My second game has just hit a turning point.
I have found the only other race in the game (I think - I turned off precursors and spawning NPRs, so that they didnt have fun fighting and slow down my game). I am guessing it is their home world, seems to have all the minerals, and have Ground Units and Shipyards. But no ships apparently. Havent seen a single one. Maybe there all off somewhere surveying. Their system does have a Jump Gate to another system, and one back, so perhaps they are somewhere near?
Anyway, the real problem is now the economy. Classic novice 4X mistake, over expanded and crashed it. The only other game I play, apart from DF, is Civ, so I had an quick look at the Aurora set up:
Population is needed for all installations, but on Earth, you start with an excess.
Research is capped by the number of labs, or the number of labs your scientists can use, but physical labs are usually the cap.
Shipyards etc need pop, but first you need to build them.
Mines, mass drivers etc just get built.
So I concluded that factory production is the main limit, and so I set out to always produce factories, up to 50% of industry for the last period. Combined with researching industrial efficiency, I have now over doubled my Earth based production capacity. And just avoided running into the red. With 3/5 of the shipyards busy, all factories busy, and reseach on full, I run a 700 odd deficiet (1250 income vs 2000 expenses).
So while I should be arming myself, I have had to scale back research and production to stay in the black. I have some production focussed on Financial Centres, but they only contribute 55 odd to the total, and I have 40 already, so I cant see them making up the 700 shortfall.
Most of my money comes from population, so this got me thinking, perhaps I need to expand my pop?
A colony grows by 10% per year, far faster than I can apparently expand the economy uses Financial Centres, so perhaps I should be spamming small colonies everywhere, shipping a handfull of colonists and infrastructure, and letting the Civvies do the rest? Past the initial set up costs, expansion is at zero cost to me, and even then generates trade and tax.
Commcercial Ports are also an option, although I may have to ship them from earth, rather than build then on location. Again though, shipping the factories and minerals is also an option.
Anyone got any thoughts, especially those reporting millions of dorfbucks in cash?
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Topic: Aurora - The Dwarf Fortress of 4X Games (Read 2853277 times)