[Slick]

Originally posted by raynfala:
Sorry if this is old news, but I hadn't realized this before, and I just had an epiphany Last night, and felt I needed to share (and and and and... )!

Let's say you've managed to max out the Applied Research tech. Now let's say you have just colonized a planet with, oh... let's say... 20 facility slots. Now let's say you want the planet to be dedicated to research, so you order up 20 Research III facilities (let's ignore Computer Complexes and such).

Guess what? Assuming that your planetary construction rate is 2000/2000/2000, you're missing out on 100,000 extra research points at a cost of only 15,000 extra minerals.

Why? Research III facilities cost 2500 minerals to build; you'll build one every other turn. In contrast, Research II facilities cost 2000 minerals; you'll build one each and every turn. By building a new research facility each turn instead of every other turn, you'll be accumulating more research points sooner. The extra 100 points of research generated by a level III facility (compared to a level II facility) does not justify the extra turn necessary to build the level III facility directly. You're better off building level II facilities more quickly, and then upgrading afterwards. This is where the extra 15,000kT of minerals come in: an extra 25,000kT to upgrade the 20 facilities (half of the level III facilities' cost), minus the 10,000kT saved by building cheaper facilities up front.

If your empire production can support the extra expenditure, you should go for it!!!

I just verified this on a spreadsheet this morning. Eeek, a spreadsheet!!! Does that mean I'm helping SEIV turn into MOO3?

--Raynfala

Yup. This applies to all "level II" facilities like Mineral Miners, Intelligence centers, etc.

The most efficient way to build them is level II's (until you can build level III's in 1 turn due to population and happiness bonuses), leaving 2 slots open on larger worlds. After you build your level II's, then look at the build times for the appropriate facility to multiply the planet's output, system output and to upgrade. Do them in order of cheapest first. For research, you would build the Central Computer Complex, then the System Computer complex, then upgrade to level III's in that order. Better yet, build the system computer on another planet in parallel.

Slick.

p.s. I had to do the spreadsheet thing myself a few months ago to prove it to myself as well.