C3C Corruption: Whoa!!!

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

Man... thank god I never did RCP.

Well, someone tell me if this basic assumption is correct:

Building an FP and/or SPHQ far away will give me two/three "core areas," but EACH core area (espeically the ORIGINAL core area) will not be as valuable as the original, pre-FP/SPHQ core area(s) was/were.

And it will increase overall corruption no matter what.

Guess I better save before I use an MGL to plunk the FP down...

[DrSpike]

The FP will likely reduce overall corruption, unless you are in Communism. It may however increase corruption in the old core.........but the overall effect is still usually a positive one.

[Catt]

Originally posted by DrSpike
The FP will likely reduce overall corruption, unless you are in Communism. It may however increase corruption in the old core.........but the overall effect is still usually a positive one.

I think this depends on the timing of the FP build (in addition to the location of the FP). If the FP build comes in the very early game and in a nice location, it probably makes long-term sense. But if you're about to build an FP in the Middle Ages, and your palace core has a bunch of very-improved cities (markets, libs, uni's, etc.) than the overall effect may be quite negative for some time. You would be decreasing corruption in your new FP cities, but all that newly uncorrupt gold doesn't benefit from the presence of city improvements; meanwhile, you increase corruption in your palace core, and each newly corrupted gold makes for a likely net loss of more than 1 gold since it no longer enjoys the effects of city improvements. I think the hit on shield loss is more tolerable if your new FP core has a high pop count.

Does this sound right, or am I overlooking something?

In any event, let's hope the patch fixing all this is just around the corner.

Catt

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

Hmmm. Holy crud. Too bad you can't keep two MGLs around at the same time. I don't want to ruin my core, but I don't want to pour the enormous sums of money into what would be the new core to make the FP placement worthwhile.

I'll probably save if I get an MGL, plunk down the FP, observe the next turn and see just how bad it really is. Then, I'll have an example to share on this thread, thus benefitting the Apolyton community, in probably the only way I can (I certainly can't offer advice, as I can barely follow this corruption debate )

[Conqueror]

Originally posted by DrSpike
The FP will likely reduce overall corruption, unless you are in Communism. It may however increase corruption in the old core.........but the overall effect is still usually a positive one.

Overall corruption has so far risen in all my test games so far. Recent one i wrote down: total corruption before FP -133 , total corruption after FP -207.

Quite a lot difference there

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by Catt


I think this depends on the timing of the FP build (in addition to the location of the FP). If the FP build comes in the very early game and in a nice location, it probably makes long-term sense. But if you're about to build an FP in the Middle Ages, and your palace core has a bunch of very-improved cities (markets, libs, uni's, etc.) than the overall effect may be quite negative for some time. You would be decreasing corruption in your new FP cities, but all that newly uncorrupt gold doesn't benefit from the presence of city improvements; meanwhile, you increase corruption in your palace core, and each newly corrupted gold makes for a likely net loss of more than 1 gold since it no longer enjoys the effects of city improvements. I think the hit on shield loss is more tolerable if your new FP core has a high pop count.

Does this sound right, or am I overlooking something?

In any event, let's hope the patch fixing all this is just around the corner.

Catt

Interesting take..........I am sure you could manufacture a case where corruption increases, especially if you play in a certain way. I am a compulsive palace bumper, and the FP is always up before AD (and I usually stop when it is until the patch). Hence I have not seen a case where corruption increases. And I did say usually to cover myself.

[MrWhereItsAt]

The bug also makes Palace jumps less attractive too - you will no longer be getting terrific results out of the new Palace area (assuming you have the FP up), so you don't make as much difference as before.

This caused me, in my current game, to save the FP for the longer term (AKA to be conquered) area I wanted a second core in. There is a tricky balance there - whether to build the FP earlier and reap the benefits over a longer period or to save the FP for the best core overall (as the FP would give it better-core corruption and waste, as opposed to the Palace that creates the worse-core situation).

[Catt]

Originally posted by MrWhereItsAt
(as the FP would give it better-core corruption and waste, as opposed to the Palace that creates the worse-core situation).

I'm afraid I don't follow the better-core and worse-core implications. Even with the present FP bug, do not the Palace and FP operate equally effective for their own cores?

Catt

[MrWhereItsAt]

Since the Palace core's city ranks drop (IIRC, I can't claim to know the problem all that well, but I have seen the effects), as soon as you build the FP it acts as before for FP-centric cities (at least broadly), BUT, the Palace-centric cities start to experience higher corruption and waste, thus leading me to say that the Palace core is the secondary one.

IOW, once you build the FP, it acts more like the Palace for reducing corruption/waste for the cities around it than the Palace itself does!

[Catt]

Originally posted by MrWhereItsAt
Since the Palace core's city ranks drop (IIRC, I can't claim to know the problem all that well, but I have seen the effects), as soon as you build the FP it acts as before for FP-centric cities (at least broadly), BUT, the Palace-centric cities start to experience higher corruption and waste, thus leading me to say that the Palace core is the secondary one.

IOW, once you build the FP, it acts more like the Palace for reducing corruption/waste for the cities around it than the Palace itself does!

I thought / think that the FP and Palace share the same ranking deficiency with respect to city rank. If I understand the ranking bug correctly, then I think it works as follows when you build an FP (disclaimer: I am ignoring RCP and the "solution" to RCP with respect to rankings -- that is a whole other can of worms ):

Your cities in your palace core were ranked 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, etc. before the FP. When you build the FP, those same cities are ranked 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 etc., and the new FP cities are ranked 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 etc. In other words, the FP cities suffer the same rank degradation - you just don't know it because the FP presents an entriely new ring of cities.

