It occurs to me that it maybe a result of the Origin Civics mod - the civics that set alternate homeworld types like habitat and tomb world may do so in a way that makes a new species instead of a new subspecies.
Okay, it's definitely a result of the mod - all of the planet-bound offshoots of the species are subspecies of the same species. They're also probably the weakest spin-off, since they need to expend 3000 minerals and 5 years of constructor time to gain a single size 6 world (that they can eventually, with the Voidborne ascension perk, upgrade to size 15).
Interesting, the most successful, from a population perspective, other member of the diaspora are the Fanatic Purifiers.
Fascinating, apparently ruthless genocide and mindless opposition to all that is different is a more than viable survival strategy.
Oh Stellaris you teach me so much 
Ugh, Marauders are so annoying. I tried a Life Seeded game last night and ended up stopping in frustration when they stopped giving me the opportunity to pay them off and ended up just raising me over and over again.
It probably also helps that they're the only group that has fast breeders, but even then, they have close to my numbers of biologicals and exceed the combined population of the "codominant evolution" group (think syncretic evolution, but as equals). They're actually the third most populous default empire after me and the neighboring devouring swarm.
The space station guys might have been closer, but they were one of like three empires to not have the fortune of being an advanced start.
Yup and apparently it doesn't accurately represent Mosley's beliefs, seems like he actually wasn't this expansionistic imperialist.
Seems to have created some kind of a commotion on the Kaiserreich subreddit.
"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn
It was, I believe, in the early version of the Union of Britain focus tree, before it and the French tree got overhauled.
Also, I fucking hate how much the Kaiserreich community tries to bend over backwards to make sure people fit their OTL political beliefs in Kaiserreich. It's such a completely unnecessary conversation to have for an ahistorical mod.
edited 21st Mar '18 12:36:34 AM by math792d
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Actually, the community itself seems mostly obsessed with memes and "waifus", at least the ones on the subreddit. Any small change is causing a commotion, no matter how much sense it makes even within the mod. See Sternberg's change from NatPop to PatAut (he simple doesn't fit the former category) or that they're changed Jian Qing's portrait (because the old one was literally NOT HER) and are going to remove the Triad path with the China rework.
Also the "Direct Rule from London" meme comes from an event that you get if you annex Ireland as the UOB - the option to keep them occupied says "Enact direct rule" or something like that - the phrase also seems to have a history when it comes to Ireland.
edited 21st Mar '18 2:27:17 AM by DrunkenNordmann
Welcome to Estalia, gentlemen.
The community is one of the reasons I don't really bother with it any more, even though I was a consultant back 2 years ago in the lead up to the HOI IV version.
edited 21st Mar '18 2:56:24 AM by Imca
They actually did a community survey a while ago and...it explained a lot, that much I can say.
It comes from Northern Ireland. After the Good Friday agreement, the Northern Irish compromise was that the government would always be made up of the largest unionist and largest republican parties, with minimal input from Whitehall.
So 'direct rule from London' in Northern Ireland is basically referring to the Troubles, or the general breakdown in cooperation between Sinn Fein and the DUP.
I want to see that survey.
edited 21st Mar '18 3:45:14 AM by math792d
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.
So many teenagers, Jesus.
Suddenly it makes all of the sense. Especially r/Kaiserreichpolitics.
edited 21st Mar '18 4:10:02 AM by math792d
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.
And the waifu obsession. When Paradox added Victoria Louise as an easter egg, people were flipping their shit because the game uses a portrait that actually makes her look the right age and not a photo from 1909.
Welcome to Estalia, gentlemen.
I did a run as Monarchist Germany just to see Wilhelm II with that sick beard.
Though I think my favorite is the democratic path, sans the whole 'France going fascist Because of Reasons' thing.
I might actually have to do a full playthrough with Germany now that it doesn't involve, you know, helping digital fascists take over the world.
edited 21st Mar '18 5:03:37 AM by math792d
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.
So you have to face either a fascist faction under French leadership or a larger Comintern.
It's been a long-standing complaint that any major nation switching ideology can bork the balance - not to mention that AI really wasn't able to deal well with the player going completely off-script.
edited 21st Mar '18 5:23:59 AM by DrunkenNordmann
Welcome to Estalia, gentlemen.
Yeah as railroading goes that seems reasonable, not to mention that Germany going Democratic (or staying Democratic I suppose) should have odd effects so it doesn't hurt my verisimilitude.
edited 21st Mar '18 5:25:19 AM by Fourthspartan56
"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn
I guess. But the thing is that it seems fairly inconsistent - if you go down the Imperial path, you get a communist France guaranteed, and I believe the democratic one brings you into contact with a fascist France, but in either case you're going to be fighting the Soviet Union, because whatever path you choose, an active component of it is opposition to the Soviets.
So if you're playing as democratic Germany, France feels like a bit of a vestigial organ - it feels like either way, France should join the Comintern, so the conflict makes more sense. Otherwise 'round one' is just a punch-up between France, Italy and Germany, and then conflict with the SU, rather than being a great big punch-up with the Comintern.
edited 21st Mar '18 5:35:36 AM by math792d
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.
Probably because of Germany fought one or the other it would steamroll them. You have to have both at once to make it a challenge.
That's sorta what I'm saying, though - in the democracy path it becomes 'punch the French, then punch the Soviets' rather than a war with the Comintern, and since there's no two 'continuous' wars going on because, unlike with Britain, there's no island power to keep the fascists from peacing out when the major powers have capitulated, running a war against the Soviet Union still happens without the backdrop of the French campaign.
(That aside, the fact that fighting the Soviet Union as Germany is so easy annoys the heck out of me, but then the Allied Powers being stronger would mean too many whiny Germany-only players.)
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.
Also, the Allies being stronger/Germany being weaker would make playing as the Allies pretty boring. Like, I never play Germany, but I always want them to be strong because I want a "boss" worth fighting.
edited 21st Mar '18 3:47:53 PM by Balmung
In HOI 4 I'm currently playing a game in Kaiserreich as Totalist Mexico and things are going very well. It's 1937 and I'm expanding and improving my industry/military at a good pace. And in a diplomatic coup I've managed to peacefully seize Texas, New Mexico, and California which is benefiting my internal expansion.
edited 21st Mar '18 6:11:30 PM by Fourthspartan56
"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn
So, I use Animated Synthetic Portraits Extended, which someone kindly upgraded to 2.0 after the original maker abandoned it. However, it has a rather odd bug (and has had it even before 2.0, so it's not like it's new) - At least for the clothed, extra-humanoid synthetics, it only loads odd-numbered male hairstyles and even-numbered female hairstyles when randomly generating new leaders and displaying POPs. This means you won't see any bald male synths (both hairstyles 2 and 4 are no hair) and a lot of bald female synths along with the short asymmetric hair, but the short symmetric Sci-Fi Bob Haircut style and the standard Stellaris long hair style will not be used.
I wound up brute-forcing a solution by simply adding a bunch of duplicate hairstyles to allow the other styles to spawn.
So, I made my first Life-Seeded civilization. I've basically made a space version of the Warhammer High Elves; made them a race that was purposefully placed on a single tailor-made planet that they essentially don't leave except in naval exploration.