Just think one of the most crucial mods I made with WolfRev was redesigning the whole city distance calculation. I think it's crucial to enjoy revolutions. Hell I never have done . .. .. .. . else but XML modding and simple things like that, but basically taught myself the basics of simple programming to do that, and am now semi comfortable with messing around with Python code cause of it. So it's cool you pushed me to learn this, but I'm wondering why you like your calculation system better. jdog what is your vision for the distance penalty?

The next version will have the roll out of the civ stability system which I'm still working on. I haven't figured out exactly how the various city-based effects are going to be updated yet ... the religion system and the city location system are both on the slate to be overhauled.

From what I remember, your changes to the distance calculations revolved around decreases to the strength at various tech levels ... bridge building, astronomy, the internet, etc, so that by the late game large empires could still be pretty stable. Have you made further refinements since then?

The idea behind the distance effects was to make the cities at the fringes of the larger empires in the game less stable so that they were easily tipped over by other effects like religion or culture. With the current system though distance can be it's own cause for a revolt ... in certain circumstances this makes sense, if an empire on the east side of a continent conquers a couple of cities far away on the west side, then those should act like colonies and be more inclined to break free. However, the current system penalizes contiguous empires that are long and slender and that's something I'm planning to remove.

Civ size effects (which modified the strength of distance effects before) are now going to effect the civ-wide stability measure. Empires with low civ-wide stability can suffer from calls for change in government and all-out civil war if things get really bad, but also a low civ stability measure will make restless cities more inclined to rebel (and conversely a high civ stability will make empires hold together better even if a few cities are unhappy).

I'm planning for the city distance effects to split in to two pieces: a detection of cities separated from the rest of the empire (ie, "colonies" on the same continent as the capital) and as a multiplier for other effects in the city. So distance will largely disappear as a direct effect, but instead make cities more sensitive to religious differences, cultural differences, etc. As you've set up currently, this city distance multiplier will decrease as new technologies are discovered.

How does that sound? Does it seem like it will address the issues you have with the current system? Any other things you came up with you think I should consider?

That actually sounds about perfect. I was always under the impression that city distance played a multiplying role to other effects, I'm surprised that's not in there already. It seems to be, if I simply increase the city distance penalty, it acts like it multiplies the penalties of other effects already. One thing though, when you rewrite it, please make it so we can see the values of all the causes (as of now some are stealth). I've tried to go through and write in parts so that stealth clauses show, but they usually don't work, not sure why. I also recomend you just remove the need to turn on debugging to see the values, this is a preference of course, but in my oppinion a lack of transparency is rarely a good thing.

Also I haven't changed my alterations to the city distance code since WolfRev v 1.1.1, so no improvements. I'm still a little confused as to why it sometimes takes into account buildings (I have it so the penalty is further reduced by harbors, etc.), and sometimes does not. Since I'm not a coder though, and this is the only true coding I've ever done, I Wouldn't be surprised if I messed something up somewhere. But overall it works really well, I reccomend you give it a try.

This is the code if you're interested (obviously there is a little more, have to define the techs and such, but this is the core of it) # Distance to capital City Distance modified by communication techs and structures
cityDistModifier = ( plotDistance( pCity.getX(), pCity.getY(), capital.getX(), capital.getY()) )*0.4
if( not pCity.isConnectedTo(capital) ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier + 1)*4
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLAirport)) > 0 ) :
if( gc.getTeam(pPlayer.getTeam()).isHasTech(self.iJetT ech) ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 6)*0.4
else:
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 5)*0.6
elif( gc.getTeam(pPlayer.getTeam()).isHasTech(self.iRadi oTech) ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 4)*0.7
elif( gc.getTeam(pPlayer.getTeam()).isHasTech(self.iRail RoadTech) ) :
if( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLHarbor)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 4)*0.7
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLCothon)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 4)*0.7
else:
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 3)*1.2
elif( gc.getTeam(pPlayer.getTeam()).isHasTech(self.iAstr onomyTech) ) :
if( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLHarbor)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 3)*1.2
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLCothon)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 3)*1.2
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLDLighthouse)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 2)*1.7
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLTradePost)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 2)*1.7
else:
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 2)*2.2
elif( gc.getTeam(pPlayer.getTeam()).isHasTech(self.iEngi neeringTech) and gc.getTeam(pPlayer.getTeam()).isHasTech(self.iHors ebackTech) ) :
if( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLHarbor)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 2)*2.2
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLCothon)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 2)*2.2
else:
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 1)*2.5
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLHarbor)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 1)*2.5
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLCothon)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 1)*2.5
elif( gc.getTeam(pPlayer.getTeam()).isHasTech(self.iWhee lTech) ) :
if( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLDLighthouse)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 1)*3
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLTradePost)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = (cityDistModifier - 1)*3
else:
cityDistModifier = cityDistModifier*3
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLDLighthouse)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = cityDistModifier*3
elif( pCity.getNumRealBuilding(gc.getInfoTypeForString(R evDefs.sXMLTradePost)) > 0 ) :
cityDistModifier = cityDistModifier*3
else:
cityDistModifier = cityDistModifier*3.6

