[Updated on: Thu, 13 October 2005 05:17]

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I posted something about it at:

http://starsautohost.org/sahforum/index.php?t=msg&th=241 3

To make a clear example:
colonized is 12 of 100 conc world
built is 30 mines
racial mine efficency is 16 of 10

1) Mining per year is 0.12*1.6*30 = 5.76 thats rounded down to 5 minerals per year.
2) To lower the conc from 12 to 11 you got to mine 456 minerals at mine efficiency 10 (look that post at that link), but you got mine efficency 16 so you will get it after 456*1.6 = 729.6 minerals.
3) At mining rate 5 minerals per year lowering from 12 to 11 will take 729/5 = 145 years.


(sorry if these are too "standard" formulas but i have tested that they actually apply )

[Updated on: Thu, 13 October 2005 13:41]

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Oh now i understand. You wanted exact 1 mineral precision! Stars keeps internally mineral conc depletion progress. Player cant see it nowhere so that thing is hard to use in formulas. That is why "standard" formulas are not accurate. There is ~50 minerals inaccuracy during 100 years but nothing to do.

As analogy player can not see population with full (1 pop) precision (but its there internally). The planet capacity fill percentage is applied with quite low accuracy to that number so pop growth and death follow strange sawtooth curve (and that is also added or substracted with precision of 1). These two factors together make it very hard to predict population at planet with exact 100 precision. No much to do.

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That raises an interesting question. If I have a red planet with 100 pop and a few die (We can't see it, but say it goes down to 80) and then I load it up into a freighter, does the freighter keep track of the fact that it has only 80 people, or does it round back up to 100?

Can I generate 5 free people every turn?

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Kotk wrote on Fri, 14 October 2005 15:44

Oh now i understand. You wanted exact 1 mineral precision! Stars keeps internally mineral conc depletion progress. Player cant see it nowhere so that thing is hard to use in formulas. That is why "standard" formulas are not accurate. There is ~50 minerals inaccuracy during 100 years but nothing to do. As analogy player can not see population with full (1 pop) precision (but its there internally). The planet capacity fill percentage is applied with quite low accuracy to that number so pop growth and death follow strange sawtooth curve (and that is also added or substracted with precision of 1). These two factors together make it very hard to predict population at planet with exact 100 precision. No much to do.

Just out of curiosity: can somebody explain just how are minconcs and/or actual pop "internally" stored? As I understand it, they should also be present in the m file, right?

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Simple. The mineral conc (displayed) is in one byte and the (not displayed) decimal part is in other byte. Some Jeff-breed algorithm merges them, mines from them and stores back again. The decimal parts are present in m file for the planets where some mining has occured, for rest there is just the displayed conc.

[Updated on: Fri, 10 March 2006 06:26]

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Kotk wrote on Fri, 10 March 2006 12:22

Simple. The mineral conc (displayed) is in one byte and the (not displayed) decimal part is in other byte. Some Jeff-breed algorithm merges them, mines from them and stores back again. The decimal parts are present in m file for the planets where some mining has occured, for rest there is just the displayed conc.

Are you positive about the "magic number" being a "decimal part"? I'd have bet the Jeffs would use integer logic for this.

I reckon nobody has a clue how that "Jeff-breed" algorithm works?

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m.a@stars wrote on Sat, 11 March 2006 11:48

Are you positive about the "magic number" being a "decimal part"? I'd have bet the Jeffs would use integer logic for this.

I actually think of that as "mining progress". I named it as "decimal part" again as its lot better than "magic number".
There certainly is no magic.

Quote:

I reckon nobody has a clue how that "Jeff-breed" algorithm works?

What is so shocking? Players have had no access to that progress byte.

Its been discussed tons of times, and made spreadsheets and what not ... the published algorithms are close enough. From few kT the results differ during 20 years you dont build fleets anyway.

[Updated on: Sat, 11 March 2006 18:56]

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Kotk wrote on Sat, 11 March 2006 23:09

m.a@stars wrote on Sat, 11 March 2006 11:48 Are you positive about the "magic number" being a "decimal part"? I'd have bet the Jeffs would use integer logic for this. I actually think of that as "mining progress". I named it as "decimal part" again as its lot better than "magic number". There certainly is no magic.

