Does SEIV Need Income?

[dogscoff]

Definitely NOT. The three resources we have now (+ population, +supply) are fine. They are an abstraction of wealth and economy, and money would only be a different and less interesting way of representing the same thing. Things I *would* like in this area:

-population "eats" resources. Actually I'm not sure abouth is one. If it meant actually moving stuff from place to place to prevent local famines, then maybe, yeah. Unfortunately the way SEIV is set up (all resources instantly available to entire empire) it would be more likely to be implemented as a simple "maintenence cost" for population, which would suck.

-Certain population levels required to operate facilities. This was originally planned for the game but was taken out before release. This really would turn population into another resource.

-A "limited resupply depot" option. Probably in the form of supply storage and limited supply generation abilities for facilities (just like we have for components). Then you could mod out the existing "infinite resupply depot" and turn supply into a true fourth resource without all the elaborate mucking about S_J has had to do in his mod.

-Trade routes/ resource distribution (ie the "invisible" ships which instantly move your minerals, rads and orgs from the colonies to the corners of your empire.) This has been long argued, and the wrong implementation could really ruin the game. I believe it could be done well though, probably through some highly abstracted system which keeps civilian transports invisible, but works out for each system how much infrastructure traffic flows through it and then measures each empire's level of influence in each system. This would be a cool motivator for taking treaties, since your "invisible" ships would benefit from allied protection=-) Don't expect to see this in a patch anytime soon though=-(