Migration and Magnates - how they work

[QSI Programming]

Migration, sometimes called ?auto-colonization? is a feature where members of your empire will move around by themselves. It is at its most obvious when combined with a multi-race empire, especially when Magnate Civs are involved. This post is an attempt to explain how both Magnate Civs and Migration work.

Magnate Civ is a special that appears on a planet. The ?effect? of the special is that it has a population of one of the unplayable races on it. The special is assigned to a planet through the normal special lottery and the species on the planet is determined by determining which race is the best fit for the planet. Originally, Magnate Civ and Splinter Colony were two separate specials. Splinter Colonies would then appear on yellow and even red planets, even when the empire did not have reasonable tech for that. So, we merged the two specials and it is a Splinter Colony if the planet is green for the discovering player?s race and a Magnate otherwise. This is why certain Magnates are difficult to find when playing certain races (essentilly the Magnates will ALWAYS have a different planet preference than you, if you discover the planet first). If it is a Magnate Civ, the population is doubled. All the population is placed in a random region on the planet and no migration processing is done until a player colonizes it, to make sure there is an open region to colonize. This is also part of why the Magnates migrate so quickly (they are often over-crowded in the one region).
The Magnate Civ line in the specials.txt sheet (which is outside the table) is no longer functional, and in fact will just generate a planet that SAYS it is a Magnate Civ with no population on it. The odds of a Magnate Civ can be modded by upping the lottery balls on the Splinter Colony spreadsheet.

Migration comes in two pieces. The spreadsheet data used by migration is in the file population.txt. In that file, the table PopulationPushFactor is not used for anything (although it is read in by the code).

The first and simplest piece is growth migration, which moves population from one region to another on the same planet. This considers only the population added through normal population growth. Tables StayPercentage, PopulationGrowthPlanet and PopGrowth are used for growth migration, along with the density values in PopMisc.

The main migration processing is the ?push/pull? migration, which is a vastly simplified version of the original migration design. For each empire in the game, each populated region (including outposts) is processed system by system. For each each region, the push factors are calculated and if the number exceeds a D100 roll, people will be moved.

The push factors are defined in the PushFactor table. The first two are for overpopulation, and an overcrowded planet will take both penalties. The unrest value is used for regions in unrest1, doubled for unrest2 and tripled for unrest3. The revolt value is used for regions in revolt, so using the current values, revolt is less of a push than unrest3. The final push is for the existence of migration targets, so that people will come when you give them a place to go (although they may choose to go elsewhere).
EDIT: Planets which are a migration target and regions which have more jobs than people will ignore the presence of other migration targets when calculating push factors if all other push factors are zero.

The number of people is determined using the PopulationMoving table, which specifies a percentage of the population based on the amount of population in the region. If this results in more than one population point, the group is divided into groups of one population point.

Candidate systems are determined by spreading out from the source system and continuing until stopped by a system which is either blockaded or contians a colony or outpost of another empire without also containing a colony or outpost of the source empire. All planets in these systems are candidates for migration.
EDIT: It turns out that all planets, not just same empire or unowned are candidates.

Pull factors for each planet are calculated using the PushPullPlanet table. Distance to system is a negative number to make farther away planets less attractive. Distance is calculated in jumps only. A larger negative number would make farther planets even less attractive. The habitibility and gravity values are straightforward. The potential maximum population uses the capacity of the planet for the race moving without regard to any existing population. The Existing pop values are multiplied by the number of regions currently populated by the same species or race (same race will get both values). There is no value assigned to an unpopulated planet (there is a space in the table, but any value there is ignored). If the planet has a set migration flag, they get the larger bonus.

Planets whose pull factors are less than 20% of the highest value are discarded and the planet is chosen from the remainder, weighted by their pull factors. Then a region is selected using the region pull factors from the PushPullRegion table. Some of the vlaues in this table are planet-wide values, but are not used to pick the planet. The -999 for different race, starving, unrest and revolt are designed to prevent immigration. (Yes, if you change starvation to a positive number, migrants will prefer starving regions). The unemployment value is not used or checked. The same is true for the tax rate values. The Underemployment value is a multiplier for the number of available jobs in excess of population (rather than unemployment rate). The population numbers are as advertised (and once again overcrowded gets both penalties). Values for piracy and pollution are available in the spreadsheet, but both are set to 0 in the original values.

If no region has a positive pull factor, the migration is cancelled. If the region has already reached its immigration cap as defined in the immigration cap entries in the PopMisc table, that group does not move.

PopMisc has several values that are not used. The used values are the two values for PopDensity, which define the percentages used to consider a planet full (natural limit) and crowded. These values are used for both types of migration. The immigration cap values are used to limit the immigration to .05 population points (50) or 5X the natural growth (whichever is larger), using the original numbers.

EDIT: I meant to mention that these rules apply to ALL races at present, except the New Orions. It is possible that at some time in the future, the Harvesters will also have some modifications in the area of preferences for planets with same/different race........

The original design included many more push and pull factors, generating three different types of emigrants, those that prefered to stay on established planets, those that preferred unpopulated planets and systems, and those that wanted to leave the empire to join another empire (yes, the original design allowed migration to go across empire boundaries). There were multiple persecution policies (racial, religious and several levels of slavery) which were major factors in this calculation, along with many other policies, many of which could be set on a planet by planet basis.

I hope this answers some of the questions I have been seeing.

[Xentropy]

:up: I'd love to see more exposes like this one on the internal workings of MOO3! For now, the fans have been forced to make their own deductions, which is fine, but "the final word" is great to see. :) Thank you!

[Xevious_2001]

Excellent! I have not read the full details of this post yet (I will do so shortly). But I am very glad to see this kind of info now being posted.

Thank You!

[DIH49]

this is VERY nice. thank you very much for posting it!!

[dadekster]

Ouch, my head hurts:)

This is a lot better than a bunch of speculation, even though I applaud the efforts of those who are trying to decipher the game.

[The Holy One]

It sounds like a bug to me.:D

[sleepyhead]

This is coming from someone who is very unhappy with his purchase :

Thank you. More communication and information like this will help immensely. I hope this continues.

[ken the great]

Originally posted by The Holy One
It sounds like a bug to me.:D
Only to you Holy One. :D

@QSI: Thanks for the info. It is very helpful.

[The Holy One]

You are so welcome. :)

[richieelias]

oooo.. I want the empire to empire migration back in. That sounds sexy. Can it be modded back in?

[warden]

Why is the term "Magnate" used? It means a powerful person and comes from the Latin word for "great". But they are not great - they are minor colonies that roll over and join you as soon as you land a viceroy. I'm still puzzled by the choice of word.

Andrew

[Archangel_Brian]

YOINK!!!


*Runs off*

[Darkspire]

Thanks for posting the information :)

Dont give up now though !! please, more of the same as regards explaining the inner math etc.

If we know which buttons to push and which levers to pull it makes the modding so much more rewarding.

How about the inside formula on races / custom races / race picks and specials?

How about an explanation or at least point us in the right direction for putting the troop experience right?

Sorry not greedy :D just love MOO3 and with a little light shone on its darker areas there are a lot of peeps like me willing to help make MOO3 a better experience for everybody.

Thanks again :)

[Prrsha Vrrn]

There is work on a mod to make all magnates available for all races here:

http://www.ina-community.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=274100

I hope it gets made soon... it sucks not being able to find a Mrrshan magnate colony while playing a Human race. :sour:

[James1701]

The one thing about magnates I find really confusing is how you add them to your empire. The only way I've found so far is to colonize the planet. Since these are red or yellow ring planets this can be a real pain. I've even had a few situations where my native race started terraforming the planet and driving off all of the natives. This costs me more money for terraforming and annoys the heck out of me. Shouldn't there be a military and/or diplomatic way off annexing magnate civs to your empire? One that makes sure the best race will stay on the planet and make it a productive member of my empire?

Another thing I'd like to see added in is the ability to see the habitablity zone of a magnate civ under my control.

I think I'll also repost this in the suggestion folder.;)

[Telastyn]

Stupid question time, but I've seen magnates on "green" worlds. (and there was still a magnate population there) Does this mean simply that another race discovered the planet first, and it was not green for them?

[QSI Programming]

There is work on a mod to make all magnates available for all races here:

http://www.ina-community.com/forums...threadid=274100

I hope it gets made soon... it sucks not being able to find a Mrrshan magnate colony while playing a Human race.

That is part of what prompted this post. The race of the Magnate is in the code - it cannot be modded.

I will add a percentage chance for a splinter colony to be a magnate even on a green world, but this would likely only be done with the other magnate changes below (i.e. not it the current patch).

Stupid question time, but I've seen magnates on "green" worlds. (and there was still a magnate population there) Does this mean simply that another race discovered the planet first, and it was not green for them?

