I scripted an entire section about the infinity sphere and I'm pretty sure I recorded it. The fact that it somehow didn't make it into the video just shows how much of an impact it makes on me. 😢
Hola, hola, 2 minor points: 1) Curators offer service of estimating how your fleet would do against a Leviathan 2) Traders offer strategic resources at fixed prices, and IMO this shouldn’t be underestimated. For one, they might be a first source of a given resource, allowing to start the edicts. Next, they unload the need for refineries, which are inefficient. Thirdly, fixed price means that we can supplement trade from market, without rising the prices.
Man, Leviathans and Utopia have a special place in my heart. I'm an OG player, been here since day one and I remember listening to your reviews/videos for it and Utopia back in 2016/2017 when I was an Erasmus student in Sofia, Bulgaria (one of the best times of my life). I remember when Utopia came out, I came back from uni, told my flatmate that I couldnt go out that night, went to KFC alone to eat while listening to Aspec talking about megastructures and ascension perks and than went back to kill my first damn Space Dragon in Stellaris after buying Utopia. I didnt get out of my room for a week. This video hits directly my nostalgia. Also War in Heaven is still my favorite event. I know it's not everyone's favorite but I get excited everytime when those scary giants decide to wake up and choose violence.
I genuinely think that Leviathans was one of the coolest DLC's at the time. Though there is no disputing the fact that the Leviathans have kind of been muddled when combined with all the other content added. They aren't so special to find and fight anymore. But I do genuinely wish we could get a sequel to Leviathans. Adding more Mini-bosses and so on. Leviathans, Ancient Relics, and Synthetic Dawn are DLC's I believe could do with a sequel of sorts, we are getting one for Synthetic Dawn already. But would love more variety of bosses to fight. Like imagine taking some notes from something like Gigastructure. And give us living planets. Imagine coming into a system. Where all planets and the sun are living beings. Almost like animals. They live together in a pack around the sun. Requiring extreme fleet strength, probably having the highest health pool by a long shot of anything so far. Imagine varied types of bosses. Like a moon and normal Earth/Mars type of planet would be weak to lasers. Ice planets something like Missiles, Gas Giants and the Sun would be a bit trickier to try making a unique weakness to. But I love the idea of a boss fight where you can't just have one giant fleet of all the same type of weapon and armor. But need to look into having your own task force for each planet. Edit: Enigmatic Fortress disappointed me with the fact that you don't get any type of cool buff to defense systems.
One of the first things when I think of Stellaris is "How to train your Space Dragon" Leviathan is a fun expansion, not needed for base game mechanics but makes me more invested in being happy, excited, sad and joyful. The more "needed" expansions to have a "complete game" with the needed mechanics, don't make me as emotionally invested as the Leviathan expansion. The Leviathan expansion is what makes Stellaris a unique game from the many other space games that makes Stellaris more unique and fun. (arguably its now the steam wrokshop mods that carry the game for the last few years in making the game unique and fun)
Once had a war in heaven that the contingency spawned halfway through and the robot fallen empire went rogue as well as robot uprisings spawning in my allies systems, I refer to that entire period as the 60 years war, for what should be somewhat obvious reasons.
Man I love The Automated Dreadnought's design. Personally my favorite Guardian design. Really wish they made The Dreadnought into a Juggernaut style Specialist Ship that you could build multiple of. Maybe have defeating The Automated Dread unlock them for you way earlier than otherwise as a fun reward. I just want to see more of it since its dope looking. Honestly its pretty disappointing how few Guardians have interesting aspects like that if you arent specifically playing a necromancer build. Wish there was more hard incentives to kill em for all empires
I liked it too, so i enjoyed the mods that fleshed out the design from a whole ship set you building your own Auto dreads if you defeat it & research it afterwards.
Nah I think making more than one automated dread would detract from it, they should make an option to upgrade and ability to repair it after enough time like the last talon though
Traders are great if your empire is severely lacking in a resource. Had a few times where exotic gases were almost non-existent within my empire until I finished a few conquests which would have been much harder without the gases I bought from the trader enclave to use to improve the research labs which gave me the edge to defeat the rivals that had the gases and worlds I wanted. So traders might be nerfed into the ground, but if you're dealing with a bad situation they really do provide a backdoor to saving yourself.
