Corruption & Waste

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Nov 14, 2012
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I have some remote cities that have corruption & waste of all but 1 gold and 1 shield, even with a courthouse. Is there anything else I can use to combat this problem? According to the site, a police station will also help, but according to the Civilopedia, it only combats war weariness. I'm operating in a Democracy and building as many courthouses as I can, except for cities close to the capital where they'd be superfluous (I'm tracking corruption/waste in all cities on a spreadsheet).
 
I have some remote cities that have corruption & waste of all but 1 gold and 1 shield, even with a courthouse. Is there anything else I can use to combat this problem? According to the site, a police station will also help, but according to the Civilopedia, it only combats war weariness. I'm operating in a Democracy and building as many courthouses as I can, except for cities close to the capital where they'd be superfluous (I'm tracking corruption/waste in all cities on a spreadsheet).

There is an "optimal city number" based on the size of the map (10 for a standard map) where corruption quickly increases beyond that limit. Building a FP doubles that number in addition to helping distance corruption in some cases. Cities past 2xOCN (20 cities on a standard map) is hard to make them traditionally productive. Here are some ways to work with that:
- Go Communism (or there may be another non-centralized government in C3C...Feudalism?) and then corruption is at a moderate level in all cities and not centered around the palace
- Make specialist farms. Just irrigate the heck out of the distant cities, grow them and make citizens into scientists, engineers or taxmen and you can make them work for you
- If you have enough happiness and can get them into WLTK Day you can make them lower-waste (more shields) but not lower-corruption (commerce)

But unless you want to go Communist just generally don't plan on getting much out of remote cities except specialists, workers or settlers.
 
There is an "optimal city number" based on the size of the map (10 for a standard map) where corruption quickly increases beyond that limit. Building a FP doubles that number in addition to helping distance corruption in some cases. Cities past 2xOCN (20 cities on a standard map) is hard to make them traditionally productive.
That would explain a lot. I'm on a small world with a single continent, and presently have something like 68 cities. Part of the reason is that population would grow so fast, and production (e.g., of an aqueduct) was so slow the only way to grow was to create more settlers, so now I've got a map littered with my cities.

- Make specialist farms. Just irrigate the heck out of the distant cities, grow them and make citizens into scientists, engineers or taxmen and you can make them work for you
This has been a slight problem. This particular game has been a learning experience in city management, and I've got zero growth in some places because there isn't enough food. What happens if I literally just abandon a city? Does the population go elsewhere?
 
That would explain a lot. I'm on a small world with a single continent, and presently have something like 68 cities. Part of the reason is that population would grow so fast, and production (e.g., of an aqueduct) was so slow the only way to grow was to create more settlers, so now I've got a map littered with my cities.
Without seeing a screenshot it's hard to say, but if growth is seriously outstripping production in all your 'core' cities, then mine more and irrigate less.

One tactic that was pointed out to me recently (SG linked below) was to place your core cities in such a way that they all have exactly 12 tiles to work -- i.e. can fully employ 12 citizens (the max.Pop per city before building Hospitals -- which you can't do until relatively late in the game, using Sanitation, an optional Industrial-Era tech). This tactic means that at 'full' size, those cities don't need to harvest more than 24 food per turn (FPT), i.e. 22 FPT from the 12 worked tiles, 2 FPT (NB 3 FPT for Agri-Civs) from the city -- so even if you've irrigated most/ all that city's Grass/Plains for fast growth, you'd then convert at least half (more if you have food bonuses, less if e.g. you are already working lots of Hills/Mountains) of that irrigation to mines instead, lowering FPT in exchange for more shields per turn (SPT).

And if you have been automating your Workers, stop doing that! They will 'improve' tiles the same way the AI does -- about 50-50 irrigation/ mines on flatland, with no regard to what you actually need from that terrain, or in what order. e.g. A city surrounded by Grassland, with all tiles mined, will give 2 FPT and an average 1-2 SPT per tile worked (before Steam/rails) and still grow using the 2-3FPT from the city -- but if 50-50 mined/ irrigated, will only give 0-1 SPT (1-2 SPT with rails) per tile, with a large food excess. At Pop12, that represents 6-12 SPT difference per city, i.e. if you have 20 non-corrupt cities, you could be 'losing' up to 120-240 SPT across your entire empire (it will actually be less than this, because of SPT lost to waste, but you get the idea). Imagine how much more/ faster you could build with that!

