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[EuchreJack]

Try playing around with Space Master.  I know you can add installations (research labs, mines, industry, and stuff).  Dunno about population.  But you seem to be doing alright.

[LoSboccacc]

Try playing around with Space Master.  I know you can add installations (research labs, mines, industry, and stuff).  Dunno about population.  But you seem to be doing alright.

probably in the next play I'll be running a better scenario and using the sm to quickstart the empire. for now I'm getting "the full experience" as the more I don't have at start, the more I learn to make myself

[Korbac]

You'll need to build the labs yourself, I'm afraid, LoSboccacc. However, increased pop will result in increased taxes, which are needed to fund research ($$$) and subsidise commercial businesses. Do you have a commercial airline yet?

[LoSboccacc]

You'll need to build the labs yourself, I'm afraid, LoSboccacc. However, increased pop will result in increased taxes, which are needed to fund research ($$$) and subsidise commercial businesses. Do you have a commercial airline yet?

not yet. I've no colonies, either. only automated mining bases.

[LoSboccacc]

2046, 4th December

We spent a lot of effort on our secret military project for the new “Terrant Empire” colonization project.

And now, here it is! Behold the Ship Zero,  ready for his maiden voyage in the universe:

Code: [Select]

Cuba Extended class Geosurvey Ship    3,500 tons     316 Crew     534.6 BP      TCS 70  TH 120  EM 0
1714 km/s    JR 3-50     Armour 1-20     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/1/1     Damage Control Rating 5     PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 19%    IFR: 0.3%    Maint Capacity 477 MSP    Max Repair 144 MSP    Est Time: 5.32 Years

J3600(3-50) Military Jump Drive     Max Ship Size 3600 tons    Distance 50k km     Squadron Size 3
Nuclear Pulse Engine E10 (3)    Power 40    Fuel Use 100%    Signature 40    Armour 0    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 100,000 Litres    Range 51.4 billion km   (347 days at full power)

Gravitational Survey Sensors (1)   1 Survey Points Per Hour
Geological Survey Sensors (1)   1 Survey Points Per Hour

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
The cuba class has been refitted with the newly discovered jump drive engine, allowing for extended operations in deep space.

The Ship Zero will run a sensor calibration first, scanning local possible jump points, and then a geological survey of the promising sectors she will jump into.

Proper colonization will need to wait a bit, unless we find a really promising and suitable planet. We don’t have the resource even to mine our own system, let alone planting factories on a remote sector of the galaxy.

The long term plan is now to find a promising and closed system to start a proper colony. Before that, we’ll need proper cargo, effective shipyards (as the one bay we have now is pretty limited) and as usual, a whole lot more of factories and mines, because I don’t really like to wait that much before putting together some basic defensive and offensive technology.

[LoSboccacc]

2049, 24 Augusts

Four years of refitting and development, and the jump survey ship is ready to roll! 

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Look at her, quite a difference from the 71km/s slug that surveyed the whole system in the last three years.

2054, 11th December

Earth jump point survey has been completed. Earth has four jump points, and so it has begun.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

These ten years were extremely uneventful. Everything is proceeding as planned, even if slower than expected.
We still have some problem from Condrium, but as mining construction is being paused and resources are diverted to research Mercassium seems the next thing that will limit us.

We're still going fine but I'll need to anticipate the trend if I want to scale up those research labs.

Technology wise, we're investing a lot in warheads and engines. I'm making up my head on how I want to build up my first cruiser, but I've to double check how much I can fit in a 30/40 kton limit. I don't want to go much heavier than that, to keep the speed acceptable. I'll need to find a way to multiply my forces strengths while covering up the problems with anemic armor and no shields.

[Felius]

You should really start making automated mines. Trying to build enough infrastructure to actually have population enough to run conventional mines is going to cost you VERY much, if it's even possible to put a non genetically changed colony there.

Also, try to find fast a new source of duranium, as you have seriously little of it in your planet. It's basically the basic building block, and pretty much uses it. You'll be hurting if you don't get a new source ASAP. If you're luck some body in the system will have over a million duranium with good accessibility (say, 0.8 to 1), but if not, for now focus on the good accessibility bodies. You'll probably want a huge source of Sorium sooner or later, specially if you get extra solar mining, as mass drivers can't drive the minerals through jump points, even if you had gates, and therefore you'll be doing a good deal of shipping. You have enough for a pretty long time though, so don't worry too much. And you'll need a new source of mercassium, with all you have in your planet you can't even finish the production you already started. It's basically used for research labs, so it won't fatally cripple you in the short run (make sure you keep some small reserve for any punctual need, just to be on the safe side), but it'll make you take even longer to build a decent research base. You'll also need more neutronium when you get your shipyards up and running, specially when you start making warships.

