The observations of 1.03 GC as US

[saileaf]

I got two observations as of US (v1.03) after playing for ten-year.

First of all, the over-supply or the lack of demand is horrendous. Except some luxuries and exotic products, such as gold and silk, everything is over-produced and almost nobody is buying. Is this expected?

Secondly the contentment of the population is dropping like a rock after 1855. The contentment increased gradually for the first a few years and gain steadily by 0.4% to 0.5% by selling products to the national market. It reached as high as 63 at some point, but now it is 1859 and the contentment is at 43. Does this drop have anything to do with tension caused by the slavery? And I have to wait for the civil war to turn it around?

[HappyBanker]

How high is your militancy (you might have to work on that) ? Might be an explanation. Too high militancy tend to drivve low contentment.

[Sir Garnet]

I could suggest looking at the international trade section of the most recent manual, but instead will briefly advise that you become the leading trading power in all corners of the world by buying as much as you find you can resell, so the sellers can in turn buy from or through you and the buyers can resell internally and use the proceeds to buy more from you each following turn.

[Jim-NC]

Welcome to the forums saileaf. You will find this a hospitable place full of people willing to help others learn the wonders of AGE games ompom:. Enjoy your stay here, and the search button is your friend. Remember, you have limited accessibility (due to combating spammers) for a while.

[NefariousKoel]

I could suggest looking at the international trade section of the most recent manual, but instead will briefly advise that you become the leading trading power in all corners of the world by buying as much as you find you can resell, so the sellers can in turn buy from or through you and the buyers can resell internally and use the proceeds to buy more from you each following turn.

So.. uhh..

Do you mean just give foreign nations money for whatever they're selling, so they can buy other stuff? I thought it was reported that the AI hoarded lots of money already. Does it need more?

Or are you saying that the AI doesn't send trade fleets to all places and tends to wanna buy a few of the foreign products yet has no trade fleet access - and you must act as a middle man for getting them their fruit/silk/whatever?

[Kensai]

Who said that the AI hoards money? The AI is set to buy and sell stuff to satisfy its respective internal market. It's usually the players that screw this aspect by playing "in a mercantilistic way" denying the AI of the stuff it needs. The simple rule to remember is this:

Suppose you have 100 of a certain resource and you produce 10 and sell 10 to your internal market. In theory you are ok, no need to buy more or sell to anyone. WRONG for the health of your game's economy! Ideally, if you indeed need to keep that resource to 100 for backup, you should also try to buy an extra 10-20 and sell an extra 10-20 as well. This is intelligent as you make money from merchant taxes too. By moving around resources and money you help the AI nations (especially the minor who don't have access to other minor markets except of the neighbors!) exchange the stuff they have in surplus for stuff they desperately need to prosper. This needs to be done from early on otherwise low contentment in minor AI nations will spiral their economy out of control, shutting it down through strikes and riots. If you reach that point the only fix is through a script I am afraid.

The spice must flow...

[Pocus]

So.. uhh..

Do you mean just give foreign nations money for whatever they're selling, so they can buy other stuff? I thought it was reported that the AI hoarded lots of money already. Does it need more?

Or are you saying that the AI doesn't send trade fleets to all places and tends to wanna buy a few of the foreign products yet has no trade fleet access - and you must act as a middle man for getting them their fruit/silk/whatever?

I can assure you that the AI places correctly the merchants fleets. AIs can buy if they want to, no problem.

[Jim-NC]

As Kensai says, the issue is minors can't trade with each other (unless they are beside each other). So you need to act as the middle man, allowing goods to flow around the planet. If you see demand is outstripping your ability to produce, then import from some other country, and sell more.

Remember, other countries need to sell things in order to buy things. If you buy nothing, and only sell, at some point the most of the other countries will run out of money, and stop purchasing from you.

[James D Burns]

It would be great if they implemented some kind of world market that bought a minimum of 20% or so of any/all goods offered for sale by every AI controlled nation, and then offered those goods for resell to those same AI controlled nations the next turn.

While the player can act as market maker if he plays a large nation like the US or Britain, it’s hard for the player to do so if he chooses Turkey or Belgium or some other small nation. The game needs an internal market maker so the player doesn’t need to do it to keep things humming along for the small nations on map.

[loki100]

While the player can act as market maker if he plays a large nation like the US or Britain, it’s hard for the player to do so if he chooses Turkey or Belgium or some other small nation. The game needs an internal market maker so the player doesn’t need to do it to keep things humming along for the small nations on map.

well I'm doing it with Sardinia-Piedmont. I can buy in some stuff I don't need from say Latin America and it is sold onto say China/Japan. I make some money (shipping fees) and in turn can sell a bit more into Latin America. I'm sure as GB/France et al you could have a greater impact but the key seems to be to scatter trade fleets widely and then act as a conduit for the secondary powers.

