Shark's quick tips on 'What to do now?'

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: MoloMowChow

You mentioned adding recreational and medical centers to the star bases, but what about the commerce center?

Commerce center is not necessary on the star base. Civilian freighters will simply dock with the planet in this case. As a player you will not notice any difference in gameplay.

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: thefinn

I'm a little confused here, so do you put one of these space stations on each planet and then put a "regular" style space station just once every 10 ?

Or do you actually just put one of these every 10 planets and leave the rest bare ?

Do you put defenses at all ? fighters? any suggestions for commerce centers ? (I have also wondered if putting more than 1 commerce center would make a difference).

Sorry for the plethora of noob questions

edit: Also any clues as to how many docking ports I can get away with ?

OK, the star base I suggest building is not a space port of any type. It is simply a little base that has the medical and recreational center component so that you still get the bonuses for the planet from those. A Space Port, has those 2 components as well, but it also has all the shipbuilding, research lab, etc components that drive up the costs. So yes, build star bases on 9 of your colonies and a space port on one of them. And spread those out, they don't need to be clumped together.

You can build as many space ports as you want, but it just isn't necessary to have a bunch of them.

So to sum up again, if I have 10 colonies:

I leave my Large Space Port on the home colony. The next 9 planets I colonize get a Medical/Recreational star base.

Docking Ports: On a space port, as many as you want. On the cheap star base, you only need 1 since it is NOT being used to transfer cargo to the colony.

[Spacecadet]

ORIGINAL: Shark7

ORIGINAL: MoloMowChow

You mentioned adding recreational and medical centers to the star bases, but what about the commerce center?

Commerce center is not necessary on the star base. Civilian freighters will simply dock with the planet in this case. As a player you will not notice any difference in gameplay.

Actually, I think Commerce Centers are a requirement on Starports.



Okay, there are still questions bouncing around so I'll throw a few of my strategy tips - they're not necessarily better or worse than what Shark7 uses, they're just an alternative.

Early game, I build one Small Spaceport per System, usually on the first colony to reach about 500M Population.

When things progress a bit I'll upgrade the most valuable colony in the system to a Medium or Large Spaceport.

Around early-mid game, once I've got one Spaceport per system, I'll cycle back and start building a Small Spaceport on the remaining planets as this will give them the Recreation and Medical benefits boost which will allow you to Tax them higher without a non-compliance.
Additionally, this will give you at least some defensive capabilities to your planets, additional Research capacity, and more Ship Construction yards.

Some will not see this, but I tend to play really long games (~100 years or more), so late game I can start redesigning/retrofitting Spaceports without Research Labs to save some maintenance costs.
I don't really do this for monetary reasons as my Economy is usually humming along, but at this point in the game I've researched everything so I don't need the Labs and I'll use the extra cash to give my Military an extra kick.

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: Spacecadet

ORIGINAL: Shark7

ORIGINAL: MoloMowChow

You mentioned adding recreational and medical centers to the star bases, but what about the commerce center?

Commerce center is not necessary on the star base. Civilian freighters will simply dock with the planet in this case. As a player you will not notice any difference in gameplay.

Actually, I think Commerce Centers are a requirement on Starports.



Okay, there are still questions bouncing around so I'll throw a few of my strategy tips - they're not necessarily better or worse than what Shark7 uses, they're just an alternative.

Early game, I build one Small Spaceport per System, usually on the first colony to reach about 500M Population.

When things progress a bit I'll upgrade the most valuable colony in the system to a Medium or Large Spaceport.

Around early-mid game, once I've got one Spaceport per system, I'll cycle back and start building a Small Spaceport on the remaining planets as this will give them the Recreation and Medical benefits boost which will allow you to Tax them higher without a non-compliance.
Additionally, this will give you at least some defensive capabilities to your planets, additional Research capacity, and more Ship Construction yards.

Some will not see this, but I tend to play really long games (~100 years or more), so late game I can start redesigning/retrofitting Spaceports without Research Labs to save some maintenance costs.
I don't really do this for monetary reasons as my Economy is usually humming along, but at this point in the game I've researched everything so I don't need the Labs and I'll use the extra cash to give my Military an extra kick.

On a space port yes. But we are discussing star bases. They have no requirements at all. Completely different thing that we are discussing. [;)]

[Shark7]

Been seeing quite a few topics on bad economy lately, so thought I'd bump this up for newer members to see again. Think of this is a set of tips, pointers and guidelines, not a step by step do it this way only.

Remember, if your economy in this game is tanking, it is usually caused by having too many ships, bases and (especially) space ports with not enough resource mines to support them.

The key to the game is to grow slowly at first, then speed up as you get the resources to support your expansion.

The last game I played I had 24 caslon/hydrogen sources and 6-7 of every other resource before I really started expanding, and I still ran into some shortages (but my economy didn't tank). The fuel sources are the most important since they are needed by everything: colonies, ships and bases.