Stellaris Mods: HAPPY NEW YEAR! (Patreon)

IT'S 2019 ALREADY???

Wow the past year has gone by in a whoosh! So much has happened in our mods and Stellaris in general! In just one year, the game became a sequel of itself... twice! Made barely recognisable by sweeping changes to its core systems and a galactic butt-ton of content! Does anyone still remember the old FTL mechanics? Not having wormholes, gateways and starbases? Having borders that blob out unpredictably and trollish AI that loved to put frontier outpost smack-dab between your colonies? Back when Titans were hardcoded and exclusive to Awakened Empires and Colossi were not even a thing? Even the old planet system feels like a distant memory at this point even though it's only been gone since December!

I love Stellaris and I can't express enough how much respect and awe I have for the dev's courage to flip core gameplay mechanics on their head to accomodate the game's growth. Every major update is like playing a new, better game and for us, as modders, it means being given more tools, more control and more options, allowing us to multiply the game's replayability even more!

I could wax lyrical about it all day but... that's probably not (the only) reason you're here n_n I was supposed to talk about Team Nessassity mods. What we've accomplished over the past year and what we have in mind going forward. Also, I'd like to talk briefly about the resolutions I made last year and how well that may or may not have gone ^^

In all respects, there is so much to talk about so let's not waste any more time on the intro! Someday I'll figure out how to keep it short! >o<

2018: Year In Review

At the start of 2018, I made a couple of resolutions. Today, I'd like to look back on them and see what lessons I managed to take away from the past year.

