Community Feature: Gold!

[12agnar0k]

Thankfully however Frixasis is full of logical thinking men and women so they will agree with me and not the few of you not able to grasp simple concepts. Which is all that really matters.

"Go" I think is a simple Chinese game comparable to the simplicity of say noughts & crosses. Correct me if I'm wrong.

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[stealth_nsk]

Thankfully however Frixasis is full of logical thinking men and women so they will agree with me and not the few of you not able to grasp simple concepts. Which is all that really matters.

Universal reply, could be used by anyone in any thread
Not meaning I disagree with you - I think both variants have some logic behind.

 

[PinkHammurabi]

Thankfully however Frixasis is full of logical thinking men and women so they will agree with me and not the few of you not able to grasp simple concepts. Which is all that really matters.

Really? That's your fallback? "They're doing this so I'm right you're wrong and your tiny brains clearly don't work?" Such a child.

Gee, how many times have we noticed gameplay "mistakes" in any game, Civ or otherwise? And I'm not even saying having gold-producing buildings cost no maintenance is a mistake. I'm saying I think there's more to gain by having a consistent mechanic which yields its own rewards.

Moderator Action: Flaming - warned
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[WillowBrook]

"Go" I think is a simple Chinese game comparable to the simplicity of say noughts & crosses. Correct me if I'm wrong.

The rules of go (which originated in China over 2000 years ago) are simple, but the strategy gets quite complex. Unlike chess, no computer program (yet) can beat the strongest players in the world in an even game.

 

[Schuesseled]

maintenance is not required for buildings that pay for themselves, its a needless complication, and civ V is all about taking needless complications dropping them in a sack, and then throwing the sack into a river of sewage! With some puppies.

And thats that.

 

[12agnar0k]

Universal reply, could be used by anyone in any thread
Not meaning I disagree with you - I think both variants have some logic behind.

Its not universal, I was referring to the logic already used by Frixasis, not something they might do in the future.

 

[Celevin]

Incorrect, the law of oppurtunity cost comes into play here, getting 1 extra gold in a city is no where near as useful as spending your valuable hammers and game time constructing other more useful buildings and troops.

maintenance is not required for buildings that pay for themselves, its a needless complication, and civ V is all about taking needless complications dropping them in a sack, and then throwing the sack into a river of sewage! With some puppies.

It makes perfect sense in making gold-producing buildings a strategic decision. Multipliers are not the same as constants, which means it's not a needless complication. You'd have a good point if it was constants and constants.

You're biased towards things that are complicated though, and you have to eliminate it to discuss this. You automate your workers and a lot of other things as you said. Considering that this entire argument is a finer point of creating strategic decisions for empire efficiency, this isn't even something that should concern you when you play.

 

[Schuesseled]

it is a needless complication, it is not needed, hence its needless, you might have a personal use for it, but don't expect it to be in the game for that reason alone.

 

[PinkHammurabi]

Yeah but that calculation isn't necessary. If a building boosts Gold by 50% and has a maintenance of 3, you can easily tell if it's going to outweigh its cost. It's not hard to know that as long as it's greater than 6 gold per turn you'll be getting a better deal.

 

[PinkHammurabi]

I can understand that, but it's definitely subjective. I find it just as interesting in determining if it's a useful build just the same as I would with a Granary or Library. I do in fact find that to be fun. I want my decisions to be wise ones, even if it's a "no brainer" sometimes (i.e. 50 gold output, duh build a Stock Exchange regardless of -3 maintenance). I just don't like the idea of free buildings (outside of hammers). Personal taste I suppose.

 

[Calouste]

The point is that doing a mental calculation such as "50% of 26.7 - 3" instead of "50% of 26.7" mildly increases complexity without making it more fun in the slightest. Its exactly the same reason that percentage bonuses in all civ games act on the base yield and are not combinatory. Reducing the maths without changing strategic options is a good thing. End of.

Except, funnily enough, in CivRev, where bonuses are multiplicative. But they are either 50% or 100%.

 

[Celevin]

True, its not hard, but its not interesting either. The interesting thing is to judge if getting an extra 3 gold per turn is worth investing a few hundred hammers. If that 3 gold is generated by having 0 maintenance and +50% gold in a city which generates 6 gold per turn; or by having a maintenance of 2 in a city with base gold yield of 10 is not an interesting decision. All it does is shift the interesting decision making to a slightly later time when your city is slightly larger.

I like having to work out if 2 food per turn more is worth 5 gold per turn and which I want to have first. I don't like doing 50% of 14 - 3. Not because its hard but because its boring and adds nothing.

