Step 5: Population Efficiency (Player Race)
Custom Race wizard / View Race dialog
Specify/view the efficiency of your colonists, mines and factories for all the planets you inhabit.
If you are confused about whether increasing or decreasing a value is providing an advantage, watch the advantage points box as you click on the controls. If the number of points decreases when you click on a control, you have given the race an advantage.
If you have a race with a high population growth, you may not care about being efficient with factories. In this case you would set the controls so colonists produce fewer and more expensive factories, thereby freeing up advantage points to use somewhere else.
If you plan on building a only low number of mines, or if you have extra advantage points, consider increasing the mining production rate. This will NOT affect the rate at which the mineral concentration is reduced on your planets. It only makes you more efficient at squeezing minerals out of the rock. This can give you a competitive advantage over a player who operates more mines but is less efficient--they'll decrease their mineral concentration faster than you. The rate at which mineral concentration decreases (always stopping at 1) is determined by the number of mines on a planet and the number of years they've been in existence.
Keep in mind that when the mineral concentrations on both your planets and your opponent's planets reaches 1, the player with more mines can do as well, and possibly better, than the player who is very efficient at extraction. If you're very good at production and are creating resources like crazy, you may find you can easily make up for low mineral concentrations with Mineral Alchemy.
These are only simple examples of possible strategies--make the choices that suit your game the best, keeping in mind the rules determining the rate at which mineral concentration is reduced.
If you choose the Alternate Reality primary trait most of these controls are disabled. Alternate Reality races can't build planetary installations.
Next you'll specify the cost of research for your race.
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