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[Tarran]

Well, if you downloaded that all-in-one pack, you're best off asking the author about what you're missing I think.

[Metalax]

I've recently gotten into this game and would like to know some of the efficient ways to transfer installations to other planets for colonies as my way is taking a long time and the civilian shipping lines are doing nothing even when I have things set up for them.

One thing to note, particularly early on in your game. It takes a long time to move significant quantities of installations between planets. As your engine tech and number of cargo ships increase the time drops but it will still take many in game years to transfer sufficient installations to be particularly useful.

You really have three options for getting facilities to new colonies.

Use your own freighters to transport them from one of your main colonies to the new colony. This can be slow dependant on how many freighters you have built and their cargo capacity, and costs you fuel, but it is fully under your control. Most installations you will want to move early on take one standard cargo bay each to transport, if you are using freighters with small cargo bays they will only transfer fractional amounts of an installation on each trip.

Use the civilian shipping lines to transport the facilities. This doesn't cost you fuel but does cost wealth. Civilians pick their own jobs from those available so it may take time for them to decide to work on your contracts and sometimes they seem to ignore them entirely. This varies from game to game, sometimes I've had civilian freighters sitting idle while there were available contracts, other times they have prioritized my contracts to the point that they are not keeping up infrastructure deliveries to colonies halting their growth. One trick I've found that tends to help them pick your contracts more frequently is to set up multiple smaller contracts to move part of the total installations rather than a single big one. So for example, if I'm moving 100 auto-mines from Earth to Mercury, I'll set up five supply contracts for 20 auto-mines each on Earth and five demand contracts for 20 each on Mercury.

The third option for a colony with a population is to transport a number of construction factories using one of the above methods, transport some minerals(either via freighter or mass driver) and have the colony build it's own facilities. You can also do this on unpopulated worlds by training construction brigades and moving them via troop transports. This method tends to be slow as you will usually only transport a limited number of construction facilities(otherwise you would likely keep using one of the above methods) but it doesn't require you to keep your freighters transporting all the time and removes dependence on the whims of the civilians.

[MarcAFK]

I recall on one game i found i didn't have enough fuel to transport all the infrastructure i needed to mars so i shipped 30% of my factories there and used mass drivers to ship duranium.
Later on i worked out the specific numbers, It actually worked out faster, i think it was because i also had a credit crunch and couldn't afford to have 30% of my production making infrastructure, while i was also using factories to rush build freighter components in order to ship the infrastructure as fast as well as trying to rush build more tankers and sorium harvesters.
So basically, factories can be better for efficient transport of large quantities of infrastructure, you just need the population to support them.

[Crimson]

Finished the research on the jump drive. Upon being placed on the ship design, it took out half of its maintenance life...

Anyways, after a few compromises and changes, it resulted in something like this.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Providence class Exploration Ship    1,000,000 tons     34137 Crew     338455.5 BP      TCS 20000  TH 62500  EM 90000
6250 km/s    JR 3-50     Armour 25-890     Shields 3000-360     Sensors 320/320/20/20     Damage Control Rating 5020     PPV 1672.8
Maint Life 5.08 Years     MSP 1013394    AFR 1695%    IFR 23.5%    1YR 65558    5YR 983375    Max Repair 58348 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 24 months    Flight Crew Berths 1401   
Flag Bridge    Hangar Deck Capacity 60000 tons     Troop Capacity: 10 Battalions   Magazine 17640   

Series X, J21S960/SFTE     Max Ship Size 1008000 tons    Distance 50k km     Squadron Size 3
XV/S-AM 'Shiva' Drive (50)    Power 2500    Fuel Use 13.98%    Signature 1250    Exp 12%
Fuel Capacity 175,000,000 Litres    Range 225.3 billion km   (417 days at full power)
Experimental EM-Plasma Shield (500)   Total Fuel Cost  6,000 Litres per hour  (144,000 per day)

Twin 80mm XM Point Defense Gun (70x16)    Range 60,000km     TS: 50000 km/s     Power 0-0     RM 6    ROF 5        1 1 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0
Mk. 50, R9C12 'Invincible' Railgun (20x4)    Range 800,000km     TS: 12500 km/s     Power 60-12     RM 9    ROF 25        20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 18
XM Point Defense Targeting System (35)    Max Range: 68,000 km   TS: 50000 km/s     85 71 56 41 26 12 0 0 0 0
'Invincible' FCS (5)    Max Range: 800,000 km   TS: 12500 km/s     99 98 96 95 94 92 91 90 89 88
SC-10/Anti-matter Reactor (2)     Total Power Output 320    Armour 0    Exp 5%

M73 Missile Launcher (300)    Missile Size 4    Rate of Fire 60
Starfire M1000 MFCS (30)     Range 151.8m km    Resolution 10
Reventant M14 ACM (1110)  Speed: 43,200 km/s   End: 45.7m    Range: 118.5m km   WH: 6    Size: 4    TH: 561/337/168
Nova AM164 ASM (3300)  Speed: 84,000 km/s   End: 24.8m    Range: 125m km   WH: 28    Size: 4    TH: 364/218/109

'Titan' Hyper LIDAR System (1)     GPS 400000     Range 12,800.0m km    Resolution 100
'Phalanx' LIDAR System (1)     GPS 1500     Range 480.0m km    Resolution 1
'Balisarda' LIDAR System (1)     GPS 50000     Range 3,577.7m km    Resolution 20
T-900 Thermalscope (1)     Sensitivity 320     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  320m km
E-900 Spectroscope (1)     Sensitivity 320     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  320m km
Phased Gravitational Sensors (4)   20 Survey Points Per Hour
Phased Geological Sensors (4)   20 Survey Points Per Hour

ECCM-4 (5)         ECM 40

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

I'm not sure about this. Still... Maybe I need to go back to the drawing board.