This is the explanation that is consistent with the implementation.

Shouldn't there be a military and/or diplomatic way off annexing magnate civs to your empire? One that makes sure the best race will stay on the planet and make it a productive member of my empire?

Another thing I'd like to see added in is the ability to see the habitablity zone of a magnate civ under my control.

These are on our list, but certainly not in the first code patch.

[Lich325]

Could the migration code be the problem causing the huge end-of-turn wait times for some people in later game stages? It seems very likely if you've got tons of high population planets all trying to spread throughout the galaxy. That would be consistent with the information if migration is calculated after the ground combat stage (where the hangs occur).

[sensoukami]

Dear QSI Programming Types:

Is this the same model for conquered races migration?

I conquered a single world of Grendarl, and before you know it I have 8 worlds full of them.

I am not sure yet if I like or dislike this feature. It has both pros and cons.

[tleng]

From what I read, planet preference is in the code but not used. I hope its implemented in a future code patch. It's just a tad annoying that forced migration throws EVERY race type in the empire to the planet, even if the planet is unsuitable in that race.

Eg. I colonized the magnate Bulrathi race as Evon. Then I colonized another world and turned on migration for that world. When I checked back a while later, I find Bulrathi citizens on that planet even though it's red for them in both habitility and gravity. Just seems wasteful of those Bulrathi citizens working and growing at 50%. Oh and after I turned migration off and checked back in about 100 turns, there was still that 1 pop of Bulrathi on the planet despite it still being red to them.

[CorporalX]

Thanks QSI for these great post, I've been wondering how Migrates and immigration work :)

I've read Tom's post on Economics, now Immigation what future posts are you guys gonna give us to tide us over till the patch is released?

Anxiously waiting for the patch so I can kick some real AI's butt....

[Telastyn]

And thanks for the replies/feedback.

[CHoPs]

The Darloks have always been the spy masters, so why not make spies created by an empire with Darloks of their ilk? It only makes sense to utilize their special abilities. Just like using magnates for ground troops...

Let's go modders!

[Arnald Rimmer]

Thanks, that's clarified things a lot and is also very interesting.
:up:

[Hachiman Taro]

Thank you QSI programming for the information, and more importantly for the on going support of MOO3.

This is what has the potential to make this very ambitious game design into a truely classic game.

I can't express how much I appreciate it, and how happy it makes me with my purchase.

I'm really looking forward to the coming months to see how MOO3 evolves, both as a consequence of official patches, and the inspired decision of QS to make the game so easily mod-able. This adds a whole new dimension to the term re-playability!

Can I pre-order an expansion pack now?

[Prrsha Vrrn]

Originally posted by QSI Programming
That is part of what prompted this post. The race of the Magnate is in the code - it cannot be modded.

I will add a percentage chance for a splinter colony to be a magnate even on a green world, but this would likely only be done with the other magnate changes below (i.e. not it the current patch).


So basically what you are saying that it is impossible for modder to raise the chance of finding a magnate race on a green world? From what I gathered from Kerensky's post was the he succeeded to replace the magnate special with the splinter colony special but I could be reading it wrong...

[Smeagol]

Hm, this is interesting, thank you for providing the details. Like many, I already suspected most of the migration "stuff" and so it wouldn't change my strategy at all, but now at least I know why I always run into the same Magnate races every time I play the game (I always play Human).

I hope some future patch, I realize not the upcoming one, will correct this over sight.

Smeagol

[moomanchu]

Thank You QSI! Keep it coming!

[Pragmatic]

Originally posted by Smeagol
but now at least I know why I always run into the same Magnate races every time I play the game

Hmmmm.... That begs the question, which Magnate Civs end up being Splinter Colonies instead for each race?

That deserves to be in the FAQ, at least. :)

[Sgt Kabukiman]

Thanks for the post. It's great to see that the devs are making an effort to keep us posted. It shows to everyone out there, yes, we're listening.

This posts enligtens us to the fact that there is more going on behind the curtains than we thought.

You guys might want to just have someone do a weekly arcticle on the website that delvs into the inner workings of the game.

[Jernau11]

Thanks for the post, please keep them coming.

[Zaqir]

All these Factors and modifiers and whatnot and when it comes down to it. Sadly it means little in the long run. While the information is nice to have most of this information is behind the scenes or untouchable while playing the game hence is almost useless. I know it sounds like a troll but honestly can someone explain how this will aid in playing the game?

[Chinova]

Hmm... if QS really wants to please the hordes of people who ponied up their money for this game, then apart from patching the game they should also add more in-depth explanations. Simple txt files will do if QS don´t have the time to add it to the in-game dictionary (F1).

Edited: After reading through more threads I realize that a lot of things still seems to be happening behind the curtains despite so-called revisions to the game in the eleventh hour. I strongly urge QS to add explanations to the game so that even if a player can´t directly change something, at least he/she won´t feel left out of the loop as there will be an understanding as to why that is the case. Not unlike Moo2.

[Smiling Death]

Greetings! (meant in a constructive manner)
I believe this is exactly what's wrong with the game. It's great that the underlying code does complex things for the player, but that's exactly what the player should _not_ have to see or know or care about to play the game.

Alan Cooper has been stumping this position for a while. What the developer values and what the end user / gamer values are two completely different things.
The developer loves the complex algorithym with multiple matrixes of inputs which produces complex output. Heck, I enjoy hearing about it, but....
the gamer wants to easily understand how the game pieces work so s/he can get on with the business of mastering the game.

It would have been very useful to have a paragraph or two in the manual explaining what the magnate civilizations do - wait for someone to colonize them then ship their excess population out in the form of new colonies, how they relate with your race - generally different planet type preference, and who does/does not get them - humans and harvestors might not refrain from eating them.
The details of how the program logic with drives the magnate civilizations interesting to the hardcore fan (e.g. those of us here on the board) but of much less value than the items listed in the paragraph above.

Cheers

[kramer316]

I know I've seen a splinter colony on a non-green planet. First game as the Psilons my home system contained a Yellow 1 world with a splinter colony.

Could the explanation of how it works be over-simplified? It seems to me to work like this:

1. Green: Always splinter
2. Others: Make a list of all the magnates and your race, then pick the race with the closest habitability match. If one of the Magnates is the closest match it becomes a Magnate Race special. If your race is the closest match it becomes a Splinter Colony special.

This would allow for the rare occurance of a non-green splinter colony in cases where it's not green to your race, but is still a closer match than any of the Magnates.

[maybe]

Would have been nice to have the explanations how the game works in the manual though :D

Fan of printed manuals that I am I'd much rather a pdf-manual that tells me the game mechanics than a "I-got-to-be-printed-long-before-game-release-and-contain-little-to-no-info"-one

Thanks for the info though, and keep the patch coming....

[karmina]

Originally posted by warden
Why is the term "Magnate" used? It means a powerful person and comes from the Latin word for "great".
Andrew

Not exactly. It means a formerly, in ancient times powerful person(s) of great renown and comes from the Latin word for "great". Thus the term fits perfectly - at least if you ever played moo2 or read the manual :)

[screwed-up]

Originally posted by richieelias
oooo.. I want the empire to empire migration back in. That sounds sexy. Can it be modded back in?

You gonna have Ithkul in all the empires? Everyone ends up as an Ithkul race?

:D :p

[Octavius III]

Well, if there will be empire-empire migration again, it might only be if you have open-borders trade. Or, you could essentially ban certain races from migrating. I've always found it annoying that once you get ithkul in your empire, it's a hit-or-miss proposition for landing a new colony ship: will it become an ithkul world, or a Darlok world like intended?

Also, before the game came out, I bided my time by creating this chart (http://www.angelfire.com/ca6/scariness/All_Races_Preferences.jpg), which isn't entirely accurate (I still don't know the exact breadth of the habitability rings). However, it at least gives some idea of who competes with whom. Another chart I made is this one (http://www.angelfire.com/ca6/scariness/Sweet_Spots.jpg), which shows the positions of all the paradise levels for all the races, magnate and playable.

[Evangeline Blue]

I know if any of you QS types have read some of my posts, they have been rather harsh sounding. It is clear from this post that you had a great vision for the game at some point and for some reason decided it was too much work to implement.

Well, I for one am drooling over the idea of grades of slaves and populations sweeping across a border.

Get that stuff in a patch! The more detail, the more realism (odd to say about a sci-fi game), the better.

[charlesy2k]

Well I know that Darloks, plant-people and Gargantua's always pop up as magnates for Harvesters, hmmm guess everyone will play Harvesters now :p

[demarn]

The problem I'm having with magnate civs, is that I can't readily tell what strengths and weaknesses they have. Therefore, besides the obvious races from MOO2, I don't know how to best take advanatge fo them. In fact, when I do colonize magnate planets, I really don't see any difference at all.

