Resorts - just a little hint

[Jeeves]

The massive passenger compartment holds 3600k passengers. Resort visitors pay 1/4 the visitor size in cash, So you get 900k for every massive passenger compartment on a resort. At size 3300 resorts you can get a couple hundred passenger compartments onboard for an income of a couple hundred MILLION. BUT you need several dozen docks and cargo bays to get the passenger traffic serviced. Asteroids of gold or dilithium are best for resorts. Plan on about 70 systems in your empire with every system with a special asteroid and a habitable planet colonized. Just to put things into perspective, the special luxuries will get you a couple of million per game year, the special ruins like Garden of Arcadia will increase your civilization benefits by a few million per year. BUT those asteroid systems! They will bring in 50 times the income, if you just get them all...
Ringed planets are also very nice, since the colony can build a resort, plan on building a spaceport at another colony in the system while the ringed planet builds a resort.
If you build a fake resort on a high luxury world, you can mine 100+ luxury from it, and maybe get a few passengers, or just call the mining base a star base.


When I get done with my current ROTS 1.5.0.8 game, I will post a screenshot or two of my best resort. I invite other hoteliers to post screenshots in the meantime.

Lonnie Courtney Clay

[Data]

They were posted previously for other versions as well. Not sure if this is still true in 1.5.0.8 but previously there were a lot of problems related to this: resorts where passengers never came though they met all the prerequisites, the number of passengers actually increasing overall and not showing how many do you service atm, etc.
I'll be curious to see how this behaves in Legends.

[feelotraveller]

So they actually work?

I've given up on them after building 4 resorts (all at scenic locations) and not recieving a single passenger. And one of them was a resort at my ringed homeworld.

After that I figured that they were some sort of long shot gamble which paid nicely but only came through occasionally. Is this not true?

So assuming they do work, how to do you get them to work/know when one with say +86% scenic bonus will actually get any customers?

[Gelatinous Cube]

They definately work. I leave all my constructors on Auto, because I'm lazy like that, and by the time I've got a good-sized empire going most of my bonus income is from resorts.

[feelotraveller]

Many people have said this. I don't doubt that it is true. What I don't understand is why I have never had any passengers frequent my resorts. First couple of games I built resorts (at blackholes or whatever with 80+% scenic bonuses) and noone came so I gave up. Then I got a game start where my homeworld had rings (+36% scenic bonus from memory) in either an abundant or excellent homeworld start - so population either 14 or 20 billion odd. I built a resort as soon as I had done the initial upgrade of my spaceport... and waited 20 or 30 years (the whole game until I was bored because was winning easily) for someone to come. No luck. So what gives?

[Gelatinous Cube]

That's a very good question. I don't often slow down and study the paths of the passenger ships, but I suspect that if I did then the answer to your question would be obvious. I know there are a lot of different factors that go into tourism, and I don't know any of them off the top of my head.

[Data]

Distance is the one the game talks about but we've never been able to determine exactly what "close to the resort" means. Building even one colony with a SP near the resort seems to be ok as all other will go to that colony to get to the resort.

[Jeeves]

My resort that I started first was about scenic +38, I would have to check. In two game months of operation it has brought in 50k for 200k passengers, mixed races. There are several no mission passenger ships parked near the resort and a few in dock. Regarding black holes, my advice is to do them after your asteroid and ringed planet resort income peters out. The reason is that unless positioned at the extreme edge of the blue system circle, incoming passenger ships get sucked into the black hole...
You DID put the resort inside the blue circle for the black hole system??? For black holes, managing the constructor yourself pays off...

It is possible that other resorts built by AI empires are drawing business away from your resorts, or that you are on less than delighted terms with the other empires? I managed diplomacy very carefully as usual, with all delighted by my gifts very early in the game...

Lonnie Courtney Clay
p.s. Regarding the Guardians, is there any point to giving them gifts? It costs several million to get them up to maximum bonus diplomatically. Perhaps I should start a question thread on that too...

