Types
  
• Improved Army types via research
  
• Industrial Connection to Army construction

Summary

Ground Command is a mod that attempts to expand upon the ground battles in Stellaris. It does this in several ways allowing for more control and greater roleplay potential. This is done by reworking the system to no longer use a single "Assault Army" but instead to use the components that an Assault army would be made of.

By giving the player the ability to recruit individual divisions it opens the door to a wide variety of different army types. These army types can be tailored to reflect the empire they come from by making certain civics, origins, authority types, or even ascension perks part of unlocking them.

There is also a system wherein more industrially taxing units, such as armored units, atmospheric air wings, and the theorized Mecha-Walker can only be built on planets that have at least 1 industrial district or have the industrial buildings (consumer goods factory/ Alloy forge). This was done both to reflect the actual challenges that armies have historically faced with producing equipment but also to give a sense of strategic importance to an empire's more industrialized worlds.

Inspiration

The inspiration came when I was playing my weekly multiplayer game with a friend and we were discussing how tedious invading worlds was. We both quickly accepted that we weren't experienced enough to make an alternate system mechanically but I had the idea of at least making it more interesting to engage with. I believed that if the ground portion of the game was as immersive as the political and naval aspects then the tedium would be a bit more bearable and so far it seems at least a few people agreed with me.

It was also a good opportunity to give some civics and origins that the community tends to neglect a little bit of love. Maybe someday someone will find all the wacky unique army types that I've hidden throughout the civics list.







# # # #

This next mod introduces new galaxy shapes and sizes to conquer, as well as new win condition mechanics that are guaranteed to spice up your next war focused run.
By Mute



Major Features:

• New Galaxy Shapes (Gemini, Triple, Islands, Split, Helix)
  
• New Galaxy Sizes (100,300,500,700,900)
  
• New Galaxy Size variants (Spotted & Aftermath)
  
• Galactic Seasons (Gameplay Modifiers)
  
• Extra Win Conditions (Emperor's Throne)
  
• Sudden Death Mechanics (Eclipse, Attrition)

Summary

Everything this mod adds are optional additions; the goal is to let players have more control over their current "campaign" via the Menu offered on game start. Customizability is the main focus, with many interesting combinations which allow for a unique experience each playthrough.

• Emperor's Throne has the Players fighting over a unique System at the Galaxy's Core, ensuring victory for whoever controls it long enough.
  
• Eclipse dooms the Galaxy to a gruesome and dark fate as all suns begin imploding into black holes starting from the Galaxy's edge and slowly creeping towards the core.
  
• Attrition plagues all life in the Galaxy, increasing costs and reducing growth, until finally pops begin dropping dead left and right.

Inspiration

The main reason I started creating this mod was to get some of my friends to finally try out Stellaris, as the lengthy playthroughs Stellaris suffers from put them off - that's where Win Conditions and Sudden Death come in. Both are inspired by other games' mechanics, such as Emperor's Throne which is a variant of a "King of the Hill" gamemode, and are intended to bring the game to an end quicker than usual, all while feeling more like a "natural end" than simply having a low victory year.







# # # #

Ever wanted to play as a Private Military Corporation? Well, with this next mod, you can!

By dimuch62



Major Features:

• transfer of fleets to other players
  
• sale of fleets to other players
  
• auction of fleets
  
• lease of fleets
  
• AI uses the functions of the mod

Summary

The mod allows you to play as a private military corporation that offers its fleets for rent to other empires. Or you can play with a friend with one player focusing on military dominance and the other on scientific dominance. The first player can always transfer fleets to the second. Or you can help an empire that is losing the war, but the defeat of which will be unprofitable.

Inspiration

It all started with a friend's phrase "can you make it so that I can transfer the fleet?" and one line of code "set_owner = player2".
Now this is a good mod that can be useful in various multiplayer games.





# # # #

And of course, in your next warfare playthrough, you’ll probably want a way to put that SPQR Namelist to good use. Want to make all roads lead to Deneb IIb? This next mod will give you the tools to do just that!

By Risker34



Major Features:
3 origins depicting different stages of Roman history, from the early Republican period, to the high Augustan Imperial Period and the late Imperial Period.

• The Republic:
  *Cheaper election costs
  * Faster ship build speed
  * +3 Admiral & General level cap
  * +25% army morale and +100 starting xp
  * Unique Ruler, Specialist, and Soldier jobs
  
• The Empire:
  * +3 General & Governor level cap
  * +100 army starting xp
  * -15% building & district cost
  * +15% megastructure build speed
  * +10 stability on all planets
  * Unique Ruler, Specialist, and Solder jobs
  
• Late Imperial State:
  * +3 Admiral & General level cap
  * +1 Limitanei job per 30 pops
  * +25% ship fire rate
  * Big Ruler class political power
  * Stability from soldier jobs +1
  * Unique Ruler, Specialist, and Soldier jobs

Summary

The mod consists of 3 origins, each with unique jobs and bonuses. The vanilla politician jobs will be completely replaced with more thematic versions along with a unique specialist job and unique soldier jobs.

Inspiration

As a big fan of Roman history I noticed that Stellaris had a SPQR name list but no actual reason to use it. The Prosperous Unification origin was a bit too overtly modern future and things like Remnants would be too detached from being future Rome. So I decided to add roleplay origins to go along with the SPQR namelist.






# # # #

Do they all work together?​

What sort of Chad-mod-enjoyer would you be if you didn’t ask this question? There are no conflicts between these four mods, meaning you should be able to run them altogether without any issues!

# # # #

That’s it for today’s Mod Highlights! We’ll be doing these all summer during gaps in the Dev Diary schedule, so stay tuned!

by Eladrin

Hello everyone!

Midsummer approaches, and with it, holidays.
We want you and your friends to have a reason to celebrate too. As we announced last week, Stellaris will be free to play on Steam from the 22nd to the 26th.

With the addition of Co-op (that is, up to five players playing as the same empire), there’s never been a better time to introduce your friends to Stellaris!

Remember, as host, your friends will have access to all of your DLC.



Stay tuned to our social media channels during the Free to Play event - they have plans.

Stellaris Nexus is a simultaneous turn-based multiplayer 4X game offering the full spectrum of a thrilling, strategic 4X experience. Choose a unique faction and leader and challenge up to 5 other players, plotting and battling your way to galactic dominance; all in about 1 hour.

As part of Steam Next Fest, it’s also playable for free until the 26th!


Hello! This is MordredViking, the Community Manager for Stellaris. We recently asked the community for their input on what DLCs to recommend to new players, and we thought we should share some of our findings.

We got 420 responses from you all, and among the questions we asked was, for how many hours had you played Stellaris? The answers ranged from a couple of hundred to a whopping 13,000! This came out to an average of 855 hours among all respondents. A pretty hardcore group!

The core of the questionnaire however, was of course which DLCs to recommend to a new Stellaris player, and here’s the top 10:



From these results, we wanted to have a bundle that provided a representative selection of available content, catering to a range of different play styles and fantasies. With this criteria and the survey results in mind, we settled on Utopia, Federations, Distant Stars and Synthetic Dawn.

Utopia allows for a broader range of empire choices, by providing new tools to develop the empire and ultimately allowing players to transform their nation into a paradise. Federations taps into a more diplomatic playstyle, and really ramps up the potential for in-game alliances and also enables power projection through bodies like the Galactic Council. Distant Stars entices eager explorers with new discoveries throughout the galaxy. Then finally, Synthetic Dawn brings those robot dreams to life with expanded robotic gameplay options.


We will return with dev diaries on July 27th with Habitat discussions, and start going into detail regarding what’s planned for the 3.9 Caelum update.

