What do I put in my first dome?

[PikaPilot]

Title. I have no idea how important all of the needs are. Can I get away with slapping down a spacebar, 2 cheaper buildings, and a park, or do I have to make serious investments into casinos/electronics? Also, will my colonists have access to food if I don't use a diner/grocery?

Also, how many farm towers will I need to feed 12 colonists? 24? 48?

 

[Blizzard_Haemimont]

One mistake I've seen far too many people do is to put big factories and many buildings requiring lots of workers in total during the founder stage. Although it is certainly possible to start with a factory, it is usually better to do it when you have more workers and to keep to bare essentials in the founders stage.

A single Hydroponic Farm fully staffed with Botanists should be enough for 12 colonists. Note that production will drop if it is not fully staffed by specialists and may fail entirely if too few people are working or water supply is interrupted for long.

 

[Promethian]

They will have access to food but if they get it raw (not from a diner or grocer) they take a sanity hit. A diner, grocer or both are absolutely critical because of this.

As for what do you build. The objective is to provide for as many needs as possible and it is ok to not provide for them all. Blizzard makes a big point about workers. For this reason I suggest a Grocer, Hydroponics and 2 Parks (1 triangle, 1 single tile) starting out in one of the dome wedges. If you have the spare polymers an open air gym in another wedge is also good.

An Infirmary is will essentially enable your colonists to start breeding and if you have one you can enable hypochondriacs.

A Diner is good. It'll provide social but also requires workers, more so than the Grocer. Its not a bad idea but I favor the grocer starting out.

Do not build an art workshop or electronics store starting out. They burn polymers and electronics per visitor. You simply do not have the resources to spare on them.

If you think you can handle the electronics maintenance the casino is quite nice (works out to about 2 electronics per 10 Sols) it meets the elusive Luxury and Gaming needs. Its worker expensive though so its not a starter but something to work into.

 

[Holce]

I think of two possibles setup. It may be others.

setup 1:
Hydroponic (first work shift, but you have no choice) + farm later (not fully staffed to improved soil) + laboratory (second workshift) + diner (1 people for the 2 first workshift) + clinic (1 people for the 2 first workshift)

You focus on research and having baby for a quick start. This will let you get a laboratory work with 2 work shift a bit quicker. You need two basic houses complex. One is enough for 12 people but I think natality is reduced when there is not enough free space. I was wondering why I have to wait 9 sol for a baby where 5-11 people wanted to have a child.

The dome use 17 power at night and 26 at day. You do not need more than 3 turbines. You don't want to use too many machin parts. The purpose is to get the tech to build machines part in your second domes. Buy buidling it you gain enough to get 20 machin parts instead of buying the prefabs. You want to focus a bit more on social and robotics. Researchs that give research boost and factories.

setup 2:
Hydroponic or farm (3 people), grocary (1 people for the 2 first workshift), laboratory (second workshift) + machine part factory (first workshift with 4 place). Or you can remove the laboratory for more food or machine parts.

You will not get baby soon, you will produce less food but enough. You need a lot more power but you can build more turbines. You will need a bit more electrocnics. I think It is a safer path.

 

[Herbert West]

I'm so happy the tutorial and manual give you in-depth guidance on this.

 

[Exemplar Voss]

I tend to find that I need to get metals and machine parts going pretty quickly. Breeding and science are less important than advanced resources , in order of maintenance needs, though some science is obviously nice. Usually machine parts then electronics, then polymers. Though the latter two usually require a second dome.

Food always matters, but is pretty easy to be self sustaining on that quickly (a few extra tons on the second cargo rocket gives plenty of buffer space).

The big requirement is the RNG on resource deposits. If you don't have concrete, water and a real metal deposit (nor just surface metal to set up starter buildings) relatively close together, you're going to have a much more difficult time, especially if you didn't go easy mode with a rocket scientist for the shuttle unlock. It also helps if rare metals are fairly close. I'd they aren't, you need a transport (or shuttles) and a lot of micro time.

 

[nindustrial]

They will have access to food but if they get it raw (not from a diner or grocer) they take a sanity hit. A diner, grocer or both are absolutely critical because of this.

Hi, thanks for the post; however, I'm still not seeing how colonists get food without one of those buildings. I'm experimenting and despite the fact that I have copious food either on depots or in the shuttle outside the dome, and I have drones within command range of both the food and the dome, my colonists are starving. Can raw food outside the dome not be delivered and consumed? Can it only be delivered to buildings...? When you say they will have access to raw food, do you mean only if they have a farm producing food inside the dome?

I'm wondering what the point of delivering food from Earth is in that case, other than I guess maybe supplying food-related buildings...?

