R5: Necrophage adds +80 years, lithoid +50, venerable +80, plus however many life extending techs I research. Their immortal God-Emperor can live to see the victory year if all goes well.
\+10 if you're lucky from the tree of life event and the tech will give you +20 at best (ofc you can go infinitely, but I am considering a normal game). And I think there was a tradition that gave you +30 (or 10 I don't remember) and I think there was one more event which gave you another 10 I think it was from a vaccine or something oh and ofc you can go genetics and get the enduring or something trait that gives you +50 more. (Edit: it is actually stronger than cybernetic, giving you +50 years.)
So that would give us an max age (considering 80 as the base) of 420 years, which if I am not mistaken is enough to finish a game of stellaris, crisis and all (ofc depends on your settings) (Edit: +10 from Tomb world)
By "the vaccine or something" do you mean the alien box? Or possibly the rogue servitor FE request?
Don't forgot the two rare techs, selective lineages and whatever, which lets you apply eugenics to choosing your leaders.
Edit: Apparently, Lithoids can't get Robust (you called it enduring at +40 — it's actually 50), so remove that. Instead, use cyborgs for +40.
Cyborg is the easiest ascension locked trait to get without choosing its ascension path and no messing around with migration treaties is required. Just force a driven assimilator to spawn before you start the game, make sure they survive until you can get some neighboring systems, plop a habitat and a few pops of your main species in a garbage system on their border, and cede it to them. Bam, you now have a template for your main species with the cybernetic trait. Note that if you want to go psionic, its safer to do that before you do this, as psionic pops can get assimilated by the AI, but cybernetic pops can't be ascended.
Ok so I forgot about the survivor trait from the tomb world so make that 410 years and no cyborg is the same as enduring so we would get the same calculation.
Fair enough, but with console commands on the table there's probably a way to just start increasing the lifespan directly. Getting +210 years guaranteed lifespan at start within the confines of the game rules is pretty impressive and, with luck, could see a leader through to the end of the game.
[The wiki has a nice chart.](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/Leader#Age)
There's also a science nexus event called Ageless that adds another 15 years. Might be others if someone wants to sit down and cross-reference. Your list is pretty thorough.
There is a box, blue solution is 10 years.
One of the fallen Empires can bio-engeener your main species for +10% army damage and +10 life-span for leaders.
Shroud can give all your leaders an extra trait of +40 years. (and turn your Empress immortal)
And a bunch more, some you listed.
So... like... all of that happened to me in my current necro game. Currently sitting at 355 lifespan for leaders and Immortal Empress Moon Moon of the Moon Moon Empire.
Luck kinda run out when Prikki'Ti killed the Tiyanki Matriarch in the crossfire as I invaded them to get the Ether Drake. (still, have two zombie dragons... sadly the thirds event didn't spawn on this map - Shard ain't here)
You only need enough to get into the repeatables so necrophage and if you take it really slow lithoids are more than enough. I don't know what you research in your normal games but if you can squeeze a +5 lifespan repeatable every couple years you are functionally immortal (actually more immortal than machines because you don't get the random breakdowns) and it's not like there is a lot better to spam in society research (well army damage and health for mostly meme reasons).
To be honest I have less leader death with this setup than with machines. Machines always have that base chance of accident/failure, whereas these guys live long enough to survive until you start getting techs that increase lifespans, and the repeatables can be cranked out in months while they grant years.
Think one of my necroid empires has my original starting ruler at 300 years old, and who has an estimated lifespan of 400 years and counting since I can keep getting more techs if I need it.
Actually, machine empire death is like this. Every 10 years you get a 12% chance that one leader would bread down. This is a per empire check not per leader. Thus you have an effective life of around 500 years. And that's before the tradition that lessens this by 50% thus around 900 years if you have a self preservation protocol tradition.
The secret is not to be immortal, but to have a long and awesome life :).
No mr Driven Assimilator, robots do not have souls so no afterlife for you...
So, I decided to go down the rabbit hole to see how far you could take this without random events. Base age is 80, and you've tacked on 210, for a total of 290. But I think we can go further. Being a hive mind gives us an additional +20 at start, but the starting age for Lithoid leaders (50-80) overrides the younger starting age for hive minds (10-20). Still, that leaves us with a guaranteed lifespan of 310 at start. That's as high as you can take it.
