TEC structure costs

[.?]

Do TEC structures need a cost reduction?

For this we're using the market as a baseline for how much metal and crystal is worth, respectively a 1 crystal/metal converts to 3 credits.

Breaking down all the material costs for structures into credits for all the factions, the TEC seems to be paying a ridiculous amount more for their buildings. The worst of these being the labs a staple building costing 1025 credits worth of resources compared to their alien counterparts paying about 600/630 credits per lab respectively.

I am suspecting this is why TEC is feeling really bad to play at the moment and their buildings need a massive reduction in both metal and crystal costs or a reduction in credit costs to bring them more in line with the other factions.

[Mander]

Good eye. It is another strangeness that afflict the game at the moment, but a more difficult to grasp on average.
I feel that the price the TEC needs to pay for their buildings is (or can be) only justified because of the profits down the line. To the point, that I feel that your first research as TEC should always be tradeports. Everything else costs too much or doesn’t grant enough return: orbital mining as TEC is a losing investment for example, when compared to the trade lanes. To the point I build orbital miners ONLY if I have 1 slot left and nothing else to build (with ice planets being the only exception: crystals are a valuable commodity as TEC). Getting your money earning up is how you establish a foothold as TEC.
Vasari are the exact opposite, while Advent are strangled by their slow growth on research cap.
Basically, orbitals’ price is the “soft cap” to TEC rushing in the early game, and I feel it is not a “problem” per se: it just forces you to rush economy to counterbalance, and it becomes a true obstacle only on small maps, where engagements begin in the first 20 mins.

[.?]

Postat inițial de Mander:

Good eye. It is another strangeness that afflict the game at the moment, but a more difficult to grasp on average.
I feel that the price the TEC needs to pay for their buildings is (or can be) only justified because of the profits down the line. To the point, that I feel that your first research as TEC should always be tradeports. Everything else costs too much or doesn’t grant enough return: orbital mining as TEC is a losing investment for example, when compared to the trade lanes. To the point I build orbital miners ONLY if I have 1 slot left and nothing else to build (with ice planets being the only exception: crystals are a valuable commodity as TEC). Getting your money earning up is how you establish a foothold as TEC.
Vasari are the exact opposite, while Advent are strangled by their slow growth on research cap.
Basically, orbitals’ price is the “soft cap” to TEC rushing in the early game, and I feel it is not a “problem” per se: it just forces you to rush economy to counterbalance, and it becomes a true obstacle only on small maps, where engagements begin in the first 20 mins.

This is an interesting thought I'll try going into trade ports first and see how things go. I really feel until you get the orbital fabrication tech things just feel bad.

Just out of curiosity what do you mean by slow growth on research for advent?
As far as I know advent specialise in research, their labs are cheap and their colonise capital gives free research slots on planets. Plus aggregated knowledge which is a Civ II tech reduces cost of research and research time by 25%.

[DaRagingLunatic]

The thing is trade ports are expensive especially in the fact that you have to upgrade your planetary logistics too. But the faster you do that better the economy. But its really really beneficial to get yourself another capital ship and some colts to expand twice as fast. But i guarantee if you keep pumping your economy by the time you encounter a hard ai, it will have a much bigger fleet than you

[Mander]

Postat inițial de Maceforface:

Postat inițial de Mander:

Good eye. It is another strangeness that afflict the game at the moment, but a more difficult to grasp on average.
I feel that the price the TEC needs to pay for their buildings is (or can be) only justified because of the profits down the line. To the point, that I feel that your first research as TEC should always be tradeports. Everything else costs too much or doesn’t grant enough return: orbital mining as TEC is a losing investment for example, when compared to the trade lanes. To the point I build orbital miners ONLY if I have 1 slot left and nothing else to build (with ice planets being the only exception: crystals are a valuable commodity as TEC). Getting your money earning up is how you establish a foothold as TEC.
Vasari are the exact opposite, while Advent are strangled by their slow growth on research cap.
Basically, orbitals’ price is the “soft cap” to TEC rushing in the early game, and I feel it is not a “problem” per se: it just forces you to rush economy to counterbalance, and it becomes a true obstacle only on small maps, where engagements begin in the first 20 mins.

This is an interesting thought I'll try going into trade ports first and see how things go. I really feel until you get the orbital fabrication tech things just feel bad.

Just out of curiosity what do you mean by slow growth on research for advent?
As far as I know advent specialise in research, their labs are cheap and their colonise capital gives free research slots on planets. Plus aggregated knowledge which is a Civ II tech reduces cost of research and research time by 25%.

