So I've found some Zentabia fluid..... (Full Version)

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Gregorovitch55 -> So I've found some Zentabia fluid..... (8/2/2014 6:42:58 PM)

... Yay!... i think.

Trouble is I'm at a loss as to what to do with it, never having had one of these super-luxuries before. I cannot make head nor tail of the advice the AI is giving me - it seems to change it's mind about who should get it and who shouldn't every five minutes and some of it's recommendations seem perverse.

I give some to my powerful neighbour and it keeps telling me to cancel it, but I suppose it also tells me to put out pirate contracts to trash their bases, which I guess confirms what we already know to wit the AI adviser has suicidal tendencies.

But it also keeps telling me to cancel supply to my second best friend. Why would it do that?

Come to think of it, why would you not trade the stuff to everyone you don't want to deliberately tick off since all it seems to do is add extra plus points to your relationship?



Aeson -> RE: So I've found some Zentabia fluid..... (8/2/2014 8:32:32 PM)

quote:

I give some to my powerful neighbour and it keeps telling me to cancel it, but I suppose it also tells me to put out pirate contracts to trash their bases, which I guess confirms what we already know to wit the AI adviser has suicidal tendencies.

But it also keeps telling me to cancel supply to my second best friend. Why would it do that?

Go to the diplomacy screen, select your big neighbor or your second best friend. Now look at the line where your faction is listed. Look at what the relations status is claimed to be (see if it says 'pleased,' 'annoyed,' 'friendly,' et cetera). If your faction has negative feelings towards your friends or the people that you're trying to keep happy, then the computer will give you advice that will make your empire behave the way that a computer empire will in this kind of situation - namely, it'll advise you to act in an unfriendly manner to those that your faction does not like. The empires that your faction likes are not necessarily the factions that like you (and which are therefore the factions that you're most closely connected to as a human player).

quote:

Come to think of it, why would you not trade the stuff to everyone you don't want to deliberately tick off since all it seems to do is add extra plus points to your relationship?

The superluxuries are a major source of income both as a traded commodity and as a consumed commodity. If I recall correctly, they improve the development rating of any world that has access to a supply of the superluxury beyond what could be attained with just the 10 regular luxury items, and this directly increases tax revenues. The descriptions for the three superluxuries also imply that there might be further benefits, such as increased growth due to improved lifespans, but I am not sure that such benefits actually exist within the game.

As a result, if you control access to a superluxury and deny access to it to certain factions, you are denying them access to something that can improve their economies both through the direct tax revenue bonus from improved planet development and from the trade tariff revenues for importing the stuff to their planets and, possibly, secondary export of those superluxuries. There is also a possibility that you may not have sufficient production of the superluxury or superluxuries that you control to justify freely selling it to all your neighbors; after all, you may want to have enough of it for your empire's consumption in addition to raking in the profits from exporting such an obscenely expensive resource.



Gregorovitch55 -> RE: So I've found some Zentabia fluid..... (8/2/2014 11:03:07 PM)

Thanks for the reply. Yes, one keeps forgetting that your own AI is making it's own mind up about who to like, who to attack etc all the time, probably because it's not easy to keep track of and impossible to examine it's reasoning. This is one of the, I wouldn't say flaw exactly, but close to it in the way DW does automation: it can be operating at cross purposes to your own plans and you cannot tell it to operate under assumptions or constraints specified by yourself. It's the same with it's attack recommendations during war. It doesn't (or cannot) factor in the orders you have already given to your fleets and make sense of them so you can be in the middle of some major fleet battles and invasions and it will recommend sending your main battle fleet to attack a little gas mining station somewhere. The fundamental problem IMO is that it can be very stupid but occasionally it's very right and you need to take notice of what it says. It's OK if you are rich enough to afford giving it a few strike fleets of it's own to play with, but a pain if you aren't.

Now, back to the zentabia fluid: I checked my colonies inventories and found they had none (presumably i had been trading it all away). So I shut down supplies to all other empires and slowly supplies are trickling in to my colonies. I can see no mention of the stuff of the colony panels however. I can see mention of other lesser luxuries but nothing about zentabia fluid even when there is plenty in the cargo bay. Nor can I see any discernible difference to any of the numbers for the colony, certainly no more money which is all that matters. In short I can't seem to see any benefit from the stuff at all, just diplomatic pain from anyone you don't sell it to, it seems to make about a 15-20pt difference to their attitude between trading it to them or not.

So are these super-luxuries a poisoned chalice you are supposed to get rid of as quickly as you can (which in my case is easy, I just have to destroy the mining station)?



Vardis -> RE: So I've found some Zentabia fluid..... (8/2/2014 11:53:15 PM)

You'll get an immediate boost (30%?) to your culture level at a planet that has a super luxury. It won't say so, however. Not like "you get a +5 happiness bonus for supplying your citizens with booze".

A higher culture level means higher GDP, which means you can get more from taxes, and more goes to the private sector. Plus, you can get huge amounts of money from trading it.



corwin90 -> RE: So I've found some Zentabia fluid..... (8/3/2014 3:00:21 AM)

In my first game, I built a mine on a planet with this super-luxury. However, the system was outside my borders. Shortly thereafter, one of the AI empires colonized the very same planet with this super luxury...



Gregorovitch55 -> RE: So I've found some Zentabia fluid..... (8/3/2014 8:55:09 AM)

Thanks. By the use of pen and paper recording i have been able to observe the effects of the stuff. Bizarrely my freighters seem to deliver it to colonies in reverse order of strategic value so it will be eons until I actually see some real benefit on the balance sheet.

The question remains as to how on earth to tell how much of the stuff I need to keep my own colonies supplied for the bonus and therefore how much I can afford to trade away.

It's unfathomable to me why this important mechanic appears devoid of any supporting UI features at all. I am miles behing where i should be in this game because of that.



corwin90 -> RE: So I've found some Zentabia fluid..... (8/10/2014 6:12:46 AM)

I found a way to get the luxury resource to my planet of choice:

1. Built a military ship with cargo and luxury extractor.
2. Send the military ship to mine the planet with the Zentabia.
3. Send the military ship loaded with the Zentabia to your planet of choice.
4. Tell the ship to 'Retire' at that planet.

Once the ship has finished disassembling, its cargo will show in the cargo of the planet where you retired the ship.

I've seen before where it seemed like I could build a military ship at a particular planet and tell the military ship to mine someplace. Then, it seemed like once the cargo hold was full, the military ship returned to the planet where it was built and emptied its cargo hold. I used the method above because I wanted to built the military ship at my home world and then ship the Zentabia to a completely different planet.




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