Thunderbrd
C2C War Dog
I think you're trying to model realism too closely to make a good game. The mechanic, regardless of how "brilliant" you think it is, is driving me crazy and I wish you were a little more understanding and not quite so patronizing. It's not about perfectionism, it's about comfort. Part of the problem is that I have a very hard time seeing where the "safe" level is in terms of total crime (so as to avoid the instability-inducing crimes) and so I feel that I have to utterly stomp it out or it will explode as soon as I take my eyes off it.
In my example, I was already running the Closed Borders civic, so I was still seeing crime problems regardless of foreign trade being cut off.
I seriously don't mean to be patronizing. I'm sorry it came across that way - internet tone of voice can be assumed in a number of ways and its tough to pick truly neutral wording.
If trade is causing you crime trouble and you're only trading internally, then apparently you must have some cities that have been allowed to maintain crime while others are heavily policed?
A safe level of crime is 0 or less crime rate I think. Its ok to have some crime problems now and then because if you stretch too much to try to control it you'll cause yourself a financial problem in staffing too much. That is by design.
I'm being very understanding by offering to option that dynamic out. Differences in personality and play style are a good thing and I like to support them all rather than have one dictate to another how the game should be played. So by no means do I mean to say you're poor player... no indeed that perfectionism is actually a really powerful gamer quality. But I personally prefer a bit of fear and uncertainty in my games because I feel that's what keeps me on the edge of my seat.