4.4.04 Issues

General Discussions about new beta versions of Capitalism Lab
megapolis
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by megapolis »

David,

I am glad to see your last post. In it you ask me quesions that I already wanted to answer anyway after another couple of days playing my last save. I did not switch to 4.4.05 yet because I wanted to finish current game.

Where did I get in my last game? I plundered all real estate property and installed all 14 mayors.
Now when I am in control of all 14 city budgets I found out one interesting thing that I want to share. Once I have started to spend all their wasted cash reserves, economy began growing. As a result, out of 45 rival companies 30 have a good profit. Other 15 are Tech companies and they have profits only after selling inventions. So their lack of profitability is just as planned.

I know only two ways of beating rivals in this game. One way is to beat them on their market and make them bancrupt. Second way is much easier. I can buy them. When economy is in constant crisis, they all suffer losses instead of getting profits. Price of their companies drops, Stock Focused companies don't invest money in their stocks and bying all the rivals becomes an easy task. When economy is on a rise, all rivals are getting profits, their price goes to infinity and beyond and the only way to buy them all is to earn more than all of them combined which is an absolutely impossible task. To be honest I was among the people who wanted more rival companies just because more profitable companies means more challenge for me to buy them all. It can even make my task impossible in 100-200 years perspective. And that is the real challenge. That's why I want AI to manage cities well (not perfect but well enough). I want rivals to grow. I want them to be unbeatable. Then I will beat them and then I will be really happy and proud of myself.

I don't know what exactly should AI managers do. mediocre AI Mayors should at least minimize their soend all their monex except for a couple of months's worth reserve. Good AI mayors should also grow 2-3 random areas to 95-99 rating polnts

Enough for now. I'll keep testing.

I always start with minimum own money and maximum competitors money and aggressiveness.

What do I see now:
0. Economy is dying.
1. Tech companies build one R&D and sit on 600m cash.
2. Diversified companies build 2-3 factories that cover all the cities because economy is dying. (and they sit on 550m of cash)
3. Retail companies build 5-10 stores, sell imported goods and buy out own stock
4. Real estate companies buy a piece of land and build nothing because there's no demand for apartments.
5. Media companies do not exist because noone advertises anything and there's no need for new media firms.
6. Stock focused companies sit on 600m of cash because there are no profitable firms to invest into.

What do i want:
0. I want economy to grow.
1. I want tech companies to count their money. I want them to build a proper amount of R&D firms to invent more. their 550m of cash is enough to cover running costs of more than one R&D center.
2. Dviersified companies, unfortunately depend on necessity index and economy health. In dying economy all except drugs are slowly dying. And first on a death row are companies specialized in Jewelry necause nesessity index for all their goods equals 10.
4. Retail companies are the only ones that act properly in dying economy.
5. I want media companies to build media forms and grow them. In my reference game they don't exist (and that's for good because now even initial media companies are suffering loss in every city).
6. Stock focused companies should buy stocks
In this case I will be the one who wishes to kill economy. But I will be unable to do it before I install my mayors in all my cities.
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David
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by David »

What you wrote makes sense. Will forward your suggestions to the dev team.

On a related note about your mentioning of taking over AI companies in stock market if you couldn't beat them in the market. That's also why I think it is not a good idea to implement tender offer (which was requested by a number of users), which will make acquiring a competing AI companies way easier and take out the challenge (and possibly fun) from the game.
megapolis
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by megapolis »

David wrote:What you wrote makes sense. Will forward your suggestions to the dev team.

On a related note about your mentioning of taking over AI companies in stock market if you couldn't beat them in the market. That's also why I think it is not a good idea to implement tender offer (which was requested by a number of users), which will make acquiring a competing AI companies way easier and take out the challenge (and possibly fun) from the game.
Totally agree with you, David. You already can buy any stocks in the game. If AI refuses you can increase price and they accept anyway. I also dislike the idea of banking services. Money on your account are your wasted money. You should not benefit from their existence.

I don't remember exactly what was this tender offer idea. But I know that IRL in UK you can convert public company into private by bying out remaining stocks if you own more than 90% of this company. That is reasonable and can be implemented.

Why do I like CES DLC? It gave an opportunity to takeover government property. Why did I ask to increase real estate value? It was imbalanced.
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David
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by David »

Please try the latest version 4.4.10, which you may download from: http://www.capitalismlab.com/forum/view ... =10&t=4046
Spac3y
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by Spac3y »

I think their is definatly a few good points their.

For instance, if you want to make money in the market, you plump for the retail focussed companies.

It is right that when their is a crisis, stock values plummet. So what do we players do when that happens, thats when we buy the stock for dirt cheap. Stock focussed companies should also be doing this.