#cityDistModifier = adjusted for map size and normalized

cityDistModifier = cityDistModifier - 1
cityDistModifier = cityDistModifier/((( CyMap().getGridWidth()**2 + CyMap().getGridHeight()**2 )**0.5)*0.013)
distMod = 1.0 + RevUtils.getCivicsDistanceMod( iPlayer )
distMod *= self.distToCapModifier
if( pCity.isGovernmentCenter() ) :
distMod *= 0.5
elif( pCity.getMaintenanceModifier() > 0 ) :
# Decrease effect if city has courthouse
distMod *= 0.75

locationRevIdx = 0
This part is particularly important, as it scales the distance penalty to the map size cityDistModifier = cityDistModifier/((( CyMap().getGridWidth()**2 + CyMap().getGridHeight()**2 )**0.5)*0.013)

If you do use something like this, you'll probably want to simplify it. I probably went a little overboard with all the clauses, but I was just pretty stoked I was actually writing code at the time.

Been working on improving it, and Am done.

In the last build there was an added function that effected the CityDist calc by era. I've just written some superior code, but I need to disable the era modifier for this code to work right (otherwise it'll scale to extremely in the later eras, destroying they city distance penalty). I thought I had it tracked down, but can't find it, here's where I loose it:

self.distToCapModifier = config.getfloat("Revolution", "DistanceToCapitalModifier", 1.0)
Where can I find this DistanceToCapModifier? It's not in Revolution.py, this is where i tracked it back to, it's calling form another file now, but I can't find where (looked through all the usual suspects.

Also this is the Code:

# Distance to capital City Distance modified by communication techs and structures
cityDistModifier = plotDistance(pCity.getX(), pCity.getY(), capital.getX(), capital.getY())
cityDistModifier = ( 97*cityDistModifier )/(( CyMap().getGridWidth()**2 + CyMap().getGridHeight()**2 )**0.5)
cityDistCommBonus = 0
pTeam = gc.getTeam(pPlayer.getTeam())
bCanTradeOverCoast = False
for i in range(gc.getNumTechInfos()):
tech = gc.getTechInfo(i)
if tech.isTerrainTrade(gc.getInfoTypeForString("TERRAIN_COAST")):
if pTeam.isHasTech(i):
bCanTradeOverCoast = True
bCanTradeOverOcean = False
for i in range(gc.getNumTechInfos()):
tech = gc.getTechInfo(i)
if tech.isTerrainTrade(gc.getInfoTypeForString("TERRAIN_OCEAN")):
if pTeam.isHasTech(i):
bCanTradeOverOcean = True
if bCanTradeOverOcean :
cityDistCommBonus += 50
if( pCity.isConnectedTo(capital) ) :
cityDistCommBonus += 31
cityDistCommBonus += 100 - (gc.getRouteInfo(pCity.plot().getRouteType()).getF latMovementCost())*1.67
if( pCity.isCoastal(-1) ) :
if bCanTradeOverOcean :
cityDistCommBonus += 66
elif bCanTradeOverCoast :
cityDistCommBonus += 33
cityDistCommBonus += pCity.getTradeRouteModifier()
cityDistCommBonus += pCity.getCommerceRateModifier(CommerceTypes.COMMER CE_CULTURE)*1.1
if (pCity.getMaxAirlift() > 0 ) :
cityDistCommBonus += 100
cityDistModifier = cityDistModifier / ( 1 + ( cityDistCommBonus / 100 ) )

This code is awesome and it will function with other mods. The citydistance penalty is incrementally decreased as various communication effects take place in the civ, and city itself. Please use this code in the next Revolution build. It's all written, and ready to go.

