Stability driving me nuts

P

Pilotis

Prince
Joined
Jan 18, 2005
Messages
500
Sorry All.

I love the way this mod is set up. Fantastic.
But unless there's some way to better understand how to manage stability I'm gonna have to give up.
There are some useful threads that give some clue, but overall I have really no idea what's going on. Importantly I have no idea whether I'm improving or worsening 'stability'. Then BANG ! my empire breaks up. I've been able to figure most things in Civ/ Warlords and I LOVE the idea of having to worry about overall stability but it's just a blackbox.........
 
I kinda sorta seriously agree with you. There really needs to be some in game documentation of that system, because I've no idea about many of the important specific elements myself.

However, I do know that checking inside the budget menu, the one with the button that looks like this ($), shows you a rough breakdown of stability and the current level of your civ's stability.

The arcana of the system entirely elude me. I know that there is some sort of penalty for having a certain civic or set of civics after attaining a certain tech. I'm not sure which ones, but I know it is the case. And there are probably tons of special rules (like no white after Labor Day or whatever) that I've never learned. It'd help if there were an abridged version of the ruleset available somewhere so that neophytes would have a shot at it, as the manual and pedia are both frustratingly vague.
 
Strange.
I don't know the details of stability calculation either (except for what has been said in that one thread), but I have never ever had problems with stability to the degree that my empire broke up. I actually haven't had a "shaky" rating except for when I had anarchy the turn before.
 
The most common problem is running a deficit. If you run your science slider in the red for more than 100 turns, you're going to have stability issues. These negatives most commonly start piling up in the beginning of the game, where you're running at -1 or -2 gpt. This is a huge difference from regular civ, where you "spend" extra cash on research.
 
Memdee. AMAZING !!! How on EARTH do you do that ???? How do you play ?

I'm pretty aggressive and tend to end up with 10 - 12 cities. I try to take the advice of the stability thread re the Civics but usually end up (even when I win) with an unstable or even collapsing empire.

Whitefire. I don't quite know what you mean re a 'deficit'. I don't think I'm ever in the red.... Maybe I'm missing a biggie here.... Help appreciated.

But utlimately Aeon221 says it for me.
 
Whitefire said:
The most common problem is running a deficit. If you run your science slider in the red for more than 100 turns, you're going to have stability issues. These negatives most commonly start piling up in the beginning of the game, where you're running at -1 or -2 gpt. This is a huge difference from regular civ, where you "spend" extra cash on research.
Click to expand...
woah thats some great info... im ALWAYS having a deficit and pillage or trade for some gold to keep my science slider up
 
fishhead said:
woah thats some great info... im ALWAYS having a deficit and pillage or trade for some gold to keep my science slider up
Click to expand...

Yeah, me too. It bugs me that I can have the largest economy in the world (playing as Japan) with a GDP about double my nearest competitor, and be dealing with shaky or worse stability because I prefer to run in the red and sell techs for cash.

Does having a massive cash pool do anything?
 
changing to commonwealth should eliminate the bad economy problem - that's my understanding. however, even when my economy is very good, such as when setting science to 0% after finishing the tech tree, and getting 600-1000 gold per turn, the economy rating stays at 1 star. the F9 graph always shows my GDP at negative levels in the modern era even with massive income. i really can't figure THAT out.
 
romelus said:
changing to commonwealth should eliminate the bad economy problem - that's my understanding.
Click to expand...

It prevents the negative modifiers from accumulating. It doesn't clear out the pre-existing ones.

romelus said:
however, even when my economy is very good, such as when setting science to 0% after finishing the tech tree, and getting 600-1000 gold per turn, the economy rating stays at 1 star. the F9 graph always shows my GDP at negative levels in the modern era even with massive income. i really can't figure THAT out.
Click to expand...

Are you running a Specialist Economy? That's usually the reason for such a low Economy score. Unfortunately, stability is biased towards large populations and cottages.
 
I love stability, but I also have a question... Is there a way to maybe cut down on instability in an area when other civs nearby collapse? For instance, in all my games lately, Carthage, Rome, Greece, Babylon, and Egypt have all collapsed, leaving a giant hole of civs. And while I don't mind seeing my enemies collapse, I don't really like having only three civs to interact with for centuries instead of the normal 12+. Just a thought.
 
Whitefire said:
It prevents the negative modifiers from accumulating. It doesn't clear out the pre-existing ones.
Click to expand...

oh crap... :sad:

Are you running a Specialist Economy? That's usually the reason for such a low Economy score. Unfortunately, stability is biased towards large populations and cottages.
Click to expand...

no, i was using a normal cottage economy. i've played three games to the modern era, and inevitably see negative F9 GDP graphs even when making several hundred gold per turn. in two of the games i was russia and china, with huge population and 1000+ gold per turn and i still got a crappy economy according to the game :confused:
 
Memdee. AMAZING !!! How on EARTH do you do that ???? How do you play ?

I'm pretty aggressive and tend to end up with 10 - 12 cities. I try to take the advice of the stability thread re the Civics but usually end up (even when I win) with an unstable or even collapsing empire.

