by Eladrin

Hello everyone!

Astral Planes and the Stellaris 3.10.0 "Pyxis" update are releasing this Thursday, November 16th. Today we've got the preliminary changelogs for your enjoyment.

The Astral Planes Narrative Expansion is available for pre-purchase now, with a 10% discount until November 27th.

Our largest story based release yet, Astral Planes focuses on mid to late game exploration content with over 30 Astral Rifts with widely branching storylines. Unlike the relative safety of Archaeology sites, the Rifts you explore will lead to completely different realms of existence, where fundamentals that were certain at home may not always be true.

• Added Astral Scars and Rifts
  
  • Added 30+ Rift Sites
    
    • Each site contains branching narratives, featuring multiple potential endings and a chance at powerful new rewards
  • Added Astral Thread Resource
    
  • Added Astral Harvesting and Rift Sphere Technologies
    
  • Added “Rift in Space” Situation and random Rift Situations.
• Added 8 New Relics
  
• Added 10 Astral Actions, plus 4 additional Astral Actions if you have the Overlord expansion
  
• Added Riftworld Origin
  
• Added 4 New Civics
  
  • Hyperspace Specialty
    
  • Dimensional Worship
    
  • Dark Consortium
    
  • Sovereign Guardianship
• Added 3 New Music Tracks from Andreas Waldetoft
  
• 70+ New Event Pictures
  
• 80+ New Sound Effects
  
• the formless...

Features

• Leader Consolidation - see Dev Diary 322 for more details.
  
  • Admirals and Generals have been merged into the Commander, the Military leader class.
    
  • Governors and some Envoy functions have been merged into Officials, the Administrative leader class.
    
    • Officials are now assigned to represent your empire in each of the Galactic Community (or Imperium) and your Federation rather than assigning multiple Envoys.
      
    • Envoys still represent your Empire's overall diplomatic bandwidth, and handle First Contact, Improving and Harming Relations, and Espionage.
  • Scientists remain the third, Scientific leader class.
    
  • All leader classes can now govern planets and sectors.
    
    • Military governors apply Martial Law to a planet or sector, which increases worker and slave output at the cost of specialist and ruler output, adds soldiers to the planet or sector, and causes soldiers to increase stability.
      
    • Administrative governors increase general material resource extraction and industrial productivity.
      
    • Scientific governors increase research output on the planet or sector. This replaces the old Assist Research Scientist action, which has been removed.
      
    • Most governor traits now include apply to a lesser extent to the rest of the sector, unless a local planetary governor is overriding them.
  • Added the Minister of State for most non-gestalt empires. (Some civics, such as Fanatic Purifiers or Inwards Perfection, remove this position.)
    
  • The Minister of Defense, Research, and State council positions are no longer locked for players with Galactic Paragons, and can be replaced with other council positions when you reorganize your council, though at a cost.
    
    • No Minister of Defense: -25% Naval Capacity
      
    • No Minister of State: -25% Diplomatic Weight
      
    • No Head of Research: -25% Research Speed
  • A balance pass has been made on all leader traits and subclasses. Many have changed significantly, and the overall power level has generally been decreased.
    
    • Traits chosen when levelling up will now be biased towards the leader's current position, whether or not you have Galactic Paragons. (i.e., A Scientist that is governing a planet will be more likely to receive leader traits related to planet governance.)
  • The classes of all event leaders and paragons, as well as leader themed civics, technologies, and traditions, have been reviewed and adjusted.
• Council Legitimacy now gives bonuses or penalties to council agenda speed.
  
• Replaced the Recommended Content window with a more full-featured Additional Content Browser.
  
  • The Additional Content Browser increases the clarity and transparency of what various DLCs contain, by letting you preview things like Origins, Civics with full tooltips that include nested concepts, animated Portraits, and Shipsets. It is our hope that this will help you make more informed decisions about DLC purchases. (The Additional Content Browser will only be available on some storefronts, and will not update information without an active internet connection.)
• Added Tabbed Outliner.
  
  • Information is now split across Government, Ships, Politics, and Structures tabs, which will appear as they become relevant to your empire.

Improvements

• Many event chains now include event chain titles in the event window.
  
• Added three new planet modifiers: Abundant Geothermal Activity, Subterranean Wildlife, Rich Microflora
  
• Added four planetary decisions to be able to remove some negative modifiers without having to terraform the planet: Remove Bleak Planet, Add Dayside Farm, Remove Hazardous Weather, Remove Dangerous Wildlife
  
• A toast message will now appear when a truce expires.
  
• Clarified tooltips of modifiers that increased leader cap
  
• Expanded on the Zroni dig site descriptions.
  
• A notification will now be sent when yoour fleets are unexpectedly forced to decloak
  
• You can now change the destination of a Leviathan Parade Situation at the cost of some unity.

Balance

• Administrative Leaders can no longer serve as the Head of Research.
  
• Archaeo-Engineers AP now gives +1 Scientist Capacity
  
• Aristocratic Elite no longer has +20% Governor XP gain, but instead gives a 20% chance for leaders to have a bonus positive and a bonus negative trait.
  
• Autonomous Drones and Sovereign Circuits now provide +1 Leader Trait Options
  
• Belligerent Diplomatic Stance now grants -1 External Leader Pool Size in addition to existing effects
  
• Blocked Inwards Perfectionists and Fanatic Purifiers from having a Minister of State.
  
• Centralised Command society tech increased to Tier 3
  
• Changed leader recruitment cost to be a quadratic equation instead of exponential
  
• Cooperative Diplomatic Stance now grants +1 External Leader Pool Size in addition to existing effects
  
• Corporate Authority and Corporate Dominion Civic now grant +1 External Leader Pool Size in addition to existing effects
  
• Council Legitimacy now directly modifies base council agenda speed, at 0% Legitimacy base agenda speed is 50%, at 50% Legitimacy it is 100%, at 100% Legitimacy it is 125%. Empires without Council Legitimacy are treated as if they have 50% Legitimacy for this.
  
• Decreased the leader XP gain from the Luminary Bloodline trait.
  
• Democratic Authority now grants +1 Leader Pool Size in addition to existing effects
  
• Dictatorial Authority now grants +25% Ruler XP and -1 Leader Pool Size in addition to existing effects
  
• Empires can now support three leaders of each class without using leader capacity. Generic leader capacity has been removed.
  
• Eternal Vigilance now gives +1 Commander Capacity
  
• Factions are now more upset if their ethic is not represented on the council or by the empire ruler.
  
• Galactic Force Projection now gives +1 Commander Capacity, +2 Max Influence from Power Projection, increases Naval Capacity by 100 and Fleet Command Limit by 50
  
• Gestalt rulers no longer count towards leader capacity
  
• Heroic Past, Precision Cogs, Pooled Knowledge and Factory Overclocking all now provide +1 Commander, +1 Official and +1 Scientist Capacity.
  
• Imperial Authority now grants -1 Leader Pool Size in addition to existing effects
  
• Imperial Cult now grants additional priest jobs to the ruler's homeworld scaling with their level.
  
• Imperial Prerogative now gives +2 Official Capacity
  
• Improvements to Mastery of Nature, planet modifier now gives +50% resource districts
  
• Increased Leadership Conditioning reward to 3,000 XP
  
• Isolationist Diplomatic Stance now grants -2 External Leader Pool Size in addition to existing effects
  
• Leader Enhancement policies now increase the starting level of leaders instead of increasing Leader XP gain.
  
• Leader starting age has once again been increased
  
• Leaders now have a slightly higher chance to start at a higher level.
  
• Learning campaign edicts leader xp gain have been reduced
  
• Mercantile Diplomatic Stance now grants +1 External Leader Pool Size in addition to existing effects
  
• Naval Tradition federation perk now gives +1 Initial Admiral Level instead of +10% Admiral XP gain.
  
• Nerve Stapled now gives -100% leader XP gain, if you somehow generate leaders from species with this trait.
  
• Not having a Head of Research (or gestalt equivalent) will impose a -25% penalty to research speed
  
• Not having a Minister of Defense imposes a -25% penalty to Naval Capacity.
  
• Not having a Minister of State (or gestalt equivalent) will impose a -25% penalty to diplomatic weight.
  
• Opener effect for Synthetics now reduces robot upkeep and robot assembly cost
  
• Philospher King now only provides +5 Effective Ruler Level
  
• Players can now build multiple Quantum Catapults.
  
• Pompous Purists Civic now grants -1 External Leader Pool Size in addition to existing effects
  
• Pops now have ethics attraction towards the ethics of the local planetary governor
  
• Rebalanced a number of species traits that affected leader XP gain.
  
