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[breadbocks]

Is it too tall or too wide?

[Nistenf]

My screen needs to be taller than it is, width is ok

[breadbocks]

My screen needs to be taller than it is, width is ok

How tall is your resolution?

[Tarran]

...
Can someone give me a crash course on colonizing, say, Mars?

Alright, I'll get you on the basics. Open up F9 and look at the top-right to see your race's tolorances:

First off, make sure the planet is within your race's gravity tolerance (AKA the "Colony cost" is not N/A. If it is, the planet has either too little or two much gravity). If it is, then it's possible to colonize it without Orbital Habitats. If it isn't, you CANNOT make the planet any better even if it has the right atmosphere, and you will need Orbital Habitats to even 'live' there.

After that, find out it's Colony Cost. If it's something other than 0.0, then it's not habitable without Infrastructure (which is a planetary building). While infrastructure is cheap, it's just better to fully terraform the planet. The higher the cost, the more infrastructure per-person is needed and the less people can work on your actual facilites (since more people will be needed to just keep the colony alive). If you have no infrastructure on the planet, your people will die off a slow and painful death.

Terraforming. First, you will need terraforming facilites (built by factories, act like ground facilities, manned my ground personnel) or Terraforming ships (AKA any ship that has a Terraforming module). Terraforming is fairly simple; select the planet in the F2 screen, select Environment / GMC, and you're in. To start Terraforming, select the Add Gas to Atmosphere button and select the gas and your Terraformers will start pumping it out. Check it off and they'll take away that gas. Set the gas to Terraforming Inactive and nothing will happen. Manned ground installations are inferior to ships with modules once you get them. There are several kinds of gasses: Those that are normal, and just fill the atmosphere and heat it up indirectly very slowly (the thicker the atmosphere, the more Green House factor there is), those that are Greenhouse that heat the atmosphere indirectly and directly (increasing the Greenhouse Pressure directly corresponding to their amount of ATM in atmosphere), Anti-greenhouse gas that indirectly heats up the atmosphere but directly decreases it (decreasing the Greenhouse Pressure directly corresponding to their amount of ATM in atmosphere, there is no limit to how low the temperature can get--you can go below Absolute Zero), then there are Toxic gasses that are hazardous in large quantities and will cause your Colony Cost to rise, and finally, Oxygen, the almighty gas that lets humans breathe. Here's what the gasses do:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

     Hydrogen. Toxic.
     Helium. Normal.
     Methane. Toxic to Oxygen breathers. Greenhouse. Vital gas to Methane Breathers. Adds Colony cost above race's natural range or above 30% of the planet's total atmosphere (?).
     Ammonia. Toxic.
     Water. Normal.
     Neon. Normal.
     Nitrogen. Normal.
     Carbon monoxide. Toxic.
     Nitrogen oxide. Toxic.
     Oxygen. Toxic to Methane breathers. Vital to Oxygen Breathers (like humans). Adds Colony cost above race's natural range or above 30% of the planet's total atmosphere.
     Hydrogen sulfide. Toxic.
     Argon. Normal.
     Carbon dioxide. Grenhouse.
     Nitrogen dioxide. Toxic. Greenhouse.
     Sulfur dioxide. Toxic. Greenhouse.
     Chlorine. Toxic.
     Florine. Toxic.
     Bromine. Toxic.
     Iodine. Toxic.
     Safe greenhouse gas. Greenhouse.
     Anti-greenhouse gas. Anti-Greenhouse.

Now, below all the stuff, there's something telling you the exact formula to what determines how hot a planet is.

Anyway, onto how Colony Cost works: The more a planet is out of your race's natural temperature range, the higher the Colony Cost is. If it's in it, temperature does not affect the Colony Cost. Then there's Atmospheric Pressure: The more a planet is above your race's max, the higher the Colony Cost. And then there's Toxic gas: They can either set the Colony Cost to a minimum of 3.0 or 2.0. Finally, if you do not have Oxygen or have too much, I believe the colony cost minimum is 2.0.

I hope this was understandable. I made it for all planets, not just Mars. If not, go ahead and read the bulky tutorial and ask specific questions later.

My screen needs to be taller than it is, width is ok

Did you try the Reduced Height Windows option underneath Game Parameters?

[Jacob/Lee]

Question: How do I actually move stuff and get stuff built on colonies?

