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Author Topic: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun  (Read 46865 times)

Reinhark

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #45 on: November 26, 2018, 06:32:29 PM »

Are those colonies profitable? IIRC the planets are all barren in Penelope's Star.

If you work for it, then yes.


Edit: I may have increased population tax income by 40% or so in previous play through because screw high hazard worlds.
« Last Edit: November 26, 2018, 06:36:45 PM by Reinhark »
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Thaago

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #46 on: November 26, 2018, 07:46:18 PM »

How long did you spend exploring/grinding to get all those AI cores and pristine nanoforges? Not gonna lie, that is an excessive amount of loot. 
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Dragon239

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #47 on: November 26, 2018, 07:46:58 PM »

What year is it in your game, Reinhark?
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knogleknuser

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #48 on: November 26, 2018, 11:55:01 PM »

Cyan Leader

My original blog post explains why I think they subtract from the gameplay experience.
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Histidine

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #49 on: November 27, 2018, 05:41:39 AM »

19 alpha cores? I found three (counting the quest one) after scouring 80% of the Sector :(

Although what really amuses me about the screenshot is that it reflects a real-life economic fact, namely that a primary economy is completely unnecessary to make an incredibly wealthy polity. Farming and resource extraction ain't got nothing on manufacturing.
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Reinhark

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #50 on: November 27, 2018, 06:27:16 AM »

How long did you spend exploring/grinding to get all those AI cores and pristine nanoforges? Not gonna lie, that is an excessive amount of loot.  

for AI cores, I've manually transferred them from last game, so that would be... 10 ingame years of exploration and non stop [ Redactated ] farming?

I could not transfer nanoforges, so I've obtained them with any means. 2 of them are from exploration. Another 3 from modded faction. Dassault-Mikoyan Engineering. 1 from same mod, Blade breakers. 1 from Hegemony and 1 from Persians.

19 alpha cores? I found three (counting the quest one) after scouring 80% of the Sector :(

The protip for getting cores is that [ Redactated ] station:
1. Respawns fleets, and therefore respawn cores.
2. Loots from station suck.

So you should let it live. And farm it. If you dare. Because their lategame fleet get really, really big.

Edit:
Oh, and get into commission while you are at it. Those factions will pay you while you farm.
« Last Edit: November 27, 2018, 06:50:48 AM by Reinhark »
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WastedAlmond

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #51 on: November 27, 2018, 08:38:32 AM »

I'm dropping in to give my experience with colonies. I've had no issues with expeditions except when my colonies were rather small and barebones.
 
First I gathered some capital by exploring and doing some minor bounty hunting. I'd managed to scrounge up some good ship BPs and a pristine nanoforge during my exploration also. Then after discovering a low hazard planet I proceeded to colonize it and rapidly expanded the infrastructure of said planet, managing to both start up its economy and defenses quite fast ~3 in game months. Then for the first few expeditions I had to help the planet fight them off.

After some time the planet produced enough revenue that it payed for most bribes by itself and even left some cash to spare in case my fleet failed at something. At this point I realized how useful it is to use growth incentives for a low hazard colony, because of the total population's effect on fleet size, at this point the planet could take most assaults and I'd bribe the absolutely huge ones. But once it grew to the size of "several millions of people" the defensive fleets would pound anything that came within the system.

I can really just leave my colonies to fend for themselves at this point, smaller outposts I have to protect occasionally, but the powers that be really hate my capital world so they don't get much hate anyways.

Edit: I started with one colony and bulked it up a bit before colonizing more, trying to avoid too much flak from pirates and factions. Throughout the game this first colony which is huge has continued to be the biggest target for factions.
« Last Edit: November 27, 2018, 08:41:51 AM by WastedAlmond »
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Dostya

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #52 on: November 27, 2018, 11:05:56 AM »

I've never had a problem defending a colony from a raid, but I tend to ensure a minimum of 2 colonies in a system and prefer 3 - all with full upgrades on their military bases. Between growth incentives being insanely broken and the tremendous profitability of even a size 3 low-hazard, I usually only bribe a raid or two before I can leave the colonies to handle themselves. Just, you know, you have to be prepared enough to found a couple colonies and have the money to set up the infrastructure to pull resources to found a third. Since I wanted to be able to provide all basic resources in faction in the same system the first time, I just never had the problems that others have had with this.

