Stellaris Vassal Contracts - How To Steal An Empire 

big mistake, you do NOT need to be stronger then them when proposing subjugation, not even close, you can be weak as all hell, but they'll accept if they like the terms but when they accept they'll hate you, but you might not care

Another little exploit I can see with this is in federations. You could set Overlord conflicts to none, but they'll still have to join wars as a federation member, and you can set subject conflicts to all but they still have to go through the federation to declare. Basically, you get the loyalty bonuses without giving the subject back their autonomy.

I think the base -500 acceptance is too high, I think it should be downed to -125 to -250 to allow us to make prospectoriums. We should also be able to use favors from the subject to allow term agreement changes that they typically wouldn't do.

I think, for the system, if I as the overlord is paying influence out of the nose for a prospectors, as well as the monthy loyalty changes, I think a vessel shouldn't be able to say no without rebeling,with the new contract being the overlords war goal.

I was able to get a Prospectorium through a weird method. I proposed the change despite it saying it would be declined. They refused but STILL converted. The best I was able to figure out (and I could be wrong) it costs them influence to decline. If they do not have the influence it auto declines but still forces the change. Update: Someone one the forum topic I made on the Stellaris forum confirmed it. He proposed Prospectorium three times in a row and on the third time they declined but were still converted.

Some changes that I believe need to be done to make this DLC better: Forced term acceptance; if I want terms they won't agree to, I can invade them and make them agree. A way to balance it out could be that you might be required to have garrisons on their planets, for example, to stop a rebellion. AI considers other factors, such as your technology level, fleet power, and economic might relative to the player's, or if they have neighbors who have repeatedly waged aggressive wars, making joining you a more attractive option. Lastly, overall less difficulty in re-negotiation of vassal contracts. If they are incredibly loyal to me after a long period, it should be far easier to re-negotiate than it currently is.

🤔 If they're an involuntary vassal, why do they have to "agree" to become a Prospectorium?

The subject system seems to be tailored more for human to human diplomacy then human to AI diplomacy...

it is theoretically possible to get a prospectorium with the changes to deal modifier. make an extremely negative deal over time, then repeal all of those when you change to prospectorium

Man it really seems like this DLC needed some more QA...

Glad to see you include the subsidies exploit I commented on your last video, another thing I noticed with subsidies is that it includes the resources sold/bought on the market through monthly orders as income so you can probably get infinite resources by buy and selling them on the monthly deal, it just weirdly alternates between buying and selling month to month which does look weird seeing your income switch between +20k energy and -12k energy month to month

ASpec and Mondu, the masters of outofthebox shinanigans

So far my main gripe with the dlc is getting a prospectorium, and trying to make a vassal a bulwark or scholarium, and they can't keep up with my tech even with me subsidizing them, so they switch to protectorate and still keep all my resources. So, the -500 modifier for each needs to go or be balance with positive, and when they change to and from protectorate we should be able to re-alter the deal without the waiting period.

i was vassalized and the ki has strange focus. i can give them 45% of my rare ressources and they give me 75% bonus on basic advanced and research

Montu have you tried playing as megacorp empire with imperial fiefdom? Its fucking insane, overlord have 3 planets with 150 pops total - you'll get 500-600energy from very START of the game!! You have also option to build outpost in other vassal planets, go for tech rush, change consumer policy for 0.5energy and unity. Unlimited crédits, unity and tech! xD

Why is the main draw of the expansion so broken?

You can also BUY Stellaris Overlord here and support this channel: www.humblebundle.com/store/stellaris-overlord?partner=montuplays&charity=25618

It's been a year since you made this video, and as someone new to Stellaris... THANK YOU. Man, I needed this explained.

I think the overlord should have some modifiers that help with negotiations. Modifiers such as relative power to their vassals and such (more so than the current one in-game), or modifiers for vassals like obedience or whatnot to help them negotiate with the overlord. The vassal shouldn't have that much freedom to negotiate with their overlord, or the overlord need to jump through that many hurdles to adjust what the vassals need to do. Cuz at the moment, I dont see the benefit of having a vassal, and I'd rather integrate them into my empire. Hopefully they do some rebalancing of this in the future, cuz the whole overlord thing is a really fun idea, especially for roleplaying empires and stuff.

