Chemical Bliss in Stellaris

What is chemical bliss?

Chemical bliss is a living standard in which entertainment media is created as/turned into a drug regimen….

This means that happiness is created and widespread among this species as they are using recreational drugs to pass the time instead of working.

But why is this a good thing…?

Surely you want all of your pops to be working tirelessly to fuel your ever-expanding empire, right? Not getting high and ignoring their work? Well, it is helpful in many situations. I find that chemical bliss is helpful when I have just annexed some species of an enemy empire or invaded a native world.

Chemical bliss is helpful in this scenario as it makes all of your newly conquered pops happy at the cost of reducing their workload and increasing consumer goods consumption.

This is a negligible effect, though, as you do not need to make the living standard permanent; you can just use it until the pops have settled into their new homes and are happier with their new overlords.

Tips & Tricks

Another way that I use it is to increase migration to my empire. This works because migrating species are designed to travel to the empire where they will be the happiest, so if you have one of a particular species on chemical bliss, you are much more likely to get more migrants of that species as they have seen how well you are treating their comrades.

If you use this strategy smartly, you can get a lot of one specific species through this tool, then change the living standard to livestock to increase food production at the cost of the species, making it a great way to expand your food production quickly.

What are the positives and negatives?

Pros

Every class of citizen (Ruler, Specialist, Worker, and Slave) gain 40% happiness and +0.5 trade value per pop (with the exception of slaves). This means that while you may suffer a slight drop in overall production, you can gain some of this lost potential back in trade value.

Cons

As with the positives, every class of citizen gets the same penalties, a -60% to job production and +1 consumer good upkeep (0.1 for slaves). This means they will produce less and cost more to maintain.

When used correctly in the right situation, chemical bliss can be a fantastic boost to your empire, while when used at a poor time can cripple your empire. Typically I don’t use this living standard for more than 20 years at a time, as by that point, any newly annexed pops will be content with my rule, and I don’t have to worry about uprisings, etc.