Like 3.1 Lem, 3.3 Libra, and 3.6 Orion, Caelum will be a Custodian update focused on revisiting old packs, catching up on technical debt, and generally improving the game.

[expand type=show more]

The newly clarified Calamitous Birth tooltip.


The home crater gets a bit of a boost.


A minor tweak to the craters makes a big difference.


What do Lithoids eat?


Pom-a-granites!


Placeholder icons on the approaches.


Once you start feasting, it's really hard to stop.
Om nom nom.

[/expand]

by Eladrin

Hello everyone!

The ‘Gemini’ 3.8.4 update has been released today. In it, we’ve continued post-release balance work. Some of the bigger changes in the release include the conversion of several leader traits into Council Traits either to reduce micromanagement (moving a governor from planet to planet to maximize benefits of some traits) or to address undesired stacking issues.

[expand type=showmore]
############################################################​
#################### VERSION 3.8.4 ######################​
############################################################​

Balance

• Rebalanced a number of leader traits: Some general and governor traits that previously encouraged moving leaders from planet to planet have been made council traits or had their modifiers changed to discourage this. Resource production traits now require the leader to have at least level 2 to gain the first tier.
  
• Empire Size now has a floor of 50, and thus can no longer go negative.
  
• Increased the bombardment effectiveness of large fleets.
  
• The base rate at which Raiding bombardment steals pops has been dramatically reduced. Each army present on a planet will also protect 2 pops from being vulnerable to Raiding bombardment. (Raiding bombardment is always unable to steal the last pop of a colony)
  
• Renormalised political power from living standards and reduced base faction unity gain to better fit intended unity production. The Shared Burdens civic no longer grants an increase to the base unity of the Egalitarian faction, as the benefit is now rolled into their living standards.
  
• Sequential End-Game Crises now get +2 strength multipliers instead of +1.5.
  
• The Khan now has terrifying admiral traits.
  
• The opinion modifier from Defender of the Galaxy now only affects normal, non-fallen/awakened, empires that are capable of independent diplomacy.
  
• Colonists now increase planetary build speed by 10% instead of creating defensive armies.

AI

• Fixed AI hiring a governor without having a planet to assign them to.
  
• Fixed AI hiring scientists without having science ships to assign them to.

Bugfixes

• Broken Shackles Origin event "Homesick" no longer casts affected Pops into the void
  
• Adjusted width of MP lobby chat entries so that they don't overlap the scroll bar.
  
• Council Agenda Costs now benefit from Empire Size Effect modifiers.
  
• Cyborg general trait will now add +2 combat width, as stated in the tooltip
  
• Empires with the Under One Ruler origin no longer ignore the initial 20 year cooldown on government reform.
  
• Federation project Flocks of Cloud should no longer get stuck ad infinitum in the situation log
  
• Fixed an error in which you may have been prevented from using Operation Crisis Beacon again - beyond the intended 4-year lockout period - if said Operation was aborted after confirming its target.
  
• Fixed duplicate tradition names in French
  
• Fixed Imperial Heirs not having a starting leader trait.
  
• Fixed queued move orders from a system with an FTL inhibitor not being displayed correctly.
  
• Fixed randomly generated empires having DLC-locked civics.
  
• Fixed randomly generated species having DLC-locked traits.
  
• Fixed randomly generated species having invalid trait and climate preference combinations.
  
• Fixed randomly generated species not having enough traits if it has traits (such as Aquatic) that are required by something else.
  
• Fixed the bonus leader trait from Aptitude Traditions not applying to Imperial Heirs.
  
• Fixed tooltip for Beacon of Liberty and Fanatic Purifiers, now they do mention that they are incompatible with Crusader Spirit
  
• Imperial Heirs are excluded from the effects of The Orb.
  
• Imperial Heirs that are generals or admirals in empires with Distinguished Admiralty now benefit from the +2 starting level.
  
• Invalid civics will get removed when authority is changed through event for Under One Rule
  
• Leaders excluded from the upkeep cost now correctly produce resources
  
• Pharma State civic is now correctly blocked by Payback and Broken Shackles.
  
• Removed DLC lock on some faction demands that were introduced in 3.8
  
• Set the AI weight for reorganizing the council to 0.
  
• Void Dweller MegaCorps with the Pharma State civic now correctly replace their starting Holo-Theaters with a Gene Clinic, unless they also have Permanent Employment (in which case it is replaced with the Employment Center).
  
• Warform no longer has the synth trait and has the second tier of the skirmisher trait.

Improvements

• Imperial Heirs are now up to 10 years younger than regular leaders of the same species. Starting Imperial Rulers are now up to 15 years older than regular leaders of the same species.
  
• Imperial Heirs that benefit from bonus starting levels now have selectable traits for those levels for owners of Galactic Paragons.
  
• Imperial Rulers and Heirs now have a 5% chance to start with a negative trait and an additional positive trait. The Philosopher King civic negates this.

UI

• Fixed leader portrait clipping in the level up window.
  
• Fixed position of Speech To Text button in the MP lobby.
  
• Fixed width of MP lobby chat text for large fonts and text to speech.
  
• If a player in your coop group adds a leader trait while you have the level up window open and there are no more traits to add, it will show the last selection.
  
• Reworked the planet occupation icon frame
  
• Selecting a ship by clicking it will now ignore its bounding box if it has a collision mesh.

Modding

• Empire size string now uses the actual defines instead of localized numbers for its message.
  
• Made it possible to set what leader portrait container to use for each location of the new portraits
  
• Made reload_gui console command more stable

[/expand]

More changes to leader traits and some of the mechanics surrounding them will be coming in 3.9 in the fall. We’re placing some of the ideas and suggestions we’ve received into our “Summer Experimentation” bucket and we’ll see which ones pan out.

At this point we feel that 3.8 Gemini is in a stable state, and barring the need for a 3.8.5 hotfix, the next planned release will be 3.9 Caelum. (Caelum, “the Chisel”, represents a sculptor’s tools. Perfect for a balancing and polish update.)


A pass has been done on living standard political power and unity generation to normalize them when compared with one another - living standards like Shared Burdens and Utopian Abundance were not generating enough, while Academic Privilege was previously the “champion of Unity” - a little odd for the Materialist living standard.

After these changes, Utopian Abundance should be at the top of the charts, followed by Shared Burdens. (Which no longer needs the “double Unity from the Egalitarian faction” crutch.)

These changes have gone live in today’s update.


A few people [ed: a few?!?] have discussed the tendency of late game systems to become flooded with extreme numbers of habitats. We have some ideas on different ways to curb this behavior while still ensuring that habitats are thematic and effective, especially in the hands of Void Dwellers.

I’ll have a broader feedback discussion later on during the summer where we present some of our ideas, discuss how experiments with them went, and collect additional feedback from the community.

Stellaris with a Twist is our streaming event, where Ep3o and AlphaYangDelete play co-op multiplayer, and try to accomplish goals suggested and chosen by the Community.


If you have a suggestion for the final stream's goals, you can submit it here, and if you've missed part of this event you can get caught up here!

The last session of Stellaris with a Twist is next week, at 1500 CEST! Don't miss the exciting conclusion and find out which of our streamers will accomplish their Community-Suggested Goals for the Stream!

But wait, there's more!


What's better than having a galaxy full of wonder to explore? Conquering that galaxy with a friend, obviously!

From June 22nd to June 26th, Stellaris will be Free to Play; there will never be a better time to introduce a friend to Stellaris -- and with the addition of co-op, you can now work together to conquer liberate the galaxy like never before.