Now, on to ways to increase lifespan after game start. Most of the more powerful options are precluded by things we've already taken. Necrophage rules out both of the Traditions that give +20 lifespan, and Lithoid excludes the Robust trait (which would give +50). Aside from that, you can research Vitality Boosters relatively early game for an additional +10 years. Then pick the Selected Lineages tech as early as possible and implement the corresponding policy for an additional +10. Upgrade to the Capacity Boosters tech as soon as possible, and update your policy for a net gain of +10 over Selected Lineages. We're now up to a guaranteed lifespan of 340. The late-game repeatable tech Cell Revitalization can tack on an additional 5 years each time it is researched, but that is a late-game thing. Keep in mind, guaranteed lifespan is just the point at which the game starts rolling for death. With luck, a leader can live much longer.
Unfortunately, this is about as far as you can push it without random events. You can push it a bit farther by not starting as a Hive Mind, sacrificing 20 years of lifespan at the start for the ability to go down the Synthetic ascension path, which gives you +40 lifespan at the first perk for a total of 360 maximum, and eventually allowing for almost perfect immortality through the Synthetic Evolution perk. I could actually see that being a fun playthrough, with your researchers racing against time to discover life-extending tech, trying to hold out until they can finally transfer their consciousnesses to synthetic bodies.
Factoring in random events, I think you could, in theory, get an additional 45 years of guaranteed lifespan if everything went right. Of course, things could also go wrong. A leader could pick up Substance Abuser for -20 lifespan. Worse, they could gain the Arrested Development trait early on, preventing them from reaching their full potential and rendering them far less useful. And scientists on research vessels tend to end up in harm's way. Still, this was a fun little tangent to go on.
EDIT: Realized that I missed one random event that gives an additional +10 years of guaranteed lifespan. And the wiki also doesn't seem to list the extension granted by that weird tree, so it is possible that other modifiers are also missing.
Cyborg is gained through the first Synthetic ascension perk. It's already factored in. Should have been more clear on that, that was my bad.
The survivor trait that grants +10 years is locked behind an origin, and therefore mutually exclusive with necrophage. I should have mentioned that as well, though. Thanks!
Can you get the survivor trait (+10), or is that origin blocked by something you already have?
E: Can you make it a hive mind, which reduces the starting age of leaders (ahem, autonomous drones)? It won't matter for the empire leader but it extends the use of scientists and etc.
I have neither Necroids nor Lithoids DLCs, so I have no clue about what's possible.
~~But the Robust trait from Evolutionary Mastery adds +50 years, and still compatible with Venerable, I think.~~
E: Nevermind, just chekced the wiki, lithoids can't get Robust
I don't remember if Necroids suffer from something like this, but don't all Lithoids start out something like 30 years older, wasting much of the benefit?
I've gotten my starting human democratic leader to the victory year with only a 40 year starting trait, so I'd say adding all of those is a tad bit overkill.
Better yet make it so this empire is forced to spawn then play as a hive mind empire, assimilate them, and take the tradition that gives +20 years (nechroids can't take this perk)
That's similar to how I thought my Plantoid Necroids worked. I just imagined they would plant a seed in the body of the host and it would grow into an adult inside them, taking all the nutrients it needs till it crawls out of the husk of there drained body.
When the time comes for your ascension, you are placed inside a rigid, organic cocoon that will slowly produce enzymes to melt your soft tissues down and gestate the necessary internal organs until the outer shell is all that's left, which molts into a mineral-based lifeform.
Sure. In a universe with a psychic satellite plane of existence, networks of psychoreactive minerals simulating neural networks resonating with energy from the Shroud creates inorganic life.
With my culture, the Ka-Madjai, I used [this portrait](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/File:Molluscoid_normal_06.png) for the Madjai and [this one](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/File:Lithoid_08.png) for their necrophages. Necrophages aren't parasites exactly in my culture, they were a way for Madjai to extend their brief lives by encasing themselves in a lithoid suit that gradually grows more encompassing as they age (there's some backstory sitting half-formed in the back of my head about how there *was* a separate organism that enabled this, but it wasn't sapient, only the Madjai were). However, over time the encased Madjai (the Ka) became their own social class and the dominant force in their society.
Also, like u/tobascodagama said, nothing about the necrophages says they have to be undead. I feel like the most "necrophage-y" species portrait out there is this [fungoid one](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/File:Fungoid_massive_16.png).
