Newbie questions

Rammr

Chieftain
Joined
Jan 3, 2004
Messages
3
I am currently playing my first SMAC game, and I have some questions. I am playing on specialist difficulty to try things out. I'll describe the observations that puzzled me, I hope you don't mind the rather long read for rather simple questions, I just can't help it.

In the beginning of the game I put my labs to 100%, like I do in civ. I forgot about it and never put it lower afterwards. At some point I noticed I had 0 energy and an income of about -75. Lowering the labs rate slightly slowed my research, while income remained at a practical 0 until reaching a 50/50 ratio. Now how does my building maintainance get paid?
I tried to find out by looking at my base's labs output, and concluded energy (going 100% to labs) gets multiplied by (scientific) base improvements first, then maintainance costs are deducted from the bonus, then the -30% penalty I get by having labs at 100%. This seemed to be correct for most cities, but some have more maintainance costs than bonus energy output, and they still get a positive bonus! Also, when I got energy from pods, my reserves seemed to drop at a slower rate than my negative income dictates.
In short: I have no clue where exactly the energy for maintainance comes from, and I'd like to be enlightened on the subject. And what are the reasons I shouldn't keep my labs at 100% most of the time (apart from keeping the people happy)? In civ I usually only lower science to pay for units & buildings, but that doesn't seem to be needed in SMAC!

When trying to figure out the terrain, I (seem to recall I) encountered the following situations (I didn't take note of them then, I might be mistaken somewhere):
- after building a mine on a tile with already a farm on it, the farm bonus was removed
- building a farm on a rainy square had no effect
- building a mine on a rainy square made it produce 1 less nutrient until I build a farm on it, making it produce 2 again
- the information on a rocky tile stated a mine would provide only +1 bonus instead of the +2 stated in the data links
Later, tiles proved the "correct" recources. What did I miss? Is there some penalty like under despotism in civ?


Thank you.
 
Rammr said:
When trying to figure out the terrain, I (seem to recall I) encountered the following situations (I didn't take note of them then, I might be mistaken somewhere):
- after building a mine on a tile with already a farm on it, the farm bonus was removed
- building a farm on a rainy square had no effect
- building a mine on a rainy square made it produce 1 less nutrient until I build a farm on it, making it produce 2 again
- the information on a rocky tile stated a mine would provide only +1 bonus instead of the +2 stated in the data links
Later, tiles proved the "correct" recources. What did I miss? Is there some penalty like under despotism in civ?
- Building a mine will demolish the farm.
- You need Gene Splicing to have nutrient production more than 2 or 3, I'm not sure.
- Building a mine gives -1 nutrient (but never less than 1)
- You need Ecological Engineering (or Adv. EE) to get more than 2 or 3 minerals in a square, I'm not sure
 
The way the farm/mine thing works is as follows:
The square produces 2/1/0 nutrients if it is rainy/moist/arid.
If there is a farm, add one to this number.
If there is a nutrient resource, add two to this number.
If there is a mine and the square produces more than 1 nutrients, subtract 1.
If you do not yet have Gene Splicing, you will get only 2 nutrients. (If you do not have Ecological Engineering, you cannot get more than 2 minerals, and if you do not have Enviromental Economics, you cannot get more than 2 energy.)
*EXCEPTION* If the square has a bonus resource, then you will get the full amount of that resource even if you don't have the necessary technology. (You still get only a maximum of 2 of the other two resources unless you have the proper technology.)

-RdF
 
No need for new thread :) :
Is there a limit to the number of units in city production screen? I make tons of specialized units and wonder if there's a limit on how much the menu displays.
 
Energy is harvested from city squares and from trade.Deduct inefficiency and you have the net energy income pr. bace/turn.This energy is then allocated to economy,science and psyce,depending on your own settings.Only at this point will the modifiers apply,such as energy banks adding 50% to the economy.The buildings with modifiers are not culuminativ,so all additional bonuses will be added to that basic allocation figure.
All energy allocated to economy,together with energi credits you find or steal,becomes a part of your energy reserves,and maintainance expenses are deducted from here.
The F3 button will tell you your financial status and the in-out flow for every base.
 
Thank you but I don't think you understod my question (my fault).
I was asking if due to the fact that I design a great number of units some of them won't be visible on a city "production menu" due to the fact that there would be too much stuff to display (including buildings). Or not?
 
Geleon
I was answering Rammr,the guy who started this thread.You are the threadjacker, remember.
 
1. You are a newbie who just came to the forum and should keep a low profile for now.
2. Your answer was so confusing I had trouble understanding what you were on about anyway.
3. My question perfectly fits the category of this thread.
4. Chill ok?
 
Gelion said:
1. You are a newbie who just came to the forum and should keep a low profile for now.
I think n00bs should be able to post whatever they want to; not having to "keep a low profile"...
 
Posting - yes I'm all for it. But not tell the old posters to say that they are that and that.
 
True. But neither should old posters...
 
True but I don't like to be accused out of the blue :).
 
Point. :)

Ah, well, this is kinda unrelated, so I think I'll end this here...
 
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