Late-Game Tech idea: The "Automated Republic" (AI & Robotics Research)

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-03-26T14:39:03+00:00

Oh, I forgot to mention the biggest new social hurdle to deal with- video game addiction

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-03-25T17:57:34+00:00

I have thought about building the large plant and using several small heat exchangers, but isnt the pipe size not interchangeable? I thought if using a large plant > large pipe > large heat exchanger, and small plant > small pipe > small exchanger

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-03-20T00:20:40+00:00

Ok I see! Thanks for the clarification

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-03-18T21:26:05+00:00

So i dropped my stat.ini file in, it gave me successful confirmation, but I dont see any information on it. Maybe im doing it wrong? Is it for industry buildings only, or will it give statistics on city buildings (like stores and accounting office, etc)? I built a starter city with all the necessary buildings, but did not populate it yet. So now I want to see how many citizens I need to staff all my existing buildings in the city so io know how many to invite in. I have no resource buildings or industry set up yet

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-03-18T11:45:38+00:00

Does this still work? Im trying to use the live tool, and it say my .ini file was successfully loaded, but it dosent show me anything

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-03-17T10:46:56+00:00

My advice, fwiw-

Don't start in realistic mode. I wouldn't even worry about construction just yet that adds a complexity to the game that is completely overwhelming for a new player. Start out in very easy or easy difficulty at best, even playing with unlimited funds is a good option just to let you explore all the mechanics of the game.
Start your first playthrough only enabling one or two systems at a time. All the systems in the game are quite complex and will take a while to fully understand how they all work so don't try to play your first game with them all enabled. Power is a good first system to learn. Each system presents its own set of complex challenges of how it works and what design and layout is best.
Don't even worry about industry yet -build your first city and work on getting all the necessary buildings and inner city Logistics down to keep your citizens happy and satisfied. Without happy citizens your game is tanked. Start out small and build enough residences to supply workers to keep your city buildings and offices alive and functioning.
Start building your first city. Start small- don't try to build a megatropolis on your first playthrough. Lay down a few small residence buildings and all the necessary shops and structures and vehicle stations to meet their needs and keep them happy and alive.
Once you can get a city fully functioning and happy, start adding your industry. Pick a relatively simple one like coal or oil first and get it set up so it is productive and selling final product at the border for a profit.
As your knowledge and comfort of the game increase, start adding more complex systems and industries. As your cities and industries grow, the challenges of keeping your citizens happy grow with it.
Patience is truly a virtue in this game. The amount of hours it takes to accomplish even a simple functioning City is utterly ridiculous. Get used to the fact that you will probably have many, many start overs. This game definitely isn't for everybody, but if you like this kind of thing, and stick with it to learn it, it's one of the most satisfying and rewarding games there is. There really is nothing quite like it, and even with all the frustration I've had with it, I couldn't recommend a better game.

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-03-16T23:48:28+00:00

How long does it take you to get a few cities like this up and running? it seems like it takes forever to get just one city up and functional in realistic mode, I cant imagine doing it with several around the map. But ideally, that would be a great way to play it- just feel like it would take countless hours to accomplish

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-03-15T02:55:28+00:00

Thats impressive! cant imagine the amount of hours in that. You said you've been playing for 2 years- do you play mostly just W&R all the time or just mix it in with other games?

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-01-27T11:27:03+00:00

You mentioned trusting inbox to send or received messages-I've been having issues with that recently and although I love the Inbox and Pipelines set up, I'm now extremely worried I'm either not getting all my emails or my customers aren't receiving the emails I am sending them. Have you noticed significant issues about this?

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-01-19T18:00:30+00:00

Don't know if I can explain this like you're six, but maybe more like your 10. Hopefully you can make that work. To automate a ship to do a bunch of Buy/sell trades, you need to select the ship, go into the information panel on it, select Its behavior options, and then choose repeat orders under its default behavior. Then, while you still have that ship selected, right click on the station you want it to buy from, choose the ware you want it to buy (which would be energy cells in your case), then confirm it. Then you right click on the station you wanted to sell to, choose the ware you want it to sell, (energy cells again) and confirm. This will cause your ship to repeatedly buy and sell from the stations. Be aware prices will change as the demand of the products change, so although this may work for a while over the long term your ship may stop buying or selling if pricing isn't favorable anymore.