Fantastic content as always! Abstaining from voting with the overlord initially is a bug actually. The workaround is that you can simply object and then support the resolution again. The calculations will kick in, and your vassals will actually vote with you if they have restricted voting or no diplomatic freedom. You can see they were forced given their desire to support is still lower than the support threshold in the UI. Given this behavior, vassals' diplomatic weight not getting added to your own proposals is also a bug. Moreover, the UI of vote indication to kick from federation is also not updated, your subject will vote with you when you try to perform the action but the UI still says they will vote no when they have no freedom to vote. So many bugs as always at launch nowadays.

I had an experience about 3 months ago in a coop run as a mil-rush with virtually no tech gain while my buddy ran a technocracy. 2300 this man had megas up while I was still running the equivalent of space AKs and pickup trucks while smashing as many of my ships against an enemy as possible, effectively 1940's Russia-ing the galaxy. I became his vassal and I was, within 20 years, brought up to his level of tech as well as repeatables. If the tweaks are this good, then I'll probably be able to become the galaxy's problem even faster.

ive just gotten the 3 vassels max and I had to give everything to the prospectorium. It was the last vassal I could get. overall they need to rebalance it since I am also unable to change anything from the change in terms. You should be able to get favors to force them to accept certain stuff

This update is pretty annoying with this whole 'diplomacy' thing. As a xenophobic, authoritarian militarist, it doesn't really make much sense that I can't force my vassals to do things they don't want to do. They start without giving me resources, or doing anything for me at all, and then I have to befriend them to do what I say? It doesn't make sense at all for my government type/species. Not to mention, with how long it takes to earn me resources, and how I have to literally convince them to do anything for me, annexing is just easier. Speaking of annexing, I just LOVE how planets gain peace treaties after rebelling... It makes no sense at all, again, as a xenophobic, authoritarian militarist, to just allow a planet to leave my empire and take some systems because they were upset at me. Oh, you have 30k fleet power in the system and 2k worth of xenomorphs on the planet? Nah. They get their peace and are completely safe until the truce wears off... Like, what? There's not even an army uprising, just an independence without any conflict. Sure. It's not particularly difficult to prevent them with a couple strongholds, but sometimes you're busy doing something else, they get freedom, and you're just stuck for years until you can retake your lost land.

I was very excited for the DLC until it comes to a situation: I had to go to war with 2 empire in around 2250, and managed to win them, and they became my vassals, but it's all meaningless because they can say no to whatever term I proposed. It feels like Paradox doesn't know what vassals are, and they made it to be some sort of "diplomatic". I thought it was cool to have vassals, and now I think destroy them all to get more territory is much easier

So glad that you added that beginning!

long live our great Hegemon, Tiberius Montuwu, long live the Montuwu dynasty!

Now all yor subsidies are belong to me

You used my comment from the last video for the intro of this one. I love it. :D

the relative power in a vassal negotiation can go to 500 but takes a huge difference I was able to turn a scholarium into a propectorium by having around 1500 fleet cap, diplomacy tradition, making them love me, and giving them pretty much everything in contract

To refuse a new contract, a vassal must spend 25 more influence than it cost you to propose it. Also, refusing the new terms doesn't reset the timer, meaning you can re-propose the same terms right after the proposal. What does this mean? Your vassals compliance doesn't matter as long as you have more influence than they do, since you can force through any changes you want to the vassal contract.

Personaly I wanted to do a "Unify the galaxy" run and get every empire to be a specialised subject, for prospectorium I HAD to use the "yesmen" command do do that, it was still fun though.

LMAO was not expecting that thumbnail image. Love it.

