written by: MrFreake, jasonpepe, AlphaAsh, Jamesfire, corsairmarks, michaelmakesgames

Hello Stellaris Community!

You’ll be pleased to know that dev diaries are currently scheduled to return next week! In the meantime, we are going to take this opportunity once again to highlight some of the lesser known mods from the Steam workshop.

This week, we will be looking at mods that add internal political interactions within your empire, from new factions, to leveling your rulers, new mechanics for vanilla civics and even an industrial overhaul. This is an exciting lineup of mods, and – judging by the sheer number of people who are interested in an Internal Politics rework – one of these could be just the mod you were looking for. handwave

If you’re a Modder, and are interested in having your mod featured in a future Mod Highlights, please fill out this form. After this week Mod Highlights will be moving to a longer-form biweekly or monthly publication (depending on the number of interested modders we get), and either taking the place of Dev Diaries when there’s no news (eg. Summer and Winter holidays), or the second Monday of each month.

So if you are liking this format, keep an eye out for future Mod Highlights!

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Features

• Up to 15 new extremist factions can now form in a run.
• There’s one extreme faction for Xenophobes, and two for all other ethics. Sorry gestalts – you get no extremist factions. Sad face.
• There are pros and cons to promoting or suppressing extremist factions.
• …and also banning each of the factions. Yes, you can ban extremist factions.
• Some factions oppose each other. Think before you promote/suppress/ban one. Another faction may be very pleased… or very upset.

Summary

This mod includes 15 new extremist factions, one for Xenophobes, and two for all other ethics. There are pros and cons to promoting, suppressing and banning each of the factions.

Some of the factions are also opposed to each other, in such a way that promoting one faction will pee off any opposing faction, or suppressing or banning a faction will please any opposing faction. You aren’t told which factions oppose which – experiment and find out.

You absolutely should not use this mod if you dislike red indicators in the factions screen. Or dislike not being able to get 100% approval from all factions all the time.

No, really. I get it, it’s not for everyone. With this mod it is intended to be very difficult to keep all factions happy at the same time. It is intended for you to make tough decisions about which factions to promote, suppress or ban. It is intended that you will make compromises with policy, ascension and a few other areas of running your empire when managing factions. It is intended that your Unity from factions may fluctuate, sometimes seeming excessive, or lacking.

Inspiration
Factions are a feature that needed more bite. This mod does that.

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This next mod was hard to classify, since it has a mix of both diplomacy and internal politics. I put it in the internal politics highlight, because I write these things and that’s what I wanted to do. Stop judging me.

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Features
Adds new mechanics to the following civics for increased depth and RP:
– Exalted Priesthood
– Nationalistic Zeal
– Parliamentary System
– Shadow Council
– Technocracy
– more on the way!

Summary
Exalted Priesthood:
– Lead a Galactic Faith that other Spiritualist empires can join
– Use the Ideology casus belli to forcefully convert empires to your faith
– Compete with other Exalted Priesthoods to win followers
– Contend with the spread of unorthodox beliefs — reform your faith or declare heresy!

Nationalistic Zeal:
– Balance your nation’s Zeal
– If your zeal gets too low, you get Nationalistic Disgrace
– High zeal grants strong military bonuses, but too much causes Nationalistic Hubris
– If you lose a war or any territory while you have Hubris, you are immediately Disgraced

Parliamentary System:
– Planets elect factions to represent them in parliament
– Each faction has a unique effect on the planet
– The factions and political power of the planet’s pops determines who wins (with a bit of randomness)
– If you don’t like the election result, you can “find some more votes” for your preferred candidate, but you risk a scandal!

Shadow Council:
– Appoint your non-Councilor leaders to positions in your Shadow Council
– The more Shadow Councilors you have, the less experience your “legitimate” Councilors earn
– Six different Shadow Council positions, each with a unique effect that scales to the leader’s skill
– Shadow Councilors can get exposed, and you’ll face a tough choice

Technocracy:
– Your non-scientist leaders can start with the Technocrat trait, producing a little science
– At level 4, your Technocrats choose a specialization (Physicist, Social Scientist, or Engineer), with a unique effect depending on the leader’s class

Each civic’s new mechanics can be individually turned off if you don’t want to play with them all.

Inspiration
I like playing civics that have a big impact on gameplay! Sometimes I want to choose a civic that fits with the RP of my empire, but the effects are a bit boring… So I made Uncivic to add some new life to conceptually interesting but mechanically simple civics.

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Those of you who remember MODJAM2020, might remember this as a mod that started off as an Origin, but now contains almost a total overhaul of how vanilla industries work!

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Summary
Industry in Stellaris is simple, and abstracted to the point of not making much sense. Not only that, but critical methods of industry that should be utilized by space-faring empires are missing entirely.

