What purpose does inflation serve?

[Emptiness]

City maintenance already does a good job of countering ICS, because it increases as a quadratic function. That is, 16 cities would have 16x the maintenance of 4 cities. Roughly. Inflation is purposefully there to counter the growing economy. If you want to reduce ICS, increase maintenance. I also did this in my mod and it has the curious effect of increasing expansion well into mid-game so it's a bit more interesting.

Increasing maintenance would have a negative effect on the AI, which currently has no means to recognize when it can no longer safely expand. A human can balance their rate of expansion to the development of their economy, but the AI will expand without limit even if that means they destroy their economy in the process. This is already a problem now, at times, and increasing maintenance will exacerbate the situation.

Also, because Law mana can reduce maintenance costs (potentially to 0%), attempting to control ICS with maintenance alone will fail in situations where the player has access to a large number of mana nodes.

Another factor that reduces ICS in Vanilla is that all of the buildings (except culture) are +%. Even if you build more of these buildings, there won't be any extra benefit.

Absolutely true. This is precisely the reason that ICS generally involves building a minimum number of buildings and then spamming troops.

 

[Vorpal+5]

Problem with inflation is that it also cripples civ which fail to expand early. It is even more difficult to climb the ladder just because of it.

 

[Revolutionist]

Problem with inflation is that it also cripples civ which fail to expand early. It is even more difficult to climb the ladder just because of it.

Well, to be fair, if you've failed to expand by the time inflation becomes crippling, you've probably hopelessly lost the game already.

 

[Mylon]

Increasing maintenance would have a negative effect on the AI, which currently has no means to recognize when it can no longer safely expand. A human can balance their rate of expansion to the development of their economy, but the AI will expand without limit even if that means they destroy their economy in the process. This is already a problem now, at times, and increasing maintenance will exacerbate the situation.

Also, because Law mana can reduce maintenance costs (potentially to 0%), attempting to control ICS with maintenance alone will fail in situations where the player has access to a large number of mana nodes.

I wouldn't consider this unbalanced. If one has access to a large number of mana nodes, there's a number of other things that player can do, from building the tower of mastery to having a very versatile group of mages. Using multiple law nodes to improve one's economy is only one possibility.

Absolutely true. This is precisely the reason that ICS generally involves building a minimum number of buildings and then spamming troops.

First I thought ICS was caused by Civ3 and SMAC style buildings which give flat +s and minuses. But then I realized, using the full potential of a non-overlapping fat cross is difficult! It requires adequate food, adequate health, adequate happiness. And considering the city does get that center tile for free, one can use slightly less farms and get more hammers/commerce by making more cities. Now this really makes me wonder if there's another way to reduce city sprawl. Happiness and health currently encourage it, as does the free tile in the center.

The other big type of 4x games, space games, limit "cities" by telling the player where they can build.

 

[odalrick]

First I thought ICS was caused by Civ3 and SMAC style buildings which give flat +s and minuses.

It started in Civilization where a settler cost one pop and allowed you to work two squares.

 

[Mylon]

I didn't mean it started in Civ3. Just saying, encouraged by the mechanics used even in Civ3 and SMAC. SMAC was particularly bad because in late game, if you built a mineral mining satellite, every city you had got +1 hammer/mineral, which really made having more cities a good thing.

 

[Emptiness]

I wouldn't consider this unbalanced. If one has access to a large number of mana nodes, there's a number of other things that player can do, from building the tower of mastery to having a very versatile group of mages. Using multiple law nodes to improve one's economy is only one possibility.

I don't mean to say that there's a problem with Law nodes reducing maintenance, or that this is inherently more powerful than what you can do with other mana nodes. My point is that because of this potential it is a bad idea to remove inflation, which also acts to limit the effectiveness of the ICS strategy but unlike maintenance cannot be circumvented.

 

[Mylon]

Inflation is a multiplier. No maintenance, no inflation. Thus, the law node strategy enables ICS whether you have inflation or not.

Again, if inflation is removed but other costs are raised (particularly that of end-game military units) we would see a much better moderating force to end-game economy than the rather arbitrary inflation.

 

[Emptiness]

Inflation is a multiplier, but not of maintenance alone. It adds to a civ's expenses an amount based on the sum of Unit Cost, Unit Supply, City Maintenance and Civic Upkeep. If you reduce your city maintenance to zero inflation will still affect your empire by increasing the cost of the other three types of expenses.

