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[Alfapiomega (OP)]

Well I would say that changes to missile engines are quite important. Also spoiler missiles should be better, that could be quite important for you as you want to have as much challenge as possible (spoiler missiles are really bad in this version).

Thanks man!

I had about 4 hours to play yesterday and I did. Several things I came to resulted in new questions Thanks ahead if you answer them (or anyone else)! And yes, I realize these are all theoretical questions that have no „right“ answer but I am looking for general ideas that I could ponder about

a) Economy - do you guys have certain tips on how to keep it running smoothly? Despite increasing the amount of mines/researching mining technology and building mining ships I end up (all the time) with messages about mineral shortages. I seem to be able to keep up with my production only so so. I probably have really bad starting system (most larger mineral deposits have only accesibility of 0.1 - 0.4) and Earth had very low starting amounts (I ran out of Corrundium and Mercassium in the first seven years). But still is there any strategy you follow? Please note I am only increasing my factories by 5% as was suggested by tutorial and I still have to pause the construction at least twice a year. I might be simply overexpanding thought.

b) How do you design you survey ships? I know this might be better suited for Ship Design thread but I am looking for general tips. My idea and design was this – conventional engines equiped interplanetary ship -> advanced engines upgrade that allowed them to scout broader spectrum of places and comets -> now upgrading to jump engines equiped long-range scout gravships/survey ships that will be send out to all corners of the universe searching for life and new places to colonize. Do you guys do this or do you have separate grav point ships / survey ships?

c) I tried but I couldn’t find anywhere if there is a limit for population on Earth? Is there a maximum number?

d) regarding colonization – when I enter the „potential colony“ screen it only lists Earth (colonized), Luna and Mars (both with cost 2). Is that really only two places where I can have colonies? I noticed that i.e. Titan has 16 which makes it insanely expansive endeavor but it should still be doable, right? Or is this a no go due to different temperatures/gravity?

[Icecoon]

A.

I usually expand fast when i have the minerals to do it. In your case you should focus on transporting automines on planets with the minerals you need + some mass drivers to shoot the stuff back to Earth.

B.

Well my geosurvey ships are usually civilian designs with the same engines that my freighters. That gives them very long range iirc around 600-1000(I'm not sure) days in average with a little amount of fuel. My gravitational survey ships on the other hand are military designs (gravitational sensors always classify the ship as military, i don't know why.) They have usually one large military engine  for fuel efficiency and a jump engine. Note that my geosurvey ships don't have jump engines of their own, so i group them together with the grav's or when i have the time and resources i design an armed survey cruiser to accompany (and defend) them.

C.
No limit as far as i know.

D.
With the proper equipment you can have populated colonies almost anywhere. Titan is tough but doable. But you should focus on 1-3 type worlds. It pays off better.

[Alfapiomega (OP)]

A.

I usually expand fast when i have the minerals to do it. In your case you should focus on transporting automines on planets with the minerals you need + some mass drivers to shoot the stuff back to Earth.

B.

Well my geosurvey ships are usually civilian designs with the same engines that my freighters. That gives them very long range iirc around 600-1000(I'm not sure) days in average with a little amount of fuel. My gravitational survey ships on the other hand are military designs (gravitational sensors always classify the ship as military, i don't know why.) They have usually one large military engine  for fuel efficiency and a jump engine. Note that my geosurvey ships don't have jump engines of their own, so i group them together with the grav's or when i have the time and resources i design an armed survey cruiser to accompany (and defend) them.

C.
No limit as far as i know.

D.
With the proper equipment you can have populated colonies almost anywhere. Titan is tough but doable. But you should focus on 1-3 type worlds. It pays off better.

ad A) Yup, I did that. I have three places that are giving me minerals (one massive mining operation on Mars and two comets being worked on for the most needed minerals).  However it barely provides enough.

ad B) Interesting. Well due to not having a civilian shipyard at the beggining I designed my geosurvey ships as military designs. Therefore I am not preparing them for a total refit to geosurvey/gravitational survey ships with long range fuel tanks, supplies and additional engines so that they are at least moderately fast. After that I plan to just send them out with their new Jump engines and let them on autopilot for some time. I have three of them and if I send them each to a different system, they will take years before basic tasks are done. I still ponder if that is a good idea but what else should I do with them?

ad C) Good to know but a bit scary.

ad D) so the list shows only 1 - 3 types? The others you need to manually decide and work on?