[feelotraveller]

Thanks for the tips. Unfortunately I've followed them all in the past. The blackhole resorts were near the edge of the blackhole system - well away from the event horizon. I've heard mentioned distance - being near to major population centres - and scenic bonus - perhaps as some sort of attractor, although others have said that this simply adds to the income from the resort... never got far enough to tell myself. This was why when I got a ringed homeworld I built a resort there (major spaceport with 14 or 20 billion right on its doorstep plus the possible attraction of the rings). But no passenger ships ever came. I tracked them on and off and they either sat around doing nothing or they transported immigrants, more sitting than transporting but that had to do with the balance of taxes I ran during that game. You do get tourists from your own empire don't you?

[Jeeves]

Interestingly enough I have a major complaint, which is that at the end of year seven I still have only three passengers ships, and all three of them, including the original one, is sitting in one of my systems with no orders. On the other hand I am getting a steady stream of tourists from other empires, 75k of resort income now...

Lonnie Courtney Clay
p.s The AI empires can't send tourists to your resort unless you traded them your territory map since the resort was built. Do that with all of them and see if you start getting visitors...

[feelotraveller]

Ah, okay, I'll give that a go in my next (or even current... it's been a couple of weeks) game.

Passenger ships seem slow to get orders. I generally count on an average of one per colony/spaceport early in the game (although it's sometimes none and sometimes two, or even rarely three) but it does average out. Never not had them built except when the private economy has been practically broke.

Don't know about resorts but you can trigger immigration orders by setting grossly different taxation rates/happiness amounts. But you probably know better than me.

I'll try to make the time to read your guide soon... stumbled across some very interesting things in threads leading up to it - so thanks. Any chance of posting the Legends guide as a work in progress so we can learn as you go?

[Jeeves]

Hmm, Legends is still in test, but I will buy a copy and begin playing as soon as it comes out. What I propose is a thread giving a synopsis of my progress in games, with a guide developed in the first six months based upon the game as the bugs and balance problems are worked out. I read the development beta testers forum, but since the current game is only my second of RotS that I have played to the seven year point, and I stopped playing any games for six months, I decided not to Beta test for Legends. There is some interesting stuff going on, and I think everyone will be thrilled when the Legends expansion comes out.

I think as a prelude to the guide for Legends, I will put my insights into game mechanics into a tips/tricks thread as I discover them, and release an organized guide about 4-6 months on with all of my advice in a logical progression. In other words, tips and tricks as found, guide more organized. How's that?

Lonnie Courtney Clay

[feelotraveller]

Now I can look forward both to the game and the guide.

Seriously I found some of your insights into the (hidden) game mechanics very worthwhile.

I will probably get the game pretty early but not immediately. Had a bit of a run of disappointments with games, which although they will be eventually good, have been either very buggy or contentless on release. Sad because my early bad experiences have put me off playing what may well be good games. Hoping/expecting that Legends will not fit into this category.

Better late than buggy. I hope Erik/Elliot is listening.

[Data]

They always are [;)]

[MartialDoctor]

Yeah, I've found that you can make too much money from resorts.  I love the idea of resorts but I hope the income generated from them are toned down in Legends...

[Data]

Given that my favorite way of developing is to keep taxes at 0 almost everywhere then resorts and trading become the cash cows, even more so early game. I'm actually 50-50 on toning them down.

[Gelatinous Cube]

Resorts are huge, but I actually make most of my money from trading tech. Would like to see an option for no tech trading at all, as I think that would make for a pretty cool alternate "feel."

[Data]

Good idea, even now we can abstain to do this and let only the AI do it.

[Gelatinous Cube]

ORIGINAL: Data

Good idea, even now we can abstain to do this and let only the AI do it.

Yeah, exactly. I try not to sell too much tech because it feels kind of "cheap" (and also, you never know when it'll turn around and bite you in the butt), but the AI will still trade amongst themselves. Might have to look at that one more indepth though, because I don't think they trade it very aggressively, preferring to guard their tech jealously.

[Bingeling]

I think the AI trade tech all the time.

Have you noticed all the tech trade requests when you got spare money? They look for people with money and suggest a trade.

I don't think the AI do complex tech trades though, and I am not sure if the AI really ever got enough cash to transfer tech through coin.

If you want to be really exploitish. Make sure to organize some juicy, conflicted mining bases, and trade them for a ton of tech and whatever coin the AI got available. Add their galaxy map too... Early mining bases can be valued very high...

I think the game is easy enough without that kind of actions though, and really, without any tech trades at all. And my problem lately has not been that the game is hard, but that they turn easy once you get past the challenge of initial proper contact.