 

[odalrick]

I didn't mean it started in Civ3. Just saying, encouraged by the mechanics used even in Civ3 and SMAC. SMAC was particularly bad because in late game, if you built a mineral mining satellite, every city you had got +1 hammer/mineral, which really made having more cities a good thing.

I've forgotten most of Civ3, corruption made it unplayable.

The mineral satellite in SMAC did nothing for or against ICS. It is late game and capped at base size anyway, ICS is all about the early game. Hab Complexes, Supply Crawlers and expensive buildings have a much greater impact.

But fundamentally the source of ICS is that extra cities is always good. Even in CivIV there are very few disadvantages to building another city. Settlers are expensive and maintenance can be crippling (and "inflation" has no major effect on that), but other than that, more cities is always better.

Inflation is a multiplier, but not of maintenance alone. It adds to a civ's expenses an amount based on the sum of Unit Cost, Unit Supply, City Maintenance and Civic Upkeep. If you reduce your city maintenance to zero inflation will still affect your empire by increasing the cost of the other three types of expenses.

Unit cost and unit supply are linear with civilization size, so that has no effect on ICS. In fact in an earlier post, I argued that they actually grow slower than linear.

Likewise civic upkeep is linear with the size of your civilization. Civic Upkeep Explained

So city maintenance is the only thing that makes "inflation" affect ICS. Take that away, and and "inflation" actually encourages ICS.

 

[Mylon]

I've forgotten most of Civ3, corruption made it unplayable.

The mineral satellite in SMAC did nothing for or against ICS. It is late game and capped at base size anyway, ICS is all about the early game. Hab Complexes, Supply Crawlers and expensive buildings have a much greater impact.

But fundamentally the source of ICS is that extra cities is always good. Even in CivIV there are very few disadvantages to building another city. Settlers are expensive and maintenance can be crippling (and "inflation" has no major effect on that), but other than that, more cities is always better.

Right. More cities = more tiles worked, and more tiles means more units and more commerce. I'm still trying to think of a method, however radical, to alter this strategy. As a very building oriented player, I'm very fond of the concept of being able to build up as well as out, in having no upper limit to the amount that one city can develop.

The simplest method is to increase maintenance from number of cities to the point where there is a definite point where having more cities is not better (at least until the empire enough total commerce to support it, limiting expansion so that it's still occuring mid-game). Other methods I've considered is replacing hammers with materials and making industry population/building based, but this still relies on food which comes from tiles.

Alternately, if total food is increased (And happiness and health) such that working all of the tiles within the radius is pretty much a given, there's less reason to cram cities together. Adding in the ability for cities to expand to radius 3 further encourages players to spread cities out.

+health and +happiness buildings should be civ-wide, or at least continent wide. Requiring that one be built in each city is a flat increase rather than the scaling increases of +25% gold or +25% research style buildings, which also encourage big cities (so less total hammers is spent civ-wide on such buildings). Perhaps if these were optional researches instead of buildings?

 

[Honor]

The real problem with the inflation mechanic is that it doesn't stop rising. It's an out of control control mechanism, if it really is a control mechanism at all.

 

[Earthling]

I have to strongly challenge the premise that ICS exists at all in civ4, let alone that inflation is what counters it. The whole maintenance system does an excellent job of countering this in my opinion - it's almost never worth it to build three small cities to each get one resource (and each require courthouse, library etc...) when one city can do it-unlike civIII where this could have been true. Among all the strategies people argue I almost never see ICS supported in high level or multiplayer play - if you count early military rush in with it then maybe but that's an entirely different ball from my perspective (increasing military maintenance would be the answer here if anything, along with Praet nerf).

So I could see FFH facing a few more slight problems by flat bonuses per city, say from religions, but other than order (basilica)+ law mana maintenance is still alive and strong. My opinion, though, is that it really isn't even necessary to increase late-game unit costs or anything - so many civs, especially military oriented ones lack a lot of economy anyway that there's no point. I'd just remove inflation and be done with it - if you wanted to slightly increase cost of late game civics that is probably enough. Thematically I don't think it makes sense for say the elves to win a war of attrition just because inflation cripples everyone (all the evil civs).

 

[Revolutionist]

In the end, the fact that I don't have much interest or experience with multiplayer Civ4 means that I couldn't comment on if ICS was alive and well. Though it did seem nonsensical, given city # maintenance. Glad to hear that it's essentially a thing of the past though. I never liked the idea in AC.

Still, despite inflation, I'm too often drowning in gold late game. And I imagine most builder-style players have the same issue, if they aren't scraping, tooth and nail, for survival on diety or something. So I still think better gold control is in order.

