Matrix Games Forums

So. One thing that's been bugging me is that I consistently face resource shortages across my empire, even though I have more than enough resources sitting on my home world. While I like the idea of the pirate smuggling missions, could there be an option later in the game to pay your private sector or that of another empire the extra money?

Or is there an option to set resource reserve rates that I'm overlooking?

I would also like that!

Kinda like you can give "missions" to your private citizens in the game Majesty

The one thing that might limit you with this is the range of the early freighter designs. Until you've got to Large Scale Construction and the next stage of the standard fuel cell it's going to be hard to move stuff around a large empire but I agree it would be useful. In my current game I'm now on to a 3rd generation of freighters with the Ultra Dense Fuel Cells fitted and they can carry a good load as well as having the range to go more or less anywhere.

I would like to see a subsidies / stimulus mechanic for several areas.

Sword of the Stars II had a decent mechanic for this. You could pump imperial funds into colonization, mining, or trade. The private sector would then produce more in that sector. DW could definetly benefit from something like this, also potentially for things like colony development and research.

If you have constant shortages around the empire, while I don't. What are we doing/observing different?

I build my state ships mostly at the capital until other major colonies with large spaceports are present. Even after that, the capital receive the largest orders. I don't order 5 small spaceports at once in an empire just into space, and I see the ones I order built reasonably fast, the resources are delivered.

I get some noise about mines missing upgrade materials, and some stupid constructors missing something. That fixes itself reasonably fast.

If you have constant (real) shortages, you either have a shortage of materials, or you have a very difficult empire with significant distances between the parts. Do your state shopping at the capital, small buys elsewhere, and I think the orders placed over the order tool actually manages to distribute themselves pretty well. Try to get a feel for where you have resources and where you do not, the new signals on build buttons should help with that.

My problem is that my private sector is running in the red. Lots in colony taxes and maintenance. As I got more shortages, I built more mines which cost the private sector more money. They have not been able to buy or upgrade their freighters in a long time. So the bottleneck for me is lack of private freighters. I would love to be able to subsidize them or give them a loan (bailout). Seems now the only solution is to destroy mines until maintenance costs drop

Ahhhh, well I just figured out that the taxes I make on colonies are paid by the private sector. I lowered all colony taxes substantial and my private sector went into the black. Now the gub-ment is in the red but I have a surplus and can make cash selling maps for now (I don't sell tech)

How many mines do you have, and how many colonies? It could be possible to have too many.

Yeah, lowering taxes and scrapping mines are really the best ways of helping the private sector at the moment. Well, that and making sure their designs( freighters, mines, etc.) have a rather low upkeep cost.

Wait, so mines (built by the state) only cost the private sector maintenance?

Yes. And who else than the state build mines in your games? [;)]

State pays for the build, privates pay maintenance.

I built mines everywhere cause I could...caught up with me though as my private sector could not afford maintenance

I like the idea of having a "stimulus" button which would let you directly give money from state to private in times of need. And certain government types could also have a "Seize Assets" button to take money from private to state. To balance this, using either option should cause temporary corruption as corporations use underhanded tactics to secure extra bailout money or hide assets away from the government's prying hands.

I just let the AI do its thing when it comes to most mines. My only exceptions tend to be gas mines for grabbing caslon clouds early in the game, or rebuilding mines that have been destroyed that would otherwise be placed at the end of very long queues.

As for the economic situation: Largest in the galaxy. High income. I have that economy wonder sitting nice and pretty on my home-world, which also has a the shipyard wonder for a lovely development bonus. I have an excess cash reserve of around five million.

My private sector gets the resources where they need to be, but it's just slower than I'd like, and I'd prefer an option to pre-place resources for certain construction projects, i.e chains of small space-ports that I use for my fleets so that I can free up my resupply ships. The only place I do mass builds is my home-world since that's where 90% of my stockpile ends up sitting anyway.

It also begs the question of what kind of lobbyists the pirate use when you can pay them extra for doing the private sector's job, even well into the classic era, but you can't do the same for your own worthless paw-I mean citizens.