• To start with, our objective with MEC: Asari was to "Stick to the plan!" It was a bit of a mess of loose ends and disparate half-baked elements because we were so incredibly distracted and kept chasing every new shiny idea that popped up.
  For the most part, we achieved that goal, having successfully completed work on all Utopia Megastructures, reworked and upscaled the shipset and portraits as well as established the groundwork for the expansion we are working on now.
  That said, I'm not entirely happy with the rate at which all of that happened. Even when sticking to the plan, we ended up delaying, reprioritising and, in a few cases, dropping various aspects for now.
  But in the end, we accomplished most of what we set out to do and that's the important part. Now that we have developed a sense of direction, we can work on improving the rate of production.
• For SCX, we aimed to "Give it the attention it deserves!" A vague promise that I don't feel l managed to keep.
  While we did the absolute minimum required to adapt SCX to the warfare environment and naval doctrine of Cherryh, reworked it into a more flexible modular format, as well as started on a very basic implementation of SCX: Mass Effect module, it quickly fell by the wayside afterwards.
  To tell you truth, I have not played many games with SCX enabled over the past year. I made it originally to fill gaps in the vanilla ship class lineup. But since Apocalypse added Titans, my yearning for a big unique flagship-type vessel has been sated. I love Titans, I think they're perfect and I can't do better.
  And Carriers... Carriers remain a thorn in my side. On one hand, I do like the idea of a carrier class ship entirely dedicated to Strike Craft deployment... but in reality, Strike Craft in Stellaris continues to be awful. Strike Craft AI is bugged, making it frustratingly unpredictable and impossible to reliably balance, and there is far less room for creativity when it comes to possible types of strike craft than I thought there would be. I can't, for example, order a wing of fighters to escort its carrier, I can't make them debuff the ship they're attacking, I can't create "repair drones" that heal friendly ships instead of attacking enemies.
  I do still believe that there is potential in the idea of Carrier-class vessels. However, I don't think Stellaris has the mechanical capability to utilise that potential just yet. Perhaps we'll see it change in the future as with many other aspects of the game that used to be hardcoded and rudimentary but are now incredibly moddable and complex? However, I cannot make plans around what might maybe happen. So for the time being, I'm afraid SCX will remain a low priority side-project. I will not make any promises regarding its evolution this year. If something happens with it, let it be a pleasant surprise ^^
• On a brighter note, Elves of Stellaris made incredible strides in 2018! We can consider the "Never too many elves!" resolution... unfulfillable because there's NEVER too many elves! But I'm still satisfied with the results n_~
  The massive Lhuren update we worked on for the better part of the year led to a comprehensive overhaul of the entire mod and established an efficient framework for the upcoming Le Guin expansion just in time. And the centrepiece of the update - the Lhuren themselves - were easily the biggest, most polished addition to the space elf family so far.
  I believe we managed to do as much as physically possible prior to Le Guin, which gave us a comfortable headstart going into the new version of Stellaris. But more on that later! n_n
• Beyond the Big Three, I made the resolution to "Expand!" Meaning, invest into new projects, mainly MEC: Omega.
  And that... unfortunately turned out to be too much too early. While we have released the small MEC: Mass Relays mod, it's really just a rudimentary reskin that doesn't really have much room for further growth, so I don't consider it a full-fledged project.
  As for Omega itself, I feel like we may have announced it too early. Funnily enough, we had done more work on it before the announcement than since. The progress we have made over the past year has been... minimal. We ended up rewriting parts of the original plan once we realised that Apocalypse was not as good of a base for it as Megacorp, so aside from art assets and the Collectors, most aspects of Omega, including Omega's own setup, the Aria's Couch Simulator system and events surrounding both, have had their progress reset.
  Add to that the fact that both Asari and Elves continued to take up most of our attention this year, and in the end, Omega barely moved forward at all.
  Will this year be different? Oh we really really hope so! Megacorp is a much better base for what we're aiming to accomplish, providing the mechanics we need to make Omega gameplay both fun and viable. And after their Le Guin updates, Elves and Asari will finally be in a good enough place to hopefully let us leave them alone for a while and focus on other projects.
• And lastly, the final resolution I made last year - to "Treat Patreon more seriously!"
  Ooof... welp, where do I even start? First of all, I completely failed on the "more activity" front. 2018 saw for the most part monthly reports. The polls and extras I was hoping to start doing did not happen at all. My interaction with Patrons dropped and I can't even look at the promise of overhauling the reward tiers without wishing the ground would open up and swallow me >.<
  That said, I don't think all my failures to fulfil these resolutions were a bad thing. throughout the year I concluded that if I had committed to some of those aspects, for example making more posts, it would have reflected negatively in my productivity.
  I also do think that my communication with users has improved, although not in the way I originally envisioned. You may have noticed over the last several months that even though I stopped posting the unscheduled WIP previews on Patreon, I started posting more teasers on Twitter. And I must say I find this arrangement a lot more comfortable.
  Writing Patreon posts is actually a lot of work. I've been writing this one for over an hour now and I still have a lot to go over. Whenever I make a Patreon post, I want to make it special, I want it to be verbose and eloquent, funny and engaging. I spend a lot of time pondering the wording and pacing as I pour the contents of my brain onto the um... the digital sheet I guess.
  Or in other words, whenever I make a Patreon post, I want it to be big or be about something big that I can talk a lot about. But... that also puts a lot of pressure on me, which is why I started incorporating twitter into my communication. What Twitter allows me to do is... not make a big deal out of everything! I can post a screenshot of what we're working on with a sentence or two of commentary, and that's enough! That way, when the time comes to write a Monthly Report, I can put all my focus into making it special without having to worry about having nothing new to say.
  I feel it overall improved the quality of Monthly Reports while increasing the quantity of news I announce in between them.
  At least that's how I see it. It's not quite what I wanted to do but I like doing it this way. Still, I'd like ask my Patrons. Do you agree with it? Would you prefer me to return to the old format of posting mid-month previews and unscheduled WIP posts here on Patreon? Or do you have any other suggestions? Ultimately, I want to find the sweet spot that will make you happy without causing me too much stress or getting in the way of productivity. If there is one big lesson I've learned in 2018 it's that... that is not as simple as I thought >.>

2019: The FUTURE!

I don't really want to make another set of resolutions for this year. Rather, I want to focus on what I did well in 2018 and capitalise on it. Obviously, there are things I need to address outside of that - indecisiveness being the big one - but I think having solid ground to stand on will help with that too. More striving to succeed, less dwelling on failures.

With that in mind, I'd like to give you a little taste of what you expect from Team Nessassity in both the short and long term this year!

Mass Effect Civilisations: Asari

We are still not ready to release the Le Guin update but we're hoping it won't be long now. I want it to be out in January and I'm hoping that the moddability bugfixes we need on the game's end will be out shortly after Paradox devs return to work next week.

