How the Demographics works

[Bamspeedy]

Although the Demographics screen isn't really useful, many people are curious as to what those numbers really mean. Many people had theories and could figure out by themselves how some of them were figured.
Here is my analysis after extensive testing in the debug mode for PTW:

Approval rating: This one's easy. The percentage of your people that are happy. If every single person is happy, you have 100%. If everyone is content it is 50%. Edit: This can be misleading when you get specialists, because the specialists count as only content people. So even if everyone is happy or an entertainer, you won't have 100% approval rating if you have any specialists.

Population: Add up all the population you get from the city view from all your cities. Not population points, like size 1, 2 or 3, etc. but the 10,000 or 100,000 you see under the city name.

GNP: Total gold in all your cities before corruption takes a bite out of it.
1 gold= 1 million

Mfg. Goods: Total unwasted shields in all your cities.
1 shield = 1 megaton.

Land Area: # of tiles in your territory * 100.
1 Tile =100 square miles
Sea is included in this, but does not help in the territory part of your game score.

Literacy: % of your citizens who live in a city with a library, university, AND research lab. If every city has just a library you will have 33%, because they are missing the other 2 science buildings.

Edit: Or live in a city with 1 or more scientific Great Wonders (Great Library, Newtons, SETI, Theory of Evolution, Cure for Cancer, and Internet) Copernicus's does not count because despite it helps science, it isn't given the scientific flag. Having 1 of those wonders counts the same as if they had all the other improvements in the city. Two small wonders (apollo and Intelligence Agency) give you credit for having 50% science in that city. You also get 3% added to your literacy rate when you get the literature tech. No bonus when you get education. Great Library still helps your literacy rate even after it is obsolete.

Disease: % of the tiles in your territory that is floodplains or jungle.

Pollution: # of tiles that are currently polluted.

Life expectancy: % of your citizens who live in a city with a granary, aqueduct, AND hospital. Minimum is 20, maximum is 99.

Family Size: The average amount of excess food that each city is producing/2. If you have 1 city that is producing 4 extra food, that 4 food would feed 2 people, so your family size would be 2 children. Minimum is 1, hard to say exactly what the max would be. In most cases you won't see this above 2, maybe 3 or 4 if all your cities are extremely rich in food, experiencing a very fast growth period or just put down a alot of railroads on irrigated tiles.

Military Service: 10 years * # of military units / # of citizens. Military units are units with an attack and defense value, so workers, scouts and princesses don't count. Kings do. So at the start of a mass regicide game you will have a military service of 70 years because of the 7 military units *10 years divided by just your 1 citizen. 0 years if you have no army or you have just a few units, but thousands of population points.

Annual Income: The number of connected strategic/luxury resource types in your territory. The minimum value is 1 and you get a +1 bonus for your first trade route with another civ. Thanks DaveMcW

Productivity: The total amount of uncorrupted gold, unwasted shields, and excess food you are producing in all your cities.

 

[cgannon64]

Good to know, Bamspeedy. I wouldn't be able to help you with the Income, though. I didn't have a clue about any of these until this thread!

CG

 

[satchel]

Bamspeedy, those are really interesting. Thanks for all your great detective work. You might consider posting these in the general discussions forum, or at least getting a link to them put in the FAQ. Really, nice job.

Folks will undoubtedly now commence critiques (not of you, but of the formulas). Here's one: family size confused a lot of people because if you have only 1 child per family, your population will shrink, not grow (neglecting immigration). So, the formula should really start at replacement rate which is a little more than 2 per family (one for each parent, plus extra to replace those who don't have children) and add to that the one child per two surplus foods in a city!

But of course, it doesn't matter, because these demographic numbers are just there for a little goofy post-game entertainment.

 

[Thunderfall]

Great stuff Bamspeedy! It's added to the War Academy.

 

[ukrneal]

Wow. Great work bamspeedy!

Question: are you sure the pollution is the tiles polluted and doesn't have something to do with the little triangle thingies?

Also, does the Great Library affect the literacy rate for the civ that builds it?

 

[Ossric]

indeed, wonders like the copornicus observatory, newton's college & the SETI can push up your literacy rate (especially if they are built in the same city)

the number of shields produced in a city also increase your science rate!

 

[ZeroOne]

Literacy: % of your citizens who live in a city with a library, university, AND research lab. If every city has just a library you will have 33%, because they are missing the other 2 science buildings.

