Better Economy Mod

[Ankorafeonix]

The Economist's Mod

Introduction:
Although this is not the first mod project I've developed, it's the first time I've decided to share my ideas on the forums and start becoming a stronger contributor, and I'd like to see whether this mod is something that others would be interested in. I've long been unsatisfied with the style of economy that Civ currently presents me, and I'm developing this mod to try and counter-act that. So, here is what I'm looking to insert into the mod. Feedback, suggestions, and/or tips all appreciated!

Note: I haven't completed this yet to test it enough, so the exact numbers

The economist is a mod aiming to bring Civilization economy into the realms of the 21st century, with more options for managing the financial aspects of your empire, and more realistic handling of the economy at a national and international level.

Features:

The Economist aims to bring the following features to Civ 5 (Brave New World).

Tax System: This system allows players to construct Tax Collection offices throughout their empire. This tax forms a significant portion of any Empire’s economy. All empires’ palaces feature an inbuilt tax office that creates a revenue of 0.25 per citizen (5% General Tax). Additional Tax offices can be created which raise the taxes, or new taxes can be imposed. Beware that each new tax building will increase the unhappiness of the Empire and reduces its growth, so finding the balance between tax revenue and public opinion will become a core part of managing your Empire!

Monetary Tax Departments: These tax departments provide 0.5 gold per Citizen in your entire empire, but increase Unhappiness by 25% and decrease Growth by 10%. Following is the list of Tech Prerequisites needed to build these departments.

Federal Tax Department: Mathematics (Classical Era)​

Property Tax Department: Civil Service (Medieval Era)​

Goods & Services Tax Department: Banking (Renaissance Era)​

Corporate Tax Department: Railroad (Modern Era)​

Secondary Tax Departments: These buildings increase Faith, Science, or Culture by 25%, while increasing Unhappiness by 15%, and with no effect on growth.

Ministry of Religious Affairs: Theology (Medieval Era)​

Ministry of Scientific Research: Acoustics (Renaissance Era)​

Ministry for Culture and Heritage: Archaeology(Industrial Era)​

Tax Refund Agency (National Wonder): This building, accessible in the Modern Era, returns 0.25 gold per turn to your citizens, but increases Happiness by 15%. Available to all empires after the Computers technology has been researched.​

Social Welfare Agency (National Wonder): This building, accessible in the Modern Era, reduces a city’s gold by 20%, but gives +3 Happiness. Three slots for unemployed citizens to become Citizen Specialists, providing +1 Prod. Only available to Civs who adopt Freedom as an Ideology.​

Trade Routes: The system of using Cargo Ships and Caravans is greatly expanded on. Caravans have been altered to be more competitive with Cargo Ships. Incentives to trade with City-States have been increased, and while the revenue gained from each trade route has been decreased significantly, the possible distance for each route has been increased, and every city can now have one Cargo Ship and one Caravan (allowing the possible number of Trade Routes to increase greatly). The benefit to the receiver of the trade route is also balanced to match that of the sender.
Note: I don't have much experience with modding the trade routes, so this is something I'll work out by trial and error, and some of these ideas may or may not be plausible. Any insights on this super appreciated!

Luxury Markets: These buildings are part of the change to the luxury system (see below), which can only be built in cities which have a luxury resource in range. When built, that luxury resource is available to the global market and will bring you revenue.

Change to current Income Buildings: Markets have been replaced with the Luxury Market buildings, which bring revenue based on proximal luxury resources. Banks and Stock Exchanges are unchanged.

Change to Happiness System: On a technical level, the new Happiness system is founded on the following principle: Each citizen gives 1 Unhappiness, while the Palace has a passive bonus of reducing Unhappiness from population by 100%, thus leading to a net Global Happiness of 0. Each additional city in the Empire adds 2 Unhappiness (which will also be affected by Tax Offices), but the Palace building awards 6 , allowing your first three cities to essentially come free. Luxuries now have a much lessened effect on Happiness levels (somewhat freeing you from the obligation of having to limit your cities only to luxury-rich areas). The Happiness buildings (Coliseum, Zoo, Stadium, and Circus) still exist, however, and will be crucial for combating the Unhappiness brought about by your Tax system. Ideally, the happiness system won’t be any more generous or painful than before, just with a more natural and realistic method of management. To sum up, some sources of Happiness and Unhappiness:

Happiness: Coliseum (+2 ), Circus (+1 ), Zoo (+2 ), Stadium(+2 ), and Stone Works(+1 )​