• Rebalanced Aptitude Traditions and Leadership Conditioning
  
• Rebalanced Feudal Society and Franchising Civics and Shared Destiny AP
  
• Rebalanced Statecraft traditions
  
• Rebalanced the Auto-Curating Vault, Vault of Acquisitions, Alpha Hub and Citadel of Faith
  
• Reduced XP gain from Transcendent Learning
  
• Removed leader pool increase from Transcendent Learning
  
• Removed Leader Pool size modifiers from ethics
  
• Removed leader upkeep modifiers from Embodied Dynamism and Collective Self techs
  
• Removed the -10% leader hire and upkeep cost from traditions that only applied to a single leader class.
  
• Replaced the +1 Leader Capacity from Oppressive Autocracy with +1 Commander Capacity
  
• Reworked the Research Institute, Planetary Supercomputer and Military Academy buildings
  
• Slightly increased time needed to survey a system.
  
• Specialist subjects now get +1 capacity of the relevant leader type instead of +20% XP gain for that subject type.
  
• Species traits that give bonuses or maluses to leader xp gain are now multiples of 10% not 25%.
  
• Technocracy now gives Expertise traits additional effects for scientists when governing planets/sectors.
  
• The effects of the Ruthless Competition council position now matches Memory Vaults
  
• The Khanate Successor origin now boosts military leaders
  
• The Lord High Admiral council position now gives increased naval capacity instead of increased commander xp gain
  
• The Minister of Defense and Head of Research are no longer mandatory council positions.
  
• The Minister of State can be removed by Reorganise Council Agenda.
  
• The Opinion lost with the Trader Enclaves for canceling a trade deal now scales with size of the deal.
  
• The traditions that previously gave -10% leader hire and upkeep costs for a given class (e.g. Science Division) now also increases the leader capacity for leaders of that class
  
• Aptitude Tradition adoption now gives Initial Leader Skill: +1 instead of +1 starting trait to leaders.
  
• Discovery, Domination, and Supremacy Traditions now increase initial skill level for leaders instead of decreasing upkeep and hire cost.
  
• Transcendent Learning leader XP gain modifier reduced to +25%
  
• Transcendent Learning now gives +2 Scientist Capacity
  
• Universal Transactions now gives +1 Official Capacity and +20% Commercial Pact Efficiency
  
• Updated five existing planet modifiers: Weak Magnetic Field, Strong Magnetic Field, Asteroid Belt, Natural Beauty, Bleak Planet
  
• You can only find one promising officer every two years.

Bugfixes

• Blocked special event leaders from having backgrounds and homeworlds. Warform was not hanging around with the Romans.
  
• Fix a case where the leader UI would remain on screen when exiting to main menu
  
• Fix councilor position triggers related to authority not being evaluated correctly in galaxy creation
  
• Fix diplo weight tooltip when affected by a resolution category weight modifier
  
• Fix gestalt leader backgrounds not clearing other leaders' BGs
  
• Fix scripted fleet order buttons having incomplete tooltips (e.g. Azaryn's terraforming special action)
  
• Fixed Alien Box event changing getsalt councilor nodes portrait
  
• Fixed bypasses mapicons always being placed in second position if there is an upgraded starbase in the system, hiding the icon below
  
• Fixed crash when checking if an invalid system is in sensor range
  
• Fixed Cultist event chain not having any target to pick planet from if the fleet that attacked was destroyed in the meantime
  
• Fixed gestalt nodes not having a starting trait
  
• Fixed leaders with a preset design using the wrong portrait when their species changes without its portrait changing.
  
• Fixed misaligned buttons and inconsistent tooltips in the Planet View
  
• Fixed num_owned_relics trigger not displaying its dynamic values in tooltip
  
• Fixed num_researched_techs_of_tier tooltip not displaying the technology tier
  
• Fixed random rulers never being generated with origin-locked traits.
  
• Fixed situation target tooltip not being completely localized
  
• Fixed Starbases receiving ship modifiers twice
  
• Fixed the "pick trait" button for recruitable leaders
  
• Fixed the Inevitable Assimilation tradition for DAs saying you need to adopt Cybernetic traditions twice.
  
• Fixed UOR ruler not benefiting from other initial skill modifiers.
  
• Fixed UOR setting ruler level to 4 instead of giving +3 initial levels.
  
• Leaders excluded from the upkeep cost now correctly produce resources
  
• Set the base value for percent_of_leader_lifespan to match the leader lifespan define value.
  
• Subjects now support their Overlords resolutions in the Galactic Community correctly
  
• The Escape key no longer closes any event windows.
  
• The first event option for the event Dysfunctional Council now informs you that the leader will be dismissed.
  
• The Xenophobic Fallen Empire will once again be able to get real mad at you if you border them.
  
• Worker Coops can no longer be Xenophobic
  
• You will no longer be able to avoid being synthetically ascended by being an assault army in space.

AI

• The AI will no longer build habitats if they have an uncolonised habitat.
  
• The AI will prefer building habitats in systems with upgraded starbases unless they have the Void Dweller origin or the Voidborn AP.

Performance

• Added game rule for possible_precalc = can_fill_precursor_job
  
• Added define TRIGGERED_MODIFIER_UPDATE_DELAY, which lets us spread out calculations of triggered modifiers
  
• Fixed a case where country modifiers would continually recalculate every day

UI/UX

• Added new backgrounds for assembly and organic assembly.
  
• Added the ability to add an element to the event window specifying the event chain this event is part of
  
• Archaeological Sites and Astral Rifts mapicons are now colored depending on their exploration state
  
• Changed the leader cap indicator in the top bar to only display envoys.
  
• Fixed fleet command limit multipliers not appearing in tooltip if they add up to +100%.
  
• Improve and Harm Relations monthly values are now shown to two decimal places.
  
• Improved the tooltips for Agenda Progress.
  
• removed the notification for leader pool renova
  
• The leader list now shows the cap for each class
  
• The tooltip for Agenda Progress now shows modifiers to monthly agenda progress.
  
• Update the Main Flag button to show the name of the empire (and debug info if you're using Debug view)
  
• Added a subtitle to all longer event chains.
  
• Added Event Chain Subtitles for the five original precursors.

Modding

• `num_leader_traits` now has a new filter `is_subclass = yes/no/any`
  
• Add `federation_modifier` and `triggered_federation_modifier` leader trait modifiers
  
• Add `galcom_modifier` and `triggered_galcom_modifier` leader trait modifiers
  
• Add `starbase_type` field for starbase components to show the correct text when a tech unlocks it and it's for orbital buildings
  
• Add alternate_civic_version to swap locked civics w/ authorities
  
• Add army_modifier and triggered_army_modifier to leader traits
  
• Add background_planet_modifier and triggered_background_planet_modifier to leader traits
  
• Add country_<type>_cap_add modifiers for specific leader class capacities
  
• Add fleet_modifier and triggered_fleet_modifier to leader traits
  
• Add new on_astral_rift_entered action
  
• Add piracy_protection_mult modifier
  
• Add set_completed_rifts command
  
• Add skill_<classname>_<task> static modifiers for each class and the "navy", "army", "planet_governor", "sector_governor" and "background_planet_governor" cases
  
• Add specialist_subject_conversion_time_mult modifier
  
• Added a debug ImGui view to the console - So long, and thanks for all the fish <3 (Editor's Note: @MonzUn thank you for all your hard work and best of luck with your new endeavours!)
  
• Added army_damage_empire_sprawl_penalty_mult modifier
  
• Added army_damage_taken_mult and army_morale_damage_taken_mult modifiers
  
• Added astral_rift_difficulty_add modifier
  
• Added can_spawn_astral_rift trigger
  
• Added council_legitimacy >= <value> country scope trigger to check an empire's council legitimacy.
  
• Added council_legitimacy trigger to check council legitimacy in script
  
• Added councilor_modifier, triggered_councilor_modifier and force_councilor_trait to leader traits and removed councilor_trait and is_councilor_trait_for_ruler.
  
• Added create_astral_rift effect
  
• Added distance_to_capital trigger
  
• Added dump_astralrifts command
  
• Added dynamic_capacity parameter to strategic resources
  
• Added export_modifier_duration_to_variable effect
  
• Added freeze_leader_age effect to allow leaders to stop aging
  
• Added in_place_of parameter to spawn_astral_rift
  
• Added in_place_of parameter to spawn_wormhole effect to use the coordinates of an existing spatial object
  
• Added inline scripts support for triggers
  
• Added is_assigned_to_galcom script trigger.
  
• Added is_bypass_type trigger
  
• Added leader_lifespan_mult modifier
  
• Added leader_starting_age_add, leader_starting_age_mult, ruler_starting_age_add, ruler_starting_age_mult, heir_starting_age_add, heir_starting_age_mult, and <leader class>_starting_age_add and <leader class>_starting_age_mult (for example commander_starting_age_mult)
  
• Added mod_<leader class>_lifespan_add and mod_<leader class>_lifespan_mult (ex: mod_scientist_lifespan_add)
  
• Added new modifiers for leader initial level
  
• Added on_build_queued and on_build_unqueued effects for mega structures
  
• Added on_truce_end on_action
  
• Added planet_max_branch_office_buildings_self_add empire modifier
  
• Added planet_non_artificial_max_buildings_add modifier
  
• Added refill_astral_rift_pool command
  
• Added research_sharing_mult modifier that increases the effectiveness of a country's research agreements.
  
