Housing technique questions

Discussion on how to play against other humans.
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Lavarn
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Housing technique questions

Postby Lavarn » Sun Mar 26, 2006 4:20 pm

Hi, I'm new here. I used to play moo2 a lot a few years ago and just started playing again recently. I'm a decent player but I rarely play against humans and I'm sure I would get slaughtered online. I was pleased to find Cybersaber's strategy guide and this forum where people really seem to know what they are talking about (unlike 99% of the strategy guides out there).

Anyway, most of my experience is with playing a production/expansion race with unification. My favorite used to be unification, aquatic, subterranean, large hw, rich hw (with the standard minuses - repulsive, ground combat, and ship defense). Basically a mass population race. However, I have to agree that the two production races Cybersaber mentions in his guide (unitol and uniaqua with +2 prod instead of subterranean) are probably better on the whole.

I understand one of the main things that makes these production races so good is the 1 pop housing technique. I'm familiar with it but one of my biggest weaknesses (I think) is only using it to fill up the population of one star system and never transferring colonists between systems (because of the turn delay). I was wondering if there are some general guidelines for when it is worth it to sacrifice being able to use a colonist for a few turns in order to move them to a more desired system. Has something already been posted on this?

I have many more questions but this is the biggest one on my mind right now :D

Thanks in advance.

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Gusset
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Re: Housing technique questions

Postby Gusset » Sun Mar 26, 2006 7:18 pm

I was wondering if there are some general guidelines for when it is worth it to sacrifice being able to use a colonist for a few turns in order to move them to a more desired system.
I don't know that I personally have a guideline for that. If it's a 2-3 turn xfer, I think nothing of it.

If it's a 4-5 turn, or even longer, trip, then I start thinking about it. When that is the case, I typically look at it from the standpoint of the destination system. If the system needs it badly enough, then I don't hesitate. For example, it might be a system that I've just colonized. By itself, that single colonist won't be able to get factories and colony bases built very quickly. Sure, I could spend 240 BC to buy a factory, then house for a 8-12 turns to get some 2 more population, then get to building cbases. Unfortunately, 240BC is a lot in the early going (or late, sometimes...).

So I'll often decide it's worth it to ship several colonists there, even if it takes 5 or 6 turns, because once they get there, the system will get up and running much quicker.

I'm interested in what others have to say about this.

-Gusset

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Cabman
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Postby Cabman » Mon Mar 27, 2006 3:36 am

I always send few pop to freshly settled system ( up to 5 turns transfer) to build factories and c bases. If the system is far away i buy factory after it's half built then house to 4-5 pop and then cloners , and c bases. Sometimes i send pop to systems far away but it significently slows down development ( it's good to tech to ion drive asap in such case).Moving pop is very important during whole game...About other questions...join us on Kali. You'll get answers there :)

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Lavarn
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Postby Lavarn » Mon Mar 27, 2006 1:20 pm

Is there a normal order for what to build on a newly settled colony? For example, when I first colonize a system in the early game, the only two buildings I'm interested in building on the new colony are automated factory and research lab - and colony bases if there are other planets in the system. I always build the automated factory first and usually buy it if I have 240 BC (I've heard it's better to buy at half-built but I don't understand the math to know why that is). Then I normally build research lab and supercomputer if I have that tech before starting on the colony bases. Is that normal or usually not the best order? Is it common to stop production somewhere in the order and do housing until you have 4-5 pop? I usually don't do housing unless I have only one colonist on the planet. If you do housing, would you do it right after the automated factory before building anything else?

Also, depending on my race, I'll sometimes get cloning center. I usually don't build it on a colony unless I can get a max pop of 10 or more. If I do decide to build it, I want to build it as early as possible. Even before the automated factory? Or second? Just curious as to what approach you guys have found to be the most optimized.

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Gusset
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Postby Gusset » Mon Mar 27, 2006 3:25 pm

I always build the automated factory first and usually buy it if I have 240 BC (I've heard it's better to buy at half-built but I don't understand the math to know why that is).
The math works like this: if a building or ship or whatever is 0% complete, you have to pay 4 BC for every 1 PP you are purchasing. In the case of an AutoFactory, which takes 60 PP to build, you pay 240 BC to just buy it outright. As the percent complete increases, the cost declines.

When the item is 50% complete or more, you only pay 2 BC for every 1 PP you are purchasing. Obviously, this is a more efficient use of your $$$. There are times when efficiency is not the most important thing to consider (such as after settling a frontier system that is close to your opponent, or when Cabman has ruined your carefully laid plans by sending in a moving van full of his stuff, escorted by an overkill fleet), but generally I will not purchase anything unless I get the good rate.

