Pretty random question this ...

[BINXTHAMINX]

Being a bit of a novice (this is my first post) this question no doubt seems daft but hey what the hell, shoot from the hip etc ... is it worth destroying data centres (-20 AI progress) whilst AI progress is still relatively low or is it best to hit them later? does it really matter? and finally can the AI progress ever be in minus numbers and if so does it have any affect?

[x4000]

Welcome to the forums!  That's a really good question, actually.

And the answer is that you should feel free to destroy them at any time, and it's always worthwhile to do so if you are able to get to them.  There is a certain AI Progress Floor below which the AI Progress will never go at any given time.  If you hover over the AI Progress display at the top of the screen (in the latest betas, anyway) it will break it down for you.

So there are definitely times when destroying a data center will be "useless" in the short term, meaning that it will not cause the effective AI Progress to go down because of the AIP Floor.  But, in all cases it remembers how much your total reduction is, and so that "useless" reduction will kick in and become useful by preventing future increases from effecting the overall effective AIP overmuch.

The lowest AIP is generally something like 1 at the start, and that floor increases as your total underlying AIP increases over the course of the game.  So, no negative AIP ever.

[keith.lamothe]

The game will track "Negative AI Progress" separately from the positive, so you never lose any of the benefit of destroying the data center even if you do it really early.  There is an "AI Progress Floor" (based on the total positive amount) that effective AIP never drops below, but if you have a big surplus of negative AIP then it will take that much more positive AIP to actually start increasing the effective AIP.

If it sounds confusing, don't worry, the point is that you can take out the data centers as early as you like and you won't lose anything

(edit: ninja'd again, he's fast!)

[Sizzle]

Poor Keith... ninja'd again.

Perhaps you need to make friends with some pirates to keep ninja-ing at bay...

[BINXTHAMINX]

Cheers guys thats cleared that one up nicely  gotta say I'm impressed by the response time, good to know the supports there!

[x4000]

Our pleasure!