• Added ruler_skill_add modifier to increase or decrease the effective level of an empire's ruler for the purposes of their council position modifiers.
  
• Added scripted triggers prefers_scientist_governors and prefers_commander_governors which determine the class of your homeworld governor on game start.
  
• Added sector_modifier and triggered_sector_modifier to leader traits.
  
• Added spawn_astral_scar effect
  
• Added spawn_beyond_gravity_well parameter to spawn_planet effect
  
• Added split_astral_scar and copy_survey_data scripted effects
  
• Added the is_site_locked = yes/no trigger for archaeology sites.
  
• Added the set_council_position_to_council script effect to place a council position in the council.
  
• Added trigger leader_lifespan to calculate leader lifespan depending on LEADER_LIFESPAN_DEATH_CHANCE_AGE, MOD_LEADER_LIFESPAN_ADD and MOD_LEADER_LIFESPAN_MULT. Updated script values referencing this define to use the trigger instead.
  
• Added triggered_system_modifier to leader traits.
  
• Added X_tech_cost_mult modifiers
  
• Armies can now have an army_modifier
  
• can_build_STATION_TYPE_around can now also have astral_rift as from scope
  
• country_leader_cap_add now increases the capacity for all leader classes
  
• create_message effect now has a recipient parameter to allow to have another recipient than the automatically resolved one
  
• create_mining_station and create_research_station now support deposit holder scopes
  
• create_pop effect now has a count parameter to spawn multiple pops at the same time
  
• created `can_be_assigned_to_federation` and `can_be_assigned_to_galactic_community` abilities for leader
  
• Created destroy_astral_rift effect
  
• Created is_astral_scar trigger
  
• Created on_astral_rift_exploration_complete on_action to count the number of explored astral rift
  
• Created set_next_astral_rift_event debug description to more easily keep track of events branching
  
• Events using the leader event window can now hide not allowed options using hide_option_if_not_allowed
  
• Fixed fleet scope command limit modifiers not being applied if the fleet doesn't have a leader.
  
• Fixed leader trait planet and system modifiers functioning identically to the regular modifiers.
  
• Fleet and megastructure modifiers from governor skill are only applied from unoccupied planets owned by the same country as the fleet/megastructure.
  
• Hiring / assigning councilors is now done based on a scripted value instead of hardcoded in the ai
  
• is_surveyed can now be used on astral rifts
  
• Leader trait planet_modifier and triggered_planet_modifier now support all leader types. Removed assist_research_planet_modifier.
  
• Leaders class no longer rely on a hard coded type, and are fully dynamic and based on leaders abilities and defined entirely in the class file
  
• Megastructures on_build_start/cancel/complete now use the constructing fleet as root if it's being built by a construction ship
  
• MetaScripts (Effects,Triggers,Values) can now substitute an argument by the value of another with $ARG1|ARG2$
  
• num_buildings effect now support's building category.
  
• on_destroying_station is now also called when an orbital station around an Astral Rift is destroyed
  
• Removed is_ruler and is_heir checks from leader potential add on traits, instead using the can_leader_get_normal_trait game rule.
  
• Removed some unused trait parameters.
  
• Removed the DLC lock on unlock_council_selection = yes
  
• Replace diplo_weight_envoys_mult and envoy_cohesion_effect_mult modifiers with diplo_weight_delegate_mult and delegate_cohesion_effect_mult
  
• Replaced LEADER_AGE_DEATH_CHANCE_AGE with LEADER_LIFESPAN_DEATH_CHANCE_AGE
  
• Replaced LEADER_AGE_DEATH_CHANCE_INC with LEADER_LIFESPAN_DEATH_CHANCE_INC
  
• Replaced LEADER_AGE_HIGH_DEATH_CHANCE_AGE with LEADER_LIFESPAN_HIGH_DEATH_CHANCE_AGE
  
• Replaced LEADER_AGE_HIGH_DEATH_CHANCE_INC with LEADER_LIFESPAN_HIGH_DEATH_CHANCE_INC
  
• Replaced subclass_background_icon and destiny_background_icon with background_icon.
  
• Replaced tenth_of_leader_lifespan script value with the more generic percent_of_leader_lifespan.
  
• Replaced the modifier leader_age with leader_lifespan_add.
  
• Replaced the required = yes/no parameter for council positions with the optional trigger in the country scope.
  
• Reworked has_envoy_task to work with any leader class
  
• Separate Scientist `can_research` into more granular capability definitions
  
• set_surveyed can now be used on astral rifts
  
• Situations can now have multiple title selected from triggers.
  
• SpawnWormhole effect now has a parameter graphics_entity_name to change graphics
  
• Updated leader trait documentation.

In addition, due to the changes being made to leaders in this update, I highly recommend that if you wish to continue a game in progress that you remain on the 3.9.3 branch until you finish.

See you Thursday!

by Eladrin

Hello everyone!

The Stellaris 3.10.0 “Pyxis” update will be released alongside the Astral Planes Narrative Expansion on Thursday, November 16th. The expansion has a 10% discount until November 27th.


https://store.steampowered.com/app/2534090/Stellaris_Astral_Planes

Today we’ll have an extra dev diary reviewing some of the features the Custodian Team has been working on.

Preliminary release notes will be posted next Tuesday, with final release notes posted on Thursday alongside the release.

Let's get to it!

We introduced the idea of the Leader Consolidation back in Dev Diary #307 and then gave an update in Dev Diary #316. Today we’ll go in deeper detail regarding the changes that will be coming in 3.10.0.

To recap from DD#316, but with the new subclass effects included:


Admirals and Generals have been merged into the Commander, the Military leader class.

Admiral and General will remain as veteran classes, with the following foci:

• Admiral - Focuses on Fleets and general naval combat
  
  • Ship Weapon Damage: +5%
    
  • Ship Fire Rate: +5%
    
  • Ship Disengage Chance: +5%
• General - Focuses on taking planets and assaulting static defenses - Armies, Planetary Bombardment, Ground Combat, and attacking defensive structures such as Starbases are the General’s forte
  
  • Ship Damage Against Starbases: +5%
    
  • Ship Orbital Bombardment Damage: +5%
    
  • Army Damage: +5%
• Commissioner - Focuses on Planetary Governance (Martial Law)
  
  • Planet Effects:
    
    • +2 Soldier Jobs
  • Sector Effects:
    
    • +1 Soldier Jobs
• Strategist - Focuses on the Council, especially the Minister of Defense position
  
  • Military Ship Build Speed: +5%

The old Governors and some Envoy functions have been merged into Officials, the Administrative leader class.

• Delegate - Focuses on Federations and the Galactic Community
  
  • GalCom Effects: +5% Diplomatic Weight
    
  • Federation Effects: +0.5 Monthly Cohesion
• Industrialist - Focuses on Planetary Governance (Industry and Development)
  
  • Planet Effects:
    
    • Resources from Specialist Jobs: +5%
      
    • Pop Amenities Usage: -10%
  • Sector Effects:
    
    • Resources from Specialist Jobs: +2.5%
      
    • Pop Amenities Usage: -5%
• Ambassador - Council Focus (Diplomacy, Espionage, and First Contact), especially suited for the new Minister of State position
  
  • Country Trust Growth: +5%
• Advisor - Council Focus (Economy)
  
  • Pop Upkeep: -5%
    
  • Trade Value: +5%

Scientists remain the third, Scientific leader class.

Veteran Classes:

• Explorer - Focuses on Surveying and Exploration
  
  • Survey Speed: +10%
    
  • Anomaly Discovery Chance: +10%
• Academic - Focuses on Archaeology and Anomalies
  
  • Anomaly Research Speed: +10%
    
  • Archaeology Excavation Speed: +10%
    
  • Astral Rift Exploration Speed: +10%
• Analyst - Focuses on Planetary Governance (Assist Research)
  
  Planet Effects:
  • Research from Jobs: +10%
  Sector Effects:
  • Research from Jobs: +5%
• Statistician - Focuses on the Council, especially the Minister of Science position
  
  • Research Speed: +5%

As part of this redesign, we’ve gone through and rebalanced or replaced hundreds of leader traits. Many have changed significantly, and the overall power level has generally been decreased.

In order to ensure that leader levelling feels rewarding, regardless of owning Galactic Paragons or not, traits chosen when levelling up will now be biased towards the leader's current position.

As mentioned in the previous dev diaries, leader caps are now per-class, and exceeding one only affects that class.



​
With the removal of the “Governor” leader class, we’ve now allowed all leader classes to govern planets and sectors. Each leader class focuses on a different aspect of governance:

• Officials are better suited to be generalists and governing your resource extraction and industrial worlds.
  
