economy bug or not?

[Adjantis]

I experienced a big problem I never had before in Distant Worlds. Maybe I just do something wrong though.

I started as a normal empire pre warp. When i discovered colonization I went for planet which already had a population on it. I colonized it and everything was ok. some time later I saw that my cashflow was around minus 19k.

I loaded a savegame pre colonization. And was doing the same. But i waited a bit longer before I colonized it and took a look on my cashflow.

Pre colonization I had a cashflow of plus 10k (first time it must have been around 8k). After something around 3k. Which I guess is ok since a new colony may cost more money than it earns at the beginning. The game went on for another ~20 min and my money was going down a bit more but not very much. And at some point I take a look up to the cashflow and its minus 19k again.

So my Question is, is it normal that a new colony cost that much money in shadows? Is there something I just dont know? Or is it just a bug? I cant really believe that its normal since this minus 20k step seems to happen in a second.

[feelotraveller]

Is it possible that you just ran out of an ultra-rare luxury (Loros, Zentabia, Korrabian) on your homeworld? You would lose 30% development and experience a large drop in cash.

[Adjantis]

Will take a look on that, thanks.

Thats not the problem. I dont have any request for the three expansive resources in my empire. Thanks anyway.

[Bingeling]

Does your capital population migrate to the new colony? That could wreck your tax income, but it should not happen.

[MarQan]

Auto-taxation went crazy maybe?
If not, could you upload the savegame? This might be interesting..

Edit: But no, I only had more cash after conquering a colony.
Maybe some advanced, high upkeep building is on the planet?

[MarQan]

Auto-taxation went crazy maybe?
If not, could you upload the savegame? This might be interesting..

[FerretStyle]

Did you have a protection agreement with pirates for a large negative number?

That would drop your cashflow pretty severely once it ended (and was fixed in the last patch since it shouldn't happen anyway).

[Adjantis]

The population didnt migrate.

Taxes seem to be fine. Got a bit lower on my capital. From 39% to 35%. But thats not that much money.

No agreements with pirates at all. And no building as well.

Here is the savegame if you still want to see it
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/697 ... eGames.zip

Thanks for all the help. Looks like its a bug though.

[MarQan]

It was Loros Fruit
You must've gotten some from a random event or smuggling ship.

[Adjantis]

Ah yes was the opposite of what i was looking for. I had it before and lost it. And not that my colony needed it

Still a bit weird since it means that I was at minus 20k the whole game and only the fruit got me into plus. And that with just one Planet

Well thanks again. At least I know what is wrong now. Guess I need to start again then since I wont get any fruit for free I guess.

[MarQan]

np. Yeah, you're probably better off with a new game; though it's not un-playable yet.

[Adjantis]

Started a new game. And at some point I had some fruits again. But my cashflow didnt go up much because of that.

Are you sure that such things are added to the normal cashflow? The bonus income got up very much at some point but thats about it. The cashflow only got the normal up and downs.

Well I hope it wont end like the other game

[MarQan]

Well, there were micromanagement issues, I just didn't want to bore you with them.
I tried to fix your economy (OCD is a b*tch), and I could get it to 2K plus.
I guess you went minus because you still have some things on automatic, so the basic and easiest solution would be building less military ships.

Short:
Ships: 5,4K; 1 alien Cruiser and 2 Constructors retired, 1 Colony ship finished mission.
Spaceport trimming: 3,1K
Increased taxes: 8-10K until happiness is just 5 on all planets.

Not so short:

Ships:
Alien Cruiser: gave research bonus, too much maintenance
Construction ships: they were sitting ducks in deep space, 1 contructor still left

Only if you want to go into designes:

Spaceports:
Research labs: you were way above your research capacity with the Research Modules, so I removed the from both spaceports.
Armor and Shield: reduced both to 20 on main SpacePort
- 10 on Small SpacePort
Construction: 10 Construction Yards and 1 of every Manufacturing Plant is enough at this point.
Various cuts: 1 Fuel Cell and Storage Bay in enough, because the spaceport share cargo hold with the planet, so refuel is instant; reactors down to a level where they still can produce enough to power weapons(above static usage); energy collectors down to when they still produce 1,5X the static usage (at max capacity); Proximity array removed; Life Support + Hab Modules down to neccessary after.

[Adjantis]

Thanks a lot for the informations.

Guess that was the problem then. Still a bit weird that it happened in one second then. Since I was able to pay that stuff before. But if the AI starts to do things wrong it can be fast I guess.

But good to know some things you added. Havent played for a year or so before Shadows and it looks like I dont know that much anymore