More Profitable Third Tier Factories

[easternblocrobotcowboy]

In the continuing battle to make top tier economy more profitable, has the idea been considered to move primary resources to secondary resources? I have heard that people have done this with the SPP (I dont know why, it is profitable enough) as well as things like 1mW shield fabs and such.

Can this be done with top tier factories to make them more profitable? Say take a computer fab and move all the resources except microchips and energy to secondary status, so they woudl not be necessary for the fab to run. This would dramatically increase the profit margin on these factories, and make them more attractive investments, as well as motivating the player to also invest in second and third tier factories like the chip plants, to supply their (now) high profit computer fabs with the micrichips it needs.

Has anyone tried this yet?
TW

[Burianek]

To be honest, I at least, haven't considered it.
Do you know/understand how the math works out w/ secondary resources? How precisely do they affect production?
I have nothing inherently against this proposal, although I tend to feel that what you're doing is, in effect, making very expensive factories much easier to run. That seems somehow counterintuitive to me.
I'm holding off doing any more testing until at least 1.3 comes out (fingers crossed for new variables to change)
But if you (or someone else) that's installed one of these mods (like crystal free spp) wants to explain exactly how they affect production, I'd be happy to work them into the mathematical model and see if I can do anything with them. (or at very least explain why I can't)

[easternblocrobotcowboy]

The motive for this is due to the common complaints that the profit margin on SPPs outstripped all other factories, while it should be reversed - the SPPs should be making the least margin, while the third tier factories should be making the most, but need complex raw materials.

Under the current game system, the *difficulty* of top tier factories is in place, but the margin is not, they usually make 1/3 to 1/10 as much as an SPP when you account for the costs of all their materials. Thus currently in the game, all factories are superfluous while SPPs are your workhorses. In fact other than the occasional crystal fab to keep your SPPs running round the clock, all other factories are a huge waste of money, and only serve as a curiosity or convenience of the ultra-rich (who got rich with 10+ SPPs)

if you move resources such as silicon and meatsteak cahoonas to secondary resources leaving chips and cuantum tubes or whatever left, you still have the dependence on chips, making the factory difficult to supply, but the margin on your computers will be much more (secondary resources are not required but when present speed up production)

Thus high tier factories can become profitable and a desirable invesntment.

Thats the idea at least....

TW

[Burianek]

I understand the motive, we agree on that completely.
I'll restate my question:
Do you know the precise mechanics behind how secondary resources affect production?
exactly how quickly does a given factory produce w/o them? with them? do the yields change? if you have two secondary resources, how does this change the equation? etc.
If you don't know, don't feel bad. I don't either, so I'd have to do a lot of testing to 'figure out' how they perturb the model, and hence, how to use them to improve the model. (if it can be done)

[easternblocrobotcowboy]

I dont know how it works. I am a little afraid of mucking around with such a 'central' aspect of the game and messing up my save games (this is my first time through the game)

Can anyone relate their experience with crystal secondary SPPs?

TW