Edit: Forgot that this design is using shield strength 6 when I'm up to shield strength 8. Still waiting for shield regen 8 to finish though before replacing the shields.

[Sheb]

You have a 1.000.000 ton military shipyard? And you can feed this beast 200.000 MSP per year? It is insane...

[Crimson]

Yes (by accident which is why I made that ship) and yes maybe. Thankfully, I got new sources of duranium and gallicite to feed the construction of my 1 million ton ship. Also just finished constructing an additional 2600 maintenance facilities to allow Earth to overhaul that ship though it put a real dent on my duranium reserves. Just need to wait for the new shield tech.

[Sheb]

Well, if you're into the large jack of all trade, why not. I'd cut some of the AM fire controls as 5 or 6 should be enough to face all the volley they might launch at you with some spare. You can use it to mount a spare AM sensor, so you don't suddenly loose all AM capability whenever you take a unlucky hit.

Same for the MFC, your launchers relod in a minute, so you can launch, assing new launchers to MFC and launch again. You don't need that many this way. You might considers making several smaller reactors so you don't loose half your capability on a lucky meson hit.

I'm not sure it's worth it having more than on ECM. What are you going to carry in your hangar?

[Crimson]

The hangars were originally meant to carry five 1k ton battalion dropships and two hundred fifty 200 ton fighters but then I didn't want to deal with the fighters anymore due to the fighter bonus bug but I still wanted to keep the hangar bays so its now ten 5k ton frigates. The remaining is for two 2.5k ton recon ships meant to probe discovered jump points.

Working on the design as we speak.

[Gamerlord]

*Gamerlord swoops in on his new experimental fighter*

Hey Crimson! If your mega-ship falls short of the requirements needed, why not use minicarriers to haul some stuff along with it, maybe also carrying fuel reserves?

Awaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!

[Crimson]

If I do encounter another hostile NPR other than the two default ones, I'll probably need to do that soon if I decided to eliminate them due to the distance. Explored a lot already on all jump points from Earth and have yet to encounter an alien race that my diplomats can properly talk to.

Anyways, decided on this as the final design. It has 15 MFCS and 10 PD FCS which is less than the previous design. The extras are mainly for backup or when I get lazy. Improvements are a faster recharging railgun, stronger and faster regenerating shields, an additional armor layer, 4 smaller power plants and one large power plant and an additional AM Sensor.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Providence class Exploration Ship    1,000,000 tons     33869 Crew     344768.9 BP      TCS 20000  TH 62500  EM 120000
6250 km/s    JR 3-50     Armour 26-890     Shields 4000-300     Sensors 320/320/20/20     Damage Control Rating 4970     PPV 1672.8
Maint Life 5.11 Years     MSP 1026331    AFR 1713%    IFR 23.8%    1YR 65605    5YR 984081    Max Repair 58348 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 24 months    Flight Crew Berths 1561   
Flag Bridge    Hangar Deck Capacity 60000 tons     Troop Capacity: 10 Battalions    Magazine 17640   

Series X, J21S960/SFTE     Max Ship Size 1008000 tons    Distance 50k km     Squadron Size 3
XV/S-AM 'Shiva' Drive (50)    Power 2500    Fuel Use 13.98%    Signature 1250    Exp 12%
Fuel Capacity 175,000,000 Litres    Range 225.3 billion km   (417 days at full power)
Experimental EM-Plasma Shield (500)   Total Fuel Cost  6,400 Litres per hour  (153,600 per day)

Twin 80mm XM Point Defense Gun (70x16)    Range 60,000km     TS: 50000 km/s     Power 0-0     RM 6    ROF 5        1 1 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0
Mk. 50, R9C16 'Invincible' Railgun (20x4)    Range 800,000km     TS: 12500 km/s     Power 60-16     RM 9    ROF 20        20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 18
'Invincible' FCS (5)    Max Range: 800,000 km   TS: 12500 km/s     99 98 96 95 94 92 91 90 89 88
XM Point Defense Targeting System (10)    Max Range: 68,000 km   TS: 50000 km/s     85 71 56 41 26 12 0 0 0 0
SC-05/Anti-matter Reactor (4)     Total Power Output 320    Armour 0    Exp 5%
SC-10/Anti-matter Reactor (1)     Total Power Output 160    Armour 0    Exp 5%