I wouldnt say they are completely obsolete. Just did a play through with only advanced AI starts GA AI starting as a hive mind with stargazers and slingshot origin. If i didnt manage to kill and ressurect the ether and void drake i would not have been able to win crucial wars declared on me when it was 75% ressurected. It was the leviathans that made me galactic emperor
I think your last couple comments there about the state of Stellaris in general and the type of game it's become explain why I've been playing other things lately, and I agree completely. At this point some of the early DLC needs to be listed as free and therefore a part of the base game. Still, it's good to see you're back around and all is well.
I hope they overhaul leviathans MASSIVELY because they added some really cool more technical leviathans or made some better through other dlcs or updates ie. Here be dragons and the Star eater. I will say though I never realized that trader enclaves were a part of the dlc lol. Although slim I could see the automated dreadnought and enigmatic fortress getting some touch ups with the new dlc releasing in early may.
The best use for the mid game unique ships is harassment and clean up, especially the ones with jump drives Their health is high enough and regens fast enough that they can be used to capture small stations and outposts on their own without dedicating any other ships/fleets
Gonna say wish defeating the automated dreadnaught unlocked a new class of ship to build but i suppose adding a dreadnaught class to each shipset that only unlocks if you beat a specific levithan is a bit much.....but it would be a nice surprise.
I hope it will get far more story to the guardians in the future. Maybe some guardian crisis, where the organic and energy based guardians start to reproduce and take more and more systems. Or something that you can add better components to the automated dreadnought, or maybe build new ones. Or add a relic to every of the guardians. The point is that the main feature need more interactions or rewards.
I would like the Here be Dragons origin to have a version with the automated battleship, that the Doomsday origin was related to the void dragon or the Stellarite Devourer.
Now how could one make Leviathans more interesting? As a roleplay enjoyer, I'd love to see each leviathan give a unique empire defining reward. Maybe an exclusive ship type (looking at you, Dreadnaught), maybe an unlockable civic (Who doesn't want to be a dragonhunter culture?) or ascension perk (Infinity sphere kilostructures for all your research needs anyone?), maybe a unique species trait (Something Worm related perchance?). Something fun, something which would make the defeat of one of these behemoths have a more noticeable lasting impact than just a trophy relic. Besides that, expanding on the event chains associated with each leviathan might make them more interesting than the big damage check most of them are now.
yeeeeah, i guess youre right about how the leviathans not really giving you a lot for the effort but i dont want to miss it. i just like those silly gigantic things that just look freakin awesome :)
Did you forget about the Void Spawn and Tiyaniki Matriarch, or were those not a part of this DLC? I think it's also worth mentioning that you can necromance the Void Spawn, Titanki Matriarch, and Either Drake if you have necroids. That's pretty fun.
It really is a shame that those 'event' ships (Automated Factory, the Automated Dreadnought, etc) can't be researched somehow. Even if just for a percentage towards something in their tech. Exactly how might need some balance runs, but it would give a lot more oomph to them than the very limited use you get. Half the time I'm disbanding them instantly! Something else (Especially for Memorialists?) some sort of 'Museum piece' option where you could turn them into a Museum bonus or something to unity?
I blew up a system that geld my farming world in a questljme and turned it into a black hole that spawned the dimensional horror which turned out to be an old god my people then decided to worship for some research bonus but reduced pop growth because drawback for praying to a ancient cosmic horror never comes cheap. Since the system that sucker now lives in as a neutral being to me is also the only choke point where enemies could potentially reach my capitol I now have a pretty cool guardian and last defense when shit goes wrong. Alone for this the leviathan dlc is worth it. After all stellaris is a great story generator.
I agree. Anything older than Nemesis or so should get baked in at this stage. I adore Stellaris, its one of my most played games that isn't World of Warcraft, a whole other beast, but its impossible to recommend Stellaris to anyone due to the mountain of outdated DLCs that are such a massive turnoff for anyone coming in at this point.