Well, or at least something to spend all that gold on. One of my new favorite features in FF are the outfitters, which let me burn some of the surplus on something useful.

In any case, it's really more of a 'Would be nice' issue than a 'We need this! Now! ' one. For my part, I'll say thanks to Magister for posting that tidbit on the option and go poke at my FfH files a bit.

 

[odalrick]

I have to strongly challenge the premise that ICS exists at all in civ4, let alone that inflation is what counters it.

REX is still alive and kicking in CivIV. Where that turns into ICS is a matter of opinion.

I agree, ICS as such isn't a strong strategy in CivIV. But "inflation" does nothing for or against ICS, it's all maintenance and lowered costs for vertical growth.


If you really want some of that old-time ISC action, try Shearim. Midgame the only thing new cities really need to be worthwhile is a planar gate. And you can spread Ashen Vale for +1 AC.

Or Scions from Fall Further.

 

[xienwolf]

Not sure what ICS stands for, but due to the Planar Gate strategy, Sheaim are really far stronger if you build your cities as close as possible. Then your output from the gates increases on a per-turn basis AND you have a higher net cap for gate creature retention. With an army flowing into your lands for free, you can easily focus on buildings.


To gain a semi-natural limit on number of cities, I would say the best approach (short of a Revolutions style mod which can fracture your empire) would be to tie number of cities (possibly mitigated/expounded upon by distance) to the "It is too Crowded!" unhappiness in each city. Then by having tons of cities crammed together you gain extra faces in each of the cities, crippling you, but by spacing your cities out to a great degree you gain bonus (or a reduction in ) for each city since they have room to stretch out in the nearby countryside.

 

[odalrick]

Not sure what ICS stands for,

Infinite City Sprawl. A degenerate case of Rapid Expansion, where one places cities close together, with little concern for vertical growth.

It is a worthwhile strategy in Civ because each city works two tiles with only one population, cities are free while buildings cost upkeep and probably a few other reasons.

It's worthwhile, at least in small doses, for Shearim, because new cities really only need a planar gate and each city raises the AC.

It is worthwhile, at least in small doses, for Scions of the Patria, because they care very little for the actual tiles. Just work the good ones and build spawn boosting and fixed commerce buildings.

 

[Renaud]

Now might be a good time for a primer on what inflation means in the real world and how it could be applied to civIV.

Inflation in world history is a tool used by rulers to gain command of additional resources: additional monetary units are created, either by cutting hard currencies with base metals or in modern times by printing additional notes, which are then spent by the ruler or those closely connected to the ruler on things they want (typically social welfare schemes, grandiose public projects or military ventures - yes just like the things YOU do as ruler of your civ empire). No new wealth is actually created by the expansion of the money supply (the productive capacity of the empire is unchanged), but the ruler benefits tremendously as they are able to spend the new money on their projects BEFORE a general rise in prices ensues, effectively redistributing production to their own uses and away from the use of private individuals and companies. By the time the additional quantity of new or devalued money reaches the peons (you and me), the general rise in prices is underway and the peons see no benefit: they have more money, but the price of everything has already gone up. Effectively, inflation acts as a hidden taxation of the productive output of all members of society who use money to conduct business.

Interestingly, civIV's simplified implementation of the price-increase effect of inflation is semi-correct: historically, rulers of empires who control the monetary system WILL create new money to finance their ventures, resulting in continually spiraling prices. This typically accelerates until the empire is no longer able to pay it's operating costs. This is what happened to the Roman Empire: ultimately the inefficiency and uncertainty created by ever-increasing inflation rendered them unable to pay the support costs of a vast empire, the social welfare keeping the citizenry happy, and the support costs of all the legions keeping the barbarians at bay. On a much shorter timescale, look at Weimar germany in the 20's and 30's or Argentina last century to see what can happen over just 5 or 10 years. Thus, civIV assumes that all of you are always inflating, resulting in ever-increasing maintenance costs until finally you can't pay and have to shrink your empire. This is perfectly realistic and in keeping with history.

The term 'inflation' is often mistakenly applied to the price increases which inevitably must arise from expansion of the monetary supply faster than the supply of real wealth (goods and services) can expand (too many dollars chasing too few goods). This terminological mistake is made in the case of civIV, but is a minor point. A 'price increase' is a price increase. Increasing the monetary base faster than the supply of real goods and services in the economy increases is 'inflation'. Sometimes the price increases happen much later, are distributed across segments of economy very unevenly, or not apparent at all if rapid productivity increases are masking the effects (1920's US).