1. What am I missing? How do I tell the strengths and weaknesses of each magnate in the game (or does it just come down to me buying the Strat Guide)?

Also, as the Klackons I conquered many human and Meklar worlds, yet the 1 Meklar troop formation that was built had the exact same stats as the Klackon, and I have yet to see any difference between what Meklar planets, Human planets, and Klackon planets can do.

2. Therefore, what screen can I best see these differences (if any), so that I may maximize conquests?

3. I did recruit 1 human spy from a conquered human world, and he has proved valuable and has remained alive inside the human empire for a long time, but yet, I have no idea if he could be a double agent or not? How would I be able to tell this?

[charlesy2k]

The "readme.txt" file included with the game tells you the advantages of the various Magnate races. In general, almost all fight better than the best player-race ground troops, so you will always do better having them as soldiers (with the wimpy Gnolam being an obvious exception).

The best advantage of Magnates is that they migrate rapidly to planets that are sweetspots or green for them, so you will pick up a bunch of free colonies. This alone makes it worthwhile trying to get as many magnate worlds colonized as possible.

I even colonize Gnolam planets for this reason alone. The Gnolam do get a +20% for spaceport trade also, which is a nifty bonus in itself.

Although a lot of control-freak types tear their hair out because they cannot control this migration, I personally don't worry about it. Seems like a win/win situation to me and if the magnates mess up the population balance of a few worlds here and there, I can live with it. It's a big galaxy after all.

[demarn]

charlesy2k,

Thanks for the info, I forgot about that readme file:bulb: .

[charlesy2k]

Thanks for the info, I forgot about that readme file

This info "should" be in the game itself but at least its in the readme file...well some of it anyway. :p

[WCT-1]

Originally posted by
I know I've seen a splinter colony on a non-green planet. First game as the Psilons my home system contained a Yellow 1 world with a splinter colony.

Could the explanation of how it works be over-simplified? It seems to me to work like this:

1. Green: Always splinter
2. Others: Make a list of all the magnates and your race, then pick the race with the closest habitability match. If one of the Magnates is the closest match it becomes a Magnate Race special. If your race is the closest match it becomes a Splinter Colony special.

This would allow for the rare occurance of a non-green splinter colony in cases where it's not green to your race, but is still a closer match than any of the Magnates.
Cheers

Interesting point as I have found a Red 1 Splinter colony. It seems odd that none of the other civilizations found this planet habitable as this would have turned it into a magnate.

QSI is this an expected outcome or have we stubbled upon a bug?

<edit: quoted wrong post>

[charlesy2k]

Interesting point as I have found a Red 1 Splinter colony. It seems odd that none of the other civilizations found this planet habitable as this would have turned it into a magnate.

Check the demographics on that world, if races you control besides your main race moved there and become the majority percentage-wise on the planet, then the terraform rating on the planet changed to reflect the race with the most peeps on the planet. Happens to me all the time, I find a nice green world with High gravity for my Harvesters, then a few klackon buddies come over and bingo, from green to red :cry:

[DeckPrism]

Originally posted by charlesy2k
Check the demographics on that world, if races you control besides your main race moved there and become the majority percentage-wise on the planet, then the terraform rating on the planet changed to reflect the race with the most peeps on the planet. Happens to me all the time, I find a nice green world with High gravity for my Harvesters, then a few klackon buddies come over and bingo, from green to red :cry:

First, you can view planet habitability by dominant race or by a particular race (via the planets tab at the bottom). If you had it set on dominant, when another race achieved a majority, it would show it with respect to them. Second, even if some other race started to teraform a planet toward thier preferences away from what you liked, they would have to pay money to keep it teraformed. If they stop, it gradualy reverts to its norm, which in this case would be good for you. So, I'd imagine if you took this place over, it would quickly become nice.

[Sixth X]

Damn... Pretty nice! The BADdest thing in MOO3 is that Darlok and Mrrshan was my MOST ADORE races !!! Elerians was pretty too... %) Hate to see them as Magnates or Laborers!

[charlesy2k]

First, you can view planet habitability by dominant race or by a particular race (via the planets tab at the bottom).

Yes and a very handy tool it is as well but unfortunately the Magnates are left out (I understand it will be in the upcoming patch). So you only find out afterwards how much those crummy Byre Eytes like the same worlds as the Gargantua, grrr :sour:

[TheGreatRa]

*sigh* a game shouldn't be this complicated. and People actually pay attention to magnates and migration values and such? Wow I just colonise a planet and only pay attention to the build que of my main military production planet...

[charlesy2k]

*sigh* a game shouldn't be this complicated. and People actually pay attention to magnates and migration values and such?

Of course we do!!! Magnates are something they did right, they are loads of fun.

I really love it when my Gargantua troops invade and every other messages is "the troops can't take this climate much longer", while they are kicking butt, its always a good chuckle. :D (They're from extreme grav so they whine everytime they have to fight somewhere that doesnt have extreme gravity.)

[elmo3]

QSI Programming wrote:

"Candidate systems are determined by spreading out from the source system and continuing until stopped by a system which is either blockaded or contians a colony or outpost of another empire without also containing a colony or outpost of the source empire. All planets in these systems which are not owned by another empire are candidates for migration."

In my last game, pre data patch, I had a Magnate race colonize a planet for me in a system that already contained a fleet and a planet of a race I was fighting in a war. Needless to say that new colony didn't fare well in that system. Can you modify the code to discourage colonizing planets in enemy controlled systems?

[saetrum]

Originally posted by elmo3
Can you modify the code to discourage colonizing planets in enemy controlled systems?

This is in the code patch.

[elmo3]

Thanks. I see it on the list after looking again.

[Chinese Tourist]

<snip: Snipping on the side of caution. -S>

[dkass]

I have two suggestions to help improve migration within the game. The first is a migration inhibition on newly conquored worlds and the second is to not allow the directed "set migration" function for outposts.

These are the results of a game where I heavily used (abused?) the migration function (thanks to Sirian for inspiring me to such heights).

1) Reduce the initial "push" factor from newly conquored worlds.

Currently they often have a major push due to the inherent conquest unrest plus all their gov and mil DEA were destroyed, resulting in more unrest (I regularly see newly conquored planets go to unrest 3--especially if I forget to leave an anti-piracy force). Furthermore, it appears they are also often starving on the first turn due to the lingering effects of any blockade. This further increases the push.

With a high push and often incompatible habitability, I usually see each captured planet spawn at least one (if not more) new outposts within my empire. This is especially true for the first race attacked (since I haven't yet colonized things my race finds less desireable).

2) Prevent players from rapidly and effortlessly (in terms of empire resources) converting outposts into full colonies by not allowing the "set migration" directed migration to be applied to outposts.

Normally a "free" colony (eg from a magnate civ) takes 20 to 30 turns to turn into a colony without extra help (a few are as fast as 10 turns and I've had a few take closer to 50 turns). With the "set migration" button, this is reduced to 5 turns or less (and at no significant cost to the empire; what's 1000 pop output of close to a million?). While not as dramatic, the same also applies to outposts due to colony ships on hostile planets (as well as outposts founded with outpost ships).

After a certain point in the game, I no longer find any need for colony ships. I just wait for free outposts and then convert them into colonies. The impressive part is that directed migration is usually even faster than trying to get a colony ship or two to the planet.

This is even a problem in the early game. Drop an outpost (or colony ship) on a magnate red 2 planet and 15 or 20 turns later you have a full colony of the magnate. This completely bypasses the colonization cost for hostile planets and is even faster than actually building the 4 colony ships at this point in the game (let alone the saved production of not needing the 4 ships). I've been wondering if it migth not be more effective to only use outpost ships and the "set migration" button. I suspect that it still makes sense to do the first few colonies on sweetspot or green planets with colony ships due to the free population, but after that...

At a minimum, it should be seriously slowed down (seeing 500 people appear in one turn is a bit extreme--its almost as good as a colony ship).

I should note that migration (and magnates) do work well overall, but there are a few abusive/unbalancing uses that need to be controlled. The patch already plans to control the magnate push and outpost problem, so these two changes should fix the rest of the issues.

Thank you,
David

[charlesy2k]

At a minimum, it should be seriously slowed down (seeing 500 people appear in one turn is a bit extreme--its almost as good as a colony ship).

I have to disagree with you wholeheartedly, I LOVE the way population moves around and that set migration can "grow" colonies. It definitely beats the headache of micromanaging the whole colonization effort.

Also to see "500" pop migrating to a world won't happen until you have an established empire with enough pop to be moving around. I think that migration works fine and choking it off really isn't neccessary.

