Can't keep people happy ??

If you have more than 18 or 20 billion people at the max, there is nothing to do. A planet cannot happily sustain such population.

Morale Techs//Trade Goods help a lot. Yellow Morale Resources on the map with fully built Starbases, every +Mining module available.

Seems you probably know these options, I am pretty certain you have too many people. Don't let a planet have more than 18 billion people. Some go for 20 billion, but absolutely no more than that.

Rules of thumb for happiness:

- Dont place Farms on Food bonus tiles - else later as you upgrade the Farm Techs you will burst through the 18/20 Billion population barrier. One Farm per Planet as a general rule is fine - just upgrade as you get the latest Farm Tech. On smaller maps you can better utilise the Food Bonus Tiles, but on (say) large and above, it becomes a living hell trying to keep up with exploding population because you need to go into every planet to sort it - that can be hundreds of Planets, and its impossible to sort out in a practical game mechanics sense (its micro-management from Hell). So just keep away from Food Bonus Tiles, they are lethal when first getting into the game.

- Build one entertainment structure per Farm, upgrading the entertainment structure at the same time as the Farm Tech to cope with the enhanced population Cap.

- Keep the Yellow Entertainment Techs "topped up" as time goes on as soon as is practical, they have a direct and immediate effect on population happiness, and therefore an immediate positive effect on your economy (more bc's to spend)

- Grab Yellow resources as soon as you find them and build their available modules asap. Happy population means more productivity means more money generated from the same population level. View the Yellow Resources as an indirect version of the green Economic Resources.

Are there other strategies re population - yup dozens, especially connected with best use of a Planet Tile - and everyone has a favourite. However as in learning to drive a car, first learn where the ignition key is and how to use a stick shift, before the fancy stuff. Once you wrap your head round those four basics your good to go, and can move onwards and upwards.

If you ever get into a situation where you have a few Farms built on a Planet and the population is exploding uncontrollably, transport population to another Planet using colony ships or transporters, and "upgrade" a Farm tile to something else (economic building/Factory/Whatever). That will kill off any remaining population over the Cap because they cant be fed, and restore order.

Regards
Zy

Just to add to the above posts, in DL having those high populations was feasible. Things have however changed since then and now it's in your best interests to stay below 18-20b in population.

If you NOTICE a planet's population going apeshit, it's easy to take care of.

If you're using a bunch of unboosted farms, replace a few with cash buildings. When a farm disappears, the people it was supporting die immediately.

If you're using a farm on a food bonus tile, replace some other building with a normal farm, THEN replace the food bonus farm with a different building.

Or, just use transports or colony ships. You need some production for both though.

The real problem I find is that I don't even realize planets of mine are overgrown until they're completely screwed. My solution to this is to simply never research the final level of farm tech. Second tier farms on booster tiles aren't that bad, provided they're the only farm on the planet.

Try looking at Civilization Manager. In there is a column "Approval". Its sortable by clicking on the column header, click again if wrong sort order. You end up with a sorted list of ascending approval ratings, the red (rebellious ones) being at the top of the list. From there you click on the planet name and sort out the moaning prolls

The other column in there to look at, is the population one, again its sortable by clicking the header. The resultant list is great for looking at populations nearing or at a Cap, or just growing too big.

They did a real good job with that screen, there's all sorts of functionality built into it.

Regards
Zy

It gives the current population, but not the max like looking at the planet. If it would, then you could, at a glance, see which planets are possible problems when they fill out.

The top tier of farms isn't bad. Just don't place on a farm tile and only place 1 farm on a planet. NEVER place a farm on your home planet as well. The Thalans in TA have this issue due to their mega factory/lab building also contains a +8 food. Most people place it on another planet, to make 2 16b pop worlds instead of a 24b pop homeworld.

Following those rules will keep you from even possibly coming into population problems and you don't need more tools to find things out.