8/1/2016 Topic: Couple of Questions about shipping and production Vulpex	Heyo first off thanks for the great project - it looks fantastic. So been here barely a day but already planning ahead and it is obvious that at some point I will need to be shipping in materials from other planets (poor Uranus is a bit limited in resources). However looking through the tutorial and all of the help files I am still not sure exactly how one goes about shipping stuff between planets. I am assuming it needs a spaceport, if not a shipyard, but it might need other stuff... and are spaceports or shipyards needed at both locations? Also - I guess I need a shuttle or something to physically move the goods around? If I missed it in the help files I apologize but I read through a couple of times and really could not find this. Also another question about upgrading the HQ, I still need to save up for this but - When I upgrade the HQ I have an option to select a product to specialize in but it is not clear to me if that is a product that my HQ (and only my HQ) will be specialized in or if it is something that all of my (mighty!) industrial complex will benefit from. Is there a point to stacking the specialty? (i.e. I specialized in industrial chemicals when I created the account, is there a point in selecting that again, or does it have no effects, or diminishing returns, or ... er... what exactly?) Thanks in advance !
8/1/2016 Topic: Couple of Questions about shipping and production Vulpex	Thanks to the both of you - very clear now on to planning how to make it all happen!
8/3/2016 Topic: Couple of Questions about shipping and production Vulpex	Ok so now all of that is clear... I have more questions (hurray!) Firstly - how do I calculate how long a ship will take to get somewhere? I assume that going to a nearby moon is faster than going to another planet in system which is probably faster than going to a different system - but does anyone have any idea how long such things will take? Just thinking about where best to expand right now. Secondly - One thing I don't understand about the economy. Why not simply buy the materials needed to build e.g. laser and just sell stacks of lasers? It takes 10 materials to build a laser which I buy at double price so the cost is 20 materials... but then I make 50 lasers so my ROI is 30 units per turn which is far far better than actually extracting ANY of the resources I can see. So... why doesn't everyone just do this? Seems a bit skewed from the economic perspective. Thanks! Finally does anyone have an updated version of this chart - I took it from the guide but clearly the costs do not correspond to the costs in game, would also be great to see what the time for upgrading is. Level 1 - Output: 1x - Upgrade Cost: 100,000 Level 2 - Output: 2x - Upgrade Cost: 200,000 Level 3 - Output: 5x - Upgrade Cost: 300,000 Level 4 - Output: 11x - Upgrade Cost: 500,000 Level 5 - Output: 22x - Upgrade Cost: 550,000 Level 6 - Output: 33x - Upgrade Cost: 600,000 Level 7 - Output: 46x - Upgrade Cost: 650,000 Level 8 - Output: 58x - Upgrade Cost: 750,000 Level 9 - Output: 87x - Upgrade Cost: 1mil Level 10 - Output: 120x - Upgrade Cost: n/a edited by Vulpex on 8/3/2016
8/3/2016 Topic: Couple of Questions about shipping and production Vulpex	No need to apologize it's a great answer I might try the buy comps and produce end products idea - haven't implemented that it just looked so good it almost felt it couldn't be true When it comes to movement though - based on what you say when I am viewing the map at the sector level that means each square is actually 25*25 -- 625 units of distance so that travelling from Sol to Gulyaev (3 squares on the vertical axis, 5 squares on the horizontal) would take for a basic ship moving 10 per turn... about 500 turns? (8*625 = 5000) correct? Seems quite the distance
8/6/2016 Topic: No wood Vulpex	Depending on the volumes you are talking about - you might want to use the contract system. It works for me, just make sure you pay above market price for the hassle of having stuffed shipped in from another planet.
8/6/2016 Topic: About Forts... Vulpex	Hmm... having built one and seen it in action against a couple of raids, I'm starting to wonder exactly how forts work. Their description states: Basic ground defenses designed to draw fire and protect other units. Ok that's what I would expect from a fort... but how does it work? Do ground units in the same location as the fort get any kind of defensive bonuses? Are forts targetted before other units/structures? Is it better to have one high level fort or two mid level ones? See my angst? Trying to design some kind of effective defense against raiders and ah, the various problems of life as a baron...
8/7/2016 Topic: No wood Vulpex	The contracts are working as far as I can see - I have used both public and private contracts, they have been accepted, and on top of it I have received the goods as expected (I have so far only used buy contracts). There are a couple of thoughts on contracts: When setting up a private contract it is not very obvious whether or not the right corporation has been selected - this is less of an issue with a smaller player base but I suspect it is going to be more complex in the future (I can take some screenshots for my next contract if you want to see what I mean.) The other issue has to do with accounting, I assume that when I create the contract it is tallied as "buys" but it is not clear whether it is tallied when the contract is created or when the contract is accepted. But at this stage - yes they work, very well. (One last thing I don't understand is the good/bad deliveries mechanic - is this in case the transport making the delivery is intercepted and destroyed or is it something else?)
8/7/2016 Topic: About Forts... Vulpex	AHA! I think I understand now - the bigger the size of a unit the more likely it is going to be hit thus with a fort it will absorb some of the hits that I would normally be expecting otherwise. Ok now to build up some mechanized and armoured units to take out these pesky raiders once and for all.
8/7/2016 Topic: No wood Vulpex	Ah ok now I understand the failed deliveries is based on periodic delivery contracts - understood. You do realise that this is something that can be gloriously abused right? Setup a juicy contract at high price low volume (say buy 10 basic chemicals per 10 turns @ 500 each) but with a very high penalty clause (say 10 million). The abuse? The person who sets up the contract also sets up an ambush - destroys the vessel carrying the goods and then claims the cash from the penalty clause. This universe looks like it can be a harsh harsh place...
