Guns Vs. Butter - - Macro and micro.

from Stardock Forums
More likely, it is merely me having a misunderstanding of the game mechanics, but I've been thinking about something that is possibly a flaw in having military and social production seperate. For example, lets assume that our production is set a 50/50 for military and social. Then, lets assume we have three planets, A, B, and C with relatively equal production capacity. All the plantets are producing the same social improvement that takes 10 turns to complete, but only planet A and B are producing military units. It doesnt seem that the production of one hurts the production of another. Beacuse planet C isint producing a military unit, shouldn't its 50% military just roll over into social?
This was the benefit of just having one column for goods production, vis a vis civ. However, its nice to produce social and military separte, but the production of one should directly effect the production of the other. This way, I could shut down social production on the periphery planets while the core empire focused on social....

Thoughts?

[Message Edited]
252 views 6 replies
Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top
I'm not too happy with the economic system myself, but I can live with it as being an original concept that works... with which I can well live with. That said...

My thoughts...

To me, the social aspect is the ability of the culture to make a shipyard or bank or store in a given period of time, whereas the production (military production) is the shipyard's abiltity to produce warships in a given period of time. Honestly, I don't know if they are related in the game's algorithm.

What is confusing to me is military production; i.e., what improves it? As I see it, only improvements which increase "Star Ship Quality" result in gains for faster warship construction. Improvements in factories result in reduced times to make social improvements (banks, entertainment improvements, etc). Well, I'm speculating at this point, as I haven't had to the time to read at fan sites regarding this. I could be misunderstanding what I'm seeing in the game.

If I read you correctly, there is but one slider for production... true... so how are the funds divided out between ship building verses social improvements? I agree with your remarks in that regard. The "money" flowing to planet production should divert to social builds, warship ques, or both, depending on what is in the build ques; and, if other planets are "turned off" and the global slider isn't repositioned, the construction should even be faster (to a certain degree, as limited by the quality or not of improvements at the planet and the total available population). Maybe there should be a sliders for each planet also? Anyway, it may do that, I don't know.... It certianly seems to me a 400 credit social item aught to build pretty fast at planet X if all other planets are "off" in both social and military production, and there is a lot of global funds available collectively from all the planets of the player's empire. Yet, it doesn't seem to work that way.

It seems to me the flow of credits (money - whatever) to planets is more based on the economy at the planet than flow of money from the common bank (whatever) of the player... something does seem amiss, and I've yet to really figure that out myself....

Heh, I'm so used to how Master Of Orion II economics functions; how 4X economic typically works, that my "understanding" of it is probably partly clouded in this game.




[Message Edited]
Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top
As I see it, only improvements which increase "Star Ship Quality" result in gains for faster warship construction. Improvements in factories result in reduced times to make social improvements (banks, entertainment improvements, etc)
End of quote

Wrong: starship quality give bette stats. Planetary maufacturing bonus work on social AND military production (contrary to empire wide manufacturing bonus that are specialized). And to some extend to research
Sins of a Solar Empire II
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top
If I read you correctly, there is but one slider for production... true... so how are the funds divided out between ship building verses social improvements?
End of quote



On the domestic screen (the one with the Tax Rate slider and the Overall spending slider) you will notice on the bottom left a box which contains 3 vertical sliders. The one on the left tells what percentage of your spending goes to Military construction, the middle one is for Social construction, and the right one is for Research spending.
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top
As I see it, only improvements which increase "Star Ship Quality" result in gains for faster warship construction. Improvements in factories result in reduced times to make social improvements (banks, entertainment improvements, etc)

Wrong: starship quality give bette stats. Planetary maufacturing bonus work on social AND military production (contrary to empire wide manufacturing bonus that are specialized). And to some extend to research
End of quote


Thanks for clearing that up... you'd think that would be more obvious in the game as to funtion of "quality" (an unclear term in my opinion).

By improving "stats" I assume you mean hit points, attack factor and defense factor? Or just hit point or just attack and defense? All of them?

Anyway, then it would seem I agree even more with the original complaint... one should be able to divert resource (money, whatever) to one or the other (social - ship building) or both ques; and if funds are redirected to one or the other, then there aught to be a shorter build time as discussed earlier.




[Message Edited]
Reply #5 from Stardock Forums Top
If I read you correctly, there is but one slider for production... true... so how are the funds divided out between ship building verses social improvements?

Reply:

On the domestic screen (the one with the Tax Rate slider and the Overall spending slider) you will notice on the bottom left a box which contains 3 vertical sliders. The one on the left tells what percentage of your spending goes to Military construction, the middle one is for Social construction, and the right one is for Research spending
End of quote


Yep... I thought I said that in my own way (via the term "Global" - to mean the same as "Over-all" - sorry if I wasn't very clear). I've always seen those sliders as global to all the star systems since no star system has it's own slider controls as in other games; e.g., Master Of Orion II. What there needs to be is social slider seperate from ship production.

Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
You may want to take a look at this thread http://www.galciv.com/forum.asp?BID=GF&id=132094