There's no reason to ever build energy districts

[Orkonkel]

Try playing hive mine and not build any energy districts. Different strategies for different empires.

What I would like to see is not infinite resources on the market. Makes no sense to me.

 

[scaper12123]

In actuality, trade can only get you so far. Even as a Megacorp, it's important to have enough generators to supplement the income you're getting from trade in case you need to buy things en-mass.

 

[Kinkness]

I got this idea when looking at the galactic market in an inward perfection + agrarian idyll game :

And well, the conclusion "Well, it's strictly better to build farms because not only I get amenities and more housing from them, but I can sell the food for more energy than I would get by building energy district".

But it's even worse than that. A farmer produce 6 food. A technician produce 4 energy credit. Even if you're selling your food on the domestic market you get 6*0.7 = 4.2 energy credit per pop.

So you can replace all your energy production with farms, still make as much money at least as you did, and get a food surplus that you can use to run the pop growth planetary edict so you can grow your pops (and economy) faster.

Suggested fix : Make energy production better.

This post completely ignores many things... This is on a base average.... It does not take into account:

1) Natural planetary modifiers that could exist
2) Technology that boosts energy income
3) Upgraded buildings such as the one that gives energy output +15%
4) Energy Grid planetary type (I forget what its called, but ultimately it gives an extra 5-10% boost to energy income if you build mostly energy districts, and focus on energy buildings)
5) Civic and governments, and traits

Energy has more buffs than food does.

Take into account as well population traits which give energy boosts to workers, etc... (Which I'm not even sure there is a food equivelant, just a energy/minerals though I could be mistaken).


Sure you can definetly make a playstyle and empire that focuses on never using energy, boosting your mineral/food production and using the excess to sell, but that by no means makes it that energy credits is unbalanced, or useless, or even generating too little..

I could make an exact post, stacking all the energy bonus modifiers together and claim there is no point to ever make food districts.

 

[Bki]

This would the depend on the Internal Market not getting price drops due to montly trades I assume? Or do you need access to the Galactic Market for this to work? Becuse as long as the price remains at the base 0.7 Energy per Food, I can see this getting you a small "profit" even without any bonuses.

If we assume you have 10 pops over, and the ability to build either 5 Energy districts or 5 Food districts. Building the Energy districts would give you 5 x 2x 4 = 40 Energy. Building the Food districs would give you 5 x 2 x 6 = 60 Food. If you then add a monthly trade of 60 Food for Energy, you would end up with 60 x 0.7 = 42 Energy. As long as the market price doesn't drop below 0.67 Energy per Food, you will break even or get a small profit by producing Food rather then Energy.
And if the Galactic Market pays you better than that, then I can see you swimming in Energy by simply building farms.

Have you tried doing this on a large scale? And does the market (Either Internal or Galactic) retain a stable price if you do so?

It's really only worth it when you get access to the galactic market, but since you can do it on the internal market for no losses, you might as well build the farms early so you have them to sell your food when it does open. And if you get the market fee reduction traditions (well of course not for isolationist empires) it would even get you some decent surplus.

As for doing it on a large scale, well :

It has stayed stable around that price for some time. Possibly there's a limit on how much you can sell, but I've yet to run into it. You can probably use trade rather than energy district for the rest of your energy need anyway.

Sounds more like a strategy specific to your game? I've never seen food selling for quite that much. Default price is .7 and that's usually where it sits. Something seems funky with the AI nations in your game if it's selling for that much. Are you on the beta patch too where they've tweaked the market? It's done a good job at making market specific strategies less worthwhile.

I could see it working out if you can routinely sell that much food, but my current empire needs to make ~2300 energy right now and still growing. That's a lot of food to sell.

I'm on the beta patch. Actually I just loaded a save started pre-beta and the food price started to climb steadily from 0.70 to 0.85 in a few months. That might be the beta making the AI buy more food or something.

 

[#Tukuro]

So you can replace all your energy production with farms, still make as much money at least as you did, and get a food surplus that you can use to run the pop growth planetary edict so you can grow your pops (and economy) faster.

Suggested fix : Make energy production better.

That trick stops working though the moment conversion rates on the market drop. Agrarian Idyll also cuts you out of wars of aggression; It's a trade-off.

 

[Kent_Lang]

And you often have even less tiles available for energy production

I've seen the opposite which is that I've ran into situations where I often have a shortage of food tiles. I think the amount of tiles you get is dependent on the planet type, with dry planets generally getting more energy, wet planets getting more agriculture and cold planets getting more mining.

 

[Jorgen_CAB]

Fact is that the market is bogus as a mechanic and simply don't work.

Second thing is that energy and credits should be a separate thing in the game.

