collectors mitigate fuel need

[adecoy95]

its been said before in this thread, but it cant be stressed enough, dont skimp out on reactors/fuel storage if your station has weapons, they will fail to fire at an acceptable speed and then run out of fuel, becoming a sitting no-shield-recharge duck.

and on top of that no civilian ships will go anywhere near a warzone to refuel it

[Data]

ORIGINAL: cookie monster
The one in deep space couldn't power the shields as there's not enough light but the long range scanner worked

Try that one without the energy collectors, you'll find the LRS still works. Somehow, some components will work even without power supply. Energy collectors for sure don't work in deep space without a solar radiation source.

[Bingeling]

Hm, so you can make really cheap monitoring stations. Just the LRS and whatever is needed to complete the design.

In my current game I spam the AI designed monitoring stations, trying to get cover on every gas cloud in the game. Damn pirates, they are annoying when things calm down.

Pirates sure feels more active in peaceful times. Is this because I pause less, so time flies faster, or is it because they are more active in peaceful times?

[cookie monster]

I can just imagine the design now

1 reactor,1 LR scanner,1 fuel tank,1 command centre,1 hab module,1 life support, 1 very lonely Sluken!

It's yours sir for 500 credits![:D]

[cookie monster]

ORIGINAL: Bingeling

Hm, so you can make really cheap monitoring stations. Just the LRS and whatever is needed to complete the design.

In my current game I spam the AI designed monitoring stations, trying to get cover on every gas cloud in the game. Damn pirates, they are annoying when things calm down.

Pirates sure feels more active in peaceful times. Is this because I pause less, so time flies faster, or is it because they are more active in peaceful times?

My pirate hunter ships are cruiser/explorers with an LR scanner. They can take down any pirate base. But struggle 1 on 1 with a pirate cruiser.

They're the biggest exploration ship graphic you will ever see. Plus you can control them from the empire management tab on the left.

[Data]

I think the latter but never looked closely at this...maybe a balancing thing [:)]

[Bingeling]

A LRS won't stop bases from being established. I had a stubborn one near the western edge. Repeated trips to kill it. So I parked my fleet in the cloud, and they stopped appearing.

I have two types of fleets, and one strange battle fleet with quite a few destroyers. And an invasion fleet.

Raiders - 4 destroyers
Battle fleets - 8 cruisers, 2 capitals

So when I find a pirate base, or have a pirate attack, I send either the closest raider fleet, or a single ship from a battle fleet. I just make sure the battle fleet leader don't go, as he will bring the rest with him and not return automatically.

Of course, if I worry about a single cruiser doing the job, I could always send two cruisers from the closest battle fleet...

And this is not in the earliest days, 4 destroyers can't safely go unattended to pirate bases until they got some fancy equipment.

[cookie monster]

Pirates are a pita, now the only reason I will include them in game is for gaining a good reputation, the game gets weird with no pirates and a dubious reputation from forcibly taking over independant colonies.

I won't buy the intel from them, cos then the game is alot easier.

[Data]

ORIGINAL: cookie monster
I won't buy the intel from them, cos then the game is alot easier.

very true...sad but true

[Bingeling]

Pirates are a nice touch, but...

They are a pita when you try to pass the time to see if some refugees will appear. This is not a problem until you are huge and dominant.
They are destroying the game by giving too high reputation boost.

I end reducing my power various ways... This game it has been not stealing a single operations map, and not placing a single deep cover agent. Just to steal some maps. I am so incredibly nasty when I got a deep cover agent, I waste all bases I can find. And I can find a lot when I can see all

[Trifler]

So the Galactopedia says that Energy Collectors don't work in deep space, but I find they still seem to work when used in gas clouds and black holes. Thoughts?

In fact as far as I can tell the Energy Collectors in my game ignore solar output entirely and just produce the same amount in all circumstances...

[Data]

Yes, this is expected. As long as you are in the area of effect for the solar radiation you get the max output from them.
It was also confirmed that they do also work in clouds but never tested near BH or super novae.....I guess they don't work only in unpopulated space and all these objects do have some solar radiation to power them.

[Locarnus]

So do I understand this correctly, within a system/cloud the collectors give the energy that is stated in the ship design?

It hast been problematic for me to design the stations/ships without knowing how much energy the collectors produce...

[Data]

Yes, you are correct

[cookie monster]

ORIGINAL: Locarnus

So do I understand this correctly, within a system/cloud the collectors give the energy that is stated in the ship design?

It hast been problematic for me to design the stations/ships without knowing how much energy the collectors produce...

Hang on a minute. A collector a.k.a a Solar Panel collects the sunlight and by clever magic turns it into electricity. Inside a system they work (there is sunlight). Outside a system aka Deep Space (theres not enough sunlight).

A collectors static energy output is also listed on the component detail listing in the ship design screen.

It also also added to the static energy output number when a collector is added.

So design your ship/station.

Then add collectors till the objects static energy is met.

Play around in the design screen, its well easy.

I know your from Earth, Sol....Hehe

I'm just not sure if you know that they just generate electricity from sunlight.

[Data]

they are solar wind turbines [:)]

[Locarnus]

ORIGINAL: cookie monster

I'm just not sure if you know that they just generate electricity from sunlight.

Well, I was just not sure what the number in the components description was.

The max output or the guaranteed minimum output in a solar system.
And before having to use fuel to power stations...

But well, some inefficiency. Its not that you have to build efficient designs to keep up with the ai...

[Data]

That number is the standard output which is the same no matter how far you are from the star as long as you are in the star system - same applies in clouds and any other solar radiation generating source. This was brought up before and Elliot clarified that atm the numbers shown for solar radiation have no effect on the collectors output, the collectors generate the same amount of energy wherever they are inside the solar radiation source radius.