DoSE Choices: What should we switch to (if anything)?

[MrWhereItsAt]

YIKES! The last chat saw us get both Democracy (EthCalc) and Planned (PlaNets) choices, and at some point we got Free Market (IndEco) and there was some discussion to changing social priorities when we had the option. Now we have three to decide on.

Analysis:

We are currently at -1 Efficiency, which affects both our tech accumulation rate and our energy generation, but not by much with the size bases we have.

Planned Economy
This will give us +2 Growth, +1 Industry and -2 Efficiency

New stats: -3 Efficiency, +2 Growth, +1 Industry

Efficiency is harder to quantify, but our bases will grow 20% faster and we will build 10% faster.

With the current state of NA, this amounts to building the HGP in 7 turns, not 8 (a 20 mineral saving), and 20% fewer nuts required for bases to grow.

However the efficiency hit will cause slower research and energy accumulation. If anyone could accurately quantify these effects I would appreciate it.

Democracy

This gives +2 Efficiency, +2 Growth and -2 Support

We would then reach +1 Efficiency, +2 Growth and -2 Support.

Our efficiency actually improves here, meaning some small increase in research rate and energy accumulation. The Growth increases also, exactly the same as for the Planned Economy. The -2 Support means only 1 unit is supported free per base, and there are no free minerals for bases (whatever that means ). Each of our bases except Mysidia would lose an extra mineral in support.

Free Market

This gives us +2 Economy, -3 Planet and -5 Police

We'd be at -1 Efficiency, +2 Economy, -3 Planet, -5 Police.

This is a more dramatic change than either Democracy or Planned Economics. The +2 Economy gives us an extra unit of energy in EVERY worked square. THis means an extra 26 energy, and assuming no loss to waste, we get an extra 13 creds and 13 towards research. This would take our net income from +9pt to +22pt and would cut down on the time to research - for the current research that has just been traded for, we would have researched it in 2 turns with Free market as opposed to the 4 turns without. However the drawbacks are extreme also. The -3 Planet will mean more problems with worms, and less population and industry is allowed before we start to disrupt the environs. The -5 Police, however, will mean +2 drones for each military unit away from home, which means Antioch, New Suez, TBIBTU and NA straight away go into riot mode and it would require many Doctors to keep them happy. This would effectively kill our exploration aspirations.

Both Planned and Democracy
With both of these choices we would reach

+4 Growth, +1 Industry, -1 Efficiency (same as now), -2 Support

The effects of this would be to dramatically speed base growth, by 40%. Mineral costs would be down by 10%, but we would lose one free mineral per base with more than one unit to support.

Both Democracy and Free Market

We reach

+1 Efficiency, +2 Growth and -2 Support, +2 Economy, 3 Planet, -5 Police.

This is basically the same as both choices individually considered, at the same time. The increased Efficiency will not aid us very much at the moment, with our low spatial extent and populations. Good Growth will allow the +1 energy/square to pay off more quickly, but once again this is tempered by the instant drone riots.

5 Day poll, as this is quite an important issue, and I'd like some discussion here.

Archaic, as candidate for the next DoSE position, I would very much like your thoughts here, and I think the rest would like to hear your views too.

[MrWhereItsAt]

Although Free Market would help considerably, the disorder in my mind will make it less helpful than keeping away from Free Marketdom for a time. I believe Planned and Democracy would be of the greatest benefit to us rught now, as we could up the population considerably with a 40% reduced nut storage necessity, and the Industry bonus would help us get Rec Commons up so that we CAN get to Free Market.

Other thoughts, suggestions..?

[Archaic]

I'll just make a quick post now. If necessary I'll give a more complete assessment later tonight when I'm back on the cable connection instead of this awful 56k.

Planned:
You forgot to state the problem of B Drones being increased due to the ineffeciency. With our expanding number of colonies, this will quickly become a problem under the "Thinker" level we're at, and could easily cause more drones than switching to FM.

Democracy:
No free minerals means that when the base is established, it won't get its 10 free minerals. This is a *VERY* significant disadvantage. It will take far longer to get our initial garrisons, formers and facilities in place.

