Production Queue

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General Information —> Setup Options —> Build Queues —> Production Queue System

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NOTE: The shipbuilding process at Planets.nu uses four different systems, each briefly described in the Build Queues page. Check your game's Settings to make sure you are in a Production Queue (PQ) game before going on.

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In the Nu Year 0044 a cross-race agreement was made to improve the starship build queue, enabling each race to have more control over their own destiny. This system is called the Production Queue and works as follows:

There is a soft limit of 500 total starships that can be built in any game (can be adjusted for Custom games). This limit is imposed to prevent the game from becoming too big and to force players to begin fighting in order to build more starships. Once there are 500 starships in the game it is now possible to continue to build ships by spending Priority Points.

Early Build Queue

Before the ship limit is reached, all starbases will be selected to build starships. After the ship limit has been reached, each turn the number of ships drops below that limit, starbases will be randomly selected to build starships until the ship limit has again been reached. When a starbase is selected it will do one of the following:

1. Build a starship that is queued, which costs 0 Priority Points
2. Produce Priority Points (see below) if no starship build is queued

It should be noted that a starbase will only be selected for a build if it is actually capable of building a ship. For this reason, the Mining Stations are ineligible for selection to build.

A special case

PQ transitions back and forth between unthrottled (Early) and throttled (Late) states. This move seamlessly occurs when there are enough ship slots to allow all builds to happen. Early builds are assigned to a random starbase.

Late Build Queue

Players can use Priority Points to build new starships at any time regardless of the number of starships in existence. As long as there exists a legal ship number (up to 999) and a player has enough priority points, the vessel can be built.

Priority building of starships cost:

• 1 + 1 point for each 50 KT (or portion thereof) of hull mass. (The base cost of 1 Priority Point can be changed in Custom games.)

For starships with a hull mass over 1000 KT, only the first 1000 KT is charged for.

Examples (default settings used):

• A Medium Deep Space Freighter which has a hull mass of 60 KT will cost 3 PP to build on the Priority Queue.
• A Diplomacy Class Cruiser which has a hull mass of 180 KT will cost 5 PP to build on the Priority Queue.
• A Dungeon Class Stargate which has a hull mass of 1970 KT will cost 21 PP to build on the Priority Queue.

You can use your Priority Points by setting a starbase Friendly Code to pb1, pb2, ..., pb9 and they will build in ascending order. Multiple starbases may share a code, but if any does and lacks a build this may confuse the ship-building system.

Earning Priority Points

Priority Points can be earned in several ways:

• For every 100 KT (or portion thereof) of starship hull mass you actively destroy (ship to ship combat or starships destroyed by setting off a glory device, but not ships destroyed by starbases, minefield hits, and the like), you will earn 1 Priority Point.
• Starbases (not Mining Stations) which do not have a starship build queued will earn 2 Priority Points when selected for building. Note that a starbase can only be selected for building at most once per turn. This value can be changed in Custom games.
• 1 Priority Point is earned when a starship is recycled.
• 1 Priority Point is earned when a glory device is activated.
• 2 Priority Points are stolen from salvaging the wreckage of a destroyed starbase. If the planet is still yours at the end of the turn, you loot the enemy player of those points. Mining stations on planetoids are significantly smaller and have nothing of worth. The value of the stolen PPs is changeable in Custom games.

Host Order

Starships can be built at several different times during the host order. The relevant steps are as follows:

27. Priority Queue builds
28. Regular Queue builds & Advanced Cloning
29. Starship cloning
33. Towing ships move
34. Most ships move
35. Intercepting ships move
48. Ship vs. ship combat
51. Starship vs. planet/starbase combat
69. Regular Queue builds (replace starships lost in combat, up to starship limit)

(Please note: The above is approximate, and based on the Simplified version of the Host Order. For more information, please see the page on The Host Order Of Shipbuilding.)

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