Happiness: +1 per Luxury Type​

Happiness: All Happiness gained from Policies, Ideologies, Religious Beliefs and Wonders has remained unchanged.​

Unhappiness: Each Tax building constructed increases the amount of unhappiness each citizen generates by a certain percentage.​

Unhappiness: Each city generates +2 , although your Palace’s +6 counteracts that for your first three cities.​

Unhappiness: All other sources of Unhappiness (annexing, razing, and creating puppet cities, and occupied population all contribute their usual levels of Unhappiness).​

Change to Luxury System: In order to reduce the pivotal importance of luxury resources in an Empire’s growth, luxuries only provide +1 per type, down from +4, and Protectionism increases Happiness from luxuries by +1, down from +2. Also, luxuries no longer provide pure gold yields directly, instead providing +1 yield, along with +1 of either , , , or depending on the resource (see below). In order to earn revenue from a Luxury resource, you must construct a Luxury Market in that city, which will make that Luxury Resource available to the global market and create revenue. You will still be able to trade Luxuries with other Civs for gold. Following are a list of Luxury Market types (one market can be built for each type of Luxury proximate to a city):

Cuisine Market: Creates a revenue of +2 yields on each of the following Luxuries:

Citrus (+1Prod, +1Food)
Crab (+1Prod, +1Food)
Salt (+2Prod)
Spices (+1Prod, +1Culture)
Sugar (+1Prod, +1Food)
Truffles (+1Prod, +1Culture)
Whales (+2Prod)
Wine (+1Prod, +1Culture)​

Fashion Market: Creates a revenue of +4 yields on each of the following Luxuries:

Gems (+1Prod, +1Gold)
Pearls (+1Prod, +1Culture)
Ivory (+1Prod, +1Culture)
Gold (+2Prod)
Incense (+1Prod, +1Culture)​

Mining Market: Creates a revenue of +3 yields on each of the following Luxuries:

Copper (+2Prod)
Marble (+1Prod, +1Culture)
Silver (+2Prod)​

Textiles Market: Creates a revenue of +3 yields on each of the following Luxuries:

Cotton (+2Prod)
Dyes (+1Prod, +1Culture)
Furs (+1Prod, +1Culture)
Silk (+1Prod, +1Gold)​

There it is, so far. I've already got the Tax System from an old mod that I made, and it shouldn't take too much longer to whip up the rest and start testing for balance. I may need to create more gold sinks to balance the tax if it all starts getting too beneficial. Again, all suggestions welcome!

Updates:

1. All Tax structures complete with XML coding and Icons
2. Happiness System altered to be based on Tax levels, not complete

 

[Viregel]

Ooh, this sounds interesting. I'm willing to help you make this, though I should probably keep in mind I have several billion other things to do as well. Anyway, I like the ideas here - I'd suggest that you could possibly have nationalised and privatised services, as that could be interesting. Just out of interest, have you managed much of it yet?

 

[Ankorafeonix]

I've made the tax offices before, as part of a Modern World scenario I tried to make a long time ago, but since the thing turned out too bulky and cumbersome for my PC, I never completed it I still have some code for the Tax offices around somewhere, but even if I lost it, it shouldn't take too long to whip up some new ones They're not overly complicated things to make.

I like the idea about nationalised and privatised services though! I only wonder how the two could differ from each other in practical terms - would one give more of something at a cost of something else, and vice versa? It's certainly something we could explore.

As far as what I've described goes, it's all pretty simple XML stuff. If there was enough interest, particularly from some more talented modders, I'd be tempted to even think about working on an Economy UI that would tie together all things financial: you could see details about all your taxes and add/remove the tax offices to raise/lower taxes, monitor all your trade routes, see all sources of income and spending, etc. Creating UI's is a bit beyond my current expertise though.

 

[Ankorafeonix]

So I've finished all the Tax structures now - will spend tomorrow playtesting and tweaking them before moving forward. Some of the mod design is changing as I go. More on this tomorrow!

 

[Krajzen]

Federal Tax Department: Mathematics (Classical Era)
Property Tax Department: Civil Service (Medieval Era)
Goods & Services Tax Department: Banking (Renaissance Era)
Ministry of Religious Affairs: Theology (Medieval Era)
Ministry of Scientific Research: Acoustics (Renaissance Era)

uhm... please just change names of these buildings so they would fit their ages more

 

[Nutty]

Here's some early tax concepts that I can think of that might inspire era-appropriate names:
General taxes: Poll tax
Military taxes: Danegeld, Military geld, Carucage tax, Knight's fief, Scutage levy
Real estate taxes: Land tax, Tallage tax
Personal property taxes: Chattel tax
Financial/transactional taxes: Customs duties, Market fees, Bridge tolls, Guild dues, Moneychanger fees
Religious taxes: Church tithes

While we're at it, I think Tax Refund Agency should be renamed Progressive (or Graduated) Tax System.

