Bureaucracy formula help...

[Helium Pond]

Hi all. The bureaucracy formula just drives me nuts. I know a lot of you experienced types have it down, so I'd like your help. I'm trying to make a more accurate version of the datalinks, and I want to make the whole bureaucracy thing simpler. I want to just list the base limits before bureacracy penalties come into play. So I need a list of when, for each difficulty level and each planet size, the bureaucracy formula comes into play. Or, failing that, if someone could just tell me what the value of MAPROOT is for each of the default planet sizes, I could work the rest out. Anyone?

[Misotu]

I'd love to help but I'm completely vague about this area too.

Where I lose it is that I think it's not quite so simple as a difficulty level with map size = # of bases thing? (I could maybe get to grips with that). Maybe I'm confused, but I thought you then have to factor in factions (ie basic efficiency rating for each) and SE settings (ie demo will help, planned makes things worse)?

The aspect that confuses me is this: Say I hit the efficiency warning at 9 bases. How many more bases would I be able to build if I switched to demo? On the other hand, how much earlier would I hit the warning if I were running planned?

And so on.

But I would *love* to have the full information ...

[Simpson II]

Misotu, the full info is in the datalinks, I think. From memory the number of bases ou can build is proportional to efficiency + 4, so if efficiency = 0 and you go to demo giving +2 you can build 4+2/4+0 or 3/2 times as many bases, i.e. 50% more.

HP, IIRC for a standard planet maproot is 1. For the sizes above and below standard it can be regarded as one once rounding is taken into account. For a huge map it's about 1.6. I don't know for tiny, I rarely play that size. I'm going to reactivate my datalinks mod now I'm free for christmas (says he! ) so I'll put the full and correct info into that.
[This message has been edited by Simpson II (edited December 17, 2000).]

[WhiteElephants]

I have the most trouble with the maproot thing too, but I think Simpson is right about standard being 1 and huge 1.6. I think large is 1.2, but don't quote me.

I guess I could then add this to the list.

Standard Transcend 0 eff. would allow six bases before the first Bueracracy warning.

+1 eff = 7.5 (rounded up or down?)

+2 eff = 9

+3 eff = 10.5

+4 eff = 12

+5 eff = 13.5

+6 eff = 15

I've never played on any map smaller than standard and don't know the map roots for them anyways.

[Helium Pond]

Wait, so if you change you EFF rating, does the number of drones caused by your # of bases also change? I mean, does it change retroactively, so that you can get rid of those drones you already have? I thought that bureaucracy drones were permanent. But that doesn't make much sense, now that I think about it. Hm. Well, okay, cool.

Okay, so, here's the Datalinks formula for bureaucracy. Simpson II, this is what you were referring to, I think:

BaseLimit = (8 - Difficulty) * (4 + Efficiency) * MapRoot / 2

Where:
Difficulty = Player's difficulty level (0 - 5)
Efficiency = Social Engineering Efficiency rating.
MapRoot = Sq. Root of # Map Squares / Sq. Root of 3200.

First off, let me just say: sqare root of 3200??? What the f*&#@!%!??? Where the heck do they come up with these things? What could possibly be gained by using the SQUARE ROOT OF 3200 that makes it a better number to use than, say, 57?

So, from alpha.txt, this info on map sizes:

Tiny planet|(early conflict), 24, 48
Small planet, 32, 64
Standard planet, 40, 80
Large planet, 44, 90
Huge planet|(late conflict), 64, 128

Which means their total # of squares is:

Tiny planet: 1152
Small planet : 2048
Standard planet : 3200
Large planet : 3960
Huge planet : 8192

Which makes MAPROOT, lemme see here...

Tiny planet: 0.6
Small planet : 0.8
Standard planet : 1
Large planet : 1.11242blah blah blah
Huge planet: 1.6

Hmmm, odd that all the numbers work out nicely except for the Large planet. I was beginning to think MAPROOT actually made some sense, but of course not.

