Everything about Corruption: C3C edition

[superslug]

What does Nopt stand for? Its not in the glossary. Number of potential towns? I don't understand why you don't just use the more familar OCN abb. You use a number of other abbreviations that you never tell us what they stand for. Your article on corruption would be easier to read if you hadn't done this.

You may want to tone down the criticism a little. First, there's no way to make a corruption article an "easy" read, considering that it's easily the most frustrating and complex mechanic in the game. Second, it's clearly stated in the article what Nopt stands for:

The rank corruption component depends on the rank (R) and optimal city number (Nopt) of each city.

 

[Grille]

What does Nopt stand for? Its not in the glossary. Number of potential towns? I don't understand why you don't just use the more familar OCN abb. You use a number of other abbreviations that you never tell us what they stand for. Your article on corruption would be easier to read if you hadn't done this.

OCN is just a constant. Very basically (but not *really*!!), you could regard it as the maximum rank a city could have before rank corruption gets more severe (for a city exceeding that rank/assuming non-communal corruption). Sort of a rank barrier, so to speak.

However, depending on difficulty etc, an individual city has an own "optimal city number". It's sort of a virtual rank barrier for a specific city alone. Call it what you want, here it's called Nopt.
Nopt figures the constant OCN (etc) in and *really* defines the rank barrier whether that single specific city in question gets "good" or "bad" rank corruption. That city's rank barrier gets compared to that city's rank. If that city's rank is greater than that city's Nopt (=rank barrier), "bad" rank corruption calculation applies.

 

[TruePurple]

You may want to tone down the criticism a little.

I made a suggestion not a criticism, please don't read into things or try to find stuff to be offended over.

it's clearly stated in the article what Nopt stands for

It certainly doesn't tell you what it stands for. As far as what it means, I read it as saying nopt= OCN, which appears to not be the case (please read next response)

However, depending on difficulty etc, an individual city has an own "optimal city number". It's sort of a virtual rank barrier for a specific city alone. Call it what you want, here it's called Nopt.

Nopt figures the constant OCN (etc) in and *really* defines the rank barrier whether that single specific city in question gets "good" or "bad" rank corruption. That city's rank barrier gets compared to that city's rank. If that city's rank is greater than that city's Nopt (=rank barrier), "bad" rank corruption calculation applies.

Sorry, I don't understand that. Especially the part about "rank barrior". Are you saying "nopt" does not equal OCN? Presumably nopt stands for something, or did someone join a bunch of random letters together? It might help me to understand what nopt is if I knew what it stood for acronym wise.

 

[Grille]

Sorry, I don't understand that. Especially the part about "rank barrior". Are you saying "nopt" does not equal OCN?

Yes, that's what I'm saying.
"OCN" is just that constant out of the editor.

Maybe just imagine an example. Let's assume you have two games which exactly look the same. Map, city layout, civ, city improvements etc are exactly the same in both games. Only that both games differ in difficulty, say warlord in one game and deity in the other.
Now pick the city called 'so-and-so' from both games (assume a specific rank etc) and crunch the numbers for Nopt...
See?
You use the same OCN for both calculations since the map size is the same for both games.
But. Nopt *is* different. It's lower in the deity city. The Nopt tells you the rank barrier (or "boundary" or whatever) for that single specific city you picked before bad rank corruption calculation applies. If the real rank of that city is higher than its Nopt, then it has the worse type of rank corruption.

Now while you're at it, you could of course imagine that both games also have the same difficulty. Then vary the other variables (one at a time) in Alex's formula and observe the different results for Nopt. OCN is still always constant here, though.

Of course, the interesting numbers for Nopt are those that are close to the rank.

Presumably nopt stands for something, or did someone join a bunch of random letters together? It might help me to understand what nopt is if I knew what it stood for acronym wise.

Well, take it easy. You could call it what you want as long as you define it. And it is very well defined in the first post.
I can't tell you why it's called "Nopt", nope. The name is (TM) by PhD corr Alexman I think. It's just a kind of "modified OCN" for a specific city. It used to be called like that in the vanilla/PTW thread IIRC.

