Problems with unrest

[Rich.h (OP)]

I have been getting a message similar to this over the past few cycles.

30th June 2064 07:52:51,Sol,Unrest is rising on Mars because the population believes that the central government is not providing sufficient military protection.  Unrest increased by 2. 1525%

Does this mean I do not have enough ground troops, PDC, or just generally not enough military ships in my empire?

[Nightstar]

It means that the planet doesn't have enough planetary protection value (ppv). PPV is the total hull spaces devoted to weaponry in orbit or on the ground of the planet. You can find the values in f2/summary under 'requested protection level' and 'actual protection value'

Ground troops do NOT count, but can suppress unrest instead, which is generally good enough.

[Rich.h (OP)]

I noticed that my ground troops have a modifier for how much they reduce unrest.  Is there somewhere I can see how much unrest is being generated to work out if the modifier is enough to counteract that?

Also the PPV is it the exact same number as hull spaces and does it count for both PDC and ships in orbit?

[Akhillis]

If you've got ground troops, it'll give you a message saying. . .

Ground forces on PLANET have reduced unrest to LEVEL

If they're not reducing it to zero, then you've got a problem. 

My rule of thumb is one garrison battalion per 50 million people, but even that seems to leave a fairly big margin for error.

[Hawkeye]

It means that the planet doesn't have enough planetary protection value (ppv). PPV is the total hull spaces devoted to weaponry in orbit or on the ground of the planet. You can find the values in f2/summary under 'requested protection level' and 'actual protection value'

Ground troops do NOT count, but can suppress unrest instead, which is generally good enough.

I am pretty sure, PPV is calculated on a system basis, otherwise fleets in the system wouldn´t count and that would be ridiculous.

[alex_brunius]

I am pretty sure, PPV is calculated on a system basis, otherwise fleets in the system wouldn´t count and that would be ridiculous.

According to the wiki it seems you are right:

"Actual Protection Level: This value shows how much protection this population is receiving from the Empire’s military forces and is based on the total PPV value of Empire forces within the same star system. If insufficient protection is being provided, it will cause unrest within the colony population"

But doesn't this also mean PDCs on a body the other side of a system would also count? Wouldn't that be fairly ridiculous too?

[Noble713]

Maybe it's "ships in system" + "PDCs on planet".

I'm not at home so I can't check my current game, but I'm pretty sure in one system where I have a PDC on the main planet but not on a secondary colony, the main planet no longer has unrest messages but the smaller colony does.  I just go and stick 1-2 garrison battalions everywhere and largely ignore the unrest messages.  Since civilian mining colonies auto-generate a garrison battalion, they are a great source of troops as you simply relocate them when the civ mines exhaust the asteroid, just before you abandon it.