So, then, MAPROOT/2, the number we really need, is:

Tiny planet: 0.3
Small planet : 0.4
Standard planet : 0.5
Large planet : 0.55621blah blah blah
Huge planet : 0.8

So, okay. This means that, for someone playing on Transcend with no Efficiency modifiers, (8 - Difficulty) * (4 + Efficiency) works out to 3 * 4, which is 12, right, so for each planet size, that's:

Tiny planet: 3.6
Small planet : 4.8
Standard planet : 6
Large planet : 6.67457blah blah blah
Huge planet: 9.6

So, huh. Can you really only have 4 bases on a Tiny planet before you get a Bureaucracy warning? Hmm. Have to take a little trip into the Scenario Editor to see how those numbers round, no time for that just now. But for comparison, let's look at those numbers with a +1 Efficiency. That means that the non-maproot numbers work out to 15. This gives us:

Tiny planet: 4.5
Small planet : 6
Standard planet : 7.5
Large planet : 8.34322blah blah blah
Huge planet: 12

Hm. Maybe making this fit into a nice little chart isn't going to be easy. Maybe the most helpful thing I could do is eliminate the friggin' MAPROOT thing, by presenting what it works out to for the standard planet sizes.

Oh---and what about the SECOND bureaucracy warning? I've heard that there's another one that comes at another threshhold. Does anyone know anything about that?
[This message has been edited by Helium Pond (edited December 18, 2000).]

[DilithiumDad]

Efficincey definitely has immediate effects. Anytime after the first warning, you can consider your efficinecy setting to be a component of your psych. Green is an excellent SE choice for controlling those dratted drones.

[WhiteElephants]

I think that if you do increase your efficency rating you will do away with the drones in bases rioting due to inefficency. I'm also not sure wether there is a second warning. I may have gotten confused when I switched SE choices rasining my efficency and then hitting the beuracracy warning again.

[Googlie]

3200 is the size of the standard planet (40 x 80)

[big_canuk]

Second warning happens at double the first, 3rd warning at triple the first, etc., etc. Of course you can't have any more drones than citizens, but those "extra" non-visible drones do cancel out talents.

[Helium Pond]

But but but, what's the *effect* of the second threshhold? Does every base over that limit now cause *two* drones? And and and, if that's the case, then does every base over the third limit cause *three* drones, or does it cause *four* drones? Help help help (and does it say this anywhere, or is it just learned from playing?)

Goog:
Yeah, I got that. But so what? So, it makes a *couple* of the calculations come out to nice, round numbers. But most of the others are still messy, ooky numbers. So why not just use a simple number, is all I'm saying. It's not like using 57 instead of 56.5685424949238019520675489683879(etc) would throw the universe off its (fir)axis. What it is, is dumb over-smartness. (Mind you, I say that as a person with a masters degree in smart over-dumbness.)
[This message has been edited by Helium Pond (edited December 19, 2000).]

[MariOne]

HP, the SQRT thing is not made to introduce some frigging decimals into the calculation, but to decide which kind (type, order, whichever) of influence a parameter has on a formula.

Indeed, you did a very good job there.
You could also write that factor as
SQRT (#tiles your Map / #tiles Standard Map)

The basic parameter is "Current/Standard Planetsize", do you agree.
You can see the way of expressing Planetsize with #tiles incidental (otoh practically, what would you use better, considering that width/height ratio may vary?)

How MUCH, should that parameter influence your bureaucracy?
AND should that relation be constant, linear, proportional?
Or should some boosting/dumpening effect better put into action?
These could have been the questions the designers posed themselves.
And indeed using SQRT is a typical way to progressively reduce the increase due to size at grater sizes.


Now, a Standard Planet is 40x80 cells.
To keep the globe-to-cylinder projection proportions, you know that usually the width of the maps is double their height.
When you refer to a planet's size, you ususally first think at its linear dimensions. You might then calcultate its total tiles, but most don't.
So, when you think to a planetsize "double than standard", what would you think to? I'd bet that the average joe would think to a 80x160 map. That is, doubling BOTH dimensions.
You know tho that, calculating areas, squares are involved. Thus a 80x160 map has FOUR times the tiles of a Standard one.
The SQRT of the #tiles ratio probably came out of that, to keep the bureaucracy linearly proportional to the linear dimensions of the map, while not linking it to a fixed width/height ratio.