Free Market:
You overstate the Planet Problem. None of our bases make enough minerals to cause any ego damage, or will they be able to for quite some time yet. Furthermore, the Planet penalty doesn't apply to Psi Attack, only to Psy Defence. And *that* can be fixed with Trance, which I assume will be added to all Garrisons as standard once we have the tech. (There's bonuses for defending bases anyway)
Also, the problems with exploration can easily be solved by exploring the areas within our own territories before we venture further afield. With Morgan likely to give us his maps soon, we don't need to explore as much, and when we do, it'll be likely our borders will have expanded anyway.

Demo & Planned
Good except that the 10 mineral loss at this point is just too much of a burden to handle. We *need* those minerals for our initial expansion phase. Once it's complete though, this is perfect for the Demo + Planned + CC Pop Boom

Demo & Free Market
Again, not an optimal solution, thanks to the 10 mineral loss. I see this as being our long term position for the near future, but not quite yet.
To be honest, I see us as being in Free Market / Wealth before Demo comes into play at all.

[Mr. President]

I'm gonna say just Democracy for now, since the riot situation is of much concern to me.

Of course, increased rights for citizens mean a lot more work for the judiciary.

[Archaic]

Oh yes, I almost forgot. Going in Planned Economics will piss Morgan off with us, and possibily get us into a war we cannot yet afford. Free Market will likely get us as being Pact Brothers with him, gaining us his maps, infiltration data, potential free comlinks, research, and great trade windfalls, substantially increasing our cashflow position, which would allow us to rush various facilities (No use having cash if you don't spend it!). That has the run on effect of making FM make itself easier to manage, as we'd be able to rush the various Rec. Commons and CC's that we'd need to build anyway, giving us even quicker production than under planned. Why would we need 10% less minerals to build things when we can already pay for 20% of minerals with energy?

[MrWhereItsAt]

Some great points, Archaic, and I admit perhaps my post DOES overstate the Planet problems too much - they are rather distant right now.

But nonetheless, FM will mean instant riots in many bases, including those buildins SPs. Unless we reallocate those distant scouts that are from New Suez and NA, these bases will not be building their SPs for a looooong time due to the necessary worker reallocations. We don't have the energy for psych investment either, so unless we change to FM, get a Morganite pact and then change back almost straight away, those SPs may be lost to us completely, or those bases will be useless for a long time. With our (hopefully still ongoing) plan of including a Scout with each CP, the no free 10 minerals, although annoying, is not fatal.

The inefficiency causing extra drones - can anyone give any more specifics on this? It's one of those things that isn't very well documented, or, if it is, I have had no luck in finding it. Is it more due to population, or number of bases, or distance from HQ, or some combination? And if we can handle it up to a certain pop, couldn't we do this and use the extra Industry to get Rec Commons online faster, thus helping negate this problem?

Great points so far, I really want as much discussion on this as possible - this shouldn't happen too often, and we want decisions to be well-informed and know.

[Archaic]

I don't say we should go to FM right away BTW. Just ASAP. Ie. As soon as we can recall those scouts to within our borders. Us building SP's at this point was pretty stupid to begin with (Shouldn't have started until those bases were pumping our ~15 to 20 minerals a turn, thanks to crawlers on Mine/Rocky/Road and Forest.), but there's nothing wrong with changing the allocations slightly. It's only 1 Doctor at most (No scouts outside borders = No extra drones), and in many cases our free talent will cover it.

And trust me, the no free minerals is a pain in the ass. With free minerals, we pop the base, and yey, next turn we have the garrison. Frankly, I say stuff the extra scout with the CP. It wastes time, and under Demo will cripple the production of the base making them due to extra support.

Simplest explanation - The more inefficiency you have, the less bases you're allowed before B Drones crop up, and the more B Drones that do crop up when it happens. Got nothing to do with pop or distance from HQ. Under current conditions, we're already about there. Going straight to planned would put extra drones in about a third to half of our bases.

And like I said, the FM would be better at getting the faster builds than Planned would be. If necessary, remember that FM would likely end up giving us enough each turn to switch to any other SE we needed. A quick switch to Planned and back over the course of 2 turns (ie. 1st turn to it, 2nd turn back) will achieve the same thing as staying in Planned due to have the Industry bonuses are figured out.

