Resource Consumption

How specialized sectors consume resources as inputs in order to produce outputs, and what that means for logistics, supply chains, and economic conflict.

Goal

Make advanced economic development depend on supply chains rather than local self-sufficiency. A holding that produces the most valuable outputs should be the most dependent on inbound resource flows from other holdings.

Core Problem

If every developed holding can produce advanced outputs purely from what its local stellar object provides, there is no reason to build trade networks or protect supply routes. Holdings become self-contained and the logistics layer of the game has no strategic weight.

Resource consumption ties specialization to dependency. The harder a holding works at higher tiers, the more it relies on external supply. That dependency is both an economic opportunity and a vulnerability.

Working Directions

Tiered Consumption Model

Sectors follow a tiered model that determines whether they consume inputs and what those inputs are.

Tier 1 — Extraction

Extraction sectors produce raw resources directly from the stellar object's composition. They consume nothing from external sources. A holding operating only at Tier 1 is self-sustaining by design — it produces what the object contains and depends on nothing else.

Tier 2 — Processing

Processing sectors consume Tier 1 raw resources as inputs and produce refined or intermediate resources. The raw inputs do not need to come from the same holding — they can be shipped in from any holding in the player's network.

This is where external logistical dependency begins. A holding with only processing sectors and no local extraction is entirely dependent on inbound supply.

Examples of Tier 2 consumption: - A refinery consumes raw ore and produces industrial alloys - A chemical processor consumes volatiles and produces fuel - A bioproduction facility consumes raw organics and produces colony supplies

Tier 3 — Advanced Production

Advanced sectors consume Tier 2 processed resources as inputs and produce the highest-value outputs: ship components, military hardware, advanced materiel.

The supply chain at this tier spans two hops: Tier 1 source holdings feed Tier 2 processing holdings, which feed the Tier 3 advanced holding. A failure anywhere in that chain reduces output at the top.

Examples of Tier 3 consumption: - A shipyard complex consumes industrial alloys and components and produces warships - A weapons foundry consumes alloys and conductive metals and produces military hardware

Higher tiers may exist for late-game or exotic-tier production, but are not yet defined.

Resources Come From Anywhere

Consuming sectors draw from a shared resource pool at the holding. That pool is filled by:

local production from extraction sectors on the same holding
incoming shipments from other holdings in the player's network

A processing holding does not need any local extraction at all. It can be fed entirely from elsewhere. Object composition still matters — but only for extraction holdings. A holding developed for processing is evaluated on its logistics position, not its stellar composition.

Consumption Rate Scales With Level

A sector's resource consumption rate increases as it levels up. A higher-level sector produces more but also demands more input per cycle. A player cannot freely max out a processing sector without ensuring a proportionally larger supply flow reaches the holding.

Exact rates per sector type and level are not yet defined.

Snapshot-Based Calculation

Resource production and consumption are not simulated continuously. Calculations happen at event boundaries — when something changes at a holding such as a sector upgrade, a shipment arriving, or a configuration change.

At each snapshot, the holding resolves the period since the last snapshot:

Take the resource pool available at the last snapshot
Add all production from local sectors over the elapsed time
Subtract all consumption demanded by processing and advanced sectors over the elapsed time
If demand exceeded supply at some point during the period, the consuming sector ran for only a fraction of the elapsed time

Because the exact moment of resource exhaustion is not tracked between snapshots, the fraction is calculated retrospectively at snapshot time.

Example:

A processing sector consumes 500 units per hour and produces 200 units per hour. The holding had 300 units of input available at the last snapshot. One hour has passed.

The sector could run for: 300 ÷ 500 = 0.6 hours = 36 minutes
Output produced: 200 × 0.6 = 120 units instead of 200 units

The sector did not produce nothing — it produced proportionally to how long it could be sustained.

When multiple sectors at the same holding consume the same resource and supply is insufficient to run all of them fully, the available resource is distributed proportionally based on each sector's consumption rate.

Example:

Two sectors consume from the same pool. Sector A consumes 500 units per hour, sector B consumes 300 units per hour. Combined demand is 800 units per hour. Supply available covers only 400 units per hour.

Sector A receives: 400 × (500 ÷ 800) = 250 units per hour — runs at 50% capacity
Sector B receives: 400 × (300 ÷ 800) = 150 units per hour — runs at 50% capacity

Both sectors degrade proportionally. Neither takes priority over the other by default.

Supply Chain Vulnerability

Because advanced holdings depend on inbound resource flows, there are three distinct ways to damage an opponent's productive capacity:

Attack the holding directly — destroy or capture it
Cut the supply line — blockade the transport route or destroy the source holding
Destroy the logistics infrastructure — prevent resources from being delivered to the holding even if production elsewhere continues

This means economic conflict does not require direct military engagement with the most developed and likely most defended target. Disrupting the supply chain achieves the same result without a frontal assault.

Open Questions

What are the exact consumption rates per sector type and level?
Is consumption rate linear with level, or does it scale differently at higher levels?
Can players configure priority order for resource distribution between competing consumers at the same holding?
Are there holding-level storage limits that cap how much of an input resource can be stockpiled, and if so, does excess production overflow or stop?
Does the snapshot calculation need to handle cascading shortages — where a Tier 2 shortage reduces Tier 3 input, which is itself calculated at the same snapshot?