Unfortunately I need to disable the era city distance modifier in order to balance the numbers, though intuitively the numbers here should work. Usually there is some tweaking that needs done in any complex calculation like this though, but this should be pretty near the mark.

@Phungus
Where can I find this DistanceToCapModifier?
That line pulls out the modifier from Revolution.ini. Check there. The variable is then used further down in Revolution.py.

Thanks for the code slab! When Jdog get's back, we'll have something to work with for changing the distance calculation.
Cheers.

Here are the two files with the code in it. Relevant code tagged with #phungus -start/end comments

Tested this, works great. Tell me what you think. It's tweakable as well. But the numbers I was getting were good. It's a better system then now where city distance penality is tied to era, this ties it to specific effects (like trade routs/bonuses, airlifting) in the city, and in the civilization (road/railroads). This makes specific C++ calls, so it's completely interchangeable with mods, doesn't pull any XML, except for TERRAIN_OCEAN, which, I'd be surprised if any mod got rid of ocean.

Edit: It took a while for this one to show up, thank god for Python Exceptions. Anyway line 1265, CityCommBonus needs to be reverted back to the default code: pPlayer.getCurrentEra()

Had a Python Exception in the last code. Plus, the numbers in the code from above were just based off of throwing around cities in random locations with WorldBuilder. Having set up a test game now (watching the AI play), gotten to the Midieval era, and needed to buff things a bit. So this is the updated code. Still doubt the numbers are exactly right (requires more play testing), but this code should be stable, at least it's gotten through 2 eras without any errors. And it is behaving as intended.

@Phungus
Thanks for sharing the code. I don't have a feel for how big your citydistmodifier variable changes are yet cause you have made a lot of changes. Would really have to sit down with a calculator and punch numbers. In theory a confidence check is to plant print commands into your code and jdog's "print citydistmodifier" and do a before and after compare on a standard save game by swapping over your revolution.py with jdog's and checking the debug log for the print readout. A calculation like this has to be triple confirmed to be working. It looks like you are not adjusting the tests on the citydistmodifier further down. Maybe they have to be changed as well?

You have also done a /100 change further down which is uncommented but intended to be related?:
connIdx = min([5 + pPlayer.getCurrentEra() / 100 + pCity.getPopulation()/3, 10])
You must have had hell with indentation errors. Single spacing indentation like that is really hard. Your indentations are not consistent all the time but it looks like you have got it going. A good start.

Cheers.

That was to make the the effect by era so small, as to have no effect. The numbers will be different then the default code that's the point. Play testing them now to tweak them. Anyway rather then check them against the default #s, play test the changes, and see if you prefer the effect to the default. Though, at this time I still need to tweak the values most likely.

As for single space indentation, for some reason I thought that was required, lol. Anyway Programmers Notepad has these neat little lines in it, so I know exactly where the indentation is.

@Phungus
What would be good is if you could collect a set of your save games of the distance scenarios you are using and maybe upload them as zip at some stage. This data would help fine tune things when Jdog get's back. Typical scenarios are good but also edge cases like duel maps and huge maps are good too. Good one.
Cheers.

In playtesting I've found that this option in the config file does nothing:

; Reduce tech given to former barbarians alone on a continent (larger means they're more behind)
; Does not apply when NewWorldPolicy is 0
NewWorldReduction = 1.00
NewWorldErasBehind = 2

Where in the code is this supposed to be read? I'd like to try to fix it, as obviously it's broken. (1.00 has the same effect as 0)


Also the code I have working (it's tweaked a little from what's posted) has been giving me good numbers. I need to see how it handles colonization and such, so need to play it into more advanced eras. But it's definatly balanced for the early, classical and medieval stages. Will keep you posted. Next goal is to get the bonuses to show up in buildings (ie, courthouse will say 50% Revolution Distance Reduction, etc.). glider do you want me to updated the new numbers I have, or just wait until I have the building modifiers being displayed?