[GeneralTacticus]

Furthermore, the Planet penalty doesn't apply to Psi Attack, only to Psy Defence.

You have it back to front. It affects Psi Attack, not Psi defense.

[Darkness' Edge]

I don't claim to be an expert on Social Engineering, so I've listened to the points above, and I'm swayed enough by Archaic's reasoning.

[Archaic]

I thought I might have. Oh well, that's even better then. Under FM, if anything, we'd be defending more than attacking anyway.

[GeneralTacticus]

Free Market:
You overstate the Planet Problem. None of our bases make enough minerals to cause any ego damage, or will they be able to for quite some time yet. Furthermore, the Planet penalty doesn't apply to Psi Attack, only to Psy Defence. And *that* can be fixed with Trance, which I assume will be added to all Garrisons as standard once we have the tech. (There's bonuses for defending bases anyway)
Also, the problems with exploration can easily be solved by exploring the areas within our own territories before we venture further afield. With Morgan likely to give us his maps soon, we don't need to explore as much, and when we do, it'll be likely our borders will have expanded anyway.

You seem to be neglecting the fact that we lose the ability to contorl our Drones using police; and even if Morgan does give us his maps, we'll still need to explore northwards.

As soon as we can recall those scouts to within our borders. Us building SP's at this point was pretty stupid to begin with (Shouldn't have started until those bases were pumping our ~15 to 20 minerals a turn, thanks to crawlers on Mine/Rocky/Road and Forest.),

Would you rather let the AI beat us to it?

[GeneralTacticus]

I thought I might have. Oh well, that's even better then. Under FM, if anything, we'd be defending more than attacking anyway.

But then it means we have no way to get a clear edge over the worms. If we defend, they get the bonus; if we attack, we lose most of it.

[Archaic]

I'm not neglecting the fact at all. It's irrelevant. We'll be able to get facilities in place in time in most locations due to the extra talent, and in all places, we'd be able to rush build the facilities sooner than we'd have them under Planned anyway.

*Laughs* The AI wouldn't beat us to it. You overestimate they're ability to build these things, and underestimate the power of crawlers. We're not even on Transcend, so our opponents would take even longer than the MP players here would be used to.

[GeneralTacticus]

*SIGH* We want through all of this once when you were voted down in the last election. Do you want to go through it all again?

I'm not neglecting the fact at all. It's irrelevant. We'll be able to get facilities in place in time in most locations due to the extra talent, and in all places, we'd be able to rush build the facilities sooner than we'd have them under Planned anyway.

True, perhaps, but we DO want to get those SPs done with a minimum of trouble. Switch afterwards.

*Laughs* The AI wouldn't beat us to it. You overestimate they're ability to build these things, and underestimate the power of crawlers. We're not even on Transcend, so our opponents would take even longer than the MP players here would be used to.

Perhaps I am. Do you want to find out?

[MrWhereItsAt]

It is certain that the SE choice we want to stick with will dictate the immediate strategy we will have for a while.

Free Market means no more exploring for some time, and we must be prepared to defend against the worms with more than what we might rely on otherwise. It will mean we need to build more infrasstructure in our bases earlier on, but will also give us the means to do so, and hopefully a fair amount more besides. The higher population we have the better for the energy bonus, so this points towards the Morgan favourite. fewer bases, but all of them are BIG.

Planned means we could expand faster and keep exploring, but with the Efficiency problems at some point we would need to change for sure, or build lotsa Childrens' Creches whenever we can.

Democracy means that our bases will grow faster and Efficiency is not a problem, but the no free minerals at the base's start is a drawback. How much of a drawback is still something I am not convinced of, however.

We could always change out of Democracy whenever we are about to build a new base, and then back again when they get their free minerals.

Perhaps that's not a completely idiotic idea - it's what? - 32 energy per new base then (16 for each of 2 changes). Especially if we had Free Market and a Pact with the Morganites at the same time, we should be able to afford this......