Thanks for any reply!

 

[ShoGuL]

Hi, thanks for the post; however, I'm still not seeing how colonists get food without one of those buildings. I'm experimenting and despite the fact that I have copious food either on depots or in the shuttle outside the dome, and I have drones within command range of both the food and the dome, my colonists are starving. Can raw food outside the dome not be delivered and consumed? Can it only be delivered to buildings...? When you say they will have access to raw food, do you mean only if they have a farm producing food inside the dome?

I'm wondering what the point of delivering food from Earth is in that case, other than I guess maybe supplying food-related buildings...?

Thanks for any reply!

You are supposed to have a grocer or diner in every dome.

 

[nindustrial]

You are supposed to have a grocer or diner in every dome.

Sure, I get that in terms of the larger game play; I was just trying to tease out what the poster that I quoted was getting at. Given that there is no answer/information on this topic in the encyclopedia or "hints", I'm just trying to understand how the systems work.

EDIT: Ok, to follow up my earlier post. Raw food was apparently delivered at one point because my colonists stopped starving and a commensurate amount of food was removed from my overall Resources Tally screen. Still unsure how/when the food gets delivered, as I was unable to simply "deliver" food via my RC Transport. I'll try to keep an eye on it unless anyone else has further insight.

 

[nindustrial]

Ok, got it figured: I noticed finally, as long as there is raw food within the outdoor radius of the dome, the colonists will don spacesuits and run outside to grab it and eat it. A little goofy given that raw food grown at a farm is grabbed by drones and removed from the dome to the nearest storage, but there you have it.

 

[Xeorm]

Curious about this too, and went looking at the interests of my colonists in my newish colony. Given my understanding is that they choose an interest at random to satisfy only from that list, the idea is to hit as many of those as cheaply as possible. Just about everyone has relaxation as an interest. Social and shopping were also common, though usually only of those two. Given I hand picked a number of colonists and many of them had traits like fit or rugged, there were a good number with exercise as an interest too. Other interests were more random and rarer. Children all have playing as their only interest, at least to start that I can see.

Which buildings then are best? All of the parks give relaxation, playing, and exercise. Given that they're cheap and have zero maintenance, I'd think 3 or so tiles at least are mandatory. 40 isn't the best comfort rating, but it's solid. Given you need a diner or grocer, that settles social or shopping. Diner looks like the better solo thing to grab, but grabbing the grocer + casino complex hits the most by far. Spacebar + grocer is cheaper, but doesn't seem quite as good, especially if you avoid recruiting alcoholics. But the casino is pretty expensive. Diner seems much better as an option if you're low on resources and want to make the most of your limited space. Grocer + gym also looks to mostly fit if you're looking for the benefits the gym can provide.

Foodwise it looks like ~.2 food per person per sol? I know I have some gluttons and I won't be surprised if there was some different math involved, but it's close enough for a ballpark answer. Leaf crops in the hydroponics farm gives 2.5 food per sol, times your workplace bonus looks like. One for every 12.5 people, plus enough for a food surplus if it's staffed with happy botanists.

Beyond those requirements, you'll probably want an infirmary if you're looking for kids, plus a nursery. Looking at the layout, that means I can have a nursery, infirmary, grocer, casino, two residences, a research lab, two hydroponics, 2 single tile gardens, and a machine parts factory. Which seems solid for a first dome.

And most of that is to allow for kids. You need at least some comfort or the colonists get upset and leave. Plus it improves morale which improves work speed. If you're not worried about producing more kids and grabbing applicants instead, you can lighter on the comfort buildings.

That's all if I understand things correctly. The documentation is...lacking.

 

[KDubya]

I like to have a Diner, a Grocer, an Infirmary, a Security hub and small parks to fill out the area. This gets me social, dining, shopping, exercise, and food. They can recover sanity and not get as stressed out with the frequent disasters. A Casino would fill out the list but that'd be later and in bigger domes.

If I can add in a real farm I will.

The rest would vary by need. For a first dome I'd go for a polymer plant if I went battery heavy or machine part factory if I went for wind. I'd try and fit in a Research Lab as well. I'd make my next dome a mining hub for rare metals and have it close to the first to be able to share mines and outside factories as needed.

My first game I've got Russia with Ecologist and a start at 33N 118E that has near maxed resources and near maxed danger except for dust devils. The Hanging Gardens gets you +30 comfort so apartments get 65 instead of 35 which is huge. Takes a bunch of water though. Seems more beneficial than the Oligarch and the Arcology as long as you can handle the water needs, comfortable apartments would be better than a comfortable arcology as they could house a lot more.