If you look at them, all the game-proposed sizes respect the 2:1 width/height ratio!
And if you notice, standard height is 40=5x8
Tiny is 3x8
Small is 4x8
Huge is 8x8
No wonder that the Size parameter for those planets come out nicely, 3/5, 4/5, 8/5!!!
Had the Large planet been of 48x96, its size parameter would have been 1.2
And a "Big" 56x112 one would have been 1.4

Finally, the average Joe's "Double to Standard" 80x160 planet, would have a bureaucracy Size Parameter of TWO.
Don't you think it comes out perfectly?
And you call this dumb over-smartness?

Now, this post demonstrates that in the end I begun to think like Firaxian developers.
All my resistance against their endless bugs was futile. There is a sense of accomplishment and fulfillment being asssimilated into one great distributed consciousness.

---
Edit: the "odd" parameter for Large planets comes indeed from the fact that its Width does NOT respect the ration to Height!!! Had a Large planet been of 44x88 instead of 44x90, its parameter would have been a nicely cut 1.1...

[This message has been edited by MariOne (edited December 26, 2000).]

[Fitz]

ARRRRGGGGGHHH. I'm so sick of how confused people get by this. It's pretty simple once you memorize the maproot values.

MAPROOTS
Tiny planet: 0.6
Small planet : 0.8
Standard planet : 1
Large planet : 1.1 (close enough)
Huge planet: 1.6

Now, don't do the /2 part yet, because it tends to cancel.

INT((8-diff)*(4-eff)*MAPROOT/2) = base limit

INT means ROUND DOWN

defaults to memorize:
librarian, 0 eff., standard planet: 10 bases
transcend, 0 eff., standard planet: 6 bases
librarian, 0 eff., huge planet: 16 bases (10*1.6)
transcend, o eff., huge planet: 9 bases (INT(6*1.6))

effect is immediate, heres how it works:

Rank all bases by fouding date (including captured bases). Using that order, count bases from the earliest to the newest. If you want to see this order, hit F4, and the base screen shows them IN THIS ORDER.

Every base after you reach your base limit gets ONE extra drone. Every base after two times the limit (21st base on Lib Stand) gets TWO extra drones. Every base after you reach three times the limit gets THREE extra drones and so on. Bases below this limit get NO extra drones, even after you have more bases than the limit total.

Important things to remember:

1) If you calculate the limit for your normal diff/eff, you can get the numbers for any planet size by multiplying it by maproot value.

2) When you capture bases, it reorganizes the order for determining which bases get drones if it has an earlier founding date. This is especially noticable when you capture an enemies HQ.

3) Edit: Removed due to faulty info. That's what I get for observing instead of testing.

4) You only get the warning when you plant a base that breaks the limitation. If you shoved yourself above by capturing a base, you will not get it when you build a new base. If you later go and change your eff. to raise the limit by several bases, you may get it if you haven't exceeded the new limit.

That's it. Simple, see?

[Googlie]

^

[Misotu]

Ah well. Sorry to upset you with my confusion Fitz but despite being an A maths student I find it *bloody irritating* to have to do this kind of stuff just to work out how many bases I can place given different map sizes, eff ratings and the rest of it (for goodness sake!!).

Rant on

It's ***way*** more complicated than I can stand. I NEED A TABLE. Or a sodding entry on the SE screen. But the only way I'm ever going to get this info is to plod through the whole damn thing in the scenario editor, because as soon as I start seeing this kind of gunk (no offence):

If you calculate the limit for your normal diff/eff, you can get the numbers for any planet size by multiplying it by maproot value

or

you could also write this as SQRT (#tiles your Map / #tiles Standard Map)


I want to:

a) shoot the person who believes this communicates anything sane at all to a normal human being

b) go and have a long drink of something very alcoholic

c) pulverise the game designers and datalinks/manual writers at Firaxis

We're not expected to use square roots and map diffs and a load of brackets to work out the effects of changing the settings on research/economy/psych. Nor are we expected to sit down with a calculator and a bunch of formulae to work out what changing to Power - for example - will do, because there's a lovely little screen that tells us.