It is actually quite annoying with R&D companies as it is spot on that they sit with large cash balances instead of having alot more / diversified / differrent time completion on R&D projects on the go at once. IF they invested more and had more R&D on the go over different time periods they could provide a steady stream of income over 1/2/3/5 years instead of just every 10 years when they manage to sell something. I mean its what from memory $7m a year to run an R&D facility so i they have 500m in the bank, they should be investing that in multitudes of R&D / time periods giving more scope on producsts to sell

Again with apartment/commercial focused companies, its exactly the same, they dont tend to buy on price dips when they should be investing.

I guess the thing with both of these is the balance of the AI. become so Overpowered and perfect, it may make it impossible to beat. With that said with the difficulty levels we like to crank too, the additional challenge would be fun.

Like real life, not all investers/investments are perfect so the balance will have to be tested.

Like we have the bars on ceo`s for retail/r&d /stock purchases, these should actually be meaningfull. A stock focussed company with a CEO with a Investing in stock rating of 80 should be quite competent, equally like with R&D . Sadly however right now it hasnt been.

Their could be a breakout in diversity of human players, suddenly R&D could become interesting if it is viable. Their could also be quite alot of competition in sectors with AI V Human , that pesky AI beat me to market on the smart phone and has the jump on me so I didnt invest in that tech as quick as I should have to sell on for example.
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David
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by David »

Tech-focused companies may eventually transform into companies with a diversification strategy (with the label "AI:All" on the corporate summary report). When this happens, the transformed company will start to use its cash aggressively to expand its business.
megapolis
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by megapolis »

I am still playing a big test game on 4.4.05.

1. Single retail store type issue. The game currently leaves only 3x3 Department Store. I think that with CES active it should be replaced with 2x2 General Store. The reason for this is that I expect the land to end too early and that otherwise General Store is useless because AI does not use them in Retail Store=Many setting.

I made some testing on real estate acquisition price.

2. Real estate acquisition price looks much better now but it still needs some polishing. I still think that there's a need to do a couple of tweaks.
2.1 There should be a restriction to destroy government-owned apartments and commercial buildings. At least in pre-built cities. For example 1 building per month. It will handle the exploit where you can destroy government real estate and build your own on its place in an instant.
2.2 If point 2.1 could be implemented then real estate market price should be further increased twice. To 10-12 years' revenue (not profit but revenue).
megapolis
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by megapolis »

Another issue to report.

When using Retail Store = One I still see all retail store types in Firm filter. it's a bit annoying. Removing them from a list will make this list shorter and will speed up access to Universities that I use to check quite often.
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David
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by David »

megapolis wrote:When using Retail Store = One I still see all retail store types in Firm filter. it's a bit annoying. Removing them from a list will make this list shorter and will speed up access to Universities that I use to check quite often.
This will be fixed in the next patch.

2.1 There should be a restriction to destroy government-owned apartments and commercial buildings. At least in pre-built cities. For example 1 building per month. It will handle the exploit where you can destroy government real estate and build your own on its place in an instant.
I'm afraid that some players may complain if we do restrict players from destroying government-owned apartments and commercial buildings. They will ask why we have to take that freedom of choice away from them when it has been in the game all along.

Maybe most players are not aware of this exploits and will just play by the rule, so it is not a really big concern. We sometimes did come across issues like this where blocking an exploit that seemingly only used by a very small number of people will bring convenience to normal players who are not aware of the exploits or not interested in taking advantage of the exploit at all.

That's why I keep thinking that the Financial DLC's potentially large number of exploits will indeed be a problem, though some users did comment that exploits are only a problem if the player wants to take advantage of them.
megapolis
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Re: 4.4.04 Issues

Post by megapolis »

David wrote:
megapolis wrote:2.1 There should be a restriction to destroy government-owned apartments and commercial buildings. At least in pre-built cities. For example 1 building per month. It will handle the exploit where you can destroy government real estate and build your own on its place in an instant.
I'm afraid that some players may complain if we do restrict players from destroying government-owned apartments and commercial buildings. They will ask why we have to take that freedom of choice away from them when it has been in the game all along.

Maybe most players are not aware of this exploits and will just play by the rule, so it is not a really big concern. We sometimes did come across issues like this where blocking an exploit that seemingly only used by a very small number of people will bring convenience to normal players who are not aware of the exploits or not interested in taking advantage of the exploit at all.
I partially agree with you. On one hand I agree that since the game is single player only, using of such mechanics can be left up to player. On the other hand I ask for a regulation, not for a removal of a feature. One government building removal per month is a light restriction. I don't know if there is a natural gameplay situation that will need mass removal of government owned apartments or commercial buildings.
David wrote: That's why I keep thinking that the Financial DLC's potentially large number of exploits will indeed be a problem, though some users did comment that exploits are only a problem if the player wants to take advantage of them.
Totally agree here. There's no natural demand for money in the game because on one hand amount of opportunities to invest them into the city economy is restricted and on the other hand injection of money from external sources can provoke hyperinflation even in current setting (Eleaza's 19 Universities).
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