Pop growth + useless buildings

For what it's worth, just to nitpick, your post has plenty to do with population, but very little to do with the growth thereof.

Secret Police Center has never worked properly and may never be fixed; the description implies it's supposed to be a flat approval bonus, rather than a morale bonus (morale is depreciated by population, whereas approval itself is not).

I'm afraid I don't have an answer for the Galactic Resort, but it wouldn't surprise me if it was also supposed to be approval.

Bonus tiles apply to base production generators only-putting Harmony Crystals (which gives 20% civ-wide morale) on a morale bonus tile will not cause it to give 40%, nor will putting a Technological Capital on a research tile cause it to give a 200% bonus.

This is only confusing because morale and influence buildings are referenced in percents-if you read the morale buildings as +40 morale, rather than +40% (for instance), and the influence buildings similarly, then it's easier to see.

Trade goods and capitals are treated in percents and will not get their bonuses impacted by being on a bonus tile, with the exception of the economic capital, which isn't so much a capital as a better stock market that's unique.

With regards to farms, most of us run one farm early game and two farms late game (for 14B/20B planets in TA with intensive farming), as the morale depreciation due to population simply grows too high beyond that.

Orion,

I will always use those food-tiles, because I´ll go for 18b-20b people on each planet. The only thing you should never do is to cross the 20b line, because moral will fall increasingly - thus never place the +7b ppl end-farm on a 300% food-bonus tile. Instead, build an older version on it - using this, you'll be able to reach your desired population using only one farm - and also you'll have a cheaper building with a lower maint.

If you have issues with moral & popgrow simply lower taxes until your pop is maxed out. Then shift to maximal taxes 79%, with some civ-wide bonuses on moral as certain techs or Mines you shoudl be able to keep all planets above 20%. But even if single planets are below 20% - don't care at all as they pop will fall until they'll have 20%, too.

You are very right on that some planetary improvements are entirely pointless....

The only Superproject you can built which takes a tile-bonus in is the 'Political Capital' - built it either on a Moral- or a Influence-tile.

The other only multiply your "base" planetary output, and it is therefore necessary to built these on HighPQ planets where they can multiply alot labs/facs.

Further, because of the way taxes are created (by the square-root of the pop of a planet) also mid-pop planets will give contribute a fair amount of taxes (e.g. a 20b planet will "only" contribute 40% more taxes than a 10b planet). And as you only need 4 tiles to max a planets population you can fairly well turn any mid-Q planet into a bank or you leave them at 13bil ppl and built 2 additional Stocks.

However, buildings as the Research Coordination Center or the Omega Research Center or PowerPlants only justify themselves on specialized HighPQ planets.

Hope I could be of help.

I was under the impression the Omega research centre was supposed to give you a civ wide bonus to your research, NOT just planet specific ?

Is it the same with nano recorders and the aerelon (?) missile defence ? for their 10 and 20 (% / points ?) bonus ?

The trade good buildings are definitely empire-wide. Morale trade goods are the same way. I will need to check on Omega, I don't remember one way or the other (read that to mean by the time I get it, I don't need it).

As to the food distribution center, it can have some situational uses. The percent it gives (20 or 25%, whatever) is invariably lower than adding an additional high-end farm onto a planet. This allows you to bump the population of a capitol planet from 16 to 19-20 billion (depends on whether it's 20% or 25% bonus) when adding a conventional high end farm would propell you to 22-23 billion. Or use it on a regular planet with one additional farm, to go from 15 to 19 billion, when a second farm woulb put you at 22 billion. Economically, it's not really worth using on a regular planet with no farms, as going from 8 to 9-10 billion isn't worth giving up a stock market for.

As mentioned above, for farm/manufacturing/research tiles, only buildigs that produce a defined number of output will get the bonus; anything with a % in it will not (unless it's something like the Torian farm structure in TA which adds both a fixed amount *and* a %, in which case the fixed amount is boosted and the % is not).