8/7/2016 Topic: No wood Vulpex	Hehe... you wouldn't accept such a contract, doesn't mean a new player who doesn't yet have a good grasp of game mechanics would not. Especially if there is a very juicy price to the basic products. Once that scout who is in charge of making the deliveries is destroyed, it won't take long for 20% of the deliveries to fail. I'm not making this up btw - I've seen it happen in other games - and yes, people fall for it.
8/8/2016 Topic: Creation of new cities Vulpex	Ok so I understand that if enough industrial activity happens at a given spot a new city will spawn there so far so good. I even recall reading somewhere that a minimum of 500 points of industrial activity are needed to make this happen. A few questions though: Does the output of the HQ count toward this total? (If the HQ is moved to that location) Do the industrial plants have to be actually in production? When moving to a new planet where there are no cities it might be a viable option to simply build up the industrial infrastructure and then start production once you have someone to sell to. Finally - how is the industrial production tallied? I know what my current industrial strength is (because I see it when I vote) but it seems a bit obscure to me at this time, any helpful insights would be most welcome. Thanks in advance!
8/9/2016 Topic: Loading units into a transport... Vulpex	Ok so I am continuing with my goals of universal domination. (Shhh.... don't tell anyone). And I have run into my latest er... hiccup. So having settled a far off system I'm trying to get some combat units out there to deal with pesky raiders and oh you know provide some kind of defence. However, when I ask my shiny new freighter (with extra powerful headlights - for that glowing like a star entrance to your favorite starsystem!) to try to load the units into it's cargo... well it just... doesn't. No fail or error message, I just give an order wait for the order to be executed and pffft.... nothing happens. A few things which might be an issue - the units I am trying to load are currently upgrading (because we need the POWER!) might that be a problem? Also - I have no idea exactly how much space these units take up in the cargo hold of my freighter (5000 available space) I figure that should be enough to load some of my mechanized infantry or even an armoured unit in there... but nope, no effect. Any insights oh great Barons of the Galaxy?
8/10/2016 Topic: Game was stuck on turn 1604 Vulpex	oopsie... sorry.
8/12/2016 Topic: Research - "Entire Category" Vulpex	I'm not sure if this is known or not but when I set research to "entire category" (e.g. Metals "entire category") - it fails to take into account the effect of that research on production. (NB - I did wait for the turn to change) Either that or I'm doing something really wrong.
8/16/2016 Topic: About the Ocrowd Vulpex	Some thoughts on Ocrowd - as it seems at this stage in the game things have turned into "manage the Ocrowd and hope it doesn't kill your profitability" First off - A HUGE thanks for the ability to see the Ocrowd effect directly in the assets list. This is beyond fantastic. With that in mind a few things I've noticed: 1) Ocrowd can kick in as early as a single lvl 7 extraction facility - (yeah oops) 2) I'm a bit concerned about the effect Ocrowd will have on newer players - with even just a few hundred active players on Sol it is likely that a new player will get hit by Ocrowd immediately on his first production - this is particularly true as the selection of starting locations pushes you to those where there is a high concentration of your chosen research value. Worse - the tutorial will push you to open up a facility in the location on your planet which has the highest concentration of the materials you want to extract. Ocrowd galore. I have some ideas about how to manage this but actually before I get too excited I'd be interested in better understanding how Ocrowd is expected to work. Anyone else having fun with Ocrowd at this point?
8/20/2016 Topic: About those dangerous fads... Vulpex	I'm looking at the way the dangerous fads etc affects the cities and it is something that I have to wonder about - especially the way it hits small cities which are trying to grow. Here is my experience: Location: Western, Gulyaev V Event ID - 1392 Event ends - Turn 1965 Stage: 2 - Voters have elected to BAN this dangerous fad - Ends: 1965 As a result of this outcome every product in the Gadgets category will fall by 100 and the population of planet Gulyaev V will increase 1% over the next 100 turns. Ok so far so good. But here is the problem. We are in turn 3074 (over 1000 turns since the fad ended) demand for gadgets which have never been sold in Gulyaev (e.g. cellphones) is now at 12.8 % - I also checked after 500 turns, demand at that point was at 7.8 %. At this rate I expect it will take something between 3000-5000 turns for a new city to recover from one of these fads. If this is working as intended - fine, but it does seem a bit harsh when trying to setup an economy in new systems. edited by Vulpex on 8/20/2016
8/20/2016 Topic: Naming assets bug Vulpex	It seems that the rules when naming an asset at creation are different from the rules when re-naming the same asset at some point after creation. I have been using a convention when naming my freighters where I include a hyphen in the name so that it looks something like this: K-19 Red But If I try to rename any asset to something equivalent (with a hyphen) I get the you need at least three letters error message. So just saying - naming rules ought to be consistent. Not a huge issue as it doesn't really impact playability but I thought you should know. edited by Vulpex on 8/20/2016
8/20/2016 Topic: About those dangerous fads... Vulpex	ok good to know :p was trying to supply high end stuff to stimulate growth, guess I was doing it wrong!
8/22/2016 Topic: About those dangerous fads... Vulpex	It can help the city I see that but it completely trashes predicted sales value if not accounted for - it will be great to have that info in the guide thanks!
8/22/2016 Topic: Problem with trading Vulpex	Actually the mines do state how much they sell. If you look at any mine and go to the buy/sell screen the very first set of information which you get in the tab is the B/S power, expressed in units. That's how much per turn a facility can sell. You also have to take into account how much a given location can buy of a product (its demand/turn) And finally you can check exactly how much stuff you are selling per turn by going to the corporate tab -> accounting and there select detail type buy/sell you will get a detailed view of your latest transactions. Hope that all can help you trade better.

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