The upshot of all this is that you, the civIV ruler, should have the choice of when to 'inflate' or not. Inflation has the short-term benefit of giving you control over more of the existing real wealth in your empire, at a long-term cost of higher future prices and lower overall productive efficiency. So this should be something you can choose to do, or not, and set the 'rate' of inflation as well. In game terms this would amount to simply setting a percentage value of 'inflation'. This percentage is applied to the current gold revenue and given to you every turn as additional free gold. However, in simplified game terms approximating reality, the penalty is that prices of everything (production cost and upkeep cost) will increase by this percentage + a small inefficiency penalty. So if you set inflation to 20%, 20 or 30 turns down the line, the cost of everything has risen by 20%, plus a nominal penalty of say 10%, for a total of 22% increase in shield cost to build anything and gold required for all upkeep and purchase costs. The benefit is that before the general cost increase hits in full force, you have a few turns (to be determined as befits game-balance, probably a variable value depending on game-length) to spend all that extra gold you got by cutting it with 20% pot-metal (or by running the printing presses, as we do today) at CURRENT prices. Ultimately what kills you is the accumulation of the nominal penalty so that the empire which inflates is able to engage in more activities short term, but pays an ever-growning unit maintenance and upkeep penalty which the non-inflating civs don't have to pay.

Needless to say, inflation is a short-term expedient which is inherently wasteful (decreases economic efficiency in ways beyond the scope of those post) and prone to spiraling out of control: the ruler must continually inflate in ever-greater amounts to reap additional benefits while simultaneously paying for the ever-increasing support costs precipitated by prior inflations.

 

[odalrick]

A good primer, but there are some points I think should be made.

Inflation in world history is a tool used by rulers to gain command of additional resources:

But they didn't really understand that they were using it. They thought: "Hey, free money!". In that respect I suppose CivIV inflation is perfect.

And not just rulers. Gold is pretty much worthless, and yet any yahoo that finds a gold mine can suddenly buy anything they want.

Can you imagine what would have happened if alchemy actually worked?

Effectively, inflation acts as a hidden taxation of the productive output of all members of society who use money to conduct business.

But CivIV; no CivN, or as far as I know any of it's clones; actually has a visible taxation. Everything the society produces is available to you as the player. One assumes that the player isn't actually a ruler, but rather the "guiding spirit" of the civ.

The upshot of all this is that you, the civIV ruler, should have the choice of when to 'inflate' or not. Inflation has the short-term benefit of giving you control over more of the existing real wealth in your empire, at a long-term cost of higher future prices and lower overall productive efficiency. So this should be something you can choose to do, or not, and set the 'rate' of inflation as well. In game terms this would amount to simply setting a percentage value of 'inflation'. This percentage is applied to the current gold revenue and given to you every turn as additional free gold. However, in simplified game terms approximating reality, the penalty is that prices of everything (production cost and upkeep cost) will increase by this percentage + a small inefficiency penalty. So if you set inflation to 20%, 20 or 30 turns down the line, the cost of everything has risen by 20%, plus a nominal penalty of say 10%, for a total of 22% increase in shield cost to build anything and gold required for all upkeep and purchase costs. The benefit is that before the general cost increase hits in full force, you have a few turns (to be determined as befits game-balance, probably a variable value depending on game-length) to spend all that extra gold you got by cutting it with 20% pot-metal (or by running the printing presses, as we do today) at CURRENT prices. Ultimately what kills you is the accumulation of the nominal penalty so that the empire which inflates is able to engage in more activities short term, but pays an ever-growning unit maintenance and upkeep penalty which the non-inflating civs don't have to pay.

Needless to say, inflation is a short-term expedient which is inherently wasteful (decreases economic efficiency in ways beyond the scope of those post) and prone to spiraling out of control: the ruler must continually inflate in ever-greater amounts to reap additional benefits while simultaneously paying for the ever-increasing support costs precipitated by prior inflations.

Since the commerce output of, say, a town presumably represents actual productivity, in time it should adjust and produce more of the less valuable currency. Only by continuously having a large inflation would you actually hurt your economy. The same effect could be acieved by allowing you to pillage your own improvements for .

Presumably that's what happened to the Romans. They expanded their currency supply so much, for so long, that the economy never got a chance to recover. Because they didn't know better, because, as you say, it is a hidden tax. They couldn't see it themselves.

In short, before inflation is added as a hidden tax, we should add a visible tax.

Also, in civilization, production hammers is largely unaffected by money gold. It is completely unaffected by "inflation", since "inflation" only applies to upkeep.

