Rush buying on a desolate planet

[Padje Dog]

Does anyone else hope rush buying with gold/energy/credits/c-bills/whatever will be either limited like in civ 4 or banned outright?

You land on the planet and need to survive. Who are you paying to rush build items? The concept of a private industry to pay to build items is silly in the context of a small population trying to survive on an alien planet.

A great solution would be to allow one of the city-states (whatever they are called) when allied with the player the ability to rush buy, which simulates the city-state doing it.

 

[s0nny80y]

Resources undergo a round of space fever politics and some items take priority such as rush buying tiles btw I am in the middle of an EPIC game and it beats up Quick mode, badly.

 

[Ivan Hunger]

Remember the replicators from Star Trek: The Next Generation?

I assume that when you "rush buy" with energy, you're actually expending a large amount of reserve energy to instantly rearrange base atomic elements into a completed structure.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Does anyone else hope rush buying with gold/energy/credits/c-bills/whatever will be either limited like in civ 4 or banned outright?

You land on the planet and need to survive. Who are you paying to rush build items? The concept of a private industry to pay to build items is silly in the context of a small population trying to survive on an alien planet.

A great solution would be to allow one of the city-states (whatever they are called) when allied with the player the ability to rush buy, which simulates the city-state doing it.

Even on an alien planet you aren't going to get your population working productively 20 hours a day.

Rush buying is consuming all the 'excess' production that normally goes into making your population relaxed and happy (like WWII mobilization.... no consumer goods)

... also in this case it is energy, and by providing energy in excess of the minimum maintenance you can run the factories for longer and use wasteful.. but fast.. processes.

 

[Fabio1701]

it would be indeed silly to rush buy in the early stages, but i think at one point it should be allowed when a combination of industrial surplus and technology allow it. Perhaps with the invention of replicators.

 

[3of5]

We had discussed it a while ago when disputing the validity of energy as a currency. One idea was that currency is actually a representation of stockpiled goods and ressources. Lets say you have 211 energy stockpiled and want to rush build a 200 energy clinic. You take all the ressources and prefabricated elements out of the stockpile and they miraculously are exactly what you need to put together a clinic.
Honestly, rush buying was stupid in every civ game to date. Only in Civ4 it was somehow mitigated/explained by tying it to the social engineering choices. Later on in CivBE i would totaly buy the replicators story, but maybe not right after landing.

 

[boghog]

I sort of get rush buying for buildings as the energy cost can be seen as money you give as extra incentives to workers. However, it makes no sense if you use it to rush buy units (where are those extra people coming from?) or to buy tiles to expand your borders (who are you buying them from?).

 

[Lord Tirian]

I guess in a early colony, energy is rationed, so energy literally means you can let machines work overtime - that's sensible for buildings and units (since without equipment, you only have a bunch of dudes doing nothing). Buying tiles is probably "just" an upfront payment of energy maintenance until the people living on/owning the tile have their own generators.

It's all a bit wonky, but explainable enough that the abstraction doesn't snap the suspension of disbelief.

 

[Smith of Lie]

I sort of get rush buying for buildings as the energy cost can be seen as money you give as extra incentives to workers. However, it makes no sense if you use it to rush buy units (where are those extra people coming from?) or to buy tiles to expand your borders (who are you buying them from?).

1. Units. Since each "citizen" represents roughly about 1000 people, one could assume that not all of them are required to work the tiles/be specialists. Energy expanded is used to automate processes they were responsible for, give them a brief training and produce necessary equipement.

2. It is less about buying tile from someone and more about expanding effort to quickly stake the land, build infrastucture and establish powerbase in the region.

Of course it is not realistic. But it is also one of those instances when gameplay trumps over realism - ability to spend currency on stuff creates options for players and makes for more meaningful choices.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

If you have 200 'energy' it doesn't necessarily mean you actually have that energy stored, it means you have enough fuel to generate it. People didn't actually have gold before the gold standard was abolished. If you rush buy with energy you pay your colonists more and/or make more energy (lterally), materials or processor cycles available to finish the project quickly. every game, especially 4X games need abstraction to work.
The restriction on rushing was one of the things I hated about Civ 4, but I wouldn't mind that much if rushing had to be unlocked in BE through a very early tech, and when I say early I mean not more than two techs removed from habitation. I would prefer it to be available from the start because it offers more opening strategies.

And please no replicators. I prefer my SF without this kind of stupid. I let Star Trek get away with it because of the grandfather clause, but any SF produced during this century should stay away from nonsense like practical matter -> energy conversion.

 

[boghog]

ability to spend currency on stuff creates options for players and makes for more meaningful choices.

Does it though?
If there are two ways to get what I want (expend hammers or expend gold in CiV parlance) the choice of what tile improvement I want to build (mine ore trading post) becomes less meaningful.

