I had this "great" idea of having mines that exctract minerals and factories that make goods in my game. After implementing it I noticed it sux :) The thing is you need an EXACT ratio of mines to factories (since factories use minerals to make goods) which is super boring and annoying. The player just tries to keep the ideal ratio without making any decisions, it's just an additional chore.

Ideas how to fix it?

Actually, I'm not so sure it's even possible to fix...

So, the way it is now, mines -> minerals which go into factories -> goods? What if there were several uses for minerals (instead of just one), and the Player has access to a slider or something that determines how quickly that thing gets done? Like a pie chart with each slive being a different facet (consumer goods, military equipment, research equipment, etc)

So, the way it is now, mines -> minerals which go into factories -> goods? What if there were several uses for minerals (instead of just one), and the Player has access to a slider or something that determines how quickly that thing gets done? Like a pie chart with each slive being a different facet (consumer goods, military equipment, research equipment, etc)

Yes, mines -> minerals which go into factories -> goods.

Different uses of minerals... hmm... But how exactly?

"consumer goods, military equipment, research equipment, etc" - but isn't that on the factory side? I mean X factories need Y minerals but what these factories produce is not connected to minerals, it's the factory that decides it. Right?

But, yeah, I like the concept of different uses for minerals (at this point I like almost any concept since basically everything is better than what I have now :D)

It could have a type of point to quality construction.

Say you have 3 factories. For it to make A quality stuff, it needs at least 300 points of wood. 200-299 is B quality. 100 - 199 is C quality. Anything under 100, just doesn't get made until you get more materials. So you need to make sure you have enough mines but you're not worried about ratio, just quantity.

I like the idea that factories determine how much you can produce and mines determine the quality of production. Gold has some amazing properties that make it great for a lot of industrial uses, but it's too expensive to actually use in most cases. If you are low on mines, the factories are going to have to use inferior substitute materials, or just skimp on quantity and build thin hulls. If you've got excess mines, the engineers are unconstrained from material cost considerations.

If you order a starship built the materials will be acquired, but the citizenry of your planets aren't emperors, so they might be affected by mineral shortages more severely. Goods cost more, it's harder to start new businesses, etc. So mining excess/shortage could also be vented off into the economy or empire happiness rather than leaving factories idle.

In VGA Planets (yes, I brought it up yet again), mines harvest resources, and factories produce supplies.

Even after a planet is dead dried of resources, it can still produce supplies, which means you can still leverage the population as workforce.

I think it's clever as it means even 'dead rocks' with good growth potential are worth your attention to get supplies, whereas harsh planets with fewer inhabitants need to focus on mining alone.

In the end, each planet has its own use (mining, supplies, taxes, military outpost, refueling station, starbase, etc.)

It could have a type of point to quality construction.

Say you have 3 factories. For it to make A quality stuff, it needs at least 300 points of wood. 200-299 is B quality. 100 - 199 is C quality. Anything under 100, just doesn't get made until you get more materials. So you need to make sure you have enough mines but you're not worried about ratio, just quantity.

I don't understand... Write this down with numbers maybe?

Like: you have 5 factories and 3 mines, each mine extracts 1 unit of minerals, each factory requires 1 unit of minerals, therefore 2 factories are idle (that's how it works now). So, 3 units of manufacturing productions are made per turn.

In VGA Planets (yes, I brought it up yet again), mines harvest resources, and factories produce supplies.

Even after a planet is dead dried of resources, it can still produce supplies, which means you can still leverage the population as workforce.

I think it's clever as it means even 'dead rocks' with good growth potential are worth your attention to get supplies, whereas harsh planets with fewer inhabitants need to focus on mining alone.

In the end, each planet has its own use (mining, supplies, taxes, military outpost, refueling station, starbase, etc.)

Hmm, an interesting dynanmic, so factories are not needed to make ships? Ships are instantly constructed via resources+taxes as the currency? And factories make supplies (I assume supplies are some sort of "upkeep currency" for ships?)

You could include a trade off between efficiency and overall output. Starcraft 2 does this well with it's workers and minerals, 2 workers per mineral patch has each worker mining at their full potential. Adding a third worker to a mineral patch is like having 2.5 workers instead of 2 or 3. Extra workers gives more output per mineral patch, but less output per worker.

I don't understand... Write this down with numbers maybe?

Like: you have 5 factories and 3 mines, each mine extracts 1 unit of minerals, each factory requires 1 unit of minerals, therefore 2 factories are idle (that's how it works now). So, 3 units of manufacturing productions are made per turn.

Going with your example, let's say that each mine has 170,450 units of wood. You send out miners and each miner can procure 1 to 5 units of wood. So the factories are now receiving their units of wood. Then you can set the production rate. Every 300 units produce something, Every 200 units produce something. Or Every 100 units produce something. But the number of units determine the quality of the product. You can spread out how the wood is distributed as well. So all 3 mines supply all 5 factories. Or all 3 mines supply only 3 factories. Or any other combination.