How do you develop your planets?

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from GalCiv2 Forums
I've been trying some different plans for planet development. When I first started playing the game, I put on starport, one embassy, one bank, one farm, one entertainment network, and then equal numbers of research and industry. It works ok, but, as the video tutorial says, one should specialize planets, the further along one gets. I gave specialization a shot, and so far, my results don't feel to different (although my specialize game isn't far along). What I did was pick one planet to be industry, and so it got a starport, and all factories, and I did the same for other building types, making certain planets exceedingly good at what they do, but a little gimped in other areas.

My question is, how do you, fellow player, develop your planets? Do you diversify? Do you specialize? Please describe how you develop your planets and why.
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Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

For me, it always depends on where in the galaxy that planet is. If I was ballsy enough to populate a world in the middle of another civ's borders, I'll focus on Embasies. If it's a backwater planet that probably won't have to worry about invasions, I'll make it a banking or research planet.

And then the bonuses also come into play. A world that'd I'd normally use for cranking out ships will sometimes become a research world if the correct bonus tile is available.

Of course, I still can't beat the toucher intelligences, so I dont know how much stake to take in the above suggestions

Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
My impression is that the only planets worth specialising are those that are intended to make you money: one wants to combine the high population (farms + entertaininment) with lots of economy buildings (go stock markets!).
+ specialising one each of industry and research, to use the relevant capitals to their maximum potential.
Influence and economic capitals dont appear to be multiplicative with the basic influence and economy buildings, so it is less important to specialise them compared to the industry and research ones.
Other planets I'm reasonably happy with having a mix of different things, and trying to use all the bonus tiles optimally.
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Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
My development plan follows the OPs...Class 9/10/11 planets usually get built up in this order: 3 Factories, Starport, Lab, Econ, Farm, Entertainment, Emb...if they have bonus tiles, then I buld accordingly.

Class 12+, I will generally follow the same build order but then specialise using the tiles that were left over.

Under class 9 planets will usually get one less factory, or no farm...depends on their location and what resources/race abilities I have.
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
i've been doing a 4-way spit between industry, research, economics, and "other", where "other" is farms, entertainment, and influence, and the initial colony and the starport don't count as being in any catagory.

so on a 14 tile world, that would be 3 each of industry/research/econ and 1 each of farms/entertainment/influence.

the planets i pick to be capitals are ones that are bigger than 14 tiles, and have at least two bonus tiles matching the type of capital it is. if nothing like that is available, i just look for whichever big world already has the highest output of whatever the captial increases.

i could imagine having a specialized industry world, but i think on a specialized reserach or econ world that the lack of enough factories would lead to building upgrades taking waaaaaay too long! they already take long enough with my balanced scheme, especially in the endgame... i can't imagine how long they would take on worlds where industry was lowered to make room for econ or research!
Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I am beating Crippling consistently (probably could go higher, but don't want the stress...), and here's a few things I do. This is in the beta 2:

I don't worry about specialization too much. The bonus squares pretty much dictate your specializations for you.

Economy Capital and Political Capital on the same planet. The high population benefits them both. Plus, the Political Capital gives a morale bonus. This planet tends to be my homeworld VERY regularly. It's not just about maximizing income--it's about maximizing income in a suitable timeframe.

Galactic Achievement planets. These have the 300% manufacturing bonus tiles. I go to the planet list, do a sort by Social Production, pick the ones at the top to build achievements. The reason is two-fold: first (the obvious), to complete them before anybody else does. But second, because these high-industry planets tend to fill up their planet tiles quickly. You can slow that down by building the big boys.

Spam the factories. In the beta, money isn't the issue; industrial capacity is.

Research Centers I put up after I have enough factories. You need the factories to produce the research centers. But if I have 100% or 300% bonus tiles, I put them up earlier--and then go on to producing more factories. My Technology Capital of course I want on the planet with the best research bonus tiles, but also it's sure nice if it also has a manufacturing bonus tile as well. I'll pass up a better research bonus planet for one with good research + manufacturing bonus. The manufacturing bonus means I can build more research centers and less factories, and I can get up the Tech capital sooner.

Starports I build as I go. During the early land grab these things are critical, but you don't have the money to sustain them everywhere. As your budget gets better, put more starports up. A huge budget surplus is just a bad as a budget deficit. More starports & more ships eats into your surplus.

Farms I build as I go, and I aim to COMPLETE them--not start them--at about the time I reach the population cap. A 17bill pop cap I can live with, though.

Entertainment Centers are low on the priority list. My strategy is an early Xeno Ethics + neutral + Harmony crystals + Populist party, so I tend to have extremely high morale. But if morale dips below 75%, or there's an approval bonus square, or you just don't have anything better to do, it's worth it to have one.

Stock Markets are also low on the priority list. By that point, I don't need the money. But because of the morale, they can help.

Embassies on all the influence bonus squares. It's good to get embassies up while you can, because cultural centers are expensive.

Later in the game, because of the budget surplus the rules change: a) I'll buy Galactic Achievements outright on crap planets. They have the spare tiles. b) I'll buy research centers on the tech capital planet. It's important to delay research academies as long as possible to do this, because buying research academies can get expensive. After I've got research academies, I'll pay to rush-upgrade the research centers on the bonus tiles. c) I rush-build anything that's almost completed. You pay a lower premium on nearly-completed stuff.
Reply #6 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I always start with a factory or two because it speeds up the build of all the remaining improvements. Depending on how many tiles are available I may wind up with even more. Once I've built it up, I may convert a couple of factories back to other purposes -- trade centers or farming or entertainment, depending on where I'm hurting the most.

I generally diversify, but I'm starting to get into more specialization. You should look at the bonus tiles to determine how to specialize -- look for research or manufacturing bonus tiles, build the appropriate improvements on those first, of course, then more of the same.

In my campaign game, I'm even specializing some planets in population development. I build a lot of farming and entertainment improvements on a planet in my 'back field', and ferry colonists up to the front lines where the Dread Lords are trying to take a planet, killing 3 or 4 billion people every time they try to invade. It's horrible to contemplate: "Reproduce faster, citizens! We require your healthy offpsring to fight the Dread Lords! Hurry up! WHY AREn'T YOU COPULATING?!?"
Reply #7 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
The more I play, the more I find that I just can't get out of the diversify mindset. I of course, always build the appropriate building on bonus tiles, but even after trying a little specialization, I find that I'm still building the farm, embassy, entertainment network, financial, and depending on planet, a starport. After that it's an even mix of research and industry, with a slight favor to research, as I'm kind of bad about expanding fast, turtling, teching up, and booming.

A variation I've been playing quite a bit of lately, and find to be more fun because I really have to carefully pick what I build where, is to make everything rare. Planets, stars, anomolies, etc. I then play this on huge. So you generally end up with 2 planets, and if you're lucky 3 or 4. Then it feels like more of a contest of stretching and using resources wisely, and not so much about putting out brushfires every turn on 100 different worlds.