ok so I get that each sector can support a colony and each colony needs to be one sector apart, what is the annexing and forward basing do though? Is forward basing forfitting the resources of that sector so you can annex others?
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Annexing attaches a sector to a colony so you can use its resources.
Forward bases give you control of sectors but no resources, they also give you claims on adjacent sectors so if someone expands there you get casus beli on them. It's basically a way to "reserve" space ahead of time in exchange for influence though they can be useful in other ways like extending roads and providing friendly territory regeneration.
Forward bases give you control of sectors but no resources, they also give you claims on adjacent sectors so if someone expands there you get casus beli on them. It's basically a way to "reserve" space ahead of time in exchange for influence though they can be useful in other ways like extending roads and providing friendly territory regeneration.
I posted this elsewhere, will paste here in case it's of some help. I'm still learning it, myself.
I’ll start at the beginning. You start with one colony, and once that colony hits 4 population (and then again at 8, 12, and 16 population) you can annex a sector.
Annexing a sector seems to require an army unit/stack to stand on the central “pin” even if you had previously done so. However, if you have a forward base built you can just annex that sector by clicking on the base, which can be handy (and forward bases are handy for keeping line of site open in that area, plus makes it harder for an enemy to casually annex a sector you both had a claim on).
Once a sector is annexed, you can then specify a specialty for it, known as exploiting it. You can specialize (exploit) in one of four ways - food, energy, research, or production. You can only have two of any one type of exploited sector in a given colony, and as far as I know, colonies will only ever be 5 total sectors, including the sector the colony itself is on, so 4 exploited sectors - plan accordingly.
Once you have an exploited sector, you can start building unique/sector specific buildings (like in an energy sector you can build a building, once researched, that makes upkeep cheaper in that sector). Those building seem to actually represent on the strategy map once built.
Often there will be a location in a sector that provides bonuses if you go the indicated direction with the sector. For instance, if you find an abandoned quarry, it grants +10 production if you annex that sector, and +5 more production if you exploit that sector as industry.
Note that you can have a claim on a sector because you visited it earlier, and so can another player (or an NPC faction). You can still annex the sector, but doing so will give Casus Beli to the faction you take it from (and vice versa) unless you first ask permission.
When you scroll out you can see the various resource potential of each sector - like 2 science icons for example, and that helps me decide how to exploit it and also what unique starting building to put in each colony. Lots of research, no food around me? I’ll go for the +10 food building. That sort of thing. It helps you plan out.
And there is a lot of buildings to research in the society tree to really get the most out of your sectors, I’ve barely scratched the surface myself.
You can only colonize sectors that are at least one sector away from another colony. When you have a colonizer selected, the central “pin” in any given sector (where you stand to annex a sector, or build a forward base, or as the Dvar prospect for free resources) changes to a little colony icon to show where it’s possible to build.
I’ll start at the beginning. You start with one colony, and once that colony hits 4 population (and then again at 8, 12, and 16 population) you can annex a sector.
Annexing a sector seems to require an army unit/stack to stand on the central “pin” even if you had previously done so. However, if you have a forward base built you can just annex that sector by clicking on the base, which can be handy (and forward bases are handy for keeping line of site open in that area, plus makes it harder for an enemy to casually annex a sector you both had a claim on).
Once a sector is annexed, you can then specify a specialty for it, known as exploiting it. You can specialize (exploit) in one of four ways - food, energy, research, or production. You can only have two of any one type of exploited sector in a given colony, and as far as I know, colonies will only ever be 5 total sectors, including the sector the colony itself is on, so 4 exploited sectors - plan accordingly.
Once you have an exploited sector, you can start building unique/sector specific buildings (like in an energy sector you can build a building, once researched, that makes upkeep cheaper in that sector). Those building seem to actually represent on the strategy map once built.
Often there will be a location in a sector that provides bonuses if you go the indicated direction with the sector. For instance, if you find an abandoned quarry, it grants +10 production if you annex that sector, and +5 more production if you exploit that sector as industry.
Note that you can have a claim on a sector because you visited it earlier, and so can another player (or an NPC faction). You can still annex the sector, but doing so will give Casus Beli to the faction you take it from (and vice versa) unless you first ask permission.
When you scroll out you can see the various resource potential of each sector - like 2 science icons for example, and that helps me decide how to exploit it and also what unique starting building to put in each colony. Lots of research, no food around me? I’ll go for the +10 food building. That sort of thing. It helps you plan out.
And there is a lot of buildings to research in the society tree to really get the most out of your sectors, I’ve barely scratched the surface myself.
You can only colonize sectors that are at least one sector away from another colony. When you have a colonizer selected, the central “pin” in any given sector (where you stand to annex a sector, or build a forward base, or as the Dvar prospect for free resources) changes to a little colony icon to show where it’s possible to build.
Annexing a sector means you wish to make that sector into a province and add it to your colony, you can only do this with sectors that are connected to your own borders. Forward bases are for sectors that aren't connected to your borders but you would still like to "claim" and perhaps annex in the future. So by establishing a forward base your are pretty much laying claim to that sector by building a mini-base there with some militia forces, so other player's/AI can't annex or claim the sector for themselves unless they want to declare war on you; however, you will not gain the resources until you annex the sector.