But as much as the technical difficulties derailed our projected schedule, we have used the extra time we were given to squeeze a lot more features into the update than originally planned. Basically, the first Le Guin update asari receive will contain features and content that was meant to arrive over the weeks and months following the initial release. I think that's worth the wait n_n

Here's everything coming to the Le Guin incarnation of Asari. First, general features:

• Reworked mining and research stations, reworked colony ship and custom Colossus model.
• All ships and stations have had their shaders reworked so they now behave as expected of a ship in all situations and any lighting conditions. This includes showing signs of hull damage in combat.
• Related to the above, all ships and stations now explode in much flashier, more dramatic ways, with lots of bright explosions throughout meticulously designed sequences. I pulled an all-nighter that flipped my sleep schedule for the rest of the week upside-down so please look forward to it! >o<
• All icons and emblems have been redrawn from scratch and are now more distinct and more specific to what they relate to.
• The Gynogenetic trait has been completely reimagined and adapted to work with the new pop and pop growth system. Gynogenetic pops have -25% growth rate by default. A harsh penalty meant to synergise with the trait's scripted functionality that triggers when a new pop is born on a planet that has gynogenetic pops.
  If it's an alien, non-gynogenetic pop, there is a chance based on the planet's population of gynogenetic pops that the newly grown pop will become one of them instead of its original species. This is their way of bypassing the base growth penalty but is not perfectly reliable.
  If it's a gynogenetic pop, there is a chance based on the planet's population of same-species gynogenetic pops that the newly grown pop will have a large population of Ardat-Yakshi individuals. This permanently reduces that pop's happiness.
  In the future, we're hoping to expand on the crossbreeding mechanics as well as ardat-yakshi.
• The Amaranthine trait continues to provide +900 lifespan, but now doubles leaders' upkeep in addition to their recruitment price. Since there is no longer a limit to how many leaders can be recruited, we feel it is fair that an ongoing benefit should be counterbalanced by an ongoing penalty. Also, the trait's tooltip now clearly states that leaders' starting age varies between 250 and 750.
• The Biotic Evolution civic has been removed. Also, starting now, Biotics in our ME mods will no longer be associated with Psionics. While functionally both may be "sci-fi superpowers", the Stellaris fluff for Psionics very explicitly paints it as a spiritual phenomenon that defies explanation and originates from an otherworldly dimension. That is at odds with Biotics which is very much a biological, genetically inheritable, scientifically quantifiable, very physical and tangible thing.
• A new species trait has been added in Biotic Evolution's place: Natural Biotics. Pending further expansion, for now it merely provides a couple of leader-based benefits.
• All systems have been rescaled, generally increasing the distances between orbits as well as making stars significantly larger. The system setups based on ME2 and 3 felt a bit claustrophobic. This should make asari home clusters feel more at home in Stellaris and less out of place when using mods like Real Space and similar (note that this does not mean 100% compatibility, just an adjustment in that direction).
• Deposits on all planets in asari home clusters have been adjusted to Le Guin standards. A few planets even have unique deposits. ALL deposits and blockers on Illium and Thessia are custom and some come with unique properties.
• Pops now pick clothes based on their jobs and colour variants based on ethics.

In addition to the general changes, the prescripted asari empires (Asari Republics and Asari Corporate Interests) have been made more distinct and each one now has its own civics and unique mechanics. For this update, we mostly focused on Illium to celebrate the release of Megacorp. Thessia has received massive changes but probably won't reach its full potential until a more diplomacy/espionage focused expansion.

• If both prescripted asari empires  spawn in game, they will now be merged into one species and their homeworld will be set to Thessia. That means Illium colonists no longer have full habitability on their starting planet and that plays into certain mechanics specific to Illium.
• Those without the Megacorp DLC will still be able to play Illium but it won't be fully featured. For the owners of the Megacorp DLC, Asari Corporate Interests is now a legitimate Megacorp with its own playstyle distinct from that of the Asari Republics.
• Asari Corporate Interests now has its own flag emblem.
• Asari Corporate Interests (for Megacorp owners) has a new civic called "Illium à la Mode". It requires the Corporate authority and any degree of Materialist and Xenophile.
  With this civic, excess Amenities on owned planets are utilised to increase Unity and Research output from pop jobs. Excess Amenities on Branch Office planets increase their Trade Value.
• Illium is now a size 20 planet, but starts with several blockers that require advanced techs and a lot of resources to clear. One of those blockers reduces the planet's habitability and increases district build cost and can only be removed with Ecological Adaptation. On the bright side, once cleaned up, Illium makes for an ideal candidate for the Arcology Project.
• Asari Republics has a new civic called "Thessian Statecraft". It requires the Democratic authority and any degree of Xenophile and Egalitarian. With this civic, Migration Pacts (up to 8) produce a small amount of Influence for this empire, and grant stability and xenophile attraction to the other party.
  In addition, the empire gains access to The Forum events. Those events occur at irregular intervals and grant various temporary buffs and debuffs to the empire, often at the same time.
• Thessia is a size 16 planet with a below-average spread of natural resources, but it compensates for it by hosting several unique features that grant special benefits instead of districts slots. For example, the Prothean archives underneath the Temple of Athame boost all Researcher output on the planet, the Thessian Communication Network increases Unity output and Element Zero Deposits produce Trade Value. These benefits are meant to make Thessia a cultural powerhouse and keep it relevant throughout the game despite its small size.

