Economic meltdown via Inflation?

[JimMorrison]

Turn 244 as the Khazad, over just the past dozen turns, my income has plummeted by ~70g/turn, and I started to become curious as to why it is dropping so fast.

I'm at 75% Inflation, and I can't help but think that most of this has happened fairly recently. I do have ~10k gold in reserve, but you have to hold gold back as the Khazad, and I like to have a war chest.

How do you manage Inflation? I'm going to play this out, and see what happens, but from checking the forums, it seems there is no way to reduce Inflation at all, so basically we're going to implode, even though our culture demands that we amass wealth, so I would assume that our economic model would support that activity. But I have never seen the Inflation get this high, certainly not this early in the game.

This is on Monarch diff, and I Advance Start with only 500 points, just so I can logically place my city, and start with a couple of Workers, nothing fancy to accelerate the game.

 

[cIV_khanh93]

farily certain that inflation jsut kinda randomly rises throughtout the game. it is an ecomonimic balncing factor to make the nedgame cost more without the messof edits that it shoudltake to do that.

 

[xienwolf]

Inflation continually rises, but it is a multiplication of all the other costs which show up in the F2 screen. Do anything to reduce those (LOW maintenance Civics, fewer/closer cities, only as many units as you can get free suppot for...) and you reduce inflation costs as well.

 

[WarKirby]

I hate inflation.

I'd like to see it removed entirely, then if necessary, the game rebalanced around not having it.

I don;'t feel it has any place in dark fantasy

 

[apotheoser]

Inflation is a game mechanic, it's not supposed to simulate real-world "inflation" in economics.

The point of inflation in the game is to make you expand your economy / keep your gold in check.

That said, inflation in Beyond the Sword got turned up a whole lot compared to previous Civ 4 expansions.

I'm curious about Khazad though - their gold mechanics are really unusual so it might be Khazad specific.

 

[Iceciro]

Wouldn't mind more ways to handle it. There hits a point where your economy won't grow anymore.

 

[JimMorrison]

Well I could find little discussion of the Inflation mechanic, it just seems to me that 75% before turn 250 is rather extreme. My roommate is playing Scions currently, and at over turn 300, he's at 53%.

Perhaps it should just be toned down a bit? Or some buildings provide some kind of modifier? Seems that if it just continually rises (especially with a random factor?) that it has the potential to just end/ruin a game. As I said, in my current game, the rate of growth of Inflation, I'm doubtful that I could possibly gain a Conquest victory before my economy becomes entirely unmanageable.

Obviously I can trim down my units, and take lower upkeep civs, but then I will gain less economic advantages from my civics, and not have the military to make forward progress, so I'm not sure that's the answer I was looking for.

 

[Vehem]

Well I could find little discussion of the Inflation mechanic, it just seems to me that 75% before turn 250 is rather extreme. My roommate is playing Scions currently, and at over turn 300, he's at 53%.

Perhaps it should just be toned down a bit? Or some buildings provide some kind of modifier? Seems that if it just continually rises (especially with a random factor?) that it has the potential to just end/ruin a game. As I said, in my current game, the rate of growth of Inflation, I'm doubtful that I could possibly gain a Conquest victory before my economy becomes entirely unmanageable.

Obviously I can trim down my units, and take lower upkeep civs, but then I will gain less economic advantages from my civics, and not have the military to make forward progress, so I'm not sure that's the answer I was looking for.

I've just looked through to see if the gold reserve/GPT is an issue that might affect it (i.e. the game decides you have too much gold, so starts to make it more expensive) - but I can't see anything of that nature in the code. Will double check, but it does seem to be just based on time played, which is odd.

 

[Jabie]

There's an inflation thread in the main FfH thread and part way through that there's some notes on a game option on how to turn it off. Personally I can't stand inflation and find it an un-fun and counterintuitive mechanism, so I'd suggest it gets turned off by default.

 

[Thunder_Gr]

Personally I can't stand inflation and find it an un-fun and counterintuitive mechanism, so I'd suggest it gets turned off by default.

Oh, no, please. Just making the option visible should be enough IMO.

 

[Vehem]

Oh, no, please. Just making the option visible should be enough IMO.

That was my thinking too.

 

[Mylon]

Inflation should be removed and the game designed better to accomodate. It's primarily there to keep a developing economy from exploding, but without any kind of feedback/scaling mechanism related to actual economic development, it does a very poor job at it. Better options would be to increase military unit costs, civic costs, and city maintenance costs so all of the costs are much more upfront and honest and, if a civilization is increasing any of these areas (like more military, bigger cities, more cities) the associated costs increase as well.

 

[zup]

I never liked inflation, but I can deal with it up to prince. Making the option visible sounds good imo.

 

[Aroldo]

Just make the option visible for those who don't want it. As for me, I find that it more or less does its job, even though it is indeed annoying. Mainly because it seems kinda poorly implemented and nothing can be done to influence it.

 

[apotheoser]

Inflation should be removed and the game designed better to accomodate. It's primarily there to keep a developing economy from exploding, but without any kind of feedback/scaling mechanism related to actual economic development, it does a very poor job at it. Better options would be to increase military unit costs, civic costs, and city maintenance costs so all of the costs are much more upfront and honest and, if a civilization is increasing any of these areas (like more military, bigger cities, more cities) the associated costs increase as well.

Well, to be fair, inflation steadily increases the value of buildings like Courthouse and Basilica over the course of the game. Also, as you grow you can build the Winter and Summer Palace, which also improve in value as inflation rises.

 

[zup]

Go Order and build courthouses and basilicas everywhere. Then secure 4 law mana, or more if you fancy buildings that increase maintenance.