 

[TruePurple]

You use the same OCN for both calculations since the map size is the same for both games.

I thought the OCN was map size * difficulty effect. Are you saying its not?

As far as the formula goes, simply trying to follow the formula is hard,

Lets take the first segment.

L is the percentage of optimal cities for the current
difficulty level, as given in the editor

Lets say emperor which has 80% as a value
80%/100 How do you divide a percentage by a number? .8 / 100? Then it would be .008?

 

[Grille]

Well, according to formula and definition in this very thread, the OCN is just that constant number (constant at a certain map size). E.g. OCN=36 for huge maps.

I thought the OCN was map size * difficulty effect.

Now you already started modifying the OCN. But it's indeed the first step to get a city's Nopt. In the formula, just use OCN=36 for a huge map.
Note: if someone mentions something like "I have already twice the OCN" or "I'm still well under the OCN", it is not necessarily that (OCN-) number out of the editor which you use here for the naked quantity analysis, but possibly already figuring modifications in (such as difficulty).
"I'm still well under the OCN" could just mean "None of my cities gets bad rank-based corruption yet"; i.e. every city's rank is lower than these cities' Nopts. (edited due to confusing nopt and rank myself lol)



L is just the number out of the editor. Ignore the percentage bit, Alex formula asks just for the value stated in the editor and that 1/100 factor in the formula scales that value correctly after all.
So for emperor, L=80. Simply put in formula, L/100=80/100=0.8
There you go.

 

[Lord Parkin]

0.008... wow, that'd be a 2500% bonus!!! The UN would cost 8 shields...

 

[TruePurple]

L is just the number out of the editor. Ignore the percentage bit, Alex formula asks just for the value stated in the editor and that 1/100 factor in the formula scales that value correctly after all.
So for emperor, L=80. Simply put in formula, L/100=80/100=0.8
There you go.

In other words 80%! Man, what a long and confusing way to go around it. If someone isn't smart enough to understand the concept of percentages, I can't imagine them to be able to figure out your confusing long way around expressing a percentage.

So is or is not the OCN- map size * difficulty plus modifications of government etc?

If OCN is your optimal city number considering all game factors, what is nopt, in english please?

Or are you calling the map factor of OCN, OCN? Thats a bit of a misnomer, since the map factor is just a factor, not your optimal number of cities you can get in a game before corruption becames a real factor.

Does Nopt=actual OCN? If so, why don't you just say OCN?

 

[Grille]

Or are you calling the map factor of OCN, OCN? Thats a bit of a misnomer, since the map factor is just a factor, not your optimal number of cities you can get in a game before corruption becames a real factor.

Sigh. I'm calling that map constant OCN because it is defined like that in the first post. If you want to use the formula and slot in values for the different variables, you must stick to the respective definitons of each variable or you don't make sense.
At home, if you wish, call OCN as it is given in the formula maybe [cute_little_number_I_stumbled_across_that_editor_thingie_which_cannot_be possibly_called_OCN_because_that'll_be_a_misnomer_in_my_book] instead - as long as you refer to it as that editor constant. It's just a naming convention.

Does Nopt=actual OCN?

Bingo!

If so, why don't you just say OCN?

No prob, I'll give it a try: ONC.
OCN, OCN, OCN.
Ok?

And in civ-reality, the optimum is in fact 512.

 

[TruePurple]

I was explaining the source of my confusion. Not trying to get you to repeat OCN over and over.

You could call it what you want as long as you define it. And it is very well defined in the first post.

I wouldn't go as far as to say very well defined. First OCN is used instead "nopt" everywhere else, using it as the map variable (as it varies according to map size, not a constant) of OCN (or nopt if you like) calculations is bound to cause some confusion.

Saying OCN was the map variable portion of "nopt" equations. And nopt was the equation to figure out your actual OCN. Would have cleared any confusion about that right up.

