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| Populating Other Planets Strategy |
Thu, 18 September 2008 04:11  |
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I figure I'd pick the brain trust, because the models I'm setting up are telling me things I'm not sure I believe. I've been playing around with some various strategies for population growth and I'm not sure what the best strategy is between two, if there is one, or if there's something in particular I'm overlooking.
I've read through the official guide and lots of other articles but I haven't found anything in particular that discusses the distribution of population from your HW. So here we go.
In a nutshell, my question is whether it's more efficient to:
a) start distributing from HW to all other new planets equally (well, by Hab probably), or;
b) focus on one planet until you have a second breeder, then you can focus on two others to get four total, then eight, sixteen, ... well, you get the idea.
The latter seems like it would be more efficient, but given the timescales we're talking about, I'm not sure if it actually ends up being more efficient? And of course, this is ignoring questions of whether it's better to have 100k people on ten worlds, or 500k on two, and the ease of pop-dropping...
At any rate, I've been running some models and in my tests it seems that, on a 30 year test, it's equally efficient. It doesn't matter what you do. As long as you're getting population off of high population worlds (all of them), then you get down to that sub-25% sweet spot of growth, and it's irrelevant whether you make a second breeder or just start growing everything.
I guess when you think about it, if you produce 100 people, and you move those people to a world 25% full or 5% full, they're going to grow the same. As long as you're not running into declining growth rates due to passing that max growth point, it's all moot...
But still, something tells me that I don't want to believe it. Any thoughts or articles or something? I'd love to RTFM on this particular issue but I can't seem to find anything that covers this kind of thing in particular.
Thanks!
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| Re: Populating Other Planets Strategy |
Thu, 18 September 2008 05:44  |
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Believe your results because in an ideal condition, which 25% or less is (excluding planet value), that's exactly what happens. This is why a 5%(really 10%) 3immune HE must be stopped while it can be, because managed properly they can maintain 10% actual growth for a long time(not quite 10% once you count transit time) whereas most normal higher growth races are doing well to get above 10% some of the time - often the can drop to 5% or lower due to the drag of planet values. This and the transit management are what makes the difference.
Of course quite a few have argued that its total resources that matter more.
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| Re: Populating Other Planets Strategy |
Thu, 18 September 2008 11:34 |
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 m.a@stars |
 | Commander |
Messages: 2765
Registered: October 2004
Location: Third star to the left | |
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| xb95 wrote on Thu, 18 September 2008 10:11 |
In a nutshell, my question is whether it's more efficient to:
a) start distributing from HW to all other new planets equally (well, by Hab probably), or;
b) focus on one planet until you have a second breeder, then you can focus on two others to get four total, then eight, sixteen, ... well, you get the idea.
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I've done both in real games, depending on hab-draw, and the results don't seem to significantly differ, in the mid and long term. Perhaps the inefficiencies of travel explain it. 
When playing vs people, podrops are also a factor. Concentrating too much on a few breeders can leave other colonies too open to attack... 
Other than that, one of the luckiest things that can happen to your pop strat is a 90%+ breeder next door to the HW. Set it in motion and you just doubled your pop output for taking the rest of the galaxy! 
So many Stars, so few Missiles!
In space no one can hear you scheme!  Report message to a moderator
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| Re: Populating Other Planets Strategy |
Thu, 18 September 2008 17:27 |
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| joseph |
 | Lt. Junior Grade |
Messages: 440
Registered: May 2003
Location: Bristol | |
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A very interesting problem and it does vary based on the kind of race you have
(-f, HG, HP).
With races that contain factories there is a benefit in speading evenly that grows as the number of factories increases.
(ie you get your factories started and compounding in several places rather than just 1).
To make things simple we will consider the -f so pop is all we care about.
We need to consider 2 factors when looking at this "Transit Time" and "Planet Hab %"
First Transit time - we want to keep the % of pop in transit at any time to a minimum.
Looking at the unrealistic 100% everywhere (3i HE anyone).
It would pay to evenly distribute pop to all the worlds within a 1y hop of your homeworld as your homeworld hit 25%.
As you reached the level where those worlds would be reaching 25% you would start hitting worlds that were 2 years away.
Why wait until they are at 25%, why not send pop from the homeworld to the 2 year planets when the 1 year are at 10% and let them grow on their own?
Well because the longer you wait before doing the 2 year jump the smaller compared to your total pop the number of pop in that ship will be.
The effect you should be going for would look like a slow motion version of what happens when you fill an ice cube tray with water from the tap with the water pouring on the centre (your homeworld).
Now we look at planet hab - which nicely blows our first model to bits.
First "initial Hab"
The higher the HAB the better it will always be worth filling up a better Hab world (to 25%).
There is a slight modifier on this based on travel time.
For example increasing the travel time so that your population is in transit for an average of 2 in 10 years rather than 1 in 10 would cause a 10% reduction in total pop growth.
So its worth hitting the 90% world at 1 year remove rather than the 100% at 2 years.
