Unit Maintenance and long games

[Sunwind]

Hello, I have a game running with no victory conditions, and I am pretty far into the future, with only three other Civs left. I want to keep playing it, see how far into the future I can take it and how the other CIvs develop. A bit inspired by the 10 year running Civ II game.

However, as the unit maintenance increases with time, I am now at the point where it increase per 1 gold per turn, each turn. So I pretty much giving up on this game, as it is clear that eventually I won't be able to pay for my current army, even if I don't increase it by a single unit. INcreased income via other sources won't be able to keep up.

Is there something I am missing, or does it really just increase with time, and nothing I can do about it? Or does that cap out at some point.

Is it possible to disable the time function of the unit mainteance via editing an XML file?

How do others deal with it if they want to run a real long game, well into the future?

 

[SMA333M]

I think the maintenance is increasing only if you recruit more units... I never seen the thing you say. My maintenance is fixed if I don't recruit more.

 

[Babri]

I think there is no thing like inflation in ciV so ur maintenance cost should remain constant unless u create new units or upgrade them.

 

[SalemSage]

I'm pretty sure that the maintenance costs of units increases as the game goes on. All units cost the same amount in terms of maintenance, whether they're a warrior or a tank.

Which is a little silly.

It's definitely possible to make maintenance costs static, so warriors cost 1 gold in upkeep and tanks cost 10 or something, regardless of the turn times. VEM managed to mod this in. Not sure if you can change the base game for something like this, but mods can certainly help you there.

 

[General Tso]

I've never done any in-depth analysis but from my in game experience, I'm guessing that it works like this:

The first few units may cost nothing - the number of "free" units decreases as you raise the difficulty level.

After you exceed your "free" unit limit each new unit adds to the over all maintenance cost.

As the game progresses it appears to me that the cost per unit increases. But not fast enough to cause your problem.

Can anyone confirm that unit maintenance actually does increase over time and if so what causes it?

 

[nefloyd]

assets\gameplay\xml\globaldefines.xml

- <Row Name="INITIAL_GOLD_PER_UNIT_TIMES_100">
<Value>50</Value>
</Row>
- <Row Name="UNIT_MAINTENANCE_GAME_MULTIPLIER">
<Value>8</Value>
</Row>
- <Row Name="UNIT_MAINTENANCE_GAME_EXPONENT_DIVISOR">
<Value>7</Value>

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=9773139&postcount=54

 

[Esperr]

I always thought it went by era. Like in the modern era each unit costs 4 gpt or something like that. But I know it caps with the information era because ive had games go to 2500 with no increase.

 

[General Tso]

Thanks nefloyd. That makes sense - now I understand. The more units you have and the more turns played the higher the unit maintenance. Early in games I do not pay anything for maintenance and I mistook that as being due to maintenance free units when it really had to do with the number of turn being very low (plus the total number of units being low).

 

[PhilBowles]

I've never done any in-depth analysis but from my in game experience, I'm guessing that it works like this:

The first few units may cost nothing - the number of "free" units decreases as you raise the difficulty level.

After you exceed your "free" unit limit each new unit adds to the over all maintenance cost.

As the game progresses it appears to me that the cost per unit increases. But not fast enough to cause your problem.

Can anyone confirm that unit maintenance actually does increase over time and if so what causes it?

Units always cost maintenance in Civ V - no free units unless you have the right social policy (though this is on Emperor - you may be right that there are free units on lower levels).

Maintenance cost per unit increases over time - I'm not sure what the trigger is, but it's likely to be era. It certainly shouldn't be 1 per turn - but if it is the solution is surely to disband/gift away some of them. Or adopt Honor and get the finisher - if you're engaged in full-scale war you'll make up any deficit.

 

[HelloGoodbye123]

I think it does increase, a scout in the beginning has no maintenance cost, but later in the game it ends up being like 2-3 a turn.. and then even more as your proceed..

 

[nefloyd]

Maintenance cost per unit increases over time - I'm not sure what the trigger is, but it's likely to be era. It certainly shouldn't be 1 per turn - but if it is the solution is surely to disband/gift away some of them. Or adopt Honor and get the finisher - if you're engaged in full-scale war you'll make up any deficit.

Already posted a link to the answers

With enough units, you CAN see a 1 gpt/turn increase in later eras

Sunwind, you don't need a huge army. Build some nukes or a load of bombers and get a few fast land units to clean up the wrecked cities.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Does anyone know, definitively, if the maintenance inflation caps out at some point?

BTW - great thread, I didn't even know this happened at all.

Also, a little OT - I don't ever see maintenance inflation being more of an issue of playing games far into the future. I have way more trouble getting through the long turn times as my comp struggles to compute movements for the massive carpets of doom the AIs pump out by the late game.

 

[elprofesor]

If you really want to keep playing for 10 years, it seems that you'll need to get tradition and/or freedom, since it's the only way to reduce unit maintenance. Although you (and all AIs) will eventually end up with all but 3 SP trees maxed out

 

[nefloyd]

If you really want to keep playing for 10 years, it seems that you'll need to get tradition and/or freedom, since it's the only way to reduce unit maintenance. Although you (and all AIs) will eventually end up with all but 3 SP trees maxed out

If you really keep playing that long you'll be forced to pick from those 3 trees and go through anarchy

 

[hobbsyoyo]

If you really keep playing that long you'll be forced to pick from those 3 trees and go through anarchy

Not if you enabled save policies, right?

 

[Sunwind]

Thanks for the feedback everyone, nice community you have here

assets\gameplay\xml\globaldefines.xml

- <Row Name="INITIAL_GOLD_PER_UNIT_TIMES_100">
<Value>50</Value>
</Row>
- <Row Name="UNIT_MAINTENANCE_GAME_MULTIPLIER">
<Value>8</Value>
</Row>
- <Row Name="UNIT_MAINTENANCE_GAME_EXPONENT_DIVISOR">
<Value>7</Value>

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=9773139&postcount=54

Thank you.

Already posted a link to the answers

With enough units, you CAN see a 1 gpt/turn increase in later eras

Sunwind, you don't need a huge army. Build some nukes or a load of bombers and get a few fast land units to clean up the wrecked cities.

Well, the point of this particular game is not really to 'win', I could have won a military victory a long time ago. I see it more of a simulation, I like seeing how the different civilizations devlop, what wars they fight, how they interact with me and themselfes. I do have a larger army then I really need, yes, but reducing it would just delay the inevitable. Besides, I like my armies

As for policies, I have full Tradition, Commerce, Rationalism, Autocracy and working on Patronage now. I am now around turn 1800 (marathon setting), and with about 80 units, the cost does increases by about 1 gold per turn, so in about 200 turns I would be pulling negative gold per turn.

It has been an interesting game, one I'd like to keep playing. As said, it's not really the point of winning, I could probably roll over the remaining Civs with my army (and done so centuries ago), but that is not really the point of this game. I just want to see how it goes on, will Austria and Iroquois ever be at peace (for more then, say 10 turns). Will China come out of their corner, oh, Kamehameha just finished the Manhatten Project, that should spice things up along his borders. Things like that

But with unit cost increasing with the number of turns, I can't keep this game running much longer. Shame really. I check the XML stuff though.

Thanks again everyone.