I have not seen Red World growing into colonies in 20 turns, more like in 75-100 turns, perhaps you are playing races with a high pop growth rate?

[dkass]

In this particular game, I'm playing Cynoid, not a "fast" growing race (as far as I know). I'm currently at turn 160, but I've been creating colonies about this fast since turn 100 or so. So this is definitely possible from the early mid-game on. At present, my empire is in NO way established. Its just barely out of the beginning game. I think I finally have 3 planets that can build ships reasonably. And yet I've colonized at least 40 planets this way at this point. Now I do focus my early development on optimizing population. But this seems to be the optimum growth strategy (as it is in many 4X games).

Note that it isn't 500 pop every turn to every planet, but at least one planet a turn receives that kind of growth (and my current per turn average migration to outposts easily exceeds 1500 pop). At this point, its almost out of control. I'm probably averaging TWO new planets per turn (I do have 4 Magnates and two other conquored races--but that's about what I would expect any good empire to have--non-Harvester, of course).

I don't think I've ever seen a planet take over 50 turns to grow into a colony, even with no forcing. Now I've never tried before turn 50 or so (I can always find a few green/sweetspot to drop my first colony ship(s)).

I'm not sure what you're doing thats making outposts not grow. And given my experiences, something needs fixed with migration (I currently don't play multi-player and won't until victory isn't based on who finds the most different magnate/CP races).

I do like the natural movement of population and the ease of populating my worlds with migrate. But its out of control for making new colonies.

[charlesy2k]

Originally posted by dkass

I don't think I've ever seen a planet take over 50 turns to grow into a colony, even with no forcing. Now I've never tried before turn 50 or so (I can always find a few green/sweetspot to drop my first colony ship(s)).

I'm not sure what you're doing thats making outposts not grow. And given my experiences, something needs fixed with migration (I currently don't play multi-player and won't until victory isn't based on who finds the most different magnate/CP races).

I do like the natural movement of population and the ease of populating my worlds with migrate. But its out of control for making new colonies.

The outposts grow, they just take a while, especially on a red world. You need to be the silicoids I think, they don't have that problem. By turn 150 I generally have 10-12 good ship producing worlds (I never play meks). To me that's the mid to end game, not the start, but to each his own.

Don't forget the "set migration" button is totally optional, you never have to use it.

[Bob the Insane]

I am also impressed by the detail going on in the background..

What are the chances of future upgrades to the UI actually exposing these working to the player... (even if it is just in a report form..)..

[Strifeguard]

None of us know exactly, but chances are pretty good that we will see much more info after the code-patch.

For example, we'll be given info on a regional basis after the code patch. Now, this may not be much more than the population of the local regions, but even that will be enough to get a better handle on the chances of migration to-and-from other planets.

[gloob]

Silicoids have a bad growth rate in the extreme. On anything less than green2 (and they don't get greens that much) they die off and if you don't send them colony ships in fast enough it's a waste of crystal lives.
I may be a little biased as I played only Silicoid for the last 2 weeks, but seeing rapid (or any) growth of a planet is really a relief. Hitting population 70/230 just 30 turns after colonizing that pretty gas giant makes my day. It displays a large expanding empire and you'll have one more production powerhouse.

Originally posted by charlesy2k
The outposts grow, they just take a while, especially on a red world. You need to be the silicoids I think, they don't have that problem. By turn 150 I generally have 10-12 good ship producing worlds (I never play meks). To me that's the mid to end game, not the start, but to each his own.

Don't forget the "set migration" button is totally optional, you never have to use it.

[Weekend Warrior]

Hi everyone! First time poster here.

Like most of you, I eagerly awaited the release of MOO3, bought it on the opening day, spent a couple of days trying to figure it all out, came here and saw that there were some problems, so I put it on the shelf until the code patch came out.

Now I am trying to figure things out again, the answers might be here but I can't seem to find them. I am playing with the post code-patch version 1.2.

So I start as the humans and on about turn 25 I find a magnate race Green 2 world with Gnolams. (Is this possible? Did QSI change the code so that Magnates can occur on Green Ring worlds? Or did somebody else find the world first?)

Anyway I colonize the world, and all is good. A few turns go by. I build an Outpost ship and deploy it in my home system. The very next turn I see a Gnolam outpost in my home system, about 4 systems away from the original Gnolam system! I send the outpost ship in the Other direction, and 1 turn later I have a Gnolam outpost in a system in a previously unclaimed system on the other side of my core, 5 systems away from the original Gnolam world! This is before my Outpost ship even gets there.

This brings up a few questions:

1. Are my outpost ship and the appearance of the Gnolam outposts totally unrelated (they seem to be correlated, but that could be a coincidence)?

2. Can a Magnate race claim previously unclaimed systems (it appears so)?

3. How do they do this without Outpost ships, if my main race has to build Outpost ships?

4. Is this normal migration behavior, or is this a bug? At this rate the whole galaxy will be full of Gnolams in a few turns!

Thanks for all help!!!

Weekend.

[Weekend Warrior]

Okay, so I pretty much figured out that the Gnolams can move to another system as long as there are no other players colonies inbetween. I guess what is bugging me now is that they do this without Outpost or Colony ships. It is like they have this incredible mobility that I as a player do not have. Also, the fact that they can go to planets that are not inhabited is sort of surprising. Do you agree with this, or am I misunderstanding something?

[zanzibar]

Originally posted by Weekend Warrior
Okay, so I pretty much figured out that the Gnolams can move to another system as long as there are no other players colonies inbetween. I guess what is bugging me now is that they do this without Outpost or Colony ships. It is like they have this incredible mobility that I as a player do not have. Also, the fact that they can go to planets that are not inhabited is sort of surprising. Do you agree with this, or am I misunderstanding something?

I think you are misunderstanding it. Colonizing a magnate planet is a key strategy to winning the game!! Since they auto-outpost, this leaves you free to build other ships (besides colonies and outposts) on your homeworlds, and you still expand quite rapidly!! Just don't forget to set migration to those new magnate outposts! :D

[Weekend Warrior]

Okay, I see the value of it for auto-expansion, but I don't understand how it's possible. The auto-outpost seems like it happens a lot faster than I can expand with my own ships, so how do the magnate races do it?

It seems like a game balance issue to me. It sounds like you almost have to have a magnate race to have a chance of winning.

[Tidwell2003]

"So I start as the humans and on about turn 25 I find a magnate race Green 2 world with Gnolams. (Is this possible? Did QSI change the code so that Magnates can occur on Green Ring worlds? Or did somebody else find the world first?) "

If in the SitRep you see the announcement, you found them.
It is one of the changes in the code patch, where there is now a chance that a world that would have always been a splinter colony before has a chance of being a magnate.

"1. Are my outpost ship and the appearance of the Gnolam outposts totally unrelated (they seem to be correlated, but that could be a coincidence)? "

Totally unrelated

"2. Can a Magnate race claim previously unclaimed systems (it appears so)? "

Yes, and so can your own population. While this should happen less after the code patch (since they magnate population is spread out over several zones) what is happening is that a particular zone has a large enough population that when its people notice a planet that seems more desireable to them, they move to it. If you were to start a game and never build a colony or outpost, eventually your home world would get so crowded that you would see them doing the same thing too.

"3. How do they do this without Outpost ships, if my main race has to build Outpost ships? "

Migration.

"4. Is this normal migration behavior, or is this a bug? At this rate the whole galaxy will be full of Gnolams in a few turns! "

Normal, though this will slow down shortly, as Gnolams when wanting to migrate will reach the point where the existing planet they started to migrate to in previous turns looks more appealing than the new planet further out that no one is on.

Chet

[Weekend Warrior]

Thanks for the very useful replies!!

Migration still sounds a bit mysterious. How do they do it? Do they have to use ships to move from place to place? Is there any kind of lag built into the system to account for how long it takes to go somewhere?

For what it's worth, the post code patch MOO3 seems like fun to me. It's an incredibly rich game once you learn your way around.

[Bob the Insane]

Originally posted by Weekend Warrior
Migration still sounds a bit mysterious. How do they do it? Do they have to use ships to move from place to place? Is there any kind of lag built into the system to account for how long it takes to go somewhere?


The empire ships shown in the games are not the only ships.. There are trade ships, transport ships, pirates and all sorts... There just don't appear in the game and there effect are felt through events (trade, spying, etc...)

[Weekend Warrior]

Ok, I see. But if it takes me 5 turns to move my capital ship from one system to the next, do migrations follow the same rules? Or are they just assumed to be instantaneous?

Well thanks, I think I understand it better now!

[Paul5343]

Auto-migrations are instantaneous. If there is a really juicy planet in a system you just explored this turn sometimes migration will have sent some people there even though it is many turns away distance wise.

