For the ql-research of chocolate cake, you need a research building with building level 2.
building level 0 -> products researchlevel 0
building level 1 -> products research level 0 - 5
building level 2 -> products research level 0 - 10
Yep, you need to upgrade your research facility, which would cost an additional 500k per wu upkeep for every level upgraded.
Ahhhh, that's the part I misunderstood! Thank you both. I'll have to wait until I'm richer for that. Like maybe sometime next round. 
Although they both have their advantages, I found that option one could be better.
General Advantages and Disadvantages:
option 1:
>Pros
- Concentrated on a few products and improved a lot
- If you start with them anyway, you get a bigger increase (by %) at the start.
- You can knock everything of the same industry down and just produce them when you move on further into the round.
>Cons
- You only have ql for those few products, making you quite inflexible
- Higher initial research costs
option 2:
>Pros
- Lower initial research costs
- Flexibility
>Cons
- The increase in revenue may not do you much good until several days into the round when you are making all the goods.
- If you have limited buildings space (say you could make one more production chain), you would probably make less money.
These are the general pros and cons. You can see that they are about the same. However, if you plan on to increase the ql further, you may want to ask yourself how many high ql products could you afford to research at the same time. You would probably need to research a high ql product on its own (1 facility only), or you would have to research it with other low ql products (more than 1 facility). It may take a while (probably serveral rounds) for you to be able to afford researching more than one high ql product (be it RL 0). So, option 1 is better in the long run.
The other factor you need to consider is that the selling price increase in % with the ql. That is you put the same amount into research, but it may not have the same yield. Take fabric and knitting needles as example, the same increase in ql could result in a huge difference between the 2 products in term of profit. So, choose wisely which product to research.
Lastly, researching with 5/40 option is the cheapest, assuming you would research to q100 eventually and you increase your price to the max shop selling price whenever your ql increase. The 6/48 is more convenient though, because it ends at the same time every two days.
ZitatOriginally posted by Kahla
Since I only started playing the last month of this round and never went beyond RL 7, I didn't get to experiment with the higher lines of production. So choosing which product QLs to raise is a gamble, ...
What I meant was simply for the same amount of research costs (same lvl of research facility), you would get different yields. The norm of RL0 products and how many you sell varies. The higher the norm, the more you can from each piece. However, the quantity also complicates it. However, there are obvious choices, like eggs are not as good as wine 
.
ZitatOriginally posted by Kahla
I'm still a bit unsure of pricing; ... But some products at QL 0 seem to sell well in my shops for the highest price on the SuDe even when they're overproduced by a large amount.
Max shop selling price = norm*(1.5 + ql/100)
I believe that is the formula you have read. The "overproduce" is not a clear defined line because the SuDe use inventory information for supply so if a certain product is used as semi-finished good, players would store them as raw goods, and throw the SuDe % off.
ZitatOriginally posted by Kahla
The one thing I wish we had here was a way to see how many units a building will produce.
This has been reflected and the admins have recently add the units one could sell in shop to the product page in portal. As for units a building could produce.... I can't answer that for the admins.
ZitatThe norm of RL0 products and how many you sell varies. The higher the norm, the more you can from each piece. However, the quantity also complicates it. However, there are obvious choices, like eggs are not as good as wine
I understand - I can make far more profit per unit from shoes than I can from knitting needles, so raising the shoe QL would be the obvious wiser choice of the two. I learned from my cafe this round that while icecream gives less profit per unit than white coffee, I can sell far more icecream in a cafe than I can white coffee, so I actually make far more profit from the icecream each wu. And then some products require far more buildings than others, leaving less room for others - some things make enough profit to make that worthwhile, some don't. So it pays to sit down and look at all that before deciding. I'm still discovering all this stuff, but all the advice and info I've gotten here on the forum has been wonderfully helpful.
ZitatThe "overproduce" is not a clear defined line because the SuDe use inventory information for supply so if a certain product is used as semi-finished good, players would store them as raw goods, and throw the SuDe % off.
Ah, now it makes more sense! I wasn't clear on what the SuDe was using to determine it. Knowing that, it'll help me recognize which products might be misleading that way on the SuDe.
ZitatOriginally posted by Kahla
I learned from my cafe this round that while icecream gives less profit per unit than white coffee, I can sell far more icecream in a cafe than I can white coffee, so I actually make far more profit from the icecream each wu.
Yea, icecream is nice.
Btw, how did you manage to read what I wrote? I got a verb left out and used 2 "however"s back to back .
Note to self: don't post at 5 am next time
This round should end on 30 April. Last wu would be 24:00mn, 30 April, server time (CET). Reset would occur about 5~10 minutes later. First wu for next round will be 12:00nn, 1 May, server time. The announcement for round reset usually doesn't get post until a couple of days before the reset... so I guess I beat stdok or maikel to it (... and no, I don't mean beating them until they get to it )
One more question. I have more than one research building. The first one is at a standstill; the second is currently researching. If I were to go ahead and assign new research to the first one, is that going to lose the progress the second one has already made? I would think that as long as I only touch the one, it should be alright, but the warning I get when attempting to do so is rather dire.
--
Edit: Never mind. I decided to go ahead and try it. Nothing terrible happened.
ZitatOriginally posted by dktc
Max shop selling price = norm*(1.5 + ql/100)
I believe that is the formula you have read. The "overproduce" is not a clear defined line because the SuDe use inventory information for supply so if a certain product is used as semi-finished good, players would store them as raw goods, and throw the SuDe % off.
I think this rule of thumb mist be changed a little:
i tried this calc rule: Max shop selling price = norm*(1.5 + ql/100)
seeing my products not being sold anymore...... so i played with the calculation a bit and found the following:
Max shop selling price = norm*(1.5 + (own Q - Avg Q)/100)
The Formula norm*(1.5 + ql/100) is correct.
But its important to round to the floor, so cut of all places after decimal sign.
Yep you are so right, i miscalculated in my own QL. the max QL of the product wasn't reached by the QL of a semi-product....
