How econ really works, and why the efficiency counter is a little bit of a lie

Here's my breakdown of how econ works, and it might change your way of thinking and building to be a little more effective.

So, the really important econ stat in PA is effective metal usage. Metal is used directly to grow econ or indirectly on combat capabilities, necessary to mitigate threats and ultimately to inflict damage on and destroy the enemy. In general, the player with higher metal usage over time has the better econ (as long as that metal isn't being wasted building unnecessary things), and with more metal built (not destroyed, or wasted because of overflow) is in a better position.

Maximizing metal usage is fairly complex, which is what makes econ so interesting. Firstly, the metal must be collected from metal points. You must control enough metal points and build on them to make this metal available. It's a good idea to build a few extra mexes if you expect to lose some, but excess mexes are wasted overflow metal until you have the backbone to use them. If lost mexes cut into your econ, they must be rebuilt immediately, (even though the efficiency counter reads 100%) your econ has taken a significant hit if your metal use goes down.

In order to use metal being collected, you need fabbers and plants to power them. If you are trying to use too many fabbers, the efficiency counter, correctly, takes a hit, and they should be pulled off. Fabbers are fairly cheap, so you can have some extra, but don't build too many, or it's wasted metal (and build time in factories). Power plants are expensive in terms of metal, but they are required for growth and radar. Just like mexes, a few extra don't hurt much, but excess power plants are simply wasted metal (even though the efficiency counter reads 100%).

Different fabbers have different efficiencies. This is very important because of how expensive power plants are. Bot and vech fabbers are the standard, bots are a tiny bit cheaper to build so try to focus on those, but if your bot factories are busy you can build some vech fabbers, no problem in using vech fabbers.

Your commander is your most efficient fabber, 2x as efficient as bot and vech fabbers. In the early game, you should always be using the commander to build, the easiest way to do this is to use him to build factories, some power, or assist T2 factories. Every step he takes moving around in the early game hurts your economy because he is not using his efficient build gun (even though the efficiency counter reads 100%; I would really like to see the commander permanently factored into the efficiency counter, so it goes down when he is not building). Once your econ starts to grow to T2 it's less of a problem, and the commander can move a little more freely, but it's still good to keep him building.

Naval and especially air fabbers are inefficient (even though the efficiency counter reads 100%; naval and air fabbers should negatively affect the counter, because this easily misleads newbies). Do not use them in groups, they suck up a lot more power than would be required for land fabbers to use the same amount of mass. Remember, power plants are expensive to build. They can be good to start build projects, or to build small things like some T1 radar, sonar, and maybe a point defense here or a mex there when required, but always rely on land fabbers and your commander if possible to do the bulk of your building. You will need less power plants this way, and can spend that mass on mexes or combat units instead.

Factories are a little more efficient than fabbers, but they take a lot of metal to build, so if you are trying to pump out a few units fast, just assist a factory instead of building a new one. But, for a long production cycle, it's better to build some extra factories, instead of tons of extra fabbers and plants to power them.

Now, all your fabbers can't be building all the time. They need to move around to get to mexes and build defenses. This, combined with roll off from factories, will create some flux in your econ, where energy and mass usage will be spiking as fabbers build, and then dropping off as they move. You accommodate this by building storage. Storage structures are expensive, but if they save more metal than would have overflowed, they are worth it. Again, don't build too many, because if you don't need them, it's wasted metal.

The outcome of a battle can largely be calculated by metal. Whichever side had more metal destroyed generally lost the battle. Also, if econ damage was inflicted (affecting metal usage), that adds up over time.

I would really like to see casters focus more on metal counts, and actively reference graphs that show metal usage over time.

Some of your assertions are outdated. For example,

• Naval fabricators are just as efficient as land.
• Bot and vehicle fabbers are identical but vehicles are built quicker, which saves time.
• Air fabbers are only 22% more inefficient which isn't that bad considering their speed and immunity to pathing around obstructions.
• Storages only cost 450 metal which is pretty cheap in my opinion. If you go 450 metal over your limit then the metal storage has already paid for itself and energy storages are vital due to the large power fluctuations as different fabbers start and stop different build projects.

I find this a highly unusual statement to make. I do not understand the concept of having 'extra mexes', you should be aiming to capture every possible mex and using every single piece of metal you have in storage, not having redundant mexes overflowing eco in case you lose some. Moderate stalling of metal is a good thing because you are utilising every piece of metal available to you. Having metal in storage reduces the number of buildings or units you could have giving you advantages on the field.

One of these days I should probably learn more about it than "extractors make metal, power generators make power, factories and fabbers build stuff, T2 doubly so".

If you ask me, the efficiency meter is there as a rough indication how you are doing, and to show new players they are doing something wrong ...

Understanding spending and future income is key to this game. Liked ur post bro!

I thought efficiency meter is how less faster you build if you lack all of a certain resource to build like you are trying to.

Fabber energy usage is a matter of using the least-energy-using fabber and the rule of thumb is the better the fabber the more energy it cost.

He has one valid point about that. While the efficiency doesn't lie at all actually, it doesn't inform you when your using crappy fabbers. Maybe have a seperate number, if someone can mod it, that adds up your total fabber energy consumption across the board and divides it by number of fabbers. That number will be your "average fabber energy use", and if it is higher you are costing yourself more metal while if it is lower you are saving yourself more energy you don't need or that you can spend on radar and the such.

However, note, you can see this number yourself just by seeing what fabbers you are using and by seeing your total energy. You know if you are using 10-20 fabbers and stalling energy when that energy is normally fine, that you are using too many air and maybe turn them off. Heck, rule of thumb, if you can use air fabbers to build proxy bots then retire the air fabbers for bot ones fresh from the distant factory.

Production percentage is a useless metric. It is in fact LESS than useless, because it directly harms the player by providing BAD information that encourages BAD game play.

A proper resource UI needs to:
1) warn the player about excess metal. Any excess is bad and you should feel bad.
2) warn the player about inadequate energy. Any brownout is a potential disaster.

That's it. A player with 0 metal in storage and a very slim surplus of energy is doing it right. I say "slim" because you may want more or less spare energy depending on how energy changes during a crisis.

It... does that? Green is a mildly stalled metal (within 90% build speed) and green for power is within a fabber or two over break even. This is because you might as well not waste a single drop of metal, and because you do need to waste power just to make sure you sustain radar.

Yellow means let up on some usage, for metal it means your wasting a lot of fabbers of energy without any metal usage from them, for energy it means your slowly dipping into negative but have time to react before energy depletes and radar goes down.

Red means hard crash, almost half or lower build speed, using almost twice the metal you income, and spending over 30% more power than available.

Blue means tons of untapped energy, or blue means your metal storage filled (which as you said is bad).

Unfortunately blue is frequently used as a positive color, usually in places where it is superior to green. There is nothing positive about wasting metal. Over filled energy is equally a concerning point.

Like I said, a bad UI that encourages bad play.

Code blue is.... bad? Means your dead, doesn't it? I could be wrong, I am not a surgeon but I do play surgeon simulator. I also think I am a pretty good goat at times too...

Anyway, color is moddable. What color you suggest? If red, you don't know from color if you need to spend more or less. If yellow, you lose a magnitude queue. Purple? Idfk...

How about using the same colors that are already being used to represent bad things? Yellow and red? Filling metal storage above 50% is kind of concerning, and maxing out is definitely a BAD thing.