Hey ASpec. I remember when this expansion came out, it was good. I played it but left Stellaris for several years. I'm just revisiting the game and had a War in Heaven event trigger. I have no idea how to beat an awakened empire's fleet at almost 400k, I've already reached repetable weapon techs and I'm still miles away from that kind of power. I've been searching for a while now how to defeat one of these things. I think it might be good content for you to make an updated video on this mechanic for people like me who are revisiting the game.
Did the infinity sphere section get cut? It's very briefly mentioned at 5:55 alongside the fortress Easily my favorite leviathan of all of them, especially when it unfolds... not that I've ever seen it unfold past the first couple times because I always help it and hope like hell Pantagruel happens
As someone who enjoys diplomatic gameplay, I've been reluctant to pick up Leviathans after hearing the War in Heaven dissolves Federations - has this been an issue in the experience of others here?
I haven't done such a playthrough in a long time, but in my games, when I was in a federation and choose the neutral path, my federation just became the neutral federation that all neutral nations ask to join. I didn't lose an federation tiers. I doubt the patches would have changed that.
Tile system was a superior alternative to expand on than jobs which tanked performance and AI competence. Three different starter FTL techs were more interesting and flavorful. Finally, removing contested system ownership was a mistake and a big blow on many mods.
Wait, the War in Heaven is supposed to happen 50% of the time? I've played for ~2000 hours and seen it I think twice. Only one of those times was it actually a credible threat by the time it triggered.
@@A_Spec That depends on how the game is set up. You can read the fallen_empire_awakening_events.txt for its first event to read the values. For a game with: -Only one fallen empire or one of your two fallen empires is the Caretakers: 0% -Two fallen empires of opposite ethos: 50% -Two fallen empires of other combinations of ethos: 33% -Three or more fallen empires that aren't Caretakers: 60% Also the more fallen empires you have in a game, the longer it takes for the war in heaven to trigger. In huge maps, it can take more than 50 years longer for the event to trigger than on a map with only two fallen empires.
According to the wiki, with two Fallen Empires there's an 18% chance of it triggering. With three, it's a 31% chance, and with four (not counting the Ancient Caretakers, who never get involved) it's 45%.
I scripted an entire section about the infinity sphere and I'm pretty sure I recorded it. The fact that it somehow didn't make it into the video just shows how much of an impact it makes on me. 😢
Nah, that's just lore-accurate Infinity Sphere.
Who is this new Stellaris TH-camr? 😉
Man this Aspec guys seems like a cool content creator, I wonder if he'll do a Smash or Pass test with the Stellaris' aliens/portraits?
Hola, hola, 2 minor points:
1) Curators offer service of estimating how your fleet would do against a Leviathan
2) Traders offer strategic resources at fixed prices, and IMO this shouldn’t be underestimated. For one, they might be a first source of a given resource, allowing to start the edicts. Next, they unload the need for refineries, which are inefficient. Thirdly, fixed price means that we can supplement trade from market, without rising the prices.
Man, Leviathans and Utopia have a special place in my heart. I'm an OG player, been here since day one and I remember listening to your reviews/videos for it and Utopia back in 2016/2017 when I was an Erasmus student in Sofia, Bulgaria (one of the best times of my life). I remember when Utopia came out, I came back from uni, told my flatmate that I couldnt go out that night, went to KFC alone to eat while listening to Aspec talking about megastructures and ascension perks and than went back to kill my first damn Space Dragon in Stellaris after buying Utopia.
I didnt get out of my room for a week. This video hits directly my nostalgia.
Also War in Heaven is still my favorite event. I know it's not everyone's favorite but I get excited everytime when those scary giants decide to wake up and choose violence.
I genuinely think that Leviathans was one of the coolest DLC's at the time. Though there is no disputing the fact that the Leviathans have kind of been muddled when combined with all the other content added. They aren't so special to find and fight anymore. But I do genuinely wish we could get a sequel to Leviathans. Adding more Mini-bosses and so on. Leviathans, Ancient Relics, and Synthetic Dawn are DLC's I believe could do with a sequel of sorts, we are getting one for Synthetic Dawn already.