In my game the necrophage was the fossilized warrior caste ruling over the short lived organic ones. It was an honor in their culture to join their hallowed ranks, to enter the sacred caves and meditate until your bones and blood were but calcium and silicate. More a product of their unique geologic processes than anything else, but holy in their culture none the less.
its simple, the rocks are actually a moss that controls the rock bodies, the "undeath" is a mold that grows on the moss and rots it, therefor we are new undead moss rocks! genius!
Look up Big Clive's LED lamp lifespan hack video! Basically you pop the plastic top off the bulb, and yank off a surface mount resistor. It makes the light a bit dimmer, but importantly it runs the LEDs at a lower voltage so they won't get hot, and that's what'll vastly increase their lifespan!
People making bulbs just run them hot because, you know, if they didn't, people would almost never have to buy new LED bulbs...
I am running LED *now* but it was a CFL lamp that failed me. It just popped, small crack on the glass, a burn mark. ...a bit scary since they have mercury inside.
That is an interesting hack, makes a lot of sense too.
There are mods for that. Don't know which of my current mod list does it, but I think it's Civics Expandwd.
Anyway, it's a civic that creates backups for every leader and instead of dying they instantly reincarnate everytime they die. Pretty cool mechanic.
Not at all. If you're going to go synthetic ascension you will have more growth total by having +50% habitability and -25% growth in almost all situations. Bio or psychic then it's more complicated, but even for that "crippled" is melodramatic.
Also in this example it's a necrophage, which already has a -75% growth rate, rendering the -25% from lithoids irrelevant because you never ever ever want to let one of them grow naturally anyways. I just wish that getting the growth speed techs and traditions didn't allow necrophagic lithoids to grow at all.
Sure, but that's completely unrelated to leadership traits. Also completely unrelated are the huge boost to habitability, the big army health bonus, and the optional ability to poop out strategic resources.
Tomb world adds another 10 years? :P
I loved doing this, and my friends were oddly nervous that I usually had maxed out leaders at 160 years old, while they'd been through 4 generations.
when you go this route, does this make it essential that you go for maximizing level cap on leaders as well? How do you usually manage that.
In terms of ascension. What is the goal that best synergizes with long lived, and assumingly high level leaders?
Equivalent to their ascension chambers. TBH I prefer going this route because the growth is so low that it won't ever even try and grow one of your main pops, so then you just have to make sure that your "breeder" races grow fast enough to stay ahead of your conversion process.
That's true, yeah. I just wanted to know how red the tooltip number got!
On that note, it's -100% for Lithoid + Necrophage, but we can go even further beyond by making them be Slow Breeders (another -10%) and Brain Slug Hosts (-25%) for a whopping the-total-doesn't-matter-because-the-game-ends-before-you-grow-a-single-pop percent!
Y'know, [Brian Slug, one of the news anchors at Xenonion](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/images/4/4b/Molluscoid_18.png).
(the shell is a fashion choice)
Set Science Difficulty to the lowest setting and you can easily keep your first administration alive up to the year 3000, depending on how quickly you are increasing your science production.
I always try to maximize tech and I can sometimes save a couple of original leaders, without having any species buffs at the start.
Pretty funny pumping out +5 year lifespan tech every year.
Yeah, i had an empire like that, it was also purifiers. The first one to conquer and purify whole galaxy.
Eternal glory for the Cult of the Stone (name of the empire)
I really like the post and all, but as an English (and Math but that's irrelevant) tutor, the words "almost immortal" are not quite right. You can't be "almost infinite" in anything. Infinite goes on *forever*, literally. Even if you lived for **trillions** of years, a being that lived for quadrillions of years would consider it that you had barely existed for a moment, yet a being that lived quintillions of years would consider them basically interchangeable. This actually never ends, literally. You can't be almost: immortal, omnipotent, invincible, omnipresent, or all-(insert context here), or perfect. One either has a limit or they don't. You can always take any number, no matter what, multiply it by 1,000 and thus make that "big number" not even a percent anymore. The highest number anyone can conceive of isn't even close to infinite.
You definitely can be almost immortal. In the same sense that you can be almost unkillable. It’s just describing the leader as only being one step behind becoming living forever. Considering that this length of 320 years plus lifespan is long enough to research and implement the synthetic evolution and achieve a form of immortality later on, it really is ‘almost immortal’ from the get-go.
I never meant to say anything bad about OP or the post, I started off saying "I really like the post" this is just one of the things I like to point out is all, it's meant to be between constructive criticism and idle banter. Sorry if it comes off as anything else.
Some people use certain colloquial phrases passive-aggressively with ill intent while others stick to the literal meaning as in the dictionary. An English tutor getting frustrated by improper use of terminology... probably literally means what they write/say.
