The best idea so far is the spread it accross planets that are using it. Perhaps with a penalty for distance it has to travel. I think it would be cool to be able to set where the overflow goes. Then have a penalty for how "overloaded" the planet it. A huge, well developed, planet could use a lot of overload but a new colony can not handle much. You could even have a set of techs about it. One to let you do it and others to limit the range penalty and "overload" penalty.

I don't understand why this is so controversial and/or difficult. The way I see it, the problem in itself is very simple:

Planet X is receiving 20bc from the Imperial coffers when all it needs to complete its current project is 12bc.

The solution then presents itself:
Planet X will be allocated only 12bc from the Imperial coffers this turn.

What to do with the 8bc saved becomes a matter of debate. Logically, one of the following should happen:
1) it is added to budget surplus (or used to reduce budget deficit) OR
2) it is spread out evenly for allocation to the other planets

I would see (2) as ideal since the money was, after all, allocated to the social budget (for instance), but (1) is most likely the easiest to actually implement.


~SDC~

bentcd: "Overflow" on completing a project is a different matter to the topic at hand. Overflow is a concern, but it's nowhere near as big an issue as the "no project, all allocated funds wasted" problem. Let's try and keep this on track so it doesn't split off into a hundred different tangents.

~SDC~

My vote is definitely for Thrags proposal. If programming concerns make that unworkable, I think getting some (50%?) percentage of the cash back makes the most sense.

I don't understand the difference between "overflow" and "no project". "No project" is just a special case of the former, where everything allocated overflows.


~SDC~

"How is your method not increasing micromanagement if you have to go through every single planet with an empty build queue to setup the proper production transfer?"

It's not increasing micromanagment since it's using the same exact controls that are used currently to change production. In a normal situation you won't ever have some big list of planets producing nothing since when you complete the last project in the list and you are prompted what to build next, you select one of the new options just as you would select a new project if there was one. Even if you have to make sweeping changes it's the same level of micromanagment that exists currently. It's no different that if you have ten planets producing, say, star fighters and you want to switch them all to corvettes.

My suggestion also adds a new level of functionality since you can choose to transfer one type of production to another even when the build list is not empty. This would allow you to, for example, focus on social production on a new planet to get some initial buildings up. The result would be similar to having individual economic sliders for each world without the extra micromanagment overhead that that entails and no new UI controls or control concept for the AI.

As to the AI issue, you're right, we don't know how much tweaking will be required for any suggestion ergo we can't dismiss any suggestion based on it.

~SDC~

First, I think I'll just continue playing this game on my roommate's computer until this issue is resolved.

Second, my suggestion is simply taking from MOO2 and having "Trade Goods" be an option you can set for the governors.

I think all this can be solved at the governor level and not need to be done done at the planet level. The above suggestion would be the absolute simplist. However, if you wanted more choices for the governors, I could see the following:

"Materialistic": that build queue produces maximum trade goods.

"Relaxed": Work force produces trade goods but not at maximum capacity. Instead, they're allowed to relax a bit and that gets that planet a morale bonus. Possibly it would always make sure that the planet has at least a positive morale score.

"Help Other Queue": Nothing to build in one queue means workers help the other queue. Since the Roman Empire and before, sitting armies have been used to help build social works. The Roman Army built roads, dams, bridges, temples, public baths, walls, etc. The US Army's Corp of Engineers helps build civilian dams, roads, bridges, etc. And the reverse is just as true. The Ford's auto plants switched from making cars to tanks during WWII. I would, however, have this option go to another option when the other build queue has nothing left.

"Science!": Simply switches them to research workers. Soldiers building labs and being guinea pigs for nuclear tests. Civilian (social) workers being transferred to the company's research wing.

"Work Holiday": no trade goods are produced in that queue. All workers are given vacation time. This gives the planet a MAJOR morale bonus. If both build queues are on "Work Holiday", morale on that planet is maxed. I'd temper this by two things: 1) It cannot be done by a governor but must be done through the planet's build queue. In other words, you, the emperor/president, have declared a "Work Holiday" for that planet when visiting it. 2) If both build queues are on "Work Holiday", all planets in your empire suffer a 1% morale hit. Afterall, it would suck not being on that party planet and grumbling would ensue. This would then likely only be used for morale emergencies for red frowning planets.

I don't have read all the posts in this thread, so this may have already been suggested, but here is my balanced view between micromanagement and large guidelines.

Instead of only one set of sliders, have for example sets A,B,C (,D...) and each planet may be assigned to be an A, B or C planet. This way the player can have settings for a newly colonized planet, a military construction planet and a research planet, etc.

I think it should definitely get sent to the other planets that do have something in the queue. If you set the slider to spend x% on military building, then x% should get spent on BUILDING, not x% minus whatever is wasted on empty queues.

I do like the work holiday idea as a named option for both queues. I'd also suggest possibly adding some kind of "trade goods" option that produces money for your empire but nothing else.

Well, trade goods sending the cash back to the pool would let you funnel all your production to a selected planet or group of them, without rush buying. Not sure how that'd screw up balance.

And what if there's no planet making any ships? I commonly have enough colony ships (usually lots just hanging in orbit waiting for a planet to be discovered), military ships, etc. All my ship queues have been game-years with nothing to build until the next tech advance is achieved, planet discovered, new race found to crush ... errr, I mean ... ummm ... set up diplomatic relations with. Yes, that's what I mean. And if this did happen (no ship or social work being built by any planet), what happens to those work resources? Seems like we're back to Square One again.

