3 hours ago, meganoth said:
At what day would you have a full solar bank if you didn't care about highest quality?
In A21, fully loaded with any tier cells? Day 80-100, usually. I usually have money for 6 low tier cells when I first start seeing the banks in traders around day 20-30 (I'm on 120min days, so double this for 60min days). By day 40, I would usually have enough for a full set of tier 6 cells if I could find them. And by day 50, at least two fully loaded banks with tier 6 cells. In A20, when you could actually find cells to buy, I'd no longer use generators except in specific locations like my horde base before day 40 most of the time. I'll point out that if I want to complete all 5 traders through tier 5 very quickly, I could get a fully loaded solar bank from tier 5 rewards in less time with tier 3-4 cells (I think that's still a valid reward at tier 5 in A21), but that requires doing a ton of questing to do that and then choosing only solar rewards. I'd rather the option to buy them, with perhaps taking one tier 5 solar reward earlier in the game to get started.
Now, based on your question, I assume the real question is "How soon do you think you should be able to be using solar in a game?" and I think the answer to that is "As soon as you level up to start seeing them in the traders and have enough money for them." If they want it to be later game, they should unlock at traders later. That would be significantly better than never finding them at traders the way it is in A21.
There are 2 reasons why I use solar instead of generators and both are simply convenience. First, it's so I don't have to constantly refill the generators, especially when you either have to top them off every time you return to base or else try to remember to randomly top them off before the run out or else refill them once they stop working. With no warning indicator of any kind that you're running low on gas, it's just something I don't enjoy dealing with. If you could wire a yellow/orange/red warning light that would turn on when you were under 25% fuel, it wouldn't be so bad, but you can't. The second is so that if I do run out of gas, I don't have to worry about whether or not my automatic doors function. Driving back to base and having your doors not open and having to go use some alternate manual door to get in so you can refill the generator so you can drive into your base/garage is also something I don't enjoy. Solar takes away the hassle of dealing with those things. It costs more and takes more space and requires certain placement to function and requires more banks than generators for the same power and I'm willing to pay those extra costs to have hassle free electricity. That's how it should work. As I mentioned, it isn't really about saving on gas because gas is extremely easy to get once you are that far into the game. At least, as long as there is a desert with shale. Spend 15 minutes mining and you can make a lot of gas and you're also getting a bunch of sand for your needs at the same time. Yes, mining takes more time than refilling the generators, but mining is an activity and not just a chore in my view.