[synchro_w]

now, to all those ppl who said moo3 was a piece of crap... d'ya see now? this game has bags of depth and i never stop tweaking my approach to strategy and tactics... it just walks all over moo2... i know i know... i'm putting my head on the block for that but i feel it's true.

of course, the dev plan not being fixed is a real bummer - afaic, the dev plan page is one of the core elements of understanding and getting to grips with this game... what a shame they still haven't fixed it? with such a stunted element it does hinder gameplay for me.... 12 dev plans are , without any shadow of doubt, nowhere near enough instructions for such a vast collection of world types... which draws the game away from macro management and back into micro[well, shall we say nano?] management.

ok. rant over.
to QSI thanks for the magnate info. i've already figured out most of it from the few games i've been enjoying but this kind of open approach to fans of a game that's been thru the mud since its release is certainly refreshing.
thanks
das

[Nolondil]

When I heard about the patch I decided to give MOO 3 a try. It's a mixed bag, with some things about the game interesting and/or fun, but many other things very frustrating. Currently, I am trying to do as suggested to 'adopt' a magnate civilization -- colonize the planet. It doesn't work. My colony ships, and even ships from two other empires are sitting there and no colonization is happening. The color on the planet has not changed, so it has not been claimed by any other empire. And the colonization AI now sends ALL of my colony ships to this system to sit there over this magnate civ planet. I have to turn off the order to colonize it in order for any other worlds to get colonized. Is there a bug that prevents colonization of magnates in the patch? Or is there something that could have gone wrong that I don't know about? T

[Beamup]

Originally posted by Nolondil
and even ships from two other empires are sitting there

That's why. Nobody can land if there's a ship from another empire in-system. So their colony ships are blocking you from landing and yours is blocking them. Only real way to do anything about it is send in a ship to blow them away. Of course, this requires breaking any non-agression pacts or alliances.

[Weekend Warrior]

Especially if it's early in the game, try sending a scout ship with your colony ship, that way you can take control of any systems that you arrive at the same time as another player. Of course, you do have to blow them up.

I find this helps to establish your territory in the beginning.

Also, does anyone have any uses for those Lancer ships? Are they just there for decoration? Here's an idea: they can be the marshmallow filling inside of smores. :p

[QSI Programming]

Well, I was looking at the code because everyone is seeing inter-empire migration some times, and it turns out that I was mistaken earlier. I have edited the first post in this thread to correct what I said previously.

It turns out that ALL planets in candidate systems are considered for migration, even if they belong in another empire.

[King's Specter]

Hey, thanks for the info. I've got a couple magnate questions that I'm sure are answered somewhere, but darned if I can find it:

#1. Say a magnate race auto migrates to a planet that's red to your base race. If you set migration to that world, will you be sending your base race there to suffer or will the AI send the magnate race?

#2. Is there a trick for telling what race a colony ship is carrying? I've got a colony ship right now that I'm pretty sure is magnate, but I can't find any indicators proving this.

Thanks!!!

[synchro_w]

Originally posted by Weekend Warrior
Thanks for the very useful replies!!

Migration still sounds a bit mysterious. How do they do it? Do they have to use ships to move from place to place? Is there any kind of lag built into the system to account for how long it takes to go somewhere?

<snip>


i remember in moo2 you had to manually build enough transport ships to manually 'emigrate' a million pop at a time. very tedious. but i suppose you could say that you 'd know exactly where those populations where going... it took time moving them tho... i much prefer the moo3 way of doing things... i mean, it's like the local gov has put up adverts and public announcements to show ppl the advantages of moving to , say, toliman V... "where the streets are paved with gold and the sun always shines!"

[Beamup]

1. Yes, your main race will migrate there, in almost as large of numbers (or even greater numbers) as the magnate. The migration flag is a huge "pull factor" that typically overwhelms habitability concerns.

2. No, you can't tell except on the TF creation screen.

[Bob the Insane]

Originally posted by Beamup
1. Yes, your main race will migrate there, in almost as large of numbers (or even greater numbers) as the magnate. The migration flag is a huge "pull factor" that typically overwhelms habitability concerns.



Total bugger that one...

My human empire was becoming quite cosmopolitan... Rhea, Ajadar, Audrieh, Gnolam and even a very small number of Eoladi..

Now one turn I notice the Eoladi had migrated themselves to a Gas Giant ideal for them... Woohoo I thought.. soon I will have a Eoladi world and can produce Eoladi colony ships and backfill all those worlds that where of no use before...

So I switched on Migration...

So after a while I go looking for my Eoladi world but can't find it at first.. The dominant population is now Human!?!? those nutty settlers have rushed off to live on a Gas Giant....

[Beamup]

Yeah, it does make "set migration" pretty useless - and in fact extremely counterproductive - in a multispecies empire. Basically, just don't use it once you get a magnate. Not a good solution, but the best there is.

[siggi]

Yeah, it does make "set migration" pretty useless - and in fact extremely counterproductive - in a multispecies empire. Basically, just don't use it once you get a magnate. Not a good solution, but the best there is.

Not completely useless, you can adjust to a degree with micromanagement.

Just make sure you only turn on migration for colonies which have all regions occupied. This lowers the chance of a colony becoming multi-racial quite a bit. But this will also further slow the development of new colonies, as those are prone to give off much of their population growth to other colonies (whether those have 'set migration' on doesn't matter).

Also note, that the simple fact of having 'set migration' on for a single colony gets your empire moving, regardless of race or species. It seems that the push on a colony is strongly boosted simply by the presence of 'set migration' anywhere. If you're lucky, some new colonies may get some of the share of migrants. On the other hand, there is a chance that a planet with 'set migration' on will be less attractive than new colonies.

Needless to say, I'm extremely unhappy by the way the implementation of migration push & pull interacts with the 'set migration' feature. There simply was too much cut from the original plans, I guess.

What I'd like to see is a more dynamic migration scheme that allows for pushing population of a species for whom a region has a worse habitability and gravity rating than for the migrants out and send them looking for living space elsewhere. It would be nice, if the presence of another species (under your control! or you'd have a hard time developing an outpost on a magnate world into a colony) better suited to living on a planet would act as a push-factor. So the population mix would have a chance to sort itself out over time...

[King's Specter]

Originally posted by Beamup

2. No, you can't tell except on the TF creation screen.

Ah! That's a big help. I'd been letting the AI make the Colony TFs for me (had a colony flag set on a border system) and just clearing the orders as I needed. Obviously with multicultural colony ships coming off the lines I need to stop doing this.

[Weekend Warrior]

I've got a question and an interesting migration story for you.

The question is: how do I stop allies from colonizing my systems? I've got a system with 1 colony on it and a ship to tell everyone I own it, and the Klackons are snooping around in my empire and before I know it, they've gone and colonized that system too! Is there any way to stop this kind of behavior short of declaring war, or colonizing every planet first? For that matter, how can I keep allies out of my empire's borders?

Now what follows is really interesting...in a few turns I notice my colony which was just getting started has Klackons on it too that belong to me! Then a few turns later I start seeing Klackons on other planets...it was as if I suddenly had a Klackon magnate race, or had conquered a Klackon world! I guess they like me better than their own government?!

[DeckPrism]

@Weekend Warrior: As I was just told, the post from QSI earlier saying that migation can occur across empire boarders if they are within the same system has several interesting consequences, most dramaticaly when it comes to Harvesters.

I think I want them to fix this.

[Phezzan]

a thread about [ei]m?migration problems and possible solutions:
http://www.ataricommunity.com/forums/showthread.php?&threadid=300803

An untested file for reducing magnate migration annoyances:
Population.txt (http://macavity.hn.org:8080/population.txt)

Feel free to post/host it anywhere

Phez

[nomicro4you]

OK, I'm trying to get my head around magnate behavior, after reading this entire thread.

Please tell me where I am not understanding things:

I have a magnate colony, it represents 75% of the population, though the planet's total population is 10,000 (max population is 26,0000).

True or false:

1) I have the AI military build queue locked on the planet, so unless I build outposts manually this magnate race will not be able to setup it's own outposts. (true?)

2) I have "set migration" turned on with several new worlds. The magnates won't send any of their population unless they start to max out space on their "home" planet. (true?)

3) The magnates I have will eventually start colonizing nearby worlds in this system or nearby systems without using outposts or colony ships or set migration. They will assess empty worlds nearby and if they are within acceptable parameters, then small portions of the magnate population will magically show up there. (false?)

4) The most effective way to use Magnates is to unlock the military build queue and let them build whatever they want and do whatever they want, unless some empire-wide situation occurs (famine, war, etc.). (false?).

