Questions about economy.

General discussions about the games by Egosoft including X-BTF, XT, X², X³: Reunion, X³: Terran Conflict and X³: Albion Prelude.

Moderator: Moderators for English X Forum

Hemmingfish
Posts: 435
Joined: Fri, 14. Mar 08, 23:00

Re: Questions about economy.

Post by Hemmingfish » Tue, 26. Mar 19, 03:32

nponoBegHuk wrote:
Mon, 25. Mar 19, 17:53
I like to do a lot of station building missions from pirates but mostly avoid all the other races. Not sure if it matters for GoD engine or not...

By the way, any good estimates on how well drugs and squash mines sell? wonder how many factories to aim for.
From my understanding player-constructed stations are completely immune to GoD. Only stations that exist at the start of the game are affected (apart from tractor beam factories I believe, which are a special case because they kept disappearing in previous patches before anyone could buy tractor beams).
Of those factories that it manages, as long as they're shipping product or buying other products or have a player ship docked they won't be removed. There are also rules about re-adding stations but I don't know what they are. In my current game the Solar Power Plant in Jupiter has about a 50/50 chance of being there or not.

As for drugs, they sell extremely well, especially Space Fuel. I have a complex in the unknown sector in TC that becomes known as Avarice using every asteroid and it sells Space Fuel as quickly as it can make it. You can even abuse it being illegal by making a complex in regulated space and freight scanning every ship that leaves.

I've never tried to make Squash Mines so I can't comment on them.

User avatar
nponoBegHuk
Posts: 474
Joined: Thu, 6. Mar 08, 19:55
x4

Re: Questions about economy.

Post by nponoBegHuk » Tue, 26. Mar 19, 14:20

Hemmingfish wrote:
Tue, 26. Mar 19, 03:32
Only stations that exist at the start of the game are affected (apart from tractor beam factories I believe, which are a special case because they kept disappearing in previous patches before anyone could buy tractor beams).
Playing 1.0.1 here, I have to hurry I guess...
nponoBegHuk wrote:
Sat, 23. Mar 19, 11:49
If only LordSuch's Sector Planner worked in TC...
Actually... 8)
Fast sector selection on the Universe Map | Rock locations for Mobile/OOS mining | Botting for max speed Hyperion | Complete list of ship sources | Capturing smaller ships

My current ship collection:
11 out of 11 *retired* ships found
17 out of 17 *unique* ships found
9 out of 9 *limited* ships found
16 out of 16 *rare* ships found

User avatar
Red-Spot
Posts: 102
Joined: Wed, 9. Jan 19, 10:22
x3ap

Re: Questions about economy.

Post by Red-Spot » Wed, 27. Mar 19, 00:13

All I get from that is that you are named 'Bob' and I can forget that long difficult to remember name you use here :D
'Ignoramus et ignorabimus'

User avatar
nponoBegHuk
Posts: 474
Joined: Thu, 6. Mar 08, 19:55
x4

Re: Questions about economy.

Post by nponoBegHuk » Wed, 27. Mar 19, 01:17

Red-Spot wrote:
Wed, 27. Mar 19, 00:13
All I get from that is that you are named 'Bob' and I can forget that long difficult to remember name you use here :D
Sector Planner stores its data in an unencrypted xml file, and since not much changed between X3:Reunion and X3TC/AP, with some effort it would be possible to adapt it to work with TC. Introduction of the new race might be an issue, as well as some trouble with solar power plants and such, but still...

Luckily, the Export Universe script works right off the bat, only had to recompile it to update for TC engine.

And yup, Bob is fine! :wink:
Fast sector selection on the Universe Map | Rock locations for Mobile/OOS mining | Botting for max speed Hyperion | Complete list of ship sources | Capturing smaller ships

My current ship collection:
11 out of 11 *retired* ships found
17 out of 17 *unique* ships found
9 out of 9 *limited* ships found
16 out of 16 *rare* ships found

Timsup2nothin
Posts: 4690
Joined: Thu, 22. Jan 09, 17:49

Re: Questions about economy.

Post by Timsup2nothin » Wed, 27. Mar 19, 20:11

Hemmingfish wrote:
Tue, 26. Mar 19, 03:32

From my understanding player-constructed stations are completely immune to GoD. Only stations that exist at the start of the game are affected (apart from tractor beam factories I believe, which are a special case because they kept disappearing in previous patches before anyone could buy tractor beams).
Of those factories that it manages, as long as they're shipping product or buying other products or have a player ship docked they won't be removed. There are also rules about re-adding stations but I don't know what they are. In my current game the Solar Power Plant in Jupiter has about a 50/50 chance of being there or not.
Yes, but...

While the algorithm removes stations based on its own somewhat arcane ideas about utility, there are other ways that the game engine is removing stations. Making sure that there is economic activity at a station will protect it from the GD algorithm, and parking a ship will protect it even better...but if the pirate job algorithm spawns a pirate task force with sufficient firepower that station is going to disappear, and unless you happen to see it getting pummeled you won't really know why it is gone, you'll just know that it is.
Trapper Tim's Guide to CLS 2

On Her Majesty's Secret Service-Dead is Dead, and he is DEAD

Not a DiD, so I guess it's a DiDn't, the story of my first try at AP
Part One, in progress

HEY! AP!! That's new!!!