So how come there isn't a box in the SE screen showing:

***MAXIMUM NUMBER OF BASES***

Huh?

How hard would this have been, exactly? It's not as if this is trivial information. It's pretty central to the game.

And I do appreciate that there are quite a few people out there who just *love* to fiddle with brackets and square roots. For whom understanding the brass tacks of the algorithm that determines these things is only a little short of nirvana. I just don't happen to be one of them. I think this sort of crap is best hidden from the general public who have, after all, bought a *game* and not a maths test paper. And I bet I'm not the only one who feels this way.

Rant off.

[Ned]

Fitz, I'm not so sure.

Have you verified everyting you say in your post? The reason I ask is that when I am in the "two-extra-drones-per-new-base" or higher level, I seem to get one or more drones in somewhat random other bases. Certainly, the new base I found gets an extra drone or two. But not always. However, other bases which were just fine before the founding of the new base now have an extra drone and are in riot.

I think I remember the same think from CIV and CIV II, but there I do not believe they had a bureaucracy warning.

I also suspect that captured bases do not count at all against bureaucracy warnings. The reason I say this is that I had a game where I got a warning that going over 39 bases would increase inefficiency. However, at the time of this warning, I had 60+ bases, more than 20 captured.

If captured bases counted, capturing a base above a bureacracy limit should cause drone problems elsewhere in the faction, but it does not, does it?

What I think is going on is that there is a counter that increases by one each time you found a new base. This counter is not incremented when you capture a base, or decreased when you give a base away. When this counter reaches the next threashold, you get the warning and if you continue to found the base, drones are then assigned to the founded base or to others in the faction. These drones are "permanent," and are not erased if you give the base away to a faction that has fewer bases than the limit.

Ned

[Fitz]

Ned, since I wrote this post, I recieved info that my statement about the drones only appearing in new bases is false, and that they appear randomly. My own (new) observations from games confirms this, so I've editted the above post.

I'm still not sure I'm willing to go along with your statement on captured bases yet, but don't have the time to test it for at least two weeks. Feel free to test it yourself. Go up to the limit, count you unmodified drones in every base, capture a single base, and see if your drones increase in any of your old bases.

Of course, if the random drone appears in your newly captured base, you'll never be able to tell.

Incidentally, I have had drone riots the turn after capturing a base plenty of times, but that could easily be due to pop growth or some other factor I overlooked.

Incidentally, IIRC from another thread, negative efficiency counts as 0 for this formula.

Mis, you're talking about a three axis table.

1) efficiency
2) world size
3) difficulty

That means you need a set of tables. Either one table per efficieny, one per world size, or one per difficulty. If I get really bored, maybe I'll do them for you.

[Ned]

Fitz, Thanks for confirming what I had long observed about bureaucracy drones. As I also said, they seem to be "fixed" to a base, once they are created. You have to have extra police or psych facilities in such a base.

If you increase efficiency so that once again you are below the limit, the extra drones problems disappear. Drop it back, they reappear - in the very same cities, not randomly.

Two things we need to understand are the following:

Whether this "fixation" is only for your faction, or whether it applies to another faction if you give the base to a pact mate.

Whether the capturing of bases affects bureaucracy drones.

I suspect that both can easily be verified by using the SE. I'll give it a shot.

Ned

[johndmuller]

IIRC, after a time, captured bases "assimilate"; I think it can be observed in the Psych subScreen where it says "Captured Base" or "Unmodified" (perhaps there are other categories too).

I would expect that the transition to assimilated could lead to a change in the drone status. Unfortunately, bases in the "Captured Base" state appear to have their own form of drone penalty, making it a little more complicated.

My guess would be that the assimilated base would show less drones (if you don't have so many bases as to make that impossible) and also that likely (but untested) a new drone or two might appear somewhere as a result of a recalculation of the drone formula.

I don't expect to have perfect control of drones when I don't have any spare psych capacity, but if I bother to look at the F4 screen before the turn ends, I might spot a problem by noticing the base name in red, which spares me most of these drone problems.

[Ned]

Guys, Some results from the SE:

First Captured Bases do count!