I see your point. I think there's two arguments for it, though

1) Consistency in buildings. Every other building has a cost, and for a reason. The only reason this one doesn't is the units are the same? That makes less sense.

2) I think it is interesting if it has a maintenance cost. Now I need to see if I really want to build that bank immediately, or if I want to wait until I get some trading posts up. This puts banks into the same kind of strategy that's used for other buildings, that you don't build something unless it's necessary.

 

[PinkHammurabi]

I see your point. I think there's two arguments for it, though

1) Consistency in buildings. Every other building has a cost, and for a reason. The only reason this one doesn't is the units are the same? That makes less sense.

2) I think it is interesting if it has a maintenance cost. Now I need to see if I really want to build that bank immediately, or if I want to wait until I get some trading posts up. This puts banks into the same kind of strategy that's used for other buildings, that you don't build something unless it's necessary.

This is exactly how I feel it should be implemented. Any building's usefulness should outweigh its cost.

 

[Schuesseled]

Yeah but that calculation isn't necessary. If a building boosts Gold by 50% and has a maintenance of 3, you can easily tell if it's going to outweigh its cost. It's not hard to know that as long as it's greater than 6 gold per turn you'll be getting a better deal.

right so if there is no mathematics involved how did you figure out that you need 6 gold, thats right by doing the math, that is a complication that none of us need or want.

 

[PinkHammurabi]

right so if there is no mathematics involved how did you figure out that you need 6 gold, thats right by doing the math, that is a complication that none of us need or want.

No, I said that THAT particular calculation wasn't necessary (the one cited earlier with 50% of 26.7 or something). But if you have a gold per turn from a city of 10 and a Stock Exchange gives +50% and has a maintenance of -3, you can easily tell it's a good idea to build it. Also, "that is a complication that none of us need or want". Bzzt, wrong. Not only are you speaking in absolutes, you're speaking for an entire community. It's a simple mechanic that would be consistent with the other features and would force the player to make a wise decision regarding a building instead of just having free Marketplaces, Banks, Mints, and Stock Exchanges in all six of their one-pop cities. I find that to be a reasonable gameplay mechanic.

1) Do you have a link to prove that? Maintenance costs change with building difficulty, so I expect that at lower levels some wont and I have seen nothing which says that even at the higher levels all other buildings do. Anyway, I fail to see why consistency matters. Only roads and RR have maintenance cost, no other improvement does, is that a problem?

2) How about, do I want to build that bank immediately, or do I wait until I've built a granary/library/barrack/mint/ect..ect...? Building buildings cost production and therefore have an opportunity cost, by choosing a building you lose the bonuses of another building. Same logic applies to Social Policies.

Everything else you mentioned in your post is countered in my previous one, which I have no particular wish to repeat,

1) What are you asking to be cited? Maintenance scaling with difficulty levels? Sorry I didn't follow that part. However, considering that roads and railroads are not on every tile (at least, they REALLY don't need to be), but that some type of improvement would span nearly all of your empire, maintaining all of that would be overkill despite the "realism" involved there. Whereas buildings make more sense to have an upkeep.

2) I don't think that choosing to spend hammers on a +gold building is a sufficient form of "cost vs reward", because you make those same decisions on each and every building, and those do indeed have maintenance.

 

[12agnar0k]

I'm not saying gold enchancing buildings should have no strategic decision, I mean they have the "X turns for Y hammers build cost" which could be used for something better sooner. I agree that eventually with nothing else to build such "cost" becomes a non-issue. Maintenance should be used to insure Strategic Decision. Except in cases where any Maintenance is self-destructive, e.g paying +X Maintenance for +2X Gold. In that case Maintenance is pointless, it may as well start off as +X. Even in the case of "+X% -Y" this can be ignored if you simply use a lower % in the first place. The need for Maintenance is only when a Building needs to have a Strategic cost, if you lower the original significance you also lower the need for that Cost, thus removing the need for it in the first place. A simple solution to insert a Strategic Decision Cost into Gold Producing Buildings, is to have the Maintenance in a different Strategic Resource, say a negative in Science Production or Food Production or w.e or maybe say costing 1 Iron. Thats a possibility. But not more effective than just removing the need for maintenance in the first place, either way you end up with a non-uniform Maintenance system. A uniform Gold Maintenance system has pointless consequences for Gold Producing buildings.

 

[PinkHammurabi]

I'm not saying gold enchancing buildings should have no strategic decision, I mean they have the "X turns for Y hammers build cost" which could be used for something better sooner.

The problem here is that all buildings have this "cost" yet most buildings still have maintenance. So, all buildings have to go through this particular "is it smart to build it now?" checklist. So that doesn't really feel like an answer.