• Scientists are better suited to governing research worlds, which has replaced the Assist Research functionality that the science ship formerly had.
  
• Commanders are better suited to govern recently conquered worlds and those with a high level of crime.

While bringing back sector governors, we still wanted local planetary governors to be desirable in some cases. Thus, throughout the game, we’ve gone and ensured that the majority of governor-related traits and leader effects apply at full strength to the planet they are governing and at half strength to all other planets in the same sector, if they are governing the sector capital.

However, a planetary governor will always supersede the sector governor, if one exists. Thus you might have an Industrialist overseeing your core sector and assign a Commissioner to a planet where that pesky Criminal Syndicate has set up shop in order to drive down crime.


The modifiers for each leader class when governing. These are multiplied by the leader’s level.​

Each leader class also has a veteran subclass dedicated to governance, which is required to gain governor veteran traits.



Many of the various traits from the Industrialist (Governor), Pioneer (Governor), Protector (General), and Analyst (Scientist) have been distributed throughout the various governing subclasses in the rework.

In addition to the Minister of State Council position that most non-Gestalt empires now have at the start of the game. Officials can now be assigned as Federation Representatives and Galactic Community Emissaries instead of Envoys. An Official assigned to one of these positions gives the same effects as a number of Envoys equal to their level did back before 3.10. Thus, your envoys are now freed to improve or harm relations with other empires or build spy networks in them.




The Minister of State position provides several bonuses to your envoys.

Certain Civics (currently Inwards Perfection and Fanatic Purifiers) block access to the Minister of State position and will instead start with their Civic Council Position unlocked. As mentioned above, as not having a Minister of State will impart a -25% Diplomatic Weight penalty, we’ve reduced the penalty for the Isolationist Diplomatic Stance from -50% to -25%.



For Officials that are assigned to either the GalCom or your Federation, there is now a subclass and variety of veteran traits that can be used in these assignments.




​
As mentioned above, we’ve combined Admirals and Generals into the Commander leader class. Broadly speaking, their subclass traits were assigned as follows:

• Aggressor -> Admiral
  
• Tactician -> Admiral
  
• Strategist -> Strategist
  
• Invader -> General
  
• Protector -> Split between General and Commissioner
  
• Marshal -> Split between Strategist (army-related traits) and Ambassador (espionage-related traits)

​
Back in 3.8 we added Council Legitimacy. Although it had no mechanical effects, it was a good step to represent the degree to which factions in your empire approve of how the empire is run, the council, empire policies and so on. In 3.10, having high Council Legitimacy will give a bonus to Council Agenda Speed (capping at +25% at 100% Legitimacy) and having low Council Legitimacy will give a penalty to Council Agenda Speed (capping at -50% at 0% Legitimacy). For modders, these values are determined by defines.

Since Council Legitimacy is a weighted sum of the approval of each faction multiplied by their support in the empire, this means that empires with relatively few factions (each of which have high approval) should manage to pass Agendas more quickly.



For owners of Galactic Paragons, we’ve made the Minister of Defense, Head of Research and new Minister of State council positions no longer mandatory. Instead, when you choose to Reorganize the Council, these positions will be removed and can be reselected, much like Civic and Enclave Council Positions. However, each of these positions will have their own penalties if they are not present and staffed.

• Minister of Defense: -25% Naval Capacity
  
• Minister of State: -25% Diplomatic Weight
  
• Head of Research: -25% Research Speed

During the work done for the Leader Consolidation, we discussed various ideas for further improving the council mechanics and may revisit them at some point in the future.

​
We’ve rebalanced the majority of civics that were leader related or themed, and I’ll leave you with a few examples. As part of this, we've also changed effects that previously made it too easy to support a near-infinite number of vassals.





While reworking leader classes and traits, we’ve also gone through and rebalanced leader adjacent tradition trees and ascension perks:

Aptitude

• Opener: Swapped +1 Trait on leaders for +1 Trait Selection when leveling up.
  
• Finisher: Replaced effects with +1 Commander, +1 Official and +1 Scientist Cap
  
• The Empire Needs You: No longer increases Leader Pool Size
  
• Specialist Training: Swapped +25% Leader XP gain for +1 Leader Pool Size
  
• Psychological Profiling: No longer reduces the number of negative traits leaders can have
  
• Healthcare Program: Swapped +20 Leader Lifespan for -1 Max Negative Traits
  
• Champions of the Empire: Replaced effects with +1 Leader Initial Level.

Discovery

• Science Division: Replaced Scientist Cost and Upkeep modifiers with +1 Scientist Capacity and +1 Scientist Initial Level.

Domination

• Colonial Viceroys: Replaced Governor Cost and Upkeep modifiers with +1 Official Capacity and +1 Official Initial Level.

Enmity

• Rise to the Occasion: Now provides +1 Commander, +1 Official and +1 Scientist Cap for every 3 Rivals.

Politics:

• Opener and Gravitas: Now affect Officials assigned to GalCom, not Envoys.

Statecraft:

• Opener: Increased Edict Fund from 20 to 50.
  
• Finisher: Replaced effects with -5% Empire Size
  
• Constitutional Focus: Increased Council Agenda Speed to 25% from 10%
  
• Immutable Directives: Increased Agenda Duration to 25% from 10%
  
• Amongst Peers: Replaced effects with Councilor gain 150 XP per Level when an Agenda is completed
  
• Shared Benefits: Replaced effects with +1 Effective Councilor Level

Supremacy

• War Games: Replaced Admiral Cost and Upkeep modifiers with +1 Commander Capacity and +1 Commander Initial Level.

Unyielding

• Resistance is Frugal: Removed modifiers for Generals

Synthetics

• Non-Machine Opener: Replaced effects with -25% Roboticist Upkeep and -25% Robot Upkeep

Ascension Perks

• Archaeo-Engineers: Added +1 Scientist Capacity
  
• Galactic Force Projection: Reworked, now increases Influence from Power Projection by 2, gives +1 Commander Capacity, +100 Naval Capacity and +50 Fleet Capacity.
  
• Eternal Vigilance: Added +1 Commander Capacity
  
• Imperial Prerogative: Added +2 Official Capacity
  
• Transcendent Learning: Now provides +2 Scientist Capacity and +25% Leader XP gain
  
• Universal Transactions: Added +1 Official Capacity and +20% Commercial Pact Effectiveness

We often see threads asking exactly what’s in each of our DLCs. In an effort to improve the clarity of what you’re getting with each release, we’ve expanded the Recommended Content element that’s been in the game for a while, and made some improvements.

The Recommended Content element gave brief descriptions of the various DLCs, but left a lot of questions. We’ve replaced this with a more robust Additional Content Browser that can draw information directly from game files, providing much more detailed and accurate preview information. Hopefully this will help you make more informed decisions about DLC purchases.



Concepts in Tooltips are fully supported in the additional content browser.


Portraits, ship sets, megastructures, and screenshots can be shown on the left hand side. Pack details and tooltip-able lists go on the right.

The Additional Content Browser will only be available on some storefronts, and will not update information without an active internet connection.

​
Another bit of feedback we’ve gotten a lot is that the outliner has gotten cumbersome over the years. While we’ve added some ability to customize it in past releases, in 3.10.0 we’re adding Outliner Tabs.

In this first version of the tabbed outliner, we have four tabs: Government, Ships, Politics, and Structures. These tabs will appear in the outliner once they’re relevant.

Notification bubbles can be activated on the tabs to let you know if there’s something of interest on them. Green ones are for non-urgent things like “a planet got colonized and has been added to the Government tab”, while red ones are a call to action, like “your science ship has no scientist”.




The OUN Avamdur is leaderless. I should do something about that.

In future releases, we plan on exploring some more ideas we had to make the Outliner more customizable and even more useful.

Finally, we custodians have also added a small new quality of life to help you keep track of what events belong to what chain! This new subtitle can be manually added to events and when clicked it will bring you to the relevant situation log.

Since these have to be added manually however we will be asking for your help to hunt down any event chains you feel should be tracked this way but aren’t once the patch is out. We should have a form available in the dev diary two weeks from now, after the 3.10.0 release.



This dev diary was a few days early so we could get this information to you before the 3.10.0 “Pyxis” and Astral Planes release. Preliminary release notes will be posted next Tuesday, with final release notes posted on Thursday alongside the release. (Replacing the normal dev diary scheduled for the 16th.)

Regular dev diaries will resume the week after, on November 23rd.

See you then!

