Part 43: Too Many Beakers
Too Many BeakersI began by scrapping most of the fleet, acquiring almost 15k BCs in the process. And a game limit of some type was reached in the turn summary, as there were a few planets that didn't have their production show up in the listing. I think I've been running into that for a while actually, just didn't realize it before.
With more money than I know what to do with I thought about abusing Scout Labs to increase our research, but it just doesn't seem to worth it given how much our population can produce. My calculations were that even maxing out our current command points would result in about 2k extra research per turn - we're about to break 30k as it is, so rather than build a bunch of ships I'll just hammer the Turn button a while more at the end of this if need be, and just have a bigger cashflow for buying the combat ships early later or something. It just doesn't seem to be worth the trouble.
SD 3537.5 - I've hit another hard limit, actually the turn before I think but this is where it became obvious. Total RP per turn is hard-capped to 32,767; this is of course a well-known data type storage amount. This kind of sucks because it means I can't keep escalating research with the increase in costs for the hyper-advanced items. I was going to blow up the research structures eventually to free up maintenance BCs for use elsewhere when the time came; turns out it is just coming sooner than expected.
So no Klackon-occupied worlds will build any more research buildings, and those that exist will begin getting the demolition treatment.
Never stop learning.
Now we have officially colonized every rock that can be found or assembled. Aside from the stupid amounts of everything, a couple other things that strike me. Savings in the treasury are not limited at the level that annual research is, because ?? Also, while I understand how it works from a game mechanics standpoint, how do you build a Colony Base on a planet with only Klackons on it and they build a colony with 1M TechnoGeeks and no Klackons? Where did they come from?? And if we can create a million citizens out of thin air, why don't we do that more often elsewhere???
The final count is 55 occupied systems; almost a full quarter of the galaxy's 72 were useless except to take up space. 167 planets contribute to the empire, just about exactly three per system. Right now we're a little over 2.1 billion citizens, but many more need to be bred before we reach our maximum.
LOL. My fleet is almost totally scrapped at the moment. We'll see I guess whether I have to divert and build more ships or whether my souped-up Star Fortresses can fend this off.
SD 3538.8 - I've reached the point where cash flow is sufficient to purchase all needed planetary improvements short of Star Fortresses. Partly because profit is about 13k per turn (LOL!) and partly because there aren't, relatively speaking, nearly as many planets still working. Probably need roughly 20 turns before getting everything completely built, but we're closing in on it.
Research is plowing through the early stages of Hyper-Advanced IV. It seems the cost increases by 10k each tier, so it's 55k now and 65k for tier V. I need 2-3 turns for each one here, and it'll probably be 3-4 each for the next level. It would appear the research part is going to take as long as anything, simply due to the costs and the hard cap on how much I can do at once. Farming adjustments has become by far the most annoying and time-consuming element of the micro, with a majority of the planets now self-sufficient in terms of feeding themselves.
SD 3538.9 - Nearly all research by assimilated populatons - i.e., Klackons & Mrrshan - has been discontinued. TechnoGeek efforts alone have us at the cap. All additional queued research structures have had their construction orders revoked, and we'll begin Housing investment instead starting with the smallest populations. Demolition efforts will be expanded to those planets as well.
ROFL. The experts were right?!? Bring it on puny lizard!
Dragon Battle (1:15)
I'm somewhat impressed that it managed - barely - to survive an entire round of our attacks. Loknar proves himself worthy, and the 'threat' is removed
SD 3539.3 - There's a housing boom going on across the empire. Orion has basically been at 2M more citizens per turn thanks to the optimal environment; a number of other planets are at better than 1M. You can also see here that the other planets in the system have begun terraforming, and those are the ones bringing up the rear. Most of the empire is now fully-developed.
Fully-populated? Not so much, hence the housing investment. It does look like we'll get the population issue sorted by the time research is finished if not before though. That continues to plod along, and the demolition crews are kept quite busy, but we are closing in.
And still there are more wishing to join us. I was also told that 'a spy sent against the Meklar was lost'. Not killed or assassinated, but lost. That's a new one.
SD 3539.9 - I run out of stuff to buy for the first time. The two add-on Orion planets aren't quite finished yet, but everywhere else either has completed development already or just got their star fortress bought this turn to finish the task. Spent almost 40k on those rush jobs this turn alone. Go-go Gadjet Moneybags!
Meanwhile we're about to break the three billion mark in total population, with the current growth rate about 85M citizens per turn. That's a lot of breeding, folks.
Hilariously pointless. GNN also notes, for the second time, that we control a majority of the galaxy. Glad they got that out of the way.
SD 3540.4 - The last planet in Orion has finished infrastructure. All that remains now is maxing out population and research. All planets have at least 10M citizens, and most of them below the 15-20M range are only there because that's the planetary maximum. Work continues on housing to boost population faster, and demolition of structures that are being phased out (research buildings and, for maxed-out planets, cloning centers). I'm no longer bothering with freighter transfers of population, it's a lot less painful to just grow them in place at this point.
SD 3540.5 - Several planets max out every year, usually to have their population do research so that the citizens of other planets can be freed up to work on housing. Meanwhile we have now started Hyper-Advanced V research.
SD 3541.5 - The Antarans have returned again. This time we'll see a Battleship of theirs for the first time. Also, we break the four billion mark in population. Growth has slowed significantly though, and I don't think it'll push much higher.
Antaran Battleship Encounter (1:33)
Well, that actually got a bit more interesting than I was hoping for. Might be a good idea to get a couple ships up to help if they return before I'm finished.
SD 3541.7 - Maximum research can be maintained while putting maximum industrial effort into housing on all planets that aren't yet full. That means I can have demolition crews working non-stop everywhere they need to be until everything that needs to go poof, has.
Oh, just go away.
SD 3542.5 - We have now reached our maximum population, coming in at 4.159 billion. Only one farming world, Proctor IV, is required ... and even that one isn't fully dedicated with several citizens not needed in agriculture. This is enough to feed every single Klackon and also all the TechnoGeeks on Toxic worlds. Of course, a few units of food here on there come from all the other non-Rich worlds, which is most of the galaxy.
We're almost there. Two more Hyper-Advanced 5 techs to research, and the last of the demolitions to go through. All Rich worlds that don't already have them will build Space Academies in preparation.
Amoeba Battle
The Space Amoeba attacked. Briefly.
SD 3542.7 - At the same time, the last round of construction was completed, with the final demolition work having been done the previous turn. Waiting for research was the only thing left. Right now we cannot make LESS than 17,330 BC per turn. That's with every planet putting everybody who isn't needed as a farmer in scientist duty.
I suppose this proves there's almost always a reason to go further. I could just keep spamming the Turn button until I max out the leaders - except I don't know what the limit is, even if there is one.
The next turn we hit our last Hyper-Advanced 5 tech. There is still more to be potentially researched, except that we'd get nothing from it. Literally the only benefit from further teching up appears to be increased score at the end of the game, and even in that case I've read conflicting information on whether that bonus maxes out at a certain point.
It's time to kill us some extra-galactic aliens. The empire is not *perfect* - for example, some radiated planets have Barrier or Flux shields instead of the cheaper Radiated ones - but it's awfully darned close.