With respect to the 1.5 patch, Martin Alward said:
“It’s a while away, that’s all I can say right now.”
What exactly does that mean? Who knows? But I think we can certainly assume it won’t be this month and likely not February either.
That’s a bummer 
but I’d rather they take their time and make it a really amazing one.
Any word on whether it’s coming with new DLC?
Ooooh, liking those end game perks. Become the Borg.
I agree. Patch 1.5, with the DLC, looks like it will be the breakout point for Stellaris, which in my view has been a lot of fun so far. I’m sitting at about 300 hours played so I’ve gotten value for my dollars. I will get the DLC with near certainty.
I promised I would update this thread when the 1.5 patch and DLC release date was announced. Well, I may be designing killer robots to end human civilization but I keep my promises.
April 6th 2017.
I am really looking forward to this Utopia expansion. Population management will be easier (finer controls) and more challenging (harder to find the optimum). I like the Victoria II vibe.
No changes to the irritating war system? Guess I’ll wait for 1.6. 
I’ve just discovered the Star Trek: New Horizons mod. Kinda cool! They replaced some of the ship model/sprites, and the UI audio cues with the LCARS audio cues.
The official 1.5 patch notes have been posted!
Some nice UI and QoL improvements on top of all the other banks/expansion goodness. After the meh-ness of Mass Effect: Andromeda, I’m really looking for my sci-fi itch to be scratched with the Expansion and update.
Just one more week!!!
Lots of nice stuff coming with that patch. Maybe it’s odd, but one point I’m most excited about is:
In other words, your built-up core worlds should be able to contribute to the growth of your frontier colonies without any micromanaging.
And some new strategic considerations to make as well. Do you store the food in case war messes up your production, or let it flow and get that growth bonus?
Youtubers got their ditty mitts on the update and Expansion Eary!
Going to check out Marzobazir and hopefully Quill, if he puts up anything tonight.
The new Mechanist perk - which lets you start with the ability to create robot pops, has me hunkering for a Quarian (from Mass Effect) playthrough! I’ll see if I can make history repeat itself.
I’m intrigued by the new diplomacy options. You can actually set your race to be “fanatical purifiers” like how some npc races already are. It makes you unable to conduct (meaningful) diplomacy, but gives you a combat bonus. Might be handy if you were going to play a xenocidial race anyway. There’s also an option to be a hive mind race, which should have some interesting options.
I am very excited for the expansion pack. I’m trying to clear up everything I need to do so I can play on Thursday (and maybe Friday).
The only thing I worry about is that Paradox DLC and patches tend to be buggy. They really need to get a tighter grip on their QA. But crossing my fingers that it will be rock solid right out of the gate.
This should be a great update to the game. I’ve been holding off playing for a month or two, so I’m eager to get back into it again.
I usually wait until the first patch to play a “real” campaign. I just fiddle around with the new mechanics and tweak my mods until then.
I’m amused at how we’ll be able to process xenos for food. Maybe my people don’t recognize xenos as sentient. Maybe they do, but eat the meat of sentients as a status symbol. Some of the very wealthy eat only the meat of sentient xenos who were fed only other sentient xenos.
You can be a real son of a bitch in this game