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[Spearton95]

Greetings everyone, I'm writing here for a weird issue. I tried reading the wiki and searching on this forum, but to no avail.
I've built a colony for the first time, I built a mining industry but I'm noticing that none of the products are being exported: ores are just sitting in stockpile, and not being exported. The colony itself is a Free Port with 162% accessibility, it's quite close to core systems, it has a Spaceport and it's already size 4. When I go around doing quests, I come back to find tens of thousands of ores doing just nothing.
I'm building a refinery right now, to make things more profitable, since right now I have started to manually exporting them myself, but it's kinda time consuming. Also, I've never heard of anyone having to do this, so I assume I am doing something wrong.

Please note that produced materials are sitting in stockpile, not in storage.

Thanks everyone in advance for your help.

[Megas]

Your mining colony is already shipping ore out to other worlds automatically.  The ore in Colony Resources is for use either by you to take (which you pay with your income that month) or by the colony if it has a Refinery and a shortage of ore.

Your Refinery will import ore from other worlds (or the same one if it has Mining and ores too).  It will take from Colony Resources only if it has a shortage.

Only put items in Colony Resources to prepare for shortages.  Otherwise, put spare items into your personal storage, or sell them.

The piles of items deposited into Colony Resources by your industries is merely a small fraction of what they actually produce.  The player should be able to use what his colonies produce, and the player goes to Colony Resources to get those resources.  Usually, the price is good (baseline and no tariffs).

[JUDGE! slowpersun]

Usually, the price is good (baseline and no tariffs).

I've always wondered why a player's colony resources always only go as low as market price, but never are considered to have an oversupply and be cheaper than baseline market price...?  Not right away, but you eventually get these crazy high numbers since storage doesn't seem to have any sort of upper limit that I'm aware of (maybe something buried in code, I dunno).  Seems like the sort of thing a player may want to take advantage of at least mid-game, since by late-game you're either too rich to care or invading the core worlds anyway.  I haven't used the commercial industry in a while, so maybe that inventory tab is what gives the cheaper price, just not so cheap with the same 30% tariff on "your" market (yes, I know it isn't really yours, Independents own commercial market for some reason, but you never get any tax income to offset their ownership for some reason).

[Amoebka]

I guess shortages don't affect the price because you can cause shortages yourself whenever you want. Want a bunch of supplies? Dismantle your own spaceport to tank accessibility, buy 10000 supplies for cheap, build the spaceport back up. Somewhat exploity.

From the in-universe perspective, selling below the base price is selling at a loss. So when your own colony does it you can't profit from it, because well, it's your own colony.

[SCC]

I've always wondered why a player's colony resources always only go as low as market price, but never are considered to have an oversupply and be cheaper than baseline market price...?  Not right away, but you eventually get these crazy high numbers since storage doesn't seem to have any sort of upper limit that I'm aware of (maybe something buried in code, I dunno).  Seems like the sort of thing a player may want to take advantage of at least mid-game, since by late-game you're either too rich to care or invading the core worlds anyway.  I haven't used the commercial industry in a while, so maybe that inventory tab is what gives the cheaper price, just not so cheap with the same 30% tariff on "your" market (yes, I know it isn't really yours, Independents own commercial market for some reason, but you never get any tax income to offset their ownership for some reason).

Logically, the price of commodities in your stockpiles should go down with increased production, because the base price should be lowered by all that production. I expect the answer to that would be "Starsector is not that kind of game".
As for commerce, have you missed the big fat "+50% money" modifier it slaps on your colony?

[JUDGE! slowpersun]

I guess shortages don't affect the price because you can cause shortages yourself whenever you want. Want a bunch of supplies? Dismantle your own spaceport to tank accessibility, buy 10000 supplies for cheap, build the spaceport back up. Somewhat exploity.

From the in-universe perspective, selling below the base price is selling at a loss. So when your own colony does it you can't profit from it, because well, it's your own colony.

Not you selling, you taking.  Your own colony doesn't "sell" to you unless you have commerce industry.  It just charges the equivalent base price at the end of the month for whatever you take.  I was referring to why the price charged for taking from your colony stockpile never seems to drop below the base price, regardless of your production at colony.

I expect the answer to that would be "Starsector is not that kind of game".

Yet.

As for commerce, have you missed the big fat "+50% money" modifier it slaps on your colony?

No, I didn't miss that, I had just assumed it was a placeholder for a better system to come later.  Seems a pretty lazy bonus to tack onto an entire industry slot, no?

[Megas]

As for commerce, have you missed the big fat "+50% money" modifier it slaps on your colony?

No, I didn't miss that, I had just assumed it was a placeholder for a better system to come later.  Seems a pretty lazy bonus to tack onto an entire industry slot, no?

Better than +1 stability it originally gave, at least for the player's colonies.

