Resources

**Resources** form the basis of your governance, allowing you to create facilities and units, expand your population, and of course, engage with other factions. Resources are the essential elements which you extract from your surroundings
to support and expand your faction. There are three types of resource—nutrients,
which support your
population and allow your
bases to grow
in size;
minerals,
which allow you
to build units and facilities; and energy,
the currency
of Planet.
To obtain the resources from any given square, it must be inside your territory, inside
the production
radius
of a base (within
a two-square
radius,
excluding
diagonals),
and that base must
assign a unit
of
its population to work that square.

Unworked
squares
yield no resources,
regardless
of their fertility.
Your ability to exploit territory is limited by your technology. When you first
arrive on Planet, you are generally unable to recover more than two of any one
resource per turn. As you acquire new
technologies, your production capacity expands until you are fully able to
exploit the resource potential of every square in a base’s production radius.

## Nutrients

For your faction to increase, you must be able to extract healthy nutrients
from the alien ecosystem of Planet. The more nutrients a base produces, the
faster and larger it can grow. Every citizen at a base must "eat" two Nutrients per turn to survive. Surplus nutrients are stored. When sufficient surplus nutrients have
been accumulated, a base will grow, producing a new citizen.

Rainfall directly determines the amount of nutrients
a square
can produce. There are three levels of rainfall on Planet—arid, moist and rainy. Rainy
squares show as green on the map, and are usually the best places to establish
new bases.
Arid squares
show
up as brown,
and moist
squares
combine
green
and brown.
When scouting for new settlements,
always
remember,
“Green
is
good.”

Without any modifiers (such as special resources, enhancements, xenofungus,
monoliths and others, all detailed below):

* an arid square produces no nutrients,
* a moist square produces 1 nutrient per turn,
* a rainy square produces 2 nutrients.

Rocky squares do not produce
nutrients
regardless
of rainfall.

Moist and rainy squares are excellent places to build farms to enhance nutrient
production.
The amount of nutrients any given
square
can produce
is
limited
until the discovery
of Gene Splicing.

## Minerals

Mineral production controls the rate at which your bases improve, as well as
your ability to produce military, transport and terraforming units. Existing
units may also require a certain amount of mineral raw materials for support.
Once a base has exceeded its free support level, any additional
units (military or non-combat) consume one Mineral per turn of support.
Surplus minerals are applied to production of facilities,
units, and secret projects which a base
is creating. When sufficient minerals are
accumulated, the facility or unit is built.

The rockier a square, the more minerals it produces. There are three levels of
rockiness—flat, rolling and rocky. Without any modifiers (such as special
resources, enhancements, xenofungus, monoliths and others, all detailed
below):

* a flat square produces no minerals,
* a rolling or rocky square produces 1 mineral per turn.

Bases cannot be established in rocky squares, nor can farms be started there.
They are, however, excellent places for mines.

The amount of minerals any given square can produce is limited until the discovery
of Ecological Engineering.

## Energy

Energy is produced in squares with solar collectors, particularly
those at high Altitudes. Depending on the Energy Allocation which you have made on the Social
Engineering screen, all the energy you produce is divided among three
priorities: Economy, Labs, and Psych.

The energy you collect is allocated to three different areas: Economy, Labs and
Psych. Energy allocated to Economy is used to maintain base facilities; any
excess is placed in the energy reserve. Your faction’s economic power is measured
by
its energy
reserves.
These reserves
are
saved
in the form of “energy
credits,”
and are
used
for maintaining base facilities,
commerce
and energy
payments
between factions.
Energy
from
the energy
reserves
may also
be
invested
in mineral
production
to hurry projects
to completion. Energy
allocated to Labs speeds
research
into new technologies. Energy allocated to Psych helps maintain
order in your bases.

Squares with solar collectors produce 1 energy per level of elevation. There are
four levels of elevation above sea level on the Planet:

* 0 to 1,000 meters above sea level, producing 1 point,
* 1,000 to 2,000 meters, producing 2 points,
* 2,000 to 3,000 meters, producing 3 points,
* and above 3,000 meters, producing 4 points per turn.

You can find the elevation of a square by checking it in the
Status View. You can also see elevations and depressions on the map.

The amount of energy any given square can produce is limited until the discovery
of Environmental Economics.

### Inefficiency

Some of the energy a base produces may also be lost to inefficiency.

The formula used to compute the energy lost to {Inefficiency} by
a base is:

Inefficiency = (Energy \* Distance / (64 - ((4 - Efficiency) \* 8))
Where:

* Energy: Amount of energy produced by base this turn.
* Distance: Distance from Headquarters base (16 if no HQ).
* Efficiency: Social Engineering EFFICIENCY rating (+2 ifChildren's Creche is present).

If the denominator reaches zero, ALL energy is lost to inefficiency. The social engineering rating is perhaps the most pivotal, as at negative levels, losses due to distance increase severely. At -2 rating, the loss is effectively doubled.

*For example, a base 16 units away from headquarters loses 50% Energy to inefficiency at 0 rating, but 100% at -2. At +2 it will lose 33%, while at +5 the loss is reduced to ~22%.*