In Stellaris multiplayer, the host's DLC is shared between all the players in the game -- the same holds true for co-op, even if one of the players is playing for free. So grab a friend, your planet cracker, and be sure to play during the Free to Play weekend! Thinking of trying Stellaris for the first time during the Free to Play, but don't know where to start? Join us on Discord; from the 22nd to the 26th, our Player Helpers will be running "Learn to Play" Stellaris sessions!

That's it for this week, see you next week!

Hello,

The latest minor patch for Stellaris is ready and released, fixing a number of issues and further balancing the new mechanics.

This should be the last of the 3.8 patches, although the teams work continues targeting later updates.

Please find the patch notes below.
3.8.4 "Gemini" Patch Notes
[expand type=details]
############################################################
#################### VERSION 3.8.4 ######################
############################################################

• Rebalanced a number of leader traits: Some general and governor traits that previously encouraged moving leaders from planet to planet have been made council traits or had their modifiers changed to discourage this. Resource production traits now require the leader to have at least level 2 to gain the first tier.
  
• Empire Size now has a floor of 50, and thus can no longer go negative.
  
• Increased the bombardment effectiveness of large fleets.
  
• The base rate at which Raiding bombardment steals pops has been dramatically reduced. Each army present on a planet will also protect 2 pops from being vulnerable to Raiding bombardment. (Raiding bombardment is always unable to steal the last pop of a colony)
  
• Renormalised political power from living standards and reduced base faction unity gain to better fit intended unity production. The Shared Burdens civic no longer grants an increase to the base unity of the Egalitarian faction, as the benefit is now rolled into their living standards.
  
• Sequential End-Game Crises now get +2 strength multipliers instead of +1.5.
  
• The Khan now has terrifying admiral traits.
  
• The opinion modifier from Defender of the Galaxy now only affects normal, non-fallen/awakened, empires that are capable of independent diplomacy.
  
• Colonists now increase planetary build speed by 10% instead of creating defensive armies.
  

• Fixed AI hiring a governor without having a planet to assign them to.
  
• Fixed AI hiring scientists without having science ships to assign them to.

• Broken Shackles Origin event "Homesick" no longer casts affected Pops into the void
  
• Adjusted width of MP lobby chat entries so that they don't overlap the scroll bar.
  
• Council Agenda Costs now benefit from Empire Size Effect modifiers.
  
• Cyborg general trait will now add +2 combat width, as stated in the tooltip
  
• Empires with the Under One Ruler origin no longer ignore the initial 20 year cooldown on government reform.
  
• Federation project Flocks of Cloud should no longer get stuck ad infinitum in the situation log
  
• Fixed an error in which you may have been prevented from using Operation Crisis Beacon again - beyond the intended 4-year lockout period - if said Operation was aborted after confirming its target.
  
• Fixed duplicate tradition names in French
  
• Fixed Imperial Heirs not having a starting leader trait.
  
• Fixed queued move orders from a system with an FTL inhibitor not being displayed correctly.
  
• Fixed randomly generated empires having DLC-locked civics.
  
• Fixed randomly generated species having DLC-locked traits.
  
• Fixed randomly generated species having invalid trait and climate preference combinations.
  
• Fixed randomly generated species not having enough traits if it has traits (such as Aquatic) that are required by something else.
  
• Fixed the bonus leader trait from Aptitude Traditions not applying to Imperial Heirs.
  
• Fixed tooltip for Beacon of Liberty and Fanatic Purifiers, now they do mention that they are incompatible with Crusader Spirit
  
• Imperial Heirs are excluded from the effects of The Orb.
  
• Imperial Heirs that are generals or admirals in empires with Distinguished Admiralty now benefit from the +2 starting level.
  
• Invalid civics will get removed when authority is changed through event for Under One Rule
  
• Leaders excluded from the upkeep cost now correctly produce resources
  
• Pharma State civic is now correctly blocked by Payback and Broken Shackles.
  
• Removed DLC lock on some faction demands that were introduced in 3.8
  
• Set the AI weight for reorganizing the council to 0.
  
• Void Dweller MegaCorps with the Pharma State civic now correctly replace their starting Holo-Theaters with a Gene Clinic, unless they also have Permanent Employment (in which case it is replaced with the Employment Center).
  
• Warform no longer has the synth trait and has the second tier of the skirmisher trait.

• Imperial Heirs are now up to 10 years younger than regular leaders of the same species. Starting Imperial Rulers are now up to 15 years older than regular leaders of the same species.
  
• Imperial Heirs that benefit from bonus starting levels now have selectable traits for those levels for owners of Galactic Paragons.
  
• Imperial Rulers and Heirs now have a 5% chance to start with a negative trait and an additional positive trait. The Philosopher King civic negates this.

• Fixed leader portrait clipping in the level up window.
  
• Fixed position of Speech To Text button in the MP lobby.
  
• Fixed width of MP lobby chat text for large fonts and text to speech.
  
• If a player in your coop group adds a leader trait while you have the level up window open and there are no more traits to add, it will show the last selection.
  
• Reworked the planet occupation icon frame
  
• Selecting a ship by clicking it will now ignore its bounding box if it has a collision mesh.

• Empire size string now uses the actual defines instead of localized numbers for its message.
  
• Made it possible to set what leader portrait container to use for each location of the new portraits
  
• Made reload_gui console command more stable

[/expand]

by Eladrin

Hello everyone!

Now that the 3.8.3 patch has been released, and it seems so far that multiplayer and co-op stability is in a pretty good state. We’re continuing work on a 3.8.4 release planned for a few weeks from now, to get some more fixes in before summer hits.

A few highlights include changes relating to ground combat collateral damage and bombardment (specifically Raiding Bombardment).

We’re reducing the amount of collateral damage ground units deal, as many invasions were destroying the colonies before the battle completed.

The base rate at which Raiding bombardment steals pops will be dramatically reduced. Each army present on a planet will also protect 3 pops from being vulnerable to Raiding bombardment. (Raiding bombardment is always unable to steal the last pop of a colony, so on a colony with three defending armies the last ten pops would be safe from raiding.)

Since next week is another short week in Sweden, our next dev diary will be on June 15th, though I may drop a little update with some more of the confirmed fixes planned for 3.8.4.

Now I’ll pass it over to MordredViking for some information on the community event that’s starting.


Hello! I’m Mordred Viking, the Community Manager for Stellaris!

To celebrate Stellaris’ 7th anniversary, we’re running our Stellaris with a Twist event! Two of our favorite content creators will explore a galaxy, with objectives suggested by, and voted on, by you, the Community. These streams will run for the first three Wednesdays in June (June 7th, 14th and 21st), at 1500 CEST (UTC+1). Want more details on this event, and how you can get involved? Check out this forum post!

Each player will have a personal goal to achieve, plus they will have a joint goal. All the Content Creator goals will be crowdsourced from the Community. Goal suggestions are currently open, so you can leave your suggestions here. Be sure to watch our social media channels (or join us on Discord!), because voting will start on Friday and be active all weekend. On Monday we will announce the goals for the first stream on Wednesday, June 7th!


Subscribe to Ep3o and follow AlphaYangDelete!​

That's it for this week, folks! See you again on June 15th (or sooner)!

Hello,

Our latest patch is now live and ready for download.

Please find the patch notes below.

Enjoy!

STELLARIS 3.8.3 PATCH NOTES
[expand type=details]
############################################################
#################### VERSION 3.8.3 ######################
############################################################

• It is now possible to rename council positions by clicking on council position name in the council view.
  
• Added additional event chains to Under One Rule.
  
• Under One Rule now will take into account if the ruler was bad or good towards citizens.
  
• Added a checkbox to toggle automatic expansion of a sector in the sector editor
  
• Made the three different "Terraforming Candidate Discovered" events turn into messages if you have already found one before.
  
