Stellaris Farming Only Challenge 

You wanan know the hilarious part? you're still having better alloy and science than an actual Lithoid Hive. For the first 30 year or so.

So is it against the rules to have livestock? It is technically a form of farming and with lithoids you can make minerals that way. Yes you can farm minerals.

ITS ALMOST HARVESTIN SEASON

"I've got a brand-new combine harvester; I'll give you the key!" I felt the pain in this video and pain is bread in French, so I guess food is inevitable.

Small note on the food selling: You are able to sell 146 food or minerals each month without the price going down. You can also cheat a little and manually sell 100 food, wait 1 day, this will make the food price rebound and you can sell 100 more. Done perfectly you can sell 3000 food each month without the price dropping.

Every time i hear "Soil of hope" my brain makes me hear "Soylent Hope". Implying that all the food coming from your farmers is hilariously ironic

"But farming... Really? Man of your talents?"

Ah Montu taking tips from the superior Stellaris RU-vidr it seems ;)

"Our sqidgy, organic, food based, *disgusting* flesh" I have never heard someone hate their physiology so much in my life

After this playthrough, Montu was so sick of food that he didn't eat for 24 hours.

This might actually be easier as a Catalytic Machine Empire. You'd get access to Bio-Reactors, which convert food into energy. Thinking of Assimilators in particular (with a biological sub-species) as they would not need as much energy as most MIs, and they don't struggle as much to get the food boosting techs. And they don't use minerals much.

Wow, I've never seen anyone condense a 100 years worth of sarcasm into a 30 minute video. Impressive :D

He is just seething with rage through his voice, especially when he mentions building more food districts.

When I saw farmers only, I initially thought Montu was going for Agrarian Idyll + Anglers for the trade bonus for generating food and consumer goods, then take the catalytic processing civic for normal empires to spec into alloys. Or ... wait, that might crash even faster

Thanks! You deserve some money after suffering through all that farming!

Let's just appreciate how Montu faced his greatest nemesis and still became the strongest empire in the known galaxy

I would have thought that this build would go with Agrarian idyll, Anglers and Catalythic processing on an Ocean world start. This surprises me.

I was so sure that this was gonna go horribly wrong, but Montu went and subjugated half the galaxy.

Welcome to the rice fields!!

Could you do another 2 of these one where its only technicians and one where its only miners, just to show the difference between the power of the 3 jobs.

I was really expecting something to do with Anglers using the trade value to generate your energy. It's not good but like, it technically gives you most of the things you need to play.

I loved this and hope for a sequel. I'm picturing the painting, American Gothic (the one with dour farmer and his daughter and a pitchfork) but xeno-ified.

If stellaris had a more robust economic system, this might be a lot easier. Very interesting video Montu, you come up with some wild challenges!!! 😀

Really enjoyed! Would love to see a part two! :)

I think they should make a massive farm megastructure. Just because why not.

_Good Montu, join the nutritious Darkside!_ 🍏 _Become a fellow farm enjoyer!_ *One Of Us* *One Of Us* *One Of Us* *One Of Us* *One Of Us* *One Of Us*

"Sir... our scanners report their ships... their ships seem to be made out of food."

Since you are offering, yes i do want to see more of this timeline and your subsequent tears of anguish.

The more I think about it, the more I feel like this challenge would be smoother as a megacorporation. You could get all the energy you need from trade and branch office. If you are also Catalytic Recycler and consumer benefit, then you shouldn't have any mineral upkeep, space mining should be enough to help you build. And you can also get some minerals from your branch offices.

My favourite playstyle is Aquatic on Ocean Paradise origin, with Catalytic Processing, Anglers and later Agrarian Idyll civics. I like roleplaying as a green empire (and i also take the genetic evolution ascension path). Also: when i build a ringworld, if i specialize one segment on forging, there are not enough minerals elsewhere to cover the huge cost (i play on very low habitable planet settings, i hate micromanaging too many worlds). But you can farm on another segment, and BAAM, you're covered.

This is a man in pain. I love it. I feast upon your pain. Anglers is a good one for this setup if you find yourself low on agri districts.

Hey Montu, I'm playing Stellaris for 2 weeks now and I love it too find almost always one of your videos covering my questions! But, actually I'm looking for a video about archaeology sites. Something like a Tier-List. Which to excavate immediately, keep for later etc. Especially early on, it takes a lot of time for my inexperienced scientists to excavate a site.

You can really spam solar panels if you play as gestalt consciousness. The penalty for being over your starbase capacity is a percentage augmentation to their upkeep, but solar panels don't have any upkeep. Plus, they produce 12 base energy instead of 6 with lvl 2 Unchained Knowledge resolution. A good rule of thumb is that if you starbases are costing you half as much as they are earning you, then it's not worth building more of them. As rogue servitor, I generally get to about 60 of them this way. Of course, the down side is if you use starbases for anything else it's gonna be very expensive. You are gonna have to rely on warrior jobs to increase your naval cap and on your mobile force for defense.

