What Is The Absolute Worst World That You Will Colonize?

Discussion on how to play against other humans.
Gorean
Posts:25
Joined:Sat Jul 04, 2009 2:49 pm
Contact:
What Is The Absolute Worst World That You Will Colonize?

Postby Gorean » Sat Jul 04, 2009 2:55 pm

Specifically I am wondering about colony basing in home systems. I typically like to avoid any worlds that produce less than 2. So, that means that I will usually skip a low G poor planet, or an abundant heavy G. Obviously I'll skip an ultrapoor, or worse, as those only produce 1 at best. I'm not so sure about this strategy, though. I feel like worlds that make 1.5 are possibly worth it, but they really are a drain on my economy in the beginning, because of all of the workers, and money, that I have to sink into them. I tend to play research races, so I need all the saved production, and money, that I can get to help me keep up while I get my tech up, and try to keep my population growing decently.

What worlds do you guys colonize at minimum?
Last edited by Gorean on Sat Jul 04, 2009 6:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Vita multis dat nimis, satis nulli.

User avatar
Gusset
Posts:99
Joined:Sun Jul 24, 2005 3:36 am
Location:Vancouver, WA, USA
Contact:

Postby Gusset » Sat Jul 04, 2009 5:42 pm

I'll colonize just about anything. I may wait in some cases, especially in the early game, but planets with low production/worker can still be a big help for farming, research, housing, etc.

Beyond the "per-unit-of-population" resource contributors, low production worlds can also be handy for increasing the number of research or farming buildings (autolabs being the biggest single example), and an extra starbase never hurts either if the game is one of the longer ones, though the time to produce all of these obviously will be increased.

The decision process will vary from one situation to another, so I don't have a personal "blanket rule" that I use, but those are a few things that I take into consideration.

-Gusset

Gorean
Posts:25
Joined:Sat Jul 04, 2009 2:49 pm
Contact:

Postby Gorean » Sat Jul 04, 2009 6:09 pm

Thanks for the input! Let me try to make my question a little more specific.

I want to know what your feeling is about just how low is too low for a planet to be useful. I love low production worlds for housing, and research, but I feel that an ultrapoor is a general bad move for colonization at any point, wouldn't you agree? I suppose that there can be a situation for anything, so lets focus on talking about early colonization, and colony base choices when the game has just begun.
Vita multis dat nimis, satis nulli.

User avatar
Gusset
Posts:99
Joined:Sun Jul 24, 2005 3:36 am
Location:Vancouver, WA, USA
Contact:

Postby Gusset » Sat Jul 04, 2009 10:06 pm

"... lets focus on talking about early colonization, and colony base choices when the game has just begun."


I guess I should say it this way: population capacity will make a low production planet worthwhile. A low pop, low production planet will likely go un-colonized for quite some time in one of my empires.

However, if it's an ultra-poor planet that has decent population capacity, I'll stick a colony base on it as the second or third colony of the system, buy an auto factory as quick as I am able, then buy a research lab when the cost gets down to 60 BC. Meanwhile, I'll funnel population from the housing colonies in the system onto that planet, either for farming if it's a good farming planet, or as researchers.

Population is key to success in any MOO2 game against human opponents. So, for example, if I'm playing aquatic and I come across a poor or ultra poor swamp, ocean, tundra, or terran planet, I'm going to snag it. It might be the second or third planet in the system that gets colonized, or it might be the first, depending on the situation, but I would be foolish to just let it sit there.

If I'm not answering your question still, give me some more specifics to define a situation...race details, what planets are in the system that are both available and have already been colonized, how far along the game is, roughly how many systems and planets in your empire at this point, what the galaxy size is, and number of opponents, human or AI. I'll tell you what my thought process would be, for better or worse. :)

