Colony cost - Revision history

One01 at 23:11, 2 October 2026

2026-10-02T23:11:22Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 19:11, 2 October 2026
Line 1:		Line 1:
	{{bothversions}}		{{bothversions}}
	The Colony Cost(CC) of a [[body]] is a measure of that body's suitability for sustaining human (or alien) life. The higher the Colony Cost, the more effort it takes to build habitable cities there.		The Colony Cost (CC) of a [[body]] is a measure of that body's suitability for sustaining human (or alien) life. The higher the Colony Cost, the more effort it takes to build habitable cities there.

	If a planet has zero colony cost, like your homeworld, the population is not restricted in any way other than the maximum growth rate, and ([[CSharp\|C#]] only) the maximum supportable population. Otherwise, the maximum population is limited by your infrastructure. [[Infrastructure]] installations support populations on bodies with gravity of 0.1G or higher, and [[Underground Infrastructure]]([[VB6]])/[[Low Gravity Infrastructure]]([[CSharp\|C#]]) can support populations on any body, albeit at a significantly higher price.		If a planet has zero colony cost, like your homeworld, the population is not restricted in any way other than the maximum growth rate, and ([[CSharp\|C#]] only) the maximum supportable population. Otherwise, the maximum population is limited by your infrastructure. [[Infrastructure]] installations support populations on bodies with gravity of 0.1G or higher, and [[Underground Infrastructure]]([[VB6]])/[[Low Gravity Infrastructure]]([[CSharp\|C#]]) can support populations on any body, albeit at a significantly higher price.

Pedroig at 11:54, 13 April 2026

2026-04-13T11:54:11Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 07:54, 13 April 2026
Line 25:		Line 25:
	\|}		\|}

	[[Category:~~Content~~]]		[[Category:Colonies]]

Wiki-admin: 1 revision imported

2026-02-22T23:09:09Z

1 revision imported

← Older revision	Revision as of 19:09, 22 February 2026
(No difference)

en>Alsadius: Added info from an interesting forum thread (with a few of my own calculations)

2024-08-04T22:11:21Z

Added info from an interesting forum thread (with a few of my own calculations)

New page

{{bothversions}}
The Colony Cost(CC) of a [[body]] is a measure of that body's suitability for sustaining human (or alien) life. The higher the Colony Cost, the more effort it takes to build habitable cities there.

If a planet has zero colony cost, like your homeworld, the population is not restricted in any way other than the maximum growth rate, and ([[CSharp|C#]] only) the maximum supportable population. Otherwise, the maximum population is limited by your infrastructure. [[Infrastructure]] installations support populations on bodies with gravity of 0.1G or higher, and [[Underground Infrastructure]]([[VB6]])/[[Low Gravity Infrastructure]]([[CSharp|C#]]) can support populations on any body, albeit at a significantly higher price.

The total supportable population on a body with CC>0 is equal to ([[Infrastructure]] * 10,000)/Colony Cost. For more details on colony cost, see the System View window {{key|F9}}, or the Environment tab of the Economy window {{key|F2}}. The Colony Cost of a body can be lowered by [[terraforming]].

Note that the civilian sector produces and ships infrastructure to your colonies by itself, although perhaps not in great quantities. See [[Trade System]] for details. Note also that any population on an [[Orbital Habitat Module]] ignores colony cost, so this can be a good alternative for high-CC worlds.

==Workforce Implications==

A higher colony cost also increases the share of the population who is required to work on non-manufacturing tasks. The mathematics of this are somewhat complex, but in brief, the population that's available to do manufacturing work (i.e., running your [[installations]]) will start to decrease at some point. If the colony cost is below 5 then it will eventually recover to exceed its previous peak, but if the colony cost is 5+, then the available workforce will eventually hit zero as population increases, and never increase again. See [https://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php?topic=12258.msg145998 this thread] for details, and [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qLIF2bAUoXdanG5NByFZ9dAAClLzyRiQAtfyPwsMYmo/edit?usp=sharing this spreadsheet] for the numerical analysis.

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"
! Colony Cost !! 2 !! 3 !! 4 !! 5 !! 6 !! 8 !! 10
|-
! Population Where Workforce Begins Dropping (million)
|215||169||131||99||74||38||17
|-
! Workforce at Peak (million)
|36.2||26.8||19.4||13.7||9.5||4.1||1.5
|-
! Population to Exceed Previous Peak (million)
|242||268||388||N/A||N/A||N/A||N/A
|}

[[Category:Content]]