I guess the solution to the subsidy exploit is to just have it pull the effective production from all available job's whether you can fill them or not. As otherwise disabling buildings/ jobs is always going to be exploitable. I guess the other option is ai gets the -500 modifier added to subsidising the vassal same as the one they get when being tithed but that kinda breaks the system somewhat. Also would likely stop the overlord from from making prospectoriums due to the science subsidy along with bulwarks. There is a possibility that the -500 modifier on the resource tithes is only when players try to vassalise ai, similir to why players vassal lost dificulty bonuse's as players would get pretty insane amounts of resources from ai tithes with their massive production and stability bonuses.

had a start where I was pinned into a tiny cluster between two much larger empires. worked a treat to absorb one of them quite early. I was rather surprised they took the offer of miniscule resources for permitted integration. Sheer audacity paid off big. It's easier to get a loyal subject to agree to things like prospectorium than it is to get someone to take it as part of the initial offer. So, the way to go is to subjugate then specialize.

A few things to note: 1. You can easily get a Prospectorium if you vassalize them through war. They'll be weaker and have at leat a 750 malus to the negotiation. 2. A lot of the acceptance is being steered over the number of changes. If you change a lot of things in the contract, even to the benefit of the subject, they will dislike it. This means it is generally a good idea to repeatedly change the contract to get closer to what you finally want to get, including transforming them into a specalization like a prospectorium.

It is WAY too difficult, IMO unfairly so, to get a Prospectorium. Tbh my playstyle doesn't really need it as I have an economy-focused play, but I was just wanting to get the achievement done, and I just could NOT get any AI to agree to it, even vassals I made out of my own sectors just would NOT do it.

Bruh I love you content!!! might consider NAP next game :D

why do you actualy need to "negotiate" with your subjects? you own them. or it should give a wargoal to force them to accept

One way that I was able to get the vassal to agree to any of the terms I put out off the bat was when I would win terrirory through claims and war then turn the new frontier sector into a vassal. I could turn them into a Prospectorium and any others and they were happy to do it.

I got a prospectorium and scholarium fairly easily. I got them up to 100 loyalty and relationships as subjects, then moved them to the specialists without large tithes, then each negotiation I increased the contribution as much as I could. Tbf though with my prospectorium I only really wanted the base resources from them to feed my ring world and ecumenopolis.

I honestly love the DLC/update. I love when galactic politics is not based on hard power but instead based on soft power. I love being able to conquer the galaxy without just having to kill everything that moves.

I was able to get a Prospectorium in this way - set vassal in worst for him terms but with positive monthly loyality (no vassal wars, all overlord wars, no sensors, all holdings etc.), next when loyality reach 100 switch to Prospectorium with best terms for vassal (no holdings, all vassal wars, no overlord wars etc.). Next when loyality reach 100 again you can change terms for little better for you. Influence costly but it works.

I could be mistaken, but it looks like the best way to get a procpectorium is to start with a tributary instead of a vassal.

If I'm not mistaken, subjects abstaining from a vote the overlord supports actually seems to be a bug that happens when the overlord is the one who first proposed the law in the galactic community. In my experience, if you change your vote to abstaining or voting against it and then change it back, your subjects will all start following your vote no matter what it is.

A lot of this vassal contract system is actually in the base game/free patch, the DLC only adds a few addional options and more vassal types.

Is there a way to force an AI empire to became a prospectorium if the player empire conquers it through a subjugation war? Or better yet is there ANY WAY AT ALL to get a prospectorium? If not I just don’t get the point of adding this type of vassal into the game in the first place.

14:02 Montu hive mind

Montu, I really wish there were timestamps so that rewatching I can skip all the stuff I already know. Would you mind adding them if the video is still relevant?

I vassalized (with the restricted voting option) an empire that had defensive pacts with other empires. When I went on to vassalize those other empires (that had defensive pacts with the first empire I vassalized) it showed my vasal as being on their side as well as my own empire (as my vassal's overlord). When I clicked to start the war, nothing happened.

I've been trying to figure this out thanks for the video. Also is this footage from the stream the other day?

That research pay at the end! Wow, they are giving you subsidies out the wazoo!

Love your intros, very creative :) ... I had a bunch of border empires submit to me as vassals by their own request. Because I had been waring against them is there any value in keeping my spies there? Seems like its a no?

I was so excited for this DLC, I like to roleplay a pirate empire that take vassals by force with Feudal and Barbaric Despoiler and thought that this would add to the fun. But nowhere in the patch notes where I looked did they say that they made the subjugation casus belli impossible to get.