M73 Missile Launcher (300)    Missile Size 4    Rate of Fire 60
Starfire M1000 MFCS (15)     Range 151.8m km    Resolution 10
Reventant M14 ACM (1110)  Speed: 43,200 km/s   End: 45.7m    Range: 118.5m km   WH: 6    Size: 4    TH: 561/337/168
Nova AM164 ASM (3300)  Speed: 84,000 km/s   End: 24.8m    Range: 125m km   WH: 28    Size: 4    TH: 364/218/109

'Titan' Hyper LIDAR System (1)     GPS 400000     Range 12,800.0m km    Resolution 100
'Balisarda' LIDAR System (1)     GPS 50000     Range 3,577.7m km    Resolution 20
'Phalanx' LIDAR System (2)     GPS 1500     Range 480.0m km    Resolution 1
T-900 Thermalscope (1)     Sensitivity 320     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  320m km
E-900 Spectroscope (1)     Sensitivity 320     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  320m km
Phased Gravitational Sensors (4)   20 Survey Points Per Hour
Phased Geological Sensors (4)   20 Survey Points Per Hour

ECCM-4 (5)         ECM 40

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Edit: Construction has begun and due to the fact that most components have been built already, it'll take around 5 months to complete. However, the problem is that my total MSP is only half of the total maximum MSP of the ship so it might be a little problematic due to currently low stockpiles in duranium and gallicite.

[Sheb]

Yeah, MSPs are going to be a problem, especially since it's apparently intended as a survey ship.

May I suggest loading the hangar bays with Grav- and Geo-surveys gunboats instead? It'd speed up things a LOT.

[Graknorke]

How do you guys manage to get past early game running-out-of-everything-but-without-enough-to-expand-with?
I never manage it. I just get stuck managing an empty Earth and a massively under-industrialised Mars. A big thing is waiting for research/shipyard expansion that ends up holding me back too long.

[JacenHanLovesLegos]

Another weird thing, I created a colony in a uninhabitable planet to act as a automated mining colony and for some inexplicable reason, there are ques in its industrial construction and ordinance list. Discovered it since I noticed that a lot of minerals were marked red while I was checking for duranium and gallicite.

Cleared them since then. I thought I was the one who did it by accident but the things in the list were really weird. As I remember, I think it was a single engine called an Orion Drive (?), a Military Academy, a Ground Force Training Facility, 2 Deep Space Tracking Station, a Spruance PDC which I have no design off, and some infrastructure. The Ordinance list were also of unknown missiles though I don't remember their names anymore. The thing that baffled me though was that they all had weird assignments in industrial capacity (0.89% is not something you want to use to build anything for that matter except maybe maintenance supplies).

That IS odd. Maybe an NPR had a colony there at one point and the database still had their industry assignments?

I had the same problem in my current game, but it was CI conversions on Pluto.

[Metalax]

How do you guys manage to get past early game running-out-of-everything-but-without-enough-to-expand-with?
I never manage it. I just get stuck managing an empty Earth and a massively under-industrialised Mars. A big thing is waiting for research/shipyard expansion that ends up holding me back too long.

• Don't produce more than a small amount of infrastructure, probably around 100 units to start off your early first colony, triggering civilian ship construction. Your civilians produce quite a large quantity for free as a trade good and it is usually sufficient to handle your first few populated colonies.
• Don't expand your shipyards too far early on. 40-50 k for 1-2 commercial yards and 10 k for 1-2 military yards is sufficient until you have secured additional supplies of Duranium/Neutronium.
• Don't build too many spare missiles, your early missiles will likely not be around for too long before they are replaced with more advanced designs so it doesn't make sense to spend the resources establishing a large stockpile of them.
• Purchase the resources mined by the civilian mining companies that set up on comets/asteroids. These need to have been surveyed first so I typically make the comets my second priority after the planets/major moons.
• Don't build too many ships/pdc's until you have the resources to do so.
• Watch your sorium levels. You need some as the actual mineral in order to build jump engines so turn off fuel production if your stocks are getting low and you don't have your jumpships/jumpgate constructors built yet.
• Dependant on how your luck is for mineral generation, you may need to expand to other systems to find the supplies you need.
• Time. Things do progress slowly to start with, it can sometimes be 20 years before I start to ramp up my production due to getting sufficient mineral supplies established.
• Conquer an enemy NPR. this can be difficult to pull off with your starting tech and ships, but if you pull it off you gain all of their facilities and surviving population, giving you a big boost.

The default start for Earth generates far less minerals than you would expect for a body of that size. This was done to encourage expansion, but can sometimes result in mineral levels that simply make the start unviable in any reasonable time period. You can use SM mode to adjust the mineral levels via the system information screen. If I'm playing a game where I'm not wanting to excessively worry about artificial mineral shortages, or doing a pre-TN start I typically just multiply the quantity of each mineral in the ground by 10.

[Lord Shonus]

Trying this out again now that I've upgraded my monitor, I've run into a small problem. I've created a fleet consisting of a cruiser, tanker, and collier. The tanker is designated as a tanker in the ship design, and has plenty of fuel, but the cruiser constantly runs out of fuel, forcing me to manually equalize fuel supplies. Is there a way to automate this? I have a conditional "refuel at tanker" order set up on the fleet.