Power management system

[Enjou]

I'm loving the game so far after getting it yesterday and playing it a bit, and as I was playing and needed some additional electricity it occurred to me that during emergency situations the player probably doesn't want to micromanage the power consumption. I think a more detailed power management system would be a good way to address this.

One way to do this would be if it were possible to set particular items to have a power usage priority your power grid could selectively shut off non-essential systems when power is low. Instead of setting an item be 'on' or 'off' the player could set it to 'high priority', 'low priority', and 'off', or something like that. When electricity is low the lower priority items would turn off automatically to preserve power for the higher priority items.

Alternatively, rather than having this be done for individual items this could be done by item type by a menu where you would set a power management policy. You could have multiple policies as well - for instance you could have one policy that is in place for day to day operations that prioritizes lighting, luxuries, etc. but has turrets set to low priority or outright turned off, and a different policy for when you're under attack where you put the defenses on high priority, but have sun lamps and doors turned off. In this system I'd also want to have the ability to have particular items capable of overriding the policy and be always on if power is available.

This system could be a research item as well so it isn't initially available, and could require the user to build a computer that does this management.

[TheSpaceMan]

[Like]

[GC13]

Now this is a good idea. A two- or three-tier system where items start turning off is good. Perhaps the lowest tier turns off automatically when power usage exceeds power generation, the middle tier turns off when there is no power stored in your batteries anymore (and functions as the bottom tier if you have no batteries, except it will try to turn off everything in the bottom tier first to fix your shortfall) and the top tier it tries to keep on all the time? Maybe a fourth tier, so you can make some of your always-on stuff more important than others (turrets versus the nutrient paste dispenser, for instance).

[Evul]

Like the idea!
I usually turn of all turrets to preserve power then if i'm loosing power i turning off all lights and doors, so a tier system would be awesome!

[Wopian]

This would make my life so much easier...

Would also be nice to see a power overlay to see which areas are causing the most trouble with power hogging.