Aeson
Posts: 784
Joined: 8/30/2013
Status: offline
|
quote:
1. How extensively do you build mining/gas stations ?
Depends on the stage of the game. Early on, I want to mine one source of each strategic resource somewhere close to my homeworld, to help keep the spaceport from running out of materials during construction (you should mine several sources of steel, if possible, because steel is used in great quantity on most ship designs, and there's little reason not to add another caslon mine). Remember that it's more economical to mine a site with, say, 3 50% resources than a site with 1 100% resource because you need to build fewer mines and can more easily defend one mine than two or three.
quote:
I usually build everything I can on every rock in my home system to get the economy started. Is it worth doing the same in every system i discover ?
In my opinion, no, this is not worth doing, and you shouldn't be doing it in your home system, either. Keep at least one mine as a source of each strategic resource in reasonably close proximity to each major shipyard you have. You can add additional mines later, if you want to or feel that you need them, but building a station on every rock in the system will severely burden your private sector with station maintenance and drain their cash on hand into your coffers, which reduces the ability of the private sector to build and fuel the freighters you need to keep the economy going.
quote:
2. When building a mining/gas stations, the station immediatly becomes private sector. Is it normal. No state mining station ?
This is entirely normal. The private sector pays the construction and maintenance costs of the station, so this is generally beneficial to the state's balance sheet. Be aware that building too many mining stations can hurt the private sector, especially if the stations are the big fortress mines that some players like due to their near-immunity to raiders.
As for state mining stations, it is possible to create a station owned by the state which mines the world it orbits. All that needs to be done is for you to add gas extractors, mining engines, or luxury extractors to a state base design, though you should be aware that a base built over a colony will not mine the colony if I recall correctly. You will also need to add at least one docking bay, at least one cargo bay, and a commerce center to any station you want to use in this way (the commerce center is unnecessary if and only if you want the station to reserve its cargo for its own use or, if built over a fuel source, to serve as a fueling point for the fleet).
quote:
3. Do you know of any comprehensive ship component guide ?
The closest things that I know of are these:
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3352769&mpage=1&key=%EF%BF%BD
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3624506
The first breaks down components by the resources they require for construction, the second has the component properties when fully upgraded and mostly duplicates the information in the first.
You could also look at the wiki pages to see if there's anything in there:
http://distant-worlds.wikispot.org/
quote:
3.1 Do i have to put cargo bays on military ships (say for transporting torpedoes) ?
No. Cargo bays are used only for holding resources, and so there is no reason to include them on military ships unless you want a state-owned and operated mining ship or a resupply ship outside of the resupply ship role.
quote:
3.2 Is it worth putting countermeasures on defense bases or space ports ?
Yes. Countermeasures and fleet countermeasures are small components, and defense bases and spaceports, as bases built over colonies, have no limit on their maximum size. Personally, I would put targeting components on every armed station and warship I have, countermeasures on every design I have, and fleet countermeasures and fleet targeting on every station I have and on my capital ship or carrier designs; civilian freighters might also get fleet countermeasures. Why? Because these are small components. They hardly cost you anything to add to a design unless you're really pressed to fit the design into your size limits, in which case you can probably sacrifice a couple armor plates for these.
quote:
4. Is there any way to upgrade a design i did myself with all the newest components i just researched ? (clic one button to automaticaly replace basic fuel cells with standard fuel cells for example)
Theoretically speaking, this is what Auto-Upgrade Selected Ship Designs is for in the Ship Design menu. I have never used it and cannot therefore vouch for its reliability or effectiveness, however.
quote:
5. How do you determine the good number of construction yards / docking bays on small / medium / large space ports ?
Depends on how you want to use your spaceports. I like to keep the small spaceports really small, with only the bare minimum components necessary for the design to function and have some minor defensive capabilities, so that if I want to have a shipyard up quickly over a new world I have a basic design available that will cover that. A single construction yard will do for this purpose. Docking bays can likewise be kept to a low number for such a purpose. I tend to keep my Large Spaceports rare and with very large numbers of both construction yards (~30 yards) and docking bays (~30 docks), while my medium spaceports tend to have lots of docks but relatively few yards. Other people make all three types of spaceport identical, and yet others will give you different numbers of docks and construction yards from what I gave on each of their spaceport designs.
quote:
5.2 do i really have to put one weapon / energy/ high tech plant per construction yard ?
No. I think that when the article on construction yards was written, it had been intended that you wanted one of each manufacturing plant for every three construction yards. However, as it currently stands, one of each manufacturing plant is sufficient for something like 30 construction yards.
quote:
5.3 are full cells useful on anything static ?
Yes. Fuel cells hold the fuel which is available to your reactors for creating power. Weapons and shield recharge, and static energy requirements if you haven't installed sufficient energy collectors, drain power, and so more fuel cells will generally translate to the station being capable of more combat between having the fuel supply renewed by freighters. Fuel in cargo bays is accessible to the fuel cells on stations, but not directly available to the reactors; a gas mining-capable station over a fuel source with cargo bays and a decent amount of time to collect resources or a station built over a planet with a decent fuel stockpile needs only the one required fuel cell for the design. However, be aware that fuel held in a cargo bay is not reserved for the station's use, whereas fuel held within a fuel cell is reserved for a station's use. If you're relying on the fuel stockpiled in cargo bays or on colonies to keep your stations powered during an attack, you can find yourself greatly disappointed when an attack hits just after you refueled a large fleet at that station or planet.
quote:
5.4 What is the use for energy collectors ?
Energy collectors are used to generate power when inside a system's boundaries. They allow your stations and your idle ships to conserve fuel by providing the power necessary for many of the components on the station or ship. Note that energy collectors are not supposed to work on ships which are under way, will not work when sufficiently far from a system's center, and have an output dependent on the distance to the system center. Adding energy collectors to the point that energy collection is at least equal to static energy requirements will cover the static requirements for any station built within about 90% of the system radius; energy collection at least twice the static requirements extends that to about 95% of the system radius, and energy collection at least triple the static requirements extends that to about 97% of the system radius. (That is, 81% of the system, ~90% of the system, or ~94% of the system, by area.) If you add enough energy collectors, you could also power a station's weapons and shield regeneration with them, but I would not recommend doing this; a reactor gives you a guaranteed amount of power no matter where you are within (or outside) of a system for as long as you have fuel, and does so in a smaller package than a set of energy collectors designed for one of the above criteria for reliable power within a system.
See A Guide to Energy for more details on power and energy collectors:
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2970969
|
Printable Version
few questions from a new player - 
New Messages
No New Messages
Hot Topic w/ New Messages
Hot Topic w/o New Messages
Locked w/ New Messages
Locked w/o New Messages
Post New Thread