Here is a big screenshot from one of my games. (Sorry, cannot rescale it as it gets unreadable! From right click menu, choose "view image")







Problems on this window:



First, I am starting with right side, analyzing system dust income/expenses

-Tax is problematic. Rename it to tax income, and just show us the actual tax, not what you would get from a planet at 100% tax, and how much of it you are not taxing (+343 from planet is what you'd get with 100% tax, but since I have 10% tax rate, it also shows -308.7 instead of just showing +34.3 from tax). This is just confusing, and unnecessary.



-OR, add breakdowns, show +343 from planets, but below that, x0.1 tax rate. But nothing like -308.7...



-Rename "- from hero" to "hero upkeep". (the 2nd hero one is actually hero upkeep). Two of the same is confusing.



-Rename "- from improvements" to "improvement maintenance". It is actually maintenance, in the end, and there is already one called "+from improvement" - clear the confusion.



-Ind-Dust conversion bonus is missing on that list; note that planet is getting +300ish due to conversion, but it is not listed (not that important, but gotta keep it straight)



Note that this panel doesn't include any modifiers, modifiers from tax, monopoly and such. Neither does the global income. But, you can see "x0.1 tax rate" and such under "empire wide bonus factors" (not on this screenshot). Now, lets look at upper left one, global income.



-Another double-confusion. "+ from system", "- from system". What is the first one, what is the second one? I assume, first one is your actual tax, and second one is total maintenance? Rename them so, if correct!



-What is "from FIDS"? Total amount of Ind-Dust conversions?



-I have a problem with "+ from monopoly". Why can't we see monopoly modifiers on individual planet/system windows aswell, but just from here? Due to this, if you get a calculator, add up incomes/expenses from a planet, it will not add up to the global income. Because systems doesn't show/calculate "+ from monopoly", as far as I can tell.



Now, lets take a look at food. By the way, end-game needs serious balancing... Food consumption should exponentially go up in my opinion... Anyway



-Doubles again. Actually, we have a triple here. Hero abilities & hero should be combined, aswell as improvement(s).



-What is "+ from empire"? Luxury & luxury monopoly bonuses? Then say us so!



Science & Dust also has same doubles and such.



Also, while I'm giving examples from this panel/window, devs, please add a way to launch survey & terraform & change exploit from this window. Best way to do those from would be the mini-overview you see when you click population meters, and clicking moon/FIDS icons from there I guess.

lyravega wrote:


-Tax is problematic. Rename it to tax income, and just show us the actual tax, not what you would get from a planet at 100% tax, and how much of it you are not taxing (+343 from planet is what you'd get with 100% tax, but since I have 10% tax rate, it also shows -308.7 instead of just showing +34.3 from tax). This is just confusing, and unnecessary.



-OR, add breakdowns, show +343 from planets, but below that, x0.1 tax rate. But nothing like -308.7...

Actually, 50% tax = x1, 100% tax = x2, but yes, I agree that it should show up as a multiplier, rather than an additive modifier.

lyravega wrote:


-Rename "- from hero" to "hero upkeep". (the 2nd hero one is actually hero upkeep). Two of the same is confusing.



-Rename "- from improvements" to "improvement maintenance". It is actually maintenance, in the end, and there is already one called "+from improvement" - clear the confusion.



-Ind-Dust conversion bonus is missing on that list; note that planet is getting +300ish due to conversion, but it is not listed (not that important, but gotta keep it straight)

Agreed.

lyravega wrote:


Note that this panel doesn't include any modifiers, modifiers from tax, monopoly and such. Neither does the global income. But, you can see "x0.1 tax rate" and such under "empire wide bonus factors" (not on this screenshot). Now, lets look at upper left one, global income.



-Another double-confusion. "+ from system", "- from system". What is the first one, what is the second one? I assume, first one is your actual tax, and second one is total maintenance? Rename them so, if correct!

That would appear to be correct. I agree that it should clearly identify maintenance as such (e.g. the fleet cost), and that it should show multipliers as multipliers (e.g. the "from monopoly" value).

lyravega wrote:


-What is "from FIDS"? Total amount of Ind-Dust conversions?

"from FIDS" likely means that you have a resource that is providing +xx% FIDS, and that's how it's rendered?

lyravega wrote:


-I have a problem with "+ from monopoly". Why can't we see monopoly modifiers on individual planet/system windows aswell, but just from here? Due to this, if you get a calculator, add up incomes/expenses from a planet, it will not add up to the global income. Because systems doesn't show/calculate "+ from monopoly", as far as I can tell.

This is, as far as I know, because the game has these monopolies configured as "+10% Dust on Empire" as opposed to "+10% Dust on System".

lyravega wrote:


Now, lets take a look at food. By the way, end-game needs serious balancing... Food consumption should exponentially go up in my opinion... Anyway



-Doubles again. Actually, we have a triple here. Hero abilities & hero should be combined, aswell as improvement(s).

Isn't this why we have "Dust Virtualization" with the "Adaptive Supply Chain" improvement that converts excess food into production (since excess food is useless at max pop), combined with the tendency to remove all food exploitations in favor of one of the others?

I believe hero abilities vs. hero is to distinguish the modifier from Labor from the modifiers from the ability that adds +10% food or those that add +50 food.

But yes, multipliers really need to indicate that they are multipliers.

Thanks for the input man. Thought my post would make no sense at all. Glad you understood it.



About the last part - food being too much at the end-game, if you apply both of those bonuses (4500 food becomes 1125 science, add half of production aswell) you get more science than your system currently produces, more or less. This creates an immense gap, this is my point.