[Tarran]

Question: How do I actually move stuff

Freighters.

and get stuff built on colonies?

...Industry tab on the F2 window for installations.

Also, reread my tutorial/overview/whatever again, I made a few mistakes which I fixed.

[Orb]

-snip-

Well, Mercury has a starting colony cost of 17. Too high to throw colonists out there right off the bat, which makes terraforming more difficult, at least in the style I do it. Considering it requires the same amount of terraforming as Mars, I'd rather just dump auto mines on it until maybe medium-late game, that is if it has minerals on it, which it doesn't in the game I'm running.

...
Can someone give me a crash course on colonizing, say, Mars?

Colonizing depends on whether you want to use land based terraformers or not. If you do, and the colony cost is 2, or less, simply dump colonists on the planet using cryogenic modules on colony ships, and transfer infrastructure via freighters. From there, station any ship based terraforming modules in orbit of the planet, and transfer as many terraforming facilities, built at your home world, to the to be terraformed planet as it can support(like .25m people per terraformer needed). From there, go to Enviroment/GMC tab on the colony window and have it either add, subtract, either greenhouse gasses or anti greenhouse gasses, depending on your temperature needs(compare to Earth's). C02 can be used as a greenhouse gas if you want to add more flavor. You will also need at least 10% 02 in the atmosphere, and no dangerous gasses. Atm needs to be around 1 also.

Once the planet is terraformed, you can start transferring facilities to it to put it to work. In my honest opinion, if its in the Sol system, you're better off just building it on Earth and transferring it. Transferring minerals is a pain of micromanagement.

Finely, if you are mining the planet, and its in the Sol system, build some mass drivers on Earth, and transfer some to the colonized planet, to ferry minerals to Earth. To ferry, there is an option on the mineral tab in the colony window.


"4 replies have been posted" - Eh. I'll post it anyway, it offers some details lacking in the other one.

[Jacob/Lee]

Question: How do I actually move stuff?

Freighters.

Well, duh. How do I load them onto the freighter?

[Orb]

Question: How do I actually move stuff?

Freighters.

Well, duh. How do I load them onto the freighter?

Fleet orders, for just about any ship order. Fleet orders window----> move to load planet, then load whatever you want to load, move to drop off planet, drop off whatever you want to drop off. If you're moving a lot of stuff, use the repeat command below the orders box.

"Edit" Misnamed the window. Its fleet orders. Sorry about that.

[Nistenf]

My screen needs to be taller than it is, width is ok

How tall is your resolution?

768. My max resolution is 1360*768, so even with the reduced height option some buttons of some windows are hidden

[The Scout]

Starship Troopers has got me into a creative mood. "It's a Good Time to Die." Basicly, horrible troops (alot) are used to take every ship and planet that you can find. That's right. An entire fleet of shitty ships trying to swarm planets and defense grids to get enough troops to take it over. It'll be fun.

[Tarran]

-snip-

Well, Mercury has a starting colony cost of 17. Too high to throw colonists out there right off the bat, which makes terraforming more difficult, at least in the style I do it. Considering it requires the same amount of terraforming as Mars, I'd rather just dump auto mines on it until maybe medium-late game, that is if it has minerals on it, which it doesn't in the game I'm running.

Who are you quoting exactly? Me?

Anyway, I suggest you just colonize it early anyway. The population, wealth, and trade boost may come in handy. But it's your choice. It's certainly better than going to another system and terraforming unless the planet is loaded with minerals, since it'd take a while for your ships to get there anyway unless they're fast.

Also, use orbital Terraforming. It's much, much easier.

[breadbocks]

My screen needs to be taller than it is, width is ok

How tall is your resolution?

768. My max resolution is 1360*768, so even with the reduced height option some buttons of some windows are hidden

If you're running XP, there's an option to go for a larger resolution than your monitor can show at once. Otherwise, if you're on 7, you're pretty much bummed like me.

EDIT: If you have another monitor, connect that, right click on the desktop and click screen resolution, and in the multiple displays menu, select extend these displays. Then drag the numbered screens around so one is above the other.

[Jacob/Lee]

How many units of infrastructure should I have per 50 million colonists?

[Tarran]

How many units of infrastructure should I have per 50 million colonists?

Depends on the Colony Cost. Check the Infrastructure Required per Million Population section on the Summary tab of F2.