Stellaris

[Rayfer]

Started a new game with the update. Not sure if it was bad luck or the patch but after surveying the Sol system I went to survey the nearest star system and immediately encountered a 150 strength alien craft, an amoeba-like thing, that pursued my science ship back to the Sol system, destroyed it and my weak 4 corvette fleet, it then set about destroying what little I had left. Game over.  :'(   Still, I haven't had this much fun with this 4X space game since Distant Worlds Universe.

Hmmm....it's not usual to find them but it is unusual for them to follow you back and wreck crap. I'm playing the new patch so maybe bad luck.

Agreed....never had them pursue me back to my home system before. Time to fire up a new campaign and see what happens.

[ghostryder]

Starting my new game I also was surrounded with space monsters---I think all types--the strong Omebas--with a strength of like 450, to minor bots at around 125 to crystals at 185. i simply had to run time to build up a fleet strong enough. I'm only about 20 years in so have not run into other civs yet--but overall I'm pretty happy with what I see so far. Like making the planet limit be a systems limit instead--the games really turning around quick from intial release--

[ghostryder]

Someone above asked what mods we use so i'll list mine:

First off I do not trust the A.I. handling sectors. So I use this mod---which by the way does work with 1.2 now that it's systems rather than planets--I'll list the name of the mod. Don't know how to link it from the steam workshop--so just use search to find it there:


Flexible Core Planet Cap & Resettlement Cost - I set mine to add 50 which is plenty now that it's systems. I do not use the resettlement part--as I like slow growth-so my race is slow breeders usually.

Auto Improve Buildings ENG/RUS/FRA - needed if you use above mod. buildings will improve or build automatically if there are sufficient resources.

No Clustered Starts - speads out the empires on the map


That's pretty much it game play wise.

Races:

Mass Effect - Races V2

-The Quarian Race (Including Lore Friendly Namelist)
The Volus Race (Including Lore Friendly Namelist)
The Vorcha Race (Including Lore Friendly Namelist)
The Batarian Race (Including Lore Friendly Namelist)
The Prothean Race (Including Lore Friendly Namelist)
The Drell Race (Including Lore Friendly Namelist)
The Hanar Race (Including Lore Friendly Namelist)
The Yahg Race (Including Lore Friendly Namelist)
The Systems Alliance Namelist (Only included a Namelist this was taken from another MOD but added a few extras)
The Asari Race (Only included a Namelist, the actual Mod excluding the Prescripted country is also included but no edits was changed full credit goes to the Modder)
The Geth Race (Only included a Namelist, the actual Mod excluding the Prescripted country is also included but no edits was changed full credit goes to the Modder)
The Salarian Race (Only included a Namelist, the actual Mod excluding the Prescripted country is also included but no edits was changed full credit goes to the Modder)
The Turian Race WIP ** (Only included a Namelist, the actual Mod excluding the Prescripted country is also included but no edits was changed full credit goes to the Modder)
The Krogan Race (Only included a Namelist, the actual Mod excluding the Prescripted country is also included but no edits was changed full credit goes to the Modder)
Animated Eldar Portraits - Warhammer 40K
Space Babes - the single best mod ever created for the game!
Star Trek Races + Uniforms

Music

SpaceAmbient Music -- just to expand on what the game offers. there's lots more music mods to get but I like this as it's subdued.

[mikeck]

As for mods. I recommend

1. "Z Beautiful battles": not as necessary after 1.2 but it still adds a better spread for ship formations and smoother movement as well as dramatically increasing the range of all weapons. Battles look more "realistic" ESPECIALLY when used with these 3:

    2.  Scaled down ships: ships are tiny but you can still double click and zoom in as much as you'd like...but the ships are scaled much better in relation to planets.

    3.  Distant world system scale: increases the distance between orbital rings and sun. There is another that increases even more. Both also better scale planets related to their moons.

    4.   Epic Explosions. Makes explosions....epic?

These 4 together really make the tactical battles look better than any other 4x I think. Takes the vanilla battles (somewhat corrected in 1.2) of ships the same size as moons swarming around like flies on crap and makes them into long range duels between spread out ships which can't be seen when zoomed out (except for effects) and gives the battle a more "realistic" feel (as real as science fiction can be)

I play the battles in "slowest" time format and I could spend all day watching my destroyers fire torpedoes with their bright plumes and extended smoke trails.


I also recommend

5. the planet cap mod above which allows control of as many planets as you want
6. Unlimited leaders
7. No influence cost for leaders

The final two correct a pet peeve of mine; that somehow I can't have an admiral leading a fleet, scientists researching or governors running my planets without influence???? Or that I can only have 14? Just use it judiciously since the AI does not use many and veteran admirals can become quite valuable.

