How to make a profit with high lever drugs

[test]

Hi,

Ill keep this short.

I make "good" money at the start, with low level products but as soon as I try to go after higher level stuff I lose money no matter what i do!

Usually its the products that require catalysts and so on ... I just dont know what Im doing wrong!

It gets even worse when I have to deal with machines that take 2-3 cycles to make something. I tried keeping the line at max production (1pill/day) but I end up losing money.

Help? There doesnt seem to be any more advanced guides out there to explain how to successfully produce and sell high level products!

EDIT: I have the DLC as well if that matters.

[Proteus]

I don´t know about the DLC (haven´t it) but usually I am just selective with the drugs I sell ... the combinations of cure and side effects is randomized in every game and there often are combinations that aren´t really profitable.
As for catalysts ... often there is more than one plant/animal with the same catalyst (but the second one being in ecosystems that first have to be researched before you can send in explorers) and which (from their placement of the catalyst side effect are better suited for the cure you aim at)
Also you usually need machines further down the development road (like autoclaves/cryonizers ... or even more advanced equipment) if you want to develope profitable drugs.

So to sum it up:
Don´t try to develope every drug, but plan carefully which may be best attainable with the machines and rooms at hand

Also:
Dare to sell durgs with side effects ... often rfemoving the side effects is so expensive that it makes a drug unprofitable ... better sell a version that has side effects but allows you to sell it at a profit

As for multiple cycle machines:
Depends ... if it makes your production line to complicated, then better think of selling only one poill every 2-3 cycles (as a machine only has running costs when it really is active, this won´t cut into your profits per pill produced)
Also, bigger is not neccessarily better ... if, for example, your autoclave just reduces your drugs concentration by 4, it is usually better to just use an ionizer and a dissolver. Again, just take your time to plan your production lines out

[Twice Circled]

In the expansion you have to be a lot more careful about how much you produce as well as what you produce.

Pay close attention to the demand of a cure in the Cure Tab before making it and try to estimate how much you might be able to sell. If the demand is less than 2/day then you might struggle to sell more than 1/day unless you have a complete monopoly or a very good sales rating.

Another tip is to apply stock limits to all of your products, say around 30. You do this by clicking on the Stock column in the company tab. This will ensure you don't have loads of stock piling up which is a very quick route to bankruptcy.

Remember that your machines only spend money when they are actually being used, so if you have a 1/day production line only running at 50%, while it's not the most efficient use of space, it might actually make you more money!

I would love for people to make additional guides for the game. For starters check out Pinstar's video guides here:

https://youtu.be/XR9hgva4bGU?list=PLrmmPKYXqaFZnzOTe2XVUB0nMMRCrAqu4

[Marisola]

Originally posted by test:

It gets even worse when I have to deal with machines that take 2-3 cycles to make something. I tried keeping the line at max production (1pill/day) but I end up losing money.

Help? There doesnt seem to be any more advanced guides out there to explain how to successfully produce and sell high level products!

I split my lines. If anything takes an autoclave - I split it into two autoclaves, rejoin and go through the Agglo/Dissole/whatever for efficacy. Then I split it back as needed. A line without autoclaves/mixers/etc. should produce two pills per cycle, so all my lines have *at least* that much.

The easiest high level drug is Hypertension as it requires no catalysts. For this, I actually split the lines into the autoclave, line up 3 chroma on each line, feed it back to one line and out by method (pill or syringe).

Any time a belt is sitting idle with ingredients is time/production wasted, which makes profits wasted.

If you have say 5 ionisers doing work at the start then only use one autoclave - you are essentially spending twice the money on those ionisers.

Also, research, reseach, research - get the costs down as quickly as possible.

[MarQan]

I ran into this as well not long ago with the Sickle Cell cure challenge. The profit did not justify the initial investment, process cost and the space-requirement.

From Intermediate the market is changing quite rapidly.
Your high-quality drugs won't sell much better than the others initally, you need to wait.
The cure rating changes over time and your competitors might make the same cures as well, so you have to change the price accordingly. Then boost the sale rating with executives, and you can get away with a 20-30% increased price on A/S rating.

It's most noticable with the Creamer: it's less profit initially but the weaker side-effects pay off on the long run. Or more like you won't have to pay for it on the long run.

Some of the upgrades need lots of space and on some maps they're just not worth it. And even if they are, maybe your competitors are already fill the market for it.

[T-Bone Biggins]

First of all I suggest the two routes at the beginning: either headquarters and desert exploration right off the bat or go for the creamer. Get creamer early enough and you can get a consistent 5-10% bonus over competitors with exactly same drugs because the side effects won't drag your ratings to an E. Get desert exploration and you will beat the AI to the new ingredients and have a good while where you are the only one on the market with those, but you have to have 2-3 explorers on hand which is $150 a day so make sure you can afford that along with the 2 scientists at $60 a day.

Depending on the ingredients drawn sometimes I immediately research the ionizer and aggrogater, grab the lowest interest loan, and go for as many level 2 cures I can without requiring catalysts. Bum rushing level 2 cures in certain circumstances can work well and get you going with a +$300 easy and from there it's not too hard to expand quick.