Seems like you need to build a power relay long before recommended in guides

[Viper]

I have looked at some guides for recommendations of build order. The recommendation for Power is like 5th or 6th facility Obviously they didn't try that out in an actual game. After building the GTS, Resistance Ring, and and Resistence Coms I am using 15/15 of the starting power available. Obviously Power has to be the next faciltiy.

[red255]

probably would have gone training facility over resistance comms for a third building, but yes, you should go for power. if you haven't picked it up from the world map.

Don't know about guides. I generally make 2 power sources on my ant farm.

and I have two spaces at the bottom which I give a lab and some turrets which are wholly unnessary.

[.O.]

The guides you're looking at may be out of date. But yes, in my game, power is usually the third or fourth building for me. General order for me is:

1. Resistance Ring
2. GTS
3. Proving Ground/Infirmary depending on squad makeup and status
4. Power

[endersblade]

In WotC, there are exactly enough rooms to fill up every single slot in the ant farm. So the question becomes, do I build more power and move rooms around later, or do I dig deep enough to get to power coils first? There are also covert missions that grant you power, and I think one of those cards that you can equip at the start of every month (sorry, forget what they're called) can also give you power.

The way I typically do it is, depending on where the exposed coils are, I just clear down to one, only building rooms as absolutely necessary. Once you cap a coil, and especially once you get Elerium researched, you should have much better breathing room for building.

I build res comms first, guerilla training second, then start working down to a coil. Depending on how well my game is going, I might build a ring before I get to a coil.

One thing to keep in mind when digging is that workshops make drones. You can get more drones from one workshop than you can engineers usually by the time you build the workshop. I usually put a workshop second row, middle column, which allows me to use drones to dig out the three tiles to the left, right, and bottom. That extra manpower could potentially help reach a coil if you don't have enough engineers to fully slot. And the drones can man rooms after the digging is done, too.

I usually see people stick workshops in strange places, and usually next to rooms that can't use the drones. Seems so suboptimal to me. Place it in the middle, and surround it with rooms that can use the drones effectively.

[red255]

why would you even bother making a workshop? I build a lab and turret place eventually just because but what I need 'core' is
1 Resistance ring +engineer
1 Resistance coms +2 engineer
2 Power relay
1 training facility
1 Psi lab +engineer
1 Shadow chamber
1 proving ground + engineer
1 infirmary eventually +1 engineer
1 GTS.

and yeah eventually a lab and turret +1 engineer for 6 or 7 engineers needed for the whole thing.

[wckowalski]

Funny thing is, assuming you have WotC, if you build 2 power relays, you are one short on available rooms if you want 1 of everything else. The workshop is the most obvious thing to leave out is the workshop as all it does is basically act like you have an extra engineer, and engineer recruitment isn't a strictly limited resource.

[Tamiore]

Originally posted by endersblade:

One thing to keep in mind when digging is that workshops make drones. You can get more drones from one workshop than you can engineers usually by the time you build the workshop. I usually put a workshop second row, middle column, which allows me to use drones to dig out the three tiles to the left, right, and bottom. That extra manpower could potentially help reach a coil if you don't have enough engineers to fully slot. And the drones can man rooms after the digging is done, too.

I usually see people stick workshops in strange places, and usually next to rooms that can't use the drones. Seems so suboptimal to me. Place it in the middle, and surround it with rooms that can use the drones effectively.

This has been already discussed quite a few times, but it's worth repeating: workshop is practically NEVER a good idea. EVER. Not on ANY difficulty.
It's a net DRAIN on building speed since you waste a slot on it that would otherwise go to a building you actually want.
It's a net drain on resources since the investment breaks even only AFTER an average campaign has already been decided one way or the other.
Workshop may seem like a nice long-term investment at the first glace, but once you try to write down what the supposed benefits of building it are you quickly realize you would have gained MORE if you simply ignored the workshop in the first place.