SLOOOOW colony ship construction

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SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/15/2012 6:05:05 AM

Pukako

Posts: 14
Joined: 8/30/2012
Status: offline

Seriously, they are building it. It's just taking forever.

It's been several months since I asked for it to be constructed - it's aimed at the second colonisable planet I discovered, and I only got the first as I found a sleeping colony ship...

From what I can gather, it's being built at the planet rather than the starbase.

What do I do to increase this type of construction? Are there tips, tricks, techs, bribes...? Or is the game trying to change to 4X experience by, well, taking the eXpand part out?

Advice welcomed, abuse, not so much but possibly deserved...

Post #: 1

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/15/2012 7:46:33 AM

Haree78

Posts: 1269
Joined: 5/18/2010
Status: offline

There are 2 things that can stall production on colony ships normally. Steel or Polymer, check the supply on that planet.
Other than that colony ships take a damn long time to build, check the production speed at the colony building it, use the colonies that have the highest production, can be viewed in the colony screen I believe.
New colonies take forever to build a colony ship because of their slow production.

It is purposely slow so expansion isn't meant to be super fast, I believe it is about right in the game at the moment.

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Post #: 2

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/15/2012 7:54:16 AM

twinkypillow

Posts: 184
Joined: 9/11/2012
Status: offline

From all the advice everybody is giving me, here is exactly what you need to do..

1. Open Designs Screen (F8) and select "show latest designs" and "Show State Ships" on the top.

2. Find your colony ship in there and Double click it or select it then press "edit".

3. Click Show "Construction Summary" , then sort list by clicking on "Qty" and look through the list...

4. then press (F2) Colony Screen. click "Cargo" and sort lists there as well and see if you have a few of those resources you saw earlier in the construction screen.. you can close the windows and your construction screen should still be there.. then just reopen (F2) again.. etc..

5. if that doesnt take you long enough.. (since this game absolutely is horrid at showing you your resources with some odd "reserve" way.. when it should just be like every other game out there with regards to resources..) then you need to look at the construction speed by pressing (F10) and then find whatever is building it (whatever colony) and select it then look at the construction yards below and see the "Progress" and "Speed" - my speed in a later down the road game right now is 500%.. but i have crazy amounts of resources.. (like 479000 Casion etc..)

hopefully that helps with your situation. although technically there is nothing you can do but take constructors and build mines and gas stations more..

1. Open Construction menu (F10) and click on

(in reply to Pukako)

Post #: 3

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/15/2012 12:42:22 PM

feelotraveller

Posts: 1040
Joined: 9/12/2011
Status: offline

Yes it is a deliberate attempt to slow down the expand phase. But rather than taking the phase out this effectively extends it.

There are several things you can do to increase construction speed.
1) Build the Bakuras shipyards wonder. This will triple build speed at that colony (and spaceport).
2) Get a leader and/or a colony govenor with colony ship construction bonuses
3) Choose a race with faster construction speed (but you need to do this before you start...)
4) Minimise the number of components on your colony ships. Each extra component adds about 10 days (assuming no bonuses).

I've probably forgotten something as usual, but hope this helps anyways.

(in reply to twinkypillow)

Post #: 4

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/15/2012 1:13:58 PM

Pipewrench

Posts: 453
Joined: 1/5/2010
Status: offline

try this

main screen
colony button (far left - top button)
-hammer shows colony is building something.
select colony

In selection panel
double click colored name

select cargo tab
sort by rsvd high to low
if amount is greater than reserved then you have enough resources on hand

select construction yard tab
shows current building status of planet

or

In selection panel near the bottom
click on yellow/orange building icon
this brings up the colony ship
double click name
select cargo
Sort by first column (completed)

Pukako

Most games are Risk type economy's. They don't deal with distance ,resources or fuel all at once.

Distant Worlds start with a finite set of resources on your home planet and you must explore to find the missing resources you need to grow your colony. One game you might find them all quickly around you and in others you might be short of polymer, silicon or even Chromium. You have these in stock at your home planet at the start. Without either finding a source or trading for it with other empires it can soon restrict your building program.

Colony ships only build on colonies, never at star bases. They are large projects that need the infrastructure of the planet. Depending on the colony's development and space construction research a faster speed can be attained.

If you have not researched that technology yet then you must rely on colonists who normally live on that world and possess that technology. They will build that ship and if their population is small and development is weak it will take longer.

Lastly, building on the planet can only be done one thing at a time. If you start building a constructor or a spaceport and then build a colony ship the spaceport will have to be built first and then the colony ship will be started.

Hope this helps.....enjoy the game.

< Message edited by pipewrench -- 9/15/2012 1:56:56 PM >

(in reply to twinkypillow)

Post #: 5

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/16/2012 12:14:17 AM

Pukako

Posts: 14
Joined: 8/30/2012
Status: offline

Thanks all

Yip, it makes a bit more sense now, and I think the first game I tried had resources out the wazoo, unlike this game. I've been looking at the resources, but differentiating between the essentials and the luxuries is probably the first thing I need to do.

