Supply ...Can`t Get There from Here

[Cheeze]

That can't be right. I'd like to see your game, because you should be able to keep MANY more ships than that. I would think you are missing something, and it seems most likely you have forgotten to build space ports in all your systems.

[dogscoff]

I`ve come back to the Game recently, and when I got it on first release, I really don`t remember this huge maintance cost issue for Ships. Was this introduced in a recent Patch ?

Maintenance/ component costs weren't changed significantly in any of the later patches, as far as I can remember. Of course if you're now running a modded game - or if you used to use modded files- that could explain the differences between what you see now and what you remember from your earlier experiences of the game.

If you're not using mods and never have, then modding the game might be the answer you are looking for. Simply tweak (copies of) your data files to increase the output of resource production facilities and the capacity of the storage facilities. That will allow you (and your enemies ) to support larger fleets.

EDIT: Cheeze's spaceport suggestion is a good one as well. DO you see little red barrel icons on all your extra-system colonies?

[Alneyan]

Another possibility to explain your economic shortages: have you lowered your resource gathering characteristics and/or your maintenance aptitude? Doing so would cripple your economy, especially in the case of maintenance, since lowering maintenance will kill your economy very quickly.

Along the same lines, what is the current happiness levels of your worlds? Happiness is paramount to determining resource income, and so the number of ships you can safely supporter. Or have you taken something besides "peaceful" as an happiness type?

Besides such odd Empire setups, I see no other reason why your economy would be in such a poor state, if you have expanded well and developped your colonies.

[Krsqk]

Black Cat said:
Seems a very modest force to me, given my production, and at that time I was at +1100 Minerals and +1200 radioactive production.

The spaceport seems like the probable culprit to me, given this quote. A 30-ship fleet shouldn't bring surpluses down to ~1k levels for a 30-system empire. In fact, very little should bring it down to ~1k. What's not clear is why they would start disappearing after that. Maybe the numbers above were actually the amounts left in storage, not the leftovers from each turn. That could explain why a single turn would be enough to start scrapping.

[Captain Kwok]

Are you saying that each of these 5 battleships, 2 battleships, and 2 minelayers had a quantum resonator? If so, each of those ships would have had at least 15K each in minerals maintainence - and could explain a sudden 120k deficit if they all were built around the same time.