So are you saying that in the ancient times literacy % can be only 33 by maximum and that 100% cannot be reached before modern times?

 

[Squirrel]

Originally posted by Bamspeedy
Pollution: # of tiles that are currently polluted.

Are you sure about this one? I thought that it depends on the amount of pollution produced by your cities as seen from the poison triangles in the City Management Screen.

 

[Portuguese]

Great job!
But can you explain better that produtivity thing?!?

 

[Bamspeedy]

Ok, about the literacy. There does seem to be a very small percentage that is influenced when you get the literature tech. When you get the literature tech, your literacy goes from a minimum of 0% to 3%, and 3% is added to your literacy rate. No change when you get education, though. So with only a library in every city, you will have a literacy rate of 36%. If you have a great Wonder (science one), this counts as the city having all the improvements. All science great wonders and 2 small wonders will add to this percentage, but Copernicus's does not.
So to get 99%, every city must have all 3 science improvements OR any science Great Wonder (edited my first post to explain which ones are covered). Although it would be foolish to have Newtons or SETI in a city without the other improvements...
If you have many cities then the wonders won't really add to your literacy rate too much. Shield output has absolutely nothing to do with literacy rate from what I've seen. Literacy rate will of course go up or down depending on which cities are growing in population and if they have the science improvements or not.
So in ancient times it will max out at 36% if you have just libraries, 99% only if you have the Great Library also, and just have 1 city. In modern times it will max out at 99%.

Yes, I have checked the pollution. I can quickly add 75+ people to my city getting 60+ pollution icons, but the megatons of pollution will still sit at 0, until I end my turn and the pollution forms. If 1 tile gets polluted it shows 1 megaton, if 5 tiles, then 5 megatons. This can be helpful when micromanaging your workers to clean up pollution, so you know you got them all.

 

[Bamspeedy]

Oh, I forgot about the productivity....
Total excess food of all cities + Total shields that every city is producing that is NOT lost to corruption/waste + total commerce that every city is producing that is NOT lost to corruption.
The commerce part is helped by marketplaces, banks, libraries, etc, depending on how you allocate your spending.
Edit: And shields would be helped by factories.

This is easy to check when you first found a city. In this example, I settled on grassland (no river nearby), and my 1 citizen is working a bonus grassland square (not mined or irrigated). I am producing 2 shields (one from the city center tile, plus 1 from the bonus grassland square. I am producing 2 EXCESS food (actually producing 4 food, but 2 is being eaten by my citizen). And producing 3 commerce (from the capital center tile). 2+2+3=7 productivity. As I mine (or irrigate in other governments), or road the bonus grassland tile, I will produce more shields, commerce, or food in some cases (not in despot because of the tile penalty), so my productivity will increase. If I set science to 100% or 0%, it doesn't make a difference, but if I have libraries, universities, etc. it would because those improvements would multiply my uncorrupted beakers, thus improving my productivity.

 

[Cantankerous]

Bamspeedy, this is exceptional!

Thanks for doing the research on this. You've uncovered the mystery of Civilization.

 

[hbdragon88]

Great work on another great article.

I think that annual income is influenced by what you get in commerce and some other factors. I'm not sure because I'm not a freak of looking at the city view screen.

 

[ukrneal]

Bamspeedy, thanks for the clarification.

On a commentary, I wonder why they changed how pollution is counted from civII to civIII. In civ II it was counted by the triangle thingies, but now is counted by actual polluted tiles. It seems more logical how it was done in civII. The more I think about it, the more I think they should combine both. Anyway, a minor point.

Great job!

 

[Darkness]

Very nice!

 

[Gramphos]

Are yuo sure that specialists not always count as content (as they do in the scoring)?

 

[Bamspeedy]

You are correct, Gramphos, I will correct that. I just did a test by building directly on top of a luxury, and turned that 1 happy person into a specialist and I had 50% approval rating (same as if I had 1 content person).

Now figure out the annual income for me .

 

[DaveMcW]

Annual Income: The number of connected strategic/luxury resource types in your territory. The minimum value is 1 and you get a +1 bonus for your first trade route with another civ.

 

[Bamspeedy]

Thanks Dave!

I just looked at one of my games, and that does look to be right. I have 8 strategics (all of them), 2 different luxuries and a trade route to other civs for 11 and that matches the 11 in the demographics screen. I will edit the first post.

 

[Lynx]

any one ever have 99% literacy?