MoO1: Robotic Controls Mechanics?

[d0om]

I have noticed in my current game an oddity I didn't realise occured:

after researching robotic controls III all my factories are costing 50% more, even ones which are less than the planet's population!

I always thought that you carried on making factories cheaply until you hit 2* the planet's pop, then you had to pay the refit cost and then build more expensive factories until you hit the next robotics tech repeat etc.

However it seems that I am paying the new, higher cost for all new factories even on new colonies, which is really slowing my growth and making me wish I hadn't researching robotic controls until I had something better than Improved Industrial Tech 9.

Has anyone else noticed this?

I am playing on impossible if that makes any difference.

 

[bahman]

I have noticed in my current game an oddity I didn't realise occured:

after researching robotic controls III all my factories are costing 50% more, even ones which are less than the planet's population!

I always thought that you carried on making factories cheaply until you hit 2* the planet's pop, then you had to pay the refit cost and then build more expensive factories until you hit the next robotics tech repeat etc.

However it seems that I am paying the new, higher cost for all new factories even on new colonies, which is really slowing my growth and making me wish I hadn't researching robotic controls until I had something better than Improved Industrial Tech 9.

Has anyone else noticed this?

I am playing on impossible if that makes any difference.

That is the rule, all extra factories which are controlled by robotic control are more expensive.

 

[d0om]

But even the ones which AREN'T extra seem to be costing more! The first factory on a planet is costing the new, higher price. Then after building 2*pop factories you have to pay to refit them (even though you allready payed 1.5*base cost) then you can build more factories at 1.5*base cost up to the new limit of 3 / pop.

It means you are paying too much for the first 2* pop factories, especially with the extra refit costs ontop of the extra factory costs!

Or am I just going mad?

 

[bahman]

But even the ones which AREN'T extra seem to be costing more! The first factory on a planet is costing the new, higher price. Then after building 2*pop factories you have to pay to refit them (even though you allready payed 1.5*base cost) then you can build more factories at 1.5*base cost up to the new limit of 3 / pop.

It means you are paying too much for the first 2* pop factories, especially with the extra refit costs ontop of the extra factory costs!

Or am I just going mad?

I think what is happening is as following. If you have a set systems and after that discover RC then all your systems goes for refit first and after that build new factories which are more expensive than normal one. But if you already have RC and colonize a new system, you pay cost of refit and extra factories in avarage for each factory you build. So that seems that price of each factory is a little bit more. Well, you finally pay the same total price for having all your factory but that makes growth of your econmy a little bit slower. You migth also noticed that the number of factories you built in your systems even goes higer than number of current max pop as far as you still didn't upgrate those systems.

So I agree that having RC decrease the economy growth if you are in the starting of the game and you have much space to expand. So you have consider the ratio of compeletly develpoed systems to the number of systems you will clonize soon to see if you get any profit from that.

 

[barron of ideas]

Or Play the Mechlars, who "do not need to pay to refit factories for Robitic Control." (page 46 of the manual.)

 

[d0om]

They still have to pay for more expensive factories though, just not the extra-bonus charge of the refits it seems.