quote:
Originally posted by Possum:
If nothing else, reduce your Tolerance to 91%, then use those points to boost Reproduction by 9%, and you will enjoy a net increase in population growth of 7%, ABSOLUTE.
There may be some limit, drawback, or hidden catch to this that I just haven't noted yet, but I'll leave that to you smart college boys to figure out 
I recall an observation from DRAKE about this:
"From previous testing I've done, Env. Resist. has only shown to have an effect on growth rate, independant of
anything else.
Every 5 points in it raises growth by 1%. I tested this for Unpleasant and up, so if someone wants to double
check this for worse conditions, be my guest.
Unfortunately, this appears to be a case where it'd make sense for it to affect how well your population handled
poor conditions, people assumed that's what it did, and the misinformation spread...
FYI, I basically had several growth tables laid out with the percentage increase charted for variations in
condition, Env. Resist. values, and reproduction values. In every case across the board, the 5% to 1% ratio held
true. The border is between 0/1 and 5/6, so you can reduce your starting % to 96% with no ill effect. I'd
suggest making it 81% and using the points in reproduction to compensate - it's cheaper until you hit the
breakpoint for repro.
"
http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/For...ML/001919.html
I always reduce environmental resistance to 81% and respectively increase pop. growth for every race (the AI also) due to this observation.