Yep, but they need, on average, more “research building constructed” to reach cap. ADVENT has other priorities and especially a weak mining on start that you need to patch. You also need to prioritize culture (because of the rewards down the line), AND while you can build research shrines (as TEC does), those shrines only grant a +1 to cap even when built planetside (except desert ones, where you jump to +3). TEC factions by contrast are a +2 planetside (civic university, for example). So, between research temples planetside and around planets, you’re growing your research cap slower than TEC everywhere but desert planets (which is why your starting planet as ADVENT is imo a research treasure and also almost the only place where you should invest in research bonuses development).
This is counterbalanced by the bonuses on research speed ADVENT possesses (Vasari Exodus, meanwhile, put their labs on ships and starbases).
So, what I usually do, is to rush starbases as ADVENT, and add culture modules inside them to spare orbital slots. This free me, allowing me to focus on mining, economy and production (and research cap) on orbital slots.

[Mander]

Postat inițial de DaRagingLunatic:

The thing is trade ports are expensive especially in the fact that you have to upgrade your planetary logistics too. But the faster you do that better the economy. But its really really beneficial to get yourself another capital ship and some colts to expand twice as fast. But i guarantee if you keep pumping your economy by the time you encounter a hard ai, it will have a much bigger fleet than you

Can confirm. And while turtling up is a functional choice in the begining, even vs Hard AI, you risk being punched through mid/late game (90 min mark, more o less) by the AI simply because it has built a doomstack and has a worse economy (orbital defenses are a disgrace for the moment).
I'm studying hard for a functional no sell on this, but other than rushing Vorastra Titan or Advent mindfrickery, TEC struggles a lot, especially surprisingly, TECE.
(As TECP, you can rush insurgents and keep the AI occupied.)
Which makes sense: TECE is a defensive faction. Defenses at the moment, don't perform adequately to support the style of the faction. Garrison forces can contain the situation, but it's not always possible to count on them being fast/good enough.

[RCMidas]

Postat inițial de Maceforface:

Plus aggregated knowledge which is a Civ II tech reduces cost of research and research time by 25%.

Incidentally, that's a reduction on the cost of upgrading planetary research, and the upgrade time it takes for each tier. Not the cost of reducing technologies or how quickly they are researched. Otherwise the best strategy would be to beeline that technology before anything else.

***

Also, TEC do get a technology for reducing orbital structure costs by 25%. Tier 2 also, about the time you start wanting lots of trade posts or extractors. Pick that up first and then start placing things.

[.?]

Postat inițial de RCMidas:

Postat inițial de Maceforface:

Plus aggregated knowledge which is a Civ II tech reduces cost of research and research time by 25%.

Incidentally, that's a reduction on the cost of upgrading planetary research, and the upgrade time it takes for each tier. Not the cost of reducing technologies or how quickly they are researched. Otherwise the best strategy would be to beeline that technology before anything else.

***

Also, TEC do get a technology for reducing orbital structure costs by 25%. Tier 2 also, about the time you start wanting lots of trade posts or extractors. Pick that up first and then start placing things.

I have failed reading comprehension 101 thanks for the correction. Yeah this isn't anywhere near as good as I thought.

[RCMidas]

No no, I made the same mistake myself. Then I noticed that technology costs hadn't changed and my research speed percentage hadn't changed either, so I began to suspect shenanigans!

[RaozSpaz]

Postat inițial de Mander:

Can confirm. And while turtling up is a functional choice in the begining, even vs Hard AI, you risk being punched through mid/late game (90 min mark, more o less) by the AI simply because it has built a doomstack and has a worse economy (orbital defenses are a disgrace for the moment).
I'm studying hard for a functional no sell on this, but other than rushing Vorastra Titan or Advent mindfrickery, TEC struggles a lot, especially surprisingly, TECE.
(As TECP, you can rush insurgents and keep the AI occupied.)
Which makes sense: TECE is a defensive faction. Defenses at the moment, don't perform adequately to support the style of the faction. Garrison forces can contain the situation, but it's not always possible to count on them being fast/good enough.

Really? Especially late game I have very little problems as TECE. The rare exception being situations where a planet only has like 1 other planet connecting to it. Or in a situation where my front door is an asteroid. Those are the worse for defensive buildings but 1 heavy factory and 3 light factories plus the starbase can make it really REALLY annoying for the AI to get through. More so if you have the Munitions Plant as your second building planetside.

If your front door is an actual planet as TECE, the likelihood of an AI punching through it even if it does only have 1 adjacent planet is pretty tiny. Unless you just aren't managing your forces at all.

I think the only time Ive really struggled is against Vasari Kanrak spam because it just chews through starbases. Even more so than Ogrovs, which is funny XD. But the garrisons can do a lot of work at keeping those mostly mopped up.