8.  "Glassing the planet": allows for something that should have been provided in the vanilla game...nuking a planet and killing the population (which leaves it uninhabitable for a short time). You can also "glass" the planet which -I guess - "super-nukes" it so that it can NEVER be inhabited. I never use the latter.

[CJReich46]

Anyone ever try 2D Galaxy?

I liked Z Beautiful Battles and you're right, Asimov fixed the battles.

I'm looking for a mod that is similar to the settings in DW where you could select the distance between stars- would non clustered start work?

Mod lists look interesting.

[KyzBP]

As for mods. I recommend

1. "Z Beautiful battles": not as necessary after 1.2 but it still adds a better spread for ship formations and smoother movement as well as dramatically increasing the range of all weapons. Battles look more "realistic" ESPECIALLY when used with these 3:

    2.  Scaled down ships: ships are tiny but you can still double click and zoom in as much as you'd like...but the ships are scaled much better in relation to planets.

    3.  Distant world system scale: increases the distance between orbital rings and sun. There is another that increases even more. Both also better scale planets related to their moons.

    4.   Epic Explosions. Makes explosions....epic?

These 4 together really make the tactical battles look better than any other 4x I think. Takes the vanilla battles (somewhat corrected in 1.2) of ships the same size as moons swarming around like flies on crap and makes them into long range duels between spread out ships which can't be seen when zoomed out (except for effects) and gives the battle a more "realistic" feel (as real as science fiction can be)

I play the battles in "slowest" time format and I could spend all day watching my destroyers fire torpedoes with their bright plumes and extended smoke trails.


I also recommend

5. the planet cap mod above which allows control of as many planets as you want
6. Unlimited leaders
7. No influence cost for leaders

The final two correct a pet peeve of mine; that somehow I can't have an admiral leading a fleet, scientists researching or governors running my planets without influence???? Or that I can only have 14? Just use it judiciously since the AI does not use many and veteran admirals can become quite valuable.

8.  "Glassing the planet": allows for something that should have been provided in the vanilla game...nuking a planet and killing the population (which leaves it uninhabitable for a short time). You can also "glass" the planet which -I guess - "super-nukes" it so that it can NEVER be inhabited. I never use the latter.

Thanks Mike.  I'll be looking into those today. O0

[mikeck]

Anyone ever try 2D Galaxy?

I liked Z Beautiful Battles and you're right, Asimov fixed the battles.

I'm looking for a mod that is similar to the settings in DW where you could select the distance between stars- would non clustered start work?

Mod lists look interesting.

I still use "Zbeautuful battles" even after Azimov. It extends ranges and the ships turn smoother and slower instead of quick changes of direction. It also spreads the ships out farther. But it's not necessary.

I'm confused about the starting situation. If I choose eight AI empires I somehow end up with like 13 or 14 in the game. I guess it's from rebellions and such starting new ones?  Anyway by the time I get the galaxy explored it's full of empires so I never got the impression that you wind up starting on top of everyone... just that the Galaxy is  pretty packed. I play a 600 star galaxy with 8 empires besides me. I always run into one or two fairly early but never have problems expanding. Right now late game there are 12 empires (besides mine), 2 fallen empires and about 5 primitives. Fairly evenly divided

I did try "no clustered starts "and another similar model but both kept placing me on the fringe of the galaxy where I could only explore in three directions. I like kind of being in the middle.

[mikeck]

Here is a good simple and short video that shows how battles look with the beautiful battles mod and the decreased scale for ships mod. Compare this battle with the oversized swarming battles at release...ships bumping into eachother and crap.

This is at "normal" speed. I play battles at "slow" or "slowest" and it really gives it a more epic feel when you zoom in.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ecvLkZLoA-Y

I wish that paradox would revisit the missiles in this game. They don't serve much of a purpose since they are easily countered by point the fence and torpedoes have a far better shield penetration and do far more damage.  I'd like to see a system where missiles evade PD much better than torpedoes do (which move slowly.) But this can be countered with perhaps electronic countermeasures modules that could be added to the ship. Right now missiles have a 100% chance to hit unless shot down by PD. seems kind of  lazy considering the ease of adding ECM  and using that along with evasion to lower the chance to hit

[ghostryder]

Over the extended weekend I gave Star Trek New Horizons a try. The .03 beta seemed to crash on me regularly but on Saturday they released the 04. beta--and I've played 50 years without a crash thus far. Lots of great touches thus far in this mod. little things like pulling sound bites from the series "Planet scan complete" to the overall trek map--with .04 you can play now 3 races--Humans, Klingons and Romulans.  They do include ship models but not complete yet across the board. Another great feature of the mod is it's intended to span from "Enterprise" era starting in the year 2150 up to the year 2400 and beyond.--and as a cool feature the uniforms change as the eras pass. .04 added the borg as well. I'm really enjoying it even in this early stage.

