Player Questions for the Far Horizons Game Moderator

Q. When doing research, if I spend points on a given area of research, and my tech level in that area of research does not increase in the next turn, do those points that I spent matter, anymore, or does the program only consider what you are spending for research in a given area for the turn in question?

Q. At game start, how many points would you recommend that players spend to research a single area of research?

Q. How many points would you consider to be excessive or unwise for a player to devote to a particular area of research at game start?

Most of this information can be deduced from "How Research Works" in the "Getting Started" section of the moderator's website:

http://fh.binaryelysium.com/How_Research_Works

This is only my first game of Far Horizons, but I'm guessing that there is no upper limit to how much you should spend on research, as long as you have enough resources to do other necessary things, such as building scouts, building planetary defenses, etc. Since Research is most effective at lower tech levels, it would make sense that the best value for your Research dollar is at the beginning of the game, when your tech levels are relatively low.

I looked at it, but I don't deduce answers from it.

My best answers to your questions from reading the Game Manual, Getting Started, and Strategy Guide, and playing a few turns of this game:

In short, the program does not "remember" what you spent on research on the previous turn. The only way those points have an affect on your future research is either by increasing the tech level (which makes it harder to do future research) or with the leftover points in the research bucket which will carry over to future turns. If you have Mining at 10 and you spend 35 points to Research MI, it will spend 10 points to have a 1 in 10 chance of improving Mining, if that fails, it will spend another 10 points to have a 1 in 10 chance of improving Mining, if that fails, it will spend another 10 points to have a 1 in 10 chance of improving Mining, and the remaining 5 points in the research bucket will be carried over to the next turn. If any of those attempts are successful at improving Mining, that tech level increases to 11, and successive attempts now take 11 points from the bucket and have a 1 in 11 chance of working.

As you can see, it is much easier to research lower tech levels than higher tech levels. This leads one to believe that you get better value for your Research points at the beginning of the game when tech levels are low. With or without Research, there is also a flat 1 in 6 chance of improving any given tech at the end of a turn. Basic strategy would seem to dictate spending as many points as you can afford on early research and then your future 1 in 6 tech increases are now "more valuable" as its better to randomly get an increase from 14 to 15, than from 4 to 5.

Following the advice of the Hints for Beginners section and the Strategy Guide, your top priorities should be to build a 2nd shipyard using the SHIPYARD command (which costs 10 x Manufacturing tech level, so its best done earlier than later), build TR1 ships to jump to nearby systems and scan them for habitable planets, and devote a small amount each turn to Planetary Defense. I would imagine that all remaining points would be well-spent on Research.

Once you have found a habitable planet to colonize, your priorities will likely shift to building larger transports, colonist units, colonial manufacturing units, and colonial mining units, and research may fall largely by the wayside for the time being.

Good write-up, Paway. I would add that (according to my reading of the manual and the player aids on the site), there is an upper limit on what it costs to move to the next level. If you pay that much, you automatically advance. There is a spreadsheet available for download that has many player aids on it, and one of the tabs on that spreadsheet shows you the basic cost to have a reasonable chance of success at advancing from any given tech level to any other tech level. Quite useful.

I myself plan to bring up a number of my lowest techs early, since they are so cheap.

paway already gave a good explanation, but I'll try and answer each one succinctly.

I'm assuming here by points you are referring to RMs or Economic Units, and not the points you spend before gamestart, creating your species. If it is the latter, do tell :)

[quote='GrimFinger' pid='478' dateline='1301143036']
Q. When doing research, if I spend points on a given area of research, and my tech level in that area of research does not increase in the next turn, do those points that I spent matter, anymore, or does the program only consider what you are spending for research in a given area for the turn in question?
[/quote]

In short, no.

When you spend resources on research, they are all used up that turn for the research, if, of course, the amount of resources you spend is a multiple of your current level. If not, then it would be left over. To maximize your potential gains from research each, you want to spend resources in multiples of the current tech level you're researching.

E.g., if your current MI level is 11, then you want to spend 11, 22, 33, 44, 55, ...

If you spend 12 on MI, then the research process would take 11 and one would be left over.

(How's that for succinct?)
[quote='GrimFinger' pid='478' dateline='1301143036']
Q. At game start, how many points would you recommend that players spend to research a single area of research?
[/quote]
Again, assuming you're not talking about creating your species:

This is a complicated question, because there are many playing styles, and strategies, not to mention RP possibilities.

Research is cheaper at lower levels, so, I would put quite a bit into research in the beginning, while scouting nearby systems for a habitable colony and building up PDs on my homeworld. But that is just my thoughts, as I said there are many different strategies and RP possibilities.

