Strategy Articles!

[Ruatha]

Ok, I was quite certain but I'll await confirmation.. I have been wrong several times in the past

[Slick]

Originally posted by Stone Mill:
Ruatha, good catches, my friend. Edited, save for:

quote:

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If you have a surplus in your resource income/expense, the total cost of the retrofits must be compared to the storage AND predicted income the next turn.
You can retrofit with a storage of 0 if you have a turn result of enough positive resources next turn.

I don't believe this is true. In my experience, it does not matter how big your income is, retrofits do come from only stored resources.

Am I incorrect? Can anyone assist to verify this?

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Stone Mill: You are correct (sorry, Ruatha ). You need resources for retrofits in the bank and can't rely on income because the cost of retrofits comes out of your storage before income goes in. If there is not enough in storage, the retrofit fails.

Also, I agree with you 100% on the monolith issue. Anyone who has run the numbers can see that monoliths pay back waaaay too far in the future in most cases. I also do use monoliths when it is a good idea, especially when you have a planet with high resources in all 3 areas it does make sense - if this planet is large or huge, it may not be.

If anyone wants to prove it to themselves, just do a few case studies and add up the net resources over time:

- make sure you subtract the resources you spend on the facilities you build and add in the resources the facility makes on the turn after it is built. Do this for every turn and you will find that building monoliths will create a large resource deficit for many turns - is your other income able to absorb this and still be competetive?,
- make sure you account for the time it takes to build the facilities,
- you can include a resource converter in the end if you wish, but this really benefits both sides of the argument,
- if you build a spaceyard before building facilities to speed up build time, include the resources and time to build it as well as the increased facility construction rate,
- if you build value improvement plants, include the resources and time to build and the time to increase resource percentages,
- use real game probabilities for planet rescource percentages. It is much easier to find a planet which is > 100% in one resource than to find one that is > 100% in all 3 resources.
- consider planet size. no matter what your build rate, it takes far longer to fill a large or huge planet with monoliths than individual resource facilities.
- since monoliths I, II, III all cost the same, they all take the same time to build, but the lower level ones produce less. on a standard planet with standard construction rate (2000, 2000, 2000) a single resource facility level II can be built in 1 turn with no spaceyard. When the Last one is built, they all can be upgraded to level III's. This method will fill a planet the quickest and the extra cost for upgrading is made up by having the level II facilites built in 1 turn instead of 2 turns for a level III so you have the income sooner.
- finally compare both schemes and see how low your rescource deficits get while building (this will surprise the monolith builders) and how many turns out it takes before a monolith planet exceeds a single resource planet. There is no doubt that a monolith system will eventually outproduce single resource facilities. The real question is at what point and what happens in the meantime? You will find that this time is very long (too many variables to put a discrete number here), but try some case studies yourself and you can see that it will be many many turns. And in the meantime, your enemies are coming...

[edit: p.s. let me know when you are done tweaking 17.3 for incorporation into the FAQ.]

Slick.

[ June 14, 2003, 19:02: Message edited by: Slick ]

[Ruatha]

Live and learn!

Slick, I guess you'll be hearing from Fyron about this
The monolith economy is very close to his heart I belive!

I just like to see those shiny high tech facilities, not spewing enviromental waste as those mineral mines are doing!

[cybersol]

It might be obvious, but no one has explicity mentioned it. If you really wanted to build the monolith economy, but still gain maximum resources as soon as possible. Would you not build the normal economy first, say resource II's. But for the final two facility slots build a space yard for improved build and start the first monolith. As each monolith completes, scrap a normal facility and build another monolith. It is a lot a micromanagement, but it will get you the most resources along the way.

[Slick]

Originally posted by cybersol:
It might be obvious, but no one has explicity mentioned it. If you really wanted to build the monolith economy, but still gain maximum resources as soon as possible. Would you not build the normal economy first, say resource II's. But for the final two facility slots build a space yard for improved build and start the first monolith. As each monolith completes, scrap a normal facility and build another monolith. It is a lot a micromanagement, but it will get you the most resources along the way.

Yes, I didn't mention this but it does work. Once again, do a few case studies because for every system there are disadvantages.

Ruatha, of course, I expect it; I am not the kind of person who needs to have the Last word on everything. I am not trying to convince anyone of anything; I am trying to show people how to come up with the answers that are right for themselves and their play style. The people here are smart enough to make up their own minds. If anyone has a play style they like or prefer, then that is the one that is right for them - the game mechanics will always be the same but different play styles can certainly be used effectively.

Slick.

[ June 14, 2003, 19:59: Message edited by: Slick ]

[cybersol]

Originally posted by Slick:

quote:

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Originally posted by cybersol:
It might be obvious, but no one has explicity mentioned it. If you really wanted to build the monolith economy, but still gain maximum resources as soon as possible. Would you not build the normal economy first, say resource II's. But for the final two facility slots build a space yard for improved build and start the first monolith. As each monolith completes, scrap a normal facility and build another monolith. It is a lot a micromanagement, but it will get you the most resources along the way.

Yes, I didn't mention this but it does work. Once again, do a few case studies because for every system there are disadvantages.

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Well, early on it has all the advantages of the normal economy system expect the one facility per planet you have to leave empty to build the monolith. And later, only 30 turns later on a huge AST world, you start to gain the advantages of the monolith economy. Except for the hassle of micromanagement I would say that is the way to go in the long run. At steady state, you sacrifice 1k of production for 3-5 turns to get 2.7k of production. Thus each monolith III becomes net positive (even with just converter I) 4-6 turns after it is completed.

[Slick]

Originally posted by cybersol:

quote:

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Originally posted by Slick:

quote:

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Originally posted by cybersol:
It might be obvious, but no one has explicity mentioned it. If you really wanted to build the monolith economy, but still gain maximum resources as soon as possible. Would you not build the normal economy first, say resource II's. But for the final two facility slots build a space yard for improved build and start the first monolith. As each monolith completes, scrap a normal facility and build another monolith. It is a lot a micromanagement, but it will get you the most resources along the way.

Yes, I didn't mention this but it does work. Once again, do a few case studies because for every system there are disadvantages.

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Well, early on it has all the advantages of the normal economy system expect the one facility per planet you have to leave empty to build the monolith. And later, only 30 turns later on a huge AST world, you start to gain the advantages of the monolith economy. Except for the hassle of micromanagement I would say that is the way to go in the long run. At steady state, you sacrifice 1k of production for 3-5 turns to get 2.7k of production. Thus each monolith III becomes net positive (even with just converter I) 4-6 turns after it is completed.

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Agreed in principle that it is better than the either/or approach. However don't forget the cost of the Monolith: 10,000 Min; 5000 Org; 5000 Rad. In those 4-6 turns that the previous one starts to turn a small profit, you have started constructing the next monolith which puts your economy as a whole for that planet back into a deficit situation again.

Again, I recommend laying out turn by turn a few cases. In each case consider resources spent, made and the time it takes till the next facility is built. Most of the time in this game (as in real life), income now is much more valuable than income later even if it is more because you can put it to work now instead of later.

Remember, your enemies might not be courteous enough to wait until you have a huge planet filled with monoliths established long enough to be superior over single facilities before they attack.

Slick.

[ June 14, 2003, 20:49: Message edited by: Slick ]