Newbe-how depoy Robos, Mines, etc...

[albireo]

I've had this game for a couple of years and had been working so much I could't sit down to learn it. Well, I got sick a while back and decided to REALLY dig in and figure out this game. I've played the tutorial (REALLY SHALLOW!) read the manual (not much better), and read through the forums, but I can't figure out how to do a few things no matter WHAT I TRY...
Please help me so I can go on...
I don't understand how to:
1. Get Robo miners on a ship, into an astroid field and mine.
2. How to lay mines.
3. If I have a planet with few facilities (no room to build facilities) how do I protect it? (Besides parking battlecrusiers in orbit)
4. How do I use weapons platforms? (where do they go, how do I get them there, how is it different from a space station...)
5. Cargo - I'm LOST. I don't understand the basics like what the difference between cargo and storage, I don't know how something gets loaded in either, I don't understand how to get things out of cargo (or if I need to). Just the whole cargo thing, both planetary and shipboard has me completely frustrated...
I have LOTS more questions, but I this would help.
I'd like to get more in depth but it's so slow going it's hard to keep it up.
Worse, now I'm back on overtime and don't have the time to dig and dig and dig...
Help!
Thanks,
Joe

[Alneyan]

Welcome! I will do my best to answer your questions, starting with question 5 (because it will matter for question 2 and 4). If you have the opportunity to do so, the Newbie FAQ will provide you with answers to many questions you might have.

5) Resource storage is only used to keep excedentary resources in storage, while cargo is used to transport units and population (was it your question?). When you build units, they go to the "cargo" of your planet, or to cargo bays on ships if there is no room left on the planet. The Cargo transfer button is used to transfer cargo between a planet and a ship, which is required in order to move units (or population) around. For example, in question 2, you have to move cargo (the mines in this case) in order to deploy them somewhere else.

There is little difference between ship cargo and planetary cargo; ship cargo is only needed if you need to move your cargo around, but they otherwise have the same features. The only other difference is that a planet can launch any cargo it has in reserve, whereas a ship will need specific launch components in order to deploy fighters or mines.

1) Ships can use remote-miners without problem, and would then be sent to an asteroid field. Once they are in position, you will see a new line above Maintenance, titled "Remote-mining". It would say, for example, 554 minerals mined by the ship.

2) You either need a Minelayer Bay or a planet to launch mines. Planets can launch anything without problem, but there are several different components for ships (Fighter Bay for fighters, Satellite Bay for satellites, something for Drone and Minelayer Bays). Build one such ship, and build a few mines at a planet. Then load the Minelayer with the mines, and send it to where you want to lay the mines. Finally order it to Launch Units remotely (or the Launch/Recover button if you are playing a non-simultaneous game), and select "mines" in the pop-up that will appear.

3) Such planets are difficult to protect, and not too important for your Empire. However, you should defend whole systems whenever possible, rather than individual planets. A fleet stationated over a wormhole (used to travel between systems) will start combat next to the invading fleet, and will have one full turn to wreak havoc on the invaders, making it an effective way of defending yourself.

4) Weapon platforms are units kept on planets, whereas bases are orbital defences, requiring a Spaceyard to be built. So weapon platforms are cheaper and easier to build, and do not require any monthly maintenance. They are also weaker than bases. You can build them at any planet or spaceyard, and they will be used whenever they are in a planet storage.

[Gandalf Parker]

albireo said:
1. Get Robo miners on a ship, into an astroid field and mine.
2. How to lay mines.
3. If I have a planet with few facilities (no room to build facilities) how do I protect it? (Besides parking battlecrusiers in orbit)
4. How do I use weapons platforms? (where do they go, how do I get them there, how is it different from a space station...)
5. Cargo - I'm LOST. I don't understand the basics like what the difference between cargo and storage,

Usually I like to give the long answers but I got beat to it. So let me try the short answers that can stick in the head.

1. build them into a ship, or build them into a satellite that a ship can deliver there.
2. there is a button on the top of the screen menu for it
3. build satellites, mines, space stations (bases). But a base needs a shipyard to build, sats and mines need cargo space on the planet to build them into so you can launch them next turn
4. planetary weapons sites. they are built into the cargo space of a planet and stay there. If you want to build/launch stas/mines then dont fill up on weapon platforms. Or build a cargo facility (think warehouse).
5.supply=fuel, cargo=storage. cargo is for moving people, sats, mines, weapon platforms to other planets. If you want to launch sats/mines into space instead of a planet (like to guard a warp) then you need a launcher built into the ship.

