Architect Archive

I'm kind of getting sick of newbies complaining about my prices on large harvesters. I sell them in the range of 175-250k depending on what it takes to make them. Each of them reguardless of type is a royal pain to make... usually taking 10-25k low-grade ore to make. Not to mention most of the parts have to come from a factory ( wasting resources on the inital BP). When I try and sell them for 6 cr per mineral + a 15% failure rate people think im trying to rob them blind or something. When the same person will pay 20-45cr per unit for a stinking weapon or set of armor.

Now it would be a better sell if there was some real lure to buying or producing a heavy harvester. Right now its 4x the power of a personal.Yet it costs nearly 100 times the materials to make. Factor in that there is 0% gain from experimentation right now... and all you are gaining from the expense is only using 1 lot instead of 4. To me thats not worth the 100x mineral cost. The reason I use them... is to pull up more ore on my very limited amount of lots... but im still stuck in a small house.

The cost / gain ratio on the heavies is really not worth the expense right now... on my part to produce or on a consumers part to buy. These installations are the peak of the chain yet worthless... To me this needs to be addressed.

I agree. The only reason I agree is because big PAs are not moving up to mediums or larges. They get a couple of members to lay down 20 personals. Personally I think there should be an extra incentive to build the big boys. Here's what I propose:

Personal Harvesters:

• 2 kg / hr


• 720 Maintence / Day


• 600 Power / Day

Medium Harvesters:

• 5 kg / hr


• 1440 Maintence / Day


• 1200 Power / Day

Heavy Harvesters:

• 11 kg / hr


• 2880 Maintence / Day


• 2400 Power / Day

I think increasing the efficiency while keeping the lots usage the same would more than justify the extra expenditure. The heavies will cost more than they do now, but gain a 4 kg / hr mining rate. Also the Mediums now gain an advantage over running 2 personals. The extra inflow of materials per day I think would be negligible because you would see fewer smaller harvesters and just a handful of larger ones. This would also save on server overhead because keeping track of 4 heavy harvesters is easier than keeping track of 22 personal harvesters.

There are a few benefits to the Large harvesters as opposed tothe smaller ones:

1) Only 1 lot restriction (maximize your lot usage)

2) Less space taken when placing on rare resource. YOu can fit 1heavy but not 4 small ones in the same area sometimes. If the resource is VERY rareand it's concentration drops quickly around its apex. THis does not happen too often

3) Easier to take care of (less clicking)

It boils down to the main advantage being: lot economy.

However this is negated by PAs. Who havelots of members who do not use their lots.

Furthermore, here are some advantages if your using the small ones:

1) You can let them be destroyed when resource shifts occur rather then paying 4500 cr to redeed.

2) A lot cheaper to make.

3) More efficient then large (2kg/hr as opposed to 7kg/hr, whereas the large is 4x maint/power reqs).

This boils down to:

If your solo, you have to pay for the higher costing higher maintaining (redeeding) of the large harvesters.

If your a PA your better off getting lots of smaller harvesters and sharing lots.

There is a definite advantage to being in a PA as opposed to single person. The PA will definately beat out the single player/casual player.

Is this fair? I would of hoped for more balance than this.

Who does this hurt?

It hurts single players, it hurts those trying to sell large harvesters, and it hurts those who try to sell massive amountsof ore.

Should it be changed?

Yes. Unrealistic to have a 'fake' impediment of 10 lots per player. Especially when that can be easily bypassed by PAs. Also unrealistic fora harvester that uses 10x resources to only have 3.5x production quality.

How can it be changed?

1) Set Lot restrictions to include lots you have administrative control over.

2) Limit total of lots ina PA to the number of players*3 or players*4 (ie, if there is 10 players in a PA, TOTAL lots that can be owned by all membersin that PA is 30)

3) Decrease outputs of small/medium harvesters. Don't increase the large, they produce enough. Lower small to 0.5kg/h and medium to 2kg/hr and people will be rightfully using the large ones

Well I dont know that changing the harvesters themeselves is going to improve this issue. I will agree with you though on the attitude of the "outspoken" players, who in my opinion simply cannot afford large harvesters.

Here is my take: Take a look at where heavy harvesters are on the food chain. The only type of player needing those, other than architects are the Factory/Production folk. The guy cranking out weapons/armor/items enmass and selling to VENDORS ... not players on the street..

