Yes, although colonies take a long time (and much resource investment) to build, and are of course quite weak compared to standard SE4 (while the homeworld is much stronger), they are still an effective way to
eventually build up an advantage over other empires in resources, research, and intelligence.
Colonies' resupply, shipyard, and resource storage abilities can also be very useful. ZeroAdunn experienced how resource storage can be very important, and can Last a long time in Proportions if you let it build up. A storage facility can store 10 to 20
years of production from a facility (or one to two years' net mineral output of a cultural center), so it may be worthwhile to build up some stockpiling capacity and fill it with surplus during times of peace, so as to be able to sustain a larger fleet during times of war. Holding a large part of the fleet in mothball reserve during peacetime may be worthwhile, as well.
PvK
quote:
Originally posted by ZeroAdunn:
Everyone says the colonies aren't important in proportions. I don't think this is true. In my most recent game I turned mega evil, and thus lost all of my treaties. When this happened I realised that I had a national defecit of 94,000 (with a storage of about 1,600,000) minerals. It was then that I realised that my colonies were painfully neglected. After pouring all of my research into mining and mothbolling nearly all of my ships in the mean time (I had a fleet of 40 high tech transports cruising the universe at the time) And just barely got my budget down to where I was only losing 5,000 minerals. Eventually Igot my facilities upgraded and managed to rebuild my funds, took both full upgrades till I finally was able to unmothball my fleet.
I had 13 battlestations at the time which I never mothballed and were the only thing keeping my enemies at bay.
[ 28 April 2002: Message edited by: ZeroAdunn ]