Also, when you right click on a juicy planet and select 'construct and send colony ship', how does the AI choose where it is made? Does it take the biggest or the fastest or just the closest planet? I'm just wondering, as I've got mainly developing colonies, and asking them to clear the local wildlife, built some houses, put up a spaceport and a defensive base, as well as a colony ship... I cna see where the holdups are sneaking in...

(in reply to Pipewrench)

Post #: 6

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/16/2012 12:33:16 AM

twinkypillow

Posts: 184
Joined: 9/11/2012
Status: offline

quote:

select cargo tab
sort by rsvd high to low
if amount is greater than reserved then you have enough resources on hand

I like this.. I didnt really think to do that.. on those same lines, can you tell me what or why I would ever sort the Cargo tab list "RSVD" High to Low and then look at the other empire color flags? What would that mean or why would i need to know what other empires have reserved and amount..??

thanks

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Post #: 7

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/16/2012 9:55:15 AM

Bingeling

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline

You can be annoyed if it is a station with limited storage, and there is a pile of goods reserved for another empire hugging your cargo space. Apart from that, I can't see much need to look at reserved items for other empires.

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Post #: 8

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/16/2012 9:59:36 AM

Pukako

Posts: 14
Joined: 8/30/2012
Status: offline

Hi again

So I looked at the reserved tab, and it was illuminating, I think.

But what does it mean - 'reserved' means? The amount there (well, obviously not, but it might be something else), or the amount that the planet wants to be there? I had 0.8 kT of steel and 58.4 kT reserved at one planet, so I think that may have been a problem. But for one luxury resource, it had a negative reserved amount, and I've got no idea what that means...

Reserves are replenished by private freighters, right? And aside from tagging the places to be mined, there isn't much we can do about that. A few of the new colonies (I have the fancy Bakuras shipyards so thing have sped up) don't have any resources other than those mined there, so they are waiting for the freighters, right?

The game is complex, and I am impressed by how helpful the forum is - not all games are like this, unfortunately...

(in reply to twinkypillow)

Post #: 9

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/16/2012 10:59:26 AM

Bingeling

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Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline

The colony (or mine) will try book a freighter to bring it what it needs. It has to know of a place that has the resource available, though. As long as you have mines producing what is needed, it will get there. Eventually.

As far as I know, there are only 3 things that can create "reserverd".

1: Construction. When the base starts to build something, it reserves the materials needed. This is the only time something not there will be reserved. Reserve is higher than amount.

2: Freighters. When a freighter gets a order for something, it will reserve that amount from the available amount at the target mine/port. This will never give higher reserved than the amount, though.

3: Ships/fleet on refuel order will reserve fuel enough to fill their tanks from 0 to full. Once they are done the reserve (for fuel not needed) is released.

4: (in a list of 3). I am not quite sure how colonies treat luxuries...

I have no clue about negative reserved. It sounds like something gone wrong...

If you have a construction bottleneck, there will always be a case of items reserved for construction that are not there. And the construction site will have higher reserved than amount for that.

800 steel and 54000 reserved is a serious shortage. Have you ordered a huge pile of ships to be built there? I don't follow reserved amount much, and there is a phase in early game where you drop your first new colonies and the private sector orders a huge pile of ships.

This is a good moment to visit the expansion planner. On the table on top, sort by your demand. The steel should be high. This is a sum of the "reserves short" as far as I know. Compare this to your amount. If you have a small demand and a large amount you got enough of the item, but not necessarily in the right place. This could be a rather insignificant problem if the difference is huge. That table should also say how many tables you got.

In the table down low, you can choose to display "your empire's resource location", and filter on the resource of interest (steel). Click on each mine, and the small map should give a hint on where the resource is.

Show "resources by your empires priority" or something, and you can again filter on steel. This shows known location where you can build steel mines. You can also filter on the "construct" symbol to see if a constructor is already aiming for a steel source for another mine.

In general, the AI is quite adept at getting the needed resources. It can be that for some resources you know no sources, or the sources are in territories of other empires. That should not be a problem for steel, though. (carbon fiber, polymer - they like continentals and can be an issue for those starting on volcanic and such).

(in reply to Pukako)

Post #: 10

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/17/2012 7:02:01 AM

Pukako

Posts: 14
Joined: 8/30/2012
Status: offline

Yeah - steel!

Several rich sources, some quite local, but obviously the easy money isn't there - failure of the common market...

And the 47 private ships queued as well, I think...

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Post #: 11

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/17/2012 9:01:46 AM

feelotraveller

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Joined: 9/12/2011
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I'll make sure that I have at least half a dozen steel mines, preferably in my home system, as soon as possible. Often I find more are needed. This is just for the homeworld spaceport. In a more mature game the load starts to spread a bit but if you have Bakuras you will probably want even more than this as close as possible.

(in reply to Pukako)

Post #: 12

RE: SLOOOOW colony ship construction - 9/17/2012 2:51:59 PM

Jeeves

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From: Arlington TN U.S.A
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You get negative reserved cargo when a ship is in dock and unloading into the colony or spaceport...

Lonnie Courtney Clay

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Post #: 13