Newbie meta question

[Kazmahu]

Hello everyone! I've had AI War in my steam library for a while and tried to get into it a few times, and this last time was actually more successful. I'm just now getting my teeth into my first real campaign, but having played the game a couple of times over the last few years, I noticed a few resource changes this time. Specifically, the absence of Crystal, and multiple types of Energy generators being reduced to one and the resource-guzzler. I'm not in a position to get judgmental about them, but I was curious about the thought process behind those changes (which are fairly recent, since the wiki still has vestigial mentions of "metal and crystal" scattered about). I know this is the kind of thing often answers in dev blogs and the like, so links to something I've missed there would also be appreciated.

Thanks in advance, and I look forward to forum-ing with you all as I learn about the game!

[Aklyon]

You can find all the changes in the series of update notes pages, but for a quick summary of the two you pointed out:
Energy generators: I'm not sure why myself they went poof. But they did.
Crystal: Too similar to metal. Thus it was combined and keith used the space to make hacking a proper resource instead of sitting in the message bar.

[Pumpkin]

Energy generators: I'm not sure why myself they went poof. But they did.

I can't really tell about before the "poof of logic" of the generators, but I can tell why there is only two now and why it's great. There is two generator types because there is two resources you can trade for energy : metal and AIP. I explain. The basic generator is limited to 150,000 production per planet (one generator per planet), and the only way to have more of them is to take planets and pay the AIP "cost". The matter converter is a simple way to trade metal for energy. There is no need for more kind of generators that would trade the same resource for the same resource. The design is simple and elegant. If previous generators were just slightly different ways to trade the same resource for energy, I understand why they were simplified.

That leads me to think: there seems to be another niche for energy generator. If we stick to this elegant design rule of one kind of PGen per resource type trade, why not making a Knowledge -> Energy trade? It would be some sort of K-locked, advanced PGen that replaces a regular PGen on a planet with a galaxy cap just like the advanced OCStations. (I often find myself in such desperate need for energy that I buy MkII Eco OCStation just for the little energy boost. I would be glad in these situations if I would be able to spend K for E, just like I spend K for M.)

*Do some wiki digging*
*Unearth something*

Wait, were the ECollectors already that simple? Were they already AIP for E and M for E? The page is 2012-old. Were they more complex before? I not sure to understand anything anymore. Welp, I let my message as it is. If some elder forumer can enlighten us all, I bet it would be appreciated.

[Kazmahu]

Thanks for the replies! And Pumpkin, I suspect the change was made long ago, but I distinctly remember that once upon a time there was no Metal-for-Energy option. Instead each planet could support one each of three types of generators, which ranged from cheap and quick with low output, to high-output but hideously inefficient to build, with a balanced one in the middle. Thinking about it I suspect the system was dropped because there would have been very, VERY few situations where you won't just build the three in sequence as necessary.

[Traveller]

Pumpkin:  There are already two K-for-E mechanics in place.
1) Higher level command stations.  'Nuff said.
2) Upgrading your turrets, surprisingly.  Turrets of a given type cost a constant E per unit, regardless of rank.  If you decide you need to put out X damage per second on a planet (instead of a cap of everything), you can accomplish that with less energy if you have higher turret ranks available.  If your turrets cost 700E apiece, and a cap of them is 100 turrets, halving the number of turrets you need on multiple planets is a HUGE energy savings.

[Toranth]

The reactor issue, as I remember it, was that it was boring micromanagement fiddling with building reactors in the proper order (because MC->E efficiency was not equal), and then turning them on/off as needed in the right order.
The Automated Energy Hamsters solved the on/off issue, but once it became a matter of "Push button X to optimally adjust energy!" why not just have it happen without pushing the button?

Basically, it didn't serve a lot of game purpose and it wasn't much fun, so the newer simplified version was introduced.  The new version was modified again, when the 10 Matter Converters per system cap was introduced to prevent hiding all the power sources in a single, safe, system and again raise the risk of brownouts.


Metal and Crystal happened because during a long series of discussions, it came out that very few players actually gave much attention to the choice of "Crystal or Metal", especially past the first system or two captured.  Again, once Metal/Crystal Converters were On/Off automated, there wasn't even that but of micromanagement to involve the player in. 
There was an aborted attempt to convert Crystal to a different purpose - like being used by bigger, rarer ships more than common, low-mark units... but there was much discussion, much disagreement, and then Hacking as a Resource came along, and most people were satisfied.

[Pumpkin]

Pumpkin:  There are already two K-for-E mechanics in place.
1) Higher level command stations.  'Nuff said.

Yap, I know. But I think it's a bit... I don't know... (*Rofl, grab the dictionary*) Mmmkay, "with poor affordance" would do it, but it's not perfectly what I feel. I feel something like "if I want to pay K for E, there must be a button for it, and only it" (just like the MkII/III MCollectors). But I know, Eco MkII/III is often my (poor) choice.

2) Upgrading your turrets, surprisingly.  Turrets of a given type cost a constant E per unit, regardless of rank.  If you decide you need to put out X damage per second on a planet (instead of a cap of everything), you can accomplish that with less energy if you have higher turret ranks available.  If your turrets cost 700E apiece, and a cap of them is 100 turrets, halving the number of turrets you need on multiple planets is a HUGE energy savings.

I also know it, and I discovered it rather recently (in my last AAR, with my first --poor-- attempt at high-AIP playstyle). However, it's still a bit odd (for a new player, for example) to think "I lack energy so I must spend K to be more E-efficient" instead of "I must spend K for more E".

I'm not saying the system is bad as it is now (rather the opposite, in fact). I'm just wondering if we can't push the design philosophy a bit further and have a clear "K->E" option just like we have "K->M" and "M->E" options. The "K->E" option would be something more "affordant" and "newb-friendly" (I say newb without bad meaning: I was a newb and I still am in some corners of the gameplay or some playstyles. There is no shame, for no one.) and the high-end turrets E-efficient will still and always be an advanced strategy, always more interesting in the "K+E->turrets" conversion. (It's like getting K->M then M->E, aka MkII/III MHarverters and MConverters: it not the most efficient option.)

Anyway, very interesting topic.
I love this game.

[Draco18s]

Energy generators: I'm not sure why myself they went poof. But they did.

The energy system has changed almost as many times as the game has major versions. (Ok, not quite)

Its kind of gone back and forth a bit, and the oldest system is one I can no longer remember (harks back to the 2.0 days, easily).  But I do remember when I played 3.0 for the first time that "it had changed."

The system then was 3 levels of resources->energy with increasingly less-optimal ratios as you built the bigger ones and built more of them, which is the one I'm sure you're familiar with.  Which prompted the change for them to be easily manageable (we hot a hotkey that would turn off the least efficient one still operating, and another hotkey to turn on the next most efficient).  There were many many calls to make this automatic, as power was a HUGE resource sink (I mean huge, each planet could easily be drawing ten thousand metal/sec regardless of whether or not you were actually utilizing the power), and saving 20% on your car insurance was crucial.

So finally Keith and/or Chris looked into the math and gathered some numbers on "about how much" power a single planet could "reasonably produce" and that turned into the free 150k we get now.  There's been a few minor changes with the system since, but nothing important enough for me to remember.

[Radiant Phoenix]

When I started playing, matter converters weren't originally limited to 10/planet. We already had energy collectors, though.