• The pre-sapients that worship the Beholder now have the Psionic trait.
  
• The Beholder's Psi-Inoculation process is now a pair of decisions to toggle it on and off, instead of a decision to be enacted for each pop you want to become psionic.
  
• The Animator of Clay has blessed the corroded one.
  
• Imperial Heirs will now be more likely to adopt the class of the current ruler if you have the Philosopher King civic.
  
• Imperial heirs will now have their chosen class weighted by civics and traditions that give bonuses to specific leader classes.
  
• Added the Reorganize Council agenda, which allows reselection of unlocked council positions without the need to reform the government.
  
• Beholder now has a recruitment event, and Azaryn's recruitment event has a couple more options
  
• Added a checkbox in the army tab of the planet view to control if a planet is used via the sector army builder or not
  
• Added scroll wheel speed settings
  
• Leaders in the leader pool that start with a negative trait, now correctly gets one less additional negative trait during their lifespan.
  
• For players without Galactic Paragons, leaders will more often get traits that match if they're assigned as councilors or not.
  
• Increased the age span of new leaders, but weighted towards the middle. Initial Leaders will now also be roughly the same age as pool leaders.
  
• The edict fund is now shown in the council view.
  
• Imperial empires can now crown a Chosen One to be the Divine Sovereign if the Chosen One is the current ruler or heir.

• Legendary leaders do not count towards Leader Capacity.
  
• The Eager trait now has an additional effect: these leaders will not contribute towards Leader Capacity until they reach level 4. Assigned some event spawned leaders the Eager (II) trait.
  
• Admirals that command fleets hired from marauders no longer count towards your leader cap.
  
• XP Penalties for going over leader capacity have been reduced. The LEADER_CAPACITY_XP_SCALE define has been added for modders to be able to easily adjust this number.
  
• Military fleets led by an Admiral can now explore unsurveyed hyperlanes. (This does not permit Admirals to survey planets, anomalies, or wormholes.)
  
• Admirals no longer give Fleet Command Limit based off of their level.
  
• Researching Galactic Administration now removes the cooldown for government reform, this was previously only done if you obtained it via Statecraft traditions.
  
• Rebalanced many traditions and ascension Perks.
  
• Opener for Aptitude traditions now gives +1 trait, moved from the Finisher. This is retroactively applied to leaders that have been hired or are in your leader pool.
  
• The Empire Needs You now gives -25% Leader Hire Cost instead of +1 Leader Capacity.
  
• Specialist Training now gives +25% Leader XP Gain.
  
• Psychological Profiling now gives -25% Leader Upkeep Cost in addition to -1 Max Negative Traits.
  
• Healthcare Program now gives +20 Leader Lifespan instead of +10 Leader Lifespan.
  
• Aptitude Finisher now gives +1 Leader Capacity and +1 Leader Trait Pick options instead of +1 trait.
  
• Science Division now gives -10% Scientist Cost and Upkeep instead of +20% Scientist XP Gain.
  
• Polytechnic Education now gives +10% Leader XP gain instead of +20%.
  
• Colonial Viceroys now gives -10% Governor Cost and Upkeep instead of +20% Governor XP Gain.
  
• War Games now gives -10% Admiral Cost and Upkeep instead of +20% Admiral XP Gain.
  
• Mind and Body now gives +10 Leader Lifespan instead of +20 Leader Lifespan.
  
• Finisher effect for Statecraft now grants Galactic Administration as a research option with 25% progress instead of giving the tech for tree.
  
• Resistance is Frugal now also gives -10% General Cost and Upkeep.
  
• Imperial Prerogative now gives +2 Leader Capacity in addition to its existing effects.
  
• Transcendent Learning Prerogative now gives +2 Leader Capacity, +1 Leader Pool Size and +33% Leader XP gain.
  
• Aptitude Tradition "Champions of the Empire" now gives bonus per Leaders' levels. Effect is now a flat -2 Empire Size per Governor level, and 0.5% Exp per Scientist level (and 2 Naval capacity per Admiral/General level)
  
• Guardian trait maximum effect is now +33% Defense Platform Damage and Hull Points.
  
• Frontier Spirit trait maximum effects changed to -10% Colony Ship Cost and +50% Colonization Speed and +1 starting pop for colonies.
  
• Cyborg generals now increase planetary combat width.
  
• Reduced passive experience gain by 30% for Progenitor Hive leaders from level 1-6 and 50% for Progenitor Hive leaders between 7-10.
  
• Gray Eminence destiny trait now reduces the effects of empire size, instead of reducing empire size directly. Updated Aturion Efficiency to match Gray Eminence.
  
• Now imperial rulers do not lose imperial heir trait, so they don't become worse when they take over the country.
  
• Lowered the spawn chance for the legendary paragon Keides by 75%.
  
• Autocannons are no longer valued at three times their intended military power.
  
• Now criminals are also unhappy when under oppressive autocracy civic
  
• Kai-Sha's "Expanded Contact Network" event will now upgrade her Shady Contacts trait if she already has it. And gives intel on other empires if it has already been maxed out.
  
• Replaced -20% Empire Size reduction for Aturion Efficiency trait with -10% Empire Size Penalty.
  
• Leader traits that have base resource production now produce the market equivalent of 8 energy/month for tier 1 and 24 energy/month for tier.
  
• Aggressor admiral sub-class now gives +7.5% weapon damage.
  
• Artillerist II trait now gives +7.5% tracking.
  
• Fortifier trait now scales between -5% Starbase upgrade cost and -5% Defense platform cost at tier 1 to -10% Starbase upgrade cost, -10% Defense platform cost, +5% Starbase hullpoints and +5% Defense platform hullpoints at tier 3.
  
• Armada Logistician trait ship upkeep maximum reduction is now -10%.
  
• Military Pioneer trait maximum effects are now +20% Ship Build Speed and -10% Ship Build Cost.
  
• Guerilla Tactician now gives a flat 10 Evasion instead of a +50% Evasion multiplier.
  
• Architect of War now gives -10% Military Ship Cost.
  
• Charisma trait now has a maximum Edict Upkeep reduction of -10%
  
• Removed -5% Military Ship Cost from the Strategist sub-class
  
• Geological Consultant trait maximum effect reduced to 9 months of unity per blocker removed.
  
• Retired Fleet Officer trait maximum effects reduced to +20% Ship Build Speed and -10% Ship Build Cost.
  
• Agrarian Upbringing trait now checks for country_uses_food = yes instead of being biological.
  
• Shipwright maximum effects reduced to +10% Ship Build Speed and -10% Ship Build Cost.
  
• Frontier Spirit maximum effects reduced to -10% Colony Ship Cost and +45% Colonization Speed.
  
• Architectural Sense maximum effects reduced to -10% Buildings and Districts Cost, -5% Buildings and District Upkeep, +25% Planetary Build Speed.
  
• Experimenter trait now gives a maxium of 2×Leader Level Research Points per month.
  
• Explorer trait maximum effects reduced to -10% Science Ship Cost and +25% Anomaly Research Speed.
  
• Expansionist maximum effects reduced to -10% Outpost Alloy and Influence Cost.
  
• Great Researcher trait now gives 5×Leader Level Research Points per month.
  
• Taskmaster trait XP reduced from 600 to 500. In return it now has soldiers produce 2/2/2 Energy/Minerals/Food (for countries that use food) or 3/3 Energy/Minerals (for countries that don't)

• Under One Rule now changes to Imperial Authority when transitioning to Galactic Emperor or Psionic Sovereign.
  
• Intellectual Espionage trait now takes into account all researcher category jobs on the planet.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Expanded Hive Warren would get deleted if there was no remaining unupgraded Hive Warrens on the planet
  
• Updated all researcher jobs to check for Academic Recruiter.
  