I think the most fundamental change needed is making money a part of the game, rather than an optional extra like it is now. Master of Orion III did a great many things, many of them wrong. One of the correct things was making money a part of the economy.

In civ terms, to build a unit or similar, you have to pay the cost in , and you can't spend more than the numbers of produced by your city per turn. comes from taxes, rather than .

Edit: I've no idea why the second quote is messed up.
Edit: Thanks to Honor for solving the quote mystery.

 

[Senethro]

Now might be a good time for a primer on what inflation means in the real world and how it could be applied to civIV.

Inflation in world history is a tool used by rulers to gain command of additional resources: additional monetary units are created, either by cutting hard currencies with base metals or in modern times by printing additional notes, which are then spent by the ruler or those closely connected to the ruler on things they want (typically social welfare schemes, grandiose public projects or military ventures - yes just like the things YOU do as ruler of your civ empire). No new wealth is actually created by the expansion of the money supply (the productive capacity of the empire is unchanged), but the ruler benefits tremendously as they are able to spend the new money on their projects BEFORE a general rise in prices ensues, effectively redistributing production to their own uses and away from the use of private individuals and companies. By the time the additional quantity of new or devalued money reaches the peons (you and me), the general rise in prices is underway and the peons see no benefit: they have more money, but the price of everything has already gone up. Effectively, inflation acts as a hidden taxation of the productive output of all members of society who use money to conduct business.

Interestingly, civIV's simplified implementation of the price-increase effect of inflation is semi-correct: historically, rulers of empires who control the monetary system WILL create new money to finance their ventures, resulting in continually spiraling prices. This typically accelerates until the empire is no longer able to pay it's operating costs. This is what happened to the Roman Empire: ultimately the inefficiency and uncertainty created by ever-increasing inflation rendered them unable to pay the support costs of a vast empire, the social welfare keeping the citizenry happy, and the support costs of all the legions keeping the barbarians at bay. On a much shorter timescale, look at Weimar germany in the 20's and 30's or Argentina last century to see what can happen over just 5 or 10 years. Thus, civIV assumes that all of you are always inflating, resulting in ever-increasing maintenance costs until finally you can't pay and have to shrink your empire. This is perfectly realistic and in keeping with history.

The term 'inflation' is often mistakenly applied to the price increases which inevitably must arise from expansion of the monetary supply faster than the supply of real wealth (goods and services) can expand (too many dollars chasing too few goods). This terminological mistake is made in the case of civIV, but is a minor point. A 'price increase' is a price increase. Increasing the monetary base faster than the supply of real goods and services in the economy increases is 'inflation'. Sometimes the price increases happen much later, are distributed across segments of economy very unevenly, or not apparent at all if rapid productivity increases are masking the effects (1920's US).

The upshot of all this is that you, the civIV ruler, should have the choice of when to 'inflate' or not. Inflation has the short-term benefit of giving you control over more of the existing real wealth in your empire, at a long-term cost of higher future prices and lower overall productive efficiency. So this should be something you can choose to do, or not, and set the 'rate' of inflation as well. In game terms this would amount to simply setting a percentage value of 'inflation'. This percentage is applied to the current gold revenue and given to you every turn as additional free gold. However, in simplified game terms approximating reality, the penalty is that prices of everything (production cost and upkeep cost) will increase by this percentage + a small inefficiency penalty. So if you set inflation to 20%, 20 or 30 turns down the line, the cost of everything has risen by 20%, plus a nominal penalty of say 10%, for a total of 22% increase in shield cost to build anything and gold required for all upkeep and purchase costs. The benefit is that before the general cost increase hits in full force, you have a few turns (to be determined as befits game-balance, probably a variable value depending on game-length) to spend all that extra gold you got by cutting it with 20% pot-metal (or by running the printing presses, as we do today) at CURRENT prices. Ultimately what kills you is the accumulation of the nominal penalty so that the empire which inflates is able to engage in more activities short term, but pays an ever-growning unit maintenance and upkeep penalty which the non-inflating civs don't have to pay.

Needless to say, inflation is a short-term expedient which is inherently wasteful (decreases economic efficiency in ways beyond the scope of those post) and prone to spiraling out of control: the ruler must continually inflate in ever-greater amounts to reap additional benefits while simultaneously paying for the ever-increasing support costs precipitated by prior inflations.

You're a ron paul voting gold standard crazy who hates fiat money, aren't you?

Moreover, you actually believe in conspiracies enough that you want them modelled in a Civ game?