Energy 0/100 ?

Started by Smoothjc1, December 13, 2009, 01:01:49 PM

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Smoothjc1

Hi to all
How do I get the energy to 100/100 ? just bought game, Really fun to play well worth the ten dollars I paid. 

haloguy48

If you have 0/100 energy, it means your underpowered. So what you need to do is slow down on how much your building and let it build up. If you want more energy produced, build Collectors so there is a lot more green covered on the map. Remember to space them out also as any collector covering an area of another doesn't give you double. If you run out of area to use collectors and have the Reactors tech, build some of those.
~Pew Pew Pew!~ 
Building campaigns from the echos of forgotten experiences.
~Pew Pew Pew!~

Aurzel

yep the 0/100 is how much spare energy you have but dont worry if you have 0/100 energy just as long as your starvation isnt going up

knucracker

Yeah, the energy bar shows you how much you have on hand.  So imagine that you start the game and do nothing.  You will show 20/20 energy.  This means you have 20 energy on hand out of a max of 20.  If you then build a storage pod, wait for it to finish, then do nothing else.... you will have 40/40 energy.

As you build things they take energy.  Every little packet that leaves Odin City takes the energy down by 1.  So if you have no collection, Odin City would be able to produce 40 little packets if you started with 40/40.  When all 40 had been produced, your energy would read 0/40.

Now, you almost always have some collection.  The city itself will produce energy if it is on the ground.  As you build collectors and reactors you produce more and more energy.  Building things and rearming weapons take energy, though.  So whenever your weapons are firing or you are building stuff you will be consuming (depleting) energy.  When your depletion is greater than your collection, your energy bar will go down.  Eventually it will hit zero... at which point if you continue to try to use more energy than you are producing you will get a big red starvation bar.

So build slower, use fewer weapons, be smart about where and when you attack and you will master the game.  Energy management is the key to being an awesome player.  Get it, cherish it, covet it, fight the creeper so you can expand and get more of it.  Energy is the lifeblood of your base, once you become its master the Creeper will become your plaything.

Aurzel

wow thats very deeper ... and hopefully after that the creeper wont be ;p

btw how does the starvation work virgil? sometimes it seems to increase slowly other times to skyrockets

Smoothjc1

Sweet. Thanks guys, I am very addicted to this game, Also I have high saturation what brings that down ? more energy ? or less building ?  Again thanks

Kamron3

That's not 'Saturation' it's Starvation.

This happens when Odin City can't get the packets to the buildings that are requesting them fast enough.

So producing more energy will bring it down.

_k

haloguy48

Quote from: Smoothjc1 on December 13, 2009, 05:44:03 PM
Sweet. Thanks guys, I am very addicted to this game, Also I have high saturation what brings that down ? more energy ? or less building ?  Again thanks

Its actually Starvation I am told (I thought it was saturation also).... So yes, the higher the starvation the lower energy income to my knowledge. If you use all energy you have, starvation kicks in. Meaning its harder to get back to the normal flow and while you have starvation, some buildings get cut on ammo or building time.

Edit: Kamron3 Ninjuh'd me.
~Pew Pew Pew!~ 
Building campaigns from the echos of forgotten experiences.
~Pew Pew Pew!~

Smoothjc1

So build more speed packet drivers

haloguy48

Quote from: Smoothjc1 on December 13, 2009, 06:45:50 PM
So build more speed packet drivers

speed packet drivers only increase the speed in which they are delivered, not the rate you produce energy.
~Pew Pew Pew!~ 
Building campaigns from the echos of forgotten experiences.
~Pew Pew Pew!~

knucracker

#10
Apologies, but I'll give a lengthy reply since most people lurk on these forums and this may help those just getting started:

Starvation is is an indicator of how much more energy you are trying to use than you are producing.  So say that you have a collection of "5".  This means that you are making 5 energy per second.... enough to produce and send 5 little packets per second out of Odin City.  Now say that you try to build 10 things all at once.  This will demand energy at 10 per second.  In this situation Odin City will only produce 5 per second (that is what your collection rate is after all).  But your structures are demanding things at 10 per second.

When this situation occurs every structure will have a backlog of packet requests.  The starvation bar is the sum of all backlogs across all units.  If the starvation bar reads "50" it means that 50 packets have been asked for and Odin City has _not_ been able to produce them yet.

Most people get into trouble because they go build crazy and have many things being built in parallel.  In the early game the collection rate is very small so Odin is only going to be able to produce 1 to 2 packets per second.  Building things in parallel can produce demands like 4-5 per second.  This will create a packet request backlog across the structures being built (so the starvation bar goes up to let you know this).  And everything will get built slower.... which in turn can delay when new collectors come online and start producing more energy.

New players will also get into trouble because they will build like 10 blasters and 10 mortars and then send them to war.  Just like in real life, those weapons are going to need supplies and munitions.  If you don't have the productive capacity to support that army, then you are going to have units without ammo.

In summary, whenever you see starvation going up you might want to get nervous.  It means you are consuming energy faster than you are making it and you have been doing so long enough to deplete your reserves.... and units aren't getting what they are asking for.  Weapons ask for ammo, and weapons without ammo will not be a pretty site (especially if they are blasters holding the line).

The only way to reduce starvation is to produce more energy, or demand less.  Deactivate mortars, don't build in parallel, fall back to a defensible position and let the Creeper gain some ground (like a lake).  

If I get a chance I'll try to do a video in the next week or two that shows a 'bad' game and a way to recover from it.  I'll play like a noob for a while and get into a real pickle and then try to recover and show expert energy management (toot toot.... yes that is my own horn you hear :)





Smoothjc1

Got it, Build more collectors or reactors And cool down on building Blasters & Mortars  if starvation is going up, I sure that will help the noobs like me  :), Just finished Ursa starting Canis tomorrow 

Aurzel

yeah thats how i thought it works but on more than one occasion my starvation has gone from 0 to somewhere around the 90s in a second even though i dont have that much thats requesting packets, maybe 2-4 over what i'm producing

n3s

So how can I have 240ish out of 260 energy stored, 16 depletion, 36 income, and have over 100 starvation? I'm guessing ammo packets?

Daos

If you move a weapon, that is reloading and cut it from the system, then the starvation will show up, even if you are overproducing energy.