Hello again,

Gary from Abrakam Entertainment here to talk some more about the upcoming expansion, Astral Planes. If you haven't yet, you might want to read the first two posts: Rifts and Scars, and Astral Actions.
​
Astral Planes will release on November 16th for US$/€19.99!​
Buy before November 27th for a 10% discount!​



Astral Planes includes:

• Core Mechanics
  
  • Astral Scars
    
  • New Site Type: Astral Rift
    
  • New Resource: Astral Thread
    
  • Astral Harvesting - Technology to harvest Astral Threads
    
  • Rift Sphere - Technology to explore Astral Rifts Rifts
    
  • "Rift in Space" Situation - Unlocks Rift Sphere tech.
    
  • Random Stage 2 Rift Situation Events
• 30+ Rift Sites - Each site contains branching narratives, featuring multiple potential endings and a chance at powerful new rewards.
  
• New Relics - Astral Planes features new Relics, from the Infinity Root to The Continuum, featuring 8 new Relics in total.
  
• Astral Actions
  
  • 10 New Astral Actions
    
  • 4 Additional Astral Actions (requires Overlord)
• The Formless
  
• Riftworld Origin - start with an active Astral Rift in your home system
  
• 4 New Civics
  
  • Hyperspace Speciality
    
  • Dimensional Worship
    
  • Dark Consortium
    
  • Sovereign Guardianship
• New Sounds, Music and Visual Effects
  
  • 3 New Music Tracks from Andreas Waldetoft
    
  • 70+ New Event Pictures
    
  • 80+ New Sound Effects

* Some content may require DLC sold separately

So far, we've covered a lot of the basic mechanics of the new content, and now we'll wrap everything up by covering the new Origin and Civics that we've developed - as well as any other loose ends we can think of.




Riftworld is what we consider our 'launchpad' Origin for this expansion. If you want to get right into what Astral Planes is all about, this is where you might want to start.

Riftworld is the only way that a full-blown Astral Rift will appear at map generation. As you may remember, all other Rifts are formed from Astral Scars that open over time throughout the course of the game. In the Riftworld, you have had one looming over your home planet as long as your society can remember.



Why is it there, and what significance does it have? You'll have accelerated access to Astral Rift technology with this Origin, so you'll be able to find out.

Being so closely connected to worlds beyond the Rifts, you'll also possess some general attunement to the planes and enjoy several bonuses that make exploring them both more likely, and less dangerous.



Debug tooltips intentionally left on so you can read the Council position descriptions.​

Hyperspace Specialty encompasses one of the core themes of the Astral Planes: the manipulation of time and space.

Gotta go fast? This might be for you. This civic will set you on the fast track for Hyperlane research, provides some extra sublight speed, and boosts your Physics research. Physics research is another recurring theme in the Astral Planes - observing many of the phenomena inside of the Rifts will give new insights to your scientists.

You'll also have a boost to planet sensor range, which will start you with some greater understanding of your initial surroundings.




There is a spiritual aspect to the Astral Planes that can be ignored, but not if you choose this Civic.

At each place you discover a weakness in the boundaries between dimensions, you have the opportunity to build a shrine to other worlds. You'll also get a bonus to Astral Rifts appearing (which stacks with the Riftworld Origin),

One area we enjoyed in developing this new content was getting the chance to explore the new design space introduced by the systems in Galactic Paragons, which in this case can gear your priests to have an additional affinity toward Physics research.

​


​
Dark Matter is a material which makes up 'the nothing' throughout various dimensions, and we thought it interesting to include an option to play as a society which is deeply attuned to its utilization.

The Dark Consortium is a type of Civic that cannot be removed* after the game starts, as it adds some significant changes to your society. Not only do you begin with a Dark Matter deposit in your home system, you already have the capability to harvest it.

*Edit for clarification: Dark Consortium is a bit unique here. If you start with the Dark Consortium Civic, it can never removed. However, you can add it once you research Dark Matter Drawing, but once you use its Council Agenda to obtain Dark Matter technologies, it can then never be removed. Sorry about any confusion there.

First, you'll have access to a set of new Edicts which have Dark Matter as a cost.



Dark Matter Forging and Dark Matter Unravelling are global production benefits which will increase your monthly Alloy and Energy generation, respectively. Baryonic Insight is yet another way to boost your monthly Physics research. Investing in Shadow Matrix provides advantages in Encryption, Codebreaking, and Infiltration Levels.

Toward the late-game, you'll also have the opportunity to activate a Council Agenda which will unlock one of the Dark Matter technologies at random, a privilege previously only available if you were able to 'borrow' it from one of the Fallen Empires.

Its Council position provides a way for you to generate even more Dark Matter, without having to find new sources of harvest.




Another Civic which cannot be added or removed, the Sovereign Guardianship may seem a bit out of left-field in the Astral Planes. It is very much the opposite of what you generally want to do regarding exploring the universe and other dimensions. This is for those who prefer to develop a 'tall' build, which should be clear by the heavy penalties introduced by expanding too much.

Those penalties are offset by some juicy defensive bonuses, including a new Starbase Module called the Reloading Bay which improves the efficiency of Starbase weaponry. You'll also be given access to a unique Edict which can convert your potentially languishing Influence into Unity.

We thought it important to provide as many playstyle options as possible with Astral Planes, even if it isn't necessarily themed to the new content. Feel free to turtle up, if you wish.


Rounding out some of the extra content we've included in Astral Planes, we have two new pre-scripted Empires. Feel free to totally ignore these if you prefer to always make your own species, but you might be interested in a quick start into the new content. For that, we recommend:

The Certeran Covenant (New Portrait)​



When a Certeran dies, it is believed that their essence feeds back through a gateway into the astral planes. In this way, they are assured of a life after death, though what form that may take remains a mystery. A strict moral code is enforced to keep the population aligned in this belief; no pious Certeran wants to wander eternity alone.

The bravest of their explorers now search for rifts in space and time, driven to answer their society's most important question: Where do you go when you die?​

Here we have a brand new Humanoid species portrait for you. This portrait will be available for use in any species you create, not just the Certerans.

The Certeran Empire represents the ultimate 'jump start' into the Astral Planes. Their boosts to physics research will make it much easier to obtain requisite technologies for exploring Rifts, and Dimensional Worship will allow you to gain Unity while you do it. Notably, their Ascensionist Civic (previously from Utopia) will become available to anyone who owns Astral Planes as well.

Guardianship of Nyrr​



The typical Nyrrian lifecycle lasts nearly two hundred years. Incubating for decades in sanctuaries below the burning sands of their home planet, only one in a hundred eggs will hatch, and only one in a thousand hatchlings will crawl their way to safety.

Upon coming of age, all Nyrrians swear a blood oath to protect their sanctuaries with their lives. To witness the death of another Nyrrian from unnatural causes is the greatest shame imaginable; the values of preservation and vigilance are etched into every facet of Nyrrian culture.

To breach the walls of any city on Nyrra is nigh impossible, and none alive can remember when the last brick fell. The most stalwart defenders now carry this ethos to the stars.​

Here we are showcasing the new Sovereign Guardianship Civic in metaphorical turtle form. This will be a good way for you to test out this Civic without having to think too hard about exactly how you'd like to customize it. Pre-scripted empires are really one of the best tools for both casual play and roleplay, and we wanted to make sure we included a couple of those for this new content.


Well, first of all, yes there is an overarching story… but we don't want to reveal too much.

Of course, the Riftworld Origin has its own narrative to weave. Beyond that, regardless of your Origin, there is something else going on. Maybe you'll encounter it, and maybe you won't. If you continue to explore beyond the Rifts, it's sure to find you sooner or later. It will be your choice on how to handle what you find.


Thank you for reading this far, and we're really looking forward to letting everyone experience what we've done with this expansion. We've poured an incredible amount of effort into its development, and Paradox has been with us every step of the way in making sure it meets the standards you expect from the game. We don't think you'll be disappointed.

Hope to see you there - in the Astral Planes.

Eladrin taking the mic.

We're going to have another dev diary tomorrow, providing expanded details on some of the Custodian changes in the 3.10.0 "Pyxis" update. (Leader Consolidation, Council Legitimacy, the Additional Content Browser, the Tabbed Outliner, and Event Chain Subtitles.)

Astral Planes will be available on November 16th!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2534090/Stellaris_Astral_Planes/


Pre-Purchase Now on Steam!

Astral Planes offers you the chance to chart your own path as you travel through Rifts in space and time for a glimpse of strange, new realities. What will you discover, in a universe beyond limits?

The Stellaris team has been working with Abrakam Entertainment since October 2022, and they've been working on Astral Planes in close collaboration with the rest of the Stellaris team and we are excited to show you what they’ve been working on all this time!


In the galaxy, there are points at which the boundaries of space and time are weaker than others. Once discovered, these will appear as Astral Scars. Astral Scars are not large enough to explore on their own, but can leak material into our galaxy that might be of some use to your empire.


An Astral Scar

After a time, these Scars will become unstable and blossom into a full-grown Astral Rift. Once you have an Astral Rift in your space, your scientists will begin studying how to explore the rift. Eventually, their studies will lead you to the Rift Sphere technology, allowing you to lower a scientist down into the rift and explore the dimension on the other side.