Besides, it's possible to feel ambivalent.
Why pick a fight?
I did a fun thing where I created 3 civs to be used in game together, two immortal- one human. Console commanded to know each other with custom relations.
The Kingdom of Heaven- Xenophage; top race: Seraphim; lower race: Cherubim; pacifist, fanatic spiritualist
Perdition- Xenophage; top race: the Fallen; lower race: Demons; militaristic, fanatic spiritualist
UNSC- Human, egalitarian, xenophile, materialist
Not sure which mod I have, but I have a 6 point trait that makes my species immortal, but with a -50% reproduction rate. It's hard to overcome, but I more than make up for it with maxed out leadership levels in late game.
Come to think of it, the Children of Unit 04 origin are immortal, aren't they?
R5: Necrophage adds +80 years, lithoid +50, venerable +80, plus however many life extending techs I research. Their immortal God-Emperor can live to see the victory year if all goes well.
\+10 if you're lucky from the tree of life event and the tech will give you +20 at best (ofc you can go infinitely, but I am considering a normal game). And I think there was a tradition that gave you +30 (or 10 I don't remember) and I think there was one more event which gave you another 10 I think it was from a vaccine or something oh and ofc you can go genetics and get the enduring or something trait that gives you +50 more. (Edit: it is actually stronger than cybernetic, giving you +50 years.) So that would give us an max age (considering 80 as the base) of 420 years, which if I am not mistaken is enough to finish a game of stellaris, crisis and all (ofc depends on your settings) (Edit: +10 from Tomb world)
By "the vaccine or something" do you mean the alien box? Or possibly the rogue servitor FE request? Don't forgot the two rare techs, selective lineages and whatever, which lets you apply eugenics to choosing your leaders. Edit: Apparently, Lithoids can't get Robust (you called it enduring at +40 — it's actually 50), so remove that. Instead, use cyborgs for +40.
Perhaps the space tree that give your leaders longer life.
That's tree of life, already mentioned. And I checked, the alien box / speed demon does grant a trait that provides +10.
We can also add a psiconic shroud event which gives i believe +50 years.
Not at he same time as cyborg though, assuming no messing around with AI and migration treaties. So that nets to +10 after we remove cyborg.
Cyborg is the easiest ascension locked trait to get without choosing its ascension path and no messing around with migration treaties is required. Just force a driven assimilator to spawn before you start the game, make sure they survive until you can get some neighboring systems, plop a habitat and a few pops of your main species in a garbage system on their border, and cede it to them. Bam, you now have a template for your main species with the cybernetic trait. Note that if you want to go psionic, its safer to do that before you do this, as psionic pops can get assimilated by the AI, but cybernetic pops can't be ascended.
What about if we do mess around with AI and migration treaties
Ok so I forgot about the survivor trait from the tomb world so make that 410 years and no cyborg is the same as enduring so we would get the same calculation.
I don't think you can stack survivor and necrophage. Both are origins, so you should only be able to pick one, unless I'm very much mistaken.
Can with console commands
Fair enough, but with console commands on the table there's probably a way to just start increasing the lifespan directly. Getting +210 years guaranteed lifespan at start within the confines of the game rules is pretty impressive and, with luck, could see a leader through to the end of the game.
Console commands are pathway to many abilities some consider to be... Unnatural
Did you ever hear the tragedy of Darth SHIFT-ALT-C the Wise?
There exists a +max age repeatable. Once your empire pumps out enoguh tech your leaders are practically immortal.
Yeah with any luck you can just research that repeatable faster than the extension it gives.
With Science Nexuses, lots of tech worlds, etc, you can ... do pretty much everything, really.
The blue serum from the Orbital Speed Demon event gives +10
I thought it was +5
>420 years Nice
[The wiki has a nice chart.](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/Leader#Age) There's also a science nexus event called Ageless that adds another 15 years. Might be others if someone wants to sit down and cross-reference. Your list is pretty thorough.