New - E) If I establish a colony in a different star system, everything I mine there has to stay there, correct? The only way to haul those resources to Earth would be via a dedicated freighter that would run a line through jump point. Is this assumption correct? Just checking.

[GreatTuna]

D.  List shows potential colonies with cost up to "Maximum Colony Cost" (usually 5, but you can change that in lower right corner).

E.  Yes.

[Icecoon]

B.
I send my survey ships out in pairs. It increases their efficiency and decreases the time needed to survey the whole system.
For instance my survey corps in my games usually look like this:

1st Geo Group
     2x Geosurvey ships
     1x Survey Cruiser
2nd Geo Group
     The same
1st Grav Group
     2x Grav ships
2nd Grav Group

 ...and so on. In the beginning of the game four geosurvey ships and four gravitational survey ships are enough.

E. Yes, mined minerals remain on the planet until you ship them away.
     

[Alfapiomega (OP)]

B.
I send my survey ships out in pairs. It increases their efficiency and decreases the time needed to survey the whole system.
For instance my survey corps in my games usually look like this:

1st Geo Group
     2x Geosurvey ships
     1x Survey Cruiser
2nd Geo Group
     The same
1st Grav Group
     2x Grav ships
2nd Grav Group

Um... why?

[Icecoon]

Um... why?

As i said, with two or more survey ships it takes less time to survey a system.

[justleroy]

B) Interesting.  Well due to not having a civilian shipyard at the beggining I designed my geosurvey ships as military designs.  Therefore I am not preparing them for a total refit to geosurvey/gravitational survey ships with long range fuel tanks, supplies and additional engines so that they are at least moderately fast.  After that I plan to just send them out with their new Jump engines and let them on autopilot for some time.  I have three of them and if I send them each to a different system, they will take years before basic tasks are done.  I still ponder if that is a good idea but what else should I do with them?

Naval shipyards can build civilian ships, so having no civilian yards at the beginning is not a big hindrance.  You are going to want to build civilian yards, though, as they are cheaper to get to the large capacities you'll need for freighters, colonizers, etc.

[Erik L]

Regarding survey ops.

I usually run my survey task groups in groups of 5 ships, usually all jump capable.

[Black]

Thanks man!

I had about 4 hours to play yesterday and I did. Several things I came to resulted in new questions Thanks ahead if you answer them (or anyone else)! And yes, I realize these are all theoretical questions that have no „right“ answer but I am looking for general ideas that I could ponder about

a) Economy - do you guys have certain tips on how to keep it running smoothly? Despite increasing the amount of mines/researching mining technology and building mining ships I end up (all the time) with messages about mineral shortages. I seem to be able to keep up with my production only so so. I probably have really bad starting system (most larger mineral deposits have only accessibility of 0.1 - 0.4) and Earth had very low starting amounts (I ran out of Corrundium and Mercassium in the first seven years). But still is there any strategy you follow? Please note I am only increasing my factories by 5% as was suggested by tutorial and I still have to pause the construction at least twice a year. I might be simply overexpanding thought.

b) How do you design you survey ships? I know this might be better suited for Ship Design thread but I am looking for general tips. My idea and design was this – conventional engines equiped interplanetary ship -> advanced engines upgrade that allowed them to scout broader spectrum of places and comets -> now upgrading to jump engines equiped long-range scout gravships/survey ships that will be send out to all corners of the universe searching for life and new places to colonize. Do you guys do this or do you have separate grav point ships / survey ships?

c) I tried but I couldn’t find anywhere if there is a limit for population on Earth? Is there a maximum number?

d) regarding colonization – when I enter the „potential colony“ screen it only lists Earth (colonized), Luna and Mars (both with cost 2). Is that really only two places where I can have colonies? I noticed that i.e. Titan has 16 which makes it insanely expansive endeavor but it should still be doable, right? Or is this a no go due to different temperatures/gravity?