Phew! That's not even the full changelog. I think there's a few other things I forgot to mention because almost everything has changed! Also, as you may have noticed, some of the features are marked as possible avenues of expansion in the future. With all the modding potential of Le Guin and future Stellaris updates we already can't wait for, there are many areas we have only dipped our toes into and definitely would like to improve and expand going forward!
A few things I'm personally very interested in are Ardat-Yakshi, Biotics and Element Zero. For now, all three are have very basic functionality, but if you've known Team Nessassity for the past year, it's reasonable to expect that it won't stay basic forever n_~

Elves of Stellaris

If you thought MEC: Asari is going to be unrecognisable, let me tell you about the Elves of Stellaris overhaul! I won't be able to list all the changes in detail as work on Elves is still very much in progress, with several team members and team associates still working on their parts so not all changes have been submitted yet. But even at this stage, here's what you can look forward to:

• Most planets have had their modifiers converted into features and many unique features have been added to all starting planets and some potential colonies. Over 20 (and growing) unique features between Elves, Drow, Lunari, Lhuren and Sidh
• Some of those features are unlike any that exist in vanilla. For example the Forbidden Arcology that takes up the space of one district but also acts as one, offering housing and high-end jobs. There are even features that come with their own special jobs such as Dragon Priests/Researchers cultivating a... particular feature I won't spoil here n_~
• The Sidh start has been completely revamped. It no longer requires the Life Seeded civic which will be good news for those who don't own the Apocalypse DLC. Instead, the new Sidh home system features neon rings, psychedelic star and a new skybox. Yes. You read all of that right. No, I will not elaborate ^^
• All Elven/Drow traits have been rebalanced and adapted to the new system. I can't bring up specific examples just yet because the implementation is not finalised yet.
  However, fans of the Xenocidal trait who were looking forward to putting your ticking time-bombs on the slave market will be happy to hear that will absolutely be possible! What could possibly go wrong?
• Similar to the Asari, ship explosions and death animations have been tweaked across the board. Each and every vessel in the Elven navy employs a clone of pointy-eared Michael Bay to ensure that there's a massive explosion for every occasion!
• Colossus animations have been reworked to hopefully look a bit less awkward during rotations
• Drow have received a few flavour events
• The Avari Shield (previously used by the Great Firewall civic) is now a full-fleged Megastructure and should be compatible with any planet-shaped planet
• Same as asari, elven pops also pick clothes based on their jobs
• And more coming soon!

In the long term, we're hoping to finally get back to the Drow shipset. Many of the ships and stations already have detailed design documents so we're hoping that once the production process starts, it will be much faster than our previous shipsets.
Additionally, we have started experimenting with custom Ecumenopolis designs and you can be sure that once the technical issues with its implementation have been resolved, we'd love to make unique city-planets for all our shipsets!
And outside the realm of art assets, we've had a lot of ideas for narrative events and flavour pieces that we'd love to put to use. And with several writers now helping the team in the one area we used to absolutely struggle with, this won't greatly derail our other plans. For now it's not the highest priority, but coming up with little backstories for dozens of planet features has definitely ignited our interest n_n

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And on that note, this is all for today! THANK YOU for staying with us through 2018 and we hope that we can continue to deliver even better mods throughout 2019 and beyond! To all my Patrons <3 hearts <3 LOTS <3 OF <3 HEARTS <3 I love you even though I still cannot understand why you're being so generous to this little derp-popsicle I>~<I

Happy New Year 2019! May it bring lots of happiness and lots of Stellaris to all of us!

(ﾉ´ヮ´)ﾉ*: ･ﾟ