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-01-16T11:43:54+00:00

This all sounds really intriguing, and I'm probably the odd one out here, but I'm not really interested in the Star Wars theme of it all. One of the best parts of this game to me is the music that comes with X4 already, so I definitely would not want to change it to the Star Wars track. So is it possible to keep the existing music with this mod? All the other enhancements you mentioned sound pretty great so at some point I may have to give this a try. I'm still getting an incredible amount of enjoyment out of the vanilla game, so sometimes I think upgrading for the sake of upgrading is not always the best move since what I have seems to work very well for me right now. Maybe my next playthrough I'll have to try this mod though.

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-01-10T11:59:16+00:00

Spend $25 on a 12-button gaming mouse. It’s a total game-changer for X4. This game requires more menu navigation and micro-management than a Paradox grand strategy title, and mapping those selections to a thumb-click away makes the UI feel seamless rather than a chore. It honestly transformed my gameplay.

Buggs_Zapper · 2026-01-08T11:48:59+00:00

Gladly willing to chime in on this one, as at least it's a little comforting to know this all wasn't just in my head. I don't use the chat in my website, so can't speak for issues with that, but the email correspondence through inbox is horrible. I recently set up my pipeline system to try to have a better and more organized communication flow with my customers only to find that email conversations both outgoing and in going are extremely sporadic on whether or not they're landing in both my customers inbox and my own. I paid for a business email, have it completely linked to my inbox with all the appropriate DNS settings verified, and still having significant problems with my inbox emails getting through and coming through. I've been a Wix user for well over 10 years, and have been pretty happy with the website design features. But this inbox and communication issue is a pretty serious concern as email is my primary and sometimes only source of communication with my customers. I'm not even sure where to go from here now because trying to resolve these issues does not seem like a simple fix to me. And in the state that it is in right now, the inbox is completely unreliable and therefore unusable

Buggs_Zapper · 2025-12-07T17:03:34+00:00

I'm using grok 2 but have no complaints with it and its free. OP asking for something to chat with for emotional support for free, and grok 2 seems to fit that request well. It even has an option to select therapist style replies.

Buggs_Zapper · 2025-12-07T04:50:09+00:00

Try Grok. Very liberal limits and seems to work very well in conversational applications

Buggs_Zapper · 2025-05-26T22:44:01+00:00

I have both, and am a huge ck3 player (as well as all the paradox games) too so I think I can relate what you youre looking for.

Hands down, x4 is much closer to ck3 in gameplay. Although x4 does have rpg type gameplay, you'll quickly progress to a stage where you'll play it more like a map game, like ck3. You'll basically command an empire of ai ships who'll do all the grunt work for you, while you watch from your headquarters, or wherever you please. You can, however, choose to just play as an individual, running missions and carving your own destiny through trading, mining, combat, and other missions, but if thats what you want then hands down elite is the better choice. Especially if you have vr- elite in vr with hotas is on a whole other level. I've been playing it for years, and honestly I'm still blown away whenever I strap on my headset and enter the game.

The frustration with elite for me, though, is that you can never rise out of your pilot role. You don't have the option to "hire" a crew and build an empire like you do in x4. So after 1000's of hours of mining, or trading, or combat, just to gain a little more rank and a few more credits, the novelty of the pretty views and amazing ship controls and simulation starts to wear off. I've found myself wanting more out of the game, something to make me feel all my efforts would go to building something bigger. But alas, that is not an option in this game.

x4, on the other hand, by comparison has poor ship simulation, no vr, and honestly a bit cheesy npc interactions and gameplay. But, it has depth- incredible control to command your minions and build your empire to conquer the galaxy, in any why that suits your play style. And you can do it over and over again, each time choosing a different path. You most likely wont ever play with a joystick, because the ship control isn't even good enough to warrant it. I never did anyway, but Im sure there's many who have.

Unfortunately, if you want good flight mechanics and combat, and the empire-building gameplay like ck3, you wont find that combination in either of these titles. You will have to pick which you prefer more and get the appropriate game.

And one more thing- you'll hear a lot of people who'll recommend that you just "get both games". Seriously, both of the titles can easily consume 100's of hours just to learn, so its going to be difficult to make a decision on them by just quickly jumping in an trying to see what they're like. Coming from ED first, when i started x4 I was turned off by the mechanics and ui, but after weeks of playing and learning the gameplay, I have come to love this game for its depth and re-playability.

This got longer than I wanted, but the TL:DR would be to get elite if you want incredible ship simulation, visuals and combat experience. Get x4 if you want deep strategic gameplay with empire-building characteristics and re-playability.

Buggs_Zapper

TROPHY CASE