Suggestion: Auto-turnoff "Energy Stockpile"

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Author Topic:   Suggestion: Auto-turnoff "Energy Stockpile"

Audrey Two posted 02-15-99 12:28 PM ET
A few times this has happened to me:
I get the "Your base has finished construction" dialog box. I go to the base screen, and set up a nice long queue of things to build. But I forget to change the "what to build now" choice-- so my base ends up "building" energy stockpile, with a long queue of things to build when it's done with the energy stockpile. And, odf course, energy stockpile never gets done. A few turns later, I notice it, and use language Sister Miriam wouldn't approve of.
An 'umble suggestion: How about if, when the base notices that you have stuff in a queue behind "energy stockpile", it automatically removes stockpile? I can think of a few ways this might be done, all of which I would much prefer to the current setup:
1. When you leave the build queue screen, if you've added things to the queue but the base is building "stockpile", the game could immediately pop up a dialog asking whether you want to remove "stockpile" and start working on the first item in the queue.
2. Alternatively, if you have "stockpile" in the queue, or as the current build when there are things in the queue, the game could take that to mean, "Build stockpile for one turn, then go to the next thing in the queue". So if people want, they could put "stockpile" in the queue five times, to make the base build up money for five turns, then go back to production. (This would make "stockpile" production work exactly the same way as "unit" production, so it should be easy to implement.)
3. Maybe a choice between these two in the "preferences"? And maybe also an option to just silently delete "stockpile" whenever something is in the queue behind it. (I'd like that option the best myself-- that way, I wouldn't have to open up two different production screens: one for what to build now, and one for what to build later.)
If it even needs saying, this is a fantastic game, and I love it. Sorry to nitpick on this little thing, but at 2:30 AM, a little thing like that can seem big...
--A2
zerlan posted 02-16-99 03:40 PM ET
Hear, hear; I'd like this too having *&'d up to many times to count.
Strategist posted 02-16-99 03:45 PM ET
I third this suggestion! I could not agree more. I hate this stockpile option... Notyhing worse than setting up an entire list of items in the queue and then coming back 15 turns later to realize it's been doing nothing the entire time.
What does the stockpile option gain you anyway?
Regards,
Strategist
will posted 02-16-99 03:50 PM ET
I experienced the same problem many times in playing the demo. After awhile, I just got used to making my first build in the "change" box, and haven't had the problem since. That said, MOO2 had a similar "stockpile" option, and would routinely notify any player foolish enough to put it in the build queue ahead of some concrete object.
marc420w posted 02-16-99 03:55 PM ET
What does the stockpile option gain you anyway?

