What are your thoughts on each source of fuel?

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What are your thoughts on each source of fuel?

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What are your thoughts on each source of fuel? - 8/12/2021 7:43:21 AM

Felius

Posts: 13
Joined: 8/10/2021
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Not counting drilling and salvaging, there are 4 types of fuel production buildings. What I don't quite get is what techs apply to each, specially since that by going by base production the higher tech ones seem downright inferior. That is to say:

Bio-Fuel: Very labor efficient as compared to the others, labor for food production non-withstanding. Uses food. You might need hydroponics to make it really worth it. Hydroponics Robotization and Mass Pools probably make it trivial to keep it fed with biomass to use. A little bit metal, IP and machine to build, and gets built very quickly even at higher levels.

Synthetic: Lots of labor and some energy, slightly higher base production than Bio-Fuel. Takes an increasing amount of metal per level, some IP (but not that much), and a few machines. If food is a concern this might work well I suppose?

Methane: Just as much labor and energy, in addition to a lot of water, for the same base production. Takes more metal, a lot more time, plus hi-tech goods (and a few machines) to build. Is it ever worth over Synthetic?

Deep Core: Same cost to build as Methane plant, takes just as much labor as either Synthetic and Methane, but about a quarter as much energy for half the base production of either. Is it ever worth it? I guess it's in a different tech group, but if you have the option, is there any factor that might make this better than the others?

To put it another way, in sum, what are the linear (and output increasing binary techs) that apply to each? Are they different to one another?

< Message edited by Felius -- 8/12/2021 8:13:38 AM >

Post #: 1

RE: What are your thoughts on each source of fuel? - 8/12/2021 4:49:00 PM

WiZz

Posts: 372
Joined: 9/28/2011
From: Ukraine
Status: offline

I always stay at Bio-Fuel. Even Dome-farming is easy to spam, so decision is obvious.

(in reply to Felius)

Post #: 2

RE: What are your thoughts on each source of fuel? - 8/14/2021 11:57:46 PM

Felius

Posts: 13
Joined: 8/10/2021
Status: offline

Doing some testing, on game with all binary economic techs and pretty good values on nearly all linear techs (the ones that I haven't put any research upon being nearly certainly irrelevant, such as shielding optimization and atomic weapons optimization), I built in a single city a Synthetic plant, a Methane plant and a Deep Core mining plant, all at level one. Governor modifier is at +25% for all, only for relations, and zone circumstances set a 10% penalty. 1.7% CO2 in atmosphere.

From them I made: 361 from the Deep Core and 406 from each of the Synthetic and Methane plants. That tells me a few things:

1. There are at least a few more techs upping the Deep Core facility's production than as it's producing 3x its base, while the Synth and Methane are making about 150% of base. Figuring out what exactly is getting that bonus, and assuming it's not only binary techs it might mean that Deep Core facilities can be worth over the other two, specially if power is a concern.

2. There absolutely no reason to ever go to methane over synth unless they get some kind of bonus if the atmosphere is heavier with CO2. Assuming that's not true (or that you aren't playing in a planet heavy with CO2) the methane plant takes the same workers and same energy, plus the addition of water, for the exact same production. And costs far more to build in the first place, including Hi-tech goods, which the synthetic plant doesn't need.

3. The bio-fuel one is still probably better, but it does take food, which may occasionally be a concern. Also, if include the farm labor for the food, before hydroponics and/or the robotization techs, it'll be less labor-efficient than the other three.

< Message edited by Felius -- 8/15/2021 12:01:10 AM >

(in reply to WiZz)

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RE: What are your thoughts on each source of fuel? - 8/15/2021 4:30:06 PM

Bellrock

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Joined: 7/1/2020
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It really depends on what world (planet) you are playing on as to which fuel industry is best. Depending on the world some of these fuel industries are not applicable (you can't use them), because you don't have those resources available to produce the fuel.

Some worlds don't have mine-able oil fields, but maybe good food production; therefore, a bio-fuel plant is your best option. If you don't have food, water, C02 atmosphere, then Deep Core mining is your only option. To answer your question Oil Drilling is the best option, but it dose not matter if you don't have any oil fields to begin with. At which point you look at the next fuel tech.

Regards,
Bell

(in reply to Felius)

Post #: 4

RE: What are your thoughts on each source of fuel? - 8/23/2021 2:32:38 PM

Jorge_Stanbury

Posts: 4320
Joined: 2/29/2012
From: Toronto and Lima
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you start with scavenging, depending on the planet, you will have to assess if bio-fuel would be needed, I prefer to play with planets that have oil, so for me it is always better to go with oil wells

by mid game, that is by the time you reach good tech levels, the only scarce resource would be manpower, and bio domes are very expensive, manpower wise. So really not a good idea to waste food on making oil. You will want to quickly shift to hydroponics and deep core or equivalent high tech for oil, if you lack the oil wells. Then use the manpower for more interesting things

Also notice it is totally possible to win with less vehicles, basically an infantry-heavy army, and maybe later on move on to electric engines

(in reply to Bellrock)

Post #: 5

RE: What are your thoughts on each source of fuel? - 8/26/2021 4:21:42 PM

Uemon

Posts: 112
Joined: 12/11/2020
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Bio fuel i never do, the labor and food cost makes it useless.

Methane is useless because i mostly play planets with little water.

Deep core is what you want.

Synthetic is what you get if you dont have deep core yet and you need that fuel now.

(in reply to Jorge_Stanbury)

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RE: What are your thoughts on each source of fuel? - 8/26/2021 4:23:38 PM

Uemon

Posts: 112
Joined: 12/11/2020
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quote:

ORIGINAL: Jorge_Stanbury

Also notice it is totally possible to win with less vehicles, basically an infantry-heavy army, and maybe later on move on to electric engines

This is very true. Youll probably need to cover the entire frontline because AI is sneaky and will exploit flanks / gaps with fast moving units, that will require often too high number of infantry units to outmanouver and destroy.

Its doable, but i dont like it. Even though it used to be my preferred way of fighting. Youre just too static.

(in reply to Jorge_Stanbury)

Post #: 7