• Increased the army upkeep from Disorder II trait.
  
• Chainbreaker trait now requires Egalitarian ethics.
  
• Honored Warmaster trait now requires Xenophile ethics.
  
• Commented out cut prospecting decision.
  
• Kidnapper trait now checks that the general's owner allows slavery instead of checking their ethics.
  
• Taskmaster trait no longer gives an undocumented +5% Building Speed per soldier job.
  
• Now you can't terraform with Azaryn without launching her special ability.
  
• The Death of a Great Leader event should no longer fire when you send a leader off to the Keepers of Knowledge.
  
• Cloaked Ships will no longer block starbases from being rebuilt.
  
• Moved gestalt nodes further apart from each other in the council view so that trait picking doesn't get blocked when they have a lot of traits.
  
• The planet visuals should now update properly when planets change class
  
• Fixed an issue where traits given via event options would not correctly display triggered effects
  
• The ambience sound effect played in the council view is now properly affected by the ambience volume slider
  
• Fixed an issue where leaders that changed empires would retain their council position in their old empire
  
• Updated all researcher jobs to check for leader_trait_academia_recruiter
  
• Fixed a bug where modding the species appearance would not apply to the ruler
  
• leader_trait_industrial_espionage now takes into account all researcher category jobs on the planet.
  
• The Scholarium Investigator leader trait now gives +25% Assist Research Efficiency instead of failing to give 10% Research Speed as a non-council trait.
  
• Fixed a COOP bug where it was possible for several players to unlock council positions at the same time resulting in duplicates
  
• If there is a wormhole in the capital system, then the Keides wormhole will spawn in a random neighboring system 1-2 jumps away
  
• Cordyceptic Stargazers now correctly spawn with an amoeba fleet again.
  
• Fixed Eager Explorer empires spawning with an extra scientist.
  
• Slaves are now properly set under dystopian living standard
  
• Any Gestalt empire generated after game start (e.g. from machine uprising) should now correctly get their Gestalt council nodes.
  
• Hyperdrive technologies no longer show duplicated icons.
  
• Fixed issues where starbase modifiers would apply to defensive platforms when they shouldn't
  
• Fixed an issue where pre FTL empires spawned from the necrophage origin would spawn in orbit of their planet
  
• Fixed a bug where ships would sometimes stop following its target when they entered a hyperlane
  
• Zroni Relic will now add 1 level to the leader, but won't choose trait on random it will be up to player to chose the trait.
  
• Fixed notification map ping staying visible for some time after dismissing the notification.
  
• Fixed a bug where some traits would not properly localize their names when their modifiers are part of tooltips
  
• Fixed a bug where the Insightful trait tooltip would duplicate headers for its effects
  
• Fixed an issue where it was not possible to unassign envoys from their current task
  
• Fixed Resilient trait to properly adjust for synths. Did the same for destiny trait which was giving leader life span
  
• Crusader Spirit Opinion Modifier: Now it gives -80 opinion towards everyone of different ethic and +20 to the same ethic empires
  
• Fixed issues with the fleet manager where the buttons to increase and decrease the number of ships would not work correctly when using shift or ctrl modifiers
  
• Rogue Scientist event chain shouldn't trigger for Governors assigned as Head of Science.
  
• Updated some trigger loc from "No of ..." to "Number of ..." to be more consistent with the rest of the game.
  
• Fixed Tooltip for Paranoid Leader Trait
  
• Fixed title case for anomaly.3141 "The Depths of Alien Life"
  
• The event that allows you to pick a Chosen One no longer says "three individuals" are capable of absorbing such power and proceeds to list four names.
  
• Events that give the Chosen traits now check that the leader in question is psionic.
  
• Fixed an issue where you could reinforce a fleet when the template was not filled with the correct ships even though the fleet was filled on command limit
  
• Fixed the spawn chance modifier of the anomaly The Orb, as it could not spawn before.
  
• Beholder planetfall error message now states that an empty building slot is required.
  
• Fixed icon for brainslug species trait again.
  
• You can no longer psi-inoculate hive-minded pops or those being purged.
  
• Fallen empire capital planets should now have the correct planetary designation.
  
• You can no longer create subjects from sectors if the primary species would be an infertile clone army species.
  
• Marauder admirals can no longer serve on the council or be manually fired.
  
• Fixed some edges where a ruler could be chosen by a shroud entity but not awarded the trait.
  
• Added scripted loc for GetDefenseForceOrArmada and GetGDFOrArmada
  
• Updated Cybernetic Advantage agenda so it doesn't display placeholder art.
  
• Regular empires no longer have machine or hive-mind leaders in their external leader pools and vice versa.
  
• Cloned Organs/Self-Preservation Protocols now correctly has the same effects as Mind and Body.
  
• Fixed incorrect modifiers on the adoption effect of Synthetic traditions.
  
• Fixed MP lobby chat messages and scroll bar spilling outside the chat box.
  
• Fixed most tooltips in the game browser not working.
  
• Fixed Plantoids Species Pack DLC not showing up in MP lobby DLC list
  
• Fixed misalignment of the DLC icons in the multiplayer lobby
  
• Fixed icon lists sometimes becoming vertical when they should be horizontal
  
• Fixed coop presence icons not always showing their tooltip.
  
• The Interstellar Recruitment Office tooltip now specifies why you can't build it if you already have one in your empire.
  
• The sentinels archaeology site will now put Azaryn back on her own ship when she returns.
  
• Fixed a bug where some mercenary fleets would not have an admiral assigned to them
  
• Mercenary Admirals now get Mercenary Warrior Trait and 2 admiral traits to represent their level
  
• Mercenary Enclaves should no longer steal their admirals which they just rented out

• AI will now wait until it has at least 5 planets and 25 years before choosing a specialization designation for its homeworld
  
• Fixed an issue where AI would be unable to build any buildings if they desired to build the Ancient Refinery but did not have access to any minor artifacts

• Fixed a number of Out of Sync errors.
  
• Increased performance in the leader view
  
• Fixed a crash that would sometimes occur when a scientist was elected ruler while performing science ship orders
  
• Fixed a rare, but persistent crash when an empire was destroyed
  
• Fixed a crash that could sometimes happen if there were issues opening or writing log files
  
• Fixed crash in MP lobby when you confirm disbanding a coop group if the player list changed while the confirmation popup was open.
  
• Disabled tooltips in the loading screen to avoid crashes related to focus loss.

• Re-enabled tooltips while the game has no focus as hiding them caused issues for screen readers.
  
• Added tooltips for the join/leave coop empire button in the MP lobby when you can't click it.
  
• Added a tooltip for the coop checkbox in the MP lobby when you can't change it due to being ready.
  
• Use different titles for the multiplayer and coop game browsers.
  
• The multiplayer game browser now has a column that shows whether a game allows coop.
  
• Fixed an issue where the active agendas list would sometimes duplicate elements
  
• Added a new version of the main coop presence view to the topbar for resolutions with width >= 1600
  
• Auto-confirm disbanding a coop group in the MP lobby if all other players leave the group.
  
• Modifiers that affect leader experience gain will now be indented under a "Experience Gain Rate:" header
  
• Added confirmation prompt when selecting a country during hotjoining
  
• Lysator Syng's hire tooltip now shows that hiring him will give you 3 pirate ships as well.
  
• Show decimals for power projection breakdown in naval cap tooltip

• Added set_random_$CLASS$_background_effect script effects, to assign a random background class to a leader. $CLASS$ can be replaced with admiral, general, governor, or scientist.
  
• Added support for custom_tooltip_with_modifiers for council positions.
  