-Gusset

User avatar
Iceman
Posts:10
Joined:Sat Jun 27, 2009 9:51 pm

Postby Iceman » Sat Jul 04, 2009 10:47 pm

I would say that colonizable worlds depend somewhat on your situation, which includes your race. If your race has any sort of production bonus at all, ultra poor worlds aren't as much of a bad thing. They shouldn't be the first worlds you colonize, but remember that you can build Automated Factories and Robo Miner Plants on any world. Once you raise the base production using these buildings, you can usually produce things fast enough at the colony. Factors that would cause a world to be less valuable to you would be low production, low maximum population, gravity penalties, and upkeep penalties. However, extra consideration should be made for colonies which are intended strictly as population farms, or which have something beneficial, such as increased farming potential (if food matters to your race), high production potential, ancient artifacts, or maybe even something as simple as gem deposits. Large, Ultra poor, Gaia worlds are extremely valuable for farming, especially if you're not Aquatic. Also, reasonably large Toxic planets which are Ultra Rich and have no gravity penalties, although rare, can be very useful, especially for Subterranean or Tolerant races. If you are using Unification as your form of government and you have at least a +1 production bonus, your workers will produce at least 3 production units each before pollution on Ultra poor worlds without any buildings, and once you get an Automated Factory and a Robo Miner Plant there, each worker will produce at least 7.5 production units each before pollution, which is more than enough production to produce colony buildings in a reasonable amount of time, assuming the colony is sufficiently large. If you are using Democracy as your form of government, buying the necessary production buildings should be easy, although after building an Automated Factory and a Robo Miner Plant, your workers will still only produce 4 production each before pollution. However, the base production should be sufficient if you can afford to purchase buildings before they are complete. Also, as a Democracy, you can almost always afford the building upkeep penalties. Keep in mind that you should never neglect a world if it could be used as a population farm, which almost every world can (if you have Biospheres or are Subterranean, every world can). If it's too much of a burden as a large colony, don't ever let it get large. Don't make it the first planet you colonize in a system unless you have absolutely no alternatives, but don't neglect it if you're thinking about building a Colony Base. With respect to the early game, you need to colonize some viable worlds in order to be successful. Hopefully you can do better than a 5 max population Radiated, Abundant world, but if you can't, then you have to decide between waiting until you build an outpost ship to explore more systems, or colonizing it right away. Being Tolerant pretty much eliminates this situation as a possibility. If food matters, you'll want to colonize another farming world besides your homeworld fairly quickly. However, high production matters more than anything. Ideally, you'll find an Ultra Rich planet that supports a sufficiently large population without a gravity penalty, in which case you should colonize that world first, regardless of any other disadvantages it might have. To more concisely answer your question, if a system has one viable world that you would grow to its maximum size, it's usually worth the effort to build Colony Bases at all the other worlds in the system, including Ultra poor worlds, worlds with gravity penalties, and Toxic worlds, even if only to use them as population farms. But by all means do not send a Colony Ship to these types of worlds unless you have absolutely no other choice. You want to be able to develop the system quickly and have the system be valuable to you later on, which requires at least one viable world (with decent production and a higher than average maximum population). This, of course, makes Aquatic, Subterranean, and Tolerant useful race picks because they all increase the viability of worlds. However, you probably shouldn't pick more than one of these, because then you are relying on your high maximum population advantage to win the game for you, and it takes a long time for having a higher maximum population on all worlds to reach its full potential as an advantage, since expansion usually allows you to increase your population just as effectively early in the game, and high production is the most important early game advantage, as well as later on. Thus, you should always consider making high production a racial advantage, as well as capitalizing on high production worlds that you come across.

Gorean
Posts:25
Joined:Sat Jul 04, 2009 2:49 pm
Contact:

Postby Gorean » Sun Jul 05, 2009 3:02 am

This was extremely interesting information. I think that I am going to completely rearrange my early game play. It is starting to sound more, and more like I should always take every world in my home system, and then my colony choice for a second system should be based on that system having a high production world of some kind, rather than having at least three worlds. A lot of times I used to pass up systems with a large rich world, simply because they only had one other planet in the system. I may not do this now.

I tend to play lithovore democracy subterranean. This makes my early game picks particularly difficult, because I have little production right off even with automated factories. I try to make this part of the game as efficient as possible so that I can get my essential research, and production saving, done, and then move on to putting my worlds on housing between research of robo miner plants, so that I can house for the rest of the game after that is done.
Vita multis dat nimis, satis nulli.

User avatar
Iceman
Posts:10
Joined:Sat Jun 27, 2009 9:51 pm

Postby Iceman » Sun Jul 05, 2009 3:52 pm

It is very important to obtain large, high production worlds early in the game because they will soon be large enough to produce your warships quickly, and attacking first is a significant advantage, but only if you have enough force. Getting an early Ultra Rich world allows you to colonize faster in the early game and then build up an invasion fleet quickly. I would colonize it first even if it was the only planet in the system, because the earlier you colonize it, the more impact it has in the following turns. Rich worlds are generally less likely to be heavy gravity, so your best choice is probably going to be a Rich world. Obviously, if your home system contains any high production worlds, you should develop them to maximum size. Your Lithovore race doesn't care about producing food, so aside from high production potential, maximum size is likely to be the most important factor in determining the order in which you choose to colonize. Also, with your race, there are practically no planets that I wouldn't choose to colonize eventually, save perhaps smaller Toxic worlds sitting by themselves in a system. You can afford to make less desirable worlds into population farms by building Automated Factories and Robo Miner Plants, and then letting housing work its magic. The value of increased population growth for your empire as a whole is worth a few BCs every turn for maintenance.