Second, giving away a base has no effect! It does not reduce the number of bureaucracy drones. This indicates that the drone counter is a faction counter that is set by the addition of bases and is not recaculated each turn.

Third, the number of drones appears to be more than one on the average. In fact, the average number of drones appears to be two per added base, but there also appears to be some random number generator assigning just how many extra drones you will receive and their location.

I present data below. I ran the test on a standard map with 0 effeciency. I ran at two difficulty levels. The results are very interesting:

Transcend										
B's over 6	1	2	3	4	5	6				
Drones	1	4	6	8	10	12				
										
Thinker										
B's over 10	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
Drones	1	2	4	7	9	10	11	13	16	20

[Fitz]

Are you absolutely sure all those are created by beuracracy?

[Ned]

Fitz, Yes. I created size one bases from start using the SE, adding pods and just pressing B. As bases were founded, typically, but not always, the new base beyond the limit would have a drone; and zero, one, or two additional drones would randomly appear elsewhere, even in the home base.

Give those same bases to a different faction, the drones disappear. Switching to that faction changes nothing. The base still has no drones. (I did this to test whether there was a difference between whether the AI or a human owned the base in question.)

I tried coming up with a formula to explain the pattern, but gave up in favor of a random number generator that would average two extra drones. Ned

[Ned]

I would just like to update this thread with recent data from a current game. The map was larger, so Transcend B/W was 12 at zero efficiency.

I had founded 24 bases and had captured 42. Each base, at zero efficiency, had at least 3 B drones. As well, it appeared that each captured base had two additional "captured-base" drones.

This data is highly consistent with the SE data. It indicates that on the average, one gets two B drones per base over the b/w. These b-drones also spread evenly, that is, if a base has a b-drone, it will not get another one until all other bases get one too. Etc., for the second b-drone.

I was also very surprised by the two, not one, extra drones in captured bases. This is also not consistent with the Datalinks.


Ned

[WhiteElephants]

Ned -- I guess we'll resume this here. Anyway, from what I understand the amount of drones per base past the bueracracy warning are cumulative, so finding the average doesn't mean anything.

For instance, if the price of beer was one dollar for the first 10 cans, and two dollars for the next 10 cans you could say that the average cost of 20 cans of beer is 1.50. But if you bought 15 cans you wouldn't pay a dollar fifty for each can (1.50 X 15 = 22.50). You'd pay 10 dollars for the first 10 (10 X 1 = 10) and two dollars for the next 5 (5 X 2 = 10) for a total of 20 dollars (10 + 10 = 20) not 22.50. The same can be applied to the bueracracy formula IF it works on the principle of twice the limit equals twice the drones.

[Ned]

WE, I agree with you that just looking at a snapshot at 5 times the b/w level does not give us complete information concerning how we got there, however, I do suggest that I have hard data reported here that one does get an average of two b-drones per base over the b/w between the first and second b/w, regardless of difficulty level. Ned

[WhiteElephants]

Well, I still think you only get one drone per base after the first bueracracy warning, yet I haven't gotten home to test it.

The two drones your seeing when you capture a base are a standard thing. They remain for some fixed amount of turns (I forget how many) and then are gone. You'll notice that the graphic of the captured base looks like the enemy's base still only the color of the flag is yours. I believe that the graphic changing to look like your base represents those drones changing back to citizens. During the time of the drones that base is more likely to be subverted by the enemy at a reduced cost, so beware.

How are you counting the drones by the way?

I'd think if you were clicking on the psych button in the base screen you'd realize what those two drones are from as they're listed there, which also calls into question your method for tallying the large (too large, in my humble opinion) amount of drones you claim are from bueracracy.

(Lets stick to this thread as it seems to apply to the title).

[Ned]

WE, I count the drones by looking at the Psych screen. Dark red counts as one. Bright red counts as two.

The screen reports drone data prior to accounting for police, psych, facilities or SP's.

What I saw I reported in the table. I founded a new base and then checked the new base and all previous bases for new drones. They occur in bunches, not two every time. Sometimes 1. Sometimes 2. At other times, 3 and 4. The table is very interesting.