Experience shows that unless the gap is very big (30% hab Vs 80%) it is not worth traveling more than 3 years to get to a planet (which is good as the ideal privateer can do 3 years at W9).
Next I will cover "Terraformable Hab"
[Updated on: Fri, 19 September 2008 09:53]
Joseph
"Can burn the land and boil the sea. You cant take the Stars from me"Report message to a moderator
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| Re: Populating Other Planets Strategy |
Fri, 19 September 2008 09:13 |
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| iztok |
| Commander |
Messages: 1206
Registered: April 2003
Location: Slovenia, Europe | |
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Hi!
| Quote: |
distribution of population from your HW
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1) any breeder (75% or better green planet) found -> 50k pop (one year of pop growth on your HW). If none, go to add 2.
2) other close green and big yellow planets -> 25k or 50k pop, depending on the minerals ot the spee of terraforming them to breeders. If no (more) such planets, let pop on HW grow to 45%-50% capacity while building infrastructure.
3) Depending on the number of available green / yellow planets:
3a) close breeders fill up to 100k pop, then leave them grow.
3b) far greens (3+ W9 jumps)-> 50k pop.
3c) close small greens and big and medium yellows -> 50k-100k pop.
4) Competition (other players) arrives:
4a) They want about the same planets as you:  all potentially habitable planets in that theatre setled with 25k/50k pop, thereafter planets closer to your core planets. If not enough pop on HW, then get them from (big) green planets in that theatre.
4b) Their hab is different: negotiate border, try to trade for green planets, settle good yellow planets with 50k pop first, small yellows next. At this phase your first breeders should provide that pop.
5) When most green and big yellow planets are settled with 50k pop, let your pop on your HW grow to 45%-50% to get more resources and minerals  . Hold breeders at 25% until they build all infrastructure, then let them also grow to 45%-50%.
6) Depending on the amount of breeders:
6a) decent amount  : backfill HW to 100%, backfill high-MC breeders to 100%, let poor breeders grow pop indefinitely for filling other small planets or invasion freighters. Colonize everything in your space to get some more resources and minerals.
6b) sparse amount  : keep filling small planets to 100%, then keep lifting pop for invasion, backfill only the HW.
HTH and BR, Iztok
[Updated on: Fri, 19 September 2008 13:15] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: Populating Other Planets Strategy |
Fri, 19 September 2008 11:00 |
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| joseph |
| Lt. Junior Grade |
Messages: 440
Registered: May 2003
Location: Bristol | |
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Now "Terraformable Hab"This supports dropping enough on a single planet to allow a click (or 2) of terraforming rather than spreading it to several planets.
Say you have 4 60% (terraform to 75%) planets all 1 year away from your homeworld.
Theory A (drop evenly)
500kT to each planet, 1 planet at a time
each planet will terraform 1 every 2 turns until the 5th turn when you start to fill them all to 1000kT (plus a bit from their growth).
On average the pop accross the 4 planets will be growing at 60% PLUS 0.5 of a terraform for the first 4 turns (say 60.5%).
Then as you fill them up for the next 4 turns they will be growing at an average of about 63%
Theory B (Fill 1 first)
500kT to the first planet for the first couple of turns.
Then 500Kt to the next for a couple of turns.
On average the pop accross the 4 planets will be growing at 63% for the first 4 turns.
Then for the next 4 it would rise to 65%
A small advantage (and a fair bit of it will be wiped out by the increase in travel time due to worlds filling up earlier) but it is an advantage.
The advantage is biggest at high value worlds and those worlds where a single click of terraforming has the most effect
[Updated on: Fri, 19 September 2008 11:02]
Joseph
"Can burn the land and boil the sea. You cant take the Stars from me"Report message to a moderator
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| Re: Populating Other Planets Strategy |
Fri, 19 September 2008 17:00 |
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nice summary, joseph!
And also, remember the growth breakpoints:
Stay at 25% hold(really work hard at it, but don't worry if you go temporarily over in a mineral crunch), until you have populated all your +25% hab green worlds. (Best 1st, according to distance.) Then, stay at 33% hold until you have populated all your -25% hab green and yellow worlds. (acually straight line? from 25% to 33% hold equates to straight line from 33 to 0% hab, but 25% hab as a break going from 25 to 33% hold works fine.) I take into account strategy here, and tend to favour colonization toward a target an ally, or possible good hab planetary areas.
If you have factories then the "resource integral" (whatever that is??) is supposed to occur at 48% hold. I guess that takes into account factories. But other than a bit of delay in transit time, factories produce the same no matter what planet they are produced on. So I tend to stay at 33% for a *looong* time, spreading germ and making sure you can 1. build factories, 2 do terraforming, 3. build mines, at all new and developing planets.
Then I tend to colonize everything. The pop loss on reds is small, and the resource gain is significant.
Then fill worlds from poorest to best. I will occasionally fill great mineral planets and maybe my HW sooner.
Again, if I have factories, then filling great mineral mineral greens and my HW becomes more attractive, once you have run out of other places to send germ.
naz
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