For morale/influence structures, no defined units are used, so most things with a % will be boosted, even things that are not primarily morale/influence like stock markets and counter espionage.

Any structure that provides an empire-wide boost will not use bonus tiles. This applies mostly to trade goods, super projects, and galactic achievements.

That would be phantastic, but no, the ORC is definitely "only" a planetary enhancer. Whereas the Hyper Computer and Nano Recorder are civ-wide.

There's too many things here and there where descriptions don't match results.  Unfortunately, the only way to become aware of them is just by experience.  I made a post a very long time ago about the Omega Research Center stating it should be civ wide as indicated by the description or the description should be changed.  Once you've done any modding, you find how simple and quick it is to correct something like this.  AFAIC, a mistake in the description is just as bad as a bug in the item's code.  I feel it's sloppy to let so many minor contradictions go uncorrected the way they have.  I don't think they pay enough attention to detail.  Though, I shouldn't critisize Stardock, they're still way better than any of the other game makers out there. 

Thanks a lot for answers: you've been very kind and quick in replying to me. Actually, I've tried to make some change to the PlanetsImprovement.html file but haven't had the chance to try it yet.

The only thing that doesn't persuade me is the path where I've saved the file: C:\Programmi\Kalypso\GalCiv2Ultimate\Mods\Default\PlanetImprovements.xml

It was the only "mods" file that I've found in the game directory. Or should I create a new Mods folder by myself following a specific path?
Thanks again.

You can use default, it's what I use for "casual" mods.  Just make sure the path is correct and mods are enabled from the main options menu.  You can also check the entry in prefs.ini.  One thing though, there's a mods folder for each version of the game, for example, if you want to change something for Twilight,  you need to put files under the Twilight mods folder.  In the mods section of the main game option menu, if you select Change then click default, you'll see the path you should be using.

wow - I used to put the Omega research centre on a planet basis, then re-read the description and reallocated to other planets. Turns out that the description is wrong ? Oh, well

Alot of these descriptions are either vague or sometimes also wrong. If you are not sure about something give it a search in the forums here, almost everything has been covered already.

Excuse me, but isn't there any unofficial patch that fixes  buildings? If that file is so easy to modify, then it is quite strange for me that there has been no volunteer to improve descriptions or re-balance effects.

Now that we have passed version 2.0x, I think it would be a good moment to do it. Sadly, I'm not expert enough (about the game) to do so.

I've never come across any "patch" - but there are some posts concerning these subjects (mostly on the MCC et al) that come off with an easy solution to correct that. It might work - but any game won't be MV legal anymore.

A lot of stuff is configurable, but some things rely coding in the game exe.  Those are the things that require a "patch" to correct.  Otherwise, it's pretty simple to change things yourself.  Most of the stuff in the game is specified in xml files which are just plain text for the most part.  Unfortunately, the ability to post things to the mod library on the GC2 site has been down for some time.  It doesn't look like it's going to be fixed either.  It pretty much killed off most of the modding people were doing and stifled a lot of interest in the game.  Don't understand why they let that fall off the face. 

Pobably they did to prevent confusion and loose "power" upon game's updates. Indeed, it is very strange that they never cared to fix those little, big things!

But now that you have spoiled me some hint, I must admit that I really don't understand the logic of Embassies and tiles with influence bonus. If both of them use percentage values, then those tiles are basically useless, aren't they?

No.

It'd be simpler if an embassy read as +15ip and if a VRC read as +40 ":)" (for lack of a better, simpler way to put it).

But since both the influence formula and the approval formula are more complicated than that, they were chosen to be represented in percents.

Perhaps a better way to think of it would be:
-If there is a base production building for that type, only the base production buildings get the bonus.
-If there is not a base production building for that type, only bonuses that apply on a planetary basis get the bonus.