If the market was a real supply and demand market and energy and credits was separate entities this whole discussion would be moot since supply and demand would sort it self out automatically.

The other problem is location, you can swap one resource in one end of the galaxy with another at the other end with NO efficiency loss, this make a real trading system moot. I can just produce one resource really effectively and then convert that magically on the market to any other resources I want.

As long as Paradox insist on a market that make no sense we will have these inconsistencies in the game. Resources on the market are completely artificial and infinite which make prices distorted and disconnected from the game production system, this will always produce distortion in things and make it possible to convert one resource for another even of some rare resources does not really exist or actually should by at a very low supply.

I hope Paradox go back to the drawing board with the market and make it actually a real market.

The internal market is also a joke and make no sense... how can you buy food from your internal market while your people is starving. If you choose not to do so they will starve and not use what food actually is there. I just make no sense. They say the internal market is the civilian market when the game really don't work like that, there are no civilian market. The empire supply all the food and consumer goods for the people not the civilian market. exactly what is and does the civilian economy do in the game?!?

Any way... the market is borked and will continue to be so as long as it is just a make believe system to buy resources that never existed... kind of how money is printed in real life just this is real tangible physical things used to create stuff, magical stuff. MANA?!?

 

[Bki]

This post completely ignores many things... This is on a base average.... It does not take into account:

1) Natural planetary modifiers that could exist
2) Technology that boosts energy income
3) Upgraded buildings such as the one that gives energy output +15%
4) Energy Grid planetary type (I forget what its called, but ultimately it gives an extra 5-10% boost to energy income if you build mostly energy districts, and focus on energy buildings)
5) Civic and governments, and traits

Energy has more buffs than food does.

Take into account as well population traits which give energy boosts to workers, etc... (Which I'm not even sure there is a food equivelant, just a energy/minerals though I could be mistaken).

Sure you can definetly make a playstyle and empire that focuses on never using energy, boosting your mineral/food production and using the excess to sell, but that by no means makes it that energy credits is unbalanced, or useless, or even generating too little..

I could make an exact post, stacking all the energy bonus modifiers together and claim there is no point to ever make food districts.

1 - There are natural planet modifiers for food too. A +5% energy credit modifier will just make energy district on par with selling food on the internal market. +10-+20% planet might be worth building energy district on if the price of food on the galactic market is low though, I will grant you that.
2 - Technology that boosts food income from job.
3 - Planetary unique that give a +15% food output.
4 - Farm world.
5 - Civics and government doesn't boost energy specifically. There is a trait for food as well as for energy.

Except planetary modifiers, most modifier can be ignored due to existing as well for food.

That trick stops working though the moment conversion rates on the market drop. Agrarian Idyll also cuts you out of wars of aggression; It's a trade-off.

You get money from it as long as you can sell the food as more than 0.67 energy credit a piece. And you don't need AI for that.

 

[Kinkness]

Fact is that the market is bogus as a mechanic and simply don't work.

Second thing is that energy and credits should be a separate thing in the game.

If the market was a real supply and demand market and energy and credits was separate entities this whole discussion would be moot since supply and demand would sort it self out automatically.

As long as Paradox insist on a market that make no sense we will have these inconsistencies in the game. Resources on the market are completely artificial and infinite which make prices distorted and disconnected from the game production system, this will always produce distortion in things and make it possible to convert one resource for another even of some rare resources does not really exist or actually should by at a very low supply.

I hope Paradox go back to the drawing board with the market and make it actually a real market.

The internal market is also a joke and make no sense... how can you buy food from your internal market while your people is starving. If you choose not to do so they will starve and not use what food actually is there. I just make no sense. They say the internal market is the civilian market when the game really don't work like that, there are no civilian market. The empire supply all the food and consumer goods for the people not the civilian market. exactly what is and does the civilian economy do in the game?!?

Any way... the market is borked and will continue to be so as long as it is just a make believe system to buy resources that never existed... kind of how money is printed in real life just this is real tangible physical things used to create stuff, magical stuff. MANA?!?

I agree with this ^

 

[Cat_Fuzz]

You can focus on trade and energy to really max your energy, then you can buy off the market.

 

[mammothhunter]

In my game I am overproducing food as well and was trying to get income out of this. Setting a deal to sell 800-1000 food montly drops its price to around 0.2. I'm not on beta patch if that matters. Basically the more you sell the worse are the prices. As they should be?

 

[Bankipriel]

Monthly trade. Set up for example to sell 50 food per month, the price will go down to 0.69 credits on the first day of the month then come back to 0.70 immediately after.

Okay, but in my current game (at 2298) I'm maxed out on food districts w/ a comfortable but not overlarge surplus (around 120 I think), and I'm producing over 2000k energy from energy districts, but 900 from trade (w/ 225 CG from the other 1/2 of my trade), with a net gain of about +60 per month, meaning that I'm using almost all of my energy production.

