Planet specialization strategies?

If you have a PQ26 use it as a econ. planet because there is no bonus titles for economy, the are bonus titles for indus. and reasearch which they are self explanetory. Influances are good for turisioum and flipping worlds and I like to use morale for worlds that pump out transports and to be a reckless defenive world.

Also think super-projects (eg capitials, moral bounses, defence (espesally on outer rim worlds) and trade).

Well, I am not sure if I qualify as a pro, but here's what I use. For tech planets, it's basically the largest planet with the most research bonuses. That's a fairly simple one. Also, I try and build at least one research centre on every planet. Also, for about PQ 7 planets and below, if they don't have enough upgradeable tiles to get above 10, I almost always make them research planets.

For income, I generally go by the number of morale bonuses. Farming bonuses don't do you much good if you can't keep the crowds happy. You would want at least a PQ 11 planet, since that provides an extra morale bonus for planet quality. The rule of thumb is generally held to be one entertainment building per farm. You need more per farm once a planet's population goes above 20 billion. For stock markets, on an economic planet I just build one anywhere I haven't built anything else. Personally, I try to never allow a population higher than 20 billion except on one planet, so I can build a Political Capital and a Secret Police Centre in one place and hopefully keep it under control, plus use the space on other planets for other things. That said, if you can keep several planets with populations above 20b, don't change that part of your strategy.

It's pretty simple, really. Just look for the bonus tiles. The planet with the greatest manufacturing bonus is your industrial planet. Likewise with research. Farming tiles give you greater population, therefore greater taxes, and income. Keep in mind, though, that you will need a couple of free tiles on this planet for 'happy camps'. If you don't have any bonus tiles on any of your planets, then you are free to do as you choose. Planet quality is really a secondary factor. A number of experienced players will set their home planet as their manufacturing capital, asap, in order to get the earliest bonuses for the initial colony rush, but I tend to hang back, until I have a chance to scout out a planet or two. Play a few games, and find out what works best for you. That is my best advice. Good luck.

And what are those little PQ6's best used for?

2 NLC and 3 SM.

For example, what planet quality / modifiers do you look for before saying "ah, that's an Econ planet", or "that's a tech planet".

Any planet is good for econ. For research I try to use a 26-32 with all NLCs. Then build econ SBs around it. Current game I am using a Class 22. Research production is 16461. the blue shiels run into the planet surface area.

Lastly, when I build an economy planet, what is the ideal ratio of farm : stock market : entertainment? Is there a rule of thumb for planet quality vs. number of farms?

Under PQ 7, no farms.
PQ 8-12, 1 SP, 2 Farms, 3 VRC, 2 NLC, X SM.
PQ 13-19, 1 SP, 2 IS, 2 Farms, 3 VRC, 3 NLC, X SM.
PQ 20-??, 1 SP, 2 IS, 2 Farms, 3 VRC, 4 NLC, X SM.

If you have 2-3 Morale resources you can run taxes at 69% with out any problems.

There's many different ways you can do things. I tend to keep the PQ4's and PQ5's as plain research planets, but other than this I specialize planets more based on thier location that on their PQ or their tile bonuses. But, I will make an exception for 700% precursor bonus tiles.

I usually look for a PQ32 type of planet to make my tech capital. I don't always get one this good, but usually you can find at least one of these. Anyway, I'll build only tech and tech bonus buildings and surround the planet with 16 economic SB's for the 384% bonus. Whatever planets are nearby that get some portion of the SB bonus, I'll make into production planets. It's doesn't matter if their PQ7's or PQ20's, it's the bonus that counts. Once I expand some I'll set up another area just like it. Pretty much everything else gets dedicated to income.

When deciding how to specialize a particular planet, I like to think about its "effective PQ" for each possible specialization. The EPQ is the planet's actual PQ plus a number that depends on the bonuses that planet has. For example, a planet with PQ 11 and a 300% bonus for research would have an EPQ of 14 for research, and an EPQ of 10 for anything else because I'd still put a lab on the bonus tile. EPQ can also include bonuses from moons, rings, colonization events, distance to enemy territory, and distance to other planets (for econ starbases). This will help you decide what each planet is suited for.

So here's how I specialize my planets:

The planet with the highest EPQ for research is my technology capital. This planet gets about PQ/4 factories because it needs decent production to build the rest of its improvements. It gets a spaceport so that those factories are not half wasted. It gets the tech capital and the omega research center, and the rest of the planet is filled with labs. This is so that the most labs possible get the big bonuses from the tech capital and omega research center. Once you've built all your discovery spheres or neutral learning centers, then you can convert the factories and starport to labs if you wish.

Next, the planet with the highest EPQ for production is my manufacturing capital. It has the manufacturing capital, a starport, and the rest of the planet is factories. It's convenient to build achievements, trade goods, and superprojects here because of the high production, but I try to avoid it because I don't want to replace the factories that get big bonuses.

