Hey guys.
Been playing for the past few days, trying different approaches to test how game mechanics will work on the long run. From fast expansion, to peaceful "1 system" games...
And it seems economy needs some heavy tweaking. In one of the games, it took me a LONG time to get terraforming tech, so i couldn't colonize a lot of planets. This locked me, and i lagged behind most other races. But the moment i got terraforming, in 40 - 50 turns, i had quite a few fully developed colonies, and started making something like 200 bc / turn. Had a LOT of ships built, so maintenance was high enough, and still my economy kept rising, to a point where i just wouldn't care anymore about credits.
Colonized planets, and just built everything there. This felt kinda... shallow! Colony roles should be more present (like, mining colonies, farming, research, etc...). I know the game is in an early alpha state, but balance is something i really appreciate in 4x games. I still don't know what to suggest on this matter, but i've seen some other posts about economy issues, and it probably will need some work to make it more "long run" possible. Maybe add inflation, or even corruption (like civilization 4 had). This way, early empires aren't crippled, and advanced ones gets some penalties due to its size, which is pretty realistic.
Maybe the maintenance costs for colonies could be increasingly higher. Like, 1st colony = 100% maintenance, 2nd = 110%, 3rd = 120%, and so on... Don't know about a formula, maybe something more complex than a linear progression.
Also, a similar thing could be applied to ship maintenance. This way, having a huge armada would be very costy, giving small empires some advantage to survive against bigger ones.
Well, still gotta play more to have some more ideas on this, but as it is, i'm pretty sure a lot of players will have similar issues.
Economy - balance
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jorgen_cab
- Citizen
- Posts: 36
- Location: Sweden
Re: Economy - balance
It is probably too late in the game development but I really like more realistic approaches. So corruption and inefficiencies in taxation should increase as an empire increase. It has been that way since the dawn of history.
A nice feature would also be to be able to release systems as vassal allies and thereby reducing corruption etc... this would be realistic and fun in my opinion.
Perhaps large terran worlds should eventually demand to become a close ally and not a slave world to what they view a corrupt government that don't cater too much to their interests.
I would also like to see a system where ship maintenance is increased the further ships are from a star-base. At least for large and huge ships. It would also require a star-base for these ship to ever be built. Or something similar...
A nice feature would also be to be able to release systems as vassal allies and thereby reducing corruption etc... this would be realistic and fun in my opinion.
Perhaps large terran worlds should eventually demand to become a close ally and not a slave world to what they view a corrupt government that don't cater too much to their interests.
I would also like to see a system where ship maintenance is increased the further ships are from a star-base. At least for large and huge ships. It would also require a star-base for these ship to ever be built. Or something similar...
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Madbiologist
- Contributor
- Posts: 98
Re: Economy - balance
Yeah, I would avoid using direct inflation on the colony. If inflation is to be used it should be more global and/or indirect.
The problem with a increase in maintenance per new worlds is that at lets say 200% some economic buildings become useless. It will be pointless to upgrade a Entertainment Sector, and sometimes even the Trade Center, because the new tier will increase the maintenance above the increase in profits. However, if you want to produce ships or science, the increase maintenance will act as you intended on those buildings.
The end result would be, as you get bigger, you will only go for Science planets or Ship forge worlds if you can afford it (even Industry for profit will be take a backseat, but it will take longer since the profits are huge for a mining world, it will just take longer before they break even and profit you). Which is not a desired state for gameplay balance, because you will have no incentive to build worlds for trade or tourism while still having incentives to build forge and science worlds. You would want the system to influence all new colony making decisions, not funnel them into one type only before you get the effect that dissuades you from making any new ones.
Actually, considering how profitable Abundant Gem and Gold worlds are. By the end you will actually only build those, but always want to build those. So it won't really slow down expansion if you can still find these sort of planets, just make the player give up on Tourism and Trade worlds, then on Science planets, then once he has enough new Mining Worlds be able to do more Science planets, and continue to do this until you hit an equilibrium. Which means the only Tourism planets and Trade planets will be your first ones, which will also create the weird gameplay effect, you will want to make your first colonies those.