• Updated documentation for council positions to include new script support. See 01_test_councilor.txt for an example of a council position not linked to civics.
  
• Added script effect "unlock_council_selection = yes" to force validation of council positions and allow the player to reselect their council positions.
  
• Fixed the ethics OverLappingElementsBox not reloading properly
  
• Fixed the spacing parameter not working for vertical OverlappingElementBoxTypes
  
• Added new "empire_size_add" modifier, which flatly increases or decreases the Empire size.
  
• Council position unlock screen will now show council positions which are available by scope check but don't require any civics
  
• Added console command "debug_trait_weights", which enables logging of some of the trait random roll weights.
  
• Added military_power_multiplier to weapon components, which allows manual adjustment of combat power assessment for intangibles that are otherwise difficult to automate.
  
• Use 2 decimals for army upkeep in army view

[/expand]

Please note that save file compatibility between versions is not guaranteed.

If you have an important game going, please back up the save file before trying to load the save in the new version. You can roll back to a prior version by right-clicking on Stellaris in your library -> Properties -> Betas -> choose the desired version from the drop-down.

If you experience crashing or other issues, first disable all mods and start a new save. If the issue persists, please report it on the Bug Report forums.

by Eladrin

Hello again!

We’ve been working on a balance and bugfixing update, which should hopefully be coming to you early next week. Today I’ll be going over some of the things that will be in it, as well as go into why we’ve prioritized certain fixes over others.

STELLARIS 3.8.3 ‘GEMINI’ PRELIMINARY PATCH NOTES

[expand type=showmore]
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#################### VERSION 3.8.3 Patch ######################​
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Improvements

• It is now possible to rename council positions by clicking on council position name in the council view.
  
• Added additional event chains to Under One Rule.
  
• Under One Rule now will take into account if the ruler was bad or good towards citizens.
  
• Added a checkbox to toggle automatic expansion of a sector in the sector editor
  
• Made the three different "Terraforming Candidate Discovered" events turn into messages if you have already found one before.
  
• The pre-sapients that worship the Beholder now have the Psionic trait.
  
• The Beholder's Psi-Inoculation process is now a pair of decisions to toggle it on and off, instead of a decision to be enacted for each pop you want to become psionic.
  
• The Animator of Clay has blessed the corroded one.
  
• Imperial Heirs will now be more likely to adopt the class of the current ruler if you have the Philosopher King civic.
  
• Imperial heirs will now have their chosen class weighted by civics and traditions that give bonuses to specific leader classes.
  
• Added the Reorganize Council agenda, which allows reselection of unlocked council positions without the need to reform the government.
  
• Beholder now has a recruitment event, and Azaryn's recruitment event has a couple more options
  
• Added a checkbox in the army tab of the planet view to control if a planet is used via the sector army builder or not
  
• Added scroll wheel speed settings
  
• Leaders in the leader pool that start with a negative trait, now correctly gets one less additional negative trait during their lifespan.
  
• For players without Galactic Paragons, leaders will more often get traits that match if they're assigned as councilors or not.
  
• Increased the age span of new leaders, but weighted towards the middle. Initial Leaders will now also be roughly the same age as pool leaders.
  
• The edict fund is now shown in the council view.
  
• Imperial empires can now crown a Chosen One to be the Divine Sovereign if the Chosen One is the current ruler or heir.

Balance

• Legendary leaders do not count towards Leader Capacity.
  
• The Eager trait now has an additional effect: these leaders will not contribute towards Leader Capacity until they reach level 4. Assigned some event spawned leaders the Eager (II) trait.
  
• Admirals that command fleets hired from marauders no longer count towards your leader cap.
  
• XP Penalties for going over leader capacity have been reduced. The LEADER_CAPACITY_XP_SCALE define has been added for modders to be able to easily adjust this number.
  
• Military fleets led by an Admiral can now explore unsurveyed hyperlanes. (This does not permit Admirals to survey planets, anomalies, or wormholes.)
  
• Admirals no longer give Fleet Command Limit based off of their level.
  
• Researching Galactic Administration now removes the cooldown for government reform, this was previously only done if you obtained it via Statecraft traditions.
  
• Rebalanced many traditions and ascension Perks.
  
• Opener for Aptitude traditions now gives +1 trait, moved from the Finisher. This is retroactively applied to leaders that have been hired or are in your leader pool.
  
• The Empire Needs You now gives -25% Leader Hire Cost instead of +1 Leader Capacity.
  
• Specialist Training now gives +25% Leader XP Gain.
  
• Psychological Profiling now gives -25% Leader Upkeep Cost in addition to -1 Max Negative Traits.
  
• Healthcare Program now gives +20 Leader Lifespan instead of +10 Leader Lifespan.
  
• Aptitude Finisher now gives +1 Leader Capacity and +1 Leader Trait Pick options instead of +1 trait.
  
• Science Division now gives -10% Scientist Cost and Upkeep instead of +20% Scientist XP Gain.
  
• Polytechnic Education now gives +10% Leader XP gain instead of +20%.
  
• Colonial Viceroys now gives -10% Governor Cost and Upkeep instead of +20% Governor XP Gain.
  
• War Games now gives -10% Admiral Cost and Upkeep instead of +20% Admiral XP Gain.
  
• Mind and Body now gives +10 Leader Lifespan instead of +20 Leader Lifespan.
  
• Finisher effect for Statecraft now grants Galactic Administration as a research option with 25% progress instead of giving the tech for tree.
  
• Resistance is Frugal now also gives -10% General Cost and Upkeep.
  
• Imperial Prerogative now gives +2 Leader Capacity in addition to its existing effects.
  
• Transcendent Learning Prerogative now gives +2 Leader Capacity, +1 Leader Pool Size and +33% Leader XP gain.
  
• Aptitude Tradition "Champions of the Empire" now gives bonus per Leaders' levels. Effect is now a flat -2 Empire Size per Governor level, and 0.5% Exp per Scientist level (and 2 Naval capacity per Admiral/General level)
  
• Guardian trait maximum effect is now +33% Defense Platform Damage and Hull Points.
  
• Frontier Spirit trait maximum effects changed to -10% Colony Ship Cost and +50% Colonization Speed and +1 starting pop for colonies.
  
• Cyborg generals now increase planetary combat width.
  
• Reduced passive experience gain by 30% for Progenitor Hive leaders from level 1-6 and 50% for Progenitor Hive leaders between 7-10.
  
• Gray Eminence destiny trait now reduces the effects of empire size, instead of reducing empire size directly. Updated Aturion Efficiency to match Gray Eminence.
  
• Now imperial rulers do not lose imperial heir trait, so they don't become worse when they take over the country.
  
• Lowered the spawn chance for the legendary paragon Keides by 75%.
  
• Autocannons are no longer valued at three times their intended military power.
  
• Now criminals are also unhappy when under oppressive autocracy civic
  
• Kai-Sha's "Expanded Contact Network" event will now upgrade her Shady Contacts trait if she already has it. And gives intel on other empires if it has already been maxed out.
  
• Replaced -20% Empire Size reduction for Aturion Efficiency trait with -10% Empire Size Penalty.
  
• Leader traits that have base resource production now produce the market equivalent of 8 energy/month for tier 1 and 32 energy/month for tier 2.
  
• Aggressor admiral sub-class now gives +7.5% weapon damage.
  
• Artillerist II trait now gives +7.5% tracking.
  
• Fortifier trait now scales between -5% Starbase upgrade cost and -5% Defense platform cost at tier 1 to -10% Starbase upgrade cost, -10% Defense platform cost, +5% Starbase hullpoints and +5% Defense platform hullpoints at tier 3.
  
• Armada Logistician trait ship upkeep maximum reduction is now -10%.
  
