Stellaris: Galactic Paragons PC

Stellaris: Galactic Paragons is a non-standalone expansion to Stellaris, a 2016 strategy game by Paradox Development Studio. The expansion focuses on new council mechanics and the leaders of created empires - it reduces their number but increases their importance, letting them hold several functions at once. It also introduces unique heroes, who will only follow the powers that meet their criteria.

Mechanics

Stellaris: Galactic Paragons further expands the changes to the imperial council system introduced in the base game. The expansion lets us expand the council by three more positions, representing a ruler, a research director and the defense minister. Their names and tasks correspond to the system we've chosen. The leaders selected provide us with bonuses, such as increasing research speed, depending on their skills. The council can also implement long-term programs, such as preparations for war. These provide some profits right away, but we'll only reap the full benefits after completing the project and for a decade after that.

The player must recruit and develop leaders fitting their council - choosing their traits and veteran classes and watching them gain experience until they retire or die. The council mechanic is unavailable for hive mind empires. Instead, we can design their ruler and four new conciousness nodes. Their growth is more limited than that of council members, but we won't lose them to old age.

The expansion introduces sixteen famous leaders with unique backstories, traits and flaws, posing the risk of negative effects. They can also activate special events tied to their personalities or backstories. We can't recruit them manually; they'll reach out to us ourselves if our empire is in line with their ideals. For example, the spymaster Kai-Sha prefers authoritarian empires, while the peace-loving diplomat Vas will only join pacifists.

Stellaris: Galactic Paragons also introduces four legendary characters tied to the game's most important mechanics, those being exploration, warfare, researchinh ancient secrets and colonization. One such hero is Azaryn, a poweful terraformer whose abilities require massive resource costs and can only be used a few times.

The expansion also introduces a new origin ("Under One Rule"), 8 leadership civics, 12 veteran classes, 2 tradition trees and nearly 700 character traits.

Last updated on 14 February 2024