Also, it is hell arbitrary that planet Y is more expansive to maintain than planet X, just because it was founded later. It literally will gate the direction you will choose you colonies, grab all the touristic ones first, then crab all the mining, then go for science (still taking mining worlds as you go), and finally only go mining worlds since they will still be profitable since even science worlds will cost way too much. While your intended effect was to slow down expansion... this will just funnel it.
Suddenly Gem and Gold worlds become the uber-oil of the game (once Terraforming is high enough, don't even need to be Terran anymore), research planets are the only thing you build in the late game along with new mining planets, and only your first worlds get to have trade or entertainment structures. Though the economy needs balancing for sure, this game has a very complex economy model operating under the hood... it is actually quite scary (this also means balancing stuff will be harder and needs to be done very carefully, since it is a complex system). Some believe the keystone component might be population growth.
So using corruption or a bureaucracy factor (or a morale factor that produces the same results) that is more global (though some worlds can be hit harder) would be a better approach (the morale mechanisms tends to be more world specific but can be influenced by global factors). I liked how Armada 2526 did it, you got a Bureaucracy hit on popularity (which was very important in that game, this game doesn't have something similar though), which also increased thrift. Thrift killed the profits of your planets, so you got less money going to the treasury, but didn't hurt their self-reliance as much nor did it prevent you from making more money... just meant you get less, way less, of it in the end. So your economy grew slower as you got bigger, and made it harder to manage a large empire.
Short version, I agree some balance is needed, but I don't think just increasing the maintenance cost of each new world will be the fix (it will do more harm than good). Other methods should be used, suggested all over the place in these forums, including your own post and thread.
Edit - I did some playing around, and I think the problem has to do more with population than actual expansion (though expansion doesn't help as it can act as a multiplier under -some- circumstances). I have a game where I only had 4 planets (Earth, Mars, and two other in the same system). My starting position put a lot of people near me and I was able to get IS Broadcasting and a good level of IS Coms early. I managed to make peace with my neighbors. It wasn't too long before I started to roll in cash, as much as I would in a 9 colony game, except even faster. So I decided to take a look at things.
See, that 3rd planet was a 12b. Seems that because it was my only world, all my migration when to it fast. So I capped that planet at 12 fast, the other was 8b. So I had Earth, an Earth clone, and a Mega Earth. The numbers started roll in that I was able to speed buy 4 Motherships a turn (at each world), and still make a profit.
My guess, once you have profitable planets (Vista, Monuments, Gem, and Gold) and get a high enough population (either by being Terran, or via Terraforming offsetting the penalty), your economy shoots through the roof. Techs that also increase Workforce numbers can also boost it en mass (since it is a boost to the ratio of your population that is used). So expansion can add to the problem as you manage to get more of these worlds, and may even amplify it as you have more worlds topping off. However, the runaway economics can occur even with a few planets a few squares away from you if you get lucky with the right ones. So the problem is deeper than just expansion and needs to be addressed at its root.
The problem with a increase in maintenance per new worlds is that at lets say 200% some economic buildings become useless. It will be pointless to upgrade a Entertainment Sector, and sometimes even the Trade Center, because the new tier will increase the maintenance above the increase in profits. However, if you want to produce ships or science, the increase maintenance will act as you intended on those buildings.
The end result would be, as you get bigger, you will only go for Science planets or Ship forge worlds if you can afford it (even Industry for profit will be take a backseat, but it will take longer since the profits are huge for a mining world, it will just take longer before they break even and profit you). Which is not a desired state for gameplay balance, because you will have no incentive to build worlds for trade or tourism while still having incentives to build forge and science worlds. You would want the system to influence all new colony making decisions, not funnel them into one type only before you get the effect that dissuades you from making any new ones.
Actually, considering how profitable Abundant Gem and Gold worlds are. By the end you will actually only build those, but always want to build those. So it won't really slow down expansion if you can still find these sort of planets, just make the player give up on Tourism and Trade worlds, then on Science planets, then once he has enough new Mining Worlds be able to do more Science planets, and continue to do this until you hit an equilibrium. Which means the only Tourism planets and Trade planets will be your first ones, which will also create the weird gameplay effect, you will want to make your first colonies those.