[Beamup]

1. False. Migration outposts do not use ships or the MBQ.

2. False. They will act just like your main race, setting migration to a world will likely send them to it.

3. True. They act just like your main race in that regard.

4. False. There is no more advantage to unlocking the MBQ on a magnate planet than any other planet. Of course, there is also little more advantage to locking it. The most likely scenario where you'd want to lock a magnate's MBQ is if they're Rhea or something and you want them continually building ground troops.

[Phezzan]

Also - it's not just nearby worlds - Every world with an unblocked path is considered by every populated region (in your empire).

Then a world is selected from the top 80%, and from that world a region is selected, if no region is suitable, immigration canceled.

It's not a quick algorithm, and if it's reasonable in speed - it isn't in memory use.

Omega(m log n) for you theory lovers - almost certainly worse (I don't know the actual algorithm).

It's not the kind of thing you run in real time.

If these calculations could be run during the turn, it could really help those suffering End of Turn wait.

Phez

[siggi]

Here is something I did once, exploiting what I was beginning to understand, or at the time suspect, of the migration mechanics.

I had at the time already understood that 'set migration' on colonies which have not all regions occupied is bad, so I was already micromanaging 'set migration'. Of course, an altogether different question is, whether this micromanagement gains you anything. The cost paid in slowed development of new colonies may be too high.

Anyway, in a war with a Silicoid empire I had conquered a few colonies. When looking at one of them, I found that it probably must be about sweet spot for Imsaeis, of which I also had a few fledgeling colonies. And furthermore there was only one region occupied by those Silicoid. Sweet spot for Imsaeis must be deep red for Silicoid, so I thought I'd try to create a multi-racial colony on purpose. Just make sure only Imsaeis, and no other race than them, get into the other regions of the planet (about size 10).

What I did was this: I looked through all the planets in my empire and, if the inhabitants weren't Imsaeis and all regions were occupied, I set them on migration. This left a number of fresh colonies, most of them with Darlok (pre-patch, now their habitability is dangerously close to the Imsaeis') but also some of my native Human, and four or five Imsaeis worlds. Lastly, I set the planet in question on migration, hoping to pull Imsaeis there and nobody else. Fortunately, all Silicoid worlds were on the 'set migration' list, or otherwise the presence of this species on the world in question would have encouraged them before all others to go there, if had I left out any.

My plan succeeded admirably (if creation of a multi-racial world can be called a success), I had pulled only Imsaeis there, with four more regions having gained population, and the later development hinted at them spreading over all the remaining unpopulated regions and leaving the Silicoids in just one. This was pre-patch so I had no way to know for sure. Also, one turn later I turned migration for this planet and most of my others off again. I had taken a gamble and didn't want to gamble this planets future for more than one turn.

Not recommended, I only want to show to what lengths of micromanagement you can go with such poorly implemented features.

Phezzan: no expreience with your Population.txt as of yet? Or are you playing with it but can't tell the effects for sure yet? Your edits to the PopulationMoving table look interesting. I tinkered a little with this file myself, but I didn't dare something so radical. I'd also like to know whether it is allowed to introduce new rows or to renumber the PctFull column (but didn't dare to just try it out).

The Yellow and Red Habitability Rating factors in PushPullPlanet look like they should give your people an extremely hard time to develop any non-green world?

[King's Specter]

If you could put some of the race you want in every zone of the planet, could you then set migration to that planet and keep the population pure? This would also make you Ithy-proof, wouldn't it?

Can you do this trick by landing an outpost ship with 8 outpost pods (or making a large TF of single-pod outpost ships)? Or would they simply dump all their crew into one zone?

Is there another way to (lightly) fill a the zones in a planet with one fell swoop?

[Phezzan]

Originally posted by siggi
Phezzan: no expreience with your Population.txt as of yet? Or are you playing with it but can't tell the effects for sure yet? Your edits to the PopulationMoving table look interesting. I tinkered a little with this file myself, but I didn't dare something so radical.
The radicalness is why it works, not that it's perfect... I'm still adjusting.


I'd also like to know whether it is allowed to introduce new rows or to renumber the PctFull column (but didn't dare to just try it out).
Don't know - wish I could add more - but Roney didn't mention adding rows so I haven't tried it.

The Yellow and Red Habitability Rating factors in PushPullPlanet look like they should give your people an extremely hard time to develop any non-green world?
Very Hard. That table prevents races from going to planets they don't like. It's useful when you have a multi-racial empire and don't want to worry about polluting your gas giants with humans, who wont do jack because they hate the place.

If you want to colonize a red planet you will have to unset 'Set Migration' everywhere, because it increases the 'push', heck - it _IS_ the 'push' factor unless the planet is full or in unrest.

Now with migration universally off - your people won't leave - so PushPullPlanet wont get used.

If you want charts in excel to understand a bit more check this out (http://macavity.hn.org:8080/population.xls).

I've tried it out in a heavily modded game with a high growth race...
so I reduced some things:
TableStart PopulationMoving
ColumnHeadingsStart PctFull Eligible
RowHeadingsStart
1 0.04 1
2 0.12 0.25
3 0.24 0.075
4 0.49 0.02
5 0.7 0.02
6 0.85 0.021
7 1 0.023
TableEnd
Fertility Multiplier (last value seemed wrong - changed 1 to 3.2)
Immigration cap 0.06 5 min cap, x growth rate
Colonization Targets exist 10 per planet targeted by empire

These changes are to reduce the 'Everybody MIGRATE!!' problem.
The first is from the Misc table and it will return the % of people who move (after decision) to near unmodded values (too many).
The Second is from PushFactor and it reduces the likelyhood of people emigrating. (normally 50% per 'Set Migration' target)

Haven't tested the new values.

The goal is to make 'Set migration' encourage people who like the planet (Green or Yellow) but not people who dont (Red). With this mod you will see more outposts from migration, maybe too many. Also outposts are often abandoned. In my current (high growth) game colony ships are for planting enough people to cement my ownership when migration is off. People will not migrate to Red planets, but they will Yellow - If you encourage them (Set Migration). Small populations will completely abandon planets if you are encouraging them to leave (by using Set Migration anywhere).

Phez

[siggi]

The Yellow and Red Habitability Rating factors in PushPullPlanet look like they should give your people an extremely hard time to develop any non-green world?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Very Hard. That table prevents races from going to planets they don't like. It's useful when you have a multi-racial empire and don't want to worry about polluting your gas giants with humans, who wont do jack because they hate the place.


Reasonable. The one concern I have is that there are a number of worlds which should be yellow at best for every race in the game. But at least they will be just the same for everybody. Maybe you could set them to immigration 'safely' with your settings, meaning no one will go there, anyway. But 'set migration' keeps the habitants from emigratiing.

Time to start my own experiments with this file, I guess ;)

King's Specter:


If you could put some of the race you want in every zone of the planet, could you then set migration to that planet and keep the population pure? This would also make you Ithy-proof, wouldn't it?


I think that has been answered above. Once every region has some population, there is no wayfor other races getting to a planet, unless one of the regions is completely emptied again, through starvation or bombardment, usually. Every planet with population in each region should be completely Ithkul-proof, yes.


Can you do this trick by landing an outpost ship with 8 outpost pods (or making a large TF of single-pod outpost ships)? Or would they simply dump all their crew into one zone?


About the multiple pods per ship 'trick', I can assure you that the number of colonization or outpost pods on a ship doesn't directly correspond to the regions that get populated. There may be some indirect relationship. Sometimes I see two or even three populated regions directly after colonization which could be related to starting population. However, at other times, when I have other planets on 'set migration', the planet loses some population on the turn of colonization. Then it is almost certain that only on region will be populated. Obviously, some migration takes place on the turn of colonization and the multiple occupied regions probably stem from that fact alone - if the migrants stay on the planet, another region gets populated, if you also have immigration, you may get a third or more (still a bit of a theory). So, probably no relationship to starting population.

I often use ships with two (later even three) colonization pods for yellow or red worlds, to gain access to them immediately. The extra pods account for the initial population loss on such planets. But it is just as if I colonized a green world with just one pod: there usually is just one populated region, sometimes two or three (actually more rarely it seems).

I have yet to try to colonize a green world with a ship with multiple pods. This could be used as a test to whether starting population plays a role in the chance of having several populated regions after colonization.


Is there another way to (lightly) fill a the zones in a planet with one fell swoop?


None that I'm aware of. Even 'set migration' will usually take a few turns to fill all regions - if anybody is responding to the call.

[Phezzan]

Originally posted by siggi
Maybe you could set them to immigration 'safely' with your settings, meaning no one will go there, anyway. But 'set migration' keeps the habitants from emigratiing.
Edit: I know that migration targets push is ignored if the planet is also a target or if there are jobs, and no other push factors...?