• Military Pioneer trait maximum effects are now +20% Ship Build Speed and -10% Ship Build Cost.
  
• Guerilla Tactician now gives a flat 10 Evasion instead of a +50% Evasion multiplier.
  
• Architect of War now gives -10% Military Ship Cost.
  
• Charisma trait now has a maximum Edict Upkeep reduction of -10%
  
• Removed -5% Military Ship Cost from the Strategist sub-class
  
• Geological Consultant trait maximum effect reduced to 9 months of unity per blocker removed.
  
• Retired Fleet Officer trait maximum effects reduced to +20% Ship Build Speed and -10% Ship Build Cost.
  
• Agrarian Upbringing trait now checks for country_uses_food = yes instead of being biological.
  
• Shipwright maximum effects reduced to +10% Ship Build Speed and -10% Ship Build Cost.
  
• Frontier Spirit maximum effects reduced to -10% Colony Ship Cost and +45% Colonization Speed.
  
• Architectural Sense maximum effects reduced to -10% Buildings and Districts Cost, -5% Buildings and District Upkeep, +25% Planetary Build Speed.
  
• Experimenter trait now gives a maxium of 2×Leader Level Research Points per month.
  
• Explorer trait maximum effects reduced to -10% Science Ship Cost and +25% Anomaly Research Speed.
  
• Expansionist maximum effects reduced to -10% Outpost Alloy and Influence Cost.
  
• Great Researcher trait now gives 5×Leader Level Research Points per month.
  
• Taskmaster trait XP reduced from 600 to 500. In return it now has soldiers produce 2/2/2 Energy/Minerals/Food (for countries that use food) or 3/3 Energy/Minerals (for countries that don't)

Bugfixes

• Under One Rule now changes to Imperial Authority when transitioning to Galactic Emperor or Psionic Sovereign.
  
• Intellectual Espionage trait now takes into account all researcher category jobs on the planet.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Expanded Hive Warren would get deleted if there was no remaining unupgraded Hive Warrens on the planet
  
• Updated all researcher jobs to check for Academic Recruiter.
  
• Increased the army upkeep from Disorder II trait.
  
• Chainbreaker trait now requires Egalitarian ethics.
  
• Honored Warmaster trait now requires Xenophile ethics.
  
• Commented out cut prospecting decision.
  
• Kidnapper trait now checks that the general's owner allows slavery instead of checking their ethics.
  
• Taskmaster trait no longer gives an undocumented +5% Building Speed per soldier job.
  
• Now you can't terraform with Azaryn without launching her special ability.
  
• The Death of a Great Leader event should no longer fire when you send a leader off to the Keepers of Knowledge.
  
• Cloaked Ships will no longer block starbases from being rebuilt.
  
• Moved gestalt nodes further apart from each other in the council view so that trait picking doesn't get blocked when they have a lot of traits.
  
• The planet visuals should now update properly when planets change class
  
• Fixed an issue where traits given via event options would not correctly display triggered effects
  
• The ambience sound effect played in the council view is now properly affected by the ambience volume slider
  
• Fixed an issue where leaders that changed empires would retain their council position in their old empire
  
• Fixed a bug where modding the species appearance would not apply to the ruler
  
• The Scholarium Investigator leader trait now gives +25% Assist Research Efficiency instead of failing to give 10% Research Speed as a non-council trait.
  
• Fixed a COOP bug where it was possible for several players to unlock council positions at the same time resulting in duplicates
  
• If there is a wormhole in the capital system, then the Keides wormhole will spawn in a random neighboring system 1-2 jumps away
  
• Cordyceptic Stargazers now correctly spawn with an amoeba fleet again.
  
• Fixed Eager Explorer empires spawning with an extra scientist.
  
• Slaves are now properly set under dystopian living standard
  
• Any Gestalt empire generated after game start (e.g. from machine uprising) should now correctly get their Gestalt council nodes.
  
• Hyperdrive technologies no longer show duplicated icons.
  
• Fixed issues where starbase modifiers would apply to defensive platforms when they shouldn't
  
• Fixed an issue where pre FTL empires spawned from the necrophage origin would spawn in orbit of their planet
  
• Fixed a bug where ships would sometimes stop following its target when they entered a hyperlane
  
• Zroni Relic will now add 1 level to the leader, but won't choose trait on random it will be up to player to chose the trait.
  
• Fixed notification map ping staying visible for some time after dismissing the notification.
  
• Fixed a bug where some traits would not properly localize their names when their modifiers are part of tooltips
  
• Fixed a bug where the Insightful trait tooltip would duplicate headers for its effects
  
• Fixed an issue where it was not possible to unassign envoys from their current task
  
• Fixed Resilient trait to properly adjust for synths. Did the same for destiny trait which was giving leader life span
  
• Crusader Spirit Opinion Modifier: Now it gives -80 opinion towards everyone of different ethic and +20 to the same ethic empires
  
• Fixed issues with the fleet manager where the buttons to increase and decrease the number of ships would not work correctly when using shift or ctrl modifiers
  
• Rogue Scientist event chain shouldn't trigger for Governors assigned as Head of Science.
  
• Updated some trigger loc from "No of ..." to "Number of ..." to be more consistent with the rest of the game.
  
• Fixed Tooltip for Paranoid Leader Trait
  
• Fixed title case for anomaly.3141 "The Depths of Alien Life"
  
• The event that allows you to pick a Chosen One no longer says "three individuals" are capable of absorbing such power and proceeds to list four names.
  
• Events that give the Chosen traits now check that the leader in question is psionic.
  
• Fixed an issue where you could reinforce a fleet when the template was not filled with the correct ships even though the fleet was filled on command limit
  
• Fixed the spawn chance modifier of the anomaly The Orb, as it could not spawn before.
  
• Beholder planetfall error message now states that an empty building slot is required.
  
• Fixed icon for brainslug species trait again.
  
• You can no longer psi-inoculate hive-minded pops or those being purged.
  
• Fallen empire capital planets should now have the correct planetary designation.
  
• You can no longer create subjects from sectors if the primary species would be an infertile clone army species.
  
• Marauder admirals can no longer serve on the council or be manually fired.
  
• Fixed some edges where a ruler could be chosen by a shroud entity but not awarded the trait.
  
• Added scripted loc for GetDefenseForceOrArmada and GetGDFOrArmada
  
• Updated Cybernetic Advantage agenda so it doesn't display placeholder art.
  
• Regular empires no longer have machine or hive-mind leaders in their external leader pools and vice versa.
  
• Cloned Organs/Self-Preservation Protocols now correctly has the same effects as Mind and Body.
  
• Fixed incorrect modifiers on the adoption effect of Synthetic traditions.
  
• Fixed MP lobby chat messages and scroll bar spilling outside the chat box.
  
• Fixed most tooltips in the game browser not working.
  
• Fixed Plantoids Species Pack DLC not showing up in MP lobby DLC list
  
• Fixed misalignment of the DLC icons in the multiplayer lobby
  
• Fixed icon lists sometimes becoming vertical when they should be horizontal
  
• Fixed coop presence icons not always showing their tooltip.
  
• The Interstellar Recruitment Office tooltip now specifies why you can't build it if you already have one in your empire.
  
• The sentinels archaeology site will now put Azaryn back on her own ship when she returns.
  
• Fixed a bug where some mercenary fleets would not have an admiral assigned to them
  
• Mercenary Admirals now get Mercenary Warrior Trait and 2 admiral traits to represent their level
  
• Mercenary Enclaves should no longer steal their admirals which they just rented out

AI

• AI will now wait until it has at least 5 planets and 25 years before choosing a specialization designation for its homeworld
  
• Fixed an issue where AI would be unable to build any buildings if they desired to build the Ancient Refinery but did not have access to any minor artifacts

Stability and Performance

• Fixed a number of Out of Sync errors.
  