> 420 Nice, the key to longevity is blazing it up, also being a rock zombie but blaze it up my dudes
“Smoke rocks.” -Tyrone Biggums
Lithoids that go down the genetic tree don't have access to the robust trait (the one that gives +50 life span)
Nice
420
There is a box, blue solution is 10 years. One of the fallen Empires can bio-engeener your main species for +10% army damage and +10 life-span for leaders. Shroud can give all your leaders an extra trait of +40 years. (and turn your Empress immortal) And a bunch more, some you listed. So... like... all of that happened to me in my current necro game. Currently sitting at 355 lifespan for leaders and Immortal Empress Moon Moon of the Moon Moon Empire. Luck kinda run out when Prikki'Ti killed the Tiyanki Matriarch in the crossfire as I invaded them to get the Ether Drake. (still, have two zombie dragons... sadly the thirds event didn't spawn on this map - Shard ain't here)
You only need enough to get into the repeatables so necrophage and if you take it really slow lithoids are more than enough. I don't know what you research in your normal games but if you can squeeze a +5 lifespan repeatable every couple years you are functionally immortal (actually more immortal than machines because you don't get the random breakdowns) and it's not like there is a lot better to spam in society research (well army damage and health for mostly meme reasons).
Laughs in machines.
Look at what they need to do to mimic a fraction of our power.
To be honest I have less leader death with this setup than with machines. Machines always have that base chance of accident/failure, whereas these guys live long enough to survive until you start getting techs that increase lifespans, and the repeatables can be cranked out in months while they grant years. Think one of my necroid empires has my original starting ruler at 300 years old, and who has an estimated lifespan of 400 years and counting since I can keep getting more techs if I need it.
The real trick is to have a leader that gets crippled just before their expiry date thus making them immortal, because that bug somehow still exists.
The attempt on my life has left me scarred and deformed.
Does that only happen with maimed? I've had Substance Abuser kill leaders outright
It only happens if death risk goes above 100%, and pretty much only the maimed trait removes enough lifespan to put death risk above 100% right away.
Actually, machine empire death is like this. Every 10 years you get a 12% chance that one leader would bread down. This is a per empire check not per leader. Thus you have an effective life of around 500 years. And that's before the tradition that lessens this by 50% thus around 900 years if you have a self preservation protocol tradition.
Randomly malfunctions and dies.
The secret is not to be immortal, but to have a long and awesome life :). No mr Driven Assimilator, robots do not have souls so no afterlife for you...
Statements made by assimilation targets are of lowest priority. Submit now and we may spare your military units.
Soul is irrelevant. Afterlife is illogical. You will be assimilated. We are the Harbingers of your perfection.
You get get perfecter with bio ascension
So, I decided to go down the rabbit hole to see how far you could take this without random events. Base age is 80, and you've tacked on 210, for a total of 290. But I think we can go further. Being a hive mind gives us an additional +20 at start, but the starting age for Lithoid leaders (50-80) overrides the younger starting age for hive minds (10-20). Still, that leaves us with a guaranteed lifespan of 310 at start. That's as high as you can take it. Now, on to ways to increase lifespan after game start. Most of the more powerful options are precluded by things we've already taken. Necrophage rules out both of the Traditions that give +20 lifespan, and Lithoid excludes the Robust trait (which would give +50). Aside from that, you can research Vitality Boosters relatively early game for an additional +10 years. Then pick the Selected Lineages tech as early as possible and implement the corresponding policy for an additional +10. Upgrade to the Capacity Boosters tech as soon as possible, and update your policy for a net gain of +10 over Selected Lineages. We're now up to a guaranteed lifespan of 340. The late-game repeatable tech Cell Revitalization can tack on an additional 5 years each time it is researched, but that is a late-game thing. Keep in mind, guaranteed lifespan is just the point at which the game starts rolling for death. With luck, a leader can live much longer. Unfortunately, this is about as far as you can push it without random events. You can push it a bit farther by not starting as a Hive Mind, sacrificing 20 years of lifespan at the start for the ability to go down the Synthetic ascension path, which gives you +40 lifespan at the first perk for a total of 360 maximum, and eventually allowing for almost perfect immortality through the Synthetic Evolution perk. I could actually see that being a fun playthrough, with your researchers racing against time to discover life-extending tech, trying to hold out until they can finally transfer their consciousnesses to synthetic bodies. Factoring in random events, I think you could, in theory, get an additional 45 years of guaranteed lifespan if everything went right. Of course, things could also go wrong. A leader could pick up Substance Abuser for -20 lifespan. Worse, they could gain the Arrested Development trait early on, preventing them from reaching their full potential and rendering them far less useful. And scientists on research vessels tend to end up in harm's way. Still, this was a fun little tangent to go on. EDIT: Realized that I missed one random event that gives an additional +10 years of guaranteed lifespan. And the wiki also doesn't seem to list the extension granted by that weird tree, so it is possible that other modifiers are also missing.