Once those two special planets are chosen, all the planets with above average EPQ for economy are made into economy planets. Build PQ/4 factories and a starport just like the tech capital, build one or two farms and at least as many morale buildings, and fill the rest of the planet with markets. I specialize the good planets for economy because tax income is produced by multiplying the square root of the planet's population with the econ bonus from markets. This means that you get the most money by having a high population and many markets on the same planet, and this is only possible on a planet with high EPQ. These planets are also good for making trade routes because of their high populations. My best economy planet gets the economic capital, the political capital, and I move my civilization capital here for even more multiplication. The economic capital is often the highest PQ in my entire empire.

The mediocre to bad planets in my civilization are production and research planets. They have a starport, about one third factories and two thirds labs. Farms and morale buildings would be useless here because population doesn't help factories or labs at all and there aren't any markets to make population worthwhile. I generally don't specialize these planets for production or research because high production on a planet causes high wastage when overproducing a ship. You waste less if your production is evenly spread across all your planets. And a research-specialized planet needs factories anyway to build and upgrade its labs. On the other hand, a planet with lots of factories is good at building superprojects quickly, so I do that sometimes. And those planets that are PQ 5 or less aren't really worth building factories and starports on, so I just cover them with labs.

I have a simple convention I use for determining how I'm going to build a planet. If I can get enough manufacturing points out of it, I'll dedicate it to building ships by putting mostly factories on it. Planets that don't build ships get a couple three factories with a mix of labs and markets. I like to put markets on low PQ planets because they don't have enough horsepower to build much and I don't need labs after I finish the tech tree. So, I can put markets on them and forget them.

The technological capitol building provides a pretty big bonus and I like to make as much use of that as possible. So, I hold off until I can find a big producer. Usually, it ends up being a planet with really high PQ or one with a lot of research bonus tiles. The Precursor Library is often the clincher. If I get one of those, the planet is going to get a lot of labs and the tech capitol.

A big turning point in the game is when I finish the tech tree and no longer need labs (I play "very fast" tech). At that time, I go for population, running 2 farms and 4 virtual reality centers on planets with high enough PQ to support it. Prior to that, I run one farm and no entertainment buildings.

All this stuff is pretty dynamic and I've changed how I build planets to some extent after every patch release. I'm sure things will be much different again with the DA expansion.

And sometimes a colonization event pops up and redetermines fate.

I mean if you pick the evil choice on throwing those pukes out in the sea and get a +49% tech on this world its defititely getting some labs.

I'm testing a new strategy at the moment which seems to be working fine.

At the begining of the game, i will colonise planets but not build anything at all.
after i finish colonising, i will focus on trade untill my finances stop being so completely unreasonable.

Only when finances are green do i even consider building on planets. At which point i start off by taking advantage of any tile bonuses. Planets without bonuses are not developed at all till later on.

I then consider which planet will be my tech capital based on tile bonuses, proximity to good starbase locations and PQ. Good starbase locations are near 'nexus points' points where the most number of planets possible are inside its radius.

Also i like a large planet to be my manufacturing capital because some of the larger ships later on will need ALLOT of factories to build em quickly.
I always use Earth as my economic capital.

PS: i never start a game unless i get at least a 300 manufacturing bonus on earth. Then i can rush buy a factory and churn out colony ships nice and fast without rush buying them and going broke as an inevitable result.

At the begining of the game, i will colonise planets but not build anything at all.

You may as well have the planet build economic buildings. They have no maintenance requirement, increase your economy and use otherwise wasted production capacity. I'll often queue up 4 econ buildings and don't come back to build anything else until the planet is profitable.

You may as well have the planet build economic buildings. They have no maintenance requirement, increase your economy and use otherwise wasted production capacity. I'll often queue up 4 econ buildings and don't come back to build anything else until the planet is profitable.

i used to do this before actually. But eventually i realised that it's pointless because the population is too low, it takes to long to construct and draws recources away which are better used to get your capitals up and running.

certainly tho i do build markets this way in useless planets one i have a nice green financial position.

Balance VS specialization is always an issue. Primarily its what the danger is however. I use a balance perspective until I have control of all the planets I’ll have for sure. Then I go into care. I look for natural bonuses each planet gives then number of tiles I have to deal with, then the Population limit for that planet. But I always will make each planet do a little of the other things just in case. (little bit of eco tech factory)

If I find a natural bonus of +700%, or a couple of them and I can fit several more research facilities there easy (PG10 or up) then that’s a definite research planet, likewise for other planets. Because that doubles the available bonus; If a planet has a bonus of +500% total for research, I have just doubled that with the tech capital.

But that’s just me.

PQ 8-12, 1 SP, 2 Farms, 3 VRC, 2 NLC, X SM. PQ 13-19, 1 SP, 2 IS, 2 Farms, 3 VRC, 3 NLC, X SM. PQ 20-??, 1 SP, 2 IS, 2 Farms, 3 VRC, 4 NLC, X SM.

Newbie here, what do those translate as?

VRC Virtual Reality Center, NLC Neutrality Learning Center, the other's have me just guessing wildly.

SP = Starport
Farm = Xeno Farm Construction 3 (Farming)
VRC = Correct
NLC = Correct
SM = Stock Market

Thanks for clarifying that for me DG.

Sorry i forgot: -

IS = Industrial Sector (Manufacturing)

& FC you are most welcome.

& FC you are most welcome.

fc = fer chrissakes?

LOL. sometimes.

When do influence buildings come in or do you reserve those for starbases?