In the 'OCN-plus' cities, growth will always outstrip production/ commerce, because FPT is the only form of 'income' not subject to corruption/ waste, under all govs except Commie (the only gov-form available in non-modded C3C with 'communal' corruption/ waste -- which means that the production/ commerce from your core will be dragged down compared to other govs, BTW). As Puppeter says, there's not much you can do to change that (apart from going Commie), so you might as well just farm those towns/cities

EDIT, just to be clear:
'Farming' means irrigating (and later railing) every flatland tile in the farm-zone, and using the massive food excess to support as many Specialists as possible per town/city (Scientists or Taxmen are the most useful once the city hits max.Pop, but you might also want to use CivEngs in the late-game -- after RepParts -- to build any needed improvements).


It's usually not worth building (m)any city-improvements in any farms, unless they will contribute directly to your intended VC, because otherwise they will cost you gold (maintenance) without providing any return -- e.g. Temples and Libs are really only useful if going for a Culture-vic (a Courthouse would be better for lowering flip-risk). A Harbour near a fish would allow a tundra-farm to grow to Pop3 and support 2 Specialists using the FPT harvested by 1 'fisherman' (i.e. the citizen works the fish for 6FPT total, and eats 2FPT, the Specialists eat the other 4 FPT for net 0FPT in that city), instead of a Pop1 town with 1 Specialist eating the 2FPT from the city-tile, and no growth. A 'Duct might let a food-bonus farm reach Pop12 for more Specialists (Taxmen or Scientists) -- but for non-Agri-civs, two Pop6 farms can generally support more Specialists per capita than one Pop12-er.
This has been a slight problem. This particular game has been a learning experience in city management, and I've got zero growth in some places because there isn't enough food. What happens if I literally just abandon a city? Does the population go elsewhere?
No, the city just disappears, leaving ruins, and all the citizens vanish. If you want to rehome them, you'll need to build Workers (i.e. takes 10 turns per Worker in a '1-shield' town, or 1 turn + 36 gold to cash-rush), move them to another city, and join them to that city. (You could build Settlers too, but that takes a lot longer/ costs a lot more.)
 
I have some remote cities that have corruption & waste of all but 1 gold and 1 shield, even with a courthouse. Is there anything else I can use to combat this problem?
Not really. You might as well sell those Courthouses, because they're costing you maintenance without improving the city's shield/ gold output
According to the site, a police station will also help, but according to the Civilopedia, it only combats war weariness.
The 'Pedia is not 100% accurate -- if you open up the 'standard game' ruleset in the Editor, you can see exactly what all the buildings do in your version.
(I'm tracking corruption/waste in all cities on a spreadsheet).
I've started using CivAssist recently -- it's a lot easier than using a spreadsheet. One of the reasons for that, is that it has a map function that will calculate distance-corruption for all potential city sites (based on current Palace location, without regard to city-rank); and show actual corruption values for already-placed cities, based on what corruption-reducing improvements they currently have. FTR, it's usually not worth building a Courthouse (or anything else) in any far-flung cities with a base-corruption of 90%, but may be worth doing in the larger cities bordering your 'core' (that is, the first 20 cities around your capital, on a Standard-size Regent-level* Map, the cities where building a Courthouse and/or Police Station will have a noticeable effect).

*
Spoiler :
Difficulty-level also affects OCN -- for any given map-size, the OCN is also multiplied by the 'AI production bonus', so e.g. at Emperor-level (where I'm playing right now), the AI needs 80% fewer food to grow a new citizen, 80% fewer shields to build a unit/ improvement/ Wonder, and 80% fewer beakers to research any given tech -- and the human player only gets 80% of the (2*)OCN, so only 8 non-corrupt cities (before building the FP, 16 after), instead of 10-20 on a Standard+Regent map.
 
A communist government will equalize the corruption% in all cities. Making far away cities more productive, but even the capital will experience some corruption.

The next trick is to use specialists. Just irrigate everything, have close size-6 cities. The trick is to only work some citizens on food-rich tiles to get to 12 FPT and make the rest of the citizens into taxmen/scientists. This output is not corrupted.

Other than that, I only build a marketplace (if I have Smith's Trade) to keep the people happy. No other buildings are necessary.
 
