Economics and maintenance?

from Stardock Forums
As a newbie just trying out this program, even on "easy" or "cakewalk" I am having major problems with economy. I have federalist gov. and +10% economy, and still can't avoid running into big debt. I have only 2 ships on the map right now (1 colony & 1 scout) and my economy is still running in the red. I have colonized about 5 planets but have not built any social or other improvements that require maintenance. Yet even with optimized taxes and NO improvements requiring maintenance, the economy screen says my "maintenance cost" is still 48 a turn! Unfortunately the game doesn't offer any further itemization of where exactly this maintenance cost comes from. And no, I haven't bought ANYTHING on credit, every spaceship I've built myself the long way.

The really bizarre thing is that the in-game rankings list my civ as the "richest" even when I am -500+ in debt! If the other civs have this problem too, then things are really bad off.

I've looked through the manual and have not found it to be helpful. The discussion of economy and trade is minimal, and that of maintenance is nonexistance. I've read through the economy FAQ and online manual too, which offer little help.

What I want to know is, WHAT are all of these expenses that are consuming my economy so that I can't build anything, even though I have NO social improvements and only 2 spacecraft to support? Even with major bonuses to economy & planet quality, optimizing tax rate, & minimizing expenses on the easiest level, I still can't keep from inevitably running into the point where I can not build or research anything due to operating in the red. Where is it all going?

I've tried this game 3 times now and am losing patience with the unfathomable and very poorly documented economic model that has scuttled all of my games. Any help would be appreciated before I relegate this program to the trash bin.

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Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top
I had the same problem in one of my first couple games. My problem was caused by colonizing sub pq15 planets.
If you colonize a planet with a planet quality of 10-14, it costs you 5bc maintenance every month, for life suport. Planets with 6-9 cost 10bc per month.
Could this be your problem?
Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top
When you start a game, your tax rate's set at 33%. You should move it up. As you do this, your planet's moral will drop. Make sure your moral do not drop to below 50% or your population will start to migrate(to where no one knows) thus your amount of tax collected will be low. Play with the tax slider untill u get the most of tax without lowing your moral to below 50%.

Keep your spent rate to the amount where it's NOT more than the amount of tax you collect. Your social/Military/Research will be slow in the first 10-20 turns but tats the way it'll be until you get your economy up.

Ways to get your economy up between 1-30 turns:
1) Build banking centre
2) Build Economic Capital
3) Trade with other civilisation

*Make sure your spend rate is NOT more than the amount of tax you're collecting.
Object Desktop - Get all of our enhancement utilities in one suite
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top
And yes, always colonise planets with 15+ PlanetQuality. Then build soil improvements.. Better planetquality = higher moral = more tax collected = ability to slide your tax rate higher(mkaing sure moral does not drop below 50%).
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top
Make sure your moral do not drop to below 50% or your population will start to migrate(to where no one knows) thus your amount of tax collected will be low. Play with the tax slider untill u get the most of tax without lowing your moral to below 50%.
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The other side to this form of play is to keep your tax rate at a level that gives 100% morale. 100% morale gives you max pop growth. More people = more taxes. I try to keep morale at 100% until the second up issue 2186 I think. By then the planets have strong pop andn you can let morale slide a little.

Adjust your spending sliders to 100% military for enough turns to get the colony ships you think you will need (# depends on galaxy size and planet habitibility). Decrease military to 15%. Move Social to 15%. That will give you 70% in reasearch. Set military from colony ships to constructors. Reasearch com theory, uni trans, diplomacy, trade. Switch planets from constructors to freighters. You should have several freighters in very few turns. After you have your freighters you can switch back to constructors, or military ships.

This worked for me playing up through challenging. A little modification to this even works at maso. Different players have other views of which is the most important aspect of the game. My pick is economic and diplomacy as what you need to win.

This is a great game. Before you trash it give us a chance to help you. Check out the strategies tab on the left of this screen. Also check out the Empires tab. Joinn an Empire if you like. Even if you don't there is lots of good info in the Empire threads you can use. Feel free to ask any and all questions. Happy Gaming! :)

Reply #5 from Stardock Forums Top
Play with the tax slider untill u get the most of tax without lowing your moral to below 50%.
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Not a good idea: morale needs to be at least 55% to have pop growth. And at 100%, the growt rate double (cap of 200 Millions per turn per planet)
This thread http://www.galciv.com/forum.asp?BID=GS&id=155077 explains a bit how growth works with morale.

I have colonized about 5 planets but have not built any social or other improvements that require maintenance. Yet even with optimized taxes and NO improvements requiring maintenance, the economy screen says my "maintenance cost" is still 48 a turn
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Life support systems (used for planets with PQ lower or equal to 14) require maintenance costs. And the propaganda slider (accessed through thedatil of a planet) is comptabilized as maintenance costs.
I think that maintenance for ships are under military spending.
Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
THANK YOU to everyone for the information! Yes, I was colonizing some sub-15 planets. I certainly don't recall seeing any documentation on this (My new CD version didn't seem to come with a PDF manual, and the online manual doesn't seem to mention the maintenance expense). Thanks everyone for the tips. will definitely try these wonderful suggstions.