Gorean
Posts:25
Joined:Sat Jul 04, 2009 2:49 pm
Contact:

Postby Gorean » Sun Jul 05, 2009 4:28 pm

What do you think about systems that have three worlds, or more, that are abundant, or worse, vs systems with less worlds, but better resources? Wouldn't the population growth be more useful to a subterranean race than the production?

I'm getting the feeling that home systems should be completely colonized in every game, now.
Vita multis dat nimis, satis nulli.

User avatar
Gusset
Posts:99
Joined:Sun Jul 24, 2005 3:36 am
Location:Vancouver, WA, USA
Contact:

Postby Gusset » Sun Jul 05, 2009 5:29 pm

In my opinion, if it can hold a few colonists or more, you should try to take it as your situation allows. Timing of colonizing is the biggest variable, as that will depend on what the game and map situation is that you are facing. Sometimes you can get them all in short order, and other times Cab, Cybersaber, Siron, or some other talented player is in the neighborhood and you need to devote production resources to combat ships. ;)

I can't give you a list of rules to follow, as every game will be different. My main intent was just to point out that low resource planets can still be quite useful, and you should not automatically snub them. If you restrict yourself to only the abundant or better planets and forsake all others, you are throwing away a lot of potential benefits.

-Gusset

Gorean
Posts:25
Joined:Sat Jul 04, 2009 2:49 pm
Contact:

Postby Gorean » Sun Jul 05, 2009 5:33 pm

Well put, Gusset.
Vita multis dat nimis, satis nulli.

User avatar
Iceman
Posts:10
Joined:Sat Jun 27, 2009 9:51 pm

Postby Iceman » Sun Jul 05, 2009 11:57 pm

What do you think about systems that have three worlds, or more, that are abundant, or worse, vs systems with less worlds, but better resources? Wouldn't the population growth be more useful to a subterranean race than the production?

I'm getting the feeling that home systems should be completely colonized in every game, now.
I agree with what the veterans have told me: you should indeed completely colonize home systems. I think that you should consider how beneficial all of the planets in the system will be: whether you will be using any of them as population farms or all of them for farming, production, or research. Population growth is always important regardless of race, but remember that you have all of the planets on your homeworld to use for population farming when you decide what system to colonize next. If you have to decide between a system with five worlds and a system with one, the choice is usually obvious, but when the numbers get closer, it gets tricky. Also, you need to be able to get at least one world in the system up and running quickly before you can efficiently colonize the rest of the system. Workers generating production on Ultra Rich worlds are a lot more useful because they can build those Colony Bases faster. Even if the rest of the worlds are low production, and there's another system with a bunch of Abundant planets, think first about how many of those planets you want to develop. Production per worker matters a lot less for population farms than for production colonies.

User avatar
Time
Posts:220
Joined:Wed Mar 22, 2006 4:27 pm
Location:Orlando, Florida, USA, Earth, Human Empire

Postby Time » Sun Jul 19, 2009 5:10 pm

Gusset and others have covered the basics well, so, I won’t repeat their already good advice. I’ll try to be short and mention other examples.
Your Race Picks matter. A UniAquaProd+2LgHW race will still choose to colonize a tiny ultra-poor planet. You mentioned your race, “I tend to play lithovore democracy subterranean.”
Since this would add up to 23 points of race picks in an unmodified race pick game, I’m sure you mean one or two of these three choices.
1a) So, for example, Lithovore Democracy (with Prod+1 too) would still choose the smaller worlds too, as you will need more worlds to retain that research advantage.
1b) With Spy+10 (to help counter the penalty of Demo) you might want to gain a better colony outward first, especially, if there are 3 or more planets in the new system.
2a) LithSubt (with Prod+1), same as DemoLithProd+1.
2b) other options, same as 1b.
3a) DemoSubt is 13 points. So, if Prod+2 is chosen as well, then definitely colonize ASAP, to build those RLabs on quickly.
3b) other options, same as 1b.
I know you emphasized starting system, but, I’ll mention, that as you expand sometimes, you won’t find a great system, so, taking the lousy planet to be able to expand to the better one, is done.
MOO1 Fan, MOO2 Fan, MOO3 needed too many changes = hopeless, getting older waiting for a MOO4 (still).

Gorean
Posts:25
Joined:Sat Jul 04, 2009 2:49 pm
Contact:

Postby Gorean » Sun Jul 19, 2009 5:27 pm

In VDC it is perfectly possible to play all three. -20 to ship attack, -10 to combat, and repulsive take care of the negatives. Then you can get demo for 5, subterranean is another 5, and lithovore is the final 10.
Vita multis dat nimis, satis nulli.


Return to “Strategy & Tactics”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 13 guests