RATS those arent so short. Im bad at that but its something Im working on

[albireo]

Thanks Alneyan!
I saw the new line above Maintenance, but noticed the number was going DOWN rather than UP and thought that it wasn't related somehow. My ship sits in an astroid field each turn but mining the number gets less. I was thinking the mining number would get bigger until it "filled" the ship? (or until the cargo bays were full??) and I had to shuttle it back and forth to my world?
I could see that I'm using cargo to transfer a population and in addition actually got ONE mine transferred in orbit around a planet, but figured I was doing something wrong since it went into the "cargo" section in the planetary screen. Also, I wondered if I had to go get more mines each time to plant more... (how do I tell my planet to make more?? or less??) Even more confusing for me is loading the mines to start with. I discovered that you have to "make" the mines on a planet - I see only one mine in the place under the population icon in my planet screen - how do I get more mines to load up? How many mines can I fit on a ship? As you can see I'm pretty lost about this...
Along the same lines, I see my weapons platform in the "cargo" section of my planet (along with the mines) which led me to believe that I should transfer it somehow to a large ship and tow it to another planet??
When I try making a ship to deploy mines I build the ship and put how many cargos per mines? I discovered that I had to have a cargo container (or storage??) or else I the ship wouldn't have mines on it...
Sorry I'm soooooo DENSE! I REALLY have read through the newbe FAQ but it covers mostly strategies not the regular nuts and bolts of how to do things. I've seen some other guides, but they are all either strategies for people knowing what to do or for folks just getting started and don't know the very basics...
Joe

[Arkcon]

albireo said:
Thanks Alneyan!
I saw the new line above Maintenance, but noticed the number was going DOWN rather than UP and thought that it wasn't related somehow. My ship sits in an astroid field each turn but mining the number gets less. I was thinking the mining number would get bigger until it "filled" the ship? (or until the cargo bays were full??) and I had to shuttle it back and forth to my world?
Joe

Your mining ship is doing what it should according to the rules of SE4 -- look over here {clicky} for a fuller explanation - blue words are hyperlinks to other topics. Click 'round, you'll see how it all fits together.

[douglas]

albireo said:
I saw the new line above Maintenance, but noticed the number was going DOWN rather than UP and thought that it wasn't related somehow. My ship sits in an astroid field each turn but mining the number gets less. I was thinking the mining number would get bigger until it "filled" the ship? (or until the cargo bays were full??) and I had to shuttle it back and forth to my world?

The resources mined are automatically transported instantly to your empire's storage each turn. The number shown there is how much is being mined in that one turn, and it goes down because remote mining reduces the value of the asteroid field being mined.

albireo said:
I could see that I'm using cargo to transfer a population and in addition actually got ONE mine transferred in orbit around a planet, but figured I was doing something wrong since it went into the "cargo" section in the planetary screen.

A mine in cargo is just a mine that hasn't been launched yet. You have to give the ship or planet an order to launch the mines before you'll have a minefield.

albireo said:
Also, I wondered if I had to go get more mines each time to plant more... (how do I tell my planet to make more?? or less??)

Yes, you do. Each mine launched is removed from cargo. When you run out of mines in cargo, you can't launch any more until you build or load more of them. When you click to add a mine to a construction queue, a small window should pop up for selecting how many mines to build at once.

albireo said:
Even more confusing for me is loading the mines to start with. I discovered that you have to "make" the mines on a planet - I see only one mine in the place under the population icon in my planet screen - how do I get more mines to load up? How many mines can I fit on a ship? As you can see I'm pretty lost about this...

I'm not sure exactly which place you're talking about, so I'll explain every possibility I can think of. In the planet detail screen (what you see when you click on a planet in the system view), a picture of a mine right below the planet's picture indicates that the planet has at least one mine in cargo. There is no difference there whether you have 1 mine or 100 mines. If you click on the cargo tab, one of the squares in the grid should show a picture of a mine. How many mines you have is indicated by a number in the bottom right corner of this square. How many mines a ship or planet can hold is determined by the cargo capacity of the ship or planet and the size of the mines. A ship with 100 kT of cargo space can hold 10 small mines, which are 10 kT each.

albireo said:
Along the same lines, I see my weapons platform in the "cargo" section of my planet (along with the mines) which led me to believe that I should transfer it somehow to a large ship and tow it to another planet??

The cargo section of a planet is exactly where weapon platforms are supposed to be. That is the only place where they have any effect. When a planet is involved in combat, it will be able to use all of the weapons of any weapon platforms that it has in cargo. You could load weapon platforms onto a ship with enough cargo space, but they wouldn't do anything but take up space until you dropped them off on a planet again.

albireo said:
When I try making a ship to deploy mines I build the ship and put how many cargos per mines? I discovered that I had to have a cargo container (or storage??) or else I the ship wouldn't have mines on it...

It depends on how many mines you want the ship to carry and how quickly you want it to launch them. In the stock game, a mine layer I provides 20 kT of cargo space in addition to its mine launching ability, enough for 2 small mines or 1 large mine. A cargo bay I provides 150 kT cargo space, enough for 15 small, 10 medium, or 7 1/2 large mines, but does not increase the number of mines the ship can launch each turn.