[quote='GrimFinger' pid='478' dateline='1301143036']
Q. How many points would you consider to be excessive or unwise for a player to devote to a particular area of research at game start?
[/quote]

See above answer.

It depends on what you're researching. Having super high LS means you'll be able to colonize anything, but you'll have low MI and MA, which means you can't produce enough to make those colonizations happen.

In general though, if unsure of what to do researching or building PDs is always a good idea in the beginning of the game.

Q. When scouting nearby systems for a habitable colony, should a player who is new to the game use a starship which is empty, or should they use a transport loaded with colonist units (CU), mining units (IU), and manufacturing units (AU)?

Q. Can you Build a ship and then use the Develop command with that ship on the same turn? For instance, will it work correctly if I issue:

START PRE-DEPARTURE
Name 1 2 3 4 PL Colony
END

START PRODUCTION
PRODUCTION PL Homeworld
Build TR5 Colonizer
Develop PL Colony, TR5 Colonizer
END

I'm operating under the assumption that this will work (that things are processed in order, rather than all at once).

Q. My understanding was that CU (Colonist Units), IU (Colonial Mining Units), and AU (Colonial Manufacturing Unit) each take up 1 cargo space. So if I built a TR5, which has a cargo capacity of 60, I can only put, say, 30 CU, 15 IU, and 15 AU on board.

I question this belief, because the Game Manual routinely seems to break this rule. From section 6.2 TRANSFER ORDERS:

"START PRODUCTION
PRODUCTION PL Earth
; Enter your production orders for planet Earth here.
; Build 120 colonist units and transfer them to a transport.
Build 120 CU TR6 Belly Laugh"

It shows the loading of 120 colonist units onto a Transport that has a carrying capacity of 78.

In section 7.3 STARTING THE COLONY:

"START PRE-DEPARTURE
; Place pre-departure orders here.
Name 13 24 7 3 PL Dickory Dock
Tra 50 cu TR5 No-one Here, PL Dickory Dock
Tra 22 iu TR5 No-one Here, PL Dickory Dock
Tra 28 au TR5 No-one Here, PL Dickory Dock
Inst 22 iu PL Dickory Dock ; Mining base will be 2.2
INst 28 au PL Dickory Dock ; Manufacturing base will be 2.8
END"

It shows unloading 100 total units (50 CU, 22 IU, and 28 AU) from a TR5, which can only hold 60 units.

Am I incorrect about how much stuff I can fit on a TRx or is the Game Manual cheating when it issues these commands?

[quote='paway' pid='534' dateline='1301269221']
Q. Can you Build a ship and then use the Develop command with that ship on the same turn? For instance, will it work correctly if I issue:

START PRE-DEPARTURE
Name 1 2 3 4 PL Colony
END

START PRODUCTION
PRODUCTION PL Homeworld
Build TR5 Colonizer
Develop PL Colony, TR5 Colonizer
END

I'm operating under the assumption that this will work (that things are processed in order, rather than all at once).
[/quote]

YES, your assumptions are correct.

[quote='paway' pid='535' dateline='1301275890']
Q. My understanding was that CU (Colonist Units), IU (Colonial Mining Units), and AU (Colonial Manufacturing Unit) each take up 1 cargo space. So if I built a TR5, which has a cargo capacity of 60, I can only put, say, 30 CU, 15 IU, and 15 AU on board.

...

Am I incorrect about how much stuff I can fit on a TRx or is the Game Manual cheating when it issues these commands?
[/quote]

Your understanding is correct, each of these takes 1 cargo space. It seems that Game Manual and examples are not checking that while illustrating other topics.

Is there a chart available that lists what it costs to build every type of component? For example, if I want to build a colony, I need to build "colonists", "IUs" and "AUs". How much do these things cost?

[quote='ixnay' pid='541' dateline='1301310046']
Is there a chart available that lists what it costs to build every type of component? For example, if I want to build a colony, I need to build "colonists", "IUs" and "AUs". How much do these things cost?
[/quote]

AFAIK there is no compehensive list / chart. For those mentioned please look at section 7.3 in the rules.

Q. For spending and construction purposes, what is the difference between Economic Units and Raw Material Units, and what can each one be spent on that the other cannot be spent on?

[quote='GrimFinger' pid='545' dateline='1301314692']
Q. For spending and construction purposes, what is the difference between Economic Units and Raw Material Units, and what can each one be spent on that the other cannot be spent on?[/quote]

Those are completely different. There are no scenarios when RMs are interchangeable with EUs.