Heh, I had guessed it would be some "progress indicator" of some kind.

Quote:

Quote: I reckon nobody has a clue how that "Jeff-breed" algorithm works? What is so shocking? Players have had no access to that progress byte. Its been discussed tons of times, and made spreadsheets and what not ... the published algorithms are close enough. From few kT the results differ during 20 years you dont build fleets anyway.

Makes sense, of course. Still, it would be nice to know it accurately, if only to replicate it reliably.

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Hi!

m.a@stars wrote on Sun, 12 March 2006 10:53

Still, it would be nice to know it accurately, if only to replicate it reliably.

Most mineral-depletion calculators work very well (within +/- 1% accuracy) down to MC 20. After that: the lower the conc, the bigger the miss. However for game purposes is the upper 20 the most important, below 20 mining goes so slowly, that is no more a game-breaker, and most gamese are usually finished before planets go below 10 anyway.
BR, Iztok

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Hi!

iztok wrote on Mon, 13 March 2006 09:40

Most mineral-depletion calculators work very well (within +/- 1% accuracy) down to MC 20. After that: the lower the conc, the bigger the miss. However for game purposes is the upper 20 the most important, below 20 mining goes so slowly, that is no more a game-breaker, and most gamese are usually finished before planets go below 10 anyway. BR, Iztok

Well, did you play AR?

I wonder whether depletion by mining robot is the same as for mines.

Also, when you have 2 allied races orbiting the same uninhabited planet, and doing remote mining, how Stars! tracks "partial" mineral units in such case? Does it tracks it for each mining robot fleet separately, or, say, over mineral concentration 1, only the first player that reaches "partial" mineral unit progress completion gets that mineral unit?

Added during editing:
I ask because it seems it is logical that when fleet 1 mines with rate 140kT and another with rate 160kT, fleet 2 would always mine 1kT more than displayed for the low concentration.
Is this correct?

[Updated on: Tue, 14 March 2006 11:23]

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Tomasoid wrote on Tue, 14 March 2006 17:43

Also, when you have 2 allied races orbiting the same uninhabited planet, and doing remote mining, how Stars! tracks "partial" mineral units in such case?

Partials are tracked together with conc each time mining occurs. Players dont care about that "partial" all they care is how lot LF-s to send.
If each of the 4 fleets (2+2) have 4000 mines anyway then players dont care about order too.

What matters is that planet is like there was 4 years of 4000 mine mining done with one year. Ironium conc 80 dropped to 37 (62,51,43,37) and ~9500 kT ironium was mined out. Next year 37 drops to 24 and another 5000 kT ironium appears. After conc 24 ARs HW is better target so these guys go away. So answer is 12 LFs if it was ironium the player was after.

Since both allies see whats on ground they also probably worry about grabbing dice (cargo transfer orders sequence is randomised).

As for HW fountain ... game anyway displays its might. Fleets of tens of LFs are needed each turn.

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Hi!

Kotk wrote on Tue, 14 March 2006 20:07

After conc 24 ARs HW is better target so these guys go away. So answer is 12 LFs if it was ironium the player was after.

Why you think only about late game?

Early in the game, when you have little of transports and require minerals for starbase upgrades and further expansion, you usually build heavy mining robots which you cannot move, and which often mine planets with concentrations lower than 20. Not building them for AR means too bad start. After you have better mining robots, you usually do not move old ones so they stay and work over that lower concentration anyway.

Also, there are persons around that like AR without ARM

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Tomasoid wrote on Wed, 15 March 2006 11:18

Also, there are persons around that like AR without ARM

I am one of them.
I try to have one miner design for whole game:
mini miner with QJ5, Robo Super, empty, empty
tech needed is C12 L6 so ... from docks no miners can be built howeer with ultra tech these come too.
mass is 324 so ... losses at 300/500 gate are minimal.
I have no other miner design.

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