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Mozzy 9 Aug @ 1:39pm
Need Planet Population Policy update
Among the last few content and improved fleet/UI updates, and roadmap for 2025 released, I still see nothing regarding improving Planet Population Policy controls.

Specifically, the lack of any current means other than pure, repetitive manual adjustments for planet population type desired.

Very brief example of the issue --> We can set all Continental planets to some desired mix of population, click apply to all, and done. This is great, and works fine if you want -ALL- Continental planets with this mix of race types. (Which means all existing/older colonies + the new one you just conquered to apply the desired policy)

However, there is no way to automatically maintain say half current Continental to Human only, while allowing newly conquered ones to be that native race + Human. It's one size fits all, or extremely manual setting per planet.

!!! ---> This is exacerbated by the key nuisance that the pop screen does not include all races, only the ones you've met so far. Which means every time you meet a new race, you need to readjust the planet population policy again, per planet. Over and over.

So, what I hope for is inclusion into the roadmap a QoL (quality of life) improvement update to address this gap. For larger galaxies with many races, the late game for me becomes unbearable and I naturally gravitate towards just quitting the game and restarting, due to this manual burden,
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Showing 1-10 of 10 comments
Mozzy 9 Aug @ 1:48pm 
Suggested solution -->

One easy way would be to re-use already working fine Fleet Template mechanic.

1- Allow us to create Planet Templates, exactly like Fleet Templates.

1b - ^^ must include ability to add races into the Planet Template based on all races possible, not just the ones we've met (otherwise we're back to same problem of having to re-update the template every time we meet a new race in the current game)

2- Then we can simply apply whichever race mix Planet Template desired, to the colony we already own or just conquered.

3- This would mean no more having to repetitively go back to re-update, allow for any number of exceptions per planet type (e.g Continental), and allow newly conquered colonies to have whatever race mix desired - but without the negative consequence of the current Apply to All function (e.g. resets all planets of that type, whether you want exceptions to stay the old mix or not)
#1
omnius 10 Aug @ 6:01am 
Not a bad idea, especially for resource management which is totally worthless on automatic. I wish I could create a planet template for resource management so that I could copy that template to new planets for the construction resources.
#2
Polly Agstrom 10 Aug @ 6:55am 
+ for planet templates
#3
Chris Gbau 10 Aug @ 7:03am 
Originally posted by Mozzy:
However, there is no way to automatically maintain say half current Continental to Human only, while allowing newly conquered ones to be that native race + Human. It's one size fits all, or extremely manual setting per planet.
well, we probably all have been there lol
Would already do a lot if there would be a filter with drop down menu like:
Apply to all:
Continental
Ocean
Deap Ocean
Forest
etc

The other problem is that Races only appear in the list after they have been discovered which makes it all so much more tedious to go back and ban them for all planets manually again.
However from my observation this is not such a big problem if you not have migration treaties in place. They not just roll in from other empire to live on your planets, especially not when its not their natural planet type.

Originally posted by Polly Agstrom:
+ for planet templates
This would be the preferable solution, yes! While mine is the easier to implement!
Less effort= Better Chances to get it in ...
Last edited by Chris Gbau; 10 Aug @ 7:06am
#4
starbuck310 10 Aug @ 8:41am 
Agreed +1
#5
SgtScum 10 Aug @ 12:42pm 
Originally posted by Chris Gbau:
Originally posted by Polly Agstrom:
+ for planet templates
This would be the preferable solution, yes! While mine is the easier to implement!
Less effort= Better Chances to get it in ...

Why not both? The bulk of the game coding is done and we are getting into the fiddly QoL bits part of development since the base framework for the game is pretty stable now. It didn't make sense to do the fiddly bits before the framework was completed.

Hoping we get a policy update that focuses just on the automation side of the game. I'd love an addition of being able to have a separate policy on fittings and such for the private sector over state. I prefer my warships to have as strong a fit as possible but that tends to be fuel hungry and thats fine because my warships are only a tiny fraction of my private sector fleet. But if I allow the ai to design the bulk of my warships with the most powerful set of components it also designs my private sector the same way which is a massive waste of fuel and resources. There is no reason for freighters to be fitted out like mini warships.
#6
Chris Gbau 10 Aug @ 1:12pm 
Originally posted by SgtScum:
Why not both? The bulk of the game coding is done and we are getting into the fiddly QoL bits part of development since the base framework for the game is pretty stable now.
:steamhappy: you have a lot of faith...well, so there was this live stream on Thursday about the Anniversary Patch and I asked about getting complete and updated XSDs and the answer was it was a priority now to have them updated but no answer wherever they really get thrown out.

(XSD= file that defines the structure and data types of XML documents. It acts as a blueprint for XML documents, specifying which elements, attributes, and data types are allowed and how they can be combined. )

This what we need for modding the game to access the functions in the exe.

These have been published (well, most of them) in 2022 when the game released but many things have been added and there is working XML nodes in the game that are not listed in the XSDs.

The untold story behind this episode is that the XSDs are like a dump.
In the SDK there is XSD.exe. They run the command lines and with not so much effort they get new XSDs, not a time consuming task for a professional, zip them, post them...and yet here we are and I bet my ass we wont see them new XSDs for months.

What I like to express is that if even such trivial things are taking ages, well...adding new widgets and code...oh well

But of course I would happily be proven wrong.
Last edited by Chris Gbau; 10 Aug @ 1:19pm
#7
SgtScum 10 Aug @ 1:23pm 
Just a personal hunch but I think they are purposely hamstringing ease of modding to both keep quality of mods high(you need a high base skill to mod it) and the fact the game isn't fully feature complete yet as there are still more gameplay mechanics to add that would absolutely trash many mods.
#8
Chris Gbau 10 Aug @ 2:38pm 
Originally posted by SgtScum:
Just a personal hunch but I think they are purposely hamstringing

Yes its on purpose and its frustrating and annoying.

Same with uploading mods to Steam...adding 2 buttons to the in-game mod-loader and attach some scripts to call the cmd for publish mod and update mod on Steam...its not even a days work yet here we are 3 1/2 years later and still have to use the archaic method of command line arguments for the exe. Gotta be kidding me.
Of course the average user is directly blocked out.

Erik stated he would like to open the game up, this tells me Elliot is blocking but once the game reaches its end of life cycle nobody needs it anymore.
Or they just play good cop - bad cop...who knows!

My Human campaign mod I just released could serve as template for race specific individualised game-play mods but cant do it for other races as this is too time consuming and maintaining a single big mod is a big commitment and liability I needed to think about seriously before doing it.
I have done it in the past and its a very expensive hobby (in terms of commitment) so by making things difficult you not motivating people to get into it.

Bethesda releases a game and before a year you have Creation Kit and modding goes off the charts. :steamhappy:

oh well...such is life
#9
SgtScum 10 Aug @ 3:11pm 
The thing with 'its just a days work' is that there are possibly hundreds of 'its just a days work' items to choose from. How to choose because you can't do them all? That choice is obviously going to annoy some users. I don't think there are any nefarious reasons modding isn't being more of a focus just practical ones from a tiny dev studio point of view. Bethesda has gigatons of employees and funding for all the little things. These fine fellows do not.
#10
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Date Posted: 9 Aug @ 1:39pm
Posts: 10

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