This is very cool, we'd love to see the saga's conclusion. You might want to grab Shared Burdens at some point if you haven't already.

Farming should be a bigger requirement. I could imagine one empire exporting food to half the galaxy. That would be so cool

Damn, this is the best FarmersOnly ad I’ve seen to date

Now, that I've watched it to the end, it was so much fun!

Dude does not know the absolute joy of biting into a fresh and juicy crop you’ve grown yourself.

Really liked this one.

Yaknow, I’ve wondered something for a while now but have always forgotten to test it. But this save seems like the perfect opportunity to do so! Build the first stage of a megastructure, then transfer the system to a subject/release it as a subject. Do this over and over until you’re happy, then integrate the subjects again or give them so many alloys they just build the megastructures themselves so you can tax them. My thinking with the integration bit is that you’d then potentially be able to have an infinite number of say.. Dyson spheres, in your empire!

I love this. As someone who actually has done a food focused run(although not with these brutal restrictions) it is nice to see the farmer’s plights and bounties both

I’ve never understood how hiveminds get research by staring at rocks

nice to see you've come around on the plantoid ship set. the one true ship set, some would say~

Can't believe this channel did this challenge, much less did so well so far. I'd be down to see how it'd go.

You got me with Bubbles!

and he did it in Fall. What a Mad lad.

This is amazing

I guess cortyceps drones might work here, as the those fleets would use food.

Nihilistic acquisition to get lithoids would be excellent to "farm"

Your awesome dude and awesome video keep up awesome video

He just sounds so furious the whole way through 🤣

You’ve turned the galaxy into a giant combine harvester, ohhh arrrr

WE NEED MORE!

waiting for next part :)

I did a run with an Aquatic Angler with Catalytic Processing, lucked into the Baol Precursor chain for the bonus consumer goods and food and then took Agrarian Idyll. The amenities, consumer goods and trade value you produce is actually...obscene - I was able to switch to marketplace of ideas for my unity production and focus on science worlds to keep up on traditions and power ahead on tech while setting up a trade federation, fielding an absolutely huge fleet, gradually converting my entire empire to Gia worlds and using the AP I saved on Ecu/Gia worlds to take Defender of the Galaxy and almost solo the crisis. I wasn't even intending it as a Farmer only run (so to be fair it wasn't played as one initially) but everything lined up so well that I just ended up only using farmers and space mining for basic resource production.

I feel like the goal is to tank the food market and sell all your food all the time and get to a point where you can purchase minerals at inflated prices. Well also burn food for energy.

It's almost harvesting season

This is sadly the kind of stream I would absolutely have loved lol

Anyone else think that organic reprocessing should be buffed so that all features that use minerals instead use food (but are 20% more expenisve) not just alloy foundaries. That would make this civic a lot more insteresting (and useful).

I made a plantoid race of healthy edible agricultural veggie pops and named it "the garden of eaten"

"It ain't much, but it's honest work...." 😂

Ok. I see now. Farming is the best way to min-max Stellaris. Thanks! 🤪

as others have pointed out having tasty pops should count, letting you farm some minerals but you can't do that on hivemind

This gives me an idea for a new civic : Fanatic Recyclers - Turns pop waste into minerals and energy

you can tell a piece of montu died with every agricultur district build and every farmer employed

I feel like this challenge is best suited to wide gestalt empires - Lots of planets with bioreactors

You don't have to be lonely, at Farmers Only space Strat

Insert "It ain't much, but it's honest work" Meme here.

It’s kinda hilarious that there are so many base mechanics involving farmers, food and increasing their output when you can literally get all your food needs met with a few star bases

please show us the conclusion of this. Also, please show us how "Stellaris Player vs EU4 - Unite Japan" ends. Seeing you in samurai armor was priceless.

Oh yes, I would love to see a humble farming community rally to defend the galaxy.

opinion and prediction: your farmers only challenge is possible, although it will still be hard, at least at first. I don't think farmers are as inefficient as you think, since growing your own food is not as bad as buying it on the market (both technicians and farmers produce 6 of their respective resource, whereas buying food costs 1.3 times more on the internal market with monthly trades.) That said though, this will still be hard, since you can't have technician jobs. However, if you have friendly neighbors you may actually be able to trade for better deals with them when contact is established, selling food to other nations and getting non food resources at an advantageous 1.2 ratio. Also, if you can potentially vassalize someone (or even produce your own vassal, if you weren't a hive mind or had progenitor hive,) they could give you resources, especially if they were a prospectorium. My prediction: this is possible, and barring bad luck (like in the quest for Jeff) you will do at least a passable job in this endeavor, since you really know what you are doing. I look forward to seeing how you do and commenting further!

Fluffy is an acceptable name for Bubbles too.

