Some more Local Resources

[scaper12123]

We only have two local resources to speak of as of now: Betharian stone and Alien Pets. That's... a pretty terrible assortment of local resources. In all honesty, I think local resources aren't nearly abundant enough on the planets where they appear; they ought to turn a planet into an extremely important asset when they make an appearance.

But that's hard to do when there's so few local resources, so I'd like to suggest a few to flesh out the local resource palette.

• High Calorie Crops: A special alien food found naturally in abundance but difficult to raise with hydroponics. It would accompany 2 food. Using it would require researching a specialized farm that produces 12 food, 2 engineering (thanks to the effort required to run the farm), and gives happiness to all biological pops.
• Rare-metal Deposit: A truly immense volume of multiple rare, valuable metals which include a large number of radioactive ores and thus require more specialized mining techniques to obtain safely. It would accompany 4 minerals. Using it would require researching a specialized mine that produces 10 minerals and 2 physics (thanks to the scientific effort needed to safely isolate the radioactive metals).
• Volcanic Ore: Deposits of useful metal getting spewed up by volcanoes; an interesting phenomena worth studying. It would accompany 1 mineral and 2 engineering. Using it would require researching a specialized science lab that produces 6 engineering and 2 minerals.
• Solar Energy Deposit: A large amount of solar radiation bombards this region, despite the planet's magnetic field; a phenomena worth studying. It would accompany 2 physics. Using it would require researching a specialized science lab that produces 6 physics and boosts science across the planet.

 

[silvasurfer]

That sounds good.
Add something like Spice too.

 

[Bearjuden]

Solar energy deposit doesn't produce energy?

But you're absolutely right, we need more. At least one for each big resource or modifier, and probably more than that to make sure planets feel unique.

 

[scaper12123]

Solar energy deposit doesn't produce energy?

But you're absolutely right, we need more. At least one for each big resource or modifier, and probably more than that to make sure planets feel unique.

I was gonna suggest it produce energy but then I thought "too many of these produce secondary resources. that's not a theme of local resources."

 

[Aëron Dúrr]

What about a medicine plant as another resource? Boosts the immune system and as an result leads to longer life spans of rulers and faster growth of Pops.

 

[scaper12123]

What about a medicine plant as another resource? Boosts the immune system and as an result leads to longer life spans of rulers and faster growth of Pops.

Problem with that is longer lifespans is a universal thing (therefor it would be strategic) and faster growth of pops is already covered.

 

[SirSprinkles]

Maybe a local resource or planetary modifier or something representing the discovery of a cache of alien technology. Could be something like +1 all research by default with and the corresponding building increases it to +2 or +3.

 

[Bearjuden]

A few other ideas:

• Stable Latitude: This latitude and region is particularly stable, allowing construction of a space elevator and the easy shipment of starship parts to space. (-ship cost and construction time if you build a space elevator, space elevators can only be built on these resources)
• Ancient Monument: This construct is clearly not natural, yet any marker of its purpose or origin have long since dissolved into dust. (+1 unity on adjacent or possibly +3 or 4 unity on the tile?)
• Hostile Training Ground: This region is at the very limits of what life can endure and troops trained here can suffer through almost any peril. (all troops start with a special unique attachment; possibly restrict this to what kind of troops are built there eg if you build a clone factory atop it then only clones get that attachment)
  • [This one is only if they ever re-introduce army attachments or something of the sort, but since they said they are interested in the concept just not the execution I will leave it here. Or the idea can be adapted to some other troop modifier, depending on how the game evolves]
• Perfect Crater: This crater is suspiciously close to a perfect hemisphere. How it got that way is arguably as big a question as what to use it for. (+energy OR +physics, depending on what you build atop it)

Not all of these should be equally weighted, of course. Alien Pets for example, might be rather common, while others might be more rare (but correspondingly stronger).

 

[DukeLeto42]

Additionally, Some of those could be more connected to planetary features:

• Excavating the ancient monument and its associated civilization might result in a discovery of ancient deposits worldwide, providing a new planetary modifier.
• Planets with high volcanic activity could be induced to generate new mineral deposits (the "volcanic ore" tile)... but the effort might go terribly wrong.
• Planets with +mineral modifiers have a higher likelihood of having special mineral deposits, or similarly special +food spots from especially lush worlds.

Another option would be to have some special techs that would allow generating new tile options based on investments - such as an empire edict promoting resource speculation and prospecting, with a tiny monthly chance for tiles to gain new resources.

 

[Gaussia]

Hydrothermal Vents: producing lots of energy.