Game progress stops completely because of lack of gold - fun?

[sadpickle]

i managed to get 6 ships in half a year after my 'Russian winter' killed all the caravans and their beasts of burden before they could trade with me so i think they plain out just added caravans into the traders list and had them priority so if someone trades with them, they will again come back,thus denying 1 the ability to get the trade ships.That needs to be fixed, not trading with land caravans being outright better once 1 builds a comm station. Traders on a whole tend to come once a month

I trade with everyone, I finally started to get space traders in year two. It has nothing to do with if you trade or don't trade with ground caravans, afaik. Perhaps it's tied to base wealth.

[Shurp]

Two suggestions:

(1) Mod the game so you don't need gold to build the multi-analyzer.  See my thread here:
https://ludeon.com/forums/index.php?topic=18562.msg202882#msg202882

(2) Kill all trade caravans.  I don't actually know that this will work, but I suspect it will cause them to stop, which in turn should cause more ships to show up.  Going to try this in my next colony & let you know how it goes.

[Limdood]

trade caravans ARE ships.

Each trade caravan directly correlates to a type of trade ship...if you get an "exotic goods" trade caravan, it will have gold. 

[ChimpX]

trade caravans ARE ships.
[/quote ]

Are you absolutely sure about that? I could have sworn I recently had a foot caravan that would buy my excess clothes but not my poorly-conceived art.

Mind you, I was simultaneously playing a game where I drank a beer every time one of my colonists did, so I could be misremembering.

[Shurp]

trade caravans ARE ships.

Each trade caravan directly correlates to a type of trade ship...if you get an "exotic goods" trade caravan, it will have gold.

Exceptionally understocked ships with poor selections and insufficient cash to buy your leftovers.

So yes, the "exotic goods" trade caravan does have gold.  But the "bulk goods trader" trade caravan has no plasteel, you'll have to mine that or get it from mechanoids.  And the "combat supplier" trade caravan has a single rusty rifle and no body armor.  Good luck killing mechanoids. 

[edit] Hmmm, a bulks good trader just showed up with plasteel.  Whaddya know... of course, this one had no gold.  OK, so the situation is not as hopeless as it might seem.  Still, depending on the RNG for critical progress is a mediocre design decision.

Oh, and that's bizarre, he won't buy beer!  What's wrong with this guy?

[Shurp]

And... my colony got killed by tribal raiders.  I had 5 colonists, they had 10 raiders with great bows.  Normally I'd have a nice screen of turrets to balance things out, but I had been saving components because I would need them later...

Nope, this component mechanic really isn't working.  If traders would visit carrying a dozen instead of 3-4, sure, I have enough silver to buy them.  But as it is this is a monstrous bottleneck.

[makapse]

i really dont see how you are spending this many components when i have got a surplus of 70 after buying 10 and mining 16 and mechs giving me another 15 and i am playing on a ice sheet so i need more hydrophonics and heaters too. and i got a nice 15 turret cushion for my 5 pawns. Are yousure youare deconstructing the spaceship chunks? there should be atleas 5 of them giving 40 components

[NephilimNexus]

The best way to obtain gold die horribly is to open an ancient structure, the guys in the cryptopods usually carry enough gold to build the analyzer.

[Shurp]

So you have a reserve of 15... and the high-tech workbench takes 10 and the component workbench takes 30... and now some tribals visit and blow up some of your turrets... and later some more... and later some more...

But admittedly I did have to use a lot of components on windmills and solar panels to power my sun lamps.  I'm going to give up on the ice for the time being and head back into a temperate climate.  Now that I know what I'm really up against I should be able to conserve properly yet still defend myself.

This definitely requires a different playing style.  Still to be determined whether it is fun or not.

[Mathenaut]

Are yousure youare deconstructing the spaceship chunks? there should be atleas 5 of them giving 40 components

[RX2000]

It actually wasnt very hard for me to get gold on my current (& so far only) A13 playthrough. I got a trader on comms after maybe a year or so, & they had around 50 gold, & I bought 30.

I'm actually having a harder time getting plasteel. NONE of the traders I've had so far have had ANY. I havent found any on my map at all. I've finally managed to get a little by smelting down some plasteel weapons, but I havent been able to scrounge up the 50 I need yet. I should get it soon tho hopefully.

[makapse]

mechs. Each centipede gives 50 and syther gives 25 plasteel along with 2 and 1 component and extra steel i dont count. So mechs are rich

[Britnoth]

This is the big problem with A13 so far. Essentially rolling dead-end colonies.

Because of gold and component gates, ontop of how the AI scales threats with time, you can reach a point where your colony is 1-2 YEARS in with almost 0 progress made. Then you're facing threats as if your colony had been advancing for 1-2 years.

There is no way to manage that.

ontop of how the AI scales threats with time,

False, threat size is scaled entirely with colony wealth. Make no progress, get the exact same sized raids.

If you play for 1-2 game years and make zero progress.. well you need to take a look at what you are doing.

Requiring gold and plasteel is a good way to encourage people to open the shrines. The problem here is the terrible land traders being practically useless unless you are willing to kill them.