Honved
Posts: 1252
Joined: Sun, 20. Jun 10, 14:53
x3tc

Re: Questions about economy.

Post by Honved » Thu, 28. Mar 19, 15:59

In my experiences, one can either work WITH the NPC stations by producing whatever inputs they're short on, and make money from the dramatic increases in trade opportunities, or else compete with the NPC stations and try to muscle them out of business. The latter can potentially produce a lot more production income, but a lot less trade income. I generally support the local economy, unless I'm playing a semi-pirate, or targeting one specific race's factories (and ships) for near-annihilation.

Clearly, the amount of materials that can be sold depends to some degree on how active the NPC stations are: if they're running at full production rates, one can sell a LOT of intermediate goods to them at a decent profit, plus make money on selling their output to final consumers (Trade Stations, Equipment Docks, Military Bases, etc.). Building a complex to handle everything only gives you profits at the final stage; granted that you get the ENTIRE price as profit, but it's possible to make MORE, because the NPCs can continue to operate at a loss at more than one stage of the total process, while you sell those goods at a profit at each step.

E-Cells purchased below average prices, sold at a little above average to bio farm. Bulk bio purchased at below average prices, sold to food processor at slightly above average. Food bought cheap and sold to weapons factory at a profit, etc. The self-contained factory will buy/sell each intermediate good to the adjacent stages at the same price, so only the final output provides a source of direct profit. Those intermediate stages also offer a lot more of a total production "sink" than the EQ Docks, Trade Stations, and Mil Bases do for specific goods, unless you're willing to manually transfer the products a few pieces at a time (in which case a few items have unlimited capacity).

User avatar
Red-Spot
Posts: 102
Joined: Wed, 9. Jan 19, 10:22
x3ap

Re: Questions about economy.

Post by Red-Spot » Mon, 22. Apr 19, 00:36

Bob, I've set up a new empire with knowledge of the last. Still working on it, will give you more info when I have more up.
This time I'm going for over the top independent hubs. (Using AM for Ore now, just finished that Hub-plot element, then attaching 10 EBC ammo and 35 EBC forges, WT = Flak hub, SB = PPC hub, HN = light weapon hub (HEPT, PAC, PRG))

Made GC into a single weed-hub, instead of the spread in previous game, it holds only slightly more than the previous hubs combined with 27 Bliss places. Let's see if it saturates the market or not :)

As per previous empire, it will all be logged :)

Edit: 27 Bliss-plexes does not seem enough to saturate the market.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/ ... 1720008154

Edit: So far ...
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/ ... 1734417265

Going to let factories fill up, even with resources, by that time I'll have completed the defensive line (Tigers on Hubs, sets of Centaurs on patrol and Borias' on gates ... add a few Panthers on multi-sector patrol perhaps :)).
Would you like me to add something specific?
'Ignoramus et ignorabimus'

DrSuperEvil
Moderator (English)
Moderator (English)
Posts: 425
Joined: Fri, 2. Mar 18, 12:13
x4

Re: Questions about economy.

Post by DrSuperEvil » Tue, 7. May 19, 23:04

From what I have been able to gather for secondary resources the formula is (timestep * percentage / (100 * 2)) / relval . The timestep is in seconds with 600 seconds for most stations and docks have 300 and percentage is either 6 or 12 with 6 for tech/missiles/weapons. Stations that are focused on (player goes IS or station is ordered to open menus) cause an interrupt which reduces the time.

This boils down to 6 or 12% of 1x productivity (which is 2x RelVal) consumed per tick so for docks it is 72% per hour for tech/missiles/weapons and 144% for other stations.

When the value to be consumed is zero the inverse is computed and then a random value is used [relval * 200 / (percentage * timestep)]. If this also returns zero then the use amount is (timestep / 20) + 1.

Solar Power Plant consumption of Crystals are a special case. They only have a 14% chance of consuming, and they will only consume crystals when in a production cycle (other factories consume them even if they aren't producing anything). Also the consumption is actually only 1 minute time steps (the comments all say 10 minutes, but the code says 1 minute).

In practice though I have not been able to verify these formulae due to having too small a data set.

User avatar
nponoBegHuk
Posts: 474
Joined: Thu, 6. Mar 08, 19:55
x4

Re: Questions about economy.

Post by nponoBegHuk » Wed, 8. May 19, 00:23

DrSuperEvil wrote:
Tue, 7. May 19, 23:04
From what I have been able to gather...
Appreciate your input. I'll look into it soon.

Also, I'll send you a private message on a different topic, hope you can help.

Cheers.
Fast sector selection on the Universe Map | Rock locations for Mobile/OOS mining | Botting for max speed Hyperion | Complete list of ship sources | Capturing smaller ships

My current ship collection:
11 out of 11 *retired* ships found
17 out of 17 *unique* ships found
9 out of 9 *limited* ships found
16 out of 16 *rare* ships found

Post Reply

Return to “X Trilogy Universe”