But would love more variety of bosses to fight. Like imagine taking some notes from something like Gigastructure. And give us living planets. Imagine coming into a system. Where all planets and the sun are living beings. Almost like animals. They live together in a pack around the sun. Requiring extreme fleet strength, probably having the highest health pool by a long shot of anything so far. Imagine varied types of bosses. Like a moon and normal Earth/Mars type of planet would be weak to lasers. Ice planets something like Missiles, Gas Giants and the Sun would be a bit trickier to try making a unique weakness to.
But I love the idea of a boss fight where you can't just have one giant fleet of all the same type of weapon and armor. But need to look into having your own task force for each planet.
Edit: Enigmatic Fortress disappointed me with the fact that you don't get any type of cool buff to defense systems.
I don't wanna talk about the tile system Dad, we promised we wouldn't :(
One of the first things when I think of Stellaris is "How to train your Space Dragon"
Leviathan is a fun expansion, not needed for base game mechanics but makes me more invested in being happy, excited, sad and joyful.
The more "needed" expansions to have a "complete game" with the needed mechanics, don't make me as emotionally invested as the Leviathan expansion.
The Leviathan expansion is what makes Stellaris a unique game from the many other space games that makes Stellaris more unique and fun. (arguably its now the steam wrokshop mods that carry the game for the last few years in making the game unique and fun)
You forgot to mention that the Artisan Troupe will also steal the bolts that hold everything down.
Only if you invite them to your worlds, which is why you NEVER have a festival of worlds
Once had a war in heaven that the contingency spawned halfway through and the robot fallen empire went rogue as well as robot uprisings spawning in my allies systems, I refer to that entire period as the 60 years war, for what should be somewhat obvious reasons.
Because it lasted 76 years?
its been a while ASpec i hope you are safe and healthy
All good, just needed time from burning out on Stellaris
Say it's not so. Stellaris burnout!
@@A_Spec Welcome back - nothing changed just more gimmicks. Military rework will not happen this year just more gimmicks.
There are 4 dlc's that I would love to see completely integrated.
Utopia, synthetic Dawn, megacorp, and leviathan.
Man I love The Automated Dreadnought's design. Personally my favorite Guardian design. Really wish they made The Dreadnought into a Juggernaut style Specialist Ship that you could build multiple of. Maybe have defeating The Automated Dread unlock them for you way earlier than otherwise as a fun reward. I just want to see more of it since its dope looking.
Honestly its pretty disappointing how few Guardians have interesting aspects like that if you arent specifically playing a necromancer build. Wish there was more hard incentives to kill em for all empires
there is a workshop shipset that is based on the automated dreadnaught design th-cam.com/video/AfnbxjQJzJ0/w-d-xo.html
I liked it too, so i enjoyed the mods that fleshed out the design from a whole ship set you building your own Auto dreads if you defeat it & research it afterwards.
Nah I think making more than one automated dread would detract from it, they should make an option to upgrade and ability to repair it after enough time like the last talon though
Leviathans is peak. It adds stuff to do read about and makes the galaxy more mysterious. Also combat even if you don't want wars with other empires.
Traders are great if your empire is severely lacking in a resource. Had a few times where exotic gases were almost non-existent within my empire until I finished a few conquests which would have been much harder without the gases I bought from the trader enclave to use to improve the research labs which gave me the edge to defeat the rivals that had the gases and worlds I wanted.
So traders might be nerfed into the ground, but if you're dealing with a bad situation they really do provide a backdoor to saving yourself.
Glad to see you back, hope you've been well
Wow, awesome new expansion! I really hope they don’t do something dumb like removing planetary tiles in the future, that would be horrific!
I wouldnt say they are completely obsolete.
Just did a play through with only advanced AI starts GA AI starting as a hive mind with stargazers and slingshot origin. If i didnt manage to kill and ressurect the ether and void drake i would not have been able to win crucial wars declared on me when it was 75% ressurected. It was the leviathans that made me galactic emperor
I think your last couple comments there about the state of Stellaris in general and the type of game it's become explain why I've been playing other things lately, and I agree completely. At this point some of the early DLC needs to be listed as free and therefore a part of the base game. Still, it's good to see you're back around and all is well.