 

[JFD]

Social Welfare Agency (National Wonder): This building, accessible in the Modern Era, reduces a city’s gold by 20%, but gives +3 Happiness. Three slots for unemployed citizens to become Citizen Specialists, providing +1 Prod. Only available to Civs who adopt Freedom as an Ideology.​

Don't unemployed citizens provide +1 Production anyway? Also, I don't think restricting the Agency to Freedom is necessary, nor does it make any inherent thematic sense.

 

[Ankorafeonix]

Thanks for the feedback everyone I'll certainly change the names. I mostly only thought about their modern counterparts, but it does make more sense to keep them relative to their era.

Don't unemployed citizens provide +1 Production anyway? Also, I don't think restricting the Agency to Freedom is necessary, nor does it make any inherent thematic sense.

I wanted to change Unemployed citizens to not grant extra production by default, and create Unhappiness instead. I'm not sure if this is possible in XML (or even at all, for that matter), since I haven't looked into it yet, but I feel it would be closer to reality if Unemployment was more detrimental and something that you had to think about. The Social Welfare system was something you could create if you found yourself with too many Unemployed citizens.

About restricting it to Freedom, perhaps not. I just thought a Welfare system was more a signature of democratic and liberal countries. Then again, since both nations following Order and Autocracy would likely find uses for their Unemployed, perhaps it does make sense to keep it open to everyone.

 

[JFD]

I wanted to change Unemployed citizens to not grant extra production by default, and create Unhappiness instead. I'm not sure if this is possible in XML (or even at all, for that matter), since I haven't looked into it yet, but I feel it would be closer to reality if Unemployment was more detrimental and something that you had to think about. The Social Welfare system was something you could create if you found yourself with too many Unemployed citizens.

Oh, okay then. I expect the default yield for unemployed citizens is an XML value, so should be easy to undo.

About restricting it to Freedom, perhaps not. I just thought a Welfare system was more a signature of democratic and liberal countries. Then again, since both nations following Order and Autocracy would likely find uses for their Unemployed, perhaps it does make sense to keep it open to everyone.

Oh certainly not. Social welfare is antithetical to liberal ideals, in the economic sense. If you were to restrict it to one, it would be Order, which is the veiled characterisation of socialism. But as ideology is not so black and white, allowing it to be available to all three works perfectly fine, too.

 

[Nutty]

Oh, okay then. I expect the default yield for unemployed citizens is an XML value, so should be easy to undo.

Oddly, unemployed citizens are considered specialists. See the SpecialistYields table. SPECIALIST_CITIZEN (i.e., an unemployed citizen) is set to YieldType YIELD_PRODUCTION and Yield 1.

EDIT: Note that Happiness isn't a yield, and the game has problems with negative happiness. So you'll need Lua:

City:GetSpecialistCount(GameInfo.Specialists.SPECIALIST_CITIZEN.ID)

...and either a DLL mod, or use a somewhat ugly hack like this one:

Spoiler :

The way I figured out how to do this (non-dll) was to lower HappinessDefault in HandicapInfos for everyone (by up to 9). Then give that happiness back with hidden buildings in the capital. Then you can "add unhappiness" by taking away those buildings.

(But I'm done with this sort of nonsense. Take a few days to learn C++ and modding this sort of thing becomes much easier...)

You're still stuck with a maximum unhappiness your mod can contribute of -9 with this building/handicap method though, so, yeah, it looks like you're going to need to make a DLL mod (or hope they figure this out for the community patch DLL).

EDIT #2: Actually, you could over-inflate your UNHAPPINESS_PER_CITY Define, then spread your hidden buildings around.

 

[whoward69]

Happiness as a yield is a very long way off, but granting -ve happiness via hidden buildings has been fixed in my DLL for a long time

 

[LastSword]

ChangeUnhappinessFromUnits()

 

[Nutty]

ChangeUnhappinessFromUnits()

Still ugly, but also a possibility.

[...or just depend on whoward69's DLL].

 

[Ankorafeonix]

Wow thanks everyone! Will look into some of these options tonight. Play-testing the tax buildings so far has been productive and I think it will work out really well