Well others already answered your questions, so I will be brief.

b) I usually build armed survey cruisers with commercial engines, mainly for RP reasons (they are of course more expensive than basic survey ships that have only geo/grav sensor, jump engine and maybe some thermal sensor). As I want to achieve something similar to The Hun class survey cruiser from Starfire.

c) There is no population limit but annual population growth is lower when there are many colonist.

d) In Sol, zero colony cost worlds are Luna, Mars, Galilean moons and Mercury. Maybe Venus too but to remove the atmosphere would take a lot of time. Titan cannot be terraformed to zero colony world.

[Alfapiomega (OP)]

Thank you all for answers! I appreciate it, getting better every single day playing this game.

I restarted Aurora and already everything is working better. I played a lot with the civilian / military designs, I have better idea about the minerals and their production etc. Experience makes wise decisions as it seems!

I will soon have my first ship designs ready so that I can post them in the shipdesign forum. In the meantime though a question - sometimes building a new ship may be cheaper than refitting the old one, correct? How can I easily figure this out without having to actually move my ship back home and doing this?

The model I am facing now:

Lilian class geosurvey ship
set for 24 month missions
has 1 geosurvey sensor
has 1 Hasswell Mk I. commercial conventional engine (25 HS)
has 2 fuel tanks

Lilian refit I class geosurvey ship would have:
set for 24 month missions
has 1 geosurvey sensor
has 1 active sensor
has 1 Barracuda Mk I. nuclear engine (25 HS) / might be two depending on the performance x size
has 4 fuel tanks
Has 1 gravitational sensor (= is no longer civilian ship)
has 1 jump engine (to be designed).
+ necessary engineering spaces (probably like 10 or more of them, depending on %)

Is it viable to start from scratch or refit?

[GreatTuna]

Thank you all for answers! I appreciate it, getting better every single day playing this game.

I restarted Aurora and already everything is working better.  I played a lot with the civilian / military designs, I have better idea about the minerals and their production etc.  Experience makes wise decisions as it seems!

I will soon have my first ship designs ready so that I can post them in the shipdesign forum.  In the meantime though a question - sometimes building a new ship may be cheaper than refitting the old one, correct? How can I easily figure this out without having to actually move my ship back home and doing this?

The model I am facing now:

Lilian class geosurvey ship
set for 24 month missions
has 1 geosurvey sensor
has 1 Hasswell Mk I.  commercial conventional engine (25 HS)
has 2 fuel tanks

Lilian refit I class geosurvey ship would have:
set for 24 month missions
has 1 geosurvey sensor
has 1 active sensor
has 1 Barracuda Mk I.  nuclear engine (25 HS) / might be two depending on the performance x size
has 4 fuel tanks
Has 1 gravitational sensor (= is no longer civilian ship)
has 1 jump engine (to be designed).
+ necessary engineering spaces (probably like 10 or more of them, depending on %)

Is it viable to start from scratch or refit?

There is "Refit cost From. . . " in Class design window, DAC/Rank/Info tab.  Just select your old design and it will show you refit cost.  If it's close to (or more than) build cost of your ship, you'd better go build your ship from scratch.

And looks like it's better for you to build "Lilian refit I" ship from scratch.

[Black]

Lilian refit I class geosurvey ship would have:
set for 24 month missions
has 1 geosurvey sensor
has 1 active sensor
has 1 Barracuda Mk I. nuclear engine (25 HS) / might be two depending on the performance x size
has 4 fuel tanks
Has 1 gravitational sensor (= is no longer civilian ship)
has 1 jump engine (to be designed).
+ necessary engineering spaces (probably like 10 or more of them, depending on %)

Is it viable to start from scratch or refit?

I would personally use passive sensors, you just need to know that there is alien ship in system. Passive sensor is good enough for that. With passives only, chance that you will be detected is lower.

It would seem that new version will be much bigger, so it is better to construct new ships and scrap the old ones.

[Alfapiomega (OP)]

Just a quick question - to move around the survey team I need to have a ship with cryogenic storage or does any ship capable of transporting people/cargo do?

[GreatTuna]

Just a quick question - to move around the survey team I need to have a ship with cryogenic storage or does any ship capable of transporting people/cargo do?

You can use any ship to carry teams around bodies.
You can even do it without ship, by disassembling and reassembling team in another place.