Questions about setting up CMM production sites

[Zador]

Much misinformation/confusion about cost increases in this thread.
Best knowledge we currently have is (from practial experience, not just quoting anyone else):
On the second tier 2 or 3 port construction being started (Ocellus, Orbis, Coriolis, Asteroid, Tier 3 Planetary Port) not counting the initial port:
Cost for Orbis, Ocellus and Tier 3 planetary port increases from 6 to 12 tier 3 points
Cost for Coriolis, Asteroid increases from 3 to 5 tier 2 points
No other construction costs increase; no commodity costs increase
This does not happen after constructing 10 things. Nothing else has been found that triggers the increase.

 

[Mako Kai]

System economy is the two largest components of the weighted sum of all station economies in the system. It doesn't do anything directly (except that the largest component sets the colour for the system on the map filter). So my system at the moment has three stations in it:
- a T1 Industrial outpost
- a T1 Colony planetary base (the biggest, about four times bigger than the outpost)
- a T1 Military settlement on a different planet (the smallest, about a tenth of the size of the outpost)
and its economy type is Colony/Industrial

My current build is a T2 Agricultural settlement on the same planet as the Colony base
I expect this to change the Colony base to Agricultural somewhat, as well as adding its own (small) Agricultural boost, so depending on how much it changes the Colony one I'll get one of these as the system economy:
- stays as Colony/Industrial (the shift of the Colony base isn't very large, so the Industrial is still the second biggest)
- moves to Colony/Agricultural (the Colony base is about a third Agricultural now, so the Colony component is the biggest bit, but the Agricultural bit is bigger than the outpost's Industrial contribution
- moves to Agricultural/Colony (the Colony base is half or more Agricultural, so that's now the biggest thing in the system, but the Colony half is still bigger)
- moves to Agricultural/Industrial (almost all the Colony economy is gone, what's left is smaller than the Industrial outpost)



Station economy - yes, you can influence a single station towards multiple economies, by building different types of System Economy Influence buildings near to it. Be careful when doing this, though - there are both advantages and disadvantages to hybrid economies.
Advantage: a hybrid economy will generally import more products, and a wider range of them, so you can trade into it for big profits later. If you're building the station to use it to make money, this can be very helpful.
Disadvantage: a hybrid economy will consume some of its own production, so e.g. a Refinery-Industrial station will export a small variety of products than separate Refinery and Industrial stations would. If you're building the station to use it to produce commodities for future colony builds, keep it single-economy.

You can certainly build up multiple different economy types on different planets where they won't interfere with each other, though - my Military settlement on the other side of the system isn't affecting the Colony base at all, other than providing a bit of +Security to the entire system and therefore letting me get it out of Lockdown.

Again, super helpful. I’m going to build colonies and refineries on the planets with 3 slots. So I got that figured out. And I think I want to keep it refinery economy.

Now, as far as the planets being RMC, do extraction ports get a bonus from this? Also is there any negative to building refinery and extraction on the two slot planets and skip the colony?

 

[Mako Kai]

Much misinformation/confusion about cost increases in this thread.
Best knowledge we currently have is (from practial experience, not just quoting anyone else):
On the second tier 2 or 3 port construction being started (Ocellus, Orbis, Coriolis, Asteroid, Tier 3 Planetary Port) not counting the initial port:
Cost for Orbis, Ocellus and Tier 3 planetary port increases from 6 to 12 tier 3 points
Cost for Coriolis, Asteroid increases from 3 to 5 tier 2 points
No other construction costs increase; no commodity costs increase
This does not happen after constructing 10 things. Nothing else has been found that triggers the increase.

Thanks!

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Now, as far as the planets being RMC, do extraction ports get a bonus from this?

Unknown. (Probably not, though)

Also is there any negative to building refinery and extraction on the two slot planets and skip the colony?