Without seeing a screenshot it's hard to say, but if growth is seriously outstripping production in all your 'core' cities, then mine more and irrigate less.
Fortunately, my core cities are doing fine. It's the remote ones causing me problems.

One tactic that was pointed out to me recently (SG linked below) was to place your core cities in such a way that they all have exactly 12 tiles to work -- i.e. can fully employ 12 citizens (the max.Pop per city before building Hospitals -- which you can't do until relatively late in the game, using Sanitation, an optional Industrial-Era tech). This tactic means that at 'full' size, those cities don't need to harvest more than 24 food per turn (FPT), i.e. 22 FPT from the 12 worked tiles, 2 FPT (NB 3 FPT for Agri-Civs) from the city -- so even if you've irrigated most/ all that city's Grass/Plains for fast growth, you'd then convert at least half (more if you have food bonuses, less if e.g. you are already working lots of Hills/Mountains) of that irrigation to mines instead, lowering FPT in exchange for more shields per turn (SPT).

And if you have been automating your Workers, stop doing that! They will 'improve' tiles the same way the AI does -- about 50-50 irrigation/ mines on flatland, with no regard to what you actually need from that terrain, or in what order. e.g. A city surrounded by Grassland, with all tiles mined, will give 2 FPT and an average 1-2 SPT per tile worked (before Steam/rails) and still grow using the 2-3FPT from the city -- but if 50-50 mined/ irrigated, will only give 0-1 SPT (1-2 SPT with rails) per tile, with a large food excess. At Pop12, that represents 6-12 SPT difference per city, i.e. if you have 20 non-corrupt cities, you could be 'losing' up to 120-240 SPT across your entire empire (it will actually be less than this, because of SPT lost to waste, but you get the idea). Imagine how much more/ faster you could build with that!
At this point, some of the core cities are building very quickly (only a few short turns for most things, now), and still growing, with very high food and shield production. (Having hospitals helps.) But are you recommending for the remote cities, I switch to mines from irrigation (apart from the based FPT needed) so as to boost production there, and not worry about growing beyond, say, 6?

In the 'OCN-plus' cities, growth will always outstrip production/ commerce, because FPT is the only form of 'income' not subject to corruption/ waste, under all govs except Commie (the only gov-form available in non-modded C3C with 'communal' corruption/ waste -- which means that the production/ commerce from your core will be dragged down compared to other govs, BTW).
That's why I don't want to "go commie" ... I don't want to lose the advantages of my larger, core cities (even a couple more remote ones are doing quite well) just because I'm losing, say, seven gold-per-turn to corruption in some small town.

It's usually not worth building huge numbers of city-improvements in any farms either, unless they will contribute directly to your intended VC, because otherwise they will cost you gold (maintenance) without providing any return -- e.g. Temples and Libs are really only useful if going for a Culture-vic (a Courthouse would be better for lowering flip-risk).
What kind of production would those farm-villages have? Just produce, say, military units rather than city improvements?
 
Not really. You might as well sell those Courthouses, because they're costing you maintenance without improving the city's shield/ gold output.
Hm ... perhaps I should stop building those that are in progress, then, and switch to something else ... ? (Some I know I can sell, as they clearly aren't helping. I only recently discovered this ability.)

The 'Pedia is not 100% accurate -- if you open up the 'standard game' ruleset in the Editor, you can see exactly what all the buildings do in your version.
I've never used the editor much, but I found what you're referring to. Neat tool! Unfortunately, the standard ruleset does have the police station not reducing corruption, though I could of course create a scenario in which it did, with non-standard rules.

I've started using CivAssist recently -- it's a lot easier than using a spreadsheet.
Is that the CivAssistII that's available here on the site?
 
Well, what I always do is... just as you did really, combined with what some fellas told you...

Courthouses + Police Station (They do work, and superbly I must say) + Specialists (Police Officers + Civil Engineers) + Widespread Irrigation (To foster population growth to support the Specialists).

If that does not work, it becomes a "What Gov should I use?" question. And that one is not easy to answer, really. Depends on your particular game in question.

I, for one, being one to avoid offensive wars, but support defensive wars/interventionism, stick to Republic. Democracy is just too much of a hassle for me. Sure, it has a lot of extra bonuses and less Corruption/Waste, but the War Weariness and extra expenditure to support the Armed Forces is just.. No...