Stellaris is really growing nicely.

I did get a Prospectorium but I took several worlds from a hive mind and made a vassal of my on species

from my experience, the new overlord mechanic is not enjoyable. i'd much rather integrate them as soon as possible. you have to do so much negotiation to build just a few holdings and get some resources from them. i'd rather just integrate them, build and profit as much as I want. additionally cheesing your overlord for free resources should have some consequences. ultimately overlord has way to much of a focus on negotiations, with the vassal having way more bargaining power than they should have

in a recent playthrough i forcefully subjugated an empire that had a subsidary, they both had way weaker economy than me. after they surrendered, my income seriously increased from that subsidary, i was confused how an empire that supposedly weaker economy can give me 150 minerals and 100 energy credits so i came to this video and apparently the contribution tab is relative to how much YOU earn and not how much the subject earns if they give you subsides. no wonder they were disloyal they were selling their entire economy to me until i changed the terms

Lol i commented about this being possible on your Channel just yesterday

the overlord garrison building is so op for monthly loyalty imo

I actually had an ai ask to become a prospectorium under me out of the blue, man was on the other side of the galaxy.

Montu can u do in the future a Video about the Subterranean Origin?

Ah yes, Art of the Deal vol. 2. Finally.

Me with a bunch or Ring World cataclysm processing. Alloys for everyone!!!

Have you thought about doing an updated guide on planet management with this new dlc i have been having like 15 planets plus witch is too much to manage. I know there is a sector system but it doenst really explain intself well.

Did you know the ai has to spend the same influence to decline a change that it cost to propose it and if they dont have it they are forced to accept the change i was able to turn a normal vassal into a prospectorium with max changes in my favor by proposing a 700 influence change and the ai didnt have it so they were force to accept it theres even no cooldown on declines so you can just keep proposing the change and as long as you have more influence in the end itll go through

Do they even playtest before releasing updates, or just waiting for you and ASpec to do it for them!?

Nice introduction.

Damn, made me bite my finger when you said you couldn't get a prospectorium, meanwhile i get 2 by them offering to be my vassels. (as a prospectorium at that.)

I managed to get a prospectorium vassal with a fairly standard contract. The thing is they said they would refuse but I sent it anyway and they accepted, then I tried it on my over vassal and they refused?

I had this problem with my vassals where they had a defensive pact with another empire I wanted to vassalize next and I would be unable to declare war on them because of my other vassal. I don't think restricting their diplomacy would purge their diplomacy deals and I forgot to check if forcing them to join my aggressive wars would nullify their defensive pact and i had to release them and use the console to cancel their treaties and revassalize them to keep collecting more vassals. Super janky.

Omg downgrading my fleets as a scholarium with cost modifier and printing alloys

You want to do a video on the new stories? Cause the Dimensional Horror story just turned my homeworld into a black hole...

I've managed to do prospectorium by offering 45% of my science, 0 holdings and all the maxed "freedom" options.

Ma guy I am crisis 5 with 4.000k fleets it’s purging time 🤩

In my current game, I got 3 Prospectorium vassals, those empires that I had created not conquered! I noticed that AI wont pick a fight with my vassals if they are pissed with me, so I placed those vassals to block any hyperspace line that is going into my empire....yes they are my meat shield! Now I can attack other empires within the safety of my home.....Crisis is anther case xD

I have altered the deal, pray i don't alter it any further.

It is pretty ridiculous how hard it is to get a prospectorium or even a scholarium imo, I hope they adjust the numbers a bit so I can actually gain resources from some of my subjects.

Some one had a miss type in the code. It must have meant to have been 50..

I noticed that it's pretty much impossible to get a prospectorium as well, it's almost like they think they're the ones in power here

I totally have vassals giving me resources in three or more categories.

10/10 thumbnail.

17:29 we do need them to be happy after all but forgot to cut the 2nt take so it then is follow wwith we do want them to be happy after all

This is hilarious! xD

How do I crush the loyalty of a small empire already a subject of another overlord in order to steal it? That -750 makes it impossible to steal even if I am a lot stronger than her current overlord...