What do you all think? Am I just really tired and sick of studying, or do I actually have an idea...?

[GeneralTacticus]

Free Market means no more exploring for some time, and we must be prepared to defend against the worms with more than what we might rely on otherwise. It will mean we need to build more infrasstructure in our bases earlier on, but will also give us the means to do so, and hopefully a fair amount more besides. The higher population we have the better for the energy bonus, so this points towards the Morgan favourite. fewer bases, but all of them are BIG.

We want to AVOID having big bases for the time being if we switch to FM, at least until we can implement some rudimentary drone control.

[DeathByTheSword]

i like the planned-demo idea but not just yet FM is too early because we are still expanding I do FM after my expansion fase....so hold it off for a turnsession and then look again but as it is now IF you want to change i would go for Planned/demo

[GeneralTacticus]

i like the planned-demo idea but not just yet FM is too early because we are still expanding I do FM after my expansion fase....so hold it off for a turnsession and then look again but as it is now IF you want to change i would go for Planned/demo

I agree we should hold off on FM... however I'm not so sure about Demo/Planned just yet. Planned alone would kill the economy, while Demo/Planned would kill the expansion.

[Maniac]

I voted Demo+Planned. As a fervent expansionist I recognize the problems of not having ten free minerals, but the advantages of +40% growth and +10% Industry are worth it IMO. Besides, the fact that we are sending a garrison along with CPs these days partially covers the lost minerals of our new bases. As for the loss of 1 mineral to support for each base, soon we will have crawler and one mineral less will hardly be a problem I think.

[Archaic]

But then it means we have no way to get a clear edge over the worms. If we defend, they get the bonus; if we attack, we lose most of it.

GT.....you're far too scared of such a minor nusiance as the worms, really. The more scouts we have out there exploring, the more of the blighters that'll crawl out. Let the formers plant forests, and let those eliminate the fungus. Problem solved.

True, perhaps, but we DO want to get those SPs done with a minimum of trouble. Switch afterwards.

Stop being afraid of a little micromanagement GT. All it means is that we just have to switch back to planned for one year at the right time. Geez.

Let me explain. The Growth & Industry bonuses work on the same system. They make things less expensive. However, they don't go off the *current* cost remaining until completion. They go off the original total cost.

ie.
Say we have something that takes 10 turns to build, and we start producing it at all bases. This is just under Free Market BTW.

After 8 turns, we switch to Planned. Now, the original cost of construction goes down to 9 turns. But we've already finished 8 turns, meaning that there's only 1 turns left to complete.

We complete next turn, and go back to FM.

Like I said, it's the same with growth, only its Nuts instead of Minerals. We had 10 turns to growth, switch to Planned on the 8th, and grow on the 9th.

In the meanwhile, our cash works for us, and while our exploration slows slightly, it won't be too hampered, with our borders increasing with every new base.

Perhaps I am. Do you want to find out?

*Yawn* You don't play SP or MP much, do you? The AI have less of an Industry Bonus than usual, meaning they have slower production. AI cities never use Crawlers, and so are often at maximum somewhere around 6~7 minerals at this stage of the game. We'd be playing catchup, yes, but when 3 of their turns of mineral production equals 1 of yours, even though they started with a lead, it's easy to grab multipule projects so long as you have multipule cities with these mineral levels and working on projects. (EG - A Head to Head game I'm playing against Flubber ATM. I've grabbed the WP, VW and EG, and will get the PTS within 2 turns. Flubber has no projects whatsoever. The 5 AI factions have 2 projects split between them, neither projects I especially needed or was aiming for.) If the game had been on Thinker like this one is, I would've grabbed the HGP as well.

We want to AVOID having big bases for the time being if we switch to FM, at least until we can implement some rudimentary drone control.

COMPLETLY the wrong way to go about things! If you have big bases under FM, then you can devote citizens to work as Doctors, increasing the Psych and leaving you with no drones. You produce the facilities at the same rate as you would in a smaller base, but your pop is already in place, and means you can take advantage of facilities upon the moment of completing them. Oh, and it's great for elections too.

