How to start a strong economy.

Plus other questions

Hey everyone I've been lurking a bit and I can't find the info I need fast enough.
I've played a few games so far, two that I carried through to the victory.
Like every other game, crushing the opposition and banishing them to the history books is more about how fast and how many cannons you can make opposed to how strong they are.

So before I can start denying different species their liberty and sovereignty I need to rev up my economy. I can manage after a while but in the very early game I'm on shakey ground. At the height of my last game where victory was coming whether I liked it or not (due to people surrendering and such) my highest income never passed 2000 on a large map, I have no idea how someone could get up to 3000 just from trade as I read here. What do people usually do?

I played the demo of galciv2 for a while about a year ago or so and I learnt to spam colonies aggressively and did alright but it doesn't seem to be working quite as well with the addon so far. I've already figured out to focus some planets towards research or production So I'm just looking for some generic tips for early game play. (I dislike hunting down anomolies so I tend to stick those to rare) One thing I did that seemed to work was ignore the diplomacy string of research until I conquered my neighbour.

Also some more specific questions.
How does population affect planet production and income?
I once played a game where my beautifully crafted destroyer design was apparently built by one of my allies, appallingly. Do ship designs carry over from one game to another? Is there any way to shut that option off? I love designing a ship for specific purposes with the technology that I happen to have.

Anyways, thanks for looking at my post and hopefully answering my questions

(or referring me to good resources)

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You can boost your trade income by building economy starbases near your trade routes (those transparant lines with a little freighter sailing to and fro). Those starbases can be upgraded with trade modules that boosts every trade route passing through its circle of influence. Those starbases stack, so building more of them adds to the trade revenue. Perhaps they got such a high trade income from that, perhaps combined with extra trade routes and trade boosters?

As to your other questions:

Population does not adjust your research, social, or military production. Imagine all sience labs and factories to be fully automated and you'll go a long way. Your population has just two functions: fighting and paying taxes. Having a larger population thus makes your planets harder to invade and earns you more cash. Important to note is that the increase in population does not equal a same increase in taxes. Doubling you population from 6 to 12 billion will not yield you twice the taxes but less. To get the highest tax income per inhabitant, you'll want to spread them evenly across your colonies (assuming this doesn't intervene with your other strategies).

It is likely your destroyer was saved into one of the templates one of the races use to build their ships. Each race has a series of ships (templates) it uses and you probably added a ship to that collection. It should be possible to delete the model but I'm not experienced in the matter.

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Being neutral gives yopu additional trade routes (i forget how many) so that in conjunction to the starbases that SleekDD mentioned could be how they got that high trade ioncome. i dont think ive even come close to that. The population of the planets involved in the routes makes them more valuable too. BTW those starbases also will add to the production and research of the planets in their radius. I play with small clusters just so i can have at least one help each of my planets.

Every planet above say.... 10-11 should have at least one farm (and of course associated entertainment buildings to keep the additional people happy). I havent done anything fancy but on my current mapo, as the terrans, im bringing in like 1500 bc a week and i only have 4 trade routes (just to keep my friends my friends). I guess its the population and the multiple money buildings on each planet. all except for my technological capital and my industrial capital. I think theres just one PQ6 planet that flipped to me that i changed to be just research.

It takes a little while to get your economy going, but once it does you'll be fine. Some other tips are:

1) A change in governnmet adds % to your economy. try to get to democracy and federation as soon as its practical. That is, when your research is good enough to do it in like 5 weeks or so. Im not suggesting to go for it when it'll take like 15 weeks. So dont ignore the diplomacy string. Thos etechs will also help you get more for you trades.

2) GET those anomolies!!! you can find like 1000 or 500 bc and be like "wheeeew". You do not have to search for the at all. You can order your survey craft to "Auto Survey" and then you just forget it. on a large map with abundant anomolies i usually build a second surveyor.

3) Research new enonomy buildings sooner that industrial and research buildings.

4) Happiness means you can tax higher. Build those trade items and construct any morale starbases that you can. Its something when you can tax your people at like 70% and 80-90% of them are still happy. Now i know what they use those ultraspices for.

5) Adjust your sliders often at the game beginning. Keep track of when youir money will run out if you're income is negative. (and it will be at the start)

6) I tried this on my latest game. I chose to be Humans an i think they have a 20% econo bonus. Well i droppedthe loyaly bonus and went Up in my econo bonuus with those points. I think i still and another point to boost me else where. I guess you can do that with any race, find a bonus you dont really want/ need and use the points to get a better economy.

7) is a fertility clinic another name for a space brothel?

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Wow thanks for the really great responses!

Its good to know you are supposed to be loosing money at the start. Thanks again

When I think fertility clinic I think of a place where they give do inverto fertilization and stuff with viagra probably. But space brothel is more fun.

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There's some good tips on the wiki's Economy Strategies.

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