All buildings are social, all spaceships are military. If no buildings get built, the left-over social production gets added to military production. The other way around it does not happen.
Each point in production costs some BC, depending on many things (for example bonus production from starbases is cheaper afaik). Using the spending slider on the domestic screen, you decide how much BC to spend. I don't know what 100% corresponds to, but generally the spending slider should be at 100% unless you're in urgend need of BC.

The sliders below for military, social and research control how much of the spent BC go into each category.

Using focus, you can focus production on the planet screen to a selected category. Open up a planet's screen and click either the military, social or research buttons (where the hammers are). Notice how some production from the other categories gets moved to the selected one.

This system has one drawback: If you both have factories and research labs, it's impossible for both of them to operate at full capacity at the same time. (Try setting sliders to 100% social + 100% research at the same time, won't work, that'd be 200% spending). Some advanced strategies used to compete on the highest difficulty levels involve building only one type of production building with a matching 100% slider and then using focus production to produce the other stuff. But for the start, don't worry about this.

Now about the economy:

As expenses you have maintenance and spending. Most buildings cost maintenance, that's a fixed cost you cannot influence (other than destroying buildings). The other one is spending. Remember that each point of production costs BC? If you build many factories, you can produce military/social stuff very fast, but at the same time you'll spend lots on BC on the production itself.

On the other side there's income. Basically there are three categories: Taxes, Trade and Tourism.

Taxes come from population. The more population, the more tax. However, it's not linear. For each planet, the formula is something like this as far as I understand (minus some constant factors): tax = squareroot(population)*taxrate
So usually it's best not to build more than one farm on each planet (exception: Planets with a capital city, they can already host 12B population by default), otherwise morale will suffer and you need morale enhancing buildings. Less population and more Stock Markets are sometimes better.
In addition, more population causes less happieness, likewise higher taxrates makes ppl less happy. Economic buildings (Trade centers, stock markets and so on) give a percentage bonus on the tax output on the planet they get built on.

Trade comes from other races. Build freighters and send them to a planet controlled by an AI player. The further away, the more profitable the route will be. You can further enhance trade outcome by building economic starbases and equipping them with trade modules. (If you have the required techs)

Tourism income comes from influence. Every planet's population generates some tourism which gets summed up in a global pool. Each player gets some of this depending on how much of the galaxy is under their influence.

The selection and customization of your race has a huge impact on how much micromanagement you have to do to keep your economy stable. If you got lots of economy problems, try the Altarians with maxed Economy and Morale abilities and Federalist political party.

Thanks alot guys, this'll certainly help get me a grip on the thing.

Unfortunately I didn't get a manual with the game, just the disk.

One thing that's important to realize is that morale buildings improve morale based on 'base' morale, that is, the morale of the planet after the population modifier alters its total value. For the most part, in Dark Avatar, even approaching 20 billion citizens on a planet will buckle the planet's approval rating, depending on the number of morale resources and your overall racial +morale ability.

true, how very true... if you dont plan ahead then you reach the point of total economical collaps.

another thing, keep your peoples happiness above 60%! any lower and you run the risks of:
People Revolting and joining an enemys empire
lowered productivity
etc...

trade is also a good source of income to.
trade with the minor races coz they are a reliable trade partner coz they know one fowl move an their history.

Agreed Mistralok, the economy is your best friend. Nothing is more than invading a puny PQ 2 planet only have a brand-new huge-hull class ship in orbit the very next turn

"...Remember- the AI plays by the same rules as you do..."

No they dont, if you play on higher levels the Ai will get the upper hand.

they get an economy bonus

Exactly! Except I can do it in fewer years.

The AI gets tremendous bonuses on Suicidal, but it still plays by the exact same rules (except for tech trading). Learn how to use and abuse those rules and you can pick it apart in no time.

I can hear you snickering Purge, kinds sounds like Mutley from Wacky Racers

Jokes aside, would the average time be around 7 years? Not including the upper echelon of players, like the two geniuses above who can destroy the AI at will, most games (gig, abundant all) seem to take around this long. Me, i can do 9 civs gig, abundant all on painful (my highest victory level, shame it was not an MV game) in 9 years, and like Wyndstar said, luck was not a factor, just my level of play.

Never did the AI have the "upper hand", nor did they in the majority of Purges' and Wyndstar's games, i assume. So you see LostHero you are quite off the mark, you experiences do not represent everyone else's. The AI will be advantaged but will not have the "upper hand" as a default.

(thinking) Now if i can just steal Purge's last 5 scores and add them to my own.....

What has everyone got againest me these days. i was merely point out the facts.

although i have to admit wyndstars scores are freaken me out. he must have been one of the first players on the metaverse. Wyndstar! how long have you been playing?

It's nothing personal, but what you want to say and what you you have said may be two very different things.

And nothing written here which you consider "against you" is close to the wrath you would incur if you stray to far.

This means you Evil! Also nice to see your partner in crime is back...Good to see Wheel is alive and well!



Yea and if he is as ruthless in court as he is to the AI, he will be back far sooner than a couple of months!