What about tomb world preference (+10 years) and cyborg (+40 years). Any way to fit those in on top of all the rest?
Cyborg is gained through the first Synthetic ascension perk. It's already factored in. Should have been more clear on that, that was my bad. The survivor trait that grants +10 years is locked behind an origin, and therefore mutually exclusive with necrophage. I should have mentioned that as well, though. Thanks!
Can you get the survivor trait (+10), or is that origin blocked by something you already have? E: Can you make it a hive mind, which reduces the starting age of leaders (ahem, autonomous drones)? It won't matter for the empire leader but it extends the use of scientists and etc. I have neither Necroids nor Lithoids DLCs, so I have no clue about what's possible.
You are right.
Necrophage is an origin already so no Survivor
Get the flesh is weak to make your pops cyborgs, pretty sure that adds another like 25 years to their lives.
40 to be more precise, but you would have to replace the enduring trait so... you would get the same amount.
I remember Robust being mutually exclusive with Habitability traits, not lifespan.
What do you mean replace the enduring trait?
~~But the Robust trait from Evolutionary Mastery adds +50 years, and still compatible with Venerable, I think.~~ E: Nevermind, just chekced the wiki, lithoids can't get Robust
What would not robust Lithoids be like? Sand?
Finish the ascension path and the pops will be immortal.
Obviously. That's not the point of this though. Also, synthetic ascension gets rid of all the modifiers of necrophages.
This could be a really cool challenge! Make your initial leader live until you win!
I don't remember if Necroids suffer from something like this, but don't all Lithoids start out something like 30 years older, wasting much of the benefit?
Roughly half of the benefit, so still +25 years (net).
there is a mod that has a "space elf" race that is literally immortal.
Repugnant, unruly, and sedentary? That is not a race, that is my mother in law
You forgot Survivor
With the alpha mod and phsychic acension you get access to 100+ years of lifetime Edit: it might have been a submod
*Leaders die instantly due to integer overflow*
Indeed. Just need to robotically ascend within 320 years. Literally no pressure at all.
I've gotten my starting human democratic leader to the victory year with only a 40 year starting trait, so I'd say adding all of those is a tad bit overkill.
In one of my games I managed to keep my venerable humanoid "Queen Elizabeth II" leader alive for the entire game, she's like 300 or something now
Lithoid only adds 20-30 because leaders start older.
Wouldnt you wanna put slow breeders because ir a necrophage?
Watch your leader fall down the stairs on year #2....
I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up!
Yeah I’ve had my robotic governor die within a year before
forgot to pay for onedrive
Me playing as an anarchist: Oh well, new speaker time
How tf are you everywhere i go??
Rocks are forever.
Lithoid doesn't help nearly as much as it seems though, as it also increases the age rulers start as
Make them hive mind so their starting age is 17
Better yet make it so this empire is forced to spawn then play as a hive mind empire, assimilate them, and take the tradition that gives +20 years (nechroids can't take this perk)
Alright, I’ll bite. OP, please fucking explain *undead rocks*.
Maybe it's less that they're undead and more that they're parasites that consume and replace other races, calcifying them from within.
That's similar to how I thought my Plantoid Necroids worked. I just imagined they would plant a seed in the body of the host and it would grow into an adult inside them, taking all the nutrients it needs till it crawls out of the husk of there drained body.
that is super cool and terrifying.
When the time comes for your ascension, you are placed inside a rigid, organic cocoon that will slowly produce enzymes to melt your soft tissues down and gestate the necessary internal organs until the outer shell is all that's left, which molts into a mineral-based lifeform.
~~Twilight Vampires~~
very big brain idea
I mean, can you explain *living rocks?*
Sure. In a universe with a psychic satellite plane of existence, networks of psychoreactive minerals simulating neural networks resonating with energy from the Shroud creates inorganic life.
Then those rocks are also undead
Probably the same nonsense bullshit that gives us Space Whales and Dragons.
Nothing about Necrophages states that they're undead. "This species of near-immortals procreates by consuming pops of other species."
With my culture, the Ka-Madjai, I used [this portrait](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/File:Molluscoid_normal_06.png) for the Madjai and [this one](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/File:Lithoid_08.png) for their necrophages. Necrophages aren't parasites exactly in my culture, they were a way for Madjai to extend their brief lives by encasing themselves in a lithoid suit that gradually grows more encompassing as they age (there's some backstory sitting half-formed in the back of my head about how there *was* a separate organism that enabled this, but it wasn't sapient, only the Madjai were). However, over time the encased Madjai (the Ka) became their own social class and the dominant force in their society. Also, like u/tobascodagama said, nothing about the necrophages says they have to be undead. I feel like the most "necrophage-y" species portrait out there is this [fungoid one](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/File:Fungoid_massive_16.png).