I dont think a one month old economy has enough cash flow to justify people being able to afford this. Once the vendors are out of stock and have a lot of demand.. you will see the acceptable price for those begin to go up. Right now its a pretty risky venture to invest in heavy harvesters without a customer base. Heck, I can make these things and I'm unsure as to whether I should or not due to how much selling I will be personally responsible for if I do. Or risk going bankrupt.

Let the merchants get established.. then we can make a killing of these harvesters.

If it makes you any feel any better, I was charging 18k for a solar power generator when a weaponsmith informed me --twice-- that I was overcharging. He informed me he could get them "anytime" for 10k. Thats 2 credits a resource. I then asked him how much for his best gun. He told me 4k. I looked it up and instantly offered him a price of 868 credits which was exactly 2 resources per credits. Once this little idiot realized how informed I was he promptly put me on ignore, but not before I let him know HE was the one GOUGING customers at 75 percent markup. And there I was getting yelled at for only 20 percent. I love when people underestimate me.. heh..

In a word, it is just you.

No, they are not easy to make. So don't approach it haphazardly. Don't start making them until you mine a boat load of minerals to make them rapidly. Expending all your time and effort trying to make one a day will discourage you.

Start with your componants, the turbine generators and ore mining units. Mine copper, alumininum, steel and Carbonate ore in good enoug quantity so that you can craft to sustain your harvesters, and save some.

When you have saved enough, pump out factory crated turbines and ore mining units. I made 50 of each before I even started on the walls.

After that, go for the low grade ore for the walls, switch all your harvesters over to low grade ore, maintain some for just general metal. While you are waiting for your ore reserves to pump up, but out some mediums for others to purchase. They'll sustain you while you accumulate. Start making those bricks daily as the ore flows in. Walls do not require factory bricks and do not effect the wall schematics.

AFter about a week, you'll be pumping them out 3 a day, plus taking care of the needs of your smaller customers. Soon, you'l lhave a stable full of heavies, then you even go faster. Develope contacts. Offer trade in deals, offer ore swaps to make up for resources you are not mining but will need. Be imaginative.

I gave this guy a deal, 1 heavy for 27770 in resources, 8k credits and his medium harvester in trade in. Been making 200k plus xp a day, accumulating additional rare resources and increasing my bankroll. Its been quite lucrative.

If you get involved in the resource trading business (seeing who is selling at the bazaar, and cold call'em) you'll be too busy to complain.

I am a mostly self sufficient architect and I use only medium and heavy harvesters with 2 solar collectors for power. The benefit is that I can collect a fair amount each day. The downside is that any mountainous area is usually 95% off limits due to placement issues.

If I had a choice I would stick with the small for ease of use. But since I am limited by lots, I spend all day many days searching out a spot with both a high concentration and a buildable spot (very hard). My life as an architect is the pits right now on account of this.

I think large harvesters are more of a niche thing. They're for when you find that SWEET spot of resources (ie rare stuff), but you're not sure how long it will be there, so you whip out your heavy guns to get as much of it as you can while it's still there.

Nikin- its not newbies that are saying your price is too much, its every player because NO ONE gets 250k of value out of a large harvester when a medium only costs 15k. The value I get out of a Heavy harvester has absolutely nothing to do with how many resources it takes you to build one. When they say that it costs too much, they aren't trying to say that you are ripping them off. They are trying to say that it isn't worth 250 k to them. Like I said before, you are selling these to people that already have medium harvesters. If they want large ones, tell them the list of resources they need and then you will assemble it for a fee. I can come up with 25k of ore a whole lot easier than I am willing to shell out 250k credits.

Well, sub manufactured componant quality has no direct effect on final assembly componant quality. At least for buildings and AFAIK. I've had turbines at 3% make harvesters at 24% and turbines at 24% make harvesters at 3%.

So, for sub componants, if you are looking for the best material possible, you are probably wasting alot of time and effort. In fact, some of my bricks are made out of some of the worst minerals you can imagine, 65 over all quality, come in at 3% and stuff, walls at 6%, yet my buildings and harvesters hit the 20% and better during finaly assembly.

The quality of what you make appears to be only dependant upon the resource quality used during the final make.