The main problems with Commerce today is...
1) Went from terrible (+1 stability) to must-have (+50% or more income), especially with items that boost income from Commerce more.

2) Kills stability (-3).  Really hurts some core worlds (those with both Free Port and Commerce), and player cannot fix those worlds he does not own.  Player needs two colony improvements to partially offset the stability tax (+2 vs. -3) from the Commerce industry tax for his worlds.  Player still wants 10 stability for fleet quality and size (to hopefully avoid babysitting his colonies personally).

[JUDGE! slowpersun]

Better than +1 stability it originally gave, at least for the player's colonies.

The main problems with Commerce today is...
1) Went from terrible (+1 stability) to must-have (+50% or more income), especially with items that boost income from Commerce more.

2) Kills stability (-3).  Really hurts some core worlds (those with both Free Port and Commerce), and player cannot fix those worlds he does not own.  Player needs two colony improvements to partially offset the stability tax (+2 vs. -3) from the Commerce industry tax for his worlds.  Player still wants 10 stability for fleet quality and size (to hopefully avoid babysitting his colonies personally).

I guess I was more referring to the fact that a flat +50% bonus (or up flat +100% with improvements) bonus itself lacks subtlety.  Increasing colony income % by the accessibility/2 seems at a minimum a more nuanced system (which would still be 50% at 100 accessibility, and like 90% max without improvements, since I think accessibility stat maxes at 185?).  How much industry reduces stability could also prolly be linked to how much bonus income is given, increasing stability penalty as income bonus increases (so normal +50% at 100 accessibility only gives -1 stability, but +100% gives -3 or even -5 stability; how it grows subject to balancing).  I'm assuming that even with bonuses maybe bumping stability penalty over -3 won't cause a colony to spiral out of control, and if stability penalty is linked to increase in income %, player shouldn't ever be able to fully min/max commerce industry income % bonus since inversely proportional.

Edit: Spelling.

[Megas]

High stability used to give bonus income, which turned stability into the god stat for colonies.  Now, income bonus was moved to Commerce, which turns Commerce into almost a must-have industry tax like Military Base.  Even so, stability is still a very important stat to keep fleet quality and size up (especially since we cannot grow our colonies past size 6 anymore).  Building clunkers out of your Orbital Works is no fun, so stability should still be at 10 at all times.

High stability not giving income was an attempt to make stability less important (or make less than 10 stability acceptable).  However, given colony fleet stats and size 6 cap, stability is as important or more so than before.

[SCC]

Yet.

Heh.

No, I didn't miss that, I had just assumed it was a placeholder for a better system to come later.  Seems a pretty lazy bonus to tack onto an entire industry slot, no?

Better than a bonus that's actually no benefit.

How much industry reduces stability could also prolly be linked to how much bonus income is given, increasing stability penalty as income bonus increases (so normal +50% at 100 accessibility only gives -1 stability, but +100% gives -3 or even -5 stability; how it grows subject to balancing).

With current interface, it would be quite annoying to manage.

[JUDGE! slowpersun]

No, I didn't miss that, I had just assumed it was a placeholder for a better system to come later.  Seems a pretty lazy bonus to tack onto an entire industry slot, no?

Better than a bonus that's actually no benefit.

True, true, a placebo false bonus is always worse, especially if determining bonus/penalty process is opaque (ie, you don't know how the snake oil is made, or its ingredients).  Maybe better to have commerce cause a demand for rec drugs instead (seriously, finance bros today can't deduct drug purchases, but they CAN deduct visits to the strip club since ordinary/necessary business expenses tax deduction added back into tax code!).

How much industry reduces stability could also prolly be linked to how much bonus income is given, increasing stability penalty as income bonus increases (so normal +50% at 100 accessibility only gives -1 stability, but +100% gives -3 or even -5 stability; how it grows subject to balancing).

With current interface, it would be quite annoying to manage.

Possibly, having bonus (accessibility) and penalty (stability) values be inverted should deal with most issues related to managing any sort of negative feedback loop that might arise (just uninstall AI core, although unlikely adding an AI core would exacerbate any issues).  SP bonus more of an issue.  But I'm assuming the primary source of instability would be commerce with Free Port status, which should mostly cancel out with accessibility bonus instead.  Can always turn Free Port off... or I guess just add another building to game that just adds free stability (but maybe would be expensive to run/use, so player only really has to build it if they have built commerce industry).

Alternatively, as I just suggested above in this post, might just be easier to have the commerce industry penalty just be an increased demand for rec drugs.  You don't have to watch "The Wolf of Wall Street" to know that people do drugs while working.  Plenty of truckers hopped up on meth to help drive all night!

Edit:  Well, much of this discussion's tangent regarding the cost/benefits of the +50% income bonus from the Commerce industry has been rendered moot, since today's post of patch notes includes the following:

• Commerce: reduced base income bonus to 25% (was: 50%)