On net it will get more people to the planet, but with my file, If you have humans on a gas giant, Using 'set Migration' anywhere else will give them a 10% chance (was 50% by game default) of emigrating unless the Gas Giant is also a target.

You could remove the push factor from 'Set Migration' but then you would rarely see any effects from using it (only emigraters would be from unrest / overpop).


Phez

[siggi]

Oops, I wasn't aware of that. It is just that I have never seen emigration from a planet with migration set on that selfsame world.

[Bob the Insane]

I don't know if livig on a Red or Yellow habitablity planet should be such a huge turn off... It's not like the original MOO where you had to aquire the tech to be able to colonize these worlds... You already have that tech in MOO3.. I will plant a colony on every world in my sphere of influence.. I just picture the ones on Red and Yellow worlds as domed settlements and cities... Population growth and production are stunted because there is not much living space and working in environment suits (or by remote drones on the worst Red worlds) is probably not very easy... The classic example is Humans on Gas Giants, remember The Empire Stikes Back and Bespin.. thats what I picture (except you would probably need an enviroment suit to go outside..)..

Now people may get really well paid (oe otherwise rewarded) for working in these conditions... Maybe (like Bespin) the conditions really aren;t so bad, but the settlement require so much in the way of resources tokeep going it reduces the overall output of the planet...

So, IMHO, it is fair the any people can migrate to a world... I however do think that people should on average be more attracted to Green worlds for there race under the background migration... And when you switch on Migration for a world it should attract all the races in your empire (maybe it does, I have to admitt I have not completely understood the above..)..

Just my opinion...

[QSI Programming]

Originally posted by siggi
But 'set migration' keeps the habitants from emigratiing.

It doesn't KEEP them from emigrating, but the people on that planet do not get the encouragement from set migration targets in the empire. They may still move due to all the other factors.

People on planets WITHOUT set migration will sometime ignore the encouragement as well. If there are no other factors pushing them and there are more jobs than people in the REGION considering a move, they will not move.

[rhony2]

Originally posted by QSI Programming


The original design included many more push and pull factors, generating three different types of emigrants, those that prefered to stay on established planets, those that preferred unpopulated planets and systems, and those that wanted to leave the empire to join another empire (yes, the original design allowed migration to go across empire boundaries). There were multiple persecution policies (racial, religious and several levels of slavery) which were major factors in this calculation, along with many other policies, many of which could be set on a planet by planet basis.

I hope this answers some of the questions I have been seeing.

I would dearly love to have an option, maybe in the empire section, to exterminate any Ikthul found on one of my planets. This might be a reason to create ground forces on your own planets...

Did you guys just ratchet up the Ikthul migration by several orders of magnitude? I have a situation where one of my scouts found a magnate (Darlok) world with Ikthul coloring. But it wasn't a full colony yet. Over the next 20 turns I colonized four other planets in that system. Another 10 or so turns passed uneventfully (other than the Ikthul empire declaring war on me, which was expected, so I placed a LR squadron in the system to protect my colonies). Anyway, I suddenly found myself the owner of this Darlok world that had a small population of Ikthul. Apparently my own Darloks had decided that this world was just perfect! Well, Ok, this had happened before the patch, so I decided to gift the planet to the Ikthul empire and then glass it, which had always worked prior to the patch. However, on the next turn, not only had the Ikthul infected the other four planets, they had jumped to a colony in a neighboring system - all this in a single turn! At this rate, so many of my colonies will be infected, that I will have to glass half of my own planets! Damn.

[ekanata]

Originally posted by rhony2
I would dearly love to have an option, maybe in the empire section, to exterminate any Ikthul found on one of my planets. This might be a reason to create ground forces on your own planets...
Using PopulationMoving table in Phezzan's mod, it's theoretically possible to isolate ithkul in planet that's green for them. Just establish an ithkul colony in planet that's green for them (or better just invade their homeworld) and set migration to it. All ithkul from other planet will leave to settle in this ithkull 'camp', and after all region in this ithkul 'camp' is populated with ithkul, no other race will visit. Not only we prevent ithkul assimilation, we can also utilize them in productive way.

[edalbert31]

I'm just starting to learn MOO3 in a single-player format. I've discovered several worlds with magnate populations on them, and dispatched outpost ships to claim them.

Now that my oupost ships have landed and, presumably, laid claim to one region of the magnate planets, I still cannot "enter" the planet view screen for them.

When I view the system in question, it shows the relevant planet with an orbit in my empire's colors, and as far as I know from the sitrep, my outpost ships did indeed land and establish an outpost. However, when I double-click the planet in question to enter the planet view screen, nothing happens. What am I doing wrong? Do I need to send a colony ship?

For that matter, what exactly is the difference between an outpost and a colony other than the size of the initial population? Is it always the case that an outpost does not allow you to enter the planet view screen until it reaches the size of a colony through normal growth? Can I set migration on an outpost?

Thanks!

[Actuarian]

Check out the last few entries in this thread (http://www.ina-community.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=294674) . You might want to follow up with a post there if you have any more questions about it.

Just like any outpost, you need to get your own population up to 1000 before it becomes a colony. Then you will control the magnates as well as your race

[Strifeguard]

This thread is important, as it's sort of the "Last Message of QS" to the forum, it would be a shame if it were lost. ;)

[Lennier]

Originally posted by Strifeguard
This thread is important, as it's sort of the "Last Message of QS" to the forum, it would be a shame if it were lost. ;) I agree.

[eastwind]

his is my first question to this board, if anyone is still out there...

(I loved MOO2, but when I read the bad reviews MOO3 got I took a pass on it, until this weekend when I wanted something new to play and MOO3 was only ten bucks. I figured even if I only played one game that would be more fun per buck than a movie. Anyhow...)

So I played the first game a while on easy, just exploring and learning the interface, got up to maybe 30 systems explored. Not too many green planets, as I'm playing cynoids, and many mistakes. So now I'm starting that game over (I always save turn one). I had discovered two magnate races, though neither is particularly awesome for me, I still want to jump on them.

In one system the Ajadar magnates are on a yellow 1 planet that is rich/subsistence size 4/2, and another planet in that system is yellow 1/very rich/barren size 3. So what do I send to that system in my replay? Do I colonize the very rich planet then try to do in-system colonization of the magnate? Do I send an outpost to the magnate or a full colony ship? There are like 6000 of them down there.
On the first play what I did is send a colony ship to the non-magnate planet (actually the AI chose this), then it had to wait a few turns while to get up to 1000 pop.

In the second system the Brye Ehts are on a red 2/average/hostile/moderate size 7 planet. I dropped an outpost on them but I still can't do anything on that planet. The planet pop is 6600 (99% B.E.'s). There's also a second planet in this system I could colonize reasonably (Green 1/Avg/Subsistance/Moderate/7).

I read about sending multiple colonization ships to a single planet (that's new!) and so maybe the way to colonize the yellow 1 planet is with an outpost followed by a colony ship, unless the right thing to do is grab the magnate planet first and spread from there.

Sorry for the long winded questions.

[robberbaron]

Take advantage of the magnates. Colonize them first. To control a magnate you need 1000 of your race on the planet. You can do this by putting two colony PODS (when you have larger ships you can use multiple pods on a ship) on a yellow and four pods on a red and or combine pods with migration (on the planets screen) it may take longer but gets the job done. You can migrate outposts too, just takes longer still. Best bet is outpost followed by colony pods (for the free military DEA). What doesn't work is an outpost pod AND a colony pod on the same ship. Remember whats Red to your race might be a "sweet spot" to them.

[Shogo Yahagi]

Some quick but important facts concerning magnates:

1. Don't forget that the habitat ring (red 2, yellow 1) you are seeing is based on your race, not the magnate race. That planet may be horrible for your race, but it is prime real estate for the magnates.

2. You can never fully optimize a mixed race planet. Setting migration to planets with open regions is usually bad in multiracial empires.

3. You can't tell by looking at them, but the colonists in a colony ship are of the same race as the primary race of the planet on which the ship was created. If a planet has more Ajadar than any other race, it will build colony ships full of Ajadar colonists.

In a genius user interface move, the designers made no way to tell them apart from your Cynoid-filled colony ships once they're on the map. Some players create a ship design with a name like "Ajadar Colony" and micromanage their build queues to make sure those ships are only built on Ajadar worlds.

You can sort the planet list based on the habitat preference of your magnates to see which planets to send your magnates to.

4. Outpost ships, however, are always filled with your starting race.

5. Magnates have itchy feet. They'll pop up on unoccupied planets without any intervention from you, and they'll migrate to their new worlds without any help.