How does this compare to a "proper" solution? Each of the Palace and FP should have cities ranked 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 etc. -- i.e., the Palace and FP should each have the capability of having their own city rankings.

How does this compare to PTW (putting aside the ranking bug in PTW that allowed for distant palace relocations)? In PTW you could have a ring of 12 productive cities (12 is just an example, not a hard number) around your palace before corruption really makes improvements a tough decision, and another ring of 12 productive cities around your FP if distant from your palace. In C3C under the current buggy implementation, you can only have 12 productive cities -- either 12 around your palace, or 6 each around Palace and FP (or maybe, given distance corruption, you can have 14 total - 7 around each core).

I think this is a correct understanding of the effect of the FP bug - if not, someone correct me. Combining the above sorry situation with the RCP "fix," the overall corruption, for human and AI alike, is greatly increased in C3C. The AI doesn't know that it might not be the best idea to build the FP and will do so when able (and an FP near your Palace, as often occurs in AI empires, is worse than a distant FP) - the human has the choice to build or forego the FP.

Catt

[vulture]

Originally posted by Conqueror

Overall corruption has so far risen in all my test games so far. Recent one i wrote down: total corruption before FP -133 , total corruption after FP -207.

Quite a lot difference there

That on it's own isn't enough to prove your point. As a counterexample, consider a civ that initiall produces 1000 gpt, with 13.3% overall corruption (133 trade lost to corruption, 867 collected). When you build the FP, overall corruption drops to 12%, but your civ now produces 1725 trade, which is then divided up into 207 lost to corruption and 1518 collected. That's the kind of thing one would see with the FP in PtW - gold lost to corruption increases, but gold collected increases far more.

So the question is: what happened to your total income before and after the FP was completed?

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by MrWhereItsAt
The bug also makes Palace jumps less attractive too - you will no longer be getting terrific results out of the new Palace area (assuming you have the FP up), so you don't make as much difference as before.

It is my experience thus far that if you bump early with a core that has only maybe barracks and a granary then corruption definitely goes down overall. However, like Catt suggested, this may not be true with a well developed initial core.

[aahz_capone]

Originally posted by vulture


That on it's own isn't enough to prove your point. As a counterexample, consider a civ that initiall produces 1000 gpt, with 13.3% overall corruption (133 trade lost to corruption, 867 collected). When you build the FP, overall corruption drops to 12%, but your civ now produces 1725 trade, which is then divided up into 207 lost to corruption and 1518 collected. That's the kind of thing one would see with the FP in PtW - gold lost to corruption increases, but gold collected increases far more.

So the question is: what happened to your total income before and after the FP was completed?

Well put vulture.

But this all seems rather lame. If the commies are the only ones (in theory) that can have a second FP, and te more capital type cities you have to more your overall corruption increase, whats the bloody point?

Anyway, I don't have C3C yet as it comes out in holland on th 28th. I will however NOT GET IT until the corruption problem is fixed. (sorry FIRAXIS, love you guys)

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

Wait... I don't understand... I thought the whole problem with the bug is that overall corruption RISES when you build the FP, regardless of its location.

Or does it just degrade your intial core severely, but otherwise improve corruption (overall)?

In other words, tell me if this is right: if I want higher output from my empire as a whole and can accept two degraded cores, I should build the FP, but if I'd rather keep my core in order I should NOT build the FP?

And the further away I build the FP, the less degraded my original core will be? Or do I have to build the FP near the initial core and then move my Palace to achieve this result?

Someone help me please... one of you corruption masters summarize the problem without too much math for us simpletons... thank you...

[Arrian]

Yahweh,

Building the FP far away from one's palace will give you a second "core" group of cities, but it will also wreck your "so-so" cities. This is because of the city rank formula alexman worked out: 2(r-1). "r" is the rank of the city prior to the building of the FP. Cities are ranked based on distance from capitol (closest = rank 1, then 2, then 3, and so on. In C3C, a tie in distance results in both cities being assigned the worse number. This was the attempted RCP fix. So if your first 2 cities are tied, they are both ranked 2). Ok, then. So when the FP is built, you subtract 1 from the city rank of your cities and then multiply by 2. So a city ranked 1 actually becomes 0 (better, same corruption as capitol/fp city), but after that, they start rising. Big time. City #10, for instance: 10-1 = 9, 9*2 = 18!! So a lot of cities that were ok prior to the FP build will sudden become useless. Basically, prior to the FP build you will have 1 large core. Building the FP will give you a new smaller core, and your original core will reduce in size. The 2 small cores will still probably beat out the 1 large one, but only once the 2nd core is developed properly.

In fact, I have a save from the turn I got a MGL and rushed a FP (the save is right before using the MGL), so if we wanted, we could study the exact effects.

My new FP core was underdeveloped (conquered, of course). Several of the cities had marketplaces, but that's about it. The AI irrigated the hell out of its land, so the shield count was low. Pop was low because I had been busily starving captured cities - my enemy had a decent amount of culture and I could not destroy them (1 tile island). I'd already had 1 city flip (I recaptured that ****er and did a abandon/rebuild). I expect that after many turns of tender loving care, my new core will build up nicely and the overall effect will be positive. My old core was fully developed, and assuming they actually work, the police stations coming online should be helping with the so-so cities (which did take a huge hit when I rushed the FP). Anyway, my basic point is that when my FP was first built, I actually took a hit.

-Arrian