Ah yes, the farmers only stream. Glorious, romantic.

those ehems shound like spy its killing me

My idea - go aquatic farmers. Bit less food, sure, but all the CG you could ever need. Perhaps it would work quite well for if, say, you decided to do a challenge of farming *workers* only.

Ahh yes, the intensive market run.

Yes we the Miroz Technocracy would formally like to review this valuable information in a strictly agriculture method your empire has employed 🤣

This was a fun idea.

"actually building a resource silo on purpose" _looks at my silo only ringworlds_

Lol, this basically a slightly more restrictive and more aggressive version of my go to build. No mining districts, a minimum number of generator districts, selling food to the market and any other empire that wants it. Focusing almost entirely on pops, food, and unity. It can absolutely work.

I feel like regular races would make an easier farmer only run, you can grab that aquatic farming trait and get food, unity, consumer goods and energy all from your farmers.

Can't help but wonder how much impact the new precursor building, the Baol Organic Plant will make since it makes farmy bois give 1 more food and +1 consumer good.

Should have done a regular empire for this. Farmers only (with catalytic processing) + trade build for consumer goods to support research labs.

🙀🙀🙀WAIT A SECOND YOU HAVE XENO COMPATIBILITY👩‍❤‍👨 ON!🙀🙀🙀

🎵You don't have to be lonely🎵

Farmers: *exist* Montu: And I took that personally.

Farmers only new meta? Farmers only new meta.

Somerset can into space

This'll be interesting...

My friend played in a multiplayer game called "Wiar Farmers" and were pacifistic snails

One of my most successful empires was a farming empire. I didn't forgo the other resources, of course, but I really focused on farming. Here is what I learned: Food is not useless. It's the easiest resource to increase with some of the strongest bonuses. I owned the senet by using my massive food production to buy favors and using those favors to bully my way around. I traded in such a way to make the sure I was giving the other side of the trade a really good deal, so I ended up with everyone liking me. Food as the backbone of your economy (not as your only economy) is not only doable, but quite good.

FOOD! FOOD! FOod! This was hilarious 😂

Why didn't you have bioreactors?

the best farm is a galactic size farm - this should have also included a Devouring Swarm

Have you ever thought about playing this challenge with a machine empire? Bio-processors employ 0 pops and generate 20 energy per 25 food upkeep, which is better than the market at least. However, you could stack machine nexus planet, governor trait and prosperity to reduce the upkeep down by 30, maybe 40% or more, turning 1 food into more than 1 energy. Is it good? It is something of a meme, so I would say yes.

This game really needs a food and consumer goods overhaul. Like, they're the only two resources that are practically useless as anything other than upkeep. The only way they have any use is if you use catalytic reprocessing or bio-reactors. The prethoryn brood queen is endgame only and honestly not that great. Hell, even the nutritional plentitude edict barely puts a dent in food production. You need to use mods to get any real use out of food. Then you've got consumer goods. Pure upkeep. The only thing I can remember them having a use for besides that is the planetary decision to give amenities, which isn't really necessary anyways because I've found that amenities aren't really difficult to get. In fact, I usually end in a gargantuan surplus of them. AI empires value them highly for trade deals at first, but that's only a temporary use. Then the only jobs that use consumer goods are bureaucrats, researchers, culture workers, and priests. All of which focus on unity except for researchers, which are arguably the only truly impactful use of consumer goods besides Utopian Abundance. I literally get so much unity just from the occasional culture building that making a dedicated planet or habitat for it is overkill. Even with a mod that adds dozens of traditions, it's not that difficult to get most of them done before endgame and have all the unity edicts active with 2K unity per month to spare. Oh and gestalts have literally no use for them because everything that requires consumer goods, for them, requires energy or minerals. Oh, and lithoid researchers take minerals too, so they have less use for consumer goods compared to other organics. Honestly, you eventually just reach a point in the game where consumer goods become totally meaningless. You can get plenty of them to sustain any amount of upkeep you could need --- it's not difficult at all. Especially with ecumenopoli and megastructures. They seriously need another use that can keep them viable in the mid-endgame where you've already researched all the tech and are never going to feasibly have a deficit. Same goes for food: we need more things to spend them on, such as ship components (imagine reverse-engineered space fauna tech requiring food cost/upkeep to use). Hell, even the ameoba strike craft doesn't require food without mods.

I tend to use my food as a driven assimilator to bribe the filthy frleshbag Zeno's into becoming my vassal then absorb them 10 years later

I would love to see a trait that allows pops to gain a ton of bonuses that scale with a dynamic food upkeep. sort of a reactive metabolism. could be cool for builds that can output ridiculous quantities of food per month (like 20k) instead of just selling it all. imagine having pops that eventually produce like 10x resources, but literally devour all the food you generate in your entire empire each month. or you could have it as a custom situation or possibly a policy.

Forsake 'bubbles'! Fluffy is eternal!