Features
Rise of Cosmic Industry is composed of 7 modules that can be independently disabled at game start, and come with minimal overwrites:

• Orbital Infrastructure is an implementation of Orbital Districts on planets, opening up more options for planetary development.
• Realistic Development overhauls how things are built, using a Labour-like system called Industrial Production, so that 2 planets don’t build twice as fast as 1 for some reason.
• Factory Automation implements Automated Factories, for making resources without pops.
• Space Exploitation is an expansion to Space Mining using Minor Colonies, allowing you to exploit celestial bodies more thoroughly.
• Fallen Empire Buildings provides a third tier of Buff Buildings, that increase the production of their appropriate job, as well as produce some resources on their own.
• Cargo Ships provides Cargo Ships that can be used to form trade routes with other empire’s planets, granting both planets resources based on their existing production.
• Shipping Costs makes planet-level deficits cost some energy credits to represent shipping in materials to cover the deficit.

In Rise Of Cosmic Industry, I provide new mechanics and new content that better match how I feel this should work, and in some cases just add missing tech.

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Want to get your ruler to the next level? Jasonpepe has you covered with this next mod!

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Features
Unique Skill System for every empire Ruler(s).
1. Customize their focus
2. Spend their Execution points for campaigns when necessary
3. Leaders are self-learning and will level up over time

Summary
A mod that allows player to customize their Ruler’s abilities, which includes:

1. Ruler Foci: A UI which allows players to customize their Ruler’s Focus and Categories.

2. Every leader has Execution Points and Idea Points.

• Execution Points: Spend to level up categories and launch Ruler Campaigns.
• Idea Points: Used to unlock or skill up focuses.
• Rulers can only have up to 15 Execution and 15 Idea points.

3. Each Ruler has their Charisma, Affair, and Inspire skill levels.

• Charisma: Determines the speed of gaining Execution Points.
• Affair: Determines the progress speed Ruler Campaigns.
• Inspire: Determines the speed of gaining Idea Points.
• Ruler’s species traits will also effect the base-value of the 3 skills.

4. Ruler Campaigns: Short-Term, powerful Campaigns that appear from time to time. More Campaigns can appear with higher Affair skill levels.

5. Over time, Rulers will gain Skill Points (scaled by their Affair skill level). Skill Points can be used to improve Ruler’s Charisma, Affair, and Inspire skills. Skill Points can also be converted to Execution & Idea Points.

Inspiration
In my gameplay of Stellaris, the Ruler is the main leader in my mind. Yet I always find a Ruler’s ability to rule a country being a lackster, as they should never appear to be a figurehead.

Putting the mind that I want my Ruler a 6-6-6 one, not 0-0-0 (EU4), a ruler mod is made.

This mod has a lot of history, the very first version was released in 1.5 (Utopia DLC). In pre 2.0 version, the mod still used the classic annoying popup events with randomized options. After 2.0 released, the first rework introduced the Ruler Campaign(s) edicts. Then in 2.6, the first version of Ruler Focus was introduced. The mod also got a complicated and massive rework in version 3.0, with a completely new custom-made UI, and an even more recent one in 3.8 with Ruler Directions getting an overhaul update.

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If an empire is subjugated and there’s no atmosphere to carry the sound, does it make a sound? No.. I don’t think that’s how the expression goes. Anyway, this mod will do the next best thing, and allow you to keep the leaders of integrated Subjects and pre-FTLs.

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Features

• Have the option to keep (and maybe assimilate) leaders in a variety of situations when gaining control of another empire:
• When integrating subjects
• When infiltrating or conquering pre-FTLs
• When firing the Nanobot Diffuser on a pre-FTL world
• Custom story text for different kinds of “Retain Leaders” situations, including integration between regular/hive/machine empires and interactions with homicidal civics
• Uses the new “Recruit Leader” functionality added in Stellaris 3.8 “Gemini,” with additional background art taken from official Stellaris art
• Empires with assimilation available to them (or necrophages) can opt to transform leaders based on the available assimilation type(s)
• Updates the “Promising Officer” events (both the standard and the variant during fleet maneuvers) to use the “Recruit Leader” functionality – other built-in Stellaris events similarly enhanced, including expanded story text
• Adds special traits for former rulers – including those who lose an election or are otherwise forced out of rulership (includes variants for different empire types and leader classes)
• Designed to work with other mods published by corsairmarks, including additional gameplay interactions

Summary
Have you ever wondered what happened to the former leaders of your subject after you integrated them? Or perhaps where that pre-FTL leader went after you annexed their planet? Wonder no more! With this mod you will be prompted to choose what to do with the now-unemployed leaders whenever you integrate a subject, conquer a pre-FTL planet, “allow” pre-FTLs to join you via covert infiltration, or convert then via a colossus weapon.

Scientists and Admirals are automatically assigned back to their pre-integration roles, if they were commanding a science ship or fleet. Notably, if you play with “pause-on-event” the science vessels will then continue their assigned orders after the leader is reassigned for command.

Inspiration
I developed this mod over two years ago and it was first published to the Steam workshop in July 2021. Its functionality dovetails nicely with the enhanced focus on fewer, more memorable leaders as part of Stellaris 3.8 “Gemini” update (and Galactic Paragons expansion). Although it’s less likely players will be integrating empires (since the Overlord expansion), the flavorful gameplay options still enhance interaction with pre-FTL empires.

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That’s it for this week! Next week Game Director Eladrin will be back with our first regularly scheduled Dev Diary after the summer!