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[StagnantSoul]

Only just now getting my civilian fleets up and running, it's 40 years into the game... Three surveyors are frantically scouting sol for minerals etc, Earth is getting rather low. A pair of asteroid miners are out and about, 5k ton cargo space making 72 per annum per mineral, so it's take quite a while to fill up their reserves. A single cargo ship is dropping off auto mines on venus and a MD is tossing minerals at earth, we're going to start plopping more on other planets too. Should start mining Luna fast. Grav surveyor is still in production, three years till it's up and the gate constructor can get to work. Still working on the science for the military, man engines take a lot to research...

Also, how to I assign a governor of earth? It's been empty and I only just now learned it's a position. Would love that 25% ship build bonus.

EDIT: Finally read the wiki page on the other types of lasers, screw gauss, going to introduce mesons as my point defense! Also thinking of using particle beams instead of spinal mounts for the long range weapons, though may just stick to spinals as that'd take a lot more research to get good particle beams.

[Shooer]

Asteroid miners like fuel harvesters are best left over their target.  For minerals just dump them onto the rock and have cargo ships pick it up.  For fuel just have a tanker refuel from the harvesters task force.

The time your ships with the harvesters are moving instead of harvesting is resources lost.

To assign officers hit Ricker's face and select civilian administrators from the top left drop down.  Select target colony and then chosen governor and hit assign.

[StagnantSoul]

How good would an orbital hab asteroid stripper be? 20+ asteroid mining modules, or however many I can fit while being able to tug it at 500 km/s, cargo space for a mass driver, and a recreational module so they don't have dropping morale after a decade or so. Plap it over a rich asteroid and let it shred it to bits.

[Shooer]

I personally don't use asteroid miners.  Each of the industrial modules is equal to 1 mine/fuel factory/terraformer.  I find it easier to just place a bunch of auto mines and a mass driver on asteroids with minerals I want.  I do that instead of asteroid miners because I can put those auto mines on places that the ships can't harvest from.

I will use orbital habs on stations with 50 fuel harvesters to get much needed fuel from places I can't place mines though.

I feel that if you are using a hab you are wasting your time with a design with less than 50 of what ever industrial you are putting in it.  You are already talking about a hundred thousand ton design with a large portion made up of something you aren't really going to use.

[StagnantSoul]

Asteroid miners are far more mobile though, and one 25k ton cargo hold<five asteroid miner modules.

[Culise]

I wouldn't call it a waste, but the reason to use a hab is if you don't have a commercial shipyard large enough to handle it; the primary purpose behind adding it to extremely large designs is to allow it to be constructed straight from planetary industry.  I'd say asteroid and sorium miners built with orbital habs and enough mining modules to make a Vogon jealous tend to be a fairly typical design, actually, to take advantage of economies of scale.  To wit, you need one orbital hab per station, but you only need one per station regardless of size.  As such, if you're already making it big, make it *really* big as far as your present industrial output can handle rather than building loads of small stations with loads of orbital hab modules.  If you can build it in a shipyard without an orbital hab, there's no real need to add one, though you may still want to do so if you don't actually want to dedicate such a large shipyard to that task. 

I wouldn't worry too much about morale, either.  It primarily affects combat and survey operations; freighters and miners don't really care unless they end up caught up in a combat operation and need to react in a hurry.  It's decent fluff, though, and I'd say a lot of fun in the game can come out of RP decisions.  Oh, one other thing occurred to me: while they'll work for asteroid miners, I don't believe rec facilities are as useful for sorium harvesters at present since I'm not sure if the change allowing them to function in deep space has made it to VB Aurora.  In other words, a sorium harvester/rec facility, while a clever idea for a deep space tender to support farflung operations, is going to have to be able to move between the gas giant for sorium harvesting and a nearby rock where a colony can be set up to run the rec facility. 

[Shooer]

My usual cargo ships are 50k storage each at a min, run in groups of 5.  I usually have 2 groups at a time.  I can have a group drop off 9 auto mines and 1 mass driver if I only wanted them to visit a rock twice.  Then those ships are free to drop more mines on that same rock or set up mines on other bodies or move other things. 

I don't have to do anything other than just make more mines.  No retooling/building a yard for a very limited run ship, no diverting construction, and (again) isn't limited to just asteroids/comets.

[Detros]

Asteroid miners are far more mobile though, and one 25k ton cargo hold<five asteroid miner modules.

But that big cargo hold can drop the automine and return again next month with another one.
I am bothering neither with asteroid miners nor with sorium harvesters.

My usual cargo ships are 50k storage each at a min, run in groups of 5.  I usually have 2 groups at a time.  I can have a group drop off 9 auto mines and 1 mass driver if I only wanted them to visit a rock twice.  Then those ships are free to drop more mines on that same rock or set up mines on other bodies or move other things. 

I don't have to do anything other than just make more mines.  No retooling/building a yard for a very limited run ship, no diverting construction, and (again) isn't limited to just asteroids/comets.

4 groups of 10 freighters with 25k storage each dropping mines by dozens here. Or transferring infrastructure in the meantime.

[Alastar]

One advantage of the ship modules beyond flexibility is that they require no population to work it, and I sometimes find myself restricted by population rather than minerals or build capacity.

Fuel production and terraforming is almost entirely shipbound for me; mining not so much:
We can have automines if population is the issue.
Logistics of supporting asteroid miners are fiddlier (freighters or mass driver; asteroids typically don't last as long as a good gas giant).

[Khan Boyzitbig]

Thought the precursors still had something. Contact detected TCS 1 quantity 71 every 5 seconds. My god thats alot of AMMs. Possibly a PDC or at least I hope it is (So I can sit back and lob nukes at it). Also found some ground units. This system is a heavily defended outpost clearly.

So much for losing less tonnage... Well I had to find out one way or another.

[Rince Wind]

I typically use sorium harvestes with 15 or 20 modules. They can go under their own power and drop off the fuel at the nearest colony when they are full (usually takes a while as I might refuel from them and they have huge tanks of a couple million litres). And those are not really limited run ships for me. Once I start they get churned out and sent to useful locations in fleets of (multiples of) 5, as my shipyards usually have 5 slipways. Unless I don't have a sorium gas giant in Sol I then mostly stop worrying about producing fuel on earth. Those workers are worth more in the labs anyway.

Terraforming is mostly done by orbital habs for me, even though I typically produce a tug for each one so I don't have to bother with the logistics as much. It is way more convenient than ground bound stations that need population and a lot of freighter trips. I kinda hope the civilans go to the good asteroids, as I usually don't bother.

[Flying Dice]

I use shipboard terraformers and asteroid miners expressly because I'm too lazy to do all the extra logistical work of moving an extra set of facilities about.

[LoSboccacc]

I use shipboard terraformers and asteroid miners expressly because I'm too lazy to do all the extra logistical work of moving an extra set of facilities about.

civilian contracts, helps the economy, helps the empire and it's a great campaign platform for the elections!

[Khan Boyzitbig]

Turns out the precursors I spotted have at least two other ship classes I hadn't encountered. Based on the fact that the listening post I set up spotted one of them (which has a 380.16m km sensor range and explains a lot about how they could hit me from outside my sensor range) and also identified one of the wrecks as that same class. Still think the 71 shot volleys came from a PDC though but it could be that the new ship (same tonnage as last two known types) is just a missile platform with a big sensor and fire control.

Either way I will claim this system as my own.

Shipboard terraformers are handy especially given the land based version requires a larger ship to move anyway.

[Rince Wind]

Or multiple ships/trips.