Policeman not working?

[Gyromancer]

What causes them to not work? I have some cities where they have no effect (playing in a multiplayer LAN game ) and others where they work fine. (Corruption in the police department? )

The cities where it didn't work were all pretty far out, so maybe it has something to do with rank being greater than OCN. Has anyone been able to isolate this?

[Arrian]

Well, I assume they reduce corruption by a set percentage, each. If a city has too high a rank (which would also mean it's far-flung), then say a 5% reduction won't do anything.

Better to use civil engineers to build stuff (to keep the city happy/let it grow) and then taxmen or scientists.

-Arrian

[Gyromancer]

That thought had occured to me. As far as I can tell, though, they convert 1 shield and 1 commerce from corrupt to not corrupt. (Assuming they work at all) Since they don't ever convert just one trade or two trade and one shield (even in cities with just a few shields before corruption is applied) I don't believe that they work on a percentage basis.

For example, a city with 5 shields, 4 of which are corrupt and 15 trade, 14 of which are corrupt get 1 less corrupt shield and 1 less corrupt trade converting a tax collector or scientist to a policeman. (and two of each if you convert two) Another city with 5 shields (4 corrupt) and 5 trade(4 corrupt) sees exactly the same modification. That is true for every city I tried it for, assuming the policemen actually work at all.

[Sarxis]

Sounds fishy.

[Arrian]

Hmm. That does sound odd.

-Arrian

[mimi]

Police not working sounds fishy? Odd?

Hmmm... perhaps they've gone for donuts?

[alexman]

Originally posted by Gyromancer
As far as I can tell, though, they convert 1 shield and 1 commerce from corrupt to not corrupt.

This is correct, as long as the city is not at maximum corruption.

According to the corruption formula, a city can have more than 100% corruption. This of course is not possible, so there is a 95% cap. If a city is getting this cap benefit, the police specialists don't work.

[Gyromancer]

That makes sense. I thought it was something like that going on. Thanks for the reply, O great master of corruption....

(hmm that didn't come out right.... )

[Arrian]

So your choices are +2 shields (civil engineer), +1 shield/+1 commerce (policeman), +2 tax (taxman), or +3 science (scientist).

Hmm. Do the policeman effects then get modified by city improvements? If not, why would you ever use one, given the other options (civil engineer and scientist especially)?

-Arrian

[alexman]

Yes, the policeman gets modified by city improvements, so one of these guys can be worth as much as 3 shields and 3 commerce.

[Arrian]

Right. I need to play around with this some more... now that I've got a game in the mid-industrial age with my core cities up past the number of tiles they can work (due to RR'd irrigation), I should be using policemen in the core cities.

I'm so used to just using taxmen. Must adjust to new rules.

-Arrian

[dexters]

Yes, the policeman gets modified by city improvements, so one of these guys can be worth as much as 3 shields and 3 commerce.

Where policemen are most needed IMO are in your really corrupt cities and they have no effect there. Perhaps their effect should be reversed with diminishing returns when used in less corrupt cities.

[alexman]

Stoppit!

[Edit: completely changed the content of this post, after dexters completely changed his ]

[dexters]

haha!

[Kuciwalker]

I second dexters' suggestion. Policemen should be a tool for where they are needed, not just a nice bonus to inner cities.