Basically, you need to focus on Duranium ASAP, and neutronium, as if you run out, you'll be locked out of your ship production. Mercassium so you can pick up your speed, but if you can't find it'll won't cripple you on the short run. Ideally you want a planet with over a million of each, with high accessibility for all of them. If you can't find one, focus on finding a planet with all of them with high accessibility, or even sacrifice a little accessibility if the planet have all of them (as you can focus your mines in one planet, it can be worth the loss in efficiency). Try to keep them all around 0.7-1, but if you can only find planets with high accessibility for one of them, even a 0.3 accessibility can be worth focusing your mines. Still, you'll need lots and lots and lots of duranium, so if you have to choose between a high-accessibility duranium and a high accessibility anything else, go for the duranium, even if it hurts the others a little.

[LoSboccacc]

Well, I've some strategic Duranium reserves so I'm not worried about a possible duranium crash. Should the problem arise, I'll move the hundred or so automated mines I've built to Venus, where there are 7M tons at 1.0 availability. Also Callisto has 8M or so at 0.7, so, while it's suboptimal because of other mineral scarcity on those planets, It's there ready to be used if needed.

I'm not exploiting those just because of that, I've in a Corundium shortage right now and automated mines production has been suspended. I can't really expand my mineral production by much, without Corundium. To thell the truth, I've huge deposits of the stuff, but all at 0.1 availability. I hope the geology working on that planets will discover a somewhat easier way to get to the vein.
 
Still, I totally hope to find a planet like the one you describe in the four sectors that are linked to Sol, then I can hollow it out and ship everything to earth to start a serious economy expansion. Having it colonizable is a nice plus, as plain mines, opposed to automated ones, cost half resources.

Right now corundium production is 50 ton/year, that means an automated mine in two year or so, which makes totally useless to try and produce more of them. My option is now to shift the mines around sol as necessity arise.

I'll build another Cuba Extended, probably without jump and with more geo sensors, to scan sol asteroids. maybe we can found some quick&easy deposit on those.

[EuchreJack]

Two suggestions:
DON'T research Composite Armor, until you have a good stockpile of Neutronium.  Currently, your ships need only Duranium for their hulls (aka most of the ship).  Once you research Composite Armor, you MUST have loads of Neutronium to build new ships (you can get away with redesigning old ships for a time, but anything new MUST have the latest armor).  Composite Armor literally can cause a Neutronium crash, as I found out the hard way in my first game.

If your economy needs a boost, try colonizing Mars.  Just dump a few hundred infastructure and colonists on the Red Planet, and let your civilian shipping companies go to town.  You'll make loads of money from taxes on the civies.

[Maldevious]

If your economy needs a boost, try colonizing Mars.  Just dump a few hundred infastructure and colonists on the Red Planet, and let your civilian shipping companies go to town.  You'll make loads of money from taxes on the civies.

This makes me laugh from a storyline perspective. "We planted a dummy colony on Mars for tax purposes. Dropped off some domes and a water extractor. If the people ever find out, there will be hell to pay. Free market for the win!"

[LoSboccacc]

Two suggestions:
DON'T research Composite Armor, until you have a good stockpile of Neutronium.  Currently, your ships need only Duranium for their hulls (aka most of the ship).  Once you research Composite Armor, you MUST have loads of Neutronium to build new ships (you can get away with redesigning old ships for a time, but anything new MUST have the latest armor).  Composite Armor literally can cause a Neutronium crash, as I found out the hard way in my first game.

If your economy needs a boost, try colonizing Mars.  Just dump a few hundred infastructure and colonists on the Red Planet, and let your civilian shipping companies go to town.  You'll make loads of money from taxes on the civies.

the stuff about the composite armor is really nice to know, thanks.

for now the economy is fine, I'll try to fend off colonization expenses as much as possible, or at least until a nice mineral rich and good planet is found. as we have abysmal build&research capability, we have really low expenses 

[EuchreJack]

See, that's the thing: Colonies are an asset, not an expense (from a payroll prospective, they suck minerally).

[LoSboccacc]

ehe. so many choices and tradeoffs..

can't wait to see npr diversities 

[LoSboccacc]

2055, 13th April: Struve 2398

Our first jump has been succesfully performed. Refueled and restocked, our Ship Zero is set off in the universe, reaching the binary system Struve 2398

Struve 2398-A, classed M3-V is a red dwarf which stands right on the main sequence, being one of the most common star type in the known universe I’m not surprise about finding one. Still, the low average temperature of the star and the wide planet orbits means we’ll have few colonization opportunities. Preliminary survey show no habitable planets, except one right in the middle of the Goldilocks Zone, which seems a perfect fit for an human colony

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Struve 2398-B, classed M4-V is on the fart outskirt of the system. I wonder if the mass drivers could be calibrated from the double revolving planets. Still, no habitable planets around here. There is one that looks promising, but has an highly toxic concentration of gas in the atmosphere. I’ll see what I can do for that in the future.

The system seems inhabited, which is good. I cant wait for the survey to complete!

[Felius]

The system being inhabited is quite bad news. Unless you meant uninhabited, which is good. You don't want to find aliens so soon.

I'm also pretty you can make mass drivers unerring shoot from any body to any other body in the system, as long the destination also have a mass driver, as it sadly doesn't let you use the MD purposefully as a kinetic kill WMD. Distance is no issue either, you could make it a binary system it shooting from a planet in one start to other in another start, all that would happen is that it would take a while before the minerals start first arriving.