Surviving Mars: Things That Should Not Be

[Technoincubus]

Surviving Mars had a serious balance problems.
1. Metals
Up until Mohole mine project I NEVER mined a single metal deposit. I had enough by gathering on-surface even on highest difficulties on metal-starved areas.
2. Water
Moisture vaporators can provide enough for three domes. Extracting water from the ground is simply not needed that much. Vaporators are sustainable and reserves can provide enough water to survive storms and stuff.
3. Stirling generators
I see absolutely zero reasons to build anything but stirling generators. They need no maintenance and after scrubbing can double your power income. They take 1 tile.
4. Waste rock processors
They came so late in game that you no longer need them. I mean they are useful as a way to convert waste rock, as by that time you will be drowning in concrete.
5. Excavator
At this point, you no longer need that much concrete.
6. Most Spire buildings are sub-optimal.
Water reclamation? Compared with arcology, even hanging gardens are not that great, not to say cloning or medical centers
7. Security
Is there any renegades at all? It is so easy to satisfy most of colonist needs that renegades are a rare sight.
8. Lack of early gambling building
You have only ONE building to satisfy gambling need - casino, with extremely high 2 elec maint. no alternatives for that. No medium buildings.
9. A lot of worthless research.
Who ever uses +10000 of rocket payload? Why do you need 10 more colonists when expanding domes are very slow and you mostly filled with colonists? Why do you need probes when scanning is not that hard and proceeds naturally?

 

[Zaskow]

Surviving Mars had a serious balance problems.

This 'problems' depend from map strongly.

Up until Mohole mine project I NEVER mined a single metal deposit. I had enough by gathering on-surface even on highest difficulties on metal-starved areas.

Really? In my recent game I have only 40 metals left on ground and 0 metal deposits. What can I do later when shortage begins?

Moisture vaporators can provide enough for three domes. Extracting water from the ground is simply not needed that much. Vaporators are sustainable and reserves can provide enough water to survive storms and stuff.

What about polymer and fuel production? Starting Moisture vaporator gives only 1 Water which is enough only for 1 Dome and I don't count food production.

I see absolutely zero reasons to build anything but stirling generators. They need no maintenance and after scrubbing can double your power income. They take 1 tile.

Yes, they are super good buildings, but this is expensive for me (both template and normal building - 10 polymers (!) and 5 electronics (!)) and I don't have a tech for now.

They came so late in game that you no longer need them. I mean they are useful as a way to convert waste rock, as by that time you will be drowning in concrete.

At this point, you no longer need that much concrete.

Depends from map, really.

Water reclamation? Compared with arcology, even hanging gardens are not that great, not to say cloning or medical centers

Yes, all these spires are a bit useless. Only 1 time I had the thought to build Water Reclamation spire when I had serious water shortage.

Is there any renegades at all? It is so easy to satisfy most of colonist needs that renegades are a rare sight.

Agreed.

You have only ONE building to satisfy gambling need - casino, with extremely high 2 elec maint. no alternatives for that. No medium buildings.

Agreed.

Who ever uses +10000 of rocket payload? Why do you need 10 more colonists when expanding domes are very slow and you mostly filled with colonists? Why do you need probes when scanning is not that hard and proceeds naturally?

I use. When I have all these small cheap domes, lack of workforce is serious issue.

 

[SillySMS]

This ranges from strange to factually incorrect. The only things I can think of that might generate a lot of these opinions are either A, playing with very generous rules (like overfunded), or B, expanding your colony very, very slowly.

1) Unless you are sticking to a very, very small colony, you are going to need to do some metals mining. It's a little better than what it used to be since cable faults and pipe leaks are so much less common, but you still need a substantial amount of metal to expand... not to mention feed metals-hungry machine parts factories.

2) Factually incorrect, unless you're talking about either micro domes (which barely count), or domes with water reclamation systems (which is labor- and machine parts-intensive, something I only use for farm domes).

3) Stirling generators are pretty neat... but until the late game, the massive up-front investment of 10 polymers/5 electronics is quite prohibitive. Unless you're willing to expand very, very slowly, you're going to be using a good number of solar panels or wind turbines, both of which play into #1.

4) Waste rock processors are less about generating concrete, and more about reclaiming useful tiles from the giant fields of waste rock you've accumulated by that point. Though, I would agree they're underpowered at present.

5) The Excavator can be quite useful on low-concrete maps, especially if you don't want to try to expand your drone network by several drone hubs just to reach those remaining deposits.

6) The water reclamation system is just about indispensable for cutting down the water use of farms, a big part of why I have specialized farm domes. The Hanging Gardens and Medical Center are great for population growth. Try playing Japan at some point, and you'll soon experience the pain of slow population growth. The Network Node helps create powerful science domes, helping concentrate your science production and reducing collaboration losses. The Sanatorium is... okay? It'd probably work better if Haemimont would fix colonist migration.