Ned

[Ned]

WE, et al., You may want to clip the following an paste it on the wall. The drone pattern is highly repeateable. The following is the pattern for a standard planet.

What apparently is happening is that as you reach the end of the first b/w, all bases have one b-drone. At the end of the second, all have two. At the end of the third, three. And so on.

Here is the data:

Transcend, Standard, 0 Efficiency.  B/W after 6 bases.
Bases start with two content workers, third is a drone		
Bases	Drones	Location
0-6	0	0
7	1	2
8	3	2, 7-8
9	4	2, 6-8
10	5	2, 5-8
11	8	2, 4-8, 10-11
12	12	1-12
13	15	1-13, 2, 8
14	19	1-14, 2. 7-8. 14-15
15	22	1-15, 2, 6-8, 12-14
16	25	1-16, 2. 5-8, 11-14
17	30	1-17, 2,  4-8, 10-14, 16-17
18	36	1-18 (2)
19	41	1-19(2), 2, 8, 14
20	47	1-20(2), 2, 7-8, 13-14, 19-20
21	52	1-21(2), 2, 6-8, 12-14, 18-20
22	57	1-22(2), 2, 5-8, 11-14, 17-20
23	64	1-23(2), 2, 4-8, 10-14, 16-20, 22-23
24	72	1-24(3)

[Basil]

My understanding of how drones in captured bases work (and this is only something I read somewhere, not something I've tested, so take it with a pinch of salt) is this: it depends on the difficulty rating of the game and the number of years since the base was captured.
- At most 5 - ceiling(years_since_capture/10) citizens are drones
- At most 7-difficulty_setting citizens are drones (difficulty_setting = 6 for transcend, 5 for thinker, etc.)

So at Transcend you get one extra drone until 50 years are up. However, at Citizen you get 5 extra drones for the first 9 years, 4 extra drones for years 10-19, etc. At Thinker you would get 2 extra drones for the first 39 years then 1 extra drone for years 40-49.

Like I said, this is just something I read somewhere I can't find now, so feel free to shoot it down !

[Ned]

Basil, Interesting that the captured-base drone problem would be more severe the easier the game!

However, the table I posted pertains only to bureaucracy drones, b-drones for short. I stopped the test after the third bureaucracy warning, so I have no I idea whether there is a cap at some point.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, it seems, and I want to double-check this, that your b-drones are not reduced in your remaining bases if you give a captured base away. This factor really complicates you life if you are capturing bases and giving them to a submissive with the partial intention of minimizing your b-drone problem so that, for example, your main bases can stay in GA.

Assume that you do not want to go over the third b/w - which apparently gives 3 b-drones per base. If you religiously give bases away as you capture them and approach the warning, you could theorectically do this and minimize your GA problems. But, as I said, it seems that the computer still counts bases given away as your bases regardless, so this is not possible.

As I said, I will double-check this.

[johndmuller]

Originally posted by Ned
What apparently is happening is that as you reach the end of the first b/w, all bases have one b-drone. At the end of the second, all have two. At the end of the third, three. And so on.

Ned, this sounds like an elegant and perfectly logical approach to your b-drones, for each (complete) level of the b-warnings, you get another drone in each of your bases. Even if it turns out not to be the way they do it, it should have been the way they did it. It is reasonably simple to calculate, and it maintains the handicapping over the various skill levels and efficiency ratings and whatever else the b-warnings key off of. The bunching effect probably is another artifact of the integer arithmatic or some such thing.

It looks like you are saying that the particular affected bases are also predictable - I gather by base age. (It would have been a nicer trouch, IMhO, to make the distribution random, though.) Does this mean that a captured base would reshuffle the b-drones insofar as the captured base's age appeared in the middle of the existing bases' age spectrum?


Basil, I can see why you distanced yourself from those formulas, the reverse handicap for max drones does look a little counter-intuitive.

The formulas would make more sense to me if the second line (7-diff) fed into the first as in:
#c-drones = 5 - ((7 - Diff) * (years_since_capture/10))

I have no idea whether or not this is true, but it is a reasonable interpretation of those equations and it looks like the handicapping would be consistent with usual practice.