Question: When is 100 billion worthwhile?

Planetary population questions.

from GalCiv2 Forums
So in my current game, I'm screwing around with a PQ25 planet I have. I tiled it entirely in with stock markets except for an economic capital. I put a super farm on a +300% tile, and then replaced a few stock markets with VR centers to keep the planet's morale in line with my other planets with hardly any approval buildings and 15 billion people.

I broke 30 billion and my morale quit dropping, I think I had 6 VR centers. one might be on an approval bonus tile. After my population maxed, I started replacing stock markets with farms. My popluation cap is now 95 billion and I have 93 billion on the planet through ferrying them from other planets with transports.

I'm making less money than when I had 20 billion and a load of stock markets.

Is there a planet combination that makes it a good idea to actually max the population? You need at least 10 farms. If you had a planet with 3 300% farming tiles, that would get taken care of. You would need 6-8 VR centers to keep the planet morale level with your other small planets. (I try to keep all my planets at about the same morality level so that I can tax evenly without causing 1 to go into the red.) Maybe half that if you got lucky with tiles. I really don't see how this could pay for itself unless you have every farm and VR center on a bonus tile, and have a PQ above 35 or so so that you have enough green squares to build a bunch of stock markets on.

One thing I did notice was that the planet's influence is ridiculously huge. Maybe I should't worry about money and just build political centers and political capitals on a high population world?

I've also realized that stock markets give you approval, economy, and influence bonuses. I think they might be the greatest buildings ever.

So to anyone that made a planet with more than 30 billion people, what did you think of it? Was it worthwhile?
13,579 views 21 replies
Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I'm making less money than when I had 20 billion and a load of stock markets.


That doesn't surprise me. Money grows with the square root of the population. Economic bonuses (from stock markets) are linear.

As an absolute rule of thumb, I never allow a population to grow past 17B. It just isn't worth it; at 17B, I can use 2-3 high-end morale buildings to keep it OK with an 80% tax rate, which leaves the other dozen or so tiles free for Stock Markets. Plus, with enouch stock markets, you can actually remove one of the morale buildings (guess what you replace it with ).

However, if you ever found an econ resource, you'd be rolling in money on your high-pop world
CursorFX - Customize your Windows cursor
Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Economic resource?? I've never ever seen or heard of this. It would be nice to HAVE a economic precursor thingy.
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Economic Resource = Green hexagon thing in space you mine for its bonus
Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
How much morale bonus are you getting from the stock markets themselves? I doubt it is enough to sustain a huge pop though...
Reply #6 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
It would be worth it as a launch pint for invasions. For example, by mid-late game, my transports can often carry between 6-8 thousand legions, which is all well and good, but just one or two of them will take out a planets ability to produce more. A planet with 100 billion would be useful for this, as your planets could produce transports, launch them with one legion, them "reload" on the big planet.

These transports are usfull since they can basically take a planet, but since it's just one ship, they can be launched with major fleets without much problem (thus protecting your investment), and your could easily launch ten to twelve of them from that monster.

Additionally, since it is basically a population planet, you wouldn't have to worry about depopulating your core worlds, leaving them open for invasion.
Reply #7 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Um, 30% econ, 10% morale, 5% influence from a stock market. thats a whopping +45% in mixed bonuses. I usually have 2 or 3 on every planet, so all of my 15 billion population worlds usually don't need any happy buildings.

The drawback I see of the invasion plan is that it really takes a long time to get the 90 million people back after you use them. 6 worlds with 15 million people each will grow population 6 times faster than the high pop world.
Reply #8 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
For maximum revenue, go with low pops plus lots of stock markets. But revenue isn't the only reason to want population. High population planets are harder to capture, produce lots of soldiers for invasions, and generate lots of influence. If you're playing a pacifist conquerer strategy, having high populations on all your worlds is key.
Reply #9 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Get rid of a few of those vr centers and keep the morale just above 30%, they wont defect and youll be pulling in a ton more cash at 90 whatever bil.
Reply #10 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Low morale = low population growth. So they may not defect, but it'll take you eternity to fill up the planet.
Reply #11 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
It's literally impossible to invade, even for the DL.
Reply #12 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Low morale = low population growth. So they may not defect, but it'll take you eternity to fill up the planet.


Well done einstein, you replace the vr centers once your at 90bil
Reply #13 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Why on earth would I wait for 90 billion people normally when I can just transport them in 1 billion per ship from a convoy of transports from the rest of my empire? You're capped at 200 million a week natural growth, so 5 weeks per billion, or about a year to fill it up assuming 100% morale bonus and may population growth. That just isn't feasable compared to running transports.
Reply #14 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Well done einstein, you replace the vr centers once your at 90bil


I love the hypocrisy here. You insult someone's intelligence, yet you can't use the word "you're" properly.