A fully formed Astral Rift

Fully grown Astral Rifts will start appearing in the midgame, offering more exploration opportunities than ever before in Stellaris.

After your Empire develops the Rift Sphere technology, you can begin to explore any Astral Rifts that exist within your space. Similar to Archaeology Sites, over time your Scientist will report back their findings and other events that happen on the other side of the rift. Unlike Archaeology Sites, Astral Rift explorations offer branching choices that can affect the outcome of the Rift. These decisions each have a difficulty - you may choose the safe option to protect your Scientists, or gamble that what they’re trying will be successful.



Nearly every rift contains some sort of unique reward, from new Faction Modifiers, Relics, Planetary Decisions and even Leaders – if you make the right choices, and provided your Scientists survive those choices.

Core Mechanics

• Astral Scars
  
• New Site Type: Astral Rift
  
• New Resource: Astral Thread
  
• Astral Harvesting - Technology to harvest Astral Threads
  
• Rift Sphere - Technology to explore Astral Rifts Rifts
  
• "Rift in Space" Situation - Unlocks Rift Sphere tech.
  
• Random Stage 2 Rift Situation Events
• 30+ Rift Sites - Each site contains branching narratives, featuring multiple potential endings and a chance at powerful new rewards.
  
• New Relics - Astral Planes features new Relics, from the Infinity Root to The Continuum, featuring 8 new Relics in total.
  
• Astral Actions
  
  • 10 New Astral Actions
    
  • 4 Additional Astral Actions (requires Overlord)
• The Formless
  
• Riftworld Origin - start with an active Astral Rift in your home system
  
• 4 New Civics
  
  • Hyperspace Speciality
    
  • Dimensional Worship
    
  • Dark Consortium
    
  • Sovereign Guardianship
• New Sounds, Music and Visual Effects
  
  • 3 New Music Tracks from Andreas Waldetoft
    
  • 70+ New Event Pictures
    
  • 80+ New Sound Effects

* Some content may require DLC sold separately


Astral Rifts are tears in space and time, and at the edge of a tear, you can always find a few threads. These threads are condensed filaments of space-time itself, and can be used to alter the shape of space and behavior of time in our own universe.

Enter, Astral Actions:

Over time your scientists will develop new ways to use these threads, from using them to further physics research or to create new Astral Rifts, to using them to attract fleets of interdimensional beings and shifting fleets to another dimension.

Overall, there are a total of 10 unique Astral Actions (plus an additional 4 Actions that require Overlord) that can be performed – provided you have enough Astral threads. Some are infinitely repeatable, while others can only be performed once, or a limited number of times.


The manipulation of space and time is one of the core themes in Astral Planes. With the Hyperspace Specialty Civic, you start on the fast lane with hyperlane research.

Effects:

• Guaranteed Research Option: Hyperspace Breach Points
  
• Low Intel on all systems within 3 Hyperlanes of your home system
  
• Planet Sensor Range: +2
  
• Sublight Speed: +10%
  
• Research Speed (Physics): +15%

Hyperlane Supervisor Council Position:

• Hyperlane Registrar Starbase Building: +1 Stability per Leader Level

Empires with the Dimensional Worship Civic believe divine existence lies beyond the folds of space and time. Systems containing instabilities in spacetime should be considered sacred, and are a source of pilgrimage and research.

Dimensional Worship can construct a Dimensional Shrine starbase building in systems containing an Astral Rift or Scar, Wormhole, L-Gate or Shroud tunnel.

Effects:

• Dimensional Shrine: +10 Unity
  
• Monthly Astral Threads: +25%
  
• Astral Rift chance in owned systems: +100%
  
• Rare Technologies appear at 1.1x the normal rate

Astral Minister Council Position:

• Priests provide +0.20 Physics Research per Leader Level

Empires with the Dark Consortium Civic have an inherent and deep understanding of the nature of the universe, which allowed them to harness the unique properties of Dark Matter before the discovery of the Hyperdrive.

The Dark Consortium Civic cannot be added or removed after game start.

Effects:

• Start with Dark Matter Drawing already researched
  
• Access to 4 unique Edicts that cost Dark Matter
  
• Access to the Dark Matter Breakthrough Council Agenda

Shadow Weaver Council Position:

• Researchers generate +0.02 Dark Matter per Leader Level

Edicts:

• Dark Matter Forging: +5% Monthly Alloys
  
• Dark Matter Unravelling: +10% Monthly Energy Credits
  
• Baryonic Insight: +10% Monthly Physics Research
  
• Shadow Matrix: +1 Encryption, +1 Codebreaking, Maximum Infiltration Level: +10

After unlocking a Tier 5 Technology, you'll also have the ability to activate a Council Agenda which will unlock one of the Dark Matter technologies at random, previously only available if you were to 'liberate' it from one of the Fallen Empires.




Empires with the Sovereign Guardianship Civic started as a collection of warring tribes and have developed a historical preference for entrenched territories and defensive posturing. Now united, they set out into the stars with this same philosophy, aiming to keep their borders solid and tensions low.

The Sovereign Guardianship Civic cannot be added or removed after game start.

Effects:

• Unlocks Fanatic Guardians defensive armies
  
• Access to Reloading Bay Starbase Module
  
• Access to Inner Focus Edict
  
• Empire Size from Planets: +100%
  
• Empire Size from Branch Offices: +100%
  
• Empire Size from Systems: +150%
  
• Empire Size from Pops: -50%
  
• Empire Size from Districts: -50%
  
• Diplomatic Weight: +20%
  
• Unity from Soldiers: +1

First Citadel Council Position:
Effects per Leader Level

• Defense Army Damage: +10%
  
• Starbase Hull Points: +5%
  
• Starbase Armor: +5%
  
• Shield Hit Points in Friendly Systems: +5%
  
• Ship Fire Rate in Friendly Systems: +5%
  
• Accuracy in Friendly Systems: +5%

Intended to enable a “tall” playstyle, Sovereign Guardianship has massive penalties for expansion. Those penalties are offset by defensive bonuses, including a new Starbase Module called the Reloading Bay which improves the efficiency of Starbase weaponry. You'll also be given access to a unique Edict which can convert your potentially languishing Influence into Unity.




With the Riftworld Origin, your species evolved with an Astral Rift looming over your homeworld. After studying the object from afar for millennia, the recent advent of starship technology will finally allow you to reach out and discover what secrets it might hold.



Effects:

• Homeworld: Ancient Crater Archaeology Site
  
• Owned Systems: Chance for Astral Rifts +100%
  
• Astral Rift Exploration Speed: +25%
  
• Astral Rift Fail Probability: -50%

The Riftworld Origin is the only way for an Astral Rift to appear at the start of the game. What significance does this Rift have to your people? After spending most of your known history studying the Astral Rift over your homeworld, you will have accelerated access to Astral Rift technologies and possess a general attunement to the Astral Planes, as well as several bonuses that give you advantages when exploring Astral Rifts.


Well, first of all, yes there is an overarching story… but we don't want to reveal too much.

Of course, the Riftworld Origin has its own narrative to weave. Beyond that, regardless of your Origin, there is something else going on. Maybe you'll encounter it, and maybe you won't. If you continue to explore beyond the Rifts, it's sure to find you sooner or later. It will be your choice on how to handle what you find.

Astral Planes will release on November 16th, and is currently available to Pre-Purchase on Steam!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2534090/Stellaris_Astral_Planes

by Atmaz

Hello!

Gary from Abrakam Entertainment here.

Last week we talked about what Astral Rifts were, how they were formed, and what you could find in them. We also briefly mentioned something nebulous about a new resource called Astral Threads and what you can do with them. We call these, simply enough, Astral Actions.

Let's dig a little deeper.


Conceptually, an Astral Thread is the material that binds the boundaries between dimensions. In areas where these boundaries are weakest, these filaments of existence unravel to the point at which they become tangible objects that can be harvested. This unique resource can be put to various uses should you possess the proper technologies and level of attunement to the Astral Planes.

You'll first be able to gather Astral Threads when you encounter an Astral Scar, which you'll remember from our last post are minor tears in space-time present at map-generation. As when discovering other rare resources such as Dark Matter or Rare Crystals, you'll be prompted to begin researching a new technology: Astral Harvesting.



This means you can begin gathering this material before you ever set foot inside of a Rift. But what can you do with it?




First, let's cover where you can find the Astral Actions.

We have taken this opportunity to create a new category on the sidebar: Discoveries. This category now contains all Relics and Astral Actions you have acquired. This means, of course, that Relics and Minor Artifact actions have been removed from the Society Management Category. With the addition of Astral Actions, more Relics, and a particular action that can manipulate Relics, this made practical sense to do.

Another extra feature we've added here is that you can now click Minor Artifacts or Astral Threads in the topbar dropdown to move immediately to this category - similar to how you can click the other resources to open the Galactic Market.