OCN is the optimal number of cities for the map size, as found in the editor

Ok that might sound loud clear and simply to some of you but for me, map size variable as found in the editor would have been much clearer. Because your optimal numbers of city in game play application is after all variables have been taken into account via the nopt formula.

there's no way to make a corruption article an "easy" read, considering that it's easily the most frustrating and complex mechanic in the game

Maybe not "easy", but it could have been a hell of a allot easier to understand then alexman made it, PHd not withstanding. T-man helped alot. But still certain pieces of confusion left over.

The point of saying all this? I hope by you guys understanding the source of my confusion a simpler, easier to understand way of explaining things might be devised. Plus I wanted to justify my confusion, I know I'm not the smartest person but the initial explanation is actually confusing IMHO, and not just a matter of my stupidity.

 

[TruePurple]

depending on difficulty etc, an individual city has an own "optimal city number". It's sort of a virtual rank barrier for a specific city alone.

So the "nopt" formula/OCN of one city might be 20 and another city it might be 23?

 

[superslug]

Plus I wanted to justify my confusion, I know I'm not the smartest person but the initial explanation is actually confusing IMHO, and not just a matter of my stupidity.

No one's questioning your intelligence.
As a matter of fact, I think your adamant curiousity regarding comprehension of the formula is highly commendable!

I do have one question though. Even if you exactly calculate your optimal number of cities, are you going to keep calculating the number if your OCN goes up? There are powerful ways to fight corruption, and/or use highly corrupt cities, techniques that have nothing to do with understanding the formula.

 

[TruePurple]

Curiosity is the right word, I like to understand things. I probably won't be using the forumula much in game, especially without a calc. But if I can understand it better I hope to be able to use that general understanding to plan and play my games better. And understanding how things are working in the background will help me to enjoy the game more as well.

 

[kamfer]

Hey guys, first post on these forums here (avid reader of the site though).
I was way too lazy to read all six pages of this stuff but I was just wondering if any of you guys had noticed that Civil Engineers in C3C COMPLETELY bypass corruption? I'm playing this game as Persia and I've got a bunch of conquered size 12 cities far away (full RR/Irrigation/mines by the CPU, all that good stuff) and where the corruption far excedes the 90% limit. But with Civil Engineers I can just go for food production with half of the city's inhabitants, completely skip the growth/shield production/commerce deal and just maintain size 12 with half of the city set to CivEngineers. This way I ALWAYS get at LEAST 13 production (unless the city can't maintain 6 CivEngineers or I need entertainers, it's a little bit less).

I think this is looking a lot like a sort of backdoor to corruption. Cheat maybe? Give me your input.

 

[HellboundHeathcliff]

It's long been known that specialists are not subject to corruption. It's not a cheat. It just requires extra micromanagement.

Edit: Welcome to CFC

 

[kamfer]

Ah, yes, the micromanagement thing is very true... I hate how the gov'nor always sets extra citizens to either tax or entertainment. Useless.

And thank you!

 

[AutomatedTeller]

Taxmen are hardly useless. Entertainers are often less than useful, that is true, since usually what happens is that they get put there when there is one more unhappy citizen than happy citizen - which has the effect of

A) removing the imbalance and
B) making another citizen content/happy. Which is good for score, but doesn't really help your civ.

 

[gmaharriet]

I think this is looking a lot like a sort of backdoor to corruption. Cheat maybe? Give me your input.

The problem is that, although CE's will help you build a barracks faster in a distant and corrupt city, they will not help you produce a tank or modern armor from that barracks faster. Once your barracks is up, it may still take you 200 or 300 turns to produce a vet unit, and you're paying 1gpt to maintain the barracks.

CE's may (or may not) be useful in growing your population to use as specialists for tax/science farms by building aquas or harbors.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

I didn't realize that civil engineer didn't give shields to units. Learn something new every day.

 

[Veronus]

Perhaps i've missed something here but where can you edit the corruption so the off button in the conquests editor will work?