Not so much negatives as potential to use the slot for other things which could be more positive. But that's really depending on what you want to do with the system.
- the Refinery hubs you've been building elsewhere will have been reducing your Security and Standard of Living, so a Military or Agricultural settlement on the 2-slot planet can bring those back up quickly
- the Refinery hubs also use up your T2 points, so you might want some sort of T1 building just to get some back
- on the other hand, even without its System Economy Influence pointing anywhere, a Refinery Hub still has good Wealth + Development Level boosts, so you could build one anyway
- and you could put a Colony orbital around the 2-slot moon later to get an orbital refinery there (no CMM, but you get some Insulating Membrane and Tritium)

 

[Mako Kai]

Ah, i didn't think of being able to grab Insulating Membrane and Tritium from space without one of the big stations, that's a great idea. Will the colony station sell refinery goods if the refinery on the surface? Also, if there is already an industrial station in orbit and a refinery on the surface, will the industrial station sell industrial and refinery goods? Or still just industrial?

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Ah, i didn't think of being able to grab Insulating Membrane and Tritium from space without one of the big stations, that's a great idea. Will the colony station sell refinery goods if the refinery on the surface?

It should do

Also, if there is already an industrial station in orbit and a refinery on the surface, will the industrial station sell industrial and refinery goods? Or still just industrial?

I think just industrial, though I'm not sure there's been enough testing yet.

(But Industrial+Refinery generally means it sells a lot less of either, because the industrial side will use all the refined metals up, and the refinery side will use almost all the industrial's products)

 

[Mako Kai]

So I built started the colony and chose the Clotho layout. However, when I checked this morning in Inara, it says the landing pad is small?

https://inara.cz/elite/starsystem-stations/78695/

I'm really hoping that is a mistake. I didn't see anywhere in the interface where it said that this layout only has small pads. That would make the whole plan useless because large ships couldn't dock and grab the CMMs.

 

[Greasetrap42]

So I built started the colony and chose the Clotho layout. However, when I checked this morning in Inara, it says the landing pad is small?

All of the surface bases that I have built and completed indicate the correct sized landing pad in INARA. I have facilities small, medium, and large pads.

It might be a mistake. My current surface facility that is under construction shows a Large pad. The construction site does have a large pad, but the completed facility will have a Medium pad. Whereas your construction site shows a Small pad.

 

[Mako Kai]

Arg, that's a slot wasted then. No way I'm finishing a colony with only small pads. There really needs to be better documentation on this stuff. And a construction undo button.

What colony layout did you use, so I can make sure I get one with a large pad?

 

[Greasetrap42]

During the construction phase there is always a Large pad available.

It is a really good idea to take a screenshot of what you selected. BEFORE you press 'Begin Construction'. So you can remember.
I have a folder for each facility I have built which includes this screenshot.

Here is a Super Handy Colonization Spreadsheet

In this example I chose a medium sized military settlement with a medium pad when completed.

 

[evanevery]

Much misinformation/confusion about cost increases in this thread.
Best knowledge we currently have is (from practial experience, not just quoting anyone else):
On the second tier 2 or 3 port construction being started (Ocellus, Orbis, Coriolis, Asteroid, Tier 3 Planetary Port) not counting the initial port:
Cost for Orbis, Ocellus and Tier 3 planetary port increases from 6 to 12 tier 3 points
Cost for Coriolis, Asteroid increases from 3 to 5 tier 2 points
No other construction costs increase; no commodity costs increase
This does not happen after constructing 10 things. Nothing else has been found that triggers the increase.

This is pretty important info I think. I started another thread with higher visibility (Subject Name) for folks who didn't know this (like me):

Colonization Tier Point Cost Increases

This was mentioned in another thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/questions-about-setting-up-cmm-production-sites.635242/post-10579443 I found it while wandering the forum and the information surprised me (and now has my plans a bit askew). I think it may be worth dedicated...

forums.frontier.co.uk

I referenced your posting. Thanks for sharing this info.