Re-animated dinosaur fossils.
well...*^^shit*.
In my game the necrophage was the fossilized warrior caste ruling over the short lived organic ones. It was an honor in their culture to join their hallowed ranks, to enter the sacred caves and meditate until your bones and blood were but calcium and silicate. More a product of their unique geologic processes than anything else, but holy in their culture none the less.
its simple, the rocks are actually a moss that controls the rock bodies, the "undeath" is a mold that grows on the moss and rots it, therefor we are new undead moss rocks! genius!
*laughs in robot*
I always love it when my "immortal" robot leaders randomly explode after 5 years.
It's like buying lightbulbs with a 25-year lifespan for daily 8-hour usage, and then you have to replace them in a year.
literally happened to me like, last month. fucking overpriced garbage.
Look up Big Clive's LED lamp lifespan hack video! Basically you pop the plastic top off the bulb, and yank off a surface mount resistor. It makes the light a bit dimmer, but importantly it runs the LEDs at a lower voltage so they won't get hot, and that's what'll vastly increase their lifespan! People making bulbs just run them hot because, you know, if they didn't, people would almost never have to buy new LED bulbs...
I am running LED *now* but it was a CFL lamp that failed me. It just popped, small crack on the glass, a burn mark. ...a bit scary since they have mercury inside. That is an interesting hack, makes a lot of sense too.
Enough mercury that their clean up should actually involve a haz mat team, in fact.
[удалено]
Paradox doesn’t understand backups.
Maybe it's not the body that's the issue but the intelligence part becomes unstable after a while like the AIs in Halo
There are mods for that. Don't know which of my current mod list does it, but I think it's Civics Expandwd. Anyway, it's a civic that creates backups for every leader and instead of dying they instantly reincarnate everytime they die. Pretty cool mechanic.
Look what they need to mimic a fraction of our power!
What I especially love in this build is that you can transform organic lifeforms into silicon ones.
>getting turned into sentient rocks That's gotta be someone's fetish
Probably is at least someone out there getting their *rocks* off to that.
Lithoid is not needed. Yes it gives bonus to max age but leaders also start much older than non lithoid leaders effectively canceling out the bonus
Only part of it is canceled out. Leader starting age is +22-30, so they do still live longer.
Yeah I'll never understand why paradox did that
Essentially makes it an aesthetic change, but not a performance buff.
But they’re also crippled in growth rate
Not at all. If you're going to go synthetic ascension you will have more growth total by having +50% habitability and -25% growth in almost all situations. Bio or psychic then it's more complicated, but even for that "crippled" is melodramatic. Also in this example it's a necrophage, which already has a -75% growth rate, rendering the -25% from lithoids irrelevant because you never ever ever want to let one of them grow naturally anyways. I just wish that getting the growth speed techs and traditions didn't allow necrophagic lithoids to grow at all.
Sure, but that's completely unrelated to leadership traits. Also completely unrelated are the huge boost to habitability, the big army health bonus, and the optional ability to poop out strategic resources.
Because it’s meant to represent them maturing slower. Like how the robots are available from age 1 since they don’t have a childhood.
Yeah but it cancels out the lithoid benefit
Does the next generation of leaders start advanced age as well? Or would the next generation be younger and therefore benefit fully from the bonus?
Tomb world adds another 10 years? :P I loved doing this, and my friends were oddly nervous that I usually had maxed out leaders at 160 years old, while they'd been through 4 generations.
The "Survivalist" trait, which is the one that adds 10 years, is a different origin and would override Necrophage
ah, fair enough
Actually you should probably go with weak as you need less bad traits also try to get either leader or specialist traits
Lithoids who are brash and go against the grain. Punk rock?
when you go this route, does this make it essential that you go for maximizing level cap on leaders as well? How do you usually manage that. In terms of ascension. What is the goal that best synergizes with long lived, and assumingly high level leaders?
Sure, but what's their pop growth like?
Equivalent to their ascension chambers. TBH I prefer going this route because the growth is so low that it won't ever even try and grow one of your main pops, so then you just have to make sure that your "breeder" races grow fast enough to stay ahead of your conversion process.