 

[Smith of Lie]

Ture if buying buildings/units was the only thing to spend gold on. But with CS loyalty, research agreements, grabbing tiles, upgrading existing units, buying off your neighbours and so forth it creates more options and allows flexibility.

Also, buying tiles is a must, considering how you have no control over the natural expansion of the borders.

 

[3of5]

Rush buying makes sense from a gameplay point of view, allowing the player more flexibility and different options in the game. Thats why i'd leave it in the game. But its hard to justify it storywise on a virgin planet with a survival oriented economy, where private initiative would sensibly curtailed the first years. Just breaking down a 20 turns build time to 1 turn through "overtime magic" does not sound very plausible to me. Aside from the stockpile idea i have no idea that would make really sense. But the rush build mechanic is so useful, i'd just overlook it not making much sense at the beginning. I could agree to being it unlocked by T2-T3 Tech (either some "energy intensive rapid fabrication" or "community goal oriented free market steering" Techs).

It could also be unlocked through social engineering like in Civ4, but should be available much earlier. This would represent the switch from a ressource based planned economy, where all yields would be managed by colony leadership to a market based economy with private property, which is more productive but yields less ressources (and maybe more money) for the colony leadership to manage. Might be hard to balance though.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

If there are two ways to get what I want (expend hammers or expend gold in CiV parlance) the choice of what tile improvement I want to build (mine ore trading post) becomes less meaningful.

Not really. Production and money are not equal in Civ 5. The mine will always be the more efficient choice if all you want is to get buildings and units in the city with the improvement, and you can't buy wonders.
On the other hand, buying can be a good way to develop a new city or to quickly raise an army for an unexpected war. You have to decide whether you would rather have more overall industrial capacity mines or more flexibility. And then there's the other stuff that you can use money for: resource deals, unit upgrades, research agreements, city states (althou not in BE).

 

[Ivan Hunger]

I'm willing to concede that buying tiles from no one has never made sense. But then, culture spread has never really made sense either.

Border growth is just one of those things that's too complicated to portray realistically.

 

[Fabio1701]

I'm willing to concede that buying tiles from no one has never made sense. But then, culture spread has never really made sense either.

Border growth is just one of those things that's too complicated to portray realistically.

I imagined that buying tiles from no one was simply the costs of installing fences and cctv cameras (or the stoneage equivalent) around wild land.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

I imagined that buying tiles from no one was simply the costs of installing fences and cctv cameras (or the stoneage equivalent) around wild land.

Actually for Civ 5 I assumed that the entire world is actually populated. its just most tiles have a population that is too small to matter.... your culture OR gold can encourage the natives to not give your people any trouble as they harvest/march troops around.


[Which is why I was hoping for a different method of border expansion for BE... its still somewhat justifiable... you spend the culture/gold to get Your own people to make the effort to tame the area.. but I was hoping for a new mechanism.]

 

[Josephias]

Actually for Civ 5 I assumed that the entire world is actually populated. its just most tiles have a population that is too small to matter.... your culture OR gold can encourage the natives to not give your people any trouble as they harvest/march troops around.

That is the most plausible explanation for CIV 5.

imagined that buying tiles from no one was simply the costs of installing fences and cctv cameras (or the stoneage equivalent) around wild land

And that is the most realistic explanation for CIV BE (and one of the main points to change gold to energy: survival scenario, you do not have extra hands to pay, but a limited, highly needed resource that can be devote for specific uses)

But then, culture expansión does not make much sense in an alien planet. Does it? Unless you consider culture something different:

> Culture in CIV 5 - likeliness to impress non-aligned people to join (or not attack) your empire (can be substitued by gold, bribing them to join/not attack you). It is also a measure of the strenght of your goverment, bringing policies and resistence against foregin influence (in BNW).

> Culture in CIV BE - conviction of your people towards the mission, quite conflicts with devotion (but this one is related to affinitives). Would lead them to explore further/take a bit more risk (tile expansión - which can be substituted with an extra effort to provide safety/confort in a newly colonized tile - energy expenditure). Also lead them to develop strong values and traditions to help you (virtues).

 

[awesome]

Lots of things don't make sense if you take them too literally.
That being said, I definitely agree that you shouldn't be able to rush buy things from turn 1. For one, while I'm sure the faction leaders have quite a bit of money, at least realistically, the focus would probably be on setting up living quarters before building power plants and such.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Lots of things don't make sense if you take them too literally.
That being said, I definitely agree that you shouldn't be able to rush buy things from turn 1. For one, while I'm sure the faction leaders have quite a bit of money, at least realistically, the focus would probably be on setting up living quarters before building power plants and such.

Why would the faction leaders have money??
You normally don't start out with a lot of money on turn 1, I don't expect that to be different here. (ie not a lot of energy expected on turn 1)