Current features:
- Static canon Galaxy
- 26 pre-scripted races with canon starting positions
- 3 playable factions: United Earth, Klingon Empire, Romulan Star Empire
- 3 ENT era ships per faction
- Full civilian shipset
- New Torpedo weapons, shields and special effects
- Proper portraits and uniforms
- Replaced the scourge crisis event with borg
- UI rework
- Sounds and music rework
- New non-playable Borg faction conquering the Delta Quadrant
- Several minor features

Patchnotes 0.4:

-New Portraits and Races: Andorian, Bajoran, Bolian, Borg, Breen, Cardassian, Ferengi, Jem Hadar, Reman, Romulan, Tellarite, Tholian, Trill, Vorta, Voth, Vulcan, several more Federation and Klingon Portraits
-Federation and Romulan Uniforms change with time passed: starting in Enterprise Era, Kelvin Era, TOS, Wrath of Khan, TNG up to First Contact
-Lots of civilian clothing
-Static Galaxy Update: 28 pre-scripted Races with canon starting positions, many many canon systems added, several fixes and rework
-Torpedo, shields and phaser special effects
-Added playable Romulan Star Empire with ships
-Several fixes and new/other ships for Federation and Klingons
-Full set of civilian ships
-No more Stellaris races
-Borg ships added and reworked
-New non-playable Borg faction conquering the Delta Quadrant

[CJReich46]

Over the extended weekend I gave Star Trek New Horizons a try. The .03 beta seemed to crash on me regularly but on Saturday they released the 04. beta--and I've played 50 years without a crash thus far. Lots of great touches thus far in this mod. little things like pulling sound bites from the series "Planet scan complete" to the overall trek map--with .04 you can play now 3 races--Humans, Klingons and Romulans.  They do include ship models but not complete yet across the board. Another great feature of the mod is it's intended to span from "Enterprise" era starting in the year 2150 up to the year 2400 and beyond.--and as a cool feature the uniforms change as the eras pass. .04 added the borg as well. I'm really enjoying it even in this early stage.

Current features:
- Static canon Galaxy
- 26 pre-scripted races with canon starting positions
- 3 playable factions: United Earth, Klingon Empire, Romulan Star Empire
- 3 ENT era ships per faction
- Full civilian shipset
- New Torpedo weapons, shields and special effects
- Proper portraits and uniforms
- Replaced the scourge crisis event with borg
- UI rework
- Sounds and music rework
- New non-playable Borg faction conquering the Delta Quadrant
- Several minor features

Patchnotes 0.4:

-New Portraits and Races: Andorian, Bajoran, Bolian, Borg, Breen, Cardassian, Ferengi, Jem Hadar, Reman, Romulan, Tellarite, Tholian, Trill, Vorta, Voth, Vulcan, several more Federation and Klingon Portraits
-Federation and Romulan Uniforms change with time passed: starting in Enterprise Era, Kelvin Era, TOS, Wrath of Khan, TNG up to First Contact
-Lots of civilian clothing
-Static Galaxy Update: 28 pre-scripted Races with canon starting positions, many many canon systems added, several fixes and rework
-Torpedo, shields and phaser special effects
-Added playable Romulan Star Empire with ships
-Several fixes and new/other ships for Federation and Klingons
-Full set of civilian ships
-No more Stellaris races
-Borg ships added and reworked
-New non-playable Borg faction conquering the Delta Quadrant

Fascinating. Must download.

[mikeck]

Do any of you guys play on "hard" difficulty? I'm sure some do. Just curious as to how that plays out. I have been playing normal and in the past 2 games I stopped once I was able to steamroll people....both times right when I was getting into the really cool tech. My concern about "hard" mode is that in some games, "hard" difficulty merry involves resource cheats which enable the AI to attack me constantly in the beginning of the game.

[OJsDad]

6. Unlimited leaders

Is the same as Unlimited Potential.  If so, then FYI, it's not working.  When you load the game, the stock races are not available and you cannot customize one as you cannot select an FLT type. 

[OJsDad]

Question on research.  I've researched what is supposed to give some bonuses for research, but I cannot find where it's give the bonus.  Also, when researching anomalies not always seeing the bonuses.  Is anyone else seeing the same thing.

[Yskonyn]

The Plant-like species have been released, but I am a little amazed at the price: 7 euro's. Not sure I am willing to pay 7 euros for every race they are going to add. 7 euros for a pack of 3, yes, but not per item.

[tgb]

That's definitely a bit steep.  I also see a patch being downloaded, but haven't found any notes for it.