colony type selection

[JenMax]

When founding a new colony, one is prompted to secelct a colony type --> "mining, military, construction, resupply, etc.

1> Does the selection have any actual affect the characteristics of the newly constructed colony?
b> Or is it just "window dressing?"
c> or is it an item needed by the AI to determine how to "treat" the colony?

Thanks...

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"nothing happens in a vaccum." - me

[Jeb]

I'm pretty sure colony type is there so that AI ministers will know what to build. Unfortunately, this means that a user-defined colony type will leave ministers even more clueless than they already are, unless you edit the relevant .txt files to include a special build queue.

My favorite new colony type is "Warehouse," which is just a planet with a couple of storage facilities. It's useful for tiny planets that aren't worth mining, etc. and aren't as efficient as large planets for research because you can't build many research centers and then a computer complex to give them all a bonus.

[Strogian]

Ummm.. In the tutorial it says that a colony type is just so the PLAYER will know how to treat a planet. This implies that the AI/ministers don't care what type of colony it is.

[Jeb]

If you say so, but look in the AI folder for a file called Default_AI_Construction_Facilities.txt, which seems to key what the AI will build to A) the colony type and B) the "game state," i.e. exploration, infrastructure, prepare for attack, etc. Am I just misinterpreting it? It sure looks like colony type influences what the AI ministers will do.

[Noble713]

Also, if the AI doesn't use colony types, then why does any AI planet you capture have a type assigned to it, and usually the facilites to match.

[This message has been edited by Noble713 (edited 27 August 2000).]