[saileaf]

Playing US (v1.03) in 1860, somehow the contentment has been miserable for several years, currently in the civil war and winning. Selling products to the domestic market gains the contentment by 0.5% per turn, but something is dragging it down. What is going on?

And also why is the warescore negative? I have occupied many confederal lands,

Confused...

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[saileaf]

It is high, but I have done everything I could, such as sending troops, social security, education reform etc. what else could I do?

[James D Burns]

Try and keep a surplus of 3k+ capital if you can. The more rare luxury items your private merchants buy with excess capital every turn, the more you can sell to your internal markets. As a rule, I usually wait till my capital gets near 4k before I spend any on improvements.

The US is probably hard coded to have higher than normal discontentment until the civil war ends, so I doubt you can fix things before the war ends. But selling lots of rare items may help prevent regions from rebelling or striking even if they have high discontentment. But this is a guess on my part, since the exact inner workings of exactly what drives loyalties and contentment have never been made public I don’t think.

[saileaf]

I really suspect it is coded, the domestic market selling is decent and it gains 0.5% contentment per term.

It just went so bad that Mahattan's contentment is 0.

[Jim-NC]

Not sure about why the warscore is negative. The game indicates that you are losing the war. This could be due to the losses you have suffered, or some other reason. I am not 100% sure. Is the warscore changing over time towards positive?

As to the contentment. Hire MPs (you can currently build 6). They help increase contentment in the region they are in due to their high police value (6). The next best thing is light calvary (3).

I have noticed that the turn you get a strike, your citizens contentment drops several points. This may explain the sudden drops you are seeing.

[saileaf]

Thanks Jim. The warscore is turning less negative. But itis really weird, I did not lose any significant battle, quite opposite you could tell the union is clearly winning.

One thing I noticed though, is that at the beginning of the civil war, almost all garrison forces in south were pulled back to north and all of them need a lot of replacement. I had to disband them, which costed me a lot of victory points. Could that contribute to the negative warscore?

[Jim-NC]

It could be that, or it could be the amount of territory you lost (at the beginning you lose about 1/3 of your land). You probably started the war very negative, and have been moving it to the postitive for a while, but haven't reached there yet.

It has been talked about other places, that once an area's contentment drops below 20, it is almost impossible to bring back up (below 30 for the AI). A lot of your areas are at that point (below 20). You will need to get troops in the low contentment area (not fortress troops, but movable troops with good police values). That should help out your contentment issues. The areas with massive strikes may never get back to being productive.

[Sir Garnet]

It could be that, or it could be the amount of territory you lost (at the beginning you lose about 1/3 of your land). You probably started the war very negative, and have been moving it to the postitive for a while, but haven't reached there yet.

It has been talked about other places, that once an area's contentment drops below 20, it is almost impossible to bring back up (below 30 for the AI). A lot of your areas are at that point (below 20). You will need to get troops in the low contentment area (not fortress troops, but movable troops with good police values). That should help out your contentment issues. The areas with massive strikes may never get back to being productive.

Lacking military police, sitting 70,000 troops including lots of cavalry in the region, slashing taxes, and fully supplying the domestic market with goods has worked for me to bring it up from around 10 to 30+. There is a table n the 1.02 manual showing the risks of various unfortunate social disorders at different contentment levels. Demonstrations are mild compared with riots and strikes, for example.

[saileaf]

So you had similiar experience with US as well?

Lacking military police, sitting 70,000 troops including lots of cavalry in the region, slashing taxes, and fully supplying the domestic market with goods has worked for me to bring it up from around 10 to 30+. There is a table n the 1.02 manual showing the risks of various unfortunate social disorders at different contentment levels. Demonstrations are mild compared with riots and strikes, for example.

[Sir Garnet]

So you had similiar experience with US as well?

The army approach can only work in a few critical regions since there are only so many troops. The US has the MP units to spread out as well, and some reforms, but ultimately it's winning and boosting NM that makes the people feel good.

[saileaf]

So it all goes down to winning the civil war?

I do not know how people think about v1.03, I really do not like the overproduction, probably introduced by the craftsmen,

The army approach can only work in a few critical regions since there are only so many troops. The US has the MP units to spread out as well, and some reforms, but ultimately it's winning and boosting NM that makes the people feel good.