Realistic Manufacturing

[buells]

One of the game's strengths is the ability to shape the entire value chain of the products you produce. The manufacturing system we have now works quite well, except that selling semi-products tends to be unprofitable. However, I think the existing game engine can accommodate more fine-grained processes that would allow the player to make more strategic decisions without getting too bogged down in the weeds.

What if instead of one kind of factory, we had different kinds of factories for different types of products? That would be far more realistic in terms of different industries having different degrees of capital intensity. Basically the categories could be light manufacturing (toys, sports equipment, jewelry, watches, apparel, leather goods, beverage, food, snacks, cosmetics, body care products, drugs), heavy manufacturing (cars, appliances, electronics) and advanced manufacturing (communication devices, computer). It could be more fine grained than that if desired. If we don't want to change the game too drastically, we could just have different types of manufacturing units within existing facilities that would do different things.

New industries could be introduced that do different things. For example, a chemicals industry could be created to make different products. Fertilizers and pesticides could be introduced to farming, which could effectively increase the quality and output of a given farm. These would have to be bought from chemical plants creating a truly B2B product. Other B2B products could be introduced that could be sold only from warehouses to prevent the proliferation of new kinds of retail. Building materials like paint, cement, windows, doors, plywood, flooring, and ceiling tiles along with more diverse steel products could be manufactured using inputs primarily already available in-game. These could be sold effectively to consumers (really fictional, non-corporation businesses). Demand for manufacturing products like industrial solvents, capital goods, and protective equipment could be variously tied to total training and upgrade spending or manufacturing activity without requiring direct sales to factories.

Rather than random distribution of mining and oil deposits, I think they should be concentrated in a certain region of each map and perhaps even in certain cities if multiple cities are in play. This way, the supply chain can be set up with reasonable assurance that the logistics on raw materials will not be totally upended by random appearance of new deposits when old deposits are exhausted.

Finally, there is more than one way to skin a cat. In the steel industry for example, heavy primary steel production is done in highly capital intensive, high fixed cost integrated plants that use iron ore and coke to make steel. Mini-mills primarily use recycled scrap and electricity to produce steel and have a more variable cost structure with lower capital intensity. My suggestion is that different inputs could be used to make the same products in different ways. Aluminum, glass, and paper can also be produced from recycled materials. Ethanol uses sugar or corn to create a product with similar end uses to oil. I know there are already proposals to introduce energy and mining DLCs, so I won't drill down too far into this.

[Kilo_SSK]

I'm 250% for a mining and energy DLC, that would be awesome... but I'm biased, one of the career choices that interested me was to become an engineer in one of these fields.
But yeah, it would be more realistic if semi-finished products were more profitable to produce and sell; after all, the companies making the inner parts of smartphones or car engines must make quite a pretty penny...

[David]

I'm 250% for a mining and energy DLC, that would be awesome... but I'm biased, one of the career choices that interested me was to become an engineer in one of these fields.
But yeah, it would be more realistic if semi-finished products were more profitable to produce and sell; after all, the companies making the inner parts of smartphones or car engines must make quite a pretty penny...

Have you voted for the Mining and Energy DLC at this poll https://www.enlight.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=6916 ?

There is a possibility that the dev team will work on this DLC after the completion of the Banking and Finance DLC if there are sufficient user interests on it.

[colonel_truman]

so I won't drill down too far into this.

Such a pity!