Hidden colony maintenance costs? (Full Version)

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jacozilla -> Hidden colony maintenance costs? (10/15/2015 2:40:26 AM)

On my F6 empire screen I can see all my income - expenses = net cash flow. Or so I thought.

Are there some 'hidden' costs or maintenance per new colony I add to my empire?

I ask because from this screen it is not evident why my iincome goes into the red when I colonize more worlds.

I totally get that:
A) new colony produces zero tax revenue, and for every new ship or base I build to defend that newly added colony is more expense with no income from that new colony until it grows to whatever taxable size I've setup

B) and that based on planet quality, population grows faster on worlds

But what I am contused about is -

1 - it seems even if I don't build a single new ship or base, just colonizing a new world lowers my net cashflow. With effect of eventually going into the red if colonizing too fast in rapid expansion. Does each new colony have some hidden cost not shown on my summary screen?

2 - while planet quality indirectly helps produce more income because better quality = faster growth = able to start taxing sooner, and higher qual planets produce overall higher population which of course means more income than smaller worlds. Other than higher population, how does planet quality affect income, if at all?

3 - I am colonizing no less than 70% worlds, usually with at least one resource on it. I've read many posts reference that '50% or lower qual planets will barely break even for you'. Can anyone explain why? Even if it grows much slower, wouldnt the eventual 1 billion people on that planet pay the same taxes as 1 billion on another higher qual planet? What is it about 50% or lower qual planets that make them non-revenue earners or income losers? (Assuming you dont go crazy with new base/ship expenses for these new adds)

If i already have a nodal force positioned to cover that sector, and i colonize all the nearby systems, i figured i am lready paying for that fleet anyways, so might as well colonize all the worlds within reaxh of that sector fleet since that lets me add new world without having to pay more ship costs. But it seems this just drives me into the red, but i dont know why.

TL DR - what is it about new colony that seems to increase expense, not shown on my empire summary screen?



Bingeling -> RE: Hidden colony maintenance costs? (10/15/2015 5:35:45 AM)

Things does not quite add up once the empire matures. For instance the sum of all colony revenues (colony screen) does not match colony revenues on the empire summary screen (with the economy overview). There is something that is not shown, and this is what you may see.

Quality influences the revenue created on the colony, and it influences maximum population. What is needed for huge profits is high development, high quality, and high population.

The 50% colony will struggle with high development, miss high quality, and not have a high population. And never give any significant revenue that you can tax.

"Faster growth" is not why you want high quality, I am not sure if it really helps in that either. It probably helps some in drawing migrants there.



Bingeling -> RE: Hidden colony maintenance costs? (10/15/2015 6:38:50 AM)

With a bit more time at hand, look at the image below. It is from an Old AAR at mine.

Notice how the top colony has almost all the revenue. It is the one with the largest population by far, it got higher development level (culture) and thus a higher tax level is possible. And it is a capital, with 0 corruption. The other colonies are hurt by more or less corruption depending on the distance to the capital.

The three important values are Qu(ality, C(ulture) and Pop(ulation). Culture is also known as development level. We can see that 110 is the normal number. 100 for 10 random luxuries in store, and 10 for meeting the population wishes for strategics.

Having more than 110 is down to either:
- Having an ultra rare resource in store.
- Having a development bonus from the planet/moon (ruin)
- Having a wonder built on the colony.

The benefit is maybe part in the revenue itself, but as I wrote, it can be taxed harder while still having the same total happiness, because development level is +happiness and tax is -happiness.

Compare Dasuukha 3 and Fripid sitting next to each other a bit down the list. They have the same Culture, the same population level, and 99% vs 84% quality. 144k vs 95k revenue before reaching max population which will be higher on the 99% colony.

A few steps lower, notice Beta Kappola 1. Only 71% quality, but more population. And quite a bit lower revenue. This colony could be at maximum population.

The scroll bar reveals that there are quite a few more colonies at the bottom, noone with less than 70% quality reached the top list.

Notice that 2-4 on the list are all high quality, and that the revenue follows the population level. There are some culture differences, though.