@Phungus
Keep up the good work on the research and development of Revolutions. There are a lot of scenarios to go through that's an understatement. I would say just concentrate on the bare minimum to get to a point where you think you are happy with the distance modifier algorithm across all maps and eras. All of the detailed stuff like the XML text/definitions etc can be done afterwards. If you make something good, please keep your save games as well. It's so handy to have the distant colony effects ready to test in a corresponding save game and often it's not easy to reproduce a save game like that from scratch.

When I fix the indexer on my Vista computer, I'll do a search and chase up your other question regarding "New World Reduction".

Cheers

Tested and done. These seem to work perfectly. Give them a try. Also code optimized according to EF's suggestions. As far as adding text to buildings to note their effect on City Distance, we could do this in one of two ways. Either just use the existing tags, and kind of hack it in via the gametext file, or create new tags in CvGameTextManager.cpp. The former is definatly easier, but adding in the text doesn't create a new bullet, giving it it's own line is easy enough, but it looks a little strange without the bullet. The latter would be much harder to do, but possible.

As usual, altered code is marked with phungus -start and end tags. Though the area of the code I've been writing hasn't changed at all. This code is just tweaked and optimized.

# Distance to capital City Distance modified by communication techs and structures
cityDistModifier = 0
map = CyMap()
deltaX = abs(pCity.getX() - capital.getX())
if map.isWrapX():
deltaX = min(deltaX, map.getGridWidth() - deltaX)
deltaY = abs(pCity.getY() - capital.getY())
if map.isWrapX():
deltaY = min(deltaY, map.getGridWidth() - deltaY)
cityDistRaw = ( deltaX**2 + deltaY**2 )**0.5
cityDistMapModifier = ( map.getGridWidth()**2 + map.getGridHeight()**2 )**0.5
cityDistCommBonus = 0
pTeam = gc.getTeam(pPlayer.getTeam())
bCanTradeOverCoast = False
bCanTradeOverOcean = False
iTerrainCoast = gc.getInfoTypeForString("TERRAIN_COAST")
iTerrainOcean = gc.getInfoTypeForString("TERRAIN_OCEAN")
for i in range(gc.getNumTechInfos()):
tech = gc.getTechInfo(i)
if tech.isTerrainTrade(iTerrainCoast):
if pTeam.isHasTech(i):
bCanTradeOverCoast = True
if tech.isTerrainTrade(iTerrainOcean):
if pTeam.isHasTech(i):
bCanTradeOverOcean = True
if bCanTradeOverOcean :
cityDistCommBonus += 50
iCityTradeRoutes = pCity.getTradeRoutes()
if(iCityTradeRoutes > 0 ) :
cityDistCommBonus += (iCityTradeRoutes - 1)*17
bCityIsConnected = pCity.isConnectedTo(capital)
if bCityIsConnected :
bTechRouteModifier = False
for i in range(gc.getNumTechInfos()):
for j in range(gc.getNumRouteInfos()):
tech = gc.getTechInfo(i)
if(gc.getRouteInfo(j).getTechMovementChange(i) != 0 and pTeam.isHasTech(i)):
bTechRouteModifier = True
break
if bTechRouteModifier:
break
if bTechRouteModifier:
cityDistCommBonus += 100 - ( gc.getRouteInfo(pCity.plot().getRouteType()).getFl atMovementCost() + gc.getRouteInfo(pCity.plot().getRouteType()).getTe chMovementChange(i) )*1.67
else:
cityDistCommBonus += 100 - ( gc.getRouteInfo(pCity.plot().getRouteType()).getFl atMovementCost() )*1.67
if( pCity.isCoastal(-1) ) :
if bCanTradeOverOcean :
cityDistCommBonus += 50
elif bCanTradeOverCoast :
cityDistCommBonus += 25
iTradeRouteModifier = pCity.getTradeRouteModifier()
iCityCulterModifier = pCity.getCommerceRateModifier(CommerceTypes.COMMER CE_CULTURE)
iCityGoldModifier = pCity.getCommerceRateModifier(CommerceTypes.COMMER CE_GOLD)
cityDistCommBonus += iTradeRouteModifier
cityDistCommBonus += iCityCulterModifier
cityDistCommBonus += iCityGoldModifier / 2
iCityMaintenanceModifier = pCity.getMaintenanceModifier()
cityDistCommBonus -= iCityMaintenanceModifier
bCityisPower = pCity.isPower()
if bCityisPower :
cityDistCommBonus += 150
iCityAirlift = pCity.getMaxAirlift()
cityDistCommBonus += 100*iCityAirlift
cityDistModifier = ( 307.0*cityDistRaw / cityDistMapModifier ) / ( 1.0 + ( cityDistCommBonus / 100.0 ) )
cityDistModifier -= int(666 / cityDistMapModifier)