6. Magnates rock. Never pass up the chance to grab a magnate planet.

[Lennier]

Originally posted by Shogo Yahagi
In a genius user interface move, the designers made no way to tell them apart from your Cynoid-filled colony ships once they're on the map. Some players create a ship design with a name like "Ajadar Colony" and micromanage their build queues to make sure those ships are only built on Ajadar worlds.What I do is just name the colony TF with the race of the colony ship(s). A lot easier than have eight designs for an eight-race empire. The race aboard colony ships shows up in the task-force-creation screen.

[Quatoes]

Of course, Bhuric's patcher should now be standardly used...seeing how you can now see what race is on what ship. :D

[Lennier]

Unless you have a Mac. :cry:

[teecee]

Lennier,

<In my best James Earl Jones voice> Come over to the Dark Side, Luke.

Embrace the horror of it all! You can still keep your MAC for all the important computing that you do.

;)

I name the Colony fleet after the planet it is destined for. Works for me.

tc

[Lennier]

No! Never!Jumps off bridge.

Actually I get enought of PCs at work.

<edit: corrected typo in vB code>

[Shogo Yahagi]

I always tell people that I have a PC at work, which is why I own a Mac.

Apple rules. I know plenty of people who have switched from a PC to a Mac. I don't know anybody who has switched from a Mac to a PC.

[Tarhalindur]

Wait a moment... WTF?! How did I get to the Post Reply screen from a different thread?! Can anybody figure this out? :eek: :weird: :confused:

Hmmm... I'd solve Ithy-kul midnight snacking by giving all races the same Ithkul resistance as Brye Eyhts, then removing No Harvester Food and Eaten By Harvester unrest. That's just me, though[/ONTOPIC]

I was going to delete this, but I'll leave it up to see if an old veteran can figure out this forum, err, "feature"...

[psilon avatar]

Originally posted by Shogo Yahagi
Some quick but important facts concerning magnates:

In a genius user interface move, the designers made no way to tell them apart from your Cynoid-filled colony ships once they're on the map. Some players create a ship design with a name like "Ajadar Colony" and micromanage their build queues to make sure those ships are only built on Ajadar worlds.



It's easier to use the same design of colony ship for all races in your empire. Number the races of your empire, maybe according to the order in which they are incorporated. Then, when you deploy a colony ship, assign it the same number corresponding to the particular race it contains. The race of the colony ship is listed next to the ship before you add it to the fleet, so that should be no problem. This way, all you colony fleets numbered 1 are such & such a race, all the 2's are this other race, & so on.

[mpotto]

Umm, Bhruic...

[Lennier]

Originally posted by psilon avatar
It's easier to use the same design of colony ship for all races in your empire. Number the races of your empire, maybe according to the order in which they are incorporated. Then, when you deploy a colony ship, assign it the same number corresponding to the particular race it contains. The race of the colony ship is listed next to the ship before you add it to the fleet, so that should be no problem. This way, all you colony fleets numbered 1 are such & such a race, all the 2's are this other race, & so on. I have an even simpler system--I put the name of the race in the colony ship(s) in the TF in the TF name (or an abbreiviation). I don't even have to remember is #3 Darlok or Meklar?

[mpotto]

...made a mod which displays the race aboard the colony ship. Am I missing something here?

[psilon avatar]

Sorry, mpotto, I haven't used any mods. Lennier's idea accompishes the same thing I was doing without the possibility of inadvertantly misnumbering the colony ship.
Observation about migration: Once migration starts & other races in your empire begin arriving on the planet, the allowable population size of the planet changes to reflect the makeup of the population. I like the fact that migration allows the planet to become useful more quickly, but I don't like the fact that what was once a green 1 planet with a max. allowable population of, say, 92 for a given race now has a max. population of 47, I presume due to the presence of other races that may see the planet as a yellow 2 or something. When you have a number of different races on the same planet, how is the max. pop. calculated? Region by region? Dominent race on the planet? It seems that even if the original colonizing race is the dominent race, the max. pop. still drops when other races begin arriving...

[mpotto]

Not trying to be rude, just comical :D. I love the colony display mod and used the method you described before I got it.

[Lennier]

Originally posted by psilon avatar
Observation about migration: Once migration starts & other races in your empire begin arriving on the planet, the allowable population size of the planet changes to reflect the makeup of the population. I like the fact that migration allows the planet to become useful more quickly, but I don't like the fact that what was once a green 1 planet with a max. allowable population of, say, 92 for a given race now has a max. population of 47, I presume due to the presence of other races that may see the planet as a yellow 2 or something. When you have a number of different races on the same planet, how is the max. pop. calculated? Region by region? Dominent race on the planet? It seems that even if the original colonizing race is the dominent race, the max. pop. still drops when other races begin arriving... I do believe it's by region, with unoccupied regions giving a pop of the dominant race. Dominant race is the one with most pop, usually the one that colonized it first ends up being the dominant one.

[psilon avatar]

OK, stupid question time (all my Q's fall into this category): Where do the Ithkul popping up on my new planets come from? I've made certain that I sterilize the planet from orbit when I colonize formerly Ithkul populated worlds, and worlds that I conquer do not seem to have Ithkul populations (I've double checked, region by region). No invasions by Ithkul fleets have been observed. Ithkul populations just seem to appear on various planets whether or not set migration is in effect for that world. Very annoying, since a High-G world with the potential for a population of 100+ Rhea is reduced to a population 40 Ithkul. Could there be a hidden Ithkul population in a region of a conquered world even if the region shows it is populated by a differenct species? i.e., could a region showing inhabited by species A actually be harboring a hidden percentage of Ithkul? Or is it simply built into the game for Ithkul to pop up on newly colonized worlds at random?

Originally posted by King's Specter
If you could put some of the race you want in every zone of the planet, could you then set migration to that planet and keep the population pure? This would also make you Ithy-proof, wouldn't it?


I don't seem to be the only one to have observed this phenomena.

[Specialist290]

Originally posted by psilon avatar
OK, stupid question time (all my Q's fall into this category): Where do the Ithkul popping up on my new planets come from? I've made certain that I sterilize the planet from orbit when I colonize formerly Ithkul populated worlds, and worlds that I conquer do not seem to have Ithkul populations (I've double checked, region by region). No invasions by Ithkul fleets have been observed. Ithkul populations just seem to appear on various planets whether or not set migration is in effect for that world. Very annoying, since a High-G world with the potential for a population of 100+ Rhea is reduced to a population 40 Ithkul. Could there be a hidden Ithkul population in a region of a conquered world even if the region shows it is populated by a differenct species? i.e., could a region showing inhabited by species A actually be harboring a hidden percentage of Ithkul? Or is it simply built into the game for Ithkul to pop up on newly colonized worlds at random?

It's a feature in the game, IIRC. If there are planets with Ithkul within a certain number of jumps from a colony with a non-Ithkul presence, they will migrate, usually in relatively small numbers, to the "food source." Of course, I could be wrong.

[Duskofdead]

A link to some stats of magnate races which isn't a dead link would be GREAT. :)

[Monkey Head]

find and download the encyclopedia mod - all in there.

[xijnjo]

Only to you Holy One. :D

@QSI: Thanks for the info. It is very helpful.
CD baby construct Neptunian castles with hardened modelling CLA Deep space, a violet grows the spherical lyrical Goblin.:( The GREEN GOBLIN! YAe

[xijnjo]

Only to you Holy One. :D

@QSI: Thanks for the info. It is very helpful.
CD baby construct Neptunian castles with hardened modelling CLA Deep space, a violet grows the spherical lyrical Goblin.:( The GREEN GOBLIN! YAe

In response to Orion, I would have ORION to say. Or if... Those coins are spinning! Gumby Painter is numeriklee much like the awesome Amberial:Nebulosa Realms For sure, this is a real possibility. Populating the Moon Colony took effort. Europa (one of Jupiter's Moons) created the gradated values needed to keep playing Authur & the Invisibles.

[xijnjo]

Only to you Holy One. :D

@QSI: Thanks for the info. It is very helpful.

Wow, what a trip, I think we can organize some sort of Domain, with an active geist and all.
More than coldfire peasants, we're like pheasants on mukhwas. i love love my little sony, and
was hoping kachinas could visit me as well. But yes Holy One, not a severed scratch but a regular
bag of Dragonball protocol. What's it's use. Karma might be interested to know that our wizard spells 48 is also not a bunch of clogged hookah, but a Gateway.:pout:

[Kahuna]

There you go Man,keep as cool as you can..
Fight piles of trials with smiles,
It riles them to believe that you perceive the web they weave
and keep on living free.....

[JosEPh]

:up:

So xijnjo, were you around back then when THO made that "famous" post? Or are you hoping Ken will someday post again?

JosEPh