Notice the difference between the two continentals Yaselur 2 and Da Suukha 3. The extra development on Yaselur 2 dominates the extra population on Da Suukha 3, both are very high quality. And neither are anywhere near maximum population.

[image]http://i1109.photobucket.com/albums/h426/Bingeling/Ikurro/part12/colonies_zps122e8cdc.jpg[/image]





jacozilla -> RE: Hidden colony maintenance costs? (10/15/2015 7:59:03 AM)

I see that culture and corruption definitely has an influence. Thanks for the images.

I also know that some techs can mitigate the corruption penalty by having regional capitals setup. Far as I'm aware though, corruption effect is basically whatever is your X taxable income (derived via the aforementioned combo of quality, culture, and corruption), then there is a certain reduction because some percent of pop doesn't pay their taxes. I see that on my left info screen as the % of population who are in compliance with paying their taxes.

What I'm still wondering about though is how can there be a direct debit or direct negative to cashflow just by colonizing a brand new planet? If I build a staircase / port or build even 1 extra ship to go system defend there, then sure that makes total sense. I now have X more expense because of the new ships/bases I built, but zero income coming in yet from that planet.

But if I don't build a single new ship, a single new base/facility of any kind, just literally plop my colony ship down, it seems the faster I expand that way, the more and more into the red negative I go in cashflow. My strategy which I guess is now flawed, was to first colonize 1 world, let's call it the node world. I pay for the staircase / spaceport and a small fleet of ships assigned to defend that sector.

But now that i've paid (and still pay the maintenance costs of that sunk cost of the sector fleet and base I just built), I figured if I colonize 4-5 surrounding systems around that nodal system, I can protect them all using my defense fleet. That concept works just fine - my automation fleets are wonderful, they go rush out to defend whatever system/planet is being attacked in that sector, so I can colonize systems in range of that sector defense fleet just fine.

But like I said, despite incurring what I thought was zero more expenses, further colony expansion somehow seems to add some sort of not-shown cost. Maybe I'm just adding things up wrong, not saying I'm 100% sure or even mostly sure, which is why I asked the question.

I read DW wasn't like other 4x games where early expansion or colony rush was the best so I suppose this would support that, but I sure would like to know what the exact mechanic is in terms of fast expansion = lot more cost when the expansion is ONLY to systems where new bases or fleets don't need to be built.



Bingeling -> RE: Hidden colony maintenance costs? (10/15/2015 8:16:08 AM)

Corruption is taken away before you see the numbers in the list above. If Kuristar 1 have 50% corruption, and I build a regional capital there setting corruption to 0, the revenue from Kuristar 1 will double.

There is something not adding up in the numbers presented by the game. A decent guess is that negative colony revenue is never shown, but there is more to it.

I did track the "earlyish" part of another AAR and found the below, I am not going to do it again or dig up the thread where I did so. You may try to browse the threads here about a title that sounds relevant, it was not _that_ long ago (a few months, half a year?). And the thread will have more than a few replies.

In the colony list, like the image above, you see colony revenue. In the empire summary, economy part, you see the civilian economy. With colony revenue.

In the early game these add up. The reported "colony revenue" is the sum of the revenues in the colony list. But as I got more colonies, and added a "rich one", it was clear that it no longer added up, and that the difference gradually increased.

Corruption is not the guilty part, corruption is before the revenue number in the colony list. There could of course be something about corruption being guilty of this, but my guess is that there are more important factors at play. Maybe there is a hidden cost based on number of colonies? It is not possible to say what it is, we can only guess.






Aeson -> RE: Hidden colony maintenance costs? (10/15/2015 8:24:49 AM)

Next time you colonize a new world, take a look at its tax revenue in the selection details panel in the lower left corner of the screen. At a 0% tax rate, your colony has a negative tax revenue, doesn't it? It's not exactly a hidden colony maintenance cost, but it's also not exactly an obvious maintenance cost, either, and it's something like a few thousand credits per year per colony.



ldog -> RE: Hidden colony maintenance costs? (10/16/2015 10:58:04 PM)

The screen doesn't update instantly either. It's like quarterly or something.



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