I hope they overhaul leviathans MASSIVELY because they added some really cool more technical leviathans or made some better through other dlcs or updates ie. Here be dragons and the Star eater. I will say though I never realized that trader enclaves were a part of the dlc lol. Although slim I could see the automated dreadnought and enigmatic fortress getting some touch ups with the new dlc releasing in early may.
Ah, the old, easily approachable tile system...
I just got called incompetent 😂 why you gotta call me out like that 3:25
They added end game crisis slider to make that challenge more challenging.
Why not add a slider for Leviathans to make it more challenging?
The best use for the mid game unique ships is harassment and clean up, especially the ones with jump drives
Their health is high enough and regens fast enough that they can be used to capture small stations and outposts on their own without dedicating any other ships/fleets
Gonna say wish defeating the automated dreadnaught unlocked a new class of ship to build but i suppose adding a dreadnaught class to each shipset that only unlocks if you beat a specific levithan is a bit much.....but it would be a nice surprise.
Unlocking its shipset or gaining upgraded ship sections/unique modules would be a good addition and help make defeating it more rewarding.
How’s the shed going
I hope it will get far more story to the guardians in the future. Maybe some guardian crisis, where the organic and energy based guardians start to reproduce and take more and more systems. Or something that you can add better components to the automated dreadnought, or maybe build new ones. Or add a relic to every of the guardians. The point is that the main feature need more interactions or rewards.
Missed you, man! ❤🎉
traders give you starbase buildings, that reduce market fee(5% per owned trader system, up to 15% if you contol all 3 of them), which is nice
I would like the Here be Dragons origin to have a version with the automated battleship, that the Doomsday origin was related to the void dragon or the Stellarite Devourer.
Nice to see new videos after few months
Now how could one make Leviathans more interesting?
As a roleplay enjoyer, I'd love to see each leviathan give a unique empire defining reward. Maybe an exclusive ship type (looking at you, Dreadnaught), maybe an unlockable civic (Who doesn't want to be a dragonhunter culture?) or ascension perk (Infinity sphere kilostructures for all your research needs anyone?), maybe a unique species trait (Something Worm related perchance?). Something fun, something which would make the defeat of one of these behemoths have a more noticeable lasting impact than just a trophy relic. Besides that, expanding on the event chains associated with each leviathan might make them more interesting than the big damage check most of them are now.
yeeeeah, i guess youre right about how the leviathans not really giving you a lot for the effort but i dont want to miss it. i just like those silly gigantic things that just look freakin awesome :)
Did you forget about the Void Spawn and Tiyaniki Matriarch, or were those not a part of this DLC? I think it's also worth mentioning that you can necromance the Void Spawn, Titanki Matriarch, and Either Drake if you have necroids. That's pretty fun.
Those are part of Distant Stars
Make leviathans great again by having the expansions main selling point a 5k star galaxy and a 10k star galaxy.
It really is a shame that those 'event' ships (Automated Factory, the Automated Dreadnought, etc) can't be researched somehow. Even if just for a percentage towards something in their tech. Exactly how might need some balance runs, but it would give a lot more oomph to them than the very limited use you get. Half the time I'm disbanding them instantly! Something else (Especially for Memorialists?) some sort of 'Museum piece' option where you could turn them into a Museum bonus or something to unity?
I blew up a system that geld my farming world in a questljme and turned it into a black hole that spawned the dimensional horror which turned out to be an old god my people then decided to worship for some research bonus but reduced pop growth because drawback for praying to a ancient cosmic horror never comes cheap. Since the system that sucker now lives in as a neutral being to me is also the only choke point where enemies could potentially reach my capitol I now have a pretty cool guardian and last defense when shit goes wrong. Alone for this the leviathan dlc is worth it. After all stellaris is a great story generator.
"... shot alian, reeve bacon." Hey, I love me some bacon!