Generally, these are various empire-wide effects that you can activate by spending Astral Threads. Some actions are repeatable on a cooldown, while others have a limited amount of uses. All actions generally have something to do with manipulating space-time or interacting with other dimensions.

When you first look here, you won't have many actions you can do at all. You'll need to attune yourself to the Planes in order to master their use. In other words, the more Astral Rifts you explore, the more actions you will unlock. After exploring 5 Astral Rifts, you will have unlocked all possible actions. Generally, the higher the attunement level required, the more powerful the action.




Initially, you will start at an Astral Thread cap of 500. This seems quite low, but increasing this cap comes naturally with increasing your level of attunement. With each Rift explored, you'll bump the cap up by 250. There is also a special structure called the Astral Siphon you can unlock which can increase the cap even further.

Many actions will increase in cost as you use them, so you'll need to be sure to increase your cap if you intend on using these routinely.

Let's show a few examples.




Astral Splitting will be one of the first actions available to you. Every 10 years, if you have the available space, you can utilize Astral Threads to tear at the space-time within your own borders and open a new Rift. Astral Rifts cannot open if one already exists in an adjacent system, so keep that in mind.

This is an example of an action that has both a limited number of uses, and an increasing cost. All 'limited use' actions are organized on the bottom row of the Astral Action tab.

This action is useful if you haven't gotten very lucky in your explorations and found as many natural Rifts as you'd hoped.




Here we have an example of a more powerful action with unlimited uses.

The Dimensional Lock allows you, for the first time in Stellaris, to prevent movement across wormholes and other bypasses. This will last for 10 years, and only those with whom you have Open Border agreements can pass through. Have a vulnerable back door into the heart of your empire? This might be worth taking advantage of.

Note: This won't work on the Shroud Tunnel in the Shroudwalker enclave, or the main L-Gate in its cluster. It can only block links between two exact points in space, not nexus points. To be clear, it will still work on Shroud Tunnels created from beacons, and normal L-Gates.


There are a few actions that give bonuses to features from the Overlord expansion, specifically for Hyper Relays and Quantum Catapults.



If you have not yet researched Hyper Relay technology, Hyper Relay Insight will give you a boost to get started in doing so.

Once researched, this action will become something entirely new: Flash Forging Hyper Relays




This action is unique in that it is the only one that costs another resource in addition to Astral Threads. At double the normal Influence cost, you'll be able to instantly place a Hyper Relay anywhere you like. If you ever find yourself in a situation where building your space highway becomes a priority, this should help out considerably. Like Dimensional Locks, this action is infinitely repeatable with a cooldown.


We're only detailing a few of the actions available to you and saving the rest to be discovered. Some you may have guessed already by their icons, and some you may have not.

Next week, we'll talk about the new Origin and Civics we're introducing with Astral Planes.

Thanks for reading. See you then!

by Atmaz

Hello!

I'm Gary Morris (or Atmaz) - Lead Game Designer on the Astral Planes DLC, from Abrakam Entertainment.

I've been playing video games my whole life. Some of my earliest memories are staying up way past my bedtime and grinding out hours and hours on strategy games on the Super Nintendo my older brother got for Christmas. I have specific memories of a particular game where I was cleaning up nuclear waste with my workers, tile by tile, and having a great time doing it. I didn't know it at the time, but I was enthralled by a type of game that would later become known as a "4X."

When I finally did get a computer, it was a Tandy 1000 HX. I still don't know what the HX stands for, or what the fascination is with adding X's onto things. On that machine, I quickly acquired a similar 4X game that was much older, but it captivated me just as much. Its lack of fancy graphics was not a problem for me, because I was given a very powerful new tool to play with: a keyboard. In my blissful ignorance, I never realized how much I had struggled with the SNES controller until I had the full complement of a keyboard and number pad (I don't remember there even being a mouse).

Fast forward about 25-30 years, and here we are today. Everyone has a mouse and keyboard, the 4X genre has exploded, and there are multiple great titles of this type to enjoy. One of the best ones, I say without prejudice, is Stellaris.

When we were asked by Paradox to start work with them on a new Stellaris expansion last year, my first thought was: What makes Stellaris fun? That's probably one of the hardest questions I've had to put serious thought to. It's easy to play the game and have fun - but why did I have fun? How do you measure… Stellaris's fun?

There are more complicated answers to this, but the simplest place to start is that it takes you somewhere else. Just like when I was cleaning up nuclear waste with my workers all those years ago to save my cities, I get the same type of feeling when I survey a new system and find something new that might kill me. I like being somewhere else.

So, where is the farthest we can go? We're already in outer space in Stellaris - and really, do you need much more? The concept of space exploration is already so full of excitement and wonder. Stellaris captures this feeling so completely, it makes you wonder: What could possibly be next?

There are hints of what this could be already in-game: the mysteries of the Shroud and what it might contain, the unexplained appearance of the Unbidden and where they have come from. It's clear that there are other dimensions adjacent to our own, and we are teased with only tastes of them. This is the seed of thought from which Astral Planes was born.


Creative Director Jean-Michael Vilain and I talk about the inspiration for Astral Planes​


In each galaxy, there are points at which the boundaries of space and time are weaker than others. Once discovered, they will appear to you as Astral Scars. These Scars are not large enough to be explored, but they do leak through a significant amount of astral material which may be of some use to you.


An Astral Scar, still closed

Over time, it may happen that these Scars become unstable. After blossoming into a fully-blown Astral Rift, they are now open for you to explore. These Astral Rifts take us to the 'somewhere else' that exists beyond our known universe.


An open Astral Rift

However, you can't just plunge yourself into one of these things. The chaotic energies involved in these phenomena would literally tear your scientists into the base components of the universe. You'll need to find a way to slip them more carefully inside. This is where Rift Sphere technology comes in.


Rift Sphere

Achieving 'perfect smoothness' on any object is incredibly difficult - if not impossible. Apparently, it has been achieved here on earth on a very small scale with what is known as the "quantum stabilized atom mirror" earlier this century, but in most practical cases we cannot accomplish this. The James Webb Space telescope, for instance, has a reflective surface polished to an average roughness of only 20 nanometers. That's quite smooth, but we need to go even smoother to safely enter a Rift and have a vessel large enough to accompany a team of scientists. This will take some scientific effort on your part, but once complete you'll be ready to begin exploring other planes of existence.

Conceptually, the Rift Sphere device is loaded onto your science ships and shot like a bullet into the center of a Rift. It possesses basic propulsion capabilities, but for the most part is otherwise helpless on the other side. This is why a cable is tethered from its point of origin to allow for retrieval. This lifeline also serves as a means to send reports and other information from between universes.


One goal we had with Astral Planes was to provide more opportunities for exploration into the mid and late game. At a certain point, after all systems are explored and all Archeological Sites are exhausted, there naturally tends to not be much out there left to see.

Where Astral Rifts help out in this regard is that they are generally not present at map start. They will procedurally open over the course of the game. This means that even in a fully explored system, something new can still appear within your borders to take a look at.


The Dimensional Machine rift


The significant difference between exploring a Rift and exploring an Archaeological Site is that your scientists are in the middle of a 'live' situation. You're not digging up the past and learning about what was, you're discovering something that currently is. This generally means they are often in much more danger, and decisions will need to be made on how to proceed based on the information you are given. On top of that, time can move much differently inside of a Rift, where years have passed on one side where only minutes have on the other end.

Most steps inside of an Astral Rift will provide a choice, and often they will have varying difficulty levels. You may choose to go the easier path to protect your scientists, or brave the danger and hope whatever it is they are trying is a success. A heavy "Risk vs Reward" concept is present in these explorations. There are multiple results that can be achieved from exploring each Rift, and we've added over 30 of them. Inside of many of those Rifts are brand new Relics you can find - provided you make the right choices, and provided your Scientists survive those choices.

There are not just Relics that you can find, however. Nearly every Rift contains some sort of possible unique reward, from new Faction Modifiers, to Planetary Decisions, to even recruitable Leaders. You're entering other places far from your own that have any number of exotic things to discover.

There are even more things, however, that you bring back with you from inside these Rifts - and we call those Astral Threads.


Astral Threads

Let's talk about what you can do with those in the next post.

From behalf of all of our team, thank you for reading this, and thanks to Paradox for giving us this amazing opportunity to create something we think is really cool.

See you soon!

Wishlist Astral Planes today!

It's my great pleasure to announce that Astral Planes will be released alongside the Stellaris 3.10 ‘Pyxis’ update.


Every adventure requires a step into the unknown.

Astral Planes is a narrative-focused expansion that adds mid to late game exploration content with over 30 Astral Rifts with branching narratives and storylines. Unlike the relative safety of Archaeology sites, the Rifts you explore will lead to completely different realms of existence, where fundamentals that were certain at home may not always be true.