Whitefire. I don't quite know what you mean re a 'deficit'. I don't think I'm ever in the red.... Maybe I'm missing a biggie here.... Help appreciated.

But utlimately Aeon221 says it for me.
Click to expand...

I've just finished german UHV. With a HUGE empire I've been less than stable only two times. Once in 1800 and france declared independence. Another one switching to communism, but nothing happened. Specialist econonmy. Civics: representation, nationalism, slavery, mercantilism, free religion, conquest first. Later, representation (I wanted police state for stability but the research was more important), nationalism, emancipation, mercantilism and commonwealth.

I never collapsed in the privious games, since the first inclusion of stability to the mod. But still, the calculations beyond it are a mistery...
 
In my Germany game I conquered all of Europe, including Spain, Turkey, Egypt, and Carthage. As far as I can figure it, it was impossible to stay stable. Even adjusting my civics to promote the maximum benefit (I think). I just couldn't keep it together. What do you do when you're massive in size and can do whatever you want with your civics? What's the best strategy to keep an empire together if you don't care about anything else?
 
I have to agree with the original poster. I love the mod, don't feel like playing the plain game ever again, but the way stability is implemented right now is killing it. It just seems too arbitrary to keep the game fun, although the idea of stability, in general, I think is good.

Maybe it would help to have (much) more in-game detail about what is affecting stability, just like we have details on food, production, happiness, health etc.

A simplification of the stability factors sounds like a good thing to me. It's just too much stuff to keep in mind all the time.

Thanks,

Rodrigo
 
Whitefire. Thanks for this:

"Are you running a Specialist Economy? That's usually the reason for such a low Economy score. Unfortunately, stability is biased towards large populations and cottages".

But 'WAAAH'. Another nugget of information.

I feel as though there's a secret club of those who know, and a bunch of nerds like me who just take what they can from 'Stability and Civics' thread, snippets here and there, and just plug away with best guesses.

Where (PLEASE!!!) can I (and all of us) find some kind of commentary by the designers, or at least the main design principles, behind stability.

And as Rodrigo suggests some kind of feedback about the stability trend of my Empire and, if possible, which are the main factors pushing stability one way or the other.

All that said -once again. Thanks to the team for a really imaginative and thoroughly engaging mod. It's brilliant.
 
Hum. Okay. Reading between your quoted lines......

I guess I'll just shut up and be grateful huh.....
 
Pilotis said:
Hum. Okay. Reading between your quoted lines......

I guess I'll just shut up and be grateful huh.....
Click to expand...

There was nothing between the lines. RFC is the only major mod on these forums completely coded by one person. Rhye is the RFC development team.

Pilotis said:
Where (PLEASE!!!) can I (and all of us) find some kind of commentary by the designers, or at least the main design principles, behind stability.
Click to expand...

The mod is called Rhye's and Fall of Civilization. Without Stability, where is the fall? That is the primary purpose behind Stability. Besides that, Stability also allows for Civs to rise from the ashes. With Stability, there is a dynamic feel to the game that allows for more realism. Besides that, no one game will ever be the same. Anyway, here are the chances of a civ being reborn.

Code: 
#RiseAndFall
tResurrectionProb = (
80, #Egypt
100, #India
100, #China
30, #Babylonia
60, #Greece
60, #Persia
40, #Carthage
65, #Rome
100, #Japan
60, #Viking
100, #Arabia
100, #Spain
100, #France
100, #England
100, #Germany
100, #Russia
50, #Mali
75, #Inca
80, #Mongolia
75, #Aztec
100, #Turkey
100, #America

As you can see, some civs are more likely to Rhyes and split from your empire than others.

Any other questions? It's good that you're asking, since it helps me pull out all the information in my head that I've memorized over the past months ^_^.
 
Y'see.....

There I am slowly conquering the North American continent, managing Stable-Shaky-Stable-Shaky. Then Bang! Unstable and 3 of my cities are suddenly Mongolian. Sorry 'Designer' but there just isn't the right feedback loop in this stability thing.

I NEED - and if I'm all alone then I'll shut up, go and leave peacably......

1. Some kind of INDICATOR. A graph would be perfect but something other than the major boxes we have right now. Or at least an arrow that points level/ up/ down to indicate stability trend.

2. Design principles. Some kind of clue set that explains what you INTENDED with stability

Civics and Civic combos - we have some clues already from the exisiting thread. Anarchy is very bad but effects don't last forever.......

Economy. Cottage-based is good; specialist-based not so good. How much and why do I have to find out from snippits in the thread ???? Medium to long-term deficit bad. How bad ? And again - I find out 'cos someone who knows tells us....!!

Combat and At War. Again. Some clues re Nationhood and at war, winning combat is good. But there must be something else here 'cos I was 'Nationhood' and at war with 7 empires, knockin' cities over rapido, but I was still 'unstable'.

What about 'happiness/ unhappiness' balance ? Anything there ? If not tell us, if so .... what ?

Wonders ? Any effect on stability ?

Tech lead.....?

And the Expansion Civics. there isn't enough detail for me to really understand the different cost/ benefits......

I still have no real idea what's going on and how I'm doing.....

Am I really the only one with these questions ?????
 
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