Also, think from the strategy angle what this would then encourage. Want that Wonder? Simple. Put all but one social build queue to "nothing" and that Wonder will pop into existence. I'd then make a Wonder Governor that has nothing in his social build queue to do just that. Same thing with warships. Want to crank them out super-fast? Just have one or a few planets build them and all the other planets have "nothing" in their ship building queues. I'd much rather (both micro-managing-wise and concept-wise) simply like it to be "Trade Goods".

As Jason says _any_ form of money or production being transferred can potentially screw up the balance. I don't really mind how it's solved except that it _must_ stay within the same planet.
Transferring production to other ques based on their percentages would be easiest to implement though I still like the idea of giving the sliders to governors the best. While you could potentially have a governor for each planet I don't see anyone really doing that, but hey, if you want to micromanage rather than actually _play_ go ahead. Me? I'd have 3 governors and that would be it and I'd set planets when I colonised them and have to change each planet perhaps _once_ in it's lifetime.

Transferring stuff between planets though... I thought of a viable means for doing that that shouldn't screw up balance... Internal trade routes. Send a freighter to your _own_ planet and then those two planets can influence each others economies a little. Any overflow can go between them because there are actually _ships_ carrying stuff. So with a newly colonised world you could send a colony ship and a freighter, so the newly colonised world is getting regular supplies as if the homeworld is helping it develop.
Trade routes in your own planets dont count against maximmums of course because you're not having to convince anyone else.
So... If Earth turned off it's social production and was just helping colonised worlds they'd get a massive boost, but the AI could still destroy the freighters and stop the route and it would've taken you work to set up as well.

So... My new suggestion is for _two_ things.
Sliders for governors
_and_ internal trade routes.

~SDC~

H) I like the idea of sending those points to other planets needing them. pehaps with a shipping penalty of like 30% of the points. TANNSTAAFL ( there ain't no such thing as a free lunch!)

~SDC~

The total amount you can spend on a planet per turn appears to be entirely independent of income and population; it's determined only by the planet rating and manufacturing modifier. It looks like sending production back to the bank with trade goods wouldn't really let you rush build, then; you could use the excess to save up and get things quickly through the purchase interface, but purchasing is such a horrid deal anyway I don't think it'll make much difference.

My recommendation: change "nothing" in both military and social to just not take anything out of the bank. The only gameplay change I can think of is a slight bias more towards specialist planets (research only, ships only, whatever).

Well worth it to get rid of the annoyance, I think.

Oh, forgot to mention: keep the per-production type caps. A planet with a spending limit of 40 BC should still only spend 20 BC on research with the slider set to 50%, regardless of what the production queues contain.

One point in favor of the current system: if you've balanced your research, colonization and military situation you ought not have too much trouble with empty queues. I rarely see a social slot open, since I keep the research slider high enough to supply me with interesting things to build. It does happen. I -never- have an empty military slider, since I can always use more starbases. Also building colonizers so I can throw my excess population away takes up military queue time. That's an odd little game mechanic, if you ask me.. kill 10 bil and morale goes -up-...


I love getting owned by sub-normals when I turtle, honestly. It really shows off the power of the AI.

I hadn't realised resources were wasted till I read this thread - thats a bit naughty!. What about giving the gov'ners a few choice boxes for some of the sensible options presented in this thread which are not unbalancing. Why be limited to one option? I agree that micromanagement should be minimized in the context of this particular game - its not MOO2.5 after all

~SDC~

Not being able to use the money generated by a planet's build queues would only make sense if the dev team were to come up with a new form of government: Confederation. Then each planet looking out for just itself and not wanting to give another planet its hard earned cash. By the way, I do like the idea of this new form of government and this penalty that comes with it. I think a counter bonus would be a very very low instance of succession since they're basically independent already.

As for as game balance, I don't think "Trade Goods" would upset it. Both you and the AI would then have this method of turning now stupidly wasted manpower resource into cash. The only thing that might need to be adjust is the price of things.

Just a few quick notes:

The concept of trade goods doesn't fit GalCiv as well as other games since we're paying to manufacture the trade goods.

Transferring the money that funds the production isn't going to throw off game balance in my opinion, since a single planet still can't fund more production than that planet has available. It's not like if you transferred all money to one planet that that planet could crank out an Avatar every turn.

Finally, if you're going to transfer money at all, you have to be able to go over the set rate (ie 50% for science) since every planet is going to be funded to that rate. Doing that means that none of the funding could be moved at all.

B,C or E

olaf

I think the safest approach would be to turn unused production directly back into money on a per-planet basis. Perhaps at a hefty markdown to minimise the potential for abuse/imbalance.

You could say that instead of making warships for your navy, the shipyard is now being leased to Fnord to make their new line of hover-SUVs

~SDC~

I don't particularly care what the solution is. All I know is that it is totally retarded/broken the way it is. I hope they fix it quick so that it's not wasted. Why is it MOO 1 and 2 are way better than MOO 3 and GalCiv right now??

Here's my two cents...

Waste of resources forces a challenge for managing the empire. In that, I think the current mechanic works well. So, I'm in favor of keeping the current system, but with a few subtle modifications.

What needs tweaking, IMO, are ways to lower the waste for planets with empty queues. That could be solved through technological advances and/or social projects. By researching or building projects, planets could lessen how much resources get wasted. One catch -- the tweaks should not allow to remove all waste. If projects were built, those projects would also require a maintenance fee.

That now forces the player to either:

Figure out how to maximize their production so there are no empty queues.

or

Research and build projects to reduce waste at the price of still having some loss and a maintenance fee.


I'm definitely not in favor of anything that would provide unfair game balance such as being able to "rush build" wonders by funneling the resources from other planets. Changes of that sort are too easily abused.

Anything the human player can "abuse" can also be "abused" by the AI, don't forget.

~SDC~

I think that interplanet transfers are a bad idea.