Early game economic strategy

from Stardock Forums
I'm having some problems getting my economy up to stuff in the early game. I don't know what I'm doing wrong.

I play with huge galaxies and common or abundant planets. Usually I play with loose clusters.

My typical strategy is to first switch to 100% production and 80% mil/ 20% tech or 80% mil/10%/10%. I build colonizers on my homeworld sending out ~200-250 colonists per ship and ~400 if I find a nice planet (PQ 19+) or if I'm crossing a great distance to get a foothold in another cluster.

For the colonized planets, I will send out 1 colonizer with ~125 people and then switch to either scout or constructor. I'll stop building scouts once I have 5 or 6 of them - less if I'm in a corner.

The problem arises after about 2 years. I'll be losing around 100bc a turn, and I can't stabilize it unless I drop spending down to 30% or so, and that tanks my growth. I will have a relatively large territory, but I'm unable to devote enough cash to stay ahaid technologically (even though I usually play a technologist race) or militarily (because I now can't spend anything to build combat ships), and I get swatted by the first person who finds me.

What am I doing wrong? I'm reading about people leaving their spending at or near 100%, and I just can't seem to make enough money to do that. :p
3,674 views 21 replies
Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top
You're probably overextending on colonies. Keeping spending at 100%, try using about a third of your initial bank in "colony ship" mode, then switch to heavy research spending for another third and finally to Social spending to finish some basic improvements (Soil Enrichment and Habitat Improvement, at least) and some Trade Goods.

Once you use up the $1000, you'll have to scale back spending, but you can sell the Trade Goods for tribute until you get some Trade going.

~SDC~
Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top
Firstly: redefine the problem: you are building industrial capacity to produce research faster than your economy is growing.

Settle the higher PQ planets first - at the begining, most of the cash you are getting is based on the PQ of the planets you colonize, not your pop, so get the better ones. (If I have a choice, I usually dont bother to settle PQ15-17 during the rush - they are backfilled later.) Put 115 on PQ16-18 planets, and 300+ on better ones if you can. On PQ15, I go as low as 1. This will maximize the bc per pop you get.

Build Soil Enrichment, Habitat, and Banking asap (they cost no maintenance, and bring in more cash - do them first)

Upgrade your government ASAP (remember +20% eco for each government upgrade!), and it costs no maintenance.

Be cautious with your military units - recent upgrades make starbases cost 5perturn, and scouts 1perturn - EXPENSIVE! (I don't begrudge the bigger military units, but beware those scouts.)

~SDC~
Ashes of the Singularity II
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top
Hrmm... the problem I have with ignoring planets is that the AI swarms in and grabs them behind me. I must be stuck in a CIV III 'grab the land' type mentality here.

I have also noticed that when switching government at the start, my income goes down. WAAAAY down - 100bc/turn or so.

I'll try to go with a more modest expansion and see if that fits the bill. I just hate having to fight my way through what I could have owned if I just went out full force and nabbed it at the beginning. :notsure:
Reply #5 from Stardock Forums Top
- Don't lease colony ships from Mitrosoft. Go 100% military instead. It only takes 2 more turns, and it doesn't tank your economy in the long-run. I also don't lease constructors.

- Do lease trade goods, and sell them to the AIs, especially minor civs. Keep diplomatic translators for yourself, and delay trading as much as possible until you get them.

- Do research trade as soon as possible. On gigantic maps, form short routes just to get the cash flowing. Then, replace them with longer routes.
- When switching governments, your production capacity increases AND your income increases. Your production capacity tends to increase by more than your income, so you tend to start running a defecit after a government change. The government change is still worth it. You should adjust your spending rate after the government change, and check the planet screen to confirm that you are producing more.
Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
Thanks all.

I pulled back on the expansion for about a year, going 50/50 civil/research and let my population stabilize. That pushed the tax income back up so that I could run with spending at 60-70% until the trade routes went operational.

I don't lease ships unless it's late in the game and I need a strategic hole filled, or if I'm rush buying a trade good/wonder. That is one "beginner's tip" that should have NEVER crept into the manual. When I first figured out the spending slider I was pissed because I tanked about 10 hours worth of games by using that strategy.

I also took a close look at the numbers when I switched to democracy. They might have told us that production jumped as well. would've saved me some consternation...

Ah well. You live, you learn
Reply #7 from Stardock Forums Top
You haven't mentioned your taxation levels, keeping them as high as possible reduces your deficit and keeps you at 100% spending longer. I always keep my taxes as high as they can go with Sol staying at 100%, which can be in the 50% range once Sol reaches (or if it starts at) PQ 20. This keeps Sol at max pop growth to feed your colony ships, there's no real reason at the start to care too much about keeping moral sky-high on your other worlds. I will even move most of Earth's population to a higher PQ world with the first colony if there's one close by to create a de-facto capital system that can handle the colony-producing role at a higher tax rate. I can keep this up for a long time on gigantic maps (painful), long enough to secure several clusters, depending on size. Another important fact is to go for higher PQ planets first as opposed to a mindless land grab, as they give a higher base tax and will be happier and thus grow faster.
Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top
I use a very high tax rate to start like around 65%. I grab as many planets as I can as fast as I can, build soil enhancement, banking, MFG and Habitat Improvement. Then I turn the Social slider up to 100 and build the Economic Center and I'm ususually spending 50% of all the spending in the universe in the pie chart at lower left by then regardless of how much trade I got going on. I rarely build the Social improvements that give you + Moral. I get off to a bad start militarily and population wise but I have an excellent Economic foundation to build on. :)
Reply #9 from Stardock Forums Top
More and more, I think the best thing to do early is set the social slider to zero, reduce taxes and then Mitrosoft lease all early social improvements----- bank, entertainment, stock market, soil, habitat, fusion and, maybe, manufacturing.