7) The "Rebel Yell" rule exists specifically to address how few renegades are generated in typical games.

8) Semi-agreed on this, but it's probably intentional that it's hard to fulfill gambling.

9) There are a few genuine duds, but expanding rocket capacity can be very, very useful, especially for sponsors with just 1-2 rockets, and if you're playing with Long Ride.

 

[Technoincubus]

Unless you are sticking to a very, very small colony, you are going to need to do some metals mining. It's a little better than what it used to be since cable faults and pipe leaks are so much less common, but you still need a substantial amount of metal to expand... not to mention feed metals-hungry machine parts factories.

Meteors supplement you just fine in addition to present deposits and even one metal deposit will be enough to hold until mohole.

Factually incorrect, unless you're talking about either micro domes (which barely count), or domes with water reclamation systems (which is labor- and machine parts-intensive, something I only use for farm domes).

Buying several prefabs is enough to sustain domes with farms and a fuel production. 4 MV produce6 waterm 2 for fuel, 1 dome and you have 3 for farming.

Stirling generators are pretty neat... but until the late game, the massive up-front investment of 10 polymers/5 electronics is quite prohibitive. Unless you're willing to expand very, very slowly, you're going to be using a good number of solar panels or wind turbines, both of which play into #1.

10 polymers and 5 elec is cheaper than wind maintenance and power output in a long run. In all my plays I never ever used other generators and I tried. They are just not worth it.

The Excavator can be quite useful on low-concrete maps, especially if you don't want to try to expand your drone network by several drone hubs just to reach those remaining deposits.

By that time you will no longer need conctrete and could survivу on concrete from waste rock processing or other sources, even if all map will be harvested.

The water reclamation system is just about indispensable for cutting down the water use of farms, a big part of why I have specialized farm domes. The Hanging Gardens and Medical Center are great for population growth. Try playing Japan at some point, and you'll soon experience the pain of slow population growth. The Network Node helps create powerful science domes, helping concentrate your science production and reducing collaboration losses. The Sanatorium is... okay? It'd probably work better if Haemimont would fix colonist migration.

But you don't need pop growth that much, you can import people by dozens and biggerthe pop the faster it grows.

 

[MylilPwny]

So whats your'e issue then?

Have you tested the hardest map locations in the game, grabbed the hardest commander and sponsor? If the answer to this is YES OFFCOURSE! Then i also suggest in addition to this, make use of the gamerules to make it harder. I find that this game is challenge for everybody, so i am atleast surprised, that i find this topic.

When it comes to the list you provided and some of the answer to other here, i just want to say that not everybody plays maps with alot of meteors, as this is a way for you to have enough metals until mohole. Stirling is a large payment upfront, and perhaps you are correct in saying that windturbines and solar is more expensive in the longer run, sure don't make it cheap in the short run when every polymer and elec matters. It sounds that you grow slowly and a 1-3 dome play, i may be wrong tho.

 

[SillySMS]

Meteors supplement you just fine in addition to present deposits and even one metal deposit will be enough to hold until mohole.

Again, I seriously suspect you are growing your colony very, very slowly. I strongly suspect you're being penny-wise and pound-foolish, neglecting the sheer power of exponential expansion in favor of reducing maintenance costs, a tradeoff that only makes sense as you start to approach a steady state.

Buying several prefabs is enough to sustain domes with farms and a fuel production. 4 MV produce6 waterm 2 for fuel, 1 dome and you have 3 for farming.

Yes. Now for dome 2, and 3, and 4, and soon enough MVs become prohibitively expensive.

10 polymers and 5 elec is cheaper than wind maintenance and power output in a long run. In all my plays I never ever used other generators and I tried. They are just not worth it.

It takes a very long time for wind maintenance to exceed the startup cost of a Stirling generator. Assuming 5 sols/maintenance period and use of polymer blades:
Stirling generator: startup cost of $240M ($400M if you need to buy prefab), 0 maintenance. 10 electricity production when closed.
Large wind turbine: startup cost of $64M ($28M for the polymer blades upgrade, $36M for the machine parts), plus some concrete I'll neglect. Maintenance: $3.6M/sol (0.2 machine parts, again assuming 5-sol maintenance period). 14 base production, boosted by elevation.

At various elevation boosts:
0%: 76 sols to break even
25%: 99 sols to break even
50%: 122 sols to break even
75%: 146 sols to break even
100%: 169 sols to break even

In that 76+ sols, you could be using that ~$200M for almost anything else. By the time you've "broken even" on that Stirling generator, the $200M saved on building a turbine can be used to expand your colony. Surviving Mars is a game in large part about exponential expansion, and "short term" moves actually get you a lot further faster in the long game, because every resource unit saved now is a resource unit you can instead plug into expansion, which will create more resources you can plug into expansion, which creates more resources you can plug into expansion...

