Posted by: Polestar
« on: March 03, 2013, 12:03:37 PM »
Part of the answer to my sad story turns out, as hinted at above, to "go to the Civilian/Ind Status" tab, and issue order to Supply and Demand Mines on the planets you want to move them from and to. I do not know how to move minerals this way yet.
Civilians are slow, but not unconscionably so, and the fuel they consume doesn't come out of the government's pocket. I'm not sure where it comes from, if civilians even run out of fuel, or what happens if they do.
I also haven't heard any complaints from them the one time I stole fuel from the fuel harvesters they love to cluster around suitable gas giants. . .
However, civilians have limitations. Except by asking and waiting, you don't know how much transport ability they have (capacity per day), on the route you want served, at the time you want the stuff moved. It's much easier to plan ahead if you have your own ships Also, if you don't occupy too much of their attention with orders, your civilians will be left free to earn taxes for you.
So, let's get some freighters outbound!
Here's my current large freighter design (tech level: I-C Fusion, x0. 40 fuel consumption). It uses more Duranium and requires a larger space yard to build than a design of the same speed and capacity based on x0. 50 power drives (all drives at maximal size, of course), but needs a lot less Gallicite, costs less, and - most importantly - consumes a more affordable amount of fuel. In the next iteration, I might add more engines of the same type to recover some of the lost speed (as pointed out by TheDeadlyShoe).
Navagatio class Freighter 357,250 tons 874 Crew 3403 BP TCS 7145 TH 12000 EM 0
1679 km/s Armour 1-448 Shields 0-0 Sensors 6/6/0/0 Damage Control Rating 1 PPV 0
MSP 6 Max Repair 100 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Spare Berths 3
Cargo 250000 Cargo Handling Multiplier 100 Tractor Beam
Astra Permanere (P300, C0.01) (40) Power 300 Fuel Use 0.99% Signature 300 Exp 3%
Fuel Capacity 1,000,000 Litres Range 50.9 billion km (350 days at full power)
Thermal Sensor TH1-6 (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 6m km
EM Detection Sensor EM1-6 (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 6m km
This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes
For comparison, here's the design that bankrupted my empire:
Imperialis fiscali cladis class Freighter 374,550 tons 1399 Crew 7524 BP TCS 7491 TH 22500 EM 0
3003 km/s Armour 1-462 Shields 0-0 Sensors 6/6/0/0 Damage Control Rating 1 PPV 0
MSP 13 Max Repair 125 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Spare Berths 1
Cargo 250000 Cargo Handling Multiplier 100 Tractor Beam
Astra Navagatio (P500, C0.035) (45) Power 500 Fuel Use 3.54% (ed: ouch!) Signature 500 Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 5,000,000 Litres Range 67.9 billion km (261 days at full power)
Thermal Sensor TH1-6 (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 6m km
EM Detection Sensor EM1-6 (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 6m km
This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes
The issue I still have with the version 6 changes is that, for commercial ships, the trade-off between build cost, fuel cost, and move-the-stuff-ability has become much less favorable, which makes operating a multi-system economy even more like swimming uphill, through molasses.
Unless you rely on civilians, which poses problems of its own - like not knowing, except by asking and waiting, how much move-the-stuff they can currently do, how quickly.
Let's compare pre v6 to post v6 freighters (relatively fast, but the speed is perfectly affordable in pre v6 games, and besides if I want slow I can use civilians). Similar comments apply when moving colonists, etc. Tech is the same, speed is the same, transport ability is the same, and extra abilities are the same.
Pre v6:
Merchant Adventurer class Freighter 362,250 tons 2555 Crew 6732 BP TCS 7239 TH 21750 EM 0
3002 km/s Armour 1-452 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 1 PPV 0
Maint Capacity 12 MSP Max Repair 100 MSP
Cargo 250000 Tractor Beam
Merchant Adventurer (P250, C0.04) (87) Power 250 Fuel Use 4% Signature 250 Armour 0 Exp 1%
Fuel Capacity 500,000 Litres Range 62.2 billion km (239 days at full power)
This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes
Post v6:
Ieiunium Navigatio class Freighter 520,150 tons 1830 Crew 6744 BP TCS 10403 TH 31200 EM 0
2999 km/s Armour 1-576 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 1 PPV 0
MSP 8 Max Repair 100 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Spare Berths 0
Cargo 250000 Cargo Handling Multiplier 100 Tractor Beam
Astra Permanere (P300, C0.01) (104) Power 300 Fuel Use 0.99% Signature 300 Exp 3%
Fuel Capacity 2,000,000 Litres Range 69.9 billion km (269 days at full power)
This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes
The post v6 freighter consumes almost 4 times the fuel per ton-kilometer, despite using highly efficient engines (max size, x0. 30 power). Because its engines are so much bigger for their thrust (the trade-off for the above), they take up an enormous amount of space, which drives up hull size by more than 40%. The only way to make this trade-off a little less bad (at a given tech level) is to drop speed.
Matters are not helped by the loss of Hyper Drives, which, painstaking to use and prone to abuse as they were, opened up vaster reaches of outer space to exploitation that in recent versions of the game are impracticably distant.
It comes hard to have my space-wings clipped like this.