How do you land armies in other empires? It won't let me survey

Lol that vassal thing being better than being an overlord reminds me of how china is still saying it's a "Developing Country" despite being a global production powerhouse. Gonna have to try that out 😂

I found a very op trick, step one become mega Corp, step two, build merc enclave, step three fund the mercs till their fleet is hella big, step four rent the fleet, step 5 profit. So by step five you're fleet power will be so strong that the whole galaxy will ask for subjection as they will belive they aren't strong enough to survive on their own. How long will it take to do this? Idk I did it by accident. But I pretty much had subjugated the whole galaxy within a hundred years. Granted I did this on a tiny galaxy because I wanted a quick game.

Imagine telling someone last year that they would want to become a vassal in this game outside of the scion origin :/

nice use of the Jeff meme on the thumbnail, not sure why you gave him hair though.

Hey Montu, have you not done an Origin Tier List yet?

I actually had an AI empire ask me to become a prospectorium. the resource bonus is an unreal benefit

I have the. Overlord DLC but I don't see the other options for types of subjects

I’m guessing this would make megacorp very stronk

Ah, yes, the negotiator.

Hey montu, how do I salvage havin 16 planets with 20% habitability in 2260?

Why isn't there a way to set starting terms after taking them from a war?

Lol 20:50 pulling insurance scams on the overlord.

14:01 *performs exorcism*

I feel like they didn't actually test this at all... Not only does the AI reject almost any contract, its even worse if you're a megacorp because all of them have a -1000 penalty to become a subsidiary. Its absolutely ridiculous. I was excited for this patch imagining the possibilities, but there are no possibilities because they all reject everything. In addition to that stupidity, I decided to try releasing my own vassals as a megacorp and got fucked there too. Because your vassals are automatically subsidiaries, they added a new rule for trading that you CANT give them resources. I wanted to immediately pump resources into the subsidiary so it could start to build itself up, but I can't even give them resources because apparently the vassal contract makes it impossible to trade resources to them. Absolutely idiotic. And the influence costs to contracts is absurd. They can get so high they go above the 1000 cap without trying too hard. Its mind blowing that this can happen in the first place, because even putting up a starbase on the opposite side of the galaxy will still only cost the cap at most and not go above it. I made the horrendous mistake of playing void dweller megacorp, as that is my usual goto origin for them because of all the traders you can get, and the influence drain was insurmountable. And now factions in your empire don't even give additional influence anymore. And nevermind trying to open branch offices. That was already expensive as hell but doable, now its just not possible because everything you do costs mountains of influence... 150 per habitat, more than cap for vassal contract, hundreds all the way to cap for branch offices... Like holy shit. Who designed this? WHo thought this was a good idea? Any other resource you can accumulate more of by focusing on it. If you need more alloys, you can get them. If you need more food, you can get it. But influence? You're fucked. Even if you become the emperor of the damn universe, it will still take an obscenely long time to get anything done. So I said to myself, "Whelp, megacorps got fucked, maybe i'll try a normal empire." and boy did it get worse. I did fairly well initially, made a lot of vassals, got some decent contracts, but then, because of the profoundly stupid way vassals will flop to protectorates if you out-tech them too much, ALL of my vassals would devolve into protectorates, resetting all of the contract terms and forcing me to renegotiate them again for every single one of them. The only way to avoid this is to use a subject type that wont change like Tributary or Subsidiary. But OOPS, both have big -1000 "FUCK YOU" modifiers on them. This can't have been tested. This seems like something a bunch of people sat around thinking would be cool, but then never actually playing a single game with it to see how it shakes out. If these people are subjects, they shouldn't have a choice in what the terms are. If they don't like it, they can rebel. Otherwise they need to just deal with it. I'd be happy to crush a rebellion now and then rather than deal with wishy washy bullshit where they dont want to agree to anything and they cant be forced to BY ANY MEANS.

Lol, that last trick is basically being an investment bank. I know I've made trillions over the course of the past decade, but it's been a bad quarter and if I don't get massive government bailouts the world will explode.