By sol +76, the colony that built the turbine instead will be in better overall shape, because the "short sighted" move of building the turbine freed up resources that could instead go to long-term, exponential growth.

By that time you will no longer need conctrete and could survivу on concrete from waste rock processing or other sources, even if all map will be harvested.

The Excavator is a lot more power/maintenance efficient than processors.

Concrete/sol per machine parts per maintenance period (~5 sols)
Baseline Excavator: 16.7
Level III Excavator: 41.7
Baseline Processor: 3
Upgraded (Factory AI, overcharged) Processor: 4.4

Concrete/sol per elecricity/hour
Baseline Excavator: 1.67
Level III Excavator: 1.04
Baseline Processor: 0.6
Upgraded Processor: 0.176

Waste rock processors aren't for generating concrete, they're for getting rid of your vast fields of waste rock.

But you don't need pop growth that much, you can import people by dozens and biggerthe pop the faster it grows.

If you're not very quickly running your applicant pool dry and begging for warm bodies to stuff your domes with, you're probably not expanding nearly as fast as you could be.

 

[Zinegata]

Surviving Mars had a serious balance problems.
6. Most Spire buildings are sub-optimal.
Water reclamation? Compared with arcology, even hanging gardens are not that great, not to say cloning or medical centers

Lol, Water Reclamation is actually one of the better spires in the game. As is Hanging Gardens.

Don't believe me? Make a big Dome full of basic residences (14 people requiring only 1 power each) and add a Hanging Garden to it. The Comfort level of all those residences basically shoots up to Arcology level, thus letting you have an entire Dome's population be at Arcology comfort.

Cloning moreover is a generally terrible way to add more colonists. Requires too much power and maintenance for a citizen that only lasts half as long. A Hanging Garden residential drone by contrast will produce far more population.

 

[Technoincubus]

Comfort is not THAT decisive. Especially early on, when you do not need that baby influx and they will be more harmful than beneficial.
Techs:
Adapted Probes - absolutely useless crap. Gradually expanding initial landing area progress is enough without buying probes as you can prend resources more effectively.
Dust Repulsion - by that time it is easier to buy some mor emachine parts than waste research time on this. You'll have scrubbers soon anyway, which will make it obsolete.
Fusion Reactor - worker requirement is what makes this building sub-optimal, better build stirlings or wind turbines.
Gene Adaptation and New crops - both techs provide negligable bonus, which could only benefit from soil enchancement and useless otherwise.
Moisture Farming - initial buildings which placed with 7000-2000. High end tech for basic building.
Low-G Fungi - was relevant only when domes could not be interconnected. The amout of food it produces, power\water consumption canno compete with the Farm, which will increase comfort and later have reduced workforce.
Martianborn Strength - sanity is so easy to replenish that it is not wort bothring with it.

 

[Foskito]

Surviving Mars had a serious balance problems.

1. Metals
I disagree. It's true that surface metals are easy to collect, but not always. For example, when you cannot access step terrain/craters. Or when your RC Transport gets in trouble while being too far away from the base and you cannot repair it. In those cases, if you are not looking properly at it, and your storage gets empty, your life support will be damaged soon and you wont be able to repair it. Then, you are dead.
2. Water
[Moisture vaporators can provide enough for three domes]. That's not exactly false, neither true. It depends on: kind of domes + #farms needing water + upgraded/not upgraded vaporators. You will need, anyway, at least 5 of them if you want the colony to be sustainable in the long term. Plus, you will need at least two refineries very soon. I mean, the water extractor can be very useful in some locations.
3. Stirling generators
Absolutely agree. So, whats your complain here? You found out this little 'secret'. Then, use it. But careful, because you wont be able to build enough generators with most of the sponsors. And, if your colony is not properly balanced, building those in early stage will cost a lot of resources/funds.
4. Waste rock processors
Not every sponsor comes up with the same tech-tree. Some of them will give you the tech required earlier. Plus, Mohole & Excavator produces waste rock. And yes, you will need concrete, ALWAYS. As much as possible.
5. Excavator
Er, what? How do you want to build more things? The map is huge. Have you ever tried to build more than 10 megadomes?
6. Most Spire buildings are sub-optimal.
50% agree. The water reclamation requires workers, so its definetly suboptimal. The nodes are not useful except in rare cases. The hanging gardens are a waste in the long term, when comfort should always be over 85 without them. Personally, I find Med Center, arcology & Sanatorium useful, not to mention silva's arcology and panoramic restaurant.
7. Security
Well, in the long term, if you dont control them, renegades can make the colony unsustainable. Thats quite difficult, but you would require security officers in a real-life colony on mars, so maybe this mechanic should be rebalanced when difficulty is set up.
8. Lack of early gambling building
100% agree. I never build the casino until my pop is +90. Plus, it provides comfort at the price of sanity breakdowns in more cases than expected.
9. A lot of worthless research.
Who ever uses +10000 of rocket payload? Me. When you can export as many rare metals as you want, with the Mohole on, you can import 200 resources with every trip. Thats useful when you want to build a lot of new things.
Why do you need 10 more colonists when expanding domes are very slow and you mostly filled with colonists? The same answer than the previous one. In the long term, if you want to have 3000 colonists on Mars you will get sick while waiting them to make babies. Its faster when you can just simply put them on Ear... Mars.
Why do you need probes when scanning is not that hard and proceeds naturally? AGREE. That tech is absolutely unnecesary imo.