• Increased performance in the leader view
  
• Fixed a crash that would sometimes occur when a scientist was elected ruler while performing science ship orders
  
• Fixed a rare, but persistent crash when an empire was destroyed
  
• Fixed a crash that could sometimes happen if there were issues opening or writing log files
  
• Fixed crash in MP lobby when you confirm disbanding a coop group if the player list changed while the confirmation popup was open.
  
• Disabled tooltips in the loading screen to avoid crashes related to focus loss.

UI

• Re-enabled tooltips while the game has no focus as hiding them caused issues for screen readers.
  
• Added tooltips for the join/leave coop empire button in the MP lobby when you can't click it.
  
• Added a tooltip for the coop checkbox in the MP lobby when you can't change it due to being ready.
  
• Use different titles for the multiplayer and coop game browsers.
  
• The multiplayer game browser now has a column that shows whether a game allows coop.
  
• Fixed an issue where the active agendas list would sometimes duplicate elements
  
• Added a new version of the main coop presence view to the topbar for resolutions with width >= 1600
  
• Auto-confirm disbanding a coop group in the MP lobby if all other players leave the group.
  
• Modifiers that affect leader experience gain will now be indented under a "Experience Gain Rate:" header
  
• Added confirmation prompt when selecting a country during hotjoining
  
• Lysator Syng's hire tooltip now shows that hiring him will give you 3 pirate ships as well.
  
• Show decimals for power projection breakdown in naval cap tooltip

Modding

• Added set_random_$CLASS$_background_effect script effects, to assign a random background class to a leader. $CLASS$ can be replaced with admiral, general, governor, or scientist.
  
• Added support for custom_tooltip_with_modifiers for council positions.
  
• Updated documentation for council positions to include new script support. See 01_test_councilor.txt for an example of a council position not linked to civics.
  
• Added script effect "unlock_council_selection = yes" to force validation of council positions and allow the player to reselect their council positions.
  
• Fixed the ethics OverLappingElementsBox not reloading properly
  
• Fixed the spacing parameter not working for vertical OverlappingElementBoxTypes
  
• Added new "empire_size_add" modifier, which flatly increases or decreases the Empire size.
  
• Council position unlock screen will now show council positions which are available by scope check but don't require any civics
  
• Added console command "debug_trait_weights", which enables logging of some of the trait random roll weights.
  
• Added military_power_multiplier to weapon components, which allows manual adjustment of combat power assessment for intangibles that are otherwise difficult to automate.
  
• Use 2 decimals for army upkeep in army view

[/expand]

There’s been a lot of discussion about the Leader Caps that were reintroduced with the 3.8 update. We feel that they are a necessary piece of the balance puzzle, as leaders are generally far more powerful than they were before, and we explicitly wanted empires to have fewer, more important leaders.

The leaders you recruit are intended to be seen as exceptional individuals within your empire, and the planets and fleets that do not possess an Admiral or Governor were not intended to be “unled” - but the rank and file administrators that led them were not as important as the ones represented by visible, portraited characters.

I agree with the comments that it’s unsatisfying to have empty space where there should be some representation of non-exceptional leaders. We’re still exploring solutions to this, whether it be envoy-style “level 0 leaders”, class-specific leader limits, authority based institutions being present in areas without exceptional leaders, a different system altogether, or a combination of some or all of the above. (Not so secretly, I’m also interested in exploring the idea of upgrading Envoys into full leaders at some point in the future, so adjustments will have to be made to the system regardless. Currently I lean towards a combination of some of the above, but some of the changes I want to make are bigger than fit into post-release support.)


You’ll also be able to rename Council positions.

We also concur that the caps are a bit on the tight side. As noted in the patch notes, we’re making some changes to loosen them a bit, but we feel that we have to tread carefully for balance reasons. We’ve reduced the rate at which leaders reach -100% XP for being over cap, and added an XP scalar in Defines for easy modder access.

We’re also merging the “Leader of Opportunity” mechanic we discussed last week into the Eager leader trait - leaders with this trait will not count against the Leader Cap for their first few levels. We originally intended for Leader of Opportunity to be used exclusively with event leaders, but the discussions that followed showed that people were looking forward to seeing leaders with the effect in the Leader Pool, and we agreed that it would be interesting to see.


Traits are also now nouns to ease localization into gendered languages.

Regarding early game exploration - while we are happy with the exploration phase of the game being longer than before, it’s a bit slower than we’d like. We’re going to let military fleets with an assigned Admiral explore hyperlanes, which also has the benefit of resolving an edge case when you’re at war and have an enemy system hidden away in a nebula. They won’t be able to survey planets or explore wormholes like a crewed Science ship, but this should provide more freedom to find hyperlane choke points during your initial steps to the stars. The change which gave Admirals increased command limit as they gained levels has also been removed - as many of you have pointed out, it didn’t feel great to have your fleets split on leader death.



In the longer term, we’re considering giving Generals more “things to do” - as some of you have pointed out, it could be interesting to let a General step in when newly conquered planets need to be pacified, perhaps acting as an interim martial law governor for freshly “liberated” sectors. #nopromises

We’re generally happy with how Gestalt Nodes have worked out - they have several major advantages over regular Empires due to these immortal specialist nodes, but also some differences that become more pronounced as the game goes on. In a future release (likely 3.9), we’re considering allowing them to “cull” a node and grow a new one as an agenda, as some Council traits are valuable in the first parts of the game but far less useful later on.

A great many leader traits have had a balance pass, described in the patch notes above. As the systems evolve, expect more motion there. We expect that we’ll be making further adjustments and improvements to all of these systems in upcoming Custodian updates.

Naturally, there must be some prioritization done when it comes to bugs and balance. At the top of the pile are things that prevent you from playing - crashes, out of syncs, and the like.

Issues that involved displayed text are often high priority as well - as Stellaris is available in ten different languages and translators need time to do their jobs, we have limited windows in which to make any changes that require localization. 3.8.1 and 3.8.3, for instance, are localized releases, while 3.8.2 and the future 3.8.4 are not. Sometimes we’ll plan ahead and slip some “emergency loc” into a localized release even if we haven’t had a chance to actually address the bug itself, but that’s relatively rare.

Bugs deemed Exploits are usually rated very low in our general triage - if an AI is unlikely to abuse a bug against you, but you can choose to use it or not, it tends to be lower priority than things that are more disruptive to general gameplay.

Some improvements to the scriptability of council positions we were working have also been added into 3.8.3.

Firstly, we've added the Reorganize Council agenda which will allow empires to reselect their council positions without needing to reform the government.

Of more interest for modders, support for council positions made possible by non-civic sources, such as country flags, ascension perks and other such triggers have been improved.

We've attached the documentation below.

COUNCILOR SCRIPT DOCUMENTATION
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EXAMPLE COUNCIL POSITION
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I mentioned this last week, but since we’re very interested in improving multiplayer stability… If you're running into frequent out of sync issues, you can help us out a lot by having the host add these startup parameters to their game:

Then, if you run into an Out of Sync, please post in the Bug Report forum and give us the Host's OOS logs as well as at least one of the clients that the popup mentioned. (OOS logs can be found in Documents\Paradox Interactive\Stellaris\oos near your save games.) Any details you can provide about what you were doing at the time is also helpful.

This setting has some performance implications (which is why it's not on by default), but if you're running into OOSes reliably, it can really help us track them down.

Ideally I’d like the 3.8.4 update to be in a state where we can remove the beta tag from the Cooperative game mode.

That's it for this week folks, see you next week!