You know, maybe 1.5X would be enough...

[Fyron]

Arkcon said:
Otherwise known as the 5thX - eXcel, as in spreadsheet. I dunno, but looking at all my planets in tabular form gives me some sort of rush. Sort of a powermad pleasure at all that info at my fingertips. Ignoring this is why n00bs end up bankrupt, once you've played the game enough so it's intuitive, maybe its not so important.

Interesting. I have never once calculated anything to such a degree. Never tabulated data in a spreadsheet, never calculated how many ships I could have available in 20 turns if I followed plan A as opposed to plan B, or anything else like that. I just build as much as I can each turn and try to stay as close to 0 in each resource without going under. At least in the earlier stages of the game where sudden "world wars" are not very likely to occur, so trade income is fairly stable. Later on a bit of a buffer is handy, though I am usually the one starting the wars, or at least I have a good idea of when it is going to start... . Of course, I prefer to reduce political savvy and place the points in resource aptitudes, so these losses from trade are less than they would be otherwise... Always worked out well for me.