Metal Storage stores 5000 metal. It costs 450 metal and between 22500 and 55000 energy. Energy Storage stores 100000 energy. It costs 450 metal and between 22500 and 55000 energy. A Metal Storage stores 1111% of its own cost. It can run a typical fabber for 500 seconds. It can run a T1 bot factory for 417 seconds. It can run a T1 vehicle factory for 333 seconds. It can run a T1 air factory for 556 seconds. It stores 91% of the cost of a T2 land factory. It stores 714 seconds of production from a T1 metal extractor. It stores 179 seconds of production from a T2 metal extractor. An Energy Storage stores 222% of its own cost. (As built by fabbers.) It can run a typical fabber for 100 seconds. It can run a T1 bot factory for 160 seconds. It can run a T1 vehicle factory for 148 seconds. It can run a T1 air factory for 121 seconds. It stores 18% of the cost of a T2 land factory. (As built by fabbers.) It stores 167 seconds of production from a T1 energy plant. It stores 20 seconds of production from a T2 energy plant. It stores 25 seconds of production from a Solar Array. You need up to five times as much energy storage to get the same amount of production value as you would from metal storage. Another way to think of this is that an equivalent Metal Storage structure would cost 2250 metal. I think this contributes to energy being a little too "bursty", or at least exacerbates the penalties with the current energy-limited economy.
While the energy storage could use a buff. Building metal storage however is something to avoid, if you can.
Actually, with the current metal surplus seen in most games, it is IMPERATIVE that you build one. Once you hit full, you can basically rush an advanced factory or nuke launcher without hurting your efficiency.
They're useful if you expect to lose most of your metal income for a significant amount of time. And that is a pretty extreme difference in efficiency. I think that that is a bit strange-- should be addressed for sure.
Metal storrage is usefull when your teammates are not spending it and you don't like to see it go to waste Also lategame when you have entire planets with T2 mex it can get hard to acutally use it all
If you are playing perfectly, yes. I don't know of any players that can play a perfect game though. I never remember to make metal storage, but once that t2 eco gets going there is always a point where I waste metal because I haven't had time to make enough fabbers to spend it all. Metal storage is a way to soften the pain of playing poorly.
I think in the current economy a metal storage is the key I was looking for to solve some metal overflow I just cannot prevent so far. It pays of a lot.
Added a couple more stats to the OP. Regarding the metal overflow, part of that could be attributed to energy storage. Because of the lower energy storage relative to production, it's easier to waste large amounts of energy. You then aren't able to use that energy to spend the metal you have accumulated in storage, adding to the problem. The result is that you either have to build much more energy storage (nearly half a T2 factory's worth), or you have to overcompensate when building energy production.
The storage solves my issue of "not enough energy, but so much metal before t2", to be precise. Once I am t2 I can use the stored metal much more efficiently.
Storage is an undervalued structure in the game. It can be quite helpful late game. As for balance... I dunno. Why not give energy storage a buff? *shrugs*
I think that energy storage would use a capacity buff, metal storage capacity sounds fine to me . I don't agree that player who decide to storage excess energy or metal is a bad player, especially in case of energy as you can spend much more energy than you produce in short periods of time (especially useful if combat fabricators speed and consumption would be larger).
With perfect play you should have almost 0 metal in storage and almost 0 energy in storage without stalling at all times. But who plays perfectly?
this is another case of "if you're not supposed to use it, WHY IS IT THERE?" if it was never meant to be used, it would have been removed, or even never implemented to begin with. for me, storage is a great way to counteract economic strain. store it up when the times are good, drain the reserves when disaster strikes...or when that certain something needed to be built a few minutes ago, and you haven't the natural income to handle it. having enough resources in reserve allows you to overcome income lapses effectively. and can sometimes save your bacon.
Well no, it's more of a case that you shouldn't need to use it if you are playing properly, and are not wasting the economy you are generating. If you are not wasting your eco, then why on earth are you wasting money and time building something that is useless? Empty storage is worthless.
This thread amuses me because I keep meaning to build a metal storage before I go to t2 and I always forget, while other people apparently wish it didn't exist.
