I think there would be a diplomatic impact from sending a ship to the Darlok's system to scan their fleet. We would be intruding on their system. We have an NAP, not an alliance, so that would be a violation of their territory.
We know the upper bounds of what could be on those designs, since we have known the Darloks' tech for 10 turns or so now and they have had the needle design for longer than that. The bigger ships I am less sure of, but they can't have anything better than what we currently know for the Darloks' tech. So merculite missiles is a possibility, along with neutron pellet guns and hyper-x. And of course, they could be loaded with death spores.
Since I'm up next, a quick question: Should I push for completing Planetary Shield research sooner or later? Researching it means that we can't build emergency missile bases on short notice, unless we pre-build shields on frontier colonies.
I would like to get at least one missile base up on each of our worlds, with the exception of Firma. (Would love to have one there, too, but.....) With all our planets maxed out, one base should not take long to build. Then we can add planetary shields once the tech comes in, with 8 points of shielding total. That should stop anything short of actual bombs or better-than-default missiles with the half damage effect of beam/gun weapons against planets.
(May 8th, 2017, 10:44)haphazard1 Wrote: That should stop anything short of actual bombs or better-than-default missiles...
... or Death Spores. The AIs do love their bioweapons.
I don't think it's worth delaying Shields V to throw up missile bases. Waiting for the next tech to come in is one of the more insidious traps in this game. It's usually better to follow your strategy and let the techs happen when they make sense.
(May 7th, 2017, 18:36)RefSteel Wrote: The "REFIT" that shows up on the Industry slider is bugged, and doesn't reflect what the world will actually produce. It behaves exactly as if the refit cost for the planet's existing factories were infinity, when in fact the refit cost you will actually pay are either 0 (my experience, not tested thoroughly) or tiny (Sargon's analysis.)
haphazard: I haven't seen the latest save, but the main thing I'd suggest is, have fun! (Back to work now...)
The funniest part is that not having to pay refit costs is supposed to be one of the perks of the Meklars...and indeed, IIRC, the control panel never displays REFIT when you play the Meklars. Awesome!
(May 8th, 2017, 02:49)shallow_thought Wrote:
(May 7th, 2017, 16:02)RFS-81 Wrote: Could you post a link, please? The manual says that every level of Robotic Controls increases factory cost by 50%, and for refitting, you simply have to pay the difference between the previous and current cost. Is it actually more complicated than that? I could imagine some weird edge cases when you discover better Robotic Controls while you're refitting, but I never had that happen.
Thanks! Pretty good discussion, there! I still agree with RefSteel that looking at the amortization time of factories makes sense. But (and here's where Zygot makes a good point), if you want to build factories (and you do, on normal or better planets), you should almost always build them as soon as possible.
For a normal or better planet, about the only time I can think of where you would not want to build factories is if you expect the world to be captured by an enemy and do not want to risk having techs captured. Or I suppose if the game is basically over, and you know you will win within a very short time.
Poor planets are a tougher decision, and it may be worth building factories if there is plenty of time for them to pay off and you do not feel at risk of invasion and tech captures. But if you have better planets available, using a poor world to seed population or support research while better planets build factories is often a useful choice.
Ultra-poor worlds...hmmm, is there ever a good time to build factories on one? Hard to think of a good case for doing so.
(May 8th, 2017, 12:38)RFS-81 Wrote: Thanks! Pretty good discussion, there! I still agree with RefSteel that looking at the amortization time of factories makes sense. But (and here's where Zygot makes a good point), if you want to build factories (and you do, on normal or better planets), you should almost always build them as soon as possible.
Wellll ... not before you (expect to) have the population to actually work them, and not before building a strategically-important colony ship if the new factories won't be reducing the number of turns it takes to build it, and not before you seed a critical tech, and not before defenses on a front-line world in wartime (with the same caveat as the colship)....
The colony ship one is quite important as the Meklar (and in my opinion also with early IT+10) - building much more than 200 factories before you start pushing out colonies - outside of a weird gambit - will leave you too far behind on expansion, likely costing you worlds the AI wouldn't have reached first in a "normal" strategy - and of course delaying the factories that would otherwise have been built on other worlds!
Quote:Also, Got it!
Cool! Good luck, and have fun with it!
(May 8th, 2017, 12:48)haphazard1 Wrote: Ultra-poor worlds...hmmm, is there ever a good time to build factories on one? Hard to think of a good case for doing so.
Meklar with good IIT and/or waste reduction/clean-up if you're not too close to the end-game already. A Meklar factory on an Ultra-Poor world with II2 and Industrial Waste Elimination pays for itself in 6 turns!
