Honestly the way deficits should works is that you have a priority setup.
If my empire needs 100 energy and I'm only able to produce 70. Then only the 70% of my empire that is considered most critical should get energy. The priority system would be a way to have an accessible means for people still learning or not interested in doing super min/max to get out of their deficit without it being an instant inescapable death spiral. At the same time, the means manual turn things off give more proactive players control to game things. For example a bio empire probably prioritizes food for energy when there is a lack of energy. So a min/max player could make the option to cut power to an agricultural district they really don't need because it was from a recent conquest, new tech put them in a massive surplus or they have enough food stores to coast for a bit.
There is probably some debate on the stuff on how jobs should be impacted. Some jobs are going to be able to do something despite not having power, while there is an argument for some being completely crippled. A farmer can still produce food, but the physics research in a FTL society might absolutely need a computer to make any headway in new research. Machines further complicate things since they need energy.
I do think everyone can agree though that if X resource is need to make Y. This also means they need to do something about modifiers allowing people to completely cheese things as well. If I only have 50% of the resources I need, it shouldn't be possible for me to hit 70% of my normal production. If I only have 50% of what I need, then my production should be at 50% of what it normally is.
If my empire needs 100 energy and I'm only able to produce 70. Then only the 70% of my empire that is considered most critical should get energy. The priority system would be a way to have an accessible means for people still learning or not interested in doing super min/max to get out of their deficit without it being an instant inescapable death spiral. At the same time, the means manual turn things off give more proactive players control to game things. For example a bio empire probably prioritizes food for energy when there is a lack of energy. So a min/max player could make the option to cut power to an agricultural district they really don't need because it was from a recent conquest, new tech put them in a massive surplus or they have enough food stores to coast for a bit.
There is probably some debate on the stuff on how jobs should be impacted. Some jobs are going to be able to do something despite not having power, while there is an argument for some being completely crippled. A farmer can still produce food, but the physics research in a FTL society might absolutely need a computer to make any headway in new research. Machines further complicate things since they need energy.
I do think everyone can agree though that if X resource is need to make Y. This also means they need to do something about modifiers allowing people to completely cheese things as well. If I only have 50% of the resources I need, it shouldn't be possible for me to hit 70% of my normal production. If I only have 50% of what I need, then my production should be at 50% of what it normally is.
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