On starting storage

Discussion in 'Balance Discussions' started by Imsvale, August 10, 2014.

  1. Imsvale

    Imsvale Active Member

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    Recently we had the boost to the commander's own resource generation. This was to simply skip the mandatory (and admittedly, perhaps, tedious) resource build in the beginning. As a long-time TA player, I find the resource balance in PA much more unstable. By this I mean, in TA you would get 1-2 metal per extractor (~3 on a metal map), and you had a starting metal storage of 1000. In PA, the initial storage is also 1000, but the income from each extractor is a whooping 7. As your metal income ramps up, it's very easy to start overflowing and not have enough time to react. In part, this is certainly due to poor planning by the player, or lack of managing skill/experience, but the game's design isn't helping in this respect. The likely rate of fluctuation is much higher than in TA, and therefore much harder to manage. Unless you build metal storage early.

    Of course, this was true before the commander change. But with it, there is now a case to be made for increased initial storage.

    An important premise here is that wasting metal is bad (and energy, but not to the same extent). This is something I have in me from the TA days, although the same would apply in PA, despite what the efficiency indicator would have you believe (that thing is confusing new players, I tells ya). I strive to avoid wasting, and I'm finding it that much harder in this game.

    My argument would be that, if early metal storage is almost mandatory, then by the same logic as the above-mentioned commander change, I'd like to see increased starting storage. This will stabilize the metal bar, and make managing one's economy a little bit less like threading a needle during an earthquake.

    (The very same argument can be applied to energy storage, but I feel it's not as big an issue. Though if we did see an increase in starting storage, it would make sense to do both, since they are both out of proportion.)

    Alternative solution: Reduce metal extractor output, rebalance all metal costs. No? Aww.

    TL;DR: Gief more initial storage. It's is out of proportion relative to income.
  2. ef32

    ef32 Well-Known Member

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    I had the idea where you start with zero metal and energy in storage, in my opinion, it would help diversify starting strategies, i.e. you can start with mex first, but it's not mandatory, and you can build energy storage, since your power is still +1500, and you can go factory first, followed by mex, but you can't really go 2 factories first, which is a good thing I guess.

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