Also, it is hell arbitrary that planet Y is more expansive to maintain than planet X, just because it was founded later. It literally will gate the direction you will choose you colonies, grab all the touristic ones first, then crab all the mining, then go for science (still taking mining worlds as you go), and finally only go mining worlds since they will still be profitable since even science worlds will cost way too much. While your intended effect was to slow down expansion... this will just funnel it.
Suddenly Gem and Gold worlds become the uber-oil of the game (once Terraforming is high enough, don't even need to be Terran anymore), research planets are the only thing you build in the late game along with new mining planets, and only your first worlds get to have trade or entertainment structures. Though the economy needs balancing for sure, this game has a very complex economy model operating under the hood... it is actually quite scary (this also means balancing stuff will be harder and needs to be done very carefully, since it is a complex system). Some believe the keystone component might be population growth.
So using corruption or a bureaucracy factor (or a morale factor that produces the same results) that is more global (though some worlds can be hit harder) would be a better approach (the morale mechanisms tends to be more world specific but can be influenced by global factors). I liked how Armada 2526 did it, you got a Bureaucracy hit on popularity (which was very important in that game, this game doesn't have something similar though), which also increased thrift. Thrift killed the profits of your planets, so you got less money going to the treasury, but didn't hurt their self-reliance as much nor did it prevent you from making more money... just meant you get less, way less, of it in the end. So your economy grew slower as you got bigger, and made it harder to manage a large empire.
Short version, I agree some balance is needed, but I don't think just increasing the maintenance cost of each new world will be the fix (it will do more harm than good). Other methods should be used, suggested all over the place in these forums, including your own post and thread.
Edit - I did some playing around, and I think the problem has to do more with population than actual expansion (though expansion doesn't help as it can act as a multiplier under -some- circumstances). I have a game where I only had 4 planets (Earth, Mars, and two other in the same system). My starting position put a lot of people near me and I was able to get IS Broadcasting and a good level of IS Coms early. I managed to make peace with my neighbors. It wasn't too long before I started to roll in cash, as much as I would in a 9 colony game, except even faster. So I decided to take a look at things.
See, that 3rd planet was a 12b. Seems that because it was my only world, all my migration when to it fast. So I capped that planet at 12 fast, the other was 8b. So I had Earth, an Earth clone, and a Mega Earth. The numbers started roll in that I was able to speed buy 4 Motherships a turn (at each world), and still make a profit.
My guess, once you have profitable planets (Vista, Monuments, Gem, and Gold) and get a high enough population (either by being Terran, or via Terraforming offsetting the penalty), your economy shoots through the roof. Techs that also increase Workforce numbers can also boost it en mass (since it is a boost to the ratio of your population that is used). So expansion can add to the problem as you manage to get more of these worlds, and may even amplify it as you have more worlds topping off. However, the runaway economics can occur even with a few planets a few squares away from you if you get lucky with the right ones. So the problem is deeper than just expansion and needs to be addressed at its root.
Re: Economy - balance
Lots of good thoughts here... What i meant about the handicaps was just a raw suggestion, it sure needs a lot of testing before being implemented.
After playing a bit more, I realized that the issue isn't related to the numbers of colonies itself, too. The main reason for unbalance in late game are 2: high population, and technology.
The high population is easy to perceive, since the maintenance cost is kinda static, but the gain from population isnt. Maybe implement a population-related maintenance. Small colonies cost less, big ones cost more, but still generate more income (this way you wouldn't get absurd numbers on big planets, like 50bc / turn as profit).
The tech part is a bit more tricky... In late game, the techs that boost economy (industry, farming, workforce and pop growth) have a HUGE impact. After researching level 10 in a few of those techs, a colony goes from 50k population to 10b very fast. Maybe the formula shouldn't be a % growth rate, maybe something not linear, geting smaller while the pop grows, but still growing more in raw numbers (think of a curve of growth... the increase would be still bigger, but not stupidly big!) And workforce had a MAJOR impact in economy. Lets say you generate 10b income, and 7b maintenance in a colony. If you double workforce (which you can, late in the game), you'll generate 20b, with the same 7b maintenance. Profit would go from 3b to 13b. Thats 433% increase, too much!