Astral Planes includes:

• Over 30 Astral Rifts to explore
  
• 8 new Relics
  
• 4 Civics
  
• 1 Origin
  
• Astral Threads and Astral Actions
  
• 3 new music tracks composed by Andreas Waldetoft

...as well as some insights into some old friends and enemies.

The Stellaris team has been working with Abrakam Entertainment since October 2022, and they've been working on Astral Planes in close collaboration with the rest of the Stellaris team. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be turning the dev diaries over to them so they can get to know you better, so you can feel some of the love they share for Stellaris, and so you can see why we trusted them to help with this release.

Hello all,

We're proud to release the 3.9.3 "Caelum" Patch promised for mid-October. This patch brings with it a balance pass on subjugation and diplomatic acceptance in-general, as well as other balance changes, bug fixes, UI, AI and modding improvements.

Please find the patch notes below.

############################################################​######################## VERSION 3.9.3 ######################### ​############################################################​

Balance

• AI Empires are more likely to seek a federation if their rivals have federated.
  
• Federations (except for Hegemonies) now default to not permitting subject members.
  
• Having less than 50 Trust with an empire imposes a -100 Acceptance to them becoming your subject or overlord.
  
• Hydroponics Designation on habitats now swaps all jobs on the housing districts for farmers.
  
• Increased the importance of being more powerful than your vassal for loyalty purposes.
  
• Insulting someone decreases their Trust of you by 5.
  
• Rebalanced requirements for diplomatic treaties to require trust.
  
• Reduced how excited subjects get about things like shared sensors.
  
• Reduced the effect differing war philosophies has on federation acceptance.
  
• Removed the ability to trade favors.
  
• Replaced all +10% Districts on Habitats from technologies and traditions with +1 District on Habitats
  
• Replaced the upgrade habitat decisions with checks for habitat capital level instead.
  
• The Intimidation menace perk now allows you to ignore diplomatic requirements for proposing subjugation.
  
• The Pharma State civic now provides +1 Medical Worker job to capital buildings.
  
• The Unity from Rivals from the Animosity Diplomatic Stance has been reduced to 10 per rival.
  
• Trade Designation on habitats now has the housing district swap a clerk for a trader.

Improvement

• Research, Energy and Mining District capacity on habitat complexes now have their own planetary features to clearly show the number of districts, current number of orbitals and maximum number of orbitals.
  
• The Crisis event chain will now use their bespoke event chain icon.

Bugfix

• Added is_scope_valid checks for anchorages.
  
• Fix to hiring events not being dismissed for other players in coop
  
• Fixed concept tooltips for starbase components.
  
• Fixed issue with nested tooltips and mouse tendency being incorrect when using UI scaling
  
• Fixed issue with some portraits being blurry on lower graphics settings due to mip levels being skipped. Disabled the functionality for portraits and related textures.
  
• Fixed the Node Culling gateway leading to an unlocalized string.
  
• Fixed Tiyanki occasionally not spawning correctly at the start of a Fruitful Partnership playthrough
  
• Massive Crater got its 25% pop growth back
  
• Restoring the Payback habitat when your homeworld is a moon now grants a minor orbital instead of a major orbital.
  
• Rewrote math for calculate tendency between mouse and nested tooltip window. This should fix issue with tooltips below and above mouse cursor behaving somewhat differently.
  
• Stopped interactions allowing multiple gaia-seeder buildings on a planet.
  
• The bonus provided by Eclipse from Enmity now correctly grants a 2% modifier instead of a 20% modifier.
  
• Updated the Eclipse tradition tooltip
  
• Updated the massive crater concept tooltip to accurately display the actual deposit.

AI

• Certain AI personalities (Federation Builders, Spiritual Seekers, Migrating Flocks, and Peaceful Traders) are now 25x more likely to select Diplomacy traditions.
  
• The AI will no longer request to be subjugated by empires that are equivalent or weaker than them.
  
• The AI will no longer request to become the subject or overlord of another empire unless they have 50 Trust with the other party.

UI

• The ship viewer's zoom speed is now scaled to the ship's size.
  
• Tooltips to select agendas now show the estimated time to launch the agenda, based off of your current agenda progress rate
  
• Trust between nations is now visible in the main diplomatic screen.
  
• When switching ships in the ship viewer, the zoom distance will now be preserved relative to the ship's size.

Modding

• Added documentation for concepts.
  
• Added support for more object types in concept tooltips.
  
• Fixed gridbox left and top padding not working.
  
• Some objects' auto-generated tooltips can now be shown as concept tooltips.
  
• Support building concept tooltips without valid scope.
  
• Calling non existing events should no longer crash the game.

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 PDX-Ruk


In this week's dev diary, I am taking the reins from Eladrin.
I am a producer on Stellaris and usually help Eladrin as best I can, but today I want to talk about my other project and let Stellaris have a week off before they talk about their next thing.

And that Project is: Star Trek: Infinite




Watch the video version of this Dev Diary


I joined Paradox back in the start of 2021, and was given the task to bring Star Trek: Infinite to Launch.
Today is that day: we launch Star Trek: Infinite.

Why am I talking about Infinite in the Stellaris Dev diary? To start off, I am a producer on Stellaris, but also the producer for Star Trek: Infinite - I love playing both games, and I think some of you might feel the same.

Secondly, as all of you can easily identify, Star Trek: Infinite is built on the Stellaris Engine, with little effort to hide it. Everyone here on the Stellaris team has been giving feedback and tips since its inception, and we are all fully behind it.

While Star Trek: Infinite is not a Stellaris Team project, it is a distinguished member of Stellaris Selective Kinship.



From a product point of view, Stellaris is the best Space/Emergent Story/Strategy game out there. Star Trek has a great tradition of 4x strategy games, and several story driven games. With that in mind, was there a possible way to mix this peanut butter gameplay of Stellaris with the strawberry jelly of Star Trek?

I for one believed it could be done. The big takeaway from Stellaris we wanted in this game was exploration, choice and evolving gameplay. From Star Trek I wanted recognizable factions, lore authentic events and leaders.

This has been our north star since the start. We don’t want to make a game that only explores the existing timeline, nor do we want a game with complete randomness. A balance between the two had to be maintained, and I think we might have pulled it off.




It really depends on what type of Stellaris player you are. I love making themed factions that are not optimized, but thematically attractive. Setting the difficulty to Ensign/Captain, and seeing how it all plays out. I will usually restart if I get boring neighbors, or I get an unwanted precursor. My favorite Origins are Post-Apocalyptic+UNE, Toxic God, Payback+UNE, or Machine Empire with Eager Explorers. I also lean heavily away from micromanagement and build optimization.

If you play anything like me, Star Trek: Infinite might be for you.

If you think seeing Klingons going to war with Romulans over their claim to Kithomer gives a different flavor than seeing UNE being attacked by Kel-Azaan Republic over a claim in Parvus, Star Trek: Infinite might be for you.

If you think you can be a better Gul than Dukat, and that there should be a statue of you on Bajor. Star Trek: Infinite might be for you…

If you think Romulans should reunite with Vulcan, but it should be done with force, and not diplomacy? Star Trek: Infinite might be for you.




This is one of the reasons we wanted to make this game a standalone, rather than part of Stellaris. We wanted this game to have its own track and not cause limitations on Stellaris, or Stellaris cause limitations for it. Stellaris should continue to evolve as the best Sci-fi sandbox strategy game in existence, and Star Trek: Infinite should be the definitive Star Trek strategy game.

Mods are already being made, and we have full Steam Workshop support. We will be paying a bit more attention to our terms and conditions, but we have not made major changes to the existing one.

So if this sounds like it could be appealing, check it out here.

Until next time,

PDX_Ruk

Ghost Signal is a VR action roguelite set in the Stellaris universe, where you captain your ship to battle a multitude of alien species. Partake in dynamic space wars, encounter planet sized creatures, gather valuable loot to conduct research, and more. No journey is the same. Will you find the origins of the mysterious Ghost Signal?



Get Ghost Signal: A Stellaris Game!
Get 20% off Ghost Signal and Stellaris with the Alternate Realities bundle! (And you don’t pay for the content you already own!)

INTERSTELLAR SPACE BATTLES
Use the full artillery of the Aurora against enemy armadas. Loot or purchase power-ups like freeze rays, atomic missiles or even dragon companions - the choice is yours.

UPGRADE & CUSTOMIZE
Scan exotic creatures for your logbook and conduct research in multiple tech trees. Asynchronous multiplayer allows you to scavenge other players' deserted ships for valuables.

A NEVER ENDING JOURNEY
Alongside the story mode where randomized maps make every session unique, Ghost Signal includes Daily Challenges with both global and local leaderboards to climb.

A UNIVERSE FULL OF WONDERS
As captain of the Aurora, encounter strange aliens in their home worlds and enter lost temples in the pursuit of the mysterious signal that seems to defy even death.