2400: I don't have time for this administrative nonsense! I've got science to do! *hastily closes a cybernetic connection to a gaming discussion group* Ok, fine! Let's review the situation. All our colonies are fully terraformed, industrialized, and populated. Well, all the important ones; there's also Firma. The only way to expand is conquest, and if we don't expand, we might end up with the Bulrathi telling us what to do some day. The problem is that we're nowhere near ready for war. The number one priority is to research better military technologies. I don't expect to go to war during my rule, but I hope to help us get ready. All our colonies are putting their resources into research, except for our homeworld, which is filling up our imperial reserve. Since we have reached our current limit for factories, there's not much point to that, so let's switch it over to tech too, shall we?
I notice that most of our planets, except those far in the backline, already have a few missile bases. If our Force Field researchers complete their planetary shield design during my reign (and I think there's a good chance for that), I plan to build up shields at the planets that are in reach of our neighbours. That will allow us to add further bases if we need them. The question now is: Which planets can they reach? Our spies report that the Bulrathi ships have a range of 5 parsecs, so they can reach Incedius. Firma is just barely outside their reach, which of course will change when they get better fuel cells. Therefore, it might be good to arm our backline colonies, too. (Not Firma itself, though!) By the way, I ordered our spies to stop stealing technologies. We don't want any incidents right now, do we? The case of the Darloks is much simpler: They definitely can reach Mentar, Incedius and Tauri. I don't even need to know what fuel cells they have. Which is good, since our reports are 21 years out of date.
2401: We now have Battle Computer IV and Mass drivers.
My research choices are highlighted here. With Fusion Beams, we might have a chance to fight against our rivals. I make a large investment into new weapon labs.
2402: Nothing much.
2403: There's never a good time to divert funding from research, but with a big "downpayment" on our new weapon tech made, and several technologies close to discovery, this is the least bad time to build a few more missile bases. I order one each at all our colonies.
2404: The backline planets go back to research, while I keep building some more defenses at our core worlds, to get in a few more bases before the shield is ready. I shift around some tech spending to make a (small-ish) downpayment on our new computer tech.
2405: The research on planetary shields is finished! I choose the Repulsor Beam next (other choices were deflector shield IV and V). I immediately make a downpayment on this new tech, since I think it will be very useful for our future ships. Building the planetary shields will have to wait a bit.
2406: We've got Fusion Drives!
I'm not sure if I made the right choice here. I don't know if the specials are important, and I thought that more speed never hurts. Anyway, I'm not going to make it a priority right now.
2407: I plan to build planetary shields on Incedius, Mentar, and Tauri, now that I made the downpayment for the Repulsor beam. Those shields will cost 500 bc apiece. I use the planetary reserve to get all of them done in one turn, so we can turn back to research faster.
2408: Our planetologists figured out how to colonize radiated planets. They have some cool looking simulations, but I don't know what they are based on, since we haven't actually seen any such planets.
I choose Advanced Eco Restoration next since that will give a big boost to our factories' efficiency. I'm not sure if I should have picked Terraforming instead. In any case, I plan to make Planetology high-priority. GNN reports that the Sakkra have cured their plague. The planetary shields go up on Mentar, Incedius, Tauri, and ... Gion? Did I forget to tell them to go back to research earlier? Anyway, they have two bases and a shield now. At least the shield will cost no maintenance.
2409: An uneventful year. I spend some more on new planetology labs. Both the Automated Repear (EDIT: You know, for when your ship isn't pear-shaped enough.) System and the Fusion Beam are at > 10%
2410: Another uneventful year, and I hand over to our next emperor. (You'll probably want to dial down our planetology spending now.) In a way, I'm glad that our construction and weapon research didn't finish yet, because that way, my successor won't be saddled with my choices there.
All in all, a rather uneventful decade, but with quite a bit of scientific progress, and more to come!
Our tech situation is looking excellent! Once Repulsors are researched we will be able to field incredibly strong ships. That makes me happy! I know that RefSteel will be on top of things but this would be a good time to find out exactly what our enemies are fielding and be sure that we can counter them. We are also lacking bombs so actually cracking planets might be tough. Always plan ahead!
Good turns, RFS-81! Lots of new tech is good to see. And some defenses for our core worlds.
Hmmmm, our planetology tree has been great for hostile environments stuff (which we have not needed) and not so great for clean up or soil enrichment (which we could really use). At least advanced eco is available, that will help a lot with clean up costs.
IRC IV would give us another round of factories everywhere. Lots and lots of production, which is always a nice option to have.
Weapons...we have plenty of options for everything but bombs. Cracking enemy missile bases may be a problem. But we will have good space superiority techs. Maybe need to grab some better missiles at some point, but we can afford to wait and see what is available at the next tier. A bomb would be really helpful....
Thanks for the link to that disucssion of factories and production, that was really useful info. And that ultra poor world example is a pretty extreme case. But I guess that there are situations where building the factories would make sense. Not many, but some.
Lots of new tech is good to see. And some defenses for our core worlds. 