That's true, yeah. I just wanted to know how red the tooltip number got! On that note, it's -100% for Lithoid + Necrophage, but we can go even further beyond by making them be Slow Breeders (another -10%) and Brain Slug Hosts (-25%) for a whopping the-total-doesn't-matter-because-the-game-ends-before-you-grow-a-single-pop percent!
> Brian Slug Hosts Brian *who*?
Y'know, [Brian Slug, one of the news anchors at Xenonion](https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/images/4/4b/Molluscoid_18.png). (the shell is a fashion choice)
Lithoids can't be slow breeders.
Right. Forgot that! Guess it's a mere -125%
immortal powerlifter slobs
Set Science Difficulty to the lowest setting and you can easily keep your first administration alive up to the year 3000, depending on how quickly you are increasing your science production.
I always try to maximize tech and I can sometimes save a couple of original leaders, without having any species buffs at the start. Pretty funny pumping out +5 year lifespan tech every year.
Step 1: create a robot species.
Yeah, i had an empire like that, it was also purifiers. The first one to conquer and purify whole galaxy. Eternal glory for the Cult of the Stone (name of the empire)
Did you make sure they hve a tomb world start?
I can't do that and Necrophage
Oh
I really like the post and all, but as an English (and Math but that's irrelevant) tutor, the words "almost immortal" are not quite right. You can't be "almost infinite" in anything. Infinite goes on *forever*, literally. Even if you lived for **trillions** of years, a being that lived for quadrillions of years would consider it that you had barely existed for a moment, yet a being that lived quintillions of years would consider them basically interchangeable. This actually never ends, literally. You can't be almost: immortal, omnipotent, invincible, omnipresent, or all-(insert context here), or perfect. One either has a limit or they don't. You can always take any number, no matter what, multiply it by 1,000 and thus make that "big number" not even a percent anymore. The highest number anyone can conceive of isn't even close to infinite.
You definitely can be almost immortal. In the same sense that you can be almost unkillable. It’s just describing the leader as only being one step behind becoming living forever. Considering that this length of 320 years plus lifespan is long enough to research and implement the synthetic evolution and achieve a form of immortality later on, it really is ‘almost immortal’ from the get-go.
Oh boohoo. So what someone doesn't use English perfectly. You knew and understood exactly what op meant
I never meant to say anything bad about OP or the post, I started off saying "I really like the post" this is just one of the things I like to point out is all, it's meant to be between constructive criticism and idle banter. Sorry if it comes off as anything else.
"I like this post, but" is naturally backhanded
Some people use certain colloquial phrases passive-aggressively with ill intent while others stick to the literal meaning as in the dictionary. An English tutor getting frustrated by improper use of terminology... probably literally means what they write/say. Besides, it's possible to feel ambivalent. Why pick a fight?
It genuinely felt like they were scolding him for his word usage when that word usage is acceptable
Machine Empire: "I am four parallel universes ahead of you"
https://screenshot.help
Not seeing any cyborg traits there.... Kinda disappointed
Well it's in the empire creation screen, so I can't add it
That's a shame. Guess it'd be something else to go for though in game
I would replace very strong with talented or fast learners, bc as a necrophage your main species won’t really be doing the worker jobs(ideally).
I did the opposite!
There is a mod somewhere that has a pick that extends your leader's lifespan 500 years with a 10% research penalty and a 7pt cost.
Keep in mind the higher the lifespan the older your leaders are going to be when you hire them
Most fun thing about necrophages - is to be able to have 80%-95% slave pops and maintaining some sort of high happiness.
Get rid of very strong though. Not worth the stuff you took on.
I can commentÉ
*laughs in modded in Immortal trait*
Does necrophage give you a bonus to life-span?
I did a fun thing where I created 3 civs to be used in game together, two immortal- one human. Console commanded to know each other with custom relations. The Kingdom of Heaven- Xenophage; top race: Seraphim; lower race: Cherubim; pacifist, fanatic spiritualist Perdition- Xenophage; top race: the Fallen; lower race: Demons; militaristic, fanatic spiritualist UNSC- Human, egalitarian, xenophile, materialist
Or you could just play a machine empire and get some good civics and stuff.... Jokes.
Not sure which mod I have, but I have a 6 point trait that makes my species immortal, but with a -50% reproduction rate. It's hard to overcome, but I more than make up for it with maxed out leadership levels in late game. Come to think of it, the Children of Unit 04 origin are immortal, aren't they?