1.21K3 Feedback re Metals

[solops]

I am 105 turns into my first game of SE since 1.21f, I think. Using the 1.21k3 patch I started with two regions. It has been interesting so far, but not particularly fun. I have been incredibly lucky. I had no minors bordering me, but I did have two majors very near and two more a bit farther away and a few wandering savages. The lucky part is that I have not been crushed. The buildup has been slow. Painfully slow. In 105 turns I have found two metal deposits. Neither was in one of my original two provinces. I have been scavenging the few available ruins like mad. My economy is stunted by lack of metals. Badly. Apparently the other majors have been as well because even though one of them declared war on me 30 turns ago I have yet to see a single foreign major unit. The random wandering raiders have not been as vicious as usual either. This is all atypical of my prior experience. Had the minor non-aligned forces come after me they would have crushed me. I have no clue what is going on in the majors other than they must be as metal hamstrung as I am or I'd be dead after almost no fight. I now have five cities, only two of which have any real development. I added three cities to my original two to control administrative strain on the useful resources I never found. Well, OK, i did find some oil and water...meh. Most of what industrial power I have is in my capital. There are simply not enough metal resources to build up infrastructure or any significant quantity of more "advanced" forces....and forget building armor! Soil demetalization is a loooong way off and if I was going to find more metal mines they would have already appeared. So, the glorious Republic of Mordor is hanging on by the grace of two aging metal mines and some ruin scavenging operations. I just got heavy industry, and I am pretty much obligated to build at least one as a bet on the future. The workshop is expensive. I shall continue on, but I am unimpressed by the new changes to metals and the research change to soil demetalization. But, there are some new things in the tech tree and we shall see.

[GoblinCookie]

Is this a problem with the game or just a challenge?

[solops]

Not sure yet. These changes to metal sources are in beta. It is definitely a challenge and is, I suspect, not yet balanced. In the past versions of SE, the lack of metal sites I encountered and the placement of the soil demetalization tech further out in the tech tree would have been fatal for me in most starts. I dodged that here though either luck or the AI majors having the same problem. It will surely makes for a slower start and a far less developed industrial infrastructure in most games. The two metal sites and ruins that I discovered outside my original two provinces totally dominated my planning and expansion for the first 100+ turns. Had any real opposition been encountered in acquiring those territories, I would have been toast. There are new techs available in this beta and I do not know how they will impact industrial development. Honestly, the last few patches have introduced huge changes to the game that I just don't have a feel for, yet.

[GoblinCookie]

Not sure yet. These changes to metal sources are in beta. It is definitely a challenge and is, I suspect, not yet balanced. In the past versions of SE, the lack of metal sites I encountered and the placement of the soil demetalization tech further out in the tech tree would have been fatal for me in most starts. I dodged that here though either luck or the AI majors having the same problem. It will surely makes for a slower start and a far less developed industrial infrastructure in most games. The two metal sites and ruins that I discovered outside my original two provinces totally dominated my planning and expansion for the first 100+ turns. Had any real opposition been encountered in acquiring those territories, I would have been toast. There are new techs available in this beta and I do not know how they will impact industrial development. Honestly, the last few patches have introduced huge changes to the game that I just don't have a feel for, yet.

I feel we should be able to use things other than metal to construct a number of buildings, like wood, or stone or bricks, to support the kind of situation where metal is scarce.

[Thrake]

In my limited experience peripheral mining allows for virtually unlimited metal in the deposit. A successful roll on a mostly exhausted deposit gave it another 70k metal. The roll was pretty generous, along the lines of 70ish difficulty and passed by a mediocre governor (there were actually three leaders rolling with the advisor). I would need to play further with the new setting to see how it plays late game but it looks like a net improvement to me.

[solops]

In my limited experience peripheral mining allows for virtually unlimited metal in the deposit. A successful roll on a mostly exhausted deposit gave it another 70k metal. The roll was pretty generous, along the lines of 70ish difficulty and passed by a mediocre governor (there were actually three leaders rolling with the advisor). I would need to play further with the new setting to see how it plays late game but it looks like a net improvement to me.