Mining base = 112.0 (MI = 20, MD = 2.09)

   1071 raw material units will be produced this turn.

Manufacturing base = 53.6 (MA = 20)

   Production capacity this turn will be 1072.
Total available for spending this turn = 1071 - 0 = 1071

RM is an intermediate product. It is then converted to EU, which is final product, given available production capacity.

EU is ingame currency, used to pay all the costs and transferrable between species
RM is a commodity created when you have tech imbalance (MI level > MA level) or planet imbalance (MI base / MI difficulty > MA base). You can either recycle it (to get EUs at 1:5 ratio) or store for the use in the future when you have extra manufacturing capacity to process it in the usual way.

All the costs of what?

Everything you make (for example IU's, AU's, CU's), everything you research, and everything you build (for example ships) are all deducted from the amount of EU you have at the beginning of your turn.

The example that Prozenfeld used indicates that he has 1071 EU in total to spend during his turn. I also believe his example is from a single planet. The rules get more complex when dealing with multiple planets within multiple systems

So, I can spend Economic Units to do research or to build things, but not raw materials? i think that I have been trying to spend both.

My understanding of the rules is that when you build or research things, FIRST it draws from the production capacity on that planet. THEN if necessary it will draw down your EU reserve, which is global to your empire.

EU is apparently produced 1 for 1 when you have unused production capacity on a planet. So if your homeworld can produce 600 and you only spend 500 on a given turn, 100 gets added to your EU reserve.

That EU reserve can be spent anywhere, so you can have one planet build "nothing" and hence add to your reserve with it's production capacity that turn, and then have some other planet spend EU out of the pool to build things locally. The only limit is that colonies can ONLY spend an amount of EU on any given turn equal to their existing production capacity. (Except the home world, which can spend at any rate.)

I have two mild criticisms of this:
- There is no penalty for stockpiling EU. You could conceivably build a large stockpile of it, 1 for 1, wait to spend it (say on a big ship), and then take no hit in terms of lost efficiency.
- Also, you don't need to ship EU anywhere - it's a global pool. So you could have colonies churning out EU and have your home world spend it the next turn with no limit. There's no reason to transport RM to your industrialized worlds.

I understand it is simpler to keep this abstract, both for playability and to keep the code simpler. But if I were the esteemed developer, I would set, say, a 20% loss when converting production to EU, as well as a distance penalty (to account for shipping costs) unless you transport it yourself.

I may have this wrong, so please correct me if I do! As it stands, I think I will set up as many remote production colonies as I can, and just keep spending the EU on the home planet. We shall see...

While most of the discussion so far was correct, I feel you beginning to blend RMs and EUs again.

EUs are put into the global pool, as previously described. You control how this happens by choosing the order in which planets are processed in production phase.

I am not sure what do you mean by "remote production colonies" - can you explain your idea in detail?

"remote production colonies" = colonies with IUs and IAs that have a positive manufacturing capacity. If you don't issue orders for them to produce anything, they will produce EUs, right? Which can then be spent anywhere, right?

Alternatively, if you have a planet where it is easy to run mines, but not to run production, you can set up NO manufacturing and make them "mining colonies" which convert the RMs they produce into EUs -- at a significant penalty.

[quote='ixnay' pid='558' dateline='1301335814']
"remote production colonies" = colonies with IUs and IAs that have a positive manufacturing capacity. If you don't issue orders for them to produce anything, they will produce EUs, right? Which can then be spent anywhere, right?[/quote]

That is incorrect. If you have imbalanced planet, you will either have idle production capacity or unprocessed RMs.

Alternatively, if you have a planet where it is easy to run mines, but not to run production, you can set up NO manufacturing and make them "mining colonies" which convert the RMs they produce into EUs -- at a significant penalty.

Actually, mining colony is more effective than normal colony in terms of EU output, but at a cost of increasing mining difficulty.

Re "production colonies" - of course an imbalanced planet would be less efficient. But if your colony is in balance, it produces in accordance with mining/manufacturing, right? And if you don't spend that production on that planet on a given turn, it's output goes into EU, right?

Re "mining colonies" - I had not actually done the math. A single unit of mining capacity takes 10 colonists and ten colonial mining units, which is then modified by mining difficulty. Likewise for manufacturing. So on an earthlike colony with no difficulty, you could commit 10 colonists/mines for each unit of RM output (times MN tech), and convert that to EUs with the penalty. OR, you could commit a further 10 colonists and 10 manufacturing units for each unit of manufacturing capacity, which would let you do the production right there on the colony, and then let it come out as EU.