Correct - just to clarify, I was only saying forward bases could be clicked on in lieu of having an army standing on the hex when you wanted to annex that sector. It happened a few times for me when I had built a forward base to prevent the AI from taking it and then later wanted to annex it for myself, I didn't have to move any units out to it thanks to the forward base.
I see the word "claim" used a lot, but how does that work? I need an in depth explanation of "claiming".
When you walk an army over the little "pin" in the center of the sector, you now have a claim on that sector. But, multiple players are allowed to have a claim on the same sector, which is where things can get tricky if you annex it without permission.
Note that there may be other ways to claim a sector, like just walking into it at all might, I haven't done any real testing. It's also possible just being adjacent to a colony "claims" it, for example.
I think just resting the cursor anywhere on the sector shows who has claims on it. Or clicking on the pin in the center to bring up the sector details should for sure.
Is it best to double down or to go broader? Like if I see a sector with 2 production and 1 or no growth, is there anything wrong with adding a growth exploit there? Is there any advantage for adding another production exploit?
You can only have one exploitation per sector. Deciding on the best choice can be anything from straightforward and simple to quite tricky. Sometimes a sector is really good for one type of resource but you need something else.
Edit: I may have misunderstood the question.
Edit: I may have misunderstood the question.
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As a general rule, try to grab sectors that have "extra" bonuses ( like the production quarry BleedTheFreak mentioned) that are helpful towards your goal for the colony, and then exploit the sector to take advantage of that extra bonus. For example, if you've got a colony that already has plenty of production, annexing a sector with a Production Quarry may not be needed. Try annexing one with a bonus to Food/Research/Power and exploit to match that instead.
If no sectors are available that have extra bonuses fitting what your colony needs, then grabbing any sector you want and exploiting it however you want is perfectly viable.
Annexing brings the sector into your empire as part of the annexing city. You then generate resources there, depending on how you exploit the sector.
As far as I can tell, forward bases allow you to make a claim over a sector. If another empire settles or annexes your claimed sector, you get a CB against them.
As far as I can tell, forward bases allow you to make a claim over a sector. If another empire settles or annexes your claimed sector, you get a CB against them.
How much output do annexed sectors actually generate per resource icon? How much do I lose by exploiting energy on a sector with one energy icon vs a sector with two icons?
Do annexed sectors incur any additional food upkeep or is this determined by the colony size alone?
Do annexed sectors incur any additional food upkeep or is this determined by the colony size alone?
The resource icons can be a bit misleading. For example some geographical features like rivers or lava flows provide a flat income of certain resources and produce those "resource icons/pips" on the zoomed out map but that doesn't necessarily mean those sectors are best candidates for exploitations of those resource types.
What you need to look at are a sector's terrain and climate. Each of those has two resources associated with it.
Terrain:
Forest - Food/Production ; Mountain - Production/Energy ; Ruins - Energy/Research ; Fertile Plains - Food/Research
Climate:
Arcadian - Food/Energy ; Arctic - Production/Research ; Fungal - Food/Research ; Arid - Energy/Production
Every sector exploitation starts at lvl 1. Research provides 2 more generic level upgrades which can take your exploitation to level 3 regardless of terrain or climate. Then you have the terrain and climate based upgrades that each provide 1 level. So if both terrain and climate are suitable for a given resource you'll be able to get a lvl 5 exploitation for that resource, this is the best outcome. If only terrain or climate are suitable you'll be capped at lvl 4. If neither, lvl 3.
So an Arcadian Forest can get lvl 5 food but only lvl 4 production or energy and lvl 3 research while a Fungal Mountain is very flexible and can get lvl 4 in any resource type but never a lvl 5.
It's important to note that terrain upgrades come much earlier in the tech tree than climate ones so always look at terrain first unless you're in the late game.
Then you have the resource nodes for each resource which provide +10 of that resource and an additional +5 if your exploitation type matches that resource. So for example if you have a Derelict Power Plant in an Arcadian Mountain not only can you reach a lvl 5 energy exploitation you'll get a total of +15 energy from the Power Plant as soon as your lvl 1 energy exploitation is complete.
These resource nodes sometimes cause the game to give kinda bad recommendations like advising you to make a food exploitation in an Arctic Mountain because it has an Overgrown Biodome so it'll give you that additional +5 food even though neither the terrain nor the climate are suitable for food. That +5 is nice in the very short term but overall it's better to avoid limiting yourself to a lvl 3 exploitation just to get 5 more of a resource unless you have no better alternatives.
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A correction, sectors are claimed by being adjacent to other sectors which you own. Be they colonies, and their sectors, or Forward Bases. Military presence in a sector has no factor into the claiming of it.
Very interesting. I did a summary table:
where:
F:Food
E:Energy
R:Research
P: Production
Bold is when suitable for terrain.
Non bold when suitable for climate.
Attachments
So how do Terrain/Clime affect the central Colony Sector? Should I have all my colonizers settle on junk sectors?
I have a Colony in which I already have 2 food sectors. I just added my 3rd sector to that colony, and it wont let me choose food. Is there any way to exploit more than 2 food sectors per colony?