I think a Leviathans 2 would be glorious
I'm real curious how many other DLCs could be combined with each other or merged into the base game to give better value.
It's the DLC to get when you're running out of content in this game and you don't want to dive into the infinite void of mods quite yet
Always wondered where this video was lmao
I agree. Anything older than Nemesis or so should get baked in at this stage.
I adore Stellaris, its one of my most played games that isn't World of Warcraft, a whole other beast, but its impossible to recommend Stellaris to anyone due to the mountain of outdated DLCs that are such a massive turnoff for anyone coming in at this point.
Traders are fine becuase purchase 5, then offer a trade deal to another empire for 200-700 energry.
actually, with cloaks and frigates you can easily kill the dimensional horror very early on. Just have to get lucky with cloaks
Hey ASpec. I remember when this expansion came out, it was good. I played it but left Stellaris for several years. I'm just revisiting the game and had a War in Heaven event trigger. I have no idea how to beat an awakened empire's fleet at almost 400k, I've already reached repetable weapon techs and I'm still miles away from that kind of power. I've been searching for a while now how to defeat one of these things. I think it might be good content for you to make an updated video on this mechanic for people like me who are revisiting the game.
I with my grandfather was alive to see this 🥹
Will you do any Homeworld 3 content when it releases?
Ye, that would be cool
you should focus on the incoming dlc we need some info dumps and lore and whatever
Did the infinity sphere section get cut? It's very briefly mentioned at 5:55 alongside the fortress
Easily my favorite leviathan of all of them, especially when it unfolds... not that I've ever seen it unfold past the first couple times because I always help it and hope like hell Pantagruel happens
As someone who enjoys diplomatic gameplay, I've been reluctant to pick up Leviathans after hearing the War in Heaven dissolves Federations - has this been an issue in the experience of others here?
I haven't done such a playthrough in a long time, but in my games, when I was in a federation and choose the neutral path, my federation just became the neutral federation that all neutral nations ask to join. I didn't lose an federation tiers. I doubt the patches would have changed that.
@@motmontheinternet That's reassuring, do you remember if the Federation votes on which side to take?
What about the tyianki matriarch? Was that not in this DLC?
Ngl i have no idea how this missed out on reanimating leviathans, especially when it brings up smaller features from other DLCs like the leaders
Tile system was a superior alternative to expand on than jobs which tanked performance and AI competence. Three different starter FTL techs were more interesting and flavorful. Finally, removing contested system ownership was a mistake and a big blow on many mods.
The BFG-9000, not 5000
Also, pretty sure Bubbles is what everyone associates with Stellaris, not the Space Dragon =p Also Genocide.
will paradox ever create a new iteration of games?
I still miss the blobby borders of pre-apocalypse stellaris
7 years? Jesus
No scavenger bot?
That's in Distant Stars
@@A_Spec
I thought that was also a leviathan for some reason... XD
I admit it's not super original but kill aliens get bacon is awesome.
I like bacon.
Wait, the War in Heaven is supposed to happen 50% of the time? I've played for ~2000 hours and seen it I think twice. Only one of those times was it actually a credible threat by the time it triggered.
If there's two fallen empires there should be a 50% trigger chance.
@@A_Spec That depends on how the game is set up. You can read the fallen_empire_awakening_events.txt for its first event to read the values. For a game with:
-Only one fallen empire or one of your two fallen empires is the Caretakers: 0%
-Two fallen empires of opposite ethos: 50%
-Two fallen empires of other combinations of ethos: 33%
-Three or more fallen empires that aren't Caretakers: 60%
Also the more fallen empires you have in a game, the longer it takes for the war in heaven to trigger. In huge maps, it can take more than 50 years longer for the event to trigger than on a map with only two fallen empires.
According to the wiki, with two Fallen Empires there's an 18% chance of it triggering. With three, it's a 31% chance, and with four (not counting the Ancient Caretakers, who never get involved) it's 45%.
Kinda sad how paradox went from along content to crumb full price “DLC”
"tile based system" good its gone in stellaris , sad that it returned in Millennia .........
Dude common, you could have at least waited another 3 years
Montu won
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