[Mander]

Postat inițial de RaozSpaz:

Postat inițial de Mander:

Can confirm. And while turtling up is a functional choice in the begining, even vs Hard AI, you risk being punched through mid/late game (90 min mark, more o less) by the AI simply because it has built a doomstack and has a worse economy (orbital defenses are a disgrace for the moment).
I'm studying hard for a functional no sell on this, but other than rushing Vorastra Titan or Advent mindfrickery, TEC struggles a lot, especially surprisingly, TECE.
(As TECP, you can rush insurgents and keep the AI occupied.)
Which makes sense: TECE is a defensive faction. Defenses at the moment, don't perform adequately to support the style of the faction. Garrison forces can contain the situation, but it's not always possible to count on them being fast/good enough.

Really? Especially late game I have very little problems as TECE. The rare exception being situations where a planet only has like 1 other planet connecting to it. Or in a situation where my front door is an asteroid. Those are the worse for defensive buildings but 1 heavy factory and 3 light factories plus the starbase can make it really REALLY annoying for the AI to get through. More so if you have the Munitions Plant as your second building planetside.

If your front door is an actual planet as TECE, the likelihood of an AI punching through it even if it does only have 1 adjacent planet is pretty tiny. Unless you just aren't managing your forces at all.

I think the only time Ive really struggled is against Vasari Kanrak spam because it just chews through starbases. Even more so than Ogrovs, which is funny XD. But the garrisons can do a lot of work at keeping those mostly mopped up.

I'm playing TECE in the "Titans of Cimtar" map: beautiful place. 8 gas giants with 6 moons each, for a FFA hard AI, minor factions in the center and I think a couple of wormholes. Each gas giant has a dead asteroid zone as a no man’s land between each other. It’s the first map where I’ve found “dead moon” as a type of planet.
Knowing the AI is as cheap as possible, I’ve rushed heavy garrison and gas giant colonization, making it the center piece of my domain and focus of production. As soon as I begun producing capital ships, my neighbor, another TECE, invaded with a well-fed garrison of capitals, rockets ships (feck those) and carriers. I had even heavy mercantile escorts with cruiser.
It was the battle of attrition to end all battle of attrition: a dozen hulks polluting the orbit, fabricators glowing red with the strain of churning anti capital ships faster than the enemy could reinforce, capital ships spawning just to tank some hits, retreat to the secondary lines and getting repaired just to come back. A Marza tried to escape to one of my moons, and I had to send a crippled Kol to finish it, playing cat and mouse for a couple of orbits…
The AI sent an Ankylon and I managed to contain it after luring it to the secondary lines, repairing my ships faster than it could damage them.
In short? The garrison did very little. Orbital defenses help? Laughable (other than as a repairing tool.)
I’m still empowering my capitals with modules, but the time for revenge is approaching.

[RaozSpaz]

The escorts is a trap. Even with them not providing exp they dont really do anything. I might get it as a tech late game but early on its a cash sink that does little more than waste investment.

Im a Cap Ship enjoyer to the point of extreme so i typically only research the Harka in order to let my garrisons produce it. Cobalts and Harkas may not do the best damage in the world, but they will keep an enemy busy for a very long time.

[Mander]

Postat inițial de RaozSpaz:

The escorts is a trap. Even with them not providing exp they dont really do anything. I might get it as a tech late game but early on its a cash sink that does little more than waste investment.

Im a Cap Ship enjoyer to the point of extreme so i typically only research the Harka in order to let my garrisons produce it. Cobalts and Harkas may not do the best damage in the world, but they will keep an enemy busy for a very long time.

Missing the point: they were further bodies that should have been of some use.
The MVP of the battle were the Kalev Gauss Frigates. They were the ones to finally put the enemy titan to rest.

[Earl Komrad]

Postat inițial de RaozSpaz:

The escorts is a trap. Even with them not providing exp they dont really do anything. I might get it as a tech late game but early on its a cash sink that does little more than waste investment.

Im a Cap Ship enjoyer to the point of extreme so i typically only research the Harka in order to let my garrisons produce it. Cobalts and Harkas may not do the best damage in the world, but they will keep an enemy busy for a very long time.

You see, the whole point of trade escorts is to make the map prettier and more alive by seeing all that traffic comming in and out.

That is their only real benefit, really. They are too few in numbers to do anything.

[Gauntlet]

Btw are you managing your garrisons? IE selecting them, grouping them, telling them a engagement range and to jump together?

Makes a big difference.

[shde2e]

I do think that Vasari also have a real early-game limiter with all the extra planetary research they need to do.
No idea how that stacks up to the TEC economy though.