Wow, cool! Just got back and will definitely check out what you've been up to.

Thanks to Tsentom, Now know we can add text to effects like these easily:

They made this really easy in BTS by adding Help tags to the XML. You simply add it under the short description for traits, (for units and buildings and stuff you add it under the strategy text):

<ShortDescription>TXT_KEY_TRAIT_AGR_SHORT</ShortDescription>
<Help>TXT_KEY_AGR_TRAIT_HELP</Help>
<iHealth>0</iHealth>

Whatever txt file you put there will show up the same as the standard trait bonuses. To make it look the same just start the new text with [ICON_BULLET].

So for the Reduced City distance penalties caused by techs & buildings, we can add in those effects being displayed easily through the XML.

Also I'm going to buff the Imperialstic Trait by giving it a 100+ CityDistCommBonus (see code in the attachment for how this would work), something to consider for the official mod. Along with a 10% overall reduction to total rev Idx penalties would be a good thing as well.

One thing to consider, is to remove the Taxes function. I understand it's intent, but I don't think it really adds to gameplay. It's main gameplay effect is to force out Specialist and some interesting Cash and Buy economy plays. Also in terms of realism I always figured the cIV engine is designed to simulate that the government is collecting optimum taxes anyway, the Civics are really what effect the tax rate. The science slider is the ammount of resources the government is funneling toward development, rather then other types of spending. The government sponsored development of technology still takes money, and this money comes form taxpayers. Anway I'm going to try this code here, and see what happens:

goldPerc = pPlayer.getCommercePercent( CommerceTypes.COMMERCE_GOLD )
goldPerc = 25 #Remove high taxes penalty
if( pPlayer.hasTrait(gc.getInfoTypeForString("TRAIT_ORGANIZED")) ):
goldPerc = 0
sciPerc = pPlayer.getCommercePercent( CommerceTypes.COMMERCE_RESEARCH )
cultPerc = pPlayer.getCommercePercent( CommerceTypes.COMMERCE_CULTURE )
if( pPlayer.hasTrait(gc.getInfoTypeForString("TRAIT_ORGANIZED")) ):
CultPerc *= 1.5

I didn't really go through and look at the tax code, let me know if this would ruin anything. Also added in a cityDistCommBonus += 100 if pPlayer has the Imperialistic trait. I"m curious to see if these modifications have the desired effect.

I think the taxes system is ok, but if you need to make changes to it, I'd make the Culture slider *NOT* count as tax. Though I do agree with your points about Civic costs representing government budgets and taxations. Problem is does Revolutions generate enough unhappiness with the civic choices, to make the Revolutions gameplay occur often enough? Or would you tweak the civics effects on revolution chances?

Another option might be to lower the effect of taxes per city, on a city by city basis of the economic buildings in place. E.g. Having a market might reduce the unhappiness rate of taxes in those specific cities. But again there might be some redundancies (e.g. markets already reduce unhappiness with the right luxuries).