If anything, there should be some kind of ingame tip about putting colonies in the same system or a means for colonies in different systems to come to each others' defense.
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Serenitis

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #53 on: November 27, 2018, 01:51:29 PM »

*harsh*
If you don't belive me, that's fine. It does not however change anything.

Spoiler
[close]
This is my current threat.
The previous one was the Hegemony with both levels at "evenly matched", and they managed to trash both the station and the port.
This one looks like it's going to put the station in again but not do anything else. I intend to be present this time to see what happens, and maybe put some missiles somewhere sensitive.

Here is my main colony, and the target of all this aggro.
Spoiler
[close]
Note the terrorism and lack of AI cores.
If I turn the free port off atm the colony goes 151K into the red. Even with all the cores I have assigned, it still totals -22K.
Will have to check again when the fuel prod. comes back online, but it should be somewhere around ~250K with the port on. Hopefully that will be enough for me to turn it off at some point.
I could assign some AI cores to reduce costs, but I'm more than a bit wary of these 'inspection' guys.
Q: What sort of threat are the inspection fleets? Going off the lore, they seem like the kind of thing that would make expeditions look quite restrained given the Hegemony's well known love of AI.

Maybe double (or more) colonies in a system is the way to go next time. Along with a great deal more exploration, looking not only for decent planets but also large systems to populate.
This system only has 1 decent world, 1 'can only afford to support mining' world, and 1 worthless irradiated rock.

Interestingly enough I have 3 other colonies besides the one above.
A small bare-bones mining world in the same system, solely for collecting volatiles.
Spoiler
[close]
A heavily built up world a few ly away, but with no free port.
Spoiler
[close]
And a stockpile in Duzahk.
Spoiler
[close]
NONE of these have had any attention whatsoever.
(Yes, I am aware that they are not the 'best' planets ever, and that lower hazard levels = mo' money. Limited amount of exploration done due to wanting to see new content etc etc.)

This is a map of the sector, and you can see the three systems I have occupied.
Spoiler
[close]
These jokers are so determined to use literally their entire annual fuel supply to harrass some idiot out on the fringes of nowhere. :P

[edit]
Just ran a few days and got a new threat:
Spoiler
[close]
Same as last time, except less/weaker ground forces.
I think the colony has grown since the last one.
« Last Edit: November 27, 2018, 02:02:37 PM by Serenitis »
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Darloth

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #54 on: November 27, 2018, 01:58:55 PM »

I do see a gamma core on that population tile, if that's worth mentioning.   Of course I think the luddites hit you anyway if you have an Orbital Works...
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Serenitis

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #55 on: November 27, 2018, 02:05:38 PM »

That's a good catch. I thought I'd pulled all the cores.
*comm chirp*
You gained a new trait: NEGLIGENT :P
(They are a bit hard to see tbh, the colours blend in with the tiles.)

Quote
I think the luddites hit you anyway if you have an Orbital Works...
I'm p. sure they hit you if you have ANY heavy industry.
« Last Edit: November 27, 2018, 02:12:40 PM by Serenitis »
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Dragon239

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #56 on: November 27, 2018, 02:10:52 PM »

What's hitting your fleet quality?
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Serenitis

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #57 on: November 27, 2018, 02:17:45 PM »

What's hitting your fleet quality?
234% doesn't seem awful. No idea what's good or what isn't though.
Possibly it might be lack of a decent nanoforge. No idea what most of this stuff does tbh, only had 0.9 for a few days.
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Dragon239

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #58 on: November 27, 2018, 02:38:04 PM »

No, no, that's the size, which yeah is pretty good.
The quality can be viewed as a tooltip by hovering over it. I can tell it's not >=100% because you still have the 1 bronze "d-mod" symbol.

Edit: Actually I don't think there's anything wrong with it, you just only have a corrupted nanoforge rather than a pristine one. Didn't notice that.
« Last Edit: November 27, 2018, 03:07:28 PM by Dragon239 »
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StarGibbon

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Re: Colony Expeditions are Unfair and Unfun
« Reply #59 on: November 28, 2018, 11:55:52 AM »

I wouldn't like the idea that a positive rep with other factions made you immune to this danger. Because expeditions are a big part of the counterbalance to colony profits. Positive faction rep already makes the game easier, it doesn't need to negate half of the endgame threats too. It could increase the interval between expeditions, possibly.

Thats why I kind of wish it was impossible to have good relations with all the factions at once, aside from pirates/LP. I wish that improving relations with one decreased it with another, for another layer of descion making and guaranteed drama.
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