Not only is there absolutely *no* way to produce the kind of food I would need to make up approx. 2k energy. Even if the market held steady at .7 (which I don't think it would w/ monthly trades close to 3k food), the approx 2857 food necessary to trade in 2000 energy at .7 trade value is a ratio of 1.4. Now, factor in the 30% trade cost, or, let's say reasonable best case scenario, 10% (because you got galactic market trade capital and you've got import/export agenda or some other buffs that knock another 10% off). Your cost now becomes 3142, which is a 1.57 ratio of conversion. That is slightly worse than the ratio of difference between base food and energy production 6 to 4.

So assuming the markets could sustain a 3k monthly trade of food into energy, on it's face my late-early game energy needs would be better met with energy districts than trading in food for energy.

Your argument in favor of this is based on the added benefits you would get from agrarian idyll and other food focuses in your empire build. And that would make sense.

Except I don't think there's any way to produce enough food. I would need 3k in 2298, meaning I would need 10-30k food for trade by mid and late game, not mention the upkeep on the massive population I would need on all those agri-worlds. Seems unlikely.

And, I don't believe the market would sustain that level of purchase (unless it does. I mean, if the market can hold price with dumping 3-15k food per month, then I guess it *might* work, but in that case, I would contend the market is broken and should be fixed). I am skeptical that your ratio of 1.57 would recover from even 3-5k monthly food trades. There may be a way to use this strategy to great effect early game, with a very specific build. But in general, it looks quite clearly like a sub-optimal (if not outright bad) way to design an economy in this game.

So, I think you're pretty significantly mistaken in your assertion that generator districts are useless and that food can be used as a substitute on a large scale and as the foundation of an empire's energy acquisition.

 

[Bki]

I think you forgot to take into account farmers making 6 food while technician only make 4. This is what make food competitive even at 0.7 energy per food.

 

[Jorgen_CAB]

In my game I am overproducing food as well and was trying to get income out of this. Setting a deal to sell 800-1000 food montly drops its price to around 0.2. I'm not on beta patch if that matters. Basically the more you sell the worse are the prices. As they should be?

The market is broken... you can just sell then buy then sell again and you end up with more money you started with. Basically an infinity machine.

You can do micro sales but that borkes out the marked equally with outrageously prices and it is not really based on supply and demand as market prices will normalize whether anyone buy or sell resources. This means you can always find ways to seriously break and abuse the market.

 

[brn4meplz]

Clearly the game needs Galactic Market events.

It should take stock of resource production and trade volume. And it should short or raise the price of things. You might find yourself rapidly changing economic style if the price of your food bottoms out.

Or properly track the cost of things based on the games historical transactions. Currently it’s self righting. Given time the values normalize

 

[Jorgen_CAB]

The market should work differently... you should offer a food for a certain price then other should bid on it.

No one should be able to buy anything if there are no one to supply it, very simple stuff.

This way you could legitimately survive buy selling stuff, at least until others figure it out and cuts in on your profitable market. Question is if the AI would ever be smart enough to deal with it, players would often be able to make huge wins on such a market if AI never reacted to market prices.

 

[Person012345]

Try to sell large amount of food (or any other resource) every month and you will see price going down and down.

Not only this but in my game food hovers at around 0.3 energy sell price

 

[Mavkiel]

Sort of neat. But honestly if it is as bad as its made out to be it will be patched out. But, I get the feeling this sort of strategy will only get you so far before the market drops out on you and your entire economy death spirals..

Also things to keep in mind, having pro growth edict on at all times is nice. (Thats 1k food a pop). Various other things you might want to spend that food on.

-gifts to improve relations
-convert to credits and spend it on resources (which you can't do if you are dependent on food to credits just to meet your monthly bill)

 

[Siven80]

You certainly need to make energy districts early game! Its actually the first thing i build on my capital.

No idea about late game as im not there yet.

 

[Jorgen_CAB]

You certainly need to make energy districts early game! Its actually the first thing i build on my capital.

No idea about late game as im not there yet.

While I agree that you will need energy districts since farms are not infinate, especially in the early game the point is that food give you more energy by selling them on the internal markets than what you get from energy districts if you have no special bonuses on either resource.

You sell 6 food for 4.2 Energy which is what one farmer give you.
Technicians give you 4 Energy.

You can sell a sum and then wait for the price to get back up to 0.7 per food and sell in bulk again.

Basically your civilian market have however much energy you need even if you have no energy districts developed on your planets or energy mined in space if you would choose not to take it for some dumb reason.

This perfect conversion of resources is one of the bigger issues I have with Stellaris economy as well as the perfect transportation and logistics of resources which make no real sense.