Yes buffing civic induced rev effects might be nessesary. Really my main point is from a gameplay perspective. The current taxes penalty eliminates some very creative strategies, and for no real benifit. Revolutionary effects can be induced by other means (Distance, Religion, Civics, War, etc). Also like I said, even from a realism perspective, I think 100% science is the same as 100% gold in terms of taxing the populace, it's just that science means government spending is being alocated differently. Only really culture spending could be considered a drop in taxes.

Edit: Might it be better, for the computer resource wise, to move most of the stuff in Revolution.py to CvCity.cpp?

I had another thought to represent the whole taxes, unhappy peasants thing. While eliminating/nerfing the 'tax' slider bar concept, and tweaking civics' affect on the revolution bar is perhaps one part of the equation---a more major part would be simply modeling the standard of living of the populace. I mean while taxation is an issue, it's more of an idealogue issue if the populace is generally satisfied with it's standard of living beyond the luxury resource mechanic, no?

The way to model standard of living dawned on me as already existing in FFH2, in the form of the Dwarf civ. Rather than focus on taxation as implying standard of living, why not go with using a ratio of total treasury to population? E.g. Treasury divided by city equals relative wealth per city, a number applied to each city. Each city then divides that number by population points in it's city. Result is a standard of living metric for that city. Standardize that to a curve to determine if the standard of living loweres/raise the revolt bar.

So rather than a "you're taxing us too hard" it's "we're too poor under your rule".

The problem still remains of how to standardize contentment this way. Yet it'd still maintain some of the fun of Revolution of managing the slider with an eye to the revolt chances, but doesn't punish increasing the treasury rapidly; It'd punish spending the treasury too rapidly. It also has the advantage of making individual citizen's wealth tangible.

On the contement, I think you'd need a sociologist to help out, but I think it could be a relative 'keep up with the jones' type problem. Meaning the civ's with the top rankings in worldwide standard of living (think GNPs per civ) would probably be the happiest, somewhat regardless of the actual standard of living, while ones in the lower tiers might be the most jealous. That would model 'rising expectations' kind of well also.
There could be other fractional modifiers to the standard of living (> 1.0 meaning a positive multiplier, and <1.0 meaning a negative multiplier), such as techs (some techs give a slight positive multiplier to standard of living), a luxury modifier (number of total untraded luxury resources, duplicates counted, the capitol has access to might give a proportionate positive multiplier to the civ's standard of living calculation), and civics (type of civic could represent degree of individual freedom and liberty in the civ---most would give a relatively negative multiplier, if at least one civ in the world has a 'better' civic actively running). Possibly also a bonus given to cities for the hammers : population ratios?

To sum it up, I think the overall model could follow a sort of individual empowerment through wealth and government = people are happy with the status quo = no tendency to revolt; But that is always tempered with what the Jones' have going, as no one likes being left behind. And like the vanilla Civ4, new civics won't always be better in terms of revolt chances.

Well, total treasury to population is a weird measure. Say I have 2 cities and 1500 gold - a high standard of living. I trade that gold for a tech or two, all of the sudden my people are penniless. I think gold per turn might be a better measure since it is relatively more stable, but it falls into the same problem with resource trading. I think something like resources/population or something like that might be better. I'm not sure how relevant this is, but in the third post of this thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=308258) I suggested replacing the standard happiness measure with the rev index, since they both are getting at the same concept - happiness of citizens. I'm still not sure how to factor wealth in, since it's very simplified in civ games.

It'd be per city, so pop per city would give each city their own standard of living.

I'd think of the gold per turn as potential, but not the actual accrued. Treasury would be actual wealth already generated.

I agree it would upset things where the AI only trades for big lumps of cash, and possibly those things might need some tweaking so it would except the financing of gold per turn. But that's the idea---that the taxes are now in how the government spends the money in hand, before the people can spend it themselves; If the people had that money in hand and circulated it amongst themselves--they'd be happier. IMHO, that's the most realistic model compared to happy face counting, viewing lightbulb slider bar as liberty, etc...


And the standard of living could be further refined if wanted as multipliers representing efficiency of trade. E.g. cities far from the capital or unconnected might not get as high a standard of living as treasurey/# of cities modified at each city per pop.