Why on earth would I wait for 90 billion people normally when I can just transport them in 1 billion per ship from a convoy of transports from the rest of my empire? You're capped at 200 million a week natural growth, so 5 weeks per billion, or about a year to fill it up assuming 100% morale bonus and may population growth. That just isn't feasable compared to running transports.


Because it weakens the other planets.
Reply #15 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Why on earth would I wait for 90 billion people normally when I can just transport them in 1 billion per ship from a convoy of transports from the rest of my empire? You're capped at 200 million a week natural growth, so 5 weeks per billion, or about a year to fill it up assuming 100% morale bonus and may population growth. That just isn't feasable compared to running transports.


Because it weakens the other planets.


And makes it pointless to have the 90+ Billion person planet in the first place. All the transports your wasting time with to fill up one planet is the reason we want this sort of "Super Trooper" planet



Reply #16 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
That too. This planet is for exporting death. I don't think of them as financial planets, rather troop reserves. Make an 18bil with 10 stock markets your econ cap. Make this the place where you can summon a huge army in weeks.
Reply #18 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I broke 30 billion and my morale quit dropping, I think I had 6 VR centers. one might be on an approval bonus tile. After my population maxed, I started replacing stock markets with farms. My popluation cap is now 95 billion and I have 93 billion on the planet through ferrying them from other planets with transports.

I'm making less money than when I had 20 billion and a load of stock markets.


At a guess, it seems like this would be a y=-x^2 type of graph, where there's a hump in the middle. Seems like one of each, going up the PQ would be a good start.

A good test would be to take that big PQ planet, and put half farms + 1 farm (with rest econ). Call that the high pop. Then try half farms, call that the middle. Then try half farms-1 farm, call that the low. I'm thinking the middle one will have the highest overall income.

The middle point might be shifted over by 5 pop because of the initial colony, and the bonus tiles count double or triple (or seven if you got one of those).

However, that doesn't include the VR centers needed to maintain morale; at 100pop, thats probably over -900% morale, and would require over a dozen VR centers, thus reducing the effective size of the planet, and putting another type of pop cap--room for farms. Other methods of controlling morale would be needed, like racial bonuses, morale resource mining, galactic wonders, tech bonuses, etc.
Reply #19 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Hi!
You're capped at 200 million a week natural growth

Not correct. The cap is 150 million + bonus growth. So if your race has 50% bonus from Aphrodisiacs, and 10% natural bonus, you'll get 150+150*0.6=240 million new pop.

Obtaining Aphrodisiacs helps big time with invasions. I usually grow more pop than I can export from my average class-10 11B pop planet - it just can not build troop transports with 2-3 factories fast enough.

BR, Iztok
Reply #20 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Hi!
I have 93 billion on the planet... I'm making less money than when I had 20 billion and a load of stock markets

The math here is quite simple. You get money from square root of pop.

sqrt(100) billion pop is 10.
sqrt(20) billion pop is 4,47.
10/4.47=2.27

So a planet with 100B pop is generating 2.27 times more money than a planet with 20B. For maintaining 100B pop a planet needs 10 farms. If those farms would be converted to Stock Markets, they would give 10*30% bost to revenue, or 3.0 factor - already more than 2.27. Even if all farms would be on 300% bonus tiles (3 farms needed), one still needs 7 best morale buildings to keep pop happy. That's again 10 buildings.

There's also a time factor. To grow 100B pop on a single planet one needs lots of time: assuming 200mil new pop each turn it's 500 turns. On such a big planet I can usually build a Stock Market in two turns, so in 20 turns I can have 300% revenue bonus.

So the rule of thumb, to not cross 20B pop is quite sound. From my experience even 20B is sometimes too high for a below 12 PQ planet, that can't afford two or three morale buildings besides a farm on a bonus tile.

When is 100 billion pop worthwhile?

To answer your original question: only when you need extremely high influence from a single planet, and you can not use influence starbase.

HTH.

BR, Iztok
Reply #21 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
And makes it pointless to have the 90+ Billion person planet in the first place. All the transports your wasting time with to fill up one planet is the reason we want this sort of "Super Trooper" planet


Well, if it was a super trooper planet, you'd need the transports anyway. So building them elsewhere and having them all fly over to the 100b pop world with a load of people would make sense. At some point, I usually add a transport per planet or so for quick invasions and stuff. they're handy.