Materials storage and mining out a sector

[adder007usa]

One bit of advice I keep hearing is not to leave stuff behind.

How in the world is this manageable? It seems like there's enough raw iron in the first (not intro) system to fill an entire sector with nothing but iron/alloy storage. Not only is it a massive drain on worker staffing, but having to unlock another sector just to have room for all that storage seems...well, I don't know if the benefit outweighs it? Not to mention all the extra resources that I know I will need later, but can't use right now (silicon, ice, hydrogen). Is it really a good idea to hang around and scrape up every single rock? or is there a point at which the population needed to run all that storage just isn't worth it?

[𐂃]

In chapter 2 you can unlock pretty much the entire tech tree if you stick around. U get 5 science every 3 day, you can just open a sector and fill it up with iron (and ice to turn into trash) or u use it up in chapter 1. There is no time limit, you just have a lot of idle time if you like to minmax. I guess casuals trying to play the story think it's too hard and minmaxers think this game is a joke because u don't get punished for maxing out tech tree in the beginning.

You shouldn't be able to spend 1000-2000 days in a chapter afk.

[Aouregan]

There's a lot of stuff you can leave behind. There is really no need to mine out a sector for everything. I would, however, take as much Si as I can, since it transforms into electronics at a lousy rate. But also that is something you can in theory tackle with recycling later on.
Take the cryopods at least, if there are any, and maybe the refined resources (Alloy, electronics, etc.)
If you did all your stuff, get outta there. Iron, Ice and other things are everywhere. Sure, getting a nice stockpile of Iron is nice to have redundancy, but it is not necessary.

[Amanoob105]

It's good advice, but only if tempered by the logic of only gathering up what you need.
The most obvious example here is Hydrogen, which is only useful in the late game and even then completely optional.
Until then it just takes up space (and we don't have an option to shove the stuff out an airlock).

Stockyards don't need people or power to store resources, just to send them to the places that want them. If one isn't being made use of by another building, turn it off.
While it is useful to strip-mine the system, you don't have to do it all at once. If you have more coming in than you can use at the same rate, then tell your transports to stop bringing it in until there's once again room for it.

First chance you get, research and build a microchip factory, as silicon isn't something you should have sitting unused right now. As the game goes on you will be needing ever more of those little yellow guys and the sooner you can start on that the better.

There will always be more ice in a system than you could hope to realistically use, so I wouldn't be in a hurry to grab more of that until you need it.

[Rekal]

Don't store the raw material. Store the processed goods. I'd suggest 3 smelters right off if you can swing the staffing (try to never go beyond Optimal work conditions) and then one each for the polymer and electronics. Get those alloys rolling in as fast as possible and use them to build out more and more buildings that you'll need. As you start out you'll be flipping these factories on and off to manage your staffing and available power.

I'd suggest three space docks in your industrial sector. Each one gets assigned one material - Fe, C, and Si - and the two cargo ships assigned to these docks pick up ONLY that resource. The space docks will act as large stockpiles and when the dock is full even the cargo ships will line up with full cargo waiting to unload. You'll only need a single stockpile in the zone to transfer from the docks to the factories. Plus when the space dock is full you can just turn it off and the stockpile will keep unloading it. Plan the process chain to be close together so transport times are short or you may need a second Fe stockpile's trucks to feed all those smelters.

Once a stockpile is full you can just turn it off and build another while you leave the ones in good locations operating. You won't even need to turn it back on when you want the material out of it -- just un-assign the stockpile and your other stockpiles assigned to that material will unload it.

You can "store" alloy in batteries which don't require any power or staffing. 3x3 spot holds 40 alloy and you get all the materials back when you deconstruct them. Plus the batteries are actually useful in the mean time.

Don't collect ice or hydrogen until you're ready to use them. No need to collect them early, there's plenty in later systems. If you have collected them already, set them in a stockpile to the side somewhere and turn off the stockpiles. You'll probably use the ice at some point, but I'd recommend never bothering with hydrogen. There's no real benefit to it and if you've already collected some then you may never use it.

There's no way currently to just discard a good once it's on the Tiqqun. So be careful about storing too much of anything. It's better to balance your inputs/outputs. When transferring material between sectors, never set the "Desired" amount to the maximum to avoid a game wrecking logistics snafu - ~90% should be fine.

The beginning of this game is all about micro-managing your stockpiles and factories until your crew gets larger and you get better tech. The tier 3 research DLS is one of the best techs you should get ASAP after only the tech lab's 3 science in 5 cycles upgrade. It's policies can help you stretch your meager work force considerably.

When people say sticking around a system to mine everything out makes the game easier it typically means they're building out the Tiqqun with those resources. Ironing out the logistic issues and the design of their sectors and basically getting more familiar with the game.

[Aouregan]

Since the game offers you an endless supply of garbage, and that can be turned into everything you need (Alloys, Polymers and Electronics), except for nuclear fuel (H) and ice, there really isn't any real need to stripmine. I like to to do it, because, as above mentioned, while I do that, I also research and build. Having a pretty large stockpile of very certain things does make the game easier on later chapters, however. Well, one specific thing in one specific chapter, at least.
And yeah, as was also mentioned: You can turn a storage off, once it's full. No need to spend people and energy on it. However, once you need the resources stored in it, you need to power it on again.

[Rekal]

Originally posted by Kaeptn Bleibaer:

And yeah, as was also mentioned: You can turn a storage off, once it's full. No need to spend people and energy on it. However, once you need the resources stored in it, you need to power it on again.

A neat work around to avoid having to turn the stockpile back on is to change what the stockpile is assigned to. For example, if you have a full stockpile of alloy turned off and then un-assign it - or assign it to food or something else - the other alloy stockpiles that are turned on will see a building with resources that don't belong there and empty the alloy out of that turned off stockpile.

A few extra moments to ship from stockpile to stockpile sure, but it avoids the power and worker cost of turning on another stock pile. If the powered on alloy stockpiles are already full, they'll only grab from it when they have room. It works great when you stock everything up and then your Fe income drops because you're avoiding a storm perhaps. Your active alloy stockpile remains full with no additional cost.

[huangism]

Why store them when you can just build more stuff, turn all raw materials into goods and use them. Build your sectors, upgrade stuff and at some point you will have left overs, when you got enough left overs, move on.
Every chapter has more than enough resources, mining out is not needed