No it isn't...

I only build them when I've got, say, 10 or more extractors within one Phase Jump.

When that instance comes up, though, you only build one, right?

And neutral extractors can service up to 4 refineries, also, unlike the usual 3.

But due to planet arrangements, getting that last slot on the neutrals used is rarely useful given the opportunity cost (a trade port).

Hey, look at what Goa did by impersonating a broken record. Keep at it. Somebody's bound to notice it. Eventually.

I'm of the opinion that refineries need a serious buff, and trade needs a slight nerf in the multiplier department.

A part of the problem could be Allegiance. Maybe. It gets lower with each planet outward you take. I'm not sure that I like that...

Actually, I don't. I usually go to Gameplay.constants and eliminate the drop-off in allegiance. Gives me some more hectic games, and makes extractors (With and without refineries) more useful.

Nerf trade port = nerf tec and only advantage they got in late game

Refineries need slight boost but don't take them out of the game. And please do something with resource focus for advent.

If it were just passive, i think I would use it.

I agree, which is why I don't think they need a whole lot of buffing...

TEC have development mandate and pervasive economy, I'd hardly say trade is their only late game advantage...I do think though they would need some compensation, but I'd rather see a military bonus (like an AoE Embolden on the cielo) than another economic bonus...

Given the limitations on the AI, I'm tempted to agree...I don't think the AI can use this ability smartly (if they even use it at all)...and it's pretty tedious for a human player to constantly have to calculate whether they should turn on resource focus or not...

However, a passive bonus wouldn't be quite as diverse or interesting...balancing resource focus would be quite easy, it's just a matter of calculation...

For simplicity, you could simply say the average planet has 3 asteroids (a bit of an overestimate but oh well)...that is 3 x .4 = 1.2 resources per second...a trade port gives 1 credit per second, which is equal to about .22 metal/crystal per second...so, basically resource focus would have to be around 18.5% for it to be useful...however, that's without any bonuses to trade (which easily can get to 50% or more)...so in reality you'd need at least a 30% bonus or so to generally make resource focus useful...

Like refineries, resource focus becomes weaker as your trade routes become longer or you're building on planets with less extractors....but, even a small tweak to the numbers would at least make the ability profitable...unlike refineries, which are simply not cost effective, resource focus actually hurts your economy more often than not...

You don't explore your planets do you? I Find stuff from Spice to farms, Ionic gases, extra minerals, pure water, mega fauna ect ect, those all offer trade bonuses.

I don't think planet bonuses are quite the same as resources...in games, "resources" generally have a special purpose....they are required to build certain things, they give you special abilities or powers, they do something interesting....planet bonuses just give a simple bonus to that one planet, and quite honestly those bonuses rarely guide one's strategy...

I mean, sure it's nice to have a small boost to population or metal income or culture or whatever...but generally the location of the planet and the needs of your empire are far more influential on decision making...you aren't going to build more trade ports than you would have otherwise just because a planet bonus gives planet XYZ a meager boost to trade income...likewise, you aren't going to fight super hard to defend a planet simply because it has "Spice" on it....

I think planet bonuses are fine to have, but you don't really explore planets to find planet bonuses...you explore planets in the hope that you find artifacts...now, if certain "resources" were comparable to artifacts in their power, then that would be an interesting game element...

A planet bonus that gives +30% trade income to that one planet is meh...an artifact that gives an empire wide trade bonus, now that is something...you might fight really hard to hold a dead asteroid with an artifact, but a desert planet is not going to be a whole lot more valuable even with a nice planet bonus...add resources that dramatically change your strategy and the importance of planets, and you've got a good element...planet bonuses simply don't fit that criteria, they are merely a "diversity" element that exist because they can....

Agreed.

Personally I'd favor cheaper exploration, as I have mixed feelings about planet bonuses...planets and starting positions are already enough of a crapshoot, making planet bonuses more powerful would just add to that...but on the other hand, making them more powerful at least would could make them more influential on decision making....

Artifacts can be enough of an incentive to justify exploring if it isn't so damn expensive...I don't have specific values in mind, but I'm sure a simple cost reduction would go to great lengths to get people playing competitively to consider exploration....

This is a true statement, but I think this approach would be problematic...the output of refineries is already quite high (it takes only 6 extractors to make a refinery more profitable than a trade port with a 6 node trade length)...it's the tech cost and construction cost that really make them not competitive...

If games consistently went on for twice as long, refineries would actually be better than trade ports (as you stated, they are better in the long run, and by a fair amount)...

Making refineries more powerful I think is just going to make the situation equally bad in a different way...sure, the payoff time will be more comparable to that of a trade port, but after that payoff time refineries will be ridiculous sources of income (far worse than trade is now)...

Now, refineries do have a serious limit since extractors can only service 3-4 refineries (a limitation trade does not have)...but buffing the output of refineries is going to marginalize tax and extractor income even more (two things that already are overshadowed by trade)...that simply is not a change I'd favor, but that's just my opinion...

Both a cost reduction and an output boost would be effective changes in making refineries more competitive...but the other consequences in my mind make a cost reduction the preferable change...

I personally think the way trade income works is just fine. Only at a point where one owns a real lot of planets you may start earning a lot of cash, but at that point the game is more or less decided anyway.

If trade was more powerful on planets with high population, then refineries would need to be more powerful on planets with low population...of course, that is a silly direct relationship, but for game balance it certainly is not unreasonable to make low population worlds (like asteroids and volcanics) have more resources and therefore refineries would be more powerful on them...then, you'd put refineries on high resource/low population worlds and trade on low resource/high population worlds...

Of course, then you'd have to limit the effect of refineries to just the local gravity well or make low population worlds (and therefore high resource worlds) more likely to spawn and connect to other low population worlds...

If we were building sins from scratch then you certainly could correlate higher trade with higher population and make refineries work appropriately to balance the two structures...but we certainly can't implement that much change ourselves...

Since there are easy ways to fix refineries that require no changes to the game engine, I'd favor those first...