Best of luck!
 
Yes, in my copy of the standard rule set, the flag "Reduces Corruption" is set for the Police Station. (In fact I have used in in lots and lots of games over the last ten years. If it would not reduce corruption, I definitely would have noticed that by now...

But are you recommending for the remote cities, I switch to mines from irrigation (apart from the based FPT needed) so as to boost production there, and not worry about growing beyond, say, 6?

No, exactly the other way around: switch from mines to irrigation to have as much extra food as possible. Remember: the mines will not boost the production at all - the shields are lost to waste anyway. But the food is not subject to corruption/waste and can be used like this:

Size 6 town: three citizens are working in the fields (lets say a railed and irrigated grassland and two railed and irrigated plains, which give a total of 2 + 4 + 3 + 3 = 12 food, enough to feed 6 citizens) and the other three citizens are working as scientists or taxman, yielding 9 beakers or 6 gold. If the town has a food bonus like, wheat, cattle, deer, you can even have two citizens in the fields supporting 4 scientists/taxmen.

Size 12 city (e.g. on a river, or sometimes a captured city from a different nation already has an aqueduct in it): six citizens in the fields can support 6 scientists/taxmen. (Or with food boni even a 5 to 7 or 4 to 8 ratio.)

That's the only way to get some benefit out of the remote towns. (Unless you are prepared for another anarchy period and go communism. I usually don't do it, because a) the lost time in terms of research can never be caught up, b) I don't bother researching the optional techs as I want to reach a space or diplomatic victory asap, and c) Communism hurts my well developed core cities, while the remote cities still need markets, libs, universities, factories, etc, etc, before they can really benefit from Communism.)
 
A communist government will equalize the corruption% in all cities. Making far away cities more productive, but even the capital will experience some corruption.

In C3C 1.22 the capital of a communist government has no corruption. By properly building forbidden palace, secret police, courthouse and police station up to 3 cities can enjoy zero corruption.

There is an "optimal city number" based on the size of the map (10 for a standard map) where corruption quickly increases beyond that limit. Building a FP doubles that number in addition to helping distance corruption in some cases. Cities past 2xOCN (20 cities on a standard map) is hard to make them traditionally productive.

It is required to differ between what Alexman called OCN, a value depending solely on map size, and Nopt. The later is a sort of an effective OCN and depends on many things, mostly on difficulty settings. A FP does not increase Nopt by 100%, but by a much lower value of 0.3 OCN at emperor level.

Long before C3C 1.22 there was a different corruption system in place where the FP created a true second capital effectively doubling the amount of cities with modest corruption.

I have some remote cities that have corruption & waste of all but 1 gold and 1 shield, even with a courthouse. Is there anything else I can use to combat this problem? According to the site, a police station will also help, but according to the Civilopedia, it only combats war weariness. I'm operating in a Democracy and building as many courthouses as I can, except for cities close to the capital where they'd be superfluous (I'm tracking corruption/waste in all cities on a spreadsheet).

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=76619
http://wiki.civforum.de/wiki/Korruption_(Civ3)

Alexman decribes how corruption works in C3C. In the german translation of that i added some details about how things do precisely work.

Courthouse and police station each half distance corruption, thus they are good at cities far away from a capital. At a sidenote this makes democrazy nearly useless in terms of corruption. The 2 buildings also increase Nopt by 25% of OCN. This is very valuable for cities with medium to high corruption, especially at higher difficulty settings.

Maybe the most import thing about those 2 buildings is their effect on maximum corruption. Without them corruption is no more than 90%, with one of them corruption is no more than 80%, with both of them corruption is no more than 70%. Rounding is important. When i say no more i mean it. 11 shields after 90% maximum corruption are 2, 4 shields after 70% maximum corruption are 2 as well. This is also the reason why policemen experts sometimes have no effect.

Aiming at 70% maximum corruption can be a good strategie in the long run. A city with 16 citizens with 40 commerce before corruption will have 12 commerce after corruption, but this can still give 30 gold per turn if the +50% each from marketplace, bank and stock exchange apply. Usually it is the better strategy to build nearly nothing in every corrupt city and use experts fed by irrigated tiles. But if for some reason you do have the patience you can build up even initially highly currupt cities at great expense to contribute something of worth to your empire. :)
 
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