If you´ll ever encounter in one of your games that an AI has low pop planet besides one of yours who has an Influence-tile upon - give it a try and built the Polit Cap on this. Most likely you'll see the AI´s planet culture-flipping.

I don't think it was intentional.  The ability to upload mods to the library was inadvertantly broken by the last major galciv2.com web site update.  I think they're putting all their web efforts into other sites like impulsedriven.com.  Impulse quickly jumped into the arena to compete with other digital distribution clients.  I'm sure there's been a ton of web development involved in that.  Galciv2.com is just a low priority anymore.  Although, I still think they should have found the time to keep the mod library working.

Can you still use the metaverse if you make corrections to files like this?

Spot on on both counts. Food tiles are good, because they let you reach high pop numbers with low-tech farms, and population unhappiness is a self solving issue : once they reach 40%, they'll stop growing anyway. Or, as you say, once the pop cap is hit, you can drop their morale down to 21% and it won't matter one bit.

There's little point in trying to have ultra high pop AND idyllic morale on every world. Unless you're using the advanced governments (from Republic to Federation) of course, in which case morale does become important... but when all your worlds house 15-20 billion unhappy taxpayers who nevertheless net you hundreds of credits through just a pair of Stock Exchanges, do you really need the piddly economy bonus that comes with those governments ? IMO, it's an either/or thing. Either you go for sheer population volume to pay the rent, or for a smaller, happier populations with a better government. The former is generally good for warmongers & high pop growth races like the Drengin or Torians (lots of pop to put on transports), the latter is better for high research races who won't waste too much time reaching Federation, or races that don't have good Morale buildings to begin with (like the Korx or Altarians).

You can easily step into any governmental form and still reside with a high pop and generally unhappy population. The day elections happens simply drop taxes until an approval rate of, at least, 57% is reached, and you'll win the election. Afterwards shift to maximum taxes back. And if one forgets to lower taxes, simply load the autosave, you'll get another chance just then.

The civ-wide economic bonuses are not to underestimate, esp. when playing a larger map. 30% is almost a full economic resource; and these techs carry also an influence and diplomacy bonus. Up to Star Democracy is easily researched, and building the PolitCap on a moral-tile will get you a 100% approval rate there most of the game, such a planet can be used as a Troops-breeder to prepare an invasion. Or you place it on an influental-tile on a planet near to weaker enemy-planets or foreign mined asteroids, and see them flip soon.

Huh. I didn't know that elections merely checked for immediate popularity. For some reason, I assumed the results were tied to the average happiness during the entire duration of the last term. Guess the game's simpler (yet, oddly enough, more realistic ;)) than I thought.

Sorry to get back on topic...

Morale resources can be your friend. Get as many as you can, then load them up with all 7 mining modules.

And still, try to keep populations below 20B unless it is a very high PQ planet. You will need at least 5 VR Centers and several more Stock Market's to keep them happy enough.

Have you tried Civilization 4 beyond the sword

Wow I read these posts obviously I'm not an expert. I read the descriptions and use them. I've considered using high population planets, and rejected that idea. Because I fought the Iconians in the dread lords expansion of the dark avatar game. All I can say it took me three days to win. I've never had a better space battle. I always use industry above population. Thats my rule of thumb. Maybe I'll try something different. I've never noticed the problems above 20 billion. Maybe your doing something wrong. Still concentrate on morale. Are random events maxed out. They will save you. Try a immense map. You don't care about your population growth. I'm confused. What I'm talking about is approval. A low approval means a low population. Low income. You probable mean in the late game, but you need to specify. Are you playing Dark Avatar. If you are you need a harder game like dread lords os twilight of the arnow. Influence I wouldn't worry about to much. It does affect your voting and culture assimilation. I honestly say that civilization 4 Beyond the sword gives this game a run for thier money. The modding is really iritating. Don't promise something and don't fall thru. I'm interested in modding solutions. I would like to see the example mod upgraded for galactic civilization 3. The editor needs to be better. A good example is civilization 3