posted 02-23-99 06:39 AM ET     

It becomes an even much more serious problem when supply crawlers are used in building special projects or unit propotypes. The amount of minerals a supply crawler contributes to a special project is determined by the value of the supply crawler at the time it delivers, not the time it is built. What makes it worse is that if you switch your society back and forth in the same turn, you don't have to pay upheavel cost (you get the full refund). Therefore, each time before you deliver a supply crawler to a special project or unit prototype, you should always switch your society to *minimize* the IND factor (should get -2 with Power), since this *increases* the value of the supply crawler. After you deliver it, get the full upheavel refund. For example, let's say you're using Planned/Wealth/Eudaimonic (IND+4), and you want to build a cost 600 special project, so the modified cost should be 360. But if you use supply crawlers and the above trick, you can build them at 60% cost and deliver at 120%, so you only need to build supply crawlers worth a total of 180, half the cost of the special project!

posted 02-23-99 05:22 PM ET            

Please don't take this in a demeaning way, but lots of games have little nuances that are abusable (like boreholes next to each other). What I do is ignore them. I play the game in the manner in which it was intended. Yes, it means I can't beat transcend level, but it also means that every game I play (including the ones I lose) I enjoy, because it is a fair struggle.

No, I am not calling you a cheater, or a bad player or anything. Just some advice on maybe how to enjoy the game a little bit more. This one is free (which I know is rare for me ) so in a sense it is worth what you paid for it. Good luck to you.

CEO Bernard

posted 02-24-99 04:27 AM ET         

Perhaps I shall rephrase the issue this way: First, it is questionable that the IND factor affects the production of a facility in a way that has no effect at any time other than the turn it is completed. A player can sometimes take advantage of this, whether deliberately or not. Second, this becomes inconsistent when supply crawlers are concerned: when you make an IND change, the number of minerals "stocked" in a supply crawler changes according to the difference in its production costs before and after the change, but the number of minerals in the production box remains the same. A player can sometimes take advantage of this, whether deliberately or not.

I think micje's suggestion is the logical solution to the problem. When your IND factor changes, the percentage of completion doesn't, which makes the number of minerals stocked in both the production box and the supply crawlers change by the same proportion. Note that as in micje's example, it should work both ways: if you're Spartans at wealth and at 138/200, then you switch to power, you're now at 179/260 (any fraction rounded down). Essentially, the IND factor doesn't just affect the total production cost, but more precisely, it determines the "worth" of each mineral towards production: for the above, one mineral is worth 1/200 of a weather paradigm under wealth, but just 1/260 of a weather paradigm under power. This makes more sense.

posted 02-24-99 06:42 AM ET            

INDUSTRY affects the lenght (number of cells) of the rows in the production box (standard should be 10, +2 IND = 8-cells rows), thus lowering the total cost of item.

As it is implemented now, if you change the IND value, the minerals already accumulated in the production box remain unchanged and get redistributed along the rows (same amount of water poured in a different-shaped jug gives different water level). The total cost reflects indeed the change (total number of rows remains the same). This can be interpreted as if the work you produce can be set aside in an undifferentiated form of energy (not SMAC energy), and re-arranged as needed.
For already completed items instead (e.g Supply Crawler), if you produced it putting say 100 units of work (minerals) in it, after you increase working efficiency you see its value in work-units decrease, giving you back say only 80 minerals, as if you were producing it now.

The effect should really be inverted; you'd get a more realistic representation and you'd fix the game design flaw.

Once the work has been deployed, it can't be stored as it is, you can only store its effect, i.e. the finished product value you got transformed from raw materials. This applies to finished products and to items underway.
If you produced 3 rows and a half of something, even if you change the IND rate, that should affect the transformation [mineral + work = product] from that moment on, but the hard matter you already put together sould remain how it is, i.e. the same 3 & 1/2 rows (wether they get represented longer or shorter now). That's just another way to explain the completion % concept that has been correctly stated before in the topic.
As for SC, if you want to convert them back to production, you should make clear what they really are.
1. they are just chassis with raw minerals accumulated on it, that is, NOT converted work.
2. they are complex units, with fully developed machinery built on them, that allows them to harvest resources and to convey them to home base.

In case 1. you expect to put the integral original mineral value into the item production you assign them to. That should NOT be affected by IND. You shouldn't be either producing them faster though, if you are only mongering minerals.

In case 2. you could treat them as disbanded units, with wasteless bonus; so you should get the number of rows (long or short as they are now) you spent to build them.
You could tweak it the other side tho: if you are more efficient to convert the same amount of minerals into product, you should as well be more efficient as to yeld more minerals from the same kind of units, thus recovering the original amount of materials employed.

I read a 3.0 patch is already on the way: it shouldn't be difficult to put it in along.