Ulgara economy guide: mines, energy and storage

Three resources

Every planet has a small flat output on top of its mines; your real income comes from the mines.

• Metal: the most used resource; the base of buildings, ships and defences.
• Crystal: for research and ships; usually the scarcest.
• Deuterium: for advanced research, ships and fleet fuel.

Production keeps going while you are away

Resources build up at an hourly rate and keep growing while you are offline. The top bar shows each resource's amount, hourly output and how full its storage is. Two things stop or slow production: a full storage and negative energy.

Energy

• Mines use energy. If energy goes negative, every mine slows down together.
• Energy comes from solar plants and, later, the fusion reactor.
• A planet's temperature matters: solar power works better on hot planets, deuterium on cold ones. Keep this in mind when you choose where to colonise.

Storage

When a storage is full that resource stops producing. Guild rewards and battle loot can go above the limit, but production does not restart: enlarge the storage or spend. Before a long break, check which storage fills up first.

What to upgrade first

• Early on, keep metal and crystal mines balanced; crystal is usually the bottleneck.
• Check energy before every mine upgrade.
• The robotics factory, and later the nanite factory, cut every build time.
• The research lab and energy technology unlock new buildings and ships.
• Tap a building to open its 'Next level' panel: cost, time and what you gain; if you are short of resources it tells you when you will have enough.

Income beyond the mines

• Pirate hideouts and expeditions: PvE rewards come home as far as your fleet's holds carry them. See [[link:pve-pvp]].
• The Merchant Guild: daily tasks, weekly contracts and story chains; rewards grow with your reputation.
• The weekly ranking round: everyone whose score grew gets a resource pack on their home planet.
• The market: post fixed-price offers to other players; prices must stay within a band and a small tax applies.
• Debris: part of every ship destroyed in battle stays in orbit as debris for Salvagers to collect.
• Colonies: every new planet brings its own mines; in the late game colonies are the engine of your economy.

Moving resources

Resources move between planets with the Transport mission on Haulers and Heavy Haulers. Fleet fuel is deuterium; the Fleet screen shows the time, fuel and cargo before you send.

Late game

As your economy grows, long-term goals open up to spend it on: endless research, the Terraformer that adds fields to a planet, monuments built only with resources that earn achievement points, and alliance megastructures. Money buys none of these: Pricing.