I agree that eventually with nothing else to build such "cost" becomes a non-issue. Maintenance should be used to insure Strategic Decision. Except in cases where any Maintenance is self-destructive, e.g paying +X Maintenance for +2X Gold. In that case Maintenance is pointless, it may as well start off as +X. Even in the case of "+X% -Y" this can be ignored if you simply use a lower % in the first place. The need for Maintenance is only when a Building needs to have a Strategic cost, if you lower the original significance you also lower the need for that Cost, thus removing the need for it in the first place. A simple solution to insert a Strategic Decision Cost into Gold Producing Buildings, is to have the Maintenance in a different Strategic Resource, say a negative in Science Production or Food Production or w.e or maybe say costing 1 Iron. Thats a possibility. But not more effective than just removing the need for maintenance in the first place, either way you end up with a non-uniform Maintenance system. A uniform Gold Maintenance system has pointless consequences for Gold Producing buildings.

First of all, it's only "pointless" (as you use the term) if it produces a profit. And, they will always produce a profit because there is no cost. That makes all +gold buildings FREE buildings in each and every city outside of the Hammer cost which EVERY building has to be weighed against. That is what I disagree with. It makes these decisions hardly a decision at all. You weigh pros and cons with all buildings except ones that produce gold, and I feel that is an improperly implemented game mechanic. I see no reason to make them exceptions.

And even if you're getting profits, with all the +% output modifiers and the likelihood that there could be buildings or Social Policies that reduce maintenance cost, there's plenty of reason to have gold-yieldings buildings with a maintenance.

 

[12agnar0k]

Yes but not a gold maintenance because its pointless because they will always be cancelled.

When you say "only in profit" you are referring too "+x% -y" well yes, it can be possible that the maintenance is higher than the +x% ("+X% < Y"), but this is not an exception to the pointless-ness of gold maintenance on gold buildings. The reason why this case is pointless is because thier is still no "should I build it" decision, the answer will always be no, and in the case of "+x% > y" the answer is always Yes, their is no strategic decision, i.e "I will have less X but more Y, which do I want more of for my goal", Instead the decision is simply, "Do I want less X" to which the answer is ALWAYS no, and "Do I want more X" to which the answer is ALWAYS yes. (Unless X=Negative e.g Lung Cancer, in which case the opposite is always true.) The only "Decision" your left with is the "hammer's cost" which exists on all buildings, which is not very strategic.
If you want Maintenance on every building that is fine (not in the game), but on gold producing buildings a "gold maintenance IS POINTLESS, thats a fact, a different kind of maintenance, e.g "+X% Gold - Y Science" is however an effective possibility, as this will introduce the "Strategic Cost" that Gold Maintenance will give to all other building types.

 

[PinkHammurabi]

Yes but not a gold maintenance because its pointless because they will always be cancelled.

When you say "only in profit" you are referring too "+x% -y" well yes, it can be possible that the maintenance is higher than the +x% ("+X% < Y"), but this is not an exception to the pointless-ness of gold maintenance on gold buildings. The reason why this case is pointless is because thier is still no "should I build it" decision, the answer will always be no, and in the case of "+x% > y" the answer is always Yes, their is no strategic decision, i.e "I will have less X but more Y, which do I want more of for my goal", Instead the decision is simply, "Do I want less X" to which the answer is ALWAYS no, and "Do I want more X" to which the answer is ALWAYS yes. The only "Decision" your left with is the "hammer's cost" which exists on all buildings, which is not very strategic.
If you want Maintenance on every building that is fine (not in the game), but on gold producing buildings a "gold maintenance IS POINTLESS, thats a fact, a different kind of maintenance, e.g "+X% Gold - Y Science" is however an effective possibility, as this will introduce the "Strategic Cost" that Gold Maintenance will give to all other building types.

The bolded sections are fallacies. Just because the profit outweighs the cost does not make it POINTLESS. They are BOTH modifiable assets and as such weigh into the building's value. You SHOULD be asking yourself if it's worth building but instead they just give you the item for no cost outside of hammer production.

And no, it's not a FACT, man. Canceled out =/= pointless, not a fact. "Pointless" is a subjective term anyway.

Edit: Oh, and in regard to "Yes but not a gold maintenance because its pointless because they will always be cancelled." specifically, I'm saying that the profit of these buildings should not always and automatically cancel out the maintenance cost. The crux of my argument is that you should have to determine if it outweighs the cost; it SHOULD be a decision, but yet it is not.

 

[Thyrwyn]

It seems to me that it is simpler, clearer, and more accessible to have only one value for a given asset or modifier. Since not all buildings require maintenance, even consistency does not mandate a maintenance cost for gold producing buildings.