 

[KeyserSozeh]

Finished my first planetary settlement last night. It was a Industrial settlement large, went to supercruise, turned around and landed right away. They were already over 1000 CMM composites in stock...Not sure how it all works but will finish a few more settlements tonight... 1 more industrial, 1 extraction and 1 military... see how it all shakes out.

 

[Mako Kai]

During the construction phase there is always a Large pad available.

It is a really good idea to take a screenshot of what you selected. BEFORE you press 'Begin Construction'. So you can remember.
I have a folder for each facility I have built which includes this screenshot.

Here is a Super Handy Colonization Spreadsheet

In this example I chose a medium sized military settlement with a medium pad when completed.

View attachment 421920

So completely missed this section of the interface. I went by the spreadsheet that said that the landing pad was large, but that might refer to the construction zone landing pad which, as was stated, is always large.

BUT, i logged in and looked up the Clotho civilian planetary outpost again (this time in game), and it DOES show a large landing pad. So I don't know why Inara is showing small. I don't want to spend the materials and find out its small.

Then I decided to try another experiment. Different planet in system, this time I tried the Nona variant of the colony port. CONFIRMED in game that landing pad is large. Same thing, Inara is listing it as small.

 

[sothiss]

Finished my first planetary settlement last night. It was a Industrial settlement large, went to supercruise, turned around and landed right away. They were already over 1000 CMM composites in stock...Not sure how it all works but will finish a few more settlements tonight... 1 more industrial, 1 extraction and 1 military... see how it all shakes out.

industrial? I see that refinery is mentioned above as the main influencing factor...so which one is the key

 

[Mako Kai]

Yea I’m confused too. Do you not have any refinery in the system?

 

[Mako Kai]

Ok GalNet News Digest just clarified some of the mystery. If we want the ground installation to have an effect on a station, the station has to be built above the planet that has the installation. So if we want refinery materials, we build a refinery hub on a RMC world and a station above it.

Source: https://youtu.be/4puOhwvXySc?si=Iep6_1yyNpORmGX_

 

[Mako Kai]

I wonder why they mentioned a refinery in an RMC world though. Wouldn’t a refinery work in any type of planet? Or do they mean you need and extraction and refinery to influence the station?

 

[Ian Doncaster]

I wonder why they mentioned a refinery in an RMC world though. Wouldn’t a refinery work in any type of planet? Or do they mean you need and extraction and refinery to influence the station?

Any type of planet should work. There's no evidence yet that planet type matters (beyond bigger planets having more slots, so a HMC is going to be better than some tiny moon if you want to build multiple Hubs) - though, that said, there's not been enough time to collect much evidence that it doesn't work either.

If you put Extraction and Refinery on the same planet, you'll influence the station to be an Extraction/Refinery hybrid economy. Whether that's better than a pure Refinery one depends on what you're after: there are advantages both ways. Given how difficult Refinery influence is to get, I'd start by adding Refinery hubs until the station above has enough Refinery economy for your needs, and then consider adding an Extraction settlement after that.

 

[Mako Kai]

That’s a great idea. I definitely want it to be a refinery system. The only reason I am thinking about extraction is because maybe (and this is a total guess) an extraction base will mean more wealth because it’s an RMC world.

But going back to keeping in a refinery system, what would be the best orbital outpost to put in orbit to have space access to the refinery materials? Industrial? Or will any of them have refinery materials and I should just build based on whatever outpost bonus points I’m after (security, development, wealth, etc)?

 

[Ian Doncaster]

what would be the best orbital outpost to put in orbit to have space access to the refinery materials?

Any of the ones with a Colony economy, so it can pick up the economy influence values from the hubs on the planet below.

Given the Refinery hubs are going to reduce your "Standard of Living", a Commercial Outpost might be good to balance that out if you're going for a T1 - or any of the T2/T3 except the Asteroid base will work.