 

[Technoincubus]

I disagree. It's true that surface metals are easy to collect, but not always. For example, when you cannot access step terrain/craters. Or when your RC Transport gets in trouble while being too far away from the base and you cannot repair it. In those cases, if you are not looking properly at it, and your storage gets empty, your life support will be damaged soon and you wont be able to repair it. Then, you are dead.

It should be the other way around - mines should be the main source of metal and surface deposits serve as a suppplement at the time of crises.

That's not exactly false, neither true. It depends on: kind of domes + #farms needing water + upgraded/not upgraded vaporators. You will need, anyway, at least 5 of them if you want the colony to be sustainable in the long term. Plus, you will need at least two refineries very soon. I mean, the water extractor can be very useful in some locations.

5 moisture vaporatos are almost nothing in terms of prefabs\resources. Moisture upgrade is the earliest tech and you will inevitable get 1.5 water per MV soon. 5 MV will get you 7.5 water. Enough to support lots of domes.

Absolutely agree. So, whats your complain here? You found out this little 'secret'. Then, use it. But careful, because you wont be able to build enough generators with most of the sponsors. And, if your colony is not properly balanced, building those in early stage will cost a lot of resources/funds.

I see problem as they overshadow other power buildings. Especially fusion - which requires workers and that is never worth it. Once you get scrubbing it is always better to build stirlings.

 

[#Tukuro]

Surviving Mars had a serious balance problems.
1. Metals
2. Water
3. Stirling generators
4. Waste rock processors
5. Excavator
6. Most Spire buildings are sub-optimal.
7. Security

Mohole for me is about Rare Metals, which can become a problem if you're exporting most of them while running certain builds. Also useful because it requires no colonists to operate, which makes the logistics of it easier to manage.
Vaporators are also a late-game tech, and not viable to import when you're playing with hard sponsors. They also don't work during dust storms.
Stirling generators are good, but expensive. High elevation turbines on the other hand can generate ~18-20 energy before upgrades. With breakthroughs I think they can output up to ~46 energy...
Waste rock processors are about saving space. It's more compact to run one processor alongside an extractor, than having a dozen dumping sites littered about. In turn, getting the Excavator becomes necessary late game on low concrete maps. A single megadome easily costs several hundred concrete each...
And water reclamation is vital for late game colonies on maps with poor water deposits. Especially for farming domes. Hanging gardens is for boosting comfort to 100, and getting 7% population growth (before bonuses). Again, this is especially useful for difficult sponsors...


And lastly; Security may be worthless except for a certain Mystery..., but Officers definitely aren't. You can run some extremely cheesy setups using nothing but officers.
All specializations come with their own service needs, but what sets officers apart is that they're extremely cheap. Most of their needs can be met without upkeep; either in colonists (shop clerks, etc.) or resources (polymers for luxury, electronics for gamers, etc.)
The best Officer sponsors are ones that slightly boost overal job performance - this negates the specialization penalty, and brings performance closer to specialists - like the Ark, Japan or even Brazil. (Stuff all colonists in one dome, then have them work elsewhere...) or those that add low upkeep service buildings like China (Just run one empty small grocer + ton of Tai Chi Gardens...).
All of this synchronizes really well with Hanging Gardens. (And to a lesser extend Tai Chi Gardens) Because that's where officers get 2/3rd of their service needs, and they get a huge bonus every time they go there. High comfort in turn leads to higher pop growth (7% at 100) and a morale bonus (5%).

But the best part remains the low upkeep. Because that makes managing colonies a lot easier. What an Officer colony loses out on in terms of on-job efficiency, it makes up for with all the labor that can now go into factories, mines, etc. And all the resources it saves on services.
Using the above setup, you don't need shops, diners, clubs, casinos, etc. And everyone will be at 100 (or close to) comfort.