No transportation cost for electricity?

from Stardock Forums

Played about 30 hours of offworld trading company and i really love the game.

However, one thing caught my eye, the fact that electricity is the only resource which doesn't include transportation costs as far as i know.

Often you see players dumping their geotherms on the other side of the map or changing an aluminium mine far away into a solar panel etc without being punished for this because it doesn't require transportation costs.

I would like to see such plays punished by reducing the power gained from these buildings as transportation cost, you could even show little power lines on the map to indicate this. This way people also have think more about their starting position in terms of power instead of looking for the good iron/aluminum tiles.

Would be nice if this could somehow be incorporated in the game.

 

 

 

 

 

8,725 views 4 replies
Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top

Actually, there are two downsides for building geotherms far from your base, and they do matter at higher levels of play.

 

1) There is a pretty sizable delay while the building floats over to the geotherm. During this time you're bleeding potential money where as a nearby goetherm will see a much quicker return on investment. When players are fighting over power income it does matter.

 

2) Distant geotherms are more vulnerable to being dynamited. If they are destroyed with dynamite they're going to be down for a LOOOONNGGG as time before they come back up again.

 

So, yeah. They're a bit more resistant to distance, but there is definitely a cost for building far away.

Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top

Fair points, altough on point one you could argue that the player placing the geotherm is skilled enough to place a goon squad on it to defend it and point two is circumstancial and can also be defended with a goon squad. I mean the effect wouldn't have to be extreme but just enough for people to think more about their starting location or consider other options like solar panels/wind turbines. In my opinion this would also make the game more realistic.

Galactic Civilizations III
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top

there's still the cost in fuel of flying the building out to the location as well. This can get bigger than you might think

Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top

It also makes sense from a physics standpoint. You're not using ships that consume fuel to transport electricity, you're using power lines. Use a transformer to convert amps to volts, send that power at 10^6 volts and laugh at the thought of resistance in a copper wire in the sub zero temperatures of space.