Well, this is too early to conclude this or that, but surely something should be made to balance things a bit.
Hope more people (and the developers) look into this. The way it is now, big and long games are not an option, it becomes so easy at a certain point that you just stop playing.
And lets keep playing/testing, hehehe! Afterall, thats what we bought, so lets help them!
After playing a bit more, I realized that the issue isn't related to the numbers of colonies itself, too. The main reason for unbalance in late game are 2: high population, and technology.
The high population is easy to perceive, since the maintenance cost is kinda static, but the gain from population isnt. Maybe implement a population-related maintenance. Small colonies cost less, big ones cost more, but still generate more income (this way you wouldn't get absurd numbers on big planets, like 50bc / turn as profit).
The tech part is a bit more tricky... In late game, the techs that boost economy (industry, farming, workforce and pop growth) have a HUGE impact. After researching level 10 in a few of those techs, a colony goes from 50k population to 10b very fast. Maybe the formula shouldn't be a % growth rate, maybe something not linear, geting smaller while the pop grows, but still growing more in raw numbers (think of a curve of growth... the increase would be still bigger, but not stupidly big!) And workforce had a MAJOR impact in economy. Lets say you generate 10b income, and 7b maintenance in a colony. If you double workforce (which you can, late in the game), you'll generate 20b, with the same 7b maintenance. Profit would go from 3b to 13b. Thats 433% increase, too much!
Well, this is too early to conclude this or that, but surely something should be made to balance things a bit.
Hope more people (and the developers) look into this. The way it is now, big and long games are not an option, it becomes so easy at a certain point that you just stop playing.
And lets keep playing/testing, hehehe! Afterall, thats what we bought, so lets help them!
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Madbiologist
- Contributor
- Posts: 98
Re: Economy - balance
Yeah, I think you nailed it. Population is obvious, but the tech definitely adds up in the late game. Once you get a few techs that add together, you get some pretty nice stacking bonuses. Throw in an increase in workforce, and it all goes into a positive feedback loop.
Indeed, and I love it!Lerinor wrote:Hope more people (and the developers) look into this. The way it is now, big and long games are not an option, it becomes so easy at a certain point that you just stop playing.
And lets keep playing/testing, hehehe! Afterall, thats what we bought, so lets help them!
Last edited by Madbiologist on Sun Jul 07, 2013 5:23 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Re: Economy - balance
This, like most, is an area where the _original_ Master of Orion nailed it. Population growth was on a bell curve, based around the percentage of the max population the colony currently had. In the beginning (or right after the damned bulrathi had wiped out almost all the population in an invasion) growth (as a percentage of current population) was very slow. As the population increased, so did the growth factor, up until you hit 50% of max pop. At that point growth slowed down until you hit max population.Lerinor wrote:Maybe the formula shouldn't be a % growth rate, maybe something not linear, geting smaller while the pop grows, but still growing more in raw numbers (think of a curve of growth... the increase would be still bigger, but not stupidly big!)
There's a reason my wife and I _still_ play MoO and not Moo2 (there were only two games in the MoO series, I don't care _what_ people try to tell you).
And in the... what, two decades?... since we first got MoO, this has been the first game that had a chance of matching it. In fact, it would take some horrible, horrible mistakes on the part of the developers to _keep_ it from matching MoO; as is, if I extrapolate from what's there to fill in the missing parts, it does.
I don't think I can give higher praise than that.
Re: Economy - balance
Pretty much, this game is REALLY promising. Liked what i saw so far!
About the bell curve, thats precisely what I meant! Would be awesome to see this here, and it might be not so hard to do, since MoO did it a long time ago.
Well, lets wait, and point out what we see as "wrong".
About the bell curve, thats precisely what I meant! Would be awesome to see this here, and it might be not so hard to do, since MoO did it a long time ago.
Well, lets wait, and point out what we see as "wrong".