Peoples, politics and laws
Worlds now hold groups with their own culture, faith and class. Interest groups push for laws, laws pass in stages, restless worlds can break away, and there are 185 decisions to take.
Your empire’s people used to be one mass. Now they’re groups that want different things.
Peoples
Every world with people holds groups, each with its own species, culture and faith. Cultures have customs and faiths have tenets, and both change the world they live on. A group’s Mood comes from how it’s treated, and a world’s Stability is the Mood of its groups. Other species arrive from neighbours and live alongside yours, with rights that depend on your laws. You can rename cultures and faiths.
Social classes
Each world has a Lower, Middle and Upper class, following the jobs it offers, and each class has its own Mood. The Lower class cares about shortages and work, the Middle about education and jobs, the Upper about the business climate. The Middle and Upper classes raise research and taxes, and a wide gap between rich and poor can boil over.
Interest groups and laws
Interest groups gather clout from the people who back them and push for the laws they want. Laws pass in stages, through votes, and who gets a say depends on your government. Movements can grow into civil war, and a world that stays unstable for years can break away and become a new empire.
Decisions
There are now 185 decisions you can take, some once and some for good, from settler incentives and resettlement orders to orders for a star system or a fleet. Each shows its price, its upkeep and a forecast of what it will do before you commit. The AI takes them too.
Leaders
Leaders have faces, traits and skill. Admirals lead your fleets, gain experience and grow, and envoys and spies serve in diplomacy.
Situations and crises
Situations now warn you before they start. As soon as one condition holds you see it brewing, along with its chance each month, what you can do to stop it, and every ending it can have.