So you are saying that it is easier to mine and sell the RM off to EU (with penalty) than to commit the resources to do manufacturing as well? I guess then that the only efficient way to do "manufacturing" on a colony is if the mining difficulties are particularly high and manufacturing is particularly easy on a given planet.

Does that mean that most players set up mining colonies, with no remote manufacturing?

[quote='ixnay' pid='560' dateline='1301337147']
Re "production colonies" - of course an imbalanced planet would be less efficient. But if your colony is in balance, it produces in accordance with mining/manufacturing, right? And if you don't spend that production on that planet on a given turn, it's output goes into EU, right?
[/quote]

No. EUs are cummulative, unused production capacity is simply wasted.

Re "mining colonies" - I had not actually done the math. A single unit of mining capacity takes 10 colonists and ten colonial mining units, which is then modified by mining difficulty. Likewise for manufacturing. So on an earthlike colony with no difficulty, you could commit 10 colonists/mines for each unit of RM output (times MN tech), and convert that to EUs with the penalty. OR, you could commit a further 10 colonists and 10 manufacturing units for each unit of manufacturing capacity, which would let you do the production right there on the colony, and then let it come out as EU.

So you are saying that it is easier to mine and sell the RM off to EU (with penalty) than to commit the resources to do manufacturing as well? I guess then that the only efficient way to do "manufacturing" on a colony is if the mining difficulties are particularly high and manufacturing is particularly easy on a given planet.

Does that mean that most players set up mining colonies, with no remote manufacturing?

Normal colony (assuming MD=1.00 and balanced MI/MA) produces (100*tech level) when fully developed. Mining colony would start prodution at (133*tech level) and deteriorate from there. For colonies with MD < 1 the difference is higher.

From my overall experience normal colonies are most common.

So on your homeworld, if you don't spend all your production, the excess goes into EU, but on your colonies your excess production disappears?

[quote='ixnay' pid='562' dateline='1301338630']
So on your homeworld, if you don't spend all your production, the excess goes into EU, but on your colonies your excess production disappears?
[/quote]

You are confusing production (EU) with manufacturing capacity.
EUs that are generated (by having RMs from MI base and manufacturing capacity from MA base) but not spent are put into the global pool. Excess manufacturing capacity (that is not used to convert RMs into EUs) is lost.

All "normal" planets (not mining/resort) are subject to the same mechanics. Your homeworld does not have a spending limit, though.

Okay, I think I had it right, but was using the wrong terms. I was using "production" as the output of a balanced colony -- mining and manufacturing together. That balanced pairing produces points that can either be spent locally or go into the EU pool.

To clarify the confusion of the past page or so:

There are three distinct terms here:

• Production Capacity
• Raw Material Units (RMs)
• Economic Units

Production capacity represents factories, robots, workplaces, warehouses, etc. That is, it represents your planet's ability to produce things.

Raw Material Units represents the materials that are put through your factories. It is the substance from which everything is assembled.

So, to build you need both production capacity (factories to build in) and raw material units (material to assemble things out of).

From the game manual (section 5):

Any items that you may wish to build, such as ships, planetary defenses, etc. will have a “cost” of equal amounts of raw material units and production capacity. Thus, if you wish to build a spaceship with a cost of 200, then a total of 200 raw material units will be used in its construction, and a total production capacity of 200 will be needed to actually build it.

Economic Units are the in-game currency. The are produced automatically out of: 1 raw material unit and 1 production capacity. So, at the end of your turn if a planet has 10 RMs and 10 production capacity remaining, then 10 EUs will be produced. (this only applies to regular colonies, not resort or mining). The reason for the automatic conversion, is that it doesn't make sense to be able to stockpile production capacity.

NOTE: Economic units can be substituted for production capacity if necessary. From the game manual: "During production on a planet, economic units owned by the species will be used automatically (if available) if orders are given which require more than the available production capacity of the planet." (section 5.8) The tradeoff to this of course is that 1 EU is not equivalent to 1 production capacity, because 1 EU is made up of 1 RM and one production capacity.

My confusion is such, that this most recent turn, I only opted to do three things - increase planetary defenses and increase research in a couple of areas.

The temptation is strong to just allocate all points (if I can ever figure out what I am allowed to spend during any given turn) to planetary defense. I'm not so sure that this is what the game 's experience is supposed to be for the player, but it is the direction that I am currently heading.

The explanations by the other players have only increased the level of confusion, not mitigated it.

Q. In a previous version/running of the game, there was an apparent bug in the game's code associated with instances where players tried to Teach a tech level to zero. Do you know if this bug still exists, in the code used for the current game, Far Horizons: The Awakening?