At this point everyone's experience with peripheral mining is limited. If it does extend the life of the mine far enough, that is good. The demand for metals in the late game is huge with masses of troops to keep replaced and lots of level 5 and 6 factories to feed. That requires a lot of per turn metal deliverability. In the past the only way to do this was with lots of high level soil demetalization facilities. There were never enough metal mines in the game to do so and they always depleted way too fast. I have not gotten anywhere near that industrial level yet with the new beta, but as it looks right now late game metal mining/deliverability cannot reach levels high enough to support the massive industry required to create and maintain a huge military. Also, game progress has been slowed down quite a bit by the new metal economy. At turn 200 I am about where I used to be at turn 120-140. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but it does demonstrate how the new economy works and impacts military creation and operations. Also, I tend to think that the introduction of ammo factories simply slows things down even more without adding a great deal. It is one more demand on a limited works force. Again, not necessarily a bad thing, but it is additional "drag" on the economy, even if it is cheaper than the making the ammo in the crafts shop. My biggest bottleneck right now is population.

[solops]

I have now had a chance to examine the metal economy in several games. I started 4 games under v1.21k3 and one under v1.21m, all using a medium size planet, two starting regions, slower tech, Survival Stress and Spread Out options.
The first 4 (v1.21k3) were started on Morgana class planets. I played two for 4-5 turns. I played one out to 16 turns and I played the last out to 176 turns (during which I updated to v1.12m). None of the games had metal sites in the starting two regions. I found no metal sites in the first three games and in the last (176 turns) I have found three in about 16-20% of the planet. It is this 176 turn game that generated this thread and the comments therein. Only in the long game was the metal problem truly displayed. I quit the 16 turn game because I could see I was getting nowhere. I played the next one out to see what would happen.

Then I started a new game (#5) two days ago on a Siwa class planet. It feels like a completely different piece of software. I am out to turn 88. I started with a metal site in each of my two starting regions. I rapidly found another and within a short time I found two more not so far off. Since then I have found another 3 in the 21% of the planet I now control. And yet, I can see that as my economy grows, I am going to have to have Soil Demetalization at some point. The game will probably be over before then, but the trend is still there. I have NEVER seen this much metal on a planet. Ever.
Conclusions: I don’t know. I can say that the delay of soil demetalization tech is a problem. In the games I have started it is THE critical tech along with solar energy. As things are now, if you get a poor planet just go ahead and restart. A big question is how the AIs are treated with regard to metals and how they are able to deal with it. The mine extension card is really helpful.

So, planetary metals…abundant, average of sparse – what are you going to get? Demetalization tech - almost always necessary, usually not necessary early but if you don’t get it in time you are dead, unless you are very, very lucky in both your neighbors and metal sites.

My sampling is inadequate to make any solid determination, but at this point I feel strongly that demetalization needs to be moved back to its old position on the tech tree. Also, I realize that slow tech research has some small impact here, but given the way that the research tree works, there is a lot more going on. Speeding up the entire R&D process is not the answer. There is a balance issue. And, honestly I think a much larger sampling of game conditions and results is necessary for a proper evaluation. I hope Vic has the resources to look at a bigger picture.

[solops]

I waited a while to to write the preceding post so that I would get it right. And in writing it I was sure that I had written a Nobel-Pulitzer prize winning epistle. But a day later, in reading it over, I see fuzziness, ambiguity, incompleteness and some confusion. Geeze...so much for my technical writing skills. My opinions/evaluation have not changed, but if there are any questions please ask. If I can answer them or clarify I will.

[solops]

I am now 174 turns into game 6 with v1.21p, same start conditions as game 5 (medium Siwa). Again, I have more metal mines than I could ever imagine. That plentitude, couple with the mine expansion/extension card, means I need to re-think my position on metal availability. To do so, I need to play 100 to 200 turns of a game started under the conditions I used in the first four games I tried under 1.21k3 (medium Morgana). I am suspicious that the starting conditions, which have a huge effect on a planets available metal sites, is an issue. Forming techs, both effects and tree structure, that "work" under a variety of start conditions may be what I am experiencing. If the AI suffers the same hurdles, then so be it. If not, then there is an issue. Anyway, too early to tell, more gaming/testing required!