How are Lab points wasted?

[Commy]

It just so happens that whenever I ask a serious question in the middle of a thread, it gets ignored, so let me ask it now...

I started a thread about the difference between the Supercollider and Theory of Everything. Thought it would be a short, simple thread. NOT. So anyway, my last post (of course, this could be changed) was about how lab points are wasted and stuff.

CEO Aaron, I believe, said that excess lab points would be wasted, so building the two projects in separate bases would mean that the lab points wouldn't be wasted. Honestly, I don't get much out of this.

Somebody please explain.

Oh, and by the way, I still don't know the difference between the Supercollider and Theory of Everything, except they cost different, so if someone would answer that, my thanks...

[Blake]

If techs cost 3000 each, and your SSC produces 4000 labs per turn, then the 1000 excess labs are wasted - they don't go towards the next tech. Worse yet, if you had already accumulated 2900 lab points to the tech then only 100 points get used, and the remaining 3900 are wasted.

So in fact every time you complete a tech it is likely some lab points will be wasted by this truncation, but the effect is only really worth worrying about for big SSC's and in OCC.

[Kody]

If you need 50 labs to complete a tech, and one of your bases makes 100 labs. Then instead of the extra labs rolling over to a new tech it insteads get thrown away.

This only happens on a per-base basis, so if you seperate the labs between multiple bases less labs get throw away whenever a tech completes.

Supercollider doubles research output, which is post any efficiency penalties

ToE doubles raw lab output, which is pre-efficiency penalties

With the supercollider and the theory of everything. I don't know if I've entirely figured it out either, however here's my understanding from googlie's explanation.

I think the efficiency penalities mean if you're got imbalanced SE settings eg 30% econ 70% research, and you have the -8% research -16% econ. The -8% is applied to raw lab output (ToE), the ToE will add it's bonus before the -8% is added in. While the Supercollider doubles the overall research output of that base and which is after the -8% labs is applied.

Now looking at that carefully I'm almost confused as you. Because if bonuses and negatives are all multiplied, it shouldn't really make much of a difference if the modifiers are applied in a different order (aside from rounding issues).

[smacksim]

{It's been a long time since I checked, but the following is my impression. So take it as untested}

To add to the truncated-labs explanation, the excess labs are only wasted in the city that crosses the threshold to the next tech. If you have 10 cities producing 100 labs each, the maximum wasteable by truncation is 99. If you have one gigantic city doing 910 labs and 9 others doing 10, it's possible you could waste 909 labs on a turn in which you make a breakthrough. Make sense?

Combine this with Kody's explanation of efficiency and SE choice losses to labs (which seems right to me),and it helps in thinking about putting both SPs in a single base. However, all these issues are pretty small if you are really cranking out a tech/turn or nearly so. They can be important if you are getting ready to probe someone for a tech and need to count turns to tech completion, etc....however, you'll then need to anticipate your reasearch-growth rate. This is micromanagement-intensive, to say the least.

-Smack

[Flubber]

I seriously don't worry about the wastage that much except to try to ensure that I don't lose TOO much.

generally my SSC is one of my older bases whose research is counted first. Even with the SSC/TOE combo its a big effort to get one base alone to exceed tech cost. If I do get in that position, I just change the labs allocation downward a bit for that turn or reallocate a few crawlers (or a few dozen) to another fully developed base. If I can get that one bases production somewhere around tech cost, I can then alter the labs allocation on a turn by turn basis to take into account rising tech costs or any remaining lab points left over from the previous turn.

As has been pointed out, if your SSC can get a tech by itself, then you are likely able to get a few more per turn from your other basis and the game should be won anyway

[CEO Aaron]

Commy, sorry I didn't reply to your question in the original thread, but it looks like the other folks here have pretty much covered the issue. In practice, unless you build an absolutely ridiculous energy park, the income of your SSC won't greatly exceed your total tech cost, so you won't encounter this problem if you don't rely on energy parks for your lab income.

[Commy]

It appears to me that this problem won't ever really affect me, but thanks anyway...I believe now I understand it...

[Santiago_Claus]

"When the SSC is producing too much" (whatever figure that might be) "I just reassign some crawlers to another base."

That's really a bombshell question:

Is it better to have one mega-science base with "extra" energy distributed more-or-less evenly amongst the other bases, or is it better to have 2 SSC's with their outputs boosted more-or-less equivalently, with much less energy (if any) going to other bases?

The huge multiplicative effects of a single SSC means it can "max out" at relatively lower energy input, freeing up more energy to hand out to other bases.

2 SSC's don't have as many multipliers at each base, so they'll eat up more energy less efficiently before they "max out", leaving less energy to distribute to other bases, but when they max they'll be outputting twice as many techs as a single SSC. (Base order is important, too: 2 SSC's are best spread apart.)

We still don't have a definition for "max", which is to say that magic point of diminishing returns adding energy to an SSC.

We know its upper boundary is 100% of tech cost ... my "gut feeling" is that 70% of tech cost is best for 1 SSC and 60% for 2, but I don't have any solid numbers to back that guess up.

These things are true:

An SSC producing 100% of tech cost makes other research useless until all other bases, added together, can produce 1 tech. 2 SSC's at 100% make the intervening bases' output useless in the same manner.