Falconhurst
Reply #7 from Stardock Forums Top
Next question. Colonizing only 15+ planets has definitely put me in the black (1800+ credits), but I am still having trouble building social improvements. I try to build "soil enhancement" & manufacturing centers, but I soon get "no resources" listing with no progress being made towards construction, even though now I am seemingly wallowing in dough.

A review of the online manual also provided no information on what the required but unlisted "resources" that are apparently necessary for social improvements, above and beyond the listed financial cost, consist of and where they come from.

Thanks in advance,

Falconhurst

Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top
Finally, some anomaly void aliens/space worms are going around blowing up my expensive starbases still in the early game, and it seems there is nothing I can do to defend against them without spending years on military projects? They blew up my survey ship as well and it seems that I have no social or military projects that are capable of winning against them at this time? The anomaly beast has an attack of 11 & defense of 4, while my best ship (the survey ship) has stats of 1&1.
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Reply #9 from Stardock Forums Top
but I am still having trouble building social improvements. I try to build "soil enhancement" & manufacturing centers, but I soon get "no resources" listing with no progress being made towards construction,
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No ressources for social projects generaly means that no BC were affected toward social production. Was is your generall spending rate and was is your social spending rate? Is your treasury in the red and below -500Bc? What is the detail of your budget?
Reply #10 from Stardock Forums Top
For the space shark: just avoid the anomalies that gives them. And when correctly played, they won't blow your survey ship since they move only at one.
Or you can try to lure them to the AI planets and ships :)
Reply #11 from Stardock Forums Top
ok, I figured it out with the social production. While I had allocated 15% of the budget to social production, apparently the planetary production was small enough that this did not result in any monthly progress. When I adjusted the social slider higher, production resumed.
Reply #12 from Stardock Forums Top
The anomaly's that produce the Space Shark (anomoly beast) are of two different looking types. The first is a grren colored asteroid, the other is a Sea Urchin looking thing (Lots of spines sticking out of it). You can simply steer clear of these anomolies, or as Peace Phoenix suggested lure them to another AI's area when your Survey Ship has enhanced its movement abilities.
Reply #13 from Stardock Forums Top
I can't quite figure out how economy works, either. Towards the end of the game my tax income was barely increasing (in comparison to my greatly increasing population). Increasing the tax slider increased tax revenue slightly until a certain point where it dropped very sharply (even if moral was still about 80%) and hovered about in the same area.

The odd thing is that my production kept increasing, but my tax revenue didn't increase at nearly the same rate. I noticed barely any change after upgrading my economy resource starbases, too.
Reply #14 from Stardock Forums Top
Towards the end of the game my tax income was barely increasing
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There are some penalties linking taxes from a planet and the PQ of this planet (see http://www.galciv.com/docs/undocs.html)

Increasing the tax slider increased tax revenue slightly until a certain point where it dropped very sharply (even if moral was still about 80%)
End of quote

Was it overall 80% or at least 80% on each planet? Because if a planet's morale is too low, you won't collect taxes from this planet: happy citizen pay taxes.

I noticed barely any change after upgrading my economy resource starbases, too.
End of quote

You have surely reach some caps. Time to found new sources of income ( trade, extortion ...) or to check if the maintenance costs aren't too high.
Reply #15 from Stardock Forums Top
Falconhurst2, a main economy problem for beginners are leases. Don't buy anything. It's much cheaper to produce it by yourself. Buy only in very urgent cases, e.g. a class 26 planet in between you and an alien and you need to be first.

You should concentrate on building colony ships. Set military and spending to 100% until you got enough!

I don't agree with chanbrothers. Your morale needs to be at 100% at any rate for your majority of planets until the population growth cap (200M per month) comes into the play.

And I disagree that you should not spend more as you earn. It's right that you should not go into dept, because it lowers your morale and when -500BC is reached all production stops! But at the beginning you need to have spending at 100% until you initial money (1.000BC) is used up.

Anyway, you should not waste your points. Check the Metaverse. When you have won a game, submit your points to the Metaverse. Empires are an additional level of fun. To join an Empire is just one click. I joined The Jedi Republic Empire http://www.galciv.com/metaverse/empires.asp?id=336 a view days ago. There are many other nice Empires. Just surf a bit on their sites and threads before you make up your mind.
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Reply #16 from Stardock Forums Top
Hi Mylon, for known caps you could check this thread http://www.galciv.com/forum.asp?BID=GS&id=134030#198040

Reply #17 from Stardock Forums Top
Heh, i been playin for a while now....

I can, from not even adjusting my starting 33% Economy, be the most powerful military, economy and culturally to the end of the game.

Method: Com Theory. U-T. Nano Electron, Stellar Cart. Defence, Deflectors, Industrial, Logigistics, Propulsion, Cold Fusion, Impulse. Load only 100 or so people into each colony ship, and every colony is to build soil enhancements, entertainment, news, bank and embassy ASAP when avalible. Also have every colony on constructors....

~SDC~
Reply #18 from Stardock Forums Top
Well, you should research diplomacy to be able to have a more efficient governement (which mean more BC spent)
Reply #19 from Stardock Forums Top
Once done impulse, yes. But then i keep going with influence and weapons..... potential military though, dont actually build much more than 1 defence per star system untill u are about to go to war....
Reply #20 from Stardock Forums Top
Well, Switching to Republic from Empire means something like 50% increase in production. It allow to research tech 33% faster