Formula for research needed to stop a supernova in MoO1?

[Psillycyber]

Hi all,

Does anyone know the formula for how much research I need at a planet to keep it from going supernova?

I know that I will need to plow extra reserve spending into the planet. The only thing I'm not sure about is, how much...

I don't happen to have any built-up reserves, but I do have a rich planet that I can devote to building up reserves. I could draft a few other planets into the effort as well, but only at the cost of all of my research coming to a screeching halt around my empire. I really don't want to do that if at all possible. So I would like to know if I can just get by with the reserves from my one rich planet.

The planet about to go nova, Sssla, was producing 384 research per turn before the nova event (thankfully it was not being boosted by extra reserve spending at the time). The news said that I have 10 turns. Any clue on whether about 120 extra reserve spending per turn (from my rich planet) would suffice?

Boy, I really wish the game would tell the player about the needed research up front, rather than telling the player a few years before the culmination of the nova event how much more there is still to go....

[Ray F]

According to p.308 of the OSG: "When an amount equal 5 to 15 times that colony's current gross production level is spent on technology there, its sun stabilizes and will no longer go nova".

It also says the nova will blow up in a random 5 to 15 turns, so I'm guessing those random variables are the same.

So you need 10 times the gross production of that colony.

[Psillycyber]

According to p.308 of the OSG: "When an amount equal 5 to 15 times that colony's current gross production level is spent on technology there, its sun stabilizes and will no longer go nova".

It also says the nova will blow up in a random 5 to 15 turns, so I'm guessing those random variables are the same.

So you need 10 times the gross production of that colony.

So if that's gross production, then I need to take into account how much the planet is spending on waste cleanup (thank goodness I got IER and Reduced Waste 80%!) and increase the research by that amount each turn, and I should be ok, right? Let's check it out...

[Psillycyber]

Okay, it worked! My raw planet production was 490 (out of which, 106 was going to waste cleanup and 384 was going to research initially). I devoted about 120 in reserves each turn to push the gross output to about 610 and the research output to about 500 per turn. And sure enough, I beat the supernova, and with a turn to spare!

In conclusion, it turns out that having good waste cleanup techs makes a big difference in how easy it is to deal with the nova event. The more of your raw production that you can devote to research, the better. In theory, if you had perfect waste elimination and didn't have to spend anything on eco, you wouldn't need any reserve spending at all. You could just plow 100% of the planet's normal raw production into research for the specified amount of turns, and then voila! The only reason why reserve spending is normally needed with this event is because normally planets must devote some of their raw production to eco cleanup, and that has to be compensated for.

Of course, it also helps if you haven't been plowing reserves into a planet to begin with (to give it inflated raw production numbers that the nova event uses as a basis).

Plus, one more thing: in the past I have had the nova event hit ultra-rich planets that were in their initial stages of getting setup. With these planets, it was actually faster to have the planet spend a few turns finishing factory construction at an accelerated pace and then focusing on research, versus focusing everything on research from the beginning. The nova event cost gets calculated at the time of the onset of the event (that I knew), based on what the planet's production was AT THAT TIME. So if your ultra-rich planet is in the middle of its growth curve, you might consider letting it finish the growth curve before turning on the research to deal with the event.

[Ianus]

Thank you for this report! I've had a general idea of how the Nova event works but to have it clearly explained like this is great! And yes, it is always ideal to have the Nova hit a fledgling UR planet, or ANY planet that is nacent enough. I've had a Nova threaten a brand new colony (pop 2) with colonists due the following turn. I turned on research, the colonist landed and the next turn bam! Solar Rejuvinator. Same idea as you discussed with a UR but normal planets develop too slowly to make a difference without reserve spending.

[SvenBent]

ghoing slgihtly off topic

i cna highly recommende to get the OSG i bought mine for a few buck + shipping a total of 8$ i think it was.
im on pages 172 of the aproiamtly 350 text pages ( and additon 50 pages with tables) it goes through alot of the math/mechanics behind the scene and also tosses in alot of good strategy advice.

i was hesitent to begind with because my experince most strategy guides pretty much just repeats what you learn yourself pretty quick is is very vague and subjetive in stuff. But this one dug deep into the sourcecode and brings back nice objective math. and even some corrections to the manual

[Ianus]

Yeah I have a pdf copy that was posted on here a couple of years ago. I look into it when I have specific questions about the game. Bear in mind that even though the MoO OSG is one of the best strategy guides ever made it still contains some incorrect information. Not a lot but some, probably related to last minute changes in the game's development. Still a fantastic resource obviously! I have been wanting to buy a hard copy for a while to go with my original big box of the game, but I haven't been able to make it happen yet.