Put those colonists to work. After all, they did sign up to transform barren rock into a thriving world for your empire!
Overview
A number of factors impact your colonies and, ultimately, your empire. Your main decisions will involve colonist resource allocation, building production items, keeping morale up, and making sure a planet does not become too polluted. All of these elements in balance will unlock your colony's potential.
Colonists and Resources
A colonist generates points toward resources equal to the number located in the resource space. These points are increased through technology and structures. A planet has three resources:
- Research: The top resource in blue is Research. These points are applied to the current technology being researched by your empire. The more colonists assigned here from each of the planets in your empire, the quicker your research will be completed. Note: Research is the only colony resource function that affects your empire as a whole yet provides no direct benefit to the colony itself (barring a system wide disaster…).
- Food: The middle resource in green is Food. Food is required to keep ALL colonists on your planet fed – if food is ever listed as a negative number your colonists will begin to die of starvation. Food also increases your population over time until the planet's maximum population is reached.
- Production: The bottom resource in orange is Production. Every structure, ship, or project that you build requires Production to complete. More production points will see your selections built quicker.
A small “clock” symbol is located under each resource bar indicating how many turns remain to finish the current task. For Research, this would be the completion of the current technology being researched, Food indicates when your next population is available, and Production is the number of turns remaining until the selected project is completed. If you have reached maximum population, or are not currently researching or producing anything, a statement of “Full” or “Nothing being researched/produced” will appear.
Colony Production
While Research and Food are fairly simple to understand, Production requires a brief description on its functionality. To be self-sustaining, your colony requires structures. These structures generate additional resources, increase credits, keep your morale up, etc. Production is also used to build ships or additional long term projects.
In the Production menu you'll see all the structures, ships, and projects available to you. Click on the desired item to add it to the queue; you may have up to 5 items selected. The first item will begin while the other four will be produced in the order selected. As one item finishes the next will begin automatically. If the queue is empty you will be reminded to select a new item for production. To change the order of items, left click and drag the item to the new queue location. To cancel an item, left click and drag it to the “Cancel” button.
Pollution
As your colony develops, pollution will begin to become a concern. Pollution, if left unchecked, will cause the biome to degrade (a few planets are unaffected by pollution so will not suffer). However, you will receive advanced warning to this crisis – a red bar will appear above the affected planet on the galactic map, the planet screen will show the level of pollution with its negative impact, and, when a critical point is reached, your advisor will pop-up to issue a final warning.
Cleaning up pollution may be accomplished by two methods. Within the production menu under “Projects” you may select “Pollution Clean-Up." All Production will then be used to cleanse the current pollution, and, when completed, will automatically shut-off and start the next item in the queue.
The second method is through researching various technologies. Initially, these technologies will provide a small percentage reduction in generated pollution. More advanced technologies will increase this percentage up to a 100% reduction. Pollution, or lack of it, is also a factor in colonist morale.
Morale
Your colonists must be kept happy if you wish them to remain productive. When a colonist becomes unhappy they go on strike. When this happens they will no longer produce resource points. A number of factors can cause a colonist to go on strike. High taxes, pollution, a conquering race, etc. can all wreak havoc on your colony’s ability to grow.
Bringing a disgruntled colonist or colonists back to positive morale will require your intervention. Taxes can be lowered and certain structures generate a positive to morale (denoted by a happy face in the corner). Pollution should be kept under control as much as possible. When conquered by other races, additional time combined with other morale enhancing options will eventually make them productive.
Empire Management Screen
For a broad overview, turn to your Empire Management screen to see how your colonies are doing. This screen will allow you to quickly view the health of your colonies. The information provided includes current resource production, production queue items and times, how much population is on strike and where, as well as other empire information. Be aware that this screen does not indicate planets approaching critical pollution levels, so heed any warnings regarding pollution.
Disclaimer: This article is based on a "work-in-progress" build of Master of Orion, and the information and screenshots above are subject to change.