Mitrosoft's leasing rate is actually extremely low when you consider the effect of growth on your economy.

~SDC~
Reply #10 from Stardock Forums Top
I'm going to recommend the exact opposite as some people here: keep your tax rates low and get the 100 morale. 100 morale means population growth, and pop growth means more taxes and more colonies. Because you have only a few planets, you can micromanage your propaganda to get the 100 morale, too. Build colony ships on the planets you're having morale problems with; that'll save you money pleasing them, and those are the planets you can afford to de-pop anyway.

Scout not only for yellow stars, but also guess where other civs are and contact them ASAP. The AI will pay quite a wad for Industrial Theory, Medical Theory, and Universal Translator if you lease it--more than it would cost them just to research it, in fact. So this keeps your economy afloat longer and is just a good deal all-around. If your neighbors are busy paying their debts to you, that's less colony ships and constructors you have to worry about.

Soil and Entertainment are awesome improvements, but they can wait until you hit Morale problems. I usually get these on other planets as I'm going for the Diplo Translators.

Reply #11 from Stardock Forums Top
A high tax rate doesn't preclude the 100 morale. The only planets that need to be at 100 morale are Earth and any other planets that will be producing colony ships. So basically your tax rate depends on Earth's PQ. If it starts out high you can set your tax rate around 50% and stay at 100 morale. I micromanage, push it as high as it can go and still be at 100 morale, lowering taxes as pop grows and raising them when a colony ship leaves. Your first colonies should be on the best PQ planets available, and even if not quite as good as Earth their smaller pop should mean they can stay at 100 morale for a while. Because you're focussing on the higher PQ planets, and depending on your map reaching choke points and expanding range, you're not colonizing a lot of planets quickly because they're travelling reasonable distances. Which lets you stretch your starting money a long time. For me, on gigantic maps, it means being able to build some two dozen colony ships and saving enough to lease the first trade good from Mitrosoft without going too deeply into debt, at which point I have to lower my spending, and have either colonized most all available systems or am just backfilling in sectors out of the AI's range and not in such a hurry anymore.
Reply #12 from Stardock Forums Top
Fascinating reading this thread - seems there's no one winning strategy. Some do one thing and others do the opposite. Sign of a great game?
Reply #13 from Stardock Forums Top
As i already said, 100 morale is a must at the start.
First 3 turns with morale 100 - population will be 1000*(1,06^3)=1000*1.191=1191
First 3 turns with morale 99..54 - population will be 1000*(1,03^3)=1000*1.093=1093

Difference in just 3 turns - 1191/1093-1=8,99% of population of your entire empire. This difference may stay more or less the same for next 100 turns.

~SDC~
Reply #14 from Stardock Forums Top
I just played a game where Earth was a 17.
Not bad, but one of the other races had a system with 21, 19 and 19 planets!

Luckily I was playing simple, and I leased 3 colony ships right away, put 200M people in them, and sent them out to colonize anything at 15 or higher. I never got anything above 16, but it gave me a good starting base. I went 0%/50%/50%, used my one survey ship to get as many free anomaly ships as possible and survived until my pop started growing faster than the rest.
During that time I built the hab improvement, etc... and got morale up.
Then it was all but done.
Reply #15 from Stardock Forums Top
#13 - Are those real growth figures Ell? Two games now I have tried to measure the pop growth differences of 100% morale or 90% morale, and the differences betweem PQ17 and PQ20 planets, and every time I get numbers suggesting that some randomizing factor is far more significant than anything I am doing, and none of this makes any difference at all. (With pops between 300 and 1500). I am at masochistic: could it be a level difference (what AI level were your figures from?)

~SDC~
Reply #16 from Stardock Forums Top
Paul A, you're right about about only really worrying about 100 morale on Earth and the other important planets. You can crank up tax rate and bombard your important planets with propaganda. Your other planets aren't as important, but then again they're not as populated so don't have the morale problems either.

What other people have said is true, too: Earth very often doesn't end up your highest PQ planet. Especially when playing Evil. I will gladly depop Earth and make a large colony on a better planet, which will end up being my future Manufacturing Capital. That helps with early Morale anyway.
Reply #17 from Stardock Forums Top
To Ralegh

Please my nick is Ellestar.

You can test it. With planetary morale 100, planet grows by Pop*1.06*(1+PopGrowthBonus)

With 54..99, it grows by Pop*1.03*(1+PopGrowthBonus)

~SDC~
Reply #18 from Stardock Forums Top
Thank you Ellestar.

Am I right in thinking your statement includes the idea that pop growth is NOT affected by PQ?
Reply #19 from Stardock Forums Top
AFAIK no. But i'm interested because i saw this suggestion several times. But my tests show that it's not affected by PQ. Maybe others tested empire population growth? PopGrowth calculated on a per-planet basis, as in any other game. Or i'm missing something?
Also, popgrowth is capped at 200 per turn for each planet.
You may look here http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=85148 if you are interested. There are some numbers on morale and income. Maybe i'll repeat tests in this sunday with 1.04 path.
~SDC~
[Message Edited]
Reply #20 from Stardock Forums Top
I didn't know that about the pop growth cap. That one's huge. I get 200/0.03=6666, which basically means that any planet over 6.5 billion hits their cap regardless of morale (more or less). That has some serious strategy ramifications, if it's still true. Maybe we should go after those class-14's after all, to farm pop.
Reply #21 from Stardock Forums Top
If you have time, please do retest the pop growth figures & let us know what you find. I did a quick test on 1.04.059 - an obvious difference between morale 100 and lower ones, and it is in the order of 3%, but there are either other factors or randomisers or something because the formulae don't predict what I actually see (at maso, but I presume level doesn't affect things.)

~SDC~