Perhaps that's not a completely idiotic idea - it's what? - 32 energy per new base then (16 for each of 2 changes). Especially if we had Free Market and a Pact with the Morganites at the same time, we should be able to afford this......

HELL YES! BUT....only if we can make enough cash that the support hit won't kill our production, thanks to rushing. That will hinge on the Pact windfall from Morgan.
Also, in addition to this, we can pull those switches from FM to Planned for quick production boosts.

And like I said before....we'll have Morgans maps, and we can explore more as our colonies expand our borders. The current scouts could perhaps become the garrisons for these bases, saving us production time elsewhere in making escorts for the CP's. We already have them.

[moomin]

I'm divided over this issue. I would normally advocate Demo+Planned at this point, but us having met up with Morgan means there are interesting synnergies going FM as well. Hmm.

[AdamTG02]

My position:

Democracy now. As soon as possible. This is my major campaign issue, and if we can accomplish it before the next term, so much the better.

Archaic has a point that we will lose the free garrisons for new bases -- but that can be remedied by building a scout or garrison as well as a colony pod when expanding. This will slow down our expansion, but shield the pod against mind worms.

As for Free Market, the benefit that appeals to me the most is the abilit to rely on the friendship of our neighbor Morgan. At this stage, we aren't prepared to start a war. Free Market would stave off war with Morgan indefinitely, and probably allow us to Pact with him. The hit on our exploration would be counteracted by the increased research.

However, that's far from the only option. If we go Planned, we should do so with the expectation that it will lead to war with Morgan -- because that would be the eventual result. With that in mind, we should prepare Command Centers and Children's Creches in our bases, building units only when those two morale-increasing facilities are in place. This would offset Democracy's support costs. (I don't consider going to Planned without Democracy a realistic option.) Under Planned, we would also want to build Synthmetal Garrisons for our eastern colonies.

Staying with Simple will allow us to continue to pursue a builder strategy, but we lose the industrial and growth bonuses of Planned. This is a middle course -- we avoid FM's eco-disruption, and avoid Planned's risk of antagonizing Morgan. As a middle course, it might very well be the best course of action for the moment.

I lean toward Free Market, simply because, even though it would antagonize Deirdre, Morgan is a known quantity while Deirdre is not. At the moment, we aren't prepared to start a war. Free Market would allow us to pursue a Builder strategy.

However, my support for Free Market would evaporate if we were unable to explore. I am going off of the assumption that Probe Teams and transports, as well as unsupported Unity Rovers discovered by those transports, will provide a viable exploration force for the midgame. If we can't pop half the pods in "unclaimed" territory, we're not doing our job. Because of my desire to avoid war, I'd support using probes for exploration in the north, even if it results in heavy losses to mindworms.

The caveat to that is that we would need to make filling up this continent a heavy priority. Once we can be sure of Morgan's friendship, we need to fill up the unclaimed territory on the way to Morgan ASAP. Then we can focus on the north, and expand onto the new terrain there. A shift to Free Market would mean that, rather than focusing on charting new territory and pod-popping, we would focus on consolidating the territory now within our reach. The reason is that, with Morgan's friendship, we would be able to rely on less of a negative response than if we claimed the intermediary territory with a Planned economy.

The points I'm going over above are options. My intent as a candidate is to ensure that we institute a Democratic society as soon as possible; the rest is secondary. However, it's not my style to rule out any options -- I'm considering Free Market as well as Planned, which may cost me support. The ultimate decision on economics will be in the hands of the voters -- all I will try to do, elected or not, is to chart out the options and go over the likely consequences of each one.

[Method]

Originally posted by moomin
I'm divided over this issue. I would normally advocate Demo+Planned at this point, but us having met up with Morgan means there are interesting synnergies going FM as well. Hmm.

i agree

once we get automation though, i'd like to initiate wealth, which would be just as good as FM if we could get some GAs going (very possible with our talent bonus)

[GeneralTacticus]

GT.....you're far too scared of such a minor nusiance as the worms, really. The more scouts we have out there exploring, the more of the blighters that'll crawl out. Let the formers plant forests, and let those eliminate the fungus. Problem solved.

