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Starsector 0.97a is out! (02/02/24); New blog post: Simulator Enhancements (03/13/24)

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Author Topic: Population Growth  (Read 26829 times)

Alex

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Population Growth
« on: November 19, 2017, 12:12:33 PM »

Blog post here.
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TheBawkHawk

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #1 on: November 19, 2017, 01:13:34 PM »

This is awesome! I don't know if it's been said before, but I noticed that you're able to develop a Luddic colony? If we have high enough standing with a faction, will we be able to create colonies for them instead of it being the player faction? As well, if I create a colony in the player faction, will I be able to sell that colony to a faction? If it hasn't been discussed or mentioned yet I think that would be quite an interesting play style, setting up colonies and selling them off to the highest bidder.
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Gothars

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #2 on: November 19, 2017, 01:22:16 PM »

Interesting!

If migration is the main driver of market growth, does that mean that growing markets typically stall the growth of surrounding markets by luring their population away?

Can you go about this actively, for example by blocking food from reaching a neighboring market, so that their pops migrate toward your own colony?


Btw, isn't "time until next market size is reached at current rate" usually more interesting to the player than "population growth in percent"? The latter is useful when comparing colony performance in an abstract way, the former tells you the more tangible info how long you have to wait to get new options.
« Last Edit: November 19, 2017, 01:28:21 PM by Gothars »
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Megas

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #3 on: November 19, 2017, 01:34:34 PM »

I hope this is the start of support for official, vanilla Nexerelin (kill'em all) style games, instead of relying on Nexerelin to do said conquest or destruction.

Yes, I eventually get tired of playing lapdog to a major faction.  Time for my character to be a new major faction, or at least wield the power of one (despite not being recognized as a major faction).
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Alex

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #4 on: November 19, 2017, 01:56:58 PM »

This is awesome! I don't know if it's been said before, but I noticed that you're able to develop a Luddic colony?

Well, in the current dev build, you can manage markets belonging to other factions, so I'm just taking screenshots at all sorts of core markets, for color variety.

If we have high enough standing with a faction, will we be able to create colonies for them instead of it being the player faction? As well, if I create a colony in the player faction, will I be able to sell that colony to a faction? If it hasn't been discussed or mentioned yet I think that would be quite an interesting play style, setting up colonies and selling them off to the highest bidder.

Maybe? It's all stuff I'm thinking about to various degrees (perhaps less about selling colonies as a playstyle, specifically), but I really can't say right now.

If migration is the main driver of market growth, does that mean that growing markets typically stall the growth of surrounding markets by luring their population away?

It's not a zero-sum game (for much the same reasons the economy isn't - needs to be comprehensible and run in reasonable time, performance-wise), so as it stands: no.

Can you go about this actively, for example by blocking food from reaching a neighboring market, so that their pops migrate toward your own colony?

Not in the base system, but I could see this sort of thing working as "events" coded on top of it - i.e. if there's a food shortage, there's a chance of a migration from the affected world going somewhere else. I think this'll depend on how it feels to play to begin with and whether outpost management will need more active things to do to interact with.

Btw, isn't "time until next market size is reached at current rate" usually more interesting to the player than "population growth in percent"? The latter is useful when comparing colony performance in an abstract way, the former tells you the more tangible info how long you have to wait to get new options.

Hmm. Time is harder to evaluate as being good or bad, though. And if the rate is negative, then it won't tell you anything about how negative it is, it'd just be "infinity" regardless. There's a progress indicator under the "population" infrastructure showing the current percentage, and I think the arithmetic involved isn't too much to ask, at least to the low level of exactness that's needed.

I hope this is the start of support for official, vanilla Nexerelin (kill'em all) style games, instead of relying on Nexerelin to do said conquest or destruction.

I'd imagine so, I mean establishing outposts pretty much means "your own faction", and being able to get into conflicts with other factions on a more even footing at that point seems like a very natural progression.
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PCCL

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #5 on: November 19, 2017, 02:55:17 PM »

From this post (admittedly specifically about population growth), it seems like the natural progression for outposts/colonies/markets is to get bigger.

Is this necessarily the case? Is there a place in the game for small and mean installations, research installations, shipyards, or hideouts that are ran more like a military base than a civilian society?
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Alex

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #6 on: November 19, 2017, 03:24:56 PM »

Is this necessarily the case? Is there a place in the game for small and mean installations, research installations, shipyards, or hideouts that are ran more like a military base than a civilian society?

To some degree, though the way the mechanics are, there's only a bit of benefit to having a smaller market, which is naturally higher stability. But, I mean, a smaller shipyard is going to be worse than a bigger one, and likewise for most other industries.

Something that might make sense is a small mining operation on a high-hazard but rich world - it doesn't need to be big due to the bonuses from the resource deposits, and it won't really get bigger w/o investment due to the high hazard rating. Though if it did get bigger, it'd be mostly upside.
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Nanao-kun

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #7 on: November 19, 2017, 03:26:53 PM »

We love you Alex.

Man, I can't wait to see all this in action. Still quite a ways off though, I suppose.
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Alex

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #8 on: November 19, 2017, 03:33:47 PM »

We love you Alex.

:D

Man, I can't wait to see all this in action. Still quite a ways off though, I suppose.

Yeah, it kind of is - still not something I'm able to even playtest on my end, far too many large missing pieces. Still, it really does feel like it's coming together. A few content things I'm super excited about adding, too, but :-X on that.
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PCCL

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #9 on: November 19, 2017, 03:40:56 PM »

Guess what I'm asking is, if I want to say run a small military hideout where everyone on board is under my employ, and it acts as a storage facility, mining operation, or shipyard with no/little civilian presence, is that possible?
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Alex

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #10 on: November 19, 2017, 03:58:04 PM »

Guess what I'm asking is, if I want to say run a small military hideout where everyone on board is under my employ, and it acts as a storage facility, mining operation, or shipyard with no/little civilian presence, is that possible?

Well, I guess how you choose to think of a size-3 or size-4 market with a negative/negligible growth rate and high stability is up to you!

I don't think I'm quite getting the question. If it's in the spirit of "I want to do it for RP reasons", then the above answer applies. If not, could you elaborate?
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bowman

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #11 on: November 19, 2017, 04:13:05 PM »

I think what he is referring to may be the ability to make a colony that doesn't naturally trade with other colonies or otherwise grow/take immigrants (because everyone is actually employed by the player at that outpost rather than just living there and working). I may be wrong though.
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PCCL

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #12 on: November 19, 2017, 04:28:23 PM »

Eh, I guess part of me hoped hired employees would be differentiated from immigrants, but I can be convinced they're the same thing under the hood.

Yeah, it's mostly an RP thing, but I do like my RP to have certain gameplay implications
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Alex

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #13 on: November 19, 2017, 05:01:20 PM »

Eh, I guess part of me hoped hired employees would be differentiated from immigrants, but I can be convinced they're the same thing under the hood.

Yeah, it's mostly an RP thing, but I do like my RP to have certain gameplay implications

Aha, right - the "higher stability for smaller markets" actually is meant to simulate that, among other things. The party in charge of the market has more control over smaller markets (thus higher stability) due to a larger proportion of the population being employed by it, etc.
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PCCL

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Re: Population Growth
« Reply #14 on: November 19, 2017, 05:11:00 PM »

in the same vein, is there/can there be an option to cap immigration?
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