Please re-enable self-sufficient metal production

from builders, caretakers, etc.
Because it was a really nice feature, especially in FFA games.
What was again the reason to remove it? I don't remember.

if you want it for FFA, make it an option?

!setoptions tweakmode=blabla

{
staticcon = {
metalmake = 0.3
}, amphcon = {
metalmake = 0.225,
} ...
}

+2 metal cons that cost 120 pay back in one minute, making mexes obsolete. The only upside is that it almost makes Mason worth having... except Convict has the same income/cost plus energy-free shield, and Conjurer gets the (area) cloak.

Old numbers were something like income = 0.03 x buildPower.

If you want a metalmakor, why not make it a dedicated unit? Why slavishly revert the past if you could instead actually design something?

So that we can finally make something like a metal fabricator from Supreme Commander? I like that idea, it will make games go faster but I think we should balance it by making it take a big abount of space, giving flat metal (not being affected by overdrive) eating a lot of energy (maybe 50?) and maybe make it explode like a fusion plant.

You can make a self sufficient metal producer by putting a nano next to a swarm turret

quote: I like the idea of making it a larger plant

All factories produce +0.5 income and are fairly large; wish granted.

The doubling time of a factory-farm economy is around 26 minutes though, so ... it's not implausible for it to make cost, but it will be a slow takeoff.

However, with your +2 universal basic income you already have a portable metal farm worth ~10 of old metal-producing caretakers.

Alternatively, i also think the recovery and offshore economy of the con-eco-ZK could be approximated via something that has about the same investment payback, but isn't self-defending, too cloakable, or mobile. So, flowing from that approach:

- The basic investment shouldn't be that huge to build on a +2 basic income
- It should be strictly worse than overdrive
- As a rule of thumb, it should not return more than (old caretaker: 0.3 / 220) = 0.00136363636 per metal invested

Let's say we want a device that produces +1 metal. At the desired efficiency, its total cost should be around 733 metal. Let's round this up for a full 800.

Let's assume the thing also consists of two modules - one that produces energy, and one that produces metal by converting energy, like the good old metalmakor. If we divide this in half, then we have 400m of an energy source, 400m of a +1 metalmakor, and a requirement that the metalmakor not be more efficient than overdrive in any practical situation.

We achieve the latter by assuming that the energy source has the maximum available efficiency - because in a non-intended scenario, this is what a thriving player would use to try to use it instead of overdrive anyway. The most cost-efficient energy source in ZK is the advanced geo, costing 1500 metal (accounting for morph) and producing +100 energy, for a ratio of 0.0666(6). A 400 metal share in an advgeo project will give us 26.666(6) energy to spend on the metal maker. We can round this down to 25 to compensate for having rounded up to 800 earlier and for a nice numerical match with basic geo.

So, in summary:
- 400 cost metal maker
- Drains 25 energy, which costs you ~400 metal to obtain
- Generates 1 metal
- Pays back under optimal conditions in 800 seconds = 13.3333333333 minutes
- Lower efficiency with less cheap energy
- energy component cost with 21 tidal generators: 735m, total project cost 1135m, payback time: 1135s (18.91 minutes)
- energy component cost with (25/35) share of a fusion: 714m, total project cost per makor: 1114m, payback time: 1114s ( 18.5666666667 minutes)
- energy component cost with (25/225) share of a singu: 445m, total project cost per makor: 885m, payback time: 885s ( 14.75m)
- Static, cannot be cloaked
- Large footprint
- Probably not worth having in the game anyway, tbh
- An energy-based makor means that players who had their singus shinied actually will be punished by higher energy costs, so maybe flat +1 for a 1000m is preferable
- do you really want it with those numbers, really?

Red Alert style crate drops could allow an interesting empty-space comeback mechanic.

Hidden econ was terrible. Right now the come back is having energy + rez.