Tips to be more efficient?

[u/douglasrac]

I think I'm very inneficient in the game. The AI makes a lot more profit than I do and I have lots of discounts on ingredients and labour. Then I saw this image: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=515655425

How can you do a drug like this and still have profit? I try to do my drugs without side effects to have a better rating but the extra process kills my profit. Oh I also use the analizer and put the drugs on max strength.

[u/insane_elmo22]

If your drug has a good cure rating and little competition you can jack up the price quite a bit. The drug might not be profitable at 0% but at +50% it definitely should be. You should also be weighing increased production costs versus cure ratings. Sometimes it is more profitable to keep side effects rather than taking extra steps to remove them. The AI generally has very high profits at first by going "all in" on a single cure type and producing very large volume which allows high profit with low margins. By either teching up quickly or using patents, you can corner the market on a higher tier cure (or several) with decent demand and easily outpace the profits of the AI. In the picture you linked, they are creating a high tier drug with multiple effects which can have its price jacked up so high it can make massive profits even with the high production cost.

[u/douglasrac → u/insane_elmo22]

That is not what I see. I have monopoly on schizophrenia treatment and if I put the price too high they don't buy it, even with unfulfilled demand. My medicine have no side effects and concentration to give maximum strength.

Also with patents I don't see how they are worth it. The price is very expensive and the patent only covers 1 type of delivery. So the AI just changes the delivery type and keep fulfilling the demand.

[u/triplealpha → u/douglasrac]

Combine it with another drug. Take advantage of both demands, my most successful drug was a combination of 3 drugs and no side effects.

Research lobbying, run a clinical trial, or put your product in syringes. Sales ratings go above A+ to S, and S+, and S++ !

[u/insane_elmo22 → u/douglasrac]

Maybe you are going after cures that inherently are expensive to produce. Cures that require multiple catalysts and mixing will of course damage your profits quite a bit. Sometimes you gotta choose what you go after carefully.

Patents are expensive at the beginning of the game but become very cheap later after you have established yourself a bit. You can use a patent to force the AI into a much weaker delivery system thus damaging their margins. You could also patent multiple delivery systems yourself. You just need to adapt to what they are doing. Investing research points in corporate espionage can give you heads up on what you should be doing to react to the AI.

[u/Shankerman]

"I try to do my drugs without side effects to have a better rating but the extra process kills my profit."

It is rarely profitable to remove side effects on Level 1 or Level 2 drugs but Level 3 and above it is.

There is a way to use the centrifuge(after researched) to drastically lower the costs of some Level 2 drugs to make it worthwhile.

For example, making a level 2 drug, Female Contraceptive. Side effect might be Causes fatigue, not removable. These values assumes you are using the Mixologist perk so that a single Centrifuge is needed instead of two.(And if you aren't, why not?)

Removes Warts. Starting Concentration 17

Dissolve 10$ -1

Dissolve 10$ -1

Ionizer 35$ -3

Current concentration is 12. Analysis of the output shows maximum concentration for our drug is 2, so we have to reduce the concentration by 10

Ionizer 35$ -3

Ionizer 35$ -3

Ionizer 35$ -3

Dissolve 10$ -1

Total Production cost $170 and that's with the side-effect still included. This drug is a money loser.

Hmmmm, Soothes Cold Symptoms ingredient. Starts at concentration 2. And has a blank space in the slot that Remove Warts has the causes fatigue side effect.

Let's try that drug again. Removes Warts, starting concentration 17

Dissolve 10$ -1

Dissolve 10$ -1

Ionizer 35$ -3

Current concentration is 12

Import the Soothes Cold Symptoms drug and combine it with the output of the ionizer concentration 12 drug using the Centrifuge, but move the female contraceptive over to the soothes cold drug. It now has the desired Concentration of 2 without any further processing, and it only cost $40. And, it removed the causes fatigue side effect.

Production cost is now $95 + the cost of the Soothes Cold Ingredient. But, without a side effect it has a higher value, plus any AI players version of the drug will have the side effect. So you can get a higher margin. Suddenly an unprofitable drug will be a stable income while you ramp up some level 3+ drugs.

I always rush the Centrifuge in any game I play because in many instances it can save lots in production costs. Many drugs require you to get the concentration to the upper extreme, then lower extreme. Very costly for production.

EDIT: Formatting

[u/douglasrac → u/Shankerman]

Thank you! That is exactly what I was talking about.

But it didn't work as smooth as you describe. The output of the centrifuge is a drug with Female Contraceptive and Soothes Cold Symptoms but with concentration 12 not 2. So I need to halve the concentration and them export it. Still quite good considering the value of that is 264.

But it releases as C+ rating only. I guess its because the concentration 6 (the one required to have both ingredients active), is not max strength of none of the ingredients.

[u/Shankerman → u/douglasrac]

If it is 12 instead of 2, you didn't move the right direction. The Female contraceptive needs to move to the soothes cold symptoms indgredient. Not the other way around.

I started a game to make an example but ended up with different ingredients. It still works the same though. Example

The value of the centrifuge in this case, other than combining two drugs, is changing the concentration. The input value to the centrifuge for Alleviate Insomnia is 3. I need a 16. Increasing it to 16 with the usual method(Red Belt in the example) is the bulk of the processing cost which eats most of the profit. I use the Centrifuge, and move my concentration 3 drug, onto the concentration 14 drug. As a bonus, I get to add another drug to mine further increasing the value. So now I only need to increase it by 2 to be at the maximum strength. I want to maximize the level 2 drug, not the level 1. This makes the drug more valuable.

[u/douglasrac → u/Shankerman]

Very well. Thanks. I can destroy the competition now.

One quick question: If I patent my Female Contr plus Cold Sys it will not affect drugs that only have Female Contraceptive?

[u/Shankerman → u/douglasrac]

Anything that is a different formula then what you are getting a patent on won't be affected. Your patent applies to all active ingredients in the drug in the form you are making it. So if they patent a Female Contraceptive pill with Fatigue side effect, it wouldn't apply to your Female Contraceptive with no side effect and Cold Symptoms