As for order of building production on a new colony, it varies for me. Generally, I go autofactory/robo miners/colony base/clones/research lab/supercomputer/autolab (eliminating those techs that I don't yet have, of course). If it's a wet UR planet, I'll go totally production buildings, including pollution buildings, followed by a starbase before I consider research or clones, because the planet's job is to pump out ships (it can plink labs, supers, and autolabs out in one turn when it's fully up and running later on without hampering ship production too much). If it's a world where I need farming to be most important and soil enrichment is available, I just might build that immediately after autofactories, because farming will be maximized, and the production and research buildings are of secondary importance on such a planet (if it's the right planet, and it can feed most of my empire and free up everyone else, I don't mind if production or research is very low).

The biggest variable for me in the build path I just described is where clones comes in. Sometimes I'll build cloning centers later rather than sooner, and sometimes I'll build them before colony bases. It all depends on the specific game situation (racial strengths, am I trying to launch an early attack on someone, am I stuck with a bunch of low pop planets so 'll have no place to put the extra population, etc.)

Just my own thoughts.

-Gusset

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Lavarn
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Postby Lavarn » Mon Mar 27, 2006 11:54 pm

The math works like this: if a building or ship or whatever is 0% complete, you have to pay 4 BC for every 1 PP you are purchasing. In the case of an AutoFactory, which takes 60 PP to build, you pay 240 BC to just buy it outright. As the percent complete increases, the cost declines.
Wow....thanks for that tip, Gusset, I never realized that before. It seems you can never get better than a 2 - 1 trade on your BCs for production points, making half-built clearly the optimized point to buy.
When the item is 50% complete or more, you only pay 2 BC for every 1 PP you are purchasing. Obviously, this is a more efficient use of your $$$. There are times when efficiency is not the most important thing to consider (such as after settling a frontier system that is close to your opponent, or when Cabman has ruined your carefully laid plans by sending in a moving van full of his stuff, escorted by an overkill fleet), but generally I will not purchase anything unless I get the good rate.
Even when you're not defending though, I wonder....I started thinking about this a little bit. Imagine you colonize a new system with one worker who produces 3 production (pretty crappy planet for a production race :wink: ). At this rate, an auto factory takes 20 turns to build. If you build for 10 turns and then buy it, you spend 60 BCs for 30 production. Pretty good. However, if you buy it immediately, you spend 240 BCs for 60 production plus whatever the auto factory can produce with the extra 10 turns. If you estimate the factory gives you about 6 extra production per turn, that's 60 extra production. So in this case you are really spending 240 BCs for about 120 production which is also 2 - 1 on your money. Both options are about the same in the long run. But most planets will do better than 3 prod to start with, so waiting to buy at half-built is probably better. Does this analysis sound correct?
Generally, I go autofactory/robo miners/colony base/clones/research lab/supercomputer/autolab
Yeah, better to build the colony bases before the research stuff I guess, unless maybe it's artifacts homeworld or something. What about housing? Do you commonly stop building to do housing somewhere in that order?

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Gusset
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Postby Gusset » Tue Mar 28, 2006 1:02 am

However, if you buy it immediately, you spend 240 BCs for 60 production plus whatever the auto factory can produce with the extra 10 turns. If you estimate the factory gives you about 6 extra production per turn, that's 60 extra production. So in this case you are really spending 240 BCs for about 120 production which is also 2 - 1 on your money. Both options are about the same in the long run. But most planets will do better than 3 prod to start with, so waiting to buy at half-built is probably better. Does this analysis sound correct?
The math sounds 100% correct, and from an individual colony perspective, it's a good thing. I'm more likely to do it if it's an ultra-poor world, similar to your example, because it's probably a waste of any colonists to let them crank out just 1 PP/turn...sometimes it can be better to "waste" the $$$ than have such low output from multiple population units.

But from the viewpoint of the empire as a whole, I'd offer the view that in most other cases, it's better to maximize the BC efficiency and spread the benefit, at least in the critical early stages of the game. Better to spend 240 BC amongst 4 new settlements than focus it all on one. 240BC is a lot, unless I'm hoarding all my cash and spending it on nothing else; that doesn't happen. For example, it's likely that I spent money buying the colony base because it was at a 2:1 rate.

It sorta comes full circle in terms of this discussion. Usually, when a system is first settled, I try to get colonists sent there, at least up to the point where the pollution penalty starts to pop up, and work off those first 30 production units before buying. Then after buying the factory, get to work on a colony base. Ideally, I'd then buy that once it's available for 2BC/PP. Then, I'd transfer some colonists to the new cbase and work off 30PP and buy THAT factory.

I can't always do this, of course. In the early game, if everything is going well, there are more opportunities to spend at the "good" rate than I usually have enough money for. Decisions, decisions...

Again, my thoughts only. Good discussion here.

-Gusset


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