How about you give reactors some flexibility in their power output/resource usage? Like, allow reactors to automatically scale down production by up to x%? You could then disable turning off energy reactors. It allows for automatic optimal generator usage in small cases (i.e. no constant tactical level micro) while still being significant in more major cases.
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Yea, I suggested something like that to Chris yesterday:
Me:
"One possible improvement I can think of is to disallow low-power-mode on reactors but make it so you only "pay" for the energy you actually use, not the excess. Or maybe you only pay like 1/5th for energy you don't use. I can think of ways of making the implementation very simple, but the more important issue is whether it would really help."
Response:
"Well, that actually doesn't work, because it removes all risk to your infrastructure from the AI hitting reactors. People would just build a comfortable buffer, leave it on, and then energy is essentially a non-factor in most of the game. This is what I mean, it just goes round and round.
"
And he's right, it would just be shuffling out one problem for a very similar version of the same problem, not actually achieving a net gain. So rather than changing the model to just-different-problems or introducing a toggle whereby the game makes the decisions for you, we're making it so that you can implement the decisions "turn on the low-power reactor that would be most efficient" and "turn off the least efficient active reactor" without actually having to do the math or navigate the lists yourself. So you still have to think about it, and keep an eye on your energy, and react to situations, but it's something you can do on the fly.