More Money, more money, More money.....
Audrey Two posted 02-16-99 03:56 PM ET
Strategist asks: "What does the stockpile option gain you anyway?"
Well, that brings us back to ancient history. In Civ I, once a city had built everything, if you didn't have a war to fight, there wasn't much for it to do. People ended updoing silly things like building a barracks, selling it, and building it again, just to keep from wasting all that production.
So in Civ II, they added a pseudo-build option which converted your production into money. This prevented you from jumping through those hoops.
It's not quite as useful in SMAC, as near as I can tell, because you can always use another satellite or ten, so you're unlikely to have a city with nothing to do. But if you're suddenly short of money, it might make sense to have a high-production city crank out some cash for a little while-- say, if you've just gotten "fusion reactor", and you want to upgrade all your troops.
--A2
Strategist posted 02-16-99 04:03 PM ET
Thanks for the information Audrey (and Marc)! I can see right off the bat exactly how useful this can be... Excellent info, thanks again!
Regards,
Strat
Stormhound posted 02-17-99 09:43 AM ET
I'd commented on build queues elsewhere, but nothing succeeds like redundancy <g>...
First off, the queues should work like MOO2. There should be NO separate "current item" maintenance; the city just builds whatever is at the top of the queue. You can thus eliminate the "Change" button, and still have an effective queue length of 9.
Since the game is already smart enough to repeat-build units (pods, formers, troops) when there is nothing else after them in the queue, then it stands to reason that it should be able to treat "Stockpile Energy" the exact same way, thus implementing exactly what Audrey suggests: it becomes a one-turn build, and auto-repeats if there's nothing else in the queue. Because of this, a city should never default to stockpile; it should pop up a box saying the queue is empty, and let you put in the queue what you want.
Can we PLEASE get "Empty Slot" (or whatever exactly it says) replaced with just a blank space? I think that if we're intelligent enough to play the game, we can figure out that a slot is empty! It's also a lot easier to see at a glance how many slots are empty if there's no filler message.
Scrubby posted 02-17-99 10:02 AM ET
Conversely, if the governors are given the intellegence to place stockpiling at the end of the queue ALWAYS, perhaps they should default to stockpile energy if given nothing else to do (or is this silly?) I like stornhound's suggestion to leave BLANKS and not have EMPTY slot in the empty slot. A lot easier to glance at and read.
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Author	Topic: Suggestion: Auto-turnoff "Energy Stockpile"
Audrey Two	posted 02-15-99 12:28 PM ET A few times this has happened to me: I get the "Your base has finished construction" dialog box. I go to the base screen, and set up a nice long queue of things to build. But I forget to change the "what to build now" choice-- so my base ends up "building" energy stockpile, with a long queue of things to build when it's done with the energy stockpile. And, odf course, energy stockpile never gets done. A few turns later, I notice it, and use language Sister Miriam wouldn't approve of. An 'umble suggestion: How about if, when the base notices that you have stuff in a queue behind "energy stockpile", it automatically removes stockpile? I can think of a few ways this might be done, all of which I would much prefer to the current setup: 1. When you leave the build queue screen, if you've added things to the queue but the base is building "stockpile", the game could immediately pop up a dialog asking whether you want to remove "stockpile" and start working on the first item in the queue. 2. Alternatively, if you have "stockpile" in the queue, or as the current build when there are things in the queue, the game could take that to mean, "Build stockpile for one turn, then go to the next thing in the queue". So if people want, they could put "stockpile" in the queue five times, to make the base build up money for five turns, then go back to production. (This would make "stockpile" production work exactly the same way as "unit" production, so it should be easy to implement.) 3. Maybe a choice between these two in the "preferences"? And maybe also an option to just silently delete "stockpile" whenever something is in the queue behind it. (I'd like that option the best myself-- that way, I wouldn't have to open up two different production screens: one for what to build now, and one for what to build later.) If it even needs saying, this is a fantastic game, and I love it. Sorry to nitpick on this little thing, but at 2:30 AM, a little thing like that can seem big... --A2
zerlan	posted 02-16-99 03:40 PM ET Hear, hear; I'd like this too having *&'d up to many times to count.
Strategist	posted 02-16-99 03:45 PM ET I third this suggestion! I could not agree more. I hate this stockpile option... Notyhing worse than setting up an entire list of items in the queue and then coming back 15 turns later to realize it's been doing nothing the entire time. What does the stockpile option gain you anyway? Regards, Strategist
will	posted 02-16-99 03:50 PM ET I experienced the same problem many times in playing the demo. After awhile, I just got used to making my first build in the "change" box, and haven't had the problem since. That said, MOO2 had a similar "stockpile" option, and would routinely notify any player foolish enough to put it in the build queue ahead of some concrete object.
marc420w	posted 02-16-99 03:55 PM ET What does the stockpile option gain you anyway? More Money, more money, More money.....
Audrey Two	posted 02-16-99 03:56 PM ET Strategist asks: "What does the stockpile option gain you anyway?" Well, that brings us back to ancient history. In Civ I, once a city had built everything, if you didn't have a war to fight, there wasn't much for it to do. People ended updoing silly things like building a barracks, selling it, and building it again, just to keep from wasting all that production. So in Civ II, they added a pseudo-build option which converted your production into money. This prevented you from jumping through those hoops. It's not quite as useful in SMAC, as near as I can tell, because you can always use another satellite or ten, so you're unlikely to have a city with nothing to do. But if you're suddenly short of money, it might make sense to have a high-production city crank out some cash for a little while-- say, if you've just gotten "fusion reactor", and you want to upgrade all your troops. --A2
Strategist	posted 02-16-99 04:03 PM ET Thanks for the information Audrey (and Marc)! I can see right off the bat exactly how useful this can be... Excellent info, thanks again! Regards, Strat
Stormhound	posted 02-17-99 09:43 AM ET I'd commented on build queues elsewhere, but nothing succeeds like redundancy <g>... First off, the queues should work like MOO2. There should be NO separate "current item" maintenance; the city just builds whatever is at the top of the queue. You can thus eliminate the "Change" button, and still have an effective queue length of 9. Since the game is already smart enough to repeat-build units (pods, formers, troops) when there is nothing else after them in the queue, then it stands to reason that it should be able to treat "Stockpile Energy" the exact same way, thus implementing exactly what Audrey suggests: it becomes a one-turn build, and auto-repeats if there's nothing else in the queue. Because of this, a city should never default to stockpile; it should pop up a box saying the queue is empty, and let you put in the queue what you want. Can we PLEASE get "Empty Slot" (or whatever exactly it says) replaced with just a blank space? I think that if we're intelligent enough to play the game, we can figure out that a slot is empty! It's also a lot easier to see at a glance how many slots are empty if there's no filler message.
Scrubby	posted 02-17-99 10:02 AM ET Conversely, if the governors are given the intellegence to place stockpiling at the end of the queue ALWAYS, perhaps they should default to stockpile energy if given nothing else to do (or is this silly?) I like stornhound's suggestion to leave BLANKS and not have EMPTY slot in the empty slot. A lot easier to glance at and read.