Fractal Softworks Forum

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Advanced search  

News:

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

Author Topic: Best Colonies  (Read 14616 times)

intrinsic_parity

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 3071
    • View Profile
Best Colonies
« on: May 24, 2019, 08:55:49 AM »

In the last patch, the best colonies were low hazard near the core. How has that changed?  I've seen some people say systems with 3+ colonies are the best now and that hazard rating matters a bit less.

So far, I've found one system with 3 habitable worlds (and 2 more high hazard high resource worlds) but its 20 ly from the core and two of the habitable worlds have 175 hazard. I've also found a system with a 50 hazard teran world 10 ly from the core but the only other planets are barren worlds with not much useful on them. Which would be better for colonization?
Logged

Recklessimpulse

  • Commander
  • ***
  • Posts: 116
    • View Profile
Re: Best Colonies
« Reply #1 on: May 24, 2019, 09:10:38 AM »

Colonies are a bit more profitable now with a 150% colony for instance making 10k a month profit with only a space port after you pay to defend the place it make less obviously but it changes the dynamic of a perfect system. Ideal you would still have one world of 100% or 75% for expensive industries/ light industry (it makes so little profit without free port) but now to have enough Materials you also want a world with +2 ideally (those world grow slower if you don't aid them so you want them to be able to lag) of everything but food (can be -1) and organics (can +0).
Logged

StarScum

  • Commander
  • ***
  • Posts: 127
    • View Profile
Re: Best Colonies
« Reply #2 on: May 25, 2019, 12:57:19 AM »

God, running this colony is killing me. I manage to fight off a HUGE pirate armada right out the gate (far larger than I think my fledgling colony should rate) and then I have to bribe the Hegemony 100,000 credits so they don't confiscate my Alpha Core governor only to turn right back around and start raiding my colony for being a freeport. I should have made nice with the Hegemony before founding the colony, I think.

Did I make a mistake trying to get Heavy Industry up and running ASAP? I've got a Pristine Nanoforage and a Beta Core running it, but it was very expensive to get up and running and the first few months I was operating at a significant loss because it was building fleets I didn't ask it to...
Logged

Goumindong

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 1889
    • View Profile
Re: Best Colonies
« Reply #3 on: May 25, 2019, 01:06:06 AM »

In the last patch, the best colonies were low hazard near the core. How has that changed?  I've seen some people say systems with 3+ colonies are the best now and that hazard rating matters a bit less.

So far, I've found one system with 3 habitable worlds (and 2 more high hazard high resource worlds) but its 20 ly from the core and two of the habitable worlds have 175 hazard. I've also found a system with a 50 hazard teran world 10 ly from the core but the only other planets are barren worlds with not much useful on them. Which would be better for colonization?

Colonies close to the core with low hazard are still "best" in that they will make the most income. But the difference between them and colonies away from the core isn't so huge as to be insurmountable.

The main thing is that there is a scaling buff which reduces effective upkeep costs by up to 50% if you can supply your own resources, which isn't that hard if you produce all the resources.

Colonies far away from the core have some advantages in that it should be possible to meet internal demand with low accessibility. Low accessibility primarily reduces your ability to export which can mean that you might be able to supply your own systems(thus reducing upkeep) while staying under the percentage of exports that trigger a retaliation.

The main advantage for having all your colonies in the same system is that it saves time when you want to go hunt the pirate base associated with your colonies and also makes it easier to defend against retaliation fleets. If you're in multiple systems you're going to get multiple bases. Which means more flying around to kill pirate bases.

Pathers are no longer a significant problem and mainly are a stability issue unless you get them and other stability issues at the same time. Though you don't even need to trigger them so long as you can deal with pirates. As you can fairly reasonably keep under their radar unless you're hard into cores.

Re: Last Post

Its probably best to not put an alpha core in until you're prepared to go to war with the Hegemony.

