Noob question: What do I do after conquering everyone?

[schnappkatze]

After two dozen failures, I managed to conquer the whole galaxy, everyone who wasn't destroyed is my vassal and no one comes even near to be a threat. Is there anything left to do? Is there a way to actually "win" like in Civilization? I have been staring at my research for about 5 years, but it has been rather boring because beside choosing new kinda meaningless technologies or watching my resources overflow there is not really anything to do.

Am I missing something that I should do or is this simply the point where you are supposed to abandon the game and try a higher difficulty?

[Sero]

If you want the game to tell you who won you have to set a game end date.
It isn't more than a scoreboard. Since I don't play with achievements enabled I never set an end date so I get to decide when I consider the game won and over.

[schnappkatze]

Alright. I heard something about a crisis - is this something that happens every game and I was just too fast or is it just a rare event? If it will always happen, should I wait until that happens or is it not really worth it?

There are also some stars at the edge that have no connection to the rest of the galaxy that I cannot reach - and I am pretty sure I looked at every single wormhole and gateway there is (I didn't find a way to automate that, but I spend quite some time looking). Is there 100% a way to reach them somehow or does the game sometimes generate galaxy maps with unreachable stars?

Playing unmodded vanilla.

[Ryika]

That's the L Cluster:
https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/L-Cluster

Crisis:
https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/Crisis

[schnappkatze]

Originally posted by Ryika:

That's the L Cluster:
https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/L-Cluster

Crisis:
https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/Crisis

Thanks for the links, although I am not too fond of reading wikis because it usually kinda spoils things for me so I tread very carefully there.

But I am confused, the first thing in the L-Cluster entry says: "Available only with the Distant Stars DLC enabled." which I am pretty sure I do not have since I have zero DLCs.

[Cinnamoon_dragon]

Unlike Civilization, in this game there is only a military victory and a victory by points that you must score over a certain number of in-game years (300 on default settings).
Points are earned by the strength of your economy and science, the size of the empire and the number of subjects, stars and vassals, the number of artifacts collected, and so on.
If you have the Nemesis add-on, another type of victory is also available for you - the construction of an Aetherophasic Engine and this is quite close to the construction of a space rocket for a scientific victory in Civilization, except that the result will not be a colony on Mars, but the end of the universe.
The downside is that you can't choose xenophile or pacifist civilization for this type of victory and everyone will know you're planning to nuke the whole world and declare war on you immediately.
After the announcement of the winner, the game continues indefinitely, but there will be no new events. You can start a new map and select new settings and origin for your specie.

[HappySack]

If you want things to be "official" then getting to the victory year would be enough to consider the current game done but fighting the crisis as a last boss should be the last thing to do though it's never a challenge under default late-game year settings and under 10x strength.

[Elitewrecker PT]

Originally posted by schnappkatze:

Originally posted by Ryika:

That's the L Cluster:
https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/L-Cluster

Crisis:
https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/Crisis

Thanks for the links, although I am not too fond of reading wikis because it usually kinda spoils things for me so I tread very carefully there.

But I am confused, the first thing in the L-Cluster entry says: "Available only with the Distant Stars DLC enabled." which I am pretty sure I do not have since I have zero DLCs.

Screenshot that cluster.

The Crisis is one of three endgame enemies that can show up after the game reaches the endgame date.
Did you change that date? What year are you in?

[schnappkatze]

Originally posted by Elitewrecker PT:

Originally posted by schnappkatze:

Thanks for the links, although I am not too fond of reading wikis because it usually kinda spoils things for me so I tread very carefully there.

But I am confused, the first thing in the L-Cluster entry says: "Available only with the Distant Stars DLC enabled." which I am pretty sure I do not have since I have zero DLCs.

Screenshot that cluster.

The Crisis is one of three endgame enemies that can show up after the game reaches the endgame date.
Did you change that date? What year are you in?

I understand better now. I left most things as default and just checked what the default is: The endgame should start at 2400 and I am only in 2350, that would be a long time even in fast forward to just wait watch my research go up.

Here is a screenshot of the unreachable cluster - maybe they appear even if the DLC is not owned, but can only be accessed if you own the DLC?

https://i.imgur.com/rdSduxH.png

Thanks everyone!

[Elitewrecker PT]

Nah that's not the l cluster. The L Cluster is always located on the top right corner and is composed of around 8 systems or so.

To go that system you'll need to use jump drives.

The way you are you probably wouldn't survive the crisis.
Why do you have unemployment with vacant building slots?

[schnappkatze]

Originally posted by Elitewrecker PT:

Nah that's not the l cluster. The L Cluster is always located on the top right corner and is composed of around 8 systems or so.

To go that system you'll need to use jump drives.

Cool, thanks for clearing that up. Maybe it will motivate me to keep playing until I research that to see what I will find there.

[Elitewrecker PT]

Well you have a lot to do to improve your empire if you want to be ready for the crisis.

[schnappkatze]

Originally posted by Elitewrecker PT:

Well you have a lot to do to improve your empire if you want to be ready for the crisis.

Yeah, I know. I reached a point were I found it just too tedious to babysit every planet, especially the newly conquered ones, so I set them all to automatic which is working out... well enough I suppose, for that difficulty setting at least.

[Elitewrecker PT]

It really isn't.
It would be best if you downgraded a lot of your upgraded starbases, you're at 40/24. That's increasing your starbase energy upkeep tremendously making you bleed energy even when probably the majority of your jobs are technicians if the AI is managing it.

Downgrade like at least 10 of them and increase your mineral and alloy production and tech output, you're gonna need a lot of ships for the crisis. And you have around 50-100 years to prepare.

[EleventhStar]

Originally posted by schnappkatze:

Is there a way to actually "win" like in Civilization?

no there isn't.

technically there is a time victory and i think technically you can do conquest victory (own everything no vasssals) if they haven't removed that yet. but in realitythose are two situations you will only rarely reach.

the idiotic part is that it's apparently on purpose so you can "make your own story". (bit silly cause they are adding a ton of story driven origins lately.)

which is a shame cause this game kinda lends itself to having a psychic ascend to the shroud victory condition, a build a very big megastructure wonder victory condition, a upload yourself into a black hole supercomputer victory for materialist, a dominte the galaxy megacorp victory, etc.

just look at all the quest/event chains they are adding in the latest DLCs/origins, they are obviously capable of it.

I have been staring at my research for about 5 years, but it has been rather boring ?

welcome to stellaris endgame where you stare at the screen waiting for the end game events to pop up. i recommend you lower end game year for your next game.

[schnappkatze]

Originally posted by Elitewrecker PT:

It really isn't.
It would be best if you downgraded a lot of your upgraded starbases, you're at 40/24. That's increasing your starbase energy upkeep tremendously making you bleed energy even when probably the majority of your jobs are technicians if the AI is managing it.

Downgrade like at least 10 of them and increase your mineral and alloy production and tech output, you're gonna need a lot of ships for the crisis. And you have around 50-100 years to prepare.

Huh, I vastly underestimated how much energy they are costing me, they were mostly from the freshly integrated vassals. Downgrading those singlehandingly put me back into the plus on my energy.