And what do you intend to do when our scouts run across multiple worms? We'll lose them, and have to build more, as well as having to waste time moving them back into position.

Stop being afraid of a little micromanagement GT. All it means is that we just have to switch back to planned for one year at the right time. Geez.

Let me explain. The Growth & Industry bonuses work on the same system. They make things less expensive. However, they don't go off the *current* cost remaining until completion. They go off the original total cost.

ie.
Say we have something that takes 10 turns to build, and we start producing it at all bases. This is just under Free Market BTW.

After 8 turns, we switch to Planned. Now, the original cost of construction goes down to 9 turns. But we've already finished 8 turns, meaning that there's only 1 turns left to complete.

We complete next turn, and go back to FM.

Like I said, it's the same with growth, only its Nuts instead of Minerals. We had 10 turns to growth, switch to Planned on the 8th, and grow on the 9th.

In the meanwhile, our cash works for us, and while our exploration slows slightly, it won't be too hampered, with our borders increasing with every new base

I know how the industry bonuses work. I'm talking about Drone problems, not 'a little extra micromanagement'. If we switch now, NA would lose at least one productive citizen, and quite a bit of growth as well.

*Yawn* You don't play SP or MP much, do you? The AI have less of an Industry Bonus than usual, meaning they have slower production. AI cities never use Crawlers, and so are often at maximum somewhere around 6~7 minerals at this stage of the game. We'd be playing catchup, yes, but when 3 of their turns of mineral production equals 1 of yours, even though they started with a lead, it's easy to grab multipule projects so long as you have multipule cities with these mineral levels and working on projects. (EG - A Head to Head game I'm playing against Flubber ATM. I've grabbed the WP, VW and EG, and will get the PTS within 2 turns. Flubber has no projects whatsoever. The 5 AI factions have 2 projects split between them, neither projects I especially needed or was aiming for.) If the game had been on Thinker like this one is, I would've grabbed the HGP as well.

I've seen AI bases with MUCH higher prducton than that, when they get industry booms. You may be right that they're building slower than us... or you may be wrong. Like I said, I don't want to have to find out.

COMPLETLY the wrong way to go about things! If you have big bases under FM, then you can devote citizens to work as Doctors, increasing the Psych and leaving you with no drones. You produce the facilities at the same rate as you would in a smaller base, but your pop is already in place, and means you can take advantage of facilities upon the moment of completing them. Oh, and it's great for elections too.

Using Doctors in big bases means that until you can actually have elections, the citizens are just more mouths to feed. I'm arguing that we should build some Rec Commons in the larger bases, THEN go Fm and use Psyche, as well as using GAs. If we use Wealth as well, we'll be able to bring in masses of cash (as you are advocating yourself).

[Pandemoniak]

We are the only legitimate faction on Planet ! If Morgan wish to contest us the UN given rights to live as we wish on Planet, so be it. I personnaly wont be scared by a TV mogul.

[GeneralTacticus]

We're arguing practicalities here, Pande, not wishful thinking. The reality is that we have to live with Morgan, at least for the time being, so we might as well make the best of it.

[GeneralTacticus]

btw, Morgan isn't a TV mogul.

[Archaic]

Originally posted by TKG
i agree

once we get automation though, i'd like to initiate wealth, which would be just as good as FM if we could get some GAs going (very possible with our talent bonus)

It's only +1 EC, not +2. Not enough to give +1 Energy per square. It only gives +1 Energy per *base* square. It's hardly worth it unless you're under FM (Under which you're at +3 EC, giving +1 Energy per square and +1 Commerce (Even more trade with Morgan!), unless you *really* need the +1 Industry.

Originally posted by GeneralTacticus
And what do you intend to do when our scouts run across multiple worms? We'll lose them, and have to build more, as well as having to waste time moving them back into position.

I am going to say this once,. Hopefully I'll never have to say it again.

STOP ****ING OVERSTATING THE PROBLEM!