I'm not sure I'm following you right- If I trade all 1500 of my gold away, I have 0 gold. 0 gold is still 0 standard of living no matter if the city is 15 pop or 1 pop. I think that using the government stockpile of gold to generate taxes/standard of living is a bad idea in the first place.

Yes, the average citizen would be completely destitute at zero gold in the treasury. I guess if you can accept the gold per turn and worked tile commerce as being potential wealth, then my idea is sound. I happen to like it very much. :)

Consider a midgame situation that at 1 gold in the treasury, with the army maintenance being paid from sliders before the treasury, the average populace will be destitute, but the army still maintained. The populace will probably be nearing revolt.

It might create a situation whereby era-based rising expecations would be needed, so that in the ancient era, a low treasury doesn't equal revolt. But as era/tech advances the gold per pop's minimum standard of living increases, simulating rising expectations.

I still take issue with the idea that the treasury is being used to determine standard of living. It makes no sense to me that the government stockpile of gold, which it has collected through taxes/trade, be used to assess the average citizen's living standard. The gold is entirely the government's and has nothing to do with the citizens. Furthermore, the gold in the treasury fluctuates too much to be used as a measure anyway.

Here's a sample situation: A new military technology is discovered, so the government uses its treasury reserves to upgrade old units to new ones. Before the turn, standard of living was fine. During the turn, standard of living plummets. Why do the citizens suddenly live in disease and filth because the government used it's own money to upgrade troops?

As I said before, if anything, standard of living should be Health + Happiness / city size.

Well, my main point of eliminating the tax based revolution penalty was to allow greater divergance of sucesful strategies. Look through the stories and tales thread, half the novel aproaches to varient games would be impossible strictly due to the tax implementation of Revolutions. My point is that it is a defacto way to pigeon whole the meta game into a max science strat, always, no matter what. It wreks havock on Specialist economies, and other novel economic concepts. And for what? I see no gains from the system as currently implemented, and certainly no benifits that outweigh it's gameplay effect.

Your idea of basing everything off the treasury would also force off novel economic strategies. So from a gameplay perspective I don't see what the benifit is.

For an idea related to what you are getting at GoodGame, a system that counted the Total Commerce Generated (all types). Then subtract losses from Maintence costs (unit, city, civic), inflation, imports, & foreign payments (buying a resource). Take the result and devide it by the total commerce and this will give you Economic spending ratio. The higher the number, the healthier your economy, the lower the number, the more waste that is experience, either in higher taxes or wealth being funneled away due to overseas trade.


Hmmm, now that I think about it, that seems like a really good system. I'll have to see about how to implement it.

Drunk nao

So, I think, mostly commented, in fact, it's all commented, there are just some calls for traits, that probably don't fit

Also I should seperate out city distance, and the tax stuff, but the tax stuff is good. City distance is good, but the code I uploaded before was better, tweaked this out of range for this build on city distance. That's included and all, and better then default, but my last city distance was better, still commented, but just commented under phungus.

Now this tax build upload, it ain't perfect, but it works, and it works better then the old, gold rate hook, that made sure you produce gold. Now to me, if the gov takes my money, if they produce gold/Research/ or use to to snipe my enemies it's all good, so this just goes:

iGDP: All earned science, culture, esionage, whatever, you earn it you get it
iGovernment waste: Inlations, maintance, cost on troops
and it takes iGov / iGDP and says that's the money you all pay on taxes
Don't matter if its spying points, gold or whatever, just if it's wasted, it's a burden the gov takes.

Then it builds off of that.

So here is that code:

Now I commented all this, just comment out everything with TRAIT_ and it'll work as a good testing build. I just gave bonuses to weak traits in this, but just comment out them TRAIT lines, and it'll work fine (also added a trait, so Enlightened is a string that just will exist in this code, and better to comment it out), anyway, try this, I think you'll like it.

Though use my old city communication function. This one works, but I nerfed it in this build, and that din't work right. The old formula for city distance was better, though that's just all miner tweaks to number anyway.

This new taxes build completely definens the function.,,
and it really is better then the old system....

What the hell?