Changing the "Labs" slider to accelerate research works better the more evenly-distributed is research output; further, a change to "Labs" requires a redistribution of energy to fully take advantage of.

If discoveries are always made at an SSC, adding more energy to it will not improve research rate.

Tech cost accelerates, ultimately balancing an over-energetic SSC.

So how am I muddling through this tangle of modular division?

I'm thinking you can sort of "feel your way" to better energy management by adding energy to an SSC any turn it doesn't make a discovery or adding energy somewhere else any time it does. That probably puts a little too much into the SSC but it multiplies so well I'd hate to underutilize it.

[CEO Aaron]

This is why I typically don't bother with extensive use of energy parks or SSC's in my games, it's just not worth the hassle. I transcended once to see what the fuss was about, but in general I'm content to combine conquest with political victory.

[Commy]

What does SSC stand for?

[Chaunk]

Super Science City.

[Commy]

Okay. So is there like a super economy city or something? I make what I call MFs, military factories, where the base only has military improvements, all squares are worked for minerals, and it makes only military units, but very quickly. Similiar idea, I guess...

[smacksim]

Generally SSCs come with an Energy Park, low inefficiency, and good trade income, but none of those things are necessary. In fact, even a remote base (high inefficiency, generally smaller and thus less trade income) can be a science city, but this gets into all-specialist bases and other complexities.

To build your first Science City, try designating a city that has good energy production from the Uranium Flats (yum! ), a river, highlands-solar, or protected ocean squares for trawling. Also important is to have low inefficiency, which means your HQ or nearby, and build a children's creche!

Now that you have your city picked out, you have four goals.

1. Grow! Use any means necessary to make this city the biggest in your empire, thus helping you to pull in energy from workers/specialists, but more importantly, guaranteeing it a healthy trade income.

2. Trade. Speaking of trade income, make peace with as many factions as possible. You only gain commerce income from factions you have treaties or pacts with.

3. Crawl. Build a former army nearby and set to work building an energy park. This generally means solar panels and eschelon mirrors at a high altitude and boreholes at a low and/or high altitude, and making rivers when possible. It is intensive terraforming to put it mildly. The very best formers for the job are clean-super-rover formers with perhaps a few clean-fungiformers thrown in. However, even your regular joe terraformer can do the job, especially with the Weather Paradigm. Once he's got some forest growing at his home base, send him to work on the Energy Park. As you get eash solar panel or Borehole built, you need to put a crawler on it. These can be built anywhere and re-homed to the SSCity. So generally, for a terribly fast Energy Park, here's what I do: A. All bases build 1-3 clean-super formers (nice if they are elite!). B. All bases then build 1-3 crawlers (fusion brings cheap rover crawlers which get there faster). C. Return all bases to normal production. As the formers are tearing *** all over the mountainside, the crawlers make there way to the SSCity and re-home, then procede to the Energy Park.. More formers/crawlers as needed.

4. Build your labs infrastructure. This is very important. If you have the cash, rush-build all the labs facilities as quick as you can at the SSCity. When people give this advice, it doesn't always mean rush-build on the first turn you start that Hybrid Forest (400+ ECs, ouch!), but rather, find the happy medium of perhaps disbanding a few crawlers to help it along, waiting a turn or two, then finishing it off, 'on the cheap'. But do so as fast as you can afford. If you are Morgan, it might just be on the first turn you start a facility. If you are Yang, maybe not! Also, though it might be obvious, don't forget to build the 4 secret projects that increase energy/labs at this base, if you can.

Trawling: All of this can be done on the ocean, but it's a little harder to defend and perhaps a little less cost effective. But it's pretty fun to have 50 tidal harnesses being worked by a city.

Notes:

Grow: As Morgan, if I can get the PTS, or even without it, I'll use colony pods to directly increase the population of this city beyond the hab limits. This is called pod-booming. If you can pop-boom, by all means do so. It will help all your bases, not just the SSC.

Trade: If you are truly playing a builder, it's worth almost any cost to form treaties, even when the AI comes and demands some tax. You don't have to, however. It's perfectly legitimate to be at war with all the AI factions and still have a SSC. It will be a bit less powerful, however.

There are lots of threads around about building Super Science Cities and/or Energy Parks. Be sure to check them all out if you want the best opinions on the matter, but by all means, build a SSC if you never have! It's just amazing how powerful they can be. You don't even have to have an energy park, or any of the other complexities to get the basics down. Just focus one city on research/trade, and you'll reap quite a windfall.

-Smack

[Chaos Theory]

SSCs are popular because of the two lab-doubling SPs. As far as economy goes, one SP increases econ 50% when using FM (Longevity Vaccine), and one SP doubles econ (Space Elevator) but is too late to consider. This lack of one-city-only econ boosters tends to make your energy production more distributed. Furthermore, with Fusion Power, if you use many specialists, you quickly get as much energy as you can use, unless you are going for Economic Victory.

[Commy]

Actually, I have been using things very similiar to SSCs, just didn't know that's what you guys called them. I've never used an energy park though, how do you defend it? Making it would just take a little art in designing, but protecting a big gap in your empire, in my opinion, is hard until clean reactors and very good infastructure.