Well the devs did say they would focus on 4x elements and making them better. So I thought that was what was happening. As above I do not mean as detailed as stellaris. But I do mean much more than we had in sins2.

Exactly. Why buy sins2 if it is literally a carbon copy of sins1 Rebellion? The answer is Sins2 better be a tonne better than the original and without new content, features and mechanics a lot of us are just going to shrug our shoulders and move on to something that does advance the genre. A lot of stuff in Stellaris could be handed over to the computer to manage, so it's not like older players who dislike the extra depth would be forced to use it.

But yeah the basic premise of the features in stellaris like you said, exploration, research, storyline among other things as well as having even richer tactical combat systems.... now that would attract an absolute motza of new sins2 players. 

To be really honest I can only stand playing sins1 rebellion through with friends every now and then and not all the time because it simple gets stale and repetitive mid game. The end game is kinda meh, thanks for coming, you just did the same thing for 5hrs straight. A final negotiation or some sort of decision or end story line would be cool. 

In short, the only think sins1 or 2 does better than stellaris is combat (including being able to attack trade ships, incidentally why are the sins2 trade ships models so bland looking compared to sins1, saving on polygons maybe?) and game length being shorter. That's pretty much it. The other 90% of sins gameplay features are woefully underdone and simple (read boring now 90% of this market people are used to stellaris) compared to stellaris. Sins does not need to come right up to stellaris levels, but should come a lot of the way towards that to make it playable for stellaris folks... 

I think the core gameplay with its current changes is good. It is still good old Sins, first and foremost RTS game. I definitely would not want it to go the way of Stellaris in that regard that it would feel like the game plays itself. I would not want a crapton of various abstract resources and traits that just add some multiplier here and there, but little to no visual representation on screen. I dont like that Fleet Manager spreadsheet mechanic from 4X games. Nor do i like the need to slow down/increase the time speed. Keep all of that out of my Sins.

What it needs to richer and more nuanced content. Most importantly deeper faction diversity - both of in form of additional tech to be researched and unique gameplay styles, and visual differences. I would love to have different capships between loyalists and rebels, just like with Titans. At least some of them and at worst, at least visually different. Additionally, the game could use alien races or whatever as minor factions (simply using visually different starships compared to playable races) and as alluded in my previous post, more random event stuff - along the way of Mad Titan, but way, way more of this, again with its own unique art. This is where Stellaris is a good source of inspiration.

Honestly I used to play mods but do not anymore. Especially with new games that get dlc and patches it’s just no fun getting half way through a game and having your save game not work because the mod breaks after a patch.

Add to that that the community can make a sins1 mod.

add to this that if people buy the game on epic mods will be a real pain for them. Even potential security risks.

ad to this that sins1 looks and plays fine right now, it may get a little slow late game on bigger maps, but other than that iits great. So it does not need a verbatim remake .

I have seen the just ipgrade the engine argument for a lot of games lstely. Dawn of War 1 is a game i’d like that done to. But ultimately without something new to play with, all but the hard core remnants of the sins1 players will stay away. The rest of the sins1 owners will think it’s just a rip off paying for a simple engine upgrade in a new game price.

Besides ironclad promised to make sins2 more 4x among other things. I want a more complex sins1 with more character, more to do and better more detailed tactical fights that are as far from stellaris "stack of doom" style play as possible. But I did like the stellaris upgrade your ships to carry the correct counter to your enemies weapons gameplay.
That means larger gravity wells with better battle mechanics and mote complicated and thus satisfying diplomacy while having a research tree that makes every game different. I already love the orbiting planets. 

However as it stands at the moment after initial expansion I feel like there is nothing interesting to do or learn. The game plays itself. Put it on 10x speed and just jump your fleet from planet to planet. It’s very formulaic and there is only really one formula.

p.s. I hate titans because they make the game even more formulaic once they level up. But I guess that really should be the end game. One thing I was not as much a fan of in stellaris was the planet killer weapons and ships and the end game events. Another problem with stellaris was that the events although random were always the same and not very dynamic. But the game is flleshed out enough with dlc for that not to be sooo repetitive anymore.

I was certainly not one of those that asked for the same game and did start with sins by getting a boxed set with special edition posters etc way back in the day. I think even back in the day my friends and I only played sins "every now and then" because it took so long and did become a slog at the end. After you finish a game you just don't think you can do it again for a while because of the repetition that happens especially at the end. So I am not one of those guys that plays the game exclusively or religiously, but have gone back to sins now and again with friends ever since I got it and did run some total overhaul mods occasionally. But I would like to be one of those guys that has it on constant rotation. However it has to be worth the slog and if it is not going to get much deeper then the discovery and adapting (playing the game other than just working the game) are just going to taper off mid game to nothing. I'd like to manage my fleets with some more mechanics so that giant deathball fleets were a little harder to keep together for long periods of time for instance.

Total War tried to manage this by basically rigging the game so that the harder you tried the more buffs the AI got. That system is just frustrating for the player. So please devs don't go that way. Just give us something more than jumping to a system and deathballing everything (which sins2 made easier with smaller graivty wells and larger orbital facility models) as well as intersting diplomacy and research. 

More than something that will be the same every single game for most people.

I'd play stellaris if it had sins combat but better. But even stellaris probably went too deep and became a simple planet management game.

P.S. Even back then patches ruined mods and mods were rarely finished and sometimes abandoned. No. I will stick to the core game these days and hope for DLC factions and mechanics.