Stacked worms. Oh my, what a problem. All worms in a stack die when you kill one. Joy. And guess what, the closer to bases you are, the less likely worms turn up in pops. Ever think of that? If we explore within our borders, only popping pods within them and reasonably close to a base, we will never have this problem. Oh yes, and we don't have enough mins at any base (And won't for a long time at the rate people are going. Is the Crawler issue sorted yet?) to cause any eco damage. In any case, pops are *good*, because they raise your clean mineral limit. It's far better in the early game to "harm planet" as much as possible to raise Planet's immune system up to scratch rather than leave it alone and find it screaming at you later, when you're forced to boost production because a lousy 15 mins isn't enough (And of course, you forgot to pop before your first Tree Farm, meaning you can't raise free min levels with facilities.).

Originally posted by GeneralTacticus
I know how the industry bonuses work. I'm talking about Drone problems, not 'a little extra micromanagement'. If we switch now, NA would lose at least one productive citizen, and quite a bit of growth as well.

Hellooooooooo. Did I say change immediatly? Nooooooo. I said change as soon as the scouts are recalled. Read my posts for once moron.
And if anything, we'd gain growth. Specialists take 1 Nut to feed, workers 2. We'd be under Demo under my current scheme of things anyway, and we can use the switch to gain Planned bonuses as needed. The bases would get to size even quicker, and be even more productive than they'd be under your simplictic Planned only system.

Originally posted by GeneralTacticus
I've seen AI bases with MUCH higher prducton than that, when they get industry booms. You may be right that they're building slower than us... or you may be wrong. Like I said, I don't want to have to find out.

Then we can take the bloody projects from them later, when warmongering Pan gets his way. But it wouldn't come to that. You're overstating yet another problem. So what if you've seen AI bases with higher production than that before? They can't have them at this stage of the game, and you know it. They're also getting less of an Industry bonus due to our difficulty level.
Seriously, did you forget that even we don't have EE yet? The AI doesn't use crawlers either, like I pointed out before. And they don't build much forests or mines. They don't have enough production to beat out a base pumping out 20+ Mins a turn thanks to Crawlers. All this time we've wasted building the Projects early could've been spent on facilities and prototypes.

Originally posted by GeneralTacticus
Using Doctors in big bases means that until you can actually have elections, the citizens are just more mouths to feed. I'm arguing that we should build some Rec Commons in the larger bases, THEN go Fm and use Psyche, as well as using GAs. If we use Wealth as well, we'll be able to bring in masses of cash (as you are advocating yourself).

So what if they're more mouths to feed? Specs. only need 1 Nut each, and having more citizens makes the base less vulnerable to the worm rape you're so fearful of. Heck, with more pop, the Psych facilities could be destroyed by worms and we'd be fine thanks to the extra Doctors in place.
Oh yes, and you obviously know little of the SMAC bugs if you don't know the famous Golden Age bug. It doesn't give the growth bonus under SMAC, though it was fixed for SMAX.

Go DEMO NOW! Go to Wealth ASAWGI. Go FM ASAP, ie. When the attached scouts come back within our borders. Use those scouts as the escorts/garrisons of any bases we build from this point onwards until we run out of them. Use the Demo switch (Out of Demo the turn before the base is planted. Stay like that for the full next turn. Switch back the turn after) to retain the free minerals. Use the Planned switch as needed as a cheap rush for pop and production. All this is provided for by the massive cashflow from FM + The Pact with Morgan.

[AdamTG02]

Archaic: You're right that in SMAC Golden Age doesn't give a growth bonus. However, it does give an energy bonus, the equivalent of +1 Econ. That's what we're discussing -- whether to go FM or Wealth + GA, which essentially amount to the same Econ score.

I'm glad to hear you've changed your position on Democracy. It's heartening to know that, even if I lose the election, we'll have a Director of Social Engineering who favors Democracy as soon as possible.

[Main_Brain]

Morgan wont War us...
thats plain ridiculous even if he would try he's not ready yet to field many Troops (He is FM?) and despite of that he doesnt lik ePlanned but he doesnt hate it like Green...
I wouldn't worry about that.
FM now is not too suitful IMO, we still need to scout much territory and ProbeScouts in a Worminfested World I dunno..
DM at this Point in Game makes Things difficult we'd wait which SPs we grab, and eventually build NN's beforeHand.