After Patch Waste and Corruption

[Bundaybd]

Too much corruption

I agree, the model for corruption in Civ3 is totally messed up. Very unrealistic to have most of the world's cities producing only 1 shield. In my game (1st game actually), warlord level with huge map, I'm Americans in South America. Washington is about where Rio really is, and Houston has ForbCity about where Buenos Aires is. I invaded Mexico and all the rest of North America--the corruption is already up to 1 shield in Columbia!!! Never mind that I have beautiful Aztec Cities in Texas and California producing 40-50 shilds per turn but after corruption only yielding 1 real shield! And pol station/courthouse don't help at all. Last night I changed the values in the editor to 100 cities, 800% corruption ( I have 50+ cities)
and it did a much better job of evening it out. I'm thinking that 500% might be a little better for getting more of the effect the authors intended.

But they ought to do better. Distance from the capitol is the main factor until you get to the max number of cities. The rulebook (or was it the strat guide?) says that corruption rises "exponentially" after the number of cities is passed. I just see it go to 1 shield/1 gold. It needs to be a continuous mathematical function of some sort, say for every additional city it goes up 2%.

Corruption should work like this: Say Corruption is C, expressed in %, for example 20% meaning 20% loss in shields. Two values ought to come into play as a function of distance from capitol / forbidden city: some minimum corruption value which is approached far away from the capitol (say 70%) and some radius which governs how fast C goes up as a function of distance. the function could be C=m[1-exp(-(x/r)^2)] where m = max corruption and r = radius. This function falls off only slightly at first, but faster later on as x passes r until, when x is much greater than r, C maxes out at value m. "m" could be a value chosen by government type, with communism having r=infinity to make corruption flat.

It also says in the Civilopedia that harbors and airports fight corruption. This seems realistic, as "things that make the world seem smaller" should lower corruption. It seems to me the way it should work is that the distance of a given city from a capitol/ForbCity should be counted, then adjusted down by 1/3 for roads and say 1/10 for railroads. If the path goes over water, the water should count double if no harbors, but if a link can be counted harbor-to-harbor (maybe with roads/railroads or plain land squares in between on each end) then the distance caused by the water should be decreased to like 1/3 per square. Likewise, if airports are involved, the "corruption" distance between airports could be 1/10 (or 1/20?) the "real" distance in counting this. This all would simulate "making the world smaller thru technology" which has been a real force--a huge empire can manage its resources much better if the government and economic guys can get around quickly.

Then they should multiply the other function by a function of the number of cities, some function that goes up gradually once the max number of cities is passed.

I've noticed that courthouses and police stations only take a little from corruption--they should tweak up the effect of these as well. It also makes since to me for marketplaces and banks to fight corruption, since banks allow laws to govern finances and marketplaces lend an alternative to black-market bartering, etc.

All the values I used above are not playtested obviously--they just serve to make the point of my idea. I would love it if Infrogrames would entertain such an improved model.

Oh yeah, there should also be a factor in the corruption function for map size, so that the radius changes as a function of the map AREA changing, so that corruption is the same proportionally on an earth on a huge map or on a medium map.

Any comments on my dissertation are welcome.

[squeeze truck]

[SIZE=1]
Oh, and the first country to go Communism should get DoWed or trade embargoed by every other country. However, to offest this disadvantage, when the first country goes Communist, every other country should get massive unhappiness for ten years.

I think every new government should, when first applied:

1. Cause a short golden age in that civ, and

2. The changes you suggest, perhaps minus the unhappiness. It should also start a war with civs using older governments.

The Soviet Union was not the first country to be feared and despised because of its radical government. America was first to become a modern republic (1776), but it was too far away from Europe to be really noticed or taken seriously. But republican France (1789) was hated by its royalist neighbors (because the French liked to kill royalty. Tee hee.)

Ideally, I think every modern government type (communism, republic, democracy, fascism) should start corruption at zero, and get progressively worse until it becomes unbearable. Perhaps some should go faster than others. Great leaders can roll back the corruption 10-20 turns.

Changing governments should be catastrophic and involve some sort of civil war.

Despotism and monarchy (what's the difference??) , being sedentary, should be able to plod along longer with more static rates of corruption.

Average lifespan of a government should be about 400 years on average.

[jgflg]

I wish that corruption had been based on a more complex model than simple distance and empire size. Ideally you'd include factors like duration of the government you're in, level of technilogical advancement, and maybe wonders like Treasury or Justice Department, European Trade Union, or even IRS . I think any of those would be truer representations of how corruption would be reduced, and productivity/commerce increased, over time. Of course maybe the IRS wonder could increase your tax income, but lower overall production as people try and stay in a lower tax bracket and seek shelters.

[squeeze truck]

Frankly, I like the corruption rules. A lot. They do apply to everyone, after all.

Example.

In my current game, I am playing the industrious Persians and have nurtured my civilization through 5000 years of mostly peace. I had the Babylonians to my south, the Germans to my West, and across a narrow northern strait were (going north) Russia, England, and Zululand.

During my golden age I had to take some bites from the very beligerent German empire, but aside from that I have poured my resources into culture, tech, wonders, and production. Culturally and scientifically I am unmatched.

During the same period, the Zulus have wiped out Russia and Germany and made holes in the English and Babylonians (and Persians ). Zululand is easily the largest empire on earth.

Shaka is a vicious slut and I hate him. Fortunately for the corruption feature however, Zululand is corrupt as hell and completely unmanageable. Due to corruption and constant warmongering, Shaka cant even manage to get temples built in most of his conquered cities. Pieces of his empire keep falling off in large chunks and swearing allegiance to me.

My current empire (now second largest in the world) is largely composed of Shaka's dandruff. My multicultual empire is happy and prosperous.


So, the corruption feature is meant to make sloppy empire building through violence less rewarding, which is good. If this is the way you won at Civ I or II, I say grow up and learn to run a country or suffer the natural consequences.

[Bundaybd]

I respect and understand what you are saying, but the main problem is that the max number of cities and the radius of the rising of corruption do not match the map size (at least on the huge map). Plus police stations and courthouses have no effect. This is messed up. My point is not to get rid of corruption--it is to bring it to the proper order of magnitude to where there is a solution or partial solution to it.