Creating a lasting and powerful space empire in Stellaris can be an exciting and thrilling prospect but with multiple choices, expansions, and updates introduced over the years, newcomers to the game can feel pretty overwhelmed and confused about how to start.
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Therefore selecting the right traits for a new race is paramount. Not only do they affect a player’s playstyle but can vary a player’s success down the road, especially when confronting new hostile factions, events, and end game crises. Thankfully several traits do stand out from others and can smoothen out the process as players stitch together their perfect interstellar empire.
6 Charismatic - Allows Players To Focus On What’s Important
Costing 2 points and having an increased 20% amenities from jobs, the charismatic trait belongs to the S tier and will allow players to maximize their resource output. The trait practically almost eliminates a biological race’s need for entertainer-type jobs, thus allowing the player to focus on more production. Hive mind races will require fewer drones as well, making things efficient all around.
Societies that lack this trait essentially end up using building slots to entertain their societies, which could have been used for other means of production. This trait is a lifesaver down the road as it only allows your species to profit.
5 Intelligence - A No Brainer
Also costing 2 points, intelligence speeds up all research by 10% across all 3 of the research branches. Technology and having access to better technology are essential to getting ahead in Stellaris.
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Another reason why this trait is among the best traits is that it allows players to have flexibility in their technological choices. Newcomers will be able to switch tech trees should they desire something else whilst in the late game, species that have the intelligence will vastly have more technologies under their belt. This trait also shines by synergizing with other positive traits as well, some of which will appear further down this list.
4 Natural Engineers - Grabbing The Best Tech Early On
This is an example of a trait that best stacks in conjunction with intelligence. The natural engineer trait just costs 1 point and increases engineering research by 15%. This area of research is arguably the most important as it covers everything from ship weaponry and armor, ship travel speed, the ability to mine more resources, etc. It covers everything that affects a player’s military ability and speed at which to acquire more resources.
Combined with the intelligence trait will allow players to increase their speed at researching this tech to a whopping 25%, which is incredible. A must-have for any player wanting to acquire tech faster using a biological race.
3 Rapid Breeders - Win With Numbers
This trait allows players to go full ‘Krogan’ at the game. Although the trait has been through several updates and isn’t as potent, the 10% population growth speed (and cost of 2) still makes a big difference especially when players begin growing their empires, due to the collective and compounded growth.
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Population is one of the most important resources in the game, so having multiple planets with growing populations will only help players regardless if their empire is already thriving or if it requires a kickstart.
2 Erudite - Intelligence 2.0
One of the more expensive traits in the game, the erudite trait doubles the amount of research speed that the intelligent trait provides (20%) whilst increasing the leader’s level cap by 1. Moreover, all leaders will have additional traits and bonuses.
This trait is rather excellent but comes with a heavy cost (4 points). However, the better research rates and bonuses to leaders do make up for it. Leaders in Stellaris give bonuses to the player as long as they are in power or are alive. They can increase empire unity, improve space fleet capabilities, and research or resource outputs depending on the specific traits they have or acquire. However, leaders can typically only live for an average of 80 years and will pass on and be replaced. Therefore, having erudite leaders can significantly improve a player’s empire by exhibiting better and more traits.
1 Adaptive - Easier Settling
This trait allows a particular species to increase habitability by 10%, allowing players to settle their race on more planets, especially ones that are hostile. This is critical for empires in the early game that need to colonize and take over planets for their strategic value and resources.
Further research, later on, can improve a species’ ability to settle and live on initially hostile planets. Players may want to do this as this trait synergizes well with the rapid breeders trait, allowing players to increase their population caps on various planets within their domain. This not only expands their empire’s borders in the easiest way possible but allows growth at a potentially unprecedented level.
Stellaris is available on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
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