Making nice with hegemony isn't going to stop their AI inspections. You're going to have to pay them off every time even if you get a commission.
Logged

Cosmitz

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 758
    • View Profile
Re: Best Colonies
« Reply #4 on: May 26, 2019, 10:41:54 PM »

Low accessibility primarily reduces your ability to export which can mean that you might be able to supply your own systems(thus reducing upkeep) while staying under the percentage of exports that trigger a retaliation.

It's funny because i stayed just in the realm of 'trying things out' with colonies in the current 0.9 and one of those experiments was 'how useless can i make a colony and will it stay off the radar if it is'. Short answer, given colonies by default 'produce' people and you 'export' crew, is no. You have huge pirate fleets attacking your peaceful, hippie commune colony just because they're having too much sex and some of those dudes want to go out and work on starships.
Logged

Goumindong

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 1889
    • View Profile
Re: Best Colonies
« Reply #5 on: May 27, 2019, 12:46:58 AM »

You can never avoid pirates unless youre friendly/non-hostile with them. You can avoid fleets from producers because youve got too large a market share
Logged

Megas

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 12118
    • View Profile
Re: Best Colonies
« Reply #6 on: May 27, 2019, 05:59:18 AM »

At least pirates are a bit easier to deal with for a fledgling player.  As for major factions, after player builds fuel production or heavy industry, those bullies will declare war in all but name and send invaders to rough your colony up.  Even mining on a world with rich ores can attract Tri-Tachyon.  I think once colony grows big enough, it may be too hard to avoid expeditions from major factions.

I refrain from taking Industrial Planning until I can no longer avoid expeditions.  Then I crank colony skills to the max and boost income.
Logged

Megas

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 12118
    • View Profile
Re: Best Colonies
« Reply #7 on: June 05, 2019, 04:47:47 AM »

For someone who wants to avoid Pathers (bugs aside), I like at least four planets:
* Two low hazard worlds (100% or less).  One for Heavy Industry with nanoforge, another for Fuel Production with synchrotron.
* Two worlds with Mining.  I do not think there is a single world with both ores and volatiles at +1 or more, and organics.  Lower the hazard, the better.  Will likely be from 150% to 200% hazard.

Low hazard worlds will also have Farming and Light Industry.  They cannot use other useful Industries without attracting Pathers.

At least one Mining world will have Refinery.  Other useful industries would be Farming, Light Industry, or Heavy Industry without nanoforge.

All will have at least Military Base.  Low hazard worlds will have High Command.  Higher hazard worlds might need to upgrade to High Command if alone in the system.  All of them need to be able to defend against the neverending stream of raiders from pirates and majors, unlike core worlds who only get raided by pirates.

If mining world is in the same system as a low hazard with High Command, it might get away with Commerce or another industry instead of Military Base.  (I do not get Commerce if I store ships there, due to extra clicks needed to access storage.)

With four planets, that means max Colony Management, and max Industrial Planning to meet demand and get max profit from four worlds.
« Last Edit: June 05, 2019, 05:02:17 AM by Megas »
Logged

Hiruma Kai

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 879
    • View Profile
Re: Best Colonies
« Reply #8 on: June 05, 2019, 12:09:32 PM »

I like colonizing a single system with at least 3 planets, closer to the core is preferable.  I tend to just use AI cores for administrators, so I don't care about the Pather interest stacking as I'm going to be dealing with them anyways.

Ideally something like a low hazard (50-125%) farming/organics planet, a low to moderate hazard (100-200%) ore/rare ore planet and a volatiles planet (ideally 250% or less hazard).  End up with farming, 3 mines, refinery, light industry, orbital works, fuel production, and 3 HQs to have a huge defense fleet by the time they hit tier 7.
Logged

Schwartz

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 1452
    • View Profile
Re: Best Colonies
« Reply #9